TC: Steam Wars funded last week on BackerKit, and now we need everybody to talk it up whenever and wherever you can!
We know it’s an odd duck in that the concept isn’t quite an established genre. In fact, we think that’s part of what makes it special and fun to play in because this “alt-not quite WW1 with big fighting Rigs” allows room to tell your stories while still providing a semi-historical backdrop and grounding.
And we know that some long-time Trinity fans are leery of stepping outside the settings that can be directly tied to our history and so into the original timeline – but that’s really the point of TC: Steam Wars, as we’ve gone and called this thing a “Continuum”, but what does that even mean? With TC: Steam Wars we are demonstrating one of the alternate realities that exist in the overall setting. In a paragraph or two, developer Matthew Dawkins will be providing links to a series of vids we’re doing, overall entitled “Letters From the Front”, which give more of an idea as to the kind of play the game encourages while also demonstrating the kinds of stories you can tell – Rig combat and outside the rig adventures alike!
Basically, with TC: Steam Wars, we’re deliberately stretching what the Trinity Continuum is capable of, including giving hints or pointers as to how the setting would work under SPU rules. We’re stoking the engines and giving this thing an all-out run to see what it can do!
And then, we are closing in on the first Stretch Goal, an additional layer that you can add to the world that we’re calling “The Kaiju Factor”, for now. We’re proving rules to add giant monsters to the setting, which dramatically changes the political situation, to say the least! The more SGs we achieve, the more we’ll be able to flesh out the monsters and what changes they have wrought!
And now, here are some thoughts from Eddy Webb and Matthew Dawkins, who worked together with our team of writers including Steam Wars creator Larry Blamire to translate his creation into the Trinity Continuum:
Eddy: I’m slowly recovering from my medical leave, and I’m excited to see that the TC: Steam Wars campaign has funded! But I really hope we can start hitting those stretch goals. Larry’s shared a sketch for his ideas on kaiju vs. steam rigs, and it looks really cool. I can’t wait to work on such a book, but it’ll only happen if we get those stretch goals going!
Matthew: Hi all
As part of the Trinity Continuum: Steam Wars crowdfunder, I’ve had the great pleasure to write and record some “war diaries” and “letters home” in the style I recall fondly from the Ken Burns’ Civil War documentary series. Throughout the campaign check out our Onyx Path YouTube channel for more of these pieces of narrated correspondence, but for now, here’s a couple:
Jake Pulaski’s Letter Home: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBwvBcbGHb4
Unknown Soldier’s Letter to “Takeshi”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VX0R2KBLbsg
Additionally, I’ve seen a good amount of enthusiasm for the construction of steam rigs, so here’s some of the manuscript covering that part of the game:
Head
Skills: Leadership, Persuasion, Pilot, Survival
Roles: Captain, Navigator, Envoy, Pilot
The rig’s headcab grants a bird’s eye view of the surrounding terrain. It’s from this position that crew members can assess the other combatants on the field, develop battle strategies, and guide the rig out of danger — or steer straight into it. The headcab is also the primary hub for communications with other rigs, military escorts, and allies in the vicinity. Some rigs have radio equipment installed, while others rely on older methods from flag signals to morse code to good old-fashioned shouting.
Possible duties at this action station include issuing orders to the crew, steering the rig, charting the rig’s path across difficult terrain, and negotiating with opposing rigs’ officers.
Enhancements
Captain: Gain +1 Enhancement on actions to inspire your crew to action.
Envoy: Gain +1 Enhancement on influence actions when communicating with someone who isn’t part of the rig’s usual crew, such as another rig’s captain, a dignitary riding along in the headcab, or a guard in a watchtower.
Navigator: Gain +1 Enhancement on actions to guide the rig through dangerous or unfamiliar terrain.
Pilot: Gain +1 Enhancement on movement actions during combat.
Tricks
A Clear Path (1 hit): With a glance at the ground ahead, you know the safest way forward. Reduce any increased difficulty on Pilot actions at the Head and Legs stations by 1.
Evasive Maneuvers (1-3 hits):Each hit spent on this Trick increases the rig’s Defense by 1.
Inspiring Speech (Hold 1-3 steam dice): Your voice rings out through the speaking tubes, encouraging your crew to grit their teeth, push a little harder, and win the day. Each steam die held on this Trick allows one character who hears the speech to increase the intensity of a bond of their choosing by 1, or to forge a new bond with another crew member. Players may also choose to deepen their characters’ rig bond (see below).
Loud and Clear (Vent 1 or 3 steam dice): Whether you’re whispering in a diplomat guest’s ear or shouting over artillery fire to the captain on a nearby rig, there’s no mistaking the intent of your words. For 1 steam die, inflict the Confused or Refreshed status effect on the target. For 3 steam dice, the target gains either the Guilt-Ridden or Inspired status effect.
Chest
Skills: Enigmas, Medicine, Science
Roles: Engineer, Envoy
John Chandler Tillencrest may have been speaking metaphorically when he described his condensed coal and steam technology as a vascular system, but rig crews swiftly embodied that image. The furnace is the steam rig’s beating heart, and every system depends on its continued operation. Here, stokers continuously shovel coal into the furnaces, adjusting their own exertion to control the rig’s speed and other needs. Engineers keep an eye on steam pressure and listen for any sounds that are outside of the rig’s usual rhythm. To others, the clanking and hissing and chugging is a frightful cacophony, but to the crew in the chest station it’s a song, and every note tells them something about the rig’s operations.
In larger rigs, the back of the rig at this level may contain the boarding hold. Here, off-duty crew members relax as best they can in cramped quarters. When the rig engages in combat, it can double as an infirmary or a place for non-combatants on the rig to shelter so they’re out of the crew’s way.
Possible duties at this action station include stoking the furnaces, adjusting steam pressure to different parts of the rig, making repairs on the fly, or patching up injured crew members.
Enhancements
Engineer: Gain +1 Enhancement to actions dedicated to diagnosing or fixing a problem on the rig.
Envoy: Gain +1 Enhancement on social actions to encourage or inspire the crew.
Tricks
Gear Song (1 hit): The engineer places her ear against a panel to listen to the rig’s inner workings or lays her palms flat against it to feel the thrum of machinery. She gains an additional insight into her investigation when diagnosing an issue.
Like Clockwork (1 hit):Thanks to your careful maintenance, the rig runs beautifully even when the crew runs it ragged. Reduce the difficulty of an ally’s roll by 1. This Trick may be purchased multiple times per round, but must be used on a different character for each purchase.
Percussive Maintenance (Vent 1 steam die): Sometimes, the best fix is a good, swift thump with your wrench. No one knows why this is, it just works — don’t ask questions. This Trick resolves a Minor Complication without spending a hit.
Running Red Hot (Hold 2 steam dice): The faster the stokers feed the engines, the hotter it gets. No one wants the stokers dropping from heat exhaustion. An engineer might find a way to bring in some cooler air, or an envoy works out a rotation that staves off the worst effects. While the steam dice are held, allies at this station are immune to the Extreme Temperature area effect.
Arms
Skills: Athletics, Close Combat
Roles: Engineer, Gunner
From their cramped quarters in the rig’s shoulders, the cranesman — along with their counterparts in the legs — keep the rig balanced and moving smoothly as it strides along. The massive crane arms and their claw-tipped hands can lift impressive weights. Why wait for a ground crew to clear a downed tree from across the railroad tracks when a steam rig’s cranesman can pluck it off like it was a twig? The rig’s arms can also be a destructive force, smashing through barriers or punching a hole in the side of a building to pluck a rival scientist’s desk right out of his office. Though it risks toppling the rig, stories abound of mechs slugging it out on the battlefield when their ammunition has run out.
Possible duties at this action station include coordinating with the ambulators to maintain the rig’s walk-swing balance, aiding in construction efforts or disaster cleanup, demolition, and close combat with other rigs.
Enhancements
Engineer: Gain +1 Enhancement to actions manipulating the rig arm’s movement.
Gunner: Gain +1 Enhancement to demolition actions using the rig arms.
Tricks
Crush (3 hits): Little can withstand the might of the rig’s claw-grips. Deal 1 additional damage to the item or target held in its claws.
Entangling Grab (1 hit): Establish a grapple on another rig, imposing the Entangled status effect (see p. XX) on the target. You may purchase any normal Close Combat Tricks against them.
Haymaker (Vent 2 steam dice): By diverting some extra power to the shoulders and holding just the right amount of tension in the cables, the cranesman delivers a wallop to the opposing rig, knocking it back one range band.
Surgical Precision (Hold 1 steam die): Your character knows exactly how to work the pulleys and levers, moving the claw-grips as though they were her own hands. Reduce the difficulty or Complication by 1 on an action requiring delicate movements. This might be something like lowering a teammate into narrow space or stealing a pipe from atop a stack without knocking the rest over.
Upper Claw (2 hits):When your rig has control of a grapple, reduce the difficulty of a Close Combat action against the grappled rig by 1.
And that’s not including the guns or legs! You’ll find even more in the manuscript, which you can find on BackerKit after backing the campaign.
https://www.backerkit.com/c/projects/onyx-path/trinity-continuum-steam-wars
FULL HOUSE RULES
For the first time this year, everybody in the crew was there for our meeting- illnesses and vacations and all sorts of other things aside, it was great!
We brainstormed a couple of topics that we’ll be presenting to y’all in the months to come, including options for dealing with upheaval in our shipping and printing.
(Which, BTW, is not an issue with ordering from DTRPG – both PDFs and PoDs are currently not a target of these sweeping changes).
We got an update from Travis on how the Storypath Nexus Game Jam is going, and here he is to share it with you:
We’ve got just under two weeks left in the Storypath Nexus Game Jam! WIth recent expansions to the Nexus allowing Scion: Dragon and Scion: Masks of the Mythos, Scion creators now have access to a broader array of materials to work with. The recent release of the Trinity Continuum Tasty Bit Compilation includes an example Tangent with The Phoebe Trust, as well as a group of novas inclined toward interdimensional exploration with Amalgamated Idea Dynamics! I’m looking forward to seeing what the community creates with these resources!
Currently, all three of our sales partners listed below have discounted prices for a variety of our projects! I’d say these are all Valentine’s Day events, but only the DTRPG one is actually that focused! Check out the links in the sales area below in The Blurbs!
Like I mentioned last week, last Friday we ran an AMA on our Onyx Path Reddit. We discovered during the build up to the Curseborne KS last October that AMAs can be a lot of fun and a very direct way to let folks out there know what we’re up to with the Q&A format, so we’re trying to have one a month-ish on various venues – if you haven’t had a chance, they’re a lot of fun, like the one last Friday. In fact, here are Matthew and Dixie, who were answer machines last week!
Matthew: We hosted a really fun AMA last Friday and fielded a lot of questions regarding our games and interestingly, our process of working on them. It was excellent to field some questions about Monster Kingdoms too, so if you’re interested in that upcoming game, check out the AMA on our subreddit for some teasers.
Dixie: I had a great time doing the AMA with my Onyx Path colleagues last Friday! It’s always fun to talk about both our projects and our processes, and it was nice seeing a mix of new names and returning friends in there. It was especially fun to tease some upcoming projects we’re in the thick of currently, like Steam Wars, Curseborne, the Realms of Pugmire expansion, and Monster Kingdoms!
If you’re wondering how things are going with the Savage Worlds adaption of Scarred Lands, here’s a video look into the first monster released so far:
The Savage Goose YouTube channel did a solid breakdown of the Scarred Lands Creature Profiles: Blood Reaper release for Savage Worlds! This breakdown compares the 5e creature to its Savage Worlds version and touches on the deadly nature of the Blood Reaper! Watch at https://youtu.be/BpKBT-vxdI4?si=5n_xuySmFcVImvL2
Finally, let me leave you with links for almost all of the Curseborne vids Travis is making to highlight the beautiful Tarot Cards illos that Priscilla Kim did for us:
The Dead on YouTube: https://youtu.be/RYP_BPHhWkg
The Dead on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@theonyxpath/video/7460626473066581291?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id=7422898717870818862
The Hungry on YouTube: https://youtu.be/unuDH6GnM70
The Hungry on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@theonyxpath/video/7462570935326100782?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id=7422898717870818862
The Primal on YouTube: https://youtu.be/1nOY_-wCc10
The Primal on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@theonyxpath/video/7465022381396888874?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id=7422898717870818862
The Sorcerer on YouTube: https://youtu.be/fJkP_Itf15g
The Sorcerer on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@theonyxpath/video/7469888848760229163?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id=7422898717870818862
Obviously, these quick vids are all about the art and the mood of the Lineages, and we’re getting a fantastic response to them just by how they represent our supernatural options so far! Pretty sure the Outcast one(s) will be out later this week, so I’ll get those links for next week’s MMN blog!
Until then, let’s keep finding different ways to enjoy:
Many Worlds, One Path!
Blurbs!
Crowdfunding!
Trinity Continuum: Steam Wars
FUNDED!
https://www.backerkit.com/c/projects/onyx-path/trinity-continuum-steam-wars
Onyx Path Media!
Check out our attached media schedule for the videos on our Twitch channel this week!
On this week’s Onyx Path News Matthew discusses the upcoming the Trinity Continuum Compilation and kaiju in Trinity Continuum: Steam Wars! Check it out right here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Ny3rG2xGYw
On The Gentleman Gamer’s YouTube channel, we have a new Gentleman’s Guide to the Accursed with his guide to the Maven family! Check out this official lore drop here: https://youtu.be/PfzcRHdUwgY
You can find out more about the alliances in Trinity Continuum: Steam Wars here: https://youtu.be/dUseeX4mviY
If you’re a fan of session recaps, Matthew has recapped his campaigns of They Came from [CLASSIFIED]! and Curseborne here: https://youtu.be/AfnTgpLF5xk and here: https://youtu.be/3fAWLv8LCgo
Virtual Tabletop!
They Came From Beneath the Sea! on Roll20 VTT!
https://marketplace.roll20.net/browse/bundle/22308/they-came-from-beneath-the-sea
The Scion: Origin and Scion Hero Compendiums are now available on Roll20!
https://marketplace.roll20.net/browse/publisher/1716/onyx-path-publishing
Scion is just the start! They Came From Beneath the Sea! and other
Onyx Path RPGs are in development for Roll20 virtual tabletop!
The first of our official Scion sheets designed for Foundry VTT are
now available! https://foundryvtt.co
Looking for more virtual tabletop resources? We have a selection of
Tokens, Encounters, and more available now at DriveThruRPG! https://bit.ly/3SnrNJ7
Our Sales Partners!
We’re working with Studio2 to provide our traditionally printed books out into your local game stores. Game stores can order via their usual distributors, and can also contact Studio2 directly. And individuals can check out our projects via the links below!
Select Chronicles of Darkness Screens and Monarchies of Mau books,
screens, and dice 50% off at Studio 2:
https://studio2publishing.com/collections/onx-onyx-path-publishing
Looking for our Deluxe or Prestige Edition books, dice, and screens? Try this link! http://www.indiepressrevolution.com/xcart/Onyx-Path-Publishing/
Select books and screens on sale at IPR:
https://www.indiepressrevolution.com/xcart/Deals-and-Specials/
As always, you can find Onyx Path’s titles in PDF and PoD versions at DriveThruRPG.com!
Romance Sale on DTRPG is live:
https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/publisher/4261/onyx-path-publishing?promo=1000255
Featuring Cavaliers of Mars and several Exalted novellas.
Amazon and Barnes & Noble!
You can now read our fiction from the comfort and convenience of your Kindle (from Amazon) and Nook (from Barnes & Noble).
On Sale This Week!
TC: Anima Terra Surge Jumpstart: Shattered Seals advances a level to be ready for sale in PDF and PoD versions this Weds on DTRPG!
Conventions!
Here’s where you can find out more info on physical and virtual conventions we’re going to be involved with!
Game Night With Onyx Path Publishing at StartPlaying is the last Friday of every month! Come play some Curseborne that night! (But any of our game lines are welcome all day long!)
Here’s a link to give anyone $10 credit to play games on Start.Playing:
https://startplaying.games/referral/clog9y0v10006ju0968iev95m
Please spread the word about GMing games as much as possible! Details on how list a game are at the bottom of the page in the FAQ:
https://startplaying.games/event/game-night-onyx-path
Project Status Updates!
Our full list of projects will be available monthly on our blog! Check out January’s full list report here: https://theonyxpath.com/release-roundup-january-2025/
DEVELOPMENT STATUS FROM EDDY!
Here are the projects that moved to the next stage of production:
FIRST DRAFTS
At the Gates – Companion
- The Companion for At the Gates is off and running!
Exalted – Infernals
- Our next “fat splat” for Exalted, Infernals, is nearly ready for first drafts, but we’re so excited that we went ahead and moved it to first drafts anyhow!
REDLINES
Storypath Ultra – Storypath Discord dice bot
- Testing of the dice bot is proceeding!
DEVELOPMENT
Scion – Additional Mythic Shard: Journey to the Wild West
- Hiromi and Kim are hard at work developing this final chapter of Mythic Shards! Soon we head to editing! Weeee!!
EDITING
Exalted – Alchemicals
- While the Infernals are kicking off, the Alchemicals are settling down as the manuscript goes to editing.
ART DIRECTION FROM MIKE CHANEY!
In Art Direction
- Ex3 Abyssals – Sending art over to Paradox.
- Ex3 Miracles of the Divine Flame – Sketches for halves in, awaiting feedback.
- Ex Essence PG – Sketch feedback sent over.
- Curseborne – Going over notes for splats. Then we figure out artnotes for the powers and all.
- SCION Wild Hunt – Working on it.
- SCION Demigod Companion – Working on it.
- SCION Titans Rising – Just waiting on Denmark and its all in.
- SCION Mythic Shards – All the art is in.
- TC the OTHER Anima Jumpstart – Gonna see what we need and who I got left to do it.
- TC From the Shadows – Need to review the current artnotes.
- Curious Cats – We are gonna send this to Gong. Other stuff has kinda shifted things.
- At The Gates – Have art notes. Unless I hear different… gonna ping Mel.
- Branch Riders – Feedback sent to Gong.
- TC: Steam Wars (BK) – BackerKit crowdfunder running.
Layout
- Scion Tasty Bit Combo
- Ex Essence Pillars of Creation – with Travis. Getting the cover tweaked…
- TC With Great Power – started on it over the weekend.
- TC Aether Screen
- SCION God Storyguide Screen
- World Below Screen – Wrapping up this week.
- Pugmire 2e Screen
- SCION God Storyguide Screen
Proofing
Indexing
- TC Aegis
At Press
- Reprints:
- Scion Origin – At Studio2, prepping for shipping to backers.
- TC Core – At Studio2, prepping for shipping to backers.
- Ex 3 Exigents – Quoting and press files.
- Ex 3 Exigents Screen – At Studio 2
- TC Aether – Talking with printer.
- Ex 3 Sidereals – Quoting and press files.
- Scion: God – Talking with printer.
- The World Below – Wrapping up everything this week and prepping PoD.
- TCF RPG Anthology – Madly scrambling to get the Quip cards ready for PoD this week.
- TC Aegis – Indexing.
- TC Tasty Bit Combo – gathering errata.
- TC Anima Jumpstart (Terra Surge) – PDF and PoD versions on sale this Weds on DTRPG!
Today’s Reason to Celebrate!
As an old Philly boy, gotta go old school and shout out to the Philadelphia Eagles pro- football team who won this year’s Superbowl last night! As the topper of a fantastic season of extraordinary playing, it was a well-deserved win!