Category: Press Release

Reliquary Games Studios is Expanding

When we nearly sold out of our sizable stock of Core Rulebooks at our GenCon release last year, we realized that the interest in exploring the Clockwork went far beyond the Kickstarter backers who brought the game to life. Although our small team had a lot of passion and enthusiasm for the game, it became clear that the three of us wouldn’t be enough to handle the new development and business needs of our fledgeling company while still working on the creative end of this endeavor. We needed to grow. Thus, we welcome the newest member of Reliquary Game Studios: Lisa.

You may remember Lisa as the medical history consultant who gave the linch pin argument for keeping Beastfolk as part of the Clockwork when much of the design team though that they were too fantastical to remain in the game. A painting of her appears in the Core Rulebook to commemorate her as the “mother of beastfolk.” Well, it turns out that in addition to a ton of ranks in Medicine, she also is one heck of an editor and developer. Thus, she’s taken on a lot of the work involved in putting books together and is now an official member of Reliquary Game Studios.

Her work has allowed us to take a few large steps forward as a company. This week we finalized the long process of working out a deal with a new printing partner. The Clockwork: Dominion Core Rulebook is now going into a second printing (our very first offset printing), and by this summer 1000 beautiful new core books, and 1000 decks of cards (in their awesome new tuck-box) will be making their way to us. This major step allows us not only to guarantee that we can keep the book available for new players, but it also opens the door for wider distribution and new opportunities to get Clockwork: Dominion into brick and mortar stores. This is a great day, and helps set up a long future for the game.

Kickstarter Update #9, News and Events

We’ve just posted a big update on our Kickstarter campaign covering a number of events. Go to the cmapign page to read it in full, but here are the highlights:

Zeke & Than will both be participating in an RPG.net Q&A chat this Tuesday at 7 PM EST. The chat is part of a regular series of designer and publisher Q&As and we’ll be covering anything and everything, so if you have questions for the designers and writers, want to know more about the setting, or see if you can catch a new tidbit about the rules and systems that will be covered in the core book, you can join the chat for free and without creating any accounts simply by hopping on the chat client tomorrow 10/29 at 7PM.

Than will be running demos and full intro sessions at The Temple Games at 167 Columbus Ave, Pawtucket, RI 02860 this Saturday from noon onwards. Come by to check out a game, ask questions, and hear more about the game.

We’re thrilled to announce that the incredibly talented Helen Mask is officially joining the roster of artists for the core book. We fell in love with her work and are already looking forward to her contributions to the book: you should drop what you’re doing and check out her gallery.

Since we’re less than $1000 from our next stretch goal – Steel & Steam – we thought it only fitting to share a glimpse of the item creation rules and talk about the many options they afford players in the game.

Keep an eye out, as we’ve got a good head of steam going into the final two weeks of the campaign, and lots more excitement to come.

Ever onwards,

Zeke & Than

Adventure Unlocked: Incident Aboard the Egret

We’ve already unlocked the first stretch goal in the Clockwork: Empire kickstarter campaign! The adventure “The Incident Aboard the Egret” is now unlocked and will be made available for free to all of our backers of “Citizen of the Empire” or higher. The “Incident” has a very different feel from “Idle Hands” – the adventure included in the QSR. “Idle Hands” was a classic exploration/delve with at least several characters who already knew each other and had a clear reason to work together, so we wanted to change that up in the “Egret”. This adventure has much more opportunity for social conflict of all sorts, and the 6 pre-generated characters that will come with the adventure each have their own reasons for being onboard, different goals for the trip, and their own concerns that might put them at odds with others when the voyage takes an unexpected turn.

To give you more of a taste for the adventure, we have a preview of the opening scene, and have posted the character sheets for Fitzwilliam and Augusta Slow. The pair can be used as alternate player characters for Idle Hands, or put to your own uses as NPCs or even antagonists in your own games.

Fitzwilliam Slow

Augusta Slow

Chapter 1, Scene 1: Up and Away

 “The airfield is just outside Sao Paolo itself, and the Egret sits shining and proud in the center of the field, surrounded by a scattering of small blimps that look fat and graceless by comparison. The blimps are used for short cargo flights into the logging camps and coffee plantations in the rainforest to the North, and they look the part of simple laborers. The Egret, though, is majestic. Long, lean, and modern. Even her cargo is more precious: mail and parcels traveling across the Atlantic, vital information that directs trade and politics, and helps bind the world close even over the expanse of the ocean. And, of course, the Egrets also provides swift passage to each of you.
 
Approaching the passenger gondola amidships you are all welcomed by Captain Malloy and First Mate Finch, both cutting sharp figures in their crisp blue uniforms. Greeting you each in turn and welcoming you aboard, you enter the cabin and are brought to your rooms. Fitzwilliam and Augusta Slow share a cabin, as the casket with their father’s corpse needs only berth with the cargo. Mrs. Morgadaz has a cabin to herself, as does Dr. Beechum. Herr Hoch and Mr. Dunn are splitting a cabin. The other passengers that come aboard are a somber priest dressed in the unrelenting black vestments of the Magisterium of Rome except for the first lines of silver streaking his hair, a well-heeled Brazilian gentleman with a pair of half-moon spectacles and a sporting a trim mustache and neat goatee, and a slightly sunburned but otherwise neatly turned out British husband and wife with a pair of two young children in tow.
 
As the final cargo is loaded and final preparations for takeoff begin, the Egret’s steward, Mr. Hay, comes through the lounge to offer everyone a small flute of champagne. With a polite smile, he invites a toast. “To your departure from Brazil and the launch of a smooth journey to London.”
The next two stretch goals are small, and will net us funds for additional art to go into the core rulebook and artbook, and the opportunity for us to give the unlocked pdf rewards like “Incident Aboard the Egret” to every backer from the Imperial Emigre ($20) level and higher.

With excitement,

Zeke and Than

Press Release: October 8, 2013

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Media Contact: Than Dean, than@reliquarygamestudios.com

Reliquary Game Studios is excited to announce the launch of a Kickstarter campaign for the Clockwork: Empire Roleplaying Game, which will run now through the first week of November. The game has been a long time in the making, and the anticipation of its fans was shown in the raising of over $4500 in the twenty-four hours of pledging. “It’s a great start and we’re very excited,” said CEO Zeke Coughlin, “but we’re only half way to our goal. The good news is that we have thirty-three days to make it the rest of the way there.” The Reliquary Games design team plans to use the proceeds of the Kickstarter campaign to fund a beautifully manufactured, 300+ page, full-color, hardback core rule book. The $9000 goal will provide the funds needed for the amazing artists and illustrators who will make the book an immersive piece of the Clockwork world.

Clockwork: Empire is a steampunk roleplaying game set in a Victorian world of gothic horror. Players take the role of exceptional individuals within the British Empire of 1896 as it strives to maintain tradition in the face of scientific advancement, powerful mystical practices, and the threat of the Pontus – the primordial chaos which is slowly reclaiming creation. The new and innovative mechanics of the game present new possibilities such as non-linear vignette-based initiative, a physical conflict that captures the threat and feel of real combat, and a social conflict system robust enough to entertain both method actors and power gamers alike.

“With an emphasis on dynamic social conflict instead of endless rounds of ‘roll-stab-repeat’ gameplay, Clockwork: Empire is not only a palate cleanser, but an invigoratingly fresh approach to the medium. This is a game every fan of the genre NEEDS to experience.”
-Dirk Manning, writer of Nightmare World, Tales of Mr. Rhee

Reliquary Game Studios invites everyone to take a look at Clockwork: Empire RPG and it’s Kickstarter campaign at http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1496416526/clockwork-empire-roleplaying-game. Discover if you have a place in the Clockwork World.

ABOUT RELIQUARY GAME STUDIOS: We are an independent game company working to create real innovation in the industry. We are composed of long-time gamers, industry writers, martial artists, historians and historical reenactors who want to use the best of our knowledge and skill to make roleplaying games that are simple enough to be approachable, realistic enough to be believable, and flavorful enough to be immersive.

#thePontusRises
http://ReliquaryGameStuidos.com
than@reliquarygamestudios.com
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