Tephra: The Steampunk RPG
Playing Guide
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| Designer(s) | Daniel A. Burrow |
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| Publisher(s) | Cracked Monocle |
| Publication date | 2012 |
| Years active |
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| Genre(s) | Steampunk |
| System(s) | Clockwork System |
| Playing time | Varies |
| Random chance | Dice rolling |
| Skill(s) required | Role-playing, improvisation, tactics, arithmetic |
| Website | Tephra RPG |
Tephra: The Steampunk RPG (2012) was a steampunk role-playing game by Cracked Monocle.
Tephra was nominated for "Best Steampunk RPG or LARP" in the 2014 Steampunk Chronicle Reader's Choice Awards and its creator, Daniel Burrow, won the award for "Best Steampunk Game Creator." The company was an exhibitor at SXSW Gaming in 2014.
In February 2015, Cracked Monocle ceased operations, releasing developers from contracts and giving them ownership of works in progress not yet paid for. Control of the LLC reverted to the original founder, who restarted the company several months later. The Kickstarter begun in 2012 was announced as complete afterward.
As of January 2017, the core book has been released to the Open Game License. All work on Tephra officially ceased on February 2, 2017, and Cracked Monocle has since permanently ceased operation as a business entity.
The Tephra Kickstarter campaign successfully raised $22,821 exceeding their $1,000 goal on February 4, 2012. On January 6th, 2014, an update was posted indicating that some international backers still did not have copies of the core rule book. Backers in the United States all received the core book and the Adversary book was released as a PDF download to donors on November 29, 2014. An announcement was made June 15, 2015, that physical copies of the Adversary Book would be sent to all backers within 2 weeks along with Tephra core books for the remaining international backers.
On July 30, 2014, Daniel Burrow announced his resignation as the head of Cracked Monocle. His inability to fulfill the Kickstarter rewards on time was cited as one reason for his resignation. On July 2, 2015, Daniel Burrow announced that he had returned to Cracked Monocle and completed the fulfillment of the Kickstarter.
Tephra employs the Clockwork System. This system uses only one die, a d12, to make all rolls. Twelves "explode," so rolling a 12 allows the player to roll again and add to the prior roll. For example, rolling a 12 and then a 7 gives a result of 19. On the other side, "A 1 is a 1." If a player rolls a 1, they cannot add any modifiers to that roll (though negative modifiers still apply). As a result, any roll other than a 1 will tend to beat a roll of 1.
Levels go from 1 to 12. Player attributes are derived from the points they invest in skills. The five attributes are Brute, Cunning, Dexterity, Spirit, and Science. All have four skills except Science, which has 6. When a skill or attribute is rolled to check for a success, that number is added to the result of the roll. Success is measured in tiers: tier one means a basic no-frills success while a tier four, the highest level, means success beyond any human expectation.
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