Transformers One Sourcebook

« Transformers One Sourcebook
Publisher	Renegade Game Studios
First published	September 2025
Written by	Jacob Blackmon, Carlos Cabrera, Ryan Costello, Kim Frandsen, Paige Leitman, Brandon Perdue, Mike Pohjola, Erin Roberts, and Jim Sorenson
Page count	112
Price	$45.00 USD

Transformers One Sourcebooks is an expansion sourcebook for the Transformers Roleplaying Game. Based on the animated movie, the book highlights settings and characters from the film, along with a new Origin to represent the film's cogless miners and seven new Influences.

It was released digitally in May 2025, with a physical release in September of the same year.

Contents

Character Options

• Origins
• Influences
• New Factions
• General Perks
• Equipment Options

Chapter 2: Your Characters, Your Group

• Family Play
• Teaching the Rules
• Ensemble Play
• Splitting the Party
• Playing Together
• Character Development
• Session Zero

Chapter 3: Threats & Allies

Profiles marked with asterisks * are designated as "non-canon".

Main Characters B-127 D-16/Megatron Elita-1 Orion Pax/Optimus Prime

Antagonists Sentinel Prime Airachnid Darkwing Guard/Advanced Guard Quintesson Scout Ship Soldier/Elite Soldier Tracker/Elite Tracker

The High Guard Redwing Shockwave Skywarp Slipstream Soundwave Starscream Thundercracker

Notable Cybertronians Alpha Trion Arcee (Bot) * Brawn (Bot) Chromia Firestar (Bot) Ironhide * Jazz Moonracer Prowl * Sideswipe * Sunstreaker * Wheeljack

Common Cybertronians Archivist Commuter Miner Mine Overseer Politician *

Cybertronian Surface Beasts Buzz-Boar * Robo-deer Techno-Thylacine * Vapor Squid *

Chapter 4: Locations

• Archives
• Energon Mines
• Iacon 5000 Raceway
• Sublevels 41-50
• Train Station and Trains
• Surface of Cybertron
• Grave of the Primes
• High Guard Hideout
• Iacon Tower
• Well of Sparks

Chapter 4: Campaigns and Variations

• The Thirteen Primes
• Origins
• Alternate Allegiances
• Alternative Origin Stories
• Side Stories & Unanswered Questions

Notes

Continuity notes

• As a tie-in with Transformers One, the book (unsurprisingly) draws quite heavily from the characters, concepts, and mythology laid down the film—profiles include Sentinel Prime, the various members of the High Guard, cogless energon miners, and soforth. Presumably in order to avoid conflict with any potential future media, certain profiles and names are marked as "non-canon"—in the case of character profiles, those that describe the characters' proficiency in battle or include alt-mode rules are marked as non-canon, while those that only describe the Bot characters in the context of being energon miners are unmarked. (However, see "Errors", below.)
• As in the film, but unlike in most other modern media (including Transformers One tie-in media), the term "Transformer" is used exclusively refer to Cybertronians with the ability to transform; "T-cog" is also explicitly noted to be short for "transformation cog". Cybertronians unable to transform are instead referred to as "Bots".
• The last chapter of the book shifts to a more multiversal focus, speaking broadly about the origins of the Thirteen, their exploits, and the history of the Cybertronian race across multiple continuities. To this end, the book includes profiles for seventeen Primes, and notes that what's true in one universe may not be true in another.

Transformers references

• Sentinel Prime's sword is referred to as the "Primax Blade", co-opting the name from Dark of the Moon Sentinel Prime's weapon of choice.
• The Reticulated Sprotchet, a doohickey from the Sticker Adventures book "Battle on the Junk Planet", is name-dropped as one of the many pieces of mining equipment in the book.
• The description of the Well of Sparks incorporates a few other characters and religions from IDW's "Phase 2" comics—these include Cyclonus of the Clavis Aurea, Pyra Magna of the Torchbearers, and Windblade of the City Speakers [sic], all marked as "non-canon".
• Emirate Xaaron, another non-canon character, is mentioned as an example of a politician who might be found in Iacon Tower.
• In addition to the standard "Covenant Thirteen"—Primus, Vector, Alpha Trion, Solus, Micronus, Nexus, Onyx, Amalgamous, Quintus, Liege Maximo, Megatronus, and The Arisen—Transformers One Sourcebook also includes a number of minor figures as potential candidates for a Thirteen roster. Three of these characters—Logos Prime, Autonomous Maximus, and Mortilus—had previously been tied to the Thirteen through Fun Publications' "Ask Vector Prime" column, written before Hasbro began aggressively marketing its "Covenant Thirteen" interpretation. Zeta Prime, of course, originated in Transformers One.
• Notably, three of the Thirteen are deliberately conflated with members of the Guiding Hand from IDW Publishing's 2005 comic continuity; "Ask Vector Prime" had previously done this for the first two Primes below, and the third one continues that extrapolation.
  • Amalgamous Prime's profile deliberately conflates him and the Guiding Hand's Adaptus, who served a similar function in Cybertronian mythology as the "first Transformer." The blurb describes him as the "Grand Architect" of the Thirteen, and suggests that his disruptive nature may have led him to deliberately initiate the God War, all feats lifted from Adaptus's appearance in Lost Light.
  • Similarly, Alpha Trion's profile notes that he is sometimes known as Solomus, another member of the Guiding Hand, and sometimes worshipped under the title of Arrius, based on half-remembered accounts of the "true" Solomus in Optimus Prime #10.
  • Logos Prime's profile incorporates a simplified version of his backstory from "Ask Vector Prime", noting that he was driven to madness after encountering a "creature beyond all understanding". Like several other profiles, Logos Prime's profile deliberately merges him with Epistemus, More than Meets the Eye's god of wisdom, and gives him the omniscient Magnificence as one of his relics.
• The Arisen wields the Scepter of Sparks, an accessory that debuted with Power of the Primes Optimal Optimus.
• Autonomous Maximus wields a Viewtrex Staff, a material that originated in the The Transformers episode "More than Meets the Eye, Part 1". The book suggests that he sometimes manifests as a Titan and could be revealed to be the Ark or Axalon, a nod to the Kingdom Ark toy, which was modeled after the Last Autobot.

• As with The Enigma of Combination, Nexus Prime's profile notes that he was originally known as "Nexus Maximus", a working name for the character that was hastily changed after an infamous mix-up.
• While Zeta Prime featured as one of the Primes in Transformers One, his profile here draws heavily from his "Generation 1" counterpart, ascribing him the vamparc ribbons used by his IDW counterpart while also describing him as an ambitious commander with a penchant for nation-building.
• The "Origins" section lays out a number of proposed backgrounds for the Cybertronian race. In addition to the well-known explanations—Primus, the Quintessons, and the AllSpark—the book also alludes to Cybertron's organic past from Beast Machines, and makes a veiled allusion to the ending of Tom Scioli's Go-Bots, describing a universe where mechanical lifeforms seeded the multiverse with mechanical worlds after evolving on Earth.
• "New and Expanded Transformers Groups" outlines a number of alternate conflicts for players who want to look beyond the traditional Autobot-Decepticon war, highlighting various subgroups and factions from across the Transformers multiverse. These include the Destructons from Transformers in 3-D, the Cybertronian Empire from Generation 2, the Functionists from More than Meets the Eye, the Acolytes of Unicron from the Marvel comic... and, of course, the Renegades from GoBots. (It wouldn't be a Jim Sorenson book without a GoBots reference!)
• A paragraph describing a theoretical Micromaster and Mini-Con-themed campaign uses the term "Bulks" to describe full-sized Transformers, a term that originated with the "Linkage" manga.
• "Alternative Origin Stories" lays out four potential campaign settings based on notable Transformers comics: The War Within, Megatron Origin, Shattered Glass, and Unicron.

Real-world references

• The Buzz-Boar, an example of a surface beast, is named after the vehicle of the same name from G.I. Joe.
• Tying back to a decade-old bit of lore from Fun Publications' "Ask Vector Prime" column, Transformers One Sourcebook revisits the idea that the Thirteen visited ancient Earth, inadvertently mythologizing themselves as various Greek deities. Transformers One Sourcebook reiterates this bit of lore, and invents some new identities for those Thirteen members who didn't appear in "Ask Vector Prime", which include...
  • The heroic tale of the Arisen gave rise to the myth of Heracles.
  • The tragic Logos Prime adopted the guise of Demeter.
  • The diminutive Micronus Prime became known as Pan.
  • The intellectual Quintus Prime adopted the identity of Janus.
  • Zeta Prime's ambitious feats of nation-building were immortalized in the exploits of Romulus and Quirinus.

Where "Ask Vector Prime" had Poseidon as an identity taken on by Adaptus, this book refers to both Adaptus and Poseidon as epithets of Amalgamous Prime. Unusually, the book claims that Nexus Prime was known as the Roman goddess Juno, where "Ask Vector Prime" had him known as her Greek counterpart Hera.

Errors

• Even allowing for the "non-canon" disclaimer, the descriptions of Arcee as a "seasoned sniper" and Ironhide as a "rugged veteran of countless battles" really don't feel in keeping with the spirit of the film, which was very explicit about the miners lacking such opportunities in life. The profiles of Ironhide, Prowl, Sideswipe and Sunstreaker are also illustrated with screencaps and stock art of their cogless forms, while the profiles—cut down from those printed in Decepticon Directive—include rules for their vehicle modes.
• On page 62, "Quintesson" is misspelled "Quientessons".
• On page 109, Gigantion is misspelled as "Gigantian".
• Zeta Prime's profile claims he has a "perchance for empire-building". You can't just say "perchance". (Presumably, a penchant for empire-building was the intention.)