Decepticon Directive

« Decepticon Directive »
Publisher	Renegade Game Studios
First published	September 12, 2023
Written by	Bryan C.P. Steele
ISBN	ISBN 978-1-957311-15-9
Page count	200
Price	$45.00 USD

Decepticon Directive is an expansion sourcebook for the Transformers Roleplaying Game. It was released digitally on September 12, 2023, followed by a physical release on September 26.

The book contains rules for players to create Decepticon characters, a plethora of new faction-specific weapons and equipment, and a collection full of potential new enemies. It also contains the introductory adventure "The Great Energon Robbery".

Contents

Chapter 1: The Decepticon Movement

• Megatron Says "Rise"

Chapter 2: Decepticon Characters

• Making a Might-Makes-Right Character Willing to Do Whatever It Takes
• Influences
• Origins
• Role Options
• New Role: Raider
• General Perks

Chapter 3: Equipment

• Decepticon Equipment Protocols
• New Equipment Options
• Energon Strains

Chapter 4: Decepticon Campaigns

• Accessing Your Dark Spark
• Dissecting Your Decepticons
• Decepticon Locations

Chapter 5: Threats

• Cybertronian Features

Specific Autobots Arcee Blaster Bulkhead Bumblebee Cliffjumper Grimlock Hot Rod Hound Ironhide Jazz Jetfire Kup Mirage Omega Supreme Optimus Prime

Perceptor Prowl Ratchet Eject Ramhorn Rewind Steeljaw Rollbar Sideswipe Sunstreaker Wheelie Whirl Windblade Wreck-Gar

Alien Life Forms Catharsian Collective Brute Eurythman Gorlamite Nebulan Probat Quintesson Sharkticon Drone

Cybertronian Civilians Cybertronian Bureaucrat Cybertronian Courier Cybertronian Laborer

Autobot Drones Autobot Infiltrator Autobot Racer Autobot Rescue Agent Autobot Soldier

Chapter 6: Adventure In Disguise

• The Great Energon Robbery
• Top Secret: For GM Eyes Only
• Summary
• Overview
• Part 1: We're Not on the Nemesis Anymore
• Part 2: Finding the Right Place for Their Wrong Time
• Part 3: Stick 'Em Up!
• Part 4: Last Stop... Calamity and Chaos

Notes

Errors

• Material describing the Assembly Forge notes that Titan is the largest of Jupiter's moons—in real life, Titan orbits Saturn, and Jupiter's largest satellite is Ganymede.
• Nightbeat is listed as a Decepticon Analyst.
• Iconoclast is mentioned as an Influence in that section's first page, but does not appear as one of the available options and is not mentioned again. May have possibly been a working name for Extremist.
• When Whirl’s artwork is displayed again, he is listed as “Whirl Wind”.

Transformers references

• The governing body of the Decepticons is the Conclave, from IDW's first continuity.
• Deathsaurus occasionally goes by the title "Emperor of Destruction", the usual title for Decepticon leaders in Japanese Transformers works. He's also known for his Living-Metal-Destroying Cannon.
• Most of the Decepticon combiner groups are listed as playable; the Constructicons, Combaticons, Stunticons, Seacons, and Predacons. Outside of Generation One come the Commandos, from the Robots in Disguise anime.
• The Constructicon profile mentions that in addition to the regular six, they also sometimes include Gravedigger, from the Find Your Fate Junior books, Hauler, Hightower, the trademark-friendly fill-in for Hook from Classics, Erector, and Scoop, who filled in for a dead Scrapper in IDW's comics.
• The description of Ceti Alpha VII and events are based on the Fun Publications comic "Descent into Evil".
• The planet Lucifer comes from the Battlestars manga. Its depiction as a brutal hellhole run by Straxus, meanwhile, is taken from AllSpark Almanac II.
• LV-117 was introduced in Spotlight: Wheelie. Its profile makes mention of being an attempted Quintesson colony which never took off. That the planet had some kind of connection to the Quintessons was a plot thread the comics never followed up on. Its temporal weirdness comes from later on, in the Robots in Disguise issue "Syndromica (2)", as does the suggested plot of it having a connection to Jhiaxus.
• One of the potential plot threads for Quintessa is mysterious goings on related to Mirdane, one of the Quintessons cited by Rewind as being banished by his kin in the Transformers episode "Madman's Paradise".
• The Decepticon prison facility Styx was introduced in Spotlight: Hot Rod. Gutcruncher is cited as one of the typically nasty 'cons working there, as was shown in that same issue.
• Bulkhead is described as having a bitter rivalry with Breakdown, a nod to their history in Transformers: Prime. However his design is based on his Legacy toy, which came out in 2022.
• Primal Energon's properties of awakening "bestial" instincts in Cybertronians seem to make it an adaptation of the energon known as the "blood" of Trypticon's as it appeared in the 2005 IDW continuity, particularly the The Transformers: Monstrosity series.

Trivia

• Despite the September release, attendees at GenCon 2023 were able to get their hands on a physical copy of the book over a month early. Players who pre-ordered the physical edition also received the PDF copy for free.
• Bryan binged almost 70 hours of assorted Transformers media during writing this book.