In May 2024 we presented two offers – one revived, one all-new – featuring the Through the Breach Lovecraftian-Wild West-steampunk RPG based on the Malifaux miniatures game from Wyrd Games. The revived November 2021 Wyrd Breach Bundle had the core rulebook and many expansions. Its all-new companion offer, Wyrd Penny Dreadfuls, added many short adventures and the recent rules expansion From Shadows.
Malifaux is a magic-saturated world parallel to our own on a timeline close to ours. In Malifaux ancient things rule the darkness, and Soulstones capture the spirits of living things to power magical spellcasting and thaumaturgy. In 1787 a dimensional Breach opened. Earth’s humans invaded and exploited Malifaux for a decade, until the shapechanging Nephilim led an army of Neverborn natives to close the gateway. On our side the resulting chaos caused worldwide Black Powder Wars, until a secret cabal, the Guild of Mercantilers, gained control over most of Earth’s Soulstones. The Guild’s prison-like peace lasted for a century.
When the Breach reopened in 1889, the Guild’s Resettlement Corps led careful re-exploration of Malifaux. Mercenaries, bounty hunters, and soldiers of fortune, who flocked there to clear away monsters and undead, eventually became the Guild’s Special Divisions: the Death Marshals, appointed to hunt Resurrectionists (necromancers) and led by the mysterious swordfighter Lady Justice; the Witch Hunters, formed to control convict laborers in the Quarantine Zone and Necropolis; and the Amalgamation Office, with its fleet of combat constructs. These and many other factions – the Miners and Steamfitters Union, the Arcanists, the Foundry, and the ruthless criminal syndicate known as the Ten Thunders – seek once again to settle the dangerous world. Their old enemies remain: the Neverborn natives, the Autumn Queen Titania, and the strange little Gremlins. Steam power and steel collide with magic and monsters.
Through the Breach determines your player character’s Fate at the moment of creation. Take on the roles of unique Fated citizens such as Gunfighters, Drudges, Dabblers, and Entertainers. Your destiny, or Fate, is created during character creation, and it affects every aspect of your life. As the game progresses, the destinies of the Fated entwine, driving you all inexorably toward a final reckoning. Will you fall to Fate, or cheat it?
WYRD BREACH [from Nov 2021]
This revived November 2021 Wyrd Breach had a large and Fateful lineup with the core 2E rulebook, five Expansion Books, and many adventures. If you’re new to Through the Breach, start here.
There were five titles in this revived offer’s Starter Collection (retail value $100), including the full-color 412-page Through the Breach Second Edition core rulebook (2017) and four full-length Penny Dreadful adventures, ideal for introducing the Gothic, necromantic-industrial city-state of Malifaux: Days Without Accident, Fire in the Sky, The Obsidian Gate, and A Stitch in Time.
Those who paid than this revived offer’s threshold (average) price also get this revival’s entire Bonus Collection with eleven more titles worth an additional $164, including five Expansion Book rules supplements – From Nightmares (play a monster!), Above the Law, Into the Steam, Into the Bayou (play a Gremlin!), and Under Quarantine – and six short Penny Dreadful One-Shots designed for a single play session each: Bubbling Up From Below, The Iktomi Shuffle, Jurassic Faux, The Show Must Go On, Silurid Showdown, and Uncontainable.
WYRD PENNY DREADFULS [all-new]
Named for the sensationalistic serials of Victorian times called “penny dreadfuls,” Penny Dreadful One Shots are single-session adventures for Through the Breach. Fatemasters can insert them into an ongoing campaign or fill one evening with a quick, low-prep scenario. This all-new Wyrd Penny Dreadfuls companion added plenty of lurid adventures along with the recent Ten Thunders expansion book.
There were eleven titles in this new offer’s Dreadful Collection (retail value $90) as DRM-free .PDF ebooks, including the complete From Shadows Expansion Book; the two-part Penny Dreadful In Defense of Innocence and Return to Innocence; and eight short, wide-ranging Penny Dreadful One-Shots: Beneath the Baumwood, Blood and Snow, The Fashun Show, The Lantern Festival, Memento Mori, The Price of Progress, Waking Dreams, and Waves Off Cordacove.
