Combat · D12
Strike Resolves
Head · Critical
Tabletop Roleplaying Game
Masters of&Magic
A high fantasy steampunk tabletop RPG. Three species, three paths of magic, six human cultures, and an arms race between magic and steam-powered industry.
What Is M3
Your Adventure Begins
Masters of Metal & Magic is a tabletop role-playing game set in the Ruined Sea, a vast swamp where steam and magic collide. You and your friends play heroes who survive its horrors, unravel its mysteries, and fight its monsters. Three ideas hold the whole game together.
Build Without Limits
No classes, no random rolls. Spend Character Points to buy the hero you imagine, from three species, six cultures, and three schools of magic.
Fight Where It Counts
Every blow finds a body part. A single twelve-sided die decides where steel lands, from head to limb, and a called shot lets you aim for the kill. Combat is tactical and lethal.
Magic Meets Machine
Mages bend their Life Force while smiths and artificers raise steam-powered war machines. Magic and engineering share the same battlefield.
The Setting
The Ruined Sea
A vast swamp stretches beyond reckoning. Across its drowned waters, six human cultures have raised city-states, kingdoms, and rival governments, each grasping for the next horizon.
A new age is dawning, the Age of Metal and Steam. Trains, dirigibles, and warships contest the canals while the science of invention presses against the magic of old.
Nightmarish creatures born of the swamp and necromantic magic wage war against the living.
The Age of Metal & Steam
Steam vs. Magic. The science of steam power and clockwork automatons wars with the magic of old. Every new invention is met by secretive magic that refuses to yield.
A war of whispers. The city-states no longer meet in open battle. Power changes hands through intrigue and assassination, a quiet war fought in shadow and coin.
The Ruined Sea. Beyond the protected bastions of civilization wait carnivorous plants, ferocious beasts, and strange magical things lurking in a massive swamp. Adventurers chase fortune across this living landscape and mercenaries are handsomely paid to guard the trade routes.
The Six Human Cultures
Swipe to explore →
Andoly
TribalTheir honor and love of nature define their culture.
Red war-stripes painted across the face
Compari
DiplomatsPeaceful diplomats and healers that seek harmony for those who have suffered.
A white or black streak through the hair
Cyndral
IndustrialLaborers and engineers who drive the age of steam forward.
Non-magical sigils inked across the whole body
Jenar
MerchantsTraders who move goods and coin across the canals and open swamp.
Flamboyant dress and sea-faring ways
Nord
IndividualisticUnbound by any rigid cultural requirements and the most populous of all cultures.
Bound by none of the others' customs
Shandral
ScholarsSeekers of arcane knowledge and led by hereditary nobility.
Faces kept hidden behind ever-present masks
Playable Characters
Three Species, Infinite Builds
Play the monstrous Elderkin, the near-human Feykin, or a Human of the six cultures. Point-based creation, no random rolls. Choose your race, rank your aspects, and buy your attributes. Every character is unique.
Ursidae
A towering Ursidae, the bear-like lineage of the Elderkin, known for their ferocious combat prowess and access to powerful psychometabolic magic. These bears are fierce protectors of the land, who become powerful allies when befriended.
The Clash of Steel
Every Blow Finds Its Mark
Combat is fast and lethal, armor as your primary protection. When your strike connects, you roll a single twelve-sided die to see exactly where it lands, and once your armor has been breached wounds soon follow.
Tap to roll a D12
Where the Wound Lands
Forget abstract hit points. Each successful attack falls on a real body location, tracked against the armor and shields covering the location. A Called Shot lets you aim true: spend two actions, then strike the zone you choose.
The Flow of Battle
How a Turn Unfolds
One Turn
A single turn covers six rounds, about a minute of frantic, close-quarters fighting.
Each Round
Every round you spend three actions: move, equip a weapon, or attack. Choose wisely.
Take Aim
Spend two actions to aim, then strike any location you choose at a bonus to hit.
Catch a foe unready and you strike with the upper hand. The surprised get a single action while you press the attack at advantage.
When a Blow Lands
The Order of Protection
A strike does not simply hit. It descends through each layer of your defense in turn, and any one of them may stop it before the wound is ever felt.
Shroud or Veil
Magical concealment turns a strike aside before it ever begins.
Hand Shield
Small, medium, or large, it guards the part it covers.
Armor / Hide
Worn plate or natural hide soaks the blow where it lands.
Endure & Endurance
What you simply withstand when every layer has failed.
Resists may be called on at any point once a Ward is raised, so long as you stay conscious.
The Arcane Arts
Three Paths of Power
Magic in the Ruined Sea is drawn from Life Force. Three paths offer radically different roads to power, from disciplined study to untamed chaos.
Disciplined Casters
Trained and Focused Casters
Those that train in the magical arts are broken into six distinct disciplines. Each discipline specializes in various forms of casting and are all part of an organized Syndicate of Mages. With over 150 unique spells and various perks for each discipline, mages are a force to be reckoned with.
How It Works
Spells come in three types: Battle (single attack action), Enchantment (full round, 3 actions), and Ritual (six turns, 108 actions). Direct Elemental Attacks require no attack roll. All spells require Life Force to cast. Each discipline has elemental advantages against specific targets.
Manufacturing
Three Trades of Industry
Where magic fails, industry prevails. Three trades produce gear that rivals enchanted artifacts.
Alchemy
Reagent-based
Brew elixirs, poisons, and compounds. Combine organic and chemical reagents to make healing potions, explosive mixtures, and transmutative substances.
Artificing
Steam-powered
Build steam-powered devices and gadgets fueled by pressurized canisters. From clockwork traps to thrown grenades and intricate locks, innovation meets engineering.
Smithing
34 Steam upgrades
Forge and upgrade weapons and armor with Steam Tech modifications. The best smiths create gear that rivals magical artifacts in raw power.
Elemental Forces
Six Elements at War
Six forces locked in eternal opposition. Elemental effects are not magic, so wards cannot stop them, and they deal extra damage to creatures of opposite elements. Only strong armor, swift evasion, or an Elemental Shroud stop these powerful attacks.
Fire
opposes
Water
An attack tied to one element deals extra harm to creatures bound to its opposite.
The Scions
A birthright pact · separate from the three paths of magic
Not a school you study but a bond you are born with. A Scion is pledged to the elements themselves, joined to as many as three of them, never opposing ones, and rises through three stages of mastery for fifteen Talents in all. True Elemental Creatures, pure forces not native to the Ruined Sea, call upon their Scions to wage war on the opposing element.
Three Stages of Mastery
15 Talents in All
Advocate
Talents · unlocks at 10 CP
Messenger
Talents · unlocks at 175 CP
Herald
ultimate · unlocks at 300 CP
The Age of Steam
Steam Tech
Magic is mysterious, takes dedication to learn, and requires loyalty to a Mage Syndicate. Smiths and Artificers attach steam-powered frameworks to weapons and armor, and the average person can wield them with deadly purpose.
34 Upgrades
Steam-powered exoskeleton frameworks attach to weapons, shields, and armor. The number of attachments depends on the size of the weapon and the canister or cartridge.
Steam Canisters & Cartridges
Every device utilizes a steam canister or cartridge. It takes one action to activate the device and they recharge on their own at sunrise or sunset.
Technicians
Only Smiths and Artificers can build or repair steam gear. They are the engineers of the Ruined Sea.
The Trade-off
Steam is loud, heavy, and prone to malfunction. Raw power bought at the price of stealth and certainty.
Vehicles & Machines
Steam Tech reaches far beyond personal gear. The civilizations of the Ruined Sea run steam-powered transports and war machines that carry whole crews across the swamp, from cargo runs to open warfare.
Boiler Pressure
One action to fire. Canisters refill on their own at sunrise and sunset.
Anyone Can Wield It
You do not need to be a Technician to use steam gear, only the skill to handle the weapon or armor it lives on. Building and repairing it, though, belongs to the Smith and the Artificer alone.
The Steam Fleet
The Library
Claim Your Tomes
Two core rulebooks open the gates to the Ruined Sea. Begin as a player, or take up the Game Master’s mantle and run the world yourself.
Players Guide
2nd Edition · 227 pages
Everything you need to sit down and play. Create characters across three lineages and six human cultures, learn the magic system, master the mechanical devices of a steam-and-sorcery world, and build your hero with point-based creation rules.
Kindle edition
Read instantly on any device · opens on Amazon
Game Masters Guide
2nd Edition
The complete toolkit for running M3 campaigns. Monster creation, encounter design, campaign frameworks, world-building tools, and rules adjudication. Everything a Game Master needs to bring the Ruined Sea to life.
Choose Format
Read instantly on any device · opens on Amazon
Questions? Email ruinedsea@gmail.com