TheRPGSite

Repeating the setup. I had a decent collection of RPG books, including RIFTS once upon a time. On moving from Alaska down to Washington, I lost, misplaced, packed away and forgot, or simply threw away (!) a lot of my gaming collection.
Over the past couple of years, the local gaming pub where I play X-Wing miniatures has had a decent selection of used games, and I have started to replace the stuff that I really missed. I've bought the original RIFTS rulebook, and a few of the source/world books.
And this has me re-reading and enjoying those old books with a new eye.
I'd like to share a few observations. Some spoilers for decades old RPG books follow-

I think the first Sourcebook (ARCHIE-3) and Vampire Kingdoms are some of (if not the) the best books that came out for RIFTS. Both underline and reinforce a concept that runs through RIFTS. That one or a few powerful adventurers can take over a small community and rule it as a king. And that while most of these kings can be various amounts of petty, vile and vindictive, that there are much worse things in the RIFTS world that will gladly swoop in and eat up the town if the current ruler(s) are killed or driven off.
Reid's Rangers are a pretty good example. They fight vampires and without Fort Reid, the locals would very likely be vampire chow. But the Rangers themselves are a motley band, comprised of most of the various alignments. Good guys, bad guys, selfish guys, assholes and heroes.
Mez Fromaline from the first Sourcebook is a pissed off guy whose body was turned into a freakshow of techno-magic cybernetics. He's harsh but fair, and without him, his little town would have no MD/MDC defender, so they tolerate him.

ARCHIE 3 is a very interesting section. It's got a pre-Rifts AI computer in an underground lair, plotting and scheming to take over humanity, but for what it perceives as humanity's own good. Pretty stock RIFTS scenario, but good for that niche.

Now, I think part of the appeal of the loved and maligned series, is that a lot of the RIFTS books set up scenarios without tying the GM down to specific adventures. Even the Hook, Line and Sinker format is a short burst of info to kick off a GM's imagination. You won't find anything like a dungeon crawl or an Adventure Path in the early RIFTS books. Instead, there's lists of NPC, and situations that they inhabit. A GM can drill down to the specifics on their own, with a few suggestions to be found in the examples given in the books.
Even the ARCHIE 3 "adventure" is more of a few pages of a rough outline.

Rifts is probably the ultimate sandbox setting. Theres nearly no actual adventures outside of some in the Rifter. Most in the books are more like loose ideas rather than plotted out scenarios. Robotech and Beyond the Supernatural had simmilar approaches. TMNT and Palladium Fantasy had adventures at the backs of some of the supplements. Especially TMNT.

100% in agreement here. Starting with Atlantis, Rifts definitely takes a more "cosmic" scope and starts to skimp on the world information in favor of toys (character classes and gear) and monsters. England and Africa actually have solid, if uninspired, world information. Triax & the NGR has very little but what little it does is great (the recent Triax & the NGR 2 fills in several blanks... 20 years later). South America 2 represents peak "skimpy world info and a ton of stat blocks". I hoped the tide would get turned back with Juicer Uprising, but then Coalition War Campaign rolled out... And so on.

Anyways, even the best post-Atlantis offerings lack material as game-table-ready as the magnificent write-up of Ciudad Juarez. Not that they don't have great setting ideas, but these often get short shrift and are left for the GM to flesh out (incidentally, this is why Triax & the NGR 2 is a great book — the author is clearly reaching for his old campaign notes as he writes it).

Quote from: The Butcher;907059100% in agreement here. Starting with Atlantis, Rifts definitely takes a more "cosmic" scope and starts to skimp on the world information in favor of toys (character classes and gear) and monsters. England and Africa actually have solid, if uninspired, world information. Triax & the NGR has very little but what little it does is great (the recent Triax & the NGR 2 fills in several blanks... 20 years later). South America 2 represents peak "skimpy world info and a ton of stat blocks". I hoped the tide would get turned back with Juicer Uprising, but then Coalition War Campaign rolled out... And so on.
Anyways, even the best post-Atlantis offerings lack material as game-table-ready as the magnificent write-up of Ciudad Juarez. Not that they don't have great setting ideas, but these often get short shrift and are left for the GM to flesh out (incidentally, this is why Triax & the NGR 2 is a great book — the author is clearly reaching for his old campaign notes as he writes it).

I call it "Erin Tarn's Amazing World Tour!" :D And yeah, I think Africa, for example, really shows this, being a book full of RCCs, OCCs, a few enemies (The Horsemen) and a tiny bit of world building, but nothing meaty that a GM could base a campaign on.
Now that I think about it, someone running a Rifts campaign, following all the Worldbooks, would do well to emulate Erin Tarn's picaresque adventures, using rifts to continent hop, visit a location, do some encounters, and then move on to the next adventure.

Personal Opinion:  North America was the best part of Rifts.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;907144Personal Opinion:  North America was the best part of Rifts.

It certainly got the lion's share of setting detail. Which makes sense, being written in America, etc.

Personally, I would have liked for the line to not have gone globe trotting, and focused on a specific area. My buddy and I were co-GMing a Rifts campaign, and we had a gentleman's agreement to buy every other world book, so as not to spoil any GM only info. He got Vampire Kingdoms, and I got Atlantis. Which is... not bad, but Atlantis takes a lot more forethought to set up than Vamp Kingdoms, IMO. And some of the critters are just nuts. The Metzla thingamabobbers with thousands of MDC... why?!?!?!
The Dimensional Market has some good stuff to involve a party of characters, but at the time I wasn't quite sure WTF to do with Atlantis, aside from a few run-ins with Slaver Minions.

I loved the fact that Rifts was not wholly focused on North America and spread out to cover points around the world. I think it would have possibly not have fared as well had it remained stationary. This is a setting that begs to be traveled and explored much like Gamma World.

Quote from: Omega;907274I loved the fact that Rifts was not wholly focused on North America and spread out to cover points around the world. I think it would have possibly not have fared as well had it remained stationary. This is a setting that begs to be traveled and explored much like Gamma World.

OK, to clarify my point:  I agree with you, Omega, that the setting was meant for exploration, but all in all, the best written stuff turned out to be in North America.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;907278OK, to clarify my point:  I agree with you, Omega, that the setting was meant for exploration, but all in all, the best written stuff turned out to be in North America.

Thats more a factor of "Write what you know" and possibly knowing most of their customers were in the US. At least initially. Some of the stuff set in other countries falls a little flat due to some lack of fammiliarity or interest. I think if theyd had someone more savvy to say Africa or England for example it would have been much better. And I'm still surprised the England book felt so... lacking?

Yeah, it felt a little flat.

However, I loved the Japan sourcebook and Underseas.  The first NGR book had some cool stuff too, except the MDC bloat was a bit silly and lead to head scratchers where in theory just by using basic math and attrition, the NGR never actually formed, if the basic Gargoyle had about twice as many MDC points as the Jaeger mechs...

Confession time: Up until Spirit West, I bought every RIFTS book as it came out, but I've always been short shrifting the magic specific splats. Of course I do HAVE Spirit West now (and Mystic Russia and the Federation Of Magic...), but I do have gaps in the later parts of the series.  

I recently played briefly in a RIFTS game that imploded when the GM accidentally tripped a hot button insult on one of the three players after being a bit of a bonehead.  As a result of that game I got some of the later books (anything after Russia is 'pretty late' in the series for me), like Northern Gun 1&2, and later Lemuria.    The art is pretty damn good, the ideas are good, and even with a reasonably weak metaplot (provided you aren't trying to take over New Lazlo I guess...), the setting is updating teh technology as the passage of time dictates,  which is a nice touch.

Lemuria is, however, deeply indicative of the problems with the setting.   Its decades late in coming (an expansion to Undersea, promised in Undersea... circa 1995!), the Lemurians are just a little TOO Nice and TOO competent to be fun, with their only real issue being one of their own turning evil because reasons. Oh, and Underwater Vampires (which in Rifts is a laughable concept, but whatever...) which only make sense because they are underwater crab vampires, lead for some inexplicable reason by Davey Jones, human pirate turned master vampire.  So... ok.

Ask me why I don't own Madhaven...

I found the RIFTS Russia books interesting.

Oddly, I'm out of sync on the South America opinion. I really love those books and I've had a great time with my SA campaign in RIFTS.

Quote from: Spike;907348Ask me why I don't own Madhaven...

Why don't you own Madhaven?

Quote from: Spike;907348underwater crab vampires, lead for some inexplicable reason by Davey Jones, human pirate turned master vampire.  So... ok.

Heh. Rifts Gonzo is a double edged sword. For every great idea, you get some goofy shit that would probably seem neato zowie pow to a 12 year old buzzed on Mountain Dew. :D

Quote from: Spinachcat;907373Why don't you own Madhaven?

I'm curious as well.

It seems Spike's experience is fairly similar to my own, except...

Quote from: Spike;907348the setting is updating teh technology as the passage of time dictates,  which is a nice touch.

...this is a joke, right?

That's got to be the lamest excuse for the power creep, ever.

Quote from: Omega;907306I'm still surprised the England book felt so... lacking?

I seem to remember reading somewhere that in hindsight, Kevin isn't very happy with the England book either. Likes the idea of going back a rewriting it. But its kinda too late now.

Its never too late to revisit and flesh out more a region.

Well when I say rewrite. I mean completely scrap it, and start over.

Yeah its not like Torg where something like that could happen.

But they could have something like the "real" England and Arthur show up off the coast or in another dimension/world and go whatever route.

Carrying on. I did get the Mechanoids sourcebook, which is nicely able to be used in just about any location. Just say the Mechanoids came through a local Rift.
The Mechanoids themselves are the "Implacable foe" type, which means that most non-combat interaction is probably going to come from NPCs involved in the events.
A time to make unsteady alliances, save villages from being smushed, that kind of thing. A useful, if limited sourcebook.

England has already been mentioned. If you're playing a campaign in England, it's the worldbook for you. If you're playing in NA, it's slim pickings for a few OCCs and monsters you can transplant over. Our campaign was set in North America, so England was of very limited use to us.

In the rotation, I got the Africa sourcebook. Same as England, it's usefulness is very limited to a campaign set in Africa. If you're detecting a pattern, you are correct. The Worldbooks were becoming less and less useful for our campaign.

A note on house rules. I found the MD to MDC ratios led to some very sloggy battles. Back in the day, guns all listed the capability to be fired in burst mode, which gave the user damage multipliers based on the burst type. This led to some very potent energy rifles. The Northern Gun particle beam rifle does 1d4x10 MD, and is capable of burst fire. This means a long burst, firing 50% of the clip, does x5 damage. On top of the listed damage, this gives the PBR, the ability to do 50-200 MD, twice before needing to be reloaded. I note that in the Unlimited edition rulebook, they do away with the burst rules.
At the time, I used a x2 damage multiple for most HTH combat with vibro or magical MD weapons and attacks. I also increased the damage for a critical (natural 20) by x3-x5, depending on where I was in tweaking the house rules. I also allowed modified (20+ due to bonuses) crits to do a multiple that was less than a natural 20 crit. This helped a bit in speeding up combat. I also house ruled that MD/MDC equaled 10 SDC/damage, instead of 100. This made Mega-Damage still important, but not overwhelmingly so.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;907594If you're playing a campaign in England, it's the worldbook for you. If you're playing in NA, it's slim pickings for a few OCCs and monsters you can transplant over. Our campaign was set in North America, so England was of very limited use to us.

In the rotation, I got the Africa sourcebook. Same as England, it's usefulness is very limited to a campaign set in Africa. If you're detecting a pattern, you are correct. The Worldbooks were becoming less and less useful for our campaign.

England and Africa are huge missed opportunities that possibly betray Kevin Siembieda's limitations as a writer (or, possibly, the limitations of his M.O.) — I dare say it's no coincidence he brought a South American writer onboard for the South America books. Though the Triax & the NGR, Japan and Russia are way better.

In any case, there's a ton of good stuff that could be placed all over the British Isles beyond neo-Arthurian Camelot, sentient trees and weaksauce druids and herbalisms. Loved temporal magic, though.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;907594A note on house rules. I found the MD to MDC ratios led to some very sloggy battles. Back in the day, guns all listed the capability to be fired in burst mode, which gave the user damage multipliers based on the burst type. This led to some very potent energy rifles. The Northern Gun particle beam rifle does 1d4x10 MD, and is capable of burst fire. This means a long burst, firing 50% of the clip, does x5 damage. On top of the listed damage, this gives the PBR, the ability to do 50-200 MD, twice before needing to be reloaded. I note that in the Unlimited edition rulebook, they do away with the burst rules.

See, this is why I say Palladium's isn't a bad system per se, just abysmally edited and weighed down by 25+ years of contradictory rulings across game lines and supplements.

First, no one seems to agree whether beam weapons get burst damage. Pulse weapons do, but use a fixed damage oer three-shot pulse instead of burst rules.

Railguns are automatic weapons but use, again, a fixed damage per X round burst instead of, you know, burst rules.

Makes you wonder why they have standing automatic fire rules at all (yeah, sure, everybody uses S.D.C. firearms all the time, right?).

Quote from: Ratman_tf;907594At the time, I used a x2 damage multiple for most HTH combat with vibro or magical MD weapons and attacks. I also increased the damage for a critical (natural 20) by x3-x5, depending on where I was in tweaking the house rules. I also allowed modified (20+ due to bonuses) crits to do a multiple that was less than a natural 20 crit. This helped a bit in speeding up combat. I also house ruled that MD/MDC equaled 10 SDC/damage, instead of 100. This made Mega-Damage still important, but not overwhelmingly so.

Oh man, don't get me started on the Mega-Damage strength madness.

There's robotic P.S. and supernatural P.S. and they are different.

There's M.D.C. beings which have neither, like the poorly explained M.D.C. humans from Wormwood.

Then there's melee weapons that cause Mega-Damage, like vibro-blades and Kittani plasma axes, but having mega-damage strength adds nothing to those. Whether you're a puny Vagabond or a Titan Juicer with a supernatural P.S. 56.

Oh, and while we're at it, can somebody tell me why Brodkil and other mega-damage monsters get puny, non-mega-damage-strength bionics?

Seriously, those things are not hard to houserule, or rule in the first place. At least Savage Rifts is addressing some of those.

Quote from: The Butcher;907607Oh, and while we're at it, can somebody tell me why Brodkil and other mega-damage monsters get puny, non-mega-damage-strength bionics?

My favorite part of the mini-comic in Triax is when the patrol leader tells the rookie to use his "head guns", which are SDC machine guns, and patter harmlessly off the Gargoyle's power armor suit. :D
The argument can be made that SDC weapons have their uses. For hunting and for police forces in the arcologies, but that bit wasn't one of them.

regarding Madhaven:  Take a setting with a lot of potential, that's been mentioned since the very beginning of the game line (Manhatten, Post Apoc style), make it nothing more than a slightly spooky swamp, and then take YET ANOTHER relatively marginal OCC with a psuedo alignment, then make a splinter faction that is essentially the opposite alignment, with cooler powers...

... and nothing else in teh god damn book...

And that is my impression of Madhaven.  Talk about a goddamn waste of potential.

What bothered me about Madhaven was that weird insanity inducing psychic imprint. Or the reason on how it was created. too many people died really quick and fast and a psychic imprint is left. All well and good but so many other cities espcially major ones suffered the same. Why do they not have a similar psychic imprint. Great concept just not well thought out imo. It's the same way that in Splicers any metal is infected with a weird nano virus making any kind of metal dangerous to use. Yet their currency is DVDs or something similar made out of metal. Yet nowhere do they say those DVDs are immune to the virus.

Besides the system which while I think is useable but clunky. Kevin and the freelancers suffer from the rotten apple syndrome when it comes to NPCs. Their a good organization one that has the potential to be a great force for good in Rifts. Yet almost every time their a super secret evil organization that no one notices right in front of them. Run by a crazy evil megalomanical powerful leader. Whos has 1000% loyalty from his followers. With the organization being well funded and well stocked in terms of everything...but no one notices them. The Atlanteans are a good example.

This has turned into a mini-review, to setup my current ideas. So I'm going to push through the next few sourcebooks.

Triax and Mindwerks. Like peanut butter and jelly, The Triax Worldbook and the Mindwerks Sourcebook are set near each other, in and around Germany. A GM who wanted to do Rifts Germany would do well to get both.
Triax and the NGR are the Coalition-lite. (Who are indeed attempting to form an aliiance with the Coalition) Their opponents are an empire of Gargoyles. Mindwerks covers the eponymous Mindwerks faction, and the lesser Gene-Splicer faction.
Atlantis is one of the factions supporting the Gargolye Empire by selling them monster-sized gear.

Somewhat useful for an NA campaign, in that Triax is selling robots and guns to some NA factions while still attempting to court the Coalition into an alliance.
And the idea that the Splugorth support monster factions makes that book much more useable for any campaign.

At this point in the line, we moved on to a Dark Sun campaign, and our purchases of Rifts products became more sporadic. And we weren't doing the co-gm thing anymore.

So, current day. I may have a group lined up to do some actual goddamn gaming, instead of pontificating on the internets. It's likely going to be a Dark Sun campaign using 2nd edition AD&D with house rules, but I'm also tinkering with some Rifts ideas, just because I like to tinker. And they might choose Rifts instead. Nothing's carved in stone yet.

Preliminary thoughts.

1. The Palladium rules suck. There's no getting around this without a conversion to another system or a lot of house rules. I'm not afraid to house rule, and it's easier than a full conversion. So house rules it is.

2. An idea I've had noodling in my head, due to this article (http://theangrygm.com/three-shocking-things-you-wont-believe-about-dd-combat/) that I don't need to slavishly obey the combat rules to resolve every conflict. For instance, if the characters set up and execute a particularly good ambush, there's little reason not to just rule that their opponents all get smushed/trapped/killed/mangled. Using the combat rules for the ambush might be unnecessary. (I have a suspicion that Kev Siembieda runs his games like this, there's a lot of "C'mon guys! Use Common Sense" arguments in the books whenever the wonkiness of the rules comes up.)
I used the words "little reason" for a... reason. I do think that rules provide a couple of necessary things for a GM.
A. Impartiality. I remember running Amber Diceless, and I don't know if I was doing it wrong but damn, I felt a lot of GM burnout from having to adjudicate actions without dice rolling. I think the dice take a lot of weight off the GM's shoulders in how actions are resolved impartially.
B. The rules give the players some idea of how an action is going to resolve. Using a dart to attack a dragon is probably a terrible idea, and the players know this because darts do X amount of damage, and dragons have Y amount of hit points, and Z amount of armor class.
For these two reasons, I wouldn't want to just chuck the rulebook and play "Let's pretend" grabass.

Random thought. A lot of the spells in Rifts say that they don't affect targets in MDC body armor/power armor or robot vehicles. This is one thing I houserule, where MDC armor/bots get a bonus to magic saves, but don't provide complete immunity. There's a lot of really good spells that suffer from having this limitation, like Sleep, Blind, Paralysis, etc.

Quote from: Spike;907616regarding Madhaven:  Take a setting with a lot of potential, that's been mentioned since the very beginning of the game line (Manhatten, Post Apoc style), make it nothing more than a slightly spooky swamp, and then take YET ANOTHER relatively marginal OCC with a psuedo alignment, then make a splinter faction that is essentially the opposite alignment, with cooler powers...

... and nothing else in teh god damn book...

And that is my impression of Madhaven.  Talk about a goddamn waste of potential.

I really liked the idea of entities and possession. There are a few monsters that do an end run around the MDC arms race. Vampires and Werewolves and Ghosts are three of them.
The rest of the book I skimmed over. The factions and shit weren't that interesting to me. The idea I took away from Madhaven was haunted pre-rifts ruins and the danger of being posessed by ghosts.

Campaign focus.

The Rifts line is big. A group could wind up in the Three Galaxies or Wormwood and never set foot on Rift earth again. I have, in the past, been guilty of this kind of thing in other RPGs where I focus the content on stuff that really doesn't "feel" right. (My last Dark Sun campaign heavily involved the undead, and while that's fine, I think it glossed over the other neat stuff that makes Dark Sun an interesting place to adventure.)

Here's a classic Rifts illustration.

(http://projects.inklesspen.com/fatal-and-friends/images/e534eb371ad0ade3b4cb456c6d66b42dad230899e74e573fc5e1098b7ae4fea0.jpeg)

That's the kinda stuff I want to be front and center in a Rifts campaign. Exploring a pre-Rifts ruin. Cyborg with big guns. The Gritty contrasts the Gonzo.

There's sinister things lurking in those ruins. Like insane computer AI and demons and shit.

(http://riftsccg.mahasamatman.com/Faction/Large/27.JPG)

There's also urban adventures. Human cities can get very high-tech, and provide places to go in a Cyberpunk direction for a few adventures.

(http://cdn.obsidianportal.com/assets/11986/City_Rat.jpg)

I also want a big, bad supernatural or alien threat. I've already decided on a clan of Werewolves, that are my local version of the Gargoyle Empire, or Vampire Kingdoms, on a bit of a smaller scale.

Tying it all together, is the Black Market. I'm tempted to straight up make it a Black Market campaign, but in any case, the Black Market can provide a lot of adventure hooks and leads for mercenaries and adventurers. Buying pre-Rifts artifacts and technology. Providing rumors and mercenary contracts. Moving goods and services for wilderness communities.

And, of course, I won't forget the Coalition. They're a big, iconic part of Rifts.

(http://i158.photobucket.com/albums/t99/Lotor5150/Rifts/csgrunt.jpg)

Whenever I look at an RPG setting, I try to keep in mind, why I'm drawn to it. What adventures do I think I will have in that setting? What kind of adventures would make me feel dissapointed, like I'm missing out on something?

Quote from: Ratman_tf;907851Here's a classic Rifts illustration.

(http://projects.inklesspen.com/fatal-and-friends/images/e534eb371ad0ade3b4cb456c6d66b42dad230899e74e573fc5e1098b7ae4fea0.jpeg)

That's the kinda stuff I want to be front and center in a Rifts campaign. Exploring a pre-Rifts ruin. Cyborg with big guns. The Gritty contrasts the Gonzo.

Actually, that's not a ruin, that's a Xiticix hive.  Those aren't buildings in the background.

We've rarely seen any of that sort of former city ruins to explore in RIFTS now that you mention it.

RIFTS always seemed like it was the game I wanted Gamma World to be... but for whatever reason we never moved over to playing it after I bought the rules. Since then there's been so many horror stories, and sooooo many sourcebooks for it... it's pretty daunting to even consider engaging with it all.
Is there some other system that does for it what Godbound does for Exalted?

Quote from: Simlasa;907904RIFTS always seemed like it was the game I wanted Gamma World to be... but for whatever reason we never moved over to playing it after I bought the rules. Since then there's been so many horror stories, and sooooo many sourcebooks for it... it's pretty daunting to even consider engaging with it all.
Is there some other system that does for it what Godbound does for Exalted?

Funny. For us Rifts was what we didnt want Gamma World to be. EG: Over the top crazy.

Remember though to have "Dinner With Drac" playing in the background when you invade the vampire kingdom. :cool:

Quote from: Omega;907909Funny. For us Rifts was what we didnt want Gamma World to be. EG: Over the top crazy.

Not sure I honestly understand, are you saying you wanted RIFTS or Gamma World to be over the top?

Cuz to me, I've heard that Gamma World is over the top crazy... At least all the anecdotal stories I've heard about the sessions.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;907898Actually, that's not a ruin, that's a Xiticix hive.  Those aren't buildings in the background.

Is it? I thought the Xiticics hives looked like mushroom buildings?

(http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/rifts/images/4/4e/103.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20091001041711)

In either case...

(https://i.warosu.org/data/tg/img/0294/88/1389640700865.jpg)

:)

QuoteWe've rarely seen any of that sort of former city ruins to explore in RIFTS now that you mention it.

There's the Gargolye Empire, where the Empire is set in bunch of ruins, and Madhaven.
In this case, I'd probably riff on Madhaven, use the idea of ghosts and crazy/possessed mutants prowling the ruins.

In Rifts (And BTS) if I'm reading the descriptions correctly, ghosts aren't actually the spirits of dead people, but entities that are trapped in the memory event of a deceased person. Now, the players, (and their characters) don't necessarily have to know this bit of info, because I like the idea of the characters putting some of the "ghosts" to rest, a-la Poltergeist (the film) by resolving whatever event caused them to be. Like, reuniting a child ghost with it's ghost parents. Whether it's the actual spirit of a dead person, or an entity trapped in the psychic impression of a dead person, the "feel" should be the same.

Actually, North America too has its share of ruins — Chicago, St. Louis with the Devil's Gate, Quebec's Old Bones, Madhaven — it's just that there's a paucity of gameable detail set in these ruins (Old Bones and Madhaven being exceptions).

Everyone keeps telling me the Palladium rules are awful but I'm rereading the core rulebook (RUE, 5th printing) and I'm not seeing why the rules are so terrible. Rifts was the second RPG I ever played and we didn't have issues back in high school playing. Reading the rulebook again and it's not that complicated of a game. Character creation takes a long time and isn't well explained but once you're in the game the rules aren't that complicated. What am I missing?

Quote from: Ulairi;908030but once you're in the game the rules aren't that complicated. What am I missing?

They're not that complicated. I think that's one of the draws of Rifts (and Palladium) I think some parts are terribly wonky though.
I'm at work and not going to do a detailed breakdown, so here are the highlights. (low lights?)

mega damage to mdc ratios. I use a "Stop attacking yourself!" check where I take the typical (average) attacks and damage capacity of a monster/npc/whatever, factor in their attack to defend score (would hit 75% of the time, for example) and calculate how many turns it would take, on average, to kill an identical target. For most games, I consider a 4-6 turn self-defeat to be acceptable/average. Anything less is bit too lethal for my tastes, and anything over that to be grindy. I think I clocked most robots and power armor in Rifts at about a 10 turn self-defeat.
This plays out at the table, where one of our most common complaints is that combat takes too long.

Attacks per turn. Unless they tweaked it in the RUE, tracking HTH attacks is annoying and fiddly. A Juicer at 1st level can have 7 HTH attacks, while most characters have 4 or 5. The system doesn't seem very well thought out at all, in that every participant alternates attacks, until one runs out, and then the "other guy" gets all the rest of their HTH attacks in a row. So our Juicer would get 2-3 combat actions, but at the end of the turn, after his opponent has run out of opportunities to do anything except "pull" actions from the next turn to actively defend.

I already mentioned there are a lot of magic spells that do not affect targets in MDC body armor/power armor and robots, which is a big disadvantage in a setting where a lot of opponents are going to be wearing/riding in MDC gear and vehicles.

Those are a few complaints off the top of my head.

Quote from: The Butcher;908019Actually, North America too has its share of ruins — Chicago, St. Louis with the Devil's Gate, Quebec's Old Bones, Madhaven — it's just that there's a paucity of gameable detail set in these ruins (Old Bones and Madhaven being exceptions).

Quote from: Ratman_tf;907981There's the Gargolye Empire, where the Empire is set in bunch of ruins, and Madhaven.
In this case, I'd probably riff on Madhaven, use the idea of ghosts and crazy/possessed mutants prowling the ruins.

I meant in terms of art, I think the Madhaven book is the only one that uses a cover illo of a ruined city in the background. I could be wrong, however.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;908075I meant in terms of art, I think the Madhaven book is the only one that uses a cover illo of a ruined city in the background. I could be wrong, however.

There's a few. In Triax there's an illustration of Gargoyles roosting in ruined skyscrapers. And I guess that one I linked to is a dead link? Bah.
It's a black and white of cyborgs prowling a ruin.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;908120There's a few. In Triax there's an illustration of Gargoyles roosting in ruined skyscrapers. And I guess that one I linked to is a dead link? Bah.
It's a black and white of cyborgs prowling a ruin.

Fair enough.  I guess, the point is that for a post-apoc world, there's not much that's been focused on ruins of older cities other than passing mention.

Then again, given how the power creep sort of exploderated over the years, that does seem a bit low powered when you can have PCs deal with Splugorth and Atlanteans and A.R.C.H.I.E. and Vampires and other big menaces...

Quote from: Christopher Brady;907921Not sure I honestly understand, are you saying you wanted RIFTS or Gamma World to be over the top?

Cuz to me, I've heard that Gamma World is over the top crazy... At least all the anecdotal stories I've heard about the sessions.

Thats Ward's doing. He kept stating Gamma World was "wild and wahoo" over and over and eventually we ended up with 4e with the cannibal biker librarian clowns, the bi-polar bear, and yadda-yadda and 4e D&D GW which happens after the "big oops" in the year ten monkey slap slap. quote the designers "Hilarity ensues."

1 and 2e were not goofball. 3e was odd but not a cartoon or over-the-top action.

Rifts though you expect weird stuff, not necessarily goofball, but look at some of the party combos possible you you get what we mean. And it tends to over the top action. Which is why I like Rifts.

And neither of those is what I look for in Morrow Project for example.

Quote from: Ulairi;908030Everyone keeps telling me the Palladium rules are awful but I'm rereading the core rulebook (RUE, 5th printing) and I'm not seeing why the rules are so terrible. Rifts was the second RPG I ever played and we didn't have issues back in high school playing. Reading the rulebook again and it's not that complicated of a game. Character creation takes a long time and isn't well explained but once you're in the game the rules aren't that complicated. What am I missing?

You are, like me, missing being spoon fed years of hate by people who 75% of the time never played the game or even looked at it and just hate it because someone told them to.

Yes there are some quirks in the rules. We played it and every other palladium game just fine.

Quote from: Omega;9081351 and 2e were not goofball.

Did 1e have Hoops? Giant humanoid rabbits that can transmute metal into rubber?
Hoops, IMO, are goofball.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;908123Fair enough.  I guess, the point is that for a post-apoc world, there's not much that's been focused on ruins of older cities other than passing mention.

Then again, given how the power creep sort of exploderated over the years, that does seem a bit low powered when you can have PCs deal with Splugorth and Atlanteans and A.R.C.H.I.E. and Vampires and other big menaces...

Big menaces make for big scenarios. But it depends on how those scenarios are designed, which does bring me to another point.

Embracing the unbalance.

A common complaint about Rifts is how a party can include a Vagabond, a Psi Stalker, a Juicer and a Glitter Boy. This might seem unbalanced, but that's only if you're plunking down combat encounters of Brodkil or Vampires or whatever willy-nilly. Having a Juicer or Glitter Boy is nice when you encounter unfriendly sorts, and I'd never want to intentionally sideline the combat characters by making all kinds of nutty, intricate stealth only scenarios. But there's more to RPGs than solving every problem with a Boom Gun. And I'd really want to emphasize that.
K Siembieda said, I think it was in the first Rifts core rulebook, that Rifts is a "Thinking man's game" and while I think that statement is pretty pompus, I also think it's an important way to approach GMing Rifts. When every encounter looks like a combat, then the most combat capable characters are going to be the ones carrying the rest of the party.

I'm not the first person to break down scenario design like the following, but for quite a while now, I've used a 1/3rd framework. 1/3 combat encounters, 1/3 role playing interaction, and 1/3 problem solving.  There's no hard lines there. An RP encounter can become a combat encounter, etc. It's a rule of thumb to help me make fleshed out and interesting scenarios, and not just strings of combat encounters.

If a Rifts GM doesn't want to have parties of all Juicers, then I'd suggest thinking more about the other 2/3rds of a scenario. And speaking of, I think Juicer Uprising had some really neat ideas about how Juicers interact with others when they're not flipping out and killing things.

Quote from: Omega;908135Thats Ward's doing. He kept stating Gamma World was "wild and wahoo" over and over and eventually we ended up with 4e with the cannibal biker librarian clowns, the bi-polar bear, and yadda-yadda and 4e D&D GW which happens after the "big oops" in the year ten monkey slap slap. quote the designers "Hilarity ensues."

1 and 2e were not goofball. 3e was odd but not a cartoon or over-the-top action.

This is purely anecdotal, but around here, no one talks about the D&D 4e version without making hissing sounds and anti-vampire motions.  They only ever talk fondly about 2e, claiming it's the best, and then they go on about some REALLY gonzo stuff they pulled in a game.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;908058Attacks per turn. Unless they tweaked it in the RUE, tracking HTH attacks is annoying and fiddly. A Juicer at 1st level can have 7 HTH attacks, while most characters have 4 or 5. The system doesn't seem very well thought out at all, in that every participant alternates attacks, until one runs out, and then the "other guy" gets all the rest of their HTH attacks in a row. So our Juicer would get 2-3 combat actions, but at the end of the turn, after his opponent has run out of opportunities to do anything except "pull" actions from the next turn to actively defend.

Even a non-Juicer character can get up there in attacks. A character in a campaign I played briefly in had from skill application a total 3 Hand to hand and 2 kicks. +2 more for playing a Blade Wing Dragon Borg for a total of 7 right out the gate. That was the exception though and a later character had just 3 HTH. Which seems the norm unless someone is gearing for a melee expert.

Quote from: Simlasa;908143Did 1e have Hoops? Giant humanoid rabbits that can transmute metal into rubber?
Hoops, IMO, are goofball.

Oh goody. Cut and paste from the internet response! Good for you.

Yes obviously a giant rabbit is soooo goofball because it can turn metal into rubber.

Next.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;908159This is purely anecdotal, but around here, no one talks about the D&D 4e version without making hissing sounds and anti-vampire motions.  They only ever talk fondly about 2e, claiming it's the best, and then they go on about some REALLY gonzo stuff they pulled in a game.

4e D&D GW is weird. People despise the slapstick setting. But praise it as what a 4e starter/streamlining should have been. As for 2e action. aheh, no different from D&D or whatever. I know some groups played it like Thundarr and others played it as closer to Morrow Project.

Quote from: Omega;908174Oh goody. Cut and paste from the internet response!

Why be a jerk? I liked 1e a lot BECAUSE it was wild and crazy... you claim it wasn't goofball... I give an example... what's your fuss? The whole mutation setup was goofy as well, and that's not a complaint. There are plenty of options for 'straight' PA games, but as written GW ain't one of them.
When Rifts came along it looked a bigger, wilder scoop of the same... more magic and aliens and mecha and whatever.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;908058They're not that complicated. I think that's one of the draws of Rifts (and Palladium) I think some parts are terribly wonky though.
I'm at work and not going to do a detailed breakdown, so here are the highlights. (low lights?)

mega damage to mdc ratios. I use a "Stop attacking yourself!" check where I take the typical (average) attacks and damage capacity of a monster/npc/whatever, factor in their attack to defend score (would hit 75% of the time, for example) and calculate how many turns it would take, on average, to kill an identical target. For most games, I consider a 4-6 turn self-defeat to be acceptable/average. Anything less is bit too lethal for my tastes, and anything over that to be grindy. I think I clocked most robots and power armor in Rifts at about a 10 turn self-defeat.
This plays out at the table, where one of our most common complaints is that combat takes too long.

Attacks per turn. Unless they tweaked it in the RUE, tracking HTH attacks is annoying and fiddly. A Juicer at 1st level can have 7 HTH attacks, while most characters have 4 or 5. The system doesn't seem very well thought out at all, in that every participant alternates attacks, until one runs out, and then the "other guy" gets all the rest of their HTH attacks in a row. So our Juicer would get 2-3 combat actions, but at the end of the turn, after his opponent has run out of opportunities to do anything except "pull" actions from the next turn to actively defend.

I already mentioned there are a lot of magic spells that do not affect targets in MDC body armor/power armor and robots, which is a big disadvantage in a setting where a lot of opponents are going to be wearing/riding in MDC gear and vehicles.

Those are a few complaints off the top of my head.

I get the quirks that you're having with the system. The combat system in RUE works the same way (HTH attacks, run out, I get the rest of my attacks in a row). It unbalanced but I'd rather a system error on the side of being unbalanced than bow to some alter of game balance.

I'm fine with the spells list. My biggest problem with Rifts is that there are so many books, with so many different rules, that a GM has to be careful how they expand the game. I'm going to start a new campaign with players new to Palladium and Rifts and we will start with just RUE and if I expand it will be campaign specific (I love Vampire Kingdoms).

Quote from: Ulairi;908198I get the quirks that you're having with the system. The combat system in RUE works the same way (HTH attacks, run out, I get the rest of my attacks in a row). It unbalanced but I'd rather a system error on the side of being unbalanced than bow to some alter of game balance.

I'm fine with the spells list. My biggest problem with Rifts is that there are so many books, with so many different rules, that a GM has to be careful how they expand the game. I'm going to start a new campaign with players new to Palladium and Rifts and we will start with just RUE and if I expand it will be campaign specific (I love Vampire Kingdoms).

Excellent. I wouldn't mind if you posted any insights or observations from your campaign in this thread.

I totally agree about a GM having to be conscious of what books to include in a campaign. I think the first sourcebook and the first worldbook are pretty "safe", but anything after that has to be vetted by the GM, especially if they're going for a specific theme and don't want to have theme-creep. (Much less power creep)

Quote from: Ratman_tf;908208Excellent. I wouldn't mind if you posted any insights or observations from your campaign in this thread.

I totally agree about a GM having to be conscious of what books to include in a campaign. I think the first sourcebook and the first worldbook are pretty "safe", but anything after that has to be vetted by the GM, especially if they're going for a specific theme and don't want to have theme-creep. (Much less power creep)

What's funny about Rifts is that it's the ultimate sandbox setting in my opinion hampered by a rules system that isn't geared towards the sandbox. To me, Rifts should be run more how WoTC wanted D&D 4E running as a game with predetermined set encounters that are designed around the party. That way, me, as the GM, has the ability to make sure every player gets a fair shake. I really think it's time for a revamp to the RUE rules, the book is what...11 years old?

Ill be sure to post reports on how the game goes.

Quote from: Ulairi;908242What's funny about Rifts is that it's the ultimate sandbox setting in my opinion hampered by a rules system that isn't geared towards the sandbox. To me, Rifts should be run more how WoTC wanted D&D 4E running as a game with predetermined set encounters that are designed around the party. That way, me, as the GM, has the ability to make sure every player gets a fair shake. I really think it's time for a revamp to the RUE rules, the book is what...11 years old?

*edit* I misread your post. Nevermind.

QuoteIll be sure to post reports on how the game goes.

Cool. :)

Quote from: Ulairi;908242What's funny about Rifts is that it's the ultimate sandbox setting in my opinion hampered by a rules system that isn't geared towards the sandbox.

Rifts should be an awesome sandbox.

Kevin Siembieda is a graduate of the Judges Guild school of setting design — witness the city writeups in WB1: Vampire Kingdoms, or any one of several Palladium Fantasy books.

However, since WB2: Atlantis the line's drifted away from setting detail and towards gear/class/monster lists with the attending, inevitable power creep. WB3: England and WB4: Africa had sparse world information that felt "phoned in" and probably got exactly no one setting a campaign at these places. WB5 has very little, but better setting material.

True, some later books seem to hint at reconciliation with setting information (Juicer Uprising was a breath of fresh air, and I hear Canada has a good write-up of Old Bones Quebec), but it's still erratic as hell, and the power creep soldiers on.

Another issue is a lack of sandbox-friendly, modular adventures.

Quote from: Ulairi;908242To me, Rifts should be run more how WoTC wanted D&D 4E running as a game with predetermined set encounters that are designed around the party. That way, me, as the GM, has the ability to make sure every player gets a fair shake. I really think it's time for a revamp to the RUE rules, the book is what...11 years old?

System-wise, I believe it's less a matter of complexity, and more a matter of presentation. 25+ years of changing, and often contradictory rulings spread across literally dozens of books. The line could use a clean-up. My ideal Rifts 2e would not change the system so much as clarify and/or streamline it.

As for set-piece encounters, well, it certainly can be played this way, but I'm not sure it would particularly benefit from it.

Quote from: Ulairi;908242Ill be sure to post reports on how the game goes.

Please do! :)

Scraypers came out fairly late in the series and is still one of my favourites from the latter half. Wormwood was pretty good too.

I love all the talk of Power Creep... as if the single most powerful weapon in the game isn't in the Main Freaking Rulebook.  Ohh, and all those rune weapons? Yeah, they are in Atlantis, which was done in the first year or so of the game line.  

Sure a few of the books are marginally more powerful than others (say: Japan, or Phase World), while others, often much later in the series are actually quite weak (Say: New West, or Russia.. Sure, teh russian borgs are balls out, but they're shooting vastly oversized pea shooters.

So, which Power Armor in Northern Gun (the one where I mention the march of technology) is superior to the Glitter Boy? Who has a better big gun than the Boom Gun? For that matter, which of hte many, many later GB variants is actually 'better' than the original?   Most are more fragile, and all are worse armed.  But they do get better artwork, so there is that.


Now Lemuria? Sure, teh Lemurians are Power Creep Humans (wadda weird thing, eh?), but if you aren't into the weird pacific island fetishistic vegan technomagic whatzit, well... balls.  Cause that's ALL the Lemurians.

Quote from: Spike;908416Who has a better big gun than the Boom Gun? For that matter, which of hte many, many later GB variants is actually 'better' than the original?   Most are more fragile, and all are worse armed.  But they do get better artwork, so there is that.

Meh.  Whatever.

The boom gun has been continually nerfed over the years.  Initially the stuff about pylon deployment was mere flavor text.  It was automatically assumed  whenever the Boom Gun was fired.  You didn't have to stop, spend an action sinking pylons, and then a later action to shoot.  That change effectively made the boom gun only do about 2d4x10 per attack, which was still decent, but the nerfing continued to the point where if you run a game semi-competently the boom gun will never be able to acquire any kind of mobile target.

The boom gun wasn't even a particularly good weapon in terms of damage output.  Under the old burst rules, just about any laser rifle capable of burst fire (any of the CS rifles) could do comparable or better damage if you were willing to burn through the e-clip.  Also, I think charging e-clips was cheaper than railgun ammo, and specialized Boom Gun flechette canisters were more expensive than that.  So if you were actually paying for ammo, then using the Boom Gun wasn't even cost effective per shot.

After all the nerfs to the Boom Gun, any pulse rifle or 1d4x10/1d6x10 railgun which could be fired on the move was preferable to the Glitter Boy's signature weapon.

Me, I never nerfed the boom gun.  Sinking the pylons always remained flavor text.  Even with a 3d6x10 damage output, they couldn't even drop guys in plain body armor reliably.  Even pissant power armor like the Flying Titan took 2 shots or more.

As for better variants of the Glitter Boy, there are two which spring to mind.

The first is in Mutants in Orbit.  Instead of the familiar flechette cannon, it is armed with a Particle Cannon which does 4d6x10 per shot and which can be fired 4 times per melee round.  It is also possible that the model doesn't have any requirement for pylons due to the energy nature of it's weapon system, although there is no word I've ever seen one way or the other on that point.

But the best Glitter Boy is the Triax model.  IIRC, it not only has the standard Boom Gun, but it also has some head lasers, an arm blade, and, most importantly, lots of mini-missiles.  It's easily the most versatile of all the GB models, putting all the Free Quebec models to shame.

Quote from: Omega;908355Scraypers came out fairly late in the series and is still one of my favourites from the latter half. Wormwood was pretty good too.

I LOVE Scraypers.  Wish I could find my copy

Quote from: Gabriel2;908426Meh.  Whatever.

The boom gun has been continually nerfed over the years.  Initially the stuff about pylon deployment was mere flavor text.  It was automatically assumed  whenever the Boom Gun was fired.  You didn't have to stop, spend an action sinking pylons, and then a later action to shoot.  That change effectively made the boom gun only do about 2d4x10 per attack, which was still decent, but the nerfing continued to the point where if you run a game semi-competently the boom gun will never be able to acquire any kind of mobile target.

The boom gun wasn't even a particularly good weapon in terms of damage output.  Under the old burst rules, just about any laser rifle capable of burst fire (any of the CS rifles) could do comparable or better damage if you were willing to burn through the e-clip.  Also, I think charging e-clips was cheaper than railgun ammo, and specialized Boom Gun flechette canisters were more expensive than that.  So if you were actually paying for ammo, then using the Boom Gun wasn't even cost effective per shot.

After all the nerfs to the Boom Gun, any pulse rifle or 1d4x10/1d6x10 railgun which could be fired on the move was preferable to the Glitter Boy's signature weapon.

Me, I never nerfed the boom gun.  Sinking the pylons always remained flavor text.  Even with a 3d6x10 damage output, they couldn't even drop guys in plain body armor reliably.  Even pissant power armor like the Flying Titan took 2 shots or more.

As for better variants of the Glitter Boy, there are two which spring to mind.

The first is in Mutants in Orbit.  Instead of the familiar flechette cannon, it is armed with a Particle Cannon which does 4d6x10 per shot and which can be fired 4 times per melee round.  It is also possible that the model doesn't have any requirement for pylons due to the energy nature of it's weapon system, although there is no word I've ever seen one way or the other on that point.

But the best Glitter Boy is the Triax model.  IIRC, it not only has the standard Boom Gun, but it also has some head lasers, an arm blade, and, most importantly, lots of mini-missiles.  It's easily the most versatile of all the GB models, putting all the Free Quebec models to shame.

I always wished that the basic GB unit to have arm mounted cannons until the pylons release and changed the suit into Siege mode.  But really, 90MDC average damage drops a soldier in up to heavy armour per pop, but other Power Suits and Robots? Nope, not a chance.

A Forager battle-bot packs 16 medium range missiles, and can fire in volleys of 4.
Since you can't dodge* 4+ volleys of missiles, that's going to be 8d6x10 MD for Plasma warheads.

* You can shoot down a volley, and roll with impact if you don't detonate the missiles.

Denying that there's a marked trend towards power creep across the Rifts line "because Boom Gun" is so preposterous it shouldn't even merit an answer. I'll tackle it out of respect for Spike's posting history, but really.

The Boom Gun deals a ton of damage, indeed, but PCs don't all buy Boom Guns and go off in the wilderness. The Glitter Boy is a good example of how very powerful tech should be handled: it's a one-trick pony. An artillery piece with two legs.

Compare to the Super SAMAS or the Ulti-Max which may deal less brute force damage (mini-missile volleys notwithstanding) but have a ton more mobility.

Phase World seemed to be a common mentioned point of power creep.

Quote from: Ulairi;908030Everyone keeps telling me the Palladium rules are awful but I'm rereading the core rulebook (RUE, 5th printing) and I'm not seeing why the rules are so terrible. Rifts was the second RPG I ever played and we didn't have issues back in high school playing. Reading the rulebook again and it's not that complicated of a game. Character creation takes a long time and isn't well explained but once you're in the game the rules aren't that complicated. What am I missing?

They're terrible if you learned to play RPGs with a different rule-set and can't adapt to something a little different that requires imagination and a decent game master. If, like me, you learned to play RPGs using Palladium rules, it's pretty simple. Every other RPG system seems bland in comparison.

Quote from: Omega;908492Phase World seemed to be a common mentioned point of power creep.

Phase World is an entirely different dimension, where everything is SUPER high tech with Galactus-style bad guys and Silver Surfer-ish good guys. If things weren't overall more powerful than on Rifts Earth, then what would be the point?

I love how everyone's got a quick answer for the BOOM Gun... but no one commented on the how terribly weak  many later books were. Is it really power creep when you can reliably pick up a book from the second half of the setting (so far) and find nothing a power gamer would actually want to use?  

I also pointed out the GB is also still one of the heaviest PA's in terms of armor.

Mostly in my experience you don't have power creep so much as a random shotgun spread of power.  New West and Russia both had flavor to spare, but no real 'gotta have it' toys.  South America had some nifty toys (and plenty of junk to go with it), but could be hit or miss on flavor.

So far, what I can tell as unabashed 'power creep' may come from two distinct 'setting updates', maybe three.  When the Coalition got revamped and redesigned, they got new and improved toys, though the actual power difference seems reasonably marginal. Ditto Northern Gun, which is set another few years past War Campaign.   It may be the third 'update' was the Seige On Tolkieen/Federation of Magic, but frankly I don't know enough to care...

But even here there is a clear hierarchy of power, which is fully explicated in... I think NG1 lays it out.   Phase World stuff is still top notch, with Naruni and Atlantis bracketing them, then you've got Archie/Titan Industries, then Japan then Coaltion... and so forth.   It's more or less a policy that no amount of 'creep' in Coalition gear will catch up to Phase World, which doesn't get that many updates. So again: where is the creep?  THe term implies a vector (Must.Resits.Urge.To.Quote.Despicable Me!)... and our 'highest power' supplement was way back in teh beginning!

Would your rather play a core rulebook Borg? Or the Triax VX-600 Marauder Borg, from WB5? Or a Sovietski Cyborg Shock Trooper, from WB17?

Would you rather fight a core rulebook Cyber-Knight? Or a Phase World Cosmo-Knight?

Would you rather pilot a SAMAS from the core rulebook, or the Striker SAMAS from WB11?

Would rather cast Call Lightning from the core rulebook, or Particle Acceleration from WB16?

Palladium's been putting increasingly powerful toys on PCs' hands ever since the line got its start. And it's all over the place. The fact that some books are not as bad as others, and that the Glitter Boy remains a sacred cow of sorts, is a Good Thing. But it's still falling short of what I would consider an ideal set-up — technology does seem to be advancing mighty fast, as WB11 Coalition gear can easily duke it out with their Triax (supposedly untouched pre-Rifts tech expertise) and even Phase World CCW (starfaring civilization capable of FTL, antigravity and stuff) equivalents.

Quote from: Spike;908543I love how everyone's got a quick answer for the BOOM Gun... but no one commented on the how terribly weak  many later books were. Is it really power creep when you can reliably pick up a book from the second half of the setting (so far) and find nothing a power gamer would actually want to use?  

I also pointed out the GB is also still one of the heaviest PA's in terms of armor.

Mostly in my experience you don't have power creep so much as a random shotgun spread of power.  New West and Russia both had flavor to spare, but no real 'gotta have it' toys.  South America had some nifty toys (and plenty of junk to go with it), but could be hit or miss on flavor.

So far, what I can tell as unabashed 'power creep' may come from two distinct 'setting updates', maybe three.  When the Coalition got revamped and redesigned, they got new and improved toys, though the actual power difference seems reasonably marginal. Ditto Northern Gun, which is set another few years past War Campaign.   It may be the third 'update' was the Seige On Tolkieen/Federation of Magic, but frankly I don't know enough to care...

But even here there is a clear hierarchy of power, which is fully explicated in... I think NG1 lays it out.   Phase World stuff is still top notch, with Naruni and Atlantis bracketing them, then you've got Archie/Titan Industries, then Japan then Coaltion... and so forth.   It's more or less a policy that no amount of 'creep' in Coalition gear will catch up to Phase World, which doesn't get that many updates. So again: where is the creep?  THe term implies a vector (Must.Resits.Urge.To.Quote.Despicable Me!)... and our 'highest power' supplement was way back in teh beginning!

KS seems to prefer slow and grindy attrition combat.

CJ Carella understood that Rifts combat sucked ass.  Low end cannon fodder monsters like the Brodkill have 250 MDC while PCs are probably only going to be able to bring 1d4x10 weapons to bear against them, but more likely only 3d6.  That doesn't even account for the fact the PCs are probably going to only have a +2 to hit against a Brodkil's +6 or +8 to dodge.  Rifts combat run by the book against published monsters is a lot of whiffing with the occasional hit doing a handful of damage points against something with hundreds of MDC.

CJ cranked up the damage values to where they should be.  His MDC values remained mostly in the range where they had been for the line at the time.  You may still have a problem hitting against his stuff, but at least when you do then there's a meaningful impact.

When KS got rid of CJ, he seemed to take a much more active interest in the mechanics.  His answer was to up MDC values and degrade weapon damage values.

I don't know much about the line past Free Quebec.  Prior to that book the power creep is mostly a Coalition centric thing.  KS got mad that the toys of other fictional groups in the setting were more powerful than the toys of his creation.  So he went out of his way to bend the setting so his skull boys were back on top.  As for Coaltion gear not catching up to Phase World, I'd say that some of the later CS stuff is on par with Phase World.

Now, in the 90s, it was very difficult to run a campaign of Rifts.  Every time a new world book came out, players wanted to ditch their current characters and make new ones with the OCCs/RCCs and gear in the new book.  It had nothing to do with flavor.  It was simply that the newer stuff simply had more bonuses, more MDC, more damage output, more power than anything which came before.  

I see what you're saying with more recent stuff trying to be more level.  I don't know.  I haven't seen anything past Arzno (other than some art in Northern Gun), and I really don't care about anything new for the game.  Maybe power creep is a thing of the past.  But rest assured that if KS needs to make his skull boys look cool, they'll find a Phase World tech memory core or something and catapult ahead of everyone.

Quote from: The Butcher;908548Would your rather play a core rulebook Borg? Or the Triax VX-600 Marauder Borg, from WB5? Or a Sovietski Cyborg Shock Trooper, from WB17?

Would you rather fight a core rulebook Cyber-Knight? Or a Phase World Cosmo-Knight?

Would you rather pilot a SAMAS from the core rulebook, or the Striker SAMAS from WB11?

Would rather cast Call Lightning from the core rulebook, or Particle Acceleration from WB16?

Palladium's been putting increasingly powerful toys on PCs' hands ever since the line got its start. And it's all over the place. The fact that some books are not as bad as others, and that the Glitter Boy remains a sacred cow of sorts, is a Good Thing. But it's still falling short of what I would consider an ideal set-up — technology does seem to be advancing mighty fast, as WB11 Coalition gear can easily duke it out with their Triax (supposedly untouched pre-Rifts tech expertise) and even Phase World CCW (starfaring civilization capable of FTL, antigravity and stuff) equivalents.

I don't remember the stats of the Marauder.  Can Triax borgs wear the standard armor types listed in the rulebook?  Meh.  I'm going to go original core rulebook military borg, then I get to customize.

I'd definitely go Cosmo-Knight.  I loved the Rom Spaceknight vibe of them.  Plus their stats backed up the fluff.  Core rulebook (and even Siege on Tolkeen Cyber Knights) had semi-decent fluff, but they were lame characters to play whose mechanical capabilities could never back up what the fluff said about them.

That's a tough one.  Of course I prefer the Striker.  Who doesn't love tons of missiles?  However, the SAMAS is still fun in it's own MADOX 01 plagarizing way.  I guess my answer would be, I'd prefer to play a SAMAS pilot who goes through his Gundamesque hero journey and gets a Striker upgrade at the midpoint of the series.

I don't remember what Call Lightning does, but you're comparing it to a spell from WB16.  All the spells from WB16 are much needed upgrades from the corebook.  As nearly all the spells in the corebook other than Carpet of Adhesion are pitifully low powered, I'll go with Particle Acceleration.

Combat, conflict and violence are all big parts of Rifts.

I don't care that a Juicer wears 45 MDC Juicer plate, and that a Coalition SAMAS can take 250 MDC. I care that a Juicer is a person who sacrificed some of their humanity in order to be able to compete against supernatural monsters. I care that a SAMAS is a way that a couple of power armor pilots can patrol a ruins and have a chance if they run into demonic minions.
I care that a Giltter Boy's Boom Gun and armor is an example of how powerful pre-Rifts technology was, that that technology was lost and found again, and that the pilots inherit their armor from their parent or mentor, instead of buying one.

 

Quote from: Gabriel2;908551KS seems to prefer slow and grindy attrition combat.

CJ Carella understood that Rifts combat sucked ass.  Low end cannon fodder monsters like the Brodkill have 250 MDC while PCs are probably only going to be able to bring 1d4x10 weapons to bear against them, but more likely only 3d6.  That doesn't even account for the fact the PCs are probably going to only have a +2 to hit against a Brodkil's +6 or +8 to dodge.  Rifts combat run by the book against published monsters is a lot of whiffing with the occasional hit doing a handful of damage points against something with hundreds of MDC.

CJ cranked up the damage values to where they should be.  His MDC values remained mostly in the range where they had been for the line at the time.  You may still have a problem hitting against his stuff, but at least when you do then there's a meaningful impact.

Pretty much agree. Though unless a target has auto-dodge, it would have to pull an action to dodge, reducing it's attacks that round, and opening it up to running out of active defenses.

Quote from: The Butcher;908548Would your rather play a core rulebook Borg? Or the Triax VX-600 Marauder Borg, from WB5? Or a Sovietski Cyborg Shock Trooper, from WB17?

I prefered the AT-C8000 Wing Blade from WB 8.(Though thats more like a mech.)
And I kinda like the original Samas.

Butcher, its like you didn't even read my post?

Seriously, I could change your second line to 'Would you rather play a Cyber Knight or a Dragon Hatchling?', and the unbalanced scales of your question would remain exactly the same, only it would prove my point, not yours.   Presto!

Did you miss the part where I pointed out a clear delination of power levels by 'faction' that remains constant through the series?  YOu know, how Triax stuff is better than Coalition stuff and anything Phase World is Top Dog?

See? I never disagreed that there are different power levels. I dispute the term 'Creep' to define it.  Creep implies constant growth, yet for the most part later books are full of 'crap', power wise. Black Market (Book... ah... 27? Fuck it. High number X), is full of junk toys. Why? Because the Black Market gets their shit from the bottom of the power stack, so even though its a fairly recent book, the stuff is still crap.

So Would You Rather pilot a core book SAMAS or a Bandito SAMAS (WB 14)?


Of course, as the levels aren't as far apart in terms of results as the fluff tends to indicate... as you note correctly...  its not much of a big deal.  I mean: Our big 'Power Creep' is so game destroying that you can play with core gear and still troop like a champ.   Whoa.   So very broken.

Quote from: Spike;908716Did you miss the part where I pointed out a clear delination of power levels by 'faction' that remains constant through the series?  YOu know, how Triax stuff is better than Coalition stuff and anything Phase World is Top Dog?

There is very little consistency as to how this is applied across 25 years of publication. The WB11 Super SAMAS is closer to the Phase World Silverhawk in terms of MDC and damage dealing capacity than to (say) the Triax Predator.

Quote from: Spike;908716See? I never disagreed that there are different power levels. I dispute the term 'Creep' to define it.  Creep implies constant growth, yet for the most part later books are full of 'crap', power wise. Black Market (Book... ah... 27? Fuck it. High number X), is full of junk toys. Why? Because the Black Market gets their shit from the bottom of the power stack, so even though its a fairly recent book, the stuff is still crap.

So it's only creep if each and every new faction is superior to previous ones in all things?

Quote from: Spike;908716Of course, as the levels aren't as far apart in terms of results as the fluff tends to indicate... as you note correctly...  its not much of a big deal.  I mean: Our big 'Power Creep' is so game destroying that you can play with core gear and still troop like a champ.   Whoa.   So very broken.

It's only game-breaking if you're a bitch ass GM who gives your players the run of the whole line to pick starting gear from and dispatches core rulebook Dead Boys against them. ;)

Quote from: The Butcher;908796So it's only creep if each and every new faction is superior to previous ones in all things?

Nah, but you should see a clear elevation of power across the game line in an upwardly mobile direction.  Again: Some of the most powerful stuff in the game came early, while plenty of later books are weak.  Its all over the place, mang.   I haven't really dug into the 'living power armor' in Lemuria, but the conventional weapons are sorta meh, but then you've got a class that tames giant sea monsters, so...  

But as can be constantly pointed out: What tops the Cosmo Knight in the entire line up?  Gods maybe?


I'm too lazy to do multiple quotes tonight, so in answer for the problem with letting players play all the cool and only giving them core rules deadboys? not broken: You've got ALL THE DEADBOYS.  Make them fight all of Chi Town. Go buy a case of printer paper (not a ream, a case), and print out ten Dead Boys in boring ass gear per side per page and I guarantee you will wipe the party in a handful of turns. Even if they are cosmo-knights! Sure, they'll only take, like, one point of MDC per shot. So what? You've got a million shots at them this turn!

Um.. I'm not liable for any repetitive motion injuries sustained in trying to roll all those attacks.

Quote from: Spike;908875Nah, but you should see a clear elevation of power across the game line in an upwardly mobile direction.  Again: Some of the most powerful stuff in the game came early, while plenty of later books are weak.  Its all over the place, mang.   I haven't really dug into the 'living power armor' in Lemuria, but the conventional weapons are sorta meh, but then you've got a class that tames giant sea monsters, so...  

But as can be constantly pointed out: What tops the Cosmo Knight in the entire line up?  Gods maybe?


I'm too lazy to do multiple quotes tonight, so in answer for the problem with letting players play all the cool and only giving them core rules deadboys? not broken: You've got ALL THE DEADBOYS.  Make them fight all of Chi Town. Go buy a case of printer paper (not a ream, a case), and print out ten Dead Boys in boring ass gear per side per page and I guarantee you will wipe the party in a handful of turns. Even if they are cosmo-knights! Sure, they'll only take, like, one point of MDC per shot. So what? You've got a million shots at them this turn!

Um.. I'm not liable for any repetitive motion injuries sustained in trying to roll all those attacks.

"Power" in Rifts tends to mean main body MDC. Adult Dragons, Intelligences, those nutty Metzla dudes from Atlantis. Gods in Rifts get thousands of MDC, but do a comparable amount of MD as everyone else. Maybe on the high end of 2d6x10 or even 3d6x10 sometimes, but that's peanuts against a main body MDC of (say) 4,500. Cosmo-knights (just re-read their entry) have around 700 MDC, and their signature attack, the cosmic energy bolt, "only" starts out at 1d6x10, geting up to 5d6x10 at max. Doubled if they juice the attack up 50 additional PPE. Some of their other powers are notable, especially innate FTL travel, but not combat oriented. A juicer has better combat bonuses, and a squad of enforcers can hose him down with MRM/SRM missile volleys.

But really, if someone is GMing Rifts by lining up various opponents and having the characters run a gauntlet of combat encounters, then they're running a pretty boring-ass game, IMO. And yes, I have been guilty of that in the past. :D

Ok. You guys can argue about power creep all you like, but I'm more interested in campaign building.

Taking my cue from Vamp Kingdoms and Juicer Uprisings as inspiration for frameworks, I've started fleshing out people, factions and places for PCs to interact with. I'll just dump my text file at this point.

The Night Clan.
Dark Claw, leader of a pack of werewolves who terrorize the area. Typical alpha werewolf type. Strongest and leads by might and personality.
Blood Moon. Werewolf dark mystic. Supports Dark Claw with her knowledge of magic, summoning demons, and spellcasting.
Wolf totem makers.
Wolf totems are carved from wood or stone, and used as magical sentries. The totems are enchanted, and a small piece of the substance is carved into an identical likeness of the totem. Any mystic or psionic character can spend 20 PPE or ISP to activate a totem by holding the matching carving and concentrating. The user can see and hear through the totem's eyes and ears. This effect lasts for 6+1d6 minutes, and then the user must expend another 20 PPE/ISP to continue the effect. Wood totems have 25-75 MDC after being enchanted, and 50-150 MDC for stone totems.
Werewolf assassins and agents.
Raiding packs. Typical raiding pack is 2d6 werewolves.
A warband is 3d6x10 werewolves. Very rare to see so many werewolves at once. Usually a warband will form in response to a powerful threat.
Most werewolves will not use technology. During times of war, 50% of the clan will use technology or magic to supplement their natural abilities. 25% have either armor, or a weapon. (Technological, technowizardy, or magical) and 25% will have both armor and weaponry.
Dark Claw posesses a runeblade Axe, techno-wizard gun and magical armor. He will use these only as a last resort, prefering his natural werewolf abilities.
Dark Claw likes things the way they are. A large territory with plenty of prey. Unfortunatley, the Clan is in danger of becoming too large to ignore, and Dark Claw knows this. Despite his best efforts Werewolves are driven to expand their numbers. The Clan has sent several spies, who remain in human form, into the nearby communties to keep tabs on any plans to attack the Werewolves stronghold.
Lycanthropy-
Like Vampires, Werewolves do not reproduce "naturally". A victim bitten by a werewolf (takes SDC damage), must make a save vs. magic at a -5 penalty. (+5 bonus if a non-human SDC race, like elves, dwarves, etc) Failing this save means the victim will become a werewolf during the next full moon. During the time between being bitten and becoming a werewolf, the victim will have disturbing dreams and act in an unusual fashion. Being territorial, dominant and aggressive. Some small percentage of new werewovles will retain much of their previous memories and attitudes, and can retain their old alignment. Most will become a selfish or evil alignment, and succumb to the desire to hunt and slay, especially liketo hunt mortals, humans and SDC D-Bees.
Mostly humans and some elves, dwarves, and human-like SDC D-Bees are vulnerable to lycanthropy. Dragons, Brodkil, non-intelligent monsters and animals cannot be turned into a werewolf.

Fort Devon.
Mid-sized Coalition base. Fort Devon is under the command of Major Krystal Wellman. Major Wellman and the troops under her are mostly indifferent to D-Bees. Their remoteness from Chi-Town and any Coalition reinforcements means that they are not usually antagonistic towards the D-Bee population. They do activley hunt and destroy demonic threats, and dangerous monsters. They will avoid mages and D-Bees and not go out of their way to help them. They do consider most humans to be worth protecting, and will respond with aid if asked by a human community. Their current orders are to establish trade and protection treaties with the nearby human arcology. To seek out rumored pre-Rifts caches in the nearby ruins, and to protect any humans that require aid in their territory.

Black Market travelling caravan.
The Black Market caravan is made up of thirty vehicles, including four huge land crawler vehicles that are almost mobile villages. Half of the caravan makes regular trips to nearby settlements to buy and sell good. They have a body chop-shop capable of MOM, Juicer and borg conversion. The caravan attempts to stay one step ahead of raiders and Coalition patrols, while being available for trade and commerce. They can provide repairs, recharging eclips, maintenence on generators and vehicles, and sell ammuntion and equipment. They have most of the inventory from Wellington, Northern Gun, Ishpeming, and some looted Coalition gear, and a smattering of Triax and Naruni equipment availalble.
Most equipment goes for listed prices. Coalition gear sells for 2-5 times it's listed price, and Triax and Naruni equipment sells for 5-10 times it's listed price.
The Black Market merchants will buy used weapons and gear at 25-50% of it's listed price. They want to turn around and sell the items at a profit, and used gear is not as valuable as new gear. They will buy new gear at 50-75% of it's listed price, if the item is in new quality, and will be easy to sell.

Human arcology.
Has a 30% pro-Coaltion population. Including some in the council. A prominent council member is willing to provoke supernatural entities, like the Night Clan werewovles, into attacking, in order to pressure the rest of the population into supporting Coalition membership.

Bandit gangs
Multiple bandit gangs roam the wilderness and wastelands, preying on villages and caravans. Made up of cyborgs, mutants, demons and D-Bees.

Pre-Rifts Ruins
Similar to Madhaven. Ghosts and entities prowl the ruin, alongside gangs of mutants. A very dangerous place to visit, but adventurers seeking pre-Rifts treasures sometimes brave the ruins. Few return, and those who do are usually disturbed, suffering from the memory of horrors and ghosts they encountered.

Quote from: Ulairi;908030Everyone keeps telling me the Palladium rules are awful but I'm rereading the core rulebook (RUE, 5th printing) and I'm not seeing why the rules are so terrible. Rifts was the second RPG I ever played and we didn't have issues back in high school playing. Reading the rulebook again and it's not that complicated of a game. Character creation takes a long time and isn't well explained but once you're in the game the rules aren't that complicated. What am I missing?

I really like the RIFTS Palladium rules. The problem isn't so much the system, as it is that the rules aren't well-organized.  It takes a bit of learning curve for a GM to master them.

Quote from: The Butcher;908268Rifts should be an awesome sandbox.

What makes a good Rifts sandbox? I'll chip in with my opinions of course.
One of the appeals of the Vampire Kingdoms and the first Sourcebook, is that they both set up locations and NPCs in such a way that adventures tend to form around them. Vampire Kingdoms tells the GM where the vampires are, what they're doing, and why they're doing it. From that, a GM can spin up a specific set of encounters, and place leads and rumors into the game session. Juicer Uprising goes about this in a bit of a different way, in that the adventures form from a series of events outlined in the world book.

QuoteAnother issue is a lack of sandbox-friendly, modular adventures.

I agree, but I also think that an adventure from K Siembieda would look like the section in Juicer Uprising that covers the details of an event driven scenario. We can also see it in the Hook, Line and Sinker format for his adventure seeds. I don't think a proper Rifts module would resemble an Adventure Path, or a D&D module.

Perhaps someone can help me with this house rule I've been stewing on for a few weeks now.

Instead of upping damage with multiplier systems, I had the brainstorm to simply reduce MDC across the board. Simple and elegant, at first.
But then I thought that I don't want to reduce body armor. That's not too bad.
First revision is, MDC up to 100 stays the same, MDC over 100, divide by 2.
Didn't get very far with that one. That puts stuff in the 100-200 MDC bracket lower than body armor in a lot of cases. Not acceptable.
Second revision. MDC up to 100 stays the same. 101-200 MDC divide by 1.5, MDC over 200 divide by 2.
Better, and I did a check of the conversion using all the MDC values in the core rulebook.
But it still creates a few edge cases. Specifically, the Flying Titan is now equal to the Samson power armor.
And this means anything from an expansion might come out worse, if it's in the 101-200 MDC range, or on the low end after 200.

It's a workable kludge to simply adjust edge cases "manually" as they come up, but I'm wondering if I'm missing a better solution along these lines.

Really, the MDC values of everything are so inflated that it doesn't hurt to divide all MDC values by 2.  Toward the end of playing I started dividing everything by 3 and 4.  But if you're just talking about original corebook stuff (pre-South America), then dividing everything by 2 will be fine.

I'm with Gabriel2.

MDC/SDC bloat isn't a new thing. I play Mechanoids: Invasion (PB's first RPG) and its got huge issues with hordes of antagonists with 100s of SDC. Splicers (another fav of mine) has truly insane MDC issues.

I let PCs keep the original MDC/SDC as written. However, behind the scenes, I chop the numbers in half or a third for everyone except the Big Name NPCs.

It's easy GM math and keeps the game moving.

I can't say I really relate to this problem in general. There may be a few monsters and mecha I felt had too much MDC, but in general I think that the MDC values are ok for what I like.

Quote from: RPGPundit;912095I can't say I really relate to this problem in general. There may be a few monsters and mecha I felt had too much MDC, but in general I think that the MDC values are ok for what I like.

A Brodkil, pretty standard Rifts monster type, has 250 main body MDC. A typical assault laser rifle will do 4d6 MD per shot. On average, that's 12 MD per attack.
250 divided by 12, rounding up, is 21 successful hits to down a Brodkil.

Burst fire can mitigate this, x2 damage runs it down to 10 successful hits, but the Rifts burst damage rules have been all over the place. (yes, no maybe? blargh)

Coalition heavy body armor has 80 MDC. That's about 7 sucessful attacks from our typical laser rifle.

These numbers can go all over the place. A vibro knife does 1d4 MD, a Boom Gun does 3d6x10. Robot vehicles can have hundreds of MDC, sometimes over a thousand, but that's pretty uncommon. Focus fire helps too, but the enemies can focus fire as well, and that simply changes the attrition from one-on-one to group-on-group.

So it depends on your tastes, of course, but I personally find anything over 4 successful attacks to be grindy, and 10+ attacks to be worth some house-ruling.

Amusingly, some of the illustrations in the Rifts books have combats that are completely impossible with the standard rules.

(http://terralthra.net/sdnet/rifts/R_Brodkil1.jpg)

Triax infantry armor has 100 MDC. A large vibro-sword does 2d6 MD. There's no way a Brodkil can cleave a man's head with one swipe like in that illustration. But it looks cool and deadly.

I wrote up an introductory adventure for my campaign setting. Feel free to snipe anything you like.


TERROR BY MOONLIGHT

 


A RIFTS adventure for 4-6 characters of levels 1-3.


Werewolf
Horror Factor: 12 as humanoid wolf-thing or huge wolf. The horror factor does not apply to human form.
Alignment: Any, usually miscreant or diabolic evil or anarchist.
Attributes of the Werewolf: The number of six-sided dice to roll is
as indicated: I.Q.: 2D6, M.E.: 3D6, M.A.: 3D6, P.S.: 4D6 (never less
than 16), P.P.: 4D6 (never less than 16), P.E.: 5D6, P.B.: 3D6, Spd
5D6 in human form or 50 (35 mph/56 km) as a wolf.
Hit Points (Special): 6D6 + 20; see natural armor rating.
Natural Armor Rating: Special! Like the vampire, the werebeast is invulnerable to virtually all weapons, including mega-damage energy weapons, explosives, bullets, fire, wood, and poison/drugs. However, also like vampires, werebeasts are vulnerable to ordinary silver. Weapons that have at least a 50% silver content inflict double damage to the supernatural things. Thus a silver-plated dagger, which normally inflicts 2D6 S.D.C. damage, inflicts 2D6x2 points of damage direct to the monster's hit points. Although werebeasts possess bio-regenerative powers, they are nothing like the vampires' so being bludgeoned or stabbed by silver can kill the creature without requiring decapitation and staking.
P.P.E.: 2D4x10+10.
Natural Abilities: The abilities listed are specifically for the werewolf, other werebeasts may differ. Speak while in animal shape, prowl 80%, swim 50%, track by smell 70%, nightvision 300 ft (91.5 m), and bio-regeneration: restores hit points at a rate of 4D6 H.P. an hour.
Limited invulnerability: See natural armor rating description. The creature is vulnerable to magic, psionic attack and weapons made of silver (double damage). Wolfbay and garlic will hold all werebeasts at bay, like a vampire, but the cross, sunlight and running water have no adverse effect. Powerful mega-damage attacks and explosions that inflict great amounts of damage may knock the creature down or stun it. Same knockdown!Impact table as for vampires.
 
 
Shape-changing power: The myth is that a werebeast is human by day and beast by night, but this is not true. The creature can shape-change at will, day or night. The metamorphosis takes about 15 seconds (one
melee) and there is no limit to the number of times the creature can perform a metamorphosis or how long he can maintain that particular shape. As stated previously, the creatures are quite cunning, thus they generally assume the less frightening form of human or wolf during the bright sunlight hours when humans are on the prowl, and into the monster-wolf humanoid form or wolf shape during the night. Also, since they are nocturnal hunters, they tend to sleep most of the day and are active during the night. The three (3) shapes are human, wolf, and its natural shape of wolf-humanoid (half-man half-wolf). Magic:  metamorphosis: animal, metamorphosis: human, summon and control canines, repel animals, see the invisible, and tongues.
Psionic Abilities: I.S.P.: 5D6. Psi-powers: Sixth sense, see the invisible, mind block.
Sixth Sense
Range: 90ft/27.4m
Duration: Until the danger passes or happens.
I.S.P.: 2
Savings Throw: None
The sixth sense is a power that gives the psychic a precognitive flash of imminent danger to himself or somebody near him (within 90ft). The character will not know what the danger is or where it will come
from, nor who it will be directed at when in a group. All he will know is that something life threatening will happen within the next 60 seconds (4 melees)! The sixth sense is triggered automatically, without the
consent of the psychic, whenever his life is in great peril or the life of somebody he greatly cares about (friend, loved one, etc.). The sixth sense is only triggered by an unexpected, life threatening event which
is already set into motion and will happen any second. The power can not be called upon at will to sense for traps or ambush. Instead, it works like an automatic reflex. If the character has used all his I.S.P. the sixth sense is temporarily rendered inoperative.
Bonuses:
The sudden flash of insight provides the following bonuses. All bonuses apply only to the initial melee when the attack occurs.
+ 6 on initiative roll
+ 2 to parry
+ 3 to dodge
The character can not be surprised by a sneak attack from behind.
Combat: Two (2) attacks per melee in natural monster or wolf form. One in human shape. Bonuses: In addition to probable attribute bonuses, the werewolf is + 1 on initiative, + 2 to strike and parry + 3 to dodge, + 1 to pull punch, +2 to roll with impact/fall, +6 to save vs horror factor, +2 to save vs psionics, and +2 to save vs magic.
Damage: Varies depending on physical form.
Human shape punch — 3D6 S.D.C. damage + P.S. bonus.
Restrained claw — 5D6 S.D.C. damage + P.S. bonus.
Power claw — 2D6 M.D + P.S. bonus.., counts as one attack.
Power punch claw — 3D6 M.D + P.S. bonus.., counts as two attacks.
Normal Bite — 3D6 M.D + P.S. bonus..
Power Bite — 5D6 M.D + P.S. bonus., counts as two attacks.
Note: All S.D.C. damage from claws or bite inflicts full damage to the hit points of vampires and other werebeasts.
R.C.C.: Werewolf— Supernatural predator
R.C.C. Skills: Werewolves can speak Gobblely and American or Euro 98%, land navigation (+15%), and track animals ( + 20%). They can also learn a total of seven additional secondary skills at first level and two additional skills at levels four, eight, twelve and fifteen. Use the same experience table as the psi-staler. Hit points and skill proficiency increase with each level; no special skill bonuses unless otherwise indicated.
Available skill categories include: domestic, espionage, science (basic math only), technical (language, lore, and photography only), pilot (automobile, motorcycle, hover vehicle, boat, and horsemanship only),
rogue (any except computer; +5%), W.P. any (lean toward ancient), wilderness (any, +10%).
NPC Experience Level: Average character: 1D4 levels.
Player Character Experience: Player characters should start at level one and use the same experience table as the psi-stalker.
Average Life Span: 300 years
Habitat: The werewolf is commonly found in Canada, USA, Europe (especially Eastern Europe), Africa, Australia and Japan. However, individuals and small groups can be found anywhere, throughout the
world. Prefer temperate climates and forests.
Enemies: Supernatural predators, humans and humanoids.
Allies: May join forces with other supernatural creatures or forces of evil.
Size: 6 to 7 feet (1.8 to 2.1 m) tall in human and humanoid monster
form, 4 to 5 feet (1.2 to 1.5 8 m) tall at the shoulders in animal form.
Weight: 200 to 300 Ibs (90 to 136 kg).
Notes: Love the taste of human and humanoid flesh and blood. Vicious and cruel, they will slaughter livestock and kill humanoids for pleasure, not just to eat. Werewolves prefer the wolf form above human. Evil arcanists sometimes summon werewolves as assassins.

Werewolf body armor.
Like vampires, werewolves do not like wearing armor. It restricts their movement, and hinders their ability to shape change. 25% of werewolves of the Night Clan will wear body armor. This armor does not cover their whole body, and thus has an AR rating, similar to Cyber Knight cyber armor. Rolling above the AR of the armor means the attack deals damage to the werewolf instead of the armor. The werewolf must remove the armor in order to change form, taking a full melee. (All actions that turn.)
Light werewolf body armor.
MDC: 30, AR 13, -5% prowl.
Heavy werewolf body armor.
MDC: 60, AR 15, -25% prowl.
Typical Werewolf NPC Villian, 2nd level.
IQ: 6, ME: 12, MA: 12, PS: 20(+5), PP: 20(+3), PE: 25(+5), PB: 12 (human form), SPD: 25/50
HP: 44, PPE: 30, ISP: 20.
Prowl skill: 80%.
Combat: Two (2) attacks per melee in natural monster or wolf form.
One in human shape. Bonuses: Including attribute
bonuses, the werewolf is + 1 on initiative, + 5 to strike and parry + 6
to dodge, + 1 to pull punch, +2 to roll with impact/fall, +6 to save
vs horror factor, +2 to save vs psionics, and +7 to save vs magic.
Damage, including strength bonus:
Power claw — 2D6+5 M.D., counts as one attack.
Power punch claw — 3D6+5  M.D., counts as two attacks.
Normal Bite — 3D6+5  M.D.
Power Bite — 5D6+5  M.D, counts as two attacks.
Farming community.
A small village of farmers and hunters. There are about 1000 people, mostly families in this community.
Militia.
6 volunteer (Vagabond OCC equivalent) defenders with MDC body armor, rifles, and SDC revolvers and rifles with silver bullets, plus a silver knife, for fighting werewolves. Led by a 4th level Headhunter named "Windy".
The village could potentially raise an additional 250 militia members in a time of crisis, but these militia would only have SDC body armor, if any, and SDC weapons, rifles, pistols and farm implements. None have silver ammunition or weapons, and would have to borrow silver ammuntion from the 12 volunteers, spreading the supply of silver weapons very thin.
 

Wendy "Windy" Vinton, 4th level Headhunter.
IQ: 12, ME: 14, MA: 13, PS: 17(+2), PP: 19(+2), PE: 18(+2), PB: 14, SPD: 15
HP: 36, SDC: 50.
Combat: Three (3) attacks per melee.
Bonuses: Including attribute bonuses, HTH Expert, + 5 on initiative, +4 to strike HTH, +6 parry, +7
to dodge, + 6 to pull punch, +5 to roll with impact/fall, +2 possesion save, +1 to save vs magic, +2 save vs horror factor.
WP ERifle, +5 strike, total bonuses.
WP Pistol, +5 strike, total bonuses.
WP Sword, +6 strike, +6 parry, total bonuses.
Partial cyborg.
Left arm, Right leg. Amplified hearing and one Multi-optic eye. +1 to strike, ranged.
Power Armor Combat, Elite: Two (2) attacks per melee.
Bonuses: +2 initiative, +4 to strike, ranged, +4 strike HTH, +5 parry, +4 dodge, +7 dodge-flying.
Weapon Systems, +5 strike, ranged total.
Flying Titan Power Armor
Crew: One
M.D.C. by Location:
Shoulder Wings (2) — 30 each, Rear Jet Pack (2) — 50 each, Lower Maneuvering Jets — 25 each
*Head — 70
**Main Body — 110
* Destroying the head/helmet has a 1-70% chance of knocking the pilot unconscious. If conscious, the pilot has two problems: one, no power armor combat bonuses to strike, parry, and dodge, and two, the
human head is now vulnerable to attack. Note: The head is a small and difficult target to hit (shielded by exhaust tubes and weapon drum). Thus, it can only be hit when a character makes a called shot and even then the attacker is —3 to strike.
**Depleting the M.D.C. of the main body will shut the armor down completely, making it useless. Note: Destroying a wing will make flight impossible. However, even with no wing(s), the armor can make jet powered leaps and hover stationary above the ground.
Speed
Running: 50 mph (80 km) maximum. Note that the act of running does tire out its operator, but at 20% of the usual fatigue rate thanks to the robot exo-skeleton. Leaping: The powerful robot legs can leap up to 15 feet (4.6 m) high
or across unassisted by the thrusters. A jet thruster assisted leap can propel the unit up to 100 feet (30.5 m) high and 200 feet (61 m) across without actually attaining flight.
Flying: The rocket propulsion system enables the Flying Titan to hover stationary up to 200 feet (61 m) or fly. Maximum flying speed is 400 mph (640 km), but cruising speed is considered to be 200 mph (320 km). Maximum altitude is limited to about 4000 feet (1200 m).
Flying Range: The nuclear power system gives the armor decades of life, but the jet rockets get hot and need to cool after a maximum of ten hours of flight when travelling at speeds above cruising, and twenty hours of cruising speed, indefinitely with rest stops.
Statistical Data
Height: 7 feet (2.4 m)
Width: Wings down: 2.5 feet (0.76 m)
Wings extended: 11 feet (3.3 m)
Length: About 3 feet (0.4 m)
Weight: 160 lbs (72 kg) without missiles.
Physical Strength: Equal to P.S. 24.
Cargo: None
Power System: Nuclear; average life is 20 years.
Black Market Cost: One million credits for a new, undamaged, fully
powered suit complete with missiles. Not often available.
Weapon Systems
1. Wing Lasers (2): A tiny laser turret is mounted on the underside of each wing. Both can rotate 360 degrees and have a firing arc of 90 degrees (up and down). The turrets are hooked directly to the armor's nuclear power supply.
Primary Purpose: Assault
Secondary Purpose: Defense
Mega-Damage: 3D6 M.D. per blast
Rate of Fire: Equal to number of combined hand to hand attacks (usually 4-6). Fired by voice command or by pressing a concealed firing stud on the forearm.
Maximum Effective Range: 4000 feet (1200 m)
Pay load: Effectively unlimited.
2. Wing Rockets: Six mini-missiles or three of the larger short range missiles can be mounted on each wing (12 or 6 total). Like the lasers, the missiles are launched by voice command or by hidden firing studs in the forearm.
Primary Purpose: Anti-Aircraft/Armored Vehicle.
Secondary Purpose: Defense
Missile Type: Any mini-missile or short range missile can be used.
Mega-Damage: Varies with missile type. The short range missiles are generally more powerful.
Range: Varies with missile type.
Rate of Fire: One at a time or in volleys of two, three, or four.
Payload: Total of 12 mini-missiles or 6 short range missiles.
Windy has loaded her Flying Titan with Armor Piercing (1d4x10 MD) mini-missiles.
3. Energy Rifles and other normal weapons are also used by the pilot of a Flying Titan. The less bulky armor allows for sidearm, rifle and the usual supply belts, harness, and containers. The only limitation
is that a belt and especially sacks and containers are subject to flying off when travelling at speeds beyond 100 mph.
4. Hand to Hand Combat: Rather than use a weapon, the pilot can
engage in mega-damage hand to hand combat. See Power Armor Combat Training in the Robot Combat section.
 Huntsman body armor: 40 MDC, -10% prowl penalty.
L-20 Pulse Rifle
A common frontier weapon is the L-20 pulse laser rifle manufactured by the black market and several kingdoms across the land. It is a dependable, lightweight weapon with the added feature of multiple laser bursts.
Weight: 7 lbs (3 kg)
Mega-Damage: 3D6 M.D. single shot, or 3d12+2 multiple pulse burst
(three simultaneous shots).
Rate of Fire: Standard, see Modern Weapon Proficiency Section.
Maximum Effective Range: 1600 feet (488 m)
Payload: 40 shots short E-Clip or 50 shots long E- Clip
NG-33 Northern Gun
Laser Pistol
Looks like a sleeker ion blaster with a pointed nose.
Weight: 4 lbs (1.8kg)
Mega-Damage: 2D6 M.D.
Rate of Fire: Single shot per attack..
'Effective Range: 800 feet (244 m)
Payload: 20 shots.
 Silver short sword, 2d6 damage, .45 auto-pistol with silver bullets.
3 clips for each weapon, including auto-pistol silver bullets.
Windy encountered the village during a werewolf attack, and swooped in to help. She has been with the community ever since, attempting to protect them and organize a volunteer militia.

Typical milita member. 1st level vagabond.
HP: 13, SDC: 15.
Combat: One (1) attack per melee.
Scavenged MDC body armor: MDC 25, AR 15, -5% prowl.
NG-L5 Northern Gun Laser Rifle
A durable, heavy-duty laser rifle that suffers from the usual problem of weight, but can endure a massive amount of abuse and keep on working.
Weight: 14 lbs (6.3 kg)
Mega-Damage: 3D6 M.D.
Rate of Fire: Single shot, short burst (x2 damage, 3 rounds) long burst (x3 damage, 5 rounds).
Maximum Effective Range: 1600 feet (488 m)
Payload: 10 shots standard clip or 20 shots long E-Clip.
Silver knife: 2d4 damage, hunting rifle.
2 clips for each weapon, including silver bullets for hunting rifle.
The militia have a very basic level of training, mostly provided by Windy, but not as much as a true combat OCC. No bonuses or penalties to combat rolls, but do not take penalties for firing bursts. Can maintain their weapons.

People of note.

Mayor Ezekiel "Zeke" Ambrose.
Leader of the village. Good natured. Fancies himself a ladies man, but is often rebuffed. Works hard to take care of the village and community, but is overwhelmed with the threat of werewolf attacks.

Agatha Humbolt.
Local doctor. Combines modern medicine with folk remedies. Has some knowledge of magic lore, but is not a spell caster herself.
Agatha typically has 3d6 sprigs of wolfsbay available per week. She charges 5 credits per sprig.

Dan Strong.
Local black market contact. Uses the village as a neutral ground meeting place. Makes his contacts and sales outside the village, and tries not to cause too much disruption. Is considering relocating due to the werewolf attacks. May be convinced to help with supplies and weapons, but will not commit to a lost cause, which he thinks the situation is shaping up to be.

Minera.
Juicer mercenary. 2nd level. 1 year old as a juicer. Dan Strong's guard and muscle. Loyal to Strong, but only due to the pay. Could be convinced to turn on Strong, if the price is right, and she thinks that there will be no way for the black market to take retribution. Will not assist in the defense of the village.

 

Minera, 2nd level juicer mercenary.
IQ: 10, ME: 12, MA: 14, PS: 26(+11), PP: 25(+5), PE: 26(+6), PB: 15, SPD: 55
HP: 56, SDC: 250.
Combat: Four (4) attacks per melee.
Bonuses: Including attribute bonuses, HTH Expert, +4  on initiative, +5 to strike HTH, +8 parry,
+8 to dodge, +6 auto-dodge, +3  to pull punch, +6 to roll with impact/fall, + possesion save, +6 to save vs magic, +4 psionics save, +6 save vs mind control, +14 poison save.
WP ERifle, +6 strike, total bonuses.
WP Knife, +6 strike, +6 parry, total bonuses.
Juicer plate armor, 45 MDC, -5% prowl.
Vibro-knife, 2d6+11 MD.
NG-E4 Northern Gun
Plasma Ejector
Another heavy energy weapon from the people at Northern Gun. Like most of their weapons, the NG-E4 is a bit heavy and has minimum range capability. Comes equipped with telescopic sight; can be fitted with any optic system.
Weight: 20 Ibs (9 kg)
Mega-Damage:3d12+2 M.D.
Rate of Fire: Single shot per attack..
Maximum'Effective Range: 1600 feet (488 m)
Payload: 10 shots standard clip or 20 shots long E-Clip.
9mm Uzi SMG. 3d6 damage.
3 clips for each weapon, including silver bullets for the SMG.



 


The village has been attacked by a pack of werewolves over the past few nights. Slaughtering livestock and killing villagers. The militia is hard pressed to defend the community, and will likely fall to the werewolf attacks, despite Windy's efforts. The village has little to offer anyone who helps, but their grattitude.

If the party defends the village, it will be attacked over the course of 3 consecutive nights by 6+2d6 werewolves each night. If the party goes out looking for the werewolves during the day, it will take a tracking skill check to find their temporary lair. There will be 18+6d6 werewolves present if the party discovers them on the first day, 12+4d6 werewolves on the 2nd day, and 6+2d6 werewolves on the third day.

The werewolves are lairing in a network of caves a few miles from the village.

This is a rough outline of how the events of the werewolf attacks will take place. Events will likely be altered by the actions of the party. The GM should read and familiarize themselves with the event outline, and be prepared to omit or change events accordingly. Players may come up with strategies and tactics, and the werewolves should react appropriately.

Day one: Encounter the village, meet important NPCs, decide on a course of action.
Night one: First werewolf attack.
Day two: One of the villagers has been bitten before the werewolves were driven off. He is in danger of becoming a werewolf that night. Agatha Humbolt can attempt a cure with an infusion of wolfsbane, but has a low chance of curing the patient, (12%) and will only prevent him from turning into a werewolf that night. It will be up to the party to resolve this dilemma. Most of the villagers will want to exile the victim. His family will plead for mercy and time to find a more effective cure. There is no easy cure for lycanthropy, and would involve seeking out a powerful spellcaster or psionicist with access to the Exorcism spell or power.
Night two: The werewolves have come prepared for resistance this time. Half of them are armed with TW TK rifles.
 

TW Telekinetic (TK) Rifle
Telekinetic firearms have been one of the oldest and easiest TW weapons to manufacture. By amplifying and directing
telekinetic energy, TK firearms hit their targets with bullet-hard bolts of force. Range and firepower is limited, but the weapon is usually lightweight, durable, and inexpensive to use in way of P.P.E. cost (making it extremely popular). It leaves no physical "shell" or spent bullets, and the absence of physical evidence
Manufacturer: Stormspire, Colorado Baronies, Tolkeen & others.
Weight: 7 Ibs (3.1 kg)
Mega-Damage: 3D4 per single bolt of telekinetic force (4D6 M.D. at a ley line) or 4D6 M.D. per burst (6D6 M.D. at ley lines).
Rate of Fire: Single shot or burst; each counts as one melee attack.
Range: 1500 feet (457.2 m); double at ley lines.
Bonus: +1 to strike.
Payload: 15 shots for a standard TK weapon, but 30 for a Stormspire weapon with a P.P.E. clip. The Tolkeen version and most other versions of this weapon do not use a P.P.E. clip and require one P.P.E. (or 21.S.P.) to reload/recharge the weapon with one TK round. The werewolves are armed with the standard version of the rifle.
Cost: Standard Rifle: 75,000; Stormspire Gun: 65,000 credits plus 40,000 for a P.P.E. Clip.

The werewolves armed with TK rifles will attempt to soften up the tougher targets, like the PCs, Windy and the militia members, while the rest again attempt to ambush victims.
Day three: In the confusion of the previous night's attack, one of the villager's children was taken. The werewolves are keeping the girl as a hostage. Windy will want to take whatever is left of the militia and attempt to rescue the child. This is obviously a trap, but Windy feels they have little choice. She can be convinced to stay and protect the village while the party attempts a rescue. If the village is left undefended, the last group of werewolves (6+2d6) will attack the village during the day! Otherwise, Long Tooth will have the child with him when they attack the next night.
Night three: If Long Tooth still has the captured village girl, he will bring her with him this time. He will threaten to kill the girl unless all of the defenders leave the village to the werewolves. Doing this will certainly doom the village. It is up to the party to deal with the hostage situation.
It happens that while the werewolves had the girl in their lair, one of the female werewolves imprinted on the girl. If it looks like the girl will actually be harmed, the female werewolf will leap at Long Tooth and try to snatch the girl away. If sucessful, this will be the chance for the party to attack. After the battle, the female werewolf will not want to give the girl up. The party may be forced to destroy the misguided monster, or be able to negotiate.

Of the last group of werewolves on day or night three, 25% will have TW TK Rifles.

Either in the lair, or leading the last raid, is the werewolves leader. Long Tooth.

Long Tooth, 3rd level werewolf.
IQ: 9, ME: 15, MA: 14, PS: 22(+7), PP: 22(+4), PE: 26(+6), PB: 13 (human form), SPD: 30/50
HP: 50, PPE: 35, ISP: 25.
Prowl skill: 75%. (80%, -5% for body armor)
Combat: Three (3) attacks per melee in natural monster or wolf form.
One in human shape. Bonuses: Including attribute
bonuses, the werewolf is + 2 on initiative, + 6 to strike and parry + 7
to dodge, + 2 to pull punch, +3 to roll with impact/fall, +7 to save
vs horror factor, +3 to save vs psionics, and +8 to save vs magic.
WP Pistol, +6 to strike, total bonuses.
Damage, including strength bonus:
Power claw — 2D6+7 M.D., counts as one attack.
Power punch claw — 3D6+7  M.D., counts as two attacks.
Normal Bite — 3D6+7  M.D.
Power Bite — 5D6+7  M.D, counts as two attacks.
Light werewolf body armor.
MDC: 30, AR 13, -5% prowl.
 

TW Shard Pistol
The Shard Pistol is an automatic weapon that fires high velocity ice fragments. In many ways, it resembles a small rail gun, firing clusters of small, hard projectiles. The pistol's barrel is large and heavily reinforced, giving the weapon a sinister, menacing look. The Shard Pistol is a favored tool of assassins because the ice shards will dissipate, leaving no evidence of the weapon used.
Weight: 2.5 Ihs. (I. I kg)
Mega-damage: 4D4 M.D. per shot (fires multiple shards). 5D6 M.D. per short burst.
Rate of Fire: Single shots or short bursts only.
Effective Range: 700 feet (2 10 m). Payload: 12 shots per P.P.E. clip. 2 PPE clips.
Black Market Cost: 72,000 credits for the pistol, 40,000 credits per clip of ammo.

Each werewolf will flee if it falls below half hit points, and the group will flee if more than half their number flee or are killed.
The werewolves will use their prowl skill to attempt to stealth past the defenders and drag off villagers, or make sneak attacks against the defenders. A sucessful prowl roll means the werewolf can get to melee range and make one free attack against their target. This attack is outside the normal combat turn. The defender cannot make any defensive action unless they have a notable ability, like auto-dodge, sixth sense psionic ability, etc.
The target does get to make a perception roll against target number 15 to spot the werewolf and negate the sneak attack.
If the party defeats all of the werewolves, any who fled will return to the Night Clan, and leave the village in peace for now. If the players manage to capture a werewolf, especially Long Tooth, they may learn more of the Night Clan through interrogation or negotiation. Long Tooth hates non-werewolves, and will be aggressive and resistant to persuasion. -30% to trust/intimidate/charm/impress rolls. He will attempt to lie and mislead if forcefully interrogated.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;912102A Brodkil, pretty standard Rifts monster type, has 250 main body MDC. A typical assault laser rifle will do 4d6 MD per shot. On average, that's 12 MD per attack.
250 divided by 12, rounding up, is 21 successful hits to down a Brodkil.

If all you have is a laser rifle, you probably shouldn't be trying to fight a Brodkil. Or you should be a lot of guys trying to fight one brodkil.

I found that combat in RIFTS usually went longer than old-school D&D for sure; but not so long as to be uninteresting.

QuoteThese numbers can go all over the place. A vibro knife does 1d4 MD, a Boom Gun does 3d6x10.

Makes sense that one of the most powerful non-missile weapons would do a lot more damage than one of the weakest. A vibro-knife isn't for killing MDC dudes, it's for killing sdc dudes.

QuoteAmusingly, some of the illustrations in the Rifts books have combats that are completely impossible with the standard rules.

(http://terralthra.net/sdnet/rifts/R_Brodkil1.jpg)

Triax infantry armor has 100 MDC. A large vibro-sword does 2d6 MD. There's no way a Brodkil can cleave a man's head with one swipe like in that illustration. But it looks cool and deadly.

Well, a LOT of games have combat-art that appears impossible within their rules.

Anyways, we can't be sure that the triax guy's armor didn't have like, 2mdc left!

Quote from: RPGPundit;912606Well, a LOT of games have combat-art that appears impossible within their rules.

Anyways, we can't be sure that the triax guy's armor didn't have like, 2mdc left!

Of we do.  He was still wearing it.  Siembeida once mentioned that until the armour hits 0, no matter the amount of damage taken, if the armour has 1 MD left, the character is fine.  It was, I believe, disparagingly called the 'G.I.Joe rule' by some fans.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;912611Of we do.  He was still wearing it.  Siembeida once mentioned that until the armour hits 0, no matter the amount of damage taken, if the armour has 1 MD left, the character is fine.  It was, I believe, disparagingly called the 'G.I.Joe rule' by some fans.

Note that the armor in the illustration is pristine. No scuffs, burns or even scratches. It looks brand new to me. But then, artistic lisence and all that. Most of Long's stuff looks clean like that.

I've sometimes thought about a damage rule where MD is done to armor, and characters inside take the same amount of damage in SDC due to impact, heat and maybe fragments of damaged armor driven into the character. But then I think it'd be a bit too "fiddly" a house rule.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;912657I've sometimes thought about a damage rule where MD is done to armor, and characters inside take the same amount of damage in SDC due to impact, heat and maybe fragments of damaged armor driven into the character. But then I think it'd be a bit too "fiddly" a house rule.

There is an existing rule.  I forget what the fraction is.  I'm thinking 1/10 MDC damage as SDC, but I'm probably wrong.  And yes, it does get very fiddly.  Most of the time it's not worth it as Rifts combat characters usually have a decent sized pile of SDC they never use, and characters like Juicers have so many that they're never going to run out unless they get struck by an MD weapon while unarmored which will probably splat them anyway.  (unless people are fighting with vibro knives or starter Wilks pistols, which an unarmored Juicer can survive a hit or two from if the rolls are low)

Making it 1-1 does make HP and SDC a lot more important though.  It makes personal armor a cap on your character's natural abilities rather than a redefinition of your character's natural abilities.  It gives a little bit of advancement incentive to characters who don't start with mountains of SDC.  I also found it makes players gravitate towards inherently MDC characters.

We've been doing 10:1, with half damage to HP/SDC to a person inside armor. If armor gets destroyed, it still provides limited protection at 2:1. Characters in PA start taking half damage when it gets below 70 MDC. Force Fields block everything until destroyed. Has worked okay so far.  Only been tested with a Rogue Scholar, Crazy, Headhunter, Borg and Line Walker. We like that healing spells/psionics are getting used more often, having trashed armor and no way to repair isn't a death sentence, and combat still goes fairly quick. Only other one of our house rules that might affect this some is that we gave +1d to all MDC pistols, and allow all laser and ion rifles to burst (3 shots, x2 damage) unless it specifies otherwise.  Only using the RUE/main book weapons for now, though.

Quote from: Voodoolaw;914282We've been doing 10:1, with half damage to HP/SDC to a person inside armor. If armor gets destroyed, it still provides limited protection at 2:1. Characters in PA start taking half damage when it gets below 70 MDC. Force Fields block everything until destroyed. Has worked okay so far.  Only been tested with a Rogue Scholar, Crazy, Headhunter, Borg and Line Walker. We like that healing spells/psionics are getting used more often, having trashed armor and no way to repair isn't a death sentence, and combat still goes fairly quick. Only other one of our house rules that might affect this some is that we gave +1d to all MDC pistols, and allow all laser and ion rifles to burst (3 shots, x2 damage) unless it specifies otherwise.  Only using the RUE/main book weapons for now, though.

I've put this in my house rules as well. +1d for weapons/attcks that do less than 1d4x10 MD.
That and the half-MDC mod brings most combats into the 4-10 sucessful-attacks-to-destroy range, which I like. (Or at least can tolerate)

Quote from: Ulairi;908030Everyone keeps telling me the Palladium rules are awful but I'm rereading the core rulebook (RUE, 5th printing) and I'm not seeing why the rules are so terrible. Rifts was the second RPG I ever played and we didn't have issues back in high school playing. Reading the rulebook again and it's not that complicated of a game. Character creation takes a long time and isn't well explained but once you're in the game the rules aren't that complicated. What am I missing?

I think the problem is more the editing than the rules themselves.
The books aren't very well organized, and there's a lot of bloat. That's my impression, at least.
A professionally edited edition of Rifts would be just fine though.

I've spent this weekend on my Phantasy Star 2 replay (I'm gonna finish that damn game one of these times!) and writing up an encounter matrix for Rifts.
I like to have various things prepped for adventure sessions. One time, while running a Dungeon Crawl Classics campaign, I had both an adventure written up, and a published module ready to go. There was a pretty major decision branch at the very beginning of my own adventure, that I really couldn't avoid. The players chose the branch that meant my entire adventure was no longer relevant. This doesn't happen often, but my philosophy is that I'd rather ad-hoc the whole session than force the party to do something they really don't want to do. It even became a meta conversation "We can destroy the Chaos Rock if you want us to." "No, that's why I brought a module too."

Along those lines, I've been cobbling together that random encounter matrix. If the players ever decide to go off script, I've got some resources to run random encounters. I'm going to post the matrix itself. Along with it, the majority of the matrix is actually concise stats for monsters/Coalition/NPC dudes, so I have quick references instead of flipping through a couple dozen Rifts books.

Roll 1d6 per 8 hour span.
4am-12pm, morning.
12pm-8pm, afternoon.
8pm-4am, night.
On a 1, there will be a random encounter.

Roll 1d6 for type of encounter.
1: Coalition.
2: Demons.
3: Creatures.
4: Magic.
5: Bandits.
6: Friendly.

Coalition encounters. Roll 1d10.
1: Lone Coalition scout. Juicer or Wilderness Scout. In disguise.
2: Foot patrol of 8+1d4 soliders plus one seargent.
3: 6+1d4 Skelebots.
4: 1d4+1 SAMAS patrol.
5: 1d6+1 Sky Cycle patrol.
6: Lone Spider Skull Walker.
7: APC patrol. Full Dead Boy squad (use foot patrol above) in a Mark V APC.
8: Robot patrol. One UAR-1 Enforcer and two Abolishers.
9: Dog pack. 1 Psi Stalker and 1d4+1 Dog Boys.
10. Roll twice on this table and combine results.

What are they doing? Roll 1d4.
1: Patrolling. Will not attack unless threatened.
2: Fighting. Roll 1d4 for foes. (1 = roll on Demons table, 2 = roll on Creatures table, 3 = roll on Magic table, 4 =  roll on Bandits table)
3: Recovering. 15% chance of surprise. 50% ammo and MDC.
4: Investigating. Roll on Feature table for what they are investigating.

Demon encounters. Roll 1d4.
1: Lone Thornhead.
2: 1d3 Gargoyles. 50% chance that there are also 1d3 Gurgoyles.
3: 2d6 Shedim.
4: Lone Baal-rog. 50% chance that there are also 1d3 Gargoyles or 1d6 Shedim.

What are they doing? Roll 1d4.
1: Wandering. 50% chance of attacking group. 25% chance of retreating. 25% chance of ignoring.
2: Attacking. Roll 1d4 for target. (1 = roll on Coalition table, 2 = roll on Creatures table, 3 = roll on Bandits table, 4 - roll on Friendly table.)
3: Resting. 15% chance of surprising the demons. 50% MDC and PPE/ISP.
4: Investigating. Roll on Features table for what they are investigating.

Creature encounters. Roll 1d4.
1: Lone Fury Beetle.
2: Lone Tyrranosaur.
3: Lone Beast Dragon.
4: Lone Rhino-Buffalo.

What are they doing? Roll 1d4.
1: Eating. Recently killed a prey and is devouring it. Roll 1d4 for prey. (1 = common animal, 2 = roll on Creatures table, 3 = roll on Magic table, 4 = roll on Friendly table.)
2: Attacking. Roll 1d4 for prey target. (1 = common animal, 2 = roll on Creatures table, 3 = roll on Bandits table, 4 = roll on Friendly table.)
3: Resting. 15% chance of surprising creatures. 50% MDC and PPE/ISP.
4: Investigating. Roll on Features table for what they are investigating.

Magic encounters. Roll 1d6.
1: Lone Black Faerie.
2: Lone Witchling.
3: Lone Hatchling Dragon.
4: Lizard mage with 1d4 lizard men.
5: Lone Spectre.
6: Lone Raskshasa.

What are they doing? Roll 1d4.
1: Terrorizing. 1d4+1 villagers. Taking as slaves, eating for food, or sacrificing for PPE.
2: Attacking. Roll 1d4. (1 = roll on Coalition table, 2 = roll on Creatures table, 3 = roll on Bandits table, 4 = roll on Friendly table.)
3 = Resting. 15% chance of surpising. 50% MDC and PPE/ISP.
4 = Investigating. Roll on Features table for what they are investigating.

Bandits. Roll 1d6.
1: Splugorth slaver barge.
2: 1d3 partial and 1d2 full conversion borg, high tech bandits.
3: 2d6 werewolf raiders.
4: 1d6+1 Orcs and 1d4+1 Ogre tech thugs.
5: 1d6+1 mercenary bandits.
6: 1d6+1 Simvan Monster Riders on Ostrasaurs.

What are they doing? Roll 1d4.
1 = Terrorizing. 1d4+1 villagers. Taking as slaves, eating for food, or sacrificing for PPE.
2 = Attacking. Roll 1d4. (1 = roll on Coalition table, 2 = roll on Demons table, 3 = Roll on Bandits table, 4 = roll on Friendly table.)
3 = Resting. 15% chance of surprise. 50% MDC, Ammo, PPE/ISP.
4 = Investigating. Roll on features table for what they are investigating.

Friendly. Roll 1d4.
1: Omega Town patrol. 1d6+1 soldiers on hovercycles.
2: Rogue scholar with 1d4 adventurers.
3: Lone Ley Line Walker.
4: Lone Techno-Wizard.

What are they doing? Roll 1d4.
1 = Travelling. Willing to parley. Will not attack unless threatened.
2 = Attacking. Roll 1d4. (1 = roll on Coalition table, 2 = Roll on Demons table, 3 = roll on Creatures table, 4 = roll on Bandits table.)
3 = Resting. 15% chance of surprise. Willing to parley. Will not attack unless threatened. 50% MDC, Ammo, PPE/ISP.
4 = Investigating. Roll on Features table for what they are investigating.

Features table. Roll 1d10.
1: Abandoned oil rig.
2: Farm.
3: Abandoned supply cache.
4: Crashed transport helicopter.
5: Giant crater.
6: D-Bee vegetation forest.
7: Ley Line.
8: Coalition watchtower.
9: D-Shifting terrain.
10: MDC magic crystal forest.

Complication. There is a 5% chance of a complication. Roll 1d4 for specific effect, if applicable.
1: Extreme weather.
2: Black market profiteers.
3: Scavengers.
4: Magical magnetism.

This is pretty good, I might have to use it.

I think some of the best sessions we had with our last OSR campaign were with random hex crawl encounters. I think as a GM it helps keep you on your toes.  Of course, there was a lair of shadows that almost brought that campaign to a halt, but even when I told the guys I was considering pulling punches, they made me make my rolls out in the open and I think it made their hard fought victory even better.  I don't think there was a dungeon encounter that topped that one. Hopefully we will have some good moments like that in Rifts.

Quote from: Voodoolaw;914604This is pretty good, I might have to use it.

Excellent. Let me know how it goes. It's a work in progress, and could use some feedback.

QuoteI think some of the best sessions we had with our last OSR campaign were with random hex crawl encounters. I think as a GM it helps keep you on your toes.  Of course, there was a lair of shadows that almost brought that campaign to a halt, but even when I told the guys I was considering pulling punches, they made me make my rolls out in the open and I think it made their hard fought victory even better.  I don't think there was a dungeon encounter that topped that one. Hopefully we will have some good moments like that in Rifts.

I think everyone should at least try a random hexcrawl once. My brother ran a 1st Ed AD&D hexcrawl with the tables in the DMG and we had a blast. Part of the fun is the GM interpreting the rolls, and the other half is the players getting to decide on the pace and level of risk/reward of the adventure for themselves.

If you have the time and patience to do so, you can organize and fit most, if not all, the combat rules onto a single sheet of paper. I know, 'cause I did it 15 years ago. Makes the game a LOT easier to play.

That's what I did for our group, since we have a 4 or so players who have never played Rifts or a Palladium RPG (and only two books for the group).  It's hard to find anything if you don't already know where to look.

I've been toying with an idea for a mini-series featuring an experimental all wolf Dog Pack.

Back in the day, one of the time saving things we always did when making our characters was to put the per level increase in a skill's percentage next to it's listing on the character sheet.  That meant when leveling up you just added the number on the sheet rather than having to flip through the book.

However, we always noted that the base skill percentages might as well have been random numbers.  There was no rhyme or reason to why one skill got 30% base and another got 50% base.  Plus, nearly all skills increased by 5% per level.

So, if I do the Dog Pack idea, the non-combat skills will be d20 roll high against TN just like in a d20 system game.  The basic bonus will be the character level plus 1 per 5% bonus from OCC or Other category.

That way the characters don't even need the skill percentage calculated, and one of the most tedious and pointless things about Palladium characters is removed.

I thought about making every skill a base of 5, increase by 1 per level. Roll below on a d20. Every 10% bonus would give another +1. I never implemented it though, because I stopped playing Rifts and moved on to other games.

Re-reading Sourcebook 3, Mindwerks. It popped out at me that Mindwerks and ARCHIE-3 have a few common ideas running through them.
Both are pre-Rifts underground facilities. Both had a period of darkness where they decided to wait out the worst of the cataclysm. Both emerged and made an attempt to bring help to the reconstructing communities. Both made some progress, only to see the patroned communities destroyed by Splugorth in the case of ARCHIE, and a stronger and more ruthless community in the case of Mindwerks. Both were then twisted by those events, and turned aggressive and "evil". ARCHIE decided that he should take over the world for it's own good, and the Angel of Mindwerks simply wants bloody revenge.

I think I want something simliar in my campaign. A secret pre-Rifts underground facility that somehow got twisted and turned malevolent. I'll be pondering exactly what.

Rifts does suffer from the good guys either getting screwed over turning evil. Or portrayed as being stubbornly stupidly independant without trusting anyone. So that none of the good organizations can ever take back Rifts Earth. The opposite can be said of the bad guys.

I loved Rifts when it was out. I quit buying during the Coalition War because...

Holy crap, Kevin, read modern combat theory and pull your head out of WW-II and quit quoting Vietnam statistics without any context or knowledge. I did buy the Chaos Earth stuff, mostly because I was resetting the campaign.

I ended up doing a HUGE write-up on the CS as a nation, it's territories, it's industrial capability, a "CIA-Factbook" entry on them, statistics for birth rate, death rate, average life expectancy, how many children a woman had, on average, over her lifetime, education rate, infant mortality, all of that good stuff, including running the numbers from Chaos Earth all the way into PA, keeping in mind enough to keep infrastructure and industry and agriculture running as well as population expansion matrixes.

I even did a new breakdown on the CS military, using stuff from the CALL and modern 4th Generation Warfare theories with some 3rd Generation stuff, stuff from modern and older military thinkers, and rebuilt the CS military from the ground up, basing it not around the equipment, but on how you'd build an MDC military to protect a large area of land with frequent insurgent insertions, terrorist attacks, and magical issues. Then I retooled the CS to be more like Starship Troopers with the "WE WERE HERE FIRST!" and moving everything into a bigger shade of gray by having CS broadcasts showing where Brodkil ran in and killed the 300+ agricultural workers at a sorghum agri-farm. Where Juicers and Mages ran in and killed the CS patrol guarding a sheep farm and killed the sheep wranglers and their families and just blew up the sheep with MDC weapons. I made it where the Federation of Magic, Tolkeen, and super-powered wanderers kept attacking the CS, the CS kept attacking DB settlements, both sides moving further and further up the atrocity scale and each atrocity just bolstering the ranks of those willing to fight.

I took the "99% of the population is illiterate" and made those who were functionally illiterate "iconoliterate" which meant they knew computer icons. See, one thing Sembedia made a mistake was with the illiteracy. He then talked about how there was smartware in the helmets allowing an AI to read written world to people, without understanding that YOU TEACH CHILDREN TO READ BY READING TO THEM! The other thing, is that a technologically advanced society makes literacy mandatory to prevent deaths and injuries.

I also junked a lot of crap that made it into his books because I knew that: A) None of the writers talked to each other; B) Sembedia would randomly edit and cut & paste people's works; C) Sourcebook one stated there could be THOUSANDS OF MILES between settlements so obviously things needed redone.

I had to junk the entire CS/Tolkeen War because that the worst use of technology and warfare in the history of RPG's (outside of maybe Bionic Commando) and had to completely redo it. I kept some stuff intact, like the march through the Xictix Hives, the last stand of Free Quebec, and other things. Mainly because Sembedia still doesn't seem to understand the whole idea of mission configurable munition loadouts.

And another thing: MDC LASERS WOULD NOT BE SILENT! Just because a laser pointer is silent, doesn't mean that a laser, transmitting a high amount of energy via visible light, would not be silent. If a lightning bolt commonly did like 1d6 MDC, a laser rifle doing 3d6 MDC would be 3X more powerful. Thunder is from superheating of air and it collapsing back into the energy channel. A laser shot would cause a CRACK as the superheated air collapsed back into the pathway of the laser.

But while I rip and tear the whole thing apart and do all kinds work to it doesn't mean I don't love the setting, the cool gadgets, the monsters, all of that.

Quote from: Warlord Ralts;916043I loved Rifts when it was out. I quit buying during the Coalition War because...

Holy crap, Kevin, read modern combat theory and pull your head out of WW-II and quit quoting Vietnam statistics without any context or knowledge. I did buy the Chaos Earth stuff, mostly because I was resetting the campaign.

Eeeeeh. 10 experts on 10 different fields will destroy any piece of fiction. (My running theory anyway) I'm not going to say to anyone "You can't critique X!", but in the end, discussing the tactical and strategic inaccuracies of an RPG compared to "real life" makes my eyes glaze over.

I am reading Chaos Earth, and it's pretty neat. I don't think I'd ever run a game of it, but it does have a lot of interesting material.

QuoteAnd another thing: MDC LASERS WOULD NOT BE SILENT! Just because a laser pointer is silent, doesn't mean that a laser, transmitting a high amount of energy via visible light, would not be silent. If a lightning bolt commonly did like 1d6 MDC, a laser rifle doing 3d6 MDC would be 3X more powerful. Thunder is from superheating of air and it collapsing back into the energy channel. A laser shot would cause a CRACK as the superheated air collapsed back into the pathway of the laser.

One thing I'm seeing reoccur, is Siembieda in one section appealing to real life, in another appealing to fictional conventions, and in a third appealing to "common sense". Lasers are slient because "real life", characters can dodge gunfire because "They're the heroes", shooting someone point-blank in the head only deals 2d6 SDC, but "Common sense, guys!" DM fiat the target into a coma.
It's like the guy can't just say, "This is the game, deal and/or change it."* He has to justify every problem with the system.

*Though he does do this in the 1st Conversion Book, regarding MDC vs SDC. It's that the justifications are all over the place.

There's an easy way to keep a population sedate, and still literate, give them a war to focus on.  Like all DBees being evil.  There, done.

Quote from: Warlord Ralts;916043epic post

Good stuff! You still got this CS writeup and numbers laying around? Because I'd love to look at them.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;916126There's an easy way to keep a population sedate, and still literate, give them a war to focus on.  Like all DBees being evil.  There, done.

Having the CS be censorious (is that a word?) works for me. I think I'd house rule (house fluff?) it that most CS citizens and soldiers simply don't care to be more literate than they need to be. Plenty of vids for entertainment and news. No need to read unless you have to for your job.
Janitors and factory grunts are probably as illiterate as the book says, and the more technical your job, the more literate you are. The top dogs in the penthouses actually read whole books on non-task related subjects, for [strike]propaganda[/strike] research. Ahem.

Quote from: The Butcher;916190Good stuff! You still got this CS writeup and numbers laying around? Because I'd love to look at them.

I wish. I did writeups on ALL the CS weapons at one point (including some Chaos Earth stuff, some WIlks, Some NG stuff) and posted it on the Palladium site, then got into armor and power armor, but the forum glitched out on me and wouldn't let me post anymore. Said I had split IP's or something because I was posting from two different computers at different times.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;916204Janitors and factory grunts are probably as illiterate as the book says, and the more technical your job, the more literate you are. The top dogs in the penthouses actually read whole books on non-task related subjects, for [strike]propaganda[/strike] research. Ahem.

Ah, here's the thing, a lot of high tech jobs need to have the Janitors and 'Factory' Grunts to be literate because of a lot of the caustic chemicals and other dangerous materials used, especially in car manufacturer's buildings in the real world.  Here's the thing, most people RIGHT now, only learn enough to do whatever job they have, and don't bother with anything else.  The CS would just enforce that a little harder than we do.