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From the Pinnacle website, (http://www.peginc.com) which for some reason isn't loading right on my iPad.

Ordinarily I'd be dubious of the ability of most "generic" systems to emulate Rifts — having an "imbalanced" party like, say, Dragon, Juicer, Mystic and Vagabond is central to the Rifts experience IMHO — but Sean Patrick Fannon has declared, in more than one online venue, that be took a wrench to the SW engine, the better to make such things viable.

This level of attention to replicating the classic Rifts experience has definitely piqued my interest and I am really looking forward to it.

So so many questions about how all of that glorious mess that is RIFTS will translate. Number 1 being how SD v MD will be handled.

How do y'all think Savage Rifts will do moneywise compared to 2D20 Conan or 7th Sea?

I'm speculating wildly, but I've always thought that the RIFTS fanbase is larger than most people know or are willing to admit. I can see this doing pretty well, though a million dollar take like 7th Sea seems a bit of a reach.

...DAMN YOU.

I'm so very tempted, but I know I'll be disappointed again.  My poor shrivel cockles can't take it.

Quote from: JamesV;891334So so many questions about how all of that glorious mess that is RIFTS will translate. Number 1 being how SD v MD will be handled.

Pretty sure they said they're just using the same Heavy Armor rules that already exists. Not 100% sure if that was "official".

'RIFTS' is incredible. How a franchise so silly can survive for 20+ years and even thrive is beyond me. It's like they took all good design decisions and did the COMPLETE opposite before hammering their books together in a format evokes a teenager doing layouts in Word 1995. And still there's a fanbase. It is beyond me :P

Will be interesting to see how many people tag along for the Kickstarter. There's a real nostalgia boom going on these days, with KULT, 7th Sea, Paranoia and now RIFTS. I think they will do pretty well.

Quote from: Battle Mad Ronin;891409'RIFTS' is incredible. How a franchise so silly can survive for 20+ years and even thrive is beyond me. It's like they took all good design decisions and did the COMPLETE opposite before hammering their books together in a format evokes a teenager doing layouts in Word 1995. And still there's a fanbase. It is beyond me :P

Will be interesting to see how many people tag along for the Kickstarter. There's a real nostalgia boom going on these days, with KULT, 7th Sea, Paranoia and now RIFTS. I think they will do pretty well.

Nostalgia is everything right now.

Some days, I literally have no idea what year it is.  Seriously.  We had a Jurassic Park movie, a Mad Max film, Star Wars is burning up the charts, and this summer out comes a Ghostbusters film!

Gaming side, we have D&D 5e which is closer to AD&D than anything new, as you point out KULT, 7th Sea and Paranoia are hitting it big...

I'm confused.  I thought we were 2016, not 1986.

Quote from: Spinachcat;891337How do y'all think Savage Rifts will do moneywise compared to 2D20 Conan or 7th Sea?

I think it'll do just fine, though not 7th Sea, 1M+ fine. Or even Modiphius Conan fine.

Quote from: Battle Mad Ronin;891409'RIFTS' is incredible. How a franchise so silly can survive for 20+ years and even thrive is beyond me. It's like they took all good design decisions and did the COMPLETE opposite before hammering their books together in a format evokes a teenager doing layouts in Word 1995. And still there's a fanbase. It is beyond me :P

• Palladium fans are really hardcore.
  
  
• "OMG Rifts is an unplayable mess" is a vast exaggeration; yeah, editing sucks and one does find contradictory rulings across books, and power creep is a thing. But neither is impossible for a good GM to manage. In fact, as an eager young GM, Rifts taught me a lot about letting go of the RAW and making a game your own.


• Rifts is a great setting. It was gonzo as fuck, before gonzo was "in", before the days of Abraham Lincoln vs. Vampires and Doctor McNinja and Axe Cop and the OSR rediscovering weird science fantasy D&D. It presents a very dangerous (frankly gritty at places) world where the constant opening of dimensional portals allows for the introduction of just about any fictional character or plot device. Most significantly, it is entirely devoid the necessity to pass itself off as super-smart, pop-culture-savvy or cleverly ironic. It runs over with sheer, sincere enthusiasm and four-color comic-book sensibilities (Kevin is a comic book guy as much as a RPG guy, and villains like the Coalition and the Splugorth wouldn't look out of place in an AD2000 title).

Quote from: Christopher Brady;891412Nostalgia is everything right now.

Nostalgia ain't as good as it used to be.

Quote from: Spinachcat;891337How do y'all think Savage Rifts will do moneywise compared to 2D20 Conan or 7th Sea?

I could be wrong here, but I get the feeling that this is going to be a pretty big one.  Savage Worlds seems to be a system that most people love, or at least, don't mind.  Rifts is a setting that everyone loves.

@The Butcher: I may have come off kind of prickish, sorry about that. I don't like RIFTS, I respect that you do and that's just a matter of taste.

Quote from: Battle Mad Ronin;891432@The Butcher: I may have come off kind of prickish, sorry about that. I don't like RIFTS, I respect that you do and that's just a matter of taste.

Nothing to apologize for! :) Just took the opportunity to articulate my love of Rifts.

How big it goes is all about the stretch goals.
Modiphius Conan - 17 new books plus 40 earlier edition PDFs and random stuff.
7th Sea - 11 new books plus 37 earlier edition PDFs and random stuff.

To be honest, Pinnacle has never had a deep approach to licensed settings, more of a 3 and out.  Maybe some Plot Point suggestions every once in a while, but nothing to draw a God-mode KS.

However, they could be ambitious and be Kickstarting conversion books.  Take the entire history of Rifts splats, get existing plus new art, convert them all to SW, so you have an entire second system with all mechanics converted...that might go big, especially if they threw in all existing Rifts PDFs somewhere into the mix.

One thing I thought would be cool if Palladium ever got a big KS going would be big, high quality poster maps of the Rifts world.  You could even do two, the Erin Tarn version, and the official Coalition Military version. :D

On the one hand, I've heard that Fannon is not just putting everything in standard SW terms, but actually coming up with new rules (like his own SW game, Shaintar) on the other hand, probably the singlemost identifiable concept unique to Rifts, mega-damage is going to be represented in standard SW terms.  Not that this is necessarily a bad thing, but let's just say that when it comes to Savage Worlds, I'm skeptical whenever someone says "this is not going to be generic SW".  Being fair though, the SW toolkit has more tools then ever.

Personally, while I think a Savage Worlds Rifts game would be awesome, and I remain hopeful, I doubt that the system can do the Vagabond, Hatchling Dragon and Glitterboy type groups.  The system just doesn't have enough scale.  I'm waiting to be joyously proven wrong, though. :D

I am torn. If it's RIFTS system with Savage rules, I am in.
If it's bastardised Savage and RIFTS setting I am out.
Why? Because the Savage philosophy is to either 'Savage it and make it FFF', or 'use the orginal system'. If it is Fast, Fun and Furious then I am with it, if it's a frankenstein then I'd rather use the original system and I read that and it wasn't for me.

Savage can cope with power imbalances, it's all in the superpower companion.

Quote from: tzunder;891676I am torn. If it's RIFTS system with Savage rules, I am in.
If it's bastardised Savage and RIFTS setting I am out.
Why? Because the Savage philosophy is to either 'Savage it and make it FFF', or 'use the orginal system'. If it is Fast, Fun and Furious then I am with it, if it's a frankenstein then I'd rather use the original system and I read that and it wasn't for me.

Savage can cope with power imbalances, it's all in the superpower companion.

Everything I've read on both sites indicates this is Savage Worlds rules with the Rifts setting.

Savage Worlds gains nothing by trying to "hybridize" their system. That defeats the entire point of Savage Worlds. I can't imagine they'd ever go that route for any license.

I'll probably back it. I've played a few Palladium games back in the day but never really cared for the system so this could be a nice take on it.

Quote from: Battle Mad Ronin;891432@The Butcher: I may have come off kind of prickish, sorry about that. I don't like RIFTS, I respect that you do and that's just a matter of taste.

Grow a pair, Krom - damn it, this is RPGsite. We do not apologize here, we escalate the conflict until everyone forgets why it started!

I might actually consider playing this. Recently, I've been more into gozno stuff that I used to be, and RIFTS carries a certain...legend around it. I'd definitely be willing to rediscover a setting through a mechanic I am more familiar with, and not covered with a certain shroud of infamy.

I just hope they adapt the setting verbatim, not pull something like D20 Gamma World.

Quote from: CRKrueger;891469On the one hand, I've heard that Fannon is not just putting everything in standard SW terms, but actually coming up with new rules (like his own SW game, Shaintar) on the other hand, probably the singlemost identifiable concept unique to Rifts, mega-damage is going to be represented in standard SW terms.  Not that this is necessarily a bad thing, but let's just say that when it comes to Savage Worlds, I'm skeptical whenever someone says "this is not going to be generic SW".  Being fair though, the SW toolkit has more tools then ever.

Personally, while I think a Savage Worlds Rifts game would be awesome, and I remain hopeful, I doubt that the system can do the Vagabond, Hatchling Dragon and Glitterboy type groups.  The system just doesn't have enough scale.  I'm waiting to be joyously proven wrong, though. :D

Actually SW's system, I think, is pretty well fit for megadamage - armour and "HPs" in SW can be easily adapted to it. Just have megadamage kill anyone on one shot, or ignore armour entirely.

Heavy Armor in Savage Worlds is basically Mega Damage Armor. You need a weapon with the Heavy descriptor to affect it. So all your small-arms fire dings off.

Interface Zero's Golem-Mechs are pretty solid examples of Glitterboys and stuff of that scale.

Heavy Weapons in Savage Worlds already do enough ridonculous damage that it might as well be Mega-Damage, because your ass is likely going to die a horrible death if you take a straight-shot from one (but not always). The FFF-mantra of SW will make Rifts probably play a lot more agile and possibly even more over the top... which I think will be awesome.

SavageCast did an interview with Sean Patrick Fannon about Savage Rifts. He answers a number of questions about how they are doing it.

http://www.savagecast.com/2016/04/episode-4-do-you-even-rifts-bro/


While I love the Megaversal System I plan to back this.

God I hate Podcasts...the SPF stuff starts around 18:00.  Some takeaways:
(SPF=Sean Patrick Fannon, SW=Savage Worlds, SR=Savage Rifts)

• Rifts Classes replaced with "Iconic Frameworks" which are a set of frontloaded abilities, skills, equipment, etc to match certain Rifts classes.  Some of the Frameworks mentioned are:

• Juicer
• Crazy
• Ley Line Walker
• Glitterboy
• Cyber-Knight
• Mind Melter
• Mystic
• MARS (Mercenaries Adventurers Rogues Scholars) - they will have unique tables to roll on for equipment (like a robot horse) and will have more skills.

• Admission that SW is a balanced system and this will be a SW system.  Turned up to 11 maybe, but not as Gonzo as Rifts (SPF thinks Cosmo-Knights are awful).
• Admission that there isn't a whole lot of room to move in with regards to weapons.  Suggestion that if, for example, you want all the weapons from Northern Gun, you buy the Palladium Northern Gun book, because while some of them will show up in various SR supplements, not all of them will.
• Confirmation that MDC will be represented by Heavy Weapons/Armor rules from SW and that normal infantry pistols, rifles, armor will NOT be Heavy.  So a guy with a normal steel bowie knife can hurt a Dead Boy.  This is by design to keep the game SW.
• Kevin Siembieda (probably because he worked as an artist for Judge's Guild, etc) left the rights to the art with his artists, so they would have to recontract with the original artists to reuse them, so new color art will be used.
• 3 Core books are planned.  First one will be the Core Rules, third one is Savage Foes of North America.
• Apparently one does not "convert" for Savage Worlds, one "interprets" :rolleyes:(I hope you heard me lift my pinkie fingers as I typed that.) So there will be no official "Conversion Guide".
• Timeline is 109 P.A. 6 months after the Fall of Tolkeen.

Personally I think they are taking something from the setting by not making infantry class items Heavy.  One of the defining elements of the Rifts wilderness was that without technology or magic, ordinary people were vulnerable.  The Coalition soldiers might as well have been Glitter Boys to a town without modern weapons.  Now medieval technology can defeat and defend against the forces of the Coalition, or any of the various nations, or private mercenary armies, robber barons, etc.  A WWI machinegun will be able to cut down a Northern Gun mercenary platoon.  It completely changes the setting.  But, if Laser Pistols were heavy, then you'd need a mechanism to allow 100 soldiers armed with pistols to eventually take out a vehicle and Savage Worlds damage system cannot support that, the numbers would get too high.

So yeah, some fundamental setting conceits are going to be changed, which is what SW fans want and are used to, but maybe not what Rifts fans looking for an alternate system might want.

In any case, SR is looking to be the perfect system that one could use to "interpret" 40k. :cool:

No Cyber-Knight? :confused:

Quote from: Christopher Brady;891773No Cyber-Knight? :confused:

That was *some* of the Frameworks.  I added all the ones specifically mentioned in the Podcast.  There will probably be more, like Hatchling Dragon, etc.

Thanks for the highlights, Krugs. I hate podcasts too ;)

Pity about "balance" but for what ir's worth, I, too, was unimpressed by Cosmo-Knights.

As for no MDC personal armor... You see, late in my Rifts GMing career I did consider doing away with Mega-Damage and converting everything to SDC on a 10:1 (rather than the default 100:1) scale. And this sounds a lot like the game that might have resulted. Which might be fun.

The whole "MDC supremacy" scenario — you know, single person in MDC body armor packing a laser pistol walks into town and subjugates it single-handedly — is bullshit because Rifts Earth is crawling with naturally MDC predators. (In fact my original motivation for thinking of doing away with MDC was thinking "what if the biosphere gets flooded with indestructible aliens") So a town with no means to defend itself from the guy in Plastic Man armor (30 MDC) toting a Wilk's laser pistol (1d6 MD) probably already disappeared long before that, the day a Rhino-Buffalo or Brodkil or even a lone Xiticix swung by.

Quote from: The Butcher;891776Thanks for the highlights, Krugs. I hate podcasts too ;)

Pity about "balance" but for what ir's worth, I, too, was unimpressed by Cosmo-Knights.

As for no MDC personal armor... You see, late in my Rifts GMing career I did consider doing away with Mega-Damage and converting everything to SDC on a 10:1 (rather than the default 100:1) scale. And this sounds a lot like the game that might have resulted. Which might be fun.

The whole "MDC supremacy" scenario — you know, single person in MDC body armor packing a laser pistol walks into town and subjugates it single-handedly — is bullshit because Rifts Earth is crawling with naturally MDC predators. (In fact my original motivation for thinking of doing away with MDC was thinking "what if the biosphere gets flooded with indestructible aliens") So a town with no means to defend itself from the guy in Plastic Man armor (30 MDC) toting a Wilk's laser pistol (1d6 MD) probably already disappeared long before that, the day a Rhino-Buffalo or Brodkil or even a lone Xiticix swung by.

The issue with MDC is actually that it's a level playing field.  Too level.

I've said this here before, but I'll repeat:

One major criteria for most military forces is money.  Finances.  So if you have a rifle that can damage a tank and jet, but is cheaper to buy at the hundreds of unit level, they're not going to buy the tank.

And I've done a test with the game, a team of 5 Coalition Infantrymen against a UAR-1 Enforcer robot.  One round, 15 seconds, the robot was ash and one trooper was dead.  Then I did it 5 more times.  The longest time was about 3 rounds, but the results were the same.  One Trooper and One Robot were destroyed.

A 20% unit loss compared to the 100% unit loss.  And the Robot cost MILLIONS.  No army, none of them, would waste resources for one.

Now, one could argue that to bring realism into gaming is foolhardy, but I contend and posit that 'realism' is what we humans use to consider something plausible.  If we do it in 'real life', we won't question what happens in a fantasy setting, because we can accept it without question.

What does this mean for Palladium Rifts?  MDC needing a scaling system.  Maybe a three tier one, Armour/Power Armour, Robot/Tank/Fighter plane and Superheavy, which is what most starships and Splugorth might fall under.

Some things might even shift from category to category.  For example, the Glitterboy Boom Gun might be a Robot Killer class weapon, but it's armoured shell is Power Armour class, meaning that they could get popped relatively easily if they start shooting each other.  As opposed to the several hour long fight you could have in the base system.

Those are both interesting points.

Butcher, you're right in that the "every town needs MDC Clint Eastwood to ride in" means there wouldn't be any towns left, but MDC Clint Eastwood is just so fucking cool. :D

Brady, you're right in that the levels of MDC for pretty much any defensive value is out of whack with MDC Infantry weapons, which is why when I played Rifts I came up with new stats for fucking everything.  In the end, it might have been better to flush MDC or have more than two levels, like you are suggesting.

I don't think the MDC thing is even a remote issue. There's plenty of examples in the SW Sci-Fi Companion and Interface Zero of heavy-power armor that quite nicely emulates Coalition Deadboy Armor in terms of their representative power.

If you think you're going to kill a Deadboy with a 1d4 MD Knife, you're probably in for a rude awakening. Much like a Deadboy trying to take on a Dragon in his armor with his plasma rifle.

And Heavy Weapons don't do extra damage to non-heavy targets. They already do a shitload of damage. So it'll be fine. The point of needing to make everything 10:1 is kinda already abstracted by that damage factor.

Cosmo-knights aren't Cyber-knights to my recollection. They're some ridiculously amped up Galactus-Power-cosmic juiced up version of a Cyber-knight. So yeah... who cares. I'm not going to have them in my games anyhow.

Quote from: tenbones;891781I don't think the MDC thing is even a remote issue. There's plenty of examples in the SW Sci-Fi Companion and Interface Zero of heavy-power armor that quite nicely emulates Coalition Deadboy Armor in terms of their representative power.

If you think you're going to kill a Deadboy with a 1d4 MD Knife, you're probably in for a rude awakening. Much like a Deadboy trying to take on a Dragon in his armor with his plasma rifle.

And Heavy Weapons don't do extra damage to non-heavy targets. They already do a shitload of damage. So it'll be fine. The point of needing to make everything 10:1 is kinda already abstracted by that damage factor.

Cosmo-knights aren't Cyber-knights to my recollection. They're some ridiculously amped up Galactus-Power-cosmic juiced up version of a Cyber-knight. So yeah... who cares. I'm not going to have them in my games anyhow.

Cosmo-Knights obviously are beyond Rifts, they come from the Three Galaxies, but still in Rifts, you can have Abolisher Robots fighting Adult Dragons, Giants, Demons, etc... There's definitely a higher than Golem-mech level in there.  Not sure how SR is going to be able to handle that.

Never played RIFTS, but I've heard it mentioned a thousand times over the internet in the last few years, so my interest is highly picked. Also, multi-dimentional games are my king of thing.

If the price for the PDF is reasonable, even as I'm not a huge fan of SW, I'll probably back it.

Quote from: CRKrueger;891771

• Confirmation that MDC will be represented by Heavy Weapons/Armor rules from SW and that normal infantry pistols, rifles, armor will NOT be Heavy.  So a guy with a normal steel bowie knife can hurt a Dead Boy.  This is by design to keep the game SW.

THIS is a major setting change...and an expected one.

However, its mostly a major change on paper. In actual play, everyone and their sister has MDC toys. Except for some background NPC squishies who effectively are just 1 HP mooks.

Quote from: CRKrueger;891771So there will be no official "Conversion Guide".

What's going to be the Pinnacle policy of people converting PB stuff on their forums for PB stuff that's beyond their license?

I hope everyone's going to be mellow about the ensuing flood of Palladium conversions that will be posted online.

Quote from: CRKrueger;891771In any case, SR is looking to be the perfect system that one could use to "interpret" 40k. :cool:

Been there, done that, added skulls to Khorne's throne. It works GREAT for 40k.

Quote from: Spinachcat;891854Been there, done that, added skulls to Khorne's throne. It works GREAT for 40k.

Did you ever get into crazymode, like Grey Knights vs. a Bloodthirster crazy?

Quote from: Spinachcat;891854I hope everyone's going to be mellow about the ensuing flood of Palladium conversions that will be posted online.

I'm not sure Kevin knows how to be mellow.

Or can even spell mellow, FWIW.

I focused the mini-campaign on a squad of Space Marines (my Beakies called the Void Raptor legion) assigned to a company of Catachan Imperial Guardsman against Orks sworn to Nurgle with a group of Eldar with their own agenda on the planet.

The PCs were the Space Marines and we got to fill the table with vehicles and minis. The Orks had their own vehicles, Traitor Plague Marines, lots of Chaos Spawn, and Chaos Sorcerers among their number.

And this is way back when SW came out with its core book. We had LOTS of fun and the only hiccup I had was the vehicle rules which I house-ruled / hybridized with some old 40k rules.

I made the PCs be Space Marines because...the players loved space marines, and the presence of heavy stuff on the battlefield vs. IG meant lots of dead IG. After one player's Space Marine was killed, he decided to instead play a series of IG sergeants who died almost as regularly as Kenny on South Park.

SW PCs are tough, but the presence of tanks, area effect damage and big monsters gets nasty pretty quick even with what I felt was a generous tossing of bennies.

I ran a couple convention one-shots using the campaign as a backdrop too. It worked fabulously, but it was Savage Worlds first and 40k second, but the presence of the 40k toys on the table made it really "feel" 40k.

Unsure how that will play out with Savage Rifts.

EDIT: I know "Orks sworn to Nurgle" isn't canon. That was a whole aspect of the campaign for the PCs to discover the how the cult was breeding Orks and enslaving them. The Eldar were there to capture the technology to make their own Orks.

One of the first RPGs I ever played was Rifts and I was always a big fan of the setting. I stopped playing around 1998 but it holds a special place in my heart. I actually like the Rifts rules more than SW but I'll back this if there are some cool things included.

Quote from: Ulairi;891927One of the first RPGs I ever played was Rifts and I was always a big fan of the setting. I stopped playing around 1998 but it holds a special place in my heart. I actually like the Rifts rules more than SW but I'll back this if there are some cool things included.

I wouldn't hold my breath if you mean "cool things" = "new things".

Listening to the podcast it sounds like they're just doing Rifts post-Tolkeen with very slightly modified Savage Worlds rules (which is normal for each setting they do). I didn't take anything from them they were creating anything new - given the fact that they outright said they'll be doing the core-book then extrapolating outward from that focusing on North America. They have, apparently, the vast library of Palladium Rifts material to draw upon.

Hell if that's actually the case, they can make a metric shit-ton of Savage Rifts books for *years* on this model. I'm curious to know what their exact limits are.

Quote from: tenbones;891944I wouldn't hold my breath if you mean "cool things" = "new things".

Listening to the podcast it sounds like they're just doing Rifts post-Tolkeen with very slightly modified Savage Worlds rules (which is normal for each setting they do). I didn't take anything from them they were creating anything new - given the fact that they outright said they'll be doing the core-book then extrapolating outward from that focusing on North America. They have, apparently, the vast library of Palladium Rifts material to draw upon.

Hell if that's actually the case, they can make a metric shit-ton of Savage Rifts books for *years* on this model. I'm curious to know what their exact limits are.

I think the biggest challenge is Siembieda realising in 2 years he could get all the money, instead of just licencing money, if he took SW's system and did his own version of it...Palladium style.

The podcast makes it pretty clear the intent is to get Rifts into the hands of gamers that have the capability to buy Rifts Palladium - but don't.  

A new Palladium "Rifts Lite" product would still probably be laid out in 2 column black and white in Wordstar 2.0 or however the hell Kevin does his patented Stream of Consciousness layout.

Quote from: CRKrueger;891998A new Palladium "Rifts Lite" product would still probably be laid out in 2 column black and white in Wordstar 2.0 or however the hell Kevin does his patented Stream of Consciousness layout.

Oh shit... I was laughing a little too much reading this.

Quote from: Rincewind1I think the biggest challenge is Siembieda realising in 2 years he could get all the money, instead of just licencing money, if he took SW's system and did his own version of it...Palladium style.

I totally agree. But sheesh! haven't people been saying this for years?? Or at least some variation of it. I confess after all this discussion about it, I was curious and popped over to the Palladium forums...

I was expecting "mild-disdain" about the announcement. What I "generally" felt after a quick skim through the vibe was like a neglected dog finally getting some attention from a stranger then wistfully hoping that maybe this mean the native-version of Rifts would rise again because maybe Savage Worlds players would come over to their side. Even a little sadness that their game has been neglected.

I know all the Siembieda stories etc. but I don't pretend to know all the inner-workings of why he's let Palladium go fallow for so long outside of the alleged ego-issues. All I know is, the tide is rising on his IP, and it's time to surf.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;891412Nostalgia is everything right now.

I think this is also a dream project for Sean Patrick Fannon--he's been converting RIFTS to other systems for his own games for 20 years. Back then, it was the Hero System; he seems to have moved to SW as his go-to game.

Quote from: tenbones;892012I totally agree. But sheesh! haven't people been saying this for years?? Or at least some variation of it. I confess after all this discussion about it, I was curious and popped over to the Palladium forums...

I was expecting "mild-disdain" about the announcement. What I "generally" felt after a quick skim through the vibe was like a neglected dog finally getting some attention from a stranger then wistfully hoping that maybe this mean the native-version of Rifts would rise again because maybe Savage Worlds players would come over to their side. Even a little sadness that their game has been neglected.

I know all the Siembieda stories etc. but I don't pretend to know all the inner-workings of why he's let Palladium go fallow for so long outside of the alleged ego-issues. All I know is, the tide is rising on his IP, and it's time to surf.

I'll play Devil's Advocate - I'd say it's less  ego, and more the fact that he's the very stereotypical artist not businessman type. A jealous artist who's ever afraid of people drinking his milkshake.

Quote from: tenbones;891714Everything I've read on both sites indicates this is Savage Worlds rules with the Rifts setting.

Savage Worlds gains nothing by trying to "hybridize" their system. That defeats the entire point of Savage Worlds. I can't imagine they'd ever go that route for any license.

.

I agree, and fingers crossed

One thing occurs to me, in SW PC's can be frighteningly squishy, so to 'mimic' MDC vs. SDC you wouldn't have to up the damage all that much.  Doubling or tripling the base damage for weapons in the core book to simulate MDC would be more than enough to paste most Wild Card characters in a single shot.

Quote from: One Horse Town;891419Nostalgia ain't as good as it used to be.

It never is, is it?

JG

Quote from: Christopher Brady;892243One thing occurs to me, in SW PC's can be frighteningly squishy, so to 'mimic' MDC vs. SDC you wouldn't have to up the damage all that much.  Doubling or tripling the base damage for weapons in the core book to simulate MDC would be more than enough to paste most Wild Card characters in a single shot.

Hell, my players complained about exploding damage as is. Just adding in an extra +1d6 damage and a decent armor piercing value (4 or 5 AP), and you'll get mountains of dead player characters.

We have (p)reviews from Chris Helton (http://www.enworld.org/forum/content.php?3374-Looking-At-Savage-Worlds-Rifts&) and Tommy Brownell (http://mostunreadblogever.blogspot.com.br/2016/04/tommys-take-on-savage-rifts-players.html) which go into some detail with regards to the modified mechanics featured in the Savage Rifts Player's Guide.

The first one also clarifies just WTF the "Tomorrow Legion" is — an anti-Coalition do-gooder outfit led by Erin Tarn. :rolleyes: I'll just ignore the fluff and use it to play circa 102 P.A. because I'm a Rifts grognard who despises the Tolkeen metaplot.

I am so very in for this. I've long loved the Rifts setting, but the gaming system isn't much liked by the people that I play with these days. But, we've done a couple of different things with Savage Worlds. This is the key to actually getting to run a Rifts game again. :D

Quote from: The Butcher;894173We have (p)reviews from Chris Helton (http://www.enworld.org/forum/content.php?3374-Looking-At-Savage-Worlds-Rifts&) and Tommy Brownell (http://mostunreadblogever.blogspot.com.br/2016/04/tommys-take-on-savage-rifts-players.html) which go into some detail with regards to the modified mechanics featured in the Savage Rifts Player's Guide.

The first one also clarifies just WTF the "Tomorrow Legion" is — an anti-Coalition do-gooder outfit led by Erin Tarn. :rolleyes: I'll just ignore the fluff and use it to play circa 102 P.A. because I'm a Rifts grognard who despises the Tolkeen metaplot.

The Tolkien Metaplot is what made the Cyber-Knights less cool to me.  They became anti-tech knights with powers that countered the Coalition's toys, mainly.

The issue with this is that according to the first Rifts book, the Coalition was created about 50 years before the start of the time line.  The Cyber-Knights were around 150 years.  And the most common type of foe that CKs would fight?  Magic based Monsters, not Techno-Bandits.

Neeters. Looks maybe affordable too.

At a glance looks like if you wanted troops to be more sturdy in armour then bump it up to heavy status? Or is there more to it than that?

Quote from: Christopher Brady;894188The Tolkien Metaplot is what made the Cyber-Knights less cool to me.  They became anti-tech knights with powers that countered the Coalition's toys, mainly.

The issue with this is that according to the first Rifts book, the Coalition was created about 50 years before the start of the time line.  The Cyber-Knights were around 150 years.  And the most common type of foe that CKs would fight?  Magic based Monsters, not Techno-Bandits.

I missed out on the Tolkeen metaplot and Cyber-Knight cruft. What little I read about did not pique my interest.

To be honest I always found Cyber-Knights sort of underwhelming. The unintuitive combination of moderately powerful psionics with a couple of unimpressive cybernetic implants never really felt like it merited the "Cyber" prefix. When Psyscape came out I seriously considered replacing all Cyber-Knights with Psi-Warriors, who feel like a better "Rifts Earth Jedi Knight" class to me.

Quote from: Omega;894234Neeters. Looks maybe affordable too.

At a glance looks like if you wanted troops to be more sturdy in armour then bump it up to heavy status? Or is there more to it than that?

I dunno. It's not clear to me if Mega-Damage weapons will "only" consist of the Heavy Damage property or if they will also feature a ton of damage dice (e.g. 4d10+4 quoted in the text). You may have to ramp up Toughness if that's the case.

In fact, since (IIRC) the Heavy Weapons property offers no additional damage against non-Heavy Armor, it may be just a matter of increasing Toughness.

Quote from: The Butcher;894236I missed out on the Tolkeen metaplot and Cyber-Knight cruft. What little I read about did not pique my interest.

To be honest I always found Cyber-Knights sort of underwhelming. The unintuitive combination of moderately powerful psionics with a couple of unimpressive cybernetic implants never really felt like it merited the "Cyber" prefix. When Psyscape came out I seriously considered replacing all Cyber-Knights with Psi-Warriors, who feel like a better "Rifts Earth Jedi Knight" class to me.



I dunno. It's not clear to me if Mega-Damage weapons will "only" consist of the Heavy Damage property or if they will also feature a ton of damage dice (e.g. 4d10+4 quoted in the text). You may have to ramp up Toughness if that's the case.

In fact, since (IIRC) the Heavy Weapons property offers no additional damage against non-Heavy Armor, it may be just a matter of increasing Toughness.

I remember reading the Glitter Boy had around 25 Toughness, which means heavy weapons need to have a higher damage output to compensate for greater defence.

If they're already sending out a preview beta copy to reviewers, I hope if you back the KS, you'll have access to the same preview doc.

I'm not too worried about Metaplot elements since I do "my own thing" with all the set-pieces in most settings.

Gotta say these preliminary reviews have got me kinda hyped.

Quote from: CRKrueger;891771

• Kevin Siembieda (probably because he worked as an artist for Judge's Guild, etc) left the rights to the art with his artists, so they would have to recontract with the original artists to reuse them, so new color art will be used.

That is very weird to read that explanation. Palladium books has a lot if reuse art in its books and the copyright notice only mentions Palladium and Kevin Siembieda as copyright holders ... Matbe the original contract with the artists only allow use for Palladium ...

It will be strange to see a Rifts books with the iconic illustrations made by Kevin Long and Vince Martin to name a few (the TMNT artist too, I forget his name).

Maybe they will still hire Zeleznik for the cover.

Quote from: tenbones;894285I'm not too worried about Metaplot elements since I do "my own thing" with all the set-pieces in most settings.

Gotta say these preliminary reviews have got me kinda hyped.

What metaplot? Rifts has, aside from the Tolkeen shakeup, had about zero metaplot?

Quote from: Omega;894393What metaplot? Rifts has, aside from the Tolkeen shakeup, had about zero metaplot?

...You never read the Rift books did you?

They had A LOT of metaplot.  It was just well written (KS is an excellent writer, even if his system leaves a lot to be desired in some aspects) to the point of being minor.

The Siege of Tolkien and the Coalition War Campaign source book were the only two instances in which things stood out and 'visibly' changed things.  The War Campaign redesigned most of the machines that the Coalition States used and gave them the infamous MDC bloat.

Where as the Siege was a series of 5 adventure books which, frankly was written as a railroad.  Nothing the Players could have done would have changed things.  It also had other issues, but I could go on for a very long post about those, and would rely on my admittedly faulty memory.

Any date for the KS yet?
[edit]
I'm an idiot, it's on the topic's freaking title. Doh'!

Quote from: tenbones;894285Gotta say these preliminary reviews have got me kinda hyped.

Do you have a link to a review you can share?

Btw, major question: do I have to buy the Savage Words core or will this book have all the rules to play?

Quote from: Maese Mateo;894406Btw, major question: do I have to buy the Savage Words core or will this book have all the rules to play?

You'll need to buy the core rules--which are all of $10 U.S.. :)

Quote from: Maese Mateo;894397Do you have a link to a review you can share?

I think there's more out there, but this is the only one I know of: http://mostunreadblogever.blogspot.com/2016/04/tommys-take-on-savage-rifts-players.html#more (http://mostunreadblogever.blogspot.com/2016/04/tommys-take-on-savage-rifts-players.html#more)

Quote from: Maese Mateo;894397Do you have a link to a review you can share?

Nope. (http://www.therpgsite.com/showpost.php?p=894173&postcount=45) :D

So as of 3:30AM EDT on 4/28/2016, the funding currently stands at $174,006 out of the requested $8,000, nearly 22x (It's actually closer to 21.75, but I rounded up) the requested amount..  Safe to say that they got a hit?

Glitter Boy "framework" (an O.C.C.-like package) is up! Link (https://www.peginc.com/store/savage-rifts-glitter-boy-preview/)

Though Siembieda is a master of brief, evocative write-ups, gotta love the world info packed in this version.

I'm in for $250. I have never played Savage Worlds at all but I'm a big Rifts fan. I think this is going to review really well partially because the gaming intelligentsia loves to hate on the Palladium system. I've found that once a player is through character creation the system itself is pretty straight forward. The splatbook bloat is hard because there are so many books but that is an easier variable to control for a GM.

Looking into Savage Worlds, it looks pretty cool, but I was a little disappointed listening to a podcast interview on the new Rifts version that the system allows players if they take a fatal hit to tell the table how they are going to die (or work with the GM) it's a little story gamerish for me.

BUT! The Solomon Kane setting looks awesome and I am going to purchase all of the products for it because I love me some Solomon Kane.

They have a hit, and they're racking up a good amount with stretch goals that are...well pretty underwhelming really.  Practically every single one looks to be a PDF article they probably cut from the main text to get each book in at 96 pages.  They're not doing a "Pre-Order Kickstarter" to fund the writing of additional books, it's just to cover printing of this run, three and out.  I can respect not wanting to get in over their head with swag goals, that eat up all the profits, but so far, this is a pretty stingy KS compared to say the 7th Sea or Modiphius one.

The Glitterboy...hmm 4d12+6 damage AP25, that's a pretty good gun, but the armor on the Glitterboy...ouch.  +18 Armor?  So basically a Glitterboy will vaporize another Glitterboy in one shot?  I realize with armor that is Absorbing instead of Ablative it completely changes the paradigm, but I would have expected Glitterboys to be tougher.

Quote from: CRKrueger;894524They have a hit, and they're racking up a good amount with stretch goals that are...well pretty underwhelming really.  Practically every single one looks to be a PDF article they probably cut from the main text to get each book in at 96 pages.  They're not doing a "Pre-Order Kickstarter" to fund the writing of additional books, it's just to cover printing of this run, three and out.  I can respect not wanting to get in over their head with swag goals, that eat up all the profits, but so far, this is a pretty stingy KS compared to say the 7th Sea or Modiphius one.

The Glitterboy...hmm 4d12+6 damage AP25, that's a pretty good gun, but the armor on the Glitterboy...ouch.  +18 Armor?  So basically a Glitterboy will vaporize another Glitterboy in one shot?  I realize with armor that is Absorbing instead of Ablative it completely changes the paradigm, but I would have expected Glitterboys to be tougher.

They said it's going to be a permanent line and will be releasing additional products, including a plot point campaign, so I am kind of glad they are not having a lot of KS bloat that could slow down release. This is functionally a big pre-order gig and that's how I'm viewing it. We aren't funding any development or production.

Quote from: CRKrueger;894524The Glitterboy...hmm 4d12+6 damage AP25, that's a pretty good gun, but the armor on the Glitterboy...ouch.  +18 Armor?  So basically a Glitterboy will vaporize another Glitterboy in one shot?  I realize with armor that is Absorbing instead of Ablative it completely changes the paradigm, but I would have expected Glitterboys to be tougher.

This is not a snark answer.  This is honestly questioning.  Aren't most "tanks" like that?  They couldn't take a direct hit from their own main gun?  I've always just kind of assumed that, so don't really know.  But I don't have a problem with it myself.  It just means you REALLY need to get the drop on the other guy.

Quote from: Imaginos;894540This is not a snark answer.  This is honestly questioning.  Aren't most "tanks" like that?  They couldn't take a direct hit from their own main gun?  I've always just kind of assumed that, so don't really know.  But I don't have a problem with it myself.  It just means you REALLY need to get the drop on the other guy.

Hmm, you do have a point, but I think a M1A3 Abrams can survive a hit from it's main gun, at least on the front, especially with DPU armor.  Maybe a tank expert can chime in here.

By my math though, you'd need to roll really low, like 13 on 4d6 to be able to not incapacitate the pilot.  In Rifts, even a headshot on a Glitterboy by a Boomgun was likely to not be a one-shot kill.  

It turns Glitterboys into glass cannons.

Quote from: Imaginos;894540This is not a snark answer.  This is honestly questioning.  Aren't most "tanks" like that?  They couldn't take a direct hit from their own main gun?  I've always just kind of assumed that, so don't really know.  But I don't have a problem with it myself.  It just means you REALLY need to get the drop on the other guy.

Maybe most actual tanks are like that, but the Glitter Boy in the Rifts core is effing strong : 700 + MDC and its main gun makes 3D6 x 10 MDC. It will one shoot most personal body armor but the Coalition SAMAS will need 2 full damage shoots to be destroyed (350 MDC).

Concerning the Rifts metaplot, there is actually one, which begins in the corebook : the Coalition invasion of Tolkeen, the Atlantis expansion, the Vampire Invasion and the NGR/Triax struggle against the Gargoyle Empire and its Brodkill allies.

It is expended with the 2 first sourcebooks with Archie 3 and the Mechanoids. There is also the 4 horsemen invasion with Rifts Africa. Then after exploring the post apocaliptic Earth (England, Germany, South America and Japan), the Rifts story continues with the Juicer Uprising and the resurgence of the Federation of Magic.

People don't think of Rifts as a "metaplot game" because Siembieda didn't whip it out right on your forehead.  It was, like all good metaplot, the background tapestry of the world, just what was going on, that the players could interact with, or not.

The Siege on Tolkeen was a change in that if you included it in your campaign, it was kind of hard to ignore if you were anywhere near the conflict.  It also changed everything that came after, so now you had to make the choice of running a "Tolkeen Compliant Campaign" or not. It also moved the world into a darker grey, as the depths to which the Tolkeen leadership sank basically validated the Coalition position that all magic-users eventually fall to evil.

I agree with you, CRKrueger. Some like to mock Rifts and Siembieda because they are too cool for them, forgetting that Siembieda is almost the only author/publisher who keeps control of his creation even after 30 years in the industry. The biggest hurdle tp onvercome concerning the Palladium ststem is the character creation because there is som much option and the OCC/RCC thing is a little restrictive.

Quote from: CRKrueger;894524They have a hit, and they're racking up a good amount with stretch goals that are...well pretty underwhelming really.  Practically every single one looks to be a PDF article they probably cut from the main text to get each book in at 96 pages.  They're not doing a "Pre-Order Kickstarter" to fund the writing of additional books, it's just to cover printing of this run, three and out.  I can respect not wanting to get in over their head with swag goals, that eat up all the profits, but so far, this is a pretty stingy KS compared to say the 7th Sea or Modiphius one.

The thing is with a lot of Kickstarters, the issue is that they're often delayed because of all the stretch goals.  Remember, when you have people putting money up, they need to print/make more of the options than they expected.  That takes time, and the more physical KS the more things they need to produce, which will change their logistics big time.

Personally, less 'stretch goals' better book is what I want.

It takes two full rounds for the Glitterboy to fire up that gun, and he has to make sure none of his friends are around him in a large Burst template, or they're gonna get deafened. Pretty much what it sounds like to me, is the Boom Gun is being set as the "Height" of damage output... the biggest baddest source of damage in the game (barring probably a few exceptions) They even encourage the Glitterboy to use another gun, since you'e not expected to use the Boom gun every round.

So they made the Boom gun worth all the penalties that come with using it. I don't expect their armor to be shitty against other things.

I'm curious what they're doing with the cyber-knight.

And I'm getting tempted to actually back this one.  But I want the $45 level, but that's in American funds and CDN is getting nailed to a wall in terms of exchange rates.

Quote from: yabaziou;894345That is very weird to read that explanation. Palladium books has a lot if reuse art in its books and the copyright notice only mentions Palladium and Kevin Siembieda as copyright holders ... Matbe the original contract with the artists only allow use for Palladium ...

It will be strange to see a Rifts books with the iconic illustrations made by Kevin Long and Vince Martin to name a few (the TMNT artist too, I forget his name).

Maybe they will still hire Zeleznik for the cover.

They mentioned in one of the podcasts that Kevin left the rights with the artists. That is why they would need to do new contracts to use any of that artwork.

I'm hoping they hire Kevin Long to do some artwork

Quote from: Ulairi;894610I'm hoping they hire Kevin Long to do some artwork

It wouldn't seem very Palladium without him, would it?

Quote from: Ulairi;894610I'm hoping they hire Kevin Long to do some artwork

Honest question:  Didn't he and Kevin Siembeida have a falling out?  And although I hope that doesn't stop Pinnacle from hiring him, perhaps there's bad blood that might keep it from happening?  I sincerely hope not, but if I'm right, that might be why we won't be getting any of his work.

Quote from: CRKrueger;894524The Glitterboy...hmm 4d12+6 damage AP25, that's a pretty good gun, but the armor on the Glitterboy...ouch.  +18 Armor?  So basically a Glitterboy will vaporize another Glitterboy in one shot?  I realize with armor that is Absorbing instead of Ablative it completely changes the paradigm, but I would have expected Glitterboys to be tougher.

I don't know much about either Savage Worlds or RIFTs, but the Glitter Boy template says "+18 MDC Armor", isn't that supposed to be better than regular armor?

Quote from: Maese Mateo;894635I don't know much about either Savage Worlds or RIFTs, but the Glitter Boy template says "+18 MDC Armor", isn't that supposed to be better than regular armor?

Yeah, it means Non-Mega Damage weapons can't inflict any damage on the character. The Boom Gun is a Mega Damage weapon, however, so most likely a boom gun hitting another Glitter boy is going to do about 30 damage... With the 25 AP yes, that baby is going to shred another Glitterboy to pieces..

However, like I mentioned earlier... it takes 2 rounds to fire the Boom gun. You can't fire it in the same round you move. One round is spent sinking in the support struts, the next round is firing the Boom Gun. You can stay in place and keep firing it from round to round, but only in a 180 degree arc, and you can't move from your position unless you want to spend another round sinking in your support struts again... Also your friends need to not be around you or they'll get hurt too... It's not something that is going to be used every round...

Furthermore, Glitter Boys are suppose to be rare and typically in the hands of Goodguys, so you shouldn't be seeing much Glitter Boy on Glitter Boy combat unless we're talking about Quebec.

I'm also guessing the Boom Gun is going to be the highest damage player available weapon in the core book.

Quote from: Maese Mateo;894635I don't know much about either Savage Worlds or RIFTs, but the Glitter Boy template says "+18 MDC Armor", isn't that supposed to be better than regular armor?

To the best of my understanding +18 M.D.C., in SW terms will probably translate to +18 Toughness with the Heavy Armor property (i.e. only vulnerable to weapons with the Heavy Weapon property, which will probably also be renamed "Mega-Damage" for this).

In Savage Worlds you get to inflict a Wound if your damage roll beats the target's Toughness.

Kruger is right, though. Without ablative armor (and armor repair bills!) this game is going to feel a lot different from classic Rifts.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;894395...You never read the Rift books did you?

Read quite a bit up to Tolkeen. Which happens to have some of my stuff in it uncredited. As said. Aside from the two wars nothing changed. Each supplement was to one degree or another self contained. Later books might mention Atlantis or other little events. But overall its one of the least metplot driven RPGs out there. Things just... are.

Quote from: Omega;894650Read quite a bit up to Tolkien. Which happens to have some of my stuff in it uncredited. As said. Aside from the two wars nothing changed. Each supplement was to one degree or another self contained. Later books might mention Atlantis or other little events. But overall its one of the least metplot driven RPGs out there. Things just... are.

Thing is, the timeline progressed in each of the World Books, every time there was an Erin Tarn story, there was a new later date.  And the game stuff in the rules reflected the time change.  Like the Coalition War Campaign, which was the first true Coalition sourcebook suddenly had new tech replacing the stuff you'd find in the Core Book OCCs.

So yes, there was a metaplot, which clearly changed the setting, but it was subtle enough that a fair amount of people, like you apparently, never really noticed or found it impacted your game.  And for the record, other than War Campaign, Juicer Uprisings or Tolkien, none of it affected my game or fun either.  Actually, that's why I found those three books egregious because I noticed it.

Quote from: The Butcher;894649To the best of my understanding +18 M.D.C., in SW terms will probably translate to +18 Toughness with the Heavy Armor property (i.e. only vulnerable to weapons with the Heavy Weapon property, which will probably also be renamed "Mega-Damage" for this).

In Savage Worlds you get to inflict a Wound if your damage roll beats the target's Toughness.

Kruger is right, though. Without ablative armor (and armor repair bills!) this game is going to feel a lot different from classic Rifts.

Technically, you only inflict a wound for every 4 damage above the target's Toughness.

Characters in Savage Worlds have 3 wounds before being incapacitated. Going by the earlier example I mentioned, 30 damage against a 5 toughness (This assumes mega damage is in fact just heavy Armor, and not extra toughness, meaning that 25 AP is going to chew through the 18 mega Armor. AP does not effect toughness in anyway.)

5 toughness minus 30 equals 25.
25 divided by 4 equals 6 wounds.

So yes a Glitter boy hitting another Glitter boy with the Boom gun is most likely going to destroy it.

Also of note, it will also rip apart a standard Savage Worlds Dragon no problem.

Quote from: Orphan81;894675Technically, you only inflict a wound for every 4 damage above the target's Toughness.

Yeah, well, that was the on-the-cell-phone quikcie version for someone who doesn't know SW. But you're right, I stand corrected.

I think it will feel a little different than Rifts, and it should. The conceits of SW is after all "FFF" - while at last point I checked, Palladium's system is orders of magnitude more granular.

Having the Glitterboy's needing 2-rounds to set up and one-shot damn near anything that gets in their way, "sounds" about right. In my limited Rifts experience (only two fairly long campaigns) Glitterboys weren't "normal" in the sense that our only PC playing one spent a lot of time outside that armor until it was time to "get it on". But when he did - "shit got blowed up".

Two rounds for setup? That's a loooong time in Savage Worlds. But whatta payout if you succeed! I think it'll work out. But I do agree it "feels" like it will be different than standard Rifts.

Quote from: tenbones;894780I think it will feel a little different than Rifts, and it should. The conceits of SW is after all "FFF" - while at last point I checked, Palladium's system is orders of magnitude more granular.

Having the Glitterboy's needing 2-rounds to set up and one-shot damn near anything that gets in their way, "sounds" about right. In my limited Rifts experience (only two fairly long campaigns) Glitterboys weren't "normal" in the sense that our only PC playing one spent a lot of time outside that armor until it was time to "get it on". But when he did - "shit got blowed up".

Two rounds for setup? That's a loooong time in Savage Worlds. But whatta payout if you succeed! I think it'll work out. But I do agree it "feels" like it will be different than standard Rifts.

I think you're right. I've played a lot of Rifts but no savage worlds (but I did purchase all of the Solomon Kane stuff). I'm excited to have a lighter system to play Rifts with. I don't have time for Palladium games stuff as much because my time for prep has to be a lot less now that I'm a family man.

Yuck. I hate the way they are stretching this out into 3 books for what should be a big single volume. But it's so Savage Worlds for you.

Quote from: Mostlyjoe;894858Yuck. I hate the way they are stretching this out into 3 books for what should be a big single volume. But it's so Savage Worlds for you.

To be fair, it's supposed to be $15 a pop, with all three (which not everyone will need) combining into a giant robot that will devour $45. Not exactly a strain on the budget here.  And if you plan on just being a player, why do you need a DM's book?

I would have prefered a bigger book with all included but 3 small books don't bother me.

On the bright side, if we reach the 300k stretch goal (and we probably will), many of the small PDFs unlocked as stretch goals are going to be included into the Player's Guide, so we can potentially end up with a big book plus two smaller ones.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;894860To be fair, it's supposed to be $15 a pop, with all three (which not everyone will need) combining into a giant robot that will devour $45. Not exactly a strain on the budget here.  And if you plan on just being a player, why do you need a DM's book?

Pretty sure the retail on the books will be $20 a pop, like most Savage Worlds splats.

No telling if they get to that new bigger $300,000 stretch goal core book though.

Today's update (https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/545820095/rifts-for-savage-worlds/posts/1561770) has new stretch goals, including... the rules for playing a Dragon at $270,000???

That's bullshit.

Any RIFTS conversion that does not contemplate Dragon Hatchling PCs right off the bat is incomplete.

I am withdrawing my pledge until the goal (which I strongly feel should be core content) is unlocked.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;894570The thing is with a lot of Kickstarters, the issue is that they're often delayed because of all the stretch goals.  

Personally, less 'stretch goals' better book is what I want.

This is a known factor for KS games. Theres a couple of warning and advice threads on BGG about how excessive stretch goals either killed the project after, or actually cost the designer more than they made.

Quote from: Jetstream;894907Pretty sure the retail on the books will be $20 a pop, like most Savage Worlds splats.

No telling if they get to that new bigger $300,000 stretch goal core book though.

Still cheaper than a full set of D&D books.

Quote from: The Butcher;894911Today's update (https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/545820095/rifts-for-savage-worlds/posts/1561770) has new stretch goals, including... the rules for playing a Dragon at $270,000???

That's bullshit.

Any RIFTS conversion that does not contemplate Dragon Hatchling PCs right off the bat is incomplete.

I am withdrawing my pledge until the goal (which I strongly feel should be core content) is unlocked.

Butcher, there's no "converting" anything for Savage Worlds, you "translate", remember? :rolleyes:

Yeah, I understand Shane's all about "We're doing our standard proven and comfortable format to hit the target and that's it."  But when that target leaves out tons of key elements of the setting that were in just the very first core book, you have to wonder if they're going about this the right way.

The stretch goals for this thing weren't thought out well at all, most of them are 1 or 2 pagers that should have been in the Core Book to begin with.  Coalition stuff as a Stretch, really?  It kind of boggles the mind and brings into question how really Rift-knowledgable these people are.

Quote from: CRKrueger;894928Butcher, there's no "converting" anything for Savage Worlds, you "translate", remember? :rolleyes:

I am actually down with this, which I understand as a philosophy of "stat it up from scratch instead of determining e.g. a fixed exchange rate between Rifts MDC and Savage Worlds "MDC" which is probably just Heavy Armor Toughness.

Quote from: CRKrueger;894928The stretch goals for this thing weren't thought out well at all, most of them are 1 or 2 pagers that should have been in the Core Book to begin with.  Coalition stuff as a Stretch, really?  It kind of boggles the mind and brings into question how really Rift-knowledgable these people are.

I am okay with 1 to 2 page stretch goals. What worries me is what these goals reveal that's not yet in the core rulebooks. The Dragon Hatchling RCC/Framework is one. As for the Coalition stuff I do hope they mean more Coalition stuff. And what's worse, these goals are down the line from a bunch of unremarkable D-bee races. Screw N'mbyr Gorilla Men, where's my frickin' Great Horned Dragon?

Quote from: The Butcher;894939I am actually down with this, which I understand as a philosophy of "stat it up from scratch instead of determining e.g. a fixed exchange rate between Rifts MDC and Savage Worlds "MDC" which is probably just Heavy Armor Toughness.

The problem is that starts off being a good idea, and then, like always, gets taken to StupidTown.  As I said earlier, with Absorptive vs. Ablative armor there isn't going to be a conversion for that.

However, Glitterboys having a powerful weapon, but being fairly weak against each other isn't an accurate representation.  GBs are Powerful AND Tough.  There are plenty of ways to model Powerful AND Tough in Savage Worlds, for example, the M1A3 MBT.  
Q. What does every "obviously a Robotic Vehicle" have and no "obviously a Power Armor" have?  
A. A Reinforced Pilot's Compartment.

Q. What does the Glitterboy have?
A. A Reinforced Pilot's Compartment.

It's a vehicle, give it it's own Toughness and Armor, done.

That's what should have happened, but because every Savage Idiot is so fucking arrogant with their "No Conversion" horseshit, that when you bring up that the Glitterboy is now a Glass Cannon hardly anything like the original, you get the "there's no way to convert exactly" etc. etc.

It's become a Mantra, ie. a shortcut to thinking used to stifle ideas and shut down criticism.  No new rules were needed to model the Glitterboy and have it stay true to the setting - it just wasn't done. Period.

Quote from: The Butcher;894939I am okay with 1 to 2 page stretch goals. What worries me is what these goals reveal that's not yet in the core rulebooks. The Dragon Hatchling RCC/Framework is one. As for the Coalition stuff I do hope they mean more Coalition stuff. And what's worse, these goals are down the line from a bunch of unremarkable D-bee races. Screw N'mbyr Gorilla Men, where's my frickin' Great Horned Dragon?

Not to mention Shifter, because Shifters are bad and Erin Tarn's Power Rangers don't have any. :rolleyes:

Quote from: The Butcher;894911Today's update (https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/545820095/rifts-for-savage-worlds/posts/1561770) has new stretch goals, including... the rules for playing a Dragon at $270,000???

That's bullshit.

Any RIFTS conversion that does not contemplate Dragon Hatchling PCs right off the bat is incomplete.

I am withdrawing my pledge until the goal (which I strongly feel should be core content) is unlocked.

You were willing to back it without those things because they were not listed as a stretch goal. What changed between a few days ago being willing to pre order the products and today?

Quote from: CRKrueger;894943Q. What does every "obviously a Robotic Vehicle" have and no "obviously a Power Armor" have?  
A. A Reinforced Pilot's Compartment.

Q. What does the Glitterboy have?
A. A Reinforced Pilot's Compartment.

It's a vehicle, give it it's own Toughness and Armor, done.

That's what should have happened, but because every Savage Idiot is so fucking arrogant with their "No Conversion" horseshit, that when you bring up that the Glitterboy is now a Glass Cannon hardly anything like the original, you get the "there's no way to convert exactly" etc. etc.

Yeah, that would probably have been for the best. The GB does skirt the line between power armor and robot vehicle, as do many Triax suits (such as the Ulti-Max which IMHO would be a way more appropriate stretch goal than the Jaeger).

Quote from: CRKrueger;894943Not to mention Shifter, because Shifters are bad and Erin Tarn's Power Rangers don't have any. :rolleyes:

No Shifters too??? WTF??? :mad:

Shifters are actually my favorite class.

Quote from: Ulairi;894945You were willing to back it without those things because they were not listed as a stretch goal. What changed between a few days ago being willing to pre order the products and today?

I didn't know these things were not included. They're such an iconic (heh) RIFTS thing that it hadn't even ocurred to me that someone would release a version of RIFTS without an option for Dragon Hatchling PCs.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;894925Still cheaper than a full set of D&D books.

The three 5e books can be had pre-order for around 85$ hardbound and clock in at around 1000 pages total.

Rifts core is around 250 pages for 25$. Ultimate at a little over 370 pages is 30$.

Dont see any listing for page count for the core books so far. But currently at 45-50$ Is there any news on what the page count will be for the three?

Quote from: Omega;894955The three 5e books can be had pre-order for around 85$ hardbound and clock in at around 1000 pages total.

Rifts core is around 250 pages for 25$. Ultimate at a little over 370 pages is 30$.

Dont see any listing for page count for the core books so far. But currently at 45-50$ Is there any news on what the page count will be for the three?

You've forgotten to factor in the MDC book binding that all Palladium books have:)  I've never have seen one of their bindings fail.  5e's binding....  I've had one go as soon as the book was opened (DMG).  The replacement that WoTC sent did the same thing.

Quote from: RunningLaser;894959You've forgotten to factor in the MDC book binding that all Palladium books have:)  I've never have seen one of their bindings fail.  5e's binding....  I've had one go as soon as the book was opened (DMG).  The replacement that WoTC sent did the same thing.

I guess it's called Perfect Bound for a reason?

Quote from: RunningLaser;894959You've forgotten to factor in the MDC book binding that all Palladium books have:)  I've never have seen one of their bindings fail.  5e's binding....  I've had one go as soon as the book was opened (DMG).  The replacement that WoTC sent did the same thing.

Just keep asking for replacements until they stop failing.

I don't understand how iconic Rifts elements are being ignored. WTF happened with all the "we're Rifts junkies, trust us"???

Also, the stretch goals confuse me. WTF would I want a bunch of short PDF articles? That shit needs to be in the core book.

I'm getting less impressed the more I see from this KS.

In the Core Book or just...in a book, period.  They started this thing basically with the straight jacket of...

• 3 books only 96 pages each.
• Delivered by X date.

They really should have closed the Kickstarter after they got the 8,000 dollars.  All the physical swag is add-on cost, the size of the KS means nothing to the physical adds.  All the Palladium stuff is the exact same stuff you can buy from Palladium at the exact same price.  The size of the KS means nothing to Palladium content.

What are you paying for with the Stretch goals?  There's two adventures and a character folio in there, ok.  But most of them are articles focused on literally one specific thing, 1-2 pages at most.

So basically every new level of $5,000 to $10,000 increments, Sean Patrick Fannon or somebody at Pinnacle pages through a Rifts book, writes up stats for a single race or single piece of power armor, then writes up the copy in Illustrator using layout templates they already have sitting there.

$10,000 dollars to look at Northern Gun II and "translate" the stats for a 2-page article on the Gun Wolf and lay it out.  That has to be the highest paid job in the RPG industry.  Especially since these 1-2 page articles belong in other books.  Unless they enjoy leaving money on the table, there's a race book coming, so the handful of races they are Stretch Goaling should have been in there.  Northern Gun. Ditto.  Triax. Ditto (also as a side rant - Why the hell is a Triax Jager in the KS, there's no Jagers in NA, that's an NGR military machine.  Predators, Hoppers and Ultimax are what Triax sells in NA.)

Look at the Weird Wars I KS.  What are the stretch goals there?

• Archetypes - Lists of various types of NPCs representing all the basic soldier types from the different armies, and Figure Flats so you can use them at the table.
• Plot Point Campaigns.
• One-Shot adventures.

You could argue that all the archetypes should have been in the main book increasing the size by a few dozen pages or that there should have been a book with all the soldier types in it, but at least each pack is self-contained and topical.

Sixth Gun
Physical cards, archetypes, figure flats, artwork and comic from the creator of the Sixth Gun graphic novels, etc...

This KS is so...atypical that I think it has to be Kevin.  Looking deeper into things as I'm writing this, I think it's most definitely Kevin.  Palladium is going to be putting out it's own Action Deck(or Adventure Deck) for Savage Rifts, that really says it all, doesn't it?  They probably don't have the license to do Figure Flats either as that counts as miniatures and we know how Kevin is with that.

Quote from: RunningLaser;894959You've forgotten to factor in the MDC book binding that all Palladium books have:)  I've never have seen one of their bindings fail.  5e's binding....  I've had one go as soon as the book was opened (DMG).  The replacement that WoTC sent did the same thing.

Yeah. Say what you will of Palladium. But their binding was great. Lamination on the other hand... not so great.

See my commentary on the warping of the pages on all thee 5e books. They flattened out eventually but yeesh. And so far only my PHB had questionable binding. Others reported worse.

My DMG. This was the least warped.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]5[/ATTACH]

It is pretty clear to me that Savage Rifts is not for me but I do hope that they will be more ambitious with this licence than doing what they are doing. I think that bring Phase World to the Savage World Rifts would be far more interesting.

Quote from: CRKrueger;895122All the physical swag is add-on cost, the size of the KS means nothing to the physical adds.

Well, if they reach the 300k goal (they probably will), the Player's Guide will get its size increased with the small PDF content unlocked.

That said, I know what you mean. I found this KS atypical as well, but still I'm backing at the 45 usd tier for all the PDFs (I never back for physical rewards anyway, save for FFG's SW almost all my gaming purchases are digital). I wish they had done a single Core Book, with a stretch goal to get the full Savage Worlds rules included on it (I'm paying 45usd but still have to pay 10usd more to be able to play the thing, it's alsmost what I've payed for a FFG's SW corebook and those books are 400+ pages monsters), or at least they could have included the SW Deluxe PDF in the 45usd package (or at the very least allow a 5usd add-on to get the pdf at a discount).

So does the Glitterboy's boom gun stow away on the back or what?  It is on a track system that pulls it up and over the shoulder when needed?  Despite enjoying Rifts books over the years, it's a question I've never really looked into or thought to question (always more a fan of characters that power themselves instead of needing power armor).

If I recall right, there was a diagram in the first Rifts rulebook that showed the boom gun being pulled down over the shoulder.

Quote from: The Butcher;894911Today's update (https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/545820095/rifts-for-savage-worlds/posts/1561770) has new stretch goals, including... the rules for playing a Dragon at $270,000???

That's bullshit.

Any RIFTS conversion that does not contemplate Dragon Hatchling PCs right off the bat is incomplete.

I am withdrawing my pledge until the goal (which I strongly feel should be core content) is unlocked.

Obviously, it's your pledge, and you can do what you like with it, but Kicktraq's low-line projection is on the order of $420K, so I think that pulling your pledge only to add it back again in a couple of days seems like a bit of extraneous work on your part. That being said, I agree with your sentiment, and I'm hoping we can get a full list of what's in the player's book so we don't end up with more frustrating surprises appearing in the stretch goals.

Quote from: ArtemisAlpha;895416Obviously, it's your pledge, and you can do what you like with it, but Kicktraq's low-line projection is on the order of $420K, so I think that pulling your pledge only to add it back again in a couple of days seems like a bit of extraneous work on your part. That being said, I agree with your sentiment, and I'm hoping we can get a full list of what's in the player's book so we don't end up with more frustrating surprises appearing in the stretch goals.

The stretch goal is only for Flame Scale dragon hatchlings, which is too arbitrarily narrow. I can't imagine adding in the other dragon hatchlings would be that much more work...

This was posted by Sean Patrick Fannon on the Savage Worlds Facebook page:

Quote from: SPF on FacebookCombat Cyborgs, Crazies, Cyber-Knights, Glitter Boys, Juicers, M.A.R.S. (Mercenaries, Adventurers, Rogues, Scholars: Body-Fixers/Cyber-Docs, City Rats, Cybernetic Techno Warriors, Merc Soldiers, Operators, Power Armor Soldiers, Psi-Operators, Robor Armor Pilots, Rogue Scholars/Scientists, Vagabonds, Wilderness Scouts), Bursters, Mind Melters, Ley Line Walkers, Mystics, Techno-Wizards.

Because so many have asked.

And now... so much more.

Quote from: RunningLaser;895409If I recall right, there was a diagram in the first Rifts rulebook that showed the boom gun being pulled down over the shoulder.

There was some discussion on the Palladium fora and apparently the guns been drawn wrong on the armature for a long time. If the comments were right then the gun moves over the shoulder then forward. Think diagram you mention showed that too.

Quote from: Imaginos;895432This was posted by Sean Patrick Fannon on the Savage Worlds Facebook page:

"Cybernetic Techno Warriors" would be Headhunters?

Quote from: Crabbyapples;895418The stretch goal is only for Flame Scale dragon hatchlings, which is too arbitrarily narrow. I can't imagine adding in the other dragon hatchlings would be that much more work...

Well this is going to be an entire new line and not just a few books. I kind of want them to hit the RUE core classes first and add others as they add new books.

Any news about Naruni hardware and the Splugorth menace ?

Quote from: The Butcher;895550"Cybernetic Techno Warriors" would be Headhunters?

That'd be my guess.

For me it's not a matter of whether or not I back it, but at what level. I am really tempted to get Just The Books but would I actually use the books? :D

I wonder if this will be popular enough to trigger a "RIFTS OSR"?

Quote from: RPGPundit;895748I wonder if this will be popular enough to trigger a "RIFTS OSR"?

Isn't that the Palladium System already considering it's heavily...inspired by AD&D?

Quote from: Ulairi;895796Isn't that the Palladium System already considering it's heavily...inspired by AD&D?

The Palladium Role Playing Game is, but stripped down in many ways.  It's one of the original clones :)

Quote from: RPGPundit;895748I wonder if this will be popular enough to trigger a "RIFTS OSR"?

Not sure. Rifts has always been in print and will remain so for the foreseeable future. As long as Kevin's got a pulse and a dollar to his name he'll be around cranking out Rifts stuff... and C&D letters.

Without the sede vacante period of being OOP, it doesn't really make much sense to speak of a renaissance. As for creating and ddistributing DIY stuff for Palladium games, there was a lively web scene in the late 1990s (pre-Rifter), not sure how it's faring these days, but no one has and no one will ever make a dollar out of it without signing up with Palladium.

Quote from: RunningLaser;895800The Palladium Role Playing Game is, but stripped down in many ways.  It's one of the original clones :)

yeah and Rifts is based on the same engine. I don't really know how Rifts could be more of an OSR type game. I think it kind of already is.

Quote from: RPGPundit;895748I wonder if this will be popular enough to trigger a "RIFTS OSR"?

Depends on if Rifts 1st ed is still on sale or how much 2e changed. Which sounds like not much. Considering Rifs hasnt changed much at all since the start. It is its own OSR. aheh.

I dont think a conversion set will change anything no more than d20 Call of Cthulhu or Gurps Vampire or system 26 Metamorphosis Alpha did. They are just kind of... there.

Quote from: The Butcher;895810As for creating and ddistributing DIY stuff for Palladium games, there was a lively web scene in the late 1990s (pre-Rifter), not sure how it's faring these days, but no one has and no one will ever make a dollar out of it without signing up with Palladium.

Dont know if its still on the site. But one of Palladiums TOU stipulations was essentially "You make a fanwork of our IP. We own it!"

Quote from: The Butcher;894911Today's update (https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/545820095/rifts-for-savage-worlds/posts/1561770) has new stretch goals, including... the rules for playing a Dragon at $270,000???

That's bullshit.

Any RIFTS conversion that does not contemplate Dragon Hatchling PCs right off the bat is incomplete.

I am withdrawing my pledge until the goal (which I strongly feel should be core content) is unlocked.

Dragons are in now. And the odds against them missing $300k are astronomical. The dragons might actually be in the book proper, depending on how many of the stretch goals they can cram in there.

Quote from: Jetstream;896610Dragons are in now.

And so am I, to the tune of $45 :D

Quote from: The Butcher;896825And so am I, to the tune of $45 :D

Honestly, I wish I could.  I know I've slagged off on KS for a while now...  But this is Rifts!  This WAS my mid to late 90s.  Most of them.  The other 40% was CP2020...  OK, 30% with 10% going to D&D, but at least 60% of 1993 to 1999 was Rifts in some fashion.  I hate being broke and poor.  I can't even afford the player's handbook.

This, in a word, sucks.

Hope you enjoy it, Butch.

Quote from: The Butcher;896825And so am I, to the tune of $45 :D

I'm getting the hardcovers. Fuck it. In for a penny, in for a pound, all that nonsense.

Quote from: Jetstream;896834I'm getting the hardcovers. Fuck it. In for a penny, in for a pound, all that nonsense.

If it wasn't for the insane $70 shipping plus the strong dollar I'd be right there with you. :(

Quote from: The Butcher;896851If it wasn't for the insane $70 shipping plus the strong dollar I'd be right there with you. :(

Australia? Or Spain? Those are the only two countries I ever dealt with that had consistently abysmal shipping for anything bigger than an envelope.

I ended up having to drop it.  Going through a divorce, so can't spend the money on a game right now.  :(

Quote from: Imaginos;896892I ended up having to drop it.  Going through a divorce, so can't spend the money on a game right now.  :(

Having been through that- hang in there.

Quote from: Omega;896876Australia? Or Spain? Those are the only two countries I ever dealt with that had consistently abysmal shipping for anything bigger than an envelope.

Brazil, actually. It's all bad, even Canada is getting charged like $50.

Spain might be better off now that they've secured an EU printer.

Quote from: Imaginos;896892I ended up having to drop it.  Going through a divorce, so can't spend the money on a game right now.  :(

Harsh. Hoping for the best. Take care.

Quote from: The Butcher;896851If it wasn't for the insane $70 shipping plus the strong dollar I'd be right there with you. :(

oh god I'm afraid to find out how much shipping to SE Asia would have been >.>

Quote from: Jetstream;896834I'm getting the hardcovers. Fuck it. In for a penny, in for a pound, all that nonsense.

Yeah - I'm ramping severely down on kickstarters due to my wife's medical woes, but I've been anticipating this for so long I put the money down anyway.  (Although not for the hardcovers.)

The only other kickstarter I'm active in is James Ernest's Tak (https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/cheapassgames/tak-a-beautiful-game), which is an abstract board game based on some fantasy novel I haven't heard of. (And even there I'm just getting the book, planning on grabbing a bunch of legos for pieces.)

After this, I'm planning on going quiet on Kickstarter for a while.

My wife broke her foot two weeks ago and last Friday had surgery on said foot so I really cannot afford the KickStarter but I'm a huge Rifts fan that I'm going to do it anyway. Just terrible timing. I'm off Kickstarters for a while. I don't like pay all this money up front and wait 6 months to get your product (or almost a year in the case of DCC RPG 4th Printing).

Quote from: The Butcher;896980...even Canada is getting charged like $50.

Yeah maybe the PDF option is the way to go. I can always get stuff printed next Lulu sale.

Quote from: Ulairi;897060My wife broke her foot two weeks ago and last Friday had surgery on said foot so I really cannot afford the KickStarter but I'm a huge Rifts fan that I'm going to do it anyway. Just terrible timing. I'm off Kickstarters for a while. I don't like pay all this money up front and wait 6 months to get your product (or almost a year in the case of DCC RPG 4th Printing).

Oooh, I was in on that 4th printing too.  At least we've got the pdf, although it's a bit busy for my tablet to easily read it. :)

Quote from: jcfiala;897073Oooh, I was in on that 4th printing too.  At least we've got the pdf, although it's a bit busy for my tablet to easily read it. :)

I hate reference books as PDFs. I need physical paper.

Quote from: The Butcher;896980It's all bad, even Canada is getting charged like $50.

I msg'd them about the shipping costs and have heard nothing back. Bit disappointed by that, as there is no way it costs $50 bucks to ship to Canada from the States, or anywhere else in the world when shipping to the USA is 1/3rd that price.

It smacks of price gouging via shipping (the way the majority of sellers on ebay do [scumbags set an items price dirt cheap to get you to buy it then charge you an arm and a leg for shipping])

Quote from: Gwarh;897224I msg'd them about the shipping costs and have heard nothing back. Bit disappointed by that, as there is no way it costs $50 bucks to ship to Canada from the States, or anywhere else in the world when shipping to the USA is 1/3rd that price.

It smacks of price gouging via shipping (the way the majority of sellers on ebay do [scumbags set an items price dirt cheap to get you to buy it then charge you an arm and a leg for shipping])

Yes, its that expensive. A big company like Amazon can eat a lot of the S&H prices. There have been Kickstarters that have killed themselves by trying to eat the S&H. I don't ship internationally often but every time the prices kill me.

Canada 5lb package.
(http://i1222.photobucket.com/albums/dd496/ShawnMerrow/misc/Canada%20shipping_zpsz36pjcpp.png) (http://s1222.photobucket.com/user/ShawnMerrow/media/misc/Canada%20shipping_zpsz36pjcpp.png.html)

Australia 5lb package.
(http://i1222.photobucket.com/albums/dd496/ShawnMerrow/misc/shipping%20australia_zpsqybjjya3.png) (http://s1222.photobucket.com/user/ShawnMerrow/media/misc/shipping%20australia_zpsqybjjya3.png.html)

So how the fuck is Savage Worlds as a system? As a Rifts fan, I'm interested, but the system sounds too rules lite for me.

I'd probably be happy with a Rifts that's just using a streamlined and cleaned up Palladium system. So that might give you an idea of how crunchy I like my rules.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;897302So how the fuck is Savage Worlds as a system? As a Rifts fan, I'm interested, but the system sounds too rules lite for me.

I'd probably be happy with a Rifts that's just using a streamlined and cleaned up Palladium system. So that might give you an idea of how crunchy I like my rules.

Been wondering this too. Was not impressed with SW Star Frontiers at all.

As for Rifts. Its actually a remarkably rules light system. Combat and Skill and not much else. Roll a d20 to hit and roll a percentile to succeed a skill. 95% of Rifts is setting, OCCs/RCCs, equipment and spells/powers.

I did a quick search on rates from New York New York to my home city of Edmonton Canada and came up with the below rates. Basically 1/2 the cost in USD (inface a smidge less than half) of what the Rifts Kickstarter is charging for shipping to Canada.

I understand that shipping product isn't cheap but when I can get shipping to and from the same loc for 50% less than what the Kickstarter is charging, I won't pretend to be sympathetic and understanding with the publisher.

The cost and profit should be built into the kickstarter price, not tacked on via shipping costs. Thats like having a price tag on a pair pants at the rack say one thing, then your charged a handling fee at the cash register. It makes the project look more appealing for the initial purchase, then the extra costs come after you've made the emotional comitment to buy the product.

Caveat Emptor I know I know, but as a customer I am also seeking a better deal on shipping.


//www.canadapost.ca
Edmonton Alberta to New York
5lb box
10x12x6
$28.89 CDN = $22.58 USD

//www.usps.com
New York to Edmonton Alberta
5lb box
10x12x6
$8162 CDN = $63.75 USD

//www.fedex.com
New York to Edmonton Alberta
5lb box
10x12x6
5 day shipping rate
$30.52 CDN = $23.84 USD

//www.purolator.com
New York to Edmonton Alberta
5lb box
10x12x6
Ground/Slow rate
$31.51 CDN = $24.61 USD

//www.ups.com
Cant get rates without creating an account and signing in.
Should be competitive rates with other private shipping companies

Wait a second, there was a Savage Worlds Star Frontiers Kickstarter ?!??!!?!

Quote from: Shawn Merrow;897284Yes, its that expensive. A big company like Amazon can eat a lot of the S&H prices. There have been Kickstarters that have killed themselves by trying to eat the S&H. I don't ship internationally often but every time the prices kill me.

I did a quick search on rates from New York New York to my home city of Edmonton Canada and came up with the below rates. Basically 1/2 the cost in USD (inface a smidge less than half) of what the Rifts Kickstarter is charging for shipping to Canada.

I understand that shipping product isn't cheap but when I can get shipping to and from the same loc for 50% less than what the Kickstarter is charging, I won't pretend to be sympathetic and understanding with the publisher.

The cost and profit should be built into the kickstarter price, not tacked on via shipping costs. Thats like having a price tag on a pair pants at the rack say one thing, then your charged a handling fee at the cash register. It makes the project look more appealing for the initial purchase, then the extra costs come after you've made the emotional comitment to buy the product.

Caveat Emptor I know I know, but as a customer I am also seeking a better deal on shipping.


//www.canadapost.ca
Edmonton Alberta to New York
5lb box
10x12x6
$28.89 CDN = $22.58 USD

//www.usps.com
New York to Edmonton Alberta
5lb box
10x12x6
$8162 CDN = $63.75 USD

//www.fedex.com
New York to Edmonton Alberta
5lb box
10x12x6
5 day shipping rate
$30.52 CDN = $23.84 USD

//www.purolator.com
New York to Edmonton Alberta
5lb box
10x12x6
Ground/Slow rate
$31.51 CDN = $24.61 USD

//www.ups.com
Cant get rates without creating an account and signing in.
Should be competitive rates with other private shipping companies

Quote from: Shawn Merrow;897284Yes, its that expensive. A big company like Amazon can eat a lot of the S&H prices. There have been Kickstarters that have killed themselves by trying to eat the S&H. I don't ship internationally often but every time the prices kill me.

I did a quick search on rates from New York New York to my home city of Edmonton Canada and came up with the below rates. Basically 1/2 the cost in USD (inface a smidge less than half) of what the Rifts Kickstarter is charging for shipping to Canada.

I understand that shipping product isn't cheap but when I can get shipping to and from the same loc for 50% less than what the Kickstarter is charging, I won't pretend to be sympathetic and understanding with the publisher.

The cost and profit should be built into the kickstarter price, not tacked on via shipping costs. Thats like having a price tag on a pair pants at the rack say one thing, then your charged a handling fee at the cash register. It makes the project look more appealing for the initial purchase, then the extra costs come after you've made the emotional comitment to buy the product.

Caveat Emptor I know I know, but as a customer I am also seeking a better deal on shipping.


//www.canadapost.ca
Edmonton Alberta to New York
5lb box
10x12x6
$28.89 CDN = $22.58 USD

//www.usps.com
New York to Edmonton Alberta
5lb box
10x12x6
$8162 CDN = $63.75 USD

//www.fedex.com
New York to Edmonton Alberta
5lb box
10x12x6
5 day shipping rate
$30.52 CDN = $23.84 USD

//www.purolator.com
New York to Edmonton Alberta
5lb box
10x12x6
Ground/Slow rate
$31.51 CDN = $24.61 USD

//www.ups.com
Cant get rates without creating an account and signing in.
Should be competitive rates with other private shipping companies

Quote from: Omega;897336Been wondering this too. Was not impressed with SW Star Frontiers at all.

As for Rifts. Its actually a remarkably rules light system. Combat and Skill and not much else. Roll a d20 to hit and roll a percentile to succeed a skill. 95% of Rifts is setting, OCCs/RCCs, equipment and spells/powers.

WAIT A SECOND!!!

There was a Savage Worlds Kickstarter?!??!!?

Quote from: Gwarh;897369WAIT A SECOND!!!

There was a Savage Worlds Kickstarter?!??!!?

If I had to guess, I'd say he's talking about The Last Parsec as it's the closest sci-fi setting SW has to Star Frontiers. The Kickstarter shipped out books about a year ago.

Quote from: Omega;897336Been wondering this too. Was not impressed with SW Star Frontiers at all.

As for Rifts. Its actually a remarkably rules light system. Combat and Skill and not much else. Roll a d20 to hit and roll a percentile to succeed a skill. 95% of Rifts is setting, OCCs/RCCs, equipment and spells/powers.

Oh yeah. Once you drill down, the Rifts Palladium system is fairly simple, but it's got a ton of wonky bits. Easily the system that I had to make the most houserules for.

Quote from: Brand55;897372If I had to guess, I'd say he's talking about The Last Parsec as it's the closest sci-fi setting SW has to Star Frontiers. The Kickstarter shipped out books about a year ago.

Fan made Star Frontiers book for Savage Worlds. Least pretty sure it is. Unfinished so thats part of the un-impressed part.

Quote from: Omega;897405Fan made Star Frontiers book for Savage Worlds. Least pretty sure it is. Unfinished so thats part of the un-impressed part.

I don't think I'd compare 99% of the fan-made supplements available online (in general, not SW specific) to a professionally released product from an established company.

The underlying system isn't going to change.  Also as mentioned elsewhere, "Savages" think their system is perfect and every setting needs to be completely rewritten and classified in SW terms where necessary to make things fit.  You want to tack on a setting rule or two to tweak a couple things, that's one thing, but suggest even minor rules hacks and you no longer are "FFF".  They're like fucking Stepford Fans.

Anyone on the fence about Savage Worlds can get a pretty good feel for the system by checking out the free Test Drive rules available at Pinnacle's website here: https://www.peginc.com/freebies/SWcore/TD06.pdf (https://www.peginc.com/freebies/SWcore/TD06.pdf)

The game isn't super crunchy but does offer quite a bit of character customization options through Edges. A lot will depend on the exact setting you use, too, as some modify the core SW rules more than others. Realms of Cthulhu, for example, offers multiple sanity and damage rules to let you play a traditional pulpy, SW-style game or more of a CoC adventure where characters die or go crazy with relative ease.

Quote from: CRKrueger;897418The underlying system isn't going to change.  Also as mentioned elsewhere, "Savages" think their system is perfect and every setting needs to be completely rewritten and classified in SW terms where necessary to make things fit.  You want to tack on a setting rule or two to tweak a couple things, that's one thing, but suggest even minor rules hacks and you no longer are "FFF".  They're like fucking Stepford Fans.

Yeah, but the post clarifying even mentioned that the publication was unfinished, which was part of the unimpressed part.  So my commentary is more to do with basing apples on oranges instead of pears on pears.

My best friend doesn't care for the SW rules either, so I can understand that.  It is part of what makes it not-so-painful to have to drop the kickstarter (don't know if we'd ever get it to the table with his dislike of the rules).  So no issue with not caring for the rules.

Quote from: CRKrueger;897418The underlying system isn't going to change.  Also as mentioned elsewhere, "Savages" think their system is perfect and every setting needs to be completely rewritten and classified in SW terms where necessary to make things fit.  You want to tack on a setting rule or two to tweak a couple things, that's one thing, but suggest even minor rules hacks and you no longer are "FFF".  They're like fucking Stepford Fans.

Oh, of course they fucking are.  *roll eyes*  Because, you know, fans of every fucking game have some people who are rabid degenerates who can't stand it when people disagree with them on their game.  Happily, none of them populate this board.

I rather like Savage Worlds, but not for fucking everything and if you need to change a fucking rule here or there, feel free!  It's your fucking game, do what you like.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;897302So how the fuck is Savage Worlds as a system? As a Rifts fan, I'm interested, but the system sounds too rules lite for me.

I'd probably be happy with a Rifts that's just using a streamlined and cleaned up Palladium system. So that might give you an idea of how crunchy I like my rules.

I like Savage Worlds for large scale combat games using minis.

But for you, it sounds like a better bet is just taking a hammer to the PB system. There are plenty of house rules for Rifts floating around the web, and its not that hard to do your own streamlining and cleaning. RPGPundit even has a Palladium houserules sticky on his forum.

For me, I prefer rules light so I took Palladium's Mechanoids system (the precursor to Rifts), fixed that to my taste, and then pull over what I want from Rifts.

Quote from: Gwarh;897368I did a quick search on rates from New York New York to my home city of Edmonton Canada and came up with the below rates. Basically 1/2 the cost in USD (inface a smidge less than half) of what the Rifts Kickstarter is charging for shipping to Canada.

Send them the links you found. Maybe they can get a better deal for Canadian fans.

Of course, the KS may be charging SHIPPING and HANDLING. aka, they are using a 3rd party shipping company which packs the shit and mails it to you and eats the costs of stuff that goes missing via insurance.  

I get International Mail costs if you can't drive there, but damn, if we can mail shit cheap from NY to LA, then we gotta be able to do the same with Canuckistan.

BTW, if Canadians go to GenCon and buy a shitload of books, do they get fucked by customs at the border when they get home?

Quote from: Gwarh;897369There was a Savage Worlds Kickstarter?!??!!?

Star Frontiers - Players Book
http://savageheroes.com/conversions/sfplayers.pdf

Star Frontiers - Referee book
http://savageheroes.com/conversions/SFreferee.pdf

Here's a link to lots more:
http://savagepedia.wikispaces.com/Savage+Conversions

I can't comment to completeness or quality, but I did download a few for eventual reading.

Quote from: jcfiala;897434Because, you know, fans of every fucking game have some people who are rabid degenerates who can't stand it when people disagree with them on their game.  Happily, none of them populate this board.

We are blessed. :)

BTW, the Palladium Books forums are actually a good place to talk Rifts house rules. Lots of GMs who share their hacks to the PB system.

http://palladium-megaverse.com/forums/index.php

Quote from: jcfiala;897434Oh, of course they fucking are.  *roll eyes*  Because, you know, fans of every fucking game have some people who are rabid degenerates who can't stand it when people disagree with them on their game.  Happily, none of them populate this board.

I rather like Savage Worlds, but not for fucking everything and if you need to change a fucking rule here or there, feel free!  It's your fucking game, do what you like.

Been reading the KS comments and a lot of posts on the Pinnacle Forums lately, so as a result, I've just about had it with the frickin' Savages and their bullshit.

I honestly don't think this thing is gonna do Rifts without neutering just about everything.  I do think it will be perfect to use for 40k though.

I ended up canceling my pledge last night. My wife had foot surgery and then was back in the ER because of infection so the money is tight and the more and more I think about it, I'd rather drop the $250 on Palladium products.

Quote from: CRKrueger;897418The underlying system isn't going to change.  Also as mentioned elsewhere, "Savages" think their system is perfect and every setting needs to be completely rewritten and classified in SW terms where necessary to make things fit.  You want to tack on a setting rule or two to tweak a couple things, that's one thing, but suggest even minor rules hacks and you no longer are "FFF".  They're like fucking Stepford Fans.

Amen CRKrueger

I like the Savage Worlds game engine, but for 1 small'ish thing. I want stats to have an impact on skill rolls, and in the rules a written they don't.

I've gone to the official forums a few times over the last decade posting for tips or ideas on how to house rule stats impacting skill rolls. You'd think I was speaking herasy by the responses I got. All I ever get are replies that it's not needed, why would you want to do that, stats do effect skills by how much the cost to raise, don't do it as it will break the delicate and perfect math behind the game/rolls. Give me a break!

I just gave up asking on the official forums and scoured the net for fan house rules on fan pages. It's annoying as it keeps me from fully embracing the game as it is a really good light game engine aside from my one personal sticking point.

Quote from: Gwarh;897528I've gone to the official forums a few times over the last decade posting for tips or ideas on how to house rule stats impacting skill rolls. You'd think I was speaking herasy by the responses I got. All I ever get are replies that it's not needed, why would you want to do that, stats do effect skills by how much the cost to raise, don't do it as it will break the delicate and perfect math behind the game/rolls. Give me a break!

I'd be interested in seeing these houserules of yours. You may wanna put them in another thread or PM them to me! Sounds interesting to me!

Quote from: Gwarh;897528Amen CRKrueger

I like the Savage Worlds game engine, but for 1 small'ish thing. I want stats to have an impact on skill rolls, and in the rules a written they don't.

I've gone to the official forums a few times over the last decade posting for tips or ideas on how to house rule stats impacting skill rolls. You'd think I was speaking herasy by the responses I got. All I ever get are replies that it's not needed, why would you want to do that, stats do effect skills by how much the cost to raise, don't do it as it will break the delicate and perfect math behind the game/rolls. Give me a break!

I just gave up asking on the official forums and scoured the net for fan house rules on fan pages. It's annoying as it keeps me from fully embracing the game as it is a really good light game engine aside from my one personal sticking point.

That's a bit weird since I've seen somewhat involved discussions among SW fans regarding things like alternate damage systems. Trust me, there are plenty of fans out there who are open to trying new things with the system, at least as many as there are who don't want to deviate much (if at all) from the core rules. It sucks that you ran into a wall when trying to get ideas for your own stuff.

I don't know if you ever found a solution that works for you, but probably the simplest solution would be to just add a bonus or penalty to the roll based on whether the attribute is higher or lower than the given skill. Personally, though, I'd probably go for more of a Cortex approach. Drop the Wild Die entirely and use attribute + skill for all Trait rolls. Adjust the calculations for things like Parry and Toughness accordingly; for example, Parry would = [(Fighting + Agility)/2] - 1.

Wild Cards can basically be used as-is. Extras require a little work. You can just give any Extras you create the stats you want to roll based on what you see their attributes and skill levels to be. For published Extras, average their attribute and skill ratings. Every die of difference adds a +1 bonus to the lower die, and every two dice of difference bumps it up one die type. So, for example, the crocodile (Agility d4, Fighting d8) from Savage Worlds Deluxe would roll a d6 to hit its foes, the dragon (Agility d8, Fighting d10) would use d8 + 1 to bite, and the giant spider (Strength d10, Climbing d12+2) would actually roll d12+1 when moving around its web.

This also has the benefit of allowing you to separate attributes and skills (which I am very much in favor of, personally). A character could make a Smarts + Climbing roll to determine the best way to get up the cliff behind the evil baron's castle, then make the actual Strength + Climbing roll to get up to the top.

Quote from: CRKrueger;897462Been reading the KS comments and a lot of posts on the Pinnacle Forums lately, so as a result, I've just about had it with the frickin' Savages and their bullshit.

WTF happened?

Is SW just not story game enough for you like Conan 2D20? (Just kidding!!! Put the Cimmerian sword down!)

BTW, I just got this fucked up email from Modiphius that they may start a Living Conan and Living Mutant Chronicles campaign. Now I may have to buy the damn hippie game. I'm so fucked because I've really, really, really wanted to play a Conan on-going campaign.

Now I'll try Conan 2D20 and a month later I'll probably be crying about safe spaces and triggering.

My soul. It is lost.

Quote from: CRKrueger;897462I honestly don't think this thing is gonna do Rifts without neutering just about everything.  I do think it will be perfect to use for 40k though.

What about the Savage Rifts KS is going to neuter Rifts? And what specific part of Rifts?

It's weird how Rifts doesn't convert.  Whenever Rifts is brought to a "better system", the flavor gets too diluted.

Quote from: Ulairi;897506I'd rather drop the $250 on Palladium products.

Unless you have a FLGS you want to support, I suggest two options for the biggest bang for your Palladium buck:

1) Buy lots off eBay. I've often found people selling 10+ books in one auction. I've bought several, then sold the overlap back on eBay as my own lot. If you don't mind used books, this is a fast way to amass a large collection. Then read them, toss the ones you don't like back on eBay.

Yes, I know buying used books makes you the enemy of all that is good in the world. But hey, what can people expect from us racist sexist terrorists? :)

2) If you want new books and you want to support Palladium, then wait for the Christmas Grab Bag sale. The deals are good, and you have your books signed too. Does that matter? Players seem to like it when I show them off. My goober cred is strong!

Quote from: Spinachcat;897809What about the Savage Rifts KS is going to neuter Rifts? And what specific part of Rifts?

It's weird how Rifts doesn't convert.  Whenever Rifts is brought to a "better system", the flavor gets too diluted.

Savage Worlds is too balanced for Rifts.

Yes. Yes it is.

Let it sink in for a moment.

Quote from: The Butcher;897825Savage Worlds is too balanced for Rifts.

Yes. Yes it is.

Let it sink in for a moment.

Or not flexible enough?

That seems to be a kinda recurring comment when someone doesnt like SW. That SW forces the settings to flex rather than the game?

How close is that though?

Quote from: Spinachcat;897809BTW, I just got this fucked up email from Modiphius that they may start a Living Conan and Living Mutant Chronicles campaign. Now I may have to buy the damn hippie game. I'm so fucked because I've really, really, really wanted to play a Conan on-going campaign.

Now I'll try Conan 2D20 and a month later I'll probably be crying about safe spaces and triggering.

My soul. It is lost.

Yeah, it's terrible.  Who would have thought that Conan of all things would be our Achilles Heel, the place the Swine could attack where we have no defense...eh, I never planned on buying for the system once I found out how *(maybe if I don't use the word we won't have a 75-page throwdown) it was.  It's like Cortex+ games.  If that's the type of roleplaying you like, ie, more than just roleplaying, then it's a good system for what it is supposed to do.

Quote from: Spinachcat;897809What about the Savage Rifts KS is going to neuter Rifts? And what specific part of Rifts?

It's weird how Rifts doesn't convert.  Whenever Rifts is brought to a "better system", the flavor gets too diluted.

Quote from: The Butcher;897825Savage Worlds is too balanced for Rifts.

Yes. Yes it is.

Let it sink in for a moment.

Pretty much this.  Savage Worlds is too balanced, too small scale, too untweakable for Godzilla, let alone a radioactive Cthulhu.  Even as a Supers game Savage Worlds is low-powered.  Sometimes in Rifts, a squad of Abolisher robots throw down against Thor, or a fleet of Triax submarines might fight against a 3,000 mile long tentacle from the Alien Intelligence that lurks at the bottom of the Marianas Trench.  Erin Tarn and her Squeaky Clean Brigade are gonna rid North America of a Boris and Natasha pulp Indiana Jones version of the Coalition, and then what?  Go to Africa and fight the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse?  Pinnacle's own setting Deadlands/Hell on Earth/Lost Colony HAS the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse...they don't stat them.  Or the Tomorrow People go to what, Atlantis and face Splynncryth, who has what d12+372 Strength?  Don't worry guys, we'll just keep him Shaken.

In 40k at least, things will start to fall apart somewhere after the Baneblade vs. Bloodthirster showdown.  That's the good thing about 40k, if you get to Titan combat, you can always go to...40k and just have SW stand in for the skirmish level stuff.

Quote from: Spinachcat;897809BTW, I just got this fucked up email from Modiphius that they may start a Living Conan and Living Mutant Chronicles campaign. Now I may have to buy the damn hippie game. I'm so fucked because I've really, really, really wanted to play a Conan on-going campaign.

Now I'll try Conan 2D20 and a month later I'll probably be crying about safe spaces and triggering.

My soul. It is lost.

Yeah, it's terrible.  Who would have thought that Conan of all things would be our Achilles Heel, the place the Swine could attack where we have no defense...eh, I never planned on buying for the system once I found out how *(maybe if I don't use the word we won't have a 75-page throwdown) it was.  It's like Cortex+ games.  If that's the type of roleplaying you like, ie, more than just roleplaying, then it's a good system for what it is supposed to do.

Quote from: Spinachcat;897809What about the Savage Rifts KS is going to neuter Rifts? And what specific part of Rifts?

It's weird how Rifts doesn't convert.  Whenever Rifts is brought to a "better system", the flavor gets too diluted.

Quote from: The Butcher;897825Savage Worlds is too balanced for Rifts.
Yes. Yes it is.
Let it sink in for a moment.

Pretty much this.

Quote from: Omega;897850Or not flexible enough?
That seems to be a kinda recurring comment when someone doesnt like SW. That SW forces the settings to flex rather than the game?
How close is that though?

This too.

Savage Worlds is too balanced, too small scale, too untweakable for Godzilla, let alone a radioactive Cthulhu.  Even as a Supers game Savage Worlds is low-powered.  Sometimes in Rifts, a squad of Abolisher robots throw down against Thor, or a fleet of Triax submarines might fight against a 3,000 mile long tentacle from the Alien Intelligence that lurks at the bottom of the Marianas Trench.  Erin Tarn and her Squeaky Clean Brigade are gonna rid North America of a Boris and Natasha pulp Indiana Jones version of the Coalition, and then what?  Go to Africa and fight the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse?  Pinnacle's own setting Deadlands/Hell on Earth/Lost Colony HAS the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse...they don't stat them.  Or the Tomorrow People go to what, Atlantis and face Splynncryth, who has what d12+372 Strength?  Don't worry guys, we'll just keep him Shaken.

In 40k at least, things will start to fall apart somewhere after the Baneblade vs. Bloodthirster showdown.  That's the good thing about 40k, if you get to Titan combat, you can always go to...40k and just have SW stand in for the skirmish level stuff.

Quote from: Spinachcat;897444But for you, it sounds like a better bet is just taking a hammer to the PB system. There are plenty of house rules for Rifts floating around the web, and its not that hard to do your own streamlining and cleaning. RPGPundit even has a Palladium houserules sticky on his forum.

On the plus side, this topic has got me to dust off my Rifts clone and do some more work on it. :D

I still want in, oh well.  Hopefully non-backers will get some of this stuff some day.

Oh, and the Squeaky Clean Brigade (Tomorrow Legion) is not my cup of tea, either.

Though the Coalition, as a whole, at my table, have always been bad guys (even if individuals may be good).

I backed the Modiphius kickstarter, but I did so to get all the PDFs for setting material, maps, etc., not for the actual system itself as I don't want to teach my players another system. I figured I could just convert it into an ACKS or SW campaign. But hearing the 2d20 system compared to Cortex+ makes me worried. Am I going to want to claw my eyes out just trying to read the material?

Quote from: The Butcher;897907Oh, and the Squeaky Clean Brigade (Tomorrow Legion) is not my cup of tea, either.

Though the Coalition, as a whole, at my table, have always been bad guys (even if individuals may be good).

One of the reasons I prefer Chaos Earth to Rifts is the Coalition makes more sense to me. Like Carcosa, Rifts magic is powered by sacrifice. Yeah, most people just use their own PPE, but have you looked at how much joy juice you get from human sacrifice?

There is no reason that an evil mage wouldn't be grinding babies in Rifts.  In the face of aliens, monsters and blood magic, standing tall with the Skull Club makes more sense for humanity than Tolkeen's Kumbaya. And MDC beings co-existing with SDC squishies? That's accidental deaths just begging to happen.

I get why SW would do the Tomorrow Legion. Most SW settings are "good vs. evil" and even their "gray" setting with Rippers is "good guys doing squicky stuff to fight evil" whereas Rifts can be much grayer and less explicitly clear (especially as Kevin has expanded his vision of the Coalition).

As I've said on PB's forums, the only reason the Coalition is the default bad guys is because players want PCs with Kewl Powerz and the "No Powerz" Coalition was set up as the easy enemy, then Kevin doubled down with a slathering of Naughty Nazi sauce.

But hey, who doesn't want to mind blast and turbo laser a bunch of skull faced space Nazis?

Quote from: Spinachcat;897970One of the reasons I prefer Chaos Earth to Rifts is the Coalition makes more sense to me. Like Carcosa, Rifts magic is powered by sacrifice. Yeah, most people just use their own PPE, but have you looked at how much joy juice you get from human sacrifice?

There is no reason that an evil mage wouldn't be grinding babies in Rifts.  In the face of aliens, monsters and blood magic, standing tall with the Skull Club makes more sense for humanity than Tolkeen's Kumbaya. And MDC beings co-existing with SDC squishies? That's accidental deaths just begging to happen.

Yeah, evil wizards would probably be a dime a dozen in Rifts Earth. No wonder they struck off and founded their own friggin' country.

And Chaos Earth is probably 101 flavors of awesome. I should look into it some day.

Quote from: Spinachcat;897970I get why SW would do the Tomorrow Legion. Most SW settings are "good vs. evil" and even their "gray" setting with Rippers is "good guys doing squicky stuff to fight evil" whereas Rifts can be much grayer and less explicitly clear (especially as Kevin has expanded his vision of the Coalition).

Deadlands? Day After Ragnarok?

Quote from: Spinachcat;897970As I've said on PB's forums, the only reason the Coalition is the default bad guys is because players want PCs with Kewl Powerz and the "No Powerz" Coalition was set up as the easy enemy, then Kevin doubled down with a slathering of Naughty Nazi sauce.

What, the skull helmets too subtle for you? ;)

"No Powrz" CS lasted what, five years into the franchise's life? Pretty soon the CS got a Psi-Battalion, and more recently a super-secret, off-the-books force of magicians (the Vanguard).

Quote from: Spinachcat;897970But hey, who doesn't want to mind blast and turbo laser a bunch of skull faced space Nazis?

The sort of people who play enthusiastic, faithful agents of the Inquisition in Dark Heresy? :eek:

I sure do, though. Also, CS deserters make great "penitent hero" PCs.

Quote from: CRKrueger;897855Sometimes in Rifts, a squad of Abolisher robots throw down against Thor, or a fleet of Triax submarines might fight against a 3,000 mile long tentacle from the Alien Intelligence that lurks at the bottom of the Marianas Trench.  Erin Tarn and her Squeaky Clean Brigade are gonna rid North America of a Boris and Natasha pulp Indiana Jones version of the Coalition, and then what?  Go to Africa and fight the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse?  Pinnacle's own setting Deadlands/Hell on Earth/Lost Colony HAS the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse...they don't stat them.  Or the Tomorrow People go to what, Atlantis and face Splynncryth, who has what d12+372 Strength?  Don't worry guys, we'll just keep him Shaken.

I actually laughed out loud at the last sentence.

To be honest, though, PCs are unlikely to make it anywhere near Splynncryth. The Four Horsemen are a real problem, though.

Krugs, old chum, I'm pledged for $45 but I just know how this is going to turn out. I'll stat up a bunch of PCs, thrilled at the convenience of ol' SW and the new toys. Then we'll play. Then I'll be disappointed at the system for breaking down at some big ol' fight and also pumped with the old Rifts books I dug out of storage. Then I'll be running a [strike]straight[/strike] moderately houseruled Palladium Rifts game, and buying new Palladium stuff and partying like it's 1996.

Can't say it's a bad outcome either way.

TBH though, players are unlikely to make it anywhere near Lord Splynncryth alive. Nevertheless, the Four Horsemen are a real problem.

Quote from: The Butcher;897825Savage Worlds is too balanced for Rifts.

Yes. Yes it is.

Let it sink in for a moment.

Well, duh.  Pathfinder is too balanced for Rifts.  EXALTED may be too balanced for Rifts.  The whole point of Rifts is that it's not balanced.

JG

Quote from: James Gillen;897978Well, duh.  Pathfinder is too balanced for Rifts.  EXALTED may be too balanced for Rifts.  The whole point of Rifts is that it's not balanced.

I know, but some of the Gaming Den regulars often come to browse. I thought I'd spell it out for their benefit. ;)

Quote from: The Butcher;897975Deadlands? Day After Ragnarok?

I haven't gotten around to reading Day After Ragnarok, but Deadlands is quite solidly a "good vs evil" setting. You're trying to stop the end of the world, after all. Sure, you can do other stuff in it, but the central premise of the whole thing is fighting all the evil stuff that the Four Horseman and their servitors are causing to pop up (and hopefully lowering the Fear Level in as many locations as possible). Most of the adventures involve supernatural evil as some sort of antagonist, and all of the plot point campaigns are stories about stopping the servitors.

Heh, we've come back now to the Rabid Savage Fan thing.

Quote from: Sean Patrick FannonYes, this gives a decidedly heroic spin on the whole thing. Instead of mercenaries, wanderers, or bandits, members of the Tomorrow Legion are  funded  and  given  a  purpose,  which  is generally to put themselves in the direct line of fire against the endless dangers of Rifts Earth. This is very much in line with what most other Savage Worlds settings do, and we felt maintaining that consistency not only supported the overall experience of Savage fans but added something new and useful to the Rifts® setting.

We heard it from the author: the setting has to change for the Savage Fans.  It's a Twilight Zone episode where the 30's Pulps are a Viral Meme infecting and altering all reality.  Hey, that doesn't sound half bad, Savage Worlds is an SCP affecting all literary settings. :D

Now we have a Rifts and The Strange crossover in this new Savage Rifts dimension and somehow Delta Green will have to be involved...and yes, that would count as gonzo. :cool:

Kinda like Gurps then? :rolleyes:

Quote from: CRKrueger;897987Heh, we've come back now to the Rabid Savage Fan thing.

We heard it from the author: the setting has to change for the Savage Fans.  It's a Twilight Zone episode where the 30's Pulps are a Viral Meme infecting and altering all reality.  Hey, that doesn't sound half bad, Savage Worlds is an SCP affecting all literary settings. :D

Now we have a Rifts and The Strange crossover in this new Savage Rifts dimension and somehow Delta Green will have to be involved...and yes, that would count as gonzo. :cool:

Honestly, I often just roll my eyes when I hear SPF talk. The guy is as pretentious as you can get. This is the guy who opened one of his Shaintar books with a two-page introduction about how his epic fantasy setting (which is a woman, apparently) was for true heroes, unlike other silly games with their stupid dungeons designed for grave robbers and mercenaries.

Quote from: Spinachcat;897970As I've said on PB's forums, the only reason the Coalition is the default bad guys is because players want PCs with Kewl Powerz and the "No Powerz" Coalition was set up as the easy enemy, then Kevin doubled down with a slathering of Naughty Nazi sauce.

But hey, who doesn't want to mind blast and turbo laser a bunch of skull faced space Nazis?

Yeah. And I find it kind of funny, my first impression about "The Tomorrow Legion" was that I plan on running my first SW:Rifts game as a Coalition campaign. I find playing in these do-gooder organizations (much like the Republic in Star Wars) is always just saccharine hand-wavy shit. There is far more interesting possibilities playing in the gray areas or purely on the ostensible "dark side". When you start in carebear-land I find players become more jaded as the realities of the world set in. When you start on the dark-side, you tend to be incentivised to try and turn the tide before it goes pitch-black. It makes for better gaming at my table, generally (but not always - depends on the genre).

The thing about the Coalition is...they're kinda right.  They may be using Nazi Germany's ideas on psychological control (like our gov't didn't), but they're not exterminating humans of a different race or religion.  They are defending a good percentage of what's left of humanity in North America from invaders from other planets and dimensions.  The Federation of Magic is real.  Atlantis is real.  Entire areas equal to what used to be US States are filled with aliens who see humans as slaves, sex toys, lunch, or all three.  A human who practices magic can unwittingly open a Rift to the xenomorph's home planet, or into Hell itself.  Should the Coalition wait for Saruman the White to become Saruman the Many-Colored before they evacuate his brainpan?  How many people die if they do?  Yeah, they burn books, is the Coalition supposed to risk humanity's future on trusting an infantry grunt to decide whether Harry Potter has any useful spells in it?  Yeah, they deck themselves out to be intimidating and scary - it works.  The one area where the CS truly shows itself to be evil is in the extermination of DBees who are not magical or supernatural, are basically normal people.  However, DBees do exist in CS territory, there aren't any ovens blazing away 24/7, also all the DBees on Rifts Earth came from someplace else, their own planet.  Comparisons to real world Genocide, Pogroms, and Immigration Policies, while standard fare at Purple, are laughably idiotic or painfully simple.  It doesn't help that Siembieda went to 19 with the "Nation of Boris and Natasha" in the early supplements.

I think that's why so many people hated the Tolkeen War books, they proved the Coalition right.  You could argue that Tolkeen only went to desperate measures because of the Coalition, but the Coalition wasn't summoning demons via human sacrifice to bolster their armies.
Power Corrupts.  Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely.  Magical Power Corrupts Inevitably.  Tolkeen proved the Coalition right.

Quote from: CRKrueger;898310I think that's why so many people hated the Tolkeen War books, they proved the Coalition right.

Pretty much agree with everything you posted.  However I thought the above was just because it was supposed to be an epic ending to the main storyline and it turned out to be poorly written and generally anticlimactic.  I know that's why I was disappointed.

Quote from: CRKrueger;898310The thing about the Coalition is...they're kinda right.  They may be using Nazi Germany's ideas on psychological control (like our gov't didn't), but they're not exterminating humans of a different race or religion.  They are defending a good percentage of what's left of humanity in North America from invaders from other planets and dimensions.

Of course they're right.  Mr. Siembeida has proven, time and time again, that he loves his Neo-Nazi's and always tries to write them in a sympathetic light.  But because of that, he glosses over several things he has written before.  Like how 90% of Dimensional Beings are on Earth by accident.  They don't want to be anywhere near this hellish ball of arcane energy.  The Coalition doesn't care though.  You come through a Rift, zap zap zap, you are dead, dead, dead, even if all you have is pointy ears.

Next, they treat a subsection of humanity itself as slaves, the psychics.  Indoctrinating them to this way of thought because the Coalition are utterly terrified that they would start plotting to take over (And KS conveniently never writes on how dissatisfied that some NPC's would about this.)  Oh, and if you're a friendly psychic but not a Coalition member?  Bang, bang, you're dead, no questions asked.

Then they uplift animals to sentience and use them as fleshy robots to send to die.  They don't care about the rights of these creatures, they just create 'em and send off to die.

Here's something else that get glossed over:  Let's say you have a LRRP, Long-range reconnaissance patrol, team wandering the wilderness, which is a very common thing, they are actually out of the Coalition Borders, and they come across a tiny village of Dee-bees.  Now, this village is made up of purple skinned farmers, who found a small section of this hellworld to live peacefully.  SOP for the Coalition?  Burn it to the ground, kill everything, men, women, children, animals, whatever, it's not one of 'them' it dies.  And when they wipe out this little SDC village, they won't laugh maniacally, they'll pat themelves on the back, and keep going on patrol.  It doesn't matter that this village couldn't fight back, it's "Shoot first, ask no questions".

Also, they have Auschwitz style death camps.  In the Coalition/Tolkien aftermath book KS details a little of it, but glosses it over as usual.

Quote from: CRKrueger;898310I think that's why so many people hated the Tolkeen War books, they proved the Coalition right.  You could argue that Tolkeen only went to desperate measures because of the Coalition, but the Coalition wasn't summoning demons via human sacrifice to bolster their armies.
Power Corrupts.  Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely.  Magical Power Corrupts Inevitably.  Tolkeen proved the Coalition right.

No, the main reason a lot of people hate the books is that KS MADE the Coalition right, by writing things about Tolkien that made them scummy and evil, despite years of writing to contrary.  At the beginning of the book series, Tolkien was against the use of Demons in war.  They were adamant to not stoop to that level.  But because Kevin WANTED the Coalition to win this fight, he decided that Tolkien would stoop to that level, to become 'EVIL' so that he could make his Neo-Nazi pet love seem 'heroic'.  He used a metaplot to force his audience into having only one option.  No one likes a railroaded adventure.

The other issue is the system.  It actively resists certain things.  Like summoning a demon, the amount of PPE to actually summon the amount they claimed to have would kill most of Tolkien's standing army.  The fact that every cyber-knight now has anti-tech powers, and yet the Coalition is literally 100 years younger than the order of Knights created by Lord Coake.  I dunno about you, but I would think that Cyber-Knights would have had more anti-magic monster powers than having to deal with a group of human bandits with scrounged guns on a regular basis.  Then the Coalition comes along.

The real reason a lot of people hated The Siege of Tolkien was that KS turned it into a railroad metaplot that made a former, clearly, good guy organization into the greater evil, because REASONS!  It removed player choice, like all good railroads.

Rifts Coalition is overall a reskinning and elabotation on After the Bomb's Empire of Humanity. Just replace  "Mutant Animal" with "DeeBee" and and humanity isnt so desperately on the ropes. Kev does love that theme.

Quote from: The Butcher;897975And Chaos Earth is probably 101 flavors of awesome. I should look into it some day.

Chaos Earth is 101 flavors of POTENTIAL awesome. The actual books have been pretty lacking. I haven't seen the newest Chaos Earth zombie book, but I've heard some positive stuff. It's on my eventual pickup list.

I've combined CE with Systems Failure which FOR ME made things much more interesting.

Quote from: The Butcher;897975"No Powrz" CS lasted what, five years into the franchise's life?

You're right! I totally forgot about the Vanguard. In the current timeline, I understand the Demon War invasion has now vastly expanded the Vanguard and the Coalition is becoming more heroic and less naughty nazi.

Quote from: The Butcher;897975The sort of people who play enthusiastic, faithful agents of the Inquisition in Dark Heresy? :eek:

Truly the best of us! :)

Quote from: The Butcher;897975Also, CS deserters make great "penitent hero" PCs.

Hell yeah! I always thought that was the whole point of CS PCs in the first Rifts main book! The "repentant Nazi" PC has been a mainstay since our earliest games.

Quote from: CRKrueger;897987We heard it from the author: the setting has to change for the Savage Fans.

At least he's being honest.

Lots of players like "mission based" RPG play. Having a "good guy" org as the home base is probably an okay idea.

BTW, I'd actually prefer to run the Tomorrow Legion as an underground rebellion - often INSIDE the Coalition territory.

Obviously some Devil's Advocacy is going to be going on here...

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898340Of course they're right.  Mr. Siembeida has proven, time and time again, that he loves his Neo-Nazi's and always tries to write them in a sympathetic light.  But because of that, he glosses over several things he has written before.  Like how 90% of Dimensional Beings are on Earth by accident.  They don't want to be anywhere near this hellish ball of arcane energy.  The Coalition doesn't care though.  You come through a Rift, zap zap zap, you are dead, dead, dead, even if all you have is pointy ears.

And who is supposed to tell that *all* they have are pointed ears?  The grunts on patrol?  "It's ok Lt. these guys look like some kind of Dbee, thin with pointy ears.  They really like the colors black and purple.  What is Comorragh? AAAAAUGHGHGHGEEEEE!!!!"

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898340Next, they treat a subsection of humanity itself as slaves, the psychics.  Indoctrinating them to this way of thought because the Coalition are utterly terrified that they would start plotting to take over (And KS conveniently never writes on how dissatisfied that some NPC's would about this.)  Oh, and if you're a friendly psychic but not a Coalition member?  Bang, bang, you're dead, no questions asked.

Again, when you have a Mind Melter who can control a whole squad with a thought, or a Burster, who can melt mega-damage vehicles with their mind, you don't get the luxury of hoping that "dude's ok".  You get, if you're lucky, one chance to strike.

You act as if the Coalition were the NYPD who all of a sudden now have immigrants from Hell, but other than that, situation as normal.  It's the year 109 P.A.  How do you think the Coalition survived the last hundred years after being almost decimated twice by the Federation of Magic?  By trusting in the good nature of their fellow man, some of whom have the power to put any woman on their knees or back with the merest thought and vaporize any dissenters?  Or they should trust the Shifters and Ley Line Walkers who are so intune with dimensional magic they can teleport along ley lines at will and summon Rifts to god knows where?

Rifts Earth wasn't populated with fields full of harp seal people playing with pre-water Gremlins and Ewoks before the Coalition decided to wake up out of the blue, step outside their cities and put the spiked curbstompers on.

Rifts Earth from the Coalition perspective is the metaphor of The Infected taken to gonzo extreme.  Virus stories, Vampire stories, Zombie stories - they all have a core exploration - what does it mean to be human, and is survival worth it, if to survive we have to become worse than the monsters we are fighting.  To be a Coalition Soldier on patrol is to cross Iraq and Afghanistan with Vietnam, add in Aliens, Predator, The Strain, Event Horizon, Apocalypse Now, Legend of the Overfiend, and every Mad Max movie with IV drip of 28 Days Later Violence Juice.  The first million or so post-Rift humans died with empathy and compassion - over the next couple hundred years, the survivors adapted.  The humans living in the area stuck in between Devil's Gate, the Federation of Magic and the Xiticix learned that to Shoot First was how humanity lived one more day.

You have to tell the CS soldier Do Not Hesitate.  Do Not Question.  Why?  Because otherwise a CS soldier is going to have pity at the wrong time and get them and their whole squad, platoon or worse killed, or they're going to do their job, then question themselves - and eat the gun.

It's easy for the "good cities" to call the Coalition soldiers monsters - they have that luxury living in a world where the Coalition is the main threat to real monsters everywhere in North America.  Let's see Laszlo, New Laszlo or the Tomorrow Legion face off against Atlantis, the Federation of Magic, the Vampire Kingdoms without the Coalition.  There will be grand, heroic deaths for everyone...and then Night will Fall.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898340Then they uplift animals to sentience and use them as fleshy robots to send to die.  They don't care about the rights of these creatures, they just create 'em and send off to die.

You've got normal people vs. Brodkil, Thornheads, and Slavers from Atlantis, you're gonna lose a lot - you prefer they use vat-grown people as opposed to uplifted animals?

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898340Here's something else that get glossed over:  Let's say you have a LRRP, Long-range reconnaissance patrol, team wandering the wilderness, which is a very common thing, they are actually out of the Coalition Borders, and they come across a tiny village of Dee-bees.  Now, this village is made up of purple skinned farmers, who found a small section of this hellworld to live peacefully.  SOP for the Coalition?  Burn it to the ground, kill everything, men, women, children, animals, whatever, it's not one of 'them' it dies.  And when they wipe out this little SDC village, they won't laugh maniacally, they'll pat themelves on the back, and keep going on patrol.  It doesn't matter that this village couldn't fight back, it's "Shoot first, ask no questions".

That's because in the villages of the Orange, Green, Puce, Rainbow, and Tapioca people, when there was no Coalition, the soldiers did ask questions...and died screaming.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898340No, the main reason a lot of people hate the books is that KS MADE the Coalition right, by writing things about Tolkien that made them scummy and evil, despite years of writing to contrary.  At the beginning of the book series, Tolkien was against the use of Demons in war.  They were adamant to not stoop to that level.  But because Kevin WANTED the Coalition to win this fight, he decided that Tolkien would stoop to that level, to become 'EVIL' so that he could make his Neo-Nazi pet love seem 'heroic'.  
He used a metaplot to force his audience into having only one option.  No one likes a railroaded adventure.

There's lots of RPGs that take place during military conflicts.  You play a Vietnam game, you think you're going to stop the Tet Offensive, you and your group?  Of course you aren't.  How the hell is that a railroad?  If you're roleplaying Churchill, Roosevelt, MacArthur, maybe you can change the outcome of the war, but generally speaking in every RPG set in a major scale conflict , the conflict is a backdrop.  You can't stop Tolkeen from falling.  It's a terrible tragedy with horrific things done on both sides.  Firebombing/Nuking cities full of civilians on one side, genocide on the other.  War brings atrocity to all.  Even the Good Guys if they are not careful.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898340The real reason a lot of people hated The Siege of Tolkien was that KS turned it into a railroad metaplot that made a former, clearly, good guy organization into the greater evil, because REASONS!

Yeah, reasons like Patriotism, Nationalism, Survival, Economic Self Interest, Personal Power, Hatred, Fear, Vengeance - you know - the reasons that even Good Beings can get find themselves trapped into committing Atrocity.  The people of Tolkeen weren't all knowing, all powerful, non-corruptible angels...damn you Siembieda you Neo-Fascist!!! :rolleyes: (Does Purple have a new mod position, I smell an audition) :D

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898340It removed player choice, like all good railroads.

Were you playing the Lords of Tolkeen?  Then it wasn't a railroad, was it?
Brady not liking the story =/= the story is a "railroad".

Now all that being said, that doesn't mean that the Coalition isn't Evil and that the society of Laszlo and people like Coake, Tarn etc, aren't Good.  History has shown us again and again that the more Authoritarian a society gets, the more Evil it gets.  In fighting monsters, the Coalition hasn't taken care not to become monsters themselves and Tolkeen showed that they are on the path to becoming perhaps a greater threat to humanity then some of the supernatural threats they fight.  However, for the Coalition to become that boot kicking in the face of humanity forever, humanity has to actually survive first.

I will have to thank Pinnacle for getting me to look at Rifts again.  Now that there's going to be a full-blown Dimensional War fought between Demons and Devils with Earth as a battlefield, it's quite possible that the Good Guys and Evil Guys may have to decide that the Really Really Evil Guys are a mutual enemy.

Siembieda is a Mad Genius Idea Machine, who can't really write all that well or coherently.  He needs a Two Rooms style partner.  I don't like Rifts for the plots, or the techporn (ok not ONLY for the techporn), I like Rifts for the canvas, the backdrop with so many brilliant, even if problematic and triggering, ideas to work with. That's why I like Rifts.  Some people say the extreme and violent nature of the setting is there to make Fascist Ideology and Nazi Fetish Wank acceptable.  I disagree.  I think, like lots of good science fiction, it provides great metaphors that can be used to explore and experience humanity: the good, the bad, the tragic, the heroic.  In the setting where literally anything is possible, then you can run any type of game you want.

Quote from: Spinachcat;898396BTW, I'd actually prefer to run the Tomorrow Legion as an underground rebellion - often INSIDE the Coalition territory.

THAT would be awesome, because as a 5th column, insurgency, freedom fighters, terrorists, whatever you want to call them, the Tomorrow Legion would then have to decide if they want to take the path of "By Any Means Necessary".  The true test of the Tomorrow Legion in that case isn't whether they win, it's whether they become as bad as the Coalition itself, thus invalidating everything they believed in.

Every pull of the trigger is a choice that may cost you your humanity if you do, and your world if you don't.  That's about as literally non-railroad as it gets.

Quote from: CRKrueger;898440Obviously some Devil's Advocacy is going to be going on here...

Holy shit. That's the best discussion about the Coalition I've read. Kudos x 1000.

Quote from: Omega;898382Rifts Coalition is overall a reskinning and elabotation on After the Bomb's Empire of Humanity. Just replace  "Mutant Animal" with "DeeBee" and and humanity isnt so desperately on the ropes. Kev does love that theme.

Palladium did publish an RPG set in the Vietnam war.

http://palladium-store.com/1001/product/600-The-Deluxe-Revised-RECON.html

Personally, I couldn't imagine a more depressing setting for a table top RPG, but there it is.

For all the "discussion" about the CS, and whether their tactics and strategy is justified, you all realize that's the point, right?

Quote from: Ratman_tf;898448Palladium did publish an RPG set in the Vietnam war.

http://palladium-store.com/1001/product/600-The-Deluxe-Revised-RECON.html

Personally, I couldn't imagine a more depressing setting for a table top RPG, but there it is.

Democrat: The Sellout

I do not understand the need for a Scooby gang like the Tomorrow Legion while the original Rifts setting has things like the Cyber Knight's legion or Psyscape ... But there is surely an huge shift between the Rifts corebook and the Rifts Ultimate edition, the former seems to assumed that the players would play some sort of vagrants/explorers rediscovering Earth ... Part of me wishes that the Rifts world books were written more like Vampire Kingdoms and less like NGR and the Triax. Note that nothing prevents anybody playing Rifts on this (smaller) scale.

Quote from: CRKrueger;898440Obviously some Devil's Advocacy is going to be going on here...

And who is supposed to tell that *all* they have are pointed ears?  The grunts on patrol?  "It's ok Lt. these guys look like some kind of Dbee, thin with pointy ears.  They really like the colors black and purple.  What is Comorragh? AAAAAUGHGHGHGEEEEE!!!!"

Again, when you have a Mind Melter who can control a whole squad with a thought, or a Burster, who can melt mega-damage vehicles with their mind, you don't get the luxury of hoping that "dude's ok".  You get, if you're lucky, one chance to strike.

You act as if the Coalition were the NYPD who all of a sudden now have immigrants from Hell, but other than that, situation as normal.  It's the year 109 P.A.  How do you think the Coalition survived the last hundred years after being almost decimated twice by the Federation of Magic?  By trusting in the good nature of their fellow man, some of whom have the power to put any woman on their knees or back with the merest thought and vaporize any dissenters?  Or they should trust the Shifters and Ley Line Walkers who are so intune with dimensional magic they can teleport along ley lines at will and summon Rifts to god knows where?

Rifts Earth wasn't populated with fields full of harp seal people playing with pre-water Gremlins and Ewoks before the Coalition decided to wake up out of the blue, step outside their cities and put the spiked curbstompers on.

Rifts Earth from the Coalition perspective is the metaphor of The Infected taken to gonzo extreme.  Virus stories, Vampire stories, Zombie stories - they all have a core exploration - what does it mean to be human, and is survival worth it, if to survive we have to become worse than the monsters we are fighting.  To be a Coalition Soldier on patrol is to cross Iraq and Afghanistan with Vietnam, add in Aliens, Predator, The Strain, Event Horizon, Apocalypse Now, Legend of the Overfiend, and every Mad Max movie with IV drip of 28 Days Later Violence Juice.  The first million or so post-Rift humans died with empathy and compassion - over the next couple hundred years, the survivors adapted.  The humans living in the area stuck in between Devil's Gate, the Federation of Magic and the Xiticix learned that to Shoot First was how humanity lived one more day.

You have to tell the CS soldier Do Not Hesitate.  Do Not Question.  Why?  Because otherwise a CS soldier is going to have pity at the wrong time and get them and their whole squad, platoon or worse killed, or they're going to do their job, then question themselves - and eat the gun.

It's easy for the "good cities" to call the Coalition soldiers monsters - they have that luxury living in a world where the Coalition is the main threat to real monsters everywhere in North America.  Let's see Laszlo, New Laszlo or the Tomorrow Legion face off against Atlantis, the Federation of Magic, the Vampire Kingdoms without the Coalition.  There will be grand, heroic deaths for everyone...and then Night will Fall.

You've got normal people vs. Brodkil, Thornheads, and Slavers from Atlantis, you're gonna lose a lot - you prefer they use vat-grown people as opposed to uplifted animals?

That's because in the villages of the Orange, Green, Puce, Rainbow, and Tapioca people, when there was no Coalition, the soldiers did ask questions...and died screaming.

There's lots of RPGs that take place during military conflicts.  You play a Vietnam game, you think you're going to stop the Tet Offensive, you and your group?  Of course you aren't.  How the hell is that a railroad?  If you're roleplaying Churchill, Roosevelt, MacArthur, maybe you can change the outcome of the war, but generally speaking in every RPG set in a major scale conflict , the conflict is a backdrop.  You can't stop Tolkeen from falling.  It's a terrible tragedy with horrific things done on both sides.  Firebombing/Nuking cities full of civilians on one side, genocide on the other.  War brings atrocity to all.  Even the Good Guys if they are not careful.

Yeah, reasons like Patriotism, Nationalism, Survival, Economic Self Interest, Personal Power, Hatred, Fear, Vengeance - you know - the reasons that even Good Beings can get find themselves trapped into committing Atrocity.  The people of Tolkeen weren't all knowing, all powerful, non-corruptible angels...damn you Siembieda you Neo-Fascist!!! :rolleyes: (Does Purple have a new mod position, I smell an audition) :D

Were you playing the Lords of Tolkeen?  Then it wasn't a railroad, was it?
Brady not liking the story =/= the story is a "railroad".

Now all that being said, that doesn't mean that the Coalition isn't Evil and that the society of Laszlo and people like Coake, Tarn etc, aren't Good.  History has shown us again and again that the more Authoritarian a society gets, the more Evil it gets.  In fighting monsters, the Coalition hasn't taken care not to become monsters themselves and Tolkeen showed that they are on the path to becoming perhaps a greater threat to humanity then some of the supernatural threats they fight.  However, for the Coalition to become that boot kicking in the face of humanity forever, humanity has to actually survive first.

I will have to thank Pinnacle for getting me to look at Rifts again.  Now that there's going to be a full-blown Dimensional War fought between Demons and Devils with Earth as a battlefield, it's quite possible that the Good Guys and Evil Guys may have to decide that the Really Really Evil Guys are a mutual enemy.

Siembieda is a Mad Genius Idea Machine, who can't really write all that well or coherently.  He needs a Two Rooms style partner.  I don't like Rifts for the plots, or the techporn (ok not ONLY for the techporn), I like Rifts for the canvas, the backdrop with so many brilliant, even if problematic and triggering, ideas to work with. That's why I like Rifts.  Some people say the extreme and violent nature of the setting is there to make Fascist Ideology and Nazi Fetish Wank acceptable.  I disagree.  I think, like lots of good science fiction, it provides great metaphors that can be used to explore and experience humanity: the good, the bad, the tragic, the heroic.  In the setting where literally anything is possible, then you can run any type of game you want.

You're making a LOT of assumptions without any data to back it up.  And it sounds very much like you WANT the Neo-Nazi death squads and camps to be considered the default 'good guy' for the game.  Which is you prerogative, I suppose, but are you REALLY going to paint that the world is 90% monster that wants to eat you?  That sounds awfully boring, and video gamey.  But I guess if you want to make the Coalition the good guys by default, that's what you have to do.

Personally, as someone who collected the whole line, Tolkien WAS the supposed good guy faction, so much so that Mr. Siembeida had to muddy them in a series of adventures.  Not in one of the world/source books, but the adventures themselves.  As if he had accidentally painted himself into a corner.

I never saw the Coalition as the default good and never read a Rifts book stating that. The Coalition is like the Empire of Star Wars, there for providing mooks to be shoot down by the PCs in vast numbers. And as it as be already written, the Coalition is a rehashed version of the Empire of Humanity from After the Bomb. But the Coalition as decribed in the Rifts corebbok is vastly different from the Coalition that exists now.

I do not agree that Tolkeen was the default good guy. It is the City of Lazlo, which has sadly done nothing notable for 30 + worldbooks (there were some mentions of them taking the fight to the Xiticixs but there was little follow up). I remember some foreshadowing that Tolkeen was dabbling in dark magic and consorting with forces hostile to Humankind.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898461You're making a LOT of assumptions without any data to back it up.

You're failing to see something, I'm explaining a point of view.  What "data" explains the viewpoint of Jack Nicholson in a Few Good Men or Robert Duvall in Apocalypse Now?

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898461And it sounds very much like you WANT the Neo-Nazi death squads and camps to be considered the default 'good guy' for the game.  Which is you prerogative, I suppose, but are you REALLY going to paint that the world is 90% monster that wants to eat you?  That sounds awfully boring, and video gamey.  But I guess if you want to make the Coalition the good guys by default, that's what you have to do.

Yay, more Virtue Signaling.  Woo-Woo-Woo, pull over it's the PC Police!

Might want to read something:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devil%27s_advocate (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Devil%27s_advocate)

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898461Personally, as someone who collected the whole line, Tolkien WAS the supposed good guy faction, so much so that Mr. Siembeida had to muddy them in a series of adventures.  Not in one of the world/source books, but the adventures themselves.  As if he had accidentally painted himself into a corner.

Not even close, now all you're displaying is your own personal bias and bitter tears that it didn't turn out in a way you like.  At least you've stopped claiming setting details are a "railroad" now, so there's some hope.  

Laszlo has always been the "Best Last Hope For Humanity", or as Erin Tarn puts it "With the tragic corruption of Chi-Town, I see this place as humankind's true hope for a free and civilized world." I guess you collected the whole line, without the main rulebook?

Let me help this time around, imagine the voice of Jack Nicholson on the stand:
Of course situated where they are, surrounded by Ley Lines and Rifts isolated by waterways, Laszlo is extremely defensible and they don't have a nation of gargoyles right next door like the New German Republic does and they're not surrounded by enemies on all sides like Chi-Town is, so they have the luxury of being Good, don't they?  They don't have to make the hard choice.  Tolkeen did have to make the hard choice...and they made the same hard choice Chi-Town did.  They did what they saw was right By Any Atrocity Necessary, just as Chi-Town does.  In fact, they proved themselves even more corruptable, because while Chi-Town may be using the play books of Hitler and Stalin, Tolkeen started using the playbooks of Satan, Moloch, and Asmodeus.

The were entreated to move West by Tarn, Plato, Coake, all the Good Guys.  They refused.  They chose to stand and fight, and when their backs were to the wall, they chose Atrocity.  Like practically every nation does.  No one cares about the Kingdom of Heaven (movie reference) they care about the Kingdom of the Earth They Are Standing On.

The destruction of Tolkeen was a morality play, a tragedy.  An important lesson that magic and psychic power isn't all rainbows, fairies and unicorn horns.  All power comes with a price, Tolkeen made the choice and paid theirs.  Years before the Siege books, Tolkeen was hiring mercenaries, and they always were an outpost of the Black Market (the Black Market that from the beginning, put bounties on CS weapons and armor).  They never were the Shining Ones.  They were a nation of Techno-Wizards and Industry, not a center of learning and wisdom.

No, the Coalition States are not the Good Guys of the Rifts World, you'd have to be an idiot to think that was even possible.  Are there good people in the rank and file of the CS States?  Of course, they're human.  Looking at the Coalition States with a perspective other than that of a Sneering, Virtue Signaling, First World Westerner is a little more interesting to me and makes for a campaign that isn't out of a 1930's Black and White Pulp Serial.

My Wilderness Scout is pretty cool, but my favorite Rifts PC is my Cyber-Knight.  In his time he saved innocents from Coalition Soldiers and saved Coalition Soldiers from demons.  In Ciudad Juarez, he helped the Guard, and stood against them when they crossed the line.  He was based out of Tolkeen for a time and fought for the city as well as against the excesses of its mercenaries.  I stopped playing Rifts long before the Tolkeen War, and started running Rifts instead, but I'm pretty sure he would have followed Lord Coake's command, and stood down in the main fight, helping the refugees as best he could and preventing the demonic forces unleashed from consuming the innocent.

So no, I'm not a Neo-Nazi lover who wanks to skulls and swastikas, pretty sure no Rifts fan ever did, despite what those filled with purple hate will claim.  But Rifts world isn't our world.  Demons walk the earth, and humans serve, call and even command them.  In Rifts, John Wayne Gacy is a Mind Melter, and entire villages bleed and die in pain.  In a world where in most places, Might Makes Right, the bad guys have a whole lot of might.  You asked us to imagine your group of purple DBees, well imagine a town of humans, the natural inhabitants of this planet, who are terrorized by monsters from another dimension, only to be saved by soldiers from the Coalition.  Are they going to fear the black skulls?  No, they're going to see them as saviors, because that day, they were.

If you don't understand the Coalition, you can't fight the Coalition, at least not without becoming as bad as them yourself.  You brand them Tools, Puppets, and Monsters like a rpg.net simpleton and you're no better than the soldier's masters who brand anything not human as Alien, Evil, and Corrupting.  You show them the lie, Again, and Again, and Again, and Again.  Erin Tarn's War isn't one of weapons, it's one of ideas.  So you have to get yourself some more useful then a soundbite or a binary metadata tag. ;)

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898461You're making a LOT of assumptions without any data to back it up.

Actually some of the early Rifts info on the Coalition does back some of that up. The average grunt was indocrinated to shoot first and ask no questions. The Coalition is seen as saviors by those who have faced DeeBee incursions, and so on. Theres been some speculation that 40k cribbed some ideas from Rifts or After the Bomb and incorperated them into 40k eventually. Theres certainly some overlap of theme.

I agree with you about Tolkeen. Its one of my annoyances with Palladium that they used some of my stuff and dropped it in all that.

Quote from: CRKrueger;898464You're failing to see something, I'm explaining a point of view.  What "data" explains the viewpoint of Jack Nicholson in a Few Good Men or Robert Duvall in Apocalypse Now?

Perhaps, but you're coming from the 'Devil's Advocate' point a little too hard.  And frankly, the amount of, for example, Mind Melters, compared to some woman who can maybe move a small object with her mind, and using the MM as the reason for why they aren't so bad is a bit disingenuous. The Coalition enslave anyone who shows any sort of psychic ability, and the odds of them being any level of powerful is exceedingly rare.  And remember, they have Psi-Stalkers that can infallibly detect them.  So, there's not one that, according to the system, can escape being turned into a second class citizen.

Quote from: Omega;898508Actually some of the early Rifts info on the Coalition does back some of that up. The average grunt was indocrinated to shoot first and ask no questions. The Coalition is seen as saviors by those who have faced DeeBee incursions, and so on. Theres been some speculation that 40k cribbed some ideas from Rifts or After the Bomb and incorperated them into 40k eventually. Theres certainly some overlap of theme.

To other Coalition members and citizens, yes, absolutely.  But to the rest of the North Americans?  Utter nutjobs that would wipe out entire peaceful, mixed villages of DBs and humans, simply because of the fact that Mr. Elf (who was born on Earth, poor sap, which makes him an earthling) had pointy ears.  They were painted as indiscriminate and uncaring, just like the Neo-Nazi's that they were.  There were monsters clad in technology. A boogie man for the rest of the 'nation' to frighten children with and hide from when they turned out to be real.

Problem is, Mr, Siembeida started to like them and tried to make them into nicer guys, and it felt incredibly clumsy.

Quote from: Omega;898508I agree with you about Tolkeen. Its one of my annoyances with Palladium that they used some of my stuff and dropped it in all that.

You wrote for Palladium?  Awesome!  Sorry it turned out bad, but still, that's awesome!

Before all the silliness of New West and Spirit West how great would it have felt to be living in the Simvan or Psi-Stalker ranges out west?  A Coalition LR patrol would be a god-send.  What if a Brodkil warlord decides to take your town as his own?

Quote from: KingCheops;898533Before all the silliness of New West and Spirit West how great would it have felt to be living in the Simvan or Psi-Stalker ranges out west?  A Coalition LR patrol would be a god-send.  What if a Brodkil warlord decides to take your town as his own?

It is actually a regular occurence in Rifts America and one of the reasons why the Coalition States are so popular amongst normal humans : they fight back against demons.

Quote from: Spinachcat;898396I'd actually prefer to run the Tomorrow Legion as an underground rebellion - often INSIDE the Coalition territory.

Definitely going to consider doing this. Good call.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898461You're making a LOT of assumptions without any data to back it up.  And it sounds very much like you WANT the Neo-Nazi death squads and camps to be considered the default 'good guy' for the game.  Which is you prerogative, I suppose, but are you REALLY going to paint that the world is 90% monster that wants to eat you?  That sounds awfully boring, and video gamey.  But I guess if you want to make the Coalition the good guys by default, that's what you have to do.

I owned a sizeable collection of Rifts books back inna-day. I wouldn't say the Coalition were the "good guys" - but they certainly were a realistic expression of what I believe humanity could/would resort to under the conceits of the Rifts setting. One of the wonderful things about the Coalition as an entity is that if you lived on the ground - not in the world of ideas, as a human in Rift's Earth, it's a pretty powerful response to dimensional invasion without making specious presumptions of "oh let's all be friends" with extra-dimensional beings whose motives are scarcely knowable by the powers that be. Hell, look around the world now, we don't even tolerate other magical beliefs that are not real and are willing to use war-rhetoric (and action) to back it up. I could *easily* see the CS be a real thing, as to whether it's "good" or not is ultimately irrelevant to me. It's about what the PC's do in the context of the philosophical conflict.

It's war. To me, there are gigantic capacities for cruelty and "evil" on any side. I love those kinds of conflicts as a setting, personally.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898461Personally, as someone who collected the whole line, Tolkien WAS the supposed good guy faction, so much so that Mr. Siembeida had to muddy them in a series of adventures.  Not in one of the world/source books, but the adventures themselves.  As if he had accidentally painted himself into a corner.

Maybe so. But ultimately "good" is dumb and boring. Like the "Republic" in Star Wars is this big kumbaya gathering of aliens, that all just get along? Of course not. That's why Republic commandos exist to put down those within the Republic that go against their authority. Tolkeen, ostensibly represents being "good" in terms of embracing magic and all that - still has *zero* to do with reconciling the reality of the real ugly shit out there that didn't give a flying fig about playing "nice" with their respective neighbors and *will* happily wipe Tolkeen and the rest of humanity off the face of the planet (or worse) without a thought. Sure not all D-bees are evil human-eating monsters - that's not really the point. The gulf that exists between the realities of Tolkeen and the Coalition have to do more with the big-picture.

Philosophically - sure the Emperor is an autocratic narcissist xenophobe. But he's also committed to dealing with the largest problems that threaten everyone. Tolkeen - not so much. There's no making diplomatic ties with the Splugorth. So live-and-let-live becomes a silly proposition when the opposition has no desire to do that. Hence the justification, on some level, of the Coalition's position. Could it be toned down? Sure. Then that's where Spinachat's excellent idea for the Tomorrow Legion comes in and you can plan to assassinate Emperor Prosek... whee!!

I don't buy any sovereign social structure being labeled as "good" vs. "evil". The question is how much of either in their own interests are you willing to deal with in context with the rest of the world.

Quote from: yabaziou;898460Part of me wishes that the Rifts world books were written more like Vampire Kingdoms and less like NGR and the Triax. Note that nothing prevents anybody playing Rifts on this (smaller) scale.

Agreed there. Sourcebook 1 and Vampire Kingdoms are what every Rifts World Book should have looked like. The Ciudad Juarez write-up is fantastic.

Quote from: tenbones;898581It's war. To me, there are gigantic capacities for cruelty and "evil" on any side. I love those kinds of conflicts as a setting, personally.
(...)
I don't buy any sovereign social structure being labeled as "good" vs. "evil". The question is how much of either in their own interests are you willing to deal with in context with the rest of the world.

Kruger's done a long and impassioned defense that I 100% agree with (which is to say, his take on Rifts Earth is precisely my take on it), but it really boils down to this.

Quote from: tenbones;898581I owned a sizeable collection of Rifts books back inna-day. I wouldn't say the Coalition were the "good guys" - but they certainly were a realistic expression of what I believe humanity could/would resort to under the conceits of the Rifts setting. One of the wonderful things about the Coalition as an entity is that if you lived on the ground - not in the world of ideas, as a human in Rift's Earth, it's a pretty powerful response to dimensional invasion without making specious presumptions of "oh let's all be friends" with extra-dimensional beings whose motives are scarcely knowable by the powers that be. Hell, look around the world now, we don't even tolerate other magical beliefs that are not real and are willing to use war-rhetoric (and action) to back it up. I could *easily* see the CS be a real thing, as to whether it's "good" or not is ultimately irrelevant to me. It's about what the PC's do in the context of the philosophical conflict.

It's war. To me, there are gigantic capacities for cruelty and "evil" on any side. I love those kinds of conflicts as a setting, personally.

The issue is that Mr. Siembeida turned Tolkien into Saturday Morning Evil!  That's the thing.  To make the Coalition a good guy organization, he made Tolkien into something that was beyond silly!

Nothing was meant to be pure good, or pure evil.  Yes, there was some nice Coalition guys, and there were evil Tolkien guys, but neither were ambiguous, or a pure shade of grey (which is just as unrealistic as pure white or black.)  But to actually make Tolkien as bad guys required more work than doing so for the Coalition.

Quote from: tenbones;898581Philosophically - sure the Emperor is an autocratic narcissist xenophobe. But he's also committed to dealing with the largest problems that threaten everyone.

No, he's not.  That's the thing.  He only cares about his 'territory'.  And even then, if it's not Chi-Town, he's not really going to act very quickly.  Which is why New Quebec (silly book notwithstanding) is listed as considering separating from the Coalition.  That and the fact that Chi-Town frowns on Glitter Boy units.  The Emperor doesn't even care about the villages within his territory, unless it was full of D-Bees in which they would make into a nice MDC bonfire.  If you're not Coalition, you are less than nothing.

Quote from: tenbones;898581Tolkeen - not so much.

But they were.  They were willing to help anyone who called on them.  You want into our kingdom for safety?  Sure!  Why not.  Now yes, there were probably some other reasons as to why they said yes, but at least to these immigrants they didn't have to fear getting gunned down because they didn't look right.

Quote from: tenbones;898581There's no making diplomatic ties with the Splugorth. So live-and-let-live becomes a silly proposition when the opposition has no desire to do that.

Not seen that in the books, not saying it doesn't exist, but if it does, that IS agreeably stupid.

Quote from: tenbones;898581Hence the justification, on some level, of the Coalition's position. Could it be toned down? Sure. Then that's where Spinachat's excellent idea for the Tomorrow Legion comes in and you can plan to assassinate Emperor Prosek... whee!!

I don't buy any sovereign social structure being labeled as "good" vs. "evil". The question is how much of either in their own interests are you willing to deal with in context with the rest of the world.

If that's the case, then the Coalition's own interests is much more self-serving, and uncaring to the general population outside it's own borders, which often do not extend past the walls of each arcology.

Quote from: The Butcher;898603Agreed there. Sourcebook 1 and Vampire Kingdoms are what every Rifts World Book should have looked like. The Ciudad Juarez write-up is fantastic.

I want to go on record saying that Rifts Atlantis is (in my opinion) another Rifts highlight, even if its scope and focus are vastly different from Vampire Kingdoms.

Quote from: yabaziou;898650I want to go on record saying that Rifts Atlantis is (in my opinion) another Rifts highlight, even if its scope and focus are vastly different from Vampire Kingdoms.

Atlantis is awesome! But very much an "epic level" module/setting. I believe its success, coupled with the "failure" of both England and Africa, may have spurred Siembieda and Carella further towards the infamous power creep.

I also believe that people disliked England and Africa not because of a lack of über-powerful character options, but because the world information was so sparse and, for the most part, uninspired. Setting a game in Germany, Russia or even goddamn South America is a breeze. England and Africa have very little to offer in this regard.

I agree with you Butcher ! In my opinion, Rifts England fails because of its weird presentation : WTF the temporal raider and their magic are in there ? Why nt more information about new camelot ? Since when Wales, Scotland, Ireland and France are parts of England ? Why no more information about the fomorian menace ? Why does Siembieda allow Wayne Breaux Jr and himself to illustrate this book while he has Kevin Long, who is more talented that the both of them, at his disposal ?

Rifts Africa fails because Africa is huge, diverse and Siembieda does not show any ambition to od it right. It is more : 4 horsemen of Apocalypse, it is cool, let's put in Africa (it is not even an African myth), an Egyptian Pharao, who is also a shapeshifter who worship Death itself, let's do that, Pygmees, yeah ! and more Siembieda's drawings ...

The whole OCC/RCC bloat is also tiresome ...

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898461Personally, as someone who collected the whole line, Tolkien WAS the supposed good guy faction, so much so that Mr. Siembeida had to muddy them in a series of adventures.  Not in one of the world/source books, but the adventures themselves.  As if he had accidentally painted himself into a corner.

I thought Lazlo was the goodies, and Tolkeen was more grey? I stopped collecting at Juicer Uprisings.

*Edit* Looks like I'm not the only one who got that impression.*

Quote from: CRKrueger;898440Siembieda is a Mad Genius Idea Machine, who can't really write all that well or coherently.  He needs a Two Rooms style partner.  I don't like Rifts for the plots, or the techporn (ok not ONLY for the techporn), I like Rifts for the canvas, the backdrop with so many brilliant, even if problematic and triggering, ideas to work with. That's why I like Rifts.  Some people say the extreme and violent nature of the setting is there to make Fascist Ideology and Nazi Fetish Wank acceptable.  I disagree.  I think, like lots of good science fiction, it provides great metaphors that can be used to explore and experience humanity: the good, the bad, the tragic, the heroic.  In the setting where literally anything is possible, then you can run any type of game you want.

This theme came up in the first Sourcebook (James T, the crazy cyborg) and especially Reid's Rangers from the Vampire Kingdoms. The PCs are likely decent enough, but there's lots of people in RIFTs who will protect you from the demons and shit, but they aren't especially nice people once you get to know them.

Quote from: tenbones;898581Maybe so. But ultimately "good" is dumb and boring.

I don't think good is dumb and boring. I think any "side" in a piece of fiction is boring if it lacks conflict. Imagine a victorious Empire where the Emperor finally managed to crush all his enemies. No rebellions, no dissenters. Everyone agrees that the Empire is right and necessary, and Vader wouldn't dare raise his hand against the galaxy's savior.

Zzzzzzz... Maybe as a peculiar short story about the Emperor sitting there shuffling papers and being bored.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898627The issue is that Mr. Siembeida turned Tolkien into Saturday Morning Evil!  That's the thing.  To make the Coalition a good guy organization, he made Tolkien into something that was beyond silly!

Understood. My take on it remains - "good" is boring. Given the necessity to create "drama", even if you want to chalk it up to "narrativism" or whatever - conflict needs to ensue. The moment you come that conclusion, in whatever capacity, you need to have someone pull the trigger. In the big picture I think we can agree the CS would do exactly that. In the *bigger* picture, having the CS gut Tolkeen makes for better conflict in which to play in considering Tolkeen winning is like the Republic winning in Star Wars - nothing much happens.

I think pointing a finger at Siembieda and minimizing it down to "Well he's a CS fanboy!" is kinda too simplistic (and you might very well be right.) However, much like I'll say below with Emperor Prosek - the means justify the ends. It makes good narrative sense in this context to do this, regardless if he's a CS fanboy or not, imo. It upsets the applecart, and given the fact that Rifts has never really done a new edition, it shook up the status-quo in a dramatic way without crapping on the rest of the world (that's for the PC's to do/not do).

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898627Nothing was meant to be pure good, or pure evil.  Yes, there was some nice Coalition guys, and there were evil Tolkien guys, but neither were ambiguous, or a pure shade of grey (which is just as unrealistic as pure white or black.)  But to actually make Tolkien as bad guys required more work than doing so for the Coalition.

No argument here. My point is that the CS is much more interesting and Tolkeen is boring. Narratively, Kevin could have had Tolkeen become the magical equivalent to the CS - but more militaristic in their approach, and have them both slug it out, fueled by their respective philosophies and let them slug it out. Because conflict is good for gaming. But he took a more decisive approach. Likewise I'd be cool with Tolkeen decimating the CS IF they took that hardline position.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898627No, he's not.  That's the thing.  He only cares about his 'territory'.  And even then, if it's not Chi-Town, he's not really going to act very quickly.  Which is why New Quebec (silly book notwithstanding) is listed as considering separating from the Coalition.  That and the fact that Chi-Town frowns on Glitter Boy units.  The Emperor doesn't even care about the villages within his territory, unless it was full of D-Bees in which they would make into a nice MDC bonfire.  If you're not Coalition, you are less than nothing.

Don't let your dislike for the autocratic totalitarian megalomaniacal Emperor Prosek make presumptions that these things are mutually exclusive. He most certainly can be the despotic piece of crazytown-shit that wants to conquer the the world *AND* still recognize the big picture for survival. They certainly can co-exist. They just can't co-exist with entities singular/social that would thwart him and his MDC-boot-wearing goosesteppers. Killing all of ones enemies is most certainly one way of dealing with the problem of their existence if one is crazy enough to perceive them as a threat. I'm not saying he's GOOD... I'm saying he sees the landscape.

Simple example - if you were a human villager living in Rifts Modesto California - and the CS invaded Atlantis and mega-nuked the Splugorth into oblivion, you may not realize it, but the world just got a little better. If they nuked Tolkeen along the way to do that, in the big picture the net-gain, for you, would probably still be better. Unfortunate for Tolkeen residents, but overall, much better for everyone else. That kind of disturbing conflict is a hyperbolic ball-of-fun for RPG's.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898627But they were.  They were willing to help anyone who called on them.  You want into our kingdom for safety?  Sure!  Why not.  Now yes, there were probably some other reasons as to why they said yes, but at least to these immigrants they didn't have to fear getting gunned down because they didn't look right.

Okay... so let me use the example above. Tolkeen was *never* going deal with the Splugorth. Even if they wanted to (among the many other supernatural/interdimensional monstrosities threatening all of humanity) - they, to my recall, did not have anything remotely close the power needed to deal with them. Let's stipulate: The Mechanoids, ARCHIE, The Splugorth, the Vampire Kingdoms, Xiticix, among others, being the largest existential threats to *everyone* - Tolkeen wasn't going to have diplomatic ties with these entities to "sort things out". They would have gotten their collective asses handed to them - actually it would have been worse than that. They'd have been enslaved and killed and tortured and maimed for pleasure - then it would probably have gone downhill from there.

I'm not saying Tolkeen was a *bad* element to have in the game. I'm saying it wasn't going to do squat against these very real threats. To what degree they are threats - that's up to the GM. You could even put the CS itself in that list. Tolkeen wasn't going to take the CS on. So these are the apex predators of the Rifts setting - *at some point* someone's gotta eat. In this case, Kevin made the call with the CS and Tolkeen was on the plate. He *could* have gone after someone else, sure. Maybe it was arbitrary, I think the CS was a good call because it's about Earth, and the CS is probably the only humanocentric organization in any position to make a move. I'm not arguing they're good. I'm just saying it makes sense to me. I'm not even making the claim that the CS *could* deal with these other issues either. I'm just saying that someone in the setting has to try to steal the bacon first. The CS is a logical choice.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898627If that's the case, then the Coalition's own interests is much more self-serving, and uncaring to the general population outside it's own borders, which often do not extend past the walls of each arcology.

Absofuckinglutly!! They are *totally* self-serving. That's the beauty of it. They're setting themselves UP for a much needed curbing. That's why the conflict posed by them doing this is damn near majestic (especially with Spinachats idea thrown into the mix - with the Tomorrow Legion being an insurgency within the CS!!!!! Jesus it's a great idea - it's a campaign waiting to happen). Kevin upped the ante (regardless of how anyone feels about it) by putting one of his big set-pieces into motion... how that gets resolved? Well that's for campaigns all over the world to figure out for themselves!!!

It's gonna be great!

Quote from: Ratman_tf;898729I don't think good is dumb and boring. I think any "side" in a piece of fiction is boring if it lacks conflict. Imagine a victorious Empire where the Emperor finally managed to crush all his enemies. No rebellions, no dissenters. Everyone agrees that the Empire is right and necessary, and Vader wouldn't dare raise his hand against the galaxy's savior.

Zzzzzzz... Maybe as a peculiar short story about the Emperor sitting there shuffling papers and being bored.

I accept your challenge with your own words, good sir.

IF "conflict" is the necessary ingredient to make a piece of fiction "not boring", WHOM, generally speaking, is more likely to create "conflict" - good or evil people?

That's right. Evil people. So your example with the Empire is a bad one. Because *they're creating conflict*. The Empire is evil by its very nature. You can't have the old mythic tale of "Good triumphing over Evil" - UNLESS Evil has already triumphed over Good. This is precisely why I don't like the modern-era of Star Wars. It presumes the era of the "Good Ol' Days of the Old Republic" were really good. So of course once the Empire takes over it becomes an inevitable quest to destroy it - it's the perfect target.

But a Good Republic... sure you'll get years of relative peace to snooze in. But at some point - conflict will need to arise. One could say "evil people" doing "evil shit" will cause that disruption. But we all know what it really takes - corruption from the inside. The moment the "Good" authority starts doing "not good" things is when the conflict starts - at which point the "Good" authority stops actually being good.

I'm not saying Tolkeen was fully evil or anything remotely like that - I'm saying that it's position as the "good human" city made it and obvious target. And let's face it, it's boring on the big scale. It's perfectly fine to adventure in and around (don't get me wrong). But from the big-picture standpoint its not something I'd base conflict OUT of, *because* it's generally "good". If I did that - they wouldn't be "good".

Quote from: tenbones;898774I accept your challenge with your own words, good sir.

IF "conflict" is the necessary ingredient to make a piece of fiction "not boring", WHOM, generally speaking, is more likely to create "conflict" - good or evil people?

That's right. Evil people.

I'd agree that "evil" is usually more proactive than "good" in fiction. Usually antagonists are the ones who have strong motivations, and go out and do shit. Mr. Freeze wants to save his cryowife. Baron Harkonen wants to destroy House Atredies. Even a goal as hackneyed as "rule the world", at least is a motivation that creates conflict.

QuoteSo your example with the Empire is a bad one. Because *they're creating conflict*. The Empire is evil by its very nature. You can't have the old mythic tale of "Good triumphing over Evil" - UNLESS Evil has already triumphed over Good. This is precisely why I don't like the modern-era of Star Wars. It presumes the era of the "Good Ol' Days of the Old Republic" were really good. So of course once the Empire takes over it becomes an inevitable quest to destroy it - it's the perfect target.

But your assertation also includes that you can't have conflict unless someone, the "good" side, is there to oppose evil. The baddies couldn't be remotely as interesting if no one contested them. The difference between interesting and boring is, IMO, agency. Bad guys are usually shown with more agency, they do shit. Good guys are usually shown as passive. They wait around for the bad guys to do something, and then oppose them.

But, there's nothing saying the good guys can't have that kind of agency. The problem is that when someone is active and another is passive, people seem to tend towards having less sympathy for the actor and more sympathy for the act-ee. Which is where I think a lot of "bad guy backlash" comes from. When the bad guys are finally defeated, it's because the good guys acted and succeeded. (Which, BTW, is where I suspect the "good guy lets the bad guy do himself in", deflecting some of that agency, comes from. See: All the Nolan Batman movies.)

QuoteI'm not saying Tolkeen was fully evil or anything remotely like that - I'm saying that it's position as the "good human" city made it and obvious target. And let's face it, it's boring on the big scale. It's perfectly fine to adventure in and around (don't get me wrong). But from the big-picture standpoint its not something I'd base conflict OUT of, *because* it's generally "good". If I did that - they wouldn't be "good".

Eh. I'm not so sure Tolkeen were ever meant to be "good". From the first Rulebook, it seemed like they were setting Tolkeen and the CS up to clash eventually, and for it to be a murky, grey conflict on both sides.

*Edit*

Ok, I've been doing some reading, and I think I've gotten some of the history of the Federation of Magic confused with Tolkeen's history. So there's that.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;898784I'd agree that "evil" is usually more proactive than "good" in fiction. Usually antagonists are the ones who have strong motivations, and go out and do shit. Mr. Freeze wants to save his cryowife. Baron Harkonen wants to destroy House Atredies. Even a goal as hackneyed as "rule the world", at least is a motivation that creates conflict.

You bet. There's always exceptions to whatever rule is being proposed. <---even that one? Shit I just ate a paradox point.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;898784But your assertation also includes that you can't have conflict unless someone, the "good" side, is there to oppose evil. The baddies couldn't be remotely as interesting if no one contested them. The difference between interesting and boring is, IMO, agency. Bad guys are usually shown with more agency, they do shit. Good guys are usually shown as passive. They wait around for the bad guys to do something, and then oppose them.

Well I generally speaking don't like using "good" and "evil" to describe opposing sides. But sure - you can have "evil" being opposed by "less evil" if you prefer. In fact on the BIG scale - that's exactly what the CS is. Because I'll take the CS any day of the week over the horrors of the Splugorth or the Xiticix etc. They are, for all their whacked-out beliefs, "less evil" than those other guys.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;898784But, there's nothing saying the good guys can't have that kind of agency. The problem is that when someone is active and another is passive, people seem to tend towards having less sympathy for the actor and more sympathy for the act-ee. Which is where I think a lot of "bad guy backlash" comes from. When the bad guys are finally defeated, it's because the good guys acted and succeeded. (Which, BTW, is where I suspect the "good guy lets the bad guy do himself in", deflecting some of that agency, comes from. See: All the Nolan Batman movies.)

Sure it's possible. It's just not set up for that in Rifts. I'll play Devil's Advocate - and bear with me, I'm going off of memory here, so someone can easily correct me - but Tolkeen is given pretty short-shrift compared to CS. Now sure we can say it's Kev fanboying on his own creation. Let's pretend that it was reversed and he started out fanboying on Tolkeen as "the cool kid" among the bad-elements of the setting.

He'd have a *lot* to reconcile in terms of dealing with those bad-apples that *do* exist. That could certainly be done, but then the very nature of Tolkeen would likely be different, darker, than what it was, by necessity. In order to give them agency to actually deal with things that if left to their own devices *would* devour the remnants of humanity, Tolkeen would almost by necessity have to destroy the CS, because I think we can all agree that Prosek sure as hell wasn't going to play ball with them (or more deviously - he'd do it only to stab them in the back). I think conflict between the two would be inevitable. That said - if Tolkeen did do that, it would fundamentally change them.

The writing was on the wall for this kind of situation - because it might have been possible in the early years of Rifts, the philosophical stance of Tolkeen is not one of expansion. The CS was by default ready to bring the fight on. Damn the torpedos and all that. By changing the philosophical stance of Tolkeen to something more pro-active, it would have changed the very nature of this conversation (and that would be a fun campaign to run too!)

Quote from: Ratman_tf;898784Eh. I'm not so sure Tolkeen were ever meant to be "good". From the first Rulebook, it seemed like they were setting Tolkeen and the CS up to clash eventually, and for it to be a murky, grey conflict on both sides.

Yep. It was bound to happen.

Quote from: tenbones;898793Shit I just ate a paradox point.

You're gonna poop a wand of wonder.

Quote from: tenbones;898793But sure - you can have "evil" being opposed by "less evil" if you prefer.

THIS is how I run Rifts and Chaos Earth.

Personally, I feel the Palladium alignment system supports this in play, because its quite possible for Scrupulous (good) person to have better dealings with an Aberrant (evil) person than with an Anarchist (neutral).

Here's a breakdown for people who aren't familiar. I wonder if Savage Rifts will include them?
http://gelvgoldenaxe.proboards.com/thread/23

I backed it. It took me a lot of hemming and hawing, but I did.

Was a big fan of various Palladium games back in the day. Basically what I cut my teeth on rpg-wise.

I have been playing Savage Worlds for a number of years now. Funnily enough, my very first experience with Savage Worlds was pretty bad and I didn't like the system for a a couple years - it was with the author of Savage Rifts at a con. Same con that the guy himself laughed when I told him I played Palladium; "haha...sorry! hahaha."  This was when Palladium announced the big embezzlement thing - but before they crowdfunded for cash.

So I have had some issues with backing this kickstarter. I find it hard to believe that a guy who was a prick and made fun of the company back in the day is now saying he's been a huge fan since the beginning. That bugs me.

However, I am a fan of the Savage Worlds rules. Been playing in an ongoing campaign for 4 or 5 years now. Stopped playing Rifts because after running it for a decade, I just couldn't take the system anymore. It just stopped jiving with me one day. Still have all my books, and I still use them for inspiration for other games. I've used several Rifts monsters in LotFP as one-time freakazoids.

So, I backed it. I don't care that MDC works differently because MDC in Rifts was always shit. In the original Robotech rule book it worked and made sense, but Rifts drove the concept into the shitter. So hardened armor and heavy/AP weapons works great for me. I really like the burn out mechanic for Juicers; it actually gives them a weakness, as the Rifts Juicer is essentially the single best combat class with no equal and no weaknesses. It was really the one class I ever saw abused in a decade of playing the game.

It will be interesting to see what they do with nukes and antimatter bombs. It isn't like they could fuck them up more than Palladium did.

And someone earlier made a point about how Savage Worlds can't handle high powered beings like Splugorth and the Four Horsemen and whatnot. Well, neither could Rifts. Splyncryth himself had what, like 56,000 MDC? If you played in a Rifts game and defeated him then you weren't playing Rifts. You were playing some bullshit. That is not a fair metric at all, since Rifts didn't handle high-MDC beings well at all. Anything with more than 2k MDC was essentially unbeatable because Rifts weapons are far weaker than Rifts armor. Even with the ridiculous burst fire rules which were all but disposed of in the GM's Guide and Ultimate edition.

Oh, by the way, in the SW campaign I've been playing in for several years now, my guy is a dragon. Well, sort of. It is in the Sundered Skies setting and I played a drakin from the very beginning. I'm finally at the final experience tier and in 2 or 3 advances my dude will be a full grown, honest to god, playable and fun, adult dragon. So SW is certainly capable of handling something of that power level.

Quote from: tenbones;898771Don't let your dislike for the autocratic totalitarian megalomaniacal Emperor Prosek make presumptions that these things are mutually exclusive. He most certainly can be the despotic piece of crazytown-shit that wants to conquer the the world *AND* still recognize the big picture for survival. They certainly can co-exist. They just can't co-exist with entities singular/social that would thwart him and his MDC-boot-wearing goosesteppers. Killing all of ones enemies is most certainly one way of dealing with the problem of their existence if one is crazy enough to perceive them as a threat. I'm not saying he's GOOD... I'm saying he sees the landscape.

That's the problem, no he does not.  And I'll explain why below.

Quote from: tenbones;898771Okay... so let me use the example above. Tolkeen was *never* going deal with the Splugorth. Even if they wanted to (among the many other supernatural/interdimensional monstrosities threatening all of humanity) - they, to my recall, did not have anything remotely close the power needed to deal with them. Let's stipulate: The Mechanoids, ARCHIE, The Splugorth, the Vampire Kingdoms, Xiticix, among others, being the largest existential threats to *everyone* - Tolkeen wasn't going to have diplomatic ties with these entities to "sort things out". They would have gotten their collective asses handed to them - actually it would have been worse than that. They'd have been enslaved and killed and tortured and maimed for pleasure - then it would probably have gone downhill from there.

Here's the problem.  ARCHIE was so secret that the Coalition would have been the first to fall if the AI REALLY wanted to do something about it.  The Mechanioids?  Neither nation would have been as prepared, also, Tolkien would have likely survived better, simply because Magic.  If I remember correctly, the Mechaniods have no defense against that.  As for the Splugorth, the Coalition with it's insistence on hating Magic would be literally no threat to Atlantis.  None.

And it's for the same in game, in world, mechanical reasons as to why Tolkien should have won.  Magic, namely, Teleportation Magic.  The CS has again, ZERO defense against it as written at the time of The Siege of Tolkien.  If Tolkien REALLY wanted to win, they'd have teleported magic users and soldiers directly into Chi-Town and that would have been the end of it.

This is the reason I have issues with the whole Coalition actually surviving.  They border on the level of stupidity that should have gotten them killed.  It's nice to have really big guns, but even then, they're denying themselves some of the more powerful ones: Glitters Boys are well known to be the most powerful man sized (10ft, yeah, yeah) portable artillery pieces in the Western world.  But NOPE!  NOT HAVING ANY!  You, Quebec, get rid of them!  NAO!  You have creatures and people with abilities that can bypass all mundane security measures, such as teleportation and ley line 'walking'.  But do they have anything to defend themselves against it?  Nope, don't need it, cuz we!  Are!  Human!

The only way that the CS will survive longer than the 50 (and even then) or so years that they claimed to have, is by Writer's Fiat.  Also known as Plot Protection.

Oh god, now Rifts=Bad because White Room Proofs.  Linear Coalition, Quadratic Tolkeen.  :rolleyes:

Someone call The Gaming Den and get them started on a thread "proving" who wins the Tolkeen Conflict.  We'll check in after they post a few hundred thousand Objectively True and Mutually Exclusive results.  Maybe the nurse who changes my bedpan in 40 years will give a shit.

Jesus, Dude.  You liked Tolkeen.   We get it. Grow the fuck up and get over it instead of trying to prove by every possible means necessary (and failing miserably) that Siembieda and Rifts are everything wrong with gaming.

Quote from: tenbones;898771Understood. My take on it remains - "good" is boring.

No argument here. My point is that the CS is much more interesting and Tolkeen is boring. Narratively, Kevin could have had Tolkeen become the magical equivalent to the CS - but more militaristic in their approach, and have them both slug it out, fueled by their respective philosophies and let them slug it out. Because conflict is good for gaming. But he took a more decisive approach. Likewise I'd be cool with Tolkeen decimating the CS IF they took that hardline position.

If they nuked Tolkeen along the way to do that, in the big picture the net-gain, for you, would probably still be better. Unfortunate for Tolkeen residents, but overall, much better for everyone else. That kind of disturbing conflict is a hyperbolic ball-of-fun for RPG's.

Okay... so let me use the example above. Tolkeen was *never* going deal with the Splugorth.

I'm not saying Tolkeen was a *bad* element to have in the game. I'm saying it wasn't going to do squat against these very real threats. To what degree they are threats - that's up to the GM. You could even put the CS itself in that list.

1: Good isnt boring. Its more challenging. Evil is boring.

2: Tolkeen isnt so much boring as its not as fleshed out as the Coalition was. We know tons about the Coalition and their gadgets. But Tolkeen? Not so much till near the end. and then its over.  Its like in Star Wars. We know alot more about the Empire than the Rebels. The Empires tech is on display alot more than the rebels all the way through the original three movies. I agree that Tolkeen could have been a very interesting magical counterpart to the Coalition. Missed opportunity amongst many many others. Theres so much that will never see light for Rifts.

3 & 4: Not necessarily. Tolkeen keeps the magical threats at bay to some degree much like the CS does with the rest. And the CS was shown to be often out of its league when faced with magic. The CS wasnt going to deal with the Splurgoth either for that reason.

5: We dont really know what Tolkeen was doing. Or not. They could have been as active as the Coalition. But without mention in the books much its hard to say or pin down. Least far as I got in the books it was still a cypher overall. Kind of like TRIAX and the NGR were till they got their own books.

X: Its a moot point at this point. I doubt Palladium will really play up the disaster potential that the loss of Tolkeen really implies. Without that magical stopgap the Coalition should be facing an uphill battle thereafter as magical threats that Tolkeen (probably) handled now filter into SC territory with no checks. Threats the CS will be out of their league to handle.

Who knows. Maybee it was all a set up for the big fall of the Coalition and some new force to stand up and defend. Psi World? Nemo? Archie? The Mechanons? Lazlo?

Back on topic. Whats the latest on the SW Rifts? Seems like its chugging along better than expected. Even if some of the rules decisions might not thrill some.

Quote from: CRKrueger;898888Oh god, now Rifts=Bad because White Room Proofs.  Linear Coalition, Quadratic Tolkeen.  :rolleyes:

Someone call The Gaming Den and get them started on a thread "proving" who wins the Tolkeen Conflict.  We'll check in after they post a few hundred thousand Objectively True and Mutually Exclusive results.  Maybe the nurse who changes my bedpan in 40 years will give a shit.

Jesus, Dude.  You liked Tolkeen.   We get it. Grow the fuck up and get over it instead of trying to prove by every possible means necessary (and failing miserably) that Siembieda and Rifts are everything wrong with gaming.

Actually no.  I much preferred the smaller kingdoms, like Ishpeming, AKA Northern Gun, Ciudad Juarez and the like.  My favourite books were the Mercenaries, Juicer Uprisings, Rifts Underseas and a few others.

The problem is that certain elements break the suspension of disbelief.  I'm willing to take a lot of stuff and bend with it, but one thing I have a hard time accepting is when the internal logic of a setting gets broken to serve some shoehorned metaplot.

The fact is, because I neither liked, nor actually disliked the Coalition or Tolkien, I could take a good long look, without (hopefully) too much bias over the other and see where the setting compromises it's own logic to make something happen that simply is impossible at the time.  I didn't care who won.  Actually, I would have preferred to have that conflict left alone, that way each and every single table could decide when, where and who would win that conflict.  Personally?  I'd have kept it simmering much, much longer than when it happened.

And the other issue I have is on this thread, we have several posters here who claim to be against 'pure' evil to the point of trying to shift goal posts around to make the Coalition, a group of genocidal, and exceedingly short sighted human supremacists, who book burn to keep their lower classes stupid and compliant, as well as the uplifting animals to sentience but do not give them the rights that we accept as sentient, oppress and kill a small segment of the population on the fear that one of them will be some sort of mental god, and who believe that Hitler was onto something, as 'real good guys'.  Despite trying to say, no, they're not. They're just 'the man with the plan'.  All evidence suggested otherwise.

And yes, yes, I actually agree, there's no such thing pure black or white, but in this world of shades of grey some are actually darker and lighter than others.  None are pure evil and none are pure good, but some do come so close it's scary.  What the Nazi's did?  Pretty damn bad.  What the Coalition, who was stated to be using some history books on Hitler, is doing?  Pretty damn bad.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;898905What the Nazi's did?  Pretty damn bad.

Holy shit, dude! I've never heard anyone say what the Nazis did was bad! What a concept.

QuoteWhat the Coalition, who was stated to be using some history books on Hitler, is doing?  Pretty damn bad.

Duh.

Was anyone else here thinking that the KS would have gone higher?  Don't get me wrong, $438,076 is a lot of money.  The initial blast off for this was impressive, then seemed to lose steam fast.

Starting off strong and then quickly losing steam is the modus operandi of Kickstarter projects.  The first few days and the last few days are where the money is made, if at all.  The middle is a slow trickle.

Quote from: Celestial;898979Starting off strong and then quickly losing steam is the modus operandi of Kickstarter projects.  The first few days and the last few days are where the money is made, if at all.  The middle is a slow trickle.

Two other factors that may account for the way it proceeded:

1. I think there was a lot of pent-up demand for this project or something like it, so a higher proportion of interested people were probably backing immediately.
2. Pinnacle didn't go crazy with stretch goals.

Quote from: RunningLaser;898971Was anyone else here thinking that the KS would have gone higher?  Don't get me wrong, $438,076 is a lot of money.  The initial blast off for this was impressive, then seemed to lose steam fast.

Thats kind of average for a KS. Big initial jump then a slowdown.

I think some Rifts fans are backing off due to how things are being done with the KS and the setting. How the elements are being handled. And at least one big Rifts fan I know who was keen to get this dropped out due to the SW designers attitude. (No clue what that was. didnt ask further.) So theres various little things thats going to rub someone the wrong way.

Same as how some Dragonlance and Gamma World fans wouldnt touch White Wolf's d20 DL and GW books for various reasons.

Quote from: RunningLaser;898971Was anyone else here thinking that the KS would have gone higher?  Don't get me wrong, $438,076 is a lot of money.  The initial blast off for this was impressive, then seemed to lose steam fast.

Shipping costs probably killed a lot of it.  It has kept me away.

Quote from: KingCheops;898991Shipping costs probably killed a lot of it.  It has kept me away.

oooh? Good point. I didnt even look at the shipping cost. It was supposed to be US and EU friendly?

Quote from: Omega;898988Same as how some Dragonlance and Gamma World fans wouldnt touch White Wolf's d20 DL and GW books for various reasons.

  White Wolf did Ravenloft for d20; Dragonlance was done by Sovereign Press/Margaret Weis Productions.

  And it was about half of the books that Ravenloft fans wouldn't touch, due to two distinct sets of freelancers doing most of them and slack control on both rules and setting content by the line editors. The stuff done primarily by the Kargatane was well-received; the stuff done by newcomers and White Wolf freelancers ... less so.

Ah. Got them mixed up then. Thanks.

Heard about the freelancer problem. Never had confirmation. Baugh and co I thought were in-house regulars for WW?

Quote from: RunningLaser;898971Was anyone else here thinking that the KS would have gone higher?  Don't get me wrong, $438,076 is a lot of money.  The initial blast off for this was impressive, then seemed to lose steam fast.

It is far more money than I would I thought for a game that many enjoy mocking on the Internet !

Quote from: RunningLaser;898971Was anyone else here thinking that the KS would have gone higher?  Don't get me wrong, $438,076 is a lot of money.  The initial blast off for this was impressive, then seemed to lose steam fast.

I thought it would hit $600k, but I also thought I was going to be one of the backers.

There were too many missteps, especially altering Rifts to fit SW (not altering their system to emulate the setting).

Also, Pinnacle missed the mark with their price points. That's something the 7th Sea KS really nailed.

For as absolutely lackluster as this KS was, they made an incredible amount of money.  All the stretch goals were small articles, probably 1-2 pagers and many of those should have been in any Core Rifts book.  There's a couple adventures, which coming from Pinnacle, means maybe 5 pages.  I mean the profit they're gonna make is crazy(even after Kevin's cut).  Modiphius is going to have to do literally 10-15 times the work at least for their money, and even Wick is gonna have 3-5 times the work.

Dollars taken in per page and rewards produced, this is the most profitable RPG Kickstarter of all time.  There's no way they can spend all that money getting those books out, not even if shipping costs somehow double to match what they listed.  They're in strippers and blow territory.

At least we know now that Rifts is way more popular than people thought, which no doubt will make purple wonder what the hell is wrong with gamers.  At least being called a Neo-Nazi will be different than the standard rapist/misogynist.  BTW, ahouldn't that be like NeoNeoNeoNeoNazi?

This is one of the few Kickstarters I wanted to back.  Couldn't.

My biggest issue with Tolkien was not the haphazard choices and metaplot, it was what it did to the Cyber-Knight OCC.  That to me was the biggest, most heinous crime in the books.

Quote from: CRKrueger;899171For as absolutely lackluster as this KS was, they made an incredible amount of money.  All the stretch goals were small articles, probably 1-2 pagers and many of those should have been in any Core Rifts book.  There's a couple adventures, which coming from Pinnacle, means maybe 5 pages.  I mean the profit they're gonna make is crazy(even after Kevin's cut).  Modiphius is going to have to do literally 10-15 times the work at least for their money, and even Wick is gonna have 3-5 times the work.

Dollars taken in per page and rewards produced, this is the most profitable RPG Kickstarter of all time.  There's no way they can spend all that money getting those books out, not even if shipping costs somehow double to match what they listed.  They're in strippers and blow territory.

At least we know now that Rifts is way more popular than people thought, which no doubt will make purple wonder what the hell is wrong with gamers.  At least being called a Neo-Nazi will be different than the standard rapist/misogynist.  BTW, ahouldn't that be like NeoNeoNeoNeoNazi?

Eh, I play 40k.  Being called a neo-nazi by a bunch of regressive fuckwits isn't exactly a new thing.

Quote from: CRKrueger;899171At least we know now that Rifts is way more popular than people thought, which no doubt will make purple wonder what the hell is wrong with gamers.  At least being called a Neo-Nazi will be different than the standard rapist/misogynist.  BTW, ahouldn't that be like NeoNeoNeoNeoNazi?

I doubt that the SJWs who actually care about such things are old enough to know anything about Palladium, and if they are they wouldn't risk their "in crowd" status by admitting that they did.

JG

The real telling point will be in how players and GMs react to it once they actually get it.

Who called who Neo-Nazis?  It wasn't me.  I was just saying that claiming that the Coalition (who, yes, are effectively Neo-Nazis) are A) the most 'prepared', when the very thing they are against, they had no defenses (as the time) and B) and calling them 'good guys' (Well, the nicer ones than Tolkien) when they practice xenophobic genocide and enslavement is both a little presumptuous and maybe short-sighted.

I did NOT call anyone anything.  I'm questioning the validity of the claim, nothing more.

I Believe this is probably Savage World's most successful Kickstarter. I can't wait to get my hands on the material since I can't stand the Rifts system. For me, this is a dream come true, finally getting to run Rifts. Pinnacle, much like SineNomine are very very conservative when it comes to stretch goals, it's so they can deliver product on time and with everything they promised..

I kickstarted 7th Sea as well, but I hope John Wick hasn't put himself into a hole with the sheer number of products we're all getting for free thanks to the stretch goals promised.

I've been re-reading the Coallition Wars series, due to this thread, and I think the worst thing about them isn't the story itself, but that K. Siembieda writes like a 12 year old.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;899359Who called who Neo-Nazis?  It wasn't me.  I was just saying that claiming that the Coalition (who, yes, are effectively Neo-Nazis) are A) the most 'prepared', when the very thing they are against, they had no defenses (as the time) and B) and calling them 'good guys' (Well, the nicer ones than Tolkien) when they practice xenophobic genocide and enslavement is both a little presumptuous and maybe short-sighted.

I did NOT call anyone anything.  I'm questioning the validity of the claim, nothing more.

It's come up more than once, elsewhere.  By the same kind of people that bitch about Space Marines and believe anyone that likes the Imperium of Man is a closeted goose-stepper.

Quote from: Warboss Squee;899450It's come up more than once, elsewhere.  By the same kind of people that bitch about Space Marines and believe anyone that likes the Imperium of Man is a closeted goose-stepper.

"Closeted"? ;)

The context in which both the Coalition and the Imperium are inserted — a universe that's actively hostile to the continued existence of mankind — makes their radical position towards non-human sophonts understable, if still ethically debatable (surely there may be one or more ways to share the universe, not with all, but with at least a few other tolerable sentient species?).

Nevertheless, what grinds my gears is to meet the (fortunately rare, IME) fanboy who believes such totalitarian societies are also a valid prescription for our own, modern society, and have no qualms about voicing this belief.

Quote from: The Butcher;899459"Closeted"? ;)

The context in which both the Coalition and the Imperium are inserted — a universe that's actively hostile to the continued existence of mankind — makes their radical position towards non-human sophonts understable, if still ethically debatable (surely there may be one or more ways to share the universe, not with all, but with at least a few other tolerable sentient species?).

Nevertheless, what grinds my gears is to meet the (fortunately rare, IME) fanboy who believes such totalitarian societies are also a valid prescription for our own, modern society, and have no qualms about voicing this belief.

Never met one. Heard a about a lot of them by virtue signalers though.

Quote from: Warboss Squee;899460Never met one. Heard a about a lot of them by virtue signalers though.

Met a few in the old, insane Palladium Mailing List and contemporaneous (mid-1990s) Palladium fan web scene.

As for 40K, only one, but my neck of the woods isn't exactly swarming with GW stores or fans.

Like I said, rare. But they are out there.

Quote from: The Butcher;899482Met a few in the old, insane Palladium Mailing List and contemporaneous (mid-1990s) Palladium fan web scene.

As for 40K, only one, but my neck of the woods isn't exactly swarming with GW stores or fans.

Like I said, rare. But they are out there.

Wouldn't surprise me. Truism: "Every community has its assholes."

Quote from: Orphan81;899424I Believe this is probably Savage World's most successful Kickstarter. I can't wait to get my hands on the material since I can't stand the Rifts system. For me, this is a dream come true, finally getting to run Rifts. Pinnacle, much like SineNomine are very very conservative when it comes to stretch goals, it's so they can deliver product on time and with everything they promised..

I kickstarted 7th Sea as well, but I hope John Wick hasn't put himself into a hole with the sheer number of products we're all getting for free thanks to the stretch goals promised.

The question there really comes down to how many PDF sales they were expecting for all those books. If they were expecting that to be a significant amount of their business, then they've lost out on... oh... 6-7000 potential sales of each of those PDFs? (edit; Okay closer to 10,000 of each, hope I'm right about the book thing)

But if they're expecting physical books to be the thing, then they were probably already planning on making those books anyway, so all the KS was for was a solid cash influx and then the rest will be funded by direct sales of all the splats.

Quote from: Jetstream;899520The question there really comes down to how many PDF sales they were expecting for all those books. If they were expecting that to be a significant amount of their business, then they've lost out on... oh... 6-7000 potential sales of each of those PDFs? (edit; Okay closer to 10,000 of each, hope I'm right about the book thing)

But if they're expecting physical books to be the thing, then they were probably already planning on making those books anyway, so all the KS was for was a solid cash influx and then the rest will be funded by direct sales of all the splats.

With the PDf sales they actually lost about nothing. Reason is that the print versions cost to make. Assuming colour. Using one of my old print shops as a comparison and assuming 270 pages total that came to about 40$ to print. I assume SW is getting far better deals than that! Lets assume they do and it costs only half that. Thats still 20$ chunked off the 85$ price tag. But still a 25$ profit over the PDF. Except probably at least half the PDF backers might not have backed if it had been just the more costly print version.

It balances out. How much depends on the print cost. Worst case scenario is they are making about 5$ a sale on the prints. Which is REALLY unlikely. They have to have better contacts than mine.

Quote from: Omega;899544With the PDf sales they actually lost about nothing. Reason is that the print versions cost to make. Assuming colour. Using one of my old print shops as a comparison and assuming 270 pages total that came to about 40$ to print. I assume SW is getting far better deals than that! Lets assume they do and it costs only half that. Thats still 20$ chunked off the 85$ price tag. But still a 25$ profit over the PDF. Except probably at least half the PDF backers might not have backed if it had been just the more costly print version.

It balances out. How much depends on the print cost. Worst case scenario is they are making about 5$ a sale on the prints. Which is REALLY unlikely. They have to have better contacts than mine.

All of that is entirely dependent, of course, on how well the print books sell. Which is why I was speculating about how much of their market is PDF vs Print.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;898448Palladium did publish an RPG set in the Vietnam war.

http://palladium-store.com/1001/product/600-The-Deluxe-Revised-RECON.html

Personally, I couldn't imagine a more depressing setting for a table top RPG, but there it is.

I seem to recall that it came out right around the time that a number of "Vietnam War" media came out (movies, TV shows, comics).

The 1st and 2nd editions of Recon were written by Erick Wujcik.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;899181This is one of the few Kickstarters I wanted to back.  Couldn't.

My biggest issue with Tolkien was not the haphazard choices and metaplot, it was what it did to the Cyber-Knight OCC.  That to me was the biggest, most heinous crime in the books.

What exactly did it to do the Cyber-Knight that you thought was so awful?

Quote from: RPGPundit;900563What exactly did it to do the Cyber-Knight that you thought was so awful?

If he's talking about the total change in focus, I think I have to agree.

Quote from: RPGPundit;900504I seem to recall that it came out right around the time that a number of "Vietnam War" media came out (movies, TV shows, comics).

Quote from: yabaziou;900516The 1st and 2nd editions of Recon were written by Erick Wujcik.

1: The original Recon came out in the very early 80s. A year before Rambo. But around the same time as Vietnam war movies were getting popular. Mostly parallel design as it were Id guess. Didnt FASA have a game out too around the same time?

2: Joe Martin wrote the original for some publisher I've never heard of, RPG Inc, and was more a wargame than a RPG. Wujcik wrote Revised, 2nd amd Deluxe Recon for Palladium. I assume Palladium bought Recon from Martin?

Quote from: RPGPundit;900563What exactly did it to do the Cyber-Knight that you thought was so awful?

Quote from: Warboss Squee;900566If he's talking about the total change in focus, I think I have to agree.

OK, bias check here:  I love 'heroic' characters, those that choose to do the 'right thing' even if it's personally painful for them, so the Cyber-Knight was a favourite concept if, badly executed in the core book.

And Warboss has it.  Mr. Siembeida needing an anti-tech faction, someone who could literally counter technology.  Now as a concept and the implementation, it was pretty cool, I rather liked it.  But because it got leashed to the Cyber-Knight (A class that did need the help) it brought up some in setting complications for me.

The Cyber-Knights have always been described as those who help those from monsters, most of which are Magical in nature and temperament.  Also, from the start point listed in the core book, the Cyber-Knights were created about 150 years before the starting date, and the Coalition (the only truly organized technologically based organization that would actively harm others) was only 50 years.  So according to the Tolkien adventure series, there was about a hundred years where the Cyber-Knights were...  Kinda useless at their goals.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;900572The Cyber-Knights have always been described as those who help those from monsters, most of which are Magical in nature and temperament.  Also, from the start point listed in the core book, the Cyber-Knights were created about 150 years before the starting date, and the Coalition (the only truly organized technologically based organization that would actively harm others) was only 50 years.  

So according to the Tolkien adventure series, there was about a hundred years where the Cyber-Knights were...  Kinda useless at their goals.

1: What I dont like is the whole sullying of what were up till then overall good aligned factions. Both Tolkeen and the Knights get dragged down. Especially Tolkeen as if they were worse than the Federation. And now everyones trust in the Knights is marred and so on and so fourth. Its the execution of it that bugs me. (That and theres alot of prose fiction in the CW3 Cyber knight book.) There were though hints of trouble well before the Coalition war. As far back as Vampire Kingdoms.

2: I kinda assume they were doing what theyve allways been doing which is being spread out and dealing with things as individuals and groups. According to the books theyve been holding the line against the vampires for a long time as one example.

All this does though bring up the following question.

When is the SW version set? Before or after all this?

Quote from: Omega;9005751: What I dont like is the whole sullying of what were up till then overall good aligned factions. Both Tolkeen and the Knights get dragged down. Especially Tolkeen as if they were worse than the Federation. And now everyones trust in the Knights is marred and so on and so fourth. Its the execution of it that bugs me. (That and theres alot of prose fiction in the CW3 Cyber knight book.) There were though hints of trouble well before the Coalition war. As far back as Vampire Kingdoms.

OK, my Cyber-Knight point was the BIGGEST issue I have.  THIS is another issue.  Tolkien was as close to being a 'good guy' faction, and still not be squeaky clean, but to make the Coalition the morally right (Really, KS?  You want the Neo-Nazi's to be RIGHT??) that he wrote them right into Saturday Morning EVIL!

Quote from: Omega;9005752: I kinda assume they were doing what theyve allways been doing which is being spread out and dealing with things as individuals and groups. According to the books theyve been holding the line against the vampires for a long time as one example.

But if they're Counter Technology, how are they doing it?

Quote from: Omega;900575All this does though bring up the following question.

When is the SW version set? Before or after all this?

I hope it's a complete reboot.

Quote from: Omega;900575All this does though bring up the following question.

When is the SW version set? Before or after all this?

SW version takes place after Rifts Aftermath, so after the Tolkien series.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;900577But if they're Counter Technology, how are they doing it?

With squirt guns and electromagnetically fired wooden stakes, I'd wager.

Quote from: everloss;900585With squirt guns and electromagnetically fired wooden stakes, I'd wager.

Ignoring the fact the a rail gun needs iron, the amount of heat that would burn it up, unfortunately, they are better OCC to do it.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;900588Ignoring the fact the a rail gun needs iron, the amount of heat that would burn it up, unfortunately, they are better OCC to do it.

In I believe Vampire kingdoms it was stated that the wood rail guns had bit of metal in the wood for the magnetic to react off of. And rail guns dont generate alot of heat unless you have it cranked up.

Will be interesting to see how SW handles stuff like that.

Quote from: Omega;900606In I believe Vampire kingdoms it was stated that the wood rail guns had bit of metal in the wood for the magnetic to react off of. And rail guns dont generate alot of heat unless you have it cranked up.

Will be interesting to see how SW handles stuff like that.

There's a reason lead is used as a bullet for weapons that move at higher than sound speeds.  A Crossbow is more efficient, and making one that auto-loads solves most of the ammo problem.  Neither here nor there, though.  Point is, you don't need a Cyber-Knight, the class no longer has any power to work against anything Supernatural, they're only good against the Coalition.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;900651There's a reason lead is used as a bullet for weapons that move at higher than sound speeds.  A Crossbow is more efficient, and making one that auto-loads solves most of the ammo problem.  Neither here nor there, though.  Point is, you don't need a Cyber-Knight, the class no longer has any power to work against anything Supernatural, they're only good against the Coalition.

Did the Siege stuff take any abilities away from the Cyber Knights? How are they different from before, besides the anti-tech stuff?

Quote from: Ratman_tf;900656Did the Siege stuff take any abilities away from the Cyber Knights? How are they different from before, besides the anti-tech stuff?

It's more that they added the wrong thing.

The Savage Worlds version is most likely going to emphasize the "Heroic" aspects of the setting and characters, given that fits Savage Worlds play style. The fall of Tolkeen is being presented as a bad thing from the promo material, and why the "Tomorrow Legion" is formed by the good guy NPC's of the setting. Savage Worlds is taking some liberties with the setting...

One of the biggest is Mega Damage Armor not being all over the damn place either. Shane Hensely didn't like the idea of a Glitter boy pilot outside of his armor and chilling by a fire would still be completely invincible against a tribal assassin with a spear. Mega Damage Armor and Weapons are going to exist of course, but no more Mega Damage Capacity jump suits.

Quote from: Omega;9005702: Joe Martin wrote the original for some publisher I've never heard of, RPG Inc, and was more a wargame than a RPG. Wujcik wrote Revised, 2nd amd Deluxe Recon for Palladium. I assume Palladium bought Recon from Martin?[/QUOTEThank you for correcting my mistake ! my bad ! If I am not wrong, the 1st edition recon does not even use the standard Palladium rules set.

Quote from: Orphan81;900800One of the biggest is Mega Damage Armor not being all over the damn place either. Shane Hensely didn't like the idea of a Glitter boy pilot outside of his armor and chilling by a fire would still be completely invincible against a tribal assassin with a spear. Mega Damage Armor and Weapons are going to exist of course, but no more Mega Damage Capacity jump suits.

I really wish I had my old computer, but I had a bunch of notes pertaining to Rifts and various changes I made to MD.  The biggest being that I stripped it from almost everything except iconic things like the Glitter Boys Boom Gun and turned all MD armor into having SD equal to 3/4 of what a straight conversion would be.  It worked fairly well in the games I ran, and even though the Glitter Boy was fairly OP at that point, it wasn't like the ammo was falling from the skies, since the places that would make it (like Quebec) made it for military purposes.  So you had to have some good contacts or be able to craft your own.

Everybody seemed rather happy with the changes.

Regardless, the whole thing came about after a discussion over MD weapons, in which I argued that MD was stupid because a laser pistol should not be capable of destroying a city block.  It's a laser pistol, not an orbital death ray!

Quote from: Warboss Squee;900885I really wish I had my old computer, but I had a bunch of notes pertaining to Rifts and various changes I made to MD.  The biggest being that I stripped it from almost everything except iconic things like the Glitter Boys Boom Gun and turned all MD armor into having SD equal to 3/4 of what a straight conversion would be.  It worked fairly well in the games I ran, and even though the Glitter Boy was fairly OP at that point, it wasn't like the ammo was falling from the skies, since the places that would make it (like Quebec) made it for military purposes.  So you had to have some good contacts or be able to craft your own.

Everybody seemed rather happy with the changes.

Regardless, the whole thing came about after a discussion over MD weapons, in which I argued that MD was stupid because a laser pistol should not be capable of destroying a city block.  It's a laser pistol, not an orbital death ray!

Or a MD vibro dagger being able to utterly disintegrate an SDC tank in a couple of whacks.

Towards the end of my RIFTS gaming, my houserule was MD/MDC = 10 SDC. I also used a lot of damage multipliers to speed up combat.

I found a bit in, I think the Rifts GM guide, where Siembeida mentioned that his preferred player group size was like 10-12 players. Something like that. I wonder if that affected the MDC values in the game. That's a lot of characters dishing out damage every turn.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;900912Or a MD vibro dagger being able to utterly disintegrate an SDC tank in a couple of whacks.

Towards the end of my RIFTS gaming, my houserule was MD/MDC = 10 SDC. I also used a lot of damage multipliers to speed up combat.

I found a bit in, I think the Rifts GM guide, where Siembeida mentioned that his preferred player group size was like 10-12 players. Something like that. I wonder if that affected the MDC values in the game. That's a lot of characters dishing out damage every turn.

Mega Damage is like a lot of things if Rifts.  It was a good idea that got massively misused.

As to the actual point of the thread, I don't like this idea of the Tomorrow Legion, only because I think it will take away from the moral viability of the setting, but I'll wait to see how it plays out.

Quote from: yabaziou;900879Thank you for correcting my mistake ! my bad ! If I am not wrong, the 1st edition recon does not even use the standard Palladium rules set.

I believe none of the editions of Recon are compatible with Palladium? I've never seen 2nd or Deluxe. But from what I've read they did not overhaul the system?

Quote from: Warboss Squee;900922Mega Damage is like a lot of things if Rifts.  It was a good idea that got massively misused.

Because like a lot of things in Rifts, it was never sufficiently tested.

JG

Quote from: Omega;900930I believe none of the editions of Recon are compatible with Palladium? I've never seen 2nd or Deluxe. But from what I've read they did not overhaul the system?

They were planning to adopt Recon Modern Combat to the Megaversal system but that is on hold that last I heard.

We played the unholy heck out of Recon and Twilight 2000 back in the day and we bounced between tropical 'Nam and frosty Poland.

Huh, maybe now I'll finally get to try this setting. I always wondered about what Rifts was all about, but I always found the books off putting. The rules that is, not the art :)


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although I have no idea if the art actually fits the setting.......

Quote from: Trond;901165although I have no idea if the art actually fits the setting.......

It's definitely got a WTF factor. ;)

jg

Quote from: Trond;901165Huh, maybe now I'll finally get to try this setting. I always wandered about what Rifts was all about, but I always found the books off putting. The rules that is, not the art :)


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although I have no idea if the art actually fits the setting.......

It does.

Yes, it does.

*Sighs dreamily*

This glorious piece of art is the Rifts stting in a nutshell !

Quote from: yabaziou;901180This glorious piece of art is the Rifts stting in a nutshell !

IE: No one has a clue.

The cover sums that up perfectly.

Tentacle tech monsters and some armed women on a weird platform surrounded by holo-skull things.

Are these the good guys/gals/things? The bad? Who knows! Who cares! Take my money!

Same with the new cover for Ultimate. Huge tentacle toothy eyeball thing and a tusken raider. Must be RCCs! Take my money!

I have a feeling the new SW cover will not be as evocative. Probably some generic group pose. bah! Rifts is never mundane!

You cannot get wrong with a game featuring gun-toting, one piece swimsuit clad babes and monsters with tentacles ! And in-game, those MF will be put the fear of the Spulgorth in you !

Quote from: Trond;901165although I have no idea if the art actually fits the setting.......

I always got the impression that the setting fitted the art. As in, KS gets some commission art done, but also a lot of pieces that he assigns stats for. "This woman with a Lemur? She's a.... Wildnerness Druid OCC! Yeah! And she has concealed mini-missles in her bra. The bra flips open to reveal 12 mini-missles." *I may be exaggerating just a tad*

(https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/236x/ea/85/95/ea8595f3e55e4187c81ffe3db782b66a.jpg)

Yeah, concerning this piece of art, I am sure that KS commissioned it for Palladium Fantasy or it was on a portfolio he bought from Keith Parkinson and then he said, fuck it, she is a Druid ans let's put in the corecook, it need more babes !

Quote from: yabaziou;901266Yeah, concerning this piece of art, I am sure that KS commissioned it for Palladium Fantasy or it was on a portfolio he bought from Keith Parkinson and then he said, fuck it, she is a Druid ans let's put in the corecook, it need more babes !

Could also be total lack of art direction. An general. "some wilderness druid type." and who knows what the hell you get. But you roll with it.

Or Parkinson was just selling some art and eventually someone notes "Hey. This piece here would fit the druid entry." which is also a pretty common way game art used to, and likely still is done with some publishers.

And sometimes you ask for a faerie and get an angel instead. You either use it elsewhere, or retool the faerie, or scrap the art and use it later maybee.

And other approaches like really hammering down what you want.

As with every thing in the gaming biz. Varies wildly from one to the next. And all bets are off on how the heck palladium runs it. Probably all of the above plus a few non-euclidian systems.

Quote from: Trond;901165Huh, maybe now I'll finally get to try this setting. I always wondered about what Rifts was all about, but I always found the books off putting. The rules that is, not the art :)


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although I have no idea if the art actually fits the setting.......

No one ever notices all the humanoids in the background encircling the Minion of Splugorth and the Altara warriors. Probably because the 15 year old in all of us is too busy looking at the Altara Warriors.

This piece of art fits the setting because it's fucking crazy. Weird science and necromancy and magic and alien boobs and slime and tentacles and giant eyeballs. And always in the background are boring humanoids creeping around.

Quote from: everloss;901497No one ever notices all the humanoids in the background encircling the Minion of Splugorth and the Altara warriors. Probably because the 15 year old in all of us is too busy looking at the Altara Warriors.

This piece of art fits the setting because it's fucking crazy. Weird science and necromancy and magic and alien boobs and slime and tentacles and giant eyeballs. And always in the background are boring humanoids creeping around.

1: They blend into the background too much. But yes they add to the WTH aspect because they dont look like the good guys. Think everyone was too busy counting the eyeballs to notice the gals.

2: er... what boobs. All three are dressed. Now alien ass. That we gots on the cover. And eyeballs.

x: This os one of the oft interesting things about Parkinsons art. Thers usually alot going on in each piece. Little details and sideline stuff. Same with Larry Elmore's pics.

Quote from: Trond;901165Huh, maybe now I'll finally get to try this setting. I always wondered about what Rifts was all about, but I always found the books off putting. The rules that is, not the art :)


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although I have no idea if the art actually fits the setting.......

I'd largely say it does.

24 hours since I got the email with the Savage Rifts Player's Guide download link and I still can't log into the Pinnacle website to retrieve it.

Their server can't keep up. This is insane.

Quote from: The Butcher;90470424 hours since I got the email with the Savage Rifts Player's Guide download link and I still can't log into the Pinnacle website to retrieve it.

Their server can't keep up. This is insane.

I was sent a drive thru rpg coupon earlier today and downloaded it from there.

Finally got the PDF yesterday and gave it a skim. Initial impressions:

The author takes liberties with both Rifts and Savage Worlds, but the more drastic changes are definitely to the Savage Worlds system.

A do-gooder organization called the Tomorrow Legion is introduced, supposedly formed under the patronage of Erin Tarn and Lord Coake, operating out of a castle in Arkansas. I'm indifferent to it as murderhobo Rifts is best Rifts.

Mega-Damage is really, really toned down. Not every laser pistol is a city-block-leveling weapon anymore. If you're tackling a Mega-Damage foe you'll have to break out the railguns and plasma ejectors. I like it but it is a departure from the source material.

Classes are handled as Iconic Frameworks, which are fun.

• Cyber-Knights now are now nanotech-enhanced cyberkinetics. The cyber-armor is external (rather than subdermal) and manifests when summoned; all technological attacks, incluing gunfire and vibro-blades, suffers a penalty. Psi-Sword's there, though, and it rocks (Mind Melters can get it but it requires taking an Edge!).
• There are new mechanics for Juicers (Burning Out) and Crazies (Losing It) that are absent from the source material but feel very fitting. What doesn't feel fitting is that Crazies have a much bigger list of psionic powers to choose from, with stuff like Bolt and Teleport.
• Glitter Boys are Glitter Boys but there's some neat fluff in the class write-up.
• Mercenaries, Adventures, Rogues and Scholars (MARS) are a set of mini-Skill, Edge and gear packages that cover everything from Headhunters and City Rats to Operators and Rogue Scholars.
• Mystics have become miracle-working holy men in all but name, which definitely feels like a departure from core Rifts, but given SW's near inability to differentiate between psionics and magic, it was probably for the best.
• Techno-Wizards only cast spells through devices which are a lot easier to create from scratch — basically good old SW Weird Science. Fits the fluff and probably makes for fun play, but again it departs from baseline Rifts.
• The one Dragon Hatchling option is impressively well-handled; most of the initial abilities of the original Dragon Hatchling RCC are there. Hats off to the writers for pulling it off.

There's also a ton of rolling on random tables for Edge, Skill, gear and other perks. Fun stuff.

The character creation chapter wraps up with a selection of crappy D-bee races, plus Dog Boys and Psi-Stalkers which are handled as racial options rather than racial Iconic Frameworks like the Dragon.

The gear chapter goes into some (super handwavey) explanations about the credit system and lists a ton of Northern Gun stuff, plus classic purveyors like Titan Robotics and Wellington Industries, and for some reason a lot of Triax. Particle beam weapons are curiously absent. No Coalition tech — probably saved for the antagonists book. Cyberware has some not-quite-Rifts-y stuff like enhanced reflexes and skill chips.

The psionics and magic chapter introduced Mega-Powers: devastating but Power Point-costly versions of regular Savage World Powers, the better to stand up to the Mega-Damage opposition.

The rules chapter adds some new rules, such as Technical Difficulties (tech malfunctions on a fumble), Death & Defeat (a table you roll on when core SW would have you killed; forgiving, but comic-booky) and Blaze of Glory (when Incapacitated you can opt to actually die, no "save" on the above table, but get a few rounds' worth of awesomeness before croaking).

The setting chapter is terse but let's not kid ourselves, if you're reading this you own Rifts. Probably a ton of books too.

The last chapter contains the nifty random tables referred to in character creation.

All in all, I liked it. It's crunchier than core SW but still less bookkeeping than the original; and while not 109% true to source, as an emulation, even when it deviates I'd say it's tapping into the right vibe. Really looking forward to the GMing and antagonist books, and to my inevitable campaign.

So how much of it has any material at all that wasn't in any of the previous RIFTS books? And what kind of material is it? And if it's crunch material, how easy would it be to convert to RIFTS?

How is magic?  Does it use the standard Savage Worlds spells where the player must bring their own trappings?  Or does it come with flavorful trapping filled spells in the book?

Wait, hold on.  They've got a release candidate ALREADY?  Wow.  I hope a hard copy comes out soon, then.  Looking forward to it.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;906230Wait, hold on.  They've got a release candidate ALREADY?  Wow.  I hope a hard copy comes out soon, then.  Looking forward to it.

That's not really unusual for PEG Kickstarters. There's typically a PDF waiting at the end of the funding period or within a few months, tops. The extra stuff like adventures, figure flats, and the like then start trickling in over the next few months.

Quote from: RPGPundit;906105So how much of it has any material at all that wasn't in any of the previous RIFTS books?

None, it's all conversions of existing Rifts material.

What actually intrigued me is how they messed around with certain assumptions about the core Rifts classics, such as giving psionicists (including Crazies!) access to some powers never given to psionic characters in Rifts (such as Teleport); making Cyber-Knights nano-enhanced "cyberkinetics" (and weaving their classic cyber-armor and psi-sword abilities into the package); and making Mystics kinda-sorta miracle-workers/"clerics" instead of the intuitive magician/psionicist types.

Quote from: Old One Eye;906124How is magic?  Does it use the standard Savage Worlds spells where the player must bring their own trappings?  Or does it come with flavorful trapping filled spells in the book?

Standard Savage Worlds "bring your own Trappings" approach, albeit some are immediately obvious, especially for Psionics (e.g. Mind Melters are classic mentalists, Bursters are pyrokinetics, etc.).

Quote from: The Butcher;906242Standard Savage Worlds "bring your own Trappings" approach, albeit some are immediately obvious, especially for Psionics (e.g. Mind Melters are classic mentalists, Bursters are pyrokinetics, etc.).

Kind of disappointing, but eh, that is how SW rolls.

Quote from: Brand55;906233That's not really unusual for PEG Kickstarters. There's typically a PDF waiting at the end of the funding period or within a few months, tops. The extra stuff like adventures, figure flats, and the like then start trickling in over the next few months.

So they have a product ready, but use Kickstarter to judge interest?  No pun intended, but interesting.

Well, here's hoping they'll have something for us non-backers soon.  I'm curious to see if it's worth my money.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;906275So they have a product ready, but use Kickstarter to judge interest?  No pun intended, but interesting.

Well, here's hoping they'll have something for us non-backers soon.  I'm curious to see if it's worth my money.

I've backed a number of their Kickstarters (Weird Wars Rome, The Last Parsec, Rippers Resurrected, Stone and a Hard Place, and most recently Weird War I) and the usual time frame for general release after the funding period ends seems to be about six to eight months. So I'd expect Rifts to see a physical release around the end of the year or early 2017 with the possibility of ordering PDFs some months before that.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;906275So they have a product ready, but use Kickstarter to judge interest?  No pun intended, but interesting.

Well, here's hoping they'll have something for us non-backers soon.  I'm curious to see if it's worth my money.

That is common with the more savvy ones on KS/CF. SJG did that with their Ogre KS for example. That and games/product that look closer to completion are more likely to draw backers than one that is still in the idea phase. Especially now-a-days after so many fails or immense stalls.

Quote from: RPGPundit;906105And if it's crunch material, how easy would it be to convert to RIFTS?

I'd say that converting to Rifts very much defeats the point of this Kickstarter, unless you mean converting the Losing It and Burning Out mechanics;).