Quote from: Nerzenjäger;1044696No, you are probably in the majority. This forum is an exception.

The system is very simple. But I do remember a time where I didn't get it and thought, that it must be broken.

Good to know!

Palladium had some very good ideas - but just badly implemented IMO. The system really could do with an update... I'm really quite surprised KS hasn't done it yet because he'd make a ton of cash redoing the whole line.

Quote from: Nerzenjäger;1044654And there's new Nightbane and Splicers stuff out, too. Both of these games happen to be excellent.

I picked up the Nightbane Survival Guide and Dark Designs.  Both are good books, but I can't shake the feeling they are somehow disconnected from the older material.  As if for an unpublished 2nd Edition.  This is Palladium Books and there are probably half a dozen unread manuscripts for Nightbane supplements that would fill this gap that are collecting dust in Kevin's inbox alongside Mechanoids Space and Tome Grotesque.

I have used most of the I Am Legion material from issues of The Rifter.  It suffers from railroading but is easily adapted into a full-fledged campaign.  I see the book contains more material, certainly enough for me to buy it in print.

I've got a ton of use farming ideas out of Mystic China and the setting for Palladium RPG

Now actually playing those games for any extended length of time is not something I will claim.

This thread made me pull out my 1st edition Palladium fantasy books. Fuck, these are fantastic. Super dark, eldritch horror stuff, plausible even while having a ton of monster races...this is way better than anything similar made in the past 20 years.

Quote from: Brad;1044909This thread made me pull out my 1st edition Palladium fantasy books. Fuck, these are fantastic. Super dark, eldritch horror stuff, plausible even while having a ton of monster races...this is way better than anything similar made in the past 20 years.

I like, and use, 2nd Edition.  However, I agree that 1st Edition is very good.  I would have been happy had 2nd Edition never been published and the source books been for 1st Edition instead.  1st Edition Palladium Fantasy had an almost perfect mix of gritty, bloody yet heroic adventure.

Really my biggest issues with Palladium's later stuff are SDC for people (who should not have SDC ever) and physical skills that build attributes but no mental ones (yes there was that one Rifter article).

Quote from: David Johansen;1045029Really my biggest issues with Palladium's later stuff are SDC for people (who should not have SDC ever) and physical skills that build attributes but no mental ones (yes there was that one Rifter article).

Was there ever an explanation why Kevin didn't have Mental boosting skills?  Gut feeling is that I'm against them but I'm not sure why...

Palladium Lite would be a great idea.

What would you keep/scrap/fix?

Quote from: Mike the Mage;1045036Palladium Lite would be a great idea.

What would you keep/scrap/fix?

Replace the term SDC with Stamina. Structural Damage Capacity sounds like an engineering term for buildings.
Remove or lower the # of HTH attacks per turn. It's escalated. Untrained gets 1, trained gets 2, and military gets 3. Add a few when leveling up.

Lower the range of stat bonuses. This gives a reason for stats below 16 to exist at all.


Generally raise damages and lower the SDC range. I'd eyeball doubling damage dice for all weapons and attacks, and halving the amounts of SDC. I could even go for more, depending on specific examples.

Skills, my god. This is where I throw up my hands. I'd probably want to do a complete overhaul. Simplify the skill categories, and make them all a d20 roll over, so they are compatible with other bonuses/penalties.

One thing I'll say about Palladium Fantasy....

Is that I liked a lot of the character options and no other game was doing that at the time (it also was pretty dark). I remember playing a Witch and mayhem did follow.  I'd definitely consider playing it again looking back at it now. But I'd try and tweak the rules a little.

Quote from: Ratman_tf;1045040Replace the term SDC with Stamina. Structural Damage Capacity sounds like an engineering term for buildings.
Remove or lower the # of HTH attacks per turn. It's escalated. Untrained gets 1, trained gets 2, and military gets 3. Add a few when leveling up.

Lower the range of stat bonuses. This gives a reason for stats below 16 to exist at all.


Generally raise damages and lower the SDC range. I'd eyeball doubling damage dice for all weapons and attacks, and halving the amounts of SDC. I could even go for more, depending on specific examples.

Skills, my god. This is where I throw up my hands. I'd probably want to do a complete overhaul. Simplify the skill categories, and make them all a d20 roll over, so they are compatible with other bonuses/penalties.

The skills was where I would start. Percentages and skills seemed pretty closely linked at the time, (thief/ranger in AD&D, RQ, C&S) but what you suggest sounds spot on. As do the rest of your suggestions.

I wuld definitely keep the quirkly wizardy system, but I have yet to figure out how Diabolist (thr Rune guys, not Summoners) operate in play.

Take a look at Mechanoid Invasion Book III.  It's already perfect.  No, I don't mind the percentile skills and d20 to hit.  What I do mind is all the extra baggage that gets layered on top of it.  Palladium books are great for ideas but it should be a really light weight system.  I'd bring back the skill charts with diminishing returns though.  That's the main thing about percentiles is that you can cut back the gains at higher levels to stay in the dice range.  Palladium does a great job of broadening the sweet spot and keeping strike, parry, and dodge bonuses to a reasonable level.  I do have a quibble with attribute bonuses as presented and feel you need an attribute advancement rule of some sort or to lower the bonus threshold.  I don't like having to hunt through the skill descriptions to find attribute modifiers for physical skills and I don't like attributes to be meaningless.  Lets keep the bonus scheme and give a bonus point for each physical or mental skill.  I like skills improving attributes.

Can't believe we're 6 pages in and nobody's mentioned heroes unlimited yet.  Its far and away my primary system of choice.

Quote from: VincentTakeda;1046120Can't believe we're 6 pages in and nobody's mentioned heroes unlimited yet.  Its far and away my primary system of choice.

I only ever played 1 session of it.  I didn't feel I should comment on HU but it does look good.

Good first post BTW.

If anything, I really want to try Microlite Platinum which looks like Palladium System but only the good parts.