Is Rifts dead?

[Ravenwing]

In my opinion Rifts has some very stiff competition in the science-fiction/ fantasy horror genre that it holds onto:

Warhammer 40k RPG - Easy game mechanics, gorgeous books, and support from one of the premier gaming companies known to man, Games Workshop.

Oh this one killed me. When that game came out, Deathwatch and the Inquisition books, I thought cool, looks neat, probably going to be one to own, read through, play a few times and let it go. And instead, it's going strong, putting out more and more books, and after picking up and flipping through the new Imperial Guard one (forget what it's called) I flashed back to a half a year ago when I was thinking of starting a Palladium Fantasy game and trying to compare those books to Warhammer Fantasy's line. Just great examples of beautiful books done right. And not just that, but done right FOR A SPECIFIC FAN BASE. I have no doubt that GW hopes to sell those books to non-Warhammer miniature gamers (and attract them to their miniature games), but they are going to sell a ton of them to their fans. GW makes an RPG book, they go all out. Palladium... Is still at it.

Now if I were to place any one of the books above next to the latest Rifts book which one do you think someone new to gaming would choose? I'm not saying Rifts is dead, but it needs some serious work to compete with the new generation of games.

Just showing someone new to gaming their options, and they will often think that RIFTS books are much older than their other choices. Now, sometimes they are, but sometimes my copy of Worldbook X is just a little beat up, and that, combined with the fact that it looks the exact same inside as my copy of Worldbook X-10+ years and the competition looks ever more amazing.

For me it's gotten to the point of frustration because the game I loved for decades has taken a steep decline.

I don't think this is accurate. The problem isn't that RIFTS is in 'steep decline', generally speaking, the books aren't in 'decline' at all. The ones being made now are every bit as good as the ones that were made when the game first started. It's just that if you stand still for 20 years, in ANY industry, you are going to get mowed down by competition.

Is Rifts dead? Well it depends on how you define 'dead'. The company still publishes books, well sort of; they do published but you really never know when. They support their products, will kind of I guess; you can always buy the Rifter as least it comes out on time, most of the time.

And so it goes. I don't think any big change is going to be coming anytime though. Palladium is what it is, they don't have the ability to expand their production or improve on their product, they can continue to produce their product and hopefully continue along. The things that they can be improving upon are non-production, namely consumer interaction, brand awareness, image marketing, ect. This was all really well spelled out in another thread recently, and hopefully some of it will come to pass.

The Imperial Guard book is called Only War lol.

And 40K RPG's are the new White Wolf. Any city, any town, drop one of the books on the table, and you'll get ten players who've never played ready to try it. And these are people that don't play Warhammer 40k. I use to run a gameshop(thank you Recession!), and when their books hit the shelves they were gone. I still have friends amongst the industry(other shop owners in various towns) and they think GW RPG's( Actually published by another company called Fantasy Flight Games.) are golden. Well as far as that goes in the RPG industry lol.

The 40k RPG's are quick and easy to learn, fun to play, and laid out extremely well, just like the old WW books were. The setting drags you in quickly. Not to mention the books look slick, with amazing art, a clean layout, and side bars and explanations throughout of the rules. It takes about twenty minutes to learn to play.

Is Rifts dead? Absolutely. It's just us old timers who fondly remember Rifts, and PB's other products from 20+ years ago keeping it going. Rifts is 20+ years out of date, it's products look 20+ years old. Even the new books look like something published back in TSR's heyday. Admit it, most of us that play these games don't play by the published rules, since the published rules don't work, we house rule everything, like a crazy surgeon putting bandaids on a leprous patient and stapling his arms back on. We house rule the entire system so it runs smoothly and they way we want it to. Which was great 20+ years ago when that was the norm. Thats how you played RPG's.

But now? Not so much. The RPG players of today expect systems that work, slick packaging, and regular support. PB sadly isn't able to give that.

Drop a Rifts book on the table. The people there will either giggle profusely and call you a munchkin(Assuming they know what Rifts is.), smile kind of fondly and say they played that when they were a kid in a kind of voice that echos, and I played with Transformers when I was a kid to! Or they'll have no clue what they're looking out, but think that it looks cool, and that it's amazing to think that people actually played these games back in the 70's!( Yeah I had a group of kids tell me that once at my store.) But they won't want to play what they see as an old, antiquated game.

[Eashamahel]

All very good points, and thanks for the Only War answere!

Here's another thing I have noticed with new games. Many of them are more 'complicated' than RIFTS, with more rules/more indepth/specific rulesystems, ect, and yet new players I have met have NO difficulty learning them, often struggling more with the RIFTS simpler rule system. The reason? Skilled writers/designers and good layout. Games have evolved. RIFTS is written like a dictionary, new game books have layout artists who understand the science of what they do, they use variable designs, side boxes, ect to very efficiently relay the information, and examples of it in use.


One of the things that I wonder about is what long term RIFTS fans still want out of the game? Myself, personally, I suppose I am still waiting for the basic world to be finished/explained. The new Northern Gun books will doubtless help that, and something about Lazlo would doubtless be great, as would be Chi-Town, but really, what can they do at this point? I am fairly certain Lazlo is at least glossed over in Canada, and that book is only vaguely usefull as it is, and Chi-Town has a lot of it's government agencies, the ISS and NTSET, already detailed in Coalition War Campaign. My point is that I don't think there is much more for them to do (that fans are waiting for) that hasn't at least been partially covered before, and wouldn't be cannibalizing/copy-pasting from previous books.

Unless they start producing a few more Shemarrian Nation style books, which would be amazing. Short, to the point, books that contain EXACTLY what they are supposed to, and NOTHING more. A book on Lazlo that was 100 pages long and contained everything about the city would great, a '240 page mega-book of awesome' would probably not be.


Aaaanyways.... I drifted off topic a lot at the end there.

[Vrykolas2k]

My house-rules are actually minimal; where rules are obscure, I clarify and where rules run counter to other rules, I use the ones which work for my group and me, consistently.

[Ravenwing]

Dead Reign, I hear, got some buzz for a bit, and people will try it, but even then getting them to try Rifts is still a no go. Plus you have to house rule everything in Dead Reign to be inline with what gamers think of when they play a zombie game that it isn't really the same game as published lol.

Rifts and the PB system needed an update ten years ago, now I think its kind of a lost cause. Idk, maybe I'm wrong, but I don't see anything changing, and it just being us old timers complaining about things lol.

Although I so want the two NG books and a Lazlo book. Can't think of much else in rifts that I want to see. Maybe the Deep South book that was talked about, as long as it doesn't turn into another Dino Swamp or Madhaven, I hate those books.

[Vrykolas2k]

Dead Reign, I hear, got some buzz for a bit, and people will try it, but even then getting them to try Rifts is still a no go. Plus you have to house rule everything in Dead Reign to be inline with what gamers think of when they play a zombie game that it isn't really the same game as published lol.

Oi Dead Reign was a nightmare. I got a couple of my buddies to play it with me in an effort to get them acclimated before moving over to Rifts. Keep in mind that everyone in this group has been playing RPGs for at least a year (with the exception of one new guy). It took us a total of 6 hours to get everyone's characters done, with errors mind you but we ignored them because we actually wanted to play the game. When we finally got down to it the problems began to rear their ugly heads. It was slow at first, the redundancy of the skill system set in at the same time everyone realized how exploitable the attributes were. Then the issues really pilled up. Why doesn't my PP or PS effect thrown attacks? Why are explosives so utterly useless against vehicles compared to other weapons? Why is every skill based off of IQ? Why are all the classes so totally unbalanced? Why are all of the enemies so totally unbalanced? and on and on and on. Plus the copy and paste nightmare and the changes from all of the normal Rifts core rules, we eventually all got fed up. The fun to coronary ratio was way off.

I've never seen even a new player take more than an hour total for character creation... in any PB game.

[Ravenwing]

Dead Reign, I hear, got some buzz for a bit, and people will try it, but even then getting them to try Rifts is still a no go. Plus you have to house rule everything in Dead Reign to be inline with what gamers think of when they play a zombie game that it isn't really the same game as published lol.

Oi Dead Reign was a nightmare. I got a couple of my buddies to play it with me in an effort to get them acclimated before moving over to Rifts. Keep in mind that everyone in this group has been playing RPGs for at least a year (with the exception of one new guy). It took us a total of 6 hours to get everyone's characters done, with errors mind you but we ignored them because we actually wanted to play the game. When we finally got down to it the problems began to rear their ugly heads. It was slow at first, the redundancy of the skill system set in at the same time everyone realized how exploitable the attributes were. Then the issues really pilled up. Why doesn't my PP or PS effect thrown attacks? Why are explosives so utterly useless against vehicles compared to other weapons? Why is every skill based off of IQ? Why are all the classes so totally unbalanced? Why are all of the enemies so totally unbalanced? and on and on and on. Plus the copy and paste nightmare and the changes from all of the normal Rifts core rules, we eventually all got fed up. The fun to coronary ratio was way off.

Lol, thats why you go through the book with a marker, black out the problems, write in the solutions, and run with it. I get DR to run smooth, but it isn't what was published.

[Ravenwing]

Dead Reign, I hear, got some buzz for a bit, and people will try it, but even then getting them to try Rifts is still a no go. Plus you have to house rule everything in Dead Reign to be inline with what gamers think of when they play a zombie game that it isn't really the same game as published lol.

Oi Dead Reign was a nightmare. I got a couple of my buddies to play it with me in an effort to get them acclimated before moving over to Rifts. Keep in mind that everyone in this group has been playing RPGs for at least a year (with the exception of one new guy). It took us a total of 6 hours to get everyone's characters done, with errors mind you but we ignored them because we actually wanted to play the game. When we finally got down to it the problems began to rear their ugly heads. It was slow at first, the redundancy of the skill system set in at the same time everyone realized how exploitable the attributes were. Then the issues really pilled up. Why doesn't my PP or PS effect thrown attacks? Why are explosives so utterly useless against vehicles compared to other weapons? Why is every skill based off of IQ? Why are all the classes so totally unbalanced? Why are all of the enemies so totally unbalanced? and on and on and on. Plus the copy and paste nightmare and the changes from all of the normal Rifts core rules, we eventually all got fed up. The fun to coronary ratio was way off.

I've never seen even a new player take more than an hour total for character creation... in any PB game.

In groups of New Players for PB, 4+ hours is the norm, about an hour for experienced players. Lots of books to flip through for skills, OCC/RCC, Gear, etc. Or atleast thats what I've seen in all my years of gaming. We used to do character creation a week ahead of any game, just so everyone would be ready.

[Eashamahel]

I've never seen even a new player take more than an hour total for character creation... in any PB game.

Can't believe this one.

A new player wants to make a character in say, RIFTS. Decides on, say, a Ley Line Walker.

Roll dice, choose skills, rock and roll?

No.

Roll Dice. Read through OCC, Select OCC skills, flip through book finding all skills, writing down all percentages, done. Now move on to Related skills. Time for WAY more reading, pretty much reading every skill available to you and selecting them, checking their starting percentages, and then applying any OCC modifications. At this point you might even be running into the RIDICULOUSNESS of redundant skills, like in the Cyber Knight, where you have to select X WPs for the OCC skills, then after you have finally got that done, you move to the next step of Related and HAVE to select X WPs AGAIN.

Then you move onto Secondary, which differs between original RIFTS and R:UE.

Great. Now you have the skills.

Time to read through EVER AVAILABLE SPELL and figure out which ones you want. LLW gets to look through 4 levels worth. And then you have the potential of Psychic powers. Even a minor psychic has to select two powers, which is going to end up with the player needing to read every available power again.

And that's before even getting to gear. Figuring out what a 'saleable black market item' is, choosing weapons, armours, ect.

Oh, and that's all assuming you know exactly what race you want to play.


An experienced player can do all this in 20 minutes, they know what's good, what's not, what they want and skip right to those things. A first time player is going to take HOURS. Infact, for most first timers, it's better just to give them the book for a day or two and let them peruse their options at length. Oh, and that's assuming that the player is not SO new to gaming that they can't make the logical leaps required to actually MAKE a character in the Palladium system, but RIFTS in particular.

[Vrykolas2k]

I've never seen even a new player take more than an hour total for character creation... in any PB game.

Can't believe this one.

A new player wants to make a character in say, RIFTS. Decides on, say, a Ley Line Walker.

Roll dice, choose skills, rock and roll?

No.

Roll Dice. Read through OCC, Select OCC skills, flip through book finding all skills, writing down all percentages, done. Now move on to Related skills. Time for WAY more reading, pretty much reading every skill available to you and selecting them, checking their starting percentages, and then applying any OCC modifications. At this point you might even be running into the RIDICULOUSNESS of redundant skills, like in the Cyber Knight, where you have to select X WPs for the OCC skills, then after you have finally got that done, you move to the next step of Related and HAVE to select X WPs AGAIN.

Then you move onto Secondary, which differs between original RIFTS and R:UE.

Great. Now you have the skills.

Time to read through EVER AVAILABLE SPELL and figure out which ones you want. LLW gets to look through 4 levels worth. And then you have the potential of Psychic powers. Even a minor psychic has to select two powers, which is going to end up with the player needing to read every available power again.

And that's before even getting to gear. Figuring out what a 'saleable black market item' is, choosing weapons, armours, ect.

Oh, and that's all assuming you know exactly what race you want to play.


An experienced player can do all this in 20 minutes, they know what's good, what's not, what they want and skip right to those things. A first time player is going to take HOURS. Infact, for most first timers, it's better just to give them the book for a day or two and let them peruse their options at length. Oh, and that's assuming that the player is not SO new to gaming that they can't make the logical leaps required to actually MAKE a character in the Palladium system, but RIFTS in particular.

Players, in my experience, generally have a pretty good idea of what they want to play.
And most have no problem asking for advice.
So, an hour or less and usually they're gaming.

[jaymz]

Believe what you will but over the weekend we helped a noob do a robotech character (no pre rolls or anything) in about an hour. My character took me 20 minutes. THAT'S the norm I have seen. I've never seen chargen take hours upon hours.

[Eashamahel]

You have experienced players.

I've been playing games with nothing but new players lately, most of them totally new to RPGs, and it's ONLY a short (hour long) process when I guide them through it personally, influencing their choices and explaining things without them needing to read through them.

And that's only using a limited number of books.

[Vrykolas2k]

Well, one of my players is a 13 year old girl.
She likes anime, asked if there was something similar to her favourite character, and made the character she wanted.
As an example.
People new to Rifts, but experienced with other games, likewise usually have an idea of what they want to play.

[Eashamahel]

Great. And she knew exactly which skills she wanted? Or what gear to take? She instantly knew which pistol to start with and what type of grenades she should have for her 1D4? When she got her 1D4x1000 in blackmarket items, she had no trouble going to the blackmarket section and choosing all the additional gear she wanted?

Probably not. When guided through it, it doesn't take long. When going through it for the first time, or first few times, when open to all the options, it's a different story.

[jaymz]

The noob I helped doesn't game. She was a noob. It took an hour.

Different experiences for different people I suppose bug I have never seen anyone take hours to make a palladium character that wasn't on purpose because they min maxing the best they could.

[jaymz]

Yet above the new players were taking HOURS being guided through the process. Even when I was new it didn't take me more than an hour and rifts was my first rpg. Yay for me yeah I know but just because one persons experiences are One thing doesn't mean another's are wrong.

[Marrowlight]

Hell, I can spend an hour just deciding on what race to play.

[Vrykolas2k]

Great. And she knew exactly which skills she wanted? Or what gear to take? She instantly knew which pistol to start with and what type of grenades she should have for her 1D4? When she got her 1D4x1000 in blackmarket items, she had no trouble going to the blackmarket section and choosing all the additional gear she wanted?

Probably not. When guided through it, it doesn't take long. When going through it for the first time, or first few times, when open to all the options, it's a different story.

Most of the gear is listed with the OCC/ RCC you decide to play...
As for the black market stuff, do you really itemize that stuff before it becomes important, or if it's not just going to be liquidated for money when needed?
Skills aren't that hard either, just pick what you want your character to know, within the (few) limits available.
I fail to see the problem.

[Eclipse]

Depends on how much min maxing you want to do on the equipment list - that can take a ridiculous amount of time. Same with skills.

Anyway, Robotech is Rifts-very-lite.

[Pepsi Jedi]

They do have a point on the robotech thing. You only have a handful of OOC's and you don't see a ton of mixed groups. If you have 4 guys in Veritechs the one guy in a ground ponder is going to get left out of most things or the other 4 will be held back for him time and time again.

So you tend to get more or less a squad of the same thing, or close. Being that they're all in the military you have a very similar character build for all of them too.

I will say I don't see -new- players to rifts or other games, building a char in under an hour unless a very experienced person basicly sits there and tells them what to write and goes "You'll pick it up as we play"

Can it be done if someone just tells you what to write? Sure.

Do I think a 13 year old girl picked up the book first time and pounded out a character of her own with no help in under an hour? No.

[Morik]

It's my favorite RPG to play. It's difficult to make characters that are truly made in detail. If I make a character and npc it takes me 40 mins. 10 for basic npc's.

I helped a new player make a techno wizard and it took about 2 1/2 hours. He has played rpg's before (and made a HU character before) but the size and scope of making a Rifts character overwhelmed him. He has trouble focusing. Most under 25 people today don't have the skill necessary to focus and get the job done on making a character in Rifts.

I honestly don't want new players in my game. I always have to babysit them on how to make a new character and it makes me want to shoot them in the face. In retrospect it makes it easier to narrate the game because I already know exactly what they can do. Still, not the point.

Is RIFTS dead.......no but I always wondered why they didn't have pre-rolled characters and a printed linear story to run new players through

The thing is if you have a average imagination, average I.Q., and a average attention span your probably going to play a simpler and shinier game. Folks, that's over half the population of the world right there. In a time where the most watched shows on TV are the stupid, who can sing better ones..........
IDOL AND THE VOICE. It's like pop culture has ruined good RPGing.

I hope I'm wrong.

[Eashamahel]

I get the low attribute idea, and it's not a bad one at all, but lets be serious. There is NO OCC that a person with an IQ of 3 could be. There's basically NOTHING that a person with an IQ of 3 could even do in the self-sufficient/functional world, and that holds for most attributes. Rifts allowed characters to roll a huge spectrum on their stats, and considering that nothing between 3-15 really had a difference other than to meet OCC pre-requisites, they could just as easily have been grouped under 1-poor, 2-average, 3-good as far as it mattered.

I get penalizing characters for low stats, but considering everything below 8 is REALLY bad (with the possible exception of Physical Strength, an adult male shouldn't really be any lower in the vast majority of cases assuming good health, but many adult women would be lower than this), and anything up to 15 is good but doesn't get any bonus, having the negative stat chart seems like unnecessarily penalizing players.

Maybe put more clearly, there are 6 rolls bellow average where your character will probably be penalized (3,4,5,6,7,8), with 4 about average (9,10,11,12), and 6 above average (13,14,15,16,17,18). However, only 2 (17, 18, sometimes 3 with 16) actually give you any kind of bonus, and most stats can't be improved, which means that you have a better chance as a human being of being cripplingly bellow average than you do of being high enough above that it matters. In the extreme end, if you roll a 3,4,5 or 6 you get negatives, but if you roll a 17 and 18 you get bonuses. That's 2x as often. I don't have a copy of all of the Palladium Games rulebooks right here with me, but I don't remember most, if ANY of them allowing you to re-roll your characters stats or taking some kind of minimum, so the penalizing for poor stats seems unnecessary, or, if not a poor idea in and of itself, a reflection of poor rules balance. For it to be equal, bonuses should start at 15.

Off topic, I know, but just an observation.

[Eashamahel]

It's my favorite RPG to play. It's difficult to make characters that are truly made in detail. If I make a character and npc it takes me 40 mins. 10 for basic npc's.

I helped a new player make a techno wizard and it took about 2 1/2 hours. He has played rpg's before (and made a HU character before) but the size and scope of making a Rifts character overwhelmed him. He has trouble focusing. Most under 25 people today don't have the skill necessary to focus and get the job done on making a character in Rifts.

I honestly don't want new players in my game. I always have to babysit them on how to make a new character and it makes me want to shoot them in the face. In retrospect it makes it easier to narrate the game because I already know exactly what they can do. Still, not the point.

Is RIFTS dead.......no but I always wondered why they didn't have pre-rolled characters and a printed linear story to run new players through

The thing is if you have a average imagination, average I.Q., and a average attention span your probably going to play a simpler and shinier game. Folks, that's over half the population of the world right there. In a time where the most watched shows on TV are the stupid, who can sing better ones..........
IDOL AND THE VOICE. It's like pop culture has ruined good RPGing.

I hope I'm wrong.

Yeah, most likely not only are you wrong, but you're also being near insulting to people who choose to play the 'simpler and shinier game'(s).

Lets be frank. If you want to start making wild claims about which game was made for 'simpler' people, look at the ones that appear to be made BY 'simpler' people. RIFTS overall rules are very 'simply' constructed (to be really nice). Now, many say they are just old/classic and that makes them better, but a PS3 isn't 'simpler' than an Atari. The Atari has lots of great games, and old time purists will probably argue all the benefits of it and how it requires more skill that the new generation just doesn't have, but in reality, it's just much simpler.

"I helped a new player make a techno wizard and it took about 2 1/2 hours. He has played rpg's before (and made a HU character before) but the size and scope of making a Rifts character overwhelmed him. "

I just want to take a second and talk about this.

My most recent group is composed of some pretty smart people, university and college educated, a Graphic Designer, Layout Artist, Advertising and Business Marketing, ect and they struggled with making characters like none other. It has nothing to do with them not being smart, or the system being too hard, and everything to do with the system being TOTALLY messed up and missing key steps, and the steps being in the wrong order.

Here's one example. The woman took the rulebook, read it, and rolled up her character, starting at step one, going all the way to the OCC. Then she asked how she could be an Elf. Because there is no 'Pick your RCC' step, there is no 'Choose your race then roll your stats' step. You have absolutely NO INSTRUCTION that you have to find ANOTHER BOOK besides the rulebook and it's character creation system to make your character. NONE. Now I, as an experienced gamer, knew where the elf was, flipped it out, and we adjusted her stats ('Elves have 4D6 for PP, so just roll one more dice, but only 2D6 for MA, so roll a dice and subtract that form what you have', ect) so she didn't have to re-roll them completely, but there is NO REASON to think you can even play another race by the character creation rules.

Same game, different person: Starts at the beggining, rolls up stats, gets to the 'choose OCC', sees there are dragons, decides she wants to be a dragon. Well, guess what? Everything about the character you just rolled up can pretty much be tossed. That's right, in the same book is an RCC that has totally different creation rules, that isn't mentioned while you are creating the character, and you won't know about it until you get to the 'choose OCC' part, unless you have done it before, and realize that in the Choose OCC section there are in fact RCCs that don't get OCCs because they are their own OCC as well as being and RCC, unlike other RCC's (like the elves) who still select OCCs.

And this is just a short look at what making a character in RIFTS is REALLY like for new players. Some of you might think I am exagerating or making this intentionally overcomplicated, but I honestly think that so many of us are just so used to the system that we forget that making huge leaps, not only in logic but also in page numbers and creation steps is not something everyone realizes they have to do.

[Ravenwing]

It's my favorite RPG to play. It's difficult to make characters that are truly made in detail. If I make a character and npc it takes me 40 mins. 10 for basic npc's.

I helped a new player make a techno wizard and it took about 2 1/2 hours. He has played rpg's before (and made a HU character before) but the size and scope of making a Rifts character overwhelmed him. He has trouble focusing. Most under 25 people today don't have the skill necessary to focus and get the job done on making a character in Rifts.

I honestly don't want new players in my game. I always have to babysit them on how to make a new character and it makes me want to shoot them in the face. In retrospect it makes it easier to narrate the game because I already know exactly what they can do. Still, not the point.

Is RIFTS dead.......no but I always wondered why they didn't have pre-rolled characters and a printed linear story to run new players through

The thing is if you have a average imagination, average I.Q., and a average attention span your probably going to play a simpler and shinier game. Folks, that's over half the population of the world right there. In a time where the most watched shows on TV are the stupid, who can sing better ones..........
IDOL AND THE VOICE. It's like pop culture has ruined good RPGing.

I hope I'm wrong.

Yeah, most likely not only are you wrong, but you're also being near insulting to people who choose to play the 'simpler and shinier game'(s).

Lets be frank. If you want to start making wild claims about which game was made for 'simpler' people, look at the ones that appear to be made BY 'simpler' people. RIFTS overall rules are very 'simply' constructed (to be really nice). Now, many say they are just old/classic and that makes them better, but a PS3 isn't 'simpler' than an Atari. The Atari has lots of great games, and old time purists will probably argue all the benefits of it and how it requires more skill that the new generation just doesn't have, but in reality, it's just much simpler.

"I helped a new player make a techno wizard and it took about 2 1/2 hours. He has played rpg's before (and made a HU character before) but the size and scope of making a Rifts character overwhelmed him. "

I just want to take a second and talk about this.

My most recent group is composed of some pretty smart people, university and college educated, a Graphic Designer, Layout Artist, Advertising and Business Marketing, ect and they struggled with making characters like none other. It has nothing to do with them not being smart, or the system being too hard, and everything to do with the system being TOTALLY messed up and missing key steps, and the steps being in the wrong order.

Here's one example. The woman took the rulebook, read it, and rolled up her character, starting at step one, going all the way to the OCC. Then she asked how she could be an Elf. Because there is no 'Pick your RCC' step, there is no 'Choose your race then roll your stats' step. You have absolutely NO INSTRUCTION that you have to find ANOTHER BOOK besides the rulebook and it's character creation system to make your character. NONE. Now I, as an experienced gamer, knew where the elf was, flipped it out, and we adjusted her stats ('Elves have 4D6 for PP, so just roll one more dice, but only 2D6 for MA, so roll a dice and subtract that form what you have', ect) so she didn't have to re-roll them completely, but there is NO REASON to think you can even play another race by the character creation rules.

Same game, different person: Starts at the beggining, rolls up stats, gets to the 'choose OCC', sees there are dragons, decides she wants to be a dragon. Well, guess what? Everything about the character you just rolled up can pretty much be tossed. That's right, in the same book is an RCC that has totally different creation rules, that isn't mentioned while you are creating the character, and you won't know about it until you get to the 'choose OCC' part, unless you have done it before, and realize that in the Choose OCC section there are in fact RCCs that don't get OCCs because they are their own OCC as well as being and RCC, unlike other RCC's (like the elves) who still select OCCs.

And this is just a short look at what making a character in RIFTS is REALLY like for new players. Some of you might think I am exagerating or making this intentionally overcomplicated, but I honestly think that so many of us are just so used to the system that we forget that making huge leaps, not only in logic but also in page numbers and creation steps is not something everyone realizes they have to do.

Killer Cyborg made a huge post about Character Creation in his " The system doesn't Work Thread." He pointed out the flaws in Character creation just like you have, how the steps were actually out of order, or how the needed information( For D-bee's and Non-human's) isn't available in the mainbook, and how you have to know what book you need to play a certain race.

Races I might add that are fairly standard in most games.

[Ravenwing]

Dead Reign, I hear, got some buzz for a bit, and people will try it, but even then getting them to try Rifts is still a no go. Plus you have to house rule everything in Dead Reign to be inline with what gamers think of when they play a zombie game that it isn't really the same game as published lol.

Oi Dead Reign was a nightmare. I got a couple of my buddies to play it with me in an effort to get them acclimated before moving over to Rifts. Keep in mind that everyone in this group has been playing RPGs for at least a year (with the exception of one new guy). It took us a total of 6 hours to get everyone's characters done, with errors mind you but we ignored them because we actually wanted to play the game. When we finally got down to it the problems began to rear their ugly heads. It was slow at first, the redundancy of the skill system set in at the same time everyone realized how exploitable the attributes were. Then the issues really pilled up. Why doesn't my PP or PS effect thrown attacks? Why are explosives so utterly useless against vehicles compared to other weapons? Why is every skill based off of IQ? Why are all the classes so totally unbalanced? Why are all of the enemies so totally unbalanced? and on and on and on. Plus the copy and paste nightmare and the changes from all of the normal Rifts core rules, we eventually all got fed up. The fun to coronary ratio was way off.

Lol, thats why you go through the book with a marker, black out the problems, write in the solutions, and run with it. I get DR to run smooth, but it isn't what was published.

One of the most totally shocking things about the book for me was that they left out penalties for low attributes. When I realised it I looked at my GM friend and said "What? Am I frickin blind or did they seriously forgot to cut and paste a good three paragraphs of vital rules?". It was probably one the biggest gafs I've ever seen, and I still can't get over it now.

Lol I know! I noticed that to, especially in a game that's mostly about everyday people, you need the tables for low stats.

I just mod the Attributes bonus's and penalties using a d20 like table, so bonuses begin at 12, and penalties at 9. Leaving 10-11 as the norm average.

[Eashamahel]

Killer Cyborg made a huge post about Character Creation in his " The system doesn't Work Thread." He pointed out the flaws in Character creation just like you have, how the steps were actually out of order, or how the needed information( For D-bee's and Non-human's) isn't available in the mainbook, and how you have to know what book you need to play a certain race.

Races I might add that are fairly standard in most games.

I remember being very pleased while reading that, since someone else had finally stepped up and fully explained all of the huge logical leaps and holes that are there, and how most characters can't even be made with the rules as they are written/presented. I really think anyone who thinks RIFTS has simple or quick character rules, or who doesn't see the problems in the rules, would do well to read that post.

[Vrykolas2k]

They do have a point on the robotech thing. You only have a handful of OOC's and you don't see a ton of mixed groups. If you have 4 guys in Veritechs the one guy in a ground ponder is going to get left out of most things or the other 4 will be held back for him time and time again.

So you tend to get more or less a squad of the same thing, or close. Being that they're all in the military you have a very similar character build for all of them too.

I will say I don't see -new- players to rifts or other games, building a char in under an hour unless a very experienced person basicly sits there and tells them what to write and goes "You'll pick it up as we play"

Can it be done if someone just tells you what to write? Sure.

Do I think a 13 year old girl picked up the book first time and pounded out a character of her own with no help in under an hour? No.

I didn't say she had no help.
In point of fact if you read what I said, I stated fairly clearly that she asked if there was something similar to her favourite anime character...
Never mind.
Not worth the argument.

[Pepsi Jedi]

They do have a point on the robotech thing. You only have a handful of OOC's and you don't see a ton of mixed groups. If you have 4 guys in Veritechs the one guy in a ground ponder is going to get left out of most things or the other 4 will be held back for him time and time again.

So you tend to get more or less a squad of the same thing, or close. Being that they're all in the military you have a very similar character build for all of them too.

I will say I don't see -new- players to rifts or other games, building a char in under an hour unless a very experienced person basicly sits there and tells them what to write and goes "You'll pick it up as we play"

Can it be done if someone just tells you what to write? Sure.

Do I think a 13 year old girl picked up the book first time and pounded out a character of her own with no help in under an hour? No.

I didn't say she had no help.
In point of fact if you read what I said, I stated fairly clearly that she asked if there was something similar to her favourite anime character...
Never mind.
Not worth the argument.

Yeah you said she asked if there was something similar to her fave anime character. You didn't say you sat there and fed her the information to go on the sheet. You said the new player, a 13 year old girl, asked for something like her anime character then the implication that she finished in under an hour.

Prior to that you made an even more difinative statement about it all

"I've never seen even a new player take more than an hour total for character creation... in any PB game.

You've never, seen even a new player, take more than an hour for character creation in ANY PB game.

Which in the experiences of those here, is not the norm, and is pretty questionable. If you've only seen 3 people make characters and they were very experienced role players and they all squeeked one out in an hour, it may be true, but your statement seemed a bit more open ended. Thus, more far fetched.

[Vrykolas2k]

They do have a point on the robotech thing. You only have a handful of OOC's and you don't see a ton of mixed groups. If you have 4 guys in Veritechs the one guy in a ground ponder is going to get left out of most things or the other 4 will be held back for him time and time again.

So you tend to get more or less a squad of the same thing, or close. Being that they're all in the military you have a very similar character build for all of them too.

I will say I don't see -new- players to rifts or other games, building a char in under an hour unless a very experienced person basicly sits there and tells them what to write and goes "You'll pick it up as we play"

Can it be done if someone just tells you what to write? Sure.

Do I think a 13 year old girl picked up the book first time and pounded out a character of her own with no help in under an hour? No.

I didn't say she had no help.
In point of fact if you read what I said, I stated fairly clearly that she asked if there was something similar to her favourite anime character...
Never mind.
Not worth the argument.

Yeah you said she asked if there was something similar to her fave anime character. You didn't say you sat there and fed her the information to go on the sheet. You said the new player, a 13 year old girl, asked for something like her anime character then the implication that she finished in under an hour.

Prior to that you made an even more difinative statement about it all

"I've never seen even a new player take more than an hour total for character creation... in any PB game.

You've never, seen even a new player, take more than an hour for character creation in ANY PB game.

Which in the experiences of those here, is not the norm, and is pretty questionable. If you've only seen 3 people make characters and they were very experienced role players and they all squeeked one out in an hour, it may be true, but your statement seemed a bit more open ended. Thus, more far fetched.

Lol I didn't sit there and feed her info either.
I helped when I was asked.
For the most part, she needed little help. She used three books.
Clear enough?

[Marrowlight]

Clear enough?

Nope, definitely not. You both know where this is going. Film it, put it up on youtube, and prove your opposing sides of how long it takes a beginner to make a character.

Or slap fight it out.

[Eashamahel]

like, actual slap fight, or Bas Rutten style early Pancrase slap fight? Because I'm all for the fun of the dog-paddle-on-land battle, but I don't think I'm willing to get heel-hooked over a discussion that seems to be pretty clearly one sided.

[Pepsi Jedi]

They do have a point on the robotech thing. You only have a handful of OOC's and you don't see a ton of mixed groups. If you have 4 guys in Veritechs the one guy in a ground ponder is going to get left out of most things or the other 4 will be held back for him time and time again.

So you tend to get more or less a squad of the same thing, or close. Being that they're all in the military you have a very similar character build for all of them too.

I will say I don't see -new- players to rifts or other games, building a char in under an hour unless a very experienced person basicly sits there and tells them what to write and goes "You'll pick it up as we play"

Can it be done if someone just tells you what to write? Sure.

Do I think a 13 year old girl picked up the book first time and pounded out a character of her own with no help in under an hour? No.

I didn't say she had no help.
In point of fact if you read what I said, I stated fairly clearly that she asked if there was something similar to her favourite anime character...
Never mind.
Not worth the argument.

Yeah you said she asked if there was something similar to her fave anime character. You didn't say you sat there and fed her the information to go on the sheet. You said the new player, a 13 year old girl, asked for something like her anime character then the implication that she finished in under an hour.

Prior to that you made an even more difinative statement about it all

"I've never seen even a new player take more than an hour total for character creation... in any PB game.

You've never, seen even a new player, take more than an hour for character creation in ANY PB game.

Which in the experiences of those here, is not the norm, and is pretty questionable. If you've only seen 3 people make characters and they were very experienced role players and they all squeeked one out in an hour, it may be true, but your statement seemed a bit more open ended. Thus, more far fetched.

Lol I didn't sit there and feed her info either.
I helped when I was asked.
For the most part, she needed little help. She used three books.
Clear enough?

Maybe she's an RPG prodigy. More power to her.

Your previous statement still stands in question that you've never seen 'even new players' take more than an hour for character creation in ANY PG game.

Such is not the experience of most here and with out a minute pool, seems hard to swallow. I've played Palladium for 20 years. When I read that, I just laughed.

[Chronicle]

Dead? No.

In need of minor face lift? Maybe.


P.S. investment in advertising and possibly loosening up on approval of finished product (one man can't do it all, but he tries his best.)

I know how hard it is to love something so much that you can't trust someone other then your self to run it.

I think it might be time to share the reigns and put others to the task of making changes to material before it gets published with big kev of course still doing final approvals

[Ravenwing]

Clear enough?

Nope, definitely not. You both know where this is going. Film it, put it up on youtube, and prove your opposing sides of how long it takes a beginner to make a character.

Or slap fight it out.

Nah go at it Gangnam style! Crack!

[NMI]

play nice folks!

[Akashic Soldier]

Is Rifts Dead?

I still sure as hell enjoy myself each week.

[Damian Magecraft]

NO offense Rap but simple does not equal dumbed down.

This.

If I want a game that defines in great detail everything that I'm allowed to do, I'd be playing a tactical war game rather than an RPG. I like simple and elegant game mechanics because nothing ruins the mood like having to pull out a book to look up a rule or a chart.

--flatline

Ah yes the KIS Maxim of rules design...
Why is it though every one forgets the corollary to this maxim?
"there is such a thing as too simple!"

[Damian Magecraft]

I just noticed something else that other game companies do that palladium hasnt'. Release constant new editions with actual rule change,s and then update old books to compensate.
WOTC, White Wolf, Hero, Chaosium, Green Ronin = ALL kept their fanbase and visibility strong by constant releases of New Editions and making people buy new core books and replace their libraries. Palladium has about 3 sets of rules = Original, REvised, and the Ultimate Edition...
and some games never made it past that.

constant "reworks" of a system requiring replacements of libraries is not a feature.

[flatline]

NO offense Rap but simple does not equal dumbed down.

This.

If I want a game that defines in great detail everything that I'm allowed to do, I'd be playing a tactical war game rather than an RPG. I like simple and elegant game mechanics because nothing ruins the mood like having to pull out a book to look up a rule or a chart.

--flatline

Ah yes the KIS Maxim of rules design...
Why is it though every one forgets the corollary to this maxim?
"there is such a thing as too simple!"

"As simple as possible, but not simpler".

This is why we search for elegant yet powerful and expressive resolution mechanisms.

--flatline

[jaymz]

What I am referring to when I said what i said above.

RTalsorians Interlock system and West End Games D6 Star Wars system. Both fairly simple but certainly not dumbed down.

[Blastaar]

I say more exposure for the game
I bet if someone at palladium contacted oh dragoncon game track director and said we would like to have a room and space
I am sure it could happen then people who like, interested in it and such can get more info about this game and raise a greater more powerful interest in it
Dragoncon is expecting 55,000 people this year alone. last year they had 52000. be interesting to see them there and have a panel or a few

http://www.dragoncon.org/?q=node/355

[DhAkael]

What I am referring to when I said what i said above.

RTalsorians Interlock system and West End Games D6 Star Wars system. Both fairly simple but certainly not dumbed down.

Seconded

[Eashamahel]

I say more exposure for the game
I bet if someone at palladium contacted oh dragoncon game track director and said we would like to have a room and space
I am sure it could happen then people who like, interested in it and such can get more info about this game and raise a greater more powerful interest in it
Dragoncon is expecting 55,000 people this year alone. last year they had 52000. be interesting to see them there and have a panel or a few

It is nice to see Palladium starting to get back out there to expos and conventions. I know people on here get upset because it means people aren't in the office working on books, but it's either get your company out there and get noticed, or work on books for your hardcore fans and fade away into obscurity.

[rrank5377]

I don't know that I'd say Rifts is Dead. You might be able to convince me that it's slowly dying. Like any other game, though, it has its problems.

As has been stated in countless forums, articles, reviews and the like, the system feels old. While I agree with that, I don't have a real problem with the system. You pick up dice, modify the rolls per bonuses and rules, and you have your action result. That sounds like just about every system on the market, new and old. If someone thinks that an old-feeling system is a reason that Rifts is a reason that it could be dying, that is their opinion. I don't agree with that sentiment.

Besides, Palladium is pretty much married to the Megaversal system (as I call it). If they scrap the system, they'll instantly obsolete their 130-ish Rifts books, risking alienation of the current fan base. For a small company to risk that is very difficult to stomach. If I was in Kevin's shoes, I couldn't do it. So for me, the system has to stay more or less intact.

Rifts has one HUGE problem in my mind: it's not approachable to new gamers. New customers are the lifeblood of EVERY industry.

I've read many reviews lamenting the layout of a Palladium book. Two columns, 10-ish point Times New Roman font with line art placed throughout the book. Personally, I have no problem with that. Two columns, three, four, one...doesn't matter. As long as it's legible, that's what matters to me. If the font grabs your eye, all the better. Times New Roman does not do the latter, but it is definitely easy to read. The black & white nature of the presentation keeps the cost of the book down, which I really like.

Rifts' major problem with its approachability to new gamers is its organization. For those of you who have it, flip your Rifts Ultimate Edition to page 275. Don't worry, I'll wait. What do you see there? The "What is a role playing game" section. That should be FAR earlier in the book. In my mind, it should be immediately after the table of contents. You could possibly convince me to put it after the setting, which was something like the first 40 pages.

Then having the OCCs before the character generation seems counter-intuitive. Again, looking at the new gamer perspective, or the new-to-Palladium perspective, I wouldn't know what I'm looking at. O.C.C.? R.C.C.? P.S.? P.E.? Alignment? And what do these percentages next to the skills mean?

I have a somewhat rare perspective on Rifts Ultimate Edition. That was the first Rifts book I'd ever read. One question that popped up in my mind and I had to wait 277 pages to answer: "What the heck is a D-Bee?" There is so much that the reader is assumed to know, but someone who has not read Rifts could not know. It was this kind of frustration that made me very close to putting the book down never to open it again. I just knew Palladium was really good at creating game worlds, so I kept at it.

Working within the limitations of Rifts Ultimate Edition, I think the organization should be something like this: Setting, Character Generation, Gear, Rules, Magic/Psychic powers, Game Master information, such as the CS section. Right or wrong, that's roughly how I would do it.

One other thing about the source books I've seen (which is mostly world books to this point): too many OCCs and always introducing more kinds of Magic. It gets old. As a GM, if I pick up a world book, I want setting and adventure Ideas. When approximately one third of the book is OCC and another quarter of it is Magic spells, the GM information starts to get squeezed out. Maybe I'm alone in this feeling.

Back to the question. Is Rifts dead? No. Is Rifts Dying? Possibly. How to "save" it? Advertising, Presentation, Quality. Advertising will get someone to pick up the book. Good presentation will get someone to hold on to it, keep reading it. Good quality will keep someone coming back for more.

[Eashamahel]

You're pretty much correct in that it's not really a problem of system or style, but the lack of a layout artist, production manager, ect. The system itself isn't 'bad' and doesn't need to be scrapped, it just needs to be put in order, and it needs to actually work. B needs to follow A, and C is after those. Currently, C comes first, followed by D, with A and B mixed in there with Z. Things are not laid out in a way that benefits readers, especially new ones.

You are dead on with the good presentation->continued interest, and the importance of advertising. I almost wish Palladium had of waited just a little longer before putting out there Revised Edition books, as it would have been a great opportunity to start from the beginning with better layout and the services of a few extra professionals. Or even interns! There are no small amount of people out there looking for a few months worth of nearly unpaid work in the graphic designing, layout, and publishing field, not to mention some pretty 'green' project managers who could get it all together.

[Pallist]

I lost my Rifts:UE core book and today went to replace it from a store. I ended up buying from amazon...

I'm in Boston area. About 8 years ago I could easily find rifts books from:

Harrisons comics, Salem MA
Hobby Bunker, Malden MA
Pandemonium, Cambridge MA

As of today, 7/21/13:
Harrisons carries NO palladium products and employees didn't know the game.
Hobby Bunker carries very few books, mostly left overs. No ETA of when they were replacing the R:UE core book.
Pandemonium no longer carries rifts books, but still has some Rifters floating around.


This is my concern... You learn about games from gaming stores. But Palladium books cant be found.

[MurderCityDisciple]

About a week ago at my local game store, I was sifting through a bunch of Rifters to see if there was one the piqued my interest. Another gamer type guy, around my age eased his way into the tiny and now crowded RPG section of the store. He was looking at Pathfinder and Shadowrun stuff (which I've never played). I noticed he was looking at what I was looking at and vice versa. I struck up a conversation, always looking to find a new gaming kindred spirit. We started talking, I mentioned that I came back to gaming after a long hiatus and he mentioned that he went through a card and klix phase and had gotten back into straight up RPGing. I then asked him what he thought about Palladium, his reply, one word "Retarded."

I asked why and he said he came up through TNMT (which he still remembers fondly), then a little BTS and then RIfTS, the original incarnation. He said, "...it was cool in the beginning, but as more and more books were added it lost it's appeal. It became a bloated, jumbled mess and still remains so."

After he gave opinion, I gave mine. Which was how it's modular and a great setting, his reply was, "No, the rules are a mess, slapdashed together, spread out all over the place, the books themselves are poorly organized and all it (meaning Rifts) attracts are power gamers who just want bigger and badder toys to play with." He said some more about it, apparently he tried RIFTS and it wasn't to his taste.

I had to concede the argument there. He was right about Palladium from his standpoint. He actually started showing me Pathfinder stuff...I agreed, "Ooooh. Yeah it's nice, yeah it looks pretty, it's organized, yeah I could probably figure this out in 15 minutes...sure."

Then it came to me, with a redneck accent, I repeated what it said, "You know what RIFTS is??...it's like a 'Hillbilly Dunebuggy'. A jalopy made out of junk parts, slapped together with duct tape, zip ties and hose clamps. But ya know what, I bet you you can have a lot of fun in that dunebuggy."

The guy laughed and smirked at my analogy but had to agree. He asked permission to use my analogy and I gave him permission. We parted ways at that point. As he left his parting words were, "You can have your hillbilly dunebuggy, I'll have to settle for a nice, new quadrunner."


So if you ever meet a guy who says that RIFTS is the Hillbilly Dunebuggy of Gaming , I came up with it.

So there....

[Alrik Vas]

Well, I just got two old dogs back into Palladium and we're bringing two new suckers with us. It's only dead if you don't play.

[Blastaar]

Well somebody is running a TMNT palladium game at dragoncon but nothing else.
I think more exposure is needed

[rrank5377]

I just started my first Rifts game with my group. Hopefully it turns out well. So yeah, Alrik, I agree with your statement.

[jaymz]

Well, I just got two old dogs back into Palladium and we're bringing two new suckers with us. It's only dead if you don't play.

Star Wars d6 is a prime example of this.