Valuable information for a new GM

[NMI]

Moved to appropriate forum.

[Armorlord]

Welcome back to the game!
On the Rifts front, had a similar thread not too long ago regarding books. I'll paraphrase my own answer there:

Well, priorities should probably be on where you want the players to go and work your way out. For instance, Japan is awesome, but if your campaign is going to be largely in England battling Splugorth slavers going after faeries, England and Atlantis would be more important.
As for books to recommend, the Rifts Game Master Guide, the Bionics Sourcebook, and the Rifts Book of Magic will cover just about all the bases starting out. The GMG will give page numbers to any OCC/RCC/PCC published before it, skill list, and basic stats on just about every piece of equipment on Rifts Earth. Amusingly, while it is 'Game Master' book, it is among the safest to let players look in, outside of letting them know something might exist somewhere it doesn't have any 'spoilers'. Bionics Sourcebook and Book of Magic cover their respective areas well, so between the three you've got a fair amount covered and can spread out into books you need for world information.
...
From there it's more a matter of where the PCs are, and what is coming to the PCs , followed by what books you want to read whether the players are dealing with it or not (at least yet).

Pantheons of the Megaverse and Dragons & Gods are good resources as well if you want to involve a few additional power groups. On the Psychic end of things your goto combo is scattered across dimensions: World Book 12: Psyscape and Nightbane: Between the Shadows are some key components, also Beyond the Supernatural 2nd Edition and Rifter #50 have good psychic stuff too.

Though that is just books. On the GMing front, with so very many options available to both the players and the GM, one of the hardest things is getting a feel for what kind of game you want to run and that the players will want to be a part of, and building that idea in early on. Depending on your group that could be easy or hard. Some people gravitate toward the same ideas easily, some can be a pain when someone else is better or more powerful than them, others get really set on certain character concepts and don't like deviating from them. Basically you should make sure to exercise some limits during setup as needed. Like, say, no Cosmo Knights if you're going for a game at more of a City Rat level, though that isn't a hard and fast rule. For example, I have a game with just an Operator and a Dragon Hatchling, and they get along with a good dynamic and the players don't mind the power disparity. On the other hand I had a new game start up recently that was mostly BtS2 classes, where I had a player that wanted to have a lot of skills, so I allowed him to take the PU2 Natural Genius instead of the Genius he was looking at, but I pulled him to the side and asked him not to take certain skills I knew were important to the other characters because I knew they would eventually be unhappy if he outshined them in their own areas. Besides classes, exercise just some logical control over starting equipment choices, look at what they ask for, see where it is compared to where they are, the cost/availability, and whether it really makes sense for them to have it. Some folks are good with that, some just look for the biggest thing they think they can get away with whether it makes sense or not.

Been a long day and I think my rambling is running dry for the moment, if you have any questions or seek any clarifications, please feel free to ask!

[TiekoSora]

Surprised nobody has suggested the Chaos Earth books. For a new GM and a group new to the PB settings, this would be the best, in my opinion, place to start. It gives you a better place to start with the familiar. Your campaign could start a month before the apocalypse, get the characters familiar with the rules and how combat flows. This may limit the initial starting O.C.C. selection however. Using this method though will allow the GM to slowly add in additional aspects such as psionics and magic.

This is the route I went when I ran my one and only Nightbane campaign, that at its height, grew to three full groups of eight running the same campaign. I disallowed the use of Nightlands or Nightbane characters, instead having a wide range from a full conversion cyborg (HU2), to a guy that owned and ran a gun store and had no combat skills, but could build from scratch, fix, or modifiy pretty much any weapon available on the market. The campaign started the week before Dark Day, and the BLAM!!!!! Non-stop action, mystery, and misdirection. They still don't know if their boss, Bob Dole, is the real Bob Dole, or an alien impersonating him.

So my advice is start small, get the feel for the system, and then when you and your group are ready to move on to a full blown Rifts campaign, you will have a great feel for what books you will need.

[mrloucifer]

Good luck to ya!

[Dustin Fireblade]

Hey guys, thanks for the helpful and insightful replies.
I'll let you know that this will actually be the first time I am playing Rifts.
Its kind of sad because I love cyberpunk and dsytopian futures, which leads me to believe why I never got into it earlier, maybe because I was sheltered?
haha

With that in mind, do the reccomendations stay the same or should I look into other books?
Is the ultimate rifts book good to have as well?

The Rifts Ultimate Edition is the place to start. It contains the latest information for the current game year, as seen through the eyes of one of the games icons - Erin Tarn. It also contains the latest rules.

Beyond that, I would suggest the Rifts Adventure Guide to get a feel for the game world. Also Rifts Aftermath is a good guide to get the latest world information as well.

[MADMANMIKE]

http://www.palladiumbooks.com/WhatIsRole-Playing.html

Towards the bottom of the page Kev gives a pretty good list of what's easiest to learn.

-Mike <8]

[Cinos]

Core Rule Book, preferably the gold, (Commonly called RUE, Rifts Ultimate Edition, gold was a limited print hard cover that's just too sexy to pass up, donno if it's still open for buying, but soft cover has all the same info).

After that, if you want a good ready made, Source Book 1 Revised has a great adventure in it ready to go. Other then that though, most of Palladiums adventures are ideas and starts, rather then a full stated out ready to go thing. Merc and Merctown have good stuff. The whole CS War Campaign set has a lot of possible ideas, and New West if I recall had some fun stuff in it.

[Spinachcat]

Unless your group are already RIFTS fans, I suggest considering a one-shot adventure with pregen characters to get them into the feel of the game and the system. It is a good way to test the waters without anyone making a huge commitment of time or money.

The Megaversal Ambassador forum has LOTS of discussion for GMs and somewhere on that forum or the Open House forum, I posted a bunch of pre-gens who are ready to lock and load.

As for purchases, I suggest starting with the Core book plus a World book for an area that really excites your interest.

[Shorty Lickens]

Rifts Adventure Guide is the best place for new people to start. It tells you a lot of things about actually running a game that normally takes years of trial and error to figure out.

[The Dark Elf]

If you have the Rifts Ultimate Edition it has a breief description of most of the books which will help you choose for yourself.

They are ALL good to.

[Shawn Merrow]

Some people like to charge way to much for OOP books. As for dice Rifts use D4, D6, D8, D10 and D20. Not sure if a D12 was ever used. On maps you can just use your imagination as the rules are not designed with minis in mind.

[Dustin Fireblade]

Alright so I picked up the RUE and first sourcebook for some extra info.
Is it vital I pick up the Game Masters Guide and Adventure Guide before we start playing?
I know the GMGuide has a lot of good info, but its backordered and almost impossible to find for regular price =\

Also, whats a good book to pick up for enemies? There doesnt seem to be much variation in what I have.

I don't think the Game Master Guide is really all that important. I don't believe I've referenced it five times - ever.

As far as enemies, well it depends on where you are setting the game at. You might want to start with either Conversion Book 1 or Dark Conversions for a lot of supernatural enemies. Note there's a "revised" edition of Conversion Book 1. Also D-Bee's of North America has tons of different races that your players could come across.

The Monsters and Animals book, mainly for Palladium Fantasy will have a lot of races/creatures from the Conversion Book in it, but with additional notes and SDC stats. Plus it has a ton of normal animals that you can use.

Vampire Kingdoms has, of course, a ton of information on vampires. I would pick this up used though as it's currently due for a major update and re-release this year (at least hopefully this year). The Arzno World Book is a great companion book to have.

If you can find one, pick up a used original Rifts Main Book - toward the back you will find some tables that you can build your own monster

The different world books will often have varied monsters and evil NPC's as well.



I would probably get the revised Conversion Book 1 along with Monsters and Animals and the D-Bee's of North America books.

[Dustin Fireblade]

Canada is a pretty good book. It's got a number of monsters and animals, and introduced a few races that are also in the D-Bee's of NA book. Plus there is a number of cities and towns (with a few mapped out) that make excellent locations to start a game. There are a number of additional OCC's as well.

[Dustin Fireblade]

Well the D-Bee's book is basically just a list of races a player can select for the most part - it's still a great resource though to give players options.

The Canada book though has plenty of places to start a game. You might want to pick up the Xiticix Invasion book (World Book 23), since there are a few hives in Canada. More enemies and adventure idea's.

[Dustin Fireblade]

What are the conversion books for?

The conversion book basically takes creatures, spells, super-powers and whatnot from the other Palladium games, and gives them stats and notes for Rifts.

[Dustin Fireblade]

Pretty much. You have the Elf, Dwarf, Wolfen and giant races along with creatures like the griffon and dragons - basically everything you expect from a fantasy game. Plus notes on playing particular OCC's from Palladium Fantasy and their spell conversions.

[Shorty Lickens]

Awesome! Thanks for all the helpful responses.
So far I've basically narrowed it down to
- RUE
- Rifts Adventure Guide
- Rifts Game Master Guide (Which is backordered and 25.00 dollars in the Palladium online store.. But from 100.00 to 200.00 on ebay? huh????)

should that be enough for me? And also... What else should I get? In terms of dice? Rifts only uses D6, right?
And alsoooo, do I need to print out any maps or hex graphs to help with battles? Or is it possible to do it all in imagination?

Im sorry for all the questions, I am totally new to this, but also really really excited to play it, as are the people who will be kneeling before my RPing.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/ ... dition=new
huh????????????

[Colt47]

Well when making an adventure for the first time, try to keep the classes people are using to something you are familiar with. I'd recommend sticking to RUE Occupations and R.C.Cs as this should eliminate some of the hassle with writing up appropriate encounters later. Don't get too deeply occupied with the characters backgrounds, either. Yes, it is interesting to maybe expand on some of the finer points of a specific individuals strange or tragic past, but it is far more fun and enjoyable if everyone feels like they are important rather than just being in the shadow of this years flavor of Othello.

Icemasters advice is deathly important: Never forget to stat out whatever monsters, potentially dangerous critters, or NPCs that will be thrown at the PCs during the game. The palladium system runs fine once the engine is working, but it takes a lot of prep work since their are so many saves and statistics.

Similarly, always have a means to track movement and enemy positions during a game of Rifts. I don't know how many people on this board do this, but it makes the game work a lot better and makes it easier to figure out what would be a good challenge to the players. My old GM group uses Dungeons and Dragons 3e movement squares and converts the speeds into squares per melee.

[t0m]

there is some good gm'ing advice in this thread on the pf forum, which you might have otherwise overlooked since you are running a rifts game.

good luck and have fun