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Saving throws are basically a mechanic to determine if your character sucessfully resists a certain effect applied to him. For instance, if your character is poisoned or is subjected to a mental assault, your character rolls against a pre-determined target number, adding in any appropriate bonuses from attributes or other abilities. If he/she succeeds, you resist the attack/poison/spell etc - either not feeling any effect or suffering reduced effects. If the roll fails you suffer the full brunt of the effect.

To use the two examples mentioned earlier, say your character is hit by a tranquilizer dart or breathes in knock-out gas. You have to roll vs poison/toxin or suffer the effects. On a failed save you go under. However, if you succeed, your character might only suffer a minor penalty (slightly slowed down or drowsy) for a limited time. In the case of a mental assault, a save might mean you feel an intrusion into your mind but you keep your wits about you and menatally withstand the attack.

It's basically a mechanic to take care of the psionics/spells/in-game-effects that cannot be dodged per se or that can be overcome by tougher/more resillient characters.

Personally...I don't use the palladium saving throw system....I find the D20 system much simpler and more streamined.

Just out of curiousity, how much difference is there in the D20 system, and Palladium, which resolves many die rolls with a D20?
If the D20 System makes more sense, then I may have to crack and pick up a book to incorporate, but I just fail to see (as an outsider looking in) how one could be much different than the other.

Sentinel wrote:Just out of curiousity, how much difference is there in the D20 system, and Palladium, which resolves many die rolls with a D20?
If the D20 System makes more sense, then I may have to crack and pick up a book to incorporate, but I just fail to see (as an outsider looking in) how one could be much different than the other.

No need to buy a book just to peek - just go here:
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=d20/article/msrd

The main thing is that instead of "save vs psionics....save vs insanity....save vs mind-affecting magic......save vs magic posions.....blah blah blah" it's condensed into 3 basic saves - things that affect your mind (Will), things that affect your body (Fortitude) and things you can dodge or evade (Reflex).

Paladium already has a dodge mechanic, so I only use the Will and Fortitude saves. Also, the save targets or DCs are not at a fixed level - they can be modified on the fly by the DM.

It's not really a huge difference but I think it's slightly more efficient - and it serves the purpose of keeping high ME or high PE people from being practically immune to psionics and magic respectively; mind-affecting psionics/magic fall under Will (ME-based) while body-affecting Magic/Psi falls under Fortitude (PE-based). It's just a personal preference.

Note - I have also adapted the wealth and reputation systems to my games. I always found it kind of...weird....keeping track of my charaters pocket change, at least in a modern super-hero setting. I think that wealth system gives a more accurate portrayal of finances in the modern world. It kind of harkens back to the old A-MSH Resource check.

AlricFlaim wrote:I get what it's for, and the idea behind it, but, how does it work? Do I roll over or under the number listed?

You roll a D20, add in any appropriate bonuses (if you are poisoned, add in your bonus to save vs poison/toxin if you have any) and hope you beat the target number (roll over).

Thank you kind human.