cramped in S. america?

Bood Samel · Unread post by **Bood Samel** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 3:18 am

A lot of us like to forget that those books exist.

Shin Kenshiro · Thu Oct 07, 2004 3:23 am

There's South America books? When did that happen? I heard something about an ATL-7 and the next thing I knew, everything south of Panama had been washed over during the Coming of the Rifts

Dustin Fireblade · Thu Oct 07, 2004 7:32 am

Well the ATL-7 could always just be placed in your favorite setting of course.
But yeah S. America is cramped to say the least.

LunarYoma · Unread post by **LunarYoma** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 8:04 am

meticulousinventor wrote:although i like a lot of the stuff and nations of south america, am i the only one who thinks that the entire continent is a bit over crowded with nations?

yep, its just you

sHaka · Unread post by **sHaka** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 8:51 am

I was always under the impression that mankind was teetering on extinction. But looking at the sheer volume of human nations, I appreciate that many are in tenuous situations, it would seem that man is flourishing on RIFTS earth.

I always ran things so that there were about 30 million humans left MAX. There's probably, according to cannon, that many in the North Europe alone.

Doesn't seem right to me, ah well....

Dr. Doom III · Unread post by **Dr. Doom III** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 9:10 am

Most "nations" are little more then city states with surrounding villages and some territory that they claim but have little control over.

Some people just don't get that. They see a country’s borders and they think of today’s countries. There is a vast difference.

sHaka · Unread post by **sHaka** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 10:12 am

oh yeah not disputing that, I've read the descriptions. But with cities of several million folk here, several million there, it still seems too high for the way I run things. i've just tweeked my campaigns a little.

Daniel Stoker · Thu Oct 07, 2004 11:02 am

It depends I guess. Imagine that you DO have a Cityt he size of LA, but that is the ONLY city from LA County down south the the Mexican border. Granted they CLAIM all that territory and have a few small villages and patrols enforcing that claim, but that's it.....

Daniel Stoker

Uber Monkey · Unread post by **Uber Monkey** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 11:12 am

Why is it surprising to find 13 nations in S. America. By itself Brazil is currently the 5th largest country in the world, only 0.4 millions square miles less than the US (including Alaska), and each of the states could be considered a nation onto itself for gaming purposes.
By comparison, S America has almost twice the land area of Europe, and there are a hell of a lot more than 13 nations in present day Europe.

Svartalf · Unread post by **Svartalf** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 12:36 pm

Yeah? so what? in a comm broken, fragmented post apocalyptic world like Rifts earth, it is normal that countries/nations should be smaller than they are nowadays... which mean there is room for MANY more entities than exist now.

What do you find wrong with that?

Vrykolas2k · Unread post by **Vrykolas2k** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 2:56 pm

Dr. Doom III wrote:Most "nations" are little more then city states with surrounding villages and some territory that they claim but have little control over.

Some people just don't get that. They see a country’s borders and they think of today’s countries. There is a vast difference.

Precisely.
The people mass in the tech havens, which is why they have high pops, while the rest of the world is typically wilderness.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 2:59 pm

Aegis wrote:
A lot of us like to forget that those books exist.

*sighs*
I wish I knew why these books are hated so much they are a couple of my favorites, there is something for everyone in them. I hope that the whole "power creap" argument doesnt come into this. I so hate that concept. Just check out another good book Woormwood and compare some of those characters to the SA characters, Holy Terrors are nastier than Anti-Monsters and what about the double damage dealing Apoks and the rest of the mega damage humans on the planet. Those are just in comparison.

Aegis
LIKES SA BOOKS

Add me to the (small)list of heretics who actually ENJOYED the SA books and wants to see more of the aliens of the region...such as the New Babylonian Navy, and the space forces of the psi-rats from outer space....POwer-creep aside(and I think part of the hatred may be a smoldering resentment that those south of the border seem to have gotten some pretty nifty toys), I thought many of the kingdoms had gret potential for allies and troublemakers in a 're-unite the world' mega-campaign/adventure..

And let us not forget the introduction of the Cult of Dragonwright in all its geopolitical ulginess...

AS for cramped? There's a difference between CLAIMING territory and HOLDING territory...in reality, those 13 kingdoms can't reasonably and reliably claim much outside cannon/missile range of their respective fortified cities, and the problem becomes even worse in the mountainous regions of the Andes and the quagmire of the Amazon region....Plenty of territory for new nations to emerge in...JUst like North America.

Vrykolas2k · Unread post by **Vrykolas2k** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 5:19 pm

taalismn wrote:
Aegis wrote:
A lot of us like to forget that those books exist.

*sighs*
I wish I knew why these books are hated so much they are a couple of my favorites, there is something for everyone in them. I hope that the whole "power creap" argument doesnt come into this. I so hate that concept. Just check out another good book Woormwood and compare some of those characters to the SA characters, Holy Terrors are nastier than Anti-Monsters and what about the double damage dealing Apoks and the rest of the mega damage humans on the planet. Those are just in comparison.

Aegis
LIKES SA BOOKS

Add me to the (small)list of heretics who actually ENJOYED the SA books and wants to see more of the aliens of the region...such as the New Babylonian Navy, and the space forces of the psi-rats from outer space....POwer-creep aside(and I think part of the hatred may be a smoldering resentment that those south of the border seem to have gotten some pretty nifty toys), I thought many of the kingdoms had gret potential for allies and troublemakers in a 're-unite the world' mega-campaign/adventure..

And let us not forget the introduction of the Cult of Dragonwright in all its geopolitical ulginess...

AS for cramped? There's a difference between CLAIMING territory and HOLDING territory...in reality, those 13 kingdoms can't reasonably and reliably claim much outside cannon/missile range of their respective fortified cities, and the problem becomes even worse in the mountainous regions of the Andes and the quagmire of the Amazon region....Plenty of territory for new nations to emerge in...JUst like North America.

List isn't that small; my gaming group of 13 loves them. The only one none of us much likes is Vampire Kingdoms, mostly because of the silly intelligences and weaknesses and invulnerabilities...

Sureshot · Unread post by **Sureshot** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 9:56 pm

Put me up as another one who liked the SA books. Tanks and other vehicles that were actually a threat to someone in body armor and had the ability to dish out as much damage as the guy with the laser rifle. Before the the two SA books most vehicles imo did less damage than a guy with body armor and guns. Which I never understood considering the size of some of the guns on the vehicles.

Bood Samel · Unread post by **Bood Samel** » Fri Oct 08, 2004 5:34 am

Some of ideas were ok, but over all I think they were conceptualy erratic, and yes they were the harbingers of power creep. They key problem with CJ's writing and the power creep issue (for me at least) is that it took away from the gritty dystopic feel of the first few core books. Source book 1 and vampire kingdoms are still some of my favorites. Some of his ideas inspired from meso-american folklore I thought were cool.

I've always been a fan of the use of an element of folklore in rifts as opposed to an element of Tolkien-esque fantasy. Canada and mystic russia seemed like they did the best job with the use of indiginous folklore in rifts, though I haven't read the china books yet.

Though conceptual juxtaposistion is an element in rifts. Juxtaposed realities in a darwinian struggle. Some writers who've dealt with rifts just are a bit much about it.

Vrykolas2k · Unread post by **Vrykolas2k** » Fri Oct 08, 2004 3:12 pm

Zylo wrote:
Aegis wrote:

Posted: 08 Oct 2004 08:02 Post subject:
Power-creep, power-schmeep.

KS is the head editor. Everything goes past him. "I let the author have too much leeway with South America" my foot. You make it your job to edit, so edit.

Exactly what I was thinking. From my understandings there was some things that KS did indeed change since he felt they were too unbalanced, so that tells me that the stuff left in was approved by the big guy himself and thus fit into his vision of the Rifts worlds.

KS told myself and a few others at Gen Con 2000 that the material CJ handed in for those books was extremely outlandish so he cut down the power level and it went out the door. I imagine the power level as is didn't seem that bad if it was halved or more from the original manuscript. In hindsight, he said, it was probably more powerful than it should have been, but within that region, things were balanced enough.

I thought this was about right. I don't hate the SA books, some things within are silly IMO, but I only hate when the items within are avaible across the Megaverse.

Two words which make me love SA 2 especially: Blue Flame.

taalismn · Unread post by **taalismn** » Fri Oct 08, 2004 7:03 pm

Another reason to like SA was the Kingdom of Cibola....okay, we got interdimensional empires trading in technology(Naruni), slaves, and magic(the Splugorth), and now we have a budding little bunch of nastiness dealing in something that might outstrip them both in the long run....

DRUGS.

Yep, those evil little bioprospectors and chemists at Cibola have the potential to undermine the efficiency of the working slobs at Atlantis and Naruni(who I consider to have made a mistake doing business with the cyclops-worm) by selling them dope. And neither of those two nations have, I believe, enlightened policies for dealing with substance addiction among their ranks....

Colonel Wolfe · Fri Oct 08, 2004 9:46 pm

CJ is an Awesome Writer, everything he dose is Quality, unfortunatly his Design and Power scale in Rifts needed help.

My Faveriot Rifts books are.

Juicer Uprising
SB 1,2 & 4
Triax
under seas
Phase world
CWC

JU is still my faveriot book,

Look up his Other books, hes a good guy...

CS John · Unread post by **CS John** » Sat Oct 09, 2004 3:30 am

I didn't care for the SA books, but I don't blame Carella for the power-creep that was started with Atlantis and Splynncrythe's army of 18 jillion Overlords.

I liked Carella's NA books though.

Dr. Doom III · Unread post by **Dr. Doom III** » Sat Oct 09, 2004 8:50 am

As a major plus, South America is the only real "finished" part of Rifts Earth.

CS John · Unread post by **CS John** » Sat Oct 09, 2004 1:52 pm

I'm not ragging on Atlantis, that was my favorite world book as far as cool ideas go. I only have a problem with the vast numbers of Splynn's army. Not that PCs in most campaigns will ever see the extent of his power, but still. It seems all the world books after that have been playing "catch up" to Altantis.

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cramped in S. america?

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Size of S America