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All I can say is.........WOW! Thats just from doing a once over. The intro is got to be one of the best ever. The interview is a perfect way to set the tone for the book! I'll comment more as I read.


Carl

Pretty cool isn't it?

I like it and I am not even a BtS player at least not till now!!!!

Finally wrapped my hands around a copy! Just did a quick flip thru (stupid work) and I am blown away, the art rocks (as usual) and I even like the layout, can't wait to read the whole thing. Congrats to the entire Palladium crew on another awesome book!

Not getting mine until tomorrow. I had to have my FLGS order it. Hope it is worth the wait!

Got mine, and overall, I've got to say I was disappointed.

While this is a great book, it doesn't stand up well to the original as a seperate RPG. As a sourcebook for the original on the other hand, it is excellent.

Kevin's new book format still doesn't do much for me (I'm not sold on moving character creation and other rules to the back of the book).

The new XP table was a joke. Kevin went to great lengths to explain how he "rewards for role-playing" but, as usual, he only rewards the "good guys" for doing "good deeds" instead of having characters actually playing their characters in alignment, based on attributes, and other personality quirks. The Zero Experience for various actions that would easily be considered "playing in character" is a slap in the face to those of us who don't always play the guys in white hats.

Combat basically has two and a half fixes from the Splicers printing of these rules. 1) The Leap Kick damages in the actual hand to hand combats are fixed to mesh with the damage listed under the combat term. 2) The "k" was added to military fork under W.P. Forked (Kev still has no clue what a Tiger Fork actually is though). 2.5) There's no mention of penalties for parrying energy blasts/bullets, getting rid of the problem of the hand to hand section of Splicers stating it will be covered in the Ranged Weapon section...when it's not.

The Psychic Combat section is a great improvement however, the highly controversial two attacks statement is missing, and psionics used in combat is actually covered.

They actually have the Parapsychology skill (in addition to a few other new skills, and some different versions of skills).

The Occupations, while working for the setup Kevin used, struck me as being an OCC that boiled down to a skill program crossed with one of N&S's Cover Identities. A good idea, but it seriously hampers characters who have worked in more than one field.

The character sheet's landscape layout really struck me as bizarre (especially with the front page on the "bottom"), and didn't come across as offering any more room to write stuff down. I particularly loved the Leap distances...since I couldn't find any place actually listing how to determine those in BTS-2.

Which brings up another thing, While this is supposed to be "Beyond the Supernatural Second Edition" Kevin seems to think it's "Beyond the Supernatural Two." What's up with that?

I did like the PCCs, excepting the Genius/Natural (the original version in BTS was better IMO), as well as the new psionic powers and the new psychic backgrounds. The new "Proximity Equals Power" method of handling ISP (and, based on what was written, PPE) is an interesting concept, but I don't know if I'd use it for my games. You might want to check it out though. On the other hand, the "discorporation" of monsters when they get croaked was too contrived for me, and clashed with the existing discorporation game mechanics (see Mystic China).

I found the Table of Contents to be fairly useless (just listing "Monsters" without individual entries pretty much killed it as a useful part of the book), and the Quick Find didn't thrill me (useful if you're looking for individual bits of fluff text, and oddly better than Splicers), and I felt an indexed version of the Psionic powers, either in the front or back of the book, would have made the book that much more useful.

I found four major points detracting from the book. There was too much fluff and not enough meat. The lack of weapons & equipment we saw in Splicers did more damage than good (and seems to be Kev's new trend ). The lack of Magic and Monsters really hurt this book (yes, I know both were explained as Kevin not having enough room, but compared to the original BTS, these are not improvements, since BTS actually IS a stand-alone game, whereas BTS-2 is not...I should also point out the disparity in monsters in both...In BTS, there were 30+ monsters in a section covering 40 pages, in BTS-2 there are 16 monsters in 30 pages...that's quite a disparity). Lastly, I felt the lack of Victim rules really hurt the full playability of BTS-2 (I found it ironic that Kevin said players made such a fuss about Ordinary People being included, yet have to wonder how many of those were confusing Ordinary People with Victim characters). These four points really hurt BTS-2 as an independent RPG when compared to the original.

I also found Kevin has once again confused himself as to just exactly what Chi is in the "Palladium Megaversal Game System" (his description of it). In BTS-2 he seems to think it is related to PPE and is considered "inner strength". In Rifts Japan it was considered "inner spirit" to PPE's "mysticism" and we often saw "PPE (inner spirit)" listed. In Rifts China, as I predicted, Chi becomes ISP (this is an outgrowth of the horrible Chi=ISP conversions seen in the "Revised" Conversion Book). His own confusion regarding this game mechanic (not too mention the actual concept) has dragged down all his other game systems by offering contradictory and confusing information for translating N&S concepts to other games. Personally, I think they need to scrap all such crap and stick with using Chi directly, despite many other gamers' frustration with the concept (of course, I also believe that they need to codify the rules for it like they have with PPE and ISP).

That's pretty much my felling on it as well, Kuseru Satsujin...Too much fluff and not enough meat.

I, however, disagree with you on the layout. I like the new layout. I do NOT like the way they did the skills were done though! The PCCs are okay. I am not trying to compare it to first edition. But it really boils down to it, I am not afraid to admit that it will be used as a source book to First edition.

But all and all 3 and 1/2 stars out of 5. For the great ideas, plot ideas, the fluff, and realism, also for the Lazlo Society web page, and also for the new PCCs, especially the Autistic Psy.

Mine just came at my FLGS. I'll have to wait until after work to go and pick it up.

so, how do you think one who never even layed eyes on the original BTS will like it?

mine SHOULD get in Tomorrow or Friday, depending on which store gets the order out and back first...

It is well writen! EXSTREMELY!!!

I like it a lot.

It's not perfect, but then again, when the other 2 core rulebooks come out (sound familiar?) It should make quite an awesome game.

Got mine today at my FLGS. I like it, I like it a lot... but what's the deal with changing some of the combat rules?!?!!? That is crazy!

So far love it though.

.....................................Omote
FPQ

Magestaff wrote:Only the Main Book is necessary to run BtS 2 ..correct? If not there is gonna be problems cause the other 2 books may never see completion. Besides I am still waiting for key releases for the Fantasy line.

Not really. While Kevin did point out that his new version of BTS was designed to be played without magic (for instance), the lack of certain other key elements (i.e. weapons and equipment) mean you pretty much have to get another book if you want to do anything in that direction.

It is otherwise great for greating psychic characters and ordinary people, though.

sweet, I don't like palladium magic, I don't use it.

this book sounds better every day.

I am probaly going to waith for both Tome Grotesque and the Arcanum book before I get BTS 2nd Edition. After looking through it I find imo that I cannot use it without at least the Arcanum book. Though I like what they did with the occupations.

I'm gonna pass on this book for now. I gave it a quick thumb through today and wasn't really all that impressed. Now, if I run across somebody else who wants to GM BTS2 and gets me hooked just by playing, then I'll go for it.

My Birthday present to myself was my copy of BtS, and I'm going to read it right before bedtime, and scare myself silly, and have vivid nightmarish dreams, and then use my visions to create new scenarios for my players.
The first section seems interesting so far, a lot of work went into setting the mood.
We'll see how it all comes together.

Just pre-ordered a copy of the Hardback, so hopefully in a few weeks i'll get a chance to post my own reveiw.

Mephisto wrote:

Sentinel wrote:My Birthday present to myself was my copy of BtS, and I'm going to read it right before bedtime, and scare myself silly, and have vivid nightmarish dreams, and then use my visions to create new scenarios for my players.
The first section seems interesting so far, a lot of work went into setting the mood.
We'll see how it all comes together.

That's your birthday present to yourself? Mine involves myself, Serena Williams, Zhang Ziyi, and Kelly Hu doing things that cannot be mentioned on a "family oriented" site such as this.

I'm on a budget. A very small budget.

I really do like the establishment of mood, and the new artwork is also very nice.
I'm not sure how much I like the new layout (Setting first, Character Creation last), but I think that my prejudice comes from the way it's always been done. I have played other games systems that also did things this way, and I didn't complain then, so I'm telling myself to get over it.
I could do without making major rules renovations that are not applied universally (are all skill programs going to use the new terminology? is this how they'll be applied to all characters in the Megaverse?) as it seems to promote confusion, and rules interpretations arguments.
Aside from the removal of magic, and the need to have another book to but in order to take advantage of magic, I like this edition as an improvement over 1st ed. Same as HUII was a step up on Revised HU, and PFRPG 2nd ed was an improvement on 1st (strangely enough, N&SS is the only game that suffered from a revision, not improved).

Unkledak wrote:speaking of reviews can anyone give a run down on the 14 pcc's and the occupations I've heard mentioned.

Pretty much all the original PCCs are present, the psychic healer, psychic sensitive, latent psychic, nega-psychic, Genius/Natural, Parapsychologist, Psi-Mechanic, Ordinary People, etc. Obviously the Arcanist was removed. New PCCs include the Psychic Savant, pretty much like it sounds, the Ghost Hunter, a sort of Men-In-Black supernatural hunter, the Psychic Medium (a personal favorite, since I loved "The Frighteners" with Michael J Fox), the Diviner, a specialist in fortune telling, the Flame Walker, Drew Barrymore's Firestarter come to life, and one other one I can't recall off the top of my head.
All the PCCs are heavily detailed, with lots of useful information and abilities (most of the book is devoted to the PCCs), and, with the exception of the Genius/Natural, all of the old PCCs get an interesting update and upgrade.

The 42 occupations are pretty much just that, occupations. They try to cover the aspect of both skill programs and cover identities and they're closely related to ATB2's apprenticeships. No, I'm not going to bother to list them all, since they're pretty obvious when you see them, covering a bunch of categories of work like military, espionage, police, criminal, scientist, psychic, and blue collar workers.

Sentinel wrote:I really do like the establishment of mood, and the new artwork is also very nice.
I'm not sure how much I like the new layout (Setting first, Character Creation last), but I think that my prejudice comes from the way it's always been done. I have played other games systems that also did things this way, and I didn't complain then, so I'm telling myself to get over it.

I'm sort of the same way myself, but it is a bit more that I would rather have character creation stuff in one place, near the front of the book, and the other rules in the back of the book, for ease of reference, rather than in the middle of the book where you have to flip through a bunch of pages to find it, rather than just flipping to an easily found section of the book.

I could do without making major rules renovations that are not applied universally (are all skill programs going to use the new terminology? is this how they'll be applied to all characters in the Megaverse?) as it seems to promote confusion, and rules interpretations arguments.

Nothing new about that unfortunately.

Aside from the removal of magic, and the need to have another book to but in order to take advantage of magic, I like this edition as an improvement over 1st ed.

I'm afraid I can' t agree. 1st edition was packed with meaty information, and covered more magic, more monsters, more setting information (not too mention the sweet sub-game involving victim rules), more adventures, and actually had weapons/equipment lists in addition to the psychic stuff BTS-2 covers. When you compare them, the new version seems more like a psychic's sourcebook than a true, independent RPG.;

Same as HUII was a step up on Revised HU, and PFRPG 2nd ed was an improvement on 1st (strangely enough, N&SS is the only game that suffered from a revision, not improved).

While I agree that N&S actually suffered from it's revision (BTS-2 just isn't as good as the original, it's not actually worse), I can't say it was improved.

As to the weapons section being removed: at first, this bothered me, but then I remembered my CCW. And it occured to me, that rather than reprint the same set of weapons over and over, from one book to another, using those pages for something else and referring to the CCW was actually an improvement. The CCW was a book I actually enjoyed buying, as it delivered what I wanted(guns, and lots of 'em) and nothing of what I didn't want (which would be anything else).
So, that's a point I'm willing to give up.
If the monster book and the magic book (whatever they end up being called) are good, then perhaps this could start a new trend: a trend where sourcebooks have info useful to players, and meta-plot is nowhere to be found. A catalog of monsters is actually sounding good to me.
The new book does seem a little stilted towards the Psychics, and I really didn't catch that the first going-over.
It may be also that I was always more biased towards Psychic characters in BtS than I was to magic characters, so I didn't objectively see your points at first. To me, magic is so complex, that an entirely separate book seems to be the way to handle it.
The cover is cool: I miss the old Richard Corben cover, but that's me being biased again.

Remember though, the original book was heavily stilted to Psionics with only one magic class as opposed to the 7 or so original P.C.C.'s.



Daniel Stoker

Kuseru Satsujin wrote:

Magestaff wrote:Only the Main Book is necessary to run BtS 2 ..correct? If not there is gonna be problems cause the other 2 books may never see completion. Besides I am still waiting for key releases for the Fantasy line.

Not really. While Kevin did point out that his new version of BTS was designed to be played without magic (for instance), the lack of certain other key elements (i.e. weapons and equipment) mean you pretty much have to get another book if you want to do anything in that direction.

It is otherwise great for greating psychic characters and ordinary people, though.

God I hope he does a serious overhaul of the weapons section. If I see another 1980's re-hash I'll puke on the books and send them back.

I don't imagine the weapons would be far off of HUII, although, I suppose they could be like Nightbane, where some of the damages are not updated.

damages are totally updated, combat is revamped.

no bonuses from modern w.p. handgun or rifle at first level, bonuses to dodge are applicable to gunfire, just -10 at point blank, -5 out to 50 ft, no minuses further away.

aimed shots take 2 attacks, called aimed shots take 3.


he's trying to make guns less lethal compared to everything else, I think that is a good thing overall.


Gives me a better reason to be fond of swords instead of just loading characters down with guns.

Basically it's the latest ruleset from Splicers and late printing Rifts GM Guides.

A good suggestion for weapons is the HU GM's guide, sicne the damages in the CMW are actually quite a bit lower than the suggested damages now.

Sentinel wrote:I like this edition as an improvement over 1st ed. Same as HUII was a step up on Revised HU, and PFRPG 2nd ed was an improvement on 1st (strangely enough, N&SS is the only game that suffered from a revision, not improved).

While I can't comment as yet on BTS2, and I agree that N&SS suffered from its revision, I disagree pretty strongly that HU2 and PFRPG2 were better than their predecessors. HU2 was (IMO) poorly formatted as well as incomplete in some areas, while PFRPG2 radically changed the feel of the setting with its inferior mechanics.

I hope my feelings about BTS2 will more closely mirror those towards ATB, where the new edition, while not a leap above the original, are at least at a parity.

maasenstodt wrote:

Sentinel wrote:I like this edition as an improvement over 1st ed. Same as HUII was a step up on Revised HU, and PFRPG 2nd ed was an improvement on 1st (strangely enough, N&SS is the only game that suffered from a revision, not improved).

While I can't comment as yet on BTS2, and I agree that N&SS suffered from its revision, I disagree pretty strongly that HU2 and PFRPG2 were better than their predecessors. HU2 was (IMO) poorly formatted as well as incomplete in some areas, while PFRPG2 radically changed the feel of the setting with its inferior mechanics.

I preferred HUII to HUR for the addition of the Mega-Hero, and the upgrading of various characters (like Physical Training) and expanded powers. These things I felt were an improvement.
I didn't really notice a change in mechanics so much, and I htroubles with the layout.[ad no color=indigo]PFRPG I liked as it added SDC to the only Palladium game without it (for Characters I mean) and brought the various monsters and animals up to par with the rest of the Megaverse (at least in terms of SDC: obviously not on par with Rifts). I didn't own any other 1st ed. PFRPG book other than the main one, so perhaps that explains my bias. I was not happy about needing a separate book for dragons, but Dragons and Gods proved to be a decent book, so my complaint is mitigated there.[/color]


I hope my feelings about BTS2 will more closely mirror those towards ATB, where the new edition, while not a leap above the original, are at least at a parity.

I had never owned 1st ed ATB, but I do own 2nd ed. I like the book, although I mostly use it as a sourcebook for HUII.

Edge wrote:damages are totally updated, combat is revamped.

no bonuses from modern w.p. handgun or rifle at first level, bonuses to dodge are applicable to gunfire, just -10 at point blank, -5 out to 50 ft, no minuses further away.

Actually, you do get a +1 at level 1 for W.P. Rifle. It's handguns and flamethrowers that don't offer a 1st level bonus.

aimed shots take 2 attacks, called aimed shots take 3.

Actually, it's more complex than that.
Single Shot takes 1 attack
Aimed Shots take 2 attacks
Called Shots take 2 attacks
Aimed Called Shots take 3 attacks

he's trying to make guns less lethal compared to everything else, I think that is a good thing overall.

I don't think I can agree. Now there's no really point in using an Aimed Shot, since it only provides a measely +2 bonus, whereas any competent gunsmith or high-level character can snap off Single Shots with a higher accuracy. Pretty much the same for making Aimed Called Shots cost 3 attacks.
Now just making "Aimed" Called Shots cost 2 attacks, and allowing characters without a W.P. to make Single Shots would be nice and usuable.

Gives me a better reason to be fond of swords instead of just loading characters down with guns.

Style. The fact of the matter is, guns are still a lot more capable than swords for contemporary combat.

Kuseru Satsujin wrote:

Edge wrote:Gives me a better reason to be fond of swords instead of just loading characters down with guns.

Style. The fact of the matter is, guns are still a lot more capable than swords for contemporary combat.

Note: A Natural Athlete, with SN P.S. and bonuses to Melee Combat, wielding a sword, is an EXCELLENT monster slayer, without the nasty noise problem, swords can be concealed in coats, or as walking sticks pretty well.

Style, Silent, and more Accurate.


I do like the changes to guns though.


Play through Metal Gear Solid 3 some time, once you really get the hang of it, you can look at a target and snap the gun up to fire an accurate shot...

but until then, it's bring up the gun, look where you want to hit, fire a shot off...and if the guy has a shield, it's look, focus and aim a bit for his head/eye slot/knees, then shoot.


really works well considering most people don't have really good skill with guns, and even if you spend alot of time at a shooting range it still isn't like shooting at a moving target, in poorly lit room, with cover for both of you, under stress.


and yes, proximity=power rocks.

I just got My BtS2!

It is Fantastic!

Thers 5 all New P.C.C,s Autistic psychic savant,Diviner,Fire walker,Psychic medium and Ghost hunter.

Ther was only 16 Monsters, the Others will be in Tome of the Grotesque.

Arcanum will cover magic.

I hope ther will be two more sourcebook on Organizations,Weapons and devices.

The other will have Adventure ideas.

Unkledak wrote:Got mine on Friday, however being that’s it's a palladium book I'll doubt its existence for at least another two weeks.

Beyond that though I love almost everything about it. The down sides are the Ghost hunter, sorry guys the character doesn't fit. The other character classes are well balanced to the setting. The idea of all the others show a bit of randomness that sets each as being just a little apart from each one. So two Naturals are different, the same for almost every other Class. (The Medium is exempt from this the sameness seems to work for them IMO). The idea of a character that everyone who takes it, all learns to make the same items is a little silly. I would have gone with the ability to make a big list of psychically powered weapons and defensive items. That way each character of the same class would feel different from the same one played by someone else.

My other big *****, is why no equipment? What 10- 12 more pages would have broke the bank? To me it's not that big a thing, I own every Palladium Book ever made but three. But if this was the first Palladium Book I ever bought I would be E-mailing Kevin Siembieda Pictures of my ass for the next six months.

Wait a second I just notice that other one little paragraph about ley lines there’s nothing in this book about 'em at all. Were the hell did I put my digital camera.

Ladies and gentlemen, a perfect example of why Kevin will never give out an e-mail address.

Sir, you are rude, crude, and... well, not nice.



Alex M

See, I agree on the Ghost Hunter.

I would like that class ALOT more if they could pick two or three devices that they can make at 1st level...

so I could get like, two of those guns, and the chest piece, and then later a sword, maybe the goggles...

instead I have this character where I have to try and figure out somewhere to put this stuff, the shotgun isn't even that well described, I mean, does it fire regular rounds PLUS the fire blast, or is it just the fire blast, which really sucks then...and how many rounds can it fire?

I don't like shotguns, why do I have to get one now?

I know I can not get one...but it says I can start with it, so I almost feel compelled to just have it...

I would like it if every character didn't feel like a bad Blade Rip-off...

even if it was just a little more Dante from Devil May Cry...


as it is I've yet to make it through character creation of a ghost hunter...

but I did just discover that Mediums are very cool.