Recruited to GM

[dante144]

So I have been recruited to GM a first time group of Rifts players.

I have actually not run or played Rifts in about 15-16 years! So...

What advice do you have? They are young gamers, freshman or sophomores in college. They are mostly computer/console gamers but they started playing the latest edition of D&D.

Please give me advice...and maybe a quick overview on how to play? It has been 16 years!

[MaxxSterling]

Keep it simple to start. Choose like 1-2 books aside from the main book. Or maybe even just the main book. Run a vanilla oh no, big bad coalition type of campaign. Depending on what they decide to play. Then, as soon as you see even 1 of them lose intrest for 1 second. Have a Rift open and send them somewhere completely off-base like Phase world. That'll make them realize D&D is like bangin' a 300 lb. girl named melva who makes fun of you to your friends and that RIFTS is like bangin' a supermodel. Man I hate D&D... Good luck, use the boards for inspiration, but I'd ignore like 99% of the posts, because almost everyone on here is a complete troll and imbecile. Myself included.

[dante144]

Keep it simple to start. Choose like 1-2 books aside from the main book. Or maybe even just the main book. Run a vanilla oh no, big bad coalition type of campaign. Depending on what they decide to play. Then, as soon as you see even 1 of them lose intrest for 1 second. Have a Rift open and send them somewhere completely off-base like Phase world. That'll make them realize D&D is like bangin' a 300 lb. girl named melva who makes fun of you to your friends and that RIFTS is like bangin' a supermodel. Man I hate D&D... Good luck, use the boards for inspiration, but I'd ignore like 99% of the posts, because almost everyone on here is a complete troll and imbecile. Myself included.

Robotech FTW

[Jorel]

Why would Robotech F the World?

[dragonfett]

FTW = For The Win.

[Jorel]

Damn imbeciles.

[dragonfett]

Who are you referring to, Jorel?

[Jorel]

I guess myself.

[Colt47]

If you are willing to go through with doing the work of making encounters and making sure the challenges don't out right kill the party, then you are probably set for starting up a game. First off, figure out what part of the world you want to do the adventure in and don't start tossing people through rifts like they're an inter dimensional Caesar salad, as it will muddle the game down and make it a lot less interesting. Second, talk with the players and figure out what kind of group they want to run with. Generally, there are two kinds of groups in Rifts: Adventuring groups and Mercenary groups. The Adventuring group is more focused on utilitarian roles and can handle a large variety of situations, but isn't so much into combat. The Mercenary group is focused more on beat em ups and dealing with threats head on, which is more like what most people coming from Dungeons and Dragons 4th edition are used to. After you've gotten those tidbits down, work on the adventure itself.

Beyond that, my advice is keep in simple.

That'll make them realize D&D is like bangin' a 300 lb. girl named melva who makes fun of you to your friends and that RIFTS is like bangin' a supermodel. Man I hate D&D...

So you like Pathfinder instead?

[Colt47]

What console games do they like to play? One of the nice things about Rifts is the "kitchen sink" mentality of the world design.

I can run games that feel like everything from Final Fantasy (any of them) to Doom, to Halo, to Starcraft, to Warcraft, to Red Dead Redemption, to...well ANYTHING!

If there is a feel that you think your group would like tell us. Then we can point you in the right direction...or give you ideas of how to "file the serial numbers off" and run their favorite game as a role-playing game.

WildWalker

Rifts is chock full of good ideas. It's just a shame that the system itself is showing its age. This isn't really a contest: if I had to pick which game has the better gameplay system it would be D&D 4th ed. If I had to say which game actually has a SOUL it would be Rifts.

[Danger]

If I had to pick which game has the better gameplay system it would be D&D 4th ed.

[Colt47]

If I had to pick which game has the better gameplay system it would be D&D 4th ed.

If you want me to elaborate I can do so in a PM. And keep in mind the rest of the content in the post being quoted.

[Killer Cyborg]

Rifts is chock full of good ideas. It's just a shame that the system itself is showing its age. This isn't really a contest: if I had to pick which game has the better gameplay system it would be D&D 4th ed. If I had to say which game actually has a SOUL it would be Rifts.

Agreed.
4th Edition has a much, much tighter system where the rules are all designed to work together, and to cover everything the game is supposed to do.
Shame it SUCKS so much.

[Killer Cyborg]

So I have been recruited to GM a first time group of Rifts players.

I have actually not run or played Rifts in about 15-16 years! So...

What advice do you have? They are young gamers, freshman or sophomores in college. They are mostly computer/console gamers but they started playing the latest edition of D&D.

Please give me advice...and maybe a quick overview on how to play? It has been 16 years!

Might try having them roll up PFRPG characters, run them through a dungeon there that rifts them over to Rifts Earth.
They don't have to know anything about the setting that way, because their characters don't.

Don't be afraid to low-ball encounters. Better too easy than a TPK, at least early on, until you get a better gauge of the party's capabilities and they get a better grasp of enemy capabilities.

One of the big differences between D&D (and computer games) and Rifts is that armor is indestructible (effectively) in D&D, and healing is easily available if you get wounded.
In Rifts, your armor is your life, and it's not too easy to repair in most cases. Sometimes there's a hundred miles or more between you and the nearest repair shop capable of dealing with armor.
This leads to a big difference in game play; D&Ders typically rush right in and start slashing, because the game isn't designed for you really care about getting hit. You expect to get stabbed a half-dozen times in every battle, and heal up afterward.
In Rifts, your armor can't be fixed with a quick spell and a healing potion, and/or a night's rest. When it gets damaged, it stays damaged until the party spends the money, time, and effort to get it repaired.
If they go in playing Rifts like D&D, and you don't lowball things at them and/or give them some access to repairs, they could die from a series of easy encounters.
"10 MDC gone? Just a scratch!"-type thinking can get you killed in just few encounters, as the small amounts of damage start stacking up to destroy your armor (and therefore your life).

Another big difference is the experience tables. They'll be used to getting xp for hacking and slashing instead of for roleplaying. You should design adventures so that they have a specific opportunity to gain XP for each one of the things listed in the XP tables: Avoiding Combat, Daring, Quick Thinking, etc. etc.
After the adventure, you can tell them how they could have gotten more XP by doing those things:
"You got 25 xp for killing the guard, but since he was napping you could have sneaked by him pretty easily, and gotten 100 xp for Avoiding Unnecessary Violence."

[Zer0 Kay]

I suggest something like KC... but, if they've become attached to their D&D characters, instead of rolling up new PFRPG characters you go through and convert their D&D characters to PFRPG. This will already give them attachement to the game put you through one of the hardest tasks, establishing your judgement, before the games starts so everything should be easier in comparison. This may backfire especially if they read ahead on their characters and were looking foward to getting some feats. Since PFRPG has no ability reward as you advance except more HP, higher skills and some bonuses to HtH or WP. They'll have to learn that the game play and role playing are supposed to be their own reward and I've seen many D&D players not enjoy some of the classic RPGs because they aren't rewarded. The new D&Ds 3.x+ have turned a RPG into a paper version of Diablo, where the game is played to advance not to interact.

[dante144]

I love you guys. Please keep it coming. Do you guys use maps at all? Like building floor plans?

[Colt47]

I love you guys. Please keep it coming. Do you guys use maps at all? Like building floor plans?

Well you can either run it with maps or you can run it on a pure text basis. Not really sure there is much more to tell you on that one and you probably already know this. If you have maps, tokens, and miniatures, they help immensely regardless of what game is being played. Heck, even when playing 3 galaxies we still have figures to represent the rough positions of ships in comparison to each other. If you decide to run it pure text be sure to explain very clearly what is happening and be prepared to do a lot of recapping if the players happen to miss something during encounters that is supposed to be obvious.

[cornholioprime]

So I have been recruited to GM a first time group of Rifts players.

I have actually not run or played Rifts in about 15-16 years! So...

What advice do you have? They are young gamers, freshman or sophomores in college. They are mostly computer/console gamers but they started playing the latest edition of D&D.

Please give me advice...and maybe a quick overview on how to play? It has been 16 years!

Hire either Killer Cyborg or Nekira Sudacne at 50 Gold per Gaming Session.

[Killer Cyborg]

Hire either Killer Cyborg or Nekira Sudacne at 50 Gold per Gaming Session.

I'm Killer Cyborg, and I support this message.

[Killer Cyborg]

I love you guys. Please keep it coming. Do you guys use maps at all? Like building floor plans?

Sometimes.
It's often handy to keep a generic stack of building and cave maps on hand, in case you need quick inspiration when your players go somewhere unexpected, and I usually have a map of major dungeons/fortresses/locations, and a map of the general terrain/wilderness/landscape/whatever.

A lot of the time, though, I just wing it, especially if the dungeon is large and fairly unpopulated. Every dungeoncrawl nets out about the same: "keep searching until you find a new encounter, defeat it, then look some more," and the details can cause things to drag at times. It's often faster, easier, and more fun to just sum up a lot of the exploration with "you wander through the twisting tunnels for a couple of hours, sometimes taking false turns and ending up back where you'd already been, sometimes hitting dead ends and turning around. Eventually, you come to a large cavern where you see...."

At other times, the details can make things awesome, though. It depends on the kind of adventure you're in. With the right group and GM, you could have a pretty decent spelunking adventure with few or zero encounters.

[Killer Cyborg]

The problem we always encountered when making PFRPG or TMNT characters and rifting them into Rifts is that it would only work for a few game sessions-- then invariably, the players would want to make up new characters, using the Rifts classes insetad, and start the campaign over. Once you find out your primitive PFRPG char can't learn to pilot a SAMAS or Glitterboy, you want to re-roll and make a cooler Rifts character who CAN pilot PA, or use TW items, or whatever other cool things Rifts characters can do! I'll admit, we dropped out of at least two Rifts games and went back to our usual D&D DM for a few months because the Rifts GMs didn't want to start over and let us make actual Rifts Characters-- to get us to play Rifts with him again, one of them had to offer to let us all play hatchling dragons, which was fun for us, but he hated it, and eventually relented and let us make more standard Rifts characters. I say skip this whole process, and make up characters from the Rifts gamebooks to start off with.

I never had that problem. If somebody wants their character to pilot power armor, they can always change OCCs.
I say, why have a Juicer when you can have a Mutant Weasel Juicer?
A lot of the fun in the game can come from mixing and matching. One of my favorite (and most deadly) characters is a mutant bat longbowman from PFRPG who ended up on Rifts Earth.
Since magic weapons inflict MD in Rifts, it's easy to get PFRPG characters to convert pretty easily if they have some decent gear.
Heck, there's PFRPG magic armor that regenerates and can have a couple hundred MDC! That beats out most stuff in Rifts. Leather of Iron can have up to 300 MDC. If you're into sheer firepower.

In any case, there's no real problem with people rolling up new characters once they have a better feel for Rifts anyway.
But I prefer to start Rifts players off low-powered, because otherwise they get too spoiled too quickly, and can turn into the "That weapon can only shoot through three school busses? That's too weak to be useful. That weapon sucks!" type snobs who don't grok the sheer power of any and every mega-damage weapon.
Everybody should have an appreciation for all the stuff in the game, not just the stuff at the higher-end.

The problem we always encountered when trying to Rift our D&D characters over to Rifts Earth for a Rifts game is the sheer nightmare of converting a well-played and well-loved D&D character into the Palladium system. It is a head-ache and a nightmare no matter how you slice it. The main problem is NOT converting the characters skills and abilities (keep in mind that this is even harder to do for a 3rd or 4th ed D&D char than a 2nd Ed char who won't have Feats-- hardly any of which have mechanics in Rifts to simply convert over) but their spells and their GEAR. Magic gear works completely differently in Palladium than it does in D&D, and the majority of magic items our D&D chars had were either impossible to convert, or had to be changed so much that they were not the same item/weapon/armor at all-- and usually the players constantly whined that it didn't work as well as it did in the D&D campaign. Or that their mage or priest could no longer make healing potions or spell scrolls or wands/rings/etc for the group to use-thus making their chosen class crippled and one-dimensional compared to the fighters or rogues.

Then don't convert them any more than necessary.
Let them keep their original powers, abilities and gear. Most of it ports over to Rifts just fine as far as I can tell. They're from another dimension, so if they have funky powers and gear that's different from the norm, that's cool.

CB1, 32
Game masters may wish to include player characters with a different magic occupational character class, spells and abilities, but not mix the different powers, spells, knowledges and abilities with Rifts or other Palladium magic and powers. This would be an example of a D-bee magic not understood nor available to the denizens of the Rifts world- something rare and alien.

I've run D&D modules pretty much as-is for Rifts adventures. Some creatures were powerful, some weren't, but it washed out about the same.

We can't discuss actual system conversions here, so I can't go into more detail (ironically) about how to use non-Palladium characters in Rifts without converting them, but if anybody has questions about it, send me a PM.

[Killer Cyborg]

(The Wilks Laser "Wand"/Pistol for the Magic-user also helped make him a happy camper)

WildWalker

Yeah, jeez!
I'd be surprised to find a D&D mage who complained a lot about suddenly being able to wear armor and carry a gun.

[Killer Cyborg]

(The Wilks Laser "Wand"/Pistol for the Magic-user also helped make him a happy camper)

WildWalker

Yeah, jeez!
I'd be surprised to find a D&D mage who complained a lot about suddenly being able to wear armor and carry a gun.

You're kidding right, KC? I would never consider trading high level spells like Timestop or Horrid Wilting or Wail of the Banshee for a wimpy laser gun and Line Walker armor to be a fair trade.

Who said anything about "Trade?"


In Rifts, mages can use armor, guns, AND spells.

Edit:
Ah, okay... I think I get it.
You were talking about the downside of changing a D&D mage into a Rifts-style magic OCC. Like turning a Magic-User into a Line Walker.
At low levels, it'd be worth it. At high levels, not so much.
But you should notice that my suggestion was to let them keep their original class/spells/gear/whatever.
And either way, it's not the presence of guns and armor that'd be the issue, it's the different spells in the different games.

[dragonfett]

4th Edition D&D did away with Clerical Domain powers. They also did away with Prestige Classes and replaced them Paragon Paths and Epic Destinies (I think is what they were called). Basically all they are are templates that are added to the original class. They sounded pretty cool to me at first, but now I am not a big fan of them.

Not to mention, WotC initially made multi-classing impossible. All you could do was take a feat that allowed you to mimic the abilities of another class, usually once per battle or once per day, and get trained in an additional skill, and be eligible to take a paragon path for paths that require that class. I know that they have updated the system since then, I am just not sure what they did to it.

[MaxxSterling]

Hahaha, Pathfinder... Yeah, I got it like 10 days later... And thanks Cain. I always liked Palladium, but no matter how many times I play or run it, it always seems like we hit a wall. And it's really hard to transport large sums of wealth, like say if you kill a dragon and get it's hoard.

And yes, use floor plans if it suits you. I had a game we were playing and a few guys wanted to play shadowrun. (I happen to F'n love 2nd edition shadowrun just about as much as RIFTS), anyhow, rather than play shadowrun, I just dumped them on a shadowrun/cyberpunkish dimension/world and had them make a few contacts, and guess what, they were shadowrunning in RIFTS in no time. Once they got that out of their systems, I tossed their butts in a PFRPG setting, talk about a mind****. Good times. Also, GURPS suck. Just putting that in here for no reason.

[Bood Samel]

I think the material in madhaven would make for a great intro to rifts adventure. Its captures the vibe and atmosphere well.

[dante144]

Not so much worried about the D&D connection. One of them asked me if the play in terms of WOW. "Do we need a tank?" As in HP frontline unit to absorb most of the damage. Something like that. But as Gm I think I could disassemble any formulas like that and encourage them thinking more on their feet. Or what ever if they like it and they are having fun.

Do you guys know of any resources for character generators and monster/enemy generators? Have any rolled up characters sheets you want to email me? It is our first session and I was thinking about just rolling up characters for them (as I have all the source books and they have none). so you guys have any shareable character sheets? Nothing extravagant. Maybe the basic icons on the rifts universe?

[MaxxSterling]

And if they are thinking of the game in terms of WoW, then they are going to get their minds blown!!! WoW friggin' sucks. They are going to die when you tell them they don't have to collect 45 of something, then farm for 100 hours to make an item.

[dante144]

I agree with you, Maxx. Their minds are going to EXPLODE!

I was thinking about using premade characters because we are just starting out, including me and we want tot get the rough mechanics down. I know from playing years ago that making beloved characters is half the fun. These guys are trying out a new system and We have about 4 hours or so to play.

I was thinking after the first adventure we could roll up characters (since all the source books will be there) that night, and they would be more familiarized with the system.

[LostOne]

What advice do you have? They are young gamers, freshman or sophomores in college. They are mostly computer/console gamers but they started playing the latest edition of D&D.

How long have they been playing D&D? Do they have any other pen and paper RPG experience? Because in my experience people who have never played P&P RPGs and do a lot of console gaming (especially first person shooters) tend to get bored with P&P pretty quick. YMMV, of course, but I'd have a lot of surprises ready to whip out when they seem to be losing interest.

Try the vanilla game, encourage roleplaying, but be ready to cater to them like they suffer from attention deficit disorder (or whatever they're calling it now) until they get into it.

[dante144]

Seriously. I need some NPC/ premade character sheets for tonight or I am fail. Please help me. Looking for any Adventure & Scholars and Coalition OCCS (the grunts and such).

Please help? One character from each of you would be great. Or if you have an archive of old characters (preferably lvl 1-5 but beggars can't be choosers)

please help

you can email me at dantedreams.com@gmail.com

[dragonfett]

I just sent you an e-mail with my quick reference combat stats for CS Grunts.

[LostOne]

Do you really need fully statted NPCs? I always just winged it. If it's a Coalition Commando I know he should have skills like prowl, demolitions, etc. He will have decent stats and combat bonuses. If it's a rogue scientist he'll likely have lesser physical attributes but good science skills and mediocre combat skills, etc. I tend to wing it to the stereotypes, that Rogue Scholar isn't also awesome in adventures because he isn't Indiana Jones. If I want to throw the group for a loop then I'll toss in someone exceptional but I'll take the time in advance to roll him up as a character I'd want to play. But throw away NPCs, why waste the time statting them out when you should have a pretty good idea what they would be capable of given what role you need them to serve in the game.

The stats don't need to be exact. The players will never know the difference unless you tell them. You'll never have a player complaining "why does that guy have a +5 to strike, all commandos should have +4 at this level" or "how did he get a 17 PP? That is insane for a rogue scientist" unless he's a rule lawyer you need to be getting rid of anyway. NPC stats should be transparent to the players, they don't know them.

[dante144]

Do you guys know of any resources for character generators and monster/enemy generators?

Unfortunately, they do not exist. We've been badgering PB to make and release one for probably 15 years at least, but it will never happen. They kaboshed both fans who were making their own free ones (even the guy who tried to make one to give to THEM for free, to sell during the CoT). I don't know if there are any others attempted since then. Boy would it be easier to GM if there was such a tool for making npcs up quickly... Alas.

Have any rolled up characters sheets you want to email me? It is our first session and I was thinking about just rolling up characters for them (as I have all the source books and they have none). so you guys have any shareable character sheets? Nothing extravagant. Maybe the basic icons on the rifts universe?

That, we can probably help you with. What level of characters are you wanting? And you want PCs, or NPCs, or both?

Thanks everyone! If you have anything to help me with that would be great. I have a couple of Bosses I am working on, but I could uses level 1-5 of anything you have. Possibly as NPCs or possibly as prerolled characters. This is their first RIFTs run and the first time for me in 15 years or so, and I only did it a couple of times before.

Thanks again, guys!(esp Dragonfett)

[dragonfett]

I also have rolled up characters for a Juicer, Minotaur Warlock, Elven Ley Line Walker, Bearman of the North Headhunter, Full Combat Borg, a Quick Flex Alien Gunslinger, a super-powered Vagabond (using the optional rules for Vagabonds and other Scholars & Rogues in Conversion Book 1), and a Simvan Monster Rider. Are you interested in any of these.

[dante144]

I also have rolled up characters for a Juicer, Minotaur Warlock, Elven Ley Line Walker, Bearman of the North Headhunter, Full Combat Borg, a Quick Flex Alien Gunslinger, a super-powered Vagabond (using the optional rules for Vagabonds and other Scholars & Rogues in Conversion Book 1), and a Simvan Monster Rider. Are you interested in any of these.

Yes very interested! I may let them use them as characters...maybe.

[dante144]

I definitely want the vagabond. For my PCs, does anyone have a Rogue scholar or scientist and Wilderness scout?


Also as an NPC does anyone have a Cyberknight(index book index should help with this. I know I have seen one in one of my books, right?) or Glitterboy?

[dragonfett]

Only Wilderness Scout that I have is a Psi-Stalker Wilderness Scout that I was playing around with (I never actually played him in a game, I only wanted to roll it up because I was bored and it seemed like they would make excellent Wilderness Scouts). I also sent a Wolfen Cyber-Knight with that last e-mail I sent to you (didn't realized it until afterwards, but it all worked out in the end).

[dante144]

It is going on now.

In the middle of a food break.

They are having a good time! Thanks for everything, guys!

[dragonfett]

Let me know how those characters worked out for you.

[dante144]

It went great! I think I have hooked them into RIFTS! next session in two weeks.

We only went through 1/3 of what I had planned.

We ended taking some time to make characters. The session went on long too. We planned on starting at 7pm we ended at 3am. I didn't get to use the characters yet, but I will probably use them as NPCs next round. Thanks for all the help and encouragement

[dante144]

Anyone have a powerful mage NPC I can use? (is asking for this and similar a faux pas?) More than one, even?

[dante144]

Frogboy, please do.. or email me at " dantedreams.com @ gmail.com "

Thanks!

[dante144]

Question: What does your NPC villain sheet look like?

[dante144]

We are documenting this campaign. Shall I post it here or is there another forum to document campaign?

Also we spent NYE doing a marathon Rifts session. I think they are loving it.

[dante144]

My guys are buying the books! RUEs are popping up at our session!

A couple of my guys also are getting/got the grab bags.

[dante144]

So. I think the boys are enjoying the campaign:

http://twitpic.com/3o9q0k

At least one more on the way, hopefully with his grabbag.

[dante144]

If you guys have contributed some NPCs or PC sheets I may have used them. If I did you can read how they were used in this log:

http://forums.palladium-megaverse.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=119702

Most likely I changed their alignment to evil (sorry).