Palladium Fantasy 2.5e: The Economic Case

[misomiso82]

Historically the best selling products of any RPG line have been the Core rulebooks, and so if Palladium wants to make a product that can sell well they should do another edition of Palladium Fantasy.

At the moment on the coming soon site they have some great Palladium Fantasy products, but it's unlikely that any of these will sell beyond the main fanbase.

On the other hand if they did a 2.5 edition the existing fanbase would buy it, AND they could appeal to other fans in the RPG community as there is a lot of dissatisfaction with the big behemoth in the room at the moment....

Plus a 2.5 edition would be an opportunity to present the game anew, reorder the rulebook, finally have a proper character creation section, clarify some of the rules that would have the benedit of almost 30 years of play, put in a few balance changes and who knows, maybe some additional world information and/or classes and races...?

What do people think? Is this a good idea? Is this a viable strategy for Palladium?

[kiralon]

I like the idea, and if there was clarification on rules i would definately buy it as a helpful addon, but I have had to put in so many houserules i would just cherry pick the rules i liked out of the new books (I still play 1st ed-ish)

But isn't going to happen, there is too much material scattered randomly across the books to make this an easy job.

[Mogge]

I would buy that book in an instant!!
As someone who are rather new to Palladium Fantasy there where some rules that confused me quite a lot. Luckely this forum is full of great people that takes time to help and clarify.
I would have loved that ranged combat was explained in the combat section with an example much like melee combat is. Maybe also what happens if someone is at melee range with someone equipped with a bow (are there any negative penalties for ranged attack?) etc etc.
The world is simply put AMAZING so really a 2.5 Edition would be their wisest action I would think.

[misomiso82]

I like the idea, and if there was clarification on rules i would definately buy it as a helpful addon, but I have had to put in so many houserules i would just cherry pick the rules i liked out of the new books (I still play 1st ed-ish)

But isn't going to happen, there is too much material scattered randomly across the books to make this an easy job.

What are you house rules please? Do you have a document?

[GoliathReturns]

1) historically, Palladium release schedule has been problematic. Especially when it comes to PF. Past couple of years seem to be better, BUT, to really catch the wave of disappointment with "that other game", pretty much everything else would need to be put on hold, and a 10,000% focus to get this out in a rush.
2) getting this out in a rush would likely mean a lot of the problems that it's meant to fix
3) a lot of us greybeards (ok, it's getting to be more white than grey, but you get the point) are seeing a trend repeat from the 90s/early 00s plethora of games.

In the 90s, we saw a rise of TTPRGs. If there was a fanbase, there was a game for it. During the early 2000s is when this really peaked (with the d20 ogl). Seriously, there was a game for EVERYTHING.

Every conceivable fan base had an RPG to target them. Anime, the supernatural, fantasy, SW, ST, B5, generic sci-fi, superheroes, absolutely anything and everything.

And that's starting to happen again, ESPECIALLY in the Fantasy side of things.

I'm not saying they shouldn't do a 2.5. On the contrary, I absolutely think they should (the anniversary would have been perfect timing, but too late now). But not as a rush to try to catch the wave. It should be a slow, methodical process. Gather all the various skills, and clean them up (like the two different versions of the history skill!). Go through with a fine tooth comb, and find all the conflicts of rules. Go through the FAQ, and find every PF question, and clarify it in the rules. And then, BAM, a bright shiny 2.5.


--
GS
"Just my two coppers"

[kiralon]

I like the idea, and if there was clarification on rules i would definately buy it as a helpful addon, but I have had to put in so many houserules i would just cherry pick the rules i liked out of the new books (I still play 1st ed-ish)

But isn't going to happen, there is too much material scattered randomly across the books to make this an easy job.

What are you house rules please? Do you have a document?

I do indeed, if you pm me an email address ill send em to ya.

also a proviso to buying it, it costs about $80 for me to to get anything shipped from america via palladium books (not including the price of the books), so i will often find it on ebay where the shipping costs can be halved.

[Veknironth]

Well first, welcome to the boards miso, took you long enough.

I don't know how profitable it would be but I do know I'd welcome it with open arms. I'd like to see 1st edition with 2nd edition magic and psionics. Since the game is in a low tech setting, the individual hand to hand skills are more important than a game in which your character is inside a robot. Goodbye SDC as well, if you want PCs to have extra HP, give them extra HP. Don't make another stat that works the same as HP. Make weapons more interesting. Don't just make the Battle.Axe obviously the best weapon. Make.more weapons do damage based in a d4, d8,or even the lowly d12. The compendium of weapons and armor is a tremendous book with all of the weapons on a d6 scale and none of the weapons have the damage listed in the description!

The spells and powers need complete rewrites. This forum is full of questions about how spells and powers work based on the vague descriptions in the book. They all are written with an idea in mind but aren't clear when you try to use that power in some other way. A book of spells/powers or something similar could cut down on a lot of confusion. They could just take 5 of us from this forum and turn us loose on the books. I, for one, would do it for free.

The book could use some real reorganization and editing. Remove all of the copy/paste errors that are replicated through books like a virus. Clear up inconsistent writing that seems to contradict itself within a single paragraph or two. Don't have descriptions of combat or abilities in several places.

And I know KS is leery of online sales because of broke ass role players preferring to steal the IP of the company rather than support it. But that's already happening. Come into the future. Do something like DnD Beyond that allows for people with laptops and tablets to.track their characters and such. Create content that is maybe only available online. Save on the printing costs. Move into the digital space with tools for VTT and pre-made adventures. Make it easier to play the game.

-Vek
"I see you Josh, trying to steal my gimmick."

[GoliathReturns]

The spells and powers need complete rewrites. This forum is full of questions about how spells and powers work based on the vague descriptions in the book. They all are written with an idea in mind but aren't clear when you try to use that power in some other way. A book of spells/powers or something similar could cut down on a lot of confusion. They could just take 5 of us from this forum and turn us loose on the books. I, for one, would do it for free.

The book could use some real reorganization and editing. Remove all of the copy/paste errors that are replicated through books like a virus. Clear up inconsistent writing that seems to contradict itself within a single paragraph or two. Don't have descriptions of combat or abilities in several places.

-Vek
"I see you Josh, trying to steal my gimmick."

A bunch of us would be willing to donate time and do it for free. But it would be a HUGE in depth working. I mean, you could break people into small groups for their "passion field". I, for one, would LOVE a rewrite of diabolists & summoners, wards and circles. (I've got a houserule versions I've actually been working on).

But yeah, have someone dig through the FAQ and the forums, and get all (well, most) of the questions, so it can all be clarified, would be a front-load task.

--
GS
"Gimmicky quote, because imitation is the sincerest form of flattery"

[misomiso82]

The difficulty is that as well as clarification by working through the forums I think there would to be some rules changes as well.

Forget for a second the megaversal system itself, but balance wise addressing Humans being underpowered, buffing men at arms, codifying battle axes and other weapons, and maybe even adding in some additional Hand to Hand skills would be necessary, and to do that you need a project lead to sign off on it.

I don't think a REVISION of Palladium Fantasy would be that big of a project, but it's the vision and the design goals that would be contentious.

[GoliathReturns]

Forget for a second the megaversal system itself, but balance wise addressing Humans being underpowered, buffing men at arms, codifying battle axes and other weapons, and maybe even adding in some additional Hand to Hand skills would be necessary, and to do that you need a project lead to sign off on it.

These are more of a "at our game" issue. Especially since "balance" is not much of a thing in any of the PB settings.

Because really, if your humans are underpowered, it's how you're playing the world. For me, for example, I do let players know, ahead of time, the racism that exists. While humans, elves, dwarves, and to a lesser extent gnomes, don't deal with it a LOT, humans barely deal with it at all. Maybe some "oh, you're from those southern lands? I'm impressed you've mastered speech! And you're literate?! Good for you!", but, if you're a wolfen in the ET, "who let you off your chain, slave? How dare you think you can do business in my shop!"

That alone does a lot to balance humans.

Buffing Men-At-Arms? Why?? They don't need it. Especially with physical skills. Between weapons and physical skills, a fighter type vs most monsters, the skills already tip in favor of the fighter.

Weapons are codified. Especially if the clean up the compendiums and make the set for 2e. Then there's even more.

The HtH available are more than enough. They cover "I know the basics" "I'm a skilled warrior" "I'm a man who kills you before you know I'm there" and "I'm a skilled fighter, but it's all about the pizzazz". This isn't rifts, where every fourth class has its own HtH. If that's what you want at your table, great. Grab Rifts or N&SS, and port stuff over. But we don't need it built in to PF.

--
GS
Remember the KISS method. Rock and roll all night, and dungeon party every day.

[kiralon]

I play that the speciality of humans is their adaptability. When you roll up their stats you can place them where you like, whereas the other races have to leave them where they lay but can 2 down one up stats. So if you really want to play a particular class, play a human as this gives you the best chance at getting the stats you need.

[GoliathReturns]

I play that the speciality of humans is their adaptability. When you roll up their stats you can place them where you like, whereas the other races have to leave them where they lay but can 2 down one up stats. So if you really want to play a particular class, play a human as this gives you the best chance at getting the stats you need.

I do something similar. Depending on the campaign I'm running, I usually handle humans one of three ways
1) roll all the stats, then place how you want (usually with reroll all 1s)
2) dice pool. Roll 32d6, drop the lowest 8, and then place the rest in sets of 3, however desired
3) humans get a 1d6 bonus points, to split among their stats as they want.

--
GS
Adaptability. That and the willingness to seduce any other humanoid species. That's the only reasons humans are so common

[misomiso82]

Forget for a second the megaversal system itself, but balance wise addressing Humans being underpowered, buffing men at arms, codifying battle axes and other weapons, and maybe even adding in some additional Hand to Hand skills would be necessary, and to do that you need a project lead to sign off on it.

These are more of a "at our game" issue. Especially since "balance" is not much of a thing in any of the PB settings.

Because really, if your humans are underpowered, it's how you're playing the world. For me, for example, I do let players know, ahead of time, the racism that exists. While humans, elves, dwarves, and to a lesser extent gnomes, don't deal with it a LOT, humans barely deal with it at all. Maybe some "oh, you're from those southern lands? I'm impressed you've mastered speech! And you're literate?! Good for you!", but, if you're a wolfen in the ET, "who let you off your chain, slave? How dare you think you can do business in my shop!"

That alone does a lot to balance humans.

Buffing Men-At-Arms? Why?? They don't need it. Especially with physical skills. Between weapons and physical skills, a fighter type vs most monsters, the skills already tip in favor of the fighter.

Weapons are codified. Especially if the clean up the compendiums and make the set for 2e. Then there's even more.

The HtH available are more than enough. They cover "I know the basics" "I'm a skilled warrior" "I'm a man who kills you before you know I'm there" and "I'm a skilled fighter, but it's all about the pizzazz". This isn't rifts, where every fourth class has its own HtH. If that's what you want at your table, great. Grab Rifts or N&SS, and port stuff over. But we don't need it built in to PF.

--
GS
Remember the KISS method. Rock and roll all night, and dungeon party every day.

Generally speaking for the majority of the gaming public having Social disadvantages for playing a race doesn't really work - you need to have tangible mechanical aspects in the game that players can latch on to. I'm not saying that it won't work at some tables, but at MOST tables the nitty gritty mechanic rules really matter and a not all games will even play with Social issues as a thing.

I don't think humans need a lot by any means, but they need SOMETHING- some kind of SDC bonus, maybe a few extra OCC and Secondary Skills, and an attribtue boost or two to attributes of choice.

[kiralon]

I find not having the stats to play the class you like works well enough, and the social does affect players. Monster races not let in town, towns people not giving them access to being able to buy stuff and then having the shopkeeper not sell to the other players due to this and then being blamed if anything bad happens anywhere nearby.
But i play the journey is the fun bit. The toughest characters i have finished DM'ing had the weeniest stats, and the players who min/maxed themselves did not give much room for growth, so didn't. You want to be able to chew rock and spit stone bullets, start as a PS 7 squire, i will definitely work with you to get there.

Start with a strength 28 human barbarian dual wielding 2 handed battle axes, you are already at your pinnacle and aren't looking for growth, you are looking to walk all over the enemy, so all your enemies are setup like you, as obviously its the best way to be and why would you do anything different.

or to put it simply, you don't start with interesting characters as the starting choices are pretty repetitive after a few years, you make interesting characters by playing them.

[Veknironth]

Well, I do have to differ with GS on the hand to hand. I don't think that those H2H skills work well, especially when compared to the 1st edition. Why does a mounted knight need to learn a jump kick? The description of the Paladin says that they are the premier fighting men, but H2H Assassin is clearly better.

I never liked the whole "put stats where you want" idea. MA is always going to be shorted in favor of stats that provide tangible benefits. Humans have the numbers. I know that people don't like to play the prejudices (there is a thread here with some hurt feelings about that) but I think it gives the world more grit and makes it more interesting. If you build a combat monkey with all the best stats, you'll do nothing but fight and eventually you will fall prey to a natural twenty. Plus there are plenty of ways to mitigate a big strong fighter. Personally, I find playing just a fighter a little boring, since I know the best practices of the palladium hand to hand combat and it's reduced to simple dice rolls. Those are fun, but I'd much rather deduce, figure, and interact and that tends to be easier with humans.

One thing I forgot to comment on with Miso's original post was the races. Don't put just the human/elf/dwarf/gnome quartet up front. You need them all. Of course, when that book was printed, the number of playable races was far lower than it currently stands.

-Vek
"1st edition with 2nd edition magic and psionics. Fixed it."

[GoliathReturns]

Well, I do have to differ with GS on the hand to hand. I don't think that those H2H skills work well, especially when compared to the 1st edition. Why does a mounted knight need to learn a jump kick? The description of the Paladin says that they are the premier fighting men, but H2H Assassin is clearly better.

I never liked the whole "put stats where you want" idea. MA is always going to be shorted in favor of stats that provide tangible benefits. Humans have the numbers. I know that people don't like to play the prejudices (there is a thread here with some hurt feelings about that) but I think it gives the world more grit and makes it more interesting. If you build a combat monkey with all the best stats, you'll do nothing but fight and eventually you will fall prey to a natural twenty. Plus there are plenty of ways to mitigate a big strong fighter. Personally, I find playing just a fighter a little boring, since I know the best practices of the palladium hand to hand combat and it's reduced to simple dice rolls. Those are fun, but I'd much rather deduce, figure, and interact and that tends to be easier with humans.

One thing I forgot to comment on with Miso's original post was the races. Don't put just the human/elf/dwarf/gnome quartet up front. You need them all. Of course, when that book was printed, the number of playable races was far lower than it currently stands.

-Vek
"1st edition with 2nd edition magic and psionics. Fixed it."

Oh, I'm not saying the HtHs are perfect choices, just that the "variety" is plenty. Heck, I've even run a few games where I allowed anyone with HtH:MA to select an art from N&SS, and tweaked special abilities to fit.

We don't necessarily need MORE, we just need them refined.

Sure, people use MA as a dump stat. I've seen it plenty. But I've also seen it used as a high stat. Had a player that had PB and MA as their prime stats, and talked/flirted their way through almost every problem in town.

And generally speaking, yeah, 1E with 2E magic and psi. Heck, I'm willing to toss aside the psionics almost completely. They're massively overpowered compared to everything else.

__
GS