Quote from: tzunder;891676I am torn. If it's RIFTS system with Savage rules, I am in.
If it's bastardised Savage and RIFTS setting I am out.
Why? Because the Savage philosophy is to either 'Savage it and make it FFF', or 'use the orginal system'. If it is Fast, Fun and Furious then I am with it, if it's a frankenstein then I'd rather use the original system and I read that and it wasn't for me.

Savage can cope with power imbalances, it's all in the superpower companion.

Everything I've read on both sites indicates this is Savage Worlds rules with the Rifts setting.

Savage Worlds gains nothing by trying to "hybridize" their system. That defeats the entire point of Savage Worlds. I can't imagine they'd ever go that route for any license.

I'll probably back it. I've played a few Palladium games back in the day but never really cared for the system so this could be a nice take on it.

Quote from: Battle Mad Ronin;891432@The Butcher: I may have come off kind of prickish, sorry about that. I don't like RIFTS, I respect that you do and that's just a matter of taste.

Grow a pair, Krom - damn it, this is RPGsite. We do not apologize here, we escalate the conflict until everyone forgets why it started!

I might actually consider playing this. Recently, I've been more into gozno stuff that I used to be, and RIFTS carries a certain...legend around it. I'd definitely be willing to rediscover a setting through a mechanic I am more familiar with, and not covered with a certain shroud of infamy.

I just hope they adapt the setting verbatim, not pull something like D20 Gamma World.

Quote from: CRKrueger;891469On the one hand, I've heard that Fannon is not just putting everything in standard SW terms, but actually coming up with new rules (like his own SW game, Shaintar) on the other hand, probably the singlemost identifiable concept unique to Rifts, mega-damage is going to be represented in standard SW terms.  Not that this is necessarily a bad thing, but let's just say that when it comes to Savage Worlds, I'm skeptical whenever someone says "this is not going to be generic SW".  Being fair though, the SW toolkit has more tools then ever.

Personally, while I think a Savage Worlds Rifts game would be awesome, and I remain hopeful, I doubt that the system can do the Vagabond, Hatchling Dragon and Glitterboy type groups.  The system just doesn't have enough scale.  I'm waiting to be joyously proven wrong, though.

Actually SW's system, I think, is pretty well fit for megadamage - armour and "HPs" in SW can be easily adapted to it. Just have megadamage kill anyone on one shot, or ignore armour entirely.

Heavy Armor in Savage Worlds is basically Mega Damage Armor. You need a weapon with the Heavy descriptor to affect it. So all your small-arms fire dings off.

Interface Zero's Golem-Mechs are pretty solid examples of Glitterboys and stuff of that scale.

Heavy Weapons in Savage Worlds already do enough ridonculous damage that it might as well be Mega-Damage, because your ass is likely going to die a horrible death if you take a straight-shot from one (but not always). The FFF-mantra of SW will make Rifts probably play a lot more agile and possibly even more over the top... which I think will be awesome.

SavageCast did an interview with Sean Patrick Fannon about Savage Rifts. He answers a number of questions about how they are doing it.

http://www.savagecast.com/2016/04/episode-4-do-you-even-rifts-bro/


While I love the Megaversal System I plan to back this.

God I hate Podcasts...the SPF stuff starts around 18:00.  Some takeaways:
(SPF=Sean Patrick Fannon, SW=Savage Worlds, SR=Savage Rifts)

• Rifts Classes replaced with "Iconic Frameworks" which are a set of frontloaded abilities, skills, equipment, etc to match certain Rifts classes.  Some of the Frameworks mentioned are:

• Juicer
• Crazy
• Ley Line Walker
• Glitterboy
• Cyber-Knight
• Mind Melter
• Mystic
• MARS (Mercenaries Adventurers Rogues Scholars) - they will have unique tables to roll on for equipment (like a robot horse) and will have more skills.

• Admission that SW is a balanced system and this will be a SW system.  Turned up to 11 maybe, but not as Gonzo as Rifts (SPF thinks Cosmo-Knights are awful).
• Admission that there isn't a whole lot of room to move in with regards to weapons.  Suggestion that if, for example, you want all the weapons from Northern Gun, you buy the Palladium Northern Gun book, because while some of them will show up in various SR supplements, not all of them will.
• Confirmation that MDC will be represented by Heavy Weapons/Armor rules from SW and that normal infantry pistols, rifles, armor will NOT be Heavy.  So a guy with a normal steel bowie knife can hurt a Dead Boy.  This is by design to keep the game SW.
• Kevin Siembieda (probably because he worked as an artist for Judge's Guild, etc) left the rights to the art with his artists, so they would have to recontract with the original artists to reuse them, so new color art will be used.
• 3 Core books are planned.  First one will be the Core Rules, third one is Savage Foes of North America.
• Apparently one does not "convert" for Savage Worlds, one "interprets" :rolleyes:(I hope you heard me lift my pinkie fingers as I typed that.) So there will be no official "Conversion Guide".
• Timeline is 109 P.A. 6 months after the Fall of Tolkeen.

Personally I think they are taking something from the setting by not making infantry class items Heavy.  One of the defining elements of the Rifts wilderness was that without technology or magic, ordinary people were vulnerable.  The Coalition soldiers might as well have been Glitter Boys to a town without modern weapons.  Now medieval technology can defeat and defend against the forces of the Coalition, or any of the various nations, or private mercenary armies, robber barons, etc.  A WWI machinegun will be able to cut down a Northern Gun mercenary platoon.  It completely changes the setting.  But, if Laser Pistols were heavy, then you'd need a mechanism to allow 100 soldiers armed with pistols to eventually take out a vehicle and Savage Worlds damage system cannot support that, the numbers would get too high.

So yeah, some fundamental setting conceits are going to be changed, which is what SW fans want and are used to, but maybe not what Rifts fans looking for an alternate system might want.

In any case, SR is looking to be the perfect system that one could use to "interpret" 40k. :cool:

No Cyber-Knight? :confused:

Quote from: Christopher Brady;891773No Cyber-Knight? :confused:

That was *some* of the Frameworks.  I added all the ones specifically mentioned in the Podcast.  There will probably be more, like Hatchling Dragon, etc.

Thanks for the highlights, Krugs. I hate podcasts too

Pity about "balance" but for what ir's worth, I, too, was unimpressed by Cosmo-Knights.

As for no MDC personal armor... You see, late in my Rifts GMing career I did consider doing away with Mega-Damage and converting everything to SDC on a 10:1 (rather than the default 100:1) scale. And this sounds a lot like the game that might have resulted. Which might be fun.

The whole "MDC supremacy" scenario — you know, single person in MDC body armor packing a laser pistol walks into town and subjugates it single-handedly — is bullshit because Rifts Earth is crawling with naturally MDC predators. (In fact my original motivation for thinking of doing away with MDC was thinking "what if the biosphere gets flooded with indestructible aliens") So a town with no means to defend itself from the guy in Plastic Man armor (30 MDC) toting a Wilk's laser pistol (1d6 MD) probably already disappeared long before that, the day a Rhino-Buffalo or Brodkil or even a lone Xiticix swung by.

Quote from: The Butcher;891776Thanks for the highlights, Krugs. I hate podcasts too

Pity about "balance" but for what ir's worth, I, too, was unimpressed by Cosmo-Knights.

As for no MDC personal armor... You see, late in my Rifts GMing career I did consider doing away with Mega-Damage and converting everything to SDC on a 10:1 (rather than the default 100:1) scale. And this sounds a lot like the game that might have resulted. Which might be fun.

The whole "MDC supremacy" scenario — you know, single person in MDC body armor packing a laser pistol walks into town and subjugates it single-handedly — is bullshit because Rifts Earth is crawling with naturally MDC predators. (In fact my original motivation for thinking of doing away with MDC was thinking "what if the biosphere gets flooded with indestructible aliens") So a town with no means to defend itself from the guy in Plastic Man armor (30 MDC) toting a Wilk's laser pistol (1d6 MD) probably already disappeared long before that, the day a Rhino-Buffalo or Brodkil or even a lone Xiticix swung by.

The issue with MDC is actually that it's a level playing field.  Too level.

I've said this here before, but I'll repeat:

One major criteria for most military forces is money.  Finances.  So if you have a rifle that can damage a tank and jet, but is cheaper to buy at the hundreds of unit level, they're not going to buy the tank.

And I've done a test with the game, a team of 5 Coalition Infantrymen against a UAR-1 Enforcer robot.  One round, 15 seconds, the robot was ash and one trooper was dead.  Then I did it 5 more times.  The longest time was about 3 rounds, but the results were the same.  One Trooper and One Robot were destroyed.

A 20% unit loss compared to the 100% unit loss.  And the Robot cost MILLIONS.  No army, none of them, would waste resources for one.

Now, one could argue that to bring realism into gaming is foolhardy, but I contend and posit that 'realism' is what we humans use to consider something plausible.  If we do it in 'real life', we won't question what happens in a fantasy setting, because we can accept it without question.

What does this mean for Palladium Rifts?  MDC needing a scaling system.  Maybe a three tier one, Armour/Power Armour, Robot/Tank/Fighter plane and Superheavy, which is what most starships and Splugorth might fall under.

Some things might even shift from category to category.  For example, the Glitterboy Boom Gun might be a Robot Killer class weapon, but it's armoured shell is Power Armour class, meaning that they could get popped relatively easily if they start shooting each other.  As opposed to the several hour long fight you could have in the base system.

Those are both interesting points.

Butcher, you're right in that the "every town needs MDC Clint Eastwood to ride in" means there wouldn't be any towns left, but MDC Clint Eastwood is just so fucking cool.

Brady, you're right in that the levels of MDC for pretty much any defensive value is out of whack with MDC Infantry weapons, which is why when I played Rifts I came up with new stats for fucking everything.  In the end, it might have been better to flush MDC or have more than two levels, like you are suggesting.

I don't think the MDC thing is even a remote issue. There's plenty of examples in the SW Sci-Fi Companion and Interface Zero of heavy-power armor that quite nicely emulates Coalition Deadboy Armor in terms of their representative power.

If you think you're going to kill a Deadboy with a 1d4 MD Knife, you're probably in for a rude awakening. Much like a Deadboy trying to take on a Dragon in his armor with his plasma rifle.

And Heavy Weapons don't do extra damage to non-heavy targets. They already do a shitload of damage. So it'll be fine. The point of needing to make everything 10:1 is kinda already abstracted by that damage factor.

Cosmo-knights aren't Cyber-knights to my recollection. They're some ridiculously amped up Galactus-Power-cosmic juiced up version of a Cyber-knight. So yeah... who cares. I'm not going to have them in my games anyhow.

Quote from: tenbones;891781I don't think the MDC thing is even a remote issue. There's plenty of examples in the SW Sci-Fi Companion and Interface Zero of heavy-power armor that quite nicely emulates Coalition Deadboy Armor in terms of their representative power.

If you think you're going to kill a Deadboy with a 1d4 MD Knife, you're probably in for a rude awakening. Much like a Deadboy trying to take on a Dragon in his armor with his plasma rifle.

And Heavy Weapons don't do extra damage to non-heavy targets. They already do a shitload of damage. So it'll be fine. The point of needing to make everything 10:1 is kinda already abstracted by that damage factor.

Cosmo-knights aren't Cyber-knights to my recollection. They're some ridiculously amped up Galactus-Power-cosmic juiced up version of a Cyber-knight. So yeah... who cares. I'm not going to have them in my games anyhow.

Cosmo-Knights obviously are beyond Rifts, they come from the Three Galaxies, but still in Rifts, you can have Abolisher Robots fighting Adult Dragons, Giants, Demons, etc... There's definitely a higher than Golem-mech level in there.  Not sure how SR is going to be able to handle that.

Never played RIFTS, but I've heard it mentioned a thousand times over the internet in the last few years, so my interest is highly picked. Also, multi-dimentional games are my king of thing.

If the price for the PDF is reasonable, even as I'm not a huge fan of SW, I'll probably back it.

Quote from: CRKrueger;891771

• Confirmation that MDC will be represented by Heavy Weapons/Armor rules from SW and that normal infantry pistols, rifles, armor will NOT be Heavy.  So a guy with a normal steel bowie knife can hurt a Dead Boy.  This is by design to keep the game SW.

THIS is a major setting change...and an expected one.

However, its mostly a major change on paper. In actual play, everyone and their sister has MDC toys. Except for some background NPC squishies who effectively are just 1 HP mooks.

Quote from: CRKrueger;891771So there will be no official "Conversion Guide".

What's going to be the Pinnacle policy of people converting PB stuff on their forums for PB stuff that's beyond their license?

I hope everyone's going to be mellow about the ensuing flood of Palladium conversions that will be posted online.

Quote from: CRKrueger;891771In any case, SR is looking to be the perfect system that one could use to "interpret" 40k. :cool:

Been there, done that, added skulls to Khorne's throne. It works GREAT for 40k.