One of my favorite game systems is Palladium Books.  Mostly because I'm a sci-fi genre fan, and started RPGs with RoboTech. 

After a lot of playing we got to know the system well.  And the critics who say it's a bit of a mess are not wrong.  It hurts to say it.  It's also true. 

One of the fundamental flaws I'll post here is how easy it is to incorrectly calculate your bonus to strike.  The problem is the game uses the same term for both hand-to-hand and to ranged attacks.  My chosen combat style might give me +2 to strike in hand to hand.  My weapon proficiency might give me +2 to strike with my pistol.  My high Physical Prowess attribute might give me +1 to strike.  And my skill piloting a power armor suit might give me +3 to strike. 

Do you add all four together when using a pistol while wearing that power armor?  No. 

The game needs to add a new combat term.  Aim.

Having a high physical prowess boosts aim by "X", and strike by "X".  Hand to hand combat skill boost strike by "X".  Weapon proficiency pistol adds aim by "X" when shooting a pistol.  Power Armor Elite skill adds "X" to strike, and the targeting system adds "X" to Aim. 

That's just one change I want.  More to follow. 

In our Palladium games experience (for 20ish years before giving up the ghost and switching to Savage Rifts), we had quite a few house rules. One, as you said, was to just sum up all those bonuses and stop differentiating between H-H and ranged combat bonuses (other than the situational Aimed Shot, Burst Fire, Wild, etc). Another was allowing people to use defenses that cost attacks to pull them from the end of the round (So a normal dodge with 4 attacks per melee didn't use your next attack, but did take one of your (unused) attacks for the melee. Which made it much more likely that people with high attack counts could just burn up mook's attacks, but that was part of the game.

We did other stuff too, that I'm sure I'll remember if you mention the things that piss you off about Palladium.

The biggest change I would make is not in the rules, but in the organization of the books. At least the core books need better organization.

Quote from: Panzerkraken on April 10, 2023, 03:07:10 PM
In our Palladium games experience (for 20ish years before giving up the ghost and switching to Savage Rifts), we had quite a few house rules. One, as you said, was to just sum up all those bonuses and stop differentiating between H-H and ranged combat bonuses (other than the situational Aimed Shot, Burst Fire, Wild, etc). Another was allowing people to use defenses that cost attacks to pull them from the end of the round (So a normal dodge with 4 attacks per melee didn't use your next attack, but did take one of your (unused) attacks for the melee. Which made it much more likely that people with high attack counts could just burn up mook's attacks, but that was part of the game.

We did other stuff too, that I'm sure I'll remember if you mention the things that piss you off about Palladium.

That is an idea I will have to remember. I'm not sure if I would do that with a parry though.

Quote from: weirdguy564 on April 10, 2023, 11:18:07 AM
One of my favorite game systems is Palladium Books.  Mostly because I'm a sci-fi genre fan, and started RPGs with RoboTech. 

After a lot of playing we got to know the system well.  And the critics who say it's a bit of a mess are not wrong.  It hurts to say it.  It's also true. 

One of the fundamental flaws I'll post here is how easy it is to incorrectly calculate your bonus to strike.  The problem is the game uses the same term for both hand-to-hand and to ranged attacks.  My chosen combat style might give me +2 to strike in hand to hand.  My weapon proficiency might give me +2 to strike with my pistol.  My high Physical Prowess attribute might give me +1 to strike.  And my skill piloting a power armor suit might give me +3 to strike. 

Do you add all four together when using a pistol while wearing that power armor?  No. 

The game needs to add a new combat term.  Aim.

Having a high physical prowess boosts aim by "X", and strike by "X".  Hand to hand combat skill boost strike by "X".  Weapon proficiency pistol adds "X" when shooting a pistol.  Power Armor Elite skill adds "X" to strike, and the targeting system adds "X" to Aim. 

That's just one change I want.  More to follow. 

Yeah, there should be a way to differentiate what attack the bonus applies to. It may be an issue where Kevin thought it was obvious, but it ended up where it wasn't

With apologies if this is stepping on the toes of a sacred cow (to mix my metaphors), but I have to admit one thing I wish the Palladium system did that D20 does is to provide varying bonuses for all attribute scores, not just those of 16+.

It breaks my suspension of disbelief nowadays to realize that an attribute of 8-9 is functionally identical to an attribute of 14-15 as far as most actual rolls go, and in my experience people are a lot happier with lower-than-peak attribute scores if they can see that they still get some level of bonus out of them.

Quote from: Stephen Tannhauser on April 10, 2023, 04:28:50 PM
With apologies if this is stepping on the toes of a sacred cow (to mix my metaphors), but I have to admit one thing I wish the Palladium system did that D20 does is to provide varying bonuses for all attribute scores, not just those of 16+.

It breaks my suspension of disbelief nowadays to realize that an attribute of 8-9 is functionally identical to an attribute of 14-15 as far as most actual rolls go, and in my experience people are a lot happier with lower-than-peak attribute scores if they can see that they still get some level of bonus out of them.

The Rifts Ultimate Edition actually addresses this. A low IQ can give you a big hit to your skill selection.

Here's is Legion of Myth's video going over that section. It may be long, but it starts into it within the first few minutes.
https://youtu.be/kN19itu04hU

Better organization and clearer rules. I own four different palladium games (five if you count Rifts core and Rift ultimate as seperate products) and I for the life of me can't figure out how the system works, let alone what an actual session would look like.
Like, is this game just shooting skull faced techno Nazis, or could you viably run a political intrigue type story with it?

There's no mechanical support for social skills beyond the effects of Mental Affinity and Physical Beauty.  I'd probably use Mental Endurance +1d6 / level as resistance to attempted social influence, much like hit points.  Social influence attempts would do "damage" based on Intelligence, Mental Affinity, or Physical Beauty, depending on the method, using the Physical Strength Damage Bonus column.  So seduction 1d6 + PB Damage, reason 1d6 + IQ Damage, Entice 1d6 + MA Damage.  Social defenses might include stubborness, reason, and dissemble.

Relationships and alliances could be set up as a hieracy or grid with shifts being achieved through social influence attempts.

Something like that anyhow.

When it comes to attribute bonuses, I think it's best to think of their effects in terms of non-modifier uses as the modifiers are already a mess.  Mental Endurance and Physical Endurance are already alblative quantities and thus fully used for something.  Physical Strength already quantifies lifting and encumbrance and Speed directly increments movement so they're already using every point.  That leaves Intelligence, Mental Affinity, Physical Prowess, and Physical Beauty not doing much.  Physical Beauty is mostly comparative and every point counts in that regard.  I'm not familiar with how Rifts Ultimate Edition is using Intelligence to modifiy skills, probably by the number available I suppose.  But Palladium lacks a perception rating so perhaps it could be used for that in a roll-under on 1d20 fashion.  Physical Prowess should probably impact a lot of things like gymnastics and acrobatics that it is already impacted by.  Maybe as a tie breaker for contests or something?  Mental Affinity might be used as a basic reaction guide, with 10 giving a neutral reaction and higher being better or a roll against it might produce a better reaction.

Alternately we could just ditch the current skill ratings and make each skill be based on an attribute x 3 + 3 x level.  It still wouldn't give mental affinity anything to do if we don't add some social skills but it would be a lot cleaner than the present, rather arbitrary system.

Our simple combat system for cover. 

If you're caught out in the open, you cannot dodge ranged attacks.  You can run for it, but this just means the default number needed aim at you goes up from 5 to 8. 

If you have cover, then you can dodge ranged attacks. 

We also like the rule that megadamage is only x10 normal damage  not x100.  This optional rule was already in the conversion book 1.