Proud owner of the Savage Rifts Players Guide!

[Treebore]

WHOOOOT!

Its nice, after so many years of waiting for it to happen, to finally have Rifts available in a different system. Not that I am a "hater" of the original, I wouldn't own over 60 books of it if I hated it. Simply put options are nice to have. This is a great option! It looks great!

[Treebore]

I am still amazed at how many people think the word "balanced" should apply to Rifts. Rifts was never about "balance". Its a "everything, plus the kitchen sink, and even more, thrown in..." kind of setting. Balance is IMPOSSIBLE. If you think you should be able to play a Hawkeye or Batman character and be "balanced" with Superman or Thor, or Galactus or Mephisto, then this is NOT the game for you. Now if you want to play pretty much any character you can imagine, and play that character with just about any character the other players can imagine, and play them together, then this is the system for you. Just don't expect balance. Not even close. That is not a concept that Rifts is concerned with. It only cares about providing you the ability to play anything you can imagine, and play that character with whatever your fellow players can imagine, and have fun doing it.

[jdizzy001]

I find the concept of balance intriguing. What players mean when they say balanced is that power levels are equal in combat. No one cares about power levels outside combat.

Balance matters in board games where the rules rule with an iron thumb. RPGs are different. I think if people were less concerned about balance and more concerned with the story, then we would see a shift in the rpg paradiagm.

[Treebore]

I don't get this demand for balance either. There isn't one single RPG out there, that I am aware of, and while I am aware of a great deal, I don't know about all, where the classes are actually fully balanced against one another. I have a feeling if such an RPG exists, its also rather boring.

[finarvyn]

I hate to admit it, but I know almost nothing about Rifts.

It was based on the Palladium RPG, I think, and I never liked Palladium when I thumbed through it. (Too many O.O.C. type abbreviations that made my head swim.)

Can you give me the 30-second tour of "what is Rifts" and why is it so cool?

[Treebore]

Rifts is a "everything and the kitchen sink" setting. You can play anything, from a old fashioned medieval knight, to a wizard, to a super hero, to a dragon, to a cyborg, to an giant alien lizard, to a turtle, to being a pilot of a HUGE Mech in Rifts. It too has a lot of OCC's that will make your head spin. So if Paladium Fantsy's OCC's made your head spin, Rifts will be far worse. Rifts, if you use every resource possible, had hundreds of OCC's, with probably just as many races with which to play those OCC's.

In such a setting, with so many OCC's and races with which to play them, "balance" is not a consideration. Balance doesn't exist. It got tossed, screaming, out the 100th story window before the game was even published. IF you want to play a Medieval Knight pulled through time to fight at the side of a Dragon, Superman, and Galactus, in Rifts you can do that. Will it be "balanced"? Heck no! Your playing what you want to play, if balance matters to you, play an OCC that is on par with the other OCC's being played, but if your playing an old fashioned Knight, balance isn't what your looking for, and it certainly isn't what your going to get. You get to find out what an old Knight can contribute to a group that consists of a Dragon, Superman and Galactus.

[serleran]

RIFTS is a multigenre settings based on a future Earth which has undergone at least one form of apocalypse, the major being a resurgence in magic. This, not unlike TORG, caused other beings to notice and so they have come to either conquer or help. Further, the return of magic has produced several "rifts" -- most of these are around the dragon lines (ley lines) of certain occult beliefs. Some of these link other worlds, dimensions, times, or what have you.

So, really, if you think of TORG (assuming you have familiarity) and then remove the "world axioms", amp everything up, you get RIFTS. The setting is far from original -- the details are another story.

[finarvyn]

I am familiar with TORG, and Rifts does sound interesting. So this new book is Rifts designed for Savage Worlds, eh?

[Treebore]

I am familiar with TORG, and Rifts does sound interesting. So this new book is Rifts designed for Savage Worlds, eh?

Yep. They've converted pretty much all of the most Iconic OCC's to the SW system. I got to play it last October, with the projects lead author running it. Had a blast. Felt like Rifts to me!