Palladium games

[leons1701]

That's because they never update their files, they just add more. The average Palladium core book is at least 30% a collection of cut and paste files that have been used in almost every other Palladium game out there, the weird part is that despite it being a "system" it's mostly NOT actual rules text, it's things like the infamous insanity tables, alignment descriptions and that opening disclaimer.

[Malkavian Grin]

3 hours ago, Michael Silverbane said:

They still have a similar disclaimer.

I want an rpg book to come out and just flat out say they do worship Satan and encourage you to do the same lmfao!

All i know is Palladium and stuff rules-adjacent to it are just too complicated for what you get out of them. Maybe at the time it was cool but anymore I'd rather play rules lite stuff. No simulations for me please.

[MrAndrewJ]

On 12/12/2023 at 12:27 PM, Snicker said:

Has anyone played any of their games?

Yes. The second game I ever ran evolved into a Heroes Unlimited / TMNT mixed game.

My brother sometimes ran Robotech games, which I fairly enjoyed. A friend of ours also loved Rifts to a fault.

In regards to balance:

This is how I had fun in the Palladium system. The unbalanced mechanics were always balanced through narrative. The person running the game needs to watch for ways to let every player character have the spotlight. Yes, the guy in the mech will do more combat damage than the mutant duck with a steak knife. The mutant duck can do things that the mech cannot. An effective GM will require all characters to shine with their respective strengths.

There is more to any role playing game than simply reducing enemy hit points. Unbalanced systems require that mindset as much as narrative systems require it.

On 12/12/2023 at 12:27 PM, Snicker said:

Would anyone be interested in playing any of their games, and if so, which ones?

It's probably better that I don't commit. I've been in a sort of survival mode where my creative well has run dry. I have access to the old TMNT & Other Strangeness book, Heroes Unlimited First Edition, and the old Robotech RPG.

Some charity bundle I purchased also gave access to After the Bomb and Ninjas & Superspies. I also bought some Robotech sourcebooks at DriveThru right before Palladium lost the license. I think those must have been on some kind of very deep sale.

I'm here to talk about games more than play. Regardless, those are my books.

[Snicker]

On 12/12/2023 at 8:22 PM, Malkavian Grin said:

In my opinion, it seems like too complex a system for what it's trying to do. I don't recall much of it, but I remember thinking "this is a GURPS ripoff but worse" while trying to figure it all out. Maybe it was just trying to shoehorn mutant ninja antics into a simulationist ruleset that didn't jive well.

I don't think I answered your questions well.

On the contrary, you answered it quite well. Palladium's "megaversal system" can be painfully inaccessible for multiple reasons:

• The books do a terrible job of communicating the rules; rules are often buried somewhere you can never find on short notice and written so ambiguously that even when you do find them you can read them over and over and still not understand precisely how a mechanic works;
• Depending on the book, important rules may be outright missing because the writer/editor expects you to have read it in another book;
• There are a thousand and one mechanics, each of which is structurally different from the one before (compare this to D&D 5E, where there are maybe four or five different mechanics that you plug different numbers into depending on the context) and often sound like they were cooked up on the spot and never reviewed;
• Despite being a "megaversal system", the mechanics differ just slightly from game to another, causing confusion even if you've gotten a handle on the rules.

I personally think the system is not as complicated and unwieldy as its reputation suggests, but due to the issues above, the only way to learn Palladium is to be taught by someone who already knows Palladium, and that someone had better be smart enough to start simple and ramp up the complexity over time.

On 12/13/2023 at 12:58 AM, Cirlot said:

I've played Rifts, Palladium Fantasy and a (heavily) houseruled variant of Heroes Unlimited in my time, and I've a fondness for Nightbane to the extent I've lobied for the chance to play some of it's OCC's and RCCs in other games (the joy of the Kitchen Sink that is RIFTS.) I also have a real fondness for RIFTS: Manhunter - lots of interesting ideas in that one though it doesn't plug in well with the other Palladium games (Phase World is the nearest fit but Phase World characters tend to be considerably more powerful as a baseline . . .).

I think I've played more Palladium in-person than any other system. I've only ever done a deep dive into Beyond the Supernatural 2E, Nightbane, and Dead Reign (you can see a theme there), but I've played at least one session of Fantasy, Heroes, Robotech, TMNT, Chaos Earth...even RECON, once. Bizarrely, I think RIFTS is the only Palladium I haven't played, either directly or in spirit by lifting OCCs or mechanics. I think that makes me some sort of Palladium unicorn.

On 12/13/2023 at 1:15 AM, cailano said:

I had TMNT back in the day but never played it. I always wanted to play their Robotech RPG as I was a huge fan of that series.

TMNT was actually the biggest reason why I started this thread. I backed the recent Kickstarter for the TMNT and Other Strangeness redux, and I was considering running a game once I get my hands on the "updated" (for whatever that's worth) book. That's a long way off from now - a year at least - but it got me curious as to how many Palladium players there even are on MW.

I also floated the idea of running a Nightbane game on another PBP forum, but got a pretty muted response. I'm seeing a lot more discussion here, but I've only seen the word "Nightbane" once, so that looks like a nonstarter.

On 12/13/2023 at 7:54 PM, Cirlot said:

That said, outside of combat the core skill mechanic is pretty simple, and the powers/spells/psionics are effectively self contained rulesets. It's just combat that would break in half via PbP? The more I think about it a socially oriented palladium game might work pretty well; maybe it's a RP on the weave, run combats on discord sort of thing.

I've been considering how I'd run combat in PBP. I feel like it would be manageable. Use block initiative and and go back and forth between the GM and the players; the GM rolls the NPCs' attacks, then the players post their defensive rolls (parry, dodge, etc.) at the same time as posting their actions. That way, it's still a simple back-and-forth between players and GM.

I may be overlooking something, though.

12 hours ago, leons1701 said:

Seriously, if you have the slightest concern for balance, you're in the wrong system.

 

12 hours ago, Michael Silverbane said:

Very true. I mean, you can play a dragon alongside a "Non-Skilled Vagabond." On the other hand, with judicious selection of classes and equipment, some semblance of balance can be achieved.

I wouldn't mind playing in a North America focused game with something like, a juicer, a psi-stalker, a cyberknight, a rogue scientist, and a (ex-)coalition special forces character.

Similarly, a game with a city-rat, headhunter, rogue scholar, cyber-doc, and soldier could be cool and relatively balanced.

Rifts also got ported over to... (goes to look it up) Savage Worlds, so that could be cool.

I feel this depends on the setting. A Glitter Boy and a Vagabond are spectacularly out of proportion from each other, but there's much less power variance in something like TMNT. The GM can reign things in as well, but they have to stay on top of it. For example, in my planned Nightbane game, players can pick whatever morphus traits they want...but then everybody meets with the GM for adjustments in order to level out the playing field.

Of course, rolling for attributes also allows for wild imbalance, but that can be house ruled.

 

7 hours ago, leons1701 said:

That's because they never update their files, they just add more. The average Palladium core book is at least 30% a collection of cut and paste files that have been used in almost every other Palladium game out there, the weird part is that despite it being a "system" it's mostly NOT actual rules text, it's things like the infamous insanity tables, alignment descriptions and that opening disclaimer.

It's always fun to go looking through a Palladium book and seeing what skill or equipment description is laughably out of date, since they've been using the same text for decades.

 

2 hours ago, MrAndrewJ said:

This is how I had fun in the Palladium system. The unbalanced mechanics were always balanced through narrative. The person running the game needs to watch for ways to let every player character have the spotlight. Yes, the guy in the mech will do more combat damage than the mutant duck with a steak knife. The mutant duck can do things that the mech cannot. An effective GM will require all characters to shine with their respective strengths.

There is more to any role playing game than simply reducing enemy hit points. Unbalanced systems require that mindset as much as narrative systems require it.

I like this concept in theory. However, my fear is that if everyone stands out in a different area but is essentially redundant outside of that area, then even if you give everyone a chance to shine, whoever is not shining at a particular moment may as well be twiddling their thumbs. I'd prefer everyone to be close enough in power that individual characters can have their chance to shine, but whoever isn't shining isn't just a bystander in the meantime.

[leons1701]

1 hour ago, Snicker said:

 

I also floated the idea of running a Nightbane game on another PBP forum, but got a pretty muted response. I'm seeing a lot more discussion here, but I've only seen the word "Nightbane" once, so that looks like a nonstarter.

Nightbane was an "interesting" game but it had a light printing and never really got any support, so few people even know it exists at this point. I'll admit, Nightbane, TMNT and probably Ninjas and Superspies are about the only Palladium games that would attract my attention. I probably wouldn't actually play any of them, but I'd consider it at least.

 

1 hour ago, Snicker said:

I like this concept in theory. However, my fear is that if everyone stands out in a different area but is essentially redundant outside of that area, then even if you give everyone a chance to shine, whoever is not shining at a particular moment may as well be twiddling their thumbs. I'd prefer everyone to be close enough in power that individual characters can have their chance to shine, but whoever isn't shining isn't just a bystander in the meantime.

^^THIS^^. It's even worse in a game like Rifts where it's entirely possible to generate a character with some sort of out of combat expertise who ends up with worse skills in that area than the guy who has a giant stompy robot AND psychic powers. But even if your "expert" is actually the party's expert on whatever, all too often that means only he gets to play the disarming security minigame, or whatever his expertise is. It's a problem in games like D&D too, when the rogue/skill monkey finally gets to do his thing, nobody else gets to play. It requires real thought from the GM to keep things moving and keep all the players motivated.

[Michael Silverbane]

9 hours ago, Snicker said:

I feel this depends on the setting. A Glitter Boy and a Vagabond are spectacularly out of proportion from each other, but there's much less power variance in something like TMNT. The GM can reign things in as well, but they have to stay on top of it. For example, in my planned Nightbane game, players can pick whatever morphus traits they want...but then everybody meets with the GM for adjustments in order to level out the playing field.

Of course, rolling for attributes also allows for wild imbalance, but that can be house ruled.

That's a good point, and is not terribly out of line with many other games. Third Edition D&D often requires this sort of intervention to keep player characters on a more even playing field, especially at higher levels. Basically any point-buy system (GURPS, Hero, Mutants & Masterminds) requires GM oversight to keep player characters from having wildly different overall competency levels.

Palladium games get a bad rap in this regard, but it is not much more deserved than these other games.

[Snicker]

15 hours ago, leons1701 said:

Nightbane was an "interesting" game but it had a light printing and never really got any support, so few people even know it exists at this point. I'll admit, Nightbane, TMNT and probably Ninjas and Superspies are about the only Palladium games that would attract my attention. I probably wouldn't actually play any of them, but I'd consider it at least.

More support than you'd think! Seven books in total, not counting reprints or deluxe editions:

• Nightbane, the core book
• Between the Shadows, which explored the setting by way of other worlds
• Nightlands, which explored the setting by way of the antagonists
• Through the Glass Darkly, which explored magic in the setting
• Shadows of Light, which nobody liked, even the writer
• Nightbane Survival Guide, which put the spotlight back on the nightbane themselves and provided character build options and explored the player factions
• Dark Designs, which is purely a character build splatbook

The latest of them came out in 2016, which means the line spans over 20 years, much longer than you'd expect given its relative obscurity.

8 hours ago, Michael Silverbane said:

That's a good point, and is not terribly out of line with many other games. Third Edition D&D often requires this sort of intervention to keep player characters on a more even playing field, especially at higher levels. Basically any point-buy system (GURPS, Hero, Mutants & Masterminds) requires GM oversight to keep player characters from having wildly different overall competency levels.

Palladium games get a bad rap in this regard, but it is not much more deserved than these other games.

I think Palladium earns that reputation with its explicit disregard (if not contempt) for balance. At least other games have the grace of being unbalanced by accident or due to power creep. RIFTS is unbalanced from the word go and wears that proudly on its sleeve. Its other settings tend to be at least a bit more restrained in that sense, but RIFTS is the one everyone knows.

[Lando The Archmagi]

I tried Nightbane years ago, but the game sorta died before it started with scheduling etc. I'd try it again as I have some digital pdfs and a book or two somewhere. I know Rifts very well, as well as most of the other Palladium lines, so I'd be interested in playing most anything.

[leons1701]

2 hours ago, Snicker said:

I think Palladium earns that reputation with its explicit disregard (if not contempt) for balance. At least other games have the grace of being unbalanced by accident or due to power creep. RIFTS is unbalanced from the word go and wears that proudly on its sleeve. Its other settings tend to be at least a bit more restrained in that sense, but RIFTS is the one everyone knows.

Yeah, other games don't print something like City Rat or Vagabond in the same book as Glitter Boy Pilot or Ley Line Walker and tell you they belong in the same game. And then it STILL manages to have power creep anyhow.

[Cirlot]

On 12/15/2023 at 12:27 PM, Snicker said:

More support than you'd think! Seven books in total, not counting reprints or deluxe editions:

• Nightbane, the core book
• Between the Shadows, which explored the setting by way of other worlds
• Nightlands, which explored the setting by way of the antagonists
• Through the Glass Darkly, which explored magic in the setting
• Shadows of Light, which nobody liked, even the writer
• Nightbane Survival Guide, which put the spotlight back on the nightbane themselves and provided character build options and explored the player factions
• Dark Designs, which is purely a character build splatbook

The latest of them came out in 2016, which means the line spans over 20 years, much longer than you'd expect given its relative obscurity.

I think Palladium earns that reputation with its explicit disregard (if not contempt) for balance. At least other games have the grace of being unbalanced by accident or due to power creep. RIFTS is unbalanced from the word go and wears that proudly on its sleeve. Its other settings tend to be at least a bit more restrained in that sense, but RIFTS is the one everyone knows.

Quick side note, even if you don't like Palladium mechanics I strongly, STRONGLY recommend Through the Glass Darkly as a magic splat for any sort of contemporary horror or supernatural game. The underlying theory of magic I found really compelling and next to Mage the Ascension it's the magic book I've returned to most in my gaming career.

You know what, I'll just quote my favorite bit:

Through the Glass Darkly, pg 10

"For four years I have labored under the misapprehension that I was a craftsman, fashioning and creating magics — like a watchmaker, tampering with unseen mechanisms. But I could not have been more wrong. My creations were not dumb objects, neither predictable nor static. I did not craft. I gave birth — I breathed life. My magics are my children, and oh how prodigal. Do not think that I am being poetical if I tell you that my every careless chant or miswrought ritual pursues me through my nightmares and stalks me through each day. I was never a mechanic. I only wish that I had been a better parent. All children return to claim their inheritance.

"There is a power that I draw on, though I cannot tell you what it is. Perhaps I deal with souls. Perhaps I invoke spirits. Or would you be more comfortable if I told you that I deal with Manna, or Essence, or Loa, or Divine Power? All names are masks, formed to hide the truth, to simplify the incomprehensible. Give something a name, and you can believe that you understand it. But I have never understood my 'magics.' I have learned the chants and perfected the gestures, studied the signs and symbols, learned to listen to hidden voices. But, to be candid, in the end I do not know how my enchantments work. I know nothing. I only feel the power flowing through me, and pray — to gods whom I no longer believe in — that I can control it.

"We all have power — all of us. All that I have learned is how to pour out my essence, to take it and to twist it into the forms that I desire, and to replenish my strength by absorbing more from other sources. I have poured out and exhausted my power ... my soul, a hundred times over. I am not the woman that I used to be. But then who am I, whose thoughts are these, and whose voices do I hear sniggering behind my eyes? I have not sold my soul. Rather I have poured it away. I needed no genteel devil to tempt me. My soul is no longer my own, though sometimes we hear it calling to us."

— Words from a Sorcerer

And that? That's why I still like and buy Palladium, even if I don't run or play it much. I'll stumble across these rough diamonds in unexpected places and steal them to ornament other games or campaigns . . .

Edited December 16, 2023 by Cirlot (see edit history)

[LargestFriend]

I collected the Robotech games as a teen/young adult (in fact, I wrote many of the articles on the Robotech wiki about the lore that came from the games), but I never really played them. Always wanted to try the TMNT games a try, even if some things from them have not aged... super well.

[TheDude2371]

On 12/12/2023 at 1:27 PM, Snicker said:

Without making any promises, is there any interest on Myth-Weavers in the Palladium line of games?

Has anyone played any of their games?

Would anyone be interested in playing any of their games, and if so, which ones?

 

Back in the day, I've played Beyond the Supernatural, Rifts, and Ninjas & Superspies.

 

Presently, the only ones I would consider playing are BtS and Fantasy.

I think Rifts and many of the other game systems have far too much bloat with too many books to track. I wouldn't really have any interest in the others.

The system itself is... meh. I've seen far better. In fact, I'm working on a BtS-style game using other systems (GURPS, HERO, perhaps even looking into PbtA:MotW)

 

 

[Snicker]

On 12/15/2023 at 4:42 PM, Lando The Archmagi said:

I tried Nightbane years ago, but the game sorta died before it started with scheduling etc. I'd try it again as I have some digital pdfs and a book or two somewhere. I know Rifts very well, as well as most of the other Palladium lines, so I'd be interested in playing most anything.

I'm glad you brought up "I've never played X, but I know Y very well", because that's a potential pitfall I'm looking for. There are subtle differences between books, and there are some books detailed in some settings (usually RIFTS) that simply don't exist in other (older or simpler) settings. I think any Palladium game run via PBP will require a lengthy and exhaustive list of house rules, of which many will be "this is how things work in this setting that differ from other settings."

On 12/15/2023 at 5:38 PM, leons1701 said:

Yeah, other games don't print something like City Rat or Vagabond in the same book as Glitter Boy Pilot or Ley Line Walker and tell you they belong in the same game. And then it STILL manages to have power creep anyhow.

I've heard the argument that Palladium's power imbalances are a boon because they allow players to choose the complexity of their gameplay. I'm not entirely convinced, but I know I've been in some meatspace games where some players want to get really clever and other players are there just to spend an evening with other players and roll big numbers. I suppose this at least lets those players play at the same table, but I still feel like there's better ways to do it.

On 12/16/2023 at 3:38 PM, Cirlot said:

Quick side note, even if you don't like Palladium mechanics I strongly, STRONGLY recommend Through the Glass Darkly as a magic splat for any sort of contemporary horror or supernatural game. The underlying theory of magic I found really compelling and next to Mage the Ascension it's the magic book I've returned to most in my gaming career.

(...)

And that? That's why I still like and buy Palladium, even if I don't run or play it much. I'll stumble across these rough diamonds in unexpected places and steal them to ornament other games or campaigns . . .

Through the Glass Darkly certainly has the most interesting treatment of magic I've seen in (my limited experience of) roleplaying games. Despite all of its problems, you can always count on Palladium for unique, in-depth, and imaginative concepts.

On 12/16/2023 at 4:17 PM, LargestFriend said:

I collected the Robotech games as a teen/young adult (in fact, I wrote many of the articles on the Robotech wiki about the lore that came from the games), but I never really played them. Always wanted to try the TMNT games a try, even if some things from them have not aged... super well.

I wonder how much of this poorly-aged material will make it into the redux version of TMNT that was recently kickstarted. While I've never gotten any sense of genuine hatred or bias from any Palladium product, even the newer books will occasionally ambush me with something that makes me say "uh-oh, you really can't say that anymore."

[Kuri_kun]

I played a lot of rifts at one time. I also remember a few games of nightbane and I remember looking at Hero's unlimited but we went with Icons instead (I dont really remember why except it was something about character creation).

The thing about palladium is all the games have fantastic settings. Full of creativity and energy and intersting ideas but as many others have said the system has its issues. Im only going to speak from a rifts perspective but the players need to agree on a power level before the game begins, this is why you have your session zero. You dont want your dragon and cosmo knight players paired up with a cyberdoc unless they all have stuff to do that has meaning. One of my favorite campaigns was taking a group of coalition soldiers into the madness of the war vs the kingdom of Tolkeen. Every character was roughly the same level of power and could easily work together. They formed plans and used each others specialties to accomplish their mission. I will never forget the EOD specailist and CS Ranger sneaking in to put fusion blocks all over an enemy ammo dump right before the power armor and samas pilots hit the engtrance of the enemy base and then when the alarms sounded the enemy combatants woke to find an angry Juicer in full combat armor backed up by a heavy combat cyborg and dogboys in their barracks. It was glorious pandemonium!

At the other end of the spectrum, theres nothing wrong with going full bore and running the most powerful RCCs and OCCs together but again you have to decide that in session zero and communicate with the GM because that might not be the kind of game they want to run. If you want to pair your dragon, your Cosmo Knight, your Promethean, and whatever else together to go take on lord Splynncyth then do it! Theres nothing saying you cant have fun with that kind of game

Much like when I played Twilight 2000 the fun of rifts for me was exploring the past. Finding ancient technology, books, recordings, etc and seeing the characters that live in this magical deadly world try and make sense of what they find and how to use it. Today we take ease of information for granted but think about it if your group finds an old generator that might as well be like striking gold in a mine for some villages.

All that said there are very few wrong ways to play rifts. The challenge is finding the right one for you and your group

Oh also Juicers are awesome, easily my personal favorite OCC

[Inash]

I've played TMNT, Heroes Unlimited, and Robotech, but all that was just slightly before Rifts came out and I never got a chance to play it.