Timewaster's Guide Archive
Games => Role-Playing Games => Topic started by: Mr_Pleasington on April 16, 2003, 05:42:22 PM
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Biased review! Biased review! ;D
A large group of my friends in undergrad started roleplaying with Rifts and absolutely loved Palladium games. I had cut my teeth on AD&D and had never been introduced to any Palladium products until I had met them.
So I hopped into their rifts game and from that and playing occasionally throughout the years I've come to two conclusions:
1) Palladium has great settings. A little cheesy at times, but anything that I disagree with can usually be easily removed. There's a lot of wiggle room and a good combination of broad descriptions mixed with good detail. I love the Rifts setting.
2) Palladium rules flat out suck. This is one of the clunkiest rule sets ever made. Combat looks like it would run great on paper, but it just takes forever...even with an experienced GM. It's sooooooooo slooooooooooooooooooow. And sure, there are a ton of character classes and combos to pick at the start, but thats pretty near the last choice you'll make as what you get when you go up in level is fairly fixed. And don't get me started on the ever increasing power levels in the supplements.There's a reason that Palladium games have a reputation of being a munchkin's dream.
The rules really need a drastic revision, but the Siembieda's are dead against it with a "if it ain't broke, don't fix it attitude. And don't even think about putting rules conversion up on the web as their rule gestappo will shut you down.
Rifts setting with BESM rules would be awesome, though.
Still, I've never even looked at the fantasy setting. I don't plan on picking it up either, but I am keeping my mind open. If someone runs a good game of it for me then I will happily tell everyone I was wrong.
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I agree on every point. Palladium was named "Best line to steal ideas from" one year, simply because their ideas are incredible and they're rules are clunky. So yeah, we're biased, but life's tough all around, isn't it?
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Well there's no such thing as a non-biased review after all.
You'll note the smiley above.
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avid Robotech gamer
sadly no longer
would they move with the times
A palladium Haiku
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I have a problem with their skill system but love the combat. I've never had any of the problems you talk about. Anyway I e-mail Fell after I submited the article and asked if it was two one sided and he posted it anyway. Anyway the Fantasy game isn't as cluttard as Rifts. There aren't, for example, skills spread across 20 book like there. I actualy think it's the best game they have.
And I'm not sure what you mean there El Jeffe. But as far as Robotech goes, fun game but wasn't selling much in the 90's and Harmony Gold wanted the same amount for the licence then as they did back when it was realy popular. Same thing with TMNT, why pay for these dead liences.
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You guys shouldn't be worried about too much subjectivity in your reviews. The review style here is actually a lot more interesting than at other places on the net. I like to hear people's anecdotes and playtest stories in a review.
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Well just about every major RPG has gone through a Major revision in the last 10 years which addresses the basic problems of the game except palladium. I loved Robotech and thought Rifts was cool before it became a munchkins dream (around book 3). Unfortunately there is a very broken aspect of Palladiums system. Combat, its really a drag running a combat with palladiums rules....
For example In Robotech you had giant robots shooting each other with huge guns in the show one shot would turn a battlepod or Veritech to shards of flying metal, unless you happen to be playing Palladiums Robotech. A missle does a whopping 4d6 damage (on a 100 or 150 mdc Veritech almost no damage at all) a gun pod does 1d6 3d6 or 1d6 X10 (at the expense of all ammo). Now whens the last time you emptied a gatling gun into a jet and it took 3 reloads to bring it down. Multiply that by the hours of tedious combat and the fact that an sdc character can be killed by 1 MDC point but even a hundred sdc points (which are supposed to = an mdc point) wont kill a tank. If you dont have mecha in Robotech killing a tank is well nigh impossible. A bazooka does 1d6 md and tanks rate at about 100 MDC.
arrrg and the Simbiada's dont think anythings broken....
Palladium RPG was ok since there were no MDC/SDC rules.
I loved TMNT and After The Bomb.
Palladium just needs a facelift.
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they're allready on thier 3rd revision in about 17 years. I personaly like the SDC rules, if used right they add a realistic element to the game. Haveing spells/weapons that bypas SDC and hurt HP make wizards realy cool. The fact that 1st and revised Palladuim RPG didn't have SDC is one reason me and my friends didn't like it.
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SDC works in their games that dont have mega damage though.
And their revisons dont seem to incorperate any major changes. To be honest They also need to hire someone else to do layout.
I like Palladium Fantasy (even if it is a little boring)
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your right about revisons not changing much, so far it's just been some minor combat rules and moslty skills. But one reason people play games is for the rules. If every few years the system changed people would get annoyed with it. Just look a D&D 3.5, it's just a skam to get more money. If it anit broke don't fix it is a good policy for games like this. How ever I wouldn't mind a new game setting that tryed new rules.
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What are your problems with MDC, exactly? It seems fairly realistic to me that you can spend all day shooting bullets at a tank without hurting it. Their combat system is weird, I'll grant you that, and their damage values are a little unbalanced (weapons don't do nearly enough damage), but that's not MDC's fault. Besides, every game in the world has damage problems--how many sword strikes does it take to kill a D&D character? If we're going for realism, one or two will be completely debilitating.
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In robotech (at least in macross) there were weapons that should do MDC, but do sdc - like Bazookas.
Plus MDC hand weapons completly invalidate the need for SDC handweapons especially with MDC armor. Lets say your wearing said suit of armor and you get hit with a blast that puts you a point over the limit. Your dead, D E A D Dead. So in rifts If I have a laser pistol that wings a guy and it does 1d6 mdc it will kill him according to the rules. MDC should only be for vehicles.
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It was MDC v SDC in one of the two Palladium games I've played in the last 4 years that ruined that particular campaign. Well, at least partially. There are a lot of specific problems with that. The system is wiggy.
And the whole idea of hit points is why I don't think it should be used for an SF or modern game. It works great for simulating an epic sword battle a la Conan. It doesn't make any sense at all in a gun battle. Which is the biggest reason why I voted for WEG SW over Palladium anything. You didn't use hit points. Because when you're hit in the head with a gun, you die.
then again, WEG SW is the ONLY sci fi game I like at all anymore. Some are much more tolerable than others (T20 Traveller for example), but so many others make me think "feh."
Spriggan has interested me in trying PFRPG though. I'll check it out.
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Id like to see a good no point oriented gun system somewhere...
like Grazed, Bruised, Fracture, Sucking Chest Wound, Vitals, Dead. Wearing Armor bumps it down one grade
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Both White Wolf and Pinnacle have systems remarkably similar to that.
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However WW errs on the side of Minor annoyance penalty to roll and not"oh my god, someone just shot me!!!"
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The Inquisitor system is similar, sort of a location-based damage level idea rather than a tally of hit points.
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Except I really dont need a hit location chart. You can die from just about any gunshot wound if you are untreated.
As a GM I just want a simple mechanic I can look at and say " you just got shot in the leg and it hurts like hell. You think your bone is broken. What are you going to do to stop the bleeding before you pass out?"
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I just think that combat should be as dangerous as it is in real life.
In Warhammer FRP I remember that characters rarely had over 4 or 5 hits before death. It made combat quick and brutal.
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The Robotech SDC/MDC situation was different the Rifts. In the Robotech universe the only MDC items they had were from the Robotech technology they found. And that stuff required so much power to generate that much damage that it wasn't untill Sentanals that they had managed to make the size/damage ratio good. It fit with the world.
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I dont think thats true- PreProtoculture stuff still had MDC (Armd Space platforms, tanks and such) and there were man portable MDC weapons back pack laser in Robotech. By Southern Cross Man Portable MDC weapons were common, but I didnt mind because in the show lots of weapons could blow up bioroids. Invid Invasion (the best Robotech book IMHO) introduced man sized mecha!!!! (Granted they were from the show) that had stats comparable to Battleroids in the first game (except the MAC II). Almost every weapon in Invid invasion did mdc except for the odd hunting rife. But since most folks always wore their battle armor (so their cyclone could transform) it was moot to have SDC.
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What, do you sleep in your armor? Do you live in it 24 hours a day? Do you never have to deal with SDC targets? I've never played Robotech, so I can't comment on it, but in Rifts it's always very useful to have SDC weapons--what happens if you get into a barfight, or a track a suspect into the Burbs? Start going crazy with MDC weapons and you'll quickly end up with dozens of collateral casualties and more than a few demolished buildings. How can you hunt for food in the wilderness if your rifle vaporizes the target?
I'm not going to argue that Palladium's combat system is without flaws, because I think it begs for house rules and modification. I've never had a problem with MDC, though.
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PreProtoculture stuff still had MDC (Armd Space platforms, tanks and such)
true but in real life does a pistol or rifle damage a tank? No the weapons that do are high explosives that in Palladium do like 1d4x100+ weapons which is 1-4 mdc. Not very much but tanks only have about that much. And if I remeber correctly all of the pre-protoculitre vheicles are listed in SDC not MDC. And the Space platforms were modified after the SDF-1 landed with new tech. But then once they get access to the alien tech the armor gets better but the weapons don't as much in the begining sence its harder to understand a how a weapon works. As for Sothern Cross. True they had hand held MDC weapons but they do sucky damage, If I remeber correctly the most damageing one did 2d4 MDC. Invid invasion happend after Sentanls while Sothern Cross happened at roughly the same time. If you compare all 4 robotech books with each other and Rifts you'll see a big damage difference. And that shows 2 things, as time progressed the Tech got better and as said in many RIFTS books: the abundance of leylines and magical energy not only affects alien creatires (makeing them MDC where as on their home world many are not) but also affects technology in a way not understood (makeing weapons deal more damage). The old rifts conversion book explained this a little better.
And as Fell said i've never had an adventure where you stay in your Mech 24/7. But I think you get that point.
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Most vehicles wern't listed in SDC, and no I dont expect a pistol to hurt a tank. But I do expect a bullet to do some damage when striking body armor, even if it is just bruising. Plus Explosives like shaped charges in Robotech were given SDC damage (untill Invid invasion).
If .50 cal bullets can bring down an A-10 in real life then why can't they bring down a veritech?
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because the alloy use in the veratechs armor was so strong and light a .50 cal wouldn't dent it. That was what made the humans scared about the aliens weapons and possible attack. So they stoped WW3 and spent 10+ years studying the new technology and only after that amount of time had figured out how to produce to same type of armor.
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Nah I dont buy it,... I watched the show the Veritech were tough but not that tough.
Hey don't worry about it, I'll never be satisfied with palladiums combat system, no big deal.
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This recent discussion reminded me that I actually RAN Robotech once...man, I had totally blocked that out. It was a terrible experience and I don't think the game emulated the show well at all. Eh.
And I'd completely forgotten about the SDC/MDC problems...
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I love the smell of validation in the middle to late afternoon. You know the smell; the warm cinnamonny smell; smells like victory! ;D
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I own the shows read the books played the game and almost spent $300 on a real tech manual for a Veratech (it was done buy real areospace and mechinal enginers and contained all the blueprints to make one) trust me when I speak Robotech. And Veratechs were tough but they allwayse fought against other MDC things so they didn't appear all that special. You don't have to beleave me if you don't want to but it is how the game and story was explained.
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But it still doesnt explain how the gunpod (which is essentially a gatling cannon (according to the blueprints, reference materials and other stuff) can tear into battlepods like hot butter and an 50 cal anti-aircraft gun (essentially built the same way) cant touch a Veritech.
Trust me Im a Protoculture Addict, loved the show and everything about it and I still have to disagree with you on the MDC/SDC issue.
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That was never realy explained in any place that I can think of off the top of my head. Except for rail guns we have no real technology that could explain that. The gun pods could be a type of rail gun, RIFTS has several like it. Back when the TV show was made Rail guns were realy uncommon. If I have time I'll check Macross Plus, they mention some things on the gun pods there (I think). It's just a story and one that's 20 years old at that a lot of things weren't explained, but that dosen't mean that one or two streaches of reality make the rules that hard to comprehend. Heck 90% of things in all RPGs are just as much of a streach.
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The Japanese Sources point toward depleated uranium slugs,... but if your using them on the enemy then you'd also have to use them on a veritech.
Robotech had no "rail guns" per se.
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ok this kills your .50 cal comparson. Have you seen the size of those shells? .50 cal aren't even 1/100th the size of them. It would be like shooting someone with a freaking Bee-Bee gun.
Also I do suspect they are a type of rail gun, but not in the sci-fi/rifts way. More like the US navy uses now. In the barrel are magnets that speed up the bullet even more (gun power is still used), the bullet is not projected sololy on magnets.
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I love the smell of flame wars in the...oh never mind.
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The sheep have brought trouble...
Seems that Maryann and Kevin Siembieda are bound for divorce. It's on the Palladium forums which seem to be down currently.
Whatever I think of Palladium, this certainly is bad news. I hope they can work through it as amicably as possible.
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OK, tell me it gets better.
I'm about 50 pages into Palladium Fantasy, so far, I have a few complaints. To wit, what is UP with the organization? Why aren't all my character generation rules in one place? Seems like they're scattered throughout the 336 pages of the book. You get your abilities right up front, and a basic process. Then alignment, then a chapter on how to roleplay? then the combat, THEN OCCs, Races and xp progression tables are at the back? What?
Also, yeah, why are there three pages on alignment when alignment appears to have absolutely no game function whatsover? Shouldn't there just be a chapter on "developing your character's personality" or something?
Finally, in the combat chapter, is the best organization he could think of to put it in alpha order of terms? It kinda jumps all over.
That is all my whine
However, I would like clarification of the "Death Blow" rules. Does it mean you can chose to make any roll of natural 19 or 20 a death blow by surrendering your next combat action? Or do you have to specifically say you're going for a death blow before you roll to hit?
Oh, and another explanation? What is the rule procedure for dodge. All the book explicitly states is that it takes a combat action to dodge. I assume it's a roll against the opponents attack roll. Any bonuses on that? and can you use it if you failed to parry?
Incidentally, now that I understand SDC, I'm not as against it. I like it better than the 5 wound levels in LOTR. However, is there also a "megadamage" or something like that? Probably that doesn't apply to Fantasy, but could I get that explained?
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dodge can only be used if you give up one of your attacks per melee, unless you have auto dodge. There are bonuses, your PP bonus and any you get from skills/magic. And you cannot use it if you miss your parry, you have to decide which one to use. The reason for dodge are there are certain attacks that cannot be parried, (mostly magical).
As for death blow if i remeber correctly you have to declare it before your roll and it you forfit your next attack. There's no MDC in PFRPG but Fell can expain that better then me.
Alignment has the same use as in D&D there are spells that affect certian ones as well as magic items and such.
The lay out dosen't bother me that much, they give you in the beginning what you need to do then they lay things out after that. I think its a lot better then say D&D or decipher where you are jumping back and fourth. But you are right about the lack of character development and the short combat section. The best book to have that explaines combat is Ninja's and superspies. I don't know why but they have a large section on combat in that book.
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So to strike a death blow you dedicate TWO attacks to the attempt, and then have a 10% chance of succeeding. Sounds hard to do a lot of damage (not a bad thing, just making sure I have it in perspective).
I guess my problem with the organization is that everything for character generation is all over the place. I've been told I get skill bonuses, but I don't know how to even really choose skills. And they aren't all right next to each other. I guess skills and OCCs are right next to each other, and THAT'S appropriate, but races are at the end. So you have attributes, then 40 pages of material, then skills and OCCs, then your magic chapter, and finally races. Player races need to be next to OCCs, because that's how most people define a character. If you have to give a 2 word description, you say "Elven Ranger," or "Human Wizard." Because not only does that give the idea, it does the most for defining your capabilities and persona. Anyway, just a beef about organization. Not system. I guess maybe I'm lonely in thinking that Wizards got it right by placing all of the generation material together, then magic and equipment later.
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I don't like Wizards' page by page layout, but their section-section organization is ver good. Decipher's, on the other hand, is abysmal.
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I like wizards character creation layout but their combat and magic section needs to be reworked.
And as for skills in Palladium, ya they can be confusing to know which ones to take. about 50% of them are never used unless your GM wants to. But takeing Physical skills is allwayse a good bet.
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The one thing that I really hate about wizards is their combat section. Better organized than alphabetically, but a lot of it isn't clear. Attacks of opportunity being one of the biggest criminals. That's STILL not clear, and there are problems with it even when you DO understand it. I mean, these are the guys who do M:tG, you'd think they'd know how to carefully word things. <sigh>.
The biggest criminal of any organizational approach at all has to be Steve Jackson though. What is UP with that guy? The sidebars in every GURPS book contain material sort of related to the material, but in a completely different strain. You have to read the book twice. Or else keep interrupting. Plus he has the WORST problems detailing rules. nothing is clear in GURPS. Though it's a fun generic system. I think I don't like points based systems as a whole though.
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I think the "poorly explained rules epidemic" is the main reason I tend to avoid rules when roleplaying. Saint keeps sending me my character sheet for AORP, and I keep ignoring it. I figure that as long as I play in character, and have a good idea of what I can and can't do, I'll tell a good story and have a good time.
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we'll I guess you could say it's an art to explain something as complex as an RPG to other people in a book when you are the one that created it and understand everything. Almost like you can tell the authors thought process by how they lay out the book. But if we're ripping on bad layout remember Riddle of Steel?
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I think I'm going to try and make a living as a consultant for RPG companies: I'll make their rules clear and well organized.
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Hey don't forget me buddy, we're a team.
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RANT WARNING
So I have been flipping through Heroes Unlimited and I’m appalled at the publishing quality. I have nothing against it being soft perfect bound or b/w interior, it’s the poor layout design and art direction.
First of all you know you are in trouble when the writer and the art director are the same person. So I quickly noticed that apparently they only know how to use Arial. Course once I did find a different font I quickly began to wish they hadn’t found out how to change the font. Apparently they get all their fonts from fan-boy web sites. Not to mention they must get only a few characters with each font, which explain the patchwork effect they have throughout the book. There is no consistency and they show no confidence or understanding in their font selections.
Another thing, kerning is good. Course I would settle for just some plain traking as there are enough rivers to let the entire state of Texas go rafting. Perhaps the rivers are just to make up for the lack of a bottom margin and the incredibly small gutters.
I also wonder how some sections get splashes and others don’t. I guess the sections without splashes we are just supposed to ignore. And they could save some money by not repeating the same illustrations over and over again. Or better yet the could use that space for margins and gutters.
Finally, would it kill them to make an index. Apparently the risk of adding an extra sig is more important than providing an easy to use format and clear information.
END OF RANT
You may disagree with me if you have a BFA in art from an accredited institution of higher learning; or you are an award winning, acknowledge graphic designer; or you are more bitter than me (which you are not).
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Palladium books were cutting edge when no one owned a PC with a decent publishing suite.
Now their just kind of jagged.
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I'm not going to disagree. After all, these are all things I noticed. Basically, a monkey could print a Palladium book. But I also think Siembieda could use a good editor (besides someone who's been playing Palladium for 20 years) to just read it and say "This rule here is not easy to understand)"
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I'll grant that the art direction is poor, but I prefer small margins and more text to the WotC tradition of insanely large margins and pointless graphics. Palladium books are blunt and functional, which (combined with the soft bound cover) gives you more content for your money.
I would also argue that the layout of a book doesn't really fall in the realm of fine art, so my degree in editing allows me to disagree with your BFA on this issue. I really don't disagree, though, I just wanted to point out that I could.
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Ok, WOTC books *look* good, but if you don't like the readability, that can still be a problem. On the other hand, Palladium books *look* terrible. Yet I'm still charged as much for a soft cover Palladium book as I am for a D&D core book, which has more care and work put into it. Really, if Palladium is going to go for just information overload and skip any frills, I'd rather they send me a .txt file and let me print it on my laser printer. They can charge 5 bucks because that's how much work went into it. Don't charge me $25 for a b/w book that you spent minimal effort designing.
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The new HU that we're using in our game is 352 pages long. I'd like to see WotC sell a book that size for under 40 dollars, let alone the 25 that Palladium charges.
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Frankly, it wouldn't be difficult if they didn't put any effort into design, printed in black and white on that rough paper, and didn't pay artists to do anything, and then failed to also copy edit the material.
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That's my point. Why should I have to pay for a graphic designer and some nice paper and a hardbound cover when the simple stuff is just as functional?
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Then you missed my point. A) with D&D core books, you don't pay more. The rules ARE clearer (with exceptions like Attacks of Opportunity) AND you get a better looking book, one that you can keep and show.
B) I don't think that Palladium books are as functional. There's no index, There isn't a good order, and it's hard to read quite a bit of it. I think this is a major reason why I didn't get into Palladium as a teenager. I *really* liked TMNT, I wanted to play it, but I couldn't figure it out. And THAT one had better design. The art was pretty cool.
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Because pure functionality doesn't sell. People like to have options and in general people like to have all the bangs and whistles. If you doubt, you can go to the WotC company info and the Palladium company info to compare. In 3 months, WotC will typically sell 100,000 copies of a new RPG book belonging to a popular product line. In 3 months, Palladium will typically sell 10,000 copies of a new RPG book belonging to a popular product line.
Also, the new core books have been promised to retail at around $20 they are hard-bound, full color and 320 pages. The key is that if you produce a superior product you gain a larger support base and therefor can offer your product at a reduced price thus increasing your demand. If Palladium spent more time on producing a quality product visually, they would likely sell more and then more people would play Palladium games. Just having all the information there isn't good enough for most people.
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It seems Fell and Ehlers have different views on functional. I tend to agree with Eric that Organization is key to functionality, a good index and TOC can save hours of flipping back and forth. Art like it or not can break a game, and Palladiums art is often sub-par. 42 is also right I don't want functional. Give me a choice between a high production value rpg book and something written on college ruled paper and I'll select the high production value every time. (I might regret it later but I'd buy it)
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Okay: I admit that I'm a Palladium fanboy, and I admit that I've been playing their games since Junior High (thus granting me an innate ability to understand their organization). That said, I find them to be the clearest RPG books to understand, even without an index. D&D confuses the crap out of me, and Decipher's new books (despite their high production values) are a jumble of weird information in the wrong places. I've never read an RPG that, in my opinion, explained the process of character creation so clearly.
I realize you don't agree with me, but that's tough. It's not like I'm forcing you to.
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I got rolling up a character pretty quick, but there's a lot of mechanics that are mindbogglingly bad.
The combat section of PFRPG doesn't explain dogding or entangling clearly, for example. Somewhere in there they talk about an attack that knocks people down. However, I couldn't find where the effects of being knocked down were. Anywhere. So I pressed on. I happened across that in the middle of a skill description somewhere.
I had the same sort of problem with TMNT. They had you roll for the education level you had, but never described any game effects (and I can imagine that impacting what sorts of skills you have, it's not like birthorder where it's purely a background thing). There are other things like that throughout both books. And this is "clear?"
It's not like an index is hard to generate. You could even do it by hand in the course of a week. Writing your document in MS Word and then having it generate an index for you automatically only takes a few moments. It won't be the BEST index in the world, but it's better than nothing.
D&D and Decipher, on the other hand, have indices (though Decipher's ToCs suck terrible terrible eggs). Every effect of a combat maneuver is described in the combat sections. One read through of both their core books left we with an understanding of the system. I didn't have to ask anyone.
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I've been thinking about this, and I believe I've identified the problem: I learned the Palladium system so long ago that I just don't remember these problems. As you describe your experience I can think back and say, "yeah, I remember being confused by that," but I found where all of that info was hiding 13 years ago so I don't remember having to look for it. Really, it's been at least ten years since I bothered reading the mechanics section of a Palladium book.
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Yeah, that can be a problem. When I was younger I couldn't believe people didn't understand D&D (but I look at it and I think, why the heck did they do THAT?!). It's like my new friend at the game store says. Gary Gygax did something that got roleplaying out there. Then everyone else made it better.
Well, not EVERYONE else (looks askance at WW). But you get the picture.
I'm really liking Palladium's actual SYSTEM better (I don't know that it will ever be my favorite, but it's certainly not comparable to a prickle in my butt anymore). And I'm seriously wondering if I should try approaching them and saying "Let me revise your books." Maybe it's a bad time, have they just come out with a new edition? But maybe something could be worked out.
And like I said, Palladium isn't the only bad organizer out there. Steve Jackson possibly needs it even worse.
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Aside from Gary Gygax, Kevin Siembieda is possibly the most well-known personality in RPG publishing...and the things he's most well-known for are control issues and unbending adoration of his own system. As 42 pointed out, he's the art director on most projects because everything has to be "his way." You never know, though. If you're serious about it, I'd say your best bet is to take an existing core book and completely re-edit yourself, and then take them the finished product. He'll probably still laugh in your face, but at least he'll see what a good design job can do to improve things.
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Yeah, I've heard that about him. I'm not sure I want to completely re-work his book with no compensation.
Then again, the other criminal is Steve Jackson, and he's not exactly sane when it comes to this sort of thing either. <sigh>
Now we're back to making my OWN game....
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Maybe this is rude but...Palladium deserves someone better than Kevin Siembieda. I think the Palladium world has grown beyond his initial vision to include those of its devoted fans. I think that Palladium could use some new business people and skills to allow it to expand into what it could be.
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There was a great thread on the rpg.net forums a while back about this very thing...
http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?s=818c9b92d50181303139a9f9c78cb33f&threadid=35956&highlight=Palladium
It's long, but has some good points.
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Palladium deserves much better marketing and management, I agree, but the reason it's so good is Siembieda himself--he writes 90% of their stuff and is a legitimate creative whiz. I think the main problem right now is that the company is stable as-is, and Siembieda is afraid to rock the boat with any major changes. I don't see how to keep him doing what he does while giving the directorial reins to someone else.
One possible solution is the upcoming Rifts movie (which hasn't been announced officially, but hinted at vigorously). If they get as big of a surge in popularity as they're expecting, they could easly afford to hire some property managers (and Siembieda could be more easily persuaded to hire some). Their could be tie-in video games, action figures, happy meals, etc., plus the book quality could improve immeasurably.
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Happy Meals, heh.
I don't think they need a better GAME designer than Kevin. They do, as I think we all recognize, need a better BOOK designer and EDITOR. He has good concepts. He doesn't describe them well.
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Ok, I gotta question
I'm not sure I like PFRPG enough to run it often. So the question is (besides the insufferable need he has to use "deevil" instead of "devil"), do I take back Monsters and Animals? I mean, how necessary is it? I'd feel much more comfortable making this decision if I knew the format that the book uses for entries. Then I'd know how easily I could make it up. The related questions is whether it's more worth it to have Monsters and Animals or to have Dragons and Gods. I like dragons. I'd love to have lots of dragons. Where can I see an example of how different dragons are from your average run of the mill monster? Is there anyway I can see a dragon listing and also see a "normal" monster listing? Someone got a scanned page they can show me?
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dragons and gods is crap it's only got 40 pages on dragons. how monsters are listed are esacly the same as in the back of the palladium FRPG book 1. How powerful are dragons? Varies, true dragons are rare and powerful so most GM's don't use them becasue a player has no chance against them.
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Ok, This is definitely helpful. But I have a follow-up question. D&D has a standard sort of powers that dragons have. Is there something analogous in Palladium? Or do they just have really high stats?
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um they're a mix of the two. But Palladium Dragons get a lot of powers from haveing magic classes as well. I'll get out my dragons and gods and try to post some of the things you'd want to know.
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Cool, I'd appreciate that. I'm thinking that I can make most of this up, and that I'll be exchanging M&A for something else. I dunno. I think I have rule books for every game I want now, since I traded in a slough of Forgotten Realms books for lots of other stuff.