The game mechanics of Palladium anything blow chunks, and I don't think the writing is all that detailed. Plus, too much of it is repeated or outright photocopied from previous books (lazy writing), horrible release schedule, shoddy writing etc. Can't stand the system anymore. There's a reason why Rifts is the game nobody ever actually plays, but reads for possible adventure ideas. Like most movies, there's an occasional gem of an idea, but the execution sucks rocks.
I played several palladium books games for years.
Palladium fantasy, rifts and beyond the supernatural (contemporary mystery/horror RPG). The latter was one of the best in my book but they never did more than one adventure book as far as I know. But that one was great. It included a newspaper with some fluff articles and reports or news for each of the adventures it contained.The only problem I ever had with rifts was the difficulty in finding a common power level for the whole party.
If all your players want a playful non-challenging adventure, give it to them, and count yourself lucky that you don't have a group where all the players want different things.
CR 3 undead do temporary negative levels; Lesser Restoration handles those.
Nope. You need Restoration and 100gp of diamond dust.
Storytelling isn't in the system, it's in the setting and the GM. I will say that the more complicated a rules system gets, the more it tends to get in the way of storytelling.
Basically, if someone can demonstrably prove that a new system is better than the ones I have, I may just switch. 4e was a definite downgrade, as it meant that you have fewer storytelling options.
Different games tend to encourage different styles of DMing. Some games do certain aspects better than others, but are worse at other aspects.
For example, the White Wolf stuff tends to do social and investigative games well, but sucks rocks at large scale or realistic combat. Pathfinder tends to do social interaction okay, but blandly, while combat is well thought out.
point out that if they blow feats on upping their poor saves, they won't have problems like this.This isn't even close to true. Most of the time I'm missing saves it's by a lot more than the two points a feat would have added. Having the feat means almost nothing, yet you've phrased it as a certainty for success here.
It's all about playing the odds, where dice mechanics are concerned. An additional +2 is approximately 10% in your favor, and is better than nothing. Getting a reroll, as in the situations you cite, is worth it in the long run.
I make characters to *last* through whatever Hell the DM puts us through. They are versatile, and durable, and I tend to be a whirlwind of activity no matter which type of character I create.
The game mechanics of Palladium anything blow chunks, and I don't think the writing is all that detailed. Plus, too much of it is repeated or outright photocopied from previous books (lazy writing), horrible release schedule, shoddy writing etc. Can't stand the system anymore. There's a reason why Rifts is the game nobody ever actually plays, but reads for possible adventure ideas. Like most movies, there's an occasional gem of an idea, but the execution sucks rocks.I played several palladium books games for years.
Palladium fantasy, rifts and beyond the supernatural (contemporary mystery/horror RPG). The latter was one of the best in my book but they never did more than one adventure book as far as I know. But that one was great. It included a newspaper with some fluff articles and reports or news for each of the adventures it contained.The only problem I ever had with rifts was the difficulty in finding a common power level for the whole party.
I can cite chapter and verse, if necessary. I am willing to bet almost every game you've played Palladium anything is massively house ruled, and published rules are selectively enforced, while published adventures/settings are massively modified.
Funny how people refer to palladium as the system you'll never play... Of the three games I've ran for my current table, two were palladium, and there's at least one member of the table that seem to show up much more often when i'm running those. Our table is getting ready to fire off a Phase World campaign as we speak.
One of the things I like about heroes unlimited and ninjas and superspies and rifts is that unless you're playing a caster or a psionic, with those versions of the palladium material, you pretty much get all of your capability up front, instead of having to grind through the typical 'level 1, level 2, level 3, bs... I mean sure, there are levels in palladium systems, but instead of starting with nothing and slowly giving you new abilities, your abilities insteaed improve over time, but you've pretty much got your whole arsenal right from the get go. I wont say it 'forces' but it definitely lends itself to the idea that the 'growth' your characters have to go through should be more narrative growth than 'stat' growth.
If there's anything I dont much care for in games its spending all those levels being just a tiny pile of hit points with something sharp to swing around.
Our warhammer gm's favorite thing about warhammer is he loves the 'grim and perilous' better than high fantasy. I'm like hey. You want grim and perilous, play palladium's Dead Reign without any houserules. Any zombie who isnt alread eating you is calling every zombie in a mile radius to the dinner table, there are fast zombies who never get tired, and you dont have much option to be sneaky because the zombies arent just 'vaguely searching for a 'lively person running around. They see your life force like a giant vegas neon sign. It is very easy to have a horde on you inside of 2 minutes. I will grant you that of everything that palladium has published, Dead Reign is the *worst* written and organized thing they've ever done, but its a kick in the pants all the same.
Hate to say it, but unless 5e is awesome, 2e adnd will always be my #1 and heroes/ninja/rifts will be my 2, with pathfinder rolling in a 3. The only reason I got into pathfinder at all is because it happesn to be what the table was playing when I joined. I try not to dog on pathfinder too much but it'll always feel more like 'a set of houserules with a publishing budget' than a 'system' to me... That's just me though.
I can cite chapter and verse, if necessary. I am willing to bet almost every game you've played Palladium anything is massively house ruled, and published rules are selectively enforced, while published adventures/settings are massively modified.The game mechanics of Palladium anything blow chunks, and I don't think the writing is all that detailed. Plus, too much of it is repeated or outright photocopied from previous books (lazy writing), horrible release schedule, shoddy writing etc. Can't stand the system anymore. There's a reason why Rifts is the game nobody ever actually plays, but reads for possible adventure ideas. Like most movies, there's an occasional gem of an idea, but the execution sucks rocks.I played several palladium books games for years.
Palladium fantasy, rifts and beyond the supernatural (contemporary mystery/horror RPG). The latter was one of the best in my book but they never did more than one adventure book as far as I know. But that one was great. It included a newspaper with some fluff articles and reports or news for each of the adventures it contained.The only problem I ever had with rifts was the difficulty in finding a common power level for the whole party.
Palladium's Macross II and Robotech ran just fine in high school, no house rules. Excellent GM, players who were focused on the experience.
Afterwards, we had a laugh about some of the oddities about the rules (magic number 4 means a missile volley can't be dodged), but these things never interfered with the game for us.
Rifts went by harder because I was running it and made all kinds of newb GM mistakes (drowning players in options, no approximate basis for party challenge, prepared for all the wrong things).
In the modern day, it's inelegant compared to newer systems. All of its more innovative concepts having been taken and done better in games more focused on a particular genre, and modern gamers are hyper-vigilant to things like relative character power (over character contribution) or their own perception of realism (over game functionality). However, my experience of playing Palladium in the beginning 3.0 D&D era is that it is functional. It doesn't really break through normal play; it will easily show its age and clunkiness if somebody wants to break it.
I still enjoy the dickens out of it for the art and the unique feel that all of the crazy thematic elements Rifts mashed together created. Rifts Earth was all kinds of crazy science fantasy comic book fun, and I haven't found a system that could duplicate that same feeling without getting bogged down in some other kind of minutia.
Ninja'd: Vincent Takeda hit upon another thing. You don't really wait around for your concept at all: you do things from the get-go. You do still improve, but you aren't slowly growing into what you really wanted to become, you are running and gunning towards your goals right away, putting the emphasis on doing things in the game world rather than banging around figuring out how to advance your character to the point where you feel confident enough to start doing what you want to accomplish.
Essentially, you don't have to earn your character, just your rewards.
A couple of points...
1) I find it kinda ironic. The reason undead have energy drain in D&D is so players will fear them as their characters should. Though a few corrections...Energy Drain was always removable in any edition of the game...the rules for energy drain though was wriotten very badly and very complicated. Removing was the same. You pretty much regained the level you just lost rerolling HPs, etc. It is was a mess.
2)Off topic: Palladium is not as a bad of a system as people make it out to be. Thje rule need work...but name a system that you don't need houserules? As to the balance of power level of Rifts...the game oddly is at it's best when it is not just about combat. Also Rifts the campaign setting is probably the best gener bending world out there.
Anyway my suggestion to the OP is talk with your players. See if you can resolve the differences in play style...if not you may have to find new players.
I can cite chapter and verse, if necessary. I am willing to bet almost every game you've played Palladium anything is massively house ruled, and published rules are selectively enforced, while published adventures/settings are massively modified.
I GMed the boxed nightmares adventures for Beyond the supernatural twice each and while it's been some years since and I could have forgotten something as far as I remember I ran everything according to the rules.
But back to topic:
I think a player should be grateful that the GM does the work to run the adventure, to cope with the players and all that stuff. But for me the most important part of RPG the the G for game and games should be fun so every player has the right to be allowed to have fun.
And therefore every GM should listen to his players and try to find a middle ground between his own ideas and his players' ideas.
Sure, in the end the gm makes the rules and the player decides if he wants to play under those rules.
I, myself don't like being the GM but my players have fun and so now and than they can talk me into doing it. If only because I hope that someone else will take over again after the adventure.
But as much as I prefer to play over GMing, there are guys who I will not play under again because it wasn't fun for me and he didn't change anything when I told him that it's not fun for me.
I even know that it is not on purpose that he did so because I'm fairly sure he just didn't understand what was my problem but that'S ok. As long as the rest has fun, who am I to change it. I just step back and join again when/if someone else takes up the GM job.
Funny how people refer to palladium as the system you'll never play... Of the three games I've ran for my current table, two were palladium, and there's at least one member of the table that seem to show up much more often when i'm running those. Our table is getting ready to fire off a Phase World campaign as we speak.
One of the things I like about heroes unlimited and ninjas and superspies and rifts is that unless you're playing a caster or a psionic, with those versions of the palladium material, you pretty much get all of your capability up front, instead of having to grind through the typical 'level 1, level 2, level 3, bs... I mean sure, there are levels in palladium systems, but instead of starting with nothing and slowly giving you new abilities, your abilities insteaed improve over time, but you've pretty much got your whole arsenal right from the get go. I wont say it 'forces' but it definitely lends itself to the idea that the 'growth' your characters have to go through should be more narrative growth than 'stat' growth.
If there's anything I dont much care for in games its spending all those levels being just a tiny pile of hit points with something sharp to swing around.
Those are precisely why I don't like Palladium anything. No amount of attributes, experience levels, nothing adds onto your oomph like the toys do. I could be a 5th level specialist in sniping, but some twit with a better gun than I have will clean my clock even at level 1 versus me at 5. And forget about being able to adapt to the setting's changing environment: Your characters is on a railroad, with no flexibility or responsiveness to anything. Worse, xp is so poorly defined and has such low values per reward that its no longer even entertaining anymore.
Want a nicer narrative, aka social environment? Tough. Palladium HATES social interaction with a passion. Look at the attributes and skills. They do jack. Want to buy your sweetie a rose or a fancy dress? Tough. Noplace to buy them, and you wouldn't know what prices they'd be. Wanna find out where you get ammo or replacement armor? Nothing on availability nor location. Maps are nearly nonexistent, and the ones you DO have a vague to the point of uselessness.
Want me to continue? Ish. Just ish.
They have this philosophy of: 'If the danger seems scary, I'm not interested in doing it', 'we also want the ability to recover relics and have entire countries revere us (one of the players told me an example about wanting to go through ruins to retrieve an ancient elven sword so that all elves will always revere them.....at level 2)' and the ability to just ignore most/any quest that comes their way that seems hard/complicated/scary.
Exactly. Whiny little kids. Earn your chops, people.
Anyway, check this url out. http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/Rifts
Don't forget that they also committed the the cardinal sin of using the term "status effects" when everyone knows the proper term is "conditions".
The horror. The horror.
When I play Chutes and Ladders, I ignore the chutes. Makes the game too hard, having to go through all those squares again.I get the feeling that a lot of the "player entitlement is ruining my elfgames" crowd unironically believes that the chutes actually add difficulty.
Thank you yes. Chutes add tedium, not difficulty.
Someone posted earlier in the topic that PC failure makes for a better story. They used stronger language, but this is the gist of it.
Consider two scenarios of "PC Failure":
1: The PCs fail to stop the BBEG's plan, and his doomsday weapon turns a town into a crater. Maybe it was a town they had friends in.
2: The PC takes negative levels, is robbed while he's sleeping, etc.
Guess which failure is more fun for the PCs? Which is better for a story?
Now let's say that the PCs had killed some monster for that town and they didn't collect the reward on it before the villain blew the town up. That I'd be fine with too, but messing with what I have is unfun.
|
Ummm.....so I had two players who clued me in on what the party leans towards in DnD/PF, they lean towards sandbox gameplay. Now I don't mean sandbox as in one region, no, I mean sandbox as in the entire world. What makes this harder is that I was planning on a multiverse spanning campaign, this will be further complicated when they get the ability to travel through different planes.
They have this philosophy of: 'If the danger seems scary, I'm not interested in doing it', 'we also want the ability to recover relics and have entire countries revere us (one of the players told me an example about wanting to go through ruins to retrieve an ancient elven sword so that all elves will always revere them.....at level 2)' and the ability to just ignore most/any quest that comes their way that seems hard/complicated/scary.
Have you considered just running a high-level game for your players? That is what they really want. You will be less frustrated, and they will have more fun. Consider adding in the Mythic rules (I think you can still download the play test document).
Run a game starting at level 10 or 12 or 15.
You can just run it as a side game, taking a short break from your regular game.
Alternatively, pick up The Red Hand of Doom. It runs levels 5 to 10. It starts out like a normal adventure, but devolves quickly into "Oh $#*%!" They will be much too busy being epic heroes to think about running away. And if they do run, thousands of people die.
Funny how people refer to palladium as the system you'll never play... .I generally refer to it as the system created by the guy who sues at the drop of a hat.
Wanna know something even funnier? I am an amateur at rpgs, in comparison to Siembieda. Yet, according to 50+ Robotech rpg fans, I actually wrote a better game than his entire bloody company did. Used d20 Modern and Future. So far, there has been only 2 complaints that I haven't yet addressed: I made the Invid too potent, because I assumed all the hive brains could do what the Regess could, and I added in bits to the gameworld to explain where all the supplies on Earth for resistance fighters were coming from (wasn't explained in the series, so not canon).
Funny how people refer to palladium as the system you'll never play... Of the three games I've ran for my current table, two were palladium, and there's at least one member of the table that seem to show up much more often when i'm running those. Our table is getting ready to fire off a Phase World campaign as we speak.
One of the things I like about heroes unlimited and ninjas and superspies and rifts is that unless you're playing a caster or a psionic, with those versions of the palladium material, you pretty much get all of your capability up front, instead of having to grind through the typical 'level 1, level 2, level 3, bs... I mean sure, there are levels in palladium systems, but instead of starting with nothing and slowly giving you new abilities, your abilities insteaed improve over time, but you've pretty much got your whole arsenal right from the get go. I wont say it 'forces' but it definitely lends itself to the idea that the 'growth' your characters have to go through should be more narrative growth than 'stat' growth.
If there's anything I dont much care for in games its spending all those levels being just a tiny pile of hit points with something sharp to swing around.
Those are precisely why I don't like Palladium anything. No amount of attributes, experience levels, nothing adds onto your oomph like the toys do. I could be a 5th level specialist in sniping, but some twit with a better gun than I have will clean my clock even at level 1 versus me at 5. And forget about being able to adapt to the setting's changing environment: Your characters is on a railroad, with no flexibility or responsiveness to anything. Worse, xp is so poorly defined and has such low values per reward that its no longer even entertaining anymore.
Want a nicer narrative, aka social environment? Tough. Palladium HATES social interaction with a passion. Look at the attributes and skills. They do jack. Want to buy your sweetie a rose or a fancy dress? Tough. Noplace to buy...
Heheheh. Well, you might be better than siembieda at writing games but if you have a hard time buying flowers in rifts, and you think the system doesnt care about the social aspect simply because it doesnt allow dice roll rules to dictate the outcomes of those social aspects, or that you're being railroaded, then for one I'd unapologetically say your gm was crap and for two I see why you and palladium dont get along so well.
I'd even venture to say that any gamer worth their salt knows that the 'feeling of the campaign being on rails' is always the gms fault and not the system's... I'm kinda hard pressed to think of a way that the 'system' could be inherently railroady. Especially a system that is so open to every genre/trope. How did someone say it above... Genre neutral? It is inherently vastly unrailroady and I'd say it would take some great effort on a gm's part to wrangle a rifts campaign into a hallway with only one door.
This is a system where not only can a 40 foot tall german battlemech fight vampires alongside a hyperintelligent mutant penguin, but if the mutant penguin took mechanolink theres every possibility that the 40 foot tall german battlemech is being PILOTED by the penguin. If you call that being 'on rails' then I'd stop complaining about it because them rails are taking you some pretty funky places. It's still not real rails though.
The xp system was written entirely for the social aspect of 'lets see if the characters will bother to do something imaginative, interesting, or dare we say valiant and heroic at great personal cost instead of just being a bunch of dull-witted zergrushing murderhobos all the time, so I'm not sure where you're coming from unless you never did anything at great personal cost because that's where the big xp bonuses are... You get experience points for using skills! You get experience points for having clever ideas even if they're useless/futile ideas! I could practically gain a whole level on nothing but having clever futile ideas.
Oh and speaking of skills? Every single character build gets 24 skills minimum. I'm pretty sure a pathfinder character with 24 skills practically knows every single skill you can have in the entire system.
But hey. YMMV.
Like I said, we're getting ready to start a Phase world campaign soon so I tell ya what i'm gonna do. I'm gonna make sure that there are flower shops in every heavily populated area... The name of that pan-galactic pan-dimensional flowershop franchise is going to be Piccolos. And if someone buys a flower I'm going to give them experience points for a clever useful idea by proving it can be done. And if they give that flower to my despondent mutant penguin mechpilot i'm going to give them *more* experience for commiting an act of generosity/kindness (its in the rules, look it up) (social xp!) Hows that?
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/TabletopGame/Rifts?from=Main.Rifts
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/TabletopGame/Pathfinder?from=Main.Pat hfinder
My biggest problems with Palladium is....
One Stat to Rule Them All. Physical Prowess is the god stat of all combats. It affects every attack and every block/dodge attempt. No other stat (and I doubt any other 3 stats combined) has as much influence in this area.
Depending on what you play PS can be very valuable in melee, too.
And for psionics/magic the mental stats are more important.In PF you use Strength for to hit and damage in melee, for CMB and CMD. That's very similar in importance to PP in Palladium.
But I don't want to say Palladium is better than PF. It is just different and I like it to much to agree with someone saying it is a bad system.
At least it is one of the systems that I would play or GM again. Something I can't say about AD&D.
I'd even venture to say that any gamer worth their salt knows that the 'feeling of the campaign being on rails' is always the gms fault and not the system's... I'm kinda hard pressed to think of a way that the 'system' could be inherently railroady. Especially a system that is so open to every genre/trope. How did someone say it above... Genre neutral? It is inherently vastly unrailroady and I'd say it would take some great effort on a gm's part to wrangle a rifts campaign into a hallway with only one door.
This is a system where not only can a 40 foot tall german battlemech fight vampires alongside a hyperintelligent mutant penguin, but if the mutant penguin took mechanolink theres every possibility that the 40 foot tall german battlemech is being PILOTED by the penguin. If you call that being 'on rails' then I'd stop complaining about it because them rails are taking you some pretty funky places. It's still not real rails though.
The xp system was written entirely for the social aspect of 'lets see if the characters will bother to do something imaginative, interesting, or dare we say valiant and heroic at great personal cost instead of just being a bunch of dull-witted zergrushing murderhobos all the time, so I'm not sure where you're coming from unless you never did anything at great personal cost because that's where the big xp bonuses are... You get experience points for using skills! You get experience points for having clever ideas even if they're useless/futile ideas! I could practically gain a whole level on nothing but having clever futile ideas.
Oh and speaking of skills? Every single character build gets 24 skills minimum. I'm pretty sure a pathfinder character with 24 skills practically knows every single skill you can have in the entire system.
But hey. YMMV.
Like I said, we're getting ready to start a Phase world campaign soon so I tell ya what i'm gonna do. I'm gonna make sure that there are flower shops in every heavily populated area... The name of that pan-galactic pan-dimensional flowershop franchise is going to be Piccolos. And if someone buys a flower I'm going to give them experience points for a clever useful idea by proving it can be done. And if they give that flower to my despondent mutant penguin mechpilot i'm going to give them *more* experience for commiting an act of generosity/kindness (its in the rules, look it up) (social xp!) Hows that?
Sigh. It's deeper than that. I spent 6 months straight inside that game system, trying to make it more socially and mechanically xp level responsive, trying to add in actual range concepts beyond zilch (ooh, a measly 100 mile targeting system! Get serious.), you name it. Every time I'd fix a mechanical problem, or even create maps where there were none, or add in pay scales that meant something, or tried to actually factor in politics and resources, yet another PAIR of problems surfaced. Eventually I abandoned the system entirely, because I was through spending night after night noticing that NOTHING in Robotech even remotely resembled the actual series.
I have also played Rifts without rules changes, and had gotten massive migraines. Try playing in an 7 man team, and playing a scientist, when everyone and their monkey's uncle has 8-9 actions per round in combat, and finding out that xp means bull, so getting any for using your skills is a drop in the proverbial ocean. That's right, it was the typical "lets blow up everyone who gets in our way because we have lots of big guns and such" because most of their stupid horribly written material focuses on nothing but the bang(hack n slash), and NOTHING about actually roleplaying.
I have played countless game systems, countless settings, and none compare in sheer ineptitude as Palladium anything.
My biggest problems with Palladium is....
One Stat to Rule Them All. Physical Prowess is the god stat of all combats. It affects every attack and every block/dodge attempt. No other stat (and I doubt any other 3 stats combined) has as much influence in this area.
Depending on what you play PS can be very valuable in melee, too.
And for psionics/magic the mental stats are more important.In PF you use Strength for to hit and damage in melee, for CMB and CMD. That's very similar in importance to PP in Palladium.
But I don't want to say Palladium is better than PF. It is just different and I like it to much to agree with someone saying it is a bad system.
At least it is one of the systems that I would play or GM again. Something I can't say about AD&D.
Nope. It's MUCH MUCH worse. PS is near useless in most cases. So too is PB, or MA, hell PB doesn't even explain what the hell charm/impress means in game! And you have to have hugely high attributes just to have any mechanical benefit, and worse, almost NONE have any sort of bonus or penalty for skills aside from IQ.
The game is simply inept and incompetently written from the get go. Even the old AD&D 2nd ed system, with the broken racial kits, was better written and more flexible. YOU might be willing to play Palladium anything again, but the next time someone seriously brings it up to me as something to play, and I will incoherently begin swearing and beating them with the nearest blunt object. It's that bad.
I have seriously never gotten a migraine from any game system aside from Palladium. Nothing makes logical sense, the system isn't even internally consistent. Even their math sucks. And that's *saying* something coming from a guy who prefers the old VtM game!
I come from a table where it works excellently every time and is just as much if not moreso an excercise in social, tactical, colorful, investigative, interesting interactions instead of being just a 40 hour stream of murderhoboing. To me it definitely sounds more like a problem with the table than with the system. Hearing that you tried hard to play it with maps says a lot about how much trouble you had with it.
If you had any leg to stand on about whether it was the players and not the system, i'd refer you to
' and playing a scientist, when everyone and their monkey's uncle has 8-9 actions per round in combat'...
Sounds like you were outnumbered 6 to 1 in trying to play the game in a way the rest of the table wasnt much interested in. But again thats a player problem not a system problem.
While the world can totally work for a "skills centric" team of investigative science types as long as the rest of your party is on board with such antics, if you chose to play a servant or a singing circus performer in warhammer when the rest of the party's 6 players have all decided to play trollslayers, well. I can tell you that isnt going to go well for you, and that the lack of fun your having isnt because of the system.
I'm not saying you're playing it wrong. I'm not even saying that those other 6 guys are playing it wrong. It can be played both ways and it works both ways.
What I'm saying is that if you spend enough time filling your cart with B.I.A.S. then pretty soon you might run out of room and the I and the A start leaking out the sides and evaporate and before you know it you're left with a cart full of B.S., so when it starts stinking don't be surpised when people start mentioning the smell.
but I don't see at all what being open to multiple genres/tropes has to do with railroading.
Its simply that many gms on these very forums would argue that the more ludicrously powerful and diverse your players are, the harder it is to keep the campaign going the direction you want it to go. It is far less likely that a powerful, diverse group of players is going to cowtow into doing the one task you think they should be doing especially if there's only one way to do it.
Or as cmastah put it, "the ability to just ignore most/any quest that comes their way" which certain gms are not very good at or not very willing to enjoy or cope with.
|
To me, part of the unwritten social contract is that players will make some effort to actually play the adventure the GM has prepared for them, instead of wandering off into areas where he'll be forced to add-lib an entire session for. It's kind of like why characters inherently trust the new guy who they've never met before (ie, a new PC)...it may not make a lot of sense naratively, but it's a lot easier to just accept it and move forward with the game.
the lack of fun you're having isnt because of the system.
too late to edit the post for correct use of you're/your.
To me, part of the unwritten social contract is that players will make some effort to actually play the adventure the GM has prepared for them
Being a predominantly (takeda style) simulationist sandbox group, our particular table has no such unwritten social contract (except for with our warhammer 1e gm, who clearly has demonstrated both a lack of willingness and a lack of capability in letting a campaign get off the rails). It works fine for us, but I can see why other tables wouldn't/couldn't cope with it, and when we have a gm that can't handle it, you either sit back and try your best to enjoy the rails or call the ball and jump the train.
|
Players have to be very careful about who they let GM.
And GMs have to be very careful about who they choose to let sit at the table.
I wish some GMs were not emotionally stunted control freaks, but some are.
And I wish some players weren't emotioally stunted control freaks, but some are.
And unfortunately, these types of people seem to be drawn to Role Playing Games as a way of acting out their power and control issues, and they are annoying.
Fortunately, I don't have to game with those people, because I am not an emotionally stunted control freak who pisses off people around them to the point I have to settle for gaming with jerks.
If the situation you described occured, I would "forget" to invite them to the next session. Ain't nobody got time for that.
|
|
I have also played Rifts without rules changes, and had gotten massive migraines. Try playing in an 7 man team, and playing a scientist, when everyone and their monkey's uncle has 8-9 actions per round in combat, and finding out that xp means bull, so getting any for using your skills is a drop in the proverbial ocean. That's right, it was the typical "lets blow up everyone who gets in our way because we have lots of big guns and such" because most of their stupid horribly written material focuses on nothing but the bang(hack n slash), and NOTHING about actually roleplaying.
I have played countless game systems, countless settings, and none compare in sheer ineptitude as Palladium anything.
You are blaming the system for the ineptitude of the GM and the players.
Normally I would agree, but Rifts is hella broken. Sure it can be a lot of fun with a social contract that no one will be "that guy" but if someone decides they have come to "win" the game...Rifts ain't gonna work.
Normally I would agree, but Rifts is hella broken. Sure it can be a lot of fun with a social contract that no one will be "that guy" but if someone decides they have come to "win" the game...Rifts ain't gonna work.I have also played Rifts without rules changes, and had gotten massive migraines. Try playing in an 7 man team, and playing a scientist, when everyone and their monkey's uncle has 8-9 actions per round in combat, and finding out that xp means bull, so getting any for using your skills is a drop in the proverbial ocean. That's right, it was the typical "lets blow up everyone who gets in our way because we have lots of big guns and such" because most of their stupid horribly written material focuses on nothing but the bang(hack n slash), and NOTHING about actually roleplaying.
I have played countless game systems, countless settings, and none compare in sheer ineptitude as Palladium anything.
You are blaming the system for the ineptitude of the GM and the players.
All RPGs are vulnerable to 'that guy'. If anybody decides to 'win' I can't think of any RPG that would work.
It is not the system...it is the players. My Rifts group for instance role-plays pretty heavily...while every World of Darkness game I have seen is usualy filled power gamers whose idea of social interaction is rolling dice.
I think the problem I run into with piccolo is that if I summarize how I read his posts in a forum asking about player entitlement, what i'm reading is:
Now I can totally see how a person who's used to playing 'the Lord AO, god of gods, might not be able to enjoy a campaign where a player can create a character thats immortal, intangible, and invulnerable. So I can totally see why he wouldnt like rifts.
I can also totally see how a person who wants to play a scientist at a table full of giantmech mutant murderhobos might find that campaign 'not fun' in the same way that if you want to play a lich in a party full of paladins you're not going to have much fun. So if, when you play rifts, this is how most of the people want to play it, well.... I can see another reason you wouldnt like rifts.
Even though ciretose says he thinks its broken, he has not only already established himself as being in the camp who believe 'gm is the lord god AO' and gm word is law, but he also immediately qualifies it by saying that it doesnt work when someone at the table wants to be 'that guy', (and that it can be fun without 'that guy') so again, its a problem with the player, not the system.
By the logic presented for why rifts is broken, every game system is broken, because if a player shows up to screw up your fun, or even worse if a whole table wants to have a different kind of fun than you, then it's the system thats broken? Every system has something in it that 'that guy' can use to ruin it.
And I'll agree. The ways that 'that guy' could break 'lord god AO's PTB gm-is-always-right-my-way-or-the-highway's campaign in rifts are practically unlimited. That doesn't mean its a broken system. It just means its a bad system for gms who think that way, and a worse system for gms who think that way and have 'that guy' at their table.
I believe the way that I edited my post agrees with your point. I apologize for being the kind of poster who tends to post first and edit a bunch to clean the ideas up.
I think at least partially my point is that for every 'entitled gm' who's day is ruined by 'that broken system' or 'that guy'
Theres a player out there who's day is ruined by being forced to 'enjoy his character being nerfed'
The simple answer to the OP's qestion is "Yes, Thats definitely entitlement..."
Is one any worse than the other? Thats for each table to decide.
Is any system 'broken' for catering to one entitlement more than the other? IMHO, i'd have to answer that with a no... because
And as for the "GM is lord God" thing, that's pretty much irrelevant.
As far as screwing with the GM, "immortal, intangible, and invulnerable" takes a backseat to teleporting, divining and all of the other high level magic abuses in D&D/PF.
Well I dont think its irrelevent. Its germaine to the issue of how broken you perceive a system to be, or at least I feel its germaine to how broken piccolo sees a system to be...
It is monstrously germaine and relevant to how you perceive and handle 'entitlement' and pcs that dont enjoy being nerfed. Even moreso if you look at such players as 'whiny entitled punks' and not as 'people at my table (some of whom I might even refer to as 'friends') who are not having fun with how I run things'.
To your second point I entirely agree that there's a strong argument to be made that the power curve of a 17th level pathfinder wizard is even more difficult to wrangle than an invulnerable intangible immortal. There's a strong contingent of gms who say 'pathfinder is broken' for allowing such unchecked power into the system. It would not surprise me if that contingent stood largely on the side of GMs who like to be 'lord AO, god of gods'
Kinda sounds to me like they don't want to play an RPG, they want you to tell them a story where their characters rip through everything around them easily.Definitely +1.
@shalafi, they're mostly 25-26, one of them is 18 (though he's the quiet one....almost no RP because of how quiet he is). I don't want to label people with a term like immaturity, but in one session they had two 'boss fights' so to speak. The one with the zuvembie was brutal (one character was frightened and the other due to his own reasons wasn't in the combat, leaving only three people to fight the creature, at level 2), and while it was hard earned, the battle turned in their favor (with some nerfing in favor of the players from the DM (I never nerf in favor of the creatures)), the other battle was with a schir. The battle with the schir amounted to little more than a little stabbing from safety from atop some pillars, and then dropping down and engaging in melee against a party that found cold iron weapons in the area, at which point the schir never had a chance and the players never wasted a single resource (I didn't use his charge ability). They considered the fight with the schir to be a great one, even though there was no struggle whatsoever. They noted that they liked the schir's use of terrain (he only jumped to two seperate pillars before going groundside) and how the battle concluded (again, no struggle), they considered THIS to be the better fight.
They were telling me that they wanted to feel like powerful heroes, capable of accomplishing great deeds....as early as level 1. I gave them quite a bit of (unrealistic) sway in the town they're currently in and if I don't cater to their desire to feel appreciated and recognized immediately (I'd like to reiterate IMMEDIATELY), I get a ton of flak about it.
Running another group instead is not an option -.-'
Great heroes, great deeds, at level 1-2....use different enemies.
You are going too fast with "cool monsters"
IF thats the game they want, they need to be fighting goblins, giant toads, NPC classes like experts and warriors, with the occasional "mad adept" hurling a spell or two.
Not Zuvembies and Schrirs?
Tone down the exotic monsters until they are higher level and can handle the saves etc to make the negative effects less common.
I think youre just getting over zealous with exciting monsters you want to use.
If you need undead, a zombie, skeleton, or ghoul will do fine. Even a skeleton champion here and here.
Need more power?
Add a level or two of fighter, cleric or anti-paladin to them, as this stuff adds no monster powers they dont like.
By the time they get higher level, they will be able to to do more things, and counter more effects on their own and it will be less of a issue.
I think the problem I run into with piccolo is that if I summarize how I read his posts in a forum asking about player entitlement, what i'm reading is:
Theres an easy answer for this
"I am the lord god AO and you will game how I want you to game
Dont you worry little brudder. Lets chat privately and I'll teach you how to wrangle these little darlins back into their cells (-_o).
Dont worry. By the time we're done with them they'll thank you for putting your strong ole man-hands back on the reigns and puttin 'em in their place. A-hyur.
Rifts is broken and I can prove it by jumping on the bandwagon fallacy presented by the rifts 'trope' page. See how right I am? Now I can totally see how a person who's used to playing 'the Lord AO, god of gods, might not be able to enjoy a campaign where a player can create a character thats immortal, intangible, and invulnerable. So I can totally see why he wouldnt like rifts.
I can also totally see how a person who wants to play a scientist at a table full of giantmech mutant murderhobos might find that campaign 'not fun' in the same way that if you want to play a lich in a party full of paladins you're not going to have much fun. So if, when you play rifts, this is how most of the people want to play it, well.... I can see another reason you wouldnt like rifts.
Even though ciretose says he thinks its broken, he has not only already established himself as being in the camp who believe 'gm is the lord god AO' and gm word is law, but he also immediately qualifies it by saying that it doesnt work when someone at the table wants to be 'that guy', (and that it can be fun without 'that guy') so again, its a problem with the player, not the system.
By the logic presented for why rifts is broken, every game system is broken, because if a player shows up to screw up your fun, or even worse if a whole table wants to have a different kind of fun than you, then it's the system thats broken? Every system has something in it that 'that guy'...
I think you are taking a series of leaps that are not warranted. Unlike many DM's, I don't feel the need to have absolute control. I shall leave it as that because I feel you are taking personal shots at me, and I don't particularly want to get into a flame war.
but the next time someone seriously brings it up to me as something to play, and I will incoherently begin swearing and beating them with the nearest blunt object.
So you are the kind of guy who thinks hurting/killing people for a difference in opinion is ok?