The Rifts RPG Review

 Today, I'm reviewing the RIFTS® roleplaying game by Kevin Siembieda. Kevin is a great guy.  He gets ideas from everywhere and turns them into RPGs.  Rifts started a long time ago, probably after Kevin watched STAR WARS A New Hope. It is certainly one of the most imaginative settings for a Roleplaying game.  It literally includes everything, including the kitchen sink.

The book begins with the usual Palladium Books' disclaimer.  That the Rifts RPG is one that deals with the supernatural and occult themes.  This disclaimer may have been warranted in the early eighties when there was a scare on Roleplaying games and their themes.  Dungeons and Dragons was attacked for including elements of the occult.  Something the publishing company got away from during the Second Edition publication of the Advanced Dungeons and Dragons game.  However, when Wizards of the Coast took over Dungeons and Dragons, the occult themes returned.

As for Rifts®, it's part of the landscape that magic is included.  And like other roleplaying games, you won't be able to learn magic for real.  Still it's a strange RPG chosen by my wife as her first time playing roleplaying games.  I don't recommend Rifts® for the first time player.  I would suggest the Dungeons and Dragons roleplaying game (BECMI) for the first timer.  Rifts is just too strange for the first time gamer to grasp.

When did the Rifts come?  When did it all began?

Technically, they came after a nuclear war exchange.  The death of so many caused their energy to pump into the ley lines.  Which opened up rifts into different places and times.  This caused more people to die, which caused a surge, and the result was a chain reaction no one could stop. As a result the Earth had changed.  With a landscape that is both familiar and alien.  The landscape is crisscrossed by a web of ley lines, which can be seen from space.  The land is full of alien creatures called "D-Bees" which is short for dimensional beings.  It is into this world that the Rifts® character enters the picture, a larger than life character.  It's a savage, violent world, the world of the Rifts®.

Character Creation

Character creation is like that in AD&D.  You roll 3d6 worth of dice on seven different attributes.  After this is done, you calculate your hit points and your structural damage capacity (SDC). After that, Mega-damage and mega-damage capacity (MDC) is figured.  Then you determine if you are psionic or not. After that, you select your Occupational Character Class (O.C.C.) or a Racial Character Class (R.C.C.), figuring out your skills. After this is done, you figure your Potential Psychic Energy (P.P.E.).  Then you figure your money and equipment.  Then comes alignment.

The concept of Alignment works like how it works in Dungeons and Dragons.  It's a guide to help you roleplay your character to your likes.  You can select between two good alignments: Principled (Lawful Good), and Scrupulous (Neutral Good); between two selfish alignments: Unprincipled (Chaotic Good), and Anarchist (Chaotic Neutral); and between three evil alignments: Miscreant (Neutral Evil), Aberrant (Lawful Evil), and Diabolic (Chaotic Evil).  After that, your character is basically done -- with a few things that need to be explained.

Innovations from Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (TSR, WotC) and Basic Roleplaying (Chaosium)

There are four major innovations from AD&D and Basic Roleplaying.  Basically, the Palladium System has these four innovations.  They are the way Character Classes are handled. The way Alignment is handled, the way experience is handled, and the way Skills are handled.  Alignment has already been touched on.  There are basically three categories of alignment, and at least two different alignments for each category.  Character class is also handled differently, in that you either select an occupational character class or a racial character class. However, within these classes there is little customization in the way of skills. So before you choose a character class, be thoughtful because it might very well be the only character class you will have.  Unlike other Palladium Roleplaying games (like Robotech or the Palladium Fantasy Game) multiclassing isn't mentioned.  It may not even be possible with some concepts.

Experience points are awarded differently than in Dungeons and Dragons. You are rewarded for performing a skill, coming up with ideas, endangering yourself to save others, avoiding unnecessary violence, and other actions.  You typically get less experience for defeating foes.

Skills are also handled differently.  Although it's the same in Basic Roleplaying, you have to roll under a certain number (in this case a percentage value) for the skill in order to successfully preform the skill in question. This percentage value has a maximum score of 98%, because there has to be a margin for error. Plus, there are a large number of skills to choose from.  This is different from Advanced Dungeons and Dragons.

All of these innovations allowed the Palladium System to be unique from Advanced Dungeons and Dragons (by TSR and WotC) as well as the Basic Roleplaying Game by Chaosium..  "Basically one can consider the Palladium setting as a major reimagination of Advanced Dungeons and Dragons.

Rifts is not a good introductory roleplaying game

I would stay away from Rifts if you are a first time gamer.  I actually got started playing Dungeons and Dragons -- but Rifts is a whole different dimension. The game features darker things to play as your regular PC -- juicers, crazies, borgs, dragon hatchlings, mind melters, psi-stalkers, "mutant" dogs, men of magic, and many others.

Plus, the system is dated.  It was great in 1990 when Rifts came out.  But now it shows it's age.  The system shows signs of wear when compared to other roleplaying games like Dungeons and Dragons 3rd edition.  The lack of customization, the plethora of O.C.C.s and the way alignment is handled can be quite counter intuitive. Plus, you have adult themes in the game.  You are most likely locked into a game of survival, where the normal concept of heroics is usually not to be had.  A RIFTS game is usually about surviving in a world that is both alien and familiar more so than about being heroic.  Although heroic actions are rewarded, and there is at least one heroic O.C.C., the Cyber-knight.

So Why Buy the Game?

You should buy this if you are looking for a different game to run.  If you want to run a survival game, where saving someone from that demon is a good idea.  The visuals are stunning, and there are a number of world books you can buy to enhance your game.  In fact, I was stunned when my wife decided to play Rifts® for her first roleplaying game. Although she chose the Savage Worlds system for her first system, she read my entire library of Rifts Books and had fallen in love with the setting.  She has picked the New West setting for her first campaign and I'll be setting that up in time. (DAZ soon).