RIFTS essential books for new players!

[Baron mugwort]

We love Palladium Books so this week I have put together a list of the books I think represent the best Bang for Buck for players and GM's that are new to the game. Hope you like it!

If you have any books you would like to add please don't hesitate!

If you want to post a review feel free, we will give you full credit for anything you submit.

http://www.ding-irl.com/RIFTS-And-Palla ... tials.html

[dpenwood]

Those are good books, but I'm not sure I'd put them as high up on the list. It really depends what kind of game you're playing, but I'd say something like:

+ The Book of Magic
+ Rifts Black Market
+ A world book of your choice (I recommend New West)
+ Sourcebook One
+ Rifts Aftermath is pretty good if you want story

[glitterboy2098]

four i would suggest for all new GM's.. regardless of the worldbook setting they are interested in.

Rifts Ultimate Edition
Conversion book 3: Dark conversions (for the monsters)
Game Master Guide (for quick stats on tons of gear)
Book of magic (for all the magic)

[Daeglan]

four i would suggest for all new GM's.. regardless of the worldbook setting they are interested in.

Rifts Ultimate Edition
Conversion book 3: Dark conversions (for the monsters)
Game Master Guide (for quick stats on tons of gear)
Book of magic (for all the magic)

Add Rifts Adventure guide.

[dpenwood]

four i would suggest for all new GM's.. regardless of the worldbook setting they are interested in.

Rifts Ultimate Edition
Conversion book 3: Dark conversions (for the monsters)
Game Master Guide (for quick stats on tons of gear)
Book of magic (for all the magic)

Rifts Ultimate Edition: yeah, that one too.

I have actually NEVER used Conversion Book 3. It's sitting in pristine condition on my bookshelf. But that's just me. I've looked at it and I can see where it would be valuable, but I think it depends on where you're going with your game.

In this thread and in another similar thread I saw many people put the Game Master Guide. I own it but rarely use it. I will admit that it's a great book with great info, I just haven't taken good advantage of it really. I do like the XP tables...

[drewkitty ~..~]

Ether RMB or RUE
Ether RCB1 or RCB1r (for monsters and non-human char races)
The world book that covers the area/land you plan to start in.
RBoM

Note: I do not use RUE as my canon for my games. There are too many stupid changes in it for me to really recommend it.

[Baron mugwort]

Thanks guys! I meant to add that those books were in addition to RIFTS:UE! I will go correct that now!

What do you think of the mini review format as opposed to full on reviews? I was thinking of reviewing 3 world books at a time in a similar fashion, is that a good idea?

Do any of you guys wish to review a book? I will add it to my site giving you full credit!

I would also like the people who visit my site to come to these forums, I have been taught so much here it is unreal

[kaid]

RUE
Book of magic

Those are the two must haves the GMG is nice but I find myself refering to the above two books way more frequently.
Once you have those two books then I tend to recommend one world book of whatever area somebody wants to start their adventure.

For a GM conversion book 1 and conversion book 3 are somewhat helpful if you need some extra critters to help populate the world. Players don't really need those books much but they are helpful for GMs.

[kaid]

Oh forgot Dbees of north america is a great book for both GM's and players.

[Eashamahel]

I'm just making my way through it, but it seems that the RIFTS: Ultimate Edition book has no Cybernetics, and just draws from the bionics section for cybernetics upgrades (at great confusion to me). So, even though I don't have many memories of using it, if you ARE going to be using the Ultimate Edition rulebook I would think the Bionic Sourcebook (assuming it includes Cybernetics) would be absolutely essential. If you are usiing the original RIFTS main book, then you don't need it.

[kaid]

The bionic source book is pretty focused but if you have anybody who wants cybernetics or bionics I highly recommend it. It has all the cybernetics/bionics from all books prior to its printing which I think even includes the warlords of russia stuff so pretty much one stop shopping for all things cybernetic/bionic.

[Eashamahel]

Seems a good choice then. I can't find any (cybernetic) prosthetics, bio-systems, ect in the R:UE book, so I would say some book that covers those is essential if you are going to be playing a game where your characters can get, well, hurt.

[Incriptus]

Take Mercenaries and Merc Ops ... cut out all the pages about NPCs and make one book out of the remaining pages. If that is not possible, you should probably just bring both books

[Eashamahel]

Oh Gork, don't start thinking about cutting out and putting together books to get the good stuff, that's a long road that leads to madness.

[MaxxSterling]

Really, all you need is RUE. From there it is a downward spiral, of what kind of game do I want to run... And then you start adding books to that list.

I run massive inter-dimensional epic adventures only, which I feel is the true meaning of the Rifts system. So, I would say either all you need is RUE, or you need every single book, note, web item and errata Palladium has ever published, even the mechanoids comic books, to be able to reference cryptic and obscure questions when they arise, which will be every single session.

[torjones]

We love Palladium Books so this week I have put together a list of the books I think represent the best Bang for Buck for players and GM's that are new to the game. Hope you like it!
If you have any books you would like to add please don't hesitate!

I would agree with most of that, except I wouldn't go with the Conversion Book 1 for players, I'd rather suggest something specific to the player's character preference. If you've got the GMG and the BOM and a basic core rule book (either RMB or RUE, depending on the rules set your GM is using, but as a generic suggestion I'd go with RUE because more new groups are going to use it instead), you're pretty much covered for a lot of stuff. I think that fourth book is better used for tuning the nascent library to the player's particular preferences, rather than being another generic book.

If you know that that particular player likes to play monster races, then suggest WB30. If they like techie characters, suggest Bionics Sourcebook. If they like westerns, go with New West. For mages, there's just so much to choose from, you may want to stick to the LLW/TW for the first few characters, and allow nature to take its course with the "4th Book" selection, once they've had a chance to flip through the other magic oriented books. Gun-bunnies are going to want either New West and/or mercenaries, there's a lot to choose from here, but I think those offer the widest selections. For players who like psychic characters, go with Psyscape. Sure, the GMG has all the psionics, but the OCCs and background material in the WB are not to be missed really. That, and it pretty effectively completes the psychic library, other than a couple of Rifters... I really do wish there was more than this, but, it is what it is...

If you don't know what that particular player likes to play, ask them what they've played before that they enjoyed, even video game characters, then they self-identify with one of the above class types, and you're set...

[kaid]

Seems a good choice then. I can't find any (cybernetic) prosthetics, bio-systems, ect in the R:UE book, so I would say some book that covers those is essential if you are going to be playing a game where your characters can get, well, hurt.

Yup one of the sections in the RUE just references the bionics source book for cybernetics and what not. They do that a lot with the book of magic as well and it makes sense since the one bionics sourcebook covers like 95% of all bionics/cybernetic/borg implants. It is only missing a couple things from the newest of books which is pretty minimal.

[Kagashi]

I find Dark Conversions to be almost obsolete. Unless it's received a shadow update, the Dyval and Hades Dimension books pretty much rewrote everything I really referenced previously and added a whole bunch more. However I do like the Undead listed in DC though.

[kaid]

I would have to compare them directly but I was reading a bit of the dark conversions stuff and they seemed to be in line with what I recalled from the dyvaal/hades book. I think the main boost to the dyvaal/hades descriptions is they flesh them out a lot more but they work fine for quick and dirty write ups for GM's.

I think the most useful stuff in it is for the unaffiliated demons and undead.

[rat_bastard]

It all depends on what kind of campaign you want to start with and where you are going to go.

[kaid]

Oddly enough I think rifts could use to some extent a "monster manual" Kinda like the old monsters and animals book for the palladium RPG.

Kinda along the lines of D-bees of north america may be nice to have monsters of north america or something like that. It is nice for a GM to have a good main book for non human baddies to throw at players.

[Athos]

Oddly enough I think rifts could use to some extent a "monster manual" Kinda like the old monsters and animals book for the palladium RPG.

Kinda along the lines of D-bees of north america may be nice to have monsters of north america or something like that. It is nice for a GM to have a good main book for non human baddies to throw at players.

Really good idea !!!

It would be nice to have a collection of monsters all in one nice convenient book. Guess that is why other game companies do it. lol.

[Eashamahel]

Oddly enough I think rifts could use to some extent a "monster manual" Kinda like the old monsters and animals book for the palladium RPG.

Kinda along the lines of D-bees of north america may be nice to have monsters of north america or something like that. It is nice for a GM to have a good main book for non human baddies to throw at players.

My problem with this is that it really only works well if it serves as a 'change point' for the series, and it won't.

If Palladium did 'Monster Manuals/Bestiaries' and put all of the monsters previously printed in them, that would be great. But the next 'World Book XX: Galapagos Islands' would STILL print a few random monsters, as would the next, as would the next. If the Bestiary/Monster Manual concept was followed, and instead of littering them around random books a 'V2' was released every once in awhile with new enemies, it would be good, but if all previous monsters were collected in 'V1' and then in a few years 'V2' came out being just a big re-print (and possible update) to things that had already been printed in-between... Well, I'm just not a fan of re-prints of material, not unless they accompany a streamlining of the main books.

[kaid]

Oddly enough I think rifts could use to some extent a "monster manual" Kinda like the old monsters and animals book for the palladium RPG.

Kinda along the lines of D-bees of north america may be nice to have monsters of north america or something like that. It is nice for a GM to have a good main book for non human baddies to throw at players.

My problem with this is that it really only works well if it serves as a 'change point' for the series, and it won't.

If Palladium did 'Monster Manuals/Bestiaries' and put all of the monsters previously printed in them, that would be great. But the next 'World Book XX: Galapagos Islands' would STILL print a few random monsters, as would the next, as would the next. If the Bestiary/Monster Manual concept was followed, and instead of littering them around random books a 'V2' was released every once in awhile with new enemies, it would be good, but if all previous monsters were collected in 'V1' and then in a few years 'V2' came out being just a big re-print (and possible update) to things that had already been printed in-between... Well, I'm just not a fan of re-prints of material, not unless they accompany a streamlining of the main books.

Yup but as with D-bees of north america it is nice to have one major compendium of that sort of thing. It won't cover everything but for GM's new to the system its a great way to flesh out the world and encounters for your players without having to own 10 different books that have a handful of things here and there spread throughout them.

[Eashamahel]

I get that, and I don't disagree that it's probably pretty helpful. That was one of the main reasons I like(d) and made such use of the first Conversion Book, for D-Bee stats.

[kaid]

I get that, and I don't disagree that it's probably pretty helpful. That was one of the main reasons I like(d) and made such use of the first Conversion Book, for D-Bee stats.

Yup same here and it always struck me a bit funny that the best place to find monsters for rifts is a conversion book and my palladium RPG monsters and animals book.

[Eashamahel]

I didn't mind that at all. Honestly I was a much bigger fan when Orcs made up the majority of the Pecos Bandits and Gargoyles were a nation ending threat, then when every book just effectively ignored everything that came before it. I loved Kingsdale (I think it was) being a city state of elves and dwarves. I liked RIFTS drawing from Fantasy heavily. I loved the idea of the Wolfen New Rome as well.