SDC Rifts - Looking for Experienced Users

[Marrowlight]

So I'm poking around with a couple new ideas today, and one of those ideas involves a setting with a lot of Rifts elements (like all of them, just in a different way), but I'm not convinced I want the nigh-invulnerability and uber-lethality of MDC gear vs. SDC gear coming into play in the setting or the game. I don't want to have to create a few hundreds suits of armor and weapons from scratch either...and thus the appeal of just down-converting the existing gear comes to mind. I'm looking for folks who've done some serious playtime in campaigns where Rifts items were used, but as SDC gear -- did you use it on the 100:1 or the 10:1 or even *gasp* 1:1 or some other ratio when converting? How was the play experience - did you run into problems where guys with rocks and slings were killing soldiers in full EBA? Any other hints or insights into how it all works when MDC gear is shifted into SDC would be cool and appreciated.

[Ectoplasmic Bidet]

Give what would otherwise be MDC gear, armor and weapons, very penetration values, minimum of no lower than 10 for even the lightest MDC body armor.

Convert Environmental body armor, light & medium power armor, and man portable weapons at a 3 to 1 ration with heavy power armor, robots, & most vehicles getting the 10 to 1 armor & weapon conversion.

[say652]

I convert it as 1:1 and assign an AR equal to Mdc/10 vs energy,bullets,explosions, ex-ps,superhuman ps= 1/2 damage for a successful roll no damage on a failed roll. Supernatural strength,magic, psionics AND magic powered characters bypass the AR inflicting normal damage. So a SAMAS has an AR of 25 vs most attacks, the real badboy is the Glitterboy with an AR of 77! vs most attacks. Make sure to remember that for every 10 sdc succesfully inflicted the pilot takes 1 hp/sdc damage. So bang around a Glitterboy enough and you can kill a pilot without disabling the power armor(I consider GlitterBoys a robot).

[say652]

In my haste to post, I forgot a few things(sorry working diligently on character development) Now lets talk MD weapons. Damage converts1:1 but bypasses AR sdc or mdc. Lets take a SAMAS railgun single shot 1d4 md shooting at an APS-Metal villian. As long as the roll to strike is succesful AND the target doesn't dodge the Metal Villian takes 1d4 damage to the tremendous sdc of its metal form. Phaseblades Kinda become Godlike weapons bypassing Armor all types and APS-all types dealing damage direct to hitpoints. Phase rifles and pistols only bypass armor damaging sdc first. For some reason my RIFTS gm wanted the Phaseswords to be uber deadly,not downing the pistols and rifles but the blades are better. So while MDC objects have an incrediblely high AR vs sdc objects MD weapons ignore AR leveling the playing field and inflicting full damage to MDC objects. Certain powers OK only invulnerable characters take half damage from MD weapons, energy or hard ordinance varieties.(MD beams,Blasts,bullets,etc) if its a Megadamage weapon it will hurt and possibly kill you Mrs Invulnerable.

[nilgravity]

I convert it as 1:1 and assign an AR equal to Mdc/10 vs energy,bullets,explosions, ex-ps,superhuman ps= 1/2 damage for a successful roll no damage on a failed roll. Supernatural strength,magic, psionics AND magic powered characters bypass the AR inflicting normal damage. So a SAMAS has an AR of 25 vs most attacks, the real badboy is the Glitterboy with an AR of 77! vs most attacks. Make sure to remember that for every 10 sdc succesfully inflicted the pilot takes 1 hp/sdc damage. So bang around a Glitterboy enough and you can kill a pilot without disabling the power armor(I consider GlitterBoys a robot).

Interesting way to do it.

[flatline]

We used a 3:1 ratio and gave MDC objects an SDC damage resistance of (current MDC)/10.

Worked just fine.

--flatline

[Nightmask]

We used a 3:1 ratio and gave MDC objects an SDC damage resistance of (current MDC)/10.

Worked just fine.

--flatline

I'm not seeing how, given the scale for damages and the like are built around 100:1 you're massively inflating the damage scale of SDC weapons and massively nerfing the MDC weapons, plus of course the hampering of the protective abilities of MDC materials.

[Marrowlight]

So it looks like most used some pretty low values. Did anyone out there use a higher scale ratio?



Thanks so far guys!

[Mech-Viper Prime]

Hmmm
If I was going to start a new adventure, I think I would do all body armor (all sizes)and power armor, and robot vehicles up to 12 ft would get current mdc divided by 10, everything vehicle wise over that gets current mdc unless otherwise noted for reduction.

Weapon wise I think I would keep damage the same

Magical beings I think I would keep their current rating as weapons too, non magical beings get their mdc dropped for sdc and ar.

[flatline]

We used a 3:1 ratio and gave MDC objects an SDC damage resistance of (current MDC)/10.

Worked just fine.

--flatline

I'm not seeing how, given the scale for damages and the like are built around 100:1 you're massively inflating the damage scale of SDC weapons and massively nerfing the MDC weapons, plus of course the hampering of the protective abilities of MDC materials.

And that was totally the goal.

We wanted SDC weapons to have limited effectiveness against people in armor, but to be ineffective against larger targets (like power armor). The 3:1 ratio with SDC DR accomplished that that goal just fine. Someone in crusader EBA actually had some reason to fear a dozen villagers with 4d6 hunting rifles, but an undamaged SAMAS was invulnerable to those same weapons.

Weapons like SDC explosive rounds were house ruled to do X damage to SDC targets and Y damage to MDC targets so that their inflated SDC damage didn't become unbalancing when applied to MDC targets.

--flatline

[jaymz]

x2 for infantry armour and weapons. x5 for most power armour and power armour weapons. x10 for most everything else. Many monsters I just use their SDC equivalents from Fantasy. I also apply ARs and go case by case on those looking at HU for guidelines though generally body armour uses normal AR while most PA's, Robots and Vehicles use vehicle AR (works the same way natural AR does). Body Armours will range anywhere from an AR of 10-19. Everything else will range from ARs of 6 all the way upto 19.

This seems to work fairly well and fixes some of the scaling issues I think exist between infantry and vehicles etc.

[say652]

i tried running the normal 100:1 to one ratio and got rid of AR for sdc objects, the players did like yelling take 500sdc from my laser pistol and a suit of body armor that has 8000 sdc but in the end my players said if they want riduclous damage that they will play Final Fantasy

[Marrowlight]

i tried running the normal 100:1 to one ratio and got rid of AR for sdc objects, the players did like yelling take 500sdc from my laser pistol and a suit of body armor that has 8000 sdc but in the end my players said if they want riduclous damage that they will play Final Fantasy

Yeah, thoughts along that line are what concerned me about the 100:1 myself. I may tinker around with these smaller scales you all seemed to have a lot of luck with. Maybe I'm just really misremembering the Palladium Fantasy Armor values (I admit, it's been a DC/Pathfinder kinda life of late)...but it seems like with the ratios folks were talking about, a good suit of Plate Armor would have as much SDC as most medium or light (or maybe even some heavy) suits of EBA, which seemed off to me. Still though, thanks again everyone!

[Marrowlight]

There won't be Ley Lines most of the time anyway. This is for my long suffering and ignored Rifts: Space setting.

Now, I admit, it's been a loooong time since I read through PU2 - what in particular am I looking for in it?

[Noon]

I'd be more inclined to use explosive rounds from rifts mercenaries that do MD with a burst, and make SDC armours with maybe three or four hundred SDC fairly common. Possibly also make some house rules that if you dodged the attack and it still penetrated the armour, it takes off a limb. Possibly also, instead of lowering MDC, make SDC weapons with special mods that are able to do more damage to that SDC armour (so it's not such a protection against SDC).

[say652]

i tried running the normal 100:1 to one ratio and got rid of AR for sdc objects, the players did like yelling take 500sdc from my laser pistol and a suit of body armor that has 8000 sdc but in the end my players said if they want riduclous damage that they will play Final Fantasy

Yeah, thoughts along that line are what concerned me about the 100:1 myself. I may tinker around with these smaller scales you all seemed to have a lot of luck with. Maybe I'm just really misremembering the Palladium Fantasy Armor values (I admit, it's been a DC/Pathfinder kinda life of late)...but it seems like with the ratios folks were talking about, a good suit of Plate Armor would have as much SDC as most medium or light (or maybe even some heavy) suits of EBA, which seemed off to me. Still though, thanks again everyone!

The 1:1 conversion works well IMO, because mdc objects have such a crazy high AR and md weapons bypass AR and damage invulnerable characters for half damage. I mean a GlitterBoy having an AR of 77 vs sdc gives them the ability to challenge a whole battilion and unless a lot of crits are rolled the GB will win showing only minor damage. My Gm house ruled that MDC materials were not availible in his world SO repair became the real issue.

[Marrowlight]

the Super solider OCC handles most rifts combat types. same with empowered and so on. The Demigods and so on are also in the immortals section.
but as far as Rifts space Goes, you need to stick to one paradigm and stick to it. MIO was loosely based on the material In Rifts Manhunter.
TMNT guide to the universe was one of Palladium's first attempt at scifi. Mechanoids (book 2) was palladium's 1st as well.
Most of the crap about quantum harmonics and other crap doesn't belong in rifts at all. (this stuff bill coffin added because he liked that bs from star wars and star trek).
It just does not fit the physics model rifts uses.

Oh I use something entirely different altogether anyway. Thanks for looking out though.

[Daniel Stoker]

MIO was loosely based on the material In Rifts Manhunter.

How do you figure that? MiO came out 2 years before Manhunter did for Rifts from what I remember.


Daniel Stoker

[The Beast]

MIO was loosely based on the material In Rifts Manhunter.

How do you figure that? MiO came out 2 years before Manhunter did for Rifts from what I remember.


Daniel Stoker

2 years and around 8 months prior to Manhunter.

[mobuttu]

I did run a SDC Rifts mini-campaign. Here is my conversion features (complete explanation in here):

1) Definitions

MDC: "Mega Damage Capacity." This destructive capacity and superior resistance to represent the technological improvements, superhuman abilities and skills presented in the mystical atmosphere of Rifts. Creature/items with MDC have the capacity to inflict / resist such damage from weapons and armor, certain spells, bonus PS creatures augmented strength / robot / supernatural (see below), etc.
SDC (in this version) differs in meaning and means Simple Damage Capacity. It is so clear, the ability to resist and hurt with old armor, weapons "primitive" or simple, and bonus PS normal creatures (see below).

2) We are in an SDC world so AR and NAR are in. You can see AR ratings in CB1 pg. 32.

3) Damage management

a) Should the attack rolls over the AR/NAR, it inflicts damage directly to the victim SDC/HP or MDC (only in case MD is inflicted).
b) Should you the hit the Armor (by rolling below AR) you damage the armor. SDC only damage SDC armor, and MDC armor/creature is immune to SDC damage.
c) Armors receive damage equal to 10% of the damage done by the attack for each AR increment. Ex. You hit a SAMAS armmor (AR16) with 21 MD; SAMAS substracts 2 MDC from its armor total. (10% of 21). If 33 MD would have been inflicted, It'll be 4 MD to the SAMAS.
d) MDC creatures with SDC weapons do SDC damage (they can be broken per RUE328).
e) Defensive spells and psi-powers are considered MDC structures with AR 18-20. But they directly receive 10% of teh damage done to them (as thet can be easy created they can also be easier to destroy, thus balancing the system).
f) PS bonus always adds to hand to hand ancient weapons attacks.


Hope it helps. Please don't hesitate to ask me for any clarification.

It really worked well: armors were more durable, character got hurt (using healing powers to full extent), an players enjoyed it.

[Alrik Vas]

Here is the nonsense i cooked up...changes too much, but i kinda like the ideas.

All MD weapons and supernatural attacks (PS, spells, psionics etc) do their damage x5 (as SDC) and do a minimum of 2d6 base (no old CS or Wilks pistols that do 1d4)

All MD creatures convert their full MDC into SDC, then get HP as a human does, unless they are larger (something 10ft tall would get double...bigger would get triple)

Armor Rating is changed (unless this is how Natural AR works, i can never remember). Instead of it being a number to beat to inflict damage on what the armor is protecting, it is instead a number to meet or exceed in order to damage the armor itself. It only applies to Force Fields and Vehicles however.

All Forcefields (of any kind, magical, psionic or tech) have their normal MDC (as SDC), but have AR 15.

All MDC Light Armors have no MDC, instead they reduce the damage of all attacks by 50-100 (depending on the type, GM's call is how we did it), with minimum damage being 1d4.

Heavier armors reduce damage by 90-150 (same story, depends on make and model), minimum damage is 1d4.

EBA loses it's seal as soon as damage exceeds it's reduction. They can take 2 hits per limb/head, 3 hits center mass, after that the armor is damaged, providing half protection. One additional hit makes it useless.

Vehicles, power armor and robots all have an AR of 12 (works the same as a Force Field) AND they have their normal MDC x10 per location (as SDC)

Heavy Weapons like Rail Guns, Missiles and explosives (not mini missiles and grenades, unless AP however), large anti armor weapons like the ATL-7 all ignore the AR of Armor and Force Fields, doing their damage directly to the target location with no chance of deflection.

Laser Resistant Armor has AR 20 vs lasers and can still deflect heavy laser weapons, however.

Also, Armor Piercing rounds/missiles still inflict double damage against armored targets on a modified 17.

This is just the general idea. A human can survive these types of encounters, just not the best circumstances. The intersting thing is you can shoot a guy wearing a hard armor vest (120 SDC if memory serves right) with a 2d6 MD pistol and if you dont' go over his AR, you likely won't even destroy his armor. Of course, a more standard 5d6(x5) or 1d4x10(x5) pistol would probably just frag the guy, but that's kind of the point...super tech.

Though put the target into armor that resists 90 damage and he's got a chance for survival. However, a guy on a .50 cal machinegun would have a shot at dropping him with good rolls or AP rounds.

[Daniel Stoker]

MIO was loosely based on the material In Rifts Manhunter.

How do you figure that? MiO came out 2 years before Manhunter did for Rifts from what I remember.

2 years and around 8 months prior to Manhunter.

But how many minutes!


Daniel Stoker