Killer Cyborg wrote:Damian Magecraft wrote:Yah Know I keep hearing this... (and you keep saying it)
The current system doesnt work...
you never finish the damn statement...
What you really mean is "the system doesnt work for my style of game play."
This post wasn't to me, it was just something I randomly saw in another thread.
But I feel like it's something worth addressing, because Damien is flat-out
wrong, although I also believe that he's being 100% honest.
The chief problem is that different people have differences in how they see things, and differences in how their minds work.
Take me, for example.
I'm a literal-minded kind of guy. Not that I can't understand metaphors, and not that I can't take things with a grain of salt, but when I'm reading game rules, I tend to read them
as-written.
And
as-written, I can tell you that
Palladium's rules system does not work.
Now, keep in mind, I'm literal-minded.
So what I'm saying by that is just that: the system itself does not work.
This does NOT mean:
-that I can't get it to work
-that it's a useless/crappy system
-that I don't have a blast playing and running games using Palladium's system.
And that's the thing- a lot of the time, when people talk about whether or not the system "works," they're talking about different things.
So I'll specify.
If you tried to take the Palladium system, as written, and turn it into a computer program, that program would crash. Constantly.
You couldn't even use it to create a character.
Here's what I'm talking about:
RUE, p. 279
The section on
Character Creation begins with a brief paragraph that describes how Palladium systems are in-depth, not simple 2-dimensional cartoons, and how they're fun and magical.
(Sentiments which I agree with, not that that's really here or there)
The intro paragraph ends with the sentence:
"Let's take it one step at a time."
Then the book goes on to describe eight steps in creating a Rifts character.
Step 1: The Eight Attributes
Step 2: Understanding Damage Ratings
Step 3: Understanding Mega-Damage & MDC
Step 4: Determine Psionics
Step 5: Pick An OCC & Skills
Step 6: Picking An Alignment
Step 7: Character Advancement
Step 8: Rounding Out The Character
And there's a lot of useful information here.
But there are some problems too.
For one thing, only 5 of the 8 steps actually discuss character creation.
Steps 2 and 3 are simply discussing game mechanics. Sure, it's kinda important to know about SDC, HP, and MDC when you're making a character... but no more important than it is to know about Saving Throws, Combat Rules, or other game rules/mechanics that affect how you might make a character.
Step 7 is something that you'll need after a number of adventures, not right out of the gate.
For another thing, the steps are in the wrong order.
Imagine that you are a new player actually trying to follow these steps as written.Somebody fairly literal-minded, whose natural state is to take things as they are presented.
Step 1: The Eight Attributes.
Okay, it tells you what attributes are, and gives you some good info.
It tells you how to roll for attributes, and it tells you "The first step in creating a character is to roll up the eight attributes..."
So you get out your completely blank character sheet, and you roll for each attribute.
Now, there's already a possible problem, because the book doesn't (that I can tell) tell you whether you can pick and choose where your rolls go, or if you're supposed to simply place them in the order rolled.
But being literal-minded, you'll probably put them in the order rolled. So your first roll is for IQ, your next roll is for ME, etc.
Piece of cake!
Step 2: Understanding Damage Ratings
This step tells you how to do two things:
a) how to determine your physical SDC
b) how to determine your Hit Points
Since this is step 2, it's safe to assume that these are the next things that you're supposed to do, right?
So you do them.
RUE 287, which describes how to determine your physical SDC:
"Each OCC should indicate how many SDC points a character gets. In the event that it does not, the character starts out with 2d6+12 SDC, plus any OCC or RCC bonuses. Many physical skills provide additional SDC. All SDC bonuses are accumulative, add them up to get the total SDC given to a character."
So you absorb this, and you realize that while the book is telling you to determine your SDC, it's also telling you that you cannot do this unless you know what OCC you're going to be playing.
Right here is where a computer, completely unable to make intuitive decisions, stops running the program.
It crashes.
But since you're a human, you eventually make a decision.
You decide to just roll for SDC now using the 2d6+12 method, and pencil it in. That way you're covered if you pick an OCC that doesn't have SDC listed. If it turns out that you DO pick an OCC that has SDC listed, and it's different, you can always just erase your original number and write a new one.
It looks like you'll be doing that a lot in any case, since it seems that bonuses will be added in at various points.
Maybe you should use scratch paper?
The book doesn't mention it, so you figure you'll go on without it.
Then you go on to Hit Points.
You look at your PE score, roll 1d6, and write the total down on your character sheet.
Again, it looks like you'll have to erase this, if bonuses are added/subtracted.
Step 3: Understanding Mega-Damage & MDC
You read this section. There are no instructions on making a character in this step, so you move on.
Step 4: Determine Psionics
This step tells you:
"There are three ways of getting a character who has psionic powers. The first, and simplest way, is to select one of the psychic RCCs described in this book...
The second way is to select an OCC that has some psionic abilities like the Operator, Wilderness Scout...
The third way is to roll percentile dice on the following random table..."
The thing is, you still haven't picked an OCC.
That's not until the next step.
This causes some more indecision or hesitation.
Eventually you decide to skip Step 4 for now, and move on to Step 5.
Step 5: Pick an OCC & Skills
You read this brief section, then you look over the OCCs (and RCCs) in the book.
Then you realize that you shouldn't have done
anything yet, because what OCC you pick determines:
-What attributes you roll for
-What dice you use (it's not just the 3d6 described in STEP 1... different classes use different dice!)
-Whether or not you HAVE Hit Points or SDC
-Whether or not you start with any psionics (as was discovered in the previous step), as well as whether or not you are even capable of having psionics (that table for determining psionics might be completely unnecessary depending on what class you pick, and you're glad that you didn't spend the time rolling on that chart, determining ISP, and picking out a the psionic powers you wanted... only to then decide that you want a Full Conversion Borg or something).
You spend some time wondering why this wasn't STEP 1, because character class seems to be the most important determining factor.
Then you notice something else. Some of the character classes have attribute requirements.
So in order to pick your class, you first have to pick your race and roll for attributes, then see if the rolled attributes affect your choice of OCCs.
Of course, there's only one non-RCC race in the main book: human.
So what you
really have to do
first in order to make a character is to decide whether or not you want to play an OCC or an RCC.
-If you decide that you want to play an OCC, then you have roll attributes to see what you qualify for. Presumably, if you don't qualify for an OCC, then you have to pick something different.
If you ultimately end up with an OCC that doesn't use certain attributes, then you rolled them for nothing.
For example, you might start off wanting to play a Cyber-Knight, but you only have a PE of 8. You might then look at playing a Cyber-Doc, but you have a PP of 11. So you end up being a Borg, and ignoring both of those rolls, replacing them with new scores based on your bionic body.
-If you decide that you want to play an RCC, then you can pick a specific one and THEN roll for attributes.
(Of course, as the players get more familiar with the game, and read other books, then the whole RCC/Race thing becomes a mess, and you can end up playing Psi-Stalkers who aren't the Psi-Stalker OCC, and other stuff that makes the official character creation steps even more inaccurate and unhelpful)
So you erase what you had written, decide to play a human (since you already went through the effort of rolling attributes, SDC, and HP), you pick an OCC that fits with your attributes.
You end up being a Mind Melter. That also means that you don't have to backtrack to Step 4, which is for some reason placed before picking an OCC/RCC.
Step 6: Picking an Alignment.
Simple and straightforward.
As long as you haven't gone through steps 1-5, then realized that the class you picked has an alignment restriction of some kind (none spring to mind, but there probably are some somewhere).
You read this section, and pick your alignment.
Step 7: Character Advancement
You read this section. It doesn't apply now, and you wonder why it's in the Character Creation section.
Step 8: Rounding Out The Character
This step is entirely optional.
But it's pretty straightforward, so you do it.
No real problems here.
Okay, after all that, you've learned a lot about the game, and you know a lot more about how to make a character next time.
So what's the problem?
The problem is that
in order to make a character, you had to break the rules.
In this case, you had to do the character creation steps out of order.
For most people, the rule-breaking doesn't end there. That's just the beginning.
In My Experience:-Most players/GMs don't roll for attributes as-written. Some roll 5d6, and keep the best 3. Some roll 3d6, but reroll 1s (and/or 2s). Some roll 4d6, keep the best three (and/or use the extra die in the case of extraordinary attributes).
-Most players place their attribute rolls wherever they like, instead of in the order of attributes. (though, technically, this might not be breaking a rule, since there is no rule on what to do with the numbers you roll.
This is another place that a computer would crash, since key information is missing- you can't even tell if you're cheating or not with this one, although I believe that the idea is to place them in the order rolled).
-Most players either swap attribute scores, or just bump them up to the minimum, when confronted with an OCC attribute restriction. Or just ignore them.
Just in trying to make a character, you have places where the rules are difficult (or impossible) to follow as-written, and where they are routinely (possibly universally) ignored in favor of house rules.
But that's not the only place.
Take a look at the rules for Combat.
RUE 339-341
Here are the steps listed:
1. Determine Initiative
2. Attacker Roll to Strike
3. Defender May Parry, Dodge, or Entangle
4. Attacker Rolls Damage
5. Defender May Attempt to Roll With Impact
Again, if it were a computer program, it would crash almost instantly. There is simply too much missing information.
Rolling for initiative is pretty straightforward. Although I could nit-pick some of it, I'd have to
try.
The rest of the steps, though, are problematic.
Summing up, the problem is that
as written, nobody can ever do anything in a combat situation that does not involve either attacking or defending.
There is no allowance, for example, for the first person with initiative to simply try to talk things down.
There is no allowance for the first person with initiative to flee combat.
There is no allowance for the first person with initiative to run forward, trying to get into melee range.
There is no allowance for the first person with initiative to cast Armor of Ithan.
There is no allowance for the first person with initiative to cast Call Lightning.
There is no allowance for the first person with initiative to draw his firearm.
There is no allowance for the first person with initiative to duck behind cover.
There is no allowance for the first person with initiative to use Telepathy to see better understand the situation.
There is no allowance for the first person with initiative to take Aim.
There is no allowance for the first person with initiative to do anything other than roll a d20 to determine whether or not he hits.Which means that every time you have initiative, and you have your character do anything other than roll a d20 to strike, you're breaking the rules.
Or, at the very, very least, wandering off into the realm of House-Rules.
This is what I mean when I say that the system does not work.
IT DOES NOT WORK.
It can be
made to work, of course, but that's not the same thing.
Making the system work takes time, effort, and energy on the part of the GMs and players, because they're the ones filling in the gaps and cracks, ignoring bad rules, playing judge and jury with conflicting rules, searching through countless books to FIND the rules (even mid-game), discussing (or arguing, or even fighting over) different interpretations of overly-vague rules, and otherwise effectively finishing/rewriting the game to fit their group's desires and personalities.
And this includes the people who honestly argue that the game
does work.
What they mean, I think, is that
their game works.
The game that they've created by reading the Palladium system, patching the heck out of it, intuiting a heck of a lot more, mistaking some of it, and ignoring chunks of it, in order to come up with something that they like... yeah, THAT game probably works really, really well for them.
But that doesn't mean that the system that Palladium publishes works, certainly not as-is.
Also, in my experience, the people who argue that the system "works" tend to be people who play fast and loose with the rules.
The kind of people who say, "as long as you're having fun, you're doing it right" or "I'm not going to let the rules get in the way of a good story."
The kind of people who don't really play Rules As Written in the first place.
Which is why I don't see the need for some of the outrage that I've seen here when the people are crying out against a new system, or against serious revision, or other changes.
Ignoring the fact that Palladium has probably averaged a new rule (or rule change) every two books or so for at least the past 22 years, the fact that the system has been in constant flux since
before its creation, I still don't see any logical reason for it.
Why would people who don't play RAW in the first place really, truly care if the rules that they're already ignoring and house-ruling regularly are changed?
I'd prefer anybody who wants to answer that, though, to start a new topic or just PM me about it.
That's not the reason why I started this Topic.
The reason why I started this topic is because there's a LOT of back-and-forth lately between people wanting the system fixed, and people who swear up, down, left, right, and all 8 points of the compass, that the system needs no fixing.
But those latter people are wrong. Clearly and simply.
And this topic is to point that out.
To make this 100% clear to everybody, and to get everybody on the same page, so that when we talk about whether the system "works," we're all talking about the same thing, and we're all in agreement.
Ideally, we can all get together, hold hands, and sing songs about the system being broken (but we love it anyway!).
More realistically, I'd be pretty happy with people being more aware that other people perceive things differently, so that when Person A starts complaining about the system not "working," Person B asks for more information about what Person A exactly means.
Because two things are pretty clear to me:
1. The system does NOT work.
2. Nobody in their right mind is
ever trying to say that they're completely unable to make Palladium's system work. It's just a matter of how much work they're willing to put into it.
So they're not (usually) trying to come here and trash something that you (and I, and probably they as well) love, they're just communicating dissatisfaction over something that is very real, and that is (for them) problematic.
There's nothing really wrong with arguments, as long as they're good-natured, and as long as everybody is arguing about the same thing.
But all too often lately, it's seemed that when the topic of the system "working" comes up, people are yelling past each other instead of trying to understand where the other people are coming from, and trying to understand what is really being said.
We're role-players. We're supposed to be good at putting ourselves in other people's shoes.
Perhaps worst of all, it's all pretty much moot, because (lately) it's centered around the "debate" of whether or not Palladium should create a new rules system.
Which is absurd, because it's like asking whether or not Kevin should fly through the air shooting laser beams from his eyes.
It'd be really cool, but it's just not (as far as I know) within any kind of realistic assessment of his powers and capabilities.
Palladium simply doesn't have the time, money, or manpower to put out a new edition of their system at this point in time. It's too big of a project, and they're stretched too thin as it is.
I would LOVE to see Palladium's system get a complete, AD&D-3.0-style overhaul, making their system more streamlined, coherent, and easily playable... but I'd also like to see Kevin flying through the sky shooting lasers from his eyes.
Unfortunately, though, my desires do not dictate reality, so the odds are about the same of me witnessing either of those things happen in the foreseeable future.
Perfect or not, the system we have now is what we have now.
It's what we're likely to have in the future.
What we WANT to have doesn't really matter much- nobody can give it to us.
It's unproductive to spend so much time arguing about something beyond our control.
What MIGHT be productive, and what MIGHT be something that we can control, would be specific rule changes and ideas.
If enough people express the same concern to Kevin, he will make official rules to deal with the concerns.
It's how we got the GI-Joe Rule, for example.
So perhaps maybe people could spend a bit less time trying to get a system-wide overhaul, and more time thinking of ways to make the existing system
better, we could actually get something useful done.
If so, and we do it often enough, well enough, and over a long enough period of time, it might turn into that overhaul that some of us are looking for anyway.
IF we can agree on what kind of things we'd like to have changed, and what compromises we'd be willing to live with.
But that's a subject for another thread.