More New Old TV: Greatest American Hero, Van Helsing, and X-Files

First, GAH - Article here. The guys behind the Lego Movie are behind this too and I'm going to say that's a plus because that was a much better and funnier movie than I ever expected. Considering how popular superhero movies have been for the last decade and a half I am a little surprised that it took this long. Much like the Trek announcement yesterday I think writing and casting will be the most important things here. Assuming the concept remains similar you need a good everyman for the lead, a hard-bitten cop sidekick, and a good comedic actress to play the wife.

Of course there's a pretty good chance they decide to change something up - what if the main character is female? Part of me says "keep it mostly the same" but there would be quite a bit of comedy there too so who knows? The basic concept is so ripe with potential, and TV effects are good enough now, that this has a lot going for it.

Next, Van Helsing - Article here. Ah, so it has really nothing at all to do with any traditional take on Van Helsing at all? It's Van Helsing's daughter (not a problem) who's resurrected (OK) five years in the future (from ... now? Is that right?) to fight against the vampires who have taken over the world.  Yeah ... so no Victorian era, no early 20th century era, it's now... ish. Oh and it's being handled by SyFy - HAH!

This sounds closer to Underworld or even the Walking Dead than previous movies and stories about the character. I'm not opposed to someone doing a modern take on it but I think they're pushing it pretty far out. Making a female lead character is fine. Making it modern is fine. But doing both and then having vampires in control of the world - that might be too much. Also, it doesn't read like it's some covert cabal ala the Masquerade from the RPG or the Authority from True Blood, it reads like it's post-apocalyptic in a way. Heck, you'd think they might try and tie in to the Steampunk thing that's out there and seems to be popular enough to latch on to, but apparently not. You could do it in the 20's/30's/40's similar to Agent Carter or Boardwalk Empire. I know "modern/near-future" = "cheaper to produce" but c'mon - you're only talking about doing 12 episodes!

Yep, that pretty much puts a ... puts the final ... oh you get it ...

This one is definitely a "wait and see and prepare to be disappointed", at least based on what I see now.


Also, don't forget the X-Files is coming back in 2016 too. I really liked that show, especially the first 5 years or so. It's one of the cardinal examples of a show staying on too long, but when it was good it was really good. With a nice long gap I'm hoping the creative team has rechanged their batteries and have some new stories worth telling.

I'd just like to see someone aiming high on some of this stuff. There is so much good TV out there now, even sci-fi/fantasy TV like Walking Dead, Flash, Daredevil, and Doctor Who that "OK" isn't going to cut it anymore. I like to think that a lot of us aren't going to settle for simple, cheaply produced shows featuring generic situations with cardboard characters and cardboard sets just because it's on the air. There are fan-produced films and shows that cover some interesting ground nowadays. If at least half of these new shows measure up to he new standard then I will be happy to call that a win.

New Trek Series

Well this was a surprise - details here. My own thoughts:

• In general I think it will be good to have a new Trek show out there
• I don't like that it will only on this new CBS streaming service. If it was on Netflix or one of the existing cable channels, sure. But now you're asking people to pay for this CBS service separately to access it. I get the business reasoning - I just don't like it.
• The people behind it:
  The new series will be produced by CBS Television Studios in association with Kurtzman’s Secret Hideout. Kurtzman and Heather Kadin will serve as executive producers. Kurtzman is also an executive producer for the hit CBS television series Scorpion and Limitless, along with Kadin and Orci, and for Hawaii Five-0 with Orci.
  I am not sure how much of this is a plus or a minus. Kurtzman also was involved in the two JJ Abrams movies and I have mixed feelings about those. I haven't heard anything earth-shattering about Scorpion or Limitless and while I enjoyed Hawaii Five-O the first couple of seasons as a sort of Miami Vice redux, I don't know that any of them show any aptitude for doing something like Star Trek. That said, I didn't know much about anybody on the Next gen series other than Roddenberry himself and that turned out alright. 
• Setting? The article does mention that it has nothing to do with the next Trek movie, and I keep seeing internet chatter that CBS only has rights to the original universe while Paramount only has rights to the new movie universe but I don't know how true that is. Is this set in some known Trek time period? Is it a new, separate continuity or is it tied to one of the existing ones? I'm very interested in where they will take this.
• The important stuff will be, regardless of platform, writing and acting. If they can hit on one, it will do alright. If they hit on both I think it will get some serious attention. Note that going to a streaming channel instead of broadcast TV means the standards are very different. We could be looking at 12 episodes per season and more blood/sex/nudity/violence than we are used to seeing. That's never been a thing with Trek, really, but it's never really had the option to push the limits like this either. 

This is clearly part of a business plan at CBS to push their streaming channel to the next level, and that's fine. Hey, if it gets us a decent Trek series then it's a big positive. I hope that we see something akin to the new Star Wars approach where they are willing to acknowledge and embrace the past stories and characters but also not afraid to push out in new directions with new characters. 

It's all very vague right now but hey, it will give us something to overanalyze for 2016 after Force Awakens is old news.

Canon, Star Wars, and Star Trek

In the 80's, despite the popularity of the movies, there were very few Star Wars novels. Splinter of the Mind's Eye, Han Solo at Star's End, and a few others. Plus some comic books. That was about it.

In contrast, we were drowning in Star Trek novels.

When it came to Trek novels, comic books, games, and other stories, there was one rule: None of them were part of a shared universe. Each one was "canon +1" -  referencing only the TV show and maybe the movies plus the new work itself. "Black Fire" was not in any kind of continuity with "Web of the Romulans" or "Dreadnought". Now an individual author could write several books that shared continuity with each other, and some authors tried to cross-reference their stories, but none of it was official.

None of it was canon.

That's probably a good thing, as a lot of these things were not very good. Rather than trying to curate a coherent, connected universe of 3rd party media, Paramount said "go nuts" and didn't try to endorse anything as official or canonical. And no one was really asking them to do so.

Then in the 90's Star Wars realized there was a lack in this area and started up a new line with a new approach - what would some day be called the Expanded Universe was canon, was coordinated, and was all in continuity with everything else.

At the time, this seemed pretty cool. Even then, however, I said to my friends and myself "sure, it's all canon - until George Lucas gets around to making Episodes 8-9-10." Did anyone really think that Lucas was going to let his movie-making be limited by a novel someone else had written? That's ridiculous.

I do admire the effort that went into it though, even if it seemed like something that almost had to have a limited lifespan. I also liked that the Star Wars RPG laid a lot of the ground work for names and locations and other elements of the universe.

Over the last year, with the new movies getting underway, there has been a lot of hubbub over the revocation of this state and the implementation of a new order: All of the old EU stuff is branded "Legends" and now there will be a new canon, undoubtedly better than the old canon.

And in 20 years (or less) you can bet they will do this same thing all over again.

So I would encourage those who spend a lot of time sweating canon, especially since 99% of you are not getting paid by Lucasfilm/Disney to work on it to stop worrying about it. A good book is still a good book and a bad one is still a bad one. "Canon" does not equal quality!

Sure, it chaps me a little bit that the Zahn books - written by an author I knew of before that time and really really good even today - are no longer "officially endorsed" and all that but that's more because I suspect not as many people will read them than because it reduces their level of goodness. It doesn't mean I wouldn't recommend them to a friend. The same thing happened to Splinter of the Mind's eye and a lot of us thought that was uncool too - circa 1980.  Yet I still see the book on shelves.

Just remember that the only true canon for Star Wars are the six movies (soon to be seven). I know, I know, Clone Wars and Rebels are canon too. So was the Holiday Special at one time.

The movies are canon. In the long run, nothing else is. Go with that and you'll sleep easier.

The Flash - Season One

I watch this show every week with Apprentice Who and it has become much more than a show I watch because one of the kids is interested. I have to say I have been pleasantly surprised - even more than that, I've been amazed. That doesn't happen a ton when it comes to TV anymore. I was cautiously optimistic a year ago. That proved to be worth it as the first season of this show is really really good. That is, if you like comic book superheroes adapted to a live action TV series. Sure, we've had the movies for over a decade now, and we've had some quality animated series, but it's been a long time since we've had a decent live action superhero show, and this one really makes me happy.

Why is this a surprise? Well ...

• I've never been a huge Flash fan. I've always thought of him as a nice supporting player in the Justice League but I've never cared enough to read his solo comic books. I've become more and more aware over the decades that he has been a fairly big player in the history of superheroes. It still wasn't enough for me to care a whole lot outside of his team appearances.
• I've always been more of a Marvel guy than  DC guy. I don't hate DC or anything, but I've spent more time digging into Marvel characters than DC characters. A DC live action show of all things turning out well is a nice surprise. Given the history, maybe I shouldn't be. It's generally upbeat most of the time. It doesn't use a washed out color palette. Flash is young but it's not a show about teenage angst. They're doing a bunch of stuff right that movie DC still hasn't figured out.
• I've usually thought of super speed as kind of a boring power. Sure, you're fast, but other than mobility and defense what do you have? This show has helped dispatch that notion for me, and the power does fit really well into an ongoing series. Plus they made it look visually interesting, which I thought was tough to do.
• They made Captain Cold interesting! CAPTAIN COLD! The guy whose whole schtick is a parka and a freezing gun, the most mundane combination of supervillain looks and power sets in comicdom, is maybe the most interesting villain on the show! That's not a disparaging comment, it's just some combination of the actor's choices and the writing has combined to make him an interesting character.  
• Overall, it doesn't feel like there have been a bunch of compromises made to get this show on TV and that's so rare when it comes to putting superheroes on TV. It's rare in putting a lot of things on TV. The Sopranos, Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones - those are other examples where it feels like there is not a lot of compromising being done. This show might not be quite at those levels in terms of drama - we're not exactly dealing with realistic life problems here - but in terms of being well-done it is right there with them. 

Another interesting note is that it generally seems to be well-liked among both marginal and more dedicated super-fan-types. That's an achievement that rarely happens. The only real criticism I've heard is that the actor who plays Barry is too young. I get that. I can understand it, especially coming from the long term hardcore Flash fans, where it seems to mostly originate. Barry is the more seasoned character, and Wally West is the young whippersnapper. It's easy for me to overlook it, shrug, and say that we're watching "Flash: Year One" and that he should be young. I understand those who have a harder time doing it though. I just worry that you're missing a really good show over an issue that may not be as important in the long run as the weight you're giving it. 

The first season gives us a quick origin, the supporting cast, a significant chunk of his rogue's gallery, several plot twists and turns, crossovers with several other heroes (Green Arrow, Firestorm, and The Atom), and the resolution of most of the major story arcs introduced along the way. 

Season 2 just kicked off this month and has already introduced Professor Zoom, Jay Garrick, Earth 2, and the 52 universes! Not only did this show start strong - it's getting better!

Another plus: There's no reset button. From 50's Superman to Batman 66 to most versions of Star Trek that's been a regrettably common element in telling out-there stories. This show is a serial. Like a comic book. Remarkable, eh?

Now it isn't perfect but the list of possible improvements in my head is limited.

• I thought the whole keeping-the-bad-guys-in-the-basement thing was a little too "silver age convenient" for a modern TV show. By the end of the season, they fixed it! Nicely too!
• I do still wonder if an HBO or Netflix approach with 12 or 13 episodes in a season wouldn't make it stronger. I didn't feel like there was a ton of filler in season one (unlike, say Agents of Shield) but filling up 20+ episodes every year can be tricky. The possibility of halving that number makes me wonder how it would be in the long run.
• Just the chance of doing "too much" - from Cisco's naming of bad guys to references to other DC universe cities and companies to crossovers to new villains to new supporting characters there is a lot going on and a lot of windows being opened. Maybe that's the key to making those 20+ episodes interesting but there is a chance of spreading things too thin and only touching on things that might deserve more attention. I haven't seen it yet - it's just a concern for the future.  

That's about as strong a recommendation as I can give. It's worth your time if you like the kinds of things I talk about on this blog. Enjoy!

Into the Unknown for D&D 4E

Just to change things up a bit ...

Why this book now? Because it's one of the two books I never picked up for 4E and I figured I might as well finish the set.

This is subtitled the "Dungeon Survival Handbook" but it's a mix of material for players and for DMs. It is very much optional and I never missed it while I was running my 4E games.

• Up front is a selection of Themes for a dungeon-heavy campaign. These were a late addition to 4E that added a lot of flavor and a little bit of crunch, first appearing in Neverwinter I believe. I liked the concept and I still do. There are 7 new ones here and they seem broad enough to be useful in a lot of campaigns if a little less flavorful than the Neverwinter themes. "Treasure Hunter" and "Trapsmith" are samples of what we're talking about here.
• We also get new races: Goblin, Kobold, and Svirfneblin. Very underdark-themed, but I could see them being fine in some games. 
• There is a section of dungeon-themed alternate powers for a bunch of classes. Nothing essential, and nothing I saw seemed to be a game-breaker, but some cool moves nonetheless.
• That's about it for the mechanics other than a few pages of magic items near the end. Most of the rest of it is good ideas for exploring dungeons, types of dungeons, things that live in dungeons (no stats, just flavor, habits, descriptions), famous dungeons (White Plume Mountain, etc) , DMing dungeon adventures, and methods for creating dungeons including a random dungeon generator. 

 In general it's a fine book if you're going to feature a dungeon-heavy or megadungeon campaign, and there's nothing bad here, but you could run a dungeon-heavy game without it too. It didn't impress me as much as Neverwinter or Mordenkainens Magical Emporium but I do like it overall. If anyone out there is still running a 4E game and doesn't have it, it's certainly worth a look

Pathfinder Strategy Guide

Why? Because I found it for cheap and thought it might be handy if someone new comes along.

This book is an introduction for new players and while it's not a replacement for the core book in that it doesn't cover all of the rules, it is a really nice walkthrough of how a Pathfinder game works.

• There's a quiz to determine what kind of character you might like to play that leads to a Theme. 
• Each of the 26 themes has a half-page description of what they are like, how they operate, and some racial considerations. They made me think of the Warhammer occupations in some ways though they are not quite the same. It's much more of a "concept" presentation than a mechanical presentation.  
• The bulk of the book is spent on the class guides. This covers each of the classes in the core book, discussing abilities, skills, feats, class benefits in general, and then goes into a section with a short table for each level covering the mechanical changes, some good ideas for feats, spells, and any class options at that level. While the book is aimed at the new player, this section is pretty slick and can be helpful even for a veteran player picking up a new class. The themes are referenced here as well discussing choices for each one at each level as needed. 
• The final third of the book is all about playing the game and that's what really makes the book nice - it's not just a guide to building a character that is then put aside. It's useful once play begins as well. A lot of time is spent on combat, but it's broken into separate sections on things like actions, then another section on spellcasting, one on maneuvers, and a really nice one on "Understanding your square" that is the single best explanation of occupied squares, threatened squares, reach, and attacks of opportunity that I have seen in a long time. There;s a section on how to sneak. There's a section on talking to people. There's a section on how dungeons work. There's even a section on making the transition to GM and running your first game.
  
  I think it's a much better book than I expected and while the class information is limited to the core book and mainly useful for the new player, the in-play section is a handy reference even for a veteran.
  
  The only downside to the book is the price - with a $30 cover price it's not cheap. If someone already bought the Beginner Box or the Core Rules, telling them that "hey this other book is an awesome way to get started" may be a step too far. 

Blood of the Night for Pathfinder

Why? Because Lady Blacksteel has been known to play a vamp PC a time or three)

This is the "Vampire PC Book" for Pathfinder and it covers exactly that.

• There are notes on running vampires as PC's, the biggest of which is "it's not a great idea but here are some ideas on how to make it a little less broken". My own take on it is that if you're starting a campaign at 1st level, sure, it's a terrible idea. If you're starting one at say 10th, well, that might work. 
• The main focus is on the Dhampir, which is basically Blade - one parent is a vampire, one is not. This lets them manage the power level to the point that it's equivalent in power to the standard races while still keeping most of the flavor of a vampire type character. I originally thought it was a stupid idea but I've come around on it and there are enough good ideas here that I can see it being a pretty interesting character to play.
• The book describes 4 different sub-races of vampire, branching into Asian, Indian, and the Nosferatu in addition to the more traditional Dracula type.
• There's a lot of information on how the various races and the dhampir fit into Golarion as well so it's not all about the mechanics. From deities to areas of influence it's plenty to get the wheels turning without overdoing it.

With a cover price of $11 it's fairly inexpensive for Pathfinder books and if you're interested in playing a vampire PC, well, this is the book you want. If you're a DM planning a fang-heavy campaign it's worth getting as well. Within that narrow scope, I like it just fine.

Pathfinder Unchained

Pathfinder Unchained is a kind of book that you could only get with a solid, mature rules system. Pathfinder may be on its initial edition but it's effectively the third edition of "d20 fantasy" and this is the kind of book you can do and do well at that point. It also helps if the game is popular enough to support this kind of supplement as I would bet that most Pathfinder campaigns will not use it, and even fewer will use anything beyond the character classes.

Unchained takes pretty much every even slightly controversial rule in Pathfinder and offers a way to change it or eliminate it. To make a comparison to a lesser-known book, it's similar to the Mutants and Masterminds "Mastermind's Manual".

• The first chapter is a reworking of 4 core classes: Barbarian, Monk, Rogue, and Summoner. I won't spend much time on these other than to say they seem solid to me and if you play one you should take a look at them. There are also sections on staggered advancement and fractional base bonuses. I've never had any players that thought the math progression in d20 was much of an issue but if you do here are a couple of ways to address it. 
• Beginning with the second chapter the skill system gets a bunch of options:
• Background Skills separates out "background" skills into their own point pool. This evens out things like Profession and Craft for everyone and makes each class' skill points count towards the more adventuring-specific things like Climb or Diplomacy. I like this  and I did something like it in some of my 3rd edition games years ago. It's nice to have an official option to refer people to.  
• The Consolidated Skills option cuts the skill list down from 35 to 12, similar to the way D&D 4E and M&M 3E handled them. I'm a fan of the broad skill list approach in games so I like this a lot. I find players and GM's spend a lot less time debating what skill is appropriate to a given task when the broader options are used.
• Grouped Skills is an option I didn't like quite as much. It lies in between the existing granular skill system and the Consolidated option as it still uses the full list but gives bonuses for groups of similar skills. It makes characters more broadly competent but doesn't completely change up the list. I think it's a half measure but it might be easier to integrate into an existing campaign. 
• Alternate Crafting and Profession rules give a different way to use them in play. The alternate crafting stuff is interesting but you need to have a player who is really interested in it to make it worth implementing. The profession section is more interesting to me as it includes a system for using one's profession to run a business, including the size of the business, profits, and how much of the character's time it takes. I don't know that it would come up a lot in my games, but it's nice to have it on the shelf if it does.
• Skill Unlocks are nifty little perks one receives in specific skills at 5/10/15/20 ranks. I'd say they are roughly equivalent to Feats but access is limited, even in this optional system, so they shouldn't break the game as presented. They's a big part of the revised Rogue class earlier in the book. I think it's a nice way to include a themed feat chain, roughly, without adding in stuff that anyone can take anytime. 
• Variant Multiclassing: This is very similar to the 4th Edition D&D version of multiclassing. Instead of spending levels, a character gives up their feats at certain levels to gain features from another class. Each of the classes from the core book and the Advanced Players Guide is written up to be compatible with this approach and somewhat to my surprise I really like it. I thought one of 3E's great innovations was per-level multiclassing and I still do, but not every concept needs to take full levels in another class. Sometimes one just wants some of the flavor, and this option allows that without losing any of the benefits of your main class. I do think they are weaker than a lot of multiclass combinations, but there are still a lot of interesting possibilities here. 

• After skills we get the general "Gameplay" chapter and it covers a lot of ground:
• There's a section looking at alignment and adding some new mechanics around using it in the game
• There's a section about taking alignment out of the game completely and how that affects some mechanics of the game
• Revised Action Economy: I'm not as clear on the goals for this section but the idea is to drop most of the different kinds of actions and give everyone 3 "acts" per round. This also drops multiple attacks as presented but it lets people use an act to make an attack if that's what they want to do. It's basically an action point system (see FASA Star Trek for my favorite AP system) but it feels really constrained with the 3 act (effectively 3 points) limit as all of the existing actions one can take in Pathfinder are presented in a list with a cost of 1-3 acts and various special rules or limitations applied. I think action point systems are great in general but I don't see what this one brings over the normal Pathfinder system. I don;t see the win here.
• Removing Iterative Attacks: This changes the existing system of rolling for each attack into what a lot of systems do for autofire type attacks - rolling higher = scoring multiple hits. The stated goal is to save time and I can see some of that but you are supposed to oll damage separately for each hit so I'm not sure it makes a huge difference in play. I am curious enough to consider trying this one at some point.
• Stamina and Combat Tricks: Options for fighters to do more than just swing and hit for damage. They can inflict various conditions, add temporary bonuses or penalties. There are over 20 pages of these with over 20 items on most pages so it's a very robust set of options if you choose to use it. To me it would make fighters more like 4E fighter types and their set of powers that did more than just "2d6 + Str". Another benefit I can see is differentiating between melee types even more than the system already allows. It looks interesting on paper and I'd like to see it in play some time.
• Wound Thresholds: A system that inflicts penalties as hit points drop. I like it but I'm not sure what it does to the rest of the game. A lot of players do not like "death spiral" mechanics but I don't have a huge problem with them. I tend to think of them as "warning lights" that it may be time to retreat when things start getting too hard. It does make in-combat healing more valuable than it already was, but I don't think that alone would stop me from using it. It's another item on the "we ought to try it sometime" list.
• Diseases and Poisons: Each type of disease or points has a progress track and as saves are failed or made the victim moves up or down the track and suffers from various problems. I think this would be worth it where a disease or poison was a big part of the adventure, particularly if it applied to a PC or important NPC. I don't think I would implement it just to accommodate the average rat bite.

• Chapter 4 covers Magic:
• Simplified Spellcasting: As a character progresses their lower level spells become a pool instead of something that has to be tracked every day. I like it, but I've never met a player who complained that setting their spells for the day was a chore - most of them enjoy it!
• Spell Alterations: This section presents some general options for  magic as a whole: Limited Magic (weakening it overall), Wild Magic (more random!), and Active Spellcasting (use attack rolls for casting spells). Interesting but nothing that wound me up a whole lot.
• Esoteric Material Components: This really made me think of Ultima IV and it's "Reagents" for casting spells. There are some materials that enhance certain schools of magic and one universal type that can be used when casting to  add in some additional effects. It's interesting but I think it would have to be a part of the campaign world to make a lot of sense. I also don't know that magic needs another option to be more powerful or have more bits to keep track of in play.
• Automatic Bonus Progression: This is one of the most interesting options in the book. The math in Pathfinder assumes characters will have certain bonus to attacks and defenses at certain levels, hence the large number of magic items that give numeric bonuses to stats, like the +1 sword, + 2 shield, or Headband of Intellect +4. This system builds those types of bonuses into the level progression (via a single table) and eliminates magical item bonuses entirely. Now a flaming sword only has the "flaming", it doesn't have to be a "+1 flaming sword". I think it would make for a very different kind of game but it's something people have discussed since D&D 3.0 rolled out and I think this is a simple and elegant approach if someone wants to explore this option/. 
• Innate Item Bonuses: This is a slightly different way to do the same thing I described above but with a little more attention to items. I can see that it would probably work but I didn't like it as much as the Innate option. In short, there is a bonus associated with the type and cost of each item slot in the game and putting anything in that slot grants the character that bonus. It eliminates the +2 stat bonus item but does not automatically grant a replacement bonus unless the character slots in another item in that same slot. 
• Scaling Items: This is a nice option. This changes the approach to magic items so that they grow as the character levels up. This gets rid of the whole scenario where a character has to set aside the magic sword they found at first level because it's just not strong enough at 10th. The section includes 17 pages of magic items rewritten for this approach and while I think you would want to implement it at the start of a campaign, I think it's a very nice way to make magic items take a better place in the campaign as rare and powerful items. I don't think you would need to account for magic item shops in a campaign using these rules.
• Dynamic Magic Item Creation: Makes creating a magic sword much more than a couple of rolls. Instead it's a little like a skill challenge form 4E in that there are a few steps to it and failure doesn't mean it didn't work, it just means you take more time and may have a quirk or a flaw in the item. As a DM I like it a lot, but I suspect my players would not like it as much, if only from a resource expenditure point of view. I'd say it's worth a look in any campaign. 

• The final chapter is Simple Monster Creation - all 50 pages of it! Humor aside, this is a great addition to the game. It takes an approach similar to 4E of looking at the monster's role in the game, type, and level and assigning stats based on that rather than the more Hero-system-esque 3E approach of building it from the ground up just like you would a player character. If you're running your game from a computer using Hero Lab or Combat Manager then I don't think it's as much of a benefit as you have decent tools already. Similarly, if you're running an Adventure Path pretty close to the book then you may not be building many monsters anyway. However, if you are writing your own material, and especially if you're doing it on paper, this is a much better way in my opinion than the existing system. 

So what parts of the book do I like? Well, I like most of it. I don't know how much of it I am going to use in my current campaign, but I do like it.  There's nothing bad here, just options that may or may not interest you or fit your game. I think the classes are the easiest part to drop in as they only really affect that character. Simple Monster Creation is mainly on the DM - the players are not likely to be able to analyze your beasties enough to know whether you're using it or not. The system changes in between those two parts though ... that's a group discussion in my eyes. Some of them could really freshen things up for a veteran group.

For me, I think we're going to continue our campaign with the standard rules. Since it's Wrath of the Righteous we're already using Mythic Power and the mass combat rules from Ultimate Campaign so it's not exactly "vanilla" anyway. Once we finish it we should have seen Pathfinder at it's most over the top, all the way through 20th level. After that we may look at trying some of these out for the next campaign, and if I get some kind of side game going then they may be on the menu too.

Why I Like Rifts - Ley Lines, Nexus Points, and Magic

I touched on this in my previous post but I thought it deserved more discussion. Ley lines get occasional mentions in other games but they are a big part of the landscape in Rifts. Here's why:

• Within a mile of a line caster get extra energy and spells are more powerful (range, duration, etc)
• Actually being on a line does even more
• Being at a nexus point (where two or more lines cross) does even more
• Certain times increase the power of a nexus point as well: noon, midnight, equinoxes, solstices, lunar eclipses, and solar eclipses. 
• Some of the above times also include a rift opening at a nexus point

Think about the above details. Before we have defined anything about kingdoms or races or other terrain we know that ley lines are where interesting things happen, and serve as paths to where more things can happen. Magic-using characters are likely to seek them out. Magic-hating characters might seek to avoid them, or they may seek them out to hunt demons or wizards or any other spell-tossing threat. Even without knowing much of anything else about the setting we know this is something to look for. 

It also makes the calendar a little more significant. It may make a huge difference if there's an eclipse coming up if a nexus point is involved in one's plans. There are reasons to be in a particular place at a particular time, from traveling through a gateway to crafting some potent new magical item.

Once we do start fleshing things out, they help define the map. A nexus point seems like an obvious place for a wizard to live ...or a demon lord! Many wizards can teleport along a ley line with little effort, and some techno-magic devices can fly along a ley line - that could make it an easy path between cities of a nation or it might be a terrible window of vulnerability that must be patrolled.  

With Magic in general Rifts gets into more details than some games. Magic users can draw energy from outside themselves, typically from another living creature. The available amount is dependent on whether they are willing or unwilling targets, and then the energy doubles at the moment of a creatures death. This gives an in-game reason for why those evil types are always performing human sacrifices and might give non-evil types a temptation in difficult circumstances.

The thing I like about all this is that it grounds magic in the world in a very playable way and gives it some flavor that you don;t find in the typical D&D type game. Sure, you can still play a classic robed, bearded, pointy-hatted fireball tosser but there's more going on in the world than just that. Maybe the reason the warlord is conquering everything in the area like a madman is not because he's evil and that's what evil warlords do, but because his wizard has promised he can bring back the warlord's dead wife if he has control of a local nexus point on the day of the next lunar eclipse. It fits the setting and it's something the players could research and figure out to some degree because it's built into the setting.

It's significant enough that they made a whole class that has powers dealing with ley lines. It's great if you're especially interested in that aspect and it's one of the signature character types of the game. Even with the mechanics change I expect Savage Rifts will spend some time on "Ley Line Walker" as a character type.

So I like the presentation and the flavor of magic in Rifts and I'm looking forward to seeing what Savage Worlds can do with them.

Why I Like Rifts - The Apocalypse

(I mentioned to Barking Alien a while back that I would do a post on "Why I like Rifts" as it's a game I like that he doesn't get and I know he's not alone. I think there's a segment of the gaming population that gets caught up in the messy mechanics or the 157 splatbooks and never gets to looking at the actual setting. With Rifts for Savage Worlds on the way I thought it was time to take a look at the setting again, so I will be doing a series of posts on "why I like Rifts". This is the first.)

That title probably sounds a little strange but in any post-apocalyptic game the nature of the apocalypse plays at least a small role in shaping the setting. Most of them are the typical Nuclear/Biological/Chemical war, the traditional late 20th century end of the world scenario. Lately the zombie thing has made a strong showing. Rifts is different though.

The Rifts background is that sometime in the future, when technology is quite a bit more advanced than now an age of enlightenment ends in a series of short skirmishes that escalates quickly into a massive worldwide war that is over in a very short time. Thousands, then millions, of people are killed almost instantly. One of Rifts conceits is that psychic energy is doubled when something dies. The psychic energy released by this massive slaughter is so tremendous that the old ley lines, currents of magical energy from a prior age when the earth was a magical place, are reawakened and become more than just a current, they become torrents of psychic energy, rushing around the globe in a flood of power. Anywhere two or more lines cross is a nexus point, and at times of high energy these nexus points can tear open gateways into other dimensions. With this kind of energy unleashed, pretty much all of the nexus points around the globe rip open and stay open, and a ton of bad things come through, adding even more carnage to the apocalypse. Large areas of the land phase in and out, trading places with other dimensions, the old continent of Atlantis is pulled back into the world, and the earth is now a supercharged magical dimensional nexus point.

The reasons this stands out to me are these:

• The apocalypse sets up and shapes the game world in interesting ways, both with the backstory and mechanically with ley lines, magic, and psionics.
• It gives the GM a great starting point to put anything into the campaign that they think is interesting. "Thousands of dimensional gateways" is wide open for exploration in a campaign.
• It gives players a reason to go places - "we're following a ley line", "We're headed for a nexus point that we believe opens up to the plane of shadows every new moon. 
• Lots of ruined cities (one of the staples of a post-apoc campaign) and they may not even be human cities.
• It provides a nice reason for widely varying conditions and terrain anywhere in the world. "Sure, Kansas is still flat. Well, except for that triangle shaped chunk just west of Wichita that's full of mountains now."

It pushes the apocalypse to be more than your standard nuclear war scenario. It explains both the end of the world and the re-entry of magic into the world at the same time. It sets up the ley lines and nexus points that are a fairly significant feature of the setting. I'll touch more on this in a future post.

One possibly overlooked aspect of the coming of the rifts is that it is considered tragic by most of the humans of earth, something to be "fixed", not some great blessing to be appreciated. Humanity used to own the planet (and some of the solar system) and that's no longer the case. Of course there are differing views but the biggest human powers view the time before rifts as normality, and the time since as a continuing war for the survival of humanity against an invasion of alien monsters. This coloring of viewpoints leads to some interesting shades of grey when it comes to non-humans who were born on earth and consider it home. That is, if you choose to explore it. Like many of the elements of Rifts, you can choose to ignore it and run a straight up shoot-and-loot campaign or you can let some of those differences play out between PCs and NPCs or even within the party. It's a nice little extra element that pushes things into more complicated territory than good vs. evil.

So that's the first element that caught my eye with Rifts and one that should remain interesting regardless of the system used for the setting.