Palladium Fantasy RPG: First Look

[dutch206]

Title: Palladium Fantasy RPG (First edition revised)

Publisher: Palladium Books

I have been playing RPG's since the late 70's and am ashamed to admit that I had never heard of Kevin Siembida or Palladium Books until last week. Several of my online friends told me that I owed it to myself to investigate this system. This review is the result of my investigation.

Overview of the book:

OCR scan of the twelfth printing of these rules from 1994. As far as scans go, this one is pretty good. There was only one messed up page, and it was just an illustration. Keep in mind that this book was written in 1983, so it definitely counts as "Old School".

Contents:

1) Character attributes and races

2) Experience points and level advancement

3) A brief overview of the Occupational Character Classes (OCC) system

4) The skill system

5) Men of Arms OCC's (Mercenary, Soldier, Knight, Paladin, etc....)

6) Optional OCC's (Peasant, Noble, etc....)

7) the combat system, weapons, and armor

8) Overview of the magic system

9) Men of Magic OCC's and spells

10) Mind Mage OCC and the psionics system

11) The Alchemist NPC profession

12) The Clergy overview, OCC's, religions, and deities

13) Creatures (Demons, devils, dragons, elementals, angels, etc....)

14) A very brief 6-page overview of the campaign setting. (each region is detailed in a separate sourcebook)

15) A sample adventure: "The Gersidi Family Crypt" set in the human kingdom of Timiro.

Likes:

1) Each character race comes with a percentage chance of cannibalism. I've never seen that in an RPG before.

2) This book is a treasure trove of interesting ideas, regardless of what system you play.

3) This book is a blast-from-the-past that reminds me of the way RPG's used to be.

Dislikes:

1) There is no table of contents, and only a limited index in the back.

2) There is no sense of organization in the book, not even chapters. It's just one page of information after another, presented (IMHO) without rhyme or reason.

3) The Men of Magic OCC's are presented like the ones in the fourth edition of the world's most popular RPG. (Profession followed by all powers available to that profession, one at a time). I wasn't a big fan of it in that book, and I like it even less in this book.

Bottom line:

Buy this book and strip it out for ideas in your own campaign. Take good notes, because the lack of organization means you may never find that particular section again.

My Review: 3 of 5 stars.
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[dutch206]

Quote:
it was just an illustration

My apologies to Peter Bradley for that remark.
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[DangerDwarf]

dutch206 wrote:
I have been playing RPG's since the late 70's and am ashamed to admit that I had never heard of Kevin Siembida or Palladium Books until last week.

How does that happen?

I haven't played Palladium fantasy since the early '90s. I really need to dig out my old book and give it a looksie.

[serleran]

Wow. I knew of KS through his days with Judges Guild. I find it interesting you'd never heard of Palladium Books... but, I suppose that's possible. Pretty cool.
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[DangerDwarf]

Curious for those who are familiar with both...

How much was changed in the 2nd edition of the game?

[Treebore]

DangerDwarf wrote:
Curious for those who are familiar with both...

How much was changed in the 2nd edition of the game?

The biggest single thing was to integrate mega damage rules into the fantasy system better. Other than that I don't remember there being much else noticeably different, other than the cover. Same layout, same rules problems, etc... Then again I haven't played it since the late 90's either.
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[moriarty777]

serleran wrote:
Wow. I knew of KS through his days with Judges Guild. I find it interesting you'd never heard of Palladium Books... but, I suppose that's possible. Pretty cool.

Hmm... it's plausible. To be honest I knew little of KS before Rifts and Palladium Books. I only became aware of his involvement with Judges Guild when I started acquiring some of the Judges Guild stuff within the past couple of years.

M
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[Omote]

Treebore wrote:
The biggest single thing was to integrate mega damage rules into the fantasy system better.

What? There is no mega-damage in Palladium Fantasy 2nd edition. Palladium Fantasy 2nd edition simply used the Palladium system as it developed and integrated SDC into the game. The classes are better then the previous edition, and the skills have been changed over to the current Palladium format, i.e. 50% +5% rather then a clunky chart of 1st ed. Spells have been added and expanded to account for the SDC rules, and the combat system, while essentially the same, is a bit more indepth with current Palladium conventions.

Overall, the game feels the same as the original, but is even more 'Palladiumy.' I think PFRPG2nd edition, other then some typos and a slight problem with a rule or two is one of the best fantasy games to ever be put on the market.

-O
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[Treebore]

Omote wrote:
What? There is no mega-damage in Palladium Fantasy 2nd edition. Palladium Fantasy 2nd edition simply used the Palladium system as it developed and integrated SDC into the game. The classes are better then the previous edition, and the skills have been changed over to the current Palladium format, i.e. 50% +5% rather then a clunky chart of 1st ed. Spells have been added and expanded to account for the SDC rules, and the combat system, while essentially the same, is a bit more indepth with current Palladium conventions.

Overall, the game feels the same as the original, but is even more 'Palladiumy.' I think PFRPG2nd edition, other then some typos and a slight problem with a rule or two is one of the best fantasy games to ever be put on the market.

-O

Hmmm. Maybe I saw the MDC damage stuff for Paladium Fantasy in a RIFTERS article then. Like I said, I haven't really played or looked at the rules as rules since 1997 or 98. I haven't even looked at 1E since I bought my copy fo the 2E book.
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[Omote]

Palladium often references that these books are fully compatible with RIFTS and other mega-damage settings. In fact, some of the Rifts books that deal with demons and the like include stats (usually HP and SDC) in those books that can be used in PFRPG2. So it's not surprising people get that idea.

-O
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[Lurker]

Slightly off topic, but how good are the Palladium PDFs ?
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[maasenstodt]

Omote wrote:
Palladium Fantasy 2nd edition simply used the Palladium system as it developed and integrated SDC into the game. The classes are better then the previous edition, and the skills have been changed over to the current Palladium format, i.e. 50% +5% rather then a clunky chart of 1st ed. Spells have been added and expanded to account for the SDC rules, and the combat system, while essentially the same, is a bit more indepth with current Palladium conventions.

Overall, the game feels the same as the original, but is even more 'Palladiumy.' I think PFRPG2nd edition, other then some typos and a slight problem with a rule or two is one of the best fantasy games to ever be put on the market.

I disagree mightily that 2nd edition PFRPG is an improvement over 1st. One problem with the newer edition is that mages and psychics totally dominate men-at-arms. Whereas warriors used to have a significant advantage in combat (their strong suit), now everyone gets the same combat skills. The only difference is all the powers that warriors lack, making them second rate characters.

Perhaps even worse is how character progression has changed. In 1st edition, a 3rd level veteran character is substantially more powerful than a 1st level rookie. This is because characters started off relatively weak (not unlike D&D) but earned very significant bumps in ability at each new level of experience. In 2nd ed., characters are heavily front loaded and gain little from level to level. Thus, high level characters often have only a small edge over 1st level counterparts.

Another problem is the addition of SDC, which serves little purpose but to drag out combats that used to be resolved rather quickly (all the extra combat rules don't help with this, ether). I appreciate that this move increased compatibility with Palladium's other (mostly super hero) titles, but only at the expense of changing the game's feel from gritty swords & sorcery towards comic book heroics.

That I think the original magic and psionic systems were much more interesting than the current, more ubiquitous point based system is, for me, one more knock on 2nd edition. Little things like the elimination of the flavorful cannibalism table don't help either.

All in all, I still like Palladium Fantasy, even despite my feeling that 2nd edition messed up a lot of things. However, I think this is primarily a consequence of the interesting setting and the great support that 2nd ed. has received, both in sourcebooks and in the Rifter. Without those things, I'd see no reason to get excited about the game.
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[Omote]

I played about and equal amout of 1st edition and 2nd edition Palladium Fantasy, couple hundred hours each I would imagine, maybe slightly more for 1st edition then 2nd.

I'll say one thing for maasenstodt's comment above, the 1st edition of PF is a lot more gritty then the 2nd. You can spend a lot of time making a character only to die horrifically fast. Other then that, I guess our opinions will just vary on this. I think 2nd edition PF is a more solid game. Yeah combat might take longer, but the cinimatic action that Palladium's combat system delivers is just fantastic (particularly for the fantasy version of the game that doesn't have all of the crazyness of modern actions in Palladium).

Another benefit for 2nd edition PF is the spell system using PPE (essentially magic points) over the original which was # of spells per day. The PPE system makes spells extremely dynamic and unique, particularly when reading the Magic Section of PFRPG2. Syphoning off PPE from ley lines, solstices, and sacrifices (among other interesting aspects) just enhances the whole magic spell usage thing to make mages more them simply, forget and fire.

Just some thoughts.

-O
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[paladin2019]

RE: my only problem with Potential Psychic Energy is that while it is great for Beyond the Supernatural where it was introduced and it is a viable system, the term itself sucks for Palladium due to genre conceits. Mana, heka, spell power, etc would all be better terms IF it it's a good idea to change the name of a mechanic to reflect a particular game's genre.

I'm also not fond of all the rules surrounding SDC. If criticals bypassed SDC instead of doubling damage, it would be a great mechanic. I also see a terminology problem of assigning something initially (in Palladium and Mechanoids) used as a HP analog for items and applying it to a living thing. But "Bruise Points" are kind of lame, too.

I like Palladium, I like it's world building, but if I were to actually play or run, I'd prefer 1E with selected 2E changes.

[TheMetal1]

Quote:
Slightly off topic, but how good are the Palladium PDFs ?

I recently picked up the Rifts PDF from RPGNow. Its a scan, but pretty good. Fully searchable, cut & paste, and all that. Though no book marks or hyper-links in the index or table of contents. It is very useful for cutting and pasting skills/info, etc. onto a character sheet or creating NPC's with. I'm hoping they'll release the Conversion Books, that will save a bunch of time for in inputings stats for an adventure. Those two things were what slowed me down when I first started GMing a Palladium Rifts game, having the PDF is a boon, IMHO.

[serleran]

I agree with Omote. When it was first released, it was actually a quite different game than much of what was around, and when expanded to be the baseline for all Palladium systems, it then started to show some cracks and curves, but PFRPG is fairly solid. I would suggest the 1st edition over the 2nd, though, but that's because I'm weird.
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[maasenstodt]

Omote wrote:
1st edition of PF is a lot more gritty then the 2nd. You can spend a lot of time making a character only to die horrifically fast.

Not unlike D&D, I think. One of the reasons I like 1st ed. PFRPG is that it feels like a really well done, heavily house ruled version of D&D. The deadliness at low levels, the significant jumps in ability from one level to the next, and the quick play are all familiar qualities that I like in my gaming.

When it comes to Palladium Fantasy, I've certainly clocked more time on 2nd edition than 1st. I've enjoyed both, and I'm happy that 2nd edition exists for all the people who enjoy it. That said, it bears much less resemblance to D&D and, to the extent that I'm looking for a non-D&D fantasy gaming experience, there's other games out there that I think do some things better.
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[Omote]

maasenstodt wrote:
That said, it bears much less resemblance to D&D and, to the extent that I'm looking for a non-D&D fantasy gaming experience, there's other games out there that I think do some things better.

Ah, that makes lots of sense maasenstodt. I think you are spot on, PFRPG2 feels different then D&D for sure, and perhaps that is why I like it so much over the original edition. You hit the nail on the head with your analysis.

-O
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