Just picked up RIFTs for the first time since 1993 ...

[JustinA]

Sure, you'd likely get a bit of an upsurge on sales, I would imagine, but you lose part of the idenity of the game if you do that. (Look at Lot5R; the D20 version, while more or less mechanically sound, lost alot of the charm and appeal (IMO) of the orginal game.)

John Wick did a great job of designing a L5R RPG with what I like to call an "evocative system": The very mechanics of the game, by being based on the Five Rings, evoked a philosophy very alien to Western thought (and very appropriate for L5R).

Traditional RPGs, dating all the way back to D&D, have embraced Western dualism: There is the body (Strength, Dexterity, Constitution) and the spirit (Intelligence, Wisdom, Charisma) and the two are distinct and separate.

But the philosophy of the Five Rings isn't a dualistic philosophy. So when Wick uses it as the basis for the ability scories in the L5R RPG, he very cleverly shifts players into thinking about the world in a way different from the way they normally would and very much in the way that their characters would.

So, long story short, I agree with you: You lose a lot if you try to take an evocative system like L5R and adapt it to D20. (Now it may still make sense to do so: There are many groups which would prefer the ease of playing a game with D20 mechanics -- since they already know them -- to the benefits of an evocative system like L5R. But that's neither here nor there.)

Deadlands is another game which had this problem: The card mechanics were evocative (in a different way, but still evocative). Losing those mechanics hurt the game. (Of course, the fact that the Deadlands D20 adapation was a POS turned out by a company that hated D20 had a lot to do with it. I remember having a discusion with a company rep about this over on RPGNet several years ago, and he was quite up front about the fact that they hated D20 going into the adaptation, never played the game, and were disappointed by the poor sales the adaptation had. It boggled my mind: You were actually surprised that your customers the piece of you designed explicitly believing it to be a piece of ?)

Ryan Dancey, tangentially, believes that PEG could have done a very successful Deadlands D20 that would have found a way to integrate the card-based mechanics into the D20 system. That would have been relatively difficult, but I would have loved to see an L5R D20 adaptation which replaced the traditional D&D ability scores with the L5R ability scores. You wouldn't need to do too much in the way of revamping the rest of the system, but you would have instantly maintained a lot of the original system's evocative nature.

Okay, I think I'm done with my tangents now.

My point is this: I really don't think that RIFTS is an evocative system. Oh, it's as unique as any other system in terms of how its mechanics interact with the game session. But ultimately, the Palladum house system is just an improved version of AD&D with a lot of new mechanics layered on top. And, ultimatey, D20 is also an improved version of AD&D. I don't think there's actually that much distance that needs to be bridged between the two.

Justin Alexander
http://www.thealexandrian.net

 

[danzig138]

he's still laying out his new products by hand

This is a commonly held idea, but several of the employees at Palladium Books have indicated that they have, in fact, moved into the modern age and use computers for much of their layout work these days.

As for me, if I had the money and he'd sell, I buy Palladium, and then pay extra to keep Siembieda from getting anywhere near the writing process for the books. I'd let him pitch ideas, but someone else would hand;e the execution. Then I'd put out a version with a home system, the d20 system, and probably any other open license as well, just to cover all the bases.

 

[ShadowDenizen]

Deadlands is another game which had this problem:

Don't even get me STARTED on DLD20, or CoCD20.
I repeat NOT everything needs to go to D20.

Beyond that, it's hard to convert a skill-based system (CoC, DL) to a Level Based system, and it shows. (The DL to DLD20 conversion pamphelt? Was a JOKE.)

 

[EditorBFG]

This is a commonly held idea, but several of the employees at Palladium Books have indicated that they have, in fact, moved into the modern age and use computers for much of their layout work these days.

Well, Kevin Siembieda himself hasn't, or at least he hadn't when this was written:

Once Kevin's ready for layout, he prints out the whole mess and fires up his wax machine because he still puts these damned things together by hand. What's that? Desktop publishing software? Naw, he's faster without it! To his credit, he lays out the book in fairly decent time, but he also illustrates why all Palladium books have a simple two-column format. Kevin isn't going to cut columns to shape or deviate from formula because he might have to reflow a section of the book, and when he does, all those columns have to be standard or else none of it works. Where this really makes you want to bang your head against the tip of an artillery shell is when he lays out 80% of the book, discovers that he'd like to rename an alphabetically ordered item on page 5 and decides that it would be too much work to reflow the rest of the list. You know how every so often in a Palladium book you'll have a series of NPCs or OCCs or something and one of them is grossly out of alphabetical order? That's why. I used to think it was because Kevin couldn't read the alphabet. Now I know it's because he's truly, madly, deeply in love with putting books together in ways that even Monty Burns would decry as old-fashioned.

This post was already linked to in this thread, but the link didn't work for me, so here is another attempt: http://forum.rpg.net/showpost.php?p=1445566&postcount=184

Whether someone at the company has finally picked up Office 97 off of Ebay or not, in the rest of this post one of Palladium's most important writers makes it clear that until Siembieda experiences a profound personality change, his company will continue to fail.

 

[drothgery]

Don't even get me STARTED on DLD20, or CoCD20.
I repeat NOT everything needs to go to D20.

... but if you're going to make a moderately rules-heavy game with tactical combat that's not d20 or d20-derived OGL, you had better have a darn good reason.

 

[Jer]

Don't even get me STARTED on DLD20, or CoCD20.
I repeat NOT everything needs to go to D20.

Beyond that, it's hard to convert a skill-based system (CoC, DL) to a Level Based system, and it shows. (The DL to DLD20 conversion pamphelt? Was a JOKE.)

CoC d20 is an awesome product that proudly sits on my shelf containing my BRP Call of Cthulhu books. It's a different flavor than BRP, and don't bother trying to do straight-up conversions, but it works really well for "pulp action" CoC games -- Howard-style fantasy games or modern-style Die-Hard-Meets-Nyarlathotep games, for example. Plus the modern "sourcebook" in there is one of the best for the CoC game (though not as good as the Delta Green material, IMO). I agree that Deadlands d20, however, is a terrible, terrible adaptation. Just awful, and one of the most disappointing games that I remember coming out that year.

But you're of course correct - NOT everything needs to be d20. But if you're going to have an AD&D knock-off system as your core mechanics, it would be nice to incorporate some of the advances that the system has had over the years, especially when they make the game easier to run and easier to teach to new players.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

But ultimately, the Palladum house system is just an improved version of AD&D with a lot of new mechanics layered on top.

I don't know that I'd call it improved. Different, yes. Altered/Tweeked, yes. Not improved.

 

[pawsplay]

I don't know that I'd call it improved. Different, yes. Altered/Tweeked, yes. Not improved.

Well, you know, a giant, mutant two-headed snake is, at some level, an improvement over your average, run of the mill snake.

 

[GreatLemur]

Well, you know, a giant, mutant two-headed snake is, at some level, an improvement over your average, run of the mill snake.

Very nice. Very nice.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

You mean, "slither of the mill," don't you?