Palladium Fantasy: Why the Hate?

[(Psi)SeveredHead]

Ohhhhhkay....

Second edition is way off the tracks. Starting mind mage can indeed have 200 power points, and a power that deals 1d6 damage / 6 power points spent.

With an average character having 14 or so hit points and about 20-30 SDC (depending on skill choices). So a 72 power attack should kill the average character. No save (just like lava).

Wait. NO save? Maybe I was self-nerfing

 

[jdrakeh]

One of the things that might have colored my view of Palladium Fantasy fan vs D&D fan is the little forum tussle that erupted early in 3E's life where KS basically said that he was doing "d20" before d20. At the time, not being familiar with any Palladium game aside from HU, I kind of scoffed and said to myself, "Ha! It uses percentile skills! How's that d20?"

Looking of Palladium fantasy, though, I can see a lot of similarities to D&D 3E, despite 15 or so years of separation:

Class skills? Check.
"Free" multiclassing? Check.
No race/class/level limits? Very nearly.
Humanoid type monsters "advanced" by class levels? Check.

I am not suggesting that any of those things are damning, or that KS was "right" -- I just find it interesting that a lot of the "advances" that people found integral and "fresh" in 3E were long present in what's often called (rightly) an AD&D clone. Of course, lots of other games' designs seem to have had an influence on 3E -- ranging from Earthdawn to Rolemaster -- and that I think is a feature of good game design.

Well, it has some similarities -- it also has a vast number of differences (e.g., no unified task resolution mechanic, no internal mechanical balance of power, etc). The claim by Siembieda was that he had pioneered every innovation in d20, which was about as honest and genuine as his claim to have invented the first universal RPG system (in truth, Basic Role Playing predated the first appearance of the Palladium system by a little over a year).

This brings us back to a dislike of Siembieda and his often baseless claims versus a dislike of Palladium Fantasy. I think your specific assertion that D&D fans hate Palladium Fantasy is about as genuine as Siembieda's claims. You say that you see this "hate" all of the time, though now you're back-pedalling to cite a single instance of a brush-up that had very little to do with Palladium Fantasy and took place nearly seven years ago.

It really seems that you're digging to reveal an animosity that simply doesn't exist.

 

[danbuter1]

I LOVE the Palladium Fantasy setting. The rules were better than ADnD 2e, but not 3e. And I also liked Rifts. But it got setting-hacked horribly in the later supplements.

 

[Reynard]

This brings us back to a dislike of Siembieda and his often baseless claims versus a dislike of Palladium Fantasy. I think your specific assertion that D&D fans hate Palladium Fantasy is about as genuine as Siembieda's claims. You say that you see this "hate" all of the time, though now you're back-pedalling to cite a single instance of a brush-up that had very little to do with Palladium Fantasy and took place nearly seven years ago.

It really seems that you're digging to reveal an animosity that simply doesn't exist.

Or, it is simply possible that when I started the thread, I was misremembering -- as i noted was likely above. I am sure you enjoy making me out to be an ogre and an idiot in every thread I start but I am actually starting to get a little tired of it.

So if ther eis some way I can offend you enough to get you to put me on your ignore list, please let me know.

 

[Tharen the Damned]

Oh well, I have fond memories of DMing a Dwarven Paladin, Troll Knight and I think an Elven Warlock back in 86.
Yeah, they were Munchkins to the core, but it was fun nonetheless. Nobody wanted to play a Troglodyte.

I bought the 2nd Edition in 97 but was not impressed at all.

 

[mcrow]

hmmmmm...........

As far as I knew Palladium Fantasy was considered to be one of the best fantasy setting by many people. There are plenty of people who don't like the system, but it's certainly playable.

 

[Zaukrie]

Great, great fluff.

I'd pay money for a monster book that was only a monster book (even using the Palladium rules). I love the monsters and the art. I'd pay a ton of money for D20 versions of the monsters, though I know that will never come. I've stolen many, many ideas from both the FRPG and RIFTS settings. I just can't juggle multiple gaming systems in my current busy life, so I've never tried the actual game.

 

[Voadam]

Great, great fluff.

I'd pay money for a monster book that was only a monster book (even using the Palladium rules). I love the monsters and the art. I'd pay a ton of money for D20 versions of the monsters, though I know that will never come. I've stolen many, many ideas from both the FRPG and RIFTS settings. I just can't juggle multiple gaming systems in my current busy life, so I've never tried the actual game.

http://www.amazon.com/Monsters-Anim...8648967?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1191258711&sr=1-1

 

[Calico_Jack73]

I LOVE the Palladium Fantasy setting. The rules were better than ADnD 2e, but not 3e. And I also liked Rifts. But it got setting-hacked horribly in the later supplements.

Personally I love the more detailed combat system of strike/parry/dodge/roll. I like the idea that shields improve your attempt to parry instead of adding to your armor rating. I like the fact that shields are considered disposable (which they were) and armor gets damaged and must be repaired.

My ideal system would incorporate the Palladium classes, magic system, and combat system with D&D 3.X's feats and skill system.

 

[Calico_Jack73]

1983 Paladium Fantasy here as well. The revised was almost as messed up as RIFTS itself, due to trying to make the two "compatible".

Personally I think the revised edition was screwed up because KS just did a "Copy/Paste" from Rifts to PFRPG. Why in the world are there modern skills in a fantasy game's skill description section??? A good editor would have been a great help... someone who actually went through the character creation steps and discovered that information on shields was sadly missing. It seems that they assumed that everything was there since they were just copying the text from Rifts and we all know that "Rifts is perfect".