The 12 Days of Rifts-mas: Day 1, Palladium Fantasy

After TNMT (and Ninjas & Superspies), our third Palladium game was the Palladium Fantasy RPG. By this point, I was hooked on the system, and nothing would save me from the Rifts book, which was next on my to-get list.

Palladium Fantasy gets fantasy right. I love how it builds a world, fills it with classes, introduces widely varying balance levels in the classes, and sets you free. I love the skill-based characters and the different fighting styles. I love mixing martial arts into this world. The magic systems are superior to D&D and much more mysterious and arcane. No two casters are alike, or pull from the same spell lists.

A warlock-style character in Palladium is a true warlock, not a D&D caster who "uses a different chart, needs frequent rests, and uses the same spell list." D&D is the perfect game for fitting round pegs into square holes, and it optimizes and simplifies far too much for its own good. All the flavor and mystery of magic is gone, and it simply becomes "powers."

Like movies are now "content," magic is now "powers." And the world sucks a little more.

My brother and I never ran a campaign in this, but I aim to fix that soon with solo play. We were too into AD&D 2nd Edition and the Forgotten Realms (with the novels) at the time, and enjoying the "story XP" introduced with that version of the rules. Once "XP for gold" was taken out of AD&D, we saw the game in a new light.

But Palladium Fantasy always remained the forbidden fruit that I wanted to try. Everything about the game seemed much more organic and sensible, built for fun; the classes don't care about balancing themselves between other party members - they are what they are. Like a superhero game where you have melee heroes, blasters, and mega heroes - some are going to be better at other things than others. This is how it works in Palladium fantasy. Unlike D&D, where every class needs melee options, healing, ranged DPS, and all sorts of other parity, Palladium throws it all out.

You are the best at what you do.

Some things you will never compete on. A softer "skill class" without magic or melee? You will have those skills better than anyone else, but the game won't artificially inflate your fighting powers or magic just so "you can be useful in a party." What you "bring to the party" are those skills you are good at, and you want to buy and sell things at the best prices? Hire a merchant. Just don't throw them into combat and expect them to come out unscathed or even alive.

It is like the bard or minstrel in this game. No magic? Limited combat powers? What use are they? You need to remember this is a game with a feudal society, not a Forgotten Realms pseudo-governance, some modern construct acting like a council or whatever, replacing the traditional monarchies that should be in the world. In this world, monarchs and kings hold all the power, and the local dukes and lords.

When you need help or need to send a message, who can get you into places of power, into the enclaves of the rich, in contact with those in power, and grant you an audience with the local lord, the king, or the queen? Your grungy soldier or archer? Some combat class? A wizard they likely do not trust?

Or that bard with the smooth voice, the interest in history, who wishes to parlay and entertain, and slip in a few extra words asking for that audience? The social power of the "skill classes" in Palladium far outweighs their lack of combat power or magic. They can get you in places that most other classes cannot. This is insane amounts of social power, and it makes them better than the D&D 5E "what are we?" combat bard-caster inspiration batteries. At least, in the world that Palladium represents.

Want to give them "party utility" during fights? Create magic instruments that can cast spells, and let them play them. Give the bard a magic sonnet book that can replicate certain spells when reciting poetry. You are never limited by the rules in Palladium, and the game tells you to make it up, add it, change it, or make it happen if you really want it. A magic flute? Found in many fairy tales, so make it so. Let the player write the poem and spend the PPE for the spell. It all works how you want it to.

I would rather play the bard in Palladium with limited combat power and no magic than a bard in D&D 5 that does not know what it is. The Palladium bard's powers far exceed the powers D&D gives to them, just through the strength and influence of their social skills in a feudal society.

Think! Put yourself in that world! This is not "MMO adventure land" like some modern world in fantasy clothing, acting far too advanced to even feel grounded in realism. There is no "adventurer class" of people like some permanent middle class. This is a medieval, feudal, low-technology world where magic does not provide everyday conveniences. People are suspicious of mages and magic, unless it comes from a god they follow, and even that is rare and special.

D&D is not set in a traditional medieval fantasy game world; it is a pseudo-modern world with modern values and attitudes. Look at the above cover of the Compendium of Weapons, Armor & Castles. That is the world you are in with Palladium. In D&D, everyone has modern values, practically knows everything, acts like there is an Internet, has an excellent education, and there is this shared "all knowledge" floating around in the ether. There are bards and entertainment everywhere! There are libraries and knowledge in every town! The more modern the world, the less players with exceptional skills, education, learning, and social ability matter.

Are we in a small town, and I am the party's minstrel? I am likely the only entertainment in the area, besides someone's toothless uncle who plays the guitar horribly and sings dirty drinking songs. You know I am getting invited to the local lord's house to put on a show for him, his 40 extended family, his wife, several mistresses, dozens of children, and other merchants and wealthy people he wishes to impress. Party members would do well to socialize, offer our services to address problems, identify lost places of magic, and conduct missions and information-gathering in the area with the people who know the most and have the most money to spend to solve their problems.

Without a bard? We are in the local tavern again, begging the drunks for rumors and asking them for something to do. The town guard is likely to mistrust us strangers. We will be shuffled along since it looks like we know magic, and they don't want a demon summoned here. Do we have a rogue in our adventuring party? That will attract the wrong attention; other thieves in town will try to blame crimes on them, and it will make us look like the wrong kind of people they want around here.

Think, people, think!

This is not complicated stuff, but it is in D&D when the entire game puts you in the wrong mindset, drops you in the wrong world, and creates false assumptions about your role in society. D&D puts you in the perspective of "adventurers" freshly dropped out of character creation in an MMO, bored and mindlessly clicking on quests for something to do, skipping the quest text, and not caring anymore.

Palladium gives you a job and a role in society, and a supporting world that makes sense and needs those roles. At a minimum, you will have a job, and you will be the best at it in your group, and likely in the area. I would rather be that Palladium bard who can make things happen than the one in D&D with all the random combat powers.

A huge difference.

Social power and skills are a magic all their own, and can open doors that even a thief would be hard-pressed to pick or a soldier could never kick down.