ONE GAME SYSTEM – EVERY GENRE – COUNTLESS WORLDS – ENDLESS ADVENTURE

Line art by Dan Berger, colors by Steve Lavigne

Alliance Open House * Granite State Comic Con * History of Palladium Books

Happy Thursday, Palladium Friends!

Convention Appearances

Happy Thursday, Everyone.

By the time you read this, Wayne, Caleb and I will be on our way to the Alliance Open House. It’s a trade show and meet and greet event with retailers and their managers hosted by our largest distributor. It is always an insightful event where we can showcase product and chat with store owners. If you are attending the event, please stop by our booth to chat and get books signed. Sean has elected to stay behind to work on the TMNT & Other Strangeness Redux edition through the weekend.

Our next (last) convention of the year will be Granite State Comic Con in New Hampshire, the weekend of September 20th. It’s a TMNT-centric comic convention where Kevin Eastman, Jim Lawson, many of the Mirage Studio crew, and many other notable comic book artists attend. This will be our first time attending this convention and we are looking forward to it. There’s a Canadian convention happening in London, Ontario, Canada, where Kevin Eastman is appearing … I think the weekend of the 13th that we’d like to attend (it’s only 2-3 hours away), but we have so much other stuff to do.

Thanks for your support of the Explore the Megaverse Sale. We’re happy to see so many of you enjoying it. Thanks to you we saw Rifters and After the Bomb titles flying out the door! Enjoy.

What’s Hot at Palladium this Week

The Rifter® and After the Bomb® titles were hot due to the sale, as well as the Archival Editions of The Rifter® #48, 58, and 65 that weren’t on sale. Otherwise, it was the usual suspects in demand: Rifts, Palladium Fantasy, and a smattering of game lines and products.

The Glitterbois’ History of Palladium Books continues with a new conversation to get posted soon. (This weekend?)  We spoke about Beyond the Supernatural and modern horror RPGs and had a great time. My only disappointment was that I failed to talk about the Creature Feature BTS Sourcebook which is a great book filled with cool monsters (15 of ‘em), rules clarifications, an adventure and adventure hooks. I think I keep forgetting to mention it because we are doing game lines in loose chronological order and Creature Feature came out in 2022 while the BTS RPG was released in 1988. It’s a fun chat that includes BTS 1 and 2, Boxed Nightmares, and working with legendary artists like Richard Corben and Stephen Bissette. I think this conversation may go live this weekend or next. You’ll want to check it out. By the way, don’t forget that BTS 1st RPG with the Operation Minotaur adventure as bonus material is available as a deluxe red foil edition hardcover (Cat. No. 699HC) . Likewise, Beyond the Supernatural 2nd Edition (hardcover and softcover), Boxed Nightmares and Creature Feature (epic) are all in stock.  

My next conversation with the Glitterbois will be about the original Robotech RPG (1986), and I imagine, Robotech II: The Sentinels.

I want to thank the dozens of you who stopped by the Palladium Gen Con booth to tell us how much you are enjoying my conversations with the Glitterbois and Legion of Myth. We’re glad, because there are a lot of conversations with the Glitterbois yet to come. And we’ll continue to drop in on Legion of Myth as well as offer history and fun on Palladium’s own YouTube channel in the months ahead.

The Rifter #48 Archival Edition – Available now!

We have gotten so many requests to reprint select, out of print Rifters that we have decided to give it a try. Other than the Archival Edition in a gold box on the spine and the front and back covers, these are exactly the same book printed years ago, including old news and ads. Enjoy.

- Rifts® Return to N.O.R.A.D., expansive material & adventure.

- Palladium Fantasy RPG look at variant clergy

- Nightbane® Questions and Answers.

- Scared Spitless - expanded Horror Factor rules.

- Dead Reign® impersonator Zombie.

- Old news, announcements and ads.

- 96 pages - $20.99 Retail – Cat. No 148

The Rifter #58 Archival Edition – Available now!

- Rifts® Lenuria “official” source material, O.C.C.s, monsters and animals; expansive.

- Rifts® Lazlo – Unofficial, fun and expansive.

- Rifts® and Phase World – The Kezel super-powered mutants.

- Nightbane® short story.

- Old news, announcements and ads.

- 96 pages - $20.99 Retail – Cat. No 158

The Rifter #65 Archival Edition – Available now!

- Rifts® Black Market source material.

- Rifts®, Fantasy, & Others – 60 new Necromancy spells + magic items.

- Rifts® Chaos Earth short story.

- Heroes Unlimited – Bionics, robots, and more.

- Heroes Unlimited – A super-hero team and adventure ideas.

- Beyond the Supernatural Hollow Road adventure, part one.

- Old news, announcements and ads.

- 96 pages - $20.99 Retail – Cat. No 165

BACK IN STOCK!  

Yin-Sloth Jungles, 2nd Edition, Revised and Expanded!

The Yin-Sloth Jungles™ is a savage and unexplored wilderness filled with exotic people, strange creatures, ancient ruins, dark gods, and ancient secrets waiting to be unearthed.

📕 15 O.C.C.s, all updated and expanded, making them seem brand new: Beastmaster, Holy Crusader, Jungle Fighter, Man-Catcher, the unique Tezcat and Pygmy Shamans, Spy, Undead Hunter, and Witch Hunter, among others.

📕 18 Jungle People and monsters updated and expanded to feel like new, plus a few additions.

📕 New and expanded Shaman Chant magic.

📕 New and unique Pygmy Shaman Chant magic.

📕 New and expanded history of the Yin-Sloth Jungles.

📕 Expanded and clarified weapons, jungle armor, poisons, & more.

📕 The Orcish Empire and a few notable cities.

📕 Filled with great artwork by Peterson (ROG) and Mike Mumah.

📕 Written by Kevin Siembieda, John Klinkel, and Patrick Nowak.

📕 160 pages – $24.99 retail – Cat. No. 459 – available now.

📕 COMING SOON! Yin-Sloth Expeditions setting and adventure book.

BACK IN STOCK!

After the Bomb® RPG “Bonus” Edition Hardcover – Available now

Create any type of intelligent, mutant animal from a turtle or raccoon to a lion or an elephant. The RPG presents stats for 100+ mutant animals, plus rules for creating any mutant animal you can imagine. Suitable for use with Heroes Unlimited™, Ninjas & Superspies™, Rifts®, Chaos Earth®, Phase World® and Palladium Fantasy®. Whatever the setting, playing anthropomorphic animal characters is a blast.

📙 100+ mutant animal stats included.

📙 Mutant animal creation rules to mutate ANY animal.

📙 52 Mutant Animal Powers.

📙 33 Mutant Animal Psionic Powers.

📙 New Animal Chimeras and their abilities.

📙 New back story to the After the Bomb® world of mutants.

📙 The post-apocalyptic Earth setting of “After the Bomb” is just one use for your mutant animal heroes.

📙 A complete RPG written by Erick Wujcik.

📙 72 pages of “bonus” material includes the original After the Bomb® sourcebook and Yucatan Adventures from the old Game Shield.

📙 296 pages (72 bonus pages) – $44.99 retail – Cat. No. 503HC – now shipping. Also available as a 224 page softcover book ($26.99 retail – Cat. No. 503). Note: After the Bomb sourcebooks provide additional mutant animal stats and settings.

BACK IN STOCK!

Rifts® Book of Magic Hardcover

A compendium of magic from across Rifts Earth. Hundreds of magic spells plus magic weapons and devices from across the Megaverse.

📔 900+ magic spells, Elemental Magic, Ley Line Magic.

📔 Necromancy, Nature Magic, Cloud Magic, Ocean Magic, Biomancy.

📔 Tattoo magic, Temporal magic, Whalesongs, Conjuring, Nazca Lines.

📔 Techno-Wizard devices, Rune Weapons, Holy Weapons, fetishes.

📔 Bio-Wizard Weapons, the Bio-Borg, symbiotes, and herbs.

📔 Magic stones, talismans, staves, wands, and more.

📔 $39.99 – 352 pages of pure magic – Cat. No. 848HC – available now. Also available in softcover ($31.99 retail, Cat. No. 848).

Palladium offers more than 300 of our books, every issue of The Rifter, sneak previews, and more in PDF format via DriveThruRPG

CLOSING THOUGHTS

Yin-Sloth Expeditions Playtest

Over the Labor Day weekend, I playtested one of the brand new adventures appearing in the Yin-Sloth Expeditions sourcebook. Sean, his daughter, and Caleb were my victims … um, I mean, players. It was a blast. I thought their characters might be dead meat because they all rolled up first-level characters, none of which were very physically powerful, and there were only three of them: a first level Thief, Man-Catcher/Bounty Hunter, and Druid. They used their actual dice rolls and skills to build their attributes and select a character class. Coincidentally, all three had high I.Q.s, but were not particularly physically powerful nor built for deadly combat. The foes they faced were not pushovers and they, potentially, held the fate of the world in their hands.

I wondered if I would need to dial down the level of difficulty, but they played great. They were smart, strategic, worked together as a team, used their skills and weapons very wisely (especially Sean), and had a few very lucky, critical rolls; one of which I could hardly believe!

We  all had so much fun. The game ran about three and a half hours, they saved the world, and as a result of their unbelievable success, leap-frogged to second level. I mean, they saved the world from … oops, sorry … I can’t say more because it would be a spoiler. I guess you’ll just have to buy Yin-Sloth Expeditionsto see for yourselves. It should be a fall release.

I think this adventure, amongst others in the book, very nicely set the stage for life and jungle adventures in this ancient land of mystery and its dark, brutal past (and present). G.M.s should be able to build on all of these jungle locations, villains, monsters, magic artifacts, and ideas. Players will have fun and come out with unique experiences you cannot find in any other part of the world, as well as get some cool weapons, magic items, and plenty of fond memories. This was the first game I have run since Kathy’s passing, so I was a little worried, but I was glad to see I still had my chops as a writer and Game Master. There were so many – “gosh, this is why I love role-playing games”  – moments. RPGs, there ain’t nothin’ like em.

Alright, that’s it for this Weekly Update. Remember, playing RPGs brings you escape, visceral excitement and fun with friends and family, so whip out those game books and throw together your own game. You’ll be glad you did.

– Kevin Siembieda, Game Designer, Writer, Friend