lets talk bout the world

[badges89]

Ok so i love the whole megaverse and the setting and its a great game and i love it. But, the one big problem i have as a player and as a character(i tend to be heroic punch the bad guy save the cat in the tree type) is that as a character i find next to impossible to find a group or organization to align myself with. The cs, ngr, qubec, fed of magic, city of brass, pecos empire, engand, atlantis, and prob more i havent mentioned here are all bad guys who rule the world or atleast a chunk of it. And the "good" guys are ether to scared to do anything themselves(lazlo and psyscape) or to spread thin and disorganized(cyberknights) to put a lasting dent in the forces of evil, i am unsure if kevin sembedia wanted us to be that x-wing to fire a fate changing proton torpedo into a 2meter wide ventaltion shaft or if he wanted a never ending onslaught of evil to fight for the players of the world. Jus an observation not a critsims.

(i accidentally posted in dimesion books instead of here so if you wana see what has been said check out "lets talke about villains")

[Killer Cyborg]

For me, part of the appeal of Rifts is that (back in 1991 anyway) you basically had two sides to choose from, Demons or Nazis.
Or you could choose to go your own way, and try not to get caught up in-between.
I like that.

But things have changed quite a bit since then, and with every new book, new world powers popped up.
The CS are still the biggest power in North America, but far from the only power.
So it's no longer having to choose between the Demons or the Nazis, it's having to choose between the Demons, the Nazis, the Cowboys, the High-Tech Native Americans, any of the Federation of Magic city/states, the MDC Mounties, Psyscape, The Black Market.... etc. etc. etc.
Which is less appealing for me.

But for YOU, I think it gives you plenty to choose from, enough choices where you should be able to find something that'll fit your needs.
So the main question is, what ARE your needs?
What are you and/or your group looking for, as far as story and character arcs?

[kaid]

I honestly don't find much "evil" about the NGR. In triax2 it seems they are at least softening on the DB issue and they never were as brutal to the DB's as the coalition is. Their reasoning was we have limited resources so they devoted their resources to protecting their own people. In a hard time of near constant warfare tough choices were made. The trick will be how things shake out if they can can maintain their upper hand on the gargyoles and break the gargoyle nations back once and for all how they treat DB's then. Given the head of triax seemed to be leaning towards more DB rights I think eventually if not great treatment DB's would find reasonable treatment there.

[badges89]

well see in star wars, the empire has the rebellion, in star trek, the federation has the borg, in D&D elves has the drow, in spidey has doc oc, batman has the joker. i just don't see any of these guys havin an check and balance. my buddy notafarid2die says that they arent entirely evil they operate alot in the ambiguous "grey area". and i had alot to say on that where i had accidently posted this topic

[badges89]

I honestly don't find much "evil" about the NGR. In triax2 it seems they are at least softening on the DB issue and they never were as brutal to the DB's as the coalition is. Their reasoning was we have limited resources so they devoted their resources to protecting their own people. In a hard time of near constant warfare tough choices were made. The trick will be how things shake out if they can can maintain their upper hand on the gargyoles and break the gargoyle nations back once and for all how they treat DB's then. Given the head of triax seemed to be leaning towards more DB rights I think eventually if not great treatment DB's would find reasonable treatment there.

i havent read triax2 yet and unfortunately have limited funds, but if that is the case then the ngr could be that group who could stand up to the cs and try and change their minds about there bigotry towards atleast DB's and eventuality other issues and be albe to stand united and have better resources larger armies to defend not just the nation but the world.

[GenThunderfist]

well see in star wars, the empire has the rebellion, in star trek, the federation has the borg, in D&D elves has the drow, in spidey has doc oc, batman has the joker. i just don't see any of these guys havin an check and balance. my buddy notafarid2die says that they arent entirely evil they operate alot in the ambiguous "grey area". and i had alot to say on that where i had accidently posted this topic

That's kind of the "thing" about Rifts. You choose the faction, and then it has "bad guys" for you. It's the same idea as if you were to play a borg in the Star Trek universe then the Humans, and IIRC everyone else, is your "bad guy". It's kind of the same here. If you choose to go ahead and play a loyal CS grunt then Mages and the inhuman scum D-Bees are your bad guys. The point of Rifts was to simulate real life but in a Science-Fantasy setting, meaning that almost everyone has the capacity to do both ultimate good and ultimate evil, thereby pretty much every faction you can choose works within this moral grey area of "is what I'm doing right?"

So long story short, there are not really any "bad guys" per se. I mean, people will shoot at you and become your enemy, but it's possible the shooter was just as good a guy as your character, but was looking at you through a different perspective or something. However, on that same token, there aren't really any "good guys" either. There are people that do good things, but there aren't really any "I punch all bad guys and save all the kittens" type people.

The checks and balances you are looking for are entirely self-contained within the entire world. CS vs. Mages. Triax/NGR vs. Gargoyles. Black Market vs. Law Enforcement. In the end it's mostly pick a side and run with it.

EDIT: I'm going to nip this in the bud before it starts. Yes, there are Diabolic Evil people too. Like Vampire Intelligences, The Four Horsemen, and Demons pouring out of Rifts. I was simply referring to the different Factions as to how they aren't really "good" or "bad" and most of them work within a morally grey area. I'm not trying to say everyone's alignment is Grey. I am trying to say that on a large scale there is no "I'm on Good Team Such and Such" and "I'm on Evil Side So and So"

[Icefalcon]

Like any society, you will have your good people and your bad people present in the same society. When choosing a group in Rifts to join, you have to look at their overall values. The NGR is getting better with their DB relations. The CS will probably never change unless someone other than the Prosek family or their supporters gains power. The Federation of Magic is the same, unless someone else gets into power, nothing will change.

In the end, it is supposed to be up to the players to get involved with one group or another to help enforce that group's values in the world.

[eliakon]

My personal view? Other than the possible exception of the Atlantians or Lemurians it feels like Palladium writes it PURPOSLY to have no big 'Were the good guys' organizations. I think that is a deliberate decision so that you dont have some one to run to for help, or to say 'let so-and-so deal with it' Its a design feature to make the players feel responsible for the fate of the world or at least for stopping that evil that they find. My personal opinon here.

[Noon]

No morally uncontentious endings.

[Mack]

Have you ever thought about how many "good" organizations there are in North America? And what could happen if they coordinated their efforts?

Cyber-Knights
Magebane
Justice Rangers
Tundra Rangers
Lyn-Srial
Psyscape
Arzno
Colorado Baronies (the original ones)
Order of the White Rose
Lazlo
The Republicans (OK, they're kinda good)
Grey Seers
Mystic Triad & Magestar

And that's just the ones I could quickly find.

[Mack]

Gryphon, you missed my point, which was that there are lots of potential allies for a player group. And a truely epic quest would be to unite them, and coordinate their efforts.

[Zamion138]

No side is ever all evil or all good (baring demons, and the other previusly mentioned merchants of doom). No one in the SS thought they were evil, No one that fought with Custer at big horn thought they were evil, che guaveria probaly thought he was a good guy and that his revolution was helping people even with all the political murders.
Anyhow whos to say who is right and wrong. Lazlo is in no way all good and neither is psyscape, just like the ngr, cs, ect. are not all evil. its all shades of grey.

I Think the cs model is inevidatble in a post apocolyptical world. "were humans and this is our world" is a pretty normal thought for a race that has never met anouther and whos world was just torn asunder.

[Killer Cyborg]

I can dig my buddy's frustrations; That there is no cut and dry, good vs evil. He's a Star Wars guy, like myself, so he's used to Jedi vs Sith, and things like that.
But even in the Jedi vs Sith example, there are shades of gray. Yes, the Jedi were a force of good... But, they could still be corrupted/tempted to the Dark Side and vice-versa.

I think that gives me a better idea of what he was talking about.

Yeah, there are organizations of good in Rifts. They are, however, spread thin, small, ill-equipped, or what have you. I think this is what Badges is finding frustrating. But it's a role playing world, so, if you want to organize a larger group of good... Well, play it! But the fact is, a self-respecting and entertaining GM is going to find ways to introduce corruption into that organization. It's just more realistic (and dramatic and fun to play).

Psyscape vs. Nxla seems pretty black and white, with lots of room to play.

[Subjugator]

The GM can make any organization they wish. I think the New Navy is large and good. Mack gave a good list too. Hell, you can go to Phase World or Wormwood and see large groups of good.

[kaid]

The GM can make any organization they wish. I think the New Navy is large and good. Mack gave a good list too. Hell, you can go to Phase World or Wormwood and see large groups of good.

It is kinda interesting that the oceans seem to be the home of the powerful forces for good on rifts earth. You have the new navy/tritonia and lemuria. All of which are for the most part forces of good.

You also have the warlords of russia which while not what one would call knights in shinning armor are a force dedicated to kicking demonic butts for mother russia. Like them or hate them they are the major force that allows people to live in the russia area without being overrun by demons/devils and other supernatural predators.

[jaymz]

In North America you have Lazlo/New Lazlo, Merctown, Dweomer, GOlden Age Weaponsmiths, Northern Gun, Manistique Imperuim, Colorado Baronies, Arzno and some other smaller factions none of which are "bad guys". Hell even Quebec isn't really a "bad guy" they are too isolationist really now that they are seceded from the CS. The REALLY "Bad guys" are The Federation of Magic and The CS. Everyone else is either neutral or pseudo good. Even then The CS is viewed as "good guys" from within.

If you want more "black and white" then Europe is likely a better section of the planet to play on. You have defined "good guys" and "bad guys".

ALl depends on really what you want to do.

[badges89]

Thats entirely my point that gryphon points out. The fact that the "good" guys are ethier complete isolationists with the whole outlook of "if we ignore the boogeyman he wont get us" or to spread thin. Lets look at the world as we know it to day as compared to 70 years ago, today lot people turn a blind eye to the mugging around the corner, or turning up the tv so we dont hear the husband beating the wife next door, but in the 30's and 40's that would not have flown, sombody would've intervined that mugging or called the police on the neighbors and gone to get on them. I myself have intervined in a situation similar situation, not because i wanted to be a hero or for a reward but because it was the right thing to do. Today we have large groups of people or organizations that do good, peace corp, armed forces, fire dept, police, emts, district attonery, soup kitchens, churches and the list goes on. My point is even those these orginzations my have issues internally but their overall influence, goal, and purpose is to do good, where is that in rifts, there just has to be like minded individuals that over the near 110 years would have banded togther and rise up or atleast have been in hiding.

[SAMASzero]

Thats entirely my point that gryphon points out. The fact that the "good" guys are ethier complete isolationists with the whole outlook of "if we ignore the boogeyman he wont get us" or to spread thin. Lets look at the world as we know it to day as compared to 70 years ago, today lot people turn a blind eye to the mugging around the corner, or turning up the tv so we dont hear the husband beating the wife next door, but in the 30's and 40's that would not have flown, sombody would've intervined that mugging or called the police on the neighbors and gone to get on them. I myself have intervined in a situation similar situation, not because i wanted to be a hero or for a reward but because it was the right thing to do. Today we have large groups of people or organizations that do good, peace corp, armed forces, fire dept, police, emts, district attonery, soup kitchens, churches and the list goes on. My point is even those these orginzations my have issues internally but their overall influence, goal, and purpose is to do good, where is that in rifts, there just has to be like minded individuals that over the near 110 years would have banded togther and rise up or atleast have been in hiding.

As much as I usually hate to invoke Godwin's Law, they did do something like that on a national Scale. To avoid a full invocation, I'll just mention the word "Appeasement".

[Zamion138]

Thats entirely my point that gryphon points out. The fact that the "good" guys are ethier complete isolationists with the whole outlook of "if we ignore the boogeyman he wont get us" or to spread thin. Lets look at the world as we know it to day as compared to 70 years ago, today lot people turn a blind eye to the mugging around the corner, or turning up the tv so we dont hear the husband beating the wife next door, but in the 30's and 40's that would not have flown, sombody would've intervined that mugging or called the police on the neighbors and gone to get on them. I myself have intervined in a situation similar situation, not because i wanted to be a hero or for a reward but because it was the right thing to do. Today we have large groups of people or organizations that do good, peace corp, armed forces, fire dept, police, emts, district attonery, soup kitchens, churches and the list goes on. My point is even those these orginzations my have issues internally but their overall influence, goal, and purpose is to do good, where is that in rifts, there just has to be like minded individuals that over the near 110 years would have banded togther and rise up or atleast have been in hiding.

In the more civilized cities im sure their are thoose things but in the wastelands and wilderness where giving a cup of soup could mean inviting vampires and demons and just thugs into town its a little diffrent. Im sure all of the major powers have district attorney offices and soup kitchens, they dont get put into the books though as its a game, people want to know the defenses of the place the shops and what not, we dont know there is a video game store or 3 in merc town but i bet there are. Its your job as gm to put thoose smaller things in place when a pc asks for them. If you think they are there.
As for churches palladium doesnt ever go into christian, jewish, islamic faiths as their gods cant be stated out and dont work well as antagonists and protagonists like norse and hindi gods do.
Wormwood has a large christian population and monk/templar or orders for them and food caves wich are like kitchens.
I see what you mean but at the same point i thi k thoose things are there but are not discussed in the books and dont work well large area due to violence and supernatrual whore lurking about

[badges89]

Well we still have interpol available, my point being that certain organizations, no matter their own internal struggles has remained a force of good even in the face of insurmountable odds, so why cant there be a single group in rifts fighting the good fight that can help snowball the campaign for equality and freedom of all

[Nightmask]

Well we still have interpol available, my point being that certain organizations, no matter their own internal struggles has remained a force of good even in the face of insurmountable odds, so why cant there be a single group in rifts fighting the good fight that can help snowball the campaign for equality and freedom of all

Because, even if you achieved freedom and equality for all (something that still hasn't happened in real life, even in America), there wouldn't be much of a game left.

Every game must come to an end sometime, certainly there are far far worse ends than ending on 'and there was equality and freedom for all'.

[Talavar]

The only places in I can think of that are pro-active good guy nations are Lazlo & New Lazlo. Both work against the CS' campaign of mis & disinformation, neither are isolationist or hidden, welcome d-bees but outlaw destructive or enslaving forms of magic, are democratic, and try to combat long-term threats like the Xiticix, and help free Atlantean slaves.

The problem with this for players is the lack of information on both, beyond sporadic mentions here or there in other world books, and a non-canon Rifter article on Lazlo. The problem in-setting is one of scale & resources - New Lazlo is tiny, and even Lazlo is too small to effectively take on the CS, or the Xiticix, or many of the other dangers of Rifts Earth. But if your players want to 'make a difference,' Lazlo is probably the nation-state they should be working with in Rifts North America.

[Noon]

Well we still have interpol available, my point being that certain organizations, no matter their own internal struggles has remained a force of good even in the face of insurmountable odds, so why cant there be a single group in rifts fighting the good fight that can help snowball the campaign for equality and freedom of all

Because, even if you achieved freedom and equality for all (something that still hasn't happened in real life, even in America), there wouldn't be much of a game left.

Indeed, it's hard for the author to know exactly how long you want to play in the setting for before the setting ends.

Or at the very least, it is a game without a set lifespan for the setting.

[Bood Samel]

I like it better when it was Nazis and Demons. It was originally a DYSTOPIC setting after all. I still play it that way. I do not like traditionally heroic campaigns in any way shape or form.

[badges89]

Even in most dystopic settings if it be movies, comics, video games, or rpgs, they still have that underground group that stands up, id jus like to see a sourcebook similar to mercenaries or lonestar that talks bout the underground resistance to them.

[Akashic Soldier]

Even in most dystopic settings if it be movies, comics, video games, or rpgs, they still have that underground group that stands up, id jus like to see a sourcebook similar to mercenaries or lonestar that talks bout the underground resistance to them.

Cyberknights my friend, Cyberknights.
Alternatively, Madhaven (Knights of the White Rose).

[flatline]

Someone already said it, but I think it bears restating: who the good and bad guys are in a particular campaign depends entirely on the point of view of the characters being played.

For instance, I generally consider people who work against my character's goals to be "bad guys" and since I almost exclusively play magic or supernatural characters, the CS pretty much always ends up in the "bad guy" category for me (even if particular NPCs are fine).

The opposite may be true for someone who likes to play tech or psionic based characters. For them, the CS might be the good guys.

Now, one of my complaints about the setting is that it's too crowded. There are too many powers defined in canon and there are too few undefined open spaces left to use however we want to. If I were to start a new campaign in North America, I'd scale down all the powers to be regional powers. Naturally, the CS would be hardest hit by this, but it's the easiest way to keep things manageable.

--flatline

[badges89]

true cyberkights are a stoic force jus need somebody to rally them

[Colonel_Tetsuya]

Someone already said it, but I think it bears restating: who the good and bad guys are in a particular campaign depends entirely on the point of view of the characters being played.

For instance, I generally consider people who work against my character's goals to be "bad guys" and since I almost exclusively play magic or supernatural characters, the CS pretty much always ends up in the "bad guy" category for me (even if particular NPCs are fine).

The opposite may be true for someone who likes to play tech or psionic based characters. For them, the CS might be the good guys.

Now, one of my complaints about the setting is that it's too crowded. There are too many powers defined in canon and there are too few undefined open spaces left to use however we want to. If I were to start a new campaign in North America, I'd scale down all the powers to be regional powers. Naturally, the CS would be hardest hit by this, but it's the easiest way to keep things manageable.

--flatline

I dont really use "good guys" and "bad guys" in this argument so much as "Protagonist" and "Antagonist" - but i have said the same thing a few times before. I also agree that the NA setting is FAR too crowded. It doesn't even make sense anymore, really, given the technology displayed, why the CS doesn't totally dominate the continent. Were i to run a game, i'd probably scale everyone down a bit in terms of area of influence. (Currently, according tot he books the CS has large swaths of farmland that are almost totally safe and well settled/civilized/patrolled, etc) - id cut this down to something more like "While CS claims all of Iowa, their actual area of influence is more like the fortified farming complexes (all surrounded by high fences/walls) + 2-5 miles around them" - everything else, even inside "CS Territory" is a lawless no mans land.

It's the only way i could make the setting make sense.

Of course, in the campaign im writing up now, my main course of action was going to be to play through the Juicer Uprising and then (As the PCs will now have large prices on their heads for being major protagonists in the Uprising) offering the PCs a branching 3-5 choice "get the hell out of mainstream North America" story path, to avoid just this problem.

I actually like Europe a lot more as a setting that is actually laid out like the original NA was - little pockets of civilization beset everywhere by bad guys. The NGR may be a "superpower" but geographically they are concentrated in one major area that is quite a bit smaller (both in actual size and as a percentage of the available landmass) than the CS - and really pretty much everything outside of that is dangerous as all hell.

[badges89]

Someone already said it, but I think it bears restating: who the good and bad guys are in a particular campaign depends entirely on the point of view of the characters being played.

For instance, I generally consider people who work against my character's goals to be "bad guys" and since I almost exclusively play magic or supernatural characters, the CS pretty much always ends up in the "bad guy" category for me (even if particular NPCs are fine).

The opposite may be true for someone who likes to play tech or psionic based characters. For them, the CS might be the good guys.

Now, one of my complaints about the setting is that it's too crowded. There are too many powers defined in canon and there are too few undefined open spaces left to use however we want to. If I were to start a new campaign in North America, I'd scale down all the powers to be regional powers. Naturally, the CS would be hardest hit by this, but it's the easiest way to keep things manageable.

--flatline

Its that ambiguity that is frustrating, if you asked somebody on the street in germany if the holocaust was a good thing im pretty sure they would say no. Its no so much an argument of point of views but one of morals and humanity.

[T-Willard]

OK,first of all, from the history classes and the other nice things I took in college, there's very few early government forms (or governments that were forced to form after major disasters) that were NOT totalitarian, and the need for an external enemy is HIGH on the priority list of any leader or council in charge. The thing to remember is NOTHING is monolithic. The Nazi's had assassination attempts against Hitler, the US government is constantly at odds with other parts of the government, even the Soviet Union had massive internal pressures and factions within the government. The PC's could easily find themselves trusted members of the CS government, but actually part of the officially recognized "Opposition Party" within the CS.

Being mercenaries trying to do a little bit of good is exciting too. There are several real world science based pressures that can come into play that can help a mercenary group as well as lead them into being the good guys against everyone else's "bad guys" status.

Number One: Resource volume depend on an equation that determines the value: Re-(Cpm*D + F) = V. Which is: The (V)alue of a (Re)source is equal to the (C)ost (p)er (M)ile of transportation multiplied by the (D)istance which then the (F)ees and other miscelanous costs are added, whic the total is then subtracted from the value of the resource at the selling point. Believe it or not this can result in rendering the most valuable resource completely worthless. It can also let you determine just how much a tech haul will be worth. Let's say they find 10 suits of Glitterboy that they can haul to a friendly Black Market contact in Free Quebec. Now, since they don't have to pay wages, just vehicle repairs and ammunition, the CpM can be removed. So, let's say they have 300 miles to go, give them, say 6 encounters, and figure repairs at 2 places, including ammunition expenditures, and you can quickly figure out that those suits they're going to get 3 million each for just became worth less than 500,000 credits apiece. Not much profit. Not in world where robot jocks and power armor pilots gotta pay for armor and weaponry repair.

Number Two: Inner faction fighting can be fun. They could be part of the very small, very much monitored, almost "stage show" Mutant Rights Legal Coalition of the COALITION STATES! Now, why would this exist? For the same reason that the Socialist Jewish League existed in Nazi Germany. It allows for "acceptable" mutants, allows for "examples" as well as letting registered mutants clean up the unregistered mutants and acting as PR examples. Membership would be mostly Dog Boys, but there would be minor mutations that are considered heriditary that CS genetic engineering hasn't gotten rid of. Or what about, say, General Ross Underhill's "Protectorate Party" that supports the military takeover and buildup of small towns, installing industrial and military development and worth into the towns to bring up their standard of living in order to make their people more willing to fight against the DeeBees as well as eject "undesirable elements" from the town. With the Post-Tolkeen World (heh) getting new recruits and expanding to those towns actually has the objective of reducing insurgency.

Number Three: Nobody is innocent. The PC's are basically wandering hobo's who are heavily armed and murder everything in their way. As Murder Hobos they are the last people who get to make any moral judgements on any society, since they all live by the Rule of the Gun. The PC's can act as judgemental as they want, but seriously, give me a break. How many trials do they hold before they shoot a CS grunt in the face? Want to make them into good guys? Start reminding them that they need to try to capture CS soldiers and give them trials that they record, and do it by following the CS's own military justice code. Or they can just resign themselves to the fact that they are actually terrorists killing people who went out to fight the very people the PC's are, because the PC's are terrorist murder-hobos who kill CS civilians, soldiers, and blow things up.

Number Three: Nobody is Evil: Let the PC's run into CS/Triax/Splugorth forces that are good. EVERYONE in the leadership positions of these organizations and nations understand the value of PR. Think of stunning imagery of CS robot troops pulling "poor defenseless dirty poor muties" out of a burning building. Do the PC's arrive for that? Nope. They arrive to find the four Samas and two UAR-1 Enforcers standing over dishelved and soot covered people crying over their home burning after a crazed meth'd up Ley Line Walker burned it. Do they ask questions? No, because they're Murder Hobos and KNOW that the CS is eeebull. So they attack. Killing a CS squad sent out by General Lucius Cabot to show the velvet glove of the CS by providing the same things that the Peace Corps does in our time, only with guns and armor, let's not be stupid, it is Rifts Earth.

Number Four: "We were here FIRST!" Give the PC's a peaceful village, people living in harmony, not even the random attacks that make up so much of the life of Rifts Earth, due to geography and the placement of the big boys. The CS sweeps away everything bad to the North and West, Texas warlords to the south-west knock everything out to that region. Archie, the Splugorth, and a few kingdoms to the east and south-east wipe out any other problems. Combine with an isolated valley where Skyfall (Sorry, my groups nickname for the Rifts) altered the landscape, making the valley only accessible from one way, with it's own micro-climate (check out the Rogue Valley in Oregon or the Olympic National Rainforest) and no ley-lines or nexuses too close with access to the valley. Sound's idyllic, right? Oops, it's a Post-Tolkeen World. Suddenly the valley is a strategic location for just about everyone. Several warlords want it for the light manufacturing, Archie wants it as a staging area, same as the Splugorth, the CS wants it for it's critical location, and Lonestar wants it for the hidden value only referred to in the Lonestar Labs deep files. With refugees flooding in, the decisions must be made. Who gets to stay, who gets to go. The characters can have returned from the CS War, maybe even after fighting on different sides, which gives some inter-party tension, but the BIG thing is: They were there FIRST! None of these Johnny Come Latelys, with their deals, their threats, their desire to take over. The PC's ae the good guys, fighting against everyone else, all of whom don't care about the people, no matter what they say or try to pull for PR. This means negotation, knives in the dark, smuggling.

Number Five: Rooting out Corruption: Following the Tolkeen War, a LOT of people managed to get into leadership positions that they had no business being in. To top it off the manufacturing companies are looking at SEVERE profit loss, even with the 5-Year Plan, since some of the vehicles and weaponry proved to be failures. This means that there will be a LOT of bribes and corruption. Remember good ol' Lt Col what's his name, Mr. "I Own the Burbs"? Yeah, think a LOT more of his type being in the military command structure and the civilian side. The PC's could be tasked with rooting out this corruption, some of which is being perpetrated by groups who have NO problem and plenty of experience in "vanishing" inconvenient people. One day the PC's could be protecting an outspoken member of the Military Approprations Committee from the hit-men of a company that provides ALL the Skelebot electronics, the next they could be gathering evidence to prove she accepted kickbacks from a company that made power-armor radar systems that were really refurbished civilian air-car flight radar systems rather then the Next-Gen systems they were supposed to provide. They might be looking for Free Quebec or Triax agents, or following leads to Federation of Magic agents. The PC's are good guys, trying to change the system from within. Not to change the entire CS, but to protect the PEOPLE within the CS.

One thing that a LOT of people don't look at is WHY the CS is Human Supremacists and Anti-Magic. Me and my friends sat down and thought about it, thought about it hard. Think about it: The Old World, where people had food, resources, lives of ease and comfort, and "First World-Centric" history shows a "Golden Age" with just "heightened tensions" that to the CS seem quite easy and no-problem. Then the Rifts opened, and monsters came out, slaughtering millions of survivors. They kept slaughtering, and kept slaughtering and kept slaughtering, through three hundred years of darkness, though over a century of "modern" history, and they are STILL killing, many for no other reason then they get off on it. Mages are part of the problem. For every "good" mage you run into, you run into 100 guys who want to rule their little corner of the world. As a CS soldier/citizen, all you see is people heavily armed with military grade gear committing atrocities, mages working with the very creatures that just kill and kill and kill. You can't even live in an open nieghborhood, without walls and security, because if you try to, you WILL be eaten, tortured, used to fuel magical experiments. This is OUR world, we were here FIRST.

What is propping up the Prosek Regime is the very people that fight against it, which forces the CS to seize control for the "Security of the State", which causes more reprisals. It is a circular, self-fulfilling cycle. Peace would assume all rational actors, and even all rational actors are going to be looking at the situation and realizing that this is not a situation where everyone can sit down and comet to peace. For some of the actors, extinction is ALL that can be achieved. The Brodkil aren't going to stop killing. The creatures from the Rifts aren't going to stop killing. The Vampires aren't going to stop killing.

Take a good look at the CS, and realize that not even PROSEK seems himself as the villain. He sees himself as the last defender of humanity, the only one with the strength and foresight to make the hard decisions, that propaganda is necessary so that people know that they have to give up thing, not just for their own safety, but to build a world where their children can live. Even the burbs, and the waiting list are necessary. Too many have gotten in and then performed sabotage or murder or even worse terrorist actions. So of course the line is long, because everyone has to be vetted closely. Do dissidents get hauled away? Yeah, they do, but why? Could it be they were hauled away because of graffiti, or maybe they're the ones who allowed a bomb to off on level 13 that destroyed the environmental machinery for 10-15 and now the whole place smells like the inside of a factory?

Sure, Prosek is a dictator, which is something that leaves a bad taste in our mouths, but seriously, how well is a democratic body going to do in the Post-Apocalypse world? The majority of the people want only to protect humanity from the very creatures that try to destroy it.

Which means: You could portray the CS as good guys, because from the PC's limited experiences, they ARE the good guys. I've run quite a few campaigns where they were the good guys, AND CS troops. They were good guys, even during the Tolkeen War. Why? Because they didn't shoot the unarmed, kill the defenseless. They basically operated under the Geneva Convention and the Hague Rules of Warfare as best as they could.

Hopefully all of this has helped you, in some small way, figure out a way to play a good versus evil campaign.

[nilgravity]

true cyberkights are a stoic force jus need somebody to rally them

Instead of being frustrated make a character that rallies them. Or if you haven't read England yet ask your gm if you can join Merlin's knights of Camelot...

[kaid]

The GM can make any organization they wish. I think the New Navy is large and good. Mack gave a good list too. Hell, you can go to Phase World or Wormwood and see large groups of good.

Between the new navy/lemuria/tritonia the pacific ocean region is a very large bastion of the forces of good. The splugorth are not very prevelant there so you are mostly dealing with hourne and nautyl and davy jones forces. You also have the lord of the deep but his direct reach is really overally not that big of an area pretty much coast of japan and to areas around what used to be the Philippines and a pretty barren area of deep ocean.

Alone any one of those forces for good is a solid match for any of the evil forces in the area and against the clear dangers to all like the lord of the deeps all three working together are well more than a match for any evil force in the area. The main reason the lord of the deep is still around is he is so deep underwater it is hard to get any attack force down to him.

[Tor]

as a character i find next to impossible to find a group or organization to align myself with. The cs, ngr, qubec, fed of magic, city of brass, pecos empire, engand, atlantis, and prob more i havent mentioned here are all bad guys who rule the world or atleast a chunk of it.

What exactly makes Camelot (I assume this is what you meant by England, it being the largest unified force in the region) a 'bad guy'? The King and his knights are swell guys. You don't think 3 bad eggs spoil the basket? Arthuu is helping build a kingdom for innocent people. If he has any flaws it's trusting a creepy old man and letting him teach his girlfriend "magic" (yeah I'm sure that's exactly what's happening when Gwen and Merl are alone at night while you're out 'questing' with Caliber-X buddy)

NGR and Quebec (and even the CS) are just trying to survive man. Trying to fortify a home base free of evil baby-eating gargoyles, xiticix and vampires. It's not like they're invading d-bees' home planets and committing genocide.

These are illegal immigrants. They snuck across our borders and are taking our land, preventing humans from finding jobs to feed their families humbly tilling the soil.

Earth belongs to REAL Earthlings. We, the people.

And the "good" guys are ether to scared to do anything themselves(lazlo and psyscape)

Probably because they are full of righteous fear of REAL Earthlings. You're talking about a place full of reckless insane mages led by a shapeshifting reptile whose very exhales incinerate our earth, and a place which is a giant rift to an imaginary cloudland where misguided humans kneel alongside d-bees to a bunch of creepy wrinkled floating aliens who are constantly high and blowing bubbles everywhere.

today lot people turn a blind eye to the mugging around the corner, or turning up the tv so we dont hear the husband beating the wife next door, but in the 30's and 40's that would not have flown, sombody would've intervined that mugging or called the police on the neighbors and gone to get on them.

Oh geez, idealize the past much? Olden days were magical and pretty? Let's ignore that actual crime statistics have gone down and that husbands beating/raping their wives was actually legal in past decades, and especially in the 30s people would've been robbing each other blind to survive. These are the days of, even after slavery, black people getting lynched. In 1906 there was mass public approval and victim-blaming when Stanford White was murdered by Harry Thaw, simply because Stanford was the Hugh Hefner of his day.

[Mech-Viper Prime]

OK,first of all, from the history classes and the other nice things I took in college, there's very few early government forms (or governments that were forced to form after major disasters) that were NOT totalitarian, and the need for an external enemy is HIGH on the priority list of any leader or council in charge. The thing to remember is NOTHING is monolithic. The Nazi's had assassination attempts against Hitler, the US government is constantly at odds with other parts of the government, even the Soviet Union had massive internal pressures and factions within the government. The PC's could easily find themselves trusted members of the CS government, but actually part of the officially recognized "Opposition Party" within the CS.

Being mercenaries trying to do a little bit of good is exciting too. There are several real world science based pressures that can come into play that can help a mercenary group as well as lead them into being the good guys against everyone else's "bad guys" status.

Number One: Resource volume depend on an equation that determines the value: Re-(Cpm*D + F) = V. Which is: The (V)alue of a (Re)source is equal to the (C)ost (p)er (M)ile of transportation multiplied by the (D)istance which then the (F)ees and other miscelanous costs are added, whic the total is then subtracted from the value of the resource at the selling point. Believe it or not this can result in rendering the most valuable resource completely worthless. It can also let you determine just how much a tech haul will be worth. Let's say they find 10 suits of Glitterboy that they can haul to a friendly Black Market contact in Free Quebec. Now, since they don't have to pay wages, just vehicle repairs and ammunition, the CpM can be removed. So, let's say they have 300 miles to go, give them, say 6 encounters, and figure repairs at 2 places, including ammunition expenditures, and you can quickly figure out that those suits they're going to get 3 million each for just became worth less than 500,000 credits apiece. Not much profit. Not in world where robot jocks and power armor pilots gotta pay for armor and weaponry repair.

Number Two: Inner faction fighting can be fun. They could be part of the very small, very much monitored, almost "stage show" Mutant Rights Legal Coalition of the COALITION STATES! Now, why would this exist? For the same reason that the Socialist Jewish League existed in Nazi Germany. It allows for "acceptable" mutants, allows for "examples" as well as letting registered mutants clean up the unregistered mutants and acting as PR examples. Membership would be mostly Dog Boys, but there would be minor mutations that are considered heriditary that CS genetic engineering hasn't gotten rid of. Or what about, say, General Ross Underhill's "Protectorate Party" that supports the military takeover and buildup of small towns, installing industrial and military development and worth into the towns to bring up their standard of living in order to make their people more willing to fight against the DeeBees as well as eject "undesirable elements" from the town. With the Post-Tolkeen World (heh) getting new recruits and expanding to those towns actually has the objective of reducing insurgency.

Number Three: Nobody is innocent. The PC's are basically wandering hobo's who are heavily armed and murder everything in their way. As Murder Hobos they are the last people who get to make any moral judgements on any society, since they all live by the Rule of the Gun. The PC's can act as judgemental as they want, but seriously, give me a break. How many trials do they hold before they shoot a CS grunt in the face? Want to make them into good guys? Start reminding them that they need to try to capture CS soldiers and give them trials that they record, and do it by following the CS's own military justice code. Or they can just resign themselves to the fact that they are actually terrorists killing people who went out to fight the very people the PC's are, because the PC's are terrorist murder-hobos who kill CS civilians, soldiers, and blow things up.

Number Three: Nobody is Evil: Let the PC's run into CS/Triax/Splugorth forces that are good. EVERYONE in the leadership positions of these organizations and nations understand the value of PR. Think of stunning imagery of CS robot troops pulling "poor defenseless dirty poor muties" out of a burning building. Do the PC's arrive for that? Nope. They arrive to find the four Samas and two UAR-1 Enforcers standing over dishelved and soot covered people crying over their home burning after a crazed meth'd up Ley Line Walker burned it. Do they ask questions? No, because they're Murder Hobos and KNOW that the CS is eeebull. So they attack. Killing a CS squad sent out by General Lucius Cabot to show the velvet glove of the CS by providing the same things that the Peace Corps does in our time, only with guns and armor, let's not be stupid, it is Rifts Earth.

Number Four: "We were here FIRST!" Give the PC's a peaceful village, people living in harmony, not even the random attacks that make up so much of the life of Rifts Earth, due to geography and the placement of the big boys. The CS sweeps away everything bad to the North and West, Texas warlords to the south-west knock everything out to that region. Archie, the Splugorth, and a few kingdoms to the east and south-east wipe out any other problems. Combine with an isolated valley where Skyfall (Sorry, my groups nickname for the Rifts) altered the landscape, making the valley only accessible from one way, with it's own micro-climate (check out the Rogue Valley in Oregon or the Olympic National Rainforest) and no ley-lines or nexuses too close with access to the valley. Sound's idyllic, right? Oops, it's a Post-Tolkeen World. Suddenly the valley is a strategic location for just about everyone. Several warlords want it for the light manufacturing, Archie wants it as a staging area, same as the Splugorth, the CS wants it for it's critical location, and Lonestar wants it for the hidden value only referred to in the Lonestar Labs deep files. With refugees flooding in, the decisions must be made. Who gets to stay, who gets to go. The characters can have returned from the CS War, maybe even after fighting on different sides, which gives some inter-party tension, but the BIG thing is: They were there FIRST! None of these Johnny Come Latelys, with their deals, their threats, their desire to take over. The PC's ae the good guys, fighting against everyone else, all of whom don't care about the people, no matter what they say or try to pull for PR. This means negotation, knives in the dark, smuggling.

Number Five: Rooting out Corruption: Following the Tolkeen War, a LOT of people managed to get into leadership positions that they had no business being in. To top it off the manufacturing companies are looking at SEVERE profit loss, even with the 5-Year Plan, since some of the vehicles and weaponry proved to be failures. This means that there will be a LOT of bribes and corruption. Remember good ol' Lt Col what's his name, Mr. "I Own the Burbs"? Yeah, think a LOT more of his type being in the military command structure and the civilian side. The PC's could be tasked with rooting out this corruption, some of which is being perpetrated by groups who have NO problem and plenty of experience in "vanishing" inconvenient people. One day the PC's could be protecting an outspoken member of the Military Approprations Committee from the hit-men of a company that provides ALL the Skelebot electronics, the next they could be gathering evidence to prove she accepted kickbacks from a company that made power-armor radar systems that were really refurbished civilian air-car flight radar systems rather then the Next-Gen systems they were supposed to provide. They might be looking for Free Quebec or Triax agents, or following leads to Federation of Magic agents. The PC's are good guys, trying to change the system from within. Not to change the entire CS, but to protect the PEOPLE within the CS.

One thing that a LOT of people don't look at is WHY the CS is Human Supremacists and Anti-Magic. Me and my friends sat down and thought about it, thought about it hard. Think about it: The Old World, where people had food, resources, lives of ease and comfort, and "First World-Centric" history shows a "Golden Age" with just "heightened tensions" that to the CS seem quite easy and no-problem. Then the Rifts opened, and monsters came out, slaughtering millions of survivors. They kept slaughtering, and kept slaughtering and kept slaughtering, through three hundred years of darkness, though over a century of "modern" history, and they are STILL killing, many for no other reason then they get off on it. Mages are part of the problem. For every "good" mage you run into, you run into 100 guys who want to rule their little corner of the world. As a CS soldier/citizen, all you see is people heavily armed with military grade gear committing atrocities, mages working with the very creatures that just kill and kill and kill. You can't even live in an open nieghborhood, without walls and security, because if you try to, you WILL be eaten, tortured, used to fuel magical experiments. This is OUR world, we were here FIRST.

What is propping up the Prosek Regime is the very people that fight against it, which forces the CS to seize control for the "Security of the State", which causes more reprisals. It is a circular, self-fulfilling cycle. Peace would assume all rational actors, and even all rational actors are going to be looking at the situation and realizing that this is not a situation where everyone can sit down and comet to peace. For some of the actors, extinction is ALL that can be achieved. The Brodkil aren't going to stop killing. The creatures from the Rifts aren't going to stop killing. The Vampires aren't going to stop killing.

Take a good look at the CS, and realize that not even PROSEK seems himself as the villain. He sees himself as the last defender of humanity, the only one with the strength and foresight to make the hard decisions, that propaganda is necessary so that people know that they have to give up thing, not just for their own safety, but to build a world where their children can live. Even the burbs, and the waiting list are necessary. Too many have gotten in and then performed sabotage or murder or even worse terrorist actions. So of course the line is long, because everyone has to be vetted closely. Do dissidents get hauled away? Yeah, they do, but why? Could it be they were hauled away because of graffiti, or maybe they're the ones who allowed a bomb to off on level 13 that destroyed the environmental machinery for 10-15 and now the whole place smells like the inside of a factory?

Sure, Prosek is a dictator, which is something that leaves a bad taste in our mouths, but seriously, how well is a democratic body going to do in the Post-Apocalypse world? The majority of the people want only to protect humanity from the very creatures that try to destroy it.

Which means: You could portray the CS as good guys, because from the PC's limited experiences, they ARE the good guys. I've run quite a few campaigns where they were the good guys, AND CS troops. They were good guys, even during the Tolkeen War. Why? Because they didn't shoot the unarmed, kill the defenseless. They basically operated under the Geneva Convention and the Hague Rules of Warfare as best as they could.

Hopefully all of this has helped you, in some small way, figure out a way to play a good versus evil campaign.

One of the best posts ever, good job

[The Jack]

One of the best posts ever, good job

Seconded. That was a very insightful read, and gave me a lot to consider for future games. Players as "Murder Hobos" is a fantastic turn of phrase which I will be unashamedly stealing. Thank you.

[badges89]

yes that is very insightful post, and it makes alot of sense

[Riftmaker]

If you dont like a faction start yourt own. Their are rules for starting mec companies and towns and stuff.

[badges89]

If you dont like a faction start yourt own. Their are rules for starting mec companies and towns and stuff.

very zen answer to this problem lol