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Warning Violence and the Supernatural
The fictional Worlds of Palladium Booksreg are violent deadly and filled with supernatural monsters Other dimensional beings often referred to as demons tonnent stalk and prey on humans Other alien life fonns monsters gods and demigods as well as magic insanity and war are all elements in this book
Some parents may find the violence magic and supernatural elements of the game inappropriate for young readersplayers We suggest parental discretion
Please note that none of us at Palladium Booksreg condone or encourage the occult the practice of magic the use of drugs or violence
The Riftertrade Number Four
A sourcebook GM amp Players guide and sourcebook for Riftsreg and the entire Palladium Booksreg Megaversereg
1
Sam
ple
file
First Printing - October 1998
Copyright 1998 Palladium Books Inc amp Kevin Siembieda
All rights reserved world wide under the Universal Copyright Convention No part of this book may be reproduced in part or whole in any form or by any means without permission from the publisher except for brief quotes for use in reviews All incidents situations institutions governments and people are fictional and any similarity without satiric intent of characters or persons living or dead is strictly coincidental
Palladium Booksreg Riftsreg RECONreg Nightbanereg The Palladium Fantasy Role-Playing Gamereg The Mechanoidsreg The Mechanoid Invasionreg and Megaversereg are registered trademarks owned and licensed by Kevin Siembieda and Palladium Books Inc
Ninjas amp Superspies Heroes Unlimited Skraypers Warlords of Russia Mystic Russia Phase World Wormwood Hanuner of The Forge The Siege Against Tolkeen Psyscape Mechanoid Space Western Empire ARCHIE-3 Northern Gun Coalition States Erin Tarn Emperor Prosek Splugorth Mega-Damage Skelebots SAMAS Dog Boys Dog Pack Techno-Wizard Ley Line Walker Shifter Cyber-Knight Mystic Knight Battle Magus Psi-Stalker Simvan Brodkil Juicer Crazy Borg Bot D-Bee Chi-Town Triax NGR and other names titles and likenesses of characters are trademarks owned by Kevin Siembieda and Palladium Books Inc
Knights of the Dinner Tabletrade is a trademark of Kenzer Co and the creation of Jolly Blackburn
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtlesreg is a registered trademark of Mirage Studio
Robotechreg is a registered trademark of Harmony Gold USA Inc
Palladium On-Line wwwpalladiumbookscom
The Riftertrade 4 RPG sourcebook series is published by Palladium Books Inc 12455 Universal Drive Taylor MI 48180 Printed in the USA
2
Sam
ple
file
Palladium Booksreg Presents
THE 4 RPG Guide and Megaversereg Sourcebook
Coordinator amp Editor in Chief Wayne Smith
Supervising Coordinator amp Typesetting Maryann Siembieda
Contributing Writers Randi Cartier Bill Coffin
James MG Cannon David Haendler David Ransom Kevin Siembieda Mark Sumimoto Steve Trustrum
Knights of the Dinner Tabletrade Jolly The Man Blackburn
Contributing Editors Alex Marciniszyn Jim Osten Julius Rosenstein
Cover Painting Michael Dubisch
Interior Artists Apollo Okamura Wayne Breaux Jr Michael S Wilson Brandon C Clark Ka Xiong Mark Dudley Kevin Long
and other Palladium Madmen
Cover Logo Design Steve Edwards Credits Page Logo Niklas Brandt Keylining Kevin Siembieda - shy
Based on the RPG rules characters concepts and Megaversereg created by Kevin Siembieda
Special Thanks to Bill Dont Call Me William Coffin (who has just recently tied the knot - congrats from us all) and all The Rifter contributors as well as all you guys and gals who support our efforts
Our apologies to anybody who got accidentally left out or whose name name was misspelled
3
Sam
ple
file
Contents - The Rifter 4 - October 1998shy
Page 6 - From Behind the Desk
of Kevin Siembieda
Publisher Kevin Siembieda tells what he did on his summer vacation - a cruise with some of the staff (so you can skip this page and move on to the good stuff packed into this issue)
Page 7 - Palladium News Info
amp Coming Attractions
A report on the latest from Palladium including news about Palladiums expanded web site better mail delivery for The Riftertrade subscribers miniatures update and more
Coming attractions makes note of Palladiums many new and special items for the rest of 1998 Take special note of the limited hardcover Crimson Edition of The Palladium Fantasy Role-Playing Game Second Edition (only 600 signed and numshybered copies in time for X-Mas) three new T-shirts and our insane 1998 X-Mas Surprise Package
Page 12 - Palladium Fantasy RPGreg Hook Line amp Sinkers for the Western Empiretrade
A hunk of material that couldnt get squeezed into the big 224 page Western Empire adventure sourcebook so weve included it in The Riftertrade A dozen or so adventure outlines that offer months of gaming by Bill Coffin
Page 21 - Knights of the Dinner Tabletrade
Another hilarious installment of KoDT by creator Jolly Blackburn
Dont forget the KoDT comic books are available from Kenzer amp Company 1935 S Plum Grove Rd Suite 194 Palatine IL 60067
Page 23 - Palladium Fantasy RPGreg Long Strange Trips (GM tips amp ideas)
Bill Coffin author of The Western Empire sourcebook offers some Game Master tips and ideas for Writing Epic Campaigns for Palladium Fantasy The accompanying artwork is by Mike Wilson
Page 33 - Palladium Fantasy RPGreg Death is Not Always Final
Being the October issue of The Riftertrade Randi Cartier with a little help from Siembieda whipped up some gruesome spirits of vengeance designed speshycifically for the Palladium Fantasy RPG but which are easily adaptable to Nightbanereg Beyond the SushypernaturaTM and other Palladium games The acshycompanying artwork is by Johnson Long and Apollo
Page 40 - Nightbanereg RPG The Tribes of the Moon
In keeping with the Halloween spmt Steve Trustrum presents werebeasts for the modem age Optional source material perfect for Nightbanereg and adaptable to Beyond the SupernaturaTM and even Heroes UnlimiteclfM and other RPGs Steve presents several werebeast RCcs OCcs skills tribes and secret societies Part one of two Artwork by Wayne Breaux Jr
Page 64 - Riftsreg ARCHlE Three vs The World
Mark Sumimoto gives us an epic Riftsreg adventure involving everybodys favorite insane computer intelshyligence ARCHIE-3 Plus data on The Titan Robotics Complex and various Cyberworks Titan Northern Gun and other bots weapons and equipment This adventure and source material can be considered opshytional but authorized additions to the Riftsreg World Artwork is by the Drunken Style Studio (Brandon C Clark Ka Xiong and Mark Dudley beshying the principle artists)
Page 90 - Riftsreg The Evolved
First time contributor David Ransom has written more optional Riftsreg adventure and source material involving the feared and hated Gene Splicers Artshywork by Apollo Okamura
Page 96 - The Siege Against Tolkeen
The next four chapters in David Haendlers Riftsreg saga Art by Apollo Okamura
4
Sam
ple
file
Page 102 - Hammer of the Forge The next chapter in James M G Cannons Phase
Worldtrade story
Page 109 - Optional Character Sheet While Kevin Siembieda was rooting around in
piles of Rifler submissions he came across these character sheets As fate would have it we had been getting requests for different log sheets so we deshycided to include them in this issue Garners can make copies for their personal use in gaming Unfortushynately any cover letter that may have accompanied these character sheets has been lost so we cant give the designer the credit he or she deserves Sorry
The Cover From the twisted mind of Michael Dubisch (and
the pages of various Palladium RPGs) comes our monster-filled Halloween cover A piece Kevin Siembieda calls Monsters on Parade It is done in ink and acrylic washes
Optional and Unofficial Rules amp Source Material Please note that this issue offers an unprecedented
amount of official rules and source material Typically the vast majority of rules tables characshyters equipment adventures and stories are optional or alternative things one can include in his camshypaign or enjoy reading They are not official to the main games or world settings For example the story Siege Against Tolkeen is likely to be very different than Siembiedas official world book(s) when it coshymes out As for optional tables and adventures if they sound cool or fun use them If they sound funky or inappropriate for your game ignore them
All the material in The Riftertrade has been included for two reasons One because we thought it was imaginative and fun and two we thought it would stimulate your imagination with fun stuff that you can use (if you want) or which might inspire you to create your own wonders
Palladium On Line wwwpalladiumbookscom
Coming Next Issue bull The second half of Tribes ofthe Moon for
Nightbanereg
bull More material for the Palladium Fantasy RPGreg
bull Source material for Heroes UnlimitedfM
bull The next chapter of the Hammer ofthe Forgetrade
bull The continuing saga of Siege Against Tolkeentrade
bull More Knights ofthe Dinner Tabletrade
bull More GM tips
bull The latest news and developments at Palladium
bull Source material for the Palladium Megaversereg
bull And a lot of new facescontributors
Late Breaking News For those of you who live in the New York City
area Kevin and Maryann will be at the Complete Strategist 11 E 33rd St New York NY on the 27th of November (the day after Thanksgiving) Kevin will be doing a signing and answering quesshytions and just having a good time (Maryann wants to see the Macys parade) For more info and details give the Complete Strat a call (212)685-3880
5
Sam
ple
file
From Behind the Desk of Kevin Siembieda
It has been wild and woolly the last few years in the role-playing industry Through it all Palladium has done well for itself I think our primary formula for success has been stickshying to what we know and love best (role-playing games) and a lot of long hours and hard work
We got off to a slow start this year and have only recently beshygun to blast out a bunch of the books we had planned for 1998 1 had thought about doing a tongue-in-cheek article called IO 1 reasons Palladium products are late This year has been particshyularly kooky for us with every weird thing imaginable occurring throughout Getting hit by hurricane force winds in Michigan was one of them This led to our hometown being declared a dishysaster area and losing power for a full week at both our home and office However I thought it might be fun to focus on one of the other unusual but fun things this year the Palladium Cashyribbean Cruise
The dedicated Palladium staff has stuck by me and worked hard through thick and thin Since Palladium is having such a good year (and we skipped Gen Con for a variety of reasons) Maryarrn and 1 decided to reward ourselves and our hardworkshying staff by taking them on a seven day Caribbean cruise Now we didnt want to force anybody into taking an all expense paid cruise so we offered the staff the choice of cruising or staying home with an extra paid vacation week and a juicy bonus They earned it
Among the cruisers were me Maryann Thom Bartold Steve Sheiring Wayne Smith and freelancer and long-time buddy Jolly Blackburn For Wayne Jolly and I this was our first cruise
The trip was a hoot First of all we had our own pirate with us - 1 mean come on with a name like Jolly R Blackburn what else could he be He even has the beard and earring And yes Jolly is Mr Blackburns real name but no his middle name is not Roger We kept teasing Jolly that his parents always wanted to be pirates and loved pirate movies so they named him Jolly (plus it goes well with Blackburn a pirate name if I ever heard one) Actually there was a lot of teasing puns jokes and silliness going on for much of the trip And as for pirates we did indeed set sail on a pirate-style sail ship as one of our side trips in Grand Cayman Poor Maryann had to put up with the five of us idiots talking like pirates the night before our excursion and the entire morning our time on the boat and half the night Hey waddaya expect Were role-players
Unfortunately the first day or two (at sea so I didnt miss much) are a blur Steve Thorn Wayne and I (Alex too but he didnt come on the trip) were up till 3 AM finishing the final typesetting and paste-up of The Western Empire The guys all crashed for an hour at our house before having to get up at five to get ready and go to the airport Maryann had a whole extra two hours of sleep so Jolly was the only one half-rested I had gotten little sleep the prior two weeks so I was pretty toasted (and I bet you guys think publishing is easy and glamorous) Beshying exhausted I got seasick our second day out at sea and slept half the day away (adrenaline and stupidity kept me going past midnight the first day at sea)
We visited Ocho Rios Jamaica (more silly accents and local jargon) CozumelCancun Grand Cayman and Key West Maryarrn Wayne Thorn and I took a side trip by prop-jet to the Yucatan to see the Mayan ruins of Chichen Itza This was one of the highlights for me Ive read a great deal about the Inca and Mayans and have studied the ruins through books but nothing compares to being there The ruins are absolutely amazing It ofshyfers the famous pyramid but also several other temples an obshyservatory a ball court and other ruins Fantastic My only complaint is there wasnt enough time to see it all in depth I brought my sketch book along with my camera but I didnt have time to do any drawings Im afraid of heights but I climbed the nine story tall pyramid along with the rest of my companions Very cool although I was terrified once I got to the top and wasnt sure how I was going to get down (looking out from the stairs made me dizzy) But I managed
Speaking of climbing Maryann and Thorn climbed the Dunns River Falls in Jamaica (we watched from the sidelines) and we also went to a plantation Jolly and I bought cash from the turn of the century in Cozumel Apparently the term cash originates from specially minted company money issued by English sponsored operations in India and other places The cash coins could be spent at company stores but had no value outside the work complex forcing workers paid in cash to spend their money at company owned facilities
Hemingway used to hang at Key West which has become a lovely and inviting tourist trap And being tourists we loved it While we were visiting the Maritime Museum we met the busishyness partner of famous treasure hunter Mel Fisher and were inshyvited to invest in their current underwater treasure hunting expedition They are continuing to salvage emeralds and gold from the Nuestra Senora de Atocha and Santa Margarita a pair of sunken Spanish Galleons that went down in a hurricane in 1622 laden with gold silver and jewels
Hey an RPG note You know how adventurers in fantasy games sometimes find gold or silver bars We got to examine and lift a real silver bar from a sunken ship that went down on the Atocha in 1622 The bar was about the size of a medium loaf of bread and weighed 80 pounds (36 kg) Ill tell you this is dead weight and not the kind of thing a warrior just tosses in his backpack forgets about and goes on his merry way PS of20+ or no This baby was small but gut-busting heavy Just some food for thought
The accommodations on the big cruise ship (cabins hallshyways dining rooms etc) were very nice although the pillows were hard little bricks the food was disappointingly average and the service varied from excellent to poor Wayne and Steve caught summer colds (it was going around on the ship) Jolly kept getting cut off from the herd by roving bands of wandering (and bored) teenagers (ages 13-16) and Maryann our most exshyperienced cruiser (this was cruise number 14 for her) kept findshying fault with many of the services expenses and food Still all in all we had a great time
1 hope 1 havent bored everybody with my little What I did on my summer vacation
Till next time
~ Kevin Siembieda
Publisher (and Pirate) of Palladium Books
6
Sam
ple
file
First Printing - October 1998
Copyright 1998 Palladium Books Inc amp Kevin Siembieda
All rights reserved world wide under the Universal Copyright Convention No part of this book may be reproduced in part or whole in any form or by any means without permission from the publisher except for brief quotes for use in reviews All incidents situations institutions governments and people are fictional and any similarity without satiric intent of characters or persons living or dead is strictly coincidental
Palladium Booksreg Riftsreg RECONreg Nightbanereg The Palladium Fantasy Role-Playing Gamereg The Mechanoidsreg The Mechanoid Invasionreg and Megaversereg are registered trademarks owned and licensed by Kevin Siembieda and Palladium Books Inc
Ninjas amp Superspies Heroes Unlimited Skraypers Warlords of Russia Mystic Russia Phase World Wormwood Hanuner of The Forge The Siege Against Tolkeen Psyscape Mechanoid Space Western Empire ARCHIE-3 Northern Gun Coalition States Erin Tarn Emperor Prosek Splugorth Mega-Damage Skelebots SAMAS Dog Boys Dog Pack Techno-Wizard Ley Line Walker Shifter Cyber-Knight Mystic Knight Battle Magus Psi-Stalker Simvan Brodkil Juicer Crazy Borg Bot D-Bee Chi-Town Triax NGR and other names titles and likenesses of characters are trademarks owned by Kevin Siembieda and Palladium Books Inc
Knights of the Dinner Tabletrade is a trademark of Kenzer Co and the creation of Jolly Blackburn
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtlesreg is a registered trademark of Mirage Studio
Robotechreg is a registered trademark of Harmony Gold USA Inc
Palladium On-Line wwwpalladiumbookscom
The Riftertrade 4 RPG sourcebook series is published by Palladium Books Inc 12455 Universal Drive Taylor MI 48180 Printed in the USA
2
Sam
ple
file
Palladium Booksreg Presents
THE 4 RPG Guide and Megaversereg Sourcebook
Coordinator amp Editor in Chief Wayne Smith
Supervising Coordinator amp Typesetting Maryann Siembieda
Contributing Writers Randi Cartier Bill Coffin
James MG Cannon David Haendler David Ransom Kevin Siembieda Mark Sumimoto Steve Trustrum
Knights of the Dinner Tabletrade Jolly The Man Blackburn
Contributing Editors Alex Marciniszyn Jim Osten Julius Rosenstein
Cover Painting Michael Dubisch
Interior Artists Apollo Okamura Wayne Breaux Jr Michael S Wilson Brandon C Clark Ka Xiong Mark Dudley Kevin Long
and other Palladium Madmen
Cover Logo Design Steve Edwards Credits Page Logo Niklas Brandt Keylining Kevin Siembieda - shy
Based on the RPG rules characters concepts and Megaversereg created by Kevin Siembieda
Special Thanks to Bill Dont Call Me William Coffin (who has just recently tied the knot - congrats from us all) and all The Rifter contributors as well as all you guys and gals who support our efforts
Our apologies to anybody who got accidentally left out or whose name name was misspelled
3
Sam
ple
file
Contents - The Rifter 4 - October 1998shy
Page 6 - From Behind the Desk
of Kevin Siembieda
Publisher Kevin Siembieda tells what he did on his summer vacation - a cruise with some of the staff (so you can skip this page and move on to the good stuff packed into this issue)
Page 7 - Palladium News Info
amp Coming Attractions
A report on the latest from Palladium including news about Palladiums expanded web site better mail delivery for The Riftertrade subscribers miniatures update and more
Coming attractions makes note of Palladiums many new and special items for the rest of 1998 Take special note of the limited hardcover Crimson Edition of The Palladium Fantasy Role-Playing Game Second Edition (only 600 signed and numshybered copies in time for X-Mas) three new T-shirts and our insane 1998 X-Mas Surprise Package
Page 12 - Palladium Fantasy RPGreg Hook Line amp Sinkers for the Western Empiretrade
A hunk of material that couldnt get squeezed into the big 224 page Western Empire adventure sourcebook so weve included it in The Riftertrade A dozen or so adventure outlines that offer months of gaming by Bill Coffin
Page 21 - Knights of the Dinner Tabletrade
Another hilarious installment of KoDT by creator Jolly Blackburn
Dont forget the KoDT comic books are available from Kenzer amp Company 1935 S Plum Grove Rd Suite 194 Palatine IL 60067
Page 23 - Palladium Fantasy RPGreg Long Strange Trips (GM tips amp ideas)
Bill Coffin author of The Western Empire sourcebook offers some Game Master tips and ideas for Writing Epic Campaigns for Palladium Fantasy The accompanying artwork is by Mike Wilson
Page 33 - Palladium Fantasy RPGreg Death is Not Always Final
Being the October issue of The Riftertrade Randi Cartier with a little help from Siembieda whipped up some gruesome spirits of vengeance designed speshycifically for the Palladium Fantasy RPG but which are easily adaptable to Nightbanereg Beyond the SushypernaturaTM and other Palladium games The acshycompanying artwork is by Johnson Long and Apollo
Page 40 - Nightbanereg RPG The Tribes of the Moon
In keeping with the Halloween spmt Steve Trustrum presents werebeasts for the modem age Optional source material perfect for Nightbanereg and adaptable to Beyond the SupernaturaTM and even Heroes UnlimiteclfM and other RPGs Steve presents several werebeast RCcs OCcs skills tribes and secret societies Part one of two Artwork by Wayne Breaux Jr
Page 64 - Riftsreg ARCHlE Three vs The World
Mark Sumimoto gives us an epic Riftsreg adventure involving everybodys favorite insane computer intelshyligence ARCHIE-3 Plus data on The Titan Robotics Complex and various Cyberworks Titan Northern Gun and other bots weapons and equipment This adventure and source material can be considered opshytional but authorized additions to the Riftsreg World Artwork is by the Drunken Style Studio (Brandon C Clark Ka Xiong and Mark Dudley beshying the principle artists)
Page 90 - Riftsreg The Evolved
First time contributor David Ransom has written more optional Riftsreg adventure and source material involving the feared and hated Gene Splicers Artshywork by Apollo Okamura
Page 96 - The Siege Against Tolkeen
The next four chapters in David Haendlers Riftsreg saga Art by Apollo Okamura
4
Sam
ple
file
Page 102 - Hammer of the Forge The next chapter in James M G Cannons Phase
Worldtrade story
Page 109 - Optional Character Sheet While Kevin Siembieda was rooting around in
piles of Rifler submissions he came across these character sheets As fate would have it we had been getting requests for different log sheets so we deshycided to include them in this issue Garners can make copies for their personal use in gaming Unfortushynately any cover letter that may have accompanied these character sheets has been lost so we cant give the designer the credit he or she deserves Sorry
The Cover From the twisted mind of Michael Dubisch (and
the pages of various Palladium RPGs) comes our monster-filled Halloween cover A piece Kevin Siembieda calls Monsters on Parade It is done in ink and acrylic washes
Optional and Unofficial Rules amp Source Material Please note that this issue offers an unprecedented
amount of official rules and source material Typically the vast majority of rules tables characshyters equipment adventures and stories are optional or alternative things one can include in his camshypaign or enjoy reading They are not official to the main games or world settings For example the story Siege Against Tolkeen is likely to be very different than Siembiedas official world book(s) when it coshymes out As for optional tables and adventures if they sound cool or fun use them If they sound funky or inappropriate for your game ignore them
All the material in The Riftertrade has been included for two reasons One because we thought it was imaginative and fun and two we thought it would stimulate your imagination with fun stuff that you can use (if you want) or which might inspire you to create your own wonders
Palladium On Line wwwpalladiumbookscom
Coming Next Issue bull The second half of Tribes ofthe Moon for
Nightbanereg
bull More material for the Palladium Fantasy RPGreg
bull Source material for Heroes UnlimitedfM
bull The next chapter of the Hammer ofthe Forgetrade
bull The continuing saga of Siege Against Tolkeentrade
bull More Knights ofthe Dinner Tabletrade
bull More GM tips
bull The latest news and developments at Palladium
bull Source material for the Palladium Megaversereg
bull And a lot of new facescontributors
Late Breaking News For those of you who live in the New York City
area Kevin and Maryann will be at the Complete Strategist 11 E 33rd St New York NY on the 27th of November (the day after Thanksgiving) Kevin will be doing a signing and answering quesshytions and just having a good time (Maryann wants to see the Macys parade) For more info and details give the Complete Strat a call (212)685-3880
5
Sam
ple
file
From Behind the Desk of Kevin Siembieda
It has been wild and woolly the last few years in the role-playing industry Through it all Palladium has done well for itself I think our primary formula for success has been stickshying to what we know and love best (role-playing games) and a lot of long hours and hard work
We got off to a slow start this year and have only recently beshygun to blast out a bunch of the books we had planned for 1998 1 had thought about doing a tongue-in-cheek article called IO 1 reasons Palladium products are late This year has been particshyularly kooky for us with every weird thing imaginable occurring throughout Getting hit by hurricane force winds in Michigan was one of them This led to our hometown being declared a dishysaster area and losing power for a full week at both our home and office However I thought it might be fun to focus on one of the other unusual but fun things this year the Palladium Cashyribbean Cruise
The dedicated Palladium staff has stuck by me and worked hard through thick and thin Since Palladium is having such a good year (and we skipped Gen Con for a variety of reasons) Maryarrn and 1 decided to reward ourselves and our hardworkshying staff by taking them on a seven day Caribbean cruise Now we didnt want to force anybody into taking an all expense paid cruise so we offered the staff the choice of cruising or staying home with an extra paid vacation week and a juicy bonus They earned it
Among the cruisers were me Maryann Thom Bartold Steve Sheiring Wayne Smith and freelancer and long-time buddy Jolly Blackburn For Wayne Jolly and I this was our first cruise
The trip was a hoot First of all we had our own pirate with us - 1 mean come on with a name like Jolly R Blackburn what else could he be He even has the beard and earring And yes Jolly is Mr Blackburns real name but no his middle name is not Roger We kept teasing Jolly that his parents always wanted to be pirates and loved pirate movies so they named him Jolly (plus it goes well with Blackburn a pirate name if I ever heard one) Actually there was a lot of teasing puns jokes and silliness going on for much of the trip And as for pirates we did indeed set sail on a pirate-style sail ship as one of our side trips in Grand Cayman Poor Maryann had to put up with the five of us idiots talking like pirates the night before our excursion and the entire morning our time on the boat and half the night Hey waddaya expect Were role-players
Unfortunately the first day or two (at sea so I didnt miss much) are a blur Steve Thorn Wayne and I (Alex too but he didnt come on the trip) were up till 3 AM finishing the final typesetting and paste-up of The Western Empire The guys all crashed for an hour at our house before having to get up at five to get ready and go to the airport Maryann had a whole extra two hours of sleep so Jolly was the only one half-rested I had gotten little sleep the prior two weeks so I was pretty toasted (and I bet you guys think publishing is easy and glamorous) Beshying exhausted I got seasick our second day out at sea and slept half the day away (adrenaline and stupidity kept me going past midnight the first day at sea)
We visited Ocho Rios Jamaica (more silly accents and local jargon) CozumelCancun Grand Cayman and Key West Maryarrn Wayne Thorn and I took a side trip by prop-jet to the Yucatan to see the Mayan ruins of Chichen Itza This was one of the highlights for me Ive read a great deal about the Inca and Mayans and have studied the ruins through books but nothing compares to being there The ruins are absolutely amazing It ofshyfers the famous pyramid but also several other temples an obshyservatory a ball court and other ruins Fantastic My only complaint is there wasnt enough time to see it all in depth I brought my sketch book along with my camera but I didnt have time to do any drawings Im afraid of heights but I climbed the nine story tall pyramid along with the rest of my companions Very cool although I was terrified once I got to the top and wasnt sure how I was going to get down (looking out from the stairs made me dizzy) But I managed
Speaking of climbing Maryann and Thorn climbed the Dunns River Falls in Jamaica (we watched from the sidelines) and we also went to a plantation Jolly and I bought cash from the turn of the century in Cozumel Apparently the term cash originates from specially minted company money issued by English sponsored operations in India and other places The cash coins could be spent at company stores but had no value outside the work complex forcing workers paid in cash to spend their money at company owned facilities
Hemingway used to hang at Key West which has become a lovely and inviting tourist trap And being tourists we loved it While we were visiting the Maritime Museum we met the busishyness partner of famous treasure hunter Mel Fisher and were inshyvited to invest in their current underwater treasure hunting expedition They are continuing to salvage emeralds and gold from the Nuestra Senora de Atocha and Santa Margarita a pair of sunken Spanish Galleons that went down in a hurricane in 1622 laden with gold silver and jewels
Hey an RPG note You know how adventurers in fantasy games sometimes find gold or silver bars We got to examine and lift a real silver bar from a sunken ship that went down on the Atocha in 1622 The bar was about the size of a medium loaf of bread and weighed 80 pounds (36 kg) Ill tell you this is dead weight and not the kind of thing a warrior just tosses in his backpack forgets about and goes on his merry way PS of20+ or no This baby was small but gut-busting heavy Just some food for thought
The accommodations on the big cruise ship (cabins hallshyways dining rooms etc) were very nice although the pillows were hard little bricks the food was disappointingly average and the service varied from excellent to poor Wayne and Steve caught summer colds (it was going around on the ship) Jolly kept getting cut off from the herd by roving bands of wandering (and bored) teenagers (ages 13-16) and Maryann our most exshyperienced cruiser (this was cruise number 14 for her) kept findshying fault with many of the services expenses and food Still all in all we had a great time
1 hope 1 havent bored everybody with my little What I did on my summer vacation
Till next time
~ Kevin Siembieda
Publisher (and Pirate) of Palladium Books
6
Sam
ple
file
Palladium Booksreg Presents
THE 4 RPG Guide and Megaversereg Sourcebook
Coordinator amp Editor in Chief Wayne Smith
Supervising Coordinator amp Typesetting Maryann Siembieda
Contributing Writers Randi Cartier Bill Coffin
James MG Cannon David Haendler David Ransom Kevin Siembieda Mark Sumimoto Steve Trustrum
Knights of the Dinner Tabletrade Jolly The Man Blackburn
Contributing Editors Alex Marciniszyn Jim Osten Julius Rosenstein
Cover Painting Michael Dubisch
Interior Artists Apollo Okamura Wayne Breaux Jr Michael S Wilson Brandon C Clark Ka Xiong Mark Dudley Kevin Long
and other Palladium Madmen
Cover Logo Design Steve Edwards Credits Page Logo Niklas Brandt Keylining Kevin Siembieda - shy
Based on the RPG rules characters concepts and Megaversereg created by Kevin Siembieda
Special Thanks to Bill Dont Call Me William Coffin (who has just recently tied the knot - congrats from us all) and all The Rifter contributors as well as all you guys and gals who support our efforts
Our apologies to anybody who got accidentally left out or whose name name was misspelled
3
Sam
ple
file
Contents - The Rifter 4 - October 1998shy
Page 6 - From Behind the Desk
of Kevin Siembieda
Publisher Kevin Siembieda tells what he did on his summer vacation - a cruise with some of the staff (so you can skip this page and move on to the good stuff packed into this issue)
Page 7 - Palladium News Info
amp Coming Attractions
A report on the latest from Palladium including news about Palladiums expanded web site better mail delivery for The Riftertrade subscribers miniatures update and more
Coming attractions makes note of Palladiums many new and special items for the rest of 1998 Take special note of the limited hardcover Crimson Edition of The Palladium Fantasy Role-Playing Game Second Edition (only 600 signed and numshybered copies in time for X-Mas) three new T-shirts and our insane 1998 X-Mas Surprise Package
Page 12 - Palladium Fantasy RPGreg Hook Line amp Sinkers for the Western Empiretrade
A hunk of material that couldnt get squeezed into the big 224 page Western Empire adventure sourcebook so weve included it in The Riftertrade A dozen or so adventure outlines that offer months of gaming by Bill Coffin
Page 21 - Knights of the Dinner Tabletrade
Another hilarious installment of KoDT by creator Jolly Blackburn
Dont forget the KoDT comic books are available from Kenzer amp Company 1935 S Plum Grove Rd Suite 194 Palatine IL 60067
Page 23 - Palladium Fantasy RPGreg Long Strange Trips (GM tips amp ideas)
Bill Coffin author of The Western Empire sourcebook offers some Game Master tips and ideas for Writing Epic Campaigns for Palladium Fantasy The accompanying artwork is by Mike Wilson
Page 33 - Palladium Fantasy RPGreg Death is Not Always Final
Being the October issue of The Riftertrade Randi Cartier with a little help from Siembieda whipped up some gruesome spirits of vengeance designed speshycifically for the Palladium Fantasy RPG but which are easily adaptable to Nightbanereg Beyond the SushypernaturaTM and other Palladium games The acshycompanying artwork is by Johnson Long and Apollo
Page 40 - Nightbanereg RPG The Tribes of the Moon
In keeping with the Halloween spmt Steve Trustrum presents werebeasts for the modem age Optional source material perfect for Nightbanereg and adaptable to Beyond the SupernaturaTM and even Heroes UnlimiteclfM and other RPGs Steve presents several werebeast RCcs OCcs skills tribes and secret societies Part one of two Artwork by Wayne Breaux Jr
Page 64 - Riftsreg ARCHlE Three vs The World
Mark Sumimoto gives us an epic Riftsreg adventure involving everybodys favorite insane computer intelshyligence ARCHIE-3 Plus data on The Titan Robotics Complex and various Cyberworks Titan Northern Gun and other bots weapons and equipment This adventure and source material can be considered opshytional but authorized additions to the Riftsreg World Artwork is by the Drunken Style Studio (Brandon C Clark Ka Xiong and Mark Dudley beshying the principle artists)
Page 90 - Riftsreg The Evolved
First time contributor David Ransom has written more optional Riftsreg adventure and source material involving the feared and hated Gene Splicers Artshywork by Apollo Okamura
Page 96 - The Siege Against Tolkeen
The next four chapters in David Haendlers Riftsreg saga Art by Apollo Okamura
4
Sam
ple
file
Page 102 - Hammer of the Forge The next chapter in James M G Cannons Phase
Worldtrade story
Page 109 - Optional Character Sheet While Kevin Siembieda was rooting around in
piles of Rifler submissions he came across these character sheets As fate would have it we had been getting requests for different log sheets so we deshycided to include them in this issue Garners can make copies for their personal use in gaming Unfortushynately any cover letter that may have accompanied these character sheets has been lost so we cant give the designer the credit he or she deserves Sorry
The Cover From the twisted mind of Michael Dubisch (and
the pages of various Palladium RPGs) comes our monster-filled Halloween cover A piece Kevin Siembieda calls Monsters on Parade It is done in ink and acrylic washes
Optional and Unofficial Rules amp Source Material Please note that this issue offers an unprecedented
amount of official rules and source material Typically the vast majority of rules tables characshyters equipment adventures and stories are optional or alternative things one can include in his camshypaign or enjoy reading They are not official to the main games or world settings For example the story Siege Against Tolkeen is likely to be very different than Siembiedas official world book(s) when it coshymes out As for optional tables and adventures if they sound cool or fun use them If they sound funky or inappropriate for your game ignore them
All the material in The Riftertrade has been included for two reasons One because we thought it was imaginative and fun and two we thought it would stimulate your imagination with fun stuff that you can use (if you want) or which might inspire you to create your own wonders
Palladium On Line wwwpalladiumbookscom
Coming Next Issue bull The second half of Tribes ofthe Moon for
Nightbanereg
bull More material for the Palladium Fantasy RPGreg
bull Source material for Heroes UnlimitedfM
bull The next chapter of the Hammer ofthe Forgetrade
bull The continuing saga of Siege Against Tolkeentrade
bull More Knights ofthe Dinner Tabletrade
bull More GM tips
bull The latest news and developments at Palladium
bull Source material for the Palladium Megaversereg
bull And a lot of new facescontributors
Late Breaking News For those of you who live in the New York City
area Kevin and Maryann will be at the Complete Strategist 11 E 33rd St New York NY on the 27th of November (the day after Thanksgiving) Kevin will be doing a signing and answering quesshytions and just having a good time (Maryann wants to see the Macys parade) For more info and details give the Complete Strat a call (212)685-3880
5
Sam
ple
file
From Behind the Desk of Kevin Siembieda
It has been wild and woolly the last few years in the role-playing industry Through it all Palladium has done well for itself I think our primary formula for success has been stickshying to what we know and love best (role-playing games) and a lot of long hours and hard work
We got off to a slow start this year and have only recently beshygun to blast out a bunch of the books we had planned for 1998 1 had thought about doing a tongue-in-cheek article called IO 1 reasons Palladium products are late This year has been particshyularly kooky for us with every weird thing imaginable occurring throughout Getting hit by hurricane force winds in Michigan was one of them This led to our hometown being declared a dishysaster area and losing power for a full week at both our home and office However I thought it might be fun to focus on one of the other unusual but fun things this year the Palladium Cashyribbean Cruise
The dedicated Palladium staff has stuck by me and worked hard through thick and thin Since Palladium is having such a good year (and we skipped Gen Con for a variety of reasons) Maryarrn and 1 decided to reward ourselves and our hardworkshying staff by taking them on a seven day Caribbean cruise Now we didnt want to force anybody into taking an all expense paid cruise so we offered the staff the choice of cruising or staying home with an extra paid vacation week and a juicy bonus They earned it
Among the cruisers were me Maryann Thom Bartold Steve Sheiring Wayne Smith and freelancer and long-time buddy Jolly Blackburn For Wayne Jolly and I this was our first cruise
The trip was a hoot First of all we had our own pirate with us - 1 mean come on with a name like Jolly R Blackburn what else could he be He even has the beard and earring And yes Jolly is Mr Blackburns real name but no his middle name is not Roger We kept teasing Jolly that his parents always wanted to be pirates and loved pirate movies so they named him Jolly (plus it goes well with Blackburn a pirate name if I ever heard one) Actually there was a lot of teasing puns jokes and silliness going on for much of the trip And as for pirates we did indeed set sail on a pirate-style sail ship as one of our side trips in Grand Cayman Poor Maryann had to put up with the five of us idiots talking like pirates the night before our excursion and the entire morning our time on the boat and half the night Hey waddaya expect Were role-players
Unfortunately the first day or two (at sea so I didnt miss much) are a blur Steve Thorn Wayne and I (Alex too but he didnt come on the trip) were up till 3 AM finishing the final typesetting and paste-up of The Western Empire The guys all crashed for an hour at our house before having to get up at five to get ready and go to the airport Maryann had a whole extra two hours of sleep so Jolly was the only one half-rested I had gotten little sleep the prior two weeks so I was pretty toasted (and I bet you guys think publishing is easy and glamorous) Beshying exhausted I got seasick our second day out at sea and slept half the day away (adrenaline and stupidity kept me going past midnight the first day at sea)
We visited Ocho Rios Jamaica (more silly accents and local jargon) CozumelCancun Grand Cayman and Key West Maryarrn Wayne Thorn and I took a side trip by prop-jet to the Yucatan to see the Mayan ruins of Chichen Itza This was one of the highlights for me Ive read a great deal about the Inca and Mayans and have studied the ruins through books but nothing compares to being there The ruins are absolutely amazing It ofshyfers the famous pyramid but also several other temples an obshyservatory a ball court and other ruins Fantastic My only complaint is there wasnt enough time to see it all in depth I brought my sketch book along with my camera but I didnt have time to do any drawings Im afraid of heights but I climbed the nine story tall pyramid along with the rest of my companions Very cool although I was terrified once I got to the top and wasnt sure how I was going to get down (looking out from the stairs made me dizzy) But I managed
Speaking of climbing Maryann and Thorn climbed the Dunns River Falls in Jamaica (we watched from the sidelines) and we also went to a plantation Jolly and I bought cash from the turn of the century in Cozumel Apparently the term cash originates from specially minted company money issued by English sponsored operations in India and other places The cash coins could be spent at company stores but had no value outside the work complex forcing workers paid in cash to spend their money at company owned facilities
Hemingway used to hang at Key West which has become a lovely and inviting tourist trap And being tourists we loved it While we were visiting the Maritime Museum we met the busishyness partner of famous treasure hunter Mel Fisher and were inshyvited to invest in their current underwater treasure hunting expedition They are continuing to salvage emeralds and gold from the Nuestra Senora de Atocha and Santa Margarita a pair of sunken Spanish Galleons that went down in a hurricane in 1622 laden with gold silver and jewels
Hey an RPG note You know how adventurers in fantasy games sometimes find gold or silver bars We got to examine and lift a real silver bar from a sunken ship that went down on the Atocha in 1622 The bar was about the size of a medium loaf of bread and weighed 80 pounds (36 kg) Ill tell you this is dead weight and not the kind of thing a warrior just tosses in his backpack forgets about and goes on his merry way PS of20+ or no This baby was small but gut-busting heavy Just some food for thought
The accommodations on the big cruise ship (cabins hallshyways dining rooms etc) were very nice although the pillows were hard little bricks the food was disappointingly average and the service varied from excellent to poor Wayne and Steve caught summer colds (it was going around on the ship) Jolly kept getting cut off from the herd by roving bands of wandering (and bored) teenagers (ages 13-16) and Maryann our most exshyperienced cruiser (this was cruise number 14 for her) kept findshying fault with many of the services expenses and food Still all in all we had a great time
1 hope 1 havent bored everybody with my little What I did on my summer vacation
Till next time
~ Kevin Siembieda
Publisher (and Pirate) of Palladium Books
6
Sam
ple
file
Contents - The Rifter 4 - October 1998shy
Page 6 - From Behind the Desk
of Kevin Siembieda
Publisher Kevin Siembieda tells what he did on his summer vacation - a cruise with some of the staff (so you can skip this page and move on to the good stuff packed into this issue)
Page 7 - Palladium News Info
amp Coming Attractions
A report on the latest from Palladium including news about Palladiums expanded web site better mail delivery for The Riftertrade subscribers miniatures update and more
Coming attractions makes note of Palladiums many new and special items for the rest of 1998 Take special note of the limited hardcover Crimson Edition of The Palladium Fantasy Role-Playing Game Second Edition (only 600 signed and numshybered copies in time for X-Mas) three new T-shirts and our insane 1998 X-Mas Surprise Package
Page 12 - Palladium Fantasy RPGreg Hook Line amp Sinkers for the Western Empiretrade
A hunk of material that couldnt get squeezed into the big 224 page Western Empire adventure sourcebook so weve included it in The Riftertrade A dozen or so adventure outlines that offer months of gaming by Bill Coffin
Page 21 - Knights of the Dinner Tabletrade
Another hilarious installment of KoDT by creator Jolly Blackburn
Dont forget the KoDT comic books are available from Kenzer amp Company 1935 S Plum Grove Rd Suite 194 Palatine IL 60067
Page 23 - Palladium Fantasy RPGreg Long Strange Trips (GM tips amp ideas)
Bill Coffin author of The Western Empire sourcebook offers some Game Master tips and ideas for Writing Epic Campaigns for Palladium Fantasy The accompanying artwork is by Mike Wilson
Page 33 - Palladium Fantasy RPGreg Death is Not Always Final
Being the October issue of The Riftertrade Randi Cartier with a little help from Siembieda whipped up some gruesome spirits of vengeance designed speshycifically for the Palladium Fantasy RPG but which are easily adaptable to Nightbanereg Beyond the SushypernaturaTM and other Palladium games The acshycompanying artwork is by Johnson Long and Apollo
Page 40 - Nightbanereg RPG The Tribes of the Moon
In keeping with the Halloween spmt Steve Trustrum presents werebeasts for the modem age Optional source material perfect for Nightbanereg and adaptable to Beyond the SupernaturaTM and even Heroes UnlimiteclfM and other RPGs Steve presents several werebeast RCcs OCcs skills tribes and secret societies Part one of two Artwork by Wayne Breaux Jr
Page 64 - Riftsreg ARCHlE Three vs The World
Mark Sumimoto gives us an epic Riftsreg adventure involving everybodys favorite insane computer intelshyligence ARCHIE-3 Plus data on The Titan Robotics Complex and various Cyberworks Titan Northern Gun and other bots weapons and equipment This adventure and source material can be considered opshytional but authorized additions to the Riftsreg World Artwork is by the Drunken Style Studio (Brandon C Clark Ka Xiong and Mark Dudley beshying the principle artists)
Page 90 - Riftsreg The Evolved
First time contributor David Ransom has written more optional Riftsreg adventure and source material involving the feared and hated Gene Splicers Artshywork by Apollo Okamura
Page 96 - The Siege Against Tolkeen
The next four chapters in David Haendlers Riftsreg saga Art by Apollo Okamura
4
Sam
ple
file
Page 102 - Hammer of the Forge The next chapter in James M G Cannons Phase
Worldtrade story
Page 109 - Optional Character Sheet While Kevin Siembieda was rooting around in
piles of Rifler submissions he came across these character sheets As fate would have it we had been getting requests for different log sheets so we deshycided to include them in this issue Garners can make copies for their personal use in gaming Unfortushynately any cover letter that may have accompanied these character sheets has been lost so we cant give the designer the credit he or she deserves Sorry
The Cover From the twisted mind of Michael Dubisch (and
the pages of various Palladium RPGs) comes our monster-filled Halloween cover A piece Kevin Siembieda calls Monsters on Parade It is done in ink and acrylic washes
Optional and Unofficial Rules amp Source Material Please note that this issue offers an unprecedented
amount of official rules and source material Typically the vast majority of rules tables characshyters equipment adventures and stories are optional or alternative things one can include in his camshypaign or enjoy reading They are not official to the main games or world settings For example the story Siege Against Tolkeen is likely to be very different than Siembiedas official world book(s) when it coshymes out As for optional tables and adventures if they sound cool or fun use them If they sound funky or inappropriate for your game ignore them
All the material in The Riftertrade has been included for two reasons One because we thought it was imaginative and fun and two we thought it would stimulate your imagination with fun stuff that you can use (if you want) or which might inspire you to create your own wonders
Palladium On Line wwwpalladiumbookscom
Coming Next Issue bull The second half of Tribes ofthe Moon for
Nightbanereg
bull More material for the Palladium Fantasy RPGreg
bull Source material for Heroes UnlimitedfM
bull The next chapter of the Hammer ofthe Forgetrade
bull The continuing saga of Siege Against Tolkeentrade
bull More Knights ofthe Dinner Tabletrade
bull More GM tips
bull The latest news and developments at Palladium
bull Source material for the Palladium Megaversereg
bull And a lot of new facescontributors
Late Breaking News For those of you who live in the New York City
area Kevin and Maryann will be at the Complete Strategist 11 E 33rd St New York NY on the 27th of November (the day after Thanksgiving) Kevin will be doing a signing and answering quesshytions and just having a good time (Maryann wants to see the Macys parade) For more info and details give the Complete Strat a call (212)685-3880
5
Sam
ple
file
From Behind the Desk of Kevin Siembieda
It has been wild and woolly the last few years in the role-playing industry Through it all Palladium has done well for itself I think our primary formula for success has been stickshying to what we know and love best (role-playing games) and a lot of long hours and hard work
We got off to a slow start this year and have only recently beshygun to blast out a bunch of the books we had planned for 1998 1 had thought about doing a tongue-in-cheek article called IO 1 reasons Palladium products are late This year has been particshyularly kooky for us with every weird thing imaginable occurring throughout Getting hit by hurricane force winds in Michigan was one of them This led to our hometown being declared a dishysaster area and losing power for a full week at both our home and office However I thought it might be fun to focus on one of the other unusual but fun things this year the Palladium Cashyribbean Cruise
The dedicated Palladium staff has stuck by me and worked hard through thick and thin Since Palladium is having such a good year (and we skipped Gen Con for a variety of reasons) Maryarrn and 1 decided to reward ourselves and our hardworkshying staff by taking them on a seven day Caribbean cruise Now we didnt want to force anybody into taking an all expense paid cruise so we offered the staff the choice of cruising or staying home with an extra paid vacation week and a juicy bonus They earned it
Among the cruisers were me Maryann Thom Bartold Steve Sheiring Wayne Smith and freelancer and long-time buddy Jolly Blackburn For Wayne Jolly and I this was our first cruise
The trip was a hoot First of all we had our own pirate with us - 1 mean come on with a name like Jolly R Blackburn what else could he be He even has the beard and earring And yes Jolly is Mr Blackburns real name but no his middle name is not Roger We kept teasing Jolly that his parents always wanted to be pirates and loved pirate movies so they named him Jolly (plus it goes well with Blackburn a pirate name if I ever heard one) Actually there was a lot of teasing puns jokes and silliness going on for much of the trip And as for pirates we did indeed set sail on a pirate-style sail ship as one of our side trips in Grand Cayman Poor Maryann had to put up with the five of us idiots talking like pirates the night before our excursion and the entire morning our time on the boat and half the night Hey waddaya expect Were role-players
Unfortunately the first day or two (at sea so I didnt miss much) are a blur Steve Thorn Wayne and I (Alex too but he didnt come on the trip) were up till 3 AM finishing the final typesetting and paste-up of The Western Empire The guys all crashed for an hour at our house before having to get up at five to get ready and go to the airport Maryann had a whole extra two hours of sleep so Jolly was the only one half-rested I had gotten little sleep the prior two weeks so I was pretty toasted (and I bet you guys think publishing is easy and glamorous) Beshying exhausted I got seasick our second day out at sea and slept half the day away (adrenaline and stupidity kept me going past midnight the first day at sea)
We visited Ocho Rios Jamaica (more silly accents and local jargon) CozumelCancun Grand Cayman and Key West Maryarrn Wayne Thorn and I took a side trip by prop-jet to the Yucatan to see the Mayan ruins of Chichen Itza This was one of the highlights for me Ive read a great deal about the Inca and Mayans and have studied the ruins through books but nothing compares to being there The ruins are absolutely amazing It ofshyfers the famous pyramid but also several other temples an obshyservatory a ball court and other ruins Fantastic My only complaint is there wasnt enough time to see it all in depth I brought my sketch book along with my camera but I didnt have time to do any drawings Im afraid of heights but I climbed the nine story tall pyramid along with the rest of my companions Very cool although I was terrified once I got to the top and wasnt sure how I was going to get down (looking out from the stairs made me dizzy) But I managed
Speaking of climbing Maryann and Thorn climbed the Dunns River Falls in Jamaica (we watched from the sidelines) and we also went to a plantation Jolly and I bought cash from the turn of the century in Cozumel Apparently the term cash originates from specially minted company money issued by English sponsored operations in India and other places The cash coins could be spent at company stores but had no value outside the work complex forcing workers paid in cash to spend their money at company owned facilities
Hemingway used to hang at Key West which has become a lovely and inviting tourist trap And being tourists we loved it While we were visiting the Maritime Museum we met the busishyness partner of famous treasure hunter Mel Fisher and were inshyvited to invest in their current underwater treasure hunting expedition They are continuing to salvage emeralds and gold from the Nuestra Senora de Atocha and Santa Margarita a pair of sunken Spanish Galleons that went down in a hurricane in 1622 laden with gold silver and jewels
Hey an RPG note You know how adventurers in fantasy games sometimes find gold or silver bars We got to examine and lift a real silver bar from a sunken ship that went down on the Atocha in 1622 The bar was about the size of a medium loaf of bread and weighed 80 pounds (36 kg) Ill tell you this is dead weight and not the kind of thing a warrior just tosses in his backpack forgets about and goes on his merry way PS of20+ or no This baby was small but gut-busting heavy Just some food for thought
The accommodations on the big cruise ship (cabins hallshyways dining rooms etc) were very nice although the pillows were hard little bricks the food was disappointingly average and the service varied from excellent to poor Wayne and Steve caught summer colds (it was going around on the ship) Jolly kept getting cut off from the herd by roving bands of wandering (and bored) teenagers (ages 13-16) and Maryann our most exshyperienced cruiser (this was cruise number 14 for her) kept findshying fault with many of the services expenses and food Still all in all we had a great time
1 hope 1 havent bored everybody with my little What I did on my summer vacation
Till next time
~ Kevin Siembieda
Publisher (and Pirate) of Palladium Books
6
Sam
ple
file
Page 102 - Hammer of the Forge The next chapter in James M G Cannons Phase
Worldtrade story
Page 109 - Optional Character Sheet While Kevin Siembieda was rooting around in
piles of Rifler submissions he came across these character sheets As fate would have it we had been getting requests for different log sheets so we deshycided to include them in this issue Garners can make copies for their personal use in gaming Unfortushynately any cover letter that may have accompanied these character sheets has been lost so we cant give the designer the credit he or she deserves Sorry
The Cover From the twisted mind of Michael Dubisch (and
the pages of various Palladium RPGs) comes our monster-filled Halloween cover A piece Kevin Siembieda calls Monsters on Parade It is done in ink and acrylic washes
Optional and Unofficial Rules amp Source Material Please note that this issue offers an unprecedented
amount of official rules and source material Typically the vast majority of rules tables characshyters equipment adventures and stories are optional or alternative things one can include in his camshypaign or enjoy reading They are not official to the main games or world settings For example the story Siege Against Tolkeen is likely to be very different than Siembiedas official world book(s) when it coshymes out As for optional tables and adventures if they sound cool or fun use them If they sound funky or inappropriate for your game ignore them
All the material in The Riftertrade has been included for two reasons One because we thought it was imaginative and fun and two we thought it would stimulate your imagination with fun stuff that you can use (if you want) or which might inspire you to create your own wonders
Palladium On Line wwwpalladiumbookscom
Coming Next Issue bull The second half of Tribes ofthe Moon for
Nightbanereg
bull More material for the Palladium Fantasy RPGreg
bull Source material for Heroes UnlimitedfM
bull The next chapter of the Hammer ofthe Forgetrade
bull The continuing saga of Siege Against Tolkeentrade
bull More Knights ofthe Dinner Tabletrade
bull More GM tips
bull The latest news and developments at Palladium
bull Source material for the Palladium Megaversereg
bull And a lot of new facescontributors
Late Breaking News For those of you who live in the New York City
area Kevin and Maryann will be at the Complete Strategist 11 E 33rd St New York NY on the 27th of November (the day after Thanksgiving) Kevin will be doing a signing and answering quesshytions and just having a good time (Maryann wants to see the Macys parade) For more info and details give the Complete Strat a call (212)685-3880
5
Sam
ple
file
From Behind the Desk of Kevin Siembieda
It has been wild and woolly the last few years in the role-playing industry Through it all Palladium has done well for itself I think our primary formula for success has been stickshying to what we know and love best (role-playing games) and a lot of long hours and hard work
We got off to a slow start this year and have only recently beshygun to blast out a bunch of the books we had planned for 1998 1 had thought about doing a tongue-in-cheek article called IO 1 reasons Palladium products are late This year has been particshyularly kooky for us with every weird thing imaginable occurring throughout Getting hit by hurricane force winds in Michigan was one of them This led to our hometown being declared a dishysaster area and losing power for a full week at both our home and office However I thought it might be fun to focus on one of the other unusual but fun things this year the Palladium Cashyribbean Cruise
The dedicated Palladium staff has stuck by me and worked hard through thick and thin Since Palladium is having such a good year (and we skipped Gen Con for a variety of reasons) Maryarrn and 1 decided to reward ourselves and our hardworkshying staff by taking them on a seven day Caribbean cruise Now we didnt want to force anybody into taking an all expense paid cruise so we offered the staff the choice of cruising or staying home with an extra paid vacation week and a juicy bonus They earned it
Among the cruisers were me Maryann Thom Bartold Steve Sheiring Wayne Smith and freelancer and long-time buddy Jolly Blackburn For Wayne Jolly and I this was our first cruise
The trip was a hoot First of all we had our own pirate with us - 1 mean come on with a name like Jolly R Blackburn what else could he be He even has the beard and earring And yes Jolly is Mr Blackburns real name but no his middle name is not Roger We kept teasing Jolly that his parents always wanted to be pirates and loved pirate movies so they named him Jolly (plus it goes well with Blackburn a pirate name if I ever heard one) Actually there was a lot of teasing puns jokes and silliness going on for much of the trip And as for pirates we did indeed set sail on a pirate-style sail ship as one of our side trips in Grand Cayman Poor Maryann had to put up with the five of us idiots talking like pirates the night before our excursion and the entire morning our time on the boat and half the night Hey waddaya expect Were role-players
Unfortunately the first day or two (at sea so I didnt miss much) are a blur Steve Thorn Wayne and I (Alex too but he didnt come on the trip) were up till 3 AM finishing the final typesetting and paste-up of The Western Empire The guys all crashed for an hour at our house before having to get up at five to get ready and go to the airport Maryann had a whole extra two hours of sleep so Jolly was the only one half-rested I had gotten little sleep the prior two weeks so I was pretty toasted (and I bet you guys think publishing is easy and glamorous) Beshying exhausted I got seasick our second day out at sea and slept half the day away (adrenaline and stupidity kept me going past midnight the first day at sea)
We visited Ocho Rios Jamaica (more silly accents and local jargon) CozumelCancun Grand Cayman and Key West Maryarrn Wayne Thorn and I took a side trip by prop-jet to the Yucatan to see the Mayan ruins of Chichen Itza This was one of the highlights for me Ive read a great deal about the Inca and Mayans and have studied the ruins through books but nothing compares to being there The ruins are absolutely amazing It ofshyfers the famous pyramid but also several other temples an obshyservatory a ball court and other ruins Fantastic My only complaint is there wasnt enough time to see it all in depth I brought my sketch book along with my camera but I didnt have time to do any drawings Im afraid of heights but I climbed the nine story tall pyramid along with the rest of my companions Very cool although I was terrified once I got to the top and wasnt sure how I was going to get down (looking out from the stairs made me dizzy) But I managed
Speaking of climbing Maryann and Thorn climbed the Dunns River Falls in Jamaica (we watched from the sidelines) and we also went to a plantation Jolly and I bought cash from the turn of the century in Cozumel Apparently the term cash originates from specially minted company money issued by English sponsored operations in India and other places The cash coins could be spent at company stores but had no value outside the work complex forcing workers paid in cash to spend their money at company owned facilities
Hemingway used to hang at Key West which has become a lovely and inviting tourist trap And being tourists we loved it While we were visiting the Maritime Museum we met the busishyness partner of famous treasure hunter Mel Fisher and were inshyvited to invest in their current underwater treasure hunting expedition They are continuing to salvage emeralds and gold from the Nuestra Senora de Atocha and Santa Margarita a pair of sunken Spanish Galleons that went down in a hurricane in 1622 laden with gold silver and jewels
Hey an RPG note You know how adventurers in fantasy games sometimes find gold or silver bars We got to examine and lift a real silver bar from a sunken ship that went down on the Atocha in 1622 The bar was about the size of a medium loaf of bread and weighed 80 pounds (36 kg) Ill tell you this is dead weight and not the kind of thing a warrior just tosses in his backpack forgets about and goes on his merry way PS of20+ or no This baby was small but gut-busting heavy Just some food for thought
The accommodations on the big cruise ship (cabins hallshyways dining rooms etc) were very nice although the pillows were hard little bricks the food was disappointingly average and the service varied from excellent to poor Wayne and Steve caught summer colds (it was going around on the ship) Jolly kept getting cut off from the herd by roving bands of wandering (and bored) teenagers (ages 13-16) and Maryann our most exshyperienced cruiser (this was cruise number 14 for her) kept findshying fault with many of the services expenses and food Still all in all we had a great time
1 hope 1 havent bored everybody with my little What I did on my summer vacation
Till next time
~ Kevin Siembieda
Publisher (and Pirate) of Palladium Books
6
Sam
ple
file
From Behind the Desk of Kevin Siembieda
It has been wild and woolly the last few years in the role-playing industry Through it all Palladium has done well for itself I think our primary formula for success has been stickshying to what we know and love best (role-playing games) and a lot of long hours and hard work
We got off to a slow start this year and have only recently beshygun to blast out a bunch of the books we had planned for 1998 1 had thought about doing a tongue-in-cheek article called IO 1 reasons Palladium products are late This year has been particshyularly kooky for us with every weird thing imaginable occurring throughout Getting hit by hurricane force winds in Michigan was one of them This led to our hometown being declared a dishysaster area and losing power for a full week at both our home and office However I thought it might be fun to focus on one of the other unusual but fun things this year the Palladium Cashyribbean Cruise
The dedicated Palladium staff has stuck by me and worked hard through thick and thin Since Palladium is having such a good year (and we skipped Gen Con for a variety of reasons) Maryarrn and 1 decided to reward ourselves and our hardworkshying staff by taking them on a seven day Caribbean cruise Now we didnt want to force anybody into taking an all expense paid cruise so we offered the staff the choice of cruising or staying home with an extra paid vacation week and a juicy bonus They earned it
Among the cruisers were me Maryann Thom Bartold Steve Sheiring Wayne Smith and freelancer and long-time buddy Jolly Blackburn For Wayne Jolly and I this was our first cruise
The trip was a hoot First of all we had our own pirate with us - 1 mean come on with a name like Jolly R Blackburn what else could he be He even has the beard and earring And yes Jolly is Mr Blackburns real name but no his middle name is not Roger We kept teasing Jolly that his parents always wanted to be pirates and loved pirate movies so they named him Jolly (plus it goes well with Blackburn a pirate name if I ever heard one) Actually there was a lot of teasing puns jokes and silliness going on for much of the trip And as for pirates we did indeed set sail on a pirate-style sail ship as one of our side trips in Grand Cayman Poor Maryann had to put up with the five of us idiots talking like pirates the night before our excursion and the entire morning our time on the boat and half the night Hey waddaya expect Were role-players
Unfortunately the first day or two (at sea so I didnt miss much) are a blur Steve Thorn Wayne and I (Alex too but he didnt come on the trip) were up till 3 AM finishing the final typesetting and paste-up of The Western Empire The guys all crashed for an hour at our house before having to get up at five to get ready and go to the airport Maryann had a whole extra two hours of sleep so Jolly was the only one half-rested I had gotten little sleep the prior two weeks so I was pretty toasted (and I bet you guys think publishing is easy and glamorous) Beshying exhausted I got seasick our second day out at sea and slept half the day away (adrenaline and stupidity kept me going past midnight the first day at sea)
We visited Ocho Rios Jamaica (more silly accents and local jargon) CozumelCancun Grand Cayman and Key West Maryarrn Wayne Thorn and I took a side trip by prop-jet to the Yucatan to see the Mayan ruins of Chichen Itza This was one of the highlights for me Ive read a great deal about the Inca and Mayans and have studied the ruins through books but nothing compares to being there The ruins are absolutely amazing It ofshyfers the famous pyramid but also several other temples an obshyservatory a ball court and other ruins Fantastic My only complaint is there wasnt enough time to see it all in depth I brought my sketch book along with my camera but I didnt have time to do any drawings Im afraid of heights but I climbed the nine story tall pyramid along with the rest of my companions Very cool although I was terrified once I got to the top and wasnt sure how I was going to get down (looking out from the stairs made me dizzy) But I managed
Speaking of climbing Maryann and Thorn climbed the Dunns River Falls in Jamaica (we watched from the sidelines) and we also went to a plantation Jolly and I bought cash from the turn of the century in Cozumel Apparently the term cash originates from specially minted company money issued by English sponsored operations in India and other places The cash coins could be spent at company stores but had no value outside the work complex forcing workers paid in cash to spend their money at company owned facilities
Hemingway used to hang at Key West which has become a lovely and inviting tourist trap And being tourists we loved it While we were visiting the Maritime Museum we met the busishyness partner of famous treasure hunter Mel Fisher and were inshyvited to invest in their current underwater treasure hunting expedition They are continuing to salvage emeralds and gold from the Nuestra Senora de Atocha and Santa Margarita a pair of sunken Spanish Galleons that went down in a hurricane in 1622 laden with gold silver and jewels
Hey an RPG note You know how adventurers in fantasy games sometimes find gold or silver bars We got to examine and lift a real silver bar from a sunken ship that went down on the Atocha in 1622 The bar was about the size of a medium loaf of bread and weighed 80 pounds (36 kg) Ill tell you this is dead weight and not the kind of thing a warrior just tosses in his backpack forgets about and goes on his merry way PS of20+ or no This baby was small but gut-busting heavy Just some food for thought
The accommodations on the big cruise ship (cabins hallshyways dining rooms etc) were very nice although the pillows were hard little bricks the food was disappointingly average and the service varied from excellent to poor Wayne and Steve caught summer colds (it was going around on the ship) Jolly kept getting cut off from the herd by roving bands of wandering (and bored) teenagers (ages 13-16) and Maryann our most exshyperienced cruiser (this was cruise number 14 for her) kept findshying fault with many of the services expenses and food Still all in all we had a great time
1 hope 1 havent bored everybody with my little What I did on my summer vacation
Till next time
~ Kevin Siembieda
Publisher (and Pirate) of Palladium Books
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