Forums of the Megaverse®

Just starting to read the books and preparing to run a game.

Has anyone written a primer? Just a brief summary of the setting in a page or two. Useful to wrap my mind and the players minds around the setting before we jump in. I have started reading the main book but free time to prep between games is rare.

Is there a list of what Rifters contain Chaos Earth material?

Also it said the super volcano lava plume was 20 miles in the sky. Anyone done any calculations to figure how far away that is visible? Should make a serious impression on the players and max out their oh-crap-o-meters. But I would assume if you're too close you're dead from poison gas and/or nuclear bomb level blast wave as the pressure releases.

I think you meant to ask if Someone has written out a "Timeline" of events for the first few days. months, years for the CE game.

I actually meant primer (a short informative piece of writing). A summarized "this is the essentials of this world" that could be handed out to players or someone interested in an overview of the setting when trying to entice them to play in this one, or when starting the players (or a late joining player) out six months or a year into the apocalypse instead of shortly before the ley-lines exploded.

A timeline would be a valuable part of the primer, but not the comprehensive response. I was hoping someone would have something already written up they could share that would cover the timeline, the human centers of camps/strongholds. In condensed form.

About five years ago I was breaking in a group new to Rifts (most had never even cracked the main book before) and I found something similar for Rifts that was very helpful to give the players a grasp of the setting so they could more or less hit the ground running with a decent idea of what people who grew up in Rifts North America would know as "common knowledge." But it also reminded me of some things I had forgotten since I hadn't reread the older books for fifteen years. I was hoping for similar for this one and figured someone would already have written something up and could save me a ton of time I don't have right now with mandatory overtime, wrangling kids, etc.

Sorry, I geuss I'm too OCD for what you asked. I actually read this part of the OP.

I should have been clearer in my original post. Hazards of posting quickly from my phone when I have a chance. Surprisingly I had time to read the first 20 pages today and make some notes on that early timeline. So I revised my original post.

basically you want the first bit of the book, with the setting stuff, summarized?

LostOne, your post was both clear and accurate. The subsequent primer on primers tickles my recursion bone.

Using the radio horizon formula, a 20 mile tall plume from a VEI-8+ would be visible from about 500 miles away before accounting for relative differences in elevation, light refraction, whatever the heck temperature differentials and ejecta would do, etc. This USGS FAQ, and the articles to which it links, suggest that not only does the ash column of a supervolcanic eruption ascend much higher than previously thought, the speed with which it does so fundamentally changes ash distribution patterns such that for the several foot depths described in Chaos Earth to at all work magic would have to be quite involved.

While there would be enough pyroclastic lightning from a winter-time eruption plume for a fleet of van paintings, I wonder to what degree it might affect upper atmospheric lightning. I don't remember off-hand if there's much ley line activity detailed for Rifts:South Dakota (or care if people get in a twist over Chaos Earth being nominally distinct). A fun possible character idea would be a tourist in Deadwood, SD witnessing blue jets and sprites before hauling tail down I-90 to NEMA-near-Chicago, and from then on swearing to other survivors that the blue lines you really have to watch out for are vertical.

Earth is a nightmare hellscape, with unimagined monsters everywhere, nowhere is safe, and you'd better be prepared to kill, to hold on to the chip bag you found in the garbage, that still had a few crumbs in the bottom

I had wrote up a narration once meant to be read to players for my one-shot that takes place a year after the start of the cataclysm. It was kind of a primer for the world before and after the coming of the rifts. I'll look to see if I still have it somewhere.

I know this is almost a month old, but I understand what you are getting at here. I too am in the same boat and I Wanted something for my group, so I did a couple of YT videos going over the history in the book so they wouldn't have to read it and so far its got them excited.

Link to Playlist:
https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLHfroCDsMXeF2KWgquGoHyVrBNxAu2CCS
Includes:
Video 1 - Overview and thoughts
Video 2 - History part 1 - going over the first days or so
Video 3 - History part 2 - The next couple of days
Video 4 - History part 3 - the final days of 2098
Video 5 - History part 4 - Its now 2099, what's going on? (coming soon)
Video 6 - the Role of NEMA in this whole ordeal. (coming soon)

Just now seeing this, unfortunately. I did make the time to read the books and start the game but I'm still watching your content and finding it helpful to keep things fresh. Much appreciated.