Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

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ardashir
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Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by ardashir »

I would like to know if anyone can give me a few titles for books that lust a few non-M.D.C. weapons, mainly firearms, being used in the Rifts setting. I mean, it's not like the Chi-Town 'Burbs or other civilized (in theory) places would let you walk down the street with your plasma ejector or laser pistol riding on your hip. Let alone stroll around in your Glitter Boy power armor. But a normal old firearm may be a little more reasonable.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Crimson Dynamo »

Merc-Ops is your one-stop shopping book for things like that.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Warshield73 »

Crimson Dynamo wrote:Merc-Ops is your one-stop shopping book for things like that.

I agree but the original Rifts Mercenaries has several good SDC weapons like the MP-10 and the MP-23A caseless weapons.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by ShadowLogan »

ardashir wrote:I would like to know if anyone can give me a few titles for books that lust a few non-M.D.C. weapons, mainly firearms, being used in the Rifts setting. I mean, it's not like the Chi-Town 'Burbs or other civilized (in theory) places would let you stroll down the street with your plasma ejector or laser pistol riding on your hip. Let along strolling around in your Glitter Boy power armor. But a normal old firearm may be a little more reasonable.

All Rifts Titles:
-MercOps has a bunch of ranged weapons
-Mercenaries has a few ranged weapons
-New West has some examples of "old west" firearms (mostly revolvers)
-Japan has "ninja/samurai" type weapons in SDC format
-Bow and Arrows can be found in numerous SB/WBs (SB1o, WB2, WB5, WB8 come to mind with possibly more out there), and might be one of the most C&Ped gear in the entire Rifts line
-Old Rifts Main Book has both ancient melee weapons and an assortment of "modern" (circa 198x) firearms, this is mostly superseded by the version in MercOps
-RUE's Skill listing for WP does include "quick/generic" figures
-CS Navy SB4 and Underseas WB each has a spear gun
-Lonestar WB has "capture" weapons
-Juicer Uprising WB and South America 2 WB both have a shotgun
-Dinosaur Swamp WB has a few rifles for hunting
-Shemarrian Nation SB has a hunting rifle (SDC)
-Triax2 has a few energy weapons that do SDC (pretty rare feature overall)
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by ardashir »

Crimson Dynamo wrote:Merc-Ops is your one-stop shopping book for things like that.


Thanks. I meant to get that book anyway, now I have one more reason.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by ardashir »

Warshield73 wrote:
Crimson Dynamo wrote:Merc-Ops is your one-stop shopping book for things like that.

I agree but the original Rifts Mercenaries has several good SDC weapons like the MP-10 and the MP-23A caseless weapons.


I double-checked and found them. Thanks.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by guardiandashi »

another book even though its not explicitly a rifts one is the compendium of contemporary weapons

pretty much everything CAN be imported to rifts, but shadow logan had a really good list other than the GMG has minimalistic stat blocks for all the rifts books up to the point at which it was printed.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by ShadowLogan »

guardiandashi wrote:another book even though its not explicitly a rifts one is the compendium of contemporary weapons

pretty much everything CAN be imported to rifts, but shadow logan had a really good list other than the GMG has minimalistic stat blocks for all the rifts books up to the point at which it was printed.

I tend to avoid the GMG because of its crib-note approach to stat blocks as it tends to leave out details and context that might be useful (also found in the Book of Magic, but on a much smaller scale). That and I don't own a copy of the book (a friend does, but I don't).

If we're suggesting non-Rifts line books for SDC gear, then really just about any SDC setting's main book (and possible some source books) are likely to also fit the bill, though I suspect there will also be a lot of C&P between them at this point, though I will add that there could be some drift between stats for the same item. Palladium Fantasy obviously won't have modern weapons, but IINM just about all the rest are "modern" (N&SS, HU, TMNT, Nightbane) or "post-apocalypse" (AtB, Dead Reign). The out-of-license Robotech Editions do have SDC guns in a few books, but most of them are C&Ped elsewhere and those that aren't from the license, and the OoL Macross2 IIRC is pure C&P (with slightly different gun stats than Robotech 1E) in terms of man-portable weapons (the focus on combat is mecha v mecha).
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Crimson Dynamo »

To be fair, it really doesn't matter. S.D.C. weapons are so meaningless in the Rifts setting that the difference between one that does 1D6 damage vs. one that does 3D6x10 damage is honestly trivial in the vast majority of encounters. Neither of them are going to do any damage to anyone or anything with so much as a single point of M.D.C.

Just choose something that looks cool and fits your mental image of the character, and have fun with it until you get your hands on the big boy weapons.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Warshield73 »

Crimson Dynamo wrote:To be fair, it really doesn't matter. S.D.C. weapons are so meaningless in the Rifts setting that the difference between one that does 1D6 damage vs. one that does 3D6x10 damage is honestly trivial in the vast majority of encounters. Neither of them are going to do any damage to anyone or anything with so much as a single point of M.D.C.

Just choose something that looks cool and fits your mental image of the character, and have fun with it until you get your hands on the big boy weapons.

Not really. Vampires, werebeasts and several other creatures with supernatural resistance to MDC weapons require SDC weapons, with yes special ammo. Even in settings like Phase World players learn quick to have an auto pistol, submachinegun or some sort of combat shotgun with silver ammo to do battle with supernatural.

Also, there are towns and villages full of SDC buildings and people that you might need to fight but don't necessarily want to vaporize.

Another situation is one that my very first Rifts group ran into which was they wanted to hunt for there food and the group realized that the only SDC weapon they had was a 45, not exactly great for hunting.

For SDC weapons, like with MDC, I encourage players to have a few choices that they can use in a variety of situations.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Crimson Dynamo »

Right, but those are all very rare and/or situational circumstances. I didn't say they were useless weapons, just that their stats were relatively meaningless in the grand scope of the game and that there wasn't really any need to try to find the most min-maxed weapon. Any S.D.C. weapon is just as good as any other for the most part. Especially given the scenario the original poster has mentioned throughout most of his related questions; that of an escaped prisoner who's going to be gearing up in-game (ie, with whatever the GM throws at them) almost immediately.

Nevermind that for most of the situations you mentioned, you'd actually want a lesser weapon anyway, as you don't want to "vaporize" that person/object/food source with a 3D6x10 S.D.C. weapon either.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Killer Cyborg »

Crimson Dynamo wrote:To be fair, it really doesn't matter. S.D.C. weapons are so meaningless in the Rifts setting that the difference between one that does 1D6 damage vs. one that does 3D6x10 damage is honestly trivial in the vast majority of encounters.


The nature of "the vast majority of encounters" is up to the GM.
If the GM commonly uses the random creature tables from the RMB, or from Creatures of Chaos, or if there are a lot of vampires/weres/etc. then the vast majority of encounters might be such that SDC weapons matter as much or more than MD weapons.

But even if you're fighting straight-up MDC enemies, a SDC weapon that inflicts 3d6x10 SDC has a chance to inflict a point of mega-damage, up to 3 points of MD if you roll max damage and a critical strike.

And of course, if the party gets ramjet rounds, explosive rounds, Enchanted Weapon bullets, CFT rounds, etc., then what kind of weapon you have can matter.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Crimson Dynamo »

I'm confused.

The previous post claimed that S.D.C. weapons were important because they didn't do mega-damage (and for specific situations like dealing with vampires, but only if you also had special bullets). Now it seems to be that they're important because they don't do enough damage and have to do mega-damage (especially if you have special bullets) in order to be important. And also that most opponents in Rifts apparently lacks M.D.C. or access to M.D.C. body armor.

So which is it?
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Killer Cyborg »

Crimson Dynamo wrote:I'm confused.

The previous post claimed that S.D.C. weapons were important because they didn't do mega-damage (and for specific situations like dealing with vampires, but only if you also had special bullets). Now it seems to be that they're important because they don't do enough damage and have to do mega-damage (especially if you have special bullets) in order to be important. And also that most opponents in Rifts apparently lacks M.D.C. or access to M.D.C. body armor.

So which is it?


All I did was address the quoted part of your post.
Whether or how that interacts with anybody else's responses is neither here nor there.

MY main point was that you were hinging your stance on a BIG assumption about how GMs run things, when that can vary wildly.
Saying stuff like "those are all very rare and/or situational circumstances" isn't valid because "rare" is meaningless when it comes to how people run their games.
MDC is "rare," but it's pretty common in most adventures.
Rune weapons are super-duper incredibly rare, but also fairly common in adventures.
Vampires are rare.... unless you're in Vampire territory.
"Rare" doesn't mean anything when it comes to how people actually play or run their games.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Killer Cyborg »

Smiling_Bandit wrote:You can always track down one of the Compendium of Contemporary Weapons and harvest some ideas from there. I also think you can find something useful from Heroes/Aliens Unlimited.

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Yeah, the CoCW has tons of good stuff!
The only issue is that the damages in that book are different from the Rifts stats, so the GM might want to take a look and make some adjustments.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by ardashir »

Thanks everyone for all the responses.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Warshield73 »

Crimson Dynamo wrote:Right, but those are all very rare and/or situational circumstances. I didn't say they were useless weapons, just that their stats were relatively meaningless in the grand scope of the game and that there wasn't really any need to try to find the most min-maxed weapon. Any S.D.C. weapon is just as good as any other for the most part.

For anyone that has been playing Rifts since the beginning this just isn't the case. With RMB you only had real world modern weapons which were single shot 2D6 or 4D6 SDC, no burst capable. while the Wellington MP weapons are lighter with much higher damage bonuses. At the same time you want a different weapon

There is also the issue of WPs. Characters want to take weapons that will give them the most flexibility to fit a given WP. Now there are a few MD weapons like the CS C-12 laser rifle that have an SDC setting. The NG SR3 Sniper Rifle also has an SDC function and would be great for hunting. Odly enough its crappy MDC damage makes it a terrible sniper rifle as even a critical hit double damage can not take most MDC helmets with one shot. For most players weapons like this will actually fill the SDC needs. The advantage of SDC slug throwers is that they can do other things as well.

Crimson Dynamo wrote:Especially given the scenario the original poster has mentioned throughout most of his related questions; that of an escaped prisoner who's going to be gearing up in-game (ie, with whatever the GM throws at them) almost immediately.

Now this part is somewhat true if the GM just provides a number of weapons equal to the players. If there is any selection at all you want to take into account the capabilities of SDC weapons just like MDC.

Crimson Dynamo wrote:Nevermind that for most of the situations you mentioned, you'd actually want a lesser weapon anyway, as you don't want to "vaporize" that person/object/food source with a 3D6x10 S.D.C. weapon either.

Actually no, just one. In hunting you want to use some sort of low to med single shot weapon but in all the others high damage might be or certainly will be preferable. Also, you are ignoring the capabilites of these weapons. Most have a single shot that can 2D6 to 6D6 SDC range, but again this is why you want to be selective and look at the stats.

Killer Cyborg wrote:The nature of "the vast majority of encounters" is up to the GM.
If the GM commonly uses the random creature tables from the RMB, or from Creatures of Chaos, or if there are a lot of vampires/weres/etc. then the vast majority of encounters might be such that SDC weapons matter as much or more than MD weapons.

This is absolutely true, but most important IMO is that a game like Rifts should be unpredictable and with the incredible variety of monsters and other foes that is usually pretty easy.

Killer Cyborg wrote:But even if you're fighting straight-up MDC enemies, a SDC weapon that inflicts 3d6x10 SDC has a chance to inflict a point of mega-damage, up to 3 points of MD if you roll max damage and a critical strike.

And of course, if the party gets ramjet rounds, explosive rounds, Enchanted Weapon bullets, CFT rounds, etc., then what kind of weapon you have can matter.

Now MD Rail-Guns can be used for some of this with things like wood and silver ammo, but again there are situations where you are going to want an SDC weapon.

Crimson Dynamo wrote:I'm confused.

The previous post claimed that S.D.C. weapons were important because they didn't do mega-damage (and for specific situations like dealing with vampires, but only if you also had special bullets). Now it seems to be that they're important because they don't do enough damage and have to do mega-damage (especially if you have special bullets) in order to be important. And also that most opponents in Rifts apparently lacks M.D.C. or access to M.D.C. body armor.

So which is it?

First, we are two different people making two different arguments so shouldn't be confusing, we have different names in the header to left.

Second, for myself I was pointing out that if you choose your SDC weapon carefully, as opposed to just taking whatever, you could get other functions out of it. KC was making a similar argument but pointing out that some weapons can have both SDC and MDC function by switching ammo. This can only be done with certain weapons so again it requires an evaluation of the SDC weapons.

Smiling_Bandit wrote:You can always track down one of the Compendium of Contemporary Weapons and harvest some ideas from there. I also think you can find something useful from Heroes/Aliens Unlimited.

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Contemporary weapons is available on Drivethru but I believe they just announced that they were going to put it back in print as well. To me the value of this book is limited as it is really dated. What you can do is look at damage and statistics and then compare them to more modern real world weapons. It only takes a few minutes work to get good gaming stats for much more recent weapons.

AU and AUGG are great books for a number of things but yes weapons in there give some great high tech SDC weapons, which is what I tend to use in Phase World.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Crimson Dynamo »

I'm really not sure how you two continue to think I'm saying S.D.C.s weapons don't have their uses.

All I said is that their damage codes (whether 1D6 or 3D6x10) are relatively meaninglessly in the grand scope of the game--where they equate to, at best, a couple M.D. worth of damage, if any at all--and that there's no need to try to find the most munchkinized S.D.C. weapon in existence. Any simple weapon found even in the descriptions for modern W.P.s in the main book--that has a base damage code of, say, 4D6 S.D.C.--is perfectly acceptable, especially considering the nature of the inquiry by the person asking if you've paid even a modicum of attention to why he's been asking his questions this last week. His character is going to be upgrading almost immediately after the initial scenario takes place as he and the rest of his team fully acclimate to their arrival on Rifts Earth. It's going to be little more than a prop he has in possession for an hour or two of game time. And I can almost guarantee it's only use by the GM is to demonstrate the existence of mega-damage in the setting as their weapons are next to useless against their prison guards, leading to exactly why they'll be upgrading as soon as possible.

It really helps to pay attention to an entire conversation rather than nitpick points that are completely out of context.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Killer Cyborg »

Crimson Dynamo wrote:I'm really not sure how you two continue to think I'm saying S.D.C.s weapons don't have their uses.


Again, I'm mostly pointing out the inaccuracy of your claims about how commonly they're useful.

All I said is that their damage codes (whether 1D6 or 3D6x10) are relatively meaninglessly in the grand scope of the game


And I pointed out that the difference between zero MD and 3 MD can make quite a difference.

there's no need to try to find the most munchkinized S.D.C. weapon in existence.


There's no need to play RPGs at all, but people have fun doing it.

Any simple weapon found even in the descriptions for modern W.P.s in the main book--that has a base damage code of, say, 4D6 S.D.C.--is perfectly acceptable


Pretty sure if the OP was looking for any old "acceptable" SDC weapon, this thread wouldn't have been started.
They want to think about things, and go into detail.

His character is going to be upgrading almost immediately after the initial scenario takes place as he and the rest of his team fully acclimate to their arrival on Rifts Earth. It's going to be little more than a prop he has in possession for an hour or two of game time.


I missed the part where he said the weapon would be taken away after one session, apparently.
Or maybe you imagined it.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Crimson Dynamo »

Killer Cyborg wrote:I missed the part where he said the weapon would be taken away after one session, apparently.
Or maybe you imagined it.

Never claimed he said that. I said I paid attention to the entire conversation, and it was heavily inferred from his other comments about the set-up for the game.

I'm also unsure why you don't seem to think that giving advice to a relatively new player includes "you don't need to find the most broken rules in the game." And, specifically referring to this topic, "pretty much any S.D.C. weapon will do for your situation."

Not everyone needs to be a munchkin.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Killer Cyborg »

Crimson Dynamo wrote:
Killer Cyborg wrote:I missed the part where he said the weapon would be taken away after one session, apparently.
Or maybe you imagined it.

Never claimed he said that.


You said:
"It's going to be little more than a prop he has in possession for an hour or two of game time."

Stated as fact, not as guesswork.
Your level of surety doesn't match the information we have, unless you've seen something I haven't.

I'm also unsure why you don't seem to think that giving advice to a relatively new player includes "you don't need to find the most broken rules in the game."


For the same reason a new player doesn't need to be told how to tie their shoes, unless they ask.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Crimson Dynamo »

I'll remember that whenever you offer any sort of advice in the future, then make some large, inappropriate, and ridiculous speech about how no one asked you. Since that's essentially what you're doing here. <thumbs up> I mean, who cares that it's a discussion forum, am I right?
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Killer Cyborg »

Crimson Dynamo wrote:I'll remember that whenever you offer any sort of advice in the future, then make some large, inappropriate, and ridiculous speech about how no one asked you. Since that's essentially what you're doing here. <thumbs up> I mean, who cares that it's a discussion forum, am I right?


Hey, all I did was to point out that you were off-base making claims about what is or is not "rare" in a game where that depends entirely on the GM.
You could have accepted the criticism and moved on with your life, but you wanted to keep talking about stuff.
So here we are.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Warshield73 »

Killer Cyborg wrote:
Crimson Dynamo wrote:I'll remember that whenever you offer any sort of advice in the future, then make some large, inappropriate, and ridiculous speech about how no one asked you. Since that's essentially what you're doing here. <thumbs up> I mean, who cares that it's a discussion forum, am I right?


Hey, all I did was to point out that you were off-base making claims about what is or is not "rare" in a game where that depends entirely on the GM.
You could have accepted the criticism and moved on with your life, but you wanted to keep talking about stuff.
So here we are.

Another point of this is the character aspect of this. Everything a player chooses for their character is something that a skilled GM can build on. Choosing the proper SDC, MDC, and even magic weapons for you character is important but so are things like the armor, communications, optics, and sensor gear.

If I have a player has lots of communications skills plus intelligence and then takes the time to choose high end communications gear, then part of what I as a GM would allow is that PC to do signals intelligence. A character with the SCUBA skill and equipment then that PC gets to do some diving.

SDC weapons can be part of the character, in fact many OCCs have under starting equipment a selection of SDC weapons, ancient and modern, just like MDC weapons and vehicles.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Crimson Dynamo »

And again, I never said he shouldn't have an S.D.C. weapon.

I said that he doesn't have to find the most broken S.D.C. weapon in the game for his character, especially given what we know about the character and the scenario he's going to be playing in. Any typical weapon will do just fine in the scenario, given that he's almost certainly going to be upgrading way sooner than later.

I'm not sure what's so hard to understand about that.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Killer Cyborg »

Warshield73 wrote:Another point of this is the character aspect of this. Everything a player chooses for their character is something that a skilled GM can build on. Choosing the proper SDC, MDC, and even magic weapons for you character is important but so are things like the armor, communications, optics, and sensor gear.

If I have a player has lots of communications skills plus intelligence and then takes the time to choose high end communications gear, then part of what I as a GM would allow is that PC to do signals intelligence. A character with the SCUBA skill and equipment then that PC gets to do some diving.

SDC weapons can be part of the character, in fact many OCCs have under starting equipment a selection of SDC weapons, ancient and modern, just like MDC weapons and vehicles.


Absolutely!
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Crimson Dynamo »

You have the order of those posts reversed.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Killer Cyborg »

Crimson Dynamo wrote:And again, I never said he shouldn't have an S.D.C. weapon.

I said that he doesn't have to find the most broken S.D.C. weapon in the game for his character,


Did he ever say that's what he was doing?

especially given what we know about the character and the scenario he's going to be playing in.


Which is "next to nothing."

Any typical weapon will do just fine in the scenario, given that he's almost certainly going to be upgrading way sooner than later.


That's your personal and unsupported opinion, which is fine to have, but keep in mind other people do things differently.
I don't see any reason why he'd discard a perfectly good SDC weapon the moment he gets new MD weapons, or whatever you're envisioning.
For that matter, since not all guns are equal, it's a pretty big leap to assume any one gun is as good as another in this adventure you know next to nothing about.
For THAT matter, who cares if they turn out to be equal?
Let people look through the books with more thought and care than you deem necessary, especially when they're not in your game.
That kind of equipment shopping can be a joy in its own right.

I'm not sure what's so hard to understand about that.


Nothing is hard to understand about your view.
The issue is that your view has no real support, that it seems to be founded on incorrect or unsupported assumptions, and that it seems to be trying to address a problem that has no evidence of existence that I've seen.
Which I've covered in my responses already, and I assume that YOU already understand.

So I don't really see why this part of the conversation is still going on.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Crimson Dynamo »

Killer Cyborg wrote:So I don't really see why this part of the conversation is still going on.

For your answer, see your previous post about you needing to have the last word.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Killer Cyborg »

Crimson Dynamo wrote:You have the order of those posts reversed.


Huh.
Thanks!

Your post wasn't supposed to be included there at all, actually.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by ZINO »

ShadowLogan wrote:
ardashir wrote:I would like to know if anyone can give me a few titles for books that lust a few non-M.D.C. weapons, mainly firearms, being used in the Rifts setting. I mean, it's not like the Chi-Town 'Burbs or other civilized (in theory) places would let you stroll down the street with your plasma ejector or laser pistol riding on your hip. Let along strolling around in your Glitter Boy power armor. But a normal old firearm may be a little more reasonable.

All Rifts Titles:
-MercOps has a bunch of ranged weapons
-Mercenaries has a few ranged weapons
-New West has some examples of "old west" firearms (mostly revolvers)
-Japan has "ninja/samurai" type weapons in SDC format
-Bow and Arrows can be found in numerous SB/WBs (SB1o, WB2, WB5, WB8 come to mind with possibly more out there), and might be one of the most C&Ped gear in the entire Rifts line
-Old Rifts Main Book has both ancient melee weapons and an assortment of "modern" (circa 198x) firearms, this is mostly superseded by the version in MercOps
-RUE's Skill listing for WP does include "quick/generic" figures
-CS Navy SB4 and Underseas WB each has a spear gun
-Lonestar WB has "capture" weapons
-Juicer Uprising WB and South America 2 WB both have a shotgun
-Dinosaur Swamp WB has a few rifles for hunting
-Shemarrian Nation SB has a hunting rifle (SDC)
-Triax2 has a few energy weapons that do SDC (pretty rare feature overall)

Rifts World Book 19 Australia pages 198 and up
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by ardashir »

I just noticed that the revised Vampire Kingdoms book has a decent listing of S.D.C. weapons for use with silver bullets on the vampires. In the 'never satisfied' department I would have liked to see some stats for what guns/rounds like the .454 Casull for the Super Redhawk or Raging Bull or the .577 Tyrannosaur would do, but no sense being greedy.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Blue_Lion »

Crimson Dynamo wrote:I'm confused.

The previous post claimed that S.D.C. weapons were important because they didn't do mega-damage (and for specific situations like dealing with vampires, but only if you also had special bullets). Now it seems to be that they're important because they don't do enough damage and have to do mega-damage (especially if you have special bullets) in order to be important. And also that most opponents in Rifts apparently lacks M.D.C. or access to M.D.C. body armor.

So which is it?

Both, can be true.
Low end sdc weapons typically do not do MDC because their damage is rated at a couple of d6.
High end can do MDC and if MDC is what you need they can be used as a back up for better MDC weapons.

As to weather or not most opponents lack MDC armor that would be a GM/campaign specific.

In most games I have GM, encounters in cities are typically sdc, encounters in the wild are typically MDC.
If the party does not have weapons to fight vampires or werewolf's they will not encounter them. (Or they will receive in game warning and time to acquire such weapons before they have to fight them.)
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Sambot »

OP, if possible let your players have a variety of weapons. They don't have to carry all of them at once. They can have some in storage and get them out as needed. Some examples are;

Hunting:
Unless you're hunting MD critters to eat you don't want to blow it up. You also don't want it getting away because it heard you approaching or was only wounded. A rifle or shotgun would work better here than a hand gun. The range and power are far better than that of a pistol. If you were to use a pistol, you'd want something better than a Saturday Night Special.

Self-defense and concealment;
Handguns are a lot more concealable than long barreled weapons. They can also be used more effectively in close quarters. And while you might want an MDC weapon in case a monster pops up, you don't want to blow up that pick-pocket and the store behind him. Besides, think of the mess. You'd be picking pieces of him out of your gear for weeks. Of course, there's times where you don't want the sound of a gunshot drawing attention so it might be better to knife the thief.

Opponents:
No one wears body armor 24/7/365. Think of how bad they'd smell, and itch, if they did. They're going to want to get clean and move about freely. There's also times when wearing body armor would attract the wrong kind of attention. If you're going to a saloon in a western town, you might want to wear the body armor. In a four star restaurant in Chi'town? An evening at the ballet? Nope! At least not armor that's recognizable as armor. If you're not wearing body armor, any likely opponents wouldn't be either. So again, you don't want to blow anyone up along with half the building. You also might not want to use a .44 magnum when a .22 will do. There might be something valuable behind them.

Ammo:
As others have pointed out, there is a variety of ammo available. If an SDC weapon can use MDC ammo, why not use it? The weapon becomes more versatile. That way you don't have to have multiple guns. Just change the ammo.

So there's all kinds of reasons for wanting a variety of weapons. Find the ones you and your players like and have fun.
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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by Warshield73 »

Sambot wrote:OP, if possible let your players have a variety of weapons. They don't have to carry all of them at once. They can have some in storage and get them out as needed.

Most of the groups I have run that have lasted over a year, especially if they have some sort of home base or group vehicle (like a ship in Phase World) end up with a group armory. So while each player has a few personal weapons they tend to have a (relative to the size of base or vehicle) large cache of group weapons that PCs can draw from when needed. This is where a lot of magic weapons tend to end up.

Sambot wrote:So there's all kinds of reasons for wanting a variety of weapons. Find the ones you and your players like and have fun.

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Re: Best books for S.D.C. weapons in Rifts

Unread post by tsh77769 »

Don't know if Someone already covered it but riffs Australia and chaos Earth also have some good STC weapons in them.

Weapons are tools you have more than one kind of weapon because you need more than one kind of tool because there's more than one kind of application.

Also they have to physically fit the user for example the number one most important part of selecting a handgun is whether or not the handgun actually fits your...

HAND

People have more than one size and shape of hand so they make more than one size and shape of handgun.

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