Customer Reviews

Rifts Mercenaries: A Giant Sourcebook for Rifts

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Mercenaries gives the GM an outline of what merc companies are like in Rifts North America and gives you some new OCCs and (of course!) a lot of new hardware, including some pretty new things, like ships, retrofitted SDC weapons, and ultra-cheap power armor. It's not just new Wilk's, Triax, and NG product lines.

The character classes fill out the basic set pretty well: we now have forgers, spies, and bounty hunters, to name a couple, and while I have yet to put one of those OCCs through a campaign, I think they look pretty good. The Coalition military OCCs in the original Rifts book were very limited, and this gives you some needed depth.

My biggest gripe is the big mercenary companies that they profile. As they did with Carnivals in World Book I, or with spy organizations in Ninjas and Superspies, Palladium presents a point-based system for designing mercenary companies. They also give you about 5 of the chief mercenary companies in North America as example units. I think that some of them get pretty cheesy, especially when some of the chief NPCs for those merc companies cross-over from other Palladium games, such as a couple super-heroes from Heroes Unlimited, and a ninja (who is a mega-damage creature!) from Ninjas and Superspies. Yes, the nature of Rifts lets you blend many things into your campaigns, and that's cool, but if you abuse it, the system is no longer a tight story but a random pastiche of leftovers from other campaigns.

But a GM is not forced to use those things, and I would definitely edit the merc companies before placing one in one of my campaigns. Otherwise, this sourcebook is a good return to the atmosphere of the first few Rifts books, with dusty adventurers and gritty frontier towns. I like it a lot.

I liked the book Rifts Mercenaries. It had lots of good weaponry and a great guide to making up fictional mercenary companies. I LOVED the new Coalition vehicles which were added in. However, I thought that there were too many descriptions of non-player character mercenaries, which don't do much except fill up space. However, for the most part, this sourcebook was informative and useful.

Firstly let me say I disagree totally with the first review. If he can write better mercenery group description then work for an RPG company. You can't expect worldbook info on a book about mercenerys. I really liked the optional point system for making mercenerie groups and the weapons were cool.

Mercenaries is one of the best sources for guns and equipment for adventurers. Most of the stuff in there is not really restricted and will be sold by the manufacturer if you have got the money. New O.C.C.'s really bring out the flavor of the paycheck warrior, and the ability to create new merc units can be invaluable to GM's who need an ally or an enemy for his players. The existing merc companies written on in the book are quite elaborate, but are also kinda droll. All around, a great book.

This book is a great book, However, you should nnot consider buying this unless you have a fair selection of worldbooks etc. It has some excelent adventure ideas and is a quick way to obtain easy money (although this is not neccesarily good). It does have some equipment that is too good (mecha-knight power armour) but gm should use their common sense and not allow such vehicles to enter the games. Overall definitely worth buying

Mercenaries was the 3rd Rifts book I had ever bought and it really reeled me into the Merc campaigns and way too powerful characters. (Which is only fun for so long). Although not as good as Vampires, The Coalition War Machine, Juicer Uprising, or Triax and the NGR, it is still one of my favorite. No new magic, but alot of weapons. There are too many profiles on merc companies however. Still a good book.

Rifts Mercenaries would have been good if it wasn't for the numerous amounts of mercenary non player characters. Their were too many of these, everything else including the character classes, weapons, mercenary group creation guidelines were excellent including Naruni Enterprises, Golden Age Weaponsmiths, Wellington Industries, Iron Heart Armaments, Smuggler O.C.C., Special Forces O.C.C. etc. Overall get this book if your a tech-head and like mercenaries, but if your looking for something more in-depth and adventurous get Rifts:Canada or the Siege on Tolkeen series.

This book contains almost NO world information (and without world information, a book is purely worthless!), a few pages on mercs (which i could of pulled out of my arse myself and done a better job), painfully long descriptions of a buncha' mercenary groups (worthless, unless you enjoy reading character bios), and WAY too many weapons (we have enough guns already!) that are pretty darned overpowered, if i do say so myself! A munchkin's wet dream, and a GM's nightmare. DON'T BUY IT!

The Rifts Mercenaries book has awesome new O.c.c.s and guns. the book has some cool new vehicles and it holds the best O.C.C yet, special forces who have everything you can imagine.

This book helps with making many very cool merc. characters for RIFTS(which is a cool RPG). Anyway, if you want that ultimate Special Forces O.C.C. youve been wanting get this BOOK!!!!!!!!!!