The Ultimate Guide to Rifts

Which books you need, and which books you don't.

Rifts is one of the most well-supported RPG settings on the market today, with over 50 books full of classes, races, equipment, world info, and rules. This level of information makes the game rewarding to play but hard to get into. If you’d like to give Rifts a try, this guide can give you an idea of where to start.

Core Books

Rifts Roleplaying Game: Ultimate Edition - $33.95
The main book is a necessity for obvious reasons, but it's a great book on its own merits. Most of the major character classes are found here, along with a firm grounding in the history and layout of the game world. The ultimate edition is a significant improvement over the original, and highly recommended. Read the review.
You can also read our review of the first edition.

Rifts Gamemaster Guide - $26.95
A compilation of every skill, map, vehicle, robot, psychic power, and piece of equipment ever printed in a Rifts book thus far. You don't need it to play, but you'll want it. Read the review.

Rifts Book of Magic - $24.95
Does for magic what the Gamemaster Guide does for everything else. Given that the magic spells and items are spread out pretty haphazardly, any campaign that includes magic (and a good Rifts campaign should) will make heavy use of this book. Read the review.

Rifts Bionics Sourcebook - $13.95
The third of the compilations, this book is just what it looks like: all of the bionics and cybernetics from previous Rifts books, reprinted in a single volume. There's also a fair selection of new tech-based classes. Not as sweepingly useful as the others, but much cheaper. Read the review.

Rifts Adventure Guide - $21.95
The first half contains some of the best GM information I've ever read, with specific and useful tips on how to build NPCs, adventures, and campaigns. The second half is not quite so good, but very handy for someone new to the setting--they go into a lot of world detail for North America, and give a lot of adventure ideas. Read the review.

Rifts Aftermath - $21.95 Though intended as a capstone to the Coalition Wars series (which we'll get to later), Aftermath has a much wider use. It updates all of the world info to incorporate the events that unfolded in prior books--in other words, it gives a comprehensive overview of the politics and conditions of the known world, all in one book. If you're going to travel around and don't want to buy a pile of world books, get this one. Read the review.

Sourcebooks

Rifts Sourcebook - $11.95
I can't find this one on their website, so it might be out of print. It only covered two main things: ARCHIE, an interesting A.I. villain that gets plenty of coverage in other books; and rules for creating robots. The art is excellent, but there are plenty of better books you could buy (if you have the Gamemaster Guide, you get most of this stuff anyway).

Rifts Sourcebook 3: Mindwerks - $12.95
A companion to the mainland Europe world book, this book details the evil organization known as Mindwerks and gives some good stats for cyber-psionic devices. Get it if you're playing in Europe, otherwise you can do without it.

Rifts Sourcebook 4: Coalition Navy - $12.95
The Coalition is the biggest faction in North America--a group of technologically superior human supremacists. This is their navy. If you plan to do a lot of ocean-based adventures this is fairly useful, but if not then forget it.

Rifts Mercenaries - $16.95
I've never seen a use for this book--it doesn't add to the storyline, give any significant world info, or present anything important enough to be referenced in other books. Spend your money on cooler stuff.

Pantheons of the Megaverse - $20.95
A handful of good ideas and a truckful of wacky crap you'll never use. Even if you want to use gods in your campaign, you can do better than this.

Conversion Books

Rifts Conversion Book One Revised - $22.95 Recently overhauled, this book contains all the info on bringing characters and powers from other Palladium games (Palladium Fantasy, Robotech, Heroes Unlimited, etc.) into the world of Rifts. Most games would be better off without this book to complicate things for them, but the races are pretty handy and the variety is exellent for people who really want it.

Rifts Dark Conversions - $22.95
Demons, witches, monsters, Nightbane (another Palldium game), etc., etc. Just like the above, though the Nightbane section presents an intriguing alternate setting for Rifts Earth.

World Books

Vampire Kingdoms - $16.95
A unique look at vampires, especially given that they live in northern Mexico. If you don't want vampires in your game, leave this book on the shelf. It does have some excellent city maps, though, and you can get a really impressive number of cool vampire-hunting adventures out of this book.

Atlantis - $16.95
Still one of the best world books, Atlantis has info on the Splugorth and their many minions--interdimensional slavers out to take over the megaverse. Definitely a weird book (take a gander at the Metzla, for example), but it has a lot of great villains and evil henchmen, and the section on bio-wizardry is very cool. Probably worth buying for the magic tattoos alone.

England - $16.95
A weak entry in the line. The druids and the mystic herbology is neat, but the actual world info is pretty lame--combine what you know about Rifts (alien intelligences control everything) with what you know about British legend (King Arthur is cool), and you've got the unimaginative premise of this book. I need say nothing further.

Africa - $16.95
Almost universally considered the worst world book in the series, and due for an update very soon. Most of the information is about the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, and almost none of it is about Africa itself. Wait for Africa 2.

Triax and the New German Republic - $20.95
Practically a second main book, with all of the classes and equipment and world info to play a game based in mainland Europe. Very tech-heavy, but combined with Mindwerks it makes a great setting.

South America 1 - $16.95
A little on the wacky side, this book is a bit unfocused and suffers from too much power creep. Given the level of detail in other parts of the world, there's not much reason to go here.

Underseas - $20.95
One of my favorites, but considered by many to be one of the least useful. The sheer amount of info in here is staggering, and the concepts are very original and intriguing, but if you're not going to play an ocean-based game then it's almost completely useless. One of the only game settings I know of where you can play a Humpback Whale with magical whale songs.

Japan - $20.95
This one always felt a little rushed, but it does manage to present a lot of great ideas. The character classes are incredibly cool, the cybernetics are neat, and the various nations provide a pretty good setting for adventure. This part of the world needs more information (the upcoming China books will help), but it's playable as it is.

South America 2 - $20.95
More power creep, but this time in the company of some interesting ideas. You could do worse, but you could still do a whole lot better.

Coalition War Campaign - $20.95
A highly detailed new look at the Coalition, who continue to be a very interesting villain as well as a fascinating player character option. Plenty of gadgets for the tech-head, and a good book overall if you’re playing in North America.

Psyscape - $16.95
Focused enough that it's almost an adventure book. Has some good ideas and some cool new psychic options, but not one I'd go out of my way to pick up.

Lone Star - $16.95
Lone Star is the Coalition lab situated in what used to be Texas. The book is full of useful info on mutants, experiments, Coalition plans, and the massive non-Coalition area known as the Pecos Empire. Not bad.

New West - $20.95
What do you know? The western U.S. in Rifts Earth is pretty much like the western U.S. in the mid-1860s, only with more monsters and cybernetics. A well-balanced book, all things considered.

Spirit West - $20.95
The mystical (read: Native American) half of the New West. Not nearly as cool as it ought to be, and largely unnecessary.

The Federation of Magic - $17.95
Details on the magic-intense part of North America known as the Magic Zone. Some cool new factions, some very cool new classes, and a lot of neat spells. If you already have the Rifts Book of Magic and you’re not using the North American setting, you don’t need this. The world info is pretty cool, though.

The Warlords of Russia - $20.95
Another personal favorite. Russia is a feudal land ruled by clashing warlords and their bionic armies. The politics of the various warlords are pretty detailed and suggest a lot of great stories, though the area is of admittedly narrow use (if you don’t want to tangle with the warlords, there's not much else to do).

Mystic Russia - $16.95
The magical aspects of Russia. Not as good as its companion, but it's nice to have both if you want to run a campaign in the region.

Australia - $20.95
Australia is practically cut off from the rest of the world, which makes it hard to visit but gave the writers a chance to counteract some of the power creep in the rest of the series. It's an interesting environment for a stand-alone campaign, but hard to work into a larger one.

Canada - $20.95
You kind of get the impression that they made this book just because Canada didn’t have one yet. Aside from some forgettable rules about cold weather effects, and some very nice bionic classes, there’s nothing in here worth the trouble. The classes are good, but they’re not worth 21 bucks.

Splynn Dimensional Market - $20.95
Splynn is the main city on Atlantis, and the marketplace is said to be the wildest in the megaverse. The book does a pretty good job of capturing the spirit and intrigue of a place where everything you could possibly imagine is bought and sold.

Xiticix Invasion - $20.95
The Xiticix are yet another faction in the turbulent politics of North America, this time in the form of insectile alien invaders. A pretty good book, all things considered, though in truth it mostly functions as a limited Monster Manual for the western great lakes area.

China One - $20.95
The Ten Hells of the Yama Kings have been rifted straight into China, and the warring factions of Chinese mythology have brought their battles and intrigues to Earth. Focusing solely on the bad guys, China One is not much use without the good guys in China Two. Read the review.

Dinosaur Swamp - $17.95
The southeastern pocket of the former US has been destroyed and reclaimed by nature, including carnivorous plants and the titular dinosaurs. Mankind is just one more link in the food chain, and most people live in barbarian tribes or overgrown ruins. A cool place to visit, if you can think of a reason to do so. Read the review.

China Two - $17.95
With a fantastic selection of wise monks, powerful spirits, and mystic martial arts, China Two is truly the Rifts-ification of your favorite Kung Fu movies. For some excellent bonus Chinese mysticism see Mystic China, a Palladium non-Rifts book. Read the review.

Dimension Books

Wormwood – $16.95 A fascinating setting that is brilliantly--but only partially--conceived. It's so restrictive that you either have to play it as a standalone or change a lot of the background…most of the other Rifts books choose the latter whenever they reference it.

Skraypers - $16.95
Kind of like a Rifts/aliens/outer space version of Heroes Unlimited, which means it's redundant on multiple counts. Unlike Wormwood, no one ever references this one.

Phase World - $20.95
Rifts in space. With three excellent companion books, Phase World is one of the better-supported settings in the Rifts line. The same kind of stuff you get in normal Rifts (magic and technology interacting on a grand scale), but done as a space opera instead of a single planet.

Phase World Sourcebook - $12.95
Some new aliens and equipment and stuff. Hardly necessary, even for a Phase World campaign, but pretty cool.

Anvil Galaxy - $17.95
Some really good adventure hooks and world (er…I mean galaxy) info. Not quite as cool as the sourcebook, but slightly more useful.

Three Galaxies - $17.95
A great source of adventure ideas and bad guys--a must for any Phase World campaign. Read the review.

Megaverse Builder - $13.95
A cool concept that doesn't quite deliver, even at such a low price. Still, it can be a valuable resource for the right campaign. Read the review.

Naruni Wave 2 - $13.95
A catalog of weapons that are way too powerful, mixed with a bit of world info that, in the end, probably doesn't justify buying the book. Read the review.

Coalition Wars
The Coalition Wars series was kind of like a super-size adventure supplement, taking the characters through a giant war from start to finish and giving them enough info for a truly immense campaign. The war was waged between the Coalition, a group of high-tech human supremacists, and the city of Tolkeen, a magical metropolis that got a little too big for the Coalition's liking. I'm not especially fond of this storyline, as I feel it's too restrictive for the characters to really let loose and do epic deeds, but it has some very good ideas and could provide your group with enough information for years of adventures. The books are very similar to each other, mostly NPCs and adventure hooks, so I won't go through each one. Read the reveiw.

Free Quebec - $20.95
Though technically a world book, this book is mostly designed as an intro to the Coalition Wars series. Much of what it established was altered by the war itself, so unless you plan to play through the war you're probably fine just getting the updated info from Aftermath.

Coalition Wars 1: Sedition - $17.95

Coalition Wars 2: CS Overkill - $12.95

Coalition Wars 3: The Sorcerer’s Revenge - $12.95

Coalition Wars 4: Cyber-Knights - $12.95
The cyber knights are one of the cooler classes from the main book--I'm glad they finally got the star treatment, but it's too bad that it had to be part of the Coalition Wars series. If you just want the cyber knight stuff and you’re not interested in the campaign, this will have a lot of extraneous junk in it.

Coalition Wars 5: Shadows of Evil - $12.95

Coalition Wars 6: The Final Siege - $20.95

Adventure Supplements

Rifts Game Shield and Adventures - $12.95
Rifts Index and Adventures Volume 2 - $12.95
These books are pretty much what they sound like, I imagine. I've never read either one.

Rifts Adventure Sourcebook 1: Forbidden Knowledge - $8.95 A bargain for some pretty impressive adventure hooks and info. The setting is the Chi-Town Burbs, which makes the decision easy: if you play in the burbs and need some cool ideas, here you go. Read the review.

Rifts Adventure Sourcebook 2: Tolkeen Crisis - $10.95
More expensive and not as good as the first one. I'd skip it.

Mechanoids - $12.95
Though officially classified as a sourcebook, this is an adventure supplement through and through. The Mechanoids make pretty cool bad guys, and the stats and tables are all easy to use. For such a small supplement, it has a pretty epic feel.

Juicer Uprising - $17.95 Some new world info (it's technically a world book, but we're not fooled), and a heap of variants for the Juicer, one of Rifts' signature classes. The brunt of the book is a series of adventures that take place in North America. Pretty good stuff, on the whole, and more specific than a lot of their adventure books.

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Wow, that's a lot of books. Just in case you're still not sure what to get, I'll break it down for you another way. Most of these books, as described above, make an interesting setting to adventure in--but some of them work together to form larger, more cohesive settings ideal for big campaigns. This is by no means an exhaustive list, but it's enough to get you started.

The Indispensables
Rifts Roleplaying Game: Ultimate Edition
Rifts Gamemaster Guide
Rifts Book of Magic
(optional: Aftermath, the conversion books, the Rifts Adventure Guide)

I want to play a(n)…

North American Campaign
Rifts Adventure Guide
Coalition War Campaign
Lone Star
Federation of Magic
Rifts Bionics Sourcebook
Rifts Adventure Sourcebook 1: Forbidden Knowledge
(optional: Mechanoids, Xiticix Invasion, Juicer Uprising, Dinosaur Swamp)

Coalition War Campaign
Coalition War Campaign
Free Quebec
Coalition War series
Federation of Magic
(optional: Xiticix Invasion)

New West Campaign
Vampire Kingdoms
New West
Lone Star
(optional: Spirit West and the Rifts Adventure Guide)

European Campaign
Triax and the NGR
Mindwerks
Rifts Bionics Sourcebook
(optional: combine it with the Russian campaign for a larger view of Eurasia)

Atlantis Campaign
Atlantis
Splynn Dimensional Market
Rifts Conversion Book One Revised
Rifts Dark Conversions
(optional: Underseas)

Seafaring Campaign
Underseas
Rifts Sourcebook 4: Coalition Navy
(optional: Atlantis, Japan, China Two)

Russian Campaign
Warlords of Russia
Mystic Russia
Rifts Bionics Sourcebook
(optional: Mindwerks)

African Campaign
Africa
(optional: beat your melon head against a wall)

Asian Campaign
Japan
China One
China Two
(optional: combine it with the Russian campaign for a larger view of Asia)

Traveling/'Bit of Everything' Campaign
Atlantis
Vampire Kingdoms
Aftermath
Triax and the NGR
China Two
Underseas
Rifts Conversion Books
(optional: any specific book that strikes your fancy)

Dimension Hopping Campaign
Megaverse Builder
Atlantis
Wormwood
Phase World
Rifts Conversion Books
(optional: just about any other Palladium book ever printed)

Phase World/Space Fantasy Campaign
Phase World
Phase World Sourcebook
Anvil Galaxy
Three Galaxies
(optional: Atlantis, Rifts Conversion Books, Megaverse Builder)

Written by Fellfrosch on September 03rd, 2003