Rifts Character Creation

Character Creation

Requirements

Dice Dice Roller Ultimate Edition Main Rule Book Character Sheet

Terminology

• D - Dice. A D4 is a four sided die. a D6 is a six sided die, and so on. Where there is a number in prefix, such as 3D6, it simply means the amount of that type of dice, in that case 3.
• D-Bee - Abbreviation of Dimensional Being, a being who came from, or whose race originates from, beyond a Rift.
• M.D.C - Megadamage Capacity
• Megadamage - Megadamage represents the incredible destructive power of the weapons used in Rifts. 1 megadamage is roughly equivalent to 100 structural (normal) damage.
• O.C.C - Occupational Character Class
• R.C.C - Racial Character Class
• S.D.C - Structural Damage Capacity

Starting off

The initial stages of character creation can be done one of two ways. Officially you should roll your stats and see what class you can play. Personally I'd pick a class then roll stats until they fit. Have a good think about what you want to play. There's a lot of classes in Rifts, so it might be worth having a think about what play style you might enjoy. Then have a look at classes with that sort of play style, and see if any jump out at you. Some might look particularly attractive either because of the class's defining features, or because an interesting idea for a twist on the character occurs to you. Once you've a good idea of which OCC you want to play, get a character sheet or piece of paper and get rolling. The character creation part of the rules can be found on page 279.

Attributes

A character's basic makeup is represented by their attributes. In Rifts these are randomly generated using 3D6, and there are 8 attributes to roll. When judging rolls bear in mind that only rolls under 9 or over 16 have a specific effect, and anything inbetween can be considered fairly average. More on that later. The attributes are;

• IQ - Intelligence, mental agility. Equivalent to a real life IQ divided by 10.
• ME - Mental Endurance, willpower, coping with stress and mental strain
• MA - Mental Affinity, charm, charisma, how naturally endearing to others a character is
• PS - Physical Strength, the amount of power the body can exert
• PP - Physical Prowess, agility, dexterity, hand to eye coordination
• PE - Physical Endurance, the body's resistance to damage and illness as well as a character's stamina and fitness
• PB - Physical Beauty, how attractive a character is
• Spd - Speed, how fast a character can run

Roll 3D6 for each attribute. A roll that comes up 16 or over is called exceptional and grants another D6 on top of that. If that comes up a 6 too, another additional D6 is added. If that comes up a 6 too, aside from having extremely unlikely dice, no more should be added. This only applies to when attributes are rolled, not when bonuses are added. However, if a low attribute (below 7) is rolled, they may choose another attribute to add 1D4+3 to. Should they have more than one attribute below 7, they may choose another attribute to add 1D4+5 to, plus either +3 to a different attribute or +2 to Perception. Also note that roleplaying low stats well (stupid, ugly, very unwise etc) is likely to bag a character extra experience points. Put the final scores into the attribute boxes on the character sheet.

Random Generation

A word on randomly generated characters. Many things in Rift's character generation are rolled, and it is very tempting to doctor them. Please don't. An experienced GM can spot people tweaking rolls, and will make sure that, in the end, you'll be worse off than if you hadn't. Likewise, it is all too easy to keep rolling until a high set of scores comes up. In fact, I'm sure someone out there could code a random number generator and leave it running until it comes up with a set of max stats. If you're going to do this you might as well just pick your attribute scores. By all means reroll a bad set of stats, but stay within the spirit of the game. A couple of slightly below average stats are not a problem, and not having any exceptional stats isn't either. If you're indecisive and keep wanting to roll again, roll half a dozen sets and choose the one you prefer, then move on. There's far more to a character than stats.