Hey all! I'll be your ever-practical Rogue Scientist with a mysterious past!

Cool. Sounds like my 'Borg will have plenty of tech support. Look forward to working with y'all.

Hello hello good people, I will be your friendly neighborhood Burster, Pyro. I'm looking forward to playing with you all as we investigate this newly rifted area.

Welcome, looking to be a good group

Man, for all its innumerable faults, no other RPG does 'motley crew' quite like Rifts.

This group is going to be awesome.

Right? I love this system. Even with all its flaws.

Very much so.  It is a great old friend. :)

I made up my first Juicer in the late '80s. It's been one of my favorites ever since.

My brother introduced me to TMNT with an old copy of the game he'd got from a car boot sale. :D I think my first Rifts character was a Glitter Boy.

We had already been playing TMNT and Heroes Unlimited and Robotech for a couple years by the time Rifts came out.

My first character was a Shifter.

Howdy, y'all! And by "howdy, y'all" I mean joyous greetings.

Mei will be joining. A displaced samurai from the Empire of Japan, she's far, far away from home. But samurai might find they like the West very much. At least if you believe a certain set of very famous movies.

Rifts was my first true love, as an RPG setting. My second was Legend of the Five Rings. I... May have been trying to find an excuse to play a Rifts samurai for like... Two decades? Maybe. I don't know. I am not a doctor.

Doctor Sunyi, your opinion?

Doctor?

Doctor who?

My opinion is that, which culture seems very stable and solid to most people, it's actually a big ball of wibbly wobbly, cultural wultural... stuff.

My first RPG love was TMNT. I'd played D&D for some years before that, but somehow D&D felt like the baseline activity. But the whole run of TMNT and the After the Bomb books just fired up my teenage imagination like nothing else.

I also love L5R. Have you seen the 5th edition? What do you think?

Welcome to the new shores.  Great thing about Rifts is the near enough anything can find it's way anywhere. :) Hmm, yes, do like a bit of L5R, not played the 5th ed yet.

In other news, description is all finished.... I think I'm pretty much ready to go.

I was really primed to dislike 5th edition. Anything with a unique die set really rubs me the wrong way. Especially because it moved away from the roll & keep system that's been with the game since its inception.

I love it. It might be my favorite edition of the game. The rules are flexible, and the unique die systems combine with pools of abilities that give players a lot of agency over HOW their character does things. The Rings becoming more conceptual and abstract mean you can build your Crane courtier who specializes in Earth with an endless dedication to history and citation, or a Hida general who strikes with the precision and tactical grace of Air. The schools are much more customizable and play less like character classes than variations on a theme- with much less gaming of Insight.

The fiction is more toned down and grounded, with a much greater focus on making Rokugan feel like a real place. Less magical nonsense than 3rd or 4th, less focus on high-caliber featured NPCs then 1st or 2nd, and none of the CCG-driven wackiness that created the Spider Clan (I will never not be mad about the Spider Clan).

I think 5th Edition is the best version of L5R. It's certainly the one I want to play the most.

I dig it.

In reply to Hideyori Mei (msg # 17):

I agree. I was also ready to dislike it intensely and I was also pleasantly surprised by how well they embedded the values of the game into the mechanics. I keep thinking I should try running a 5E game, but I keep not quite getting around to it.

In other news, I am also ready to go, I believe.

yes, sir, you are ready to go. take the first door on the right and talk with my assistant, Mr. Cthuhlu.

Hey there Cthulhu!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxScTbIUvoA

Really looking forward to getting to know characters.

Did someone call for a sawbones with magic and psionics?
Don't worry augmented folks, I have an MD in Bionics as well.

Your sometimes friendly neighborhood Nutball here!  Howdy folks!

"Nutballs and Sawbones" is the name of my new Folkcore album.

Welcome everyone!

Always good to have a doctor on side, was concerned that we might have to rely on Jen's psychic surgery only. :)
A friendly Nutball is better than and unfriendly one that is for sure.

Very cool mix of characters I must say.

hello all,
thanks for all the effort that it took to put up with my tedious GM bullcrap. I feel we have workable group. everyone should be ready to go this weekend at the latest. I will post the binging thread later today. You can post into that thread at your leisure, just please have your first post in by monday so we can move forward.

if there is any last minute questions or requests go ahead and get them out of your system. if you guys want to work on any connections, shared backstories, etc. between the characters feel free to do that here.

i have set up a large cast is large and i hope everyone stays in the game, but it is RPoL after all so attrition happens. however, if i am not making it fun speak up before you split and let me know. bring up here for discussion, i may own the game but we all have to participate so everyone has a voice in the game. if there is an issue lets work it out and move to enjoy our game.

well, all that said. thanks for your participation and i look forward to the game.