Sourcebook 1 Remastered is out!
6 months ago – Thu, Mar 23, 2023 at 11:12:54 AM

Sourcebook 1 Remastered is OUT!

Woohoo! With all of the behind the scenes challenges, updating of processes, and constantly changing digital requirements, it feels good to get product finished and released to you via DriveThruRPG.  We haven't had many issues reported to us, so it seems the digital release went smoothly.

PDF Delivery troubleshooting

That said, before I talk about how cool the Sourcebook 1 remaster is and what it means for the future, I'd like to urge all of you to make sure that you have received the file and that it works!  Click around and have fun with it.

If you haven't received Sourcebook 1 remastered, the first step is to make sure you have done your BackerKit survey (about 10% of you haven't yet) - PLEASE go to https://titanrobotics.backerkit.com/ and enter your Kickstarter email to get started. 

If you have done your BackerKit survey, then please message us via BackerKit so that we can help you get your digital rewards through DriveThruRPG, or anything else you might need :)

Oh, and one last housekeeping note, please make sure that your Kickstarter email is one that you actually check. For instance, we've had a couple of people use Apple ID's email obfuscating option when setting up their Kickstarter account via the iPhone app, and FYI if you use an option like that you will never receive our emails because it just enters a dummy email address that doesn't forward to your real email!

The Importance of Sourcebook 1 Remastered

There are some of the new features to keep an eye out for in Sourcebook 1 Remastered, which is cool in and of itself. However, the big deal for long time fans will be the updated standard it represents for Palladium Books. It might seem simple from the outside, but making this happen has required some big changes in Palladium's production pipeline and software suite. It's been challenging to work out a lot of the kinks, but these improved workflow and layout techniques are already paying off. I'm kind of a geek when it comes to this stuff, so I want to publicly thank Kevin, Wayne, and Alex for being so very flexible throughout this transition and their willingness to adopt new software and methods. They've all embraced the possibilities and helped push the standard forward with their own great ideas!

So here are some things you will notice with Palladium products going forward, whether they are new releases or remastered versions of older products.

• Table of Contents: These will generally be more detailed and accurate.
• Index: You have spoken and we are listening! Instead of a Quick Find in the ToC, we are going for full-fledged Indexes at the end of our books (assuming yall like the new Indexes). As we do Remasters, we will try to get you the best of both worlds by including helpful Quick Find items in the Index. 
• PDF Bookmarks: We are using a new process to build these, which should have satisfyingly detailed results.

We are also taking steps at multiple levels to make sure less misspellings slip into printed products, and to fix as many as we can when we do remastered editions. 

The entire Palladium family is working hard to up our game and get you the best products possible. If you have any feedback please let us know through the helpdesk on our website, we want to know what you think!

What's Next?

Since the release of Sourcebook 1 Remastered seems to have gone without a hitch, we will be releasing Rifts® Sourcebook Titan Robotics in the next few business days (probably Friday or Monday), with the other Remastered PDFs soon to follow. So you will be hearing from me again very soon when that goes out. 

Thank You!

Even with the slight delay to PDF book releases (we are a few weeks behind where I wanted to be right now, but I think the delays are worth the quality improvements), we remain on track to be shipping physical product in June. I know I say it all the time, but we truly appreciate your support. I hope you can feel our gratitude reflected in the hard work and various updates we are making to our processes to ensure you are getting the best products possible.

Cheers,

Sean Owen Roberson

PS: Please see today's Palladium Books Weekly Update (it should be posted soon) for a cool opportunity to participate in an auction by the prestigious Heritage Auctions which includes some of the earliest Dungeons & Dragons original art, which is all very rare, done by Kevin Siembieda himself waaay back in the day when he was an RPG industry artist before he started his writing career. I know a lot of you are big fans so I wanted to mention this unique opportunity to own a piece of history.

BackerKit is live, and so is the pre-order store!
7 months ago – Wed, Feb 22, 2023 at 03:54:35 PM

Howdy Rifters,

All backers should have received or should be receiving their BackerKit surveys now or very shortly. AND, for the fans who missed the Kickstarter and want to get in on the fun, you can use the BackerKit page to preorder Titan Robotics and other products including Rifts® and Mechanoids® swag.

BackerKit is LIVE!

Thanks for your patience. We have been working hard to get things set up properly, and I didn't want to send out this update until we knew the surveys were functioning correctly. Our test surveys appear to have performed flawlessly so here I am with fingers crossed!

Honestly, I shouldn't have worried. Wayne has put a ton of effort into our pledge manager and the wonderful folks at BackerKit have been nothing but pleasant and super helpful to work with. If you hit any snags please let us know through a direct message and we will make good things happen.

Progress Report

Titan Robotics Kickstarter rewards are coming along nicely and digital rewards will begin flowing soon. It's been a ton of extra effort to get it set up the way it is, but I am very excited about the BackerKit pledge and preorder manager.

But Sean, why is that so exciting? Well, besides the fact that this is an important part of smoothly rolling out the rewards to you, it’s also really neat on another level –- shipping.

But Sean, shipping is annoying and expensive, not cool and fun. Aha! That’s where we are making some progress. Many of you asked us to figure out a way to reduce shipping prices, and we listened! Shipping has vastly changed over the past few years, so we’ve been hard at work finding the best solutions possible in this brave new world of post-pandemic logistics.

Shipping

The result? Steeply discounted shipping rates for customers outside the USA, through the magic of bulk shipping negotiated through our partners at Spiral Galaxy Games (for the UK and EU)and Quartermaster Logistics (for the rest of the world). We anticipate the shipping rates for items fulfilled through the Titan Robotics campaign to come in well below the standard commercial shipping rates you would normally incur ordering directly via Palladium’s online store, especially from outside the USA. USA backers should also see savings, though smaller. 

In addition to the Titan Robotics items, many of Palladium’s other titles are available through the BackerKit pledge and preorder manager and you can get those mailed to you at this steep discount.

You will be able to update your shipping address and pay shipping-related fees through the BackerKit pledge manager, which will be open until the printed books are ready to mail out (estimated June 2023). We won't be charging shipping until then to make sure you get the most accurate prices possible.

For this crowdfunder, we have added the Rifts line of books and a selection of other core titles to BackerKit. We plan on expanding what other titles are available through BackerKit in future crowdfunding campaigns but that might be quite a few months down the road, so please take advantage of this unique opportunity while you can. For those who didn’t back the Kickstarter, you can order products a la carte through BackerKit and get in on the low overseas shipping too; you don’t even have to buy Titan Robotics. Note that none of the items will ship until the final product does, so if you want something now, please order through the Palladium Books webstore.

Upgrading Your Pledge

We've already had multiple people reach out to ask about upgrading their pledge level. If you were a backer on the Kickstarter please message us directly and we will help you out on a case-by-case basis.

What is Next? 

Books! Files! Cool rules for machines and androids! In the next few weeks we will be releasing files for your review via PDF fulfillment on DriveThruRPG. These initial digital-only files won't be final, but they will be close with near-final layout, art, etc. that have gone through multiple proofreading and editing passes. Inevitably, there are always things we can do better, so we want to give you a chance to take a look at the materials for a couple of weeks and give us feedback prior to them going to print. I've done this with all of the books I wrote for Savage Rifts®, and it was a great way to get your input and make sure we sent the best product possible to print. We will set up a forum online to coordinate that, so stay tuned for details coming very soon. In the meantime, please verify/update your shipping and personal info through your BackerKit survey, or check out the preorder store. Thanks!

Cheers,

Sean Owen Roberson

Art Preview, Card Samples, and more!
8 months ago – Sun, Jan 22, 2023 at 04:48:37 PM

Everything is progressing!

Howdy Rifters, 

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season. Here at Palladium we just finished up the Christmas Surprise Package offer and wow I am still blown away by how many of you order those. Kevin enjoys choosing the goodies, I enjoy signing them, and we hope you love them! 

They do take time, though, so it is nice to move into a more "normal" work schedule where entire mornings aren't spent signing books and coordinating orders.

We just received some updated poker card samples, as well as some of the original physical art by Steven Cummings, so I thought it would be nice to give yall a sneak peak. 

Poker Card Samples

As I mentioned in the video, the new Cyberworks Poker Deck looks really great. I'm excited to share that, due to your support of this crowdfunding campaign, we can order a large-scale print run of the cards. This is huge because now it becomes feasible for us to print through premier poker card providers, which require larger orders to be economical. What does that mean? Well, in this case we still need to get a print proof, but it looks like we will be able to print on higher quality card stock using higher quality printers at virtually the same price as the boutique service we were using before. This was only possible through the magic of Kickstarter and all of you!

Art Preview

Please enjoy the art depicted in the video. We can show a ton of preview images, but nothing compares to seeing the original art at full size. A big part of my work on Titan Robotics has been to integrate the details of the awesome art into the writeups of the new power armor suits and robot vehicles, and it has been a blast to do — the art is stellar and really sparks my imagination. I can't wait for you to read the full results soon.

Now that I've shared the cool art stuff, let's move on to more nuts and bolts updates.

Shipping

The global logistics issues and various changes to EU and UK tax and import laws have really changed the global shipping landscape over the last two years. Fortunately, we are working with Quartermaster Logistics for USA and global fulfillment. In addition, they put us in touch with Spiral Galaxy, who are helping us get the (constantly evolving) details correct for EU and UK fulfillment so we can get your rewards to you as quickly and efficiently as possibly. Thanks again for everyone's patience on this front, we are doing our best to keep shipping costs down and I think you will be pleased with the final results.

BackerKit

The wonderful folks at BackerKit are helping us get the pledge manager set up, and I can only say they have been wonderful to work with. We are finalizing your backer surveys, making sure we can get shipping set up properly within their pledge manager, and listing tons of non-Titan Robotics products as add-ons. 

Why list other books as add-ons? Well, we hope that this is a way for our fans to get as much product shipped at once to take advantage of the bulk shipping rates we have arranged — I think this is an especially great opportunity for fans in Canada, the UK, EU, Australia, and other overseas locations where shipping rates from the US are normally quite high.

We hope to have the BackerKit pledge manager ready for business in the coming week or so.

But Wait, there's MORE!

Yall unlocked quite a few Milestones during the course of the campaign, and those extra goodies are in progress. The Savage Rifts conversion of the Titan Robotics and Cyberworks Collection material is rocketing along, as is the template for the Titan Courier Team bonus adventure and pregenerated characters.

As for the books themselves, we are almost finished getting all of the text and art files remastered so Wayne and I can get the Cyberworks Collection into (re)layout. This is a ton of work, but I think it will be well worth it.

In summary, every aspect of the Titan Robotics campaign is progressing quite well. I am very confident that we are on track with our fulfillment timeline as presented on the main campaign page and in previous updates.

Cheers,

Sean Owen Roberson

PS: Many of you have reached Kevin and I regarding the current state of the OGL. Please check out the most recent Weekly Update for what our thoughts are on the matter, written by me. In fact, this is the first Weekly Update that I've written a significant portion of — there will be many more in the future :)

A Quick Update Regarding Rifts for Savage Worlds
9 months ago – Sat, Jan 07, 2023 at 01:42:17 AM

Join in the fun as we count down to the end!

A quick note. We are closing in on the final hour of the crowdfunding campaign from Pinnacle Entertainment which includes a massive new pawn set (deluxe die-cut paper minis), the first-ever Rifts campaign boxed set Terror on the Dark Frontier (New West), The Land of a Thousand Islands worldbook (South America), and other cool items like a new beautiful map of the South American continent in all its glory. 

It's been a crazy holiday season and new year, we hope you enjoy the show with Sean Owen Roberson and the rest of the team behind these new goodies on the Palladium YouTube channel, starting in just a few minutes (or see it under the live events tab later).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4fbZfzpV7o

TWO Rifts® Mega Bundles of Holding - Available NOW!
10 months ago – Mon, Dec 12, 2022 at 10:40:27 PM

Dear Rifters,

This first-ever PDF “Mega” Bundle of Holding for Rifts®launches with the Rifts® Core Books Collection and Sourcebook Collection – 17 major Rifts® titles in all! A great way to build your PDF library on the cheap AND support a worthy charity at the same time.

- $19.95 US gets you all 6 titles in the Corebook Collection (retail value $71) as DRM-free PDF ebooks, including the complete Rifts® Ultimate Edition RPG (plus the Rifts® Primer), and Rifts® Adventure Guide, Game Master Guide, Game Master Kit, and Index and Adventures Volume 1 and Volume 2.

- Pay more than the threshold price of $39.99 for the Rifts® Sourcebook Collection (retail value $129) and you’ll get 11 additional major Rifts® titles including Rifts® Sourcebook One, The Mechanoids®, Mindwerks, Book of Magic, The Bestiary Volume One, Black Market, Bionics Sourcebook, all three Conversion books – Rifts® Conversion Book 1, Two: Pantheons of the Megaverse, Three: Dark Conversions.

For those of you new to the Bundle of Holding, you pay less when you “buy in” during the first couple weeks of the offer. Ah, but a Bundle of Holding is always a bargain no matter when you buy in. Even on the last day! We recommend jumping in early to get the best value for your money.

Bundles of Holding are a great way to build your PDF library on the cheap AND support a worthy charity. The Mega Bundle supports the Diana Jones Award Emerging Designer Program. Each year, the Diana Jones Award for Excellence in Gaming, a 501(c)3 nonprofit, amplifies the voices of up-and-coming game designers by featuring them during an expenses-paid visit to Gen Con.

Follow this link to get in on the action https://bundleofholding.com/presents/RiftsCoreMega