Blue Rose vs Rifts

Compare Blue Rose and Rifts side by side. See differences in complexity, dice, genre, cost, and more.

	Blue Rose	Rifts
Genre	Fantasy	Post-Apocalyptic, Scifi, Fantasy, Horror, Superhero
Tags	Character-Driven, Corruption, Tactical, Crunchy, Social Intrigue, Strong GM Support, High-Fantasy, Lore-Heavy, Heroic, Roleplay-Heavy	Character Building, Combat-Heavy, Crunchy, Fear & Stress Mechanics, Gonzo, High-Power, Mana Points, Mecha, Superpowers, Tactical
Core Mechanic	Roll d20 and add the relevant ability, skill, or arcanum modifier against a Difficulty set by the Narrator. Attacks use the same procedure against Defense. Successful damage forces a Toughness save that moves the target along an injury track instead of reducing hit points.	Combat and saving throws use a d20 plus bonuses, with high results overcoming a target number or opposing roll. Skills use d100 and succeed when the result is at or below the character's percentage.
Dice	d20	d20, d100
Complexity	High	Very High
Accessibility	Medium	Medium
Runnability	Very High	Very High
License	Open Game License Version 1.0a	All Rights Reserved
Third-Party Publishing	Commercial publishing allowed — Open Game License v1.0a	Noncommercial only — Palladium Books Internet Policy limited license
Summary only, not legal advice. Check current terms before publishing.
Cost	$	$$
Publisher	Green Ronin Publishing, LLC	Palladium Books Inc.
Year	2005	2005
Best For	Groups who want hopeful romantic fantasy campaigns where personal motivations, political intrigue, and heroic service matter alongside tactical conflict.	Groups who want long-form science-fantasy campaigns that move from a ruined Earth to other dimensions. The game suits tables whose GM will decide which parts of the broad setting a campaign uses.
Highlights	Acting on a Calling and either nature restores Conviction, turning personal motives into a renewable resource. Reputation and Influence give past deeds and changing attitudes mechanical weight in social scenes. Sorcery risks Corruption that erodes abilities and can culminate in madness or unlife, making forbidden magic a sustained consequence rather than a binary choice.	Occupational and racial class packages assign distinct abilities and advancement tracks, giving each archetype a different role in the party. Mega-Damage places many supernatural creatures and war machines on a separate durability scale beyond the reach of ordinary Structural Damage Capacity attacks. Rifts and ley lines make dimensional travel a standing feature of the setting, letting campaigns move between devastated Earth and other worlds.
Considerations	Character creation combines a background and role with several layers of customization, requiring choices across multiple chapters. Combat tracks actions, modifiers, saving throws, and damage conditions instead of a single hit-point total. Sorcery's Corruption rules attach moral consequences to forbidden magic, so groups must engage with the setting's Light and Shadow framework.	Character creation combines rolled attributes with extensive skill selection, making first-time preparation lengthy. Combat asks each player to track an action economy, active defenses, and which damage scale applies. Magic and psionics use separate point pools and power procedures, adding class-specific rules to the shared system.