Savage Rifts Arcana and Mysticism

by Sean Tait Bircher, Robin English-Bircher

Arcana and Mysticism gives players the tools to dive deep into the magical side of Rifts, including new Iconic Frameworks, MARS packages, Technowizardry gear, and vehicles.

Genres: Role Playing Games

190 pages, Hardcover

Published January 1, 2020

Reviews

[Gonzalo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Arcana and Mysticism is the North America expansion for all things magic and psychic for Savage Worlds Rifts. As part of a trilogy of supplements, you will be missing something, not a lot, if you do not have Blood and Banes and Empires of Humanity. These book have the admittedly hard task of summarizing and adapting a large number of Rifts supplements to the new era and the new rules. Not having read any of the original books I felt the result is just ok. As a GM, I think the player section is perfectly good—my players already struggle with the options in the core books—and I believe the plot point campaign can work very well, even it it is not a masterpiece. My real criticism is with the geographical sections. For the most part, I found them rather short, and when I found one that was longer (or of the right size) I was left wondering, why Dweomer deserves this treatment but not the rest of the Magic Zone? No clue, but I wished there would have been more pages devoted to other cities and areas, particularly the True Federation of Magic. My other bone to pick is the art. There is no map in the book (I know we got a nice one in the core box), and many of the creatures and characters I would expect to have a picture for don’t have one (or are not clearly identified as such). I believe one of the strongest suits of the original Rifts is that its art was always very good—if of a style that might not convince everyone. That luxury of odd drawing is sadly missing here.

Hopefully the next two volumes are a bit more to my taste.

[David Rugge · Rating 3 out of 5]

Arcana and Mysticism delivers exactly what it claims to deliver: a supplement that describes in detail how the different factions in the Magic Zone interact with each other. There are many new Iconic Frameworks, items, and monsters. It also includes several adventures, varying from short, one-shot sessions to an entire plot-point campaign.

Arcana and Mysticism has the same problems as many of the D&D supplements: they have some good content, but they also spread it across many sub-200 page books rather than collecting related topics into one book. I would rather have one 300-page book that is "Blood and Banes" combined with "Arcana and Mysticism" to make it easier to look things up, even if you had to remove some of the short campaigns to make it fit. I'm also a little disappointed that this book has not been revised to match the SWADE version of the Savage World: Rifts rules as classes such as the Zapper are interesting but annoying to reconcile with the SWADE rules changes.