General Information for Play
Rifts and Ley Lines?
A rift is a tear in the fabric
of space and time. Basically what a rift does is opens
a hole or a door into another dimension that occupies a
different place in time or space or both. This can be
very good but most time it is very bad. Why is it bad
you might ask? Well it's bad because you have no idea
what is on the other side. For the purposes of the game it is
usually not good, but it can be of great importance.
The planet of Earth is now called (only by non-humans) Rifts Earth
because of the sheer number of rifts that exist. Rifts
Earth, or just Rifts, is what is called a Multi-Dimensional
Nexus Anomaly. What this means is that Rifts is open to
entry from many, many dimensions. The words rift and
nexus are synonomous but this is in effect a misnomer.
A nexus is the crossing of several lines of force called
Ley Lines. A ley line is a a source of magical energy
that wells up from out of the earth and travels in
relatively straight lines. When several ley lines cross
over each other their magical energy is increased and a
nexus is formed. Now under certain circumstances the
magical energy makes the frabric of the universe to tear
and what ensuse is a rift, the crossing of another
dimensional plane into ours.
A ley line is a pathway of mystical energy rising up from the earth.
A ley line which may be as short as one mile or as
long as practically half way around the world is always a
half mile wide and are always 300 feet tall. A ley line
is a shimmering blue colour, and has an endless supply of
energy. It is always the spell caster who has a limit
of how much energy they can handle at one time, not the
ley line itself. An actual rift usually looks like a
candle flame, has a narrow base, extends out too a sphere
and then tapers off at the top. A rift is measured in
size from the ground up to where the shape just begins to
taper off. A rift can be any size from 50 feet tall to
3000 feet tall depending on how it was made.
Usually the more interconnecting leylines at the base of a
rift the larger the rift is. A rift is usually a
brilliant white in colour tinged with blue at the edges.
Most often through a rift another world can be seen.
In the case of the Lazlo Rift there is no other world
seen on the other side. No one knows exactly why,
although it is theorized that opens up on a distant sun,
however nothing other than light passes through, there is no
excess heat or anything other than the light which oddly
enough (in terms of the theory) has no ultraviolet component.
Ley lines are of varying amounts of strength thus
making the same true of nexus points. Thus the greater
the power, the higher the chance of a rift opening on its own
(a very important concept), and usually the greater the size
of a rift. Anything that can pass through the hole the
rift has made can enter the new world. This means energy,
creatures, elements (such as weather, atmospheric anomalies)
can pass through a rift. The danger of course is that a
monster or demon will pass through, to our world, where it can
wreak havoc because of great strength of the body or mind or
magical ability. These same things can also use the same
rift to leave Rifts Earth.
Now comes the scary part, not only do these
rifts open themselves but a powerful user of magic can
often open their own rift to where or when ever they please
and call forth demonic forces that are better off left where
they are. Notable places that natural (and unnatural) rifts
open up on are 20th Century Earth, Palladium, Wormwood,
Phase World, Alternate Earths, Hades, Dyval, and several
nasty places without names. As to what kind of creatures
and peoples have passed through rifts in Rifts Earth, the
numbers and types are endless, major notables are the
Mechanoids, the Splugorth and thier minions, the Apocalypse
Demons, the Xicitic, and numerous D-bees (Dimensional
Beings).
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