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Old 03-05-2012, 02:05 PM   #7
Engurrand
 
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Join Date: Dec 2010
Location: Wormtooth Nation
Default Re: Skill: Games (Gurps)

I'll start with one.

This is more of a type 2 story, but I'll let it speak for itself.

I have the benefit of a great GM, who has traveled rather far and wide, and has a good eye for detail. At one point, a favorite character of mine, the reincarnated spirit of Bedwyr Bedrydant (one of the welsh knights of the round table) got lost, alone, in a bad part of Dublin in 1938. He was mugged.
You'd think a Knight of the Round table could handle a simple mugging, but it turns out that when somebody is behind you with a club, and you don't know they're there, no amount of broadsword badassery will save you. My GM described the behavior of the culprits, leading up to the mugging, in some detail, sufficient to give me some forewarning, if I had known what to look for. Suffice to say, I missed the cues (though the character did survive).

A year later, in real life, I was working on a documentary film about the street children of Medellin Colombia. If you're not familiar with that situation, suffice to say that the combination of guerrilla warfare and drug trade has displaced a lot of people from the Colombian countryside, who have migrated to live in slums in Medellin.
I found myself, late one night, quite suddenly alone on a dark street. It is shocking how quickly a well lit shopping center can become a dark and dangerous alley when you don't pay close attention to where you're going.
No sooner had I started making my way back toward safer territory, then I noticed I had attracted some attention. It is worth mentioning that I am Caucasian, and had with me a camera. I must have stuck out like a sore thumb. I had been on the streets several nights already, but normal operating procedure was to go out with the members of the aid group I was working with, who were both local and well known. In their company I was safe (mostly), but none were with me that night.

This is where the gurps comes in. The fellows who noticed me, four young men in old clothes, engaged in the exact same target acquisition, assessment, and then tactical maneuvering my GM had described to me when my character was lost on the streets of Dublin.

In Dublin (in game) three men had noticed Bedwyr, one crossed the street and circled around behind him while the other two approached from the front, and one asked for help lighting a cigarette.

In Medellin, four men noticed me, one crossed the street and circled around behind me while two approached from the front, one drawing out an unlit cigarette. (The fourth stayed behind on the steps of the building where they had noticed me from).

In Dublin, Bedwyr stopped and fumbled for a lighter, then the man behind him hit him in the head with a sap. Things got worse from there.

In Medellin, I checked the reflection in a parked car, and confirming that the guy who'd circled around behind me was now approaching, and had something in his hand. I crossed the street away from them, hopped a low fence and made a dash back to the shopping center and it's well-lit public areas.
(Since reading GURPS Martial Arts, and following the "Build Yourself" threads on these forums I was no longer confidant in my 11 Karate-Art skill as a self defense mechanism, and so was unwilling to risk the possibility they were actually just interested in a light.)

Who knows? Maybe they just wanted a match. I still thanked my GM when I got home, and I think this a good opportunity to thank Steve Jackson Games et al. as well. Thanks guys. I don't have a knife in my ribs just now. That's cool.

Last edited by Engurrand; 03-05-2012 at 02:42 PM.
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