Steve Jackson Games Forums - View Single Post - Alternatives to GURPS? Other tabletop RPGs to try?

Black Leviathan · 07-30-2020, 12:12 PM

We've played games other than GURPS but I don't think in the context you want. Usually it's because other players feel they need to play a game that's comfortable for them. A lot of the time that means D&D of various stripes. But we've played a few WoD settings. We will occasionally try a game that looks cool. That's how we sampled The Strange and Fading Suns.

Pretty much the advantage is Theme Control. Other games limit scope in a way that few GURPs GM's think to but they do it in a way that severely curbs player choices. This isn't all negative, it can be a good thing to be forced into certain character choices and have to flex your RP muscles.

Sometimes 'other' games will have a unique mechanic that's nice. Changeling the Lost had some really great powers in their glamour abilities that wouldn't work as well in GURPS.

More often what happens is we find a game that looks cool, we read through the setting and the rules and we POWERED BY GURPS it by stretching the setting over GURPS mechanics for it's better mechanical realism and character representation. Often in the process we make improvements on the setting by opening up options that wouldn't have been possible in the original game.

07-30-2020, 12:12 PM	#29
Black Leviathan Join Date: Sep 2018	Re: Alternatives to GURPS? Other tabletop RPGs to try? We've played games other than GURPS but I don't think in the context you want. Usually it's because other players feel they need to play a game that's comfortable for them. A lot of the time that means D&D of various stripes. But we've played a few WoD settings. We will occasionally try a game that looks cool. That's how we sampled The Strange and Fading Suns. Pretty much the advantage is Theme Control. Other games limit scope in a way that few GURPs GM's think to but they do it in a way that severely curbs player choices. This isn't all negative, it can be a good thing to be forced into certain character choices and have to flex your RP muscles. Sometimes 'other' games will have a unique mechanic that's nice. Changeling the Lost had some really great powers in their glamour abilities that wouldn't work as well in GURPS. More often what happens is we find a game that looks cool, we read through the setting and the rules and we POWERED BY GURPS it by stretching the setting over GURPS mechanics for it's better mechanical realism and character representation. Often in the process we make improvements on the setting by opening up options that wouldn't have been possible in the original game.