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Old 01-06-2018, 07:14 PM   #101
sir_pudding
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Default Re: Realistic Point Gains

I think that if you actually have players that are happy with this game then you really don't need get our opinion, when most of us probably wouldn't like it.

However, if you don't have such players, though, based on this and your previous threads, the reason is probably because they are playing merely minor characters in your NPCs' story, and that nothing they do can actually change the destiny you have already decided for these powerful NPCs, since no attempt, either by the PCs or their enemies, can actually prevent these NPCs from succeeding at anything significant. If you are hoping that by proving these characters are "realistic" you can assuage criticism of your game, you are addressing a problem that is probably not actually relevant. If they aren't having fun, I suspect it is because they are on a railroad heading to a destination that isn't even about them.
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Old 01-06-2018, 07:24 PM   #102
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Originally Posted by whswhs View Post
Alonsua: It's kind of you to quote my long post in full, but I don't think you've actually said anything that addresses, or responds to, the points I was trying to make. Did I not manage to make them clear? I'm willing to try to answer questions or comments, if you have any to make.
Yes, I wanted to bring in that they are quite limited by their disadvantages, such as Duty (FR15), Sense of Duty (Humanity), Obsession (Long Term) or Enemies (Activists and Media), and show that though they are highly competent (the best in history in a number of skills), they dont fill up every niche, because they lack lots of skills (even when they work together complementing each other, and moreover when they work individually, which is very usual, since each of them follow their own line of research). As for the learning time, I was able to bring them down two years by considering that they cannot follow "regular education" until they come out of age or reach a certain point of maturity (IQ-10). The average character in this setting got 36-90, depending on their education and not counting attributes (unless they are trained, such as using anabolics to increase strength).
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Old 01-06-2018, 07:40 PM   #103
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Default Re: Realistic Point Gains

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Originally Posted by sir_pudding View Post
I think that if you actually have players that are happy with this game then you really don't need get our opinion, when most of us probably wouldn't like it.

However, if you don't have such players, though, based on this and your previous threads, the reason is probably because they are playing merely minor characters in your NPCs' story, and that nothing they do can actually change the destiny you have already decided for these powerful NPCs, since no attempt, either by the PCs or their enemies, can actually prevent these NPCs from succeeding at anything significant. If you are hoping that by proving these characters are "realistic" you can assuage criticism of your game, you are addressing a problem that is probably not actually relevant. If they aren't having fun, I suspect it is because they are on a railroad heading to a destination that isn't even about them.
I actually want as much criticism as I can get, because that improves the setting and the game, and the players are not really giving me any. The worst I got was from a person in charge of the ethic wing in a hospital of Madrid when discussing euthanasia with Adam, and some professional poker players who got angry and tried to rob them after they won a tournament at Vancouver, both happening when the characters barely aged 16. There are actually a few others characters who are both highly competent and wealthy, such as an spaceship engineer who also designs and mods himself with cutting-edge cybernetics, and is planning on achieving immortality and take over russia with a private army, and a software developer who has designed some kind of mind controlling technology... But most enjoy playing simple average characters and trying to get out of the problems when I throw them on their average lifes and skills, such as paying rent, getting on their new lifestyles after a divorce, avoid getting fired or blackmailed or trying to get rich out of several scams and crimes.
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Old 01-06-2018, 07:55 PM   #104
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Default Re: Realistic Point Gains

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Yes, I wanted to bring in that they are quite limited by their disadvantages, such as Duty (FR15), Sense of Duty (Humanity), Obsession (Long Term) or Enemies (Activists and Media), and show that though they are highly competent (the best in history in a number of skills), they dont fill up every niche, because they lack lots of skills (even when they work together complementing each other, and moreover when they work individually, which is very usual, since each of them follow their own line of research). As for the learning time, I was able to bring them down two years by considering that they cannot follow "regular education" until they come out of age or reach a certain point of maturity (IQ-10). The average character in this setting got 36-90, depending on their education and not counting attributes (unless they are trained, such as using anabolics to increase strength).
I think for this type of discussion it works better if you explain that reasoning, rather than expecting us to go through the character sheets and analyze all their details.

I'm not sure what you mean by "got 36-90." Thirty-six to ninety of what, exactly?
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Old 01-07-2018, 12:19 AM   #105
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Default Re: Realistic Point Gains

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Originally Posted by Alonsua View Post
I actually want as much criticism as I can get, because that improves the setting and the game, and the players are not really giving me any.
Okay.
Quote:
The worst I got was from a person in charge of the ethic wing in a hospital of Madrid when discussing euthanasia with Adam, and some professional poker players who got angry and tried to rob them after they won a tournament at Vancouver, both happening when the characters barely aged 16.
Disagreeing with the NPCs in-character isn't really the same as critique of the game as art.
Quote:
There are actually a few others characters who are both highly competent and wealthy, such as an spaceship engineer who also designs and mods himself with cutting-edge cybernetics, and is planning on achieving immortality and take over russia with a private army, and a software developer who has designed some kind of mind controlling technology...
Player characters? Or more NPCs?
Quote:
But most enjoy playing simple average characters and trying to get out of the problems when I throw them on their average lifes and skills, such as paying rent, getting on their new lifestyles after a divorce, avoid getting fired or blackmailed or trying to get rich out of several scams and crimes.
None of that sounds appealing to me at all. I already have to deal with paying rent, being a husband, working a job, being underemployed, and so on. I don't have much interest in simulating that in a game, for which I generally want something that would qualify as adventure fiction of some description.

I also don't have much interest in playing in a setting with godlike NPCs who never make mistakes and have effectively enslaved humanity unless I am permitted to engage that setting as the horror fiction that it should be. I don't want to play a villager in Bixby's "It's a Good Life" who genuinely believes that Anthony is a good boy, or worse where it is doesn't matter if they don't.

Your Anthony Fremonts are actually worse because they personally don't have godlike control of reality, in-universe they seem opposable, but in a metagame way you are exercising your godlike control of the setting, which demoralizes the player but makes demoralizing the character, in response, metagaming.

Worse still is the way that instead of wishing rebels to the cornfield, your tyrants just always happen to discredit their opponents or turn public opinion against them or whatever. At least being wished to the cornfield has some nobility of courage in comparison.

What is especially missing here is any kind of sense of a campaign frame. What are the PCs expected to do?

In my last three GURPS games the PCs were: secret agents carrying out missions in opposition to an invading alternate reality whose denizens controlled human language, a group of mercenary adventures racing to recover some lost artifacts before another group did, and a group of people who were assembled by a sinister shadowy patron to undertake a conspiracy to restore interstellar travel, respectively. What are players told about your expectations for the kinds of PCs they should be expected to play and the kinds of adventures they are expected to undertake?

Last edited by sir_pudding; 01-07-2018 at 04:26 AM.
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Old 01-07-2018, 03:27 AM   #106
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Originally Posted by whswhs View Post
I think for this type of discussion it works better if you explain that reasoning, rather than expecting us to go through the character sheets and analyze all their details.

I'm not sure what you mean by "got 36-90." Thirty-six to ninety of what, exactly?
Character points to invest on skills or trained advantages, sorry :)
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Old 01-07-2018, 03:42 AM   #107
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Okay. Disagreeing with the NPCs in-character isn't really the same as critique of the game as art. Player characters? Or more NPCs?
None of that sounds appealing to me at all. I already have to deal with paying rent, being a husband, working a job, being underemployed, and so on. I don't have much interest in simulating that in a game, for which I generally want something that would qualify as adventure fiction of some description.

I also don't have much interest in playing in a setting with godlike NPCs who never make mistakes and have effectively enslaved humanity unless I am permitted to engage that setting as the horror fiction that it should be. I don't want to play a villager in Bixby's "It's a Good Life" who genuinely believes that Anthony is a good boy, or worse where it is doesn't matter if they don't.

Your Anthony Fremonts are actually worse because they personally don't have godlike control of reality, in-universe they seem opposable, but in a metagame way you are exercising your godlike control of the setting, which demoralizes the player but makes demoralizing the character, in response, metagaming.

Worse still is the way that instead of wishing rebels to the cornfield, your tyrants just always happen to discredit their opponents or turn public opinion against them or whatever. At least being wished to the cornfield has some nobility of courage in comparison.

What is especially missing here is any kind of sense of a campaign frame. What are the PCs expected to do?

In my last three GURPS games the PCs were: secret agents carrying out missions in opposition to the invasion alternate reality whose denizens controlled human language, a group of mercenary adventures racing to recover some lost artifacts before another group did, and a group of people who were assembled by a sinister shadowy patron to undertake a conspiracy to restore interstellar travel, respectively. What are players told about your expectations for the kinds of PCs they should be expected to play and the kinds of adventures they are expected to undertake?
Exactly, so they are not giving me any useful criticism at all. The refered are player characters, though they are more invested naturally in a particular attribute (getting IQ to 15, instead of splitting among other stats) and only the "cyber-man" tried to fix it with cybernetics (raising the rest to 12, I think). The programmer is average or near to average in the other attributes, with exception of appearance (handsome/bodysculpting) and wealth (multimillonaire 3). Individually the players are not expected to assume any role, and they are free to involve as deep and play any realistic role they like, aslong as it fits any timeline (year 2018 game is the only open to new players one at the moment) (and of course if they are russian and the "cyber-man" appears at their zone, they are mostly guaranteed having to swallow his influence, because he is not the discreet dominance type of character). So to speak they can decide to play a journalist investigating about Adam's research with ebola, an industrial spy trying to steal Eve's patents, a business competitor, a mother of family, the president of the government... it is a free open world.
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Old 01-07-2018, 07:26 AM   #108
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[MOD]
If you consider some post(s) breaking the rules of the forum, insulting or the like, you should use the report function and not start a public discussion or act as a 'junior moderator'.

To everyone else: derivative discussion starting from the quoted post is off-topic.
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Old 01-07-2018, 11:14 AM   #109
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Default Re: Realistic Point Gains

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Exactly, so they are not giving me any useful criticism at all. The refered are player characters, though they are more invested naturally in a particular attribute (getting IQ to 15, instead of splitting among other stats) and only the "cyber-man" tried to fix it with cybernetics (raising the rest to 12, I think). The programmer is average or near to average in the other attributes, with exception of appearance (handsome/bodysculpting) and wealth (multimillonaire 3). Individually the players are not expected to assume any role, and they are free to involve as deep and play any realistic role they like, aslong as it fits any timeline (year 2018 game is the only open to new players one at the moment) (and of course if they are russian and the "cyber-man" appears at their zone, they are mostly guaranteed having to swallow his influence, because he is not the discreet dominance type of character). So to speak they can decide to play a journalist investigating about Adam's research with ebola, an industrial spy trying to steal Eve's patents, a business competitor, a mother of family, the president of the government... it is a free open world.
I think what I have to ask is, what function does it serve in terms of running the game for you to have these two high-powered characters in the world? In what way do they make actual appearances in play?
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Old 01-07-2018, 06:17 PM   #110
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I think what I have to ask is, what function does it serve in terms of running the game for you to have these two high-powered characters in the world? In what way do they make actual appearances in play?
They run an international corporation (with which details I am having problems at the current date, 2018).

This corporation is supposed to be an organization with the following stats:

Members: 282.592
Wealth: Very Wealthy
Contacts: Different specialties-(21); Business-(15)
Member Traits: Enemy (Watcher; Medium; FR12); Enemy (Weak; FR9); Fanaticism; Hidden Facilities.
Startup Cost: $176.337.672.000.
Resource Value: $881.688.360
Patron Value: 40 Points
Enemy Value: -40 Points

(I am trying to determine to determine a value for market cap in order to improve a "company website" for playing purposes, and after doing some calculations with averages and sales, and looking into companies such as Apple, I got to:

Gross Sales: $538.646.000.000
Market Cap: $1.884.252.600.000)

This company (which they run, owning 50% each) produces and sell over 1.092 million cancer vaccines a year (each lasting from five to ten years), provides healthcare services to over 26.32 million patients a year, runs a virtual reality planet with over 1.2 billion users and is the biggest computers manufacturer in the world with over 131.04 million units shipped a year. It also owns basically the full market for realistic flesh robots, with over 1.000 sales a year, and the artificial intelligences market, with more than 945.000. These characters do not usually appear directly, since they are busy running the company and researching into new discoveries, but they tend to do a lot of propaganda and regularly make public appearances. Some characters have gotten to associate with them in the past, such as a couple of special agents, some multimillonaire girl, a band of scammers, a group of thieves, quite a number of spies and a few of them usually look to join their researches.
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