03-07-2019, 03:35 AM | #71 | |
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Iceland*
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Re: Disads: the Second Best CP Deal in GURPS
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It's either a fatal combination or it's what makes the PCs continue to have adventures well beyond what any realistic person would ever encounter in a lifetime. Sometimes both. It's important to keep in mind that what counts as suicidal stupidity for a real person can be pretty par for the course for adventurers. Reasonable people contact the authorities or pass things up the chain of command instead of confronting one dire threat to the kingdom/nation/world after another, all by themselves and without adequate support.
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03-07-2019, 05:10 AM | #72 | ||
Banned
Join Date: Jul 2006
Location: 100 hurricane swamp
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Re: Disads: the Second Best CP Deal in GURPS
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Granted I prefer to run Action!, not 'gritty realism simulator' so I might not align well* with all GURPS GMs. And lastly, as a GM I keep my PCs Disads in mind when running. If I were running a modern game and had Mr Triple Threat (Curious, Impulsive, Overconfident) on a bus where a sketchy looking person left a backpack, would I want him alerting the bus driver and calling the police? Or do I want him opening that bag? The later naturally! So I do I make it a bomb that goes off the moment the bag is opened? Of course not, I want that bag opened! So why would I ever put a bottle of hemlock labeled "Drink Me, I Taste Great!" before the PC? I wouldn't, that would be breaking the Player/GM compact. * For instance I prefer to use disads as a carrot rather than a stick. For someone with Curious, the disad is what I poke when they are refusing to chase the unknown, not something I hit them with by making the unknown repeatedly horrible and deadly. For Impulsive, they're the ones keeping the game from becoming boardroom and spreadsheets, so do I make hying off without intricate plans infinitely deadly? No. Etc. |
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03-07-2019, 05:53 AM | #73 | |
Join Date: Dec 2009
Location: Saint Paul, MN
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Re: Disads: the Second Best CP Deal in GURPS
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As for the combination of the three, I can see where you are coming from. This, to me, depends on the genre of the game, style of the table, and compact between the GM and players. At my table, a basic agreement is that if I approve your disadvantages, I won't go out of my way to kill your character for good roleplaying. If there's a tough combination, we'll discuss how the player could stay true to the character and still manage to survive. I expect the players to do some of the work here. There are always choices about how to play out your Impulsiveness. If you always impulsively choose the most deadly option, then life may be short. In the Puddin' example, if she were Impulsive, she could just try to open the box. But she could also impulsively poke it with her dagger or pick it up and shake it or toss it down to an ally saying, "Seamus, think fast! Check it for magical traps!" This last course would work even if she were Overconfident; she's just confident in her ability to throw it. Finally, as I've mentioned before, it's always possible that some combo slips through my filter at character creation, or, more likely, that a player chooses to play their disads in a way that breaks willing suspension of disbelief. At that point, I would talk to the player(s) about it, allow them to either change their play style or adjust the character, and/or enforce full consequences of their actions according to the rules of the genre and setting. |
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03-07-2019, 06:29 AM | #74 | |
Join Date: Oct 2007
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Re: Disads: the Second Best CP Deal in GURPS
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In some campaigns "a lot of trouble" will often result in either death or lengthy imprisonment, in others it may merely get them fired or cause them to suffer various social penalities. If they're lucky they may gain some sort of benefit, but the Overconfidence part is sooner or later going to get them in deeper trouble than they can handle on their own (unless both GM and player ignores what the disadvantage does, in that case: Free Points). But it depends on the type of campaign and the GM's style. If the GM fudges dice in the favour of players taking risks/in danger of dying and/or the campaign leans towards cinematic, this type of character can be fairly powerful because their disadvantages lead them towards taking risks. In that scenario the disadvantages hinder the character a lot less than their points indicate (which is essentially Free Points). If the GM lets the dice fall as they may and/or the campaign is leaning towards realistic, this type of character can be at high risk of dying quickly. They may be lucky with the dice (or the party assisting their endeavours) and live long and interesting lives, but in this scenario they always run the risk of a roll (or series of rolls) ending their career prematurely. For the Terminally Ill (at the -100 points level) character, they have 1 month of ingame time and once that is up they're gone. If the GM decides they get more time, the character has to pay those 100 points back and/or pile on new disadvantages. The character can't get a string of lucky rolls that keeps them alive, an active GM decision (or forgetfulness, which equals Free Points) is the only thing that can do it. |
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03-07-2019, 07:00 AM | #75 | ||
Join Date: Oct 2007
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Re: Disads: the Second Best CP Deal in GURPS
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Another player could certainly intervene and ask to look for traps, but I'd at best give a bonus to the self-control in that situation unless there have been prior experiences with trapped chests in the area. |
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03-07-2019, 09:27 AM | #76 |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Wellington, NZ
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Re: Disads: the Second Best CP Deal in GURPS
It seems to me that this is turning Overconfidence into a belief that the universe is benign until proven otherwise.
Overconfidence means deciding that in the absence of an expert, you can disarm that bomb. Or that you can stay and grab that last piece of loot because you can totally outrun or soak the blast from the bomb that's counting down. It's only a 5-point disad at its base level, so it shouldn't be more of an issue that a 5-point Sense of Duty (party members), or Chummy, or Oblivious. Likewise, Curious shouldn't get you blown up for poking things best left unpoked any more often than Incurious should get you blown up for not prodding that which should be prodded. Impulsive, on its own, doesn't remove the ability to be cautious, either. It just means that you decide how something should be done, and then set about it. Now. Adding in Overconfidence is when things start getting messy, because that means inadequate safety measures and acting before others can intervene. However, this idea that Impulsive, plus Curious, and Overconfidence (presumably at base levels, because nobody has said otherwise) is so bad that it's clearly a lot worse than Impulsive at CR6 (-20 points), or say Charitable (CR9) (-22 points) bothers me. It's unfair to make it worse, given the similar point return, and it's unfair when the Impulsive Curious character (overconfident or not) is likely to be very useful to the GM for moving things along.
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Rupert Boleyn "A pessimist is an optimist with a sense of history." |
03-07-2019, 11:45 AM | #77 |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Shoreline, WA (north of Seattle)
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Re: Disads: the Second Best CP Deal in GURPS
I've noticed a couple tendencies here on the forum that I quite dislike. One is the idea that players need to be punished or controlled by the disadvantages that they take for their PCs - at its worst, it's a very adversarial relationship between GM and players, which the GM then blames on the system instead of working out how to actually play a game with friends. That tendency isn't universal, or even consistent by which people present it, but it's irritating as all hell.
(The other tendencies I hate are nitpicking, blocking (especially common in Reality Seeds or setting premises), an urge to use GURPS to simulate everything complete with points costs, and an emphasis on mechanics to the exclusion of all other parts of the RPG experience.) |
03-07-2019, 12:07 PM | #78 |
Doctor of GURPS Ballistics
Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Lakeville, MN
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Re: Disads: the Second Best CP Deal in GURPS
I got kicked out of a game once because my staid, solid character reported unusual activity up the military chain of command instead of haring off and investigating it myself. Was a Trail of Cthulhu campaign and my understanding of the game's expectations was not aligned with the GM's.
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03-07-2019, 12:11 PM | #79 | |
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: Iceland*
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Re: Disads: the Second Best CP Deal in GURPS
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The forumites have no social contract in place which makes them participants in an improv scene with anyone posting on the forums. It seems natural to assume that by seeking feedback from a GURPS forum, a poster is looking for advice, criticism and help in modeling something using GURPS mechanics. Buying into a scene or premise would not provide the GURPS-related assistance one assumes that a poster is implicitly seeking by posting in the GURPS subforum, not Roleplaying in General or the Play-by-Post subforums.
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03-07-2019, 12:13 PM | #80 | |
Join Date: Aug 2007
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Re: Disads: the Second Best CP Deal in GURPS
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This does suggest to me that picking Disads to get a certain number of cp is the wrong reason and that doing it because the Player _wants_ to play a character who has that trait is the right reason.
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Fred Brackin |
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Tags |
disadvantage limit, disadvantages, gurps, quirks |
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