Ravens N' Pennies - GURPS Content Posts

[Christopher R. Rice]

Triple Threat: Hedleyspawn

I've been through the wringer the last few days. First I rescued a kitten from a engine block Sunday (and then adopted him). Then last night I ended up in the ER and got multiple steroid shots in the mouth for my rapidly swelling throat. More strep/tonsillitis issues. Wee. But fear not! I have delivered unto you these 4! Errr 3, write-ups for a semi-unique creature: the spawn of the Hedleykow. That's right, I'm going to be doing a lot of demons and fae and other oddities for Triple Threats for the next couple of months. Enjoy. Just make sure that the Buick you're driving is actually a Buick and not a shapeshifter (or a Kelpie keeping up with the times...)

[Christopher R. Rice]

Melee Academy: Martial Arts Training

Today I'm talking about kung fu today and how to make it better than your target's. Inspired by a forum post I poke around a few ideas, codify a new trait, and offer up a couple of optional rules for it.

[Kalzazz]

I haven't had near as eventful of time, but still been busy, so haven't gotten to read all your posts (but I will catch up!)

I will definitelly allow and make available the Martial Arts Style Training idea, I really like that! I can't see myself using it directly as written though, as soon as I read it I think I have at least one tweak I must make, which is reducing cost to 1 + XYZ instead of 2+XYZ, 2+XYZ seems rather dissonant as there are a fair number of examples of '1 + XYZ' powerups, but few of '2 + XYZ' (unless I am hallucinating, which is very possible)

I really like the idea now I might actually have to do a style write up for 'Dragon Style Kung Fu' which is the semi-serious/semi-joke style that Dragons tend to learn in my games (many dragons actually only known Brawling at varying often low levels or are flailing around at raw DX, but if a Dragon tells you it knows Dragon Style Kung Fu most people don't ask it to demonstrate Forms)

[Christopher R. Rice]

Glad you liked it. :-) And feel free to mod and tweak away.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Pyramid Mentoring Group - Year 1 Final Report

My end of the year report for how my grand experiment in teaching others how to write went - in short - not bad, not bad at all.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Gamemaster's Guidepost: Master of None

Every skill for every man - that's what I always say...wait, what do I always say? Ignore that gobbledy**** and pay attention, you ever have a character who was omni-competent? Could do damn near anything? I love those types of characters. In this installment of Gamemaster's Guidepost I talk about playing a Jack of All Trades and what traits you might need.

[Kalzazz]

" . . . that most limited of all specialists, the 'well-rounded man.'" - The Great Gatsby

Its very interesting to read posts like this as they are almost opposite my view . . . . one of the big draws of GURPS when I was first getting into it, having played mainly DnD and D6 Star Wars and Shadowrun and such, was that in GURPS you could make characters with razor edge specialization, a common problem I had with DnD

One thing you didn't address in the post though I am curious about is the DX/IQ balance, a proper Omnigeneralist (at least as I have always thought of it) has both DX and IQ skills, not just IQ

A couple things I suggest for the budding Omnigeneralist to look into are Wildcards (especially at low level, a 3pt wildcard combined with a decent controlling stat is a very good way to represent Omnigeneralist levels of a wide field), also, Modular Abilities can be very nice as well. Those are things I tend to suggest

edit - of course, the term I use when complaining about it is 'Ubercompetent Omnigeneralists', and its funny to look back on now that I think of it when I have GURPS characters who have 10-20 skills or such, when I was mad about being forced to make DnD characters that had 1 skill

[Kalzazz]

One question on the Martial Arts Training (since I went back to reread it), you say (at the end) "Going this route instead of just buying more Dexterity, higher skill, or Strength is probably a better deal for someone who knows more than a few styles."

I am clearly following this poorly, since, Martial Arts Training is (unless I am reading it wrong) for _one_ style, someone who wants to be good at several styles would much prefer say, DX or buying relevant skills or ST directly, since then could use for all their styles?

edit - also not terribly relevant to GURPS, but your new kitten is awesome! Orange kitties are great. Also, vaguely relevant to RPGs, but I had a orange Beanie Baby kitten during college that was perfectly sized for the 'mini' (a little Sailor Moon toy collectible figure) for my Jedi in our D6 Star Wars game to ride on, so I kept trying to convince the DM my Jedi needed to find such a mount! (I never succeeded, because the DM thought I wanted my Jedi to literally ride a beanie baby kitten into battle, while I was thinking more like Cringer from He-Man)

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

Its very interesting to read posts like this as they are almost opposite my view . . . . one of the big draws of GURPS when I was first getting into it, having played mainly DnD and D6 Star Wars and Shadowrun and such, was that in GURPS you could make characters with razor edge specialization, a common problem I had with DnD

Oh, don't get me wrong - I love the ability and as I said the JoAT is a favorite archetype, but when I make a character I stick to the concept.

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

One thing you didn't address in the post though I am curious about is the DX/IQ balance, a proper Omnigeneralist (at least as I have always thought of it) has both DX and IQ skills, not just IQ

That's true, but IQ overshadows them all - it has 146 skills (not including specialities) - that's more than Will, Perception, Health, and Dexterity combined! (Will has 12, Perception has 12, Health has 13, and Dexterity has 93). Now my counts could be off - but I used an Excel spreadsheet so I don't think they are. Anyways, yes, this is a valid point - you need DX if you're going to be able to say I am "SUPER NPC #1 AND I HAZ ALL TEH SKILLZ."

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

A couple things I suggest for the budding Omnigeneralist to look into are Wildcards (especially at low level, a 3pt wildcard combined with a decent controlling stat is a very good way to represent Omnigeneralist levels of a wide field), also, Modular Abilities can be very nice as well. Those are things I tend to suggest

Wildcards are awesome. I love them. I have a entire file devoted to ones I create for campaigns. It's about 10,000 words long right now. :-) Modular Abilities are okay - but I think they are overused too much. Just my opinion, mind.

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

edit - of course, the term I use when complaining about it is 'Ubercompetent Omnigeneralists', and its funny to look back on now that I think of it when I have GURPS characters who have 10-20 skills or such, when I was mad about being forced to make DnD characters that had 1 skill

LOL.

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

One question on the Martial Arts Training (since I went back to reread it), you say (at the end) "Going this route instead of just buying more Dexterity, higher skill, or Strength is probably a better deal for someone who knows more than a few styles."

That's a parsing issue on my part - what I was trying to say (and failed) was if you have multiple styles you really are better off buying more DX, ST, and Skill.

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

edit - also not terribly relevant to GURPS, but your new kitten is awesome! Orange kitties are great. Also, vaguely relevant to RPGs, but I had a orange Beanie Baby kitten during college that was perfectly sized for the 'mini' (a little Sailor Moon toy collectible figure) for my Jedi in our D6 Star Wars game to ride on, so I kept trying to convince the DM my Jedi needed to find such a mount! (I never succeeded, because the DM thought I wanted my Jedi to literally ride a beanie baby kitten into battle, while I was thinking more like Cringer from He-Man)

He's smart too! He knows if I bap is his he did bad and shouldn't do it again. He also loves water (he is a weird cat), I mean he falls asleep in warm water if I hold him. Loves baths. He also likes going places. When I had to head to the doctor's the other day I put him in my jacket pocket so he could peak out and see the world as I walked and he loved it, purred the whole time. I'll probably be one of those odd cat owners who gets a walking leash so he can follow me wherever I go. He also seems to sense when my glucose gets low (which is awesome) and when I have a night terror he'll bite my ear (gently) to wake me up. I lucked out. He's mine now. :-3

[Kalzazz]

There a Thursday blog entry? I must have been confused because I thought entries came on Thursday