[GURPS Heart Corps] Can AI design a GURPS campaign?

[Embassy of Time]

Originally Posted by Inky

I'm not sure what you're asking for, whether you're asking for comments about the Heart Corps setting in general or about how to get the AI to do it.

Either one. Sorry if that was not made clear, my bad.

Security Level 1 might be tricky as it seems to be mostly about shady business practices on a fairly realistic level, which ChatGPT seems to be reluctant to discuss unless you keep reminding it that you're talking about a fictional company. (If you extended it to using a different text generator AI for that, you might have an easier time, I'm not sure. ChatGPT's precautions against people using it for nefarious purposes seem to be unusual).

Yes, this is a real issue! I tried doing a crime story and it refused to describe even the basics of the crime, too! I doubt it can even help with Security Level 2... Any other AI you would suggest for this?

[Pursuivant]

Originally Posted by Embassy of Time

An example of one of the things AI apparently does well is write an intro to Heart Corps so squeaky clean it is actually creepy:

No surprise given that one of the things that ChatGPT seems to do fantastically well is generate generic corporate speak. If you're looking for oily-slick advertising copy or corporate mission statements it's got you covered.

Maybe I'm jaded, but reading the ChatGPT intro for Heart Corps made me instantly think "Cult," "MLM or Ponzi scheme," or "Evil corporation gunning for a massive fraud investigation and class action lawsuit." Leave it exactly as is and see how many players' BS detectors go off.

[RyanW]

I asked ChatGPT if ChatGPT could co-author a novel, and it's response seems relevant to this thread.

As an AI language model, I am capable of generating human-like text and writing in various styles and genres. However, co-authoring a novel would require a human writer to work alongside me to provide the necessary creativity, plot development, and character building that make a novel unique and engaging.

That being said, I can certainly help with the writing process by generating ideas, suggesting plot points, and even generating some text based on prompts and guidelines given by a human writer. I can also help with the editing process by providing suggestions for improving sentence structure, grammar, and syntax.

In short, while I cannot co-author a novel on my own, I can certainly assist a human writer in creating a compelling and well-written work of fiction.

[Embassy of Time]

Currently collecting Security Level 2-4 materiaal from the AI. It gets better as I learn ho to talkto it, but stilll.... hmmm...

Originally Posted by Pursuivant

Maybe I'm jaded, but reading the ChatGPT intro for Heart Corps made me instantly think "Cult," "MLM or Ponzi scheme," or "Evil corporation gunning for a massive fraud investigation and class action lawsuit." Leave it exactly as is and see how many players' BS detectors go off.

Exactly ;)

Originally Posted by RyanW

In short, while I cannot co-author a novel on my own

AI is not a threat to creatives or intellectuals juuuust yet, me thinks.

[RyanW]

Sometimes you do have to trick it into doing what you want. When generating ideas for a hard SF campaign, it seemed to not understand that SF doesn't necessarily include FTL, and insisted on including interstellar travel through one method or another. Even when prompted to work with a SF set entirely on Earth, it seemed to want to make a generic space opera planet that had committed indentity theft.

Then I tried asking it to generate a hypothetical future history of the next hundred years, which resulted in a timeline not entirely unlike that of Transhuman Space (though very simplified), and it happily adopted that as the basis for discussion of SF. Apparently, a series of pandemics in the 40s and 50s triggers a bit of a golden age for bioengineering research.

[Embassy of Time]

Originally Posted by RyanW

Sometimes you do have to trick it into doing what you want. When generating ideas for a hard SF campaign, it seemed to not understand that SF doesn't necessarily include FTL, and insisted on including interstellar travel through one method or another. Even when prompted to work with a SF set entirely on Earth, it seemed to want to make a generic space opera planet that had committed indentity theft.

Then I tried asking it to generate a hypothetical future history of the next hundred years, which resulted in a timeline not entirely unlike that of Transhuman Space (though very simplified), and it happily adopted that as the basis for discussion of SF. Apparently, a series of pandemics in the 40s and 50s triggers a bit of a golden age for bioengineering research.

It does seem to have "triggers". While making stuff for Heart Corps,I noticed that "weird" makes it jump to interdimensional [insert whatever]s, while crime always seems to point it towards "cybercrime"/hacking, or [trigger warning] "human tr*ff*king", but it refuses to describe anything vioent or gory (for crime, haen't tested it for horror tories yet).

I am getting better at working with it, though, and there should soon be a rather massive update to Heart Corps. Stay tuned!

[Embassy of Time]

Just an update, the PDF is now 23k words / 64 pages, all world description, 80-85% AI created. I only assembled it quickly, so the layout is a mess, but my GM apprentices seemed thrilled! I'm slooooowly getting the hang of AI prompt design, and hope to get a much nicer secomd draft on the table sometimes over the next few weeks!

[Inky]

It may be a bit late to change this, but are you sure it should be Corps and not Corp? Corps sounds more like either a military division or a voluntary organisation, although the latter kind of fits Heart Corps/Corp's schtick of pretending to somehow be a voluntary organisation while at the same time obviously being a profitable business.

The "self-help" schtick combined with the ancient secret society angle reminds me a lot of those Rosicrucian adverts there seem to be a lot of in old pulp science-fiction magazines. (If you're not familiar, here's what seems to be a pretty typical Rosicrucian advert https://archive.org/details/galaxyma.../n161/mode/2up ). Maybe this was Heart Corps or their predecessors many years ago... if you take it that the advertiser really is, in fact, a secret society with mysterious age-old information, but won't necessarily give the real heavy stuff to everyone who sends off for the booklet... only to those who show promise.

I'm guessing that the various New Age items Heart Corps sell in their public outlets at Level 0 don't actually work? Maybe a little bit better than the competition (putting the research findings from Level 4 to work!), but nothing reliable enough to impress a paranormal investigator - they'd keep that stuff for the higher levels. At most, they might be a place that characters who know what they're doing could buy components - crystals, spare packs of Tarot cards, what have you - that could be used as part of something bigger.

Heart Corps's habit of building very big buildings might be quite useful to them when it comes to undue influence, actually (as well as giving them plenty of room to hide dinosaurs and aliens). (Maybe you had that in mind, I'm not sure!) It seems like they'd be likely to be one of the biggest, if not the biggest employer in any town that had an official Heart Corps store in it. That by itself might mean that local authorities would be very reluctant to start a fight with them...

ChatGPT seems to be quite efficient at turning out realistic corporate-speak - possibly a lot of that kind of thing is sort of written by a machine, in the sense of relying heavily on copy-and-paste and stock phrases, so having it written by an actual machine isn't that much different!

For the dodgy-sounding stuff, you might try this manual https://platform.openai.com/docs/gui...n/introduction about using the GPT-3 system by other means than ChatGPT - that seems to give access to the "post a chunk of text and the AI will try to continue it" mode, like Talk to Transformer (based on GPT-2) used to do. Talk to Transformer didn't seem to have many inhibitions about what it would do! Although, going by the updated PDF, it looks like you're getting somewhere with that already!

Judging by one Discord bot that seemed to be using ChatGPT in a cut-down mode rather than the full version, it also seems to give rather different answers that way - sometimes a bit less "generic", which might be useful for bits that aren't supposed to sound generic - it whereas the full version might be more efficient for bits that are! For instance, it gave these answers to your question "Write a list of ten really weird things that I might find on the shelves at the secret Illuminati shopping mall.".

1. Plutonium-Infused Healing Elixir
2. Copper-Lined Time-Traveling Suit
3. Gallows for Silent Assassins
4. Neanderthal-Engineered Artificial Intelligence
5. Crystal Skulls with Secret Messages
6. Cloaking and Mind-Control Device
7. Cognition-Enhancing Brain Implant
8. Healing Vibration Ankh of the Gods
9. Dark Matter Manipulator
10. Super Magnetic Power Gauntlets

1. An over-sized crystal ball filled with rainbow-colored water
2. A sentient robotic owl that can control the weather
3. A live Flux capacitor
4. Glowing ancient tablets inscribed with forgotten languages
5. A map of the world that lights up whenever a world leader makes a major decision
6. A pocket watch that runs on hot air
7. A levitating painting of an other-worldly landscape
8. A chalice made from the teeth of Cerberus
9. A talking briefcase that can unearth any secret
10. A 3-D printer that can print out any power or ability desired

Looks like you get a noticeably different "flavour" from that version.

[Embassy of Time]

(not sure why, but my extensive reply to this post got deleted. I'll try again...)

Originally Posted by Inky

It may be a bit late to change this, but are you sure it should be Corps and not Corp?

Sound it out loud. What does "Heart Corps" sound like?

The "self-help" schtick combined with the ancient secret society angle reminds me a lot of those Rosicrucian adverts there seem to be a lot of in old pulp science-fiction magazines. (If you're not familiar, here's what seems to be a pretty typical Rosicrucian advert https://archive.org/details/galaxyma.../n161/mode/2up ).

*sound of jaw hitting floor* WHAT IS EVEN REAL ANYMORE?!?

I'm guessing that the various New Age items Heart Corps sell in their public outlets at Level 0 don't actually work?

Not as.... advertised...

At most, they might be a place that characters who know what they're doing could buy components - crystals, spare packs of Tarot cards, what have you - that could be used as part of something bigger.

Yeeeeaaahhhh.... I definitely thought of that waaay before you mentioned it.... *scribbles notes frantically*

Heart Corps's habit of building very big buildings might be quite useful to them when it comes to undue influence, actually (as well as giving them plenty of room to hide dinosaurs and aliens).

I forgot the dinosaurs. I FORGOT THE DINOSAURS!!! And the kaiju. And l**ard pe*ple!!! WHO WILL BUILD MY ORBITAL MIND LASER NOW?!?!?

It seems like they'd be likely to be one of the biggest, if not the biggest employer in any town that had an official Heart Corps store in it. That by itself might mean that local authorities would be very reluctant to start a fight with them...

It brings a tear to my eye to read. It's so beautiful.....

ChatGPT seems to be quite efficient at turning out realistic corporate-speak - possibly a lot of that kind of thing is sort of written by a machine

So you're saying corporate employees are machines, not people? *makes quick note*

For the dodgy-sounding stuff, you might try this manual https://platform.openai.com/docs/gui...n/introduction about using the GPT-3 system by other means than ChatGPT - that seems to give access to the "post a chunk of text and the AI will try to continue it" mode, like Talk to Transformer (based on GPT-2) used to do.

You have my undivided attention. Please elaborate!

For instance, it gave these answers to your question "Write a list of ten really weird things that I might find on the shelves at the secret Illuminati shopping mall.".

Looks like you get a noticeably different "flavour" from that version.

Those examples are great! I need to know more about this!

EDIT: Added l*z*rd people. The world is in balance once more.

[Embassy of Time]

So, the final first draft is out there. I decided, without artificial help, not to do more about layout, etc., because this whole AI thing, and the bizarre setting, have grabbed me enough to go for a second, more complete draft. I want to see where this goes.....