GURPS Monster Hunters 5: Applied Xenology

[PK]

Not all myths are old;
Not all knights come from the past;
Evil's time is now.

— Not Your Usual Poet

The champions of GURPS Monster Hunters have long been embracing the supernatural in order to combat it. Holy crusaders and wise witches fight alongside well-equipped commandos and techies to save our world from demons, vampires, and worse. But The Enemy is not limited to creatures from ancient myth and legend . . . and hunters can find more to draw upon than paranormal power.

GURPS Monster Hunters 5: Applied Xenology gives your game new options -- some focusing on the scientific side of The Mission, but others existing just to expand your horizons! Upgrade your champions with new lenses and choices: Play a commando obsessed with unraveling conspiracies . . . or a sage who's brilliant with a soldering iron instead of a spellbook . . . or a warrior who relies on just one signature weapon (perhaps a TL10 superfine vibroblade?) rather than being a master of all.

If you're a fan of Ritual Path magic, whether from Monster Hunters or GURPS Thaumatology: Ritual Path Magic, prepare for a high-tech upgrade with technomagic. Technomages code their spells as programs, empowering their computers to do the casting for them. These spell-scripts can be emailed to friends, stored by the hundreds on removable media, and (with luck and skill) run multiple times before losing their energy. Technomages may be the perfect fusion of modern gear and ancient power; underestimate them at your peril.

Of course, this all wouldn't be as much fun without things trying to kill you, and Applied Xenology offers The Enemy in spades. If you prefer intelligent aliens to hang conspiracies on, the Greys, Nordics, and Reptoids are custom-made for that. Perhaps you just want terrifying space monsters like the Devourers, Insectoids, and Phasites? Should the Stalkers turn the tables on your champions by hunting the hunters? Or are the most terrifying threats the unseen plagues, like the Brain Flu, Cybercytes, or Husk Virus? Heck, we've even included advice on meshing the old-school monsters with these modern ones, in case the GM is worried about genre clashes. And needless to say, all of these horrifying aliens can be used in any campaign -- consider the second half of this work "GURPS Monsters from Space" if you will.

The setting of Monster Hunters is finally fleshed out along both the "supernatural" and "scientific" axes -- the latter covering everything from Aliens to Predator to Primeval -- all in the ready-to-use format that you're used to. The world just became a scarier place; you're already used to looking around you for threats, now get used to looking to the sky as well.

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[ham2anv]

If this had included cryptids, it would be literally everything I've wanted since The Enemy came out. As it is, it's still 100% awesome.

[Langy]

Excellent stuff. I saw a lot of the influences going into it, and I liked what I saw. This really makes me want to make an X-Files/X-COM hybrid game (one I had already planned out a little tiny bit way back when but never got around to playing); always a good sign.

[Pragmatic]

Originally Posted by PK

If you're a fan of Ritual Path magic, whether from Monster Hunters or GURPS Thaumatology: Ritual Path Magic, prepare for a high-tech upgrade with technomagic. Technomages code their spells as programs, empowering their computers to do the casting for them. These spell-scripts can be emailed to friends, stored by the hundreds on removable media, and (with luck and skill) run multiple times before losing their energy. Technomages may be the perfect fusion of modern gear and ancient power; underestimate them at your peril.

Funnily enough, I got the first three or four books of the Laundry Files on audiobook.

The thought of a technomage terrifies me. :-)

(Think "accidentally summon Cthulhu"...)

[Michele]

The truth is out there, and we can kill it.

[Mailanka]

I've wanted to run Black Ops with Monster Hunters for ages. And going over the table of contents, I also see plenty of opportunities to pillage this for my Cabal game (You can never have enough Ultraterrestrial inspiration). This is more than Black Ops, then, it's also a bit of Atomic Horror. Well done!

[Celti]

It figures this comes out just as I'm finishing up my own RPM-based technomagic system. Time to start re-writing based on new input, I guess...

[GM Joe]

Originally Posted by Celti

It figures this comes out just as I'm finishing up my own RPM-based technomagic system. Time to start re-writing based on new input, I guess...

Thanks for making this project happen! :)

(If all Californians would get their cars washed on the same day, I think the drought would end.)

[Langy]

BTW, I really like the aliens this book has in it. Great stuff. The only alien race I'm not keen on is the Nordics - I'm just not a big fan of Aliens Who Look Like Us.

[PK]

First off, thanks to everyone for the kind words!

Originally Posted by Langy

Excellent stuff. I saw a lot of the influences going into it, and I liked what I saw. This really makes me want to make an X-Files/X-COM hybrid game

Originally Posted by Mailanka

This is more than Black Ops, then, it's also a bit of Atomic Horror.

I tried my best to wear my influences on my sleeve, and keep my references as thinly veiled as possible. Glad to see that it worked! :)

Originally Posted by Celti

It figures this comes out just as I'm finishing up my own RPM-based technomagic system. Time to start re-writing based on new input, I guess...

Isn't that always the way it seems to work out? On the bright side, I'm sure that between what you've already come up with and my take on it, you can synthesize something even more awesome than what either of us would come up with individually!

Originally Posted by Langy

BTW, I really like the aliens this book has in it. Great stuff. The only alien race I'm not keen on is the Nordics - I'm just not a big fan of Aliens Who Look Like Us.

I can understand that. I considered just saying that they used MIs to look like us, but really the whole mythos of Nordics is "beautiful humans" so I embraced that instead with the "genetic modification" angle. That said, it's simple enough to reverse that assumption. Either way, I think their niche as Master Manipulators of the Masses (and intergalactic drug lords) keeps 'em interesting. :)

An interesting (if un-fun) behind-the-scenes note is that the real reason Nordics are always depicted as "beautiful Aryan humans" by the alien conspiracy nuts is that so many of 'em are racist as hell. I spent a lot of time crawling through Believer/UFOlogy boards when writing this book, and the most common take on the Nordics is "hyper-evolved humans, which is the reason why they're invariably Aryan in appearance." (Of course, the second most common take is the one I took, which is that we can't trust 'em.) My reviewers suggested that I go to lengths to make it clear that Nordics have a wide range of human appearances, specifically to avoid accidentally dragging any racist taint into this book. :P

(And taking this in a third direction, the Subgenius mythos instead parodies that view by reversing it, depicting the "Xists" as formless blobs of disgusting goo which we're somehow insanely attracted to due to buried impulses in our animalistic hindbrains.)