Ravens N' Pennies - GURPS Content Posts

[Christopher R. Rice]

GURPS 101: Mass and Power - What ST/HP Means To My Players

Like Doug, Jason, and Peter, I've done some review on ST and HP - rather than go their route, I decided to highlight what ST and HP mean specifically to my own players and what the typical traits/levels are in my own games.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Session Recap: The Awakening - The Night-Dimmed Day, Part III, Game Session 2

Well that's that. After nearly 156 hours of game sessions the first story arc of my ongoing weird horror campaign is finished. The PCs managed to pull off something that should have been impossible thanks to numerous critical successes - they killed a shoggoth. I blame the damn ninja. Or maybe the samurai. Or it could have been the psychic vampire. It was probably all of the above and more.

[Langy]

Originally Posted by Ghostdancer

Interesting. I, on the other hand, do my best work (as you say) off the cuff. One of the most visceral and satisfying moments of my GMing career came when the PCs learned who the Big Bad was. It was a toss up between three NPCs and a PC. The PC was so the obvious choice that when they found out it was the PC, the other players were so unbelieving it took over a hour to get back on track. One burst into tears after he realized that his fellow player tortured his character near to death (they were very close). It was highly emotional for everyone, including the PC who turned out to be the villain because even he was unsure who it was (he had some mental issues). Any time I can make someone cry over a game (in a "good" way), I'm happy as a GM.

I tend to do lots of prep-work before a campaign starts - prep work to define the world, things like that - and then run the campaign largely off of a very small set of notes. For example, the latest mission in Edgerunners has taken most of a year to run through from (mostly) one session per week, and the only real 'prep' I did for this mission was the following set of notes:

The Route:
-NorCal
-SoCal
-Rising
--Rampaging Gen-Nu Herd
--Gen-Nu Arena (If Deals With Police)
-Foundry
--Texans
-Citadel
--NorCal Police
-Omaha
-Offut Military Base
--Master Computer

Encounters:
-Nomads (Friendly)
-Scavengers/Bandits
-Gen-Nu Creatures
-Abandoned Buildings/Roadway
-Plague Zone/Minefield/Rad Zone
-Corporate Enclave
-Breakdown!

Other Groups:
-Red Riders
-Texans
-Edgerunners TV Show
-Desert Rangers

Note: FNORD

The FNORD is a one-sentence spoiler of the upcoming final session's ending. This FNORD in itself is something that I only came up with halfway through the mission, as it relies on something that I hadn't planned out prior to the mission starting. There's a little more planning than this, but it's not written down anywhere. The stuff on the Edgerunners wiki also counts as 'prep', but that's the 'before the campaign starts' kind of prep, for the most part.

The way this mission fits into the overall plot arc of the campaign was worked out with my co-GM ahead of time, but even large parts of that were invented off-the-cuff. For example, the semi-religious overtones and the recent 23 Enigma revelation were both off-the-cuff decisions. Elaboration: The mission was all about a road trip to check out the Omaha Exclusion Zone, a radioactive wasteland of a city that was destroyed a dozen years ago and is the 'El Dorado' of the current age. The big revelation is that an AI that was being tested at US Strategic Command, which is based in Offut Air Force Base in Omaha, has been preparing for the past ten years to defend the human race against some other AI intent on enslaving it. The Offut AI, called 'Mother' by her robotic creations, has the official name of 23 Enigma, the 23rd 'Enigma Machine'. 23 Enigma is also the name of a terrorist group the party encountered in the previous mission; the 23 Enigma terrorist group is actually orchestrated/led by 'Mother'. All of this is couched in semi-religious language, and the most recent session ended with the Offut AI being attacked by mysterious extremely high-tech, high-capability soldiers who came in via orbital drop pods. The only reason they were able to get in: the players mission disabled the Offut AI's defense systems.

Everything but the first sentence of that Fnord was essentially an off-the-cuff idea.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Right, but you've done a ton of prep for the world itself - so I'd like to think that you and I are similar in our GMing methods. I rarely plan more than 3,000 words for a whole arc. I like to let it evolve by itself. More fun that way. :-)

[Kalzazz]

Since Douglas Cole's blog mentioned Melee Academy and mentioned Your stolen lucky charm's article (which is the best article name ever btw) I had somehow missed I went and read it

I think the point is exceptionally well made that trying to fling raw damage downrange is a questionable use of a mages time

Unfortunately, in my experience, the battle would be long over well before the mage cast any of the spells you mentioned on the page (the fastest you calculated they would be flung would be 8 rounds . . . . its a very rare GURPS fight I've seen last 8 rounds)

For the most part, the Mage would be much better served pulling out his own gun and blasting away than casting any of them I think, he would probably be able to do more that way

However, the mage (hopefully) has a full ER pool (he should really make sure to replenish it every chance he gets if he is an Adept . . . if he is not an Adept, then spellcasting in a fight isn't happening anyway)

So, spending the time to cast a low end spell from pool could happen!

So, an example spell that a Magery 5 Mage could cast from Pool that would serve him well in a fight (and fits the Melee Academy theme!)

Melee Academy
Lesser Strengthen Mind 3
Lesser Strengthen Mind 3
Altered Traits (5) - Greater Weapon Bond
Duration (2) 10 minutes
Bestows a Bonus, Single, 2, +2 to weapon skill
14 energy
This friendly spell instantly puts the mage through a mental melee bootcamp, greatly boosting their skills with One Particular Weapon (usually the one their holding!)

(of course, a TL 8 MH spellcaster would probably overhaul the spell to work with a gun instead)


Note - for some reason I couldn't convince the spell design website to work in tidy fashion, so I hand typed that, sorry for the ugliness

[Christopher R. Rice]

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

Since Douglas Cole's blog mentioned Melee Academy and mentioned Your stolen lucky charm's article (which is the best article name ever btw) I had somehow missed I went and read it

I think the point is exceptionally well made that trying to fling raw damage downrange is a questionable use of a mages time

Unfortunately, in my experience, the battle would be long over well before the mage cast any of the spells you mentioned on the page (the fastest you calculated they would be flung would be 8 rounds . . . . its a very rare GURPS fight I've seen last 8 rounds)

Maybe my players are different or maybe I am, I've had fights last all the way up to half a minute without including lulls. My players play their character's intelligently. They are not afraid to take the time to Evaluate, Feint, work together (even if it takes them longer), etc. So in my experience this is still within the range of possibility.

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

For the most part, the Mage would be much better served pulling out his own gun and blasting away than casting any of them I think, he would probably be able to do more that way

Yeah. Which I really do not like. I've got some stuff in the works to help some mages be better "spellslingers."

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

However, the mage (hopefully) has a full ER pool (he should really make sure to replenish it every chance he gets if he is an Adept . . . if he is not an Adept, then spellcasting in a fight isn't happening anyway)

Right.

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

So, spending the time to cast a low end spell from pool could happen!

Yes. One of my players doesn't even bother to gather energy for more than one second - he just pulls from his pool or spends character points (1 point = 25 energy).

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

So, an example spell that a Magery 5 Mage could cast from Pool that would serve him well in a fight (and fits the Melee Academy theme!)

Melee Academy
Lesser Strengthen Mind 3
Lesser Strengthen Mind 3
Altered Traits (5) - Greater Weapon Bond
Duration (2) 10 minutes
Bestows a Bonus, Single, 2, +2 to weapon skill
14 energy
This friendly spell instantly puts the mage through a mental melee bootcamp, greatly boosting their skills with One Particular Weapon (usually the one their holding!)

(of course, a TL 8 MH spellcaster would probably overhaul the spell to work with a gun instead)

Interesting, but if I may point out something here - you are going around your shoulders to get to your tailbone (as my Granddaddy might say). Something like this might be better:

Melee Academy
Spell Effects: Lesser Strengthen Mind.
Inherent Modifiers: Bestows a Bonus, all rolls with one weapon.
Greater Effects: 0 (×1).

This spell gives a character +3 bonus to all rolls made with one particular weapon, including Fast-Draw, breakage, rolls to hit, rolls to damage, and so on.

Typical Casting: Lesser Strengthen Mind (3) + Bestows a Bonus, all rolls with one weapon (8) + Duration, 10 minutes (1). 12 energy (12×1).

Despite this being pretty powerful, it affects the caster, not the weapon, meaning he can only have up to two instances of this spell "on" at a time. Thus it was created using a Moderate range instead of a Broad one.

Originally Posted by Kalzazz

Note - for some reason I couldn't convince the spell design website to work in tidy fashion, so I hand typed that, sorry for the ugliness

No worries!

[Christopher R. Rice]

GURPS 101: Agility, Speed, and Reaction Time - What DX/Speed/Move Mean To My Players

Like Doug, Peter, and Jason, I've continued my review on GURPS attributes, this time DX, Basic Speed, and Basic Move. And like last time, I've highlighted what these traits mean to my players and what the typical levels are in my own games.

[Christopher R. Rice]

Session Recap: The Awakening - Christmas Slay Bells, Part I, Game Session 1

In what has become a yearly tradition, I run a "Christmas" themed game session for whatever campaign I'm running at the time. This year, I come back to a old favorite for a new campaign: Krampus. When Black Peter starts taking children that are not "naughty" the PCs intervene and attempt to stop him...

[Christopher R. Rice]

Triple Threat: Krampus

Black Peter has become strangely popular the last couple of years...so for your Yuletide Game Sessions, I present - Krampus. Merry Christmas, y'all!

[Nosforontu]

Originally Posted by Ghostdancer

Triple Threat: Krampus

Black Peter has become strangely popular the last couple of years...so for your Yuletide Game Sessions, I present - Krampus. Merry Christmas, y'all!

Looks good overall but I may have caught a typo in the build "Regeneration (Extreme; 20 HP/second)" when the build has 35 hit points kicking the regeneration up to 30 a second.