My 5th Edition Wish List

[GameBuddah]

I was recently thinking about what I would look for in GURPS 5th Edition, and here's what I came up with.

1) Consolidate the powers book into the characters book.
2) Depreciate the classic magic system out of the core book.
3) Re-build the classic magic system as an implementation of the powers system.
4) Have everything, and I mean everything, derived from the core rule book power system.

Also, here's my wish list item for GURPS.

In Hero, there is a book called the UNTIL Super Powers Database. We need something like this for GURPS, not just for Super Powers, but for all sorts of powers, with examples from media and fiction.

[Lord Carnifex]

Originally Posted by GameBuddah

In Hero, there is a book called the UNTIL Super Powers Database. We need something like this for GURPS, not just for Super Powers, but for all sorts of powers, with examples from media and fiction.

This may not happen real soon - many, many intellectual property gremlins would need slaying first.

Wait, 'gremlin' isn't copyrighted by Warner Brothers or anything, right?

[Grouchy Chris]

I think they should convert to the metric system, d10s, and a square combat grid.

Okay, I don't really want any of those things. But unless they're going to do something at least that radical, I see no need for a 5th edition.

[GameBuddah]

Originally Posted by GameBuddah

In Hero, there is a book called the UNTIL Super Powers Database. We need something like this for GURPS, not just for Super Powers, but for all sorts of powers, with examples from media and fiction.

Agreed, Kromm and I discussed doing a Who's Who in Fiction book, and the technical problems thereof. However, it would be good to have real examples of how a power manifests in the source material, and then a worked example of how to model that in GURPS.

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by GameBuddah

I was recently thinking about what I would look for in GURPS 5th Edition, and here's what I came up with.

3) Re-build the classic magic system as an implementation of the powers system.

If 5th edition won't be published until this is done we'll never see 5th edition.

It doesn't really work in Hero and I've run Fantasy Hero. FH mages end up having what are effectively 3 to 6 super powers and their isn't really much reason to not to vary the spell details on an individual character basis.

So you already have what you need for "Magic as Powers" _characters_. I have no faith in the ability to create a "Magic as Powers" based _system_. Certainly not one with the equivalent of 800 spells.

I have seen _years_ of multiple proposals to design Magic as Powers" systems and very very little has come of them,

[sgt.sargent]

Magic as powers is a nice idea in theory, but I don't see that SJ Games would get sufficient return on the substantial time investment it would take to really flesh that out. Disappointing I know, I'd like to see it to, but I don't think we will see it happen.

Rolling additions from sources such as Powers in to the Characters book seems like a good idea to me, as I've enjoyed the equivalent in fourth edition (a lot of what's in Characters is basically copied in from several third edition sources).
I would rather see this idea go even further, with so much brought in from what's now secondary sources that it would probably end up three books or more. I personally prefer idea, as I said in the 4.5e thread a few days ago, of something like a book for character creation, a book for campaign running, and a book for equipment creation (instead of all these low-tech armor, Deadly Spring, etc. rules scattered to the four winds), with free "lite" supplements outlining IW (basically the IW chapter torn from Characters), DF, and other settings, along with lite combat rules and a set of lite equipment lists (built using the equipment creation rules) available online, alongside links to order the full products.

[trooper6]

Originally Posted by GameBuddah

I was recently thinking about what I would look for in GURPS 5th Edition, and here's what I came up with.

1) Consolidate the powers book into the characters book.
2) Depreciate the classic magic system out of the core book.
3) Re-build the classic magic system as an implementation of the powers system.
4) Have everything, and I mean everything, derived from the core rule book power system.

That would make me sad. If I wanted to play in the Hero system, I'd play in the hero system. But I like playing GURPS, and GURPS does have skills, and skills are one of my favorite parts of GURPS. Y'all have got all sorts of resources to do your all-powers-all-the-time thing now, why take away the options for other people to enjoy GURPS as well?

[Turhan's Bey Company]

Originally Posted by trooper6

If I wanted to play in the Hero system, I'd play in the hero system.

This. The advantage/disad/enhancement/limitation system is fine and good, but it's just one possible approach to making things work. I like skill-based approaches a lot for some substantial areas [1]. Putting everything into the powers framework would feel like a straightjacket, making everything conform to a particular rules regime because you can, not because you should.


1. Martial arts abilities, for example. And, yes, I really like it for magic systems, and I'm specifically quite fond of the long prerequisite chain, skill based magic system GURPS has had since first edition.

[NorphTehDwarf]

Originally Posted by trooper6

That would make me sad. If I wanted to play in the Hero system, I'd play in the hero system. But I like playing GURPS, and GURPS does have skills, and skills are one of my favorite parts of GURPS. Y'all have got all sorts of resources to do your all-powers-all-the-time thing now, why take away the options for other people to enjoy GURPS as well?

Even if SJG went to a fifth edition, they wouldn't confiscate our 4e books.

...

Hopefully.

[jeff_wilson]

Originally Posted by GameBuddah

I was recently thinking about what I would look for in GURPS 5th Edition, and here's what I came up with.

1) Consolidate the powers book into the characters book.
2) Depreciate the classic magic system out of the core book.

There has to be some kind of ready-to-zap magic system to serve fantasy groups, and it is useful to all players in the group to have it. The stuff in POWERS is primarily useful to superhero GMs, which is a much smaller audience, and it takes up a book of its own as it is.

Would you be able to talk even 1/10 of the people at your local game shop into spending $80 for a GM's book or $40 for a players book for a "universal" game with no spells or monsters in either?

EDIT for disclosure: I was one of the boosters for including smaller bites or more diverse offerings in the 4/E basic set during playtest, and we carried the day with "more options, more possibilities" as our slogan, so that's why (IMO) there's the classic spell magic list *and* a way to make it a kind of ritual magic and path magic *and* a psionics chapter *and* the huge alphabetized lists of advantages and modifiers. But there are still way too many bears.