Bestiary comment thread

[Phil Masters]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

As there is only one fantasy setting for 4e, Banestorm, and it has goblins listed in it.

That is very very incorrect, even if you ignore all the homebrew fantasy worlds people may have developed, and refuse to class the Dungeon Fantasy setting as a “world”. And only one of those three has goblins. (Well, maybe two depending on local peasant terminology.)

[scc]

I'll start out with two statements:
1. People tend to want stats for things that don't really need stats, I don't need to know how fast a car is or how well it handles unless we get into a chase or race with it, and I don't need to know how much DR or how many HP it has until we get into a shootout or vehicular combat. And for most civilian cars will have near-identical stats. And all of what I just said applies to animals and other critters as well.
2. SJG and the products they make for GURPS in this sort of vein, that is creating IP like creatures or settings, tend to be stange and there's no guarantee that you'll be able to use them.

Originally Posted by Proteus

GURPS Aerial Adventures — with rules for dragon vs. biplane dogfights, magic spells for cloud-castle construction, etc.,

This should already be covered by existing rules.

Originally Posted by Proteus

[*]GURPS Fantasy: Familiars — with actual (not amped-up Dungeon Fantasy) versions of cats, ravens, toads, and so on, and perhaps a few oddities like hedgehogs, porcupines, or penguins?

Pretty sure the reason they where amped-up was to make them viable. If IQ had remained low players would have to contend with whatever these literal animals got up to, not fun. Other stats where raised to make them worth more then a perk, if they where raised at all.

Originally Posted by Proteus

[*]GURPS Powers: Lycanthropy — with stats for wolves, dingos, jackals, coyotes, maybe foxes, and assorted domestic canines, along with myths and mechanics?

This is really two different books.

Originally Posted by Proteus

[*]GURPS High-Tech: Safari — with rules for administering long lines of native bearers, etc., in Teddy-Roosevelt-style expeditions into deepest Africa or the Amazon, and information on exotic beasts like giraffes, rhinoceros, hippopotami, ostriches, hyenas, Komodo dragons, kangaroo, Tasmanian devils, and more?

Too niche

Originally Posted by Proteus

[*]GURPS Low-Tech: Beasts of Burden — with stats for oxen, camels, elephants, mammoths, donkeys, and various types of horses, along with amplifications for rules on barding, packing, and the like?

I think Low-Tech already covers armor, and stats are probably in Basic.

Originally Posted by Proteus

[*]GURPS Low-Tech: Farmers and Hunters — with some of the farming rules from Pyramid; stats for game animals from deer and elk to rabbits and snakes; stats for domesticated creatures like cattle, alpacas, sheep, goats, emus, pigs, turkeys, chickens, and other small fowl. Oh, and rules for Celtic cattle raids.

No actual need for stats for these

[Joseph Paul]

Originally Posted by scc

I'll start out with two statements:
1. People tend to want stats for things that don't really need stats, I don't need to know how fast a car is or how well it handles unless we get into a chase or race with it, and I don't need to know how much DR or how many HP it has until we get into a shootout or vehicular combat. And for most civilian cars will have near-identical stats. And all of what I just said applies to animals and other critters as well.

I think you are actually making the case for a bestiary.

Every time the players instigate or provoke a situation where stats are necessary to resolve play it takes away from the narrative flow to have to dig through different books looking for them or even just making them up on the spot. Having the stats compiled and accessible takes a burden off the GM for prepping for that eventuality and provides more consistency across the play sessions so they aren't surprised by animals being able to do a thing at one time and now can't because the GM is making it up differently each time.

[Black Leviathan]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

This already exists. As there is only one fantasy setting for 4e, Banestorm, and it has goblins listed in it.

I'd want much more than that..

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Phil Masters

That is very very incorrect, even if you ignore all the homebrew fantasy worlds people may have developed, and refuse to class the Dungeon Fantasy setting as a “world”. And only one of those three has goblins. (Well, maybe two depending on local peasant terminology.)

"Incorrect"? Yeah, I forgot they existed, however in the context of my statement, "and it has goblins listed in it", Discworld, the only of those three that has gobs, also has them well developed.

Alchemical Baroque and Roma Arcana are very "fill in the blanks yourself".

Other settings I forgot: Nordlond, which kinda has goblins in that it has Norðalfar and Stóralfar either of which can be 'goblinesque'; and Caverntown, which despite having 'setting' on the cover, is not a an actual setting.

Thus, I feel my statement stands: There isn't a need for a 'monsters' book that details humanoids for a setting we don't have.

Which isn't to say I'm against someone developing a vague 'D&Desque' setting and developing the need for a set of setting specific monster books that describe the cultures, habits, and niches of monsters that the setting has need of.

Originally Posted by Black Leviathan

I'd want much more than that..

To what end? We don't have a setting that has a need. Any such book written is of dubious use to the majority of GURPS GMs unless their personal worlds line up with it, so until we get a setting...