How We're Doing Vehicles in GURPS Fourth Edition

[Chris Aylott]

There has been a lot of wondering about this, so I suppose it's time to make my first Official Comment. Keep in mind that I've been on the job two weeks and I'm not even in Austin yet. So if I get something wrong... it's my fault!

The philosophy of GURPS Fourth Edition is to get you into the game as quickly as possible, then provide the details needed to build and customize the bejeezus out of stuff. With that in mind, here's how we're doing vehicles.

1. We're hammering out internal guidelines first. This means all our writers will be able to build vehicles that are consistent with GURPS rules and make sense, in the game and in comparison with the real world. Once that job is done, writing good Vehicles material gets much easier.

2. When you open a printed Vehicles book, you're going to see a book focused on describing vehicles rather than giving rules to build them. There will also be guidelines showing you how to customize vehicles and build your own, but they're going to be a small part of the book and not a big part. If you want to create good stats fast, these are the rules you use.

3. We also know that folks want to play with the design toys, and we think that's cool. The full design system will become an e23 supplement. It'll have all the crunch anybody could want, and -- if we're really on the ball -- useful tools that you just can't put into a printed book.

When is all this happening? I don't know yet. We've got a lot of ground to make up, and the schedule is still in flux.

I can tell you that there is a lot of work to be done, and it's going to take some time. Sean and David know exactly what they want to do, though, so all we have to do is give them some breathing space in which to do it.

cheers,

[RelFexive]

As First Official Comments go, very good! Well done! :)

[Hex]

I'd rather have the crunch in the book rather than a pdf...I just don't get why you'd have a vehicles book and not have the crunchy bits included?

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Hex

I'd rather have the crunch in the book rather than a pdf...I just don't get why you'd have a vehicles book and not have the crunchy bits included?

It's a minority market. There are a lot of people who want vehicles that are either ready to use or easily customized. The space needed to describe a vehicle construction system would displace many designs for such vehicles. That would make the product less useful to the many people who don't want to do complicated design, and produce more complaints about GURPS being inaccessible and hard to use.

The people, like me, who think working with design systems is fun in its own right will be disappointed. But we're not a big enough market to sustain a gaming company. And if we get a document that contains a construction system we can use, we'll be moderately happy.

[cmdicely]

Much as I'd like the design system in print, I think this sounds like the best possible compromise to make everyone as happy as possible. Particularly if it means that the design system and tools are going to be more useful for those who want them because they won't be compromised by competing with space for the other content or trying to avoid scaring off the kind of people who mostly aren't going to want to use them anyway.

Plus, heck, even I, gearhead that I am, always thought that GURPS needed better examples and quick customization rules for vehicles.

[cmdicely]

Originally Posted by whswhs

The people, like me, who think working with design systems is fun in its own right will be disappointed. But we're not a big enough market to sustain a gaming company. And if we get a document that contains a construction system we can use, we'll be moderately happy.

Some of us will be more than moderately happy, depending on what the "useful tools you just can't put into a printed book" are.

[Chris Aylott]

Well, there are going to be times when my comment is, "No comment." I'd rather not say anything than tell you something that we're not sure of yet, or that creates false expectations.

That said, I'm a firm believer in "tell people what you're going to do, do it, and then tell them what you've done." Barring a few nightmare scenarios that I don't care to think about, this is what we're going to do.

best wishes,

[Luther]

Hi Chris,

thanks for the head-up. I was in the camp proposing a book with both a VDS and a catalog, so your news don't sound really exciting to me! However I understand that SJG have better inside knowledge than me and that choice was surely well thought.

That said, I'm a bit concerned about one thing. The complete rules, scheduled as e23 supplement, will be more detailed and complex than the internal guidelines you are going to develop. This means vehicles written by authors before the VDS release could end up being inconsistent or worst incompatible with the full blown system.

How will you avoid such problem?

[Andrew Hackard]

Originally Posted by Luther

That said, I'm a bit concerned about one thing. The complete rules, scheduled as e23 supplement, will be more detailed and complex than the internal guidelines you are going to develop. This means vehicles written by authors before the VDS release could end up being inconsistent or worst incompatible with the full blown system.

How will you avoid such problem?

I'm not speaking for Chris, but the way I would handle it would be to say, explicitly, that the detailed VDS might not produce the same results as appear in the less-refined version. "Rounding errors," if you like. I really don't think it's a big problem; if you like the detailed version, use that, and if you don't, use the other.

[Luther]

Originally Posted by Andrew Hackard

I'm not speaking for Chris, but the way I would handle it would be to say, explicitly, that the detailed VDS might not produce the same results as appear in the less-refined version. "Rounding errors," if you like. I really don't think it's a big problem; if you like the detailed version, use that, and if you don't, use the other.

Rounding errors aren't really a problem, but inconsistencies and incompatibilities are. It would be better to release the VDS first, and then produce the vehicles catalog. With all the experience gained during development, a simplified system will be much more solid.