Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

We are seeking playtesters for GURPS Furries, by William H. Stoddard. This is a moderately long guide to the furries/anthropomorphics genre, including an extensive list of "furry" templates for GURPS.

A major focus of this playtest will be checking the templates for correct point values, legality under the standard rules of GURPS, and suitability of design to the underlying concept. Familiarity with the GURPS Basic Set and with GURPS Template Toolkit 2: Races is vital for this process. Knowledge of anthropomorphic material in graphic novels, animation, art, and other media, and of its historical sources and inspirations, is also important. Templates will prioritize fidelity to this material over scientific accuracy, and general discussion also needs to be checked against it. Playtest experience is desirable, but space will be available for participants new to playtesting.

The playtest is currently scheduled to run for about five weeks, from July 10 to August 17, 2020.

Preferential playtest slots will be given to those who have spent at least $50 on PDFs from Warehouse 23 in the past calendar year, though this is not a requirement. For more, see the general playtest information page.

Prospective playtesters should email Roger Burton West at pt-furries@firedrake.org with [playtest] in the subject. Include your preferred email address for the closed playtest mailing list, your name as you wish it to appear in the published supplement, your Warehouse 23 login name, and a few words on why we should pick you: qualifications, experience, current gaming group(s), etc. Please submit in this format:

We look forward to hearing from you!

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

This is amazing. I've been waiting for this for such a long time, and William is such a great writer.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Looking forward to this. Wish I had the time to playtest it.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I just deleted a “hurr, hurr, furries” post from someone who should have known better make.

Consider this your general warning: This is neither the time nor the place for posters to make jokes at the expense of people who have a hobby you may not share, approve of, or understand. These comments will be deleted and the posts will receive infractions or bans depending on the severity.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I think the title "GURPS Furries" is a little misleading. At least for me, furries are the fandom members as opposed to Anthros or Fursonas, which I hear more often when the characters in question are concerned. I'm not saying the title should be "GURPS Anthros" or "Anthropomorphics", but maybe the plain furries is shifting the focus for some.

Anyway, best of luck to the playtesters. I hope many people who are part of the fandom can take part in this, even if there is more stat-checking involved than fandom questions.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

That's an interesting question of semantics. I"m accustomed to the members of the fandom being called "furry fans." What the fictional characters are to be called might be argued (and might have changed over the past few years, when I haven't been attending fannish events), but it seems as if a "furry fan" is logically a fan of "furries," Q.E.D. But actual usage prevails over logical deduction.

Would you call the fictional characters "anthropomorphics," "funny animals," "furries," or something else?

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Depends on the nature but generally I would call fictional characters anthrophomorphics. It fits along with anthropomorphism of concepts and natural forces.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

In d20 Modern, there were the Moreaus.

But good connotations or bad, Furry has more name recognition.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Well, yes, but on the other hand, that usage is different from the usage specifically for characters such as Usagi Yojimbo or Judy Hopps, or before them Bugs Bunny or Pogo Possum. Dream of the Endless is described by his big sister as an "anthropomorphic personification," but he's not *specially* appealing to furry fans. So I wonder if GURPS Anthropomorphics would imply the wrong subject matter to readers who aren't furry fans?

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

It very well might, hence those qualifiers I used. It really depends on usage and audience and I dont know enough of the books content at this point to gauge or calibrate my thoughts really well.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Pretty much this. It isn't as if we didn't discuss titles at length, but the only word all of those involved knew – setting aside their feelings about it – was "furry." Somehow, I think we'll be okay.

(I'd compare it to "dungeon fantasy": Yeah, it provokes off-color jokes about how well-equipped this dungeon you're fantasizing about is, and what fantasies come to life there, but in a gaming context everybody understands what it means.)

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I'll chime in and say I'm honestly confused by what is intended by the term 'furries' here. Am I right in assuming the book is about fictional adventures of anthropomorphic animal-like characters and NOT about people in the real world who socialize in animal-like costumes?

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

The book is about anthropomorphic animals as characters in a fictional world that has such things, be they Egyptian-esque animal-headed humans, fantasy beasts that talk and walk upright, uplifted animals, "toons," or something else again.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Ouch, sorry. Didn't intend to hijack the thread. I just go by my non-native speaker usage and that might be biased by the rest of my hermeneutic background. And yeah Anthros is what I mainly hear, but it leads you into exactly the opposite direction if you are not in the know.

Good one!

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

No worries. It was a fair thing to wonder about, and it gave me an opening to clarify some (and to drop a bad joke).

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I don't think you did. It's a relevant question, one that needed to be considered, and it's one we can discuss here without anyone having read the manuscript. No harm done.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I was a little worried at first, as I usually encounter the term "Furry" as being "people who socialize (and go farther than that) wearing animal costumes (usually homemade) and generally honestly believe 'I am an $animal* stuck in a human skin, and the fursona is the true me'."

As this will be covering more of the Bugs Bunny and Ninja Turtles types rather than Fursona types, all is good, and I may actually pick it up. Maybe. (Still a low priority, IMO.) If it adds traits like "retractable head", though, it may be more useful to me.


* Sometimes believing themselves to be fictional/mythological creatures such as unicorns and dragons Fsckin' furries

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

You may have a broader set of life experiences than some other people.

I had no trouble at all decoding "Furries" to mean "anthropomorphic animals" perhaps because I was thinking in a fiction and rpg contest. Whereas "Gurps Anthros" makes me think of Margaret Mead in an Indiana Jones costiume.

You could call it "Boardroom and Curia II" so as to force anyone wondering what the book was about to read the blurb. :)

I certainly haven't thought of a better name yet.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

(1) I have met people in that subculture. They're part of the target market for this book, in the same way that otherkin who think they are really elves are part of the target market for GURPS Fantasy. Their kinkier interests are not part of its subject matter; GURPS isn't that kind of game. On the other hand, there are people like me, who follow some furry fiction, comics, and animation and own some furry art, and who might also be part of the target market for this book, who don't fit the stereotype you're referring to.

(2) It seems to me that most readers can figure out that human fans of furry material neither need as elaborate a set of rules and templates to be roleplayed as anthropomorphized animals, nor are as likely to have adventures that most people would be interested in roleplaying; so they would be less likely to be the subject of a GURPS supplement.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

IMHO "Anthropomorphics" might have been better, though it could have caused people to think it was about anthropomorphic personifications (e.g. Death from Discworld) rather than anthropomorphic animals.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

It's a bit of a mouthful, and I think anyone who makes the appropriate association between "anthropomorphics" and "human-like animal characters" is probably going to make the association between "furries" and the same at least as readily. Honestly, the only misconception I can see happening with the current title is someone thinking it's a book about Furry Fans, and I don't think it's much of a stretch to assume most people who would a) make this mistake and b) would have an interest in the actual book will quickly realize that making an entire rulebook about such folks doesn't make any sense (as already noted).

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Kromm has already explained that the title went through a lot of internal discussion and Furries was considered the best title to describe the content in a way understandable to the most people. If that title is a deal breaker for anyone, I'd suggest not applying for the playtest, because the title is exceedingly unlikely to change at this very late date. Regardless, though, we can consider it a dead issue here.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

When I went to college, I met a young woman who claimed she was half sky elf from her father's side. I never did find out what she claimed a sky elf was. But then again, my nickname then was "Spock," I wore a stocking cap everywhere, and had people convinced I had pointed ears....

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Just adding my voice to the chorus. But when I saw GURPS Furries, I knew immediately what the book would be about. While it could be argued whether GURPS Anthros or GURPS Anthropomorphics are or are not technically more accurate, my first reaction would likely have been "what on Earth is that?"

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I must say that I would resist calling it GURPS Anthros; seeing the Greek root mutilated like that is painful.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Just because I can't resist looking things up and then spreading it around, here's a reference to "furry" going back to 1994:

'(Jefferson) Swycaffer’s (1994) article is itself in two parts. He first defines ‘Furry Fandom’ as “the organised appreciation and dissemination of art and prose regarding ‘Furries,’ or fictional mammalian anthropomorphic characters.”'

http://www.anthrozine.com/site/lbry/yarf.reviews.b.html

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I saw this post and immediately thought of the game Albedo from the 80's and thought "Except it's Gurps so it'll be more than sci-fi..."
I personally would love to run a game based on Rock & Rule but I'm a nostalgic nerd.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

As someone who never has heard the term "furry" used for anything other than people who wear animal costumes, I had no problem figuring out what this book was going to be about.

But perhaps that was because Steven said "Familiarity with the GURPS Basic Set and with GURPS Template Toolkit 2: Races is vital for this process. Knowledge of anthropomorphic material in graphic novels, animation, art, and other media, and of its historical sources and inspirations, is also important. Templates will prioritize fidelity to this material over scientific accuracy, and general discussion also needs to be checked against it."

Or perhaps because I've allowed and created anthropomorphic races for my games for some time now.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Interesting to see you mention him! He and I have known each other for decades now; when I lived in San Diego he played in many of my campaigns, and had many arguments about politics—one year he and I agreed to meet for a pillow-fight after a particularly heated argument. Both of us were paying attention to furry material a decade before the article you refer to. . . .

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Is this synchronicity, or do I have Hidden Lore? (Actually, I had no idea of the connection).

I do think, though, that some political debates might be improved with a little pillow fighting....

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I have to say, Jefferson and I were a lot less cranky with each other after ours.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I'd be very interested in doing this part, but my knowledge of anthropomorphic material in graphic novels, animation, art, and other media is as limited as it can be while still being a gamer.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

That doesn't have to prevent you from applying, though of course we'll take it into account.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

And don't forget Thundercats (the first two iterations); that's definitely in the realm of GURPS Furries.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I'm curious how much of the Sliding Scale of Anthropomorphism the book will cover.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

The focus will be levels 3–8. But I expect to look a little above and below.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Looking forward to this because I want to update my 3rd edition adventure I ran a Gencon many years ago. It was called "A furry thing happened to me on the way to the spaceport." Basically inspired by the Albedo comic.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

That's about the range I was hoping for.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Why not call it something like GURPS: Animalfolk/Animal People? It describes the content without risking any associations with the reputation of the Furry Fandom.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I think the audience of this is made up partly of people who belong to that fandom, and partly of people who appreciate the material and are not deterred from doing so by anyone's reputation. So I personally prefer to have a title that will appeal to them and make it clear what this book is about. If it were established that furry fans themselves took such a title as offputting or offensive, that would be a reason to think about other titles; negative reactions from people who want to keep their distance from furriness aren't such a concern.

Secondarily, "animalfolk" might invite the supposition that this book is about otherkin. And that's certainly not the case. We have GURPS Powers: Totems and Nature Spirits for that. (Hmmm, got to add a cross-reference to that book!)

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Yes, please do. Totems and Nature Spirits definitely covers related but different ground.

As a more general question, how long does SJG leave a Call for Playtesters open? And how long after the call is sent out does a playtest typically start?

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Honestly, I don't see the point in a name change. GURPS Furries will appeal to the furry/anthro crowd quite well, and those who would get "turned off" by the title are usually the kind who don't have an interest in Furry RPG campaigns to begin with.

I'm curious about joining the Playtest (and will definitely buy this book the moment it's released), but I don't know if my usual gaming group will be interested.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I don't know if there's a rule. I'm giving it a couple of extra days in case anyone else might want to apply, but I expect to make a decision soon. The announced start date was 10 July, and I don't know that we're even thinking about moving it closer.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

The Tabaxi, Vargr, and Cidi are all furries. Furries show up a lot in settings that aren't furry settings. In fact one of the things I did in one fantasy game I toyed with after Biotech came out was to toy with the idea of a stereotypical Dark Lord using biotech magic to uplift wolves as a replacement for orcs.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Agreed, GURPS Furries is probably a good enough descriptor that those into the genre as books or animated media will get most of it. Though I dont think of Bugs as a furry its probably because I grew up on those cartoons and think of them ass Toons. I do think of Thundercats, Albedo, Zootopia as furries though.
As for those who dress up in real life I dont seem them minding either and I hope some will be lured into GURPS by the title. Depending on the content I expect to circulate it among my furrie friends.
Also good point on Anthrophormic being a bad fit from a literal and accuracy point, already knew it was a bad fit marketing wise.
Finally, thanks for the call out to GURPS Totem and Nature spirits, to date I think it has the most animal powered templates in GURPS and a lot of that material should be useful for prebuilt abilities and inspiration- some tweaking likely required.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

At this point, let's please drop discussions of the title. We discussed the title to death internally and concluded that we can take it as read that:

• "Furries" is far easier to say, write, read, and lay out on a page than "anthropomorphics" (which should by rights be "anthropomorphic animals," which is even more unwieldy).
  
  
• "Furry" and "furries" were being used to refer to anthropomorphic animals at least three years before becoming shorthand for "furry fandom" (fans of said characters), of which the people in fursuits are only a subset, of whom those who fetishize fursuits are an even smaller subset.
  
  
• No gamer is really, truly not going to "get it" unless being disingenuous.

Disputing any of that veers into "Ackchyually . . ." territory, so we can just let it go. Thanks in advance!

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I have Jadeclaw campaign setting and, although I have never convinced my group to play it, I have always thought it was very nice. I think furry territorry has not been very explored and there are lots of good histories waiting to be told. A "furry" fantasy setting, furry fantasy martial arts, furry super or furry urban fantasy.


Even there are some settings where some "furriness" can be added without much difficulty. In a fantasy setting dog/wolf folk or cat folk or fox folk can be added. In a "dragon ball" world exists some furry people also.


I probably buy the book as soon as it is launched.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

At this point we have enough applicants so that we could choose a list and get things started, and applications have been tapering off. If you want to take part, but haven't applied yet, you should do so today, 1 July; we'll still consider applications that come in today, but after that, we'll want a really convincing application to add you. At this point about half the applicants are fairly new to playtesting, so don't hesitate if it's just that you haven't done it before; that's not a deal-breaker.

Thanks!

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I'm going to buy it, obviously.

Just wondering if it will cover animal uplifts well?

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

They'll be discussed, but they won't be the main focus.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Smart quadrupeds seem to be out of the target range. Genetic tinkering is of course a totally reasonable pretext for smart bipedal wolves and cats.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Hmmm...this may be useful for a Dungeon Fantasy adventure with Narnia-style talking animals I've been considering...

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I think there are maybe three templates for smart quadrupeds.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Likewise, my wife isn't terribly interested in RPGs in general, but she loved the one-shot GURPS adventure I did featuring the adventures of a squirrel saving her forest from a rotting hill giant's corpse, and she's been asking me to write up a sequel.

I was using Bunnies and Burrows, but it got a bit confusing, especially as I kept all the stats human-level, so most of the squirrel's friends had ST scores of around 1 or 2.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I think this may be one of those "sleeper" works - at first glance, it will only appeal to a subset of users. But when you stop and think about it, this work may be very useful in a variety of genres. For example, how many alien races in SF are re-skinned anthropomorphic animals?

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Personally, I think this could open up a new market for GURPS. There's tons of RPG gamers in the Furry community, although we've mostly made due with a few Anthro races in D&D-based games for the most part, or admittedly niche games like Ironclaw.

GURPS, with it's much more open character creation system, would be perfect for a kind of rpg campaign that involves creating one's ideal, customized in-game persona, so why not cater to them?

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I think part of the reason why Template Toolkit 2 was referenced in the call is because it contains a lot of useful meta-traits: Furries are primarily anthropomorphic animals; but add appropriate morphology meta-traits, and you could use it to play something like the Rats of NIMH or The Lion King. Toss in a suitable Mentality Meta-Trait, and you have Watership Down. Throw in the Animated Character Meta-Trait, and you have Looney Tunes. This would let GURPS Furries focus more on the roleplaying aspects of these things, while reserving the crunch space for various “kinds of animals” meta-traits assumed at humanoid characters: feline, canine, bovine, etc. While the focus, again, will be on humanoid characters, I could see it working quite well as a substitute of sorts for GURPS Bestiary.

(In terms of “The Rats of NIMH” et al, I'm hoping that it will have a rules section along the lines of the “When We Were Small” Pyramid article; but if not, perhaps a GURPS Furries: Bunnies and Burrows supplement could be developed.)

(And in terms of Loony Tunes, a reference to Power-Ups 5: Impulse Buys and some guidance about how to use those rules to promote and empower cartoon mayhem could allow GURPS Furries to double as GURPS Toon, with only a paragraph or two of Toon-specific material.)

My point is that GURPS Furries looks to me to be a very useful book, with gaming benefits well beyond its nominal subject matter.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

OK...I just had a funky idea for a Dungeon Fantasy game where a curse turns the adventurers into animals for a while. Could make an interesting adventure!

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Or just go with a dungeon fantasy variance for the humans, elves, dwarves, and so on are replaced by furries.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Yeah...but it's more fun surprising players with an unexpected transformation...

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

There is a published long ago D&D adventure where the PCs are the animals of a missing wizard and are looking for him. Cat, dog, horse, two birds I think.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Just so you all know, Roger and I have submitted a list to Steven Marsh, and things will be getting started over the next few days. Thank you all! We're going to try to make this the best possible treatment of its topic, whatever you personally like to call it . . .

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I trust one of them is ponies.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Earth, unicorn, or pegasus?

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Probably, with the ever-elusive unipeg (or what does MLP call it?) as a lens?

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

Alacorn.

And I'd think all of them would be lenses, or Earth Pony would be the base with the others as lenses.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I'm guessing that they're more likely to have an equine template, which you can then add the quadropad metal traits to — along with suggestions for size for horses and ponies. Possibly with lenses for unicorn a door Pegasus on top of that.

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

I was looking for GURPS material that covered anthropomorphic animals and here I am, finding out they are actually releasing a book about it! Too bad I missed out on the playtest. When is it expected to be released?

Re: Call for Playtesters: GURPS Furries
 

This months Gurps news today says

Bill Stoddard's GURPS Furries is queued for editing. We've assigned an editor, so it's mostly a matter of finding time.