Questions GURPS-wise
 

Hi,

I may have posted once or twice before. However, I've had problems with the GURPS mechanics about skills. If there is a thread that can answer this, please forgive me and please link me to the following threads. Let me explain first my problem.

I've been hammering away on my world-building; obviously working on everything that my hands could practically work on. When I came up with some reading on skills, I was stumped. I was working on both occupational templates and deciding on what the game world would require on the basis of skill use.

I'd go for relative skills with attributes since without talents, your skills are dependent on how well you do; with talents, it helps improves your odds in combat. I'm more of a GURPS player that prefers realism with some favoring odds and some hurting to feel like it can happen in real life vs. cinematic realism where shootouts last longer, feels like a cheesy action movie.

Only problem with the screws in my head is I'm wondering about the skills. Do you have to buy up the skill levels from zero to whichever you must purchase to? For 3e, a friend of mine was able to help me get started on my first GURPS campaign (which he created and still going). He had skill costs which came with GURU. How then do you know how much does a skill cost? If there is a cost, then is there a base level for a skill to be built from? Kind of like what you do with your attributes. ST 10, DX 10, IQ 10, HT 10 and then purchase + or - depending on cost, that kind of thing.

Any suggestions?

Another thing. I even tried my first hand on advantages. A particularly new type of advantage.

Say I wanted to create an advantage based on a binary language. Really. The advantage requires that the race have a spoken binary language. However, I've been able to pour my time into the Basic Set to find the proper advantages with certain limitations and enhancements.

I found that I wanted to change Mindlink to Datalink, a robotic form of Mindlink. So I changed it, but here came the catch. Mindlink said you had to have a permanent link to a person. I'd be willing to specify the user of Datalink would be linked to an AI Core program. The range between the user and the AI Core program requires it be very long. Let me explain.

A Platform ship capable of carrying an AI Core program within itself is capable of sending binary-coded battleplans to its recievers, establishing that communications is not a problem. However, the communications established between the parent AI Core program and the receivers can be very long as the Platform ship would normally be in orbit around a planet while the recievers do make planetfall when necessary.

By making planetfall, the recievers are able to move as a single-minded army; however, the AI Core is capable of producing thousands of tactical options based on binary alone depending on how the planet is. I do not know how far the range should be because I am not quite mathematical in this aspect.

By adding Datalink to Wordpad, I was able to add another advantage as a prerequisite of Datalink, Obscure (Binary) (Stealthy), to determine that the binary code language cannot be detected by the five senses of a humanoid race.

Linking Datalink (Mindlink version) Digital Mind, Increased Range (Enhancement), and Preparation Required (Limitation) altogether makes for the Hidden AI Communications advantage; however, I am not so sure if it would work if I specified that the recievers of battleplans can be prepared for battle synchronization in 1 minute, resulting in a No Movement penalty for a turn when coming across combatants or percieved threats hence why I thought I should add Preparation Required.

The overall picture of the advantage was to present the idea that the recievers are not like humanoids, and always must prepare themselves for battle synchronization a minute when coming across percieved threats or pockets of combatants.

I would like some input from some of the experienced GURPS players who may have tinkered with advantages before. Perhaps it'll be useful to learn from some of you while I keep building my own game world.

Thank you!

Re: Questions GURPS-wise
 

What you're buying, in a way, is a bonus to an attribute. You don't buy a skill up from, say, zero to twelve. Rather, you're buying a skill level relative to an underlying attribute. Let's say that you want to buy Broadsword skill. Broadsword, reading the description, is a DX-based skill. Your skill, then, is a consequence of the number of points you spend on the skill and your DX. 2 points gets you DX+0, so if your DX is 10 and you spend two points, you have Broadsword-10. If your DX is 12 and you spend 2 points on it, you have Broadsword-12.

You'll need to disentangle the in-game effect and the underlying justification. As I understand what you've written, the fact that this advantage happens to use a binary language is essentially a special effect. What it does, in game terms, is to allow rapid, stealthy communication with other characters who have the same advantage. Is that what you're after?

Re: Questions GURPS-wise
 

Thanks alot for the help on skills. One thing. For any skill you purchase, they're always 2 points or can the GM dictate how much it costs?

For the advantage I wrote on this topic, yes, does allow for rapid, stealthy communications. I did also intend some drawbacks for the characters such as the "No Movement" penalty resulting in a turn to prepare. I thought it'd be an advantage, but come to think of it, to see it be a special effect does make more sense than it does an advantage. Before, I wanted it to have an in-game effect towards combat before it starts, allowing the defender a turn to decide what they will do. After the turn expired, the attacker would be fully prepared as a single army to counter whatever moves the defender may have prepared.

I do hope you're not confused.

Re: Questions GURPS-wise
 

Sounds like there's two things going on here. These combat robots, or whatever, can communicate via stealthy radio (for example) but they are unable to make a plan of attack on their own, relying on the AI core on the mothership. Is that about right?

Re: Questions GURPS-wise
 

Those combat robots, as we speak, cannot make a plan of attack on their own because they do not have the resources to do it themselves. Reasons can be from not well sosphicated and antiquated, or designed for pure obedience rather than singular individuality, etc. And yes, the AI Core from a Platform ship (or mothership in your words) is the most heavily reliant on older types of combatants than it does with newer ones.

There are others who can make plans of attack on their own; but in this one, I'm speaking for the more broader types of robots that will be more commonly seen in my game world. Hence, they need to rely on the AI Core program in order to fight like an army.

Re: Questions GURPS-wise
 

There is a chart for the costs at the beginning of the skill chapter in Basic. No books atm.

The pattern in skill cost goes 1/2/4/4/4/4/etc. Depending on the difficulty of the skill 1 cp could get you a skill DX+0 for easy skills, DX-1 for average skills, or DX-2 for hard skills.

Hope that helps.

Re: Questions GURPS-wise
 

See the table outlining skill costs on p. B170 (this is the 4e Basic Set; if you're using an earlier edition or GURPS Lite, it'll be elsewhere). Skills have a difficulty (easy/average/hard/very hard) as well as a governing attribute. Easy skills are 1 point for attribute+0, 2 for attribute+1, Average are 2 points for attribute+0, 4 for attribute+1, etc. So really, your final skill level depends on three factors: governing attribute, skill difficulty, and points spent on the skill (there are also Techniques, which allow you to increase your ability with certain subsets of a skill for a somewhat reduced cost, and Wildcard skills, which somewhat cinematically allow you to buy broad areas of skill, but ignore those for the moment). The GM may dictate the difficulty of new skills and even decide to change the difficulty of existing skills, but it's probably a bad idea to do the latter.

Hmmm...I'm not entirely sure what "be fully prepared...to counter whatever moves the defender may have prepared" means in game terms, so I'm uncertain how that would be represented. As it stands, it sounds like the Telecommunication advantage with a few modifiers like Racial and perhaps Requires Concentration, but that's starting to get into a degree of tuning I rarely deal with myself.

Re: Questions GURPS-wise
 

Don't have my GURPS books atm. But I'll look into it. Though, I do thank you for your help. :D

*Sorry, Turhan. I may have omitted thanks to you as well. I'll look into the pages you mentioned to see what it says.

Re: Questions GURPS-wise
 

I looked into Telecommunication advantage a couple times before, and I didn't find it interesting since it listed itself as telecommunication.

I wasn't asking that it be a pyschic skill, which is why I may have overlooked it. Still, the modifiers you mentioned, Racial and Requires Concentration, can make sense. Maybe too much of adding here and there can really seem like a cool advantage but messed up. Maybe that's what I've been doing.

I'll look into Telecommunication but I'd think I'd need to rename the Telecommunication advantage and rework how it works for the race if I were to be satisified with the end result.

As for your initial skepticism of the "allowing defender a turn before attacking," would it work if I had simply done what I said, having renamed the advantage, add Racial and Require concentration, modify some stats of the race and always have a chance to allow the defender to prepare combat?

The race stats I am working on, but not atm, does have some benefits to them allowing them more strength, a close set of weapons they're finely attuned with, but at the expense lose familiarity as most races would do towards them (which I'll do for other racial templates. Not a problem.)

Anyway, thanks for the Telecommunications advantage. Maybe I should really look into it.

Re: Questions GURPS-wise
 

Ehem. "Tele" doesn't mean mental or psychic. Hence "telegraph", "telephone".