Are quirks officially counted as disadvantages?

[Mark Skarr]

Personally, I do not count quirks toward the disadvantage limit. Why? Because I don’t. I feel that by taking and playing quirks, the players are adding value to the game, and giving them points is a reward.

Are quirks as disadvantage points RAW? Yes. Do I care? Not so much. It’s five points. Five points! If I’m being such a stickler over five points I really need to look at my priorities (or in the case of MonkeyFist’s Rapture game, the point values were very important metagaming clues for us)

I use a disadvantage limit for several reasons:
#1, It puts a cap on the starting power level for my players’ characters.
#2, It reduces the likelihood of having caricatures instead of characters.
#3, It encourages players to use their points more efficiently.
#4, It encourages players to focus on the disadvantages they want to play as opposed to ones they just want for points.

Now, I don’t go set in stone that a disadvantage limit is 50%, but I’ve found that it’s a safe place to start. My GURPS MegaDenver: The Fall of Greenpeace game is about to start with 850 point characters with a -150 point disad limit because I don’t want to see characters with -425 points in disads . . . which would be ridiculous. I’m not saying that you can’t have a realistic, dynamic, interesing and useful character with -425 points in disadvantages . . . but I’d really look long and hard at the character before I said “yes” to it.

Also, I don’t stick, hard-and-fast, to the limit. Tell me a story and we’ll see where that takes you.