GURPS would be more successful if it were more friendly to new players

[bumbot]

Originally Posted by Gollum

In my humble opinion, pre-generated characters are the best for a very first game.

I agree entirely, and not just for GURPS. Two of the best games I've ever run used pre-gens, one Call of Cthulhu one Star Wars D20. Both times I made more characters than I had players, just to make sure everyone got a choice, and I gave out pictures and descriptions and made everyone choose before they got character sheets. Next GURPS game I run that doesn't use templates, I think I'll do the same thing, either that or get the players to give me pictures and write-ups and I'll make the characters if they're intimidated by the process.

[Rasputin]

Originally Posted by Gollum

In my humble opinion, pre-generated characters are the best for a very first game.

Depends on the game. For GURPS, sure. For D&D, walking into the dungeon with the guy you just rolled up and fighting a goblin is part of the thrill. For Call of Cthulhu, who cares since the character will be dead or insane in about four hours anyways?

[mehrkat]

I considered playing GURPS lite and creating new advantages for a few specific magic type things. In other words handwaving anything else.

I once created a setting for GURPS lite with magic similar to World of Darkness disciplines. with a cost for each level. there was a standard warning at the beginning that GURPS proper did it differently and the whole system was far superior but that I wanted them to get used to the general system first. I never actually got a chance to run it but I still think the idea has merit and in my old gaming group when I had ready relatively experimental gamers I would have tried it.

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by Rasputin

For Call of Cthulhu, who cares since the character will be dead or insane in about four hours anyways?

My players survive much more than that!

They are extremely careful and don't hesitate to flee away as soon as possible!

;-)

Without kidding anymore, even with Chaosium's Call of Cthulhu, pre-generated characters sounds to be the best choice for a very first game. Choosing the character's skills can take a lot of time when you don't know at all what will be important during the game.

And an adventure can completely fail if nobody think to take a good score in Library Use and Spot Hidden.

[Johnny Angel]

I've actually found GURPS to work pretty well when I've been teaching new players; for one specific reason: the vast majority of the rules work the same way.


"How do I swing my sword?"
"Roll 3d6"
"I want to cast a spell."
"Roll 3d6"
"How can I weave a basket on the moon while fighting aliens?"
"Roll 3d6"

In general, there's not an issue with one set of mechanics interacting with the game, and then needing to know a completely different scheme (offhand, I am thinking of the turning rules for clerics in D&D 3.5) depending on what I'm trying to do.

Obviously, that is a little bit of an oversimplification, but it's been my experience that it's pretty easy to convey the idea that you need to roll the dice and compare the result to your skill number. Once I've gotten that idea across, I then introduce the idea of modifiers. It seems to make sense to most people that good conditions (i.e. having a master weaving kit for the basket) would make things easier, and having bad conditions (i.e. low mana for the spell) would make things harder.

There are people who knock GURPS for the grittiness and the lean toward realism. I find it to be beneficial when first teaching someone the game because I can relate concepts to them by using real world examples they might be familiar with. In my experiences, this helps*.

One thing I've found is that creating a GURPS character is usually faster if you don't look at the rules first. What I mean is that I find it better to come up with the fluff and background concept and then fit the rules to the concept. Paging through the entire book like some sort of menu works, and that's a perfectly valid way to do it. However, I find that ordering at a resteraunt goes more smoothly when I have at least a vague idea of what I want.

In addition; just like at a resteraunt, I'm not required to order everything. If I don't want to add an appetizer or a dessert to my meal, that's perfectly fine. I can still eat. Likewise, I don't need to use every rule for GURPS to play.



*Though I have found that I have an easier time using this method with someone who is not familiar with rpgs than I do when trying to bring someone from a different game into GURPS. Mainly because some players have an idea about what is 'realistic' based upon the way those games work.

[csm]

Originally Posted by joppeknol

Another complaint with GURPS comes from one of my players. "Yeesh, you need an academic degree to understand the character sheet.". Compared to COC or Gemini, there are tons and tons of options, which makes it much harder to create a workable character. Templates make things easier, but still you have things like: 'pick 20 points from the following advantages ..<insert list of advantages which should be looked up>

I can completely relate with this, and I think the main issue is how you approach your character creation. If you look at it as though you just won a shopping spree for 100-250 character points, and now need to use every last one, your head will explode with the sheer vastness of options. If, however, you look at your character as a concept (ie: powerful apprentice wizard with OCD tendencies and a love of cats and quilting), you can start to fill in the major blocks with the pieces you want: (ie: Magery #, OCD, etc.)

[Opellulo]

I had a lot of games with newbie GURPS players that were seasoned in D&D and I found more difficult introducing the game to them than to totally RPG Newbies; D&D "archetypes" are like superhero comics: the worst that everyone knows.

The main problem with GURPS is that it doesn't have a strong "Immaginary Mechanism" that can dig fast in players minds (Mage got magic, D&D got fantasy combats, CoC got Chtulhu and so on...). It's "genericness" it's both its greater strength and its greater flaw: everything is in the hand of the GM: a poor GM could give a good D&D or WoD game (all is very aimed and simplified) but this is impossible with GURPS that needs an experienced GM to work right.

I tried every trick in the book: premade and converted characters, campaigns from movies and TV shows, simplified rules, "Real" one shots (the most funny part is letting your friend Gurps-statting you) but everytime i take a break i got the same response: the group shifts to some other system.

In a catchphrase: "GURPS is phisically tiring for GM!"

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by josha

Now that I've evaluated it further, flipping through a friend's GURPS books are reading GURPS Lite; I've started to recognize it as a good system. However, I'm reluctant to start playing due to the enormous size of the core rulebooks and the enormous price that comes with them. GURPS Lite doesn't really include enough to play, and I don't want to rush out and buy the books just yet. What should I do?

PS. I'm mostly interested in gritty, low-powered military games.

· You get the Basic Set books (Characters and Campaigns). For the Ps., get GURPS High Tech, too.

· Players get GURPS Lite (freely downloaded from e23, and printed), along with Basic Set: Characters for themselves.

· You prepare a cool, attractive, and Player Friendly campaign conspectus. Putting there some images is helpful, too. Think about it like a pamphlet containing all the basic guidelines about how is the setting and the feeling of your campaign and what is expected from the players, along with suggested Player Character roles. Then, print it too.

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by Opellulo

(. . .) The main problem with GURPS is that it doesn't have a strong "Immaginary Mechanism" that can dig fast in players minds (Mage got magic, D&D got fantasy combats, CoC got Chtulhu and so on...). It's "genericness" it's both its greater strength and its greater flaw: everything is in the hand of the GM: a poor GM could give a good D&D or WoD game (all is very aimed and simplified) but this is impossible with GURPS that needs an experienced GM to work right.

Hence the usefulness of the aforementioned campaign conspectus: you can design it with inexpensive or free software (text, images, basic layout), for stressing on it -through written text and color images- the "imaginary mechanism" that is suitable for your own GURPS campaign setting.

Printing it and giving copies to the Players is indeed very Player Friendly :-)

[SCAR]

Originally Posted by sn0wball

What about a combination between an introductory adventure and GURPS Lite ?
...
Some premade characters, a little adventure, ...

Originally Posted by OldSam

But without expanding the Lite-rules...
Bundling it with a free, small introductory adventure with Lite would be good marketing, wouldn't it...?

Just posting a cross reference since people seem to have missed cccwebs post:

Originally Posted by cccwebs

..there are two very important free downloads that are great for introducing new players to the GURPS toolkit. One is GURPS Lite and the other is Caravan to Ein Arris. While it may be a fantasy adventure, it is great for introducing the basic mechanics of the game to new GURPS players and GM's alike.

While not specifically 'Combined', these are GURPS Lite and an introductory Adventure, both available FREE! from e23 as linked above!