GURPS Lite Supplements

[David Johansen]

Well, now that I've openned a game store I'm wanting to do something more to promote GURPS than my irregular (funny how bi-weekly always turns into rarely) Friday night game.

In particular I'd like to do some genre support for GURPS Lite. I recognize this would have to be entirely a fan project and would need to artfully dance around the edges of copyright and trademark. It wouldn't be the first time I've been slapped down by a game company for writing what I saw as harmless fan support to promote a game and thus improve sales.

So obviously generic fantasy would be the first thing to do. Eventually I'd like to do a book for supers and space opera as well. I want to do about 16 pages. Maybe 4 for characters, 4 for monsters, 4 for magic, and 4 for a bit of a world and an adventure.

I lean towards a cut down version of Magic. Yes I know Magic is unpopular with some, but it's what people will get when they buy the book. I probably wouldn't be doing this at all if I wasn't running a store and trying to sell the book as I generally write things I want or need.

Any thoughts?

[vierasmarius]

Originally Posted by David Johansen

Any thoughts?

Sounds like a fun and useful project.

Hawthorne Magic is a big web of spells and prerequisistes. Even the "short form" presented in Basic is a dozen pages. For something that will fit in 4 I'd basically drop the Collges and prereqs (apart from Magery at least), and instead give a simple list of adventure-useful spells. A few utilities, a couple each healing and attack, buffs and afflictions, some information-gathering and movement, etc. Definitely include a note that the full system is more complicated and will introduce special requirements for learning spells.

[Kuroshima]

There was a Magic chapter in GURPS Lite for 3rd ed, and given the few changes in this subsystem in 4E, it would be trivial to update it to 4e

[ericbsmith]

Originally Posted by Kuroshima

There was a Magic chapter in GURPS Lite for 3rd ed, and given the few changes in this subsystem in 4E, it would be trivial to update it to 4e

You can still get GURPS Lite 3rd Edition from e23. The Magic system takes up about a page and a half, and contains 14 spells. Note that several of these spells require a bit of a rewrite for 4e - Lend Health becomes Lend Vitality, Lend Strength becomes Lend Energy, and Shield needs to replace PD with DB, ST needs to get changed to FP and HT to HP in quite a few places.

I've also suggested printing out the 20 pages from the Basic Set Characters to use as a GURPS Magic Lite for a handout. Obviously, distributing this as a freebie is a no-no, but allowing people to use it as a reference at the gaming table is probably fair. It's bigger than the 4-page goal the OP desires, but if used properly I think it could work. Hand out the two-pages from 3e Lite for the initial rules; let them look over the Magic chapter from the Basic Set if they want something fuller; let them browse Magic if they're really curious.

[mehrkat]

I've been periodically working on this for my personal use for a while.

I decided to highlight the basic system and its simplicity and add just enough for a standard fantasy world. I threw the flexibility to the winds though of course I mentioned that the regular system was incredibly flexible.

I went with
Racial Templates
Basic Adventurer Templates

And magic created as powers in 5 levels (like world of darkness vampiric disciplines). The player to play a mage would pick several magic areas and get a level maybe two in those areas. Maybe 10 or 15 magic areas.

The game play that I was shooting for was epic DnD novel like Dragonlance or Icewind Dale.

It would seem like you could do the same thing with Supers create "super" powers and in Space Opera add in "mind powers"

I know it goes against the concept of flexibility but truthfully the flexibility seems to overwhelm most new players and you can always suggest how to add to the game later.

[Beoferret]

What about a Banestorm Lite? It'd even offer an opportunity to include some sort of "magic lite" as well. For anyone who'd be interested in how GURPS can do fantasy (aside from hack 'n slash), it'd provide a brief intro into the use of racial templates, occupational templates, lists of acceptable skills (and advantages, disadvantages, etc.), etc. all within a coherent setting. If folks didn't like the setting, they could still use the meat and taters to start their own very basic fantasy campaign.

[ClayDowling]

If you were going to do a setting to support GURPS Lite, I would suggest starting from the free Blackmarsh material. While it didn't strike my fancy as written, if you're doing a GURPS-specific adaptation you could change the tricky bits to be something that you liked.

One useful feature would be to not use the GURPS magic system, since Lite doesn't include one, and use the magic or a variant thereof described in the Blackmarsh material.

Rather than writing up potential copyright and trademark violations, have you considered creating adventures to run as in-store events? Getting people playing GURPS in short digestable demos is a great way to convince them they should buy the full system in hardcover from you.

[Beoferret]

For that matter, how about a Transhuman Space Lite or Traveller Lite? Again, they'd offer the chance to help introduce new players to the game and what it can do, all within the supporting structure of a fleshed-out setting (albeit settings that are primarily served by 3rd ed material). Action Lite, maybe?

Anyhow, thank you for doing this. One would hope that you could get some sort of official sanction or support for this. Maybe your idea will form the seed for a future marketing campaign/effort to entice more people to give GURPS a try.

[David Johansen]

Well, I plan to demo in 1/32 scale. It's been an obsession of mine for years. I'll make no secret of the fact that one of the motivations for doing the store is the ability to do some extreme gaming projects that simply wouldn't fit at home and aren't portable enough to do anywhere else.

I think if it's good enough sjg might be willing to add it to e23 but, that's their end of things and I'm tired of waiting for them to do it.

[Ts_]

Originally Posted by Beoferret

For that matter, how about a Transhuman Space Lite or Traveller Lite?

Just in case you didn't know: There is a free sci-fi version of Gurps Lite taken from the back of Transhuman Space: Gurps Lite for Transhuman Space. Edit: It is for 3rd edition Gurps.

But it does not contain any setting info, just useful sci-fi skills and equipment, while the standard Gurps Lite is mostly about medieval stuff*. Still it could be a useful basis a free (Gurps) setting.

Sadly, it doesn't look very printer friendly.

Regards
Ts

edit: *) Well, there is some TL 5-8 equipment as well and some modern skills, but nothing specifically from the future, I think.