GURPS Dungeon Fantasy Denizens: Barbarians

ErhnamDJ · 09-03-2015, 05:46 PM

The problem isn't with the concepts, it's with the character point prices of those traits. Outdoorsman is hardly better than a level of Per, but it costs double. If you removed the Fishing skill from Outdoorsman, you would be paying only 5/level for it. This means you're paying five points a level for Fishing when you take Outdoorsman. Compared to other traits, Outdoorsman is one of the worst deals in the game. It's bad enough that we're sinking large numbers of points into wilderness abilities in a game about killing things in dungeons already. We shouldn't have to overpay for them as well! If we were given the option to remove Fishing and take a 5/level version of Outdoorsman, it would be a good deal.

And Gigantism is bad because it doubles the cost and weight of the Barbarian's armor. This is a serious enough disadvantage that it would be best avoided if possible. Like with Outdoorsman, this would be dandy if it gave you, say, fifteen points back as a disadvantage.

These traits aren't bad because of what they do. They're bad because of what they cost in metagame character creation points. The Barbarian template takes enough bad deals like these that it ends up much less powerful than the other comparable templates.

You can play as a Halfling or Gnome to fix the problem with Gigantism, but I always feel like I'm getting ripped off when I spend points on Outdoorsman, and getting ripped off isn't any fun.

09-03-2015, 05:46 PM	#8
ErhnamDJ Join Date: Aug 2009 Location: OK	Re: GURPS Dungeon Fantasy Denizens: Barbarians The problem isn't with the concepts, it's with the character point prices of those traits. Outdoorsman is hardly better than a level of Per, but it costs double. If you removed the Fishing skill from Outdoorsman, you would be paying only 5/level for it. This means you're paying five points a level for Fishing when you take Outdoorsman. Compared to other traits, Outdoorsman is one of the worst deals in the game. It's bad enough that we're sinking large numbers of points into wilderness abilities in a game about killing things in dungeons already. We shouldn't have to overpay for them as well! If we were given the option to remove Fishing and take a 5/level version of Outdoorsman, it would be a good deal. And Gigantism is bad because it doubles the cost and weight of the Barbarian's armor. This is a serious enough disadvantage that it would be best avoided if possible. Like with Outdoorsman, this would be dandy if it gave you, say, fifteen points back as a disadvantage. These traits aren't bad because of what they do. They're bad because of what they cost in metagame character creation points. The Barbarian template takes enough bad deals like these that it ends up much less powerful than the other comparable templates. You can play as a Halfling or Gnome to fix the problem with Gigantism, but I always feel like I'm getting ripped off when I spend points on Outdoorsman, and getting ripped off isn't any fun. __________________ "For the rays, to speak properly, are not colored. In them there is nothing else than a certain power and disposition to stir up a sensation of this or that color." —Isaac Newton, Optics My blog.