What GURPS needs... now

[Stormcrow]

Originally Posted by JMason

One thing that I have noticed from quite a few people recently, is reflecting on how the 3rd edition basic set was more manageable. The 4th edition basic set is more expensive, more dense, and can be hard to parse for someone new. DFRPG is one solution to this, but gamers that are looking for a great universal system might skip a worked genre game.

There has been talk of reworking GURPS Lite (4th edition) since... well for a long time! I think Lite 4th is good... but the lack of magic and many other options makes it feel less than... "universal".

The third edition was easier to manage because it was less generic. It assumed you were more or less humanoid and you more or less had no more than the traditional super powers one finds in many RPGs. It was less interested in catering to cinematic styles. It focused more heavily on combat than other activities. Anything outside these assumptions and focuses were put in add-on books.

The fourth edition generalized the game. It lays out rules for being just about anything, not just a humanoid. It gives rules for constructing your own super powers (though it wasn't entirely clear that this is what it does until Powers came out). Cinematic options are given much more attention, and non-combat activities gain ground (e.g., in the third edition, the equipment chapter goes pretty much straight into armor; in the fourth edition, it lays a groundwork for cost of living, legality class, and general goods before it goes into weapons).

With generalization comes complexity. Third edition's Toughness DR1 or DR2, which simply means your skin is tough, is now expanded to fourth edition's more general Damage Resistance. You can take it in as many levels as your GM will allow. You can use it to turn damage into character points (Absorption), it can be a Force Field, it can have an armor divisor (Hardened), and it can reflect damage (Reflection). It can be Ablative, it can prevent you from wearing armor (Can't Wear Armor), it can protect only from one direction (Directional), it can ineffective against blunt trauma (Flexible), it can be limited to certain damage types (Limited), it can be limited to certain hit locations (Partial), its ablativeness can be partial (Semi-Ablative), and it can leave you vulnerable to poisonous scratches and the like (Tough Skin). It can be taken in multiple layers.

If you want to make the fourth edition more manageable, take away the complexity due to generalization. Write up whatever advantages exist in your campaign, in a format easier for you to digest than what's in the book. You'll have to do this work yourself, though: I don't think SJG will be making "De-generalized GURPS for Realistic Humanoids" anytime soon. It's a "Basic Set" not in that it requires "basic" understanding, but in that it's the core of the game, and all other rules build off of it.