The GURPSICLE, and: how you do GURPS "onboarding"?

weevis · 06-21-2019, 12:03 PM

I am 100% committed to growing the GURPS player base. In my games from one-quarter to half of the players have never played a tabletop RPG before. Over the years I've developed what I think of as my "onboarding" script/procedure.

I even have specific "recruiting pitches" and advice that I cut-and-paste from email to email when I am trying to get a new person to join my group.

It my own experience the stuff I would have expected to use for this (GURPS Lite, GURPS Ultra-Lite, Combat Cards, even the Basic Set -- Characters) don't really work. I'm not sure why. Perhaps they might work for experienced RPG players, but that's not who I am trying to recruit. So I end up cobbling together my own evangelism.

Here is an example of one of my e-mail pitches:

If they've never done ANY tabletop RPG before they usually ask, "Are there any examples that show what it's like to play?" Since 2015, I always answer by emailing:

In case it helps you decide here is a podcast of some people playing a sci-fi tabletop RPG. It's not our game but the gameplay feels close to what happens, except that none of us do voice impressions and we aren't actors. http://www.oneshotpodcast.com/campaign/episode-one/ They start playing after 2:25 in the podcast.

One super-critical part of my "onboarding" is my revision of Eric B. Smith's "one page GURPS" game aid / cheat sheet. I just posted this over at the Resources sub-forum: http://forums.sjgames.com/forumdisplay.php?f=85 A direct link is here:

The GURPSICLE (GURPS In a Concise Limited Edition cheat sheet)
https://reqcon.game.blog/2019/06/21/...d-cheat-sheet/

The process of posting it and writing that blog post made me think: How do other GURPS GMs do this?

For example, if there was an appealing, accessible podcast involving GURPS game play (ideally sci-fi, ideally including women, but whatever) I'd send them that URL instead of the One Shot Podcast -- which is Star Wars.

06-21-2019, 12:03 PM	#1
weevis Join Date: Jul 2015 Location: 3.165, -3.048, -0.0818	The GURPSICLE, and: how you do GURPS "onboarding"? I am 100% committed to growing the GURPS player base. In my games from one-quarter to half of the players have never played a tabletop RPG before. Over the years I've developed what I think of as my "onboarding" script/procedure. I even have specific "recruiting pitches" and advice that I cut-and-paste from email to email when I am trying to get a new person to join my group. It my own experience the stuff I would have expected to use for this (GURPS Lite, GURPS Ultra-Lite, Combat Cards, even the Basic Set -- Characters) don't really work. I'm not sure why. Perhaps they might work for experienced RPG players, but that's not who I am trying to recruit. So I end up cobbling together my own evangelism. Here is an example of one of my e-mail pitches: If they've never done ANY tabletop RPG before they usually ask, "Are there any examples that show what it's like to play?" Since 2015, I always answer by emailing: In case it helps you decide here is a podcast of some people playing a sci-fi tabletop RPG. It's not our game but the gameplay feels close to what happens, except that none of us do voice impressions and we aren't actors. http://www.oneshotpodcast.com/campaign/episode-one/ They start playing after 2:25 in the podcast. One super-critical part of my "onboarding" is my revision of Eric B. Smith's "one page GURPS" game aid / cheat sheet. I just posted this over at the Resources sub-forum: http://forums.sjgames.com/forumdisplay.php?f=85 A direct link is here: The GURPSICLE (GURPS In a Concise Limited Edition cheat sheet) https://reqcon.game.blog/2019/06/21/...d-cheat-sheet/ The process of posting it and writing that blog post made me think: How do other GURPS GMs do this? For example, if there was an appealing, accessible podcast involving GURPS game play (ideally sci-fi, ideally including women, but whatever) I'd send them that URL instead of the One Shot Podcast -- which is Star Wars.