How to avoid killing your player characters as GM

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by Colonel__Klink

I still don't think there's a ruling in the basic set that declares that a full ROF attack from a firearm gets all shots landed on a critical hit or only the first is guaranteed. I found that rule *here* and I have a suspicion that the rule is actually in high tech not the basic set!

I have a suspicion that it isn't in any rule book (an unfortunate oversight) and is from a clarification by the line editor.

This is the burden of me, the GM and so I need to master this and be the conduit that makes it all intuitive for my future players. That... that's my burden but the rest of it. The powers and cybernetics and spells that say "see this other page", at least I can fix that. My players won't have to reference basic set 245 or whatever in order to see what the power listed in my book says. The power, cyberwear, spell, hack, special ability ect will have a complete description of it's effects right then and there. Then there will be an index at the start of the chapter so you know what page said ability is on within the chapter itself. When you open the source book (at first digitally, if it's good enough? Who knows maybe I'll print one copy and bind it!) asking "what are the advantage of cyber arms" there will be absolutely no confusion about where exactly on what page that information is. No skipping around, no flipping between books. It's right there. Clean and easy to get.

This is the effect of several things. Firstly, the main rules being only able to be a certain size. Secondly, not all the rules for stuff even being invented at the time the core rules were printed. Thirdly, putting very niche rules in the books with the stuff to which they apply (and if you think 4e is bad for that, try 3e, or most other game lines by other publishers). And fourthly, you're looking to set up and run a game with very high detail around gunfights and injuries, and want outcomes that require the use of many of these optional niche rules.

One thing I'd do, once you've decided on all the rules you think fit your game is to go over them and ask yourself which ones can be dumped for being too fiddly or adding too much rolling for the value they bring, and then discarding those.

Also on survivability it was a lucky pass in a sense. I could shift the point of target to one that's not 4x damage and the others don't hit. I have a few more tools now. Roll 1d6. 1-2 body. The other 4 possible outcomes represent arms and legs. No head targeting for now. The face has a good chance to obliterate an eye doesn't it?

Not by default. To damage an eye you generally need to target the eyes, though a critical head hit has about a one in eight chance of turning into an eye hit.

Originally Posted by Colonel__Klink

And yup, you're right about the face hit. Maybe I was reading the critical hit table for faces? I dunno. It seems odd that shooting the face provides no benefit other than bypassing many armor types considering how obsessive gurps is with putting the boot in on characters who are losing. A portion of the t-box is actually in that facial area... Not gonna complain though.

Hitting the face for any damage at all forces a knockdown check (B420), and if it's a major wound it's at -5, so it has a very good chance of putting your average dude on the ground, ready for a good kicking.

Also you're exactly right about the modern armor. That's a whole can of worms that also got me to consider deleting that original comment. I don't know why gambeson were a fair bit better at pointy threats than modern fiber armor. Were gambeson thicker than the normal 40 layers of kevlar? I have no idea!

They were very tightly woven compared to most kevlar, for one thing.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

I can't think of where that would happen. Needing at least 1 RoF per hit means that you need to hit by incredibly margins to score 100% hits with even a single round of buckshot and if you're anywhere close to that with something with significantly higher RoF than that your problem isn't the RoF rules, it's what you've done to your basic attack roll.

Aimed attacks with laser rifles. RoF10, Acc12, Rcl1. If an unaimed single shot would've hit, a full-RoF aimed attack will land all 10. If you want cinematic Space Opera games either throw out the lasers, or make sure the PCs and other major characters are in laser-proof armour.

[Boomerang]

Apologies if this has been mentioned before. From experience the most dangerous encounters are regular adventures (without magic, high tech armour, or superpowers) going against opponents with automatic weapons. In my games this most commonly occurs in fairly realistic historic war zones like the American-Vietnamese war. Assuming that type of scenario I employ the following:

Engagements typically start at beyond half dice range in open terrain (half damage) or in very thick cover for short range engagements making it difficult to score a hit. This has the added advantage of seeming realistic as the enemy wants to minimise their own casualties.

Use random hit locations for NPC fire. There is a good chance of striking a limb which is non-lethal.

Make realistic assumptions about enemy behaviour. The Viet Cong for example often used hit and run tactics, this greatly reduces the chance of character deaths. Looking at the American-Vietnamese war from an Australian perspective about 60,000 soldiers were deployed during the war and there were around 500 fatalities, not all of those were combat related. Sure the PCs might be exposed to more danger than the average soldier who might not even see combat, but even casualties amongst SASR soldiers was fairly low (I can’t recall the exact number). As GM I try to investigate the historic reasons for the surprisingly low casualty rate and make sure they are reflected in game.

Encourage PCs to take advantages like Luck and Danger Sense.

Encourage PCs to use reconnaissance and planning, and allow it to work well. Reinforce the idea that GURPS is not like those other games.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Rupert

Aimed attacks with laser rifles. RoF10, Acc12, Rcl1. If an unaimed single shot would've hit, a full-RoF aimed attack will land all 10. If you want cinematic Space Opera games either throw out the lasers, or make sure the PCs and other major characters are in laser-proof armour.

True, but they're not shotgun-style.

(Bonus: even if the PCs are wearing laser-proof protection, their equipment isn't and laser acc is so high it's practical for fairly ordinary shooters to do things like shoot somebody's gun.)

[Farmer]

Originally Posted by Rupert

Aimed attacks with laser rifles. RoF10, Acc12, Rcl1. If an unaimed single shot would've hit, a full-RoF aimed attack will land all 10. If you want cinematic Space Opera games either throw out the lasers, or make sure the PCs and other major characters are in laser-proof armour.

This is why we never use lasers as written. It's one of the strengths of GURPS that we easily overcame the issue by either using Blasters or just not using the "they all hit" rules. I don't doubt there are game where this works nicely, but not for us. Easy fix.

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Farmer

This is why we never use lasers as written. It's one of the strengths of GURPS that we easily overcame the issue by either using Blasters or just not using the "they all hit" rules. I don't doubt there are game where this works nicely, but not for us. Easy fix.

What 'they all hit' rules? UT laser rifles hit a lot thanks to generating excessively high bonuses on the attack roll, having a bit of RoF, and not having recoil. There's no special case there, the numbers are just extreme.

A lot of technologically advanced settings should not use the UT laser rifle, for sure.

[sjmdw45]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

Though your rabbit hole here goes weird - the "all HP loss" thing implies you think this is multiple hits, which it is not.

Huh? I don't see how it implies that, since I don't. It just means I can't remember if there's a canonical order for DR loss vs. HP loss. (Or at least couldn't at the time. Turns out there is, and HP is lost first, so DR 6+ saves you from dying to the first shot.)

[mburr0003]

Originally Posted by Colonel__Klink

It's got my curiosity so I'm gonna check em out!

There is a thread around here somewhere that semi-reviews each issue of the Third Generation of the magazine (all 4e rules), so I'd read that thread to get an idea of which issues might be more useful to you before you just willy-nilly buy them all.


I mean, I bought them all*, but that's just me. Others might be more discerning with their money.


* I've also since purchased all the digital issues for the first GURPS mag, Roleplayer, as well the first gen Pyramid (3e rules), of which I already owned all the hard copies... so... I'm not as discerning. I'm still missing a good bit of the 2nd gen Pyramid, since I didn't have internet at the time... but if I ever get a time machine, I'll get that corrected as well.

[corwyn]

Originally Posted by mburr0003

There is a thread around here somewhere that semi-reviews each issue of the Third Generation of the magazine (all 4e rules), so I'd read that thread to get an idea of which issues might be more useful to you before you just willy-nilly buy them all.


I mean, I bought them all*, but that's just me. Others might be more discerning with their money.


* I've also since purchased all the digital issues for the first GURPS mag, Roleplayer, as well the first gen Pyramid (3e rules), of which I already owned all the hard copies... so... I'm not as discerning. I'm still missing a good bit of the 2nd gen Pyramid, since I didn't have internet at the time... but if I ever get a time machine, I'll get that corrected as well.

Yeah, it sure would be sweet for them to sell an archive of v2.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Colonel__Klink

When a player is losing you don't normally put the boot in and intentionally finish the job as gurps is systemically designed to do. (sorry if the player has a HIGH dodge roll of 12 and the game halves it you get a 6... which is basically "get a critical roll or you're dead.")

This is what the groups I play in call the "death spiral", and it does mean that the way players should go about playing combats is different from D&D family games. Look at p. B380, "Effects of Injury".

1. If you have less than a third of your hit points left, your Move and Dodge get drastically reduced. If you're in a melee combat, you may want to carry on, but if you're in ranged combat, it's time to stop fighting.
2. When you're on zero or less hit points, you need to make a HT roll at the start of each turn to avoid passing out. It's definitely time to stop fighting.
3. When you're "fully negative", only then are you at risk of death. You won't die for certain until you're on -5*HP.
4. Few enemies will take the time to finish off a downed character when there are still some who are fighting.

So you need some teamwork. A party of characters needs to keep track of each other and be ready to react to someone going down. They need to accept that their fellows will stop fighting when badly injured. It's not cowardice, but good sense, and is the main reason Berserk is a 10-point disadvantage: it prevents you accepting that you're out of a fight.

It's easy to make GURPS characters fall over, but killing them takes quite a bit more damage.