eGURPS (GURPS 5e)

[Buzzardo]

Originally Posted by The Fox

And the stuff that's in Quark is the easy stuff to get to. I think we still have stuff in Ventura. And paste-ups. Really, it all depends on how far back you want to go.

'Zooks! I had forgotten about Ventura, and I used to use it (a couple decades ago). That's yet more confirmation that pulling all that old content into a CMS would be a Herculean task.

[DeDiceManCometh]

Originally Posted by Buzzardo

So am I, for more than 20 years now.

Then we have close to the same number of years of experience. I respect your views.

Originally Posted by Buzzardo

Also, you might want to recognize that some of us have been writing web applications since 1995 and that we know enough to know when something is just marketing fluff, such as "Web 2.0." Consider this article.

I am included in the "some of us." There *is* a valid argument to be made about the true "paradigm shift" created by some of the hodgepodge of stuff that gets thrown into the Web 2.0 bucket. Some of it doesn't cut it. On the other hand, if your criteria for discounting something (Let's just say the CMS for an example) is because its built on older technology (relational databases) or that, in retrospect, you can stretch to define earlier technology as the same thing ("stone tablets were a CMS"), I disagree. Wikipedia blew Britannica off the map: it absolutely *is* a paradigm shift. The relevant question is: to what degree can this be leveraged on an RPG.

I will be my own Devil's Advocate here and state that it seems that the "strange attractor" in the Wikipedia case is "the Truth" -- all the chaos is managed and seems, profoundly, to coalesce to an astonishing degree around the Truth. Contrast this with WikiNovel, which is a failed site, as far as I can tell. I would venture to say that it is because fiction (ergo non-Truth) is infinite and no chaotic system would iteratively tend toward a massively collaborative work of fiction; it would tend to entropically proliferate into ever more chaos. Perhaps this means RPGs are not suited to the Wiki model. But they are sufficiently different from fiction to warrant consideration.

Originally Posted by Buzzardo

I see a number of issues with moving GURPS content to a publicly available (even on a subscription basis) application.

How can SJG ensure its content is safe?

Who decides which bit of content gets which tags? Someone would have to develop a taxonomy. Kromm is the obvious choice, but he has other work to do..

All these arguments are reminscent of Britannica's complaints about Wikipedia, to me. Doesn't make them wrong, just worth considering.

And lastly I would like to add: I think the division of the RPG product from the endeavor is an artifact of our old tech. Putting the content (the IP) on the web merely as reference is certainly pre-2000 thinking. Putting the IP and the ability to play the game seamlessly together on the web is the future.

[ClayDowling]

I've been toying around with the idea of the sort of online campaign planning suite that we've been talking about here. Maybe I'll throw something simple together in the evening to let people try it out.

[Metallic Vortex]

Originally Posted by ClayDowling

I've been toying around with the idea of the sort of online campaign planning suite that we've been talking about here. Maybe I'll throw something simple together in the evening to let people try it out.

Alpha tester reporting for duty!

[The Final Door]

I like this discussion. I do find that the original premise sounds like a lot of semi-empty buzzwords (Why is FILTERED in caps? It's just a data search, known since, well, data was invented. And Web 2.0 is, amongst my tech-savvy friends, known as "nothing, but with a label"), but there is merit to the idea of putting GURPS into new media ideas.

The first alarm bell in my head, though, is the poor results from the GURPS Wiki. While not a remanagement of rules, it did offer a new format to expand GURPS in. But nobody really ran with it after the initial fuzz. Would the same be true for another technology?

If we stay optimistiv and assume that the technology would be supported, I could see some form of better-controlled Wiki media work, adding a kind of search-and-assemble function to it. It would allow two things that I would enjoy:

1) As mentioned in posts here, it would allow me to put together my own collections of rules applicable to my campaign, complete with equipment lists and traits (advantages, skills, etc.) allowed in it. A complete Powered by GURPS standalone for every campaign I'd ever want!

2) I like the idea of user-generated content. And while I do have requirements for quality, I'd like to see quantity pumped up a bit, because I am not interested in every subject, so releases that fit my taste are getting too far between. I have a feeling I am not alone (though others, of course, have different tastes in what they want). A good digital system would allow for a new boost in user-produced Stuff.

What I could see, in more detail, is an annual membership fee (perhaps part of Pyramid?). For that, you get access to a network of all this stuff, in an application that does all that fancy sorting and produces a PDF of what you want. Someone could trigger projects in which users supply (and maybe suggest) parts, like new spell collections under a topic, lists of new equipment by topic, or other things like that. After some debate, official versions are made and rubber stamped. Everyone can see the old versions, but one version becomes official.

Heck, with sufficient backing, there might be room for a paperback-of-the-month thing. Knowing how many want one makes a publisher's work much easier, and this way, everyone pays in advance.

Just thinking out loud :)

EDIT: Just learned that Joomla is (as I understand from a tech-savvy friend) an open source (free!) CMS system in wide use (UN, MTV, a lot of webhosts, etc.). Any reactions from the professionals??

[macphersonrants]

I am not computer guy, so I'm not sure one way or the other about the various proposals that have been thrown up in this thread. One thing I DO think is important is that SJG continue to explore new ways to use technology to envigorate a hobby that seems to have a shrinking demographic. If we don't want to see GURPS completely give way to Munchkin we have to hope that a way will be found to draw new people into the system and roleplaying in general. Creative use of technology might be one possibility.

[warmachine]

I think GURPSWiki stalled for a number of reasons

• House rule writers already had their own website.
• Navigation was difficult.
• Lack of editors cleaning up layout.
• No rating system.

A filtered cheat sheet generator would fare better

• Still useful with only SJG data and no user generated data beyond a few dozen filters.
• Basic function is select a filter and print the lists. Fiddly fine tuning can be available but isn't necessary.
• Content layout is hardcoded, not badly written by users.
• Even total breakdown of any rating system won't affect the core SJG data and users can just filter out anything user generated.

This looks like a bespoke system but easily within the stride of a professional web programmer. I think it's possible but I doubt SJG can do it. We'll have to do it. Alas, I know J2EE, not PHP, but I can help with database design.

[Turhan's Bey Company]

Originally Posted by The Final Door

What I could see, in more detail, is an annual membership fee (perhaps part of Pyramid?).

You may have missed the fireworks in November, but Pyramid no longer runs on a subscription model. You can buy a Pyramid subscription, but that's really just pre-paying for issues which you buy separately just as easily, not the old "paying for temporary access to the entire archives" approach. SJ Games has recently had pretty bad luck with "renting" information rather than bundling it into discrete bits which can be sold individually and kept by the purchaser in perpetuity, so one would probably have a hard time selling them on this particular approach.

[Kromm]

Originally Posted by DeDiceManCometh

At this point GURPS is so robust, you're not doing anybody any favors by "revising" it without (or with limited) backward compatibility

I don't agree. I have no desire to create a new edition of the rules any time soon, but I don't believe that focusing on the delivery system or the wrapper as opposed to the content is likely to be profitable. Customers fundamentally want new stuff, not a new front end on old stuff. Nothing is as good for the spectacle as slaughtering a few sacred cows for the cause and giving things a good shake. Rewrapping the same old same old and calling it a "new edition" is a fine way to go out of business.

Originally Posted by warmachine

I'm wondering if SJG should make their trait, template, equipment and creature databases (but not rules) publically available and, thus, free.

That won't happen, ever, because as was said upthread:

Originally Posted by DeDiceManCometh

the vast majority of the system is comprised of databases.

And this is indeed true. The majority of GURPS content, and the ovewhelming majority of the hours spent testing and verifying stats, concern these "databases." That translates into nearly all of the money spent to publish GURPS being spent on these things, which means that we expect them to earn their keep. Next to objects such as advantages, skills, spells, martial-arts styles, powers, templates, and equipment, the content that remains is almost a small postscript that doesn't earn enough money to keep GURPS profitable. The proposed model might work for a game that's primarily selling a setting, but that's almost exactly the opposite of GURPS. To a first approximation, GURPS is selling people data that they're supposed to use to build their own settings.

[hackbarth]

What I would like:

To print my own GURPS Basic Set, with only the portions that will be relevant for the next campaign that'll GM. Only low-TL stuff plus magic for fantasy, only high-TL stuff plus ultra-tech for SF. Modified for technological path or magic systems of the settings.

So that I can take a guide like Dungeon Fantasy or Action, and turn it in my own specialized RPG using GURPS rules in a single book.

All that and Cheap. Waiting for the next TL to roll out.