GURPS Does It The Hard Way!

[opposedToGravity]

Originally Posted by Graham

I know this seems silly but I have to ask. Are you aware that you can buy these things online at e23.sjgames.com and print them out?

Graham

i am also aware of the (in my opinion) overpriced pdfs.

[opposedToGravity]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

Tower of Octavius isn't fantasy? It's a detailed layout and description of a wizard's tower! Sounds like a potential ready-made dungeon to me...

And, well, if you're going to wait for SJG to put modules on shelves, I think you're a bit out of touch. I could be wrong, but I don't think any of the things I listed are expected to see print.

thats a real pity. i wont buy overpriced pdfs which have dubious use. The description and layout of a wizards tower could also be the tower of good Octavius, a potential ally. There is nothing that implies it is a scenario.

[Gigermann]

Originally Posted by Lord Carnifex

I'll do this with one caveat: I'd like to have ten users on this forum agree on what it is they want.

1) What genre, and what generic or specific setting assumptions?

2) What TL?

3) Where on the gritty realism to four-color cinematic spectrum?

4) What CP level for PC's?

Start with an easy one:
(1) Fantasy
(2) Late TL3, maybe a bit of 4
(3) Middle
(4) 150-ish—I'm guessing this is a typical starting point
Addendum: In each of these cases, you'd need to provide some "scaling" help (specifically, I'm thinking of scaling to 250pts/cinematic, to work better w/ DF).

If you decide to go through with this, PM me, and we can talk about getting you some illustrations, when you're ready for them.

[mikeejimbo]

Originally Posted by Lord Carnifex

All right, ambulate solveram.

I've been ruminating for some time about subitting something to SJ Games, but thus far, I haven't found anything on the wishlist I felt good about writing. I'm not really into it for the money, I just want to build a portfolio.

Ergo, I'd be happy to write a pre-fab scenario and see if TPTB feel it's good enough and marketable enough to accept.

I'll do this with one caveat: I'd like to have ten users on this forum agree on what it is they want.

1) What genre, and what generic or specific setting assumptions?

2) What TL?

3) Where on the gritty realism to four-color cinematic spectrum?

4) What CP level for PC's?

I too would love to build up a portfolio, though not because I'm going to become a freelance writer when I get out of school. (If you are, I wish you luck! I would absolutely love to do that but unless I marry a rich girl I don't think I'm going to be able to!) Anyway, I just want to say that I think you totally should submit. It can't hurt, and the folks at SJG are very polite at declining stuff. And even if you've been declined you can get other stuff published.

Anyway, to answer your questions... right now I'm interested in Modern Horror or Fantasy campaigns, so about TL8. I like my games rather in the middle on the realism to cinematic spectrum. I find 150 points to be good for a CP level for the PCs, too. So that's what I take an interest in, right now.

[opposedToGravity]

Originally Posted by Graham

Again, this might be the key market here. New players. Perhaps old hands don't pick up adventures, because, as discusssed, they're looking for something more specific. Perhaps new players don't pick up adventures because, let's face it, nothing on e23 is yelling "take up GURPS because I exist".

Is it possible that a dedicated page on e23 or the main site for new players, with ready-to-run material, would tap into a new source of revenue, and so not be bound by the arguments given above?

How do you get from where we are now to there? Probably by getting, somehow, that elusive string of adventures for one of the published settings books. But it would seem to make sense that a single book that only needed the Basic Set would be the most likely to sell in this way.

Graham

you are absolutely right. none of the published material has the special something that fascinates the potential customer. none of the world books have. most of us buy world and genre books because we like gurps, not the other way.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by PrinceYyrkoon

I think theres a certain amount of 'itll never work' here! OTHER generic systems have NO PROBLEM in creating scenario material for their games.

Well, to some degree that's a fair complaint. For me, at least, it's not easy to imagine creating such material, precisely because I almost never buy that kind of product for other games. And that's a widespread attitude among old GURPS hands, I believe.

But the nature of GURPS somewhat encourages this.

Consider one of the best books I've ever run a campaign out of: Griffin Mountain for RuneQuest II. It was a series of linked adventures set in the world of Glorantha, which was the setting for RQII. If you bought the core book for RQII, a substantial part of it was a description of Glorantha. The genre was legendary/mythic fantasy (with a comedic subtext at times). And RQII as a game was written to serve the one genre of legendary/mythic fantasy, set in the one world of Glorantha. If you were going to run an RQII campaign, it was going to be a legendary/mythic fantasy campaign set in Glorantha. So there was absolutely zero risk that your adventure book would fail to appeal to the audience for RQII. You might lose sales because only GMs were buying it (a factor of a few) or because you did a crap job on it (fortunately they didn't), but not because it wasn't what people were looking for.

Now with GURPS, you have no precommitment to any genre, and still less to any subgenre or any flavor within a genre. But okay, you could probably identify two or three genres that a lot of GURPS players like. And then you have no precommitment to any setting within a genre. GURPS has Banestorm for fantasy, and Traveller and THS for science fiction . . . and each of those has enough appeal to draw in some people who will buy all the new material. But you've narrowed your appeal.

But then, each of those worlds is too big, and has no one central location where everything is happening, no natural starting place. If you write an adventure for players from Caithness, it's not a big help for campaigns based in, say, Megalos. And after publishing a Caithess scenario, if you next get a Tredroy scenario, there's not all that much cumulative usability between them.

What you need is to have a book that creates a starting point, base of operations, and mission for a campaign set in that world. And than you need to write a series of adventures for that specific campaign. And you have to make the whole thing so cool and so exciting that people who were sort of thinking of playing GURPS, or GURPS fantasy, or an Yrth campaign, will decide that this is exactly what they want to be involved in.

And, well, that book might be a challenging pitch to make. Steve Jackson Games has never really gone in for books that define a specific starting point, as opposed to a larger world within which you can choose your starting point. If they had such a "base of operations" book, or a "you have to go here and do this" book, it might give rise to the more specific adventure scenarios you're hoping for.

Bill Stoddard

[opposedToGravity]

Originally Posted by Lord Carnifex

All right, ambulate solveram.

I've been ruminating for some time about subitting something to SJ Games, but thus far, I haven't found anything on the wishlist I felt good about writing. I'm not really into it for the money, I just want to build a portfolio.

Ergo, I'd be happy to write a pre-fab scenario and see if TPTB feel it's good enough and marketable enough to accept.

I'll do this with one caveat: I'd like to have ten users on this forum agree on what it is they want.

1) What genre, and what generic or specific setting assumptions?

2) What TL?

3) Where on the gritty realism to four-color cinematic spectrum?

4) What CP level for PC's?

ten users? how many contributed to this thread? are we 10 already?

lets modify this. lets not say what we want but what would most likely attract most new customers.

1.) any genre / world book that sells well according to e23 or other official sources.

2) default setting of whatever is decided under 1.)

3.) default setting of whatever is decided under 1.)

4.) 100 points. or 150 points. pretty standard stuff.

[Cybren]

Originally Posted by opposedToGravity

i am also aware of the (in my opinion) overpriced pdfs.

That's... thats a joke of some kind

lets modify this. lets not say what we want but what would most likely attract most new customers.

That kind of conjecture isn't really helpful, since the Carnifex can make wild guesses just like anyone else

[opposedToGravity]

Originally Posted by Brett

Bingo! Any possible adventure, 95% of GURPS players say "This is not what I play."

really? take a hotseller from e23. and do some pretty good scenarios. the scenarios should be so good in fact that people become interested in the setting and start playing it.

[Cybren]

Originally Posted by opposedToGravity

really? take a hotseller from e23. and do some pretty good scenarios. the scenarios should be so good in fact that people become interested in the setting and start playing it.

http://e23.sjgames.com/hot.cgi

Which of these things would you give an adventure? You have to go third down the list to even get a genre book. seventh to get a setting book.