Gaming Ballistic - GURPS Content Posts

[fredtheobviouspseudonym]

Originally Posted by Kromm

I am at best an ordinary Joe, but here is what I look like.

The Kromm of a Thousand Faces.

[DouglasCole]

Once again, this issue contains support for a recently released GURPS product, this time GURPS Martial Arts: Yrth Fighting Styles.

While this is sort of in the nature of a Designer's Notes type article, that part of it takes all of one sentence for David to cover: he loves Banestorm as a setting, has played games set it in often, and has written about Ytarrian martial arts in the past. So when a Banestorm-related item showed up on the wish-list, he screamed and leaped.

[DouglasCole]

Well, it took a while, but someone (Gef) actually wrote a review of Technical Grappling, and posted it on the GURPS Forums. Mostly this post is just spreading the word beyond the forums themselves.

[DouglasCole]

This article contains the Designer's Notes for the relatively new release GURPS Martial Arts: Technical Grappling. I will likely cover this briefly; reviewing my own Designer's Notes for my own book is a bit too recursive for my tastes.

This is a relatively long article at over 5,200 words, and opens with a long quote from TV Tropes, expounding on why grappling is so very different than regular combat.

Hogwash, in short.

[DouglasCole]

Thursday is GURPS-Day, and release day! We get more goodness today with Loadouts: Low-Tech Armor.

I had a hand in this one, as you cans see - I was listed as Lead Playtester. Interestingly enough, this title, so to speak, came last.

I was approached by Steven Marsh a while back to see if I could potentially check up on the loadouts. Sure, I thought.

Then I got the manuscript. Holy. Crap.

Over twenty different historical warrior-types, each with anywhere from just a few to nearly two dozen individual pieces of armor, each written up, sometimes a bit cryptically, using Dan Howard's Instant Armor style. All in all I think I calculated that there were something like four hundred individual pieces to validate. A lot of work went into this.

[Irenaeus]

I found Takedown Sequences to really useful. Seeing how you relate Technical Grappling positions to... eh... technical grappling positions makes the rules a lot easier to relate to the narrative of a particular combat.

A minor note on the blog post (not the article), is that the picture of the ankle lock is actually Dean Lister applying a reverse heel hook, which attacks the knee.

P.S. Not a comment about the article per se, but the way you describe the triangle there gives me the impression you're doing it pretty old school. If you aren't aware of it yet, you should try the (relatively) new approach a try, where the position of the opponents arm is largely ignored in favour of obtaining an advantageous angle.

It's just an excerpt from Ryan Hall's extensive instructional on the subject, but it shows the main differences fairly well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rsNtpxKVn5M

[DouglasCole]

Originally Posted by Irenaeus

I found Takedown Sequences to really useful. Seeing how you relate Technical Grappling positions to... eh... technical grappling positions makes the rules a lot easier to relate to the narrative of a particular combat.

Thanks! If this one is well received, there were MANY cuts, mostly starting from "first, parry a punch/kick, then . . . "

A minor note on the blog post (not the article), is that the picture of the ankle lock is actually Dean Lister applying a reverse heel hook, which attacks the knee.

Point, but you have to grapple the foot hit location in GURPS to do it. I'll give more thought to this, since it's a neat nuance. I can grapple the hand/foot, but attack/damage either the wrist/ankle (doing certain locks) or the elbow/knee (doing many others).

P.S. Not a comment about the article per se, but the way you describe the triangle there gives me the impression you're doing it pretty old school. If you aren't aware of it yet, you should try the (relatively) new approach a try, where the position of the opponents arm is largely ignored in favour of obtaining an advantageous angle.

It's just an excerpt from Ryan Hall's extensive instructional on the subject, but it shows the main differences fairly well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rsNtpxKVn5M

Thanks. I'll look it up.

[DouglasCole]

Here's what's potentially going on with the blog over the next, um, whatever. 

[DouglasCole]

A forum post reminded me of something I'd wished I'd thought of when writing TG, but there we go. As most anyone who has roughhoused knows, it's possible to hurt yourself if someone throws you to the ground, executing what GURPS would call a Takedown, and what Technical Grappling calls Force Posture Change (though admittedly takedown is more evocative).

What might some rules for damaging takedowns look like? I ponder.

[Irenaeus]

Originally Posted by DouglasCole

Point, but you have to grapple the foot hit location in GURPS to do it. I'll give more thought to this, since it's a neat nuance. I can grapple the hand/foot, but attack/damage either the wrist/ankle (doing certain locks) or the elbow/knee (doing many others).

Yeah, kimura/Armbar, Heel Hook/Straight ankle lock, both dual threats working like this. I was really just nitpicking, but now I've been thinking about this since you wrote it. As you said: neat nuance.

Good stuff on the takedowns.