Math, GURPS, and its reputation for complexity

[Ulzgoroth]

Originally Posted by Anthony

I would dispute 'almost everyone'. In fact, I doubt it's even a majority; my experience with games that have resource management systems is that players go out of their way to make sure that the resource management turns into a nonfactor.

Not anyone who plays magic classes in Dungeons & Dragons any edition.

(Resource management not being limited to material goods.)

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

Not anyone who plays magic classes in Dungeons & Dragons any edition.

The way you make resource management a nonfactor for spellcasters in D&D is by taking long rests after any significant encounter (the classic 'five minute workday' problem). The DM can discourage that, but it's a perennial problem with D&D that the game is assuming 4-6 (depending on edition) encounters per day, and very few groups actually play that way.

[WingedKagouti]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

Do you mean which difficulty offset it uses? In 4e that's the only difference in pricing. (Though there are a few weird defaults.)

And once again, a lot of GURPS' reputation stems from 3E (and possibly earlier editions) where DX and IQ skills used different scaling (and IQ/VH a third). The jump to 4E didn't change the general perception of the system, because it was still GURPS and "GURPS is difficult and complex".

A lot of people don't try GURPS because "that guy I know who plays lots of roleplaying games says it's complex" (and "that guy" may just have gotten his information from a similar person years ago), so they won't even begin to consider it a factor when looking at what they want to play. They picks are almost certainly going to be limited to the preferred game of "that guy they know", whatever is currently played by their favourite content creators and systems tailored to a specific setting they're interested in.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by Ulzgoroth

Not anyone who plays magic classes in Dungeons & Dragons any edition.

(Resource management not being limited to material goods.)

Oh, I assure you that if possible you make it a non-issue, assuming the edition you're playing doesn't make it such at some point anyway (high-level 3e, for example).

[kirbwarrior]

Before Fourth Edition, skills could also have half points in them, which I know for a fact confused a lot of players.

Originally Posted by safisher

Most games require you to count expendable resources, whether it's throwing stars, arrows, spells, or X feet of rope.

These are the kinds of things that end up being the most tedious at the table. It's one thing in a video game where a lot of it is automated and thus it boils down to player decisions, but I've definitely sat at tables and played a full round of Magic with one player while the other three players and GM really cared about resource management over the course of an hour. That's not even in GURPS where I bet it would be even more complicated as players try to decide how to build their armor via Low Tech or something.

Getting away from that so we can actually get back to the exploring/combat/social triangle of roleplaying quickly is the basis of a lot of my houserules and GM choices (and one of the many, many reasons I don't use Magic and instead use other systems).

Actually, no, I don't even know if it's fun in video games. Unless it's a game that's heavily restricted in how you get resources, then it largely becomes busy work to have 'infinite' arrows.

[RGTraynor]

Originally Posted by Anthony

I would dispute 'almost everyone'. In fact, I doubt it's even a majority; my experience with games that have resource management systems is that players go out of their way to make sure that the resource management turns into a nonfactor.

Agreed. I love resource management myself, but over the years one of the chief reasons some players wash out of my game is that they can't stand resource management more detailed than "Here's my sword, here's my torch, here's the armor, and here's the backpack I shove the amorphous 'loot' into. Done."

But that being said, look. Sometimes we're our worst enemy. I would ten times rather a newbie looking for a question about GURPS go to the dedicated subreddit on Reddit than come to this forum. There, they get relatively straightforward, relatively short answers for their questions. Here, there've been just too many instances where posters go for the most insanely complex ways to do anything, choked with jargon and numbers-crunching, and the concept of KISS is met with derision.

And fair enough: that's the type of game some people prefer. As long as we understand the predictable result of that.

[Anthony]

Originally Posted by safisher

Most games require you to count expendable resources, whether it's throwing stars, arrows, spells, or X feet of rope.

I'd want to see polling on that. My experience is that most games, as played, do not bother with detailed record keeping (and that includes GURPS; the point you start tracking arrows is the point when the archer decides it's time to get a cornucopia quiver)

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by Anthony

I'd want to see polling on that. My experience is that most games, as played, do not bother with detailed record keeping (and that includes GURPS; the point you start tracking arrows is the point when the archer decides it's time to get a cornucopia quiver)

For one D&D2e game I loaded 300 arrows into a Bag of Holding. The DM didn't even care about those much less the 20lbs of cheese I added for provisions.

Vancian magic-users running out of spells is a more common problem but the healers run out of spells at least as fast as the fireball-tossers and the fighters run out of HP about then too. The one size fits all solution is then "strategic retreat" which is kind of dull but practical.

Resource management is way over-rated.

[sir_pudding]

Maybe it's because I play war games too. but I'm pretty used to ammo tracking.

[kirbwarrior]

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

Maybe it's because I play war games too. but I'm pretty used to ammo tracking.

"Used to" and "enjoys" are very different things. I'm used to dealing with ammo in all the various systems and games that have it, but so few make it actually enjoyable to do and not just unpaid labor.