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Old 06-24-2021, 09:07 PM   #121
Fred Brackin
 
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Default Re: How to Be a GURPS GM: Managing Expectations

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Originally Posted by awesomenessofme1 View Post
Paizo is the creator of Pathfinder. The vast majority of their stuff is within that system, but they also have a sci-fi version called Starfinder.
Starfinder might be more closely described as "bizarre Space Fantasy" than sci-fi. It's certainly not a generic sci-fi game.

The Pathfinder 1e Adventure Paths that I'm familar with were probably broader than "dungeon fantasy". They had extensive city and wilderness-based sections. Definitely no generic "towns" close to "The Dungeon" that you saw in the old modules.

My group dropped Pathfinder when it went to a heavily altered 2e.
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Old 06-24-2021, 09:11 PM   #122
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Default Re: How to Be a GURPS GM: Managing Expectations

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Originally Posted by awesomenessofme1 View Post
Paizo is the creator of Pathfinder. The vast majority of their stuff is within that system, but they also have a sci-fi version called Starfinder. Not sure the current breakdown of what they produce.
I don't know anything about Pathfinder either. Is it dungeon fantasy?
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Old 06-24-2021, 09:14 PM   #123
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Default Re: How to Be a GURPS GM: Managing Expectations

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I don't know anything about Pathfinder either. Is it dungeon fantasy?
Ah, sorry, should have realized you meant literally not familiar at all. Pathfinder was created as a reaction to D&D 4e. Its first edition was designed as a direct successor to D&D3.5 and uses the same basic rule structure, with PF2e forging a bit more of its own identity, but still very D&D-derived and solidly in the "kitchen sink dungeon fantasy" niche.
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Old 06-24-2021, 09:15 PM   #124
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Default Re: How to Be a GURPS GM: Managing Expectations

Polydamas got me thinking about what a younger (or rather Millennial-generation that I'm arguably able to speak for) audience expects from GURPS. I think Dungeon Fantasy, the DFRPG and the broader DF line of products for GURPS, has the most immediate appeal to a younger GURPS audience. Contemporary pop culture has put TTRPGs back into the mainstream conscience of youth, and I think it'd be of meaningful use to appeal to this new younger market. If anything, I'm certain there's a certain amount of DnD's younger player base that would like to wet their taste buds on either more nuanced or further abstracted rule set... which I see being either being a system like GURPS perhaps, or a "OSR" game like Old School Essentials for that faux-Dark Souls vibes.

I'm part of the demographic of young Millenial players who've tired of 5E's brand of the dungeon fantasy genre. There's a whole lot of hokey design choices that don't sit well with me but I'm sure appeals to some audience... afterall, they are pretty much the hottest TTRPG on the market. What drew me to GURPS is that it does enable the popular trends in contemporary TTRPGS: emphasis on dramatic character driven narratives in equally colorful, imaginative worlds. Young people love exploring fiction with their idealized characters. Wanna play as the hot pink demon-blooded girl with her magical animal friend? GURPS can do that. Want to do a dark dank cave-crawl with your party of heroines in space power armor fighting subterranean alien monsters? GURPS can do that. GURPS can do all of that.

I think the key to getting to younger audiences, and thus new blood into the GURPS fandom, is selling them on the infinite possibilities. GURPS has the seeds for broader market appeal and greater growth but it needs to figure out the secret sauce of getting it into the hands of youngsters I think.
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Old 06-25-2021, 04:01 AM   #125
Willy
 
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Default Re: How to Be a GURPS GM: Managing Expectations

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Originally Posted by awesomenessofme1 View Post
Paizo is the creator of Pathfinder. The vast majority of their stuff is within that system, but they also have a sci-fi version called Starfinder. Not sure the current breakdown of what they produce.
In the lack of SJG adventures now and than I buy a bundle of Paizo, most adventures i read so far, are pretty straight forward. You get a job, including introduction and most often pregen Characters ( mostly you can make your own too ) and follow the questline, all with good maps, enemys, gear and background information. Some of this quests are part of a series or play in one city / area, and build up on the quest before. The whole mass of different adventures is stunning nearly for everything which can be covered via Pathfinder rules has adventures for sale.
It hurts to say that they are much cheaper and have imho better graphics and illustrations than everything SJG offers. The return comes from much more sales and a broader audience, also the earlier used other online stores like drivethrough a lot earlier, which also broadens there player base, most people tend to shop in one place, like computergames where Steam is the big player and the rest has still to make ground.

They are a good source of inspiration and can easily be adapted for GURPS.Because of the lack of a actual bestiary, you need to be creative and have to use fan bestiarys for most monsters, adapting the NPCs itself is fairly easy.

There IS one drawback since GURPS is much more flexible and let you really play the game you want, sooner or later this adventures all met hack and slash a la DF, as I wrote pretty straightforward adventures. Oh and of course, it´s mostly not even a hint of being pseudorealistic, GURPS is still the best in this.
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Old 06-25-2021, 01:48 PM   #126
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Default Re: How to Be a GURPS GM: Managing Expectations

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<snip> seeing what happens when someone hits someone in GURPS is often an involved procedure. It may involve blocks, dodges. margin of success, hit location, damage type, split armour type, hardened armour, DR reduction, a damage roll, flexible armour, hit location and damage type again, major wounds, crippling wounds, mortal wounds, shock, stunning, knockdown, knockback, having 1/3 or fewer of your hit points left, rolling to avoid unconsciousness, and rolling death checks. Just what's involved there depends on a lot of situational and conditional checks.
Yet you forgot lighting, footing, weapon quality, handedness...

Look. You chose a list of optional rules to prove that the non-optional mechanics are not simple. That is inaccurate. Quoting from the introduction to the game:

Quote:
GURPS starts with simple rules, and – especially in the combat system – builds up to as much optional detail as you like.
(emphasis very much not added)

GURPS was built with a very simple mechanic to be a very easy game, with optional layers of complexity that can be added or ignored at the whims of the players & GMs. We make it complicated because we like it complicated. Then, sometimes, we gatekeep, using the optional complexity as a way to protect our turf from those other people who don't like complicated games.

GURPS is a very simple game to learn. Roll three dice, see what happens. Literally everything else, according to the book as written, is optional.
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Old 06-25-2021, 01:59 PM   #127
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Default Re: How to Be a GURPS GM: Managing Expectations

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There is a demand in professional written GURPS Adventures and literally nobody is catering to it.
As the author of the lion's share of published adventures for the dungeon fantasy line, I must sadly inform you that this isn't nearly as much the case as one might hope. Quite the contrary, as my royalty statements never fail to remind me. I mean, they sell well enough to justify my continuing writing them, but the real money makers are elsewhere.
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Old 06-25-2021, 02:08 PM   #128
Tuk the Weekah
 
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Default Re: How to Be a GURPS GM: Managing Expectations

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If I were addressing people unfamiliar with GURPS, and trying to persuade them to take up GURPS, you would have a point. In the actual circumstances I demonstrated something else: that the policy Tuk put forward involves telling an untruth that would be very quickly exposed.
No, you didn't. You basically pointed out that, since most people cannot build -- or even choose the components of -- a functional personal computer in 2021 that computers are too complicated for people to buy them, and that anyone who cannot build one should go back to banging the rocks together.

The literal second paragraph of the book says
Quote:
Generic.” Some people like quick, fast-moving games, where the referee makes lots of decisions to keep things moving. Others want ultimate detail, with rules for every contingency. Most of us fall somewhere in between. GURPS starts with simple rules, and – especially in the combat system – builds up to as much optional detail as you like. But it’s still the same game. You may all use it differently, but your campaigns will all be compatible.
The core of the game is simple; we are encouraged to make it as complicated -- or not complicated -- as we want it to be. But it's still all the same system. And characters can move from one campaign to the next. A character can go from a Celtic-inspired mythic world to a D&D-style campaign to transdimensional science fiction to high fantasy to the Wild West to 19th-century pulp adventure to becoming a Musketeer to monster-hunting in Victorian London and still be the same character with the same stats and skills. (That's not a hypothetical example, by the way; that's Corwyn's CV in several of my games.) This kind of portability is only possible in GURPS because the core of the game is so simple, and the optional additional rules so genre- and campaign-specific, that they can be added in or dropped out as needs be.

I reiterate my statement. GURPS is simple. Roll three dice, see what happens.

Last edited by Tuk the Weekah; 06-25-2021 at 02:15 PM.
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Old 06-25-2021, 04:24 PM   #129
Willy
 
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Default Re: How to Be a GURPS GM: Managing Expectations

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Originally Posted by Turhan's Bey Company View Post
As the author of the lion's share of published adventures for the dungeon fantasy line, I must sadly inform you that this isn't nearly as much the case as one might hope. Quite the contrary, as my royalty statements never fail to remind me. I mean, they sell well enough to justify my continuing writing them, but the real money makers are elsewhere.
Since bought some of your Work, I can say that you did great work, with Low Tech and The Tower of Octavius for example.

Sadly selling well enough to justify the continued effort is actually a part of the GURPS standard. Changing it needs new players, which needs new products, which needs money and that is the point where the cat is biting herself in the tail. The reason for and why that is so should better be a own thread.

As for the Adventure sales thanks for the update about it, it seems to be part of the same problem as above.
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Old 06-25-2021, 07:47 PM   #130
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Default Re: How to Be a GURPS GM: Managing Expectations

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Originally Posted by Fred Brackin View Post
Starfinder might be more closely described as "bizarre Space Fantasy" than sci-fi. It's certainly not a generic sci-fi game.

The Pathfinder 1e Adventure Paths that I'm familar with were probably broader than "dungeon fantasy". They had extensive city and wilderness-based sections. Definitely no generic "towns" close to "The Dungeon" that you saw in the old modules.
Contrary to DF's stance, Dungeon Fantasy has always included those elements. TSR published city/wilderness sections as early as 1982. Assassin's Knot, Desert of Desolation, Cult of the Reptile God, etc.
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