What are GURPS' true strengths?

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by whswhs

Overall, I'd say GURPS is a highly useful second-best system for almost any particular genre you might want. If someone has written customized rules from scratch for a particular setting (licensed or original), they may well work better, but GURPS can adapt to do nearly as good a job.

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Examples where that has happed elude me at the moment. Perhaps it's just that nostalgia has me going through my WEG Star Wars material. It's a fast and simple system and some might think was ideal for star Wars but I can't help but see where it breaks.

For example, the large herbivore known as a "bantha" is very strong compared to a human so the game gives it a high Strength, 8D vs. 2-4D for a Human.

The problem is that resistance to damage is also based on a roll of Strength and an average blaster rifle rolls 5D for damage. It has to roll equal to or better than the bantha's 8D to do even temporary "Stun" damage. It has to beat that 8D by 13 to leave the bantha in the "Mortally Wounded" condition.

It's more reasonable that melee damage is based of the Strength stat but 8D is so much that a bantha can usually destroy small armored vehicles. In fact, if you match a bantha v. one of the Imperial's bipedal "scout" walkers seen on Endor it completely favors the bantha.

<waives hand> Sorry to digress into the D6 SW system but it's an example of a place where a custom designed system still breaks and Gurps wouldn't. You can kill a bantha with a blaster rifle in Gurps.

So there's a specific strength. Gurps not only stretches to fit many power levels and settings it doesn't break in the process. Gurps has base mechanics that are both flexible _and_ resilient.

[GodBeastX]

Depth.

Seriously, this is why I use GURPS, depth.

I tend to play with mature people who ask questions that most RPG engines don't ask or won't answer.

GURPS seems to have thought about anything I can come up with and made it game able.

[whswhs]

To me the outstanding example of a custom designed system is the Buffy the Vampire Slayer rpg. I ran a campaign in it, with five players who were big Buffy fans, and it totally captured the flavor of the show for us.

[johndallman]

Originally Posted by Nymdok

GURPS is getting praise for doing normal people well and yet this is the system that spawned the 'psychic blueberry muffin' trope.

My interest in being able to handle normal people isn't so much because PCs are normal people (although that happens sometimes). It's a bit more subtle:

I want to be able to think about normal people while I'm thinking in terms of the game and the system. I don't want to have to switch mental tracks to consider them. I want this because the way ordinary people think about events in the game and react to them is pretty important. Sure, the most important reaction to the events of the game is that of the players. But the reaction of the ordinary population matters too, for any game that lasts more than one or two adventures.

[Embassy of Time]

Originally Posted by GodBeastX

Depth.

Seriously, this is why I use GURPS, depth.

I tend to play with mature people who ask questions that most RPG engines don't ask or won't answer.

GURPS seems to have thought about anything I can come up with and made it game able.

I'm not trying to be a smart-ass, but.... can you elaborate on that?

[Embassy of Time]

Originally Posted by whswhs

To me the outstanding example of a custom designed system is the Buffy the Vampire Slayer rpg. I ran a campaign in it, with five players who were big Buffy fans, and it totally captured the flavor of the show for us.

Never really heard anyone who tried that system. How dod it capture the flavor so well?

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Embassy of Time

I'm not trying to be a smart-ass, but.... can you elaborate on that?

The example I can think of is the space book. It has a section where it lists off every different type of FTL it can. Then it gives suggestions about what super-science is appropriate for your campaign and what isn't. Then it talks about common tropes to use in the genre...

[Shostak]

Originally Posted by Embassy of Time

So, if you had to explain to someone why GURPS would be better than Brand X RPG, what would you describe as GURPS' real strengths?

I started playing GURPS (circa 1986) because it offered the most believable, consistent system that I could find that let fantasy stories feel real, and it would let me play in any genre I wanted to, from Sci-Fi to historical. It has only gotten better. I think the storytelling GURPS supports is as fine- or coarse-grained as one could hope for. The options for fuzziness (as opposed to grittiness) allow it to do cinematic if that's what you want, and to do it with enough realism to keep the suspension of belief going, which is what every good story needs.

I think the only thing that isn't a strength for GURPS is its reputation among some (perhaps those who haven't played much?) that it is too complex. I don't understand them--it is only as complex as you want it to be.

[whswhs]

Originally Posted by Embassy of Time

Never really heard anyone who tried that system. How dod it capture the flavor so well?

Well, a couple of points:

Its game mechanic for combat and other contests has the players roll for the PCs, but the NPCs are assumed to get average rolls, which speeds up play and keeps the focus on the agency of the PCs.

The PCs have drama points to spend on fortunate coincidences, recovery from injuries, and the like, which gives the players some ability to script the scenario. Moreover, since non-hero-level characters have twice as many drama points, it's possible to have both a Slayer and a gang of scoobies as PCs without imbalance.

The magic system does a really good job of improvisational magic, as good as I've ever encountered.

[T.K.]

I also need to point out, while not being something specific to the system per se, its one of the strongest if not THE strongest point in GURPS for me and my group:

How active Kromm and Editors are in the forums and Comm channels.

To me and my group, being able to directly connect and have feedback from Editors and Creators is simply invaluable, specially due to the fact that most times they also give a bit of insight on what the line of thinking was at the time for a decision or rule.

That allows a deeper understanding of the balance of the system and even permits, if you so choose to go against their rulings, to make educated changes knowing why they went the route they went and what could possibly happen going your route.

It werent few times where I got divergent answers or straight out ludicrous ones from D&D GMs when using my WotC subscription account (which seemed much more like random, unprepared players that decided to answer) when It was still active.

Maybe some groups are not as nitpicking as we are in my group, but I can't stress enough how wonderful it is to be able to have such direct access to these guys.