GURPS X-Com

[Thamior]

Originally Posted by Randover

Hi there,

I tried and failed twice. So I will post some points I came up with afterwards.

First think you need to figure out is what role will the players play. (Are there members of Strike One squad? - If yes you need to think realy carefully about tactical situations. What is smooth in PC game is realy long and could be boring in tabletop.)

As always but more so - be on the same page as your players. I had a very inconsistent groups both times. It eventualy broke the games neck. Some wanted to shoot aliens, other's wanted to feel the struggle and grim situation of X-COM. And there were players that did have some forknowledge of the setting, and had hard time adapting for it.

Lastly about gear and aliens. I used gurps Ultra tech and in blowed back in my face quickly. It confused players a lot. While computer game does this with ease and gear research and upgrade feels rewarding for tabletop they felt lost. Maybe because the campaign was relatively short. But I would love to stick to one type of enemy for several missions if I get to do it again.

Beware of Ultra tech while in X-COM series lasers and plasma weaponry only improved damage. In GURPS both lasers and plasma work quite differently from normal bullets. Same goes for armor. While in game agent in powerarmor or mech suit is still vurneable to normal weapons TL10-12 power armor is basicly too good for anything other that plasma.

On the side note - light amored agent can survive one plasma shot if lucky in X-COM. There is no way that would be true to GURPS. (Actualy he might, but with loosing limb or another crippling injury, writting the character of.)

Just to point out a huge difference - in new computer game a granade o rocket is sure source of set damage with 0 miss chance. In GURPS in exact opposite.

I don't see much value in trying to convert PC game mechanics though it is possible with a hefty tweaking. But all you will get is a streamlined wargame rules. You could tweak a few weapon and armor stats here and there to preserve their relative balance from the game though.

[AlexanderHowl]

One way to represent X-Com armor is to give armor DR Ablative (-80%) and Hardened 4 (+80%) and have normal maintenance restore Ablative DR (cost of repairs would be (25/DR)% for each point of Ablative DR).

[The Benj]

I'd be concerned that, even using the bonus for having a sample to retroengineer, the invention rules will be very punishing for tech advancement.