(Unofficial) FAQ of the GURPS Fora

[vicky_molokh]

Some notes on Will, inspired by a recent thread. Might come in handy some day.

Originally Posted by Kromm

Yes. That's pretty much self-evident, since Will = IQ and Per = IQ by default, so buying IQ down to 0 takes Will and Per down to 0, too. You don't get Will for free!

It seems applicable to all dumb machines. Note that rocks aren't machines, though . . . a robot body is inherently Unliving, not Homogenous.

If the attack in question would affect you at all, sure. Note that lots of things with Will 0 have no mind to affect, so mind-affecting abilities fail automatically. Things that have low IQ but a mind generally buy up Will to allow resistance. Those that have low IQ but no mind often have Immunity to Mind Control. And some power modifiers already assume "Only affects targets with minds."

Exactly what I was saying above, yes.

[vicky_molokh]

Q: Please resolve an ambiguity - do Side Effects work based on Injury, or on Penetrating Damage?
A: Penetrating Damage.

[vicky_molokh]

Q: Could you clarify the details of immediate HT checks for unconsciousness at 0 HP and the periodic checks that follow?
A:

Originally Posted by Kromm

The instant you're injured to 0 HP or less: No matter what maneuver you selected before being injured, you must roll vs. HT to avoid unconsciousness. Do Nothing – as a choice on that turn or as a consequence of something else – is beside the point.

Turns after you're injured to 0 HP or less: If you select any maneuver but Do Nothing, you must roll vs. HT to avoid unconsciousness before you take action. If you select Do Nothing – as a choice on that turn or as a consequence of something else – you do not have to roll but of course have no action to take.

That is, my clarification was of the two offending sentences. The Do Nothing exception isn't in either of them, and works as it always did: It lets you avoid a HT roll. But that's neither here nor there in what I was trying to clarify. The whole rule would be:

0 HP or less – You are in immediate danger of collapse. In addition to the above effects, make an immediate HT roll, at -1 per full multiple of HP below zero. Failure means you fall unconscious (or simply stop working, if you weren’t truly alive or conscious in the first place); see Recovering from Unconsciousness (p. 423). Success means you can act normally, but must roll again at the start of every turn to continue functioning. Exception: If you choose Do Nothing on your turn, and do not attempt any defense rolls, you can remain conscious without rolling. Roll only on turns during which you attempt a defense roll or choose a maneuver other than Do Nothing.

[vicky_molokh]

Q: Summonable Allies - how long do they last, can they be summoned/de-summoned repeatedly etc.?
A: Generally, there are two flavours of Summonable - the Classic (as intended by Basic Set) and Spell-Like (emulating spiritual predecessors of Dungeon Fantasy, computer games etc.) Here are some details:

Originally Posted by Kromm

I'll try to sum this up:

Common to All Interpretations

Ally can be summoned at the time and place of your choosing, and no social or practical considerations impinge on appearance. The place can be anywhere you can go, even if the Ally couldn't get there for reasons of size, lack of mobility or stealth, etc., and even if the GM imposes dramatic conditions that allow just one person (yourself) to be present. Until summoned, Ally occupies no space, consumes no food, requires no transportation, and cannot be detected.

If the appearance roll fails, the cooldown is one day, not one full adventure.

These things are what make a Summonable Ally worth the points.

Classic Ally Interpretation

Frequency of Summoning: Once per adventure.
Duration of Summoning: One adventure.

This is no change from a standard Ally, and is worth no points.

Spell-Like Interpretation

Frequency of Summoning: However often you like until you fail and hit the cooldown.
Duration of Summoning: One minute.

This is a big change from a standard Ally, but it's a tradeoff and worth no points.

Notes:
Spell-Like assumes a Concentrate manoeuvre is enough to summon an ally in combat, behinds someone's back etc.
Classic assumes that once you de-summon an Ally, you have to wait until the end of the Adventure. With Spell-Like, there is no such drawback.

More from Kromm:

Originally Posted by sir_pudding

[Refplace]

Sounds to me like he clarified it nicely.
Not sure what all the hubub was in the thread of doom but...
These posts are consistent in saying that with the "spell like" version you can summon and dismiss or "put away" as often as you like until you fail the roll.
http://forums.sjgames.com/showpost.p...8&postcount=56
http://forums.sjgames.com/showpost.p...2&postcount=60
http://forums.sjgames.com/showpost.p...4&postcount=63

[roguebfl]

Originally Posted by Refplace

Sounds to me like he clarified it nicely.
Not sure what all the hubub was in the thread of doom but...
These posts are consistent in saying that with the "spell like" version you can summon and dismiss or "put away" as often as you like until you fail the roll.
http://forums.sjgames.com/showpost.p...8&postcount=56
http://forums.sjgames.com/showpost.p...2&postcount=60
http://forums.sjgames.com/showpost.p...4&postcount=63

don't forget http://forums.sjgames.com/showpost.p...&postcount=179

There is a 24 hour cool down on a failed summoned or dismissal not it not just keep rolling.

[vicky_molokh]

Q: Chameleon (and Silence) seems overpriced compared to a Racial Skill Bonus . . .
A: Well, there's this old PM exchange with Kromm:

Originally Posted by Molokh

Also, your mention of partial Invisibility hints (as far as I understand) that Chameleon should plain penalize all vision-related action by the enemy [as opposed to providing a Stealth bonus]. Should Dynamic Chameleon give a penalty to hit, like Blur [even in the middle of combat]?

Originally Posted by Kromm

Yes. If your enemy can only see part of you, because other parts look like the wall, floor, bushes, etc., then it makes no sense that he would have no trouble hitting you.

Yes, the answer is fuzzy. But it is reason enough for GMs to houserule the change from providing a Stealth bonus, to providing a Vision penalty instead (which can be used even in combat with Dynamic).

[vicky_molokh]

Q: Where do the Hit Location penalties (the numbers, that is) come from?

A:

Originally Posted by Kromm

This is 100% correct. Hit location penalties consider three factors:

1. Target size. How large or small the body part is -- in essence, its Size Modifier. (On bigger or smaller foes, overall SM accounts for changes in the size of body parts; e.g., since an SM +2 giant is attacked at +2 no matter where you hit him, his hands and head are effectively larger by +2.)

2. Target mobility. The body part's potential range of movement, speed of movement, and likely movements in a combat situation. (This isn't treated as a Dodge bonus simply because a body part moving unpredictably is still a hard target for, say, a surprise attack where no defense is allowed. An entire man running in a straight line isn't, really.)

3. Target attitude. How the body part is normally offered in combat. This accounts for whether it's presented or denied by combat stances, often behind other body parts or a shield, above or below the usual line of attack for an equal-sized foe, etc. (Incidentally, this explains why the feet of a higher fighter or head of a lower fighter are struck at a bonus, despite the body part not changing size!)

A helmed head, for instance, isn't all that small; it's between 8" and 1' across (SM -5) and basically spherical (+2 to SM, for a net -3 for size). However, it's highly mobile (-1): it twists around on a neck constantly in a fight, and it's maximally displaced from the center of mass, meaning its potential range of movement is exceptionally high. It's also generally denied (-1): no tried-and-true combat stance leads with the jaw; moreover, against another man, it's above the median line of attack. This gives -5.

A gloved hand is over 5" across (SM -6) and basically spherical (+2 to SM, for a net -4 for size) when balled into a fist for punching or around a weapon grip. It, too, is highly mobile (-1): it whizzes around striking and parrying, and is highly displaced from the center of mass. However, it is most commonly presented (+1), since all that striking and parrying is a tad difficult otherwise -- and if it's able to defend, then it has a high probability of being right on the median line of attack. This gives -4. The same hand behind a shield has the full -6 for size, as it isn't balled up into a sphere, and is mobile (-1) and denied (-1), which gives -8.

A weapon arm, shoulder to wrist, is about a yard long (SM -2), long and skinny (no SM adjustment), mobile (-1), and presented (+1). That's -2.

A shield arm, shoulder to wrist, is also about a yard long (SM -2), mobile (-1), and denied (-1). That's -4.

And so on. A few body parts might not quite make sense in these terms if you don't agree with my assessments of mobility and attitude, or whether the SM ought to assume a stick (0), elongated box (+1), or sphere (+2), but I think you can see how it works.

[vicky_molokh]

Q: All-Out Attack (particularly when Berserk) makes it trivial to become Pinned. This seems dubious.

A: While Martial Arts indeed says that AoA deprives one of the right to defend against Pins, it can be reasoned that Pinning a wildly thrashing target should not be that easy. Thus, it can be ruled as a partial or complete exception. Full answer:

Spoiler:  

Originally Posted by Toadkiller_Dog

As for pins not being resistible if you All-Out Attack: I think that doesn't reality check well, but it didn't come up in the playtest.

I think it's perfectly reasonable to say that the Regular Contest for a pin is, in fact, an effect roll (much like injury, or the quick contest for strangulation and neck snap), not a defense-like roll. Had this come up during the playtest, I'm sure we would have changed the wording to make it so.

So IMO (remember I'm a freelancer and co-author, not an SJG employee) you could amend the rule to takeout "pins" from the sentence about automatically losing a contest, and revise the line below to say "You get a ST roll to resist a pin, or a ST or HT roll to resist injury from strangling, Arm Lock, Neck Snap, Wrench Limb, etc."

I personally wouldn't apply the -2 to the contest for a Committed Attack, either, but if you like that, -2 for a CA, -4 for an AOA would parallel nicely, I think.

Reality checking would support this, I think - it's easy to take someone down if they aren't trying to stop you, but it's not easier to pin someone who is furiously fighting with no thought to defense. That would make it reasonable to do that multi-man rush against a crazed person in order to get them down - suddenly, you need all of them. It should be harder to hold down a berserker, even if it's easier to get them down. Plus this would match Sweep, where you still get your normal rolls, you just don't get much chance to stop the attacker from trying.

Doug can discuss what Technical Grappling does, since I know he's said it handles "pin" in an entirely different fashion than BASIC SET or MARTIAL ARTS.

Originally Posted by Kromm

As Peter's coauthor on Martial Arts (and an official staff member, too!), I endorse his words. The spirit of the rule was to prevent people from doing All-Out Attacks against grapplers knowing that they could still evade the many grappling moves that rely on the Quick Contest mechanism instead of the attack roll-defense roll mechanic for their roll to "hit." The exception to allow ST and HT rolls was meant to cover all "saving throws" against all bad effects from grappling moves that had already "hit" by either mechanism . . . and where we called out injury from locks, we probably ought to have explicitly allowed all rolls to resist control (forced change of position, pin, etc.), injury, or affliction (choking or whatever). In short, read that as: "You can't use DX in Quick Contests vs. grappling moves."

[vicky_molokh]

Q: How do Very Fit and Extra Effort In Combat interact?

A:

Originally Posted by Kromm

You always round FP costs (and most other things that are bad for the characters) up in GURPS. Half of 1 is still 1. You need at least 2 FP for a single action before Very Fit does a thing. The main job of Very Fit is to halve multi-point FP costs for things like exertion in armor.

Extra Effort In Combat use assumes FP expenditure in single-FP bursts. GURPS does not support half-FPs. Even though further supplements may add cases where combat Extra Effort can spend more than one FP at a time, the original intent was only to affect FP expenditures from effort over a period of time.

Also of interest whenever 'what does FP affect' comes up:

Originally Posted by Kromm

FWIW, I give pretty much all career combat soldiers Fit in my games (and I give most special operators Very Fit and Combat Reflexes). This reflects the effects of marching around all the time with heavy loads, not sleeping much, and so on. If you don't wash out – which is antithetical to "career" – then you're Fit. I give most amateur athletes Fit, too, and anybody better than amateur Very Fit. This treatment makes these types of characters tougher survivors without automatically making them all sexy singers with excellent drinking skills.

Originally Posted by Kromm

A trained jock with Fit and Breath Control (which in 4e is the totally realistic skill of pacing yourself) can get back 1 FP per minute (1 per 2 minutes with Breath Control, doubled for Fit).

Originally Posted by Kromm

The fact that GURPS always rounds injury, fatigue, and point costs up for the PCs is entirely consistent. "Inconsistent" here would be rounding down for any reason. One could argue that there are bizarre "quantum effects" owing to the fact that N 1-FP expenditures always round up to N FP, while for N > 1, a single N-FP expenditure would become N/2 and always save at least 1 FP . . . but so it goes. Such quantum effects are part and parcel of GURPS having a resolution level or granularity, like any other game. In this case, the effects were also intended. Very Fit is the advantage of suffering less from large, realistic FP burns and not the advantage of needing fewer FP for unrealistic effects (cinematic martial-arts skills, magic, psi, etc.) -- and extra effort in combat is heroic silliness, not realism. Its FP cost was set at 1 FP with the full knowledge that no effects that halve FP costs would work on it. Realistic FP costs for a fight are the ones assessed at the end.

In fact, the decision to make virtually all special skills that cost FP and all extra effort cost 1 FP per use was made with the full knowledge that round-ups would negate Very Fit. :)

Originally Posted by Kromm

"All HT rolls" means what it says. HT is used for four things:

• HT rolls
• secondary characteristics (FP and Basic Speed)
• HT-based skills
• HT-based calculations (notably effect durations)

Fit affects the first of those things. I'm not sure why bleeding rolls would be excluded . . . they're unambiguously part of "all HT rolls" and none of the other three things.

Q: Does Unfit (and Very Unfit) apply to Extra Effort in combat? What does it apply to? How is it applied?
A:

Originally Posted by PK

Any FP lost to natural conditions, such as exertion, environmental effects, and otherwise pushing your body too hard. It doesn't affect FP spent on spells or similar powered abilities, nor does it increase the FP loss when you're hit with a Fatigue Attack.

Yep.

Sort of. Combat-related Extra Effort involves quantum expenditures of 1 FP over a period of time that is effectively instantaneous. And some non-combat uses do work the same way. But if an out-of-combat use instead covers a measurable span of time (e.g., Extra Effort that costs 1 FP per minute), Unfit instead doubles the rate by halving the time (that is, that theoretical example would become 1 FP per 30 seconds, not 2 FP per minute).

Yes, those are all examples of pushing your body too hard. An Unfit character is terrible at doing such things.