GURPS Dune

[AllenOwen]

I have a pdf written in the 90s by Sean Ware detailing Dune as a setting for GURPS 3rd Ed. Has anyone else tried a Dune setting for GURPS 4th Ed?

[beetle496]

Should be a good fit, right?

I started to noodle around with some specifics after one of the TV series. I gave up though when I couldn’t think of how I would expose a group of players to enough of the different cultures. If you are not Paul Atreides, you are pretty much stuck to your caste! I am just not creative enough, so I would be better off with the Traveller universe.

[shawnhcorey]

Originally Posted by beetle496

If you are not Paul Atreides, you are pretty much stuck to your caste!

Unless you're a smuggler. They take all types.

[AllenOwen]

Well I mean you wouldn't have to play peasants. You'd be members of a noble household, like Duncan Idaho or Gurney Halleck.

[evileeyore]

Just like with Star Wars, you have decide the level of importance of the PCs as part of the campaign premise.

[AllenOwen]

I was also looking for how to work out the personal shields they use too.

[Humabout]

I'd just make their DR apply to non-melee physical attacks and detonate like a mini nuke if hit with a lasgun.

[pestigor]

Originally Posted by Humabout

I'd just make their DR apply to non-melee physical attacks and detonate like a mini nuke if hit with a lasgun.

Also, there's a random chance the explosion will be centered on the lasgun so that idea of sniping with a lasgun and setting off small nukes is a no-go.

[beetle496]

Originally Posted by AllenOwen

You'd be members of a noble household, like Duncan Idaho or Gurney Halleck.

Of course, but that doesn’t solve the problem. What you really want is an excuse for one player to be Bene Gesserit, one Sardaukar, one Mentat, etc. I couldn’t figure out a start that felt plausible.

Originally Posted by evileeyore

Just like with Star Wars, you have decide the level of importance of the PCs as part of the campaign premise.

With Star Wars, marginal individuals can still zip around the universe. The player characters meet at a bar and off they go! Important to the campaign premise (or not) isn’t really a factor to having great and varied adventures.

With Dune, the Spacing Guild has a lock on FTL travel, so the players are stuck on one planet without a patron / strong plot hook. If they players are mobile (i.e., important to the plot) they will be from one house, and pretty homogenous. If the players are on the fringe, they can be more varied, but it is going to be harder to get them exposed to all the lovely weirdness, especially after the initial setting.

[shawnhcorey]

Originally Posted by beetle496

Of course, but that doesn’t solve the problem. What you really want is an excuse for one player to be Bene Gesserit, one Sardaukar, one Mental, etc. I couldn’t figure out a start that felt plausible.

It is plausible if they are advisors to the noble. Every noble house in Dune has a variety of characters with diverse backgrounds.

Originally Posted by beetle496

With Dune, the Spacing Guild has a lock on FTL travel, so the players are stuck on one planet without a patron / strong plot hook. If they players are mobile (i.e., important to the plot) they will be from one house, and pretty homogenous. If the players are on the fringe, they can be more varied, but it is going to be harder to get them exposed to all the lovely weirdness, especially after the initial setting.

Or the PCs could be spies for a house. They would have a variety of skills and backgrounds. They would be sent to different places and planets for their spying. And they may be the ones looking for the weirdness, to retrieve it or sabotage it.