What GURPS needs... now

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Gollum

Sure. But the huge problem here is that when your players see you running a GURPS game with a D&D, Pathfinder, Call of Cthulhu, Eclipse Phase or whatever else adventure, they inevitably wonder: why do you play GURPS and not D&D, Pathfinder, Call of Cthulhu, Eclipse Phase or whatever else?

Then, you answer them that GURPS is an amazing toolbox which allows to do everything possible. But then, they just ask: what did GURPS publishers do with it?

That isn't the answer I give. Because that isn't why I play GURPS.

My answer is (it's a very personal answer*): Because I can make Howard's Conan[1], Lieber's The Grey Mouser[2], or the Heartbow Wielder[3] without going to a million different supplements or 'tweaking' the rules. I just need this one book (and then I pat the Characters book).

And then I usually get a response of "That's cool!" or "Who the hell are those guys?".

Sigh. Philistines.


Though admittedly... that stopped being a useful 'go to' answer when D&D 4e came out... it did a 'reasonable' job of doing what I wanted. For various definitions of reasonable.


1 - A Conan that isn't "The Barbarian" class from D&D. In DF he'd be Barbarian with a 50 point buy-in into Thief.
2 - In GURPS DF, The Mouser is Swashbuckler with Magery 0, one point in Thaumaturgy, and a bit more than a 50 point buy into Thief.
3 - An old movie (I think it was from the 60's, I've only since it once in the very early 80's on tv and never again), but basically in DF it's a Scout with Imbuements and a Signature Bow. Essentially.... kinda... look, it's the easiest way with out explaining more of the movie.


* Though basically my answer is more neatly summed up in Stormcrow's "It does anything you want".

Originally Posted by trooper6

Hm...that isn't my experience for conversion. I find that in order to convert a module into GURPS...I need to know the system I'm converting from. I need to know what "average" is in that system, so I can make the equivalencies.

Ah. I don't bother with "equivalences". The GURPS PCs aren't in anyway "equivalent" so why bother doing that with the mobs?

[knarf]

Originally Posted by Phil Masters

See, my problem here is that you can end up defining "the core conflict" so vaguely and loosely that it ends up as a useless point of reference - and any game that isn't just about sitting in a corner meditating has a "core conflict" on those terms. Certainly, every TS campaign concept I've ever created has some kind of "core conflict".

If you're playing bodyguards or memetic consultants, the core conflict is with the parties hostile to your current client - except in those scenarios where you stumble over some third party who needs to be opposed out of good citizenship, common morality, or PR concerns, or where the client turns out to be playing some kind of dubious strategy and actually needs to be stopped. If you're playing kid detectives (in TS or anywhere else), the core conflict appears to be with whatever illicit actor is responsible for the badness in your current mystery, but may actually be with an adult world that doesn't understand your priorities, or for that matter with your own difficulties in relating to an inadequately comprehensible world (oh gods Bad Machinery the RPG pleasepleaseplease). If you're playing a journalist and her support team, the conflict is with whoever wants to stop you getting the story out, or to get revenge on you for having got the story out. And so on.

Wherever there's a story, there's a "core conflict". But so what?

"Core conflict" is a red herring. A more helpful term might be "core activity."

The core activity of D&D, famously, is "Kill monsters and take their stuff." The core activity of your investigative campaign is "solve the mystery." Other campaigns might be based around core activities like "survive the night" or "find out who the princess marries."

The advantage of a core activity is that it's easier to write adventures/scenarios around. This is a benefit to both publishers and gamers. A publisher can sell scenarios that revolve around the core activity, and gamers can use their knowledge of the core activity (and pilfer from published scenarios) to create their own material.

(Ken Hite had an article/blog that explained this far better than I could, but my Google-fu is weak.)

[JMason]

Originally Posted by knarf

(Ken Hite had an article/blog that explained this far better than I could, but my Google-fu is weak.)

Was it Robin Laws, maybe?:
http://robin-d-laws.blogspot.com/201...pg-design.html

[Stormcrow]

Originally Posted by trooper6

Hm...that isn't my experience for conversion. I find that in order to convert a module into GURPS...I need to know the system I'm converting from. I need to know what "average" is in that system, so I can make the equivalencies. I wouldn't feel all that comfortable converting a Pathfinder module, for example, without knowing the Pathfinder rules.

Fair enough. But the point here isn't to "convert a module into GURPS," it's to PLAY a module using GURPS. Whatever the exact stats for hobgoblins in Pathfinder, you can easily wing or jot down stats for hobgoblins in GURPS based on your own ideas of what hobgoblins are supposed to be like. If I have no idea what "AC 6, HD 1+1, ML 8" means, so what? It's a big boogeyman with a club and maybe leather armor, and it's really good at fighting. If I define "really good" as hitting nine times out of ten given ideal conditions, I give him a weapon skill of 14 and probably Brawling 14 too; if I define "big" as larger than man-sized and with bulging muscles, I give him SM +1 and ST 13. Everything else is average or derived, and I'm done; go deal with him.

No, you can't do this with a monster you've never heard of that you don't know what it's like. *shrug*

Getting the conversion exactly right, or even "balanced," isn't the point. The point is you can just take whatever description the third-party product gives you and play it in GURPS using common-sense statistics.

[robertsconley]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

Fair enough. But the point here isn't to "convert a module into GURPS," it's to PLAY a module using GURPS.

Exactly. GURPS has a particular feel even when used for a genre that another RPG is famous for. For me it a grittiness and characters that feel completely developed. Why does Bob the Barbarian have a point into taxidermy? Well there is a small story behind that and so on.

Part of the reason I switched to GURPS back in the 80s was to find a more satisfying way of doing the same things I was doing with D&D. Using GURPS mean the players had more ways of tackling the challenges of my campaigns. And it became easier to explore other aspects of the campaign because the work was done. If I wanted to run a campaign where all the character were 75 points characters living a neighborhood of the City-State of the Invincible Overlord GURPS had that covered as far as characters goes. One character could be a cook with a little bit of militia training and GURPS handles that with ease.

But there comes a point because you are pressed for time or whatever that you just want to be able to crack open a monster manual, a treasure guide, or an adventure and just run with it.

[robertsconley]

Originally Posted by trooper6

Hm...that isn't my experience for conversion. I find that in order to convert a module into GURPS...I need to know the system I'm converting from. I need to know what "average" is in that system, so I can make the equivalencies. I wouldn't feel all that comfortable converting a Pathfinder module, for example, without knowing the Pathfinder rules.

It because you are trying to replicate the balance found in another set of rules which is a fool's game that just generate a lot of extra work.

The trick is to look at the adventure as a real place existing in that setting. If there is a high priest, priest, and acolytes, an orc sergeant, and orc guards. You figure out what those titles and position mean in the context of your setting. The just plug those elements in lieu of the original.

Does this means that some things that are easy become hard and vice versa? Yup it does however the end result well feel more "natural". This is because GURPS even when incorporating the supernatural has a more "rich" and often realistic take on a given genre. It is this richness and realism that one of many of the attractions of GURPS.

Why don't you write you own then if you not bothering to replicate the balance of the original modules? Because adventures have maps, descriptions of location, descriptions of inhabitants and their motivations and plots. All of which takes time and energy to come up on your own. However that negated if in addition you feel you have replicate the balance of the mechanics in the original.

For example a simple 10' foot pit in GURPS versus D&D. In GURPS a 10 foot is pretty much a fixed effect if there no supernatural abilities involved. In D&D more experienced character can shrug off the effects of a 10' fall far more easy than when starting out at 1st level.

Now you could replicate the "balance" by altering the damage and effect of a 10' foot but now you moving away from GURPS' realism and the question can be legitimately raised "Why not just use the original system?"

This is the basis of my criticism of Dungeon Fantasy starting out with 250 point templates. I am far more interested in Dungeon Fantasy with 125 point characters as it a very different kind of challenge than what I get with my D&D campaigns even when using the same adventures.

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by JMason

I have the same answer to both:
Discworld, Hellboy, Conan, Mars Attacks, Cabal, Reign of Steel, Transhuman Space, Illuminati University, Traveller, Banestorm, Infinite Worlds, Cyberworld, Chthulupunk, International Super Teams, historical settings, fantasy historical settings, and more.

GURPS has a ton of worlds in just about every genre you can think of, and allows cross-setting play without having to change the rules.

Sure.

But how many of these worlds has been developed enough to attract newcomers, that it (in my humble opinion) to be played without hours of preparation work?

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by lachimba

THS totally not evocative.

Or Technomancer.

Or Conan...

Im pretty sure GURPS tried the interesting evocative settings

Yes, they did. But the problem with those tries is that most of them are one shots. One book, one adventure (if you are lucky) and then, make your own way.

If the Basic Roleplaying System is one of the most famous roleplaying systems in France (the second most famous one, just after the D20 one), it is for one reason:

• Call of Cthulhu,
• Runequest,
• Stormbringer,
• Hawkmoon
• ...

Evocative gameworlds fully developed, with a lot of really ready to play stuff and amazing adventures and campaigns. Almost every roleplaying player and gamemaster in France has tried one of these games.Those who tried GURPS are exceptions.

[knarf]

Originally Posted by JMason

Was it Robin Laws, maybe?:
http://robin-d-laws.blogspot.com/201...pg-design.html

No. I distinctly remember it being Ken Hite and it looked at how games like D&D and CoC were able to sell adventures because of their strongly defined core activity.

[Gollum]

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

You gave them the wrong answer. The answer to "Why do you play GURPS and not X?" is not "GURPS can do everything," it's "GURPS can do anything." "Everything" implies that whatever they're looking for is already published for them; "anything" means GURPS will do what YOU want it to do.

Sorry, my English level is not high enough here. By "everything" I wanted to mean "anything" - my players are french and I answered them in French.

Originally Posted by Stormcrow

GURPS is not everything at once. It is what you need it to be when you need it to be that. Pick up a Pathfinder module and play it without learning Pathfinder or converting your whole campaign. Add an idea from Call of Cthulhu to your space campaign without having to invent any rules. Depart from genre conventions (wizards with swords) whenever you want to without breaking any rules.

Of course I answered things like that. But, as mentioned above, they also know a universal system which allows that and which is much more attractive for newcomers ...

So, the question may be: do we want to be as attractive as the BRP system (for instance; or as any other universal roleplaying game which attracts newcomers and regularly win awards), or do we want to go on complaining that GURPS doesn't sell very well - and that it is not really liked, except by GURPS fans and people who play with them.

Don't misunderstand me. I play GURPS and my players like my games. As long as I am the GM and as long as I do all the preparation work for them (and the rules explanations when they need it). None of them has ever wanted to be a GURPS GM, even with GURPS Lite. When I am a player, it is always with another system.