4e Revised

[acrosome]

Originally Posted by Professor Phobos

Also, I'll just put this out there, if they were to launch a 5th edition kickstarter, I can see myself backing that.

Pity I can't upvote this...

[mburr0003]

Originally Posted by hal

Part of the issue is that [Shields Up] is dependent upon DUNGEON FANTASY material, which I do not collect with any real effort...

Ah... no it isn't.

Okay, ostensibly it is, but since DFRPG uses GURPS 4e rules... everything* in Shields Up works perfectly fine with regular old GURPS Basic Set 4e.

And anywhere it might not, the rules from DFRPG have been ported into Shields Up for ease of page flippage.


* Everything except the 'Technical Grappling' rules which go along with Douglas Cole's Fantastic Dungeon Grappling, which is GURPS 4th Martial Arts Technical Grappling pared down in all the best ways. And of course, as with all rules (especially the ones marked as optional) those rules are optional.

[Colonel__Klink]

Originally Posted by binn05

I agree. A better presentation and reorganization of topics would help many new players.
Also, graphical improvements. Today's market wants shiny colors and glossy pages.
I would also update to 4E the solo adventure "A Night's Work" from 3E and include it in the basic set. It helped me a lot to understand GURPS during the 3E era.
At the end, a page with a link to Caravan to Ein Arris will help people GM and play a ready-to-go adventure. Include with it pre-gen 150-point characters.
Those two "modules" would teach newcomers basic combat and social interaction.

Create one more free adventure for the Dungeon Fantasy series to teach basic magic use and a little bit of powers. Also, include 150-point pre-gen characters.

I emphasize 150 points instead of DF 250 because it is easier to manage 150 points than 250, and they can still act within their chosen niche.

Link, in some way, all three "modules" with Infinite Worlds if it will continue to be GURPS default setting.

Also, each of your three books must come with 50 to 250-point iconic characters. And more down-to-earth ones, instead of the "I have no idea how to play this C3IR07-guy".

I would include a line of novels with iconic characters and settings, such as Dragonlance romances. But that is off-topic.

One thing I can say as a newer entry to GURPS than most here is that the basic set 4th edition is gorgeous. It certainly doesn't have as many character illustrations some other books have but the colorized almost Star Trek page borders are a brilliant move. The little in page "bubbles" wind up "feeling" nice too.

Most TTRPG books aren't like a DND book. You either wind up with Wraith the Oblivion which is impossible to use because the book is written like a novel or you get Rift which has most of the really nice pictures in the middle a history book or something lol.

The issue is organization. The rules for a good gunfight are a lot with the way the book lays it out and I really think that's where the game can improve. I feel like I'm always going back and forth trying to figure things out because these rules in a gunfight especially all are needed or the characters are instantly liquid.

[Colonel__Klink]

Originally Posted by acrosome

• I make criticals less common- on a natural 3 or 18 or success/failure by 10. It's more intuitive (all ones or all sixes) and 5% of attacks being criticals is silly.
• I add a self-control roll to Pacifism.
• I use the more regular Strength Damage progression, with swing damage increasing for every ST point and thrust increasing for every 2 ST points at high ST.
• I have picks and spikes do piercing damage with a (2) armor divisor, like a bodkin.
• I have slings do crushing damage.

And I use a lot of optional rules or rules from other sources:

• Optional Rules for Injury (B420).
• Optional Wounding Rules (HT162).
• A bunch of the meta rules for Buying Success/Effect/Reactions, Player Guidance, Flesh Wounds, Miraculous Recoveries, etc. from Impulse Buys. These can pretty much replace Luck and Serendipity.
• The rules for Tactics skill in Martial Arts.
• The Slam rules from Dungeon Fantasy.
• Etc.

The funny thing? Is I'd go the opposite direction with criticals and high skilled players? Maybe it's too many video games instead of TTRPG but it feels like you shouldn't even bother to have critical hits in the game if you're doing everything you can to prevent players from getting one including not allowing them to build a character to achieve them. If critical hits are bad for your game just remove them? If they are good for game then I really think an absolute cap of 5% is too low (you might go a year, playing every weekend with one combat session per game and never see one.)

The strength scaling is something I'm still struggling with. The difference between 10 and 12 IQ is absolutely titanic. But the difference between strength 10 and 16 doesn't seem that much? Am I wrong to think in my campaign with super strong vampires and cyborgs they need a strength of 30 to flip a car. Not throw a car but flip a car with force? (I think with 20 they can slowly flip it but I'm talking as a 1 second action.)

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Colonel__Klink

If they are good for game then I really think an absolute cap of 5% is too low (you might go a year, playing every weekend with one combat session per game and never see one.)

You could, but it would be extremely unlikely. There are a bit over 52 weeks in a year; let's round that down to 50. If you averaged, not one combat encounter per game, but one combat roll per game and a 5% chance of a Critical Success, you'd be at right around a 92% chance of seeing at least one Critical Success in combat. A typical combat encounter probably involves 10 or more combat rolls, but if we instead go with just 5 (maybe it's 10 each, but you only average one combat encounter every other game), you have around a 99.9997% chance of seeing at least one Critical Success in combat. On average, that means you'd have such a "Year without a Crit" roughly once every 370,765 years - so if you'd been playing since sometime around when Neanderthals first showed up, you would likely have experienced such a year once (well, you'd have had about a 63% chance of experiencing at least one such year, anyway).

That said, if you like crits being more common, go for it.

[Colonel__Klink]

Originally Posted by Varyon

You could, but it would be extremely unlikely. There are a bit over 52 weeks in a year; let's round that down to 50. If you averaged, not one combat encounter per game, but one combat roll per game and a 5% chance of a Critical Success, you'd be at right around a 92% chance of seeing at least one Critical Success in combat. A typical combat encounter probably involves 10 or more combat rolls, but if we instead go with just 5 (maybe it's 10 each, but you only average one combat encounter every other game), you have around a 99.9997% chance of seeing at least one Critical Success in combat. On average, that means you'd have such a "Year without a Crit" roughly once every 370,765 years - so if you'd been playing since sometime around when Neanderthals first showed up, you would likely have experienced such a year once (well, you'd have had about a 63% chance of experiencing at least one such year, anyway).

That said, if you like crits being more common, go for it.

Bear in mind, I am just about to start my first GURPS campaign in about 5 weeks. Before then we have been playing DND for 2 years and the critical hit chance is about 5% in DND. In those two years we had ONE critical hit with on average a bit of combat almost every session.

The likelihood is so low that when the GM is like "this weapon does x special thing on critical hit" I don't even bother writing it down. I can't find a hole in your math and probability I'm not good enough at that. I just know that in other systems where the chance is 5% I've only ever seen one in years.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by Colonel__Klink

Bear in mind, I am just about to start my first GURPS campaign in about 5 weeks. Before then we have been playing DND for 2 years and the critical hit chance is about 5% in DND. In those two years we had ONE critical hit with on average a bit of combat almost every session.

The likelihood is so low that when the GM is like "this weapon does x special thing on critical hit" I don't even bother writing it down. I can't find a hole in your math and probability I'm not good enough at that. I just know that in other systems where the chance is 5% I've only ever seen one in years.

I think your groups' dice must hate you. I play in a D&D 3.5 game weekly, and criticals are fairly common, despite the chance for most characters being around 5% - higher for some, lower for others.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by Colonel__Klink

Bear in mind, I am just about to start my first GURPS campaign in about 5 weeks. Before then we have been playing DND for 2 years and the critical hit chance is about 5% in DND. In those two years we had ONE critical hit with on average a bit of combat almost every session.

The likelihood is so low that when the GM is like "this weapon does x special thing on critical hit" I don't even bother writing it down. I can't find a hole in your math and probability I'm not good enough at that. I just know that in other systems where the chance is 5% I've only ever seen one in years.

How often does someone roll a natural 20? Because that honestly sounds like something wrong with the dice. I tend to have atrocious dice luck, and even I rolled them more often than that back when I played (although part of that may be colored by my hilariously-overpowered character who threatened a crit on something like a 13 or higher, and attacked 10 times a round). I could potentially see it happening if DnD still has the roll to confirm - if you tend to get your nat 20's on foes with high AC, such that you rarely manage to actually confirm the crit when you roll one - but I was under the impression they had done away with that.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by Varyon

I could potentially see it happening if DnD still has the roll to confirm - if you tend to get your nat 20's on foes with high AC, such that you rarely manage to actually confirm the crit when you roll one - but I was under the impression they had done away with that.

It's long gone.

[acrosome]

Originally Posted by Colonel__Klink

If they are good for game then I really think an absolute cap of 5% is too low (you might go a year, playing every weekend with one combat session per game and never see one.)

Really? A crit every 20th time you roll the dice and you think you won't see one for a year?

Also, recall that success by 10+ would also be a crit, so players can build whatever they want.