So...GURPS D&D?

[robertsconley]

Originally Posted by HardMaple72

Personally I will continue to use D&D 3.5e for medieval fantasy games (I'm not even interested in 4.0 since 3.5 does what I want it to do). So I can't help you there.
.....
So my suggestion is if you want to remain in Medieval Fantasy, I won't recommend a change to GURPS.

That a good choice. But Dungeon Fantasy can done in GURPS and done well. I been doing it since 1988 when I switched my main fantasy campaign over. I have some notes on different aspects here http://home.earthlink.net/~wilderlands.

The Dungeon Fantasy pdfs are great because now I have a firm benchmark to set my stuff too. Monsters have always been a problem either too weak or too strong. Most of my adventures in the past have revolved around human or humanoid opponents.

The reason I even used 3.0 in 2000 a couple of times is that it was enough like GURPS to suit my GMinng and now I have all these shiny monsters and modules to play with.

But frankly I built so much homebrew stuff for my own game that it was just wasn't worth the hassle of the switch. Also I had issues with the power curve of 3.X after 10th level. In the end I returned to GURPS where I happily remain to this day.

Recently I ran a conversion of Blackguard's Revenge (Dungeon Crawl Classic #12). With GURPS 4th.

[Almafeta]

Originally Posted by Extrarius

Finally, considering that the templates are 250 pts, you're not exactly starting out at anything equivalent to a D&D "level 1".

It depends which D&D you're talking about. And how cinematic you play GURPS vs how cinematic you play D&D.

We had a thread about this a few months ago, on how best to map D&D's levels to points in GURPS. People varied from as much as 50 to 500 points on what a "Level 1" adventurer could do, but each individual level after that most people agreed would be 25 or 50 points.

[B9anders]

Originally Posted by Almafeta

It depends which D&D you're talking about. And how cinematic you play GURPS vs how cinematic you play D&D.

We had a thread about this a few months ago, on how best to map D&D's levels to points in GURPS. People varied from as much as 50 to 500 points on what a "Level 1" adventurer could do, but each individual level after that most people agreed would be 25 or 50 points.

do you have a link for that one?

[sjmdw45]

Originally Posted by Mailanka

GURPS Dungeon Fantasy works the same way. It hones the engine to focus on the resource management, hack-n-slash strategies of dungeon crawling games, whether those are Warhammer Quest, D&D, Hackmaster, Diablo or Dugneon Seige. It doesn't change anything: There are no levels, no classes, no new rules. Instead, it shows you how the GURPS engine can already do this sort of game, and provides what amounts to a cheatsheet to do it even faster.

Well, there are actually some new rules. If there weren't I wouldn't find it nearly as useful. These aren't huge, worldshaking changes; they're more on the level of the house rules I would make up if I were running a dungeon fantasy anyway. For example, "if you're in town, you can make an Urban Survival roll to rummage in the sewers for coin. Success nets you $1 per point of success. Critical failure means you get a disease." So the new rules are useful, especially because it gives everyone doing DF an "official" common baseline. Similarly, clearly delineating that Bards can buy Mind Control (with limitations) even though it's supernatural is a new, setting-specific rule that is useful under the conditions of Metcalf's Law: it gets more useful as more gamers start using DF.

I wasn't particularly impressed when I first skimmed DF: Characters (although I've since gone back and liked it more) because it seemed to be mostly templates and rules for creating clerical powers, etc., with no rules added from the Basic set. DF: Dungeons impressed me a lot more with new rules, equipment rules and options, magical items, etc. Crunchy bits, as it were.

-Max

[Peter Knutsen]

Originally Posted by sjmdw45

I wasn't particularly impressed when I first skimmed DF: Characters (although I've since gone back and liked it more) because it seemed to be mostly templates and rules for creating clerical powers, etc., with no rules added from the Basic set. DF: Dungeons impressed me a lot more with new rules, equipment rules and options, magical items, etc. Crunchy bits, as it were.

-Max

The most disappointing bit about the two GURPS Dungeon Fantasy PDFs is exactly that they contain almost no crunchy bits at all.

[demonsbane]

Originally Posted by nmoody

But...convince me. Is there anything useful to running a Banestorm game in these pdfs?

The above posters are right.

Personally, my main interest is running serious fantasy campaigns (4e Fantasy is my central GURPS book, for saying it in some way), and myself am a Dungeon Fantasy enthusiast because... it is strongly useful in the type of game I want to run.

Furthermore, GURPS DF is all what is great in Dungeons & Dragons but... without its strong non-senses and bad parts!

It is more like showing and playing some GURPS inherent strenghts, until now almost hidden in a potential way during years, for a lot of people...

And the forthcoming Thaumatology is going to enhance all this, I guess...

Definitely, I think this is useful to Banestorm campaigns, and even I think this DF line could be regarded as companion or extension to 4e Fantasy (by William H. Stoddard).

Cheers

[robertsconley]

Originally Posted by demonsbane

The above posters are right.

Personally, my main interest is running serious fantasy campaigns (4e Fantasy is my central GURPS book, for saying it in some way), and myself am a Dungeon Fantasy enthusiast because... it is strongly useful in the type of game I want to run.

I agree. It primary appeal to me is that it saves time. It's not like we have all day to stat up every thing or come up a new combination of Magic, Advantages and Enhancements to build our worlds and adventures.

[Pmandrekar]

Originally Posted by nmoody

I'm not sold on the GURPS Dungeons products. I mean, I keep hearing how it pushes the rules to show what can be done, but is it really pushing the rules to turn GURPS into D&D?

Maybe I'm thinking about it wrong, but this is one product (or series of products) that doesn't interest me.

But...convince me. Is there anything useful to running a Banestorm game in these pdfs?

Okay, to begin with, I don't think that it's trying to get GURPS to Do D&D...

GURPS is a generic set of rules (as I'm sure you're well aware), that has been successfully applied to various setting and campaign types. We've got generic Science Fiction toolbooks, generic Fantasy toolbooks that tell you how to adapt your favorite gameworld to this specific set of rules. They've got specific gameworlds and situations covered, from Traveller and Transhuman Space.

Now, by contrast, D&D is a specific set of rules that were originally designed to do Dungeon fantasy. Sure, people use D&D for all sorts of other campaign types, but the original intent of D&D was to design a system that allows you to run adventures where a group of party members head down into a dungeon/cavern/series of tunnels, whatever, fight monsters, and take their stuff.

The fact of the matter is that whether a matter of history, or mass appeal, a *lot* of players play Dungeon Fantasy type games. I play in a D&D 3.5 campaign that is a sort of 'Pretzel and Root Beer' chance to let off steam, blow things up and take their stuff campaign. We use D&D 3.5 because it's well adapted to the kind of adventure that we're playing in.

It isn't my favorite ruleset, but it support what we're doing.

I see GURPS as my favorite ruleset (that I have lots of books detailing Magic, Weapons, Fantasy character types, and settings, such as Banestorm) adapted to play this particular genre of fantasy type game.

So, it's not that GURPS is doing D&D. It's more along the lines that finally, Dungeon Fantasy players (and again, there are a *LOT* of those) have the option to play in the GURPS rules.

Nobody is pushing you to play GURPS rules with your Dungeon Fantasy. It's an option. It's there if you want it.

As I play (occasional) games of Dungeon Fantasy with friends. And as we generally like the GURPS rulesets, this is a great addition to our arsenal of rulesets that cover a different type of campaign.

Frankly, I'm hoping that GURPS publishes these supplements in hardcover and puts them right out there at the FLGS. Not to do D&D, but to give players more options to go with their Dungeon Fantasy. More options is a good thing.

Cheers,

-P.

[robertsconley]

Originally Posted by Pmandrekar

Now, by contrast, D&D is a specific set of rules that were originally designed to do Dungeon fantasy. Sure, people use D&D for all sorts of other campaign types, but the original intent of D&D was to design a system that allows you to run adventures where a group of party members head down into a dungeon/cavern/series of tunnels, whatever, fight monsters, and take their stuff.

That not entirely correct. Original D&D was designed to expand on the fantasy and man to man rules of a medieval miniatures wargame. The reason that that minatures game got fantasy is so players could run battles in Middle Earth. The dungeon came about because going into the dungeons of Castle Blackmoor or Castle Greyhawk is what started the focus on individual characters.

However the second activity everyone was did was use the loot to go carve out a barony and build a castle. Using D&D for fighting monsters and clearing out lairs and Chainmail for fighting any battles that were needed.

However when D&D spread beyond the initial circle of wargamers people focused on the dungeon element. Miniature wargamers became a minority in the D&D hobby.

[Pmandrekar]

Originally Posted by robertsconley

That not entirely correct. Original D&D was designed to expand on the fantasy and man to man rules of a medieval miniatures wargame. The reason that that minatures game got fantasy is so players could run battles in Middle Earth. The dungeon came about because going into the dungeons of Castle Blackmoor or Castle Greyhawk is what started the focus on individual characters.

However the second activity everyone was did was use the loot to go carve out a barony and build a castle. Using D&D for fighting monsters and clearing out lairs and Chainmail for fighting any battles that were needed.

However when D&D spread beyond the initial circle of wargamers people focused on the dungeon element. Miniature wargamers became a minority in the D&D hobby.

Well, sure. My use of 'original', I had meant to use as the original assumptions behind the existing ruleset. Certainly if you go back to the origins of D&D, it is in a wargame. But D&D 3.5, for example, was designed to be a bit closer to Dungeon Fantasy than to Medieval Fantasy.

-P.