That's more work and thought than he's willing to put into GURPS these days.

Quote from: David Johansen;827007That's more work and thought than he's willing to put into GURPS these days.

Good point.

jg

As a GM who mastered GURPS decades ago (and added house rules), it's interesting to see the divide between people who like it, and those who can't get into it and bash it. From my perspective, games with no combat maps and/or no attempt at simulation, don't even seem like RPG's to me, or they seem like very handwavy ones lacking real combat systems and with an unworkable lack of internal consistency. I wonder, if an axe and a sword behave identically, how is one an axe and the other a sword? I'm glad that people have invented and enjoy new types of storytelling games, but I have a hard time believing I would like playing most of them. If I were to pick a storytelling game, I'd play _Microscope_.

Quote from: David Johansen;827007That's more work and thought than he's willing to put into GURPS these days.

Good thing that Kromm (Sean Punch, line editor) and PK (Jason Levine, assistant line editor) are there. :-P Not to mention the active cadre of peeps writing GURPS supplements.

There are literally thousands of pages of materials in PDF. You can use those to tune GURPS down to a simpler game or ramp it up to extreme detail.

GURPS is not "languishing" nor is it forgotten. It IS getting an incredible amount of support. The OGRE KS derailed things for a moment, but that pipeline has recently unclogged and things are pouring out at a brisk pace.

Obviously I am aware of that and obviously I disagree that it's worthwhile support.

Quote from: David Johansen;827699Obviously I am aware of that and obviously I disagree that it's worthwhile support.

Based on that response it was not obvious. Looking at the amount of material published I have no idea how that doesn't qualify as "worthwhile".

What is worthwhile support in your opinion?

Quote from: trechriron;827705Based on that response it was not obvious. Looking at the amount of material published I have no idea how that doesn't qualify as "worthwhile".

What is worthwhile support in your opinion?

Yeah.  This is something that's long since been a mystery to me.

Take GURPS.  The corebooks are in print.  All the necessary splatbooks are in print.  There's an active forum where the line editor and another editor or two are in constant presence to answer questions and make interpretations.  There are many many dozens of worldbooks in print or available in PDF form.

That is ALL the support a GM needs, and more than many RPGs enjoy.  No, SJ Games doesn't release two new GURPS publications a month, every month, like was the case 25 years ago ... when there were a lot fewer GURPS publications in print.  Neither do they need to.

I do understand that a lot of people define "support" as "publishing a constant flood of New Stuff."  IMHO, that's bizarre.  I really don't want constant revisions of everything and constant new material bolted on -- that idiocy leads to the need to publish multiple Compendiums and "Uttering of False Currency" skills.

Well, as a retailer print product is at the very top of my list.  Material that helps promote and sell GURPS is also high on my list.

And that includes stuff that's easy to open up and play out of the book because I've DM'd hundreds of hours of GURPS at my store and even at my standard 40% off GURPS Basic Set Book I, I've sold 3.

What I see when I look at the on-line supplements is endless cluttering optional rules for a game that's already seen as an unplayable mess by the majority of gamers.  It's been a long time since they added anything to GURPS that didn't prompt a "DO NOT WANT" response.

So, yes there's a bias here in David land.  But let me point this out: I can't even give GURPS away in its current state.

Basically, I keep my GURPS 3e book around as secret decoder ring for my copies of GURPS Swashbucklers and GURPS Japan. Would be happy if I still had my copy of GURPS 2e, but I lent it out and never got it back.

I picked up the two core books for 4e at HPB a while ago, could never work up any enthusiasm, and eventually sold them off. Big turn-offs included: anticipating wading through all the ads/disads to figure out which ones to exclude for a particular genre, and the extremely thin, low weight, glossy paper on which the rules were printed.

Still I would play or GM GURPS sooner than Hero, partly out of familiarity, partly because when it comes to fantasy, I'd rather have ready-made spells than have to design them. (I do keep Fantasy Hero 1e and Champions 4e around to decode various Hero supplements.)

Then again I'm also pretty disillusioned with the idea of systems that build detailed characters from a single pool of points, with ads/disads, etc. So it's not just the genericness or the complexity per se that's turned me away from these systems.

Quote from: David Johansen;827761But let me point this out: I can't even give GURPS away in its current state.

I call you on your bullshit: send me some free GURPS books.

Quote from: Matt;827795I call you on your bullshit: send me some free GURPS books.

heh...walked right into that one...

It is of course, easier to give away free GURPS books on the internet.  Free shipping is a different matter entirely.  On the other hand I'm disinclined to give free stuff to people who "call me on my bullshit" so maybe I'll just keep trying give it to someone else thanks.

Quote from: Matt;827795I call you on your bullshit: send me some free GURPS books.

Yeah!!  :-)

Sorry for your troubles David. I agree the retail support could be better.

I think we'd all be happy to see more GURPS players in any case.

Sometimes I wonder if lowering the cost of the pdfs would help build the fan base.  It wouldn't help retailers of course, but the harsh reality is that a lot of people just down load free copies and don't care how SJG does financially.

I've heard, "well I'd like to buy the book but I can't afford it and I already downloaded it," all too often when it comes to rpgs, including around half a dozen GURPS fans.  I know I'm not the only retailer who's tired of hearing how would be customers downloaded free copies of everything I have on the shelf.  Especially not when they justify it economically while waving around their brand new tablet.

And, as much as I'm fond of cheaper products, Savage Worlds hasn't sold any better.  Ten dollar core book not withstanding.

Mostly I sell miniatures, while looking somewhat apprehensively at the progress of 3d printing.

Quote from: David Johansen;827830heh...walked right into that one...

It is of course, easier to give away free GURPS books on the internet.  Free shipping is a different matter entirely.  On the other hand I'm disinclined to give free stuff to people who "call me on my bullshit" so maybe I'll just keep trying give it to someone else thanks.

That'll learn ya!

For me, BRP is the go-to "generic" system.