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From John's review of EDIT: THREE EEE THIRD EDITION FOLKS NOT FOURTH I GOT IT WRONG WHATS IT TO YOU CRACKERJACK

QuoteSince so much rests in the 4* attributes, it can be hard to maintain skill niches in a group of PC's, beyond mental types vs physical types. For example, suppose a PC group has a sage has a 16 IQ but no outdoor skills of any type, and ranger who has 10 IQ and 8 points in tracking and lots of other outdoor skills. For just 1/2 point, the sage can get "Tracking" skill better than the ranger.

*In fact, just 2, as far as skill selection is concerned. Right?  If all skills are derived either from DX or IQ, you're going to end up with bunches of magic-users who are potentially great at shadowing, tracking, survival, observation, scrounging...

Q1: Is the above correct?

Q2: Why just DX/IQ? Irrational holdover from Fantasy Trip or sound design decision?

Q3: In GURPS, are fighters who are a) superstrong, b) clumsy, c) kinda dumb a dysfunctional concept?

Q4: Did 1 through 3 get fixed in 4E? (GM Fiat is not a fix.)

I want to like this game, but the above sounds like a major turn-off.

Quote from: Pierce InverarityFrom John's review of 4E:



*In fact, just 2, as far as skill selection is concerned. Right?  If all skills are derived either from DX or IQ, you're going to end up with bunches of magic-users who are potentially great at shadowing, tracking, survival, observation, scrounging...

Q1: Is the above correct?

Q2: Why just DX/IQ? Irrational holdover from Fantasy Trip or sound design decision?

Q3: In GURPS, are fighters who are a) superstrong, b) clumsy, c) kinda dumb a dysfunctional concept?

Q4: Did 1 through 3 get fixed in 4E? (GM Fiat is not a fix.)

I want to like this game, but the above sounds like a major turn-off.

There are a few skills based on HT or ST, but the vast majority (99%) are based on those two, yeah.

Superstrong fighters are suboptimal uses of points mostly, but that can be chalked up to the basic lethality of any given hit, and the vast amount of points it takes ot be 'strong enough' for it to really matter.  On the other hand, a fighter is best served by being very healthy!

I don't know if it has changed since 3e, but is used to be that in GURPS a wizard needed a decent amount of strength as spells exhausted Strength (fatigue really, based on ST).

An average DX fighter, in a low level game (100 pts or less...) is not that bad off, particularly if he is, yes, strong, and decently armored and healthy.  He can make up the deficiency in DX in his chosen weapon skill cheaper than just upping DX, he just won't have the broader expertise of the High DX character.  On the other hand, he can use heavier armor and weapons... Also, as I recall, in 4E, strength is half the cost of DX to raise...

EDIT:: To add, this also discounts the role of advantages and 'sub attributes'. your low IQ ranger might have acute senses which would add to all perception based rolls (tracking, fer ex), which your sage is unlikely to have. Or you could just let the Sage track and have the ranger do all the physically demanding forest tasks and not worry that in D*D tracking is the ranger's job. The Sage becomes Sherlockian with the ranger doing the ninja work...

A1. Except they wouldn't be as good a magic user as the guy who DIDN'T take all those other skills and instead invested in magic. If they want to be a good magic user instead of just having some spells and other skills, they gotta spend the points on the magic spells.

Also there are times where 8 points in a skill means something vs just 2, especially if there is reason to make a skill check based on another stat than IQ. If the tracking is long and arduous and must be done in a hurry over days and days, the guy with the higher skill will be better able to pace himself knowing better what is involved and therefore when it comes time to use HT with the skill, be better off, assuming that there isn't an equal disparity in HT.

A2. I wouldn't know, you'll have to ask the game developers. I will say it works for me. It makes sense to me logically and in game.

A3. No. Except maybe against that lightly armored weak really skilled guy who can dodge like the dickens. That weak guy just better hope he hits a lot more in a lot more critical areas. Cause one good strike from the strong/clumsy/stupid guy might just take him out. WHAM!

A4. The cost for DX and IQ have gone up in 4e. Up enough to ameliorate the above? I think so.

Speaking of GURPS 4e - in the first place, the review is incorrect in that in 4e, you can't get 1/2 point in skills; the minimum is 1 character point. Secondly, a sage with IQ 16 will have spent 120CP on that high intelligence. 150CP total is "hero material", 200+CP is essentially superhuman. So with 120CP in one stat, either

• they have IQ 16 and a lot of Disadvantages, severely limiting their usefulness), or
  
• their IQ is almost all they have, meaning they're masters of a few things and useless at everything else
• you have a high CP campaign, in which case the GM and players have decided they want to have ridiculous things like, "spend 1CP and you're an expert."

In the last case, if you've a high CP campaign you'll have high challenges, too - so that a skill level of 14 or so isn't very good, since the GM will often be saying, "roll that skill -10".

GURPS 4e has effectively six attributes, not four - Strength, Dexterity, Intelligence, Health, Will and Perception. Will and Per are based on IQ, however there's good reason to specialise in one or two of the three, and a fairly common house rule has Will and Per based on 10, not on IQ.

Most but not all skills are based on DX or IQ. None are based on ST. A few are based on HT, and quite a few on Will and Perception. Those based on Perception (Tracking, etc) are quite significant as "adventurer" sorts of skills. A ranger or thief sort of character will definitely have to have high Perception to be successful. So the "review" of 4e talking about Tracking being based on IQ is entirely wrong.

Also, there's a thing called "relative skill level." If for example your Broadsword skill is 3 above DX, you'd write it as DX+3. Now, there may come times when you'll use your Broadsword skill with another attribute. For example, to watch someone else fight and guess their fighting skill would be Broadsword using IQ. To look at a broadsword for sale and try to figure out its quality would use Per. And so on. This requires imagination from the GM. In this way, no one attribute comes to dominate in importance.

Taking the sage and ranger as an example again, IQ costs 20/level, and Per costs 5/level, beginning at whatever the IQ level is.

So the ranger could have IQ 10

• and Per 16 [30], while the sage has IQ 16 [120] and Per 16
• . Thus, the ranger has 90CP spare to spend on skills. If they took the 8CP in Tracking as described, they'd have Tracking (A) Per+2 [8] - 18. The sage with Per 16
• and Tracking (A) Per-1 [1] - 15 will be definitely inferior at Tracking, and the ranger will have 82CP still to spend.

An effective character in most campaigns won't be maxed out in one skill, but have a range of skill relevant to their profession. A good ranger isn't just a good at Tracking, but good at Survival, some weapon skill for hunting, Traps, Stealth, Area Knowledge, Naturalist, and so on. So while someone who's a specialist in one area may have a particular skill better than a specialist in another area, they won't have the range of skills required to do the job. The sage can't be a replacement ranger. They can replace them in one or two skills, but not in the job as a whole.

There are no "dysfuctional concepts" for characters except in relation to the particular game world. In one GM's game world a stupid strong fighter may do wonderfully, in mine they may do badly. It just depends on the GMing and game world. Given that GURS has a heap of skills, to make the most of that a sensible GM will ensure that a broad range of skills is needed in the adventuring party. If you only ever ask them to roll for two or three skills, then a system with two or three hundred skills is the wrong choice for you. Choose soemthing simpler.

Skills  and Advantages are weighted more heavily in terms of niche protection in 4e than in 3rd edition.  This is further emphasised with the Powers rules, where it becomes all about crafting specific advantages.  In my experience, niches are very narrow in GURPS.  It is preferable to really sink your points into one or two things and become masters at that, then to try and be a generalist.  

so Q1:  No, not in my experience.  Though there can be some overlaps here and there.  There are so many skills and the difference between 13 and 14 is both significant and expensive, so generally players will spend points on the things they want to be good at.

Q2:  Sound design decision.  If you want to have high DX or IQ, it's going to cost, which cuts down on the wide range of skills you can take, thus encouraging specialization.  Worked very effectively in my experience.  Especially when you throw powers into the mix (another place to spend points).

Q3: Absolutely not.  I've played a really strong, dumb and charismatic fighter (wannabe social climber) who did some serious damage.  He was very dominant in a fight and fun to roleplay.  It was basically an ST-based build.  I've also played an HT-based build, a super tough guy in the sense that he was almost impossible to take down.  He couldn't dish out that much damage, but he could soak it all day (he was sort of modeled on the idea of Concrete, the comic book character, but he was a drunken old man whose powers were all about withstanding pain, deadly atmospheres, poisons, etc.).  This also proved very effective in that he kept alive and was a distracting target for the baddies to waste their time and ammo on.

Q4:  Absolutely.  It was a fundamental shift and has been very succesful.  I am not alone in this opinion.  I have moved to lighter, quicker systems, but in terms of emulation and mechanics, GURPS is an impressive piece of engineering.  

That review actually sounds like a review of 3rd edition.  Who is John?  Is there a link?

John Kim. It's a review of 3e, here (http://www.darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/reviews/gurps.html).

And this is very much a problem that I had with 3e, or should I say whenever I contemplated playing it, since I didn't get in more than a handful of test sessions. It seemed that whenever I designed a character, he'd end up with high attributes and then 1/2 point skills over a wide range.

Walker, exactly, it's a 3E review, I should have made that clear. By John Kim:

http://www.darkshire.net/~jhkim/rpg/reviews/gurps.html

KA: I'm looking at GurpsLite 4E, and it says that Perception and Will are derived attributes equal to IQ. It doesn't mention they're raiseable/lowerable independently from it. It also seems as though they are little more than the bases for "Notice X" or "Resist X" rolls?

Quote from: Pierce InverarityWalker, exactly, it's a 3E review, I should have made that clear. By John Kim:

http://www.darkshire.net/~jhkim/rpg/reviews/gurps.html

KA: I'm looking at GurpsLite 4E, and it says that Perception and Will are derived attributes equal to IQ. It doesn't mention they're raiseable/lowerable independently from it. It also seems as though they are little more than the bases for "Notice X" or "Resist X" rolls?

In the complete version they can be bought up as attributes from a base of the primary attribute, along with similar, but less useful ones for strength.

In the Companions they first raised the option of perception and will as sub attributes, that's presumably the 'source' of the idea of basing them at ten as a houserule (it was one option presented).

Ah, well, that's important. Thanks! They should at least have mentioned that in Lite.

Quote from: Pierce InverarityWalker, exactly, it's a 3E review, I should have made that clear.

Yes, because your original post says "From John's review of 4E"

Quote from: Pierce InverarityKA: I'm looking at GurpsLite 4E, and it says that Perception and Will are derived attributes equal to IQ. It doesn't mention they're raiseable/lowerable independently from it. It also seems as though they are little more than the bases for "Notice X" or "Resist X" rolls?

In general you'll find "lite" versions of rpgs cut down on the number of options you have in all respects. In the complete 4e, Will and Per can both be raised/lowered for +/-5 CP per level, with the text recommending not past 20 or more than 4 lower than IQ without GM permission.

In the complete game, they're the basis for a number of skills.
   Will: Autohypnosis, Captivate*, Dreaming*, Enthrallment*, Exorcism*, Intimidation, Meditation, Mental Strength*, Persuade*, Power Blow*, Suggest*, Sway Emotions*

Per: Detect Lies, Fishing, Lip Reading, Observation, Scrounging, Search, Survival, Tracking, Urban Survival

* cinematic/supernatural skills

Will is also used as the basis for Fright Checks. This would be very important in a horror game, or a realistic-themed game where regular people come into contact with violence for the first time. It's also used to resist mind-affecting magic, and social skills. So if some NPC tries to intimidate the PC...

Per as a "notice" trait is pretty important. Quite a wide variety of adventurers - from mercenaries to detectives - need to be able to notice stuff, from ambushes to smudged fingerprints.

Consider for example a warrior who put all their points in fighting skills, and had an average Per, against a warrior who put some points into Stealth, with less fighting skills as a result. The second guy could ambush the first, rendering the first guy's superior fighting skills irrelevant.

Or consider a warrior who maxed out fighting with an average Will, they'd end up commanded by a warrior who put points into Leadership skill and Will.

And again, as I said, there's the thing where the GM can ask for a skill roll based on some other attribute. "You want to know how good a swordsman this other guy is? Okay, roll Broadsword, but based on Per instead of DX." Then the DX 14 [80] Per 9 [-5] guy says, "hmmm... um..." while the DX 13 [60] Per 13 [15] guy gets to assess the other guy's skill level, and gain a bonus in the fight following it.

So there are a heap of options for a PC, provided the GM allows those options. For example, I've had a GURPS GM who always made us roleplay social interactions, and rarely let us roll for Diplomacy, Intimidation, etc - so there was no sense spending points on those skills. This same GM asked for multiple Perception and Stealth checks - if you wanted to stealthily cross a street and enter a building, you'd have to make a Stealth check from the first to the second garbage bin, then from the bin to the shop doorway, then from the shop doorway to the street corner, and so on. So we had to max out Per and Stealth. The GM wasn't really allowing us options, it was as though three-quarters of the skills didn't even exist. Someone playing in that game might get the sense that GURPS was unbalanced; it's not, just the GMing was.

A good GURPS GM will make use of the options in the book. If you're only going to ask for rolls for skills X and Y, then why even have skill Z? Choose some system without it. So that's the thing - GURPS is a big and complicated system, it offers you lots of options. If you like lots of options, and using the skills and attributes creatively in play, then it's good for you. If like just a few options, and not having to think about how to run or play the game, choose something simpler.

Quote from: Pierce InverarityFrom John's review of 4E:



*In fact, just 2, as far as skill selection is concerned. Right?  If all skills are derived either from DX or IQ, you're going to end up with bunches of magic-users who are potentially great at shadowing, tracking, survival, observation, scrounging...

Q1: Is the above correct?

Q2: Why just DX/IQ? Irrational holdover from Fantasy Trip or sound design decision?

Q3: In GURPS, are fighters who are a) superstrong, b) clumsy, c) kinda dumb a dysfunctional concept?

Q4: Did 1 through 3 get fixed in 4E? (GM Fiat is not a fix.)

I want to like this game, but the above sounds like a major turn-off.

That didn't make a lick of sense.

 How many of these reviewers go into a review with a bias against the product or pre-conceived notions?


 Look, most of the screwed up stuff from 3rd edition GURPS was fixed with the release of 4th edition GURPS.
 As Zachary joked with me at GenCon - at least SJG  can stick with an edition of their game for more than 5 years.


- Ed C.

Yeah, that's a review of GURPS 3rd ed from 2000, long before 4th ed came out.  Pierce cited it incorrectly as 4th edition.  Pierce, could you edit the top reference?  

I've had some experience with 4E since then, though not a lot.  Still, my impression is while the problem was reduced by some of the new options, the underlying issue that Pierce mentioned is still there to some degree.  Details of my review will no longer apply under 4th ed GURPS, but we can still discuss the general point.  

Quote from: Kyle AaronConsider for example a warrior who put all their points in fighting skills, and had an average Per, against a warrior who put some points into Stealth, with less fighting skills as a result. The second guy could ambush the first, rendering the first guy's superior fighting skills irrelevant.

Or consider a warrior who maxed out fighting with an average Will, they'd end up commanded by a warrior who put points into Leadership skill and Will.

Well, this is looking at it in isolation, which is irrelevant to the question of niche protection that was my point in the review.  The real comparison would be if you looked at parties of 3 to 5 characters.  Even in 3rd ed GURPS, the fighter could buy Charisma separately from IQ.  

Suppose that in one group, the high-DX fighter spends a bunch of points for Leadership and Will.  In another, instead the high-IQ mage puts 1 point in Leadership to get the same score.  Since the group as a whole doesn't need a lot of leaders, the former is inefficient.  The fighter in the first group would get something for his points spent, but it is inefficient for the group.  

The underlying issue is that IQ has a lot of sub-abilities folded into it (Per, Will, skills, spells) - and that buying up the sub-abilities by individuals in the group is much less efficient than buying up the base stat.  It's better in some respects under 4E than it was, but it's still frequently big savings to buy up the base stat.

Basically it boils down to this:

 Its not D&D.

 Whatever cliches you got used to about fighers, wizards, clerics, rogues, rangers,  etc.... aren't going to apply much with GURPS.

However there is a thread somewhere on the SJG forums where KROMM or someone posted GURPS templates that get you characters pretty close to those typical classes of D&D characters - there will be some differences tho...also more oppurtunity for customizing them with GURPS.


- Ed C.

John: DONE

Other than that: Yes, absolutely, coming fresh to the game, no prior experience, it looks like later editions tried to lump several stats onto IQ.

This may well work now in 4E, but it's interesting to see that GURPS has its own set of quirks. I used to assume it was this paragon of bland but perfect rationality, but to my uneducated mind SJ seems to love TFT too dearly to ditch that two-stats-only mechanic.

Quote from: jhkimWell, this is looking at it in isolation, which is irrelevant to the question of niche protection that was my point in the review.  The real comparison would be if you looked at parties of 3 to 5 characters.

In a game where the GM is careful to ensure that almost all skills and advantages chosen are useful, and where all disadvantages actually disadvantage a character, a specialist in X will overall always outperform a specialist in Y who happens to have some skills in X area, and vice versa.

Someone who wants their character to excel in a niche will take not simply one or two skills and max out, but will take 6-12 skills, some relevant advantages, and choose attributes to complement these. A character in another niche can certainly have one or two skills which exceed those of the first one, but they'll be overall worse in that other niche.

I can understand that you don't believe me, many players of GURPS 4e don't believe it, they create some character with a single huge attribute and just five skills, then are confused and upset when they turn out to be crap in play.

Now, if the GM never asks for particular skills to be rolled against, there will certainly be character builds which in effect act as you describe. If the sage gets high Tracking and the GM only ever asks for Tracking rolls, and never Survival, Scrounging, Observation, etc - then yes, the scout's wide range of skills won't help them, and the sage can outperform them. But no system is proof against stupid and unimaginative GMs.

Assuming a GM with a couple of brain cells to rub together, and assuming that the player knows how to build a character to occupy a niche - rather than just maxing out a few skills - then in GURPS 4e the specialist will overall do better in their specialty than some other specialist will.

Your complaint reminds me of the guy who played d4-d4, chose for his character to be "Fair" in twenty different traits, then complained,
"I'm not Good at anything. And this other guy is a better shot than me, and I'm supposed to be a soldier."
"No," I said, "you're Fair at many things, as you chose to be. You chose not to be Good at anything."
"This system is stupid."

Like I said, many GURPS 4e players think the same. It's because they've had stupid GMs who only ask them to roll against a few skills. Whereas if the GM asks you to roll against (say) 12 different skills each session, then it really shows who's crawled into their niche properly, and who's just put one skilled toe into it.

Quote from: Pierce InverarityThis may well work now in 4E, but it's interesting to see that GURPS has its own set of quirks. I used to assume it was this paragon of bland but perfect rationality, but to my uneducated mind SJ seems to love TFT too dearly to ditch that two-stats-only mechanic.

Actually reading and playing a system allows your criticisms to be relevant and founded; having neither read it nor played it will obviously lead to funny colnclusions about it. There's a lot to criticise in GURPS, having just two attributes isn't among it. It has effectively six stats, and an intelligent GM will ensure they're all relevant in play.

You have GURPS players and GMs telling you, "it has six stats" and yet you insist that it actually has two. You know, you're under no obligation to try every game out there, or even any game. If you don't like the look of it, just don't play it. We don't care, really. But if you're going to critique it, base those critiques on reality, not fantasy. Criticising GURPS 4e for having two stats is like criticising it for being written in Swahili. It's simply not true.

It's quite alright just to say, "I don't like it" and give no rational reason for it. No-one sane cares. No need to make bullshit up.

Quote from: jhkimI've had some experience with 4E since then, though not a lot.  Still, my impression is while the problem was reduced by some of the new options, the underlying issue that Pierce mentioned is still there to some degree.  Details of my review will no longer apply under 4th ed GURPS, but we can still discuss the general point.  

What is your experience with 4e, because I really have to disagree with you here.  I think the problem is GONE in 4th and I don't think we can continue to discuss the general point. This whole thread seems to be tainted with the problems of 3rd that no longer apply to 4th.  It has been my experience that specialization is encouraged in 4th and works extremely well.  One of the main design goals with 4th was to address the problem of people taking high DX and IQ and being good at everything.  I believe they have succeeded in doing this.  The only "underlying issue" is people who only have experience with 3rd edition applying it mistakenly to 4th.

I apologize if that comes off as harsh, but I keep seeing this misconception come up, especially on this site, despite people like Kyle and Koltar who have been very clear about it (with evidence based on play experience and a thorough knowledge of the rules).  

Pierce, I suggest you find a review of 4th edition.

Quote from: Kyle AaronActually reading and playing a system allows your criticisms to be relevant and founded; having neither read it nor played it will obviously lead to funny colnclusions about it. There's a lot to criticise in GURPS, having just two attributes isn't among it. It has effectively six stats, and an intelligent GM will ensure they're all relevant in play.

What he said.

Quote from: Kyle AaronYou have GURPS players and GMs telling you, "it has six stats" and yet you insist that it actually has two. You know, you're under no obligation to try every game out there, or even any game. If you don't like the look of it, just don't play it. We don't care, really. But if you're going to critique it, base those critiques on reality, not fantasy. Criticising GURPS 4e for having two stats is like criticising it for being written in Swahili. It's simply not true.

What he said again.

You are being told the truth here people.  We are appreciators of GURPS but not rabid fanboys. There are things to criticize about the system (overland walking rates, anyone?) but this is not one of them.

Build a few characters.  You'll see.  My players spend a lot of time agonizing over their skill choices and they rarely overlap.

Well, this has been a useful thread for me. I just regret that I already have 3e plus a number of sourcebooks which cover the kinds of stuff I'd be most interested in doing with GURPS. So I'm torn between getting the two 4e books vs. just trying to incorporate Lite vs. picking up the 3e Companions.

Me too, El. Contrary to what above personages think, I'm not a GURPS hater at all. I'm curious about the game and was irritated by 4E Lite.

The thing is that since 4ELite treats the game as dual-statted only, one would have to plunk down 50 bucks on amazon in order to get the real thing. Well, or getting those companions.

GURPS Lite is GURPS Shite. But I think that's true of most "lite" versions of relatively complex rpg systems.

If you do enjoy a game with oodles of options and a deal of complexity which allows for players to have those arguments they love, "a big dumb fighter will beat a dextrous one any day!", then you'll enjoy GURPS.

If you felt that GURPS 3e was basically good, but that the various optional rules in the sourcebooks and companions made it a bit of a spaghetti mess of rules, and that too much weight was put on DX and IQ, then you'll like GURPS 4e, which is a streamlined version - all the same options are there, but in one book instead of twenty - and where six stats are important, not two.

If you're going to run or play it, fifty bucks for all that enjoyment isn't a big deal. Here they're A$55 or so each; by comparison, a pizza is $10, a bag of chips for the evening is $2.50, a bottle of coke is $3, a train ticket around the city is about $3.50, and so on. So if you play at least 10 sessions, you'll spend far more on transport to the session and munchies for it than you do on the books. And really, even if the books were free, you'd want more than 10 sessions of play out of them just for the effort of learning the rules, explaining them to other players, planning a character or campaign, etc.

Quote from: walkerpWhat is your experience with 4e, because I really have to disagree with you here.  I think the problem is GONE in 4th and I don't think we can continue to discuss the general point. This whole thread seems to be tainted with the problems of 3rd that no longer apply to 4th.  It has been my experience that specialization is encouraged in 4th and works extremely well.  One of the main design goals with 4th was to address the problem of people taking high DX and IQ and being good at everything.  I believe they have succeeded in doing this.

I've played about a dozen sessions of GURPS 4E -- six in a Supers game, three in a GURPS Traveller game, and three in a Fantasy game.  I borrowed other people's books for these games.  Since I didn't really like 3rd edition mechanics, and wasn't particularly taken by 4th, I did not invest the considerable expense and time in it.  

It is possible that I missed things in my readings, but I've heard similar arguments against my conclusions about 3rd edition, which I'm quite solid on.  Hence, I wanted to discuss things.  

If you acknowledge the problem in 3rd, but believe it fixed in 4th, what are the specific changes that you think contribute to this?  Specifically, what specializations do you think are supported?

GURPS Martial Arts gives so many options for fighters makes specialization almost mandatory. Not just the karate guys but the regular sword and board western European style fighter. For the first time in a RPG I feel playing a fighter is as interesting rules-wise as  playing a mage.

A friend of mine who is 1/2 mage and 1/2 fighter was lamenting about he doesn't have enough points to get everything he wants.

The only problem area I seen so far is high magery like 10 levels and 1 point spells. The Rule of 16 helps.

Quote from: jhkimIf you acknowledge the problem in 3rd, but believe it fixed in 4th, what are the specific changes that you think contribute to this?  Specifically, what specializations do you think are supported?

I think 3e had problems, but what exactly those were are irrelevant now because we have 4e, it's a meaningless academic discussion.

I assume you mean the "only DX and IQ matter" problem.

It was fixed in 4e in four ways.

• by making DX and IQ cost 20/level compared to 10/level for ST and HT or 5/level for Will and Per,
• by having many important skills based on Will and Per
• by advising that there are times when a skill normally based on X should isntead for this roll be based on Y
• by noting that skill defaults aren't automatic - defaults available deend on cultural background

Bearing in mind that each player has a limited pool of points to spend on their character, and a smaller pool of points to spend between sessions, the first fix puts definite limits on the IQ or DX characters will have. In play, players roll against skills and only rarely against attributes, so the player will be aiming to have Broadsword - 12 or Fireball - 15 or whatever, rather than DX 12 and IQ 17. If you have for example more than five average skills at IQ/DX+2 [4], then it's more cost-effective to raise IQ/DX than those skills individually. However, in practice you'll find that your character uses just a couple of those in the difficult situations requiring very high (16+) skill levels, while the others can afford to be lower, so that putting your points into skills is encouraged at character generation, and in between sessions, well if you're getting 2-5CP per session, you're not going to save up 20 to get some benefit in 4-10 sessions (4 real weeks to a year, dependeing on frequency of play) when you can have a benefit now by boosting some skill.

Having the skills which depend on Will and Per encourages specialisation there. Taking your critique from 3e,

Quote from: John KimFor example, suppose a PC group has a sage has a 16 IQ but no outdoor skills of any type, and ranger who has 10 IQ and 8 points in tracking and lots of other outdoor skills. For just 1/2 point, the sage can get "Tracking" skill better than the ranger.

First we have to up the 1/2 point to 1, since 1 is the minimum now. Next,

Sage, IQ 16 [120], Tracking (A) Per-1 [1] - 15
Ranger IQ 10

• , Tracking (A) Per+2 [8] - 12

But note that the sage is a 121 CP character so far, and the ranger an 8CP character. It's thus not surprising that the 121CP sage can do stuff better than the 8CP ranger, that's part of the system's design, that higher CP total reflects overall better capability. But let's look at giving the ranger even a quarter to a third as many CP.

Sage, IQ 16 [120], Per 16

• , Tracking (A) Per-1 [1] - 15 = [121]

Ranger IQ 10

• , Per 16 [30], Tracking (A) Per+2 [8] - 20 = [38]

The ranger is now much better at Tracking than the sage. And if we up the ranger's CP to 121, we'll find that they can get quite a wide variety of skills in the ranger area. Another 83CP will buy a lot of skills. So your example simply doesn't hold up as a critique in GURPS 4e. Attribute-focused characters aren't always better than skills-focused characters, given that they're built on the same points.

So you see that remembering that the characters in a party are built on limited points, and in a game group will have the same CP totals, the specialist in X may if they try hard enough beat a specialist in Y at some skill, but the specialist in Y will overall do better. A ranger does more than Tracking.

The second, third and fourth points will also discourage just buying up high attributes because there'll be times when a high IQ or high DX are useless, some other attribute or a skill is important instead.

Every specialisation is supported in GURPS 4e, but whether it's supported by the GM is another matter. In a game where the GM never asked for rolls against Observation, Scrounging, Survival, Navigation, Naturalist and so on, but did ask for Tracking rolls and History and Biology and Egyptology, the ranger specialisation would be poorly-supported, and the sage specialisation well-supported. But that is not the fault of the rules.

Quote from: Kyle AaronI think 3e had problems, but what exactly those were are irrelevant now because we have 4e, it's a meaningless academic discussion.

I assume you mean the "only DX and IQ matter" problem.

It was fixed in 4e in four ways.

• by making DX and IQ cost 20/level compared to 10/level for ST and HT or 5/level for Will and Per,
• by having many important skills based on Will and Per
• by advising that there are times when a skill normally based on X should isntead for this roll be based on Y
• by noting that skill defaults aren't automatic - defaults available deend on cultural background

Bearing in mind that each player has a limited pool of points to spend on their character, and a smaller pool of points to spend between sessions, the first fix puts definite limits on the IQ or DX characters will have.

I was aware of all of these.  I feel that this cuts back some the most extreme cases of 3e characters, and it weakens the issue -- but the point is still there.  Compared to many other games, there are two notable features:

• There is very low buy-in for skills (1 point out of over 100).  
• Buying up all mental aspects (i.e. increased IQ) is a very worthwhile package deal compared to buying up multiple skills and/or sub-stats.  Other games often have separate stats for perception, willpower, intellectual ability, social ability, and/or magical ability.

The first of these is addressed to a fair degree by removing half-point skills and limiting defaults, but it is still cheap compared to most other systems.  For example, in the HERO system, it is 3 points out of a similar total (100-150) to get a stat-based roll in most skills (2pts for background skills like Knowledges or Sciences).  Other systems may have 1 point minimum out of a smaller point total.  

The issue isn't simply that only IQ and DX matter, but that IQ/DX matter more than any other part of the concept.  i.e. What is important about a sage character isn't his concept as a scholar, but rather his high IQ.  There is little protection for different niches within the mental abilities (i.e. nuclear physicist vs archeologist vs poet vs diplomat) or within physical abilities (i.e. ranger vs dancer vs thief).  With a long list and low buy-in, players are more likely to "cherry pick" the most useful skills for the campaign rather than concentrating on logically related skills.  

For example, if I have a city-bred high IQ sage as my PC, it is pretty tempting after the first long quest to put 1 point into a few useful skills outside my initial concept -- like Tracking or Survival.  It seems justified since I have now been adventuring in the wilderness.  But with just a bit of that, the niches between character types quickly break down.  

Other systems typically deal with this by having broader skills, higher buy-in cost, and/or more attractive incentives to take grouped skills.  

Quote from: Kyle AaronEvery specialisation is supported in GURPS 4e, but whether it's supported by the GM is another matter. In a game where the GM never asked for rolls against Observation, Scrounging, Survival, Navigation, Naturalist and so on, but did ask for Tracking rolls and History and Biology and Egyptology, the ranger specialisation would be poorly-supported, and the sage specialisation well-supported. But that is not the fault of the rules.

Under this logic, it is possible to justify any cost scheme by faulting the GM.  i.e. If flame resistance costs a huge amount, and a player takes it, the GM can balance it by constantly throwing flame attacks at the PCs.  

However, the question is what is natural for most GMs.  I think that in practice for a given campaign, certain skills are going to be more important than other skills.  That means that it is natural and reasonable for PCs to buy into those skills.  I don't think this is inherently bad GMing, since under some systems it wouldn't be a significant issue.

Quote from: jhkimThere is very low buy-in for skills (1 point out of over 100).  

That depends on the CP total the GM starts the PCs on, and the Disadvantage limit. Some campaigns I've run or seen included,

• 30CP characters with up to -30 Disadvantages, and -5 Quirks, leading to +65CP to spend on useful stuff
• 50CP characters with up to -30 Disadvantages, and -5 Quirks, leading to +85CP to spend on useful stuff
• 100CP characters with no Disadvantage limit, so that some players chose -20 Disadvantages, while one chose -100 Disadvantage

These led to very different kinds of characters, in the last case very different ones within the same campaign. You can't make a general rule about "1 point out of over 100" because there's no such rule, neither in the book nor in play across many campaigns.

In general what we find is that at low (0-75) CP totals, players choose a lot of skills; at high (150+) CP totals, they choose a lot of attributes. In the mid-range is where players will argue with each-other which is best, and where having -50 of Disadvantages to get you useful stuff rather than -10 makes a big difference.

Quote from: jhkimBuying up all mental aspects (i.e. increased IQ) is a very worthwhile package deal compared to buying up multiple skills and/or sub-stats.  Other games often have separate stats for perception, willpower, intellectual ability, social ability, and/or magical ability.

You seem to have forgotten that the system has not only attributes and skills, but also Dis/Advantages, which cover the things you mention. It's possible to be a Will 20 character who's a coward - so they'll stand up to any social confrontation, but no physical ones. Magical ability is an Advantage costing varying CP depending on how good it is and how wide the range, etc.

Quote from: jhkimOther systems may have 1 point minimum out of a smaller point total.  

Again, the point total is nowhere advised or mandated in the rules, but depends on the particular campaign. 3e and earlier recommended 100CP characters, 4e doesn't.

In addition, the GMing chapter gives advice about character creation, and mentioning "character-design problems" in "high-powered campaigns", by which they mean characters designed on 200+CP. It says,

Quote from: GURPS 4eSome players spend lots of points in one area, resulting in abusive levels of ability. Others use their ample points to prepare for almost every conceivable situation, thereby poaching on the territory of more focused PCs [...]

They suggest many fixes, including, "limit attribute levels [...] or on total points allowed in attributes."

And next, "Emphasize the value of relative skill level." It seems to be something you've not grasped, jhkim, even though I've mentioned it several times - sometimes your skill will be based on different attributes. Of course, if the GM never does that then particular attributes will be of exagerrated importance, but that's like saying that "oh the GM never asks us for social skill rolls, we just have to roleplay it, so the social skills are useless, this system is stupid" - the system isn't responsible for GMs and players ignoring large chunks of it.

Another aspect to our busy sage learning Tracking skill is - how did he learn it? Surely he did not learn it in his study. Did the ranger agree to teach him? More from the GMing chapter,

Quote from: GURPS 4eGiven the chance, some players will spend points without regard for their characters' origins and stated goals [...]

Discuss all improvements. Don't just let players buy whatever they want - ask them to explain why, especially if they wish to increase attributes. [...]

Keep awards small enough that players must think about their purchases. [...]

Don't make it too easy to learn new skills. If you et the PCs learn skills whenever they have enough points, their skill lists will eventually grow indinstinguishable from one another. [...]

Give awards other than points. [...] Patrons, Rank, Reputation, Status, Wealth, etc.

Of course you may argue that a system should deal with all possible abuses, rather than simply having GM advice to deal with the abuses, but that is like saying that my circular saw should physically prevent itself from cutting off my finger, rather than putting on a guard which will deal with all but the most deliberate self-injury, and the instruction book warning me to be careful. If a tool's at all useful, it will have some dangers. Its design can minimise but not eliminate those dangers, in the end it comes down to the common sense of the user, complemented by advice from the designer of the tool.

Quote from: jhkmimThere is little protection for different niches within the mental abilities (i.e. nuclear physicist vs archeologist vs poet vs diplomat) or within physical abilities (i.e. ranger vs dancer vs thief).  With a long list and low buy-in, players are more likely to "cherry pick" the most useful skills for the campaign rather than concentrating on logically related skills.  

Again there's the issue of GM approval of these ridiculous characters. But even if they pass muster somehow, there's Dis/Advantages again. There exist in 4e various Advantages that can make a big difference to a specialist while being cheaper than high IQ/DX.

For example, we have Flexibility [5], which gives +3 on Climbing, Escape and Erotic Art, and alows you to ignore up to -3 in penalties for working in close quarters (for example under a car).

There's High Manual Dexterity [5/level] which gives +1 t DX for all tasks that require a delicate touch, which includes all DX-based rolls (that relative skill level again!) against Artist, Jeweler, Knot-Tying, Leatherworking, Lockpicking, Pickpocket, Sewing, Sleight of Hnad, and Surgery, as well as DX-based rolls to do fine work with Machinist or Mechanic. So your clockmaker or thief or finework artisan could get +1 from DX for 20CP, or +1 from this trait for 5CP and 15 left over for other stuff, or even +4 for the same 20CP.

We have Talents, which you can buy in levels, and give +1 to a group of skills, and +1 to reaction rolls for people in similar professions. An Animal Friend [5/level] gets to be helped in Animal Handing, Falconry, Packing, Riding, Teamster and Veterinary. Sure the sage can do well at many of those with his IQ 16 [120], but the Animal Friend with IQ 10

• can get +6 to all those skills for 30CP giving an effective IQ of 16 for those particular skills, be well-liked by all animals (+6 to reaction rolls from them), and have 90CP left over for other stuff.

Quote from: jhkimFor example, if I have a city-bred high IQ sage as my PC, it is pretty tempting after the first long quest to put 1 point into a few useful skills outside my initial concept -- like Tracking or Survival.  It seems justified since I have now been adventuring in the wilderness.  But with just a bit of that, the niches between character types quickly break down.  

Learning new skills is not automatic in the RAW (rules as written). You need to have a teacher, or for "quick learning under pressure" to have succeeded in a roll against them at their default level, and to have succeeded on an IQ roll after the adventure. And you need points spare, either CP awarded by the GM - and most GURPS GMs seem to award 2-3 per session - or else be able to spend 200 hours per CP being instructed, or 400 hours per CP doing private study.

As GM, my question to the ranger would be, "are you teaching the sage Tracking or Survival?" If the answer's "no", sage-boy is going to have a harder time learning them, the IQ roll won't be a problem but the original default roll will. But whatever the answer, I would say, "why does the sage want these skills? What's wrong with the ranger doing them? What kind of a sage grubs about in the dirt looking for roots and herbs to eat, or sets up the camp for the night? Shouldn't he be concentrating on his real studies, thinking about myths and legends as you walk along in the wilderness, while the ranger gets dirty?"

Again, this is the stuff that GM advice is made of, and as I noted before, we do indeed find it in GURPS 4e.

Quote from: jhkimHowever, the question is what is natural for most GMs.  I think that in practice for a given campaign, certain skills are going to be more important than other skills.  That means that it is natural and reasonable for PCs to buy into those skills.  I don't think this is inherently bad GMing, since under some systems it wouldn't be a significant issue.

A given campaign will have certain skills be more important, yes. But a good GM will design the campaign to make every PCs' abilities useful at some point, and good players will design their characters to have appropriate skills. If the GM tells you that this will be a postapocalyptic campaign in which all electronics has burned out, and then you design a character with 50CP in computer-related stuff, then we have a problem. The campaign or the character, or a bit of both, have to change.

If the sage's player is sitting there being a spare one, and the ranger's player is making fifty dice rolls a session, then of course the sage's player is going to want to give him some Tracking. But if the sage's player and ranger's player both get to use their abilities, they'll focus on improving them.

A good campaign design, and good GMing in play, will ensure that the broad range of abilities present in the party are useful; good character design will ensure they fit the campaign. If the sage's knowledge proves to be vital in several sessions, and the ranger's knowledge vital, too, then the player of each will be content to focus in the areas they're already good in. Let each PC shine in their own way, and then they won't try to shine in the other PCs' ways.

In summary, by looking at the whole of GURPS 4e as a system, remembering not only attributes and skills but also the Dis/Advantages, we find that specialised characters are well-supported in play, provided the GM also supports that specialisation by making it useful in the game session. While abuses and warped characters are quite possible, the GMing advice chapter in combination with many of the rules more than make up for this.

Any investment in new skills comes only after default use of or significant time spent in the game actually learning it. Only as an optional rule can characters just spend earned points on any new skills.

Tightly related skills default to each other, a player would have a greater opportunity to learn those skills that can be used as defaults of skills he already has.

There are advantages that some skills require, encouraging characters to concentrate on learning and improving related skills.

Skills in GURPS are not the only mechanism for niche protection. Advantages and disadvantages are the greater tool of niche protection in GURPS. For instance, using the default magic system, in normal mana worlds, only mages can cast spells, even though anybody 'could' learn spells.

Other ads/disads could be built depending on the campaign that would provide other kinds of niche protection, if that is important. I know that seems like a cop out, relying on GM Fiat, but it isn't. In a system that supports lots of different kinds of genres, the niche's could be radically different and defined only at a campaigns inception or conception. So the base rules don't instill or force these, the campaign should.

Well, I think John is making some good points here, especially given the level of effort I'd be willing to put in, either as a player or as a GM, in ensuring that a character build makes sense and includes all the skills that ought to be there. I remember toying with a method in GURPS to buy skills up from their defaults from related skills, but I had trouble getting the math to work right. FATE has a simple approach with its skill pyramid system. I think I'll start a new thread on this.

Quote from: darOther ads/disads could be built depending on the campaign that would provide other kinds of niche protection, if that is important. I know that seems like a cop out, relying on GM Fiat, but it isn't. In a system that supports lots of different kinds of genres, the niche's could be radically different and defined only at a campaigns inception or conception. So the base rules don't instill or force these, the campaign should.

I think it is a cop-out.  There are plenty of other rules that support specific genres in GURPS -- the fact that there are infinite possibilities to cover shouldn't preclude you from covering the common basics.  Many campaigns will want some sort of niche protection, grouping together related skills.  I think a more reasonable design would be to make a default niche protection, and a given campaign can always house-rule the default in order to change the niches.  

3rd edition had plenty of ostensibly "niche" advantages as well, but they were rarely worth it compared to basic DX and IQ.  i.e. Flexibility, or High Manual Dexterity.  From what I have seen of 4th, that is equally true -- they simply aren't worth it.  Indeed, a number of niches got more expensive under 4th edition.  For example, I wanted a musically talented starship captain in my GURPS Traveller game as a bit of color, but under 4th edition the cost of this was raised dramatically to be 5 points per +1.  

Kyle goes on about how you have to stomp on those dirty power-gaming players who put too many points into attributes instead of these good, flavorful advantages.  I don't deny that there are power-gamers whom you might not like.  However, the fact that they suggest setting limits on points on attributes suggests to me that they are still too good for their cost.  

I think it's reasonable to not worry about power-gaming loopholes like someone who combines Lightning Bolt with the Self-Only limitation with Absorbtion (Electricity Only).  However, when the terrible munchkin idea that has to be stomped on is "I want my character to be really smart" -- then maybe the system has something to do with it.  

Quote from: Kyle AaronA given campaign will have certain skills be more important, yes. But a good GM will design the campaign to make every PCs' abilities useful at some point, and good players will design their characters to have appropriate skills. If the GM tells you that this will be a postapocalyptic campaign in which all electronics has burned out, and then you design a character with 50CP in computer-related stuff, then we have a problem. The campaign or the character, or a bit of both, have to change.

If the sage's player is sitting there being a spare one, and the ranger's player is making fifty dice rolls a session, then of course the sage's player is going to want to give him some Tracking. But if the sage's player and ranger's player both get to use their abilities, they'll focus on improving them.

No, they're not.  Most often, they're going to spend on what gains them the most benefit.  And most times that's perfectly reasonable in-character.  Raising their existing skills is not necessarily what will gain them the most benefit.  Because of the exponential cost (1-2-4-8), buying up existing skills is often pretty inefficient.  i.e. Compared to getting +1 in your good 4pt skill, you could get 4 new skills.  

So suppose we have a cat-burglar character with a high DX and a bunch of purely thieving skills -- not an unreasonable concept.  With 4 XP, she could get +1 to her Stealth, or she could take some combat skills like Broadsword and Shield and Fast-Draw which would be greatly useful to her when the party gets into a fight -- as it has a number of times thus far.  

Similarly, if the party is hunting down fugitives and there is a lot of tracking going on, it would be very attractive for the sage to spend 1 point on Tracking and thus give the party an extra chance to stay on the trail if the Ranger fails.  This is true even if he is getting good use out of his ability to research the fugitive's background.

Quote from: jhkimHowever, when the terrible munchkin idea that has to be stomped on is "I want my character to be really smart" -- then maybe the system has something to do with it.  

That 'really smart' will be expensive, precluding being highly trained or experienced in skills having fewer points to spend on them. A character that isn't 'really smart' but spent more points on the same skills would end up with the same overall level but be more highly trained/experienced. That character will have an advantage, when it comes to those skills. No GM fiat. It is built into the rules.

Edit: trying to be more polite.

Quote from: jhkimSimilarly, if the party is hunting down fugitives and there is a lot of tracking going on, it would be very attractive for the sage to spend 1 point on Tracking and thus give the party an extra chance to stay on the trail if the Ranger fails.

And again unexplained is how the sage is to learn Tracking.

And again ignored is that a ranger is more than someone with Tracking; the sage can get a single rangerish skill without really stepping into the ranger's niche; saying that a sage learning Tracking ruins a ranger player's fun is like saying that Buffy is no fun to play because Xander can use a sword, too. He can, but a Slayer is more than someone with a sword.

And again unexplored is just how much better a dedicated ranger of the same point total will be at Tracking alone than any sage, just as Buffy will be better with her sword than Xander.

Since jhkim is persisting in ignoring 3/4 of my responses, it seems pointless responding further.

As I said earlier, it's quite alright to just dislike a game for no real reason. You don't have to make up reasons and ignore people's explanations of that game.

Quote from: Elliot WilenWell, I think John is making some good points here, especially given the level of effort I'd be willing to put in, either as a player or as a GM, in ensuring that a character build makes sense and includes all the skills that ought to be there.

I think that Kyle has more than adequately de-bunked most of John's points.  But I do agree (and Kyle's answers re-iterate this) that keeping GURPS working smoothly takes a dedicated GM.  If you aren't prepared to put in the effort, flaws will become apparent.  Some systems are more forgiving of a slack GM, but GURPS isn't one of them.

But I don't think it is much of a criticism to make.  SJ Games can hardly be accountable for crappy GMs.

Quote from: Kyle AaronAnd again unexplained is how the sage is to learn Tracking.

And again ignored is that a ranger is more than someone with Tracking; the sage can get a single rangerish skill without really stepping into the ranger's niche; saying that a sage learning Tracking ruins a ranger player's fun is like saying that Buffy is no fun to play because Xander can use a sword, too. He can, but a Slayer is more than someone with a sword.

And again unexplored is just how much better a dedicated ranger of the same point total will be at Tracking alone than any sage, just as Buffy will be better with her sword than Xander.

Since jhkim is persisting in ignoring 3/4 of my responses, it seems pointless responding further.

Look, you posted a 1300 word response in little more an hour to my post before last, which was just a few hours ago.  I'm not going to try to go word-for-word with you and respond to every sentence you post.  Sorry.  I'll try to cover the broad points, but that's it.  It seems to me that you're taking a minor criticism of GURPS personally, which seems screwy.  

I never said that a sage learning Tracking "ruins the ranger's player's fun".  That depends the player and on the general group dynamic.  The ranger's player might like having another tracker, or simply not care.  I have no strong predictions about that.  Some people don't care much about niches at all.  

However, if you do care about niches -- as Pierce Invarerarity indicated he did in his original post -- then this is one case of mixing.  Obviously, the one example isn't a game-breaker, but it's also only 1 point spent.  If he's bothered by that, then there are liable to be other things that bother him about the game.  

You give the impression that lack of niche protection means that the sage will be better than the ranger in everything.  i.e. That the problem is abusive super-characters by munchkin players that break the game.  That's not what I'm talking about.  I'm talking about just characters that don't have sharp distinctions between them.  For example, you gave example stats of characters as:

Quote from: Kyle AaronSage, IQ 16 [120], Per 16

• , Tracking (A) Per-1 [1] - 15 = [121]

Ranger IQ 10

• , Per 16 [30], Tracking (A) Per+2 [8] - 20 = [38]

So you're postulating that the ranger has 8 points in Tracking, which means he is deliberately specializing in that.  If he put 8 points into all his ranger skills, he'd be simply throwing points away because of the inefficiency.

That's not my point.  Obviously if a character is specialized in tracking, he's not going to be overtaken in it.  But if the ranger has a variety of outdoor skills (climbing, survival, camouflage, etc.) -- then on any particular one other characters are likely to have comparable skill.

Why not just TRY the game instead of arguing and nitpicking numbers?


- Ed C.

And again, jhkim, you give me no genuine response.

Again, you don't need to pretend to have a rational reason to dislike a game. Your own website records at my last count 989 first editions of English-language rpgs. No-one can possibly look at even a tenth of them thoroughly, we have to go on personal whim about them. Let's just not pretend it's anything more.

I think it's been pretty conclusively shown that there are a number of builds possible for different charaqcters with similar levels in particular skills, and that a character which specialises in skills along a certain theme (ranger, animal handling, pub quiz trivia) can attain high levels of competence by using specific advantages at a fraction of the cost of the guy who puts all his points into IQ.

It's also true that a character with a high IQ stat will be able to pick up a strong academic understanding of many skills with minimum tuition, albeit that his knownledge will remain largely theoretical and often fall short under duress (i.e. when the skill is applied to an attribute other than IQ).

What I don't understand is where the problem is. It is a fact of life which is sadly infrequently found in many games that significantly more intelligent people generally find it easy to pick up a superficial level of understanding in new areas. That many games overlook this fact and instead impose various standards of equality is a feature of those games. Likewise, the ability of a very intelligent GURPS character to learn new skills quickly is likewise a feature of GURPS.

What is important is the earlier observations that this IQ based approach is not the most cost effective way to build a character who specialises in a particular niche, so it should not be the case that most characters are abnormally intelligent. If a player frequently takes the high IQ approach to chargen to gain some sort of minmax skill boost then he is displaying the deficiencies in his minmaxing skill since this in not the most cost effective way to build anything but the most bland and generalist character.

There is a post somewhere where Kromm very clearly explains why specialization is always superior in GURPS and that generalization will only make you strategically less effective over time.

I don't know how your games when JHKim because it sounds like you played in quite a few sessions, but I found myself as a player constantly agonizing where to spend my points.  We were approaching 500 point builds and I never had enough points where I could just crank out IQ and/or DX and suddenly supercede any of the other 4 players in their niche.  We played a steady 3 points per session award system, plus big chunks of points when we got powers and extra points here and there for long training periods.

I also think you are overemphasizing the impact of skills.  Once you get advantages and advantage-based powers into the mix, the impact of skill levels (and the points you put into them) become less significant.

Maybe your GM was a long time 3rd edition player and was carrying over those biases in the way character development was influenced?

Quote from: KoltarWhy not just TRY the game instead of arguing and nitpicking numbers?

Agreed
Or the least he could do is show us a broken build. It not like a GURPS character is hard to post. If GURPS 4th is so broken then the poster should stop lecturing us and post some builds.

Quote from: walkerpThere is a post somewhere where Kromm very clearly explains why specialization is always superior in GURPS and that generalization will only make you strategically less effective over time.

I'd be interested to see the post.  It's not like this disagrees with my point by itself.  It says very little until you specify how broad or narrow the specialization should be.  For example, I would completely agree that trying to make a do-everything character, or even a do-half-of-everything character is a losing proposition.  

What I am saying is that it is common for a character to have, say, one 8-point skill and then twenty or more 1-point skills.  Those 1-point skills may cluster some in a theme, but you'll have a scattering of other 1-point skills -- especially after some adventures.  The out-of-theme 1pt skills will be at the same level as the in-theme 1pt skills.  

Yes, a talent or certain other advantages can technically change that -- but from what I've seen they aren't generally worth it.  Some players may spend a few points to get one for flavor, but it isn't encouraged by the system because they cost a lot.  

Quote from: walkerpI don't know how your games when JHKim because it sounds like you played in quite a few sessions, but I found myself as a player constantly agonizing where to spend my points.  We were approaching 500 point builds and I never had enough points where I could just crank out IQ and/or DX and suddenly supercede any of the other 4 players in their niche.  We played a steady 3 points per session award system, plus big chunks of points when we got powers and extra points here and there for long training periods.

I also think you are overemphasizing the impact of skills.  Once you get advantages and advantage-based powers into the mix, the impact of skill levels (and the points you put into them) become less significant.

I would completely agree that if there are superpowers, then the overlap of skill niches becomes largely irrelevant.

However, I'm puzzled by your statement.  By "supercede", do you mean you couldn't do everything better than the other character?  If so, then yeah, that's obvious.  But conversely, I find it hard to believe that with 500 points, you couldn't get even one out-of-niche skill higher than another PC.  

For reference, here's two of my 4th edition characters (the only ones I have online):

Captain Emily Clarke (http://www.darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/gurps/chars/captain.txt)
The Mouth (http://www.darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/gurps/chars/mouth.txt)

Quote from: jhkimYes, a talent or certain other advantages can technically change that -- but from what I've seen they aren't generally worth it.  Some players may spend a few points to get one for flavor, but it isn't encouraged by the system because they cost a lot.  

If you think it worth it to boost IQ/DX rather than the several skills under them, then you must think it worth it to boost a Talent rather than the several skills under them. After all, IQ/DX are 20/level, while Talents are 5-15.

Talents and other similar Advantages answer the comment you made, that there's just IQ and DX, and no niche-specific "intelligence." There actually is. You can have a Talent with a group of related skills. That's a kind of smarts that's specific to a niche, and it's much cheaper than IQ or DX.

Quote from: jhkimBy "supercede", do you mean you couldn't do everything better than the other character?  If so, then yeah, that's obvious.

That's not what you've been implying. Let's revisit the original quote.

Quote from: jhkim, in his review of GURPS 3eSince so much rests in the 4* attributes, it can be hard to maintain skill niches in a group of PC's, beyond mental types vs physical types. For example, suppose a PC group has a sage has a 16 IQ but no outdoor skills of any type, and ranger who has 10 IQ and 8 points in tracking and lots of other outdoor skills. For just 1/2 point, the sage can get "Tracking" skill better than the ranger.

This tells us that you think a single skill is enough for a "niche". It's not. If someone's character is defined by a single skill, that's a pretty boring character. An able character will have a range of skills, and be able in a group of related skills. A ranger is not just someone with Tracking, an IT person is not just someone with Computer Programming, a leader is not just someone with Leadership, and so on.

You've been talking about "niche protection." A "niche" is more than just one skill. A ranger does more than Tracking.

Quote from: jhkimBut conversely, I find it hard to believe that with 500 points, you couldn't get even one out-of-niche skill higher than another PC.  

Which would be why in my first post to this thread, the fourth one here (http://www.therpgsite.com/forums/showpost.php?p=161893&postcount=4), I said,

Quote from: Kyle AaronSo while someone who's a specialist in one area may have a particular skill better than a specialist in another area, they won't have the range of skills required to do the job. The sage can't be a replacement ranger. They can replace them in one or two skills, but not in the job as a whole.

You don't even need 500CP for it, it can be done at any character power level. It's trivially easy to get an out-of-niche skill at a higher level than some other character whose niche it's in. But they'll still be better at their job overall - you won't have but a toe in their little niche.

Let's make this as clear as possible. A character with a "niche" has more than one skill in it.

Once you realise that, all the other stuff about attributes not being way superior to skills, Talents being useful, etc, all fall into place.

Just for the record: I don't consider one point skills to be 'broadening my niche' or what have you.  You consider yourself an expert? You gonna have at a minimum a +0 skill, Minimum. That's a 2 or even 4 skill points.

I know that the 1 point difference isn't looking like much, but we are talking over potentially a dozen skills.

Those 1 pointers (or 1/2 pointers in ye olde dayes) were for things you knew but weren't your area of expertise. You know, the ranger who happens to have a working knowledge of the Cult of Set or whatever.  

GURPS being what it is, you can have a huge raft of 'out of niche' skills, and probably should. Unless you want to be an expert at everything, you only put the minimum in there and hope it's enough if it ever comes up.

but yeah: ONE skill with 8 points in it does not a niche fill.

And at 500 points? I expect to see many 8's on that sheet.

But I will leave this to the experts. Damn lazy players, no good GURPS games goin' on... grumble grumble :mad:

Quote from: jhkimHowever, I'm puzzled by your statement.  By "supercede", do you mean you couldn't do everything better than the other character?  If so, then yeah, that's obvious.  But conversely, I find it hard to believe that with 500 points, you couldn't get even one out-of-niche skill higher than another PC.  

Well I don't have their sheets in front of me and I don't remember them well enough to say.  Certainly we had many skill overlaps.  But it never got to the point where it made any strategic sense to try and poach their niches.  I tried.  Not because I wanted to steal their spotlight, but I couldn't really commit to a niche myself, so I kept spreading my points all over the place.  The other players were all hardcore GURPS experts and were focused right from the get-go.

What ended up happening is that I would try and get in on their area of expertise and either flail or make a minimal impact.  This happened with trying to be stealthy, trying to be ass-kicking in a fight, doing face stuff.  It was very unsatisfying (and actually led me to my own personal frustrations with GURPS).  When I finally cottoned on and started listening to the other players' strategic suggestions for my point-builds, and focused on making my guy's niche be survival, then I started seriously having an impact in the game.  I could soak damage and go anywhere (outside of the space ship, underwater, inside a trash compactor, etc.).

Again, we were dealing with powers here, so the specialization manifests itself in very complex Advantage builds.  But in my own game, where the players were working with around 150 points, all 3 players started to branch out into their areas of specialization. There was skill overlap (things like Stealth and some gun skills) but in most systems these are baselines anyways and none of the other players felt that their niche was being trampled on.

Kyle, you're simply repeating exactly what I said.  I'll say it again:  I never claiming that GURPS 4th edition is totally broken, and that the sage character build beats all others at their own game.  That's a straw man that you constructed.  

Also, you should make clear that you were quoting my review of 3rd edition GURPS.  I did say that 4th was different, but that it still had a lesser form of the same feature.  Let's go back over what niche protection is...

Quote from: Kyle AaronYou don't even need 500CP for it, it can be done at any character power level. It's trivially easy to get an out-of-niche skill at a higher level than some other character whose niche it's in. But they'll still be better at their job overall - you won't have but a toe in their little niche.

Let's make this as clear as possible. A character with a "niche" has more than one skill in it.

Let's make this as clear as possible: You don't need to be better than a specialist at all skills of his specialty for niche protection to be an issue.  The case of tracking is indeed just one skill, but it was also just one point spent.  

You just said it yourself:  In GURPS, it is "trivially easy" to be better than someone else at one skill in their niche.  Some people don't like that feature of GURPS.  Different people will different feelings about how easy it should be for someone to put a toe in someone else's niche, and/or what constitutes a toe versus a foot.  However, I don't think one has to be an irrational wacko to dislike that feature.  

Now, that could potentially be offset by 4th edition talents, but I don't think that is true in practice with their implementation.  

Quote from: Kyle AaronIf you think it worth it to boost IQ/DX rather than the several skills under them, then you must think it worth it to boost a Talent rather than the several skills under them. After all, IQ/DX are 20/level, while Talents are 5-15.

Talents and other similar Advantages answer the comment you made, that there's just IQ and DX, and no niche-specific "intelligence." There actually is. You can have a Talent with a group of related skills. That's a kind of smarts that's specific to a niche, and it's much cheaper than IQ or DX.

In principle, I agree that a similar system could address the issue.  I did write up an aptitude system (http://www.darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/gurps/gurps_apt.html) for 3rd edition GURPS for exactly this reason.  However, the costs assigned are key.  Obviously the lower cost has to be considered relative to what you get.  I don't have a copy of the rules handy, but what I remember is that the cost for talents was quite high relative to what you got.  I know that I found the 5pts per +1 Musical Talent little help, for example.  i.e. Spending 10 pts got you a lot less than half of what +1 IQ got you.  

On the other hand, maybe I missed something.  Let me ask you and anyone else here:  Within your last PC party, how many points were spent on DX+IQ versus how many points on talent advantages?  In my GURPS Traveller party, I was the only one who took a talent advantage, which was a 5 point Musical talent compared to over 300 points in DX and IQ among the four PCs.  Do you find in practice that players take them instead of DX/IQ?

Quote from: SpikeThose 1 pointers (or 1/2 pointers in ye olde dayes) were for things you knew but weren't your area of expertise. You know, the ranger who happens to have a working knowledge of the Cult of Set or whatever.  

GURPS being what it is, you can have a huge raft of 'out of niche' skills, and probably should. Unless you want to be an expert at everything, you only put the minimum in there and hope it's enough if it ever comes up.

but yeah: ONE skill with 8 points in it does not a niche fill.

And at 500 points? I expect to see many 8's on that sheet.

Well, as GM you can run things however you like in your game.  

Mechanically, if you have five skills at the 8 point level, you can instead raise all your other skills by +1 as well as your Will and Perception for free.  (And yes, Kyle, I realize that it's possible to call for skill rolls on an alternate stat -- i.e. like rolling IQ + Broadsword skill to talk about swordsmanship.  So there would be a -1 to talking about your swordsmanship and such, but it has to be weighed against the gain.)

Quote from: jhkimWell, as GM you can run things however you like in your game.  

Mechanically, if you have five skills at the 8 point level, you can instead raise all your other skills by +1 as well as your Will and Perception for free.  (And yes, Kyle, I realize that it's possible to call for skill rolls on an alternate stat -- i.e. like rolling IQ + Broadsword skill to talk about swordsmanship.  So there would be a -1 to talking about your swordsmanship and such, but it has to be weighed against the gain.)

If, by chance, all your 8 point skills fall under IQ? Sure.  And again, I put that at 500 point gaming.

Of course if you want to go 'straight super optimal', any time you collect more than twenty points in skills on your character sheet there is the possibility of 'wasted points' by that mentality.   Sounds not unlike the guys who played every champions game with all their characters being 'super strong guys'... not because they wanted to play 'super strong' but because every five points in STR gave you (as I recall...) seven points back in derived attributes.  STR therefor was 'optimal'.

Not everyone sits down and streamlines their characters that far. Sometimes ya just want to be 'that really good ranger guy, the expert, ya know?'. and not 'that really smart guy who knows a little about rangering' even though their dice rolls play out identically.

Quote from: jhkimAlso, you should make clear that you were quoting my review of 3rd edition GURPS.

What part of "Originally Posted by jhkim, in his review of GURPS 3e" was unclear? It was in bold and everything.

Quote from: jhkimLet's make this as clear as possible: You don't need to be better than a specialist at all skills of his specialty for niche protection to be an issue.

Bullshit.

If you believe that, go back to AD&D1e with character classes and no chance at cross-abilities by banning multi-classing.

Quote from: jhkimIn GURPS, it is "trivially easy" to be better than someone else at one skill in their niche.  Some people don't like that feature of GURPS.  Different people will different feelings about how easy it should be for someone to put a toe in someone else's niche, and/or what constitutes a toe versus a foot.  However, I don't think one has to be an irrational wacko to dislike that feature.  

Yes, you have to be an irrational wacko to think that one skill is a big imposition on the other guy with the pile of skills. It'd be like me as a chef worried that because the kitchenhand can chop onions, I might lose my job. It's ridiculous.

Quote from: jhkimSpending 10 pts got you a lot less than half of what +1 IQ got you.  

If we're talking about characters have niches, areas of focus in their abilities, then that IQ for 20 can add to 100 skills, and a Talent for 10 adds to 12 skills only, it doesn't matter to you - you're only interested in those 12 skills plus a few others. Sure, IQ can help with 100 skills. But you don't have 100 skills, you're not going to roll for 100 skills. Just the dozen niche-specific skills, and another dozen to round them out. So then the 10 point Talent looks pretty bloody good.

Quote from: jhkimWithin your last PC party, how many points were spent on DX+IQ versus how many points on talent advantages?  [...] Do you find in practice that players take them instead of DX/IQ?

I begin players with 50CP characters, in general. I find that they spend 20-40CP on Attributes, and about 20CP on traits which can affect skills, like Flexibility, Talents, and so on. They spend another 20CP on Advantages which have non-skill effects, like Hard to Kill, Attractive, Status and so on. I note again that you're ignoring the in-game importance of things other than skills and attributes.

I find that the unimaginative players choose high DX and/or IQ, but do very little with them in play. "I don't know what I want my character to be able to do... fuck it, I'll give them high DX/IQ." But at the 50CP power level, it doesn't help them much. Having IQ 12 [40] rather than IQ 10

• means they'll have default skill rolls of 7 or 8 rather than 5 or 6 - not much difference, really, unless you're rolling dice a zillion times a session.

The imaginative players decide what they want their character to be able to do, and focus selection of attributes, skills and dis/advantages on that.

So in the Roman Republic game we had a social guy, a fighting guy, and a healer. Each had relevant skills at 12-14, and some-other-niche's skills at 9 or so.

In First Tiwesdaeg (Dark Ages Englandish) game we had a fighter, a healer, a ranger and a non-focused character. The fighter ended up with a skill of 16, attacking with two weapons a turn, etc. The ranger ended up with high Perception, able to spot lots of things and so on.

In both cases, players pursued their own specialites and didn't worry about side stuff too much, and if someone else got a skill they had, it really didn't worry them. If the fighter had tried to be a ranger then she would have been less of a fighter, if the social guy had tried to be more of a fighter he would have been less social. That's the nature of a point-buy system.

Yes, it's trivially easy to have a single skill your niche better than that particular skill inside the other guy's niche - but most players won't bother, because they could spend those points on something else.

If the ranger has really good Tracking, why, oh why would the sage bother? He has sagey things to think about. Is it because he's worried the ranger might fail? Then the ranger can't be very bloody good. In any case, that could apply to any skill - so the sage ends up doing nothing but learning the skills of the rest of the party, and is no longer much of a sage, just a jack of all trades, master of none.

Is it because the GM keeps asking for Tracking rolls, and never anything else? Then the GM is an idiot, and should be removed by a bloodless coup. The deal in a sensible game is, "if I let you put it on your character sheet, then I will make sure it comes out in play - good or bad." That then is the real niche protection for PCs - a competent GM.

Quote from: jhkimMechanically, if you have five skills at the 8 point level, you can instead raise all your other skills by +1 as well as your Will and Perception for free.

Am I missing something?  How is paying 20 points for the IQ raise free?

Quote from: walkerpAm I missing something?  How is paying 20 points for the IQ raise free?

With +1 IQ, you can get the same level in those five skills (assuming they are mental) for only 4 points each.  Reducing those points would save you twenty points.  Under GURPS 3rd edition, I often noticed published characters who would cost less points if you increased their DX and/or IQ while keeping skills the same.  

To Kyle:

Our experiences differ regarding talents.  Being at a lower point scale does seem important.  As I noted, one of the two key causes was the low relative cost of buy-in, but the buy-in is significantly more if you have only half as many points.

Quote from: jhkimWith +1 IQ, you can get the same level in those five skills (assuming they are mental) for only 4 points each.  Reducing those points would save you twenty points.  Under GURPS 3rd edition, I often noticed published characters who would cost less points if you increased their DX and/or IQ while keeping skills the same.  

1) We're not talking about 3e.  You really need to drop those assumptions.
2) If you can wait long enough to save up 20 points, then go for it.
3) This is making a lot of assumptions about all those skills being under IQ and being skills that someone else has (the person whose niche you are targetting, I guess).
4) It's fewer.

...be a lot simpler if he just referred to 4th edition GURPS for all of the conversation...


- Ed C.

I don't know. Our group uses GURPS as our default system, and I can certainly sympathise with a lot of jhkim's criticisms. But then, I think that probably has a lot to do with the fact that we grew up with 3rd edition and played that incessantly for a decade or more before 4th edition came along. It's very hard to unlearn those lessons, and frankly, I'm still unconvinced that the changes made in 4E adequately address the problem.

Whilst floating skills are a nice idea, in reality, it doesn't happen often enough to make a sizeable difference, and neither do things like skill-investment only feints. Talents never see any action, since the cost differential between taking the talent and just upping the relevant attribute isn't sufficient. And I've never ever seen any GM use the training time rules.

Are our GMs all crap? Maybe so, though I'd suggest that we're probably average at worst. I can certainly imagine that there might be better GMs out there, but I would suggest they were actually good GMs, and a game should be designed to work for average groups, not just really good ones.

Oh, and I have to strongly disagree with the notion that players will invest in their strengths and specialities. In my experience, unless those strengths weren't really pronounced in the first place (eg skill levels below 15), players will always opt to shore up their weaknesses first and foremost, especially when that is usually cheaper and more cost-effective than augmenting existing strengths.