TheRPGSite

I was rereading Gurps Powers after a thread on the Big Purple made me get out the book to examine statting a demon.

 I've been put off by the complexity of GURPS 4E and while I've read it, never made use of it.

I've played 3E off and on for many years, and run many Horror and other "no specific engine" games with that.

Yet, as I'm looking at it now, in the new light of having reread M&M2E and it seems to me that other than my dislike of "2 books needed" setup, that Gurps 4 is actually better, more logically constructed, and in many ways simpler, than M&M2E--so why doesn't it get more love "in the wild?"

You kind of answerred your own question.

 Many people have this "knee-jerk" reaction as you put it against there being two corebooks for GURPs 4/e...yet similiar people seem to have no problem with D&D having 3 "corebooks".

TO BE ACCURATE: GURPS 3/e really needed people to get THREE books after a cetain point - the main GURPS book, Compendium I and Compendium II. The new version boils down all that stuff into just two hardbacks.


In general, fourth edition is easier and smoother than 3rd edition GURPS.


- Ed C.

I think the lack of clear division between 'ordinary' advantages and disadvantages and 'supernatural' ones is a very real stumbling block for a lot of gamers.  I'm an old GURPS fan and I have a problem with it!!!

I mean, in 3e I could just hand over the main book to a new player and trust anything they took out of it was fine, and I could steal the older pre-compendium suplements for other useful, campaign specific advantages and disadvantages. Now its a painful process of weeding, rejection and going 'um...look for the little head icon' or what have you.

Metaphorically: Its flying a jet through skyscrapers. Sure, its possible, maybe even fun for an expert, but for that guy on his second flight lesson? Sheer terror followed by a firey explosion.

Quote from: SpikeI think the lack of clear division between 'ordinary' advantages and disadvantages and 'supernatural' ones is a very real stumbling block for a lot of gamers.  I'm an old GURPS fan and I have a problem with it!!!

I mean, in 3e I could just hand over the main book to a new player and trust anything they took out of it was fine, and I could steal the older pre-compendium suplements for other useful, campaign specific advantages and disadvantages. Now its a painful process of weeding, rejection and going 'um...look for the little head icon' or what have you.

Metaphorically: Its flying a jet through skyscrapers. Sure, its possible, maybe even fun for an expert, but for that guy on his second flight lesson? Sheer terror followed by a firey explosion.

That's in large part my issue with it, it's just not as user friendly.  I liked Gurps for gritty and/or historical games, I tended to use it for real world settings, I don't want to spend chargen vetoing stuff the players ask for.  That and it makes just way more to wade through.

For me Gurps lost its way with Compendium I, it just tipped it over the complexity edge for me, not least because much of the stuff in Compendium I made damn all sense when removed from the supplement it was originally written for.

I love GURPS. It's complexity isn't as bad as it seems at first, and serves a purpose.

It seems that there are lots of special cases and niche rules. In a way it's presented like that to spell things out. Ultimately, though, most rules tie together in a way that makes sense.

For example, the character sheet for 4th and in part 3rd. Each skill seems to have three stats. The actual level, the adjustment from base stat, and the point cost. It boils down to something simple though, really the skill level is the adjustment from base stat. Every thing else is for convenience and can be derived from the adjustment. But it LOOKS complex at first.

(I've started to just record the adjustment for skills, I have not tried it in game yet but I think it'll work just fine, also it highlights that different base stats could be used depending on what the character is trying to do with a skill)

Also in the first two core books there are THREE combat systems. Each one building on the previous one. It adds to the heft of the books, and complexity of the written game. The combat system, however, is really a single one with optional levels of detail.

The other thing is choice paralysis. Approaching character generation from the shopping mentality can be daunting. Templates help, but it kinda becomes its own worst enemy by seeming to offer MORE choices. When people new to GURPS cotton on to the idea that they need a character idea first and build to that, the choices become a blessing. Also in a long long campaign those choices help prevent characters from ending up statistical clones of each other, all with the same skills and options.

The book layout and texture puts me off, actually.   It's not that there are two books; it's that the books feel and look cheap and magazine-like to me.  The paper, the supergloss, all that.

I passed over them in the store a few times, in favor of whatever else seemed interesting, before eventually picking them up because of this.

Even now, they aren't my first pick off the shelf when I want to sit about on my couch curled up in a blanket and just toy about with ideas - which is the situation in which campaign ideas often "gell" for me.

What's wrong with 4e? 15 years of 3e. I've got my hardback GURPS Basic Set. I never use Compendium I or II, except for the compiled ads/disads/skills listings, so that's a red herring. And between me and my group, we've probably got 95% of all the supplements ever released. We know the rules we use (note, that's not ALL of them - its a buffet, innit?) like the back of our hands.

So, we don't need 4e.

You could say, I guess, that we're what's wrong with 4e.

That said, I do have the two new 4e Basic books. But I'll almost certainly never use them.

As I've said before, SJG lost a guarenteed sale of every supplement they could put out for 3e, from my group, when they shifted to 4e. I know plenty of people will take up the slack, but I can't imagnie we're the only GURPS players in the world who took that tack.

I played 3e for about a year before 4e came out, so I wasn't to deeply inculcated in third edition.  As far as detailed, internally consistent, simulationist rulesets go, nothing beats GURPS, in my opinion.  You can take that system and stretch into all kinds of insanity and it still holds up.  I just found that it didn't address my gaming style after a while, but theoretically speaking, I consider it to be a work of technical genius.  I have no experience with Hero 5th edition, so that could be comparable as well, as there seems to be equal proponents on both sides.

To be more specific, the way that Powers took the idea of breaking down Advantages into components (either negative or positive) and using that to build practically anything, took the system to level of mechanical detail that makes the game the ultimate simulationist tool.  I played in a sci-fi campaign where we knew ahead of time that our characters were going to have powers unleashed in them.  We spent many sessions getting into the world, building up our characters before we got those points to spend.  When we did, we (with our GM) had such a cool, customizable range of powers.  My guy was all about drunken imperviousness (kind of like a vulgar version of Concrete, the comic) and one of his powers was to power barf on people.  Just the specificity and detail of the build of his powers was amazing.  It also created all kinds of granular paths of power development that made for a lot of fun and creative strategic thinking.

Also, SJGames is a cool company.  They totally reacted to the fan outcry over the initial cover (with the raygun dildo) and came up with a much nicer design motif (again based on fan input).  Their podcast is all about gaming fun, not just SJGames products and Kromm will pop up anywhere with very helpful answers.  

You guys should check out the first 3 or 4 pages of this thread to see some gaming goodness that got squeezed out of the GURPS tube:

http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?t=364589

I've heard about the raygun dildo cover one too many times. I gotta have a link! ;)

Quote from: The_ShadowI've heard about the raygun dildo cover one too many times. I gotta have a link! ;)

My google fu didn't have enough chi.  I tried and failed.  Anyone else?

Quote from: KoltarYou kind of answerred your own question.

 Many people have this "knee-jerk" reaction as you put it against there being two corebooks for GURPs 4/e...yet similiar people seem to have no problem with D&D having 3 "corebooks".

Far be it from me to defend D&D... from a player's perspective though, there is only one book to deal with, the PHB.  And a pretty large chunk of the PHB is just spells.  For the DM, a large chunk of the DMG is basically a swag of magical items, and of course the MM is just lists of monsters.  In other words, the volume of rules is relatively small.  D&D does tend to scale though.  So as players grow in power, the GM needs to be familiar with more feats, higher level spells and more powerful monsters.  But for a starting GM, the game is simple.

By comparison, GURPS feels much more overwhelming.  Sure, you can start simple, and slowly introduce more and more rules as you learn the game.  But that doesn't make it any less overwhelming in appearance.

GURPS 4 is too damn complicated.  That's really it.  They aimed for the hardest of the hardcore players that spend hours in GURPS Vehicles and the like, and went in all kinds of wierd, HERO5-ish directions with the overall complexity and lack of modularity.  

It lacks that simple, straight-forward core that 3e did, and it's resultant modularity, instead choosing to try and cover absolutely everything it possibly can in the core book, and wound up a convoluted mess because of it.  

It's not a bad game if that sort of major gearheadedness is your bag, but it just went too far for me.  I just wanted GURPS 3 with a few mechanical tweaks, and maybe a little wider selection of stuff in the corebook, instead I got page after page of details, and effects-based advantage system, over a dozen different damage types each with unique effects, and just generally a whole lot more than I wanted dumped in my lap all at once.

Quote from: J ArcaneGURPS 4 is too damn complicated.  That's really it.  They aimed for the hardest of the hardcore players that spend hours in GURPS Vehicles and the like, and went in all kinds of wierd, HERO5-ish directions with the overall complexity and lack of modularity.  

It seems more modular to me, not less. What's more 4e does not cater to those guys more than 3e did. In fact, it's less to their taste, as a read through the SJGames forum's GURPS sub-forum will show.

QuoteIt lacks that simple, straight-forward core that 3e did, and it's resultant modularity, instead choosing to try and cover absolutely everything it possibly can in the core book, and wound up a convoluted mess because of it.  

It's still there.

QuoteIt's not a bad game if that sort of major gearheadedness is your bag, but it just went too far for me.  I just wanted GURPS 3 with a few mechanical tweaks, and maybe a little wider selection of stuff in the corebook, instead I got page after page of details, and effects-based advantage system, over a dozen different damage types each with unique effects, and just generally a whole lot more than I wanted dumped in my lap all at once.

There are actually no more damage types than 3e had - it's just that they are actually explicitly spelled out for you, so there's no more "bullets do crushing damage that isn't really crushing", and "fire does plain damage with these exceptions while acid does plain damage with those exceptions". Instead bullets do piercing of a particular size, fire does burning damage, acid does corrosive damage, and that tells you all you need to know about how the damage is applied. It's much simpler, really.

I'm a huge fan of SJG. I'm a former GURPS player who moved on eventually to other things after many years of playing 3rd edition. When 4e came out, I was happy and didn't mind at all the two setup book. But I ended up not being excited at all.

GURPS 4th didn't change enough for me. It's cleaned up a bit and I would probably have liked it better when I used to play GURPS but I've moved on to less complex and GURPS is still way too complex for my tastes. On top of that, SJG's release schedule for the game is not thrilling me at all.

I crunched the numbers when it came out, made a few characters and tested combat and it's a fine game with nothing wrong. But this level of detail is totally useless for me and for each and every single gamer I know.

Quote from: J ArcaneGURPS 4 is too damn complicated.  That's really it.  They aimed for the hardest of the hardcore players that spend hours in GURPS Vehicles and the like, and went in all kinds of wierd, HERO5-ish directions with the overall complexity and lack of modularity.  

Hogwash!  They're all but erradicating Vehicles from the core for fuzzy "because I thought so" stating.  They may at some point get around to publishing a pdf of vehicle design but it won't be a book release.

Anyhow, what bothers me is the stat block bloat.  Especially when power modifiers are involved and with the various stats you have to list for skills these days, the stat block makes Rolemaster look awfully clean and straightforward.

Also, GURPS is very much a game where you need a copy of the rule book to make a character and the beginning player pretty much has to read the damn book to make a character.  As such the fifty dollar buy in for Characters is a real road block and I'm not likely to run GURPS in the future.  Even though I have around $400 in GURPS4e as we speak.

Also, the sixteen pages wasted on Infinite Worlds material instead of sf vehicle stats will piss me off until my dying day.

Yeah, I do have to agree that there is a lot thrown at the new player.  It actually is quite modular, but there is no way to see that until you've absorbed a good chunk of the rules.  Part of it is layout (though I find their books quite attractive).  There is just so much stuff in them.  A lot of it is actually just cool ideas and not too much mechanics, but again it's hard to separate those if you are coming in for the first time.

They really need a GURPS medium à la SWEX but a little thicker and more GURPS-y.

Ultimately GURPS 4 suffers from the universal weakness of Ultimate Compendium Editions.

They become inapproachable and it's impossible to trim them down and maintain compatability in supplements and adventures because there will always be references to the complete edition that aren't covered in the supplements because there's a complete edition that covers it.

So the streamlined entry book doesn't scale up to the supplements without the inapproachable compendium.

NOTHING is wrong with GURPS 4/e.

 I'm starting to think people just whine about it too much and they should maybe just  try it.
 Is it really just a case of whiny internet voices saying : "I Don't wanna!! It looks different... I don't wanna!! It doesn't have d20s...I'm distrubed by that WAAAH!! I Don't wanna!"

Also, sometimes the arguments against it seem to boil down to "I gotta think? Make up my own mind? Thats scary...don't know if I want to...".

- Ed C.

Quote from: KoltarAlso, sometimes the arguments against it seem to boil down to "I gotta think? Make up my own mind? Thats scary...don't know if I want to...".

Sometimes I get that very same vibe from the people who claim Hero System sucks.

-=Grim=-

3e supplements fit in 4e games rather well. 4e, I think, was designed with the idea that folks would be pulling game aids for other systems anyway. 3e ones more so.

Quote from: David JohansenUltimately GURPS 4 suffers from the universal weakness of Ultimate Compendium Editions.

Huh?  There are no Compendiums in 4e.  So far, all the rules extension books are just more complex and detailed builds off of the structure presented in the Characters books.  If you want a supers game, Powers will super-charge it and give you infinite possibilities.  Same with Martial Arts for a super-nerdy, detailed combat-oriented game.  But you don't need either and so far there is no product out there that requires either of them.

SJGames has done an excellent job of keeping the core rules the core.

Quote from: KoltarNOTHING is wrong with GURPS 4/e.

 I'm starting to think people just whine about it too much and they should maybe just  try it.
 Is it really just a case of whiny internet voices saying : "I Don't wanna!! It looks different... I don't wanna!! It doesn't have d20s...I'm distrubed by that WAAAH!! I Don't wanna!"

Also, sometimes the arguments against it seem to boil down to "I gotta think? Make up my own mind? Thats scary...don't know if I want to...".

Gotta agree with Koltar here.  I've seen it in action so many times.  Got a Gamer's Day here and the GURPS GM showed up to run games.   Got all kinds of resistance from the regular players but every newbie ends up at his table.  Now he has too many players.

QuoteAnyhow, what bothers me is the stat block bloat. Especially when power modifiers are involved and with the various stats you have to list for skills these days, the stat block makes Rolemaster look awfully clean and straightforward.

The modifier system is one of the biggest headaches for me.  It's too much extra complexity.  Yes, I realize they did the same thing back in the day for psionics, but it wasn't applied across the whole goddamn system.  Ads and Disads to me should be grab-and-go.  It just feels out of place in the feel of the game, more suited to a supers game than GURPS 3e.  And of course, large numbers of those ads and disads are intentionally designed with the expectation that you'll tack plenty of modifiers on them, because the core ad itself is often either incredibly basic or nonspecific, or just way too expensive or worthless without them.  

The combat goes to the same lengths.  Rather than the clean Basic/Advanced split of the original game, everything's all lumped into the same big hunk of mechanics, with the only thing still seperated cleanly out at this point being the actual hex map rules.  

It's just not the light, simple core that GURPS 3e was.  Take the core of GURPS 3e's lists, plus Basic combat, and you've got a rather straightforward, easy to pick up game, on which you can very easily simply bolt on extra options, like Adv. Combat, or Magic and Psi, or a grab a sourcebook or netbook for the missing bits you need for a given campaign.  Hell, even the character generator I used for it, MAKECHAR, was built this way.  You could set up "genre" files, and simply pick and choose which books or rulesets were in use for a given campaign, and use that.  

That was what I loved about 3e, and I spent probably way too much time defending the game from idiots who'd simply seen the Advanced Combat chapter while thumbing through and declared "too complicated" without having actually read the fucking book, or even the paragraph at the start of that chapter that expressly states it to be optional.  

But the same just does not hold true in the current edition, no matter what it's fanboys would like you to believe.

Quote from: GrimJestaSometimes I get that very same vibe from the people who claim Hero System sucks.

-=Grim=-

I've at least PLAYED the HERO system. Its not the system I prefer, but I don't start threads running it down either.

 Quite the contrary - find it quite appealing. If I made double the income that I do I would probly have just as many HERO system books as I do GURPS books.

Actually I have bought at least two HERO system source books thinking I might blend some of the ideas in them with my GURPS stuff.


- Ed C.

I do agree generally with what J Arcane is saying.  Once you open up the Ad/Disad structure, it introduces a level of granular complexity that is just too much for many players.  Though I think the Basic book only really hints at how those work and there are tons of turnkey ads and disads there.

I played Gurps 3e for over 10 years, so I think when I say I thought the Compendium book damaged the game I do at least have experience from which to draw, though I of course accept others disagree.

For me 4e corrects some of the issues I had with 3e, but at the cost of reinforcing some of the other issues, but my dislike of it as a system nowadays is not borne of fear of options.  It's borne of boredom with for me needless complexity.

It doesn't suck or anything, it's good design even, doesn't mean I have to particularly enjoy it.

Okay by an "Ultimate Compendium Edition" I mean the edition where they take everything from every last supplement and clean up the mechanics a bit and put them in a single core game.  By this definition I'm talking every edition of HERO since third (second was the only HERO), GURPS Third and Fourth, AD&D First, Second, and probably Fourth, Rifts Ultimate Edition, Rolemaster Standard System (much as I love it I'll confess that it causes san loss, I just happened to hit 0) the new BRP will be one too.  I think Mega Traveller counts more than the Traveller Book because they didn't do any rules tweaking or try to bring the whole thing into a standardized package until MT.

Oh, got you.  I think it made sense for GURPS, but you are right there is an argument to be made that it never really makes sense.  It's not like technology.

Well, I bought the 2 core 4e books.  And I may be in the far minority, but I love the layout.  And overall, I thought the rules were pretty good.  I've also thought the supplements (though a little too slow-coming) were all very well done.

I do, however, have some of the same problems as others regarding the inclusion of waaaay too many ads/disads/skills in the core book.  It's just too much for me too weed through when trying to plan a game.  I don't want to have to come up with a giant list of "stuff you can / can not choose from" for players, nor do I want to spend hours trying to figure out which skill/adv/disad covers the specific things I am trying to model with NPCs.

I discovered this by trying to convert a relatively simple game - Star Frontiers - into GURPS.  It become obvious very quickly that trying to codify a Drasalite was just way more work than it needed to be or that I was willing to put into it.  In many ways, I prefer HERO on this front because it breaks things down to more standard effects (though HERO has its own share of things that overcomplicate it).

Conversely, the core books were way, way too light on weapons/vehicles/equipment for me.  I didn't feel it gave me enough to work with.

What I have seen, though, is a lot of people just use 4e Lite so they have the streamlined rules, and then combine them with the whole bang (!) skill concept from the core books.  That makes the game a lot more managable.

Honestly, though, the biggest reason I don't play GURPS is that I personally find the 3d6 roll under mechanic to be "dull" in play for me.  It may be silly, but for some reason I really dislike 3d6 roll-under and it limits my enjoyment of the game.

http://www.gamesdiner.com/star_frontiers_to_gurps

Just cause you mentioned Star Frontiers and GURPS in one place. :)

Though I'd probably look towards GURPS Powers 'Body Alteration' for the Dralasite. T-Bone didn't have Powers at the time.

Quote from: KoltarNOTHING is wrong with GURPS 4/e.

Sorry dude, but that's just plain bollocks.  Of course there are things wrong with GURPS 4e.  It's long, complicated and very, very crunchy.  For folks that don't mind that sort of thing, they'll also find it is detailed and highly flexible with a range of high quality supplements.

But it's hardly a perfect system.

QuoteI'm starting to think people just whine about it too much and they should maybe just  try it.

Again, given that it's a pretty detailed and complex game, I wouldn't bother trying it if you are more interested in games like Risus, Wushu or even Savage Worlds.

I love GURPS.  I own about 130 books for 2nd/3rd edition and a few of the 4th edition books.  I've GMed some 4th ed. games and ran a short campaign a few years ago.

My players liked it, but didn't love it.  It is also too much work for me to GM.  Unfortunately, with grad school and my job eating up most of my time, I only have a few hours a week for my hobbies.  GURPS needs more time than I can give right now.

Quote from: J ArcaneThe combat goes to the same lengths.  Rather than the clean Basic/Advanced split of the original game, everything's all lumped into the same big hunk of mechanics, with the only thing still seperated cleanly out at this point being the actual hex map rules.

Meh? I admit that my memory might be playing tricks on me, but IIRC the basic combat system is in the 4E Characters book and the advanced options are in the Campaigns book. How much separation do you require?

Quote from: TrevelyanMeh? I admit that my memory might be playing tricks on me, but IIRC the basic combat system is in the 4E Characters book and the advanced options are in the Campaigns book. How much separation do you require?

There is no more basic/advanced split in 4e.

True.

There is combat lite in the 'Characters' book, while being the intro to the core combat system, is functional for most situations. Everything else can be cherry picked from the core combat system or the combat special situations chapter in the 'Campaigns' book.

The core combat system from the 'Campaigns' book is designed to be used without the additional 'Tactical Combat' system.

Quote from: darTrue.

There is combat lite in the 'Characters' book, while being the intro to the core combat system, is functional for most situations. Everything else can be cherry picked from the core combat system or the combat special situations chapter in the 'Campaigns' book.

The core combat system from the 'Campaigns' book is designed to be used without the additional 'Tactical Combat' system.

I think I remember what you're talking about now.  Yes, there was a rather curt summary of the combat system in the Characters book, but I got the distinct inmpression that it was entirely intended to simply introduce a few of the basic concepts to players who didn't care to read the full system in Campaigns.  

I didn't find it to be comparable to the Basic/Advanced split, where they were clearly delineated as two seperate and complete combat systems, in the way they were in 3e.

I've read your posts on this subject before, and I get ya, sortof.

I do think that the split is still there, and can be made even more pronounced. The lite combat section with a bit of core and a bit of the special combat situations and your mostly there. Though I think they tried to keep the split by using a 'core' and moving the tactical stuff aside.

I have found the combat section in the Characters book is never quite enough.  It's more like combat from the player's perspective rather than combat lite that both the players and the GM can use.

QuoteI have found the combat section in the Characters book is never quite enough. It's more like combat from the player's perspective rather than combat lite that both the players and the GM can use.

Exactly.

Yea, you'll need to borrow a few things from the 'core' and 'special situations' sections of the Campaign book. I, however, do not think that you'll have to borrow very much.