GURPS General

Thanks. I'll be sure to drop in with whatever questions I get as I'm sure they will come.

As for a campaign a few that come to mind are Martial Arts, Pulp, Samurai, and Western.

I need to design an NPC that meets the following criteria, use as many points as you deem reasonablet:
>fucking seven feet tall
>good at stealth, small arms, explosives, and swimming
>has above average strength and dexterity, but is not particularly bright and looks like an uglier Ryan Gosling
>has to, under any and all circumstances, obey the orders of his 'employer' (whoever holds his contract)
>also speaks with the same mannerisms as Gosling's character in Drive
>completely neutral on moral angles and the like
>doesn't sleep

He is, in essence, the autistic terminator dressed like the road warrior. Even has the shotgun.

There are two ways to break a weapon barring the obvious critical failure result: through parrying a heavier weapon, and through having your weapon deliberately attacked.

The former is pretty straight forward, but is hard to grasp at first unless you have a good example, which I will provide:

As written, it states that a weapon has a chance of breaking if used to parry an object three times its weight. So a standard broadsword having a weight of 3 lbs will have a 2 in 6 (1 or 2 on 1d6) chance to break if used to parry a weapon weighing 9 lbs or more. If the broadsword were to parry a poleaxe (p. 68 in Low-Tech) weighing 10 pounds, the broadsword-using-player would roll 1d6 and if his result was 1 or 2, his broadsword breaks. A GM might require that the player roll 1d6 and refer to the "Swords" section of "Broken Weapons" on p. 485 of the Basic Set for the exact outcome.

Continuing the example: you "add +1 to these odds per whole-numbered multiple past 3," so parrying a weapon 4 times the weight of your own means it has a 3 in 6 chance of breaking (a roll of 1, 2, or 3 on 1d6). 5 times the weight and you'll have a 4 in 6 chance. If you attempt to parry something and you end up with a 6 in 6 chance, your weapon automatically breaks and your parry was useless.

A cheap weapon adds a flat +2 to these odds, while fine and very fine are -1 and -2 respectively.

(continued...)

(cont.)

The latter option of breaking a weapon, where it is deliberately attacked, is simple: a weapon is attacked, damage is rolled, DR is subtracted, and the remainder comes off of the weapon's HP. Refer to "Damage to Objects" on pp. 483-485 of the Basic Set for details, but I'll put some of the information here:

When the weapon is reduced to 0 HP, roll against its HT (usually 12 for homogeneous objects) whenever it is put under stress (i.e. used). If it fails it is considered disabled and the user must roll 1d6 and refer to the appropriate result from "Broken Weapons" p. 485 of the Basic Set.

If the weapon is reduced to -1xHP, roll against its HT and if it fails it "dies," more appropriately: useless. You're basically rolling for its "death" as per "General Injury: Lost Hit Points" on p. 419 of the Basic Set. Do not roll for a result from the "Broken Weapons" section, the weapon is useless.

If the weapon is reduced to -5xHP it is automatically broken. Same as above.

That's it. I hope this helped you, user.

Narrow down how much information you really need. If you are just going to throw him away, or have him as a background character, you only need to consider his most important stats (for example: ST 16, DX 12, IQ 11, HT 12) and skill levels (a 15 in stealth, a 18 in pistols and explosives, 13 in everything else), and have everything else as filler information.

If you plan on having the players recruit him as an Ally or something, giving him a full suite of traits is appropriate, but even then you can ballpark the point value since the price of an Ally is based on percentages and not exact values.

Thanks. It's odd that there are two different sets of rules. Are fine/very fine weapons any higher DR and HP, or do they only get a bonus on the special rolls for parrying?

>2 different sets of rules
user didn't mention 2 different sets. He mentioned 2 rules, each for very different circumstances. There'll never be a conflict between them.

If you want a different rules, see Pyramid 3/87: Low Tech III. It has an article called "The Broken Blade." Quote:
>Weapons in GURPS are nigh eternal, breaking only in extreme circumstances: critical failure, parrying an ogre's club, and so on. Yet historically, The Broken Blade was the risk that prompted knights to carry backup weapons and armies to travel with armorers. Douglas Cole's new rules for robustness, breakage, and dulled edges add not only realism but also risk, excitement, and a reason to keep a knife in your boot.

Not that expensive. He's not exactly a complicated creature.

Read Action for starters. Adding in extra books and details hurts more than it helps for new groups that may still be struggling with the basics. Action focuses on simplified, pulpy adventure, and its templates, rules tweaks, and GMing advice makes it great for newbies. I know there's one Pyramid article that covers using Action in an Wild West setting, and Action 3 covers martial arts and samurai explicitly.

>Literally naked
Not even a Dr 2 coat?

>Your clothes.

>Give them to me.

Padre bless

fine/very fine weapons by default do not have more DR, and HP is based on weapon weight. You can vary this for exceptional materials, of course.

So a question regarding the Invisiblity Advantage. Trying to stat up a creature. Basically what I want to do is have a form of invisibility that makes the target invisible to normal vision and unable to be photographed. But the target will still cast a shadow while stealthed. (visible shadow; -10%) And also they can still have their heat seen.

When selecting what type of vision I want to be invisible too do I choose something like (ordinary Vision) or do I pick the whole (Electromagnetic vision) If I get up either of these would also have to pick up the 'Affects machines' modifier to reflect not being able to be photographed? Wouldn't being invisible to ordinary eyes also make me invisible to cameras?

Ordinary vision would fit fine. Cameras work similarly enough to the human eye that it makes sense.

Remember, if you're designing a monster that the players will never be, or never be allies with, you can skip giving it detailed stats and just say its invisible but it casts a shadow. The character points are there for proper characters, not simple monsters.

>character points are there for proper characters, not simple monsters
That being said, it is useful as fuck to do these stat blocks as exercises for your eyeballing skill.

Until you realize the rule of 11, it's sometimes necessary to stat out 50 point mooks

Rule of 11? Which book is that in, I don't remember coming across it.

I suppose. But I'm with . What's the rule of 11?

>Ordinary vision would fit fine. Cameras work similarly enough to the human eye that it makes sense
That's what I thought, thanks

>hat being said, it is useful as fuck to do these stat blocks as exercises for your eyeballing skill.
That's partly why I'm bothering with this. This is going to be part of my first session. I am working out on some templates for the players for occupations, and I'm also stating out this one creature (and it's variants) so I can better understand how these components work numerically.

Who is Asian Noir Secretary and why is she GURPS?

Normal invisibility with a visible shadow and effects machines works fine for what you need. It can still be seen on non-visible light like IR.

But seriously, what is this Rule of 11?

How stupid is to have a small sized martial artist/unarmed fighter?

Also how does small animal "grappling" such asa pitbull bite or similar clenching works?

It depends if the small sized martial artist is strong and dexterous.

GURPS Martial Arts has rules for "teeth grappling".

Being SM -1 is pretty awesome. It's a fair number of bonuses and not much of down sides as long as you've got decent ST.

Doggos mostly get "Born Biter" as a racial trait when using the Teeth rules in MA. This lets them count as SM +1 for grappling with their teeth. This means they can use their teeth to grab as if using two hands anyone SM 0 or smaller. When grappling they can worry for more damage and hang on or use grappling to make a take down attack and pull someone down.

So the Dog rolls Brawling or DX to hit with a bite attack, then can choose to hold on and Grab automatically with teeth. When grappling with teeth they can Worry to cause bite damage automatically (no defense or attack roll) as an attack action, or perform grapple actions like break neck, wrench limb, take down or others.

I have a SM +1 PC with Fangs and ST 18. Things can get pretty brutal.

Do you use the rules for smaller/larger equipment? I'm tempted to hand wave it away for +-1 SM, but I don't know if that's imbalanced or not.

They visually bigger and smaller then human sized. If tools maybe can be used with replaceable grips, but clothes and armor are not, especially if tailored to wearer.
Also
>weight
>cost
>volume

How doyou get higher resistance to mind altering abilities, such as mindcontrol, etc?
Just more will?

Resistant advantage, hello

For humans with giantism or dwarfism it's hard to say that the cost are right. A 7' tall human is very large but doesn't have the same surface area as a warhorse that weighs more then a ton and clothes sized for children aren't that much less expensive then clothes for adults, especially in conditions where the labor to assemble the garment represents more of the cost then the materials.

I find a 25% change to be fair for giantism and dwarfism characters. This makes the armor for a 7' tall man heavier then the armor for a 6'4" man, but not 220% heavier. Likewise, a 4'8" girl pays 75% and has clothes that weigh 75% that of a 5'1" girl, rather then 50%.

Ignoring cost multipliers would give a boost to SM +1 people, a pretty big one really, as typically SM +1 doesn't double Basic Lift, making armor proportionally much heavier. (If you want a heavily armored warrior you are better off going for a shorter man with 10% less ST).

Mind Shield (Advantage, page 70 basic set)
Adds to Will/IQ rolls to resist any mind effecting stuff. Barely cheaper then Will.

Unfazeable (Advantage, page 95 basic set)
Makes you immune to some effects of mind control, rather then mind control itself. They can't scare or surprise you.

Resistant. (Advantage, page 81 basic set)
A valid option in many games, though Mind Control might cost 15 or 30 points for immunity.

Mental Strength (Skill, page 209 basic set)
You can roll this instead of Will to fight off many mind altering abilities

Mind Block (Skill, page 210 basic set.)
Only prevents people from listing in on your brain, it can't help vs mind control.

>For humans with giantism or dwarfism it's hard to say that the cost are right. A 7' tall human is very large but doesn't have the same surface area as a warhorse that weighs more then a ton and clothes sized for children aren't that much less expensive then clothes for adults, especially in conditions where the labor to assemble the garment represents more of the cost then the materials.
>I find a 25% change to be fair for giantism and dwarfism characters. This makes the armor for a 7' tall man heavier then the armor for a 6'4" man, but not 220% heavier. Likewise, a 4'8" girl pays 75% and has clothes that weigh 75% that of a 5'1" girl, rather then 50%.

25% sounds reasonable, but I might still handwave it away anyway. In my group I have a half orc with Gigantism, and a gnome. I don't particularly want to add too much extra book keeping for them / me

I advise against handwaving it away totally. SM increase is a 0-point feature; the discount to ST and bonus to grapple/Intimidation is balanced by attack bonuses and increased armor costs. Without that weight/cost increase, high-SM characters with discounted high ST will be able to tote around more armor while being less encumbered, more than nullifying the bonus others get to attack them.

If you want to do away with the only real downside of positive SM, consider making it an Advantage that costs points. 5/level may work; at that point, an SM+1 character with discounted ST 15 has a net point change of 0.

I honestly don't see any extra bookkeeping being required, though. You multiply cost/weight exactly once when buying the gear, then you spend the cash and record the weight just like any other piece of equipment. This shouldn't be something they have to do more than half-a-dozen times throughout an entire campaign.

That is a very good point. Colour me convinced.

Size is a zero point racial feature, but it's set by race.

Giantism is a zero point feature that gives you +1 SM and +1 Basic Move, representing an unusually large member of a race. I'd say that it's balanced pretty well.

Dwarfism gives 5 points as a disadvantage and gives -1 SM and -1 Basic Move. Honestly I think this should be more like a 0 point feature, given that -1 SM is quite good for a lot of reasons (cheap, light armor, to hit penalty, ect).

I agree with your points, I'd keep some kind of extra cost/weight modifier to the armor and other support gear so that those traits and disadvantages stay important.

Rule of 11
>If you don't know what it is, roll against 11
When you've got ninjas, mooks, grunts, pirates or zombies...whatever they are, they're not exceptional at what they do, so roll against an 11 for them.

If they're good at it, 13
Great? 15
Best at what they do? 17

Thanks!

bumps

I use this and BAD, and together they handle 90% of the encounters I write up.

BAD?

I've heard that being outnumbered in GURPS is pretty rough but does anyone have experience with throwing 2 to 1 or worse odds at player characters in GURPS? I'm planning a big climatic fight and I want to be aware of any pitfalls.

Basic Abstract Difficulty, Action2 page 4

It really depends on how strong the enemies are in comparison to your PCs.

Usually a bunch of weaker NPC's aren't too much of a threat if your PC's have decent speed. Really depends on how tough you make them though and if the PC's have any AOE weapons with them.

Three things.

1. Higher enemy Speed means The Enemy Will Win. High Speed Always Wins. Make them slow as fuck.

2. Penetration. Does the team have lots of armor? Don't go hog wild on the armor-chink and hit location attempts on bare spots. Don't go wild with Armor Divisors.

3. Do you used advanced rules? Facing ALONE turns *every single fight* into a stupendously fucking deadly whack-a-mole if you get mobbed. Toss stuff like facing and carefully consider your choice of defense rule options.

How do my players survive? They break those rules! They stay light, have extreme Speed, abuse the fuck out of opening rounds and sneak shots, go for the weakest parts without a second's hesitation, and seek to end the fight within the first three seconds it began.

I dare you
DARE YOU
to throw a literal bucket full of Tucker kobolds at them

Sm-2 shortspears X 15, targeting back facing hit locations, all out, telegraphed, with fucking LUCK

Not really effective in GURPS. SM-2 means that they are about as strong as a toddler (ST 5) and can be disabled with even a casual blow from an adult human.

1d-3 imp damage is stopped by pretty much any armor, and the spear is reach 1 (barely).

Two men back-to-back deny any shot at the back faceing. One of the monsters can get into each Side hit locations, but each man shares those so out of 8 enemies that can surround them at once 2 get a shot at a Side hex, everyone else is trying to hit a front hex.

So.. Yeah, this would be pointless.

Good points. It's all about threat management, but GURPS facing rules are pretty generous with only attacks coming from directly behind denying defense.

Hey, is the user looking for GURPS OGRE still hanging around?

Turns out I have it on an old external. I'll try and throw it on the MEGA soon.

How in God's name is it so hard to find a token for a mob of peasants for roll20?

Oh shit, not him but I'd love that.

I kind of like Grae Hunter tokens. The art style isn't for everyone but if you like it well enough then there are several good packs that offer a bunch of human types.

Do you mean like, a single token to represent several people? That would be harder.

Which magic system would be best for a setting where "magic" is actually the use of femtobots to manipulate the molecular structure of the environment?

How are the machines controlled or directed? Is it something fast (simple mental/vocal command) or slow ("coding" the machines for each task)? Is using the machines a learned skill or an inborn ability? Are the machines self-powered, external-battery-powered, or user-powered?

Also, consider how much depth you're looking for. Some groups really really like a deep magic system with tons of moving parts while others want something that's lite on mechanics.

The machines are controlled via mental commands that require extensive coding beforehand. Using the machines is an inborn ability, as the capacity to control them is installed in the womb. The machines are self-powered.
And my group is looking for a lot of depth, as well as the ability to build their own spells.

It sounds like Ritual Path Magic is right up your alley. If you ban Ritual Adept, RPM rituals are lengthy affairs that require time, prepared space, and more, and you can keep rituals "hanging" to trigger them later. They also don't cost the caster any FP; the rituals power themselves. Require Unusual Background [15] to represent natal installation. Between nine-ish path skills, six or so words, and a plethora of modifiers, it's a VERY robust system.

RPM
Powers
Mix 'em

Thanks! They are ST 10/ DX 10/ HT 10 human(ish) enemies with either sharp claws, long knives or clubs.

The player characters are 150 point / -40 disadvantage TL 3.

They have ST 13, ST 11, ST 9 and ST 12. Torso DR is 1 to 4.

Can someone with a staff attack over/past an ally in front of them to hit someone at reach 2?

>attack over/past an ally
Yes, iirc without penalty. Accidentally hit an ally possible if you miss enemy while he is in close combat with your ally, or if you miss with shooting and have ally on line of fire or in close combat with target.

It's in a big barn so that should make things easier.

That makes this a lot easier. Two people can fill the doorway and one person behind them with a staff should be pretty hard to beat. There is a window but climbing though it should take 2 seconds unless I am wrong and the the other person inside should have no trouble beating down people climbing though.

>doorway
Yeah, one time I've got 3 frags with one shot from Elephant Rifle. Overpenetration is a thing.
And in gurps you can freely step thru enemy occupied hex, with committed attack.

Introducing a bunch of new players; How do you normally do magic? Hasn't normally come up in earlier campaigns. Do you use homebrew or do you use the magic book?

I'm not a fan of the basic magic system and usually pick one from thaumatology

Thaumatology lets you make your own magic. I'd always recommend people use it, since GURPS's standard magic is kinda broken.

Alright, thanks

Stepping into someone's hex means you are in close combat. Hope you have a reach C weapon.

And an elephant gun won't be much use at TL 3.

>what is evasion

What books could I use for an Wuxia campaign? Only thing I settled on so far is Low Tech, due to me wanting to have it in some sort of ancient Warring States period.

Martial Arts, maybe Powers

I'm pretty sure theres a GURPS China (maybe from 3E).

How would you stat the damage of high-velocity golf balls being hit at a target?

I'm looking at making a tribal civilization on an abandoned golf course and I thought that would make for an interesting cultural weapon, that and the club itself, probably decorated ceremoniallu. Think I'll give them sheep too, given It's a grassy course, maybe horses... I'm guessing Low-Tech is good for what I'm aiming at?

can't you use the collision rules in the basic set?

Probably approximately the same a thrown stone or maybe launched from a slingshot.

>damage of high-velocity golf balls being hit at a target?
from d-3 cr to 5d*2 pi++

>Low-Tech is good for what I'm aiming at?
I guess LT is good

>skill caps or lower point totals
Lower point totals. Inexperienced players may need a guiding hand, but anybody with an understanding of probability or the game in general will understand the practical limitations and the shrinking return on investment. There is a natural incentive to spread character points around new skills, for how cheap they are and how much better they are than defaulting skills. If one has the choice between being able to eat one more point of penalty, or increase their chance of success in some secondary or background skill by a whopping 12% or more, I hope they're smart enough to make a more generally competent character.

There are other options and rules which can supplement this decision. Within reason, the GM can always decline a character, or disallow skill improvement without training, whatever, if they deem the character to be broken or of limited utility. Unless it disrupts the vision of the character or the niche of another character, though, the GM generally shouldn't prevent growth of a skill such that they can eat penalties for breakfast. For example, unless gradual character development dictated it, I wouldn't allow a knightly character to eat penalties on spell casting or stealthy shit. However, I would let him eventually know his sword-and-board-play well enough to fight a bushel of goblins in the dark..

Someone here haves the new gurps fantasy pdf?

I've recently had a read though the Uplift Universe books and really liked the setting. I looked to see if it had a game and I found a 2nd Edition GURPS splatbook. I'm going to assume that nobody ever updated it because that series is niche as all hell, and I know very little about GURPS.
Does anyone know the stuff I'd need to start a game with that book or the work I'd need to do to update it myself?

GURPS Fantasy or the standalone GURPS Dungeon Fantasy Role Playing Game?

I wasn't aware that there's a new PDF of the former, and I haven't seen any copies of the latter in the wild yet. Looks like the kickstarter backers are hanging on to their copies.

There's a new DF splat that released today. DF Encounters: Pagoda of the Gods.

It probably isn't too hard to update to 4e. There's a free PDF the company put out to help convert 3e characters to 4e, and it should work passably well for 2e to 4e as well. Thankfully, GURPS editions aren't all that different: a few added mechanics, a few dropped ones, and some point value retooling, but that's it. To someone like myself that grew up seeing D&D totally reinvent itself like a college freshman every edition, it's quite a change.

It is an adventure that takes place in a Far-East inspired monastery. It is relatively random, with lots of content being spontaneously generated by tables. It includes 1 new item, 6 new monsters, and a few extra rules for a new manual type to expand on those in DF4.

Martial Arts has a section on chambara fighting (Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon-style wireplay and related actions) as well as a robust technique-creation system. However, while those techniques can be very cinematic, they hold back from being literally magic; you can backflip off a tree and decapitate eight enemy soldiers, but you can't set your sword on fire or have it kill a man at ten paces.

For that, you need Imbuements. I've expiremented with stunting Imbuements off of TBaM/WM and having them default to weapon skill, and that would certainly fit a wuxia game where magical swordplay is just the next step of mastery rather than a separate thing.

A simpler approach is to simply use Powers like suggested. I think there's a splat or Pyramid article that covers elemental wuxia abilities, and it uses powers as a base.

OK then. Guess I'll have a go at bodging it into 4e at some point, since I mostly want the extra setting information and the assorted guides for making species and equipment and such.

Ta very much.

I made a dark fantasy setting where very powerful magic caused a catastrophe when it was used without regulation in what amounts to a Napoleonic scale war, which caused magic to be severely restricted and regulated, with arbitrarily selected rules put in place to make magic more difficult and limited for future generations. Setting is in the early age of sail and gunpowder, and technology has somewhat advanced since the start of the dark age of magic. What would be the best system to demonstrate something like this? I kinda want spell schools but it is not necessary if you got better ideas. Hermit mages who hid away since the war still retain their old powers and so do the archmagi who are the old generation of mages, who have established schools to force this limited spell curriculum on would-be spellcasters, so I'd also need a way to demonstrate old magic and how stupidly powerful it is to this new form.

Any tips?

Have two systems in place: Old Magic, which is powerful and flexible but also risky, and Sanctioned Magic, which only teaches people how to cast rote premade spells.

I'd have Old Magic be either Syntactic or Symbol (or even Realm) and use the Threshold system; all four of these are found in GURPS: Thaumatology. Sanctioned Magic would use the basic spell system (with additional spells from GURPS: Magic), but the number of available spells is cut down *significantly* with only a handful of archmages being trusted with the really good spells (e.g. the entire Gate college).

ok, thanks a lot.

I forgot to mention two other forms of magic that exist so I was hoping you could help?

there is also alchemy which is basically unlocking magical potential from material components which could be mundane or otherwise, and there is magic which are actually powers granted by corruptive forces within the setting, which have a lot of ties to life/body horror. Any tips?

So alchemy is all about enhancement? Alchemically treated steel is tougher, alchemically treated crops grow bigger/more nutritious vegetables, fire from alchemically treated wood burns longer/hotter, stuff like that? You could go with a general rules-lite system where every +/-20% to a value's parameters is a -1 to your Alchemy roll. Alchemy would need to be specialized, like Alchemy (Metal), Alchemy (Plants), etc., but the skill would stay at IQ/VH. I'm heavily ripping ideas from the first bit of Ars Metallica (Pyramid #3/68: Natural Magic).

A more gamist approach would use advantages/abilities/powers centered around (beneficial) Afflictions. You could take a note out of Sorcery as well, using a combination of Modular Abilities and alternative abilities to represent experimental and mastered alchemical processes. The focus would be on Affliction with Takes Immediate Preparation (to represent the time it takes), Trigger (to represent the cost of alchemic catalysts and solutions), and Duration (many may be permanent!).

GURPS: Horror has a neat corruption mechanic, but Thaumatology has another version that's specifically for casters being corrupted by spirits that "help" them cast spells and/or cast spells for them. You could maybe adapt it to a more flexible system like Powers/Sorcery.

GURPS OGRE is up on the MEGA.

Also shit guys, it looks like we're running low on room there.

this works well, thank you.

I'm that user. Thank you.

So, Demiurgy from Powers - The Weird is ridiculously OP for the point cost, right?

Excuse me, I'm new to the system: if an item is a tech level ahead of the setting, It's price is doubled for ever level, but is it applied in the reverse or are the prices as is? (Example: in a TL 4 world, a $30 item that is TL3 is $15)

I think backwards the prices stay the same but you get more GURP$ on higher TLs.