Quote from: sureshot;1078178Being in the business X amount of years does not make one immune to making mistakes as a business. Look at Palladium books with their string of failures.

True however if look through the internet archives and the various magazine I know who I would say who has run the more professional business and who has been more stable and consistent over its lifetime.

Quote from: sureshot;1078178Not really much in the way of releases if you go to their main site. Sure we have smaller PDFs yet nothing to me that shows that they are really going to make an effort releasing more Gurps. That being said I do not blame them at all because if what they say is true and Gurps is not profitable. It makes no business sense to keep investing in rpg line that is losing money.

Again the problem is that GURPS isn't profitable it isn't as profitable by an order of magnitude.

Quote from: sureshot;1078178They have competition that is eating into their market share.

I picked this about because in the past they argued that RPG are no longer popular and board game rule the roost. While true the problem is that GURPS declined faster than its competitors and when things recovered did not rebound compared to their competitors.

Which obviously indicates something is wrong with their approach beyond the cyclical rise and fall of RPGs relatives to other types of gaming.

Quote from: sureshot;1078188I can see why they did Dungeon Fantasy as imo the fantasy rpg genre was and is still one of the more popular one played at tables. Except the market for that is saturated and D&D has that market share locked down imo.

If one tries to take it head on. GURPS has two historical strengths in regards to other fantasy games particular dungeon fantasy.

1) Extensive customization of one's characters
2) A far more gritty combat with a well designed system.

Since the advent of D20 and other RPGs like Savage World, the AGE system that have customization lite. #1 isn't the compelling advantage that it once was.

However #2 is still very much true and can be used to GURPS advantaged provided it properly showcase in a form that makes people go "Yeah I can use that in the time I have for a hobby".

D&D, Savage Worlds, AGE, all tend to be heroic to super heroic.

I think they did Dungeon Fantasy because Dungeon Fantasy is their best selling pdf line.  It also meant much of the work had been done.  I'd love to see a series of 100 page saddle stitched complete in one games like Cliffhangers, Space Opera (with the old GURPS Space Aliens), Hard Future (Transhuman Space Lite), Supers, and so forth.  I do wonder if it would be a good idea to develop a secondary combat system that runs on ten second rounds, and dumbs down...errr...simplifies...errr elaganitifizes...combat down to roll to hit, roll for damage.  There does seem to be a great deal of dislike for the one second rounds.  I love them but D&D players really struggle with 4-5 rounds to effectively fire a bow or needing to make a fast draw roll, heroic archer roll, and to hit roll to fire once per round.

Quote from: David Johansen;1078204I do wonder if it would be a good idea to develop a secondary combat system that runs on ten second rounds, and dumbs down...errr...simplifies...errr elaganitifizes...combat down to roll to hit, roll for damage.  There does seem to be a great deal of dislike for the one second rounds.  

I love them but D&D players really struggle with 4-5 rounds to effectively fire a bow or needing to make a fast draw roll, heroic archer roll, and to hit roll to fire once per round.

When this comes up I explain it like this.

In D&D (this been true since 3.X)  you can two things a round basically move and attack.

In GURPS, you can do one thing and only one thing during a round, either move or attack but not both.

Because most RPGs allow at least a move and an attack every round, when a players plays GURPS they feel something has been taken away because before they could do two things but now they can only do one thing.

Something I learned while designing the Majestic Wilderlands rules and an important reason why I opted to use OD&D in the form of Swords & Wizardry as a base. It easier to tell people I was using OD&D and adding X stuff from the MW rules, then it was to tell them I was using AD&D and taking away X stuff to use the MW rules.

As for making GURPS combat more approachable for begineers. There are already four "levels" already.

1) Opposed rolls
2) Basic Combat with a handful of maneuvers.
3) Basic Combat (the above) with a grid).
4) Combat with the supplements particular Martial Arts.

Damage is not quite the same but could be re-organized to work on a three tier system of complexity.

1) Damage it just straight off hit points with maybe a death rule for when go negative.
2) Damage plus a few effects like damage multipliers for weapon edge type.
3) Damage with all the options like hit location.

Quote from: David Johansen;1078204I think they did Dungeon Fantasy because Dungeon Fantasy is their best selling pdf line.  It also meant much of the work had been done.  I'd love to see a series of 100 page saddle stitched complete in one games like Cliffhangers, Space Opera (with the old GURPS Space Aliens), Hard Future (Transhuman Space Lite), Supers, and so forth.  

When I active on the SJ Games forums, I advocated for a fantasy set of rules, science fiction, and horror. That each should have the stuff of popular games in each genre (D&D, Traveller, and Call of Cthulu). However should be done with a GURPS twist toward the gritty basically start out with 125  to 150 pt templates.

Somebody actually told me off that 125 point start you out with nothing. That they don't want to waste their time grinding their way back up. Which is totally at odds with my experience where 125 to 150 points felt like starting out at 5th level in D&D.

Quote from: estar;1078198I picked this about because in the past they argued that RPG are no longer popular and board game rule the roost. While true the problem is that GURPS declined faster than its competitors and when things recovered did not rebound compared to their competitors.

Which obviously indicates something is wrong with their approach beyond the cyclical rise and fall of RPGs relatives to other types of gaming.

I take what SJGames says and predicts with a very large gran of salt. Their market research indicated print would be completely dead in a few years and only PDF. I and others tried to convince them otherwise on their forums many years ago and their response was "trust use we have the market search to back that" Here we are in 2019 and while print format is hurting it's not completely dead. I could be wrong yet from what I'm seeing the trend will be towards PDf and similar formats. Unlike SJGames and having worked in retail and general observations of gamers. One many like print and only print. At the time they made that announcement e-readers were expensive and Apps were just starting to hit the market. Many people don't like change and adapt slowly to it. I just found it quite remarkable coincidence that SJGames shift to mostly PDF seemed to be backed up by market research at the time.

The shift from complexity and crunchiness in rpgs to less. Anyone with an active brain cell could see the trend towards it and they just marketed to older fans with little to no attempt at trying to get new or dissatisfied fans back into the fold. Hero Games is the same. If they keep the rules as is even with 3pp I just can't see it being as popular as it once was imo.

Quote from: estar;1078199If one tries to take it head on. GURPS has two historical strengths in regards to other fantasy games particular dungeon fantasy.

1) Extensive customization of one's characters
2) A far more gritty combat with a well designed system.

Since the advent of D20 and other RPGs like Savage World, the AGE system that have customization lite. #1 isn't the compelling advantage that it once was.

However #2 is still very much true and can be used to GURPS advantaged provided it properly showcase in a form that makes people go "Yeah I can use that in the time I have for a hobby".

D&D, Savage Worlds, AGE, all tend to be heroic to super heroic.

Very good post and points being made. As you said about #1 they lost that advantage and market share to Fate And Savage Worlds and to a lesser extent  D20. Number 2 your right about D&D not being gritty combat with a well designed system. It's easy enough imo to make it grittier. The combat system is not the best adequate for gamer needs. For some the choice of an adequate system vs a more complex well designed system the choice is usually the first. Another strike against Gurps and it being gritty is that many will want to use Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay. It is fairly complete and pretty much the standard for grim and gritty fantasy imo.

Quote from: estar;1078211In GURPS, you can do one thing and only one thing during a round, either move or attack but not both.

I think the question is: why do I have to decide second for second what my character is going to do next? Isn't that too much micromanagement?

Quote from: Alexander Kalinowski;1078216I think the question is: why do I have to decide second for second what my character is going to do next? Isn't that too much micromanagement?

Nah.

Games tend to work poorly when the GM engagement far outweighs player investment. In GURPS the GM has to basically craft a game for you, the player can at least bother to care what their character does every second in combat.

Not defending Kickstarter yet a certain amount of how incompetently the project was handled is mainly Kevin Seimbeda fault. We are talking about a guy who released the first ever Rifts videogame on a platform almost no one really wanted. While ignoring any and all suggestions to the contrary. Made worse that he also signed a contract where said Rifts game cannot be translated to other platforms. Not a fan of Kickstarter nor of those who defend Kevin actions from the Kickstarter a certain amount of blame has to be placed on the owner as well.[/QUOTE]


Totally hear you, I got educated on what a jerk Siembieda was through that project. Believe me, that guy shouldn't be in business.

I just won't give kickstarter another dime for abandoning us during that fiasco.

Quote from: Alexander Kalinowski;1078216I think the question is: why do I have to decide second for second what my character is going to do next? Isn't that too much micromanagement?

Depends on what that one and only one thing you can do is about. The actual time period is somewhat important as far as verisimilitude but in term of how the mechanics work it is about design.

This is very general but most everything works action wise like later edition D&D except you only do one action period per round. If it not movement you can probably do a single yard step as part of it. When I have time I will work up some examples in a new thread.

Not there are not issues. One I ran into in two decades of refereeing GURPS is when people space themselves out in their marching order. If the front of the order is more than 20 yards away from the back.  It quite possible that the fight will be over before the rear can move up to engage in melee.

But when I started playing SCA and boffer LARPS in the 90s, that what really happens.

Quote from: Rhedyn;1078218Nah.

Games tend to work poorly when the GM engagement far outweighs player investment. In GURPS the GM has to basically craft a game for you,

Once you done it once, you don't have to do it again and just works. And if you get an idea for a tweak it is pretty easy to implement.

Quote from: estar;1078211As for making GURPS combat more approachable for begineers. There are already four "levels" already.

1) Opposed rolls
2) Basic Combat with a handful of maneuvers.
3) Basic Combat (the above) with a grid).
4) Combat with the supplements particular Martial Arts.

You explain this better than the game authours. This, really, is the core of the problem.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;1078242You explain this better than the game authours. This, really, is the core of the problem.

Thanks, in the years I been refereeing GURPS I have come up with notes and cheat sheets like the below.

[ATTACH=CONFIG]3234[/ATTACH]
[ATTACH=CONFIG]3235[/ATTACH]

Quote from: estar;1078212When I active on the SJ Games forums, I advocated for a fantasy set of rules, science fiction, and horror. That each should have the stuff of popular games in each genre (D&D, Traveller, and Call of Cthulu). However should be done with a GURPS twist toward the gritty basically start out with 125  to 150 pt templates.

Yes, I quite agree. And maybe Modern/Guns. They should have done those as their first "Powered By GURPS" lines (stand-alone lines that don't need the Basic Set and leave out stuff not needed to play the genre).

Instead they did these lines, and the Dungeon Fantasy RPG.

Quote from: estar;1078212Somebody actually told me off that 125 point start you out with nothing. That they don't want to waste their time grinding their way back up. Which is totally at odds with my experience where 125 to 150 points felt like starting out at 5th level in D&D.

That somebody clearly had a limited skewed experience, and/or superhero/cinematic-type expectations.

Quote from: Alexander Kalinowski;1078216I think the question is: why do I have to decide second for second what my character is going to do next? Isn't that too much micromanagement?

No if you want to have a say about what your character does when attacked in a certain way, etc. It creates a fun game about life & death actions with actual well-developed mechanics that make sense and are logical and in proportion and that make the other decisions you have made in play have relevant effects.