The advantages drove me nuts too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFpuuvV65GU Explains some of the method behind their madness.

GURPS works well only when the GM makes a lot of preparation in terms of what he will or won't allow; and then instead of letting the players look through the various choices and try to do a budgeting of points to maximize the mechanical side of things, instead having them tell the GM "I want this type of character with this sort of abilities" and having the GM tell them what they have to buy.

As much as I'm a fan of fourth edition GURPS from a mechanical stand point, third edition always worked better for just handing players the book.  The more specialized stuff was in the supplements where it belonged.

But yeah, even then GURPS takes a GM with a strong spine.

I was doing some research on GURPS the other day and I was surprised that the 4th edition is still the latest and is about 11 years old. Isn't it about time for a 5th edition or is the game pretty well "set" and not much new has been done to it in the 11 years to warrant a new edition? Maybe the game is as good as it's ever going to be and will not be changed (beyond a few small details.)

4th Edition is pretty solid, and they seem happy to add settings and supplements rather than make a new edition.

I've been checking out some of the 4th Edition supplements lately and I'm pretty surprised at how good they are. I personally preferred the more focussed style of 3e over the streamlining/accessibility attempt of 4e in some ways, but 4e also incorporated several of my 3e house rules and the quality of the supplements seems far better in the 4e books compared to earlier editions.

The 4e world- and genre-books I've been looking at seem to all do a good job of what we've been talking about: listing which advantages, disads and skills etc should be used, and listing templates and lenses and sample characters so GMs and players know what to give to whom.

I just browsed GURPS 4e Warhammer, for example, and was impressed that it pretty much read like a stand-alone RPG book (though you'd also need the Basic Set to get the combat system etc). It also had rules for converting Warhammer stats to GURPS, and a sample adventure with nice examples of very simple and modest NPCs.

Quote from: RPGPundit;838453GURPS works well only when the GM makes a lot of preparation in terms of what he will or won't allow; and then instead of letting the players look through the various choices and try to do a budgeting of points to maximize the mechanical side of things, instead having them tell the GM "I want this type of character with this sort of abilities" and having the GM tell them what they have to buy.

I don't disagree; this is in fact my approach to new players.  "Tell me what you want, in as much detail as it suits you to do, and I'll tell you how to get it."

Quote from: RPGPundit;838453GURPS works well only when the GM makes a lot of preparation in terms of what he will or won't allow; and then instead of letting the players look through the various choices and try to do a budgeting of points to maximize the mechanical side of things, instead having them tell the GM "I want this type of character with this sort of abilities" and having the GM tell them what they have to buy.

I do both, for most I have a series of templates and cheat sheets that do the above. For experienced players I let them have at it after they discuss their concept with me. Even then they use the cheat sheets so they don't take something they shouldn't have.

For example the Dwarven Race
http://www.batintheattic.com/downloads/Races%20-%20The%20Dwarves,%20Ver%202.pdf

A Myrmidon of Set.
http://www.batintheattic.com/downloads/Gods%20-%20Set,%20Myrmidon%20Template.pdf

The Myrmidon of set is a good example of what I try to do. I present a set of option and explain why they are what they are in terms of the template. I choose the options that reflect the typical diversity of the profession/social class/profession/etc.s

Quote from: estar;838801I do both, for most I have a series of templates and cheat sheets that do the above. ...

These are fantastic! Easy to read and understand.

Quote from: Ravenswing;838714I don't disagree; this is in fact my approach to new players.  "Tell me what you want, in as much detail as it suits you to do, and I'll tell you how to get it."

Yeah, it's pretty much the only sane way to do it.

Quote from: RPGPundit;837736The advantages drove me nuts too.

They had the added issue that point costs really are not invariant based on setting.  They had a clunky "unusual background" hedge and they used things like "mana level" as well, but technology can replace a lot of things and make the organic level much less important.  If you have hover belts available for a few dollars, fly isn't so important.  Similarly, if you can actually loot dragon hoards, filthy rich looks like a waste of points.  

The costs also vary based on what the campaign is based on.  It's almost too easy to take disadvantages that never come up paired with advantages that are laser focused.  

It is a very interesting system (and one I have played a lot) but this piece really requires a lot of fiddling, which makes it hard for players to get creative on their own (which was one of the nice things about a toolkit).  

That being said, it still has to be one of the better space rules sets and the world books are awesome.

Quote from: Votan;839294They had the added issue that point costs really are not invariant based on setting. ...

You can of course change them based on your preferences and/or setting. It is upfront work for the GM/Setting creator, but so is creating a game. :-)

Quote from: trechriron;839404You can of course change them based on your preferences and/or setting. It is upfront work for the GM/Setting creator, but so is creating a game. :-)

Yep.

One of my ongoing riffs is that GURPS isn't the easiest game out there.  It's not for someone who doesn't want to do any legwork, it's not for a "lazy GM" type, and it isn't for a rookie GM who's never been on that side of the dice.

I am okay with all of this.

Quote from: trechriron;839404You can of course change them based on your preferences and/or setting. It is upfront work for the GM/Setting creator, but so is creating a game. :-)

Oh, fair enough.  But this does explain why GURPS is really a game for a very advanced GM who is trying to target a niche that other games have trouble with.  If you have to go through the rulebook and make dozens of decisions about what is and is not changed (and track these) then it is really only worthwhile in the context of advanced world building.  

Which is okay.

The exception seems to be science fiction, as so little out there does it well and GURPS can do it tolerably well out of the box (ad extremely well with tweaks).

Yes, I agree with the above. GURPS takes experience to do well, and jumping in without an experienced GURPS GM has all sorts of potential pitfalls, unless following a nicely-prepared beginners' adventure or something, of which there are not enough.

(Off-hand there's Orcslayer (ancient), Caravan to Ein Arris, a few Conan programmed adventures, um...)

It'd be great if there were more.

It'd also be great if there were more detailed campaign starter materials. Like I wrote above, I thought GURPS Warhammer did a good job of that, especially since you could also get any/all Warhammer RPG supplements and adapt them. It'd be great if there were more of those. The worldbooks (especially before 4e) tend to not give anywhere near enough detail to actually run a campaign unless the GM does tons more work or is great at improvising. There aren't many that give a bunch of detailed ready-to-use content, and it takes some research to find out which do and which don't.

And ya, GURPS Space is pretty good, and there's also GURPS Traveller, GURPS Spaceships, Transhuman Space, etc.