The arrival of Koltar, with his staggering affection for GURPS triggered this thread.

I´ll let you partake in my laser-like dissection of the reason why GURPS doesn´t work:

Skills.
The number and width of the skills varies in an insane manner. Depending on which supplements you use, you´ve got a more or less gigantic skill list.
Are these skills really options, really adding to the game?

No.

Because they are totally differing in power level. That is to say, one skill can do lots of things, whereas others are mearly mandatory for a taks, some are even subdivided into oblivion.

The amount of skills neccessary to solve a task is basically a historic artifact:

For some weird reason, medicine is subdivided into a load of skills. Whereas geology is just geology [no historical geology, geomorphology, quarternary geology, impact geology, paleontology, in-situ analysis, lab working skill, soil science, geophysics, structural geology etc. ad nauseam].

There´s neither rhyme nor reason for what is a seperate skill, and what is not.
 
The problem: skills all cost an equal amount of points.
Therefore GURPS is total rubbish, it´s not a consistent model for anything.

The anal retentive bean counting (which I usually dig, come see my traveller campaign) is made worhtless by the vast differences in skill applicability range.

q.e.d

I believe that GURPS divides skills into different difficulties, which cost different amounts of points.  (Either because the levels are more expensive, or the base number is lower, or both -- I forget.)

However, the stupendous number of skills is the reason why I haven't played GURPS.  I don't want to pore over hundreds of items just to discover that I forgot to take Skill: Wiping My Ass.  Having decent example characters in the books would be a good way to solve this problem.

QuoteI believe that GURPS divides skills into different difficulties, which cost different amounts of points.

That´s correct, but the cost is modified by the perceived difficulty of learning the fucker.  So all my geology examples would be highest cost, as they would be "mental/hard", just like the  plethora of medicine skills.

I played third edition Gurps exclusively for around a decade.  We had a great time, certainly as good a time as I'm having now with a range of systems.

Actual play trumps theory, we played Gurps and had fun, therefore it works.

Edit:  That said, I entirely agree with the criticism, I'll post a follow up on this actually.

For me, Gurps was at its best before the compendia came out.

I had my Gurps 3e book, I took that book and one supplement, say Gurps Japan, which gave me some setting specific extra skills and stuff and then I went and played.

Gurps Compendia introduced all the skills and stuff from all supplements, made them all official as it were and left it to the GM and players to wade through them all and choose which ones were applicable to a given game.  It added huge and unnecessary complexity, and later supplements post Compendium I assumed you were using Compendium I.

That to me was a huge error, Gurps 3e on its own was a ton of fun, despite the perfectly accurate criticisms Set makes here.  Gurps 3e plus Compendium I was a bore.

Oh, of course can you have a blast of a game with GURPS. But the steps you have to take in order to do that, are actually eliminating all the advantages that GURPS seems to offer.

I do admit that the skills are one of the turn offs for me when it comes to GURPS.  I solve this by using a broad skill list, including only skills important within the game.

I played an English doctor in a GURPS game once, my first character, and by the second session I had a patient to diagnose... only I had bought every single doctor oriented skill except Diagnose and had to default it at a penalty

Templates are also very helpful when it comes to skills, I wish there were more of them.

I do agree, however, that a character can spend an awful lot of points on completely useless skills in a given game.  I consider this to be in large part the fault of the GM for not looking at the sheet and saying "You know, you'll never roll your Geology skill in my wilderness survival fantasy game..."

Quote from: SettembriniOh, of course can you have a blast of a game with GURPS. But the steps you have to take in order to do that, are actually eliminating all the advantages that GURPS seems to offer.

Well, the advantages for us were knowing the system well enough it faded into the background, and having a system that we could run most types of game we wanted to with.

You do need as CW points out the GM to guide you a bit, in his particular example I'd have allowed him to amend his sheet to add Diagnose once we spotted it was missing.

But what it enabled us to do was to take a concept and reflect it in game without too much work, and since we used it each week it really wasn't that much work.  3e on its own didn't have an ocean of skills, it had lots but not an overwhelming number.

The main problem was the trapezoid effect, all PCs had something along the lines of Str 10 or 11, Dex and Int of 13 or 14, Health of 10 or 11, because the point breaks were so strong you were making a crap character to do anything else.

I fell foul of this plethora of skills in my first GURPS tabletop session.
"What, you mean the fireball spell doesn't actually include the ability to throw it with any accuracy, I should have taken a separate skill?"
Cue a blue-on-blue incident with a 6 die fireball :eek: Lucky one of the players was a healer and with my first earned XP I took skill Innate Attack. This hasnt stopped everyone from taking cover whenever I start casting


IMNSHO, the huge range of Ads/Disads lead people to make those super-unique characters that irritate me. But that's the system my GM loves so that's the one we play.

Quote from: O'BorgI fell foul of this plethora of skills in my first GURPS tabletop session.
"What, you mean the fireball spell doesn't actually include the ability to throw it with any accuracy, I should have taken a separate skill?"
Cue a blue-on-blue incident with a 6 die fireball :eek: Lucky one of the players was a healer and with my first earned XP I took skill Innate Attack. This hasnt stopped everyone from taking cover whenever I start casting

Yeah, we never used that spell throwing skill rule on the basis that we just thought it a bit lame.

But IMO the GM should have let you amend your sheet to have the skill, it's something the character would have and it makes no sense to just carry on because the player was unaware of it.

Quote from: BalbinusBut IMO the GM should have let you amend your sheet to have the skill, it's something the character would have and it makes no sense to just carry on because the player was unaware of it.

I'm afraid my GM does go a bit Captain Mainwaring at times

Quote from: hgjsI believe that GURPS divides skills into different difficulties, which cost different amounts of points.  (Either because the levels are more expensive, or the base number is lower, or both -- I forget.)

However, the stupendous number of skills is the reason why I haven't played GURPS.  I don't want to pore over hundreds of items just to discover that I forgot to take Skill: Wiping My Ass.  Having decent example characters in the books would be a good way to solve this problem.

Late 3rd Edition books and 4th edition have templates which solves the bucket o' skills problem.

Rob Conley

Quote from: BalbinusThat to me was a huge error, Gurps 3e on its own was a ton of fun, despite the perfectly accurate criticisms Set makes here.  Gurps 3e plus Compendium I was a bore.

I don't know if I quite agree with you. Trying to make a modern or sci-fi character was pretty difficult even pre-compendium. By difficult I mean pick the basket of skills to do the job you wanted your character to perform.

The compendium just show the problem in one spot.The smartest thing GURPS did was introduce templates. And using 4th edition with templates included from the start has all but eliminated the skill selection problem.

Quote from: SettembriniI´ll let you partake in my laser-like dissection of the reason why GURPS doesn´t work:

Except that it does work. It does not suit every kind of player or playstyle, but with a competent GM who knows the rules and is reasonable about them, and players who enjoy the detail without being rules lawyers, it works well. This is proven by the large number of long-lasting and enjoyable campaigns people have had with it.

Therefore, your "laser" is in fact a sputtering candle. You are as silly as Ron Edwards.

I'll say it again, but this time with pictures.


Unmanageable.


Aaaah, that's easier to eat.

GURPS is big and full of options.  If you try to use all of it at once, well...