TheRPGSite

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 :D


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 :D

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.

(http://www.poslovniforum.hr/poljoprivreda/poljoslike/holstein.jpg)
Unmanageable.

(http://askthemeatman.com/images/beefroundallcuts.jpg)
Aaaah, that's easier to eat.

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

Quote from: SettembriniWhereas 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].

As a professional geologist, I can attest that this is, in fact, the case.  There is only "Geology".  All of those little subsets are just jokes we made up long ago so we have something to talk about at society meetings.  GURPS somehow got in on the secret and nailed it just right.

For my part, the bit that always got me about GURPS -- and I realise that, as with about 70% of the published matieral, it's wholly optional -- was buying a character's personality.  Aspects of personality that should have come to be as a natural progression of play have point costs.  To be fair, GURPS is not the only game to implement this specious rule.

!i!

Actually, to be precise, personality traits don't "cost" you points, they gain you points. Things like cowardice, code of honour, laziness, chummy, etc, are "disadvantages" in GURPS - they're Disadvantages because they limit your freedom of action with a character.

That means you get extra points to build your character with if you commit to roleplaying them a certain way. Anyone can occasionally be cowardly, honourable, lazy, or chummy - but if you commit to roleplaying your character consistently by taking any of those as Disadvantages, then you get extra points for good stuff.

The player who has some idea of what their character will be like - thus allowing the GM to plan for it, and other players to adjust their own characters to it, and tie them together - and commits to playing their character in that way, gets to have more cool stuff.

I don't see that as a bad thing. Planning ahead, and playing with a degree of consistency - I'm happy to have players rewarded for that.

Offhand I'd say medical skills have more direct application to most games than Geology so they shouldn't be equal. That and GURPS combat system warrents more detail in both dealing and healing damage. ;)

That being said I much prefer GURPS Lite (3e over 4e for more completeness & several tailored genre versions) or Powered by GURPS over core+. While I like the idea of the templates in theory and they work nice with the chargen programs, they produce a long list of skills, ads and disads I don't care for. They also take up a good bit of space.

Which is why I buy GURPS books for info and play using other games. BESM 2e with bits from other Tri-Stat games (margin of success, damage multipliers, etc.) accomplishes much of the same feel I want out of GURPS with a much smaller skill and ad/disad list. "Hexstat" (Tekumel: Empire of the Petal Throne uses a modified 6 stat version of BESM) is even closer out of the box.

Not fully tried out GURPS 4e yet nor BESM 3e. Both look nice but I don't have to have full color full option books and roll low isn't a deal breaker for me.

I really never had a problem this GURPS skills. If the skills given were to narrow, I just broadened them. No big deal.

I'm a big GURPS fan, so I may have lost objectivity, but I'm trying.

Someone said it before. A medical doctor is more powerful than a geologist. In order to reflect this without having special rules for uber expensive skills that leave characters with an overall minuscule chance of doing any thing with said skill, it gets broken up into smaller skills. I think this is what they were trying to achieve.

I think this is done for game balance as much as anything else. It may be the wrong decision and lead to a plethora of skills... but I for one like choices and character customization.

Where the sam hell is koltar?

Most of the complaints I see here (minus the "skills' value variance") have been fixed in 4th ed.  

The variance issue, Sett, that you're raising is indeed a balance issue.  The compendium problem is completely gone now, being that a trimmed and generic skill set is in the Basic Set now.

I've run 4th ed., and found it to be at once easier and more fun than 3rd.  I've had tons of fun with both, mind you, but haven't had the chance to play as much as I'd like.

Since turnabout's fair play: your favorite game sucks too, Sett.  :)

Quote from: joewolzMost of the complaints I see here (minus the "skills' value variance") have been fixed in 4th ed.  

The variance issue, Sett, that you're raising is indeed a balance issue.  The compendium problem is completely gone now, being that a trimmed and generic skill set is in the Basic Set now.

I've run 4th ed., and found it to be at once easier and more fun than 3rd.  I've had tons of fun with both, mind you, but haven't had the chance to play as much as I'd like.

Since turnabout's fair play: your favorite game sucks too, Sett.  :)

I don't know if I'd call the 4th ed skill list trim - it can still be a bit unwieldy at times.  But the wildcard skill option helps that a lot.

Now, if only the advantages/disadvantages weren't quite as all over the place (personally, I think Hero's reliance on effect-based ads/disads makes much more sense).

But still, GURPS is perfectly playable and I'm sure some people have a lot of fun with it (3d6 roll under always seems a little dull to me, but other people seem to like it).

GURPS not perfect, film at 11:00!

That said, yes--the skill composition of GURPS is a reasonable target for complaint.

But making the game a joke? Not so much.

-Marco

Quote from: darWhere the sam hell is Koltar?

 Guys, I have to do normal things like SLEEP sometimes.


 Settembrini started this thread probably after I had laid down to get 5 to 7 hours worth of sleep.
 Which in GURPS terms probably  means I've regained some points in my HP score. Woo-Hoo!!


 You know starting a thread just to trash someone's favorite game is kind of silly.  I've partcipated in D20 and DitV threads  - but I didn't start them.   Besides GURPS (both 4th/e and 3rd/e), I I also own the rules to D&D/D20 (PHB, DMG, DMG II,  Eberron setting book, Cityscape), SAVAGE WORLDS ,  SERENITY :the RPG , SPACESHIP ZERO , the classic TRAVELLER hardback book (also have 25 + of the LBBs) The WARLORD game sttting from REAPER Miniatures,  and the  newer WORLD Of DARKNESS core rulebook
 Of all those choices, I still prefer the GURPS 4th/e  rules for their ease of use.

- Ed C.

To twist this around : If GURPS is a joke then its one that a lot of us like telling and groups of people enjoy hearing our version of the joke.

 Ever seen the movie The ARISTOCRATS ?  Its an extremely funny documentary movie about one joke. Thats right ONE Joke.
 This is a joke that comedians usually told each other  behind-the-scenes or at parties.  Its a filthy , scatological dirty joke.  It is als one that could be told dozens of different ways. ...as long as the punchline winds up the same or mostly the same. (0kay maybe hundreds of ways it could be told)

 This documentary showed that even something like a  Joke might be considered a work or art and others could change it around the way jazz musivcians do with a piece of music.

 So to add it all together...:

 If GURPS is a joke - then Sett doesn't get it and is still trying to understand the punchline.
 The rest of us who like and ENJOY  GURPS - we get the Joke and we're having fun telling it and sharing it .

- Ed C.

The Aristocrats wikipedia articles: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Aristocrats_%28film%29

The joke itself: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Aristocrats_%28joke%29
IMDB page : http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0436078/

I've got 3e and 4e - ironically, I've never played them.  I have them for reference.  I know it sounds silly, but I just seem to have a problem with the roll under thing.

Hi, my name is Jim, and I'm a roll-over addict...

Having said that, the main complaint was about skills (though I'd not use the term "laser" or "disection," personally).  I always saw the skill lists differently  I mean, if you were going to run a game where the main characters were pitting their Geology knowledge against the Evil Empire of Igneous From The 10th Dimension (tm), I'd expect Geology to be as granular as medical skills. If you ran a campaign where regeneration was a basic character trait (assume nobody needs healing), perhaps medical skills would be just as broad as Geology.

Your campaign will determine the skill list and the granularity of the various skills on that list.

What are you playing anyhow, Set? I mean, when you're not ripping on games other peeps play?

QuoteHaving said that, the main complaint was about skills (though I'd not use the term "laser" or "disection," personally). I always saw the skill lists differently I mean, if you were going to run a game where the main characters were pitting their Geology knowledge against the Evil Empire of Igneous From The 10th Dimension (tm), I'd expect Geology to be as granular as medical skills. If you ran a campaign where regeneration was a basic character trait (assume nobody needs healing), perhaps medical skills would be just as broad as Geology.

Your campaign will determine the skill list and the granularity of the various skills on that list.

Exactly. Now let´s review what GURPS promises to do:

Basic Rules + Campaign specific book(s) = ready to play.

And that´s just not the case. You have to balance the skill selection yourselves. Do you have an idea of the work involved? You might be as well drop GURPS and adapt the setting to your favorite skill based system (if that happens to be also GURPS, there you go).

The basic engine of GURPS obviously does work well, there´s nothing bad or special about it. The special thing about GURPS is:

- an allegedly balanced point buy system

And it just isn´t balanced, that´s why it is a joke.

Now there are hundreds of reasons to be playing GURPS, there are hundreds of sorts of fun to be had. But the point buy rules compared to their mission are: you guessed it, a joke. There´s no point denying that.

Or does anybody on these boards believe in the balance of GURPS point buy rules?

Quote from: Ian AbsentiaFor my part, the bit that always got me about GURPS -- and I realise that, as with about 70% of the published matieral, it's wholly optional -- was buying a character's personality.  Aspects of personality that should have come to be as a natural progression of play have point costs.  To be fair, GURPS is not the only game to implement this specious rule.

!i!

You know, it's funny... I've never played GURPS, and exactly for that reason, among others--the "psycho with Ninja skillz" point-buy paradigm etc. etc.

But now, as my Traveller fetish has suddenly reasserted itself and I find myself looking at GT Far Trader, some of those templates really do appeal. The Free Trader template would give me a guy who on one hand is a charismatic, gregarious, daring, intuitive J-o-T, and who on the other hand has baroque tastes (alcohol, gambling), dresses extravagantly, is overweight and greedy with a bad rep.

In other words, a guy who's just like this shifty merchant whom Kirk & Co. run into periodically in ST. In yet other words, a really cool dude I'd play in a heartbeat. I just need to buy him baldness, a fez and a couple of tasteless rings to wear (hopefully those are disads), and I'm good to go.

Quote from: James J SkachI've got 3e and 4e - ironically, I've never played them.  I have them for reference.  I know it sounds silly, but I just seem to have a problem with the roll under thing.

Hi, my name is Jim, and I'm a roll-over addict...

Me too.

Quote from: Pierce InverarityMe too.

 Roll-over addicts -eh?

 I've had new players with the same problem. They hear that they got to roll under  and their reaction has been : "Shit!! I Need different dice!! These are my lucky always-rolls-high dice."

 The first few dice rolls I go easy on them.

- E.W.C.

I think you could say the problem with GURPS is the problem with any generic roleplaying system.  They expand out to different genres and then consolidate those aspects in later editions.  A Palladium core system would look just as bungled if they ever made one.  Because of the OGL, D20 is impossible to consolidate.  From what I've read of Hero System, adjusting the system to a specific genre is one of the biggest hurdles.

Quote from: KoltarRoll-over addicts -eh?

 I've had new players with the same problem. They hear that they got to roll under  and their reaction has been : "Shit!! I Need different dice!! These are my lucky always-rolls-high dice."

 The first few dice rolls I go easy on them.

- E.W.C.

I once proved conclusively that roll-under is ontologically ass backwards. For, in effect, it is not you who's trying to beat the game world environment by rolling over its obstacleness, using only your wit and skillz as modifiers. But, au contraire, it is your skillz that are the obstacle (target number), and it is the game world that tries to beat them.

In Soviet Game System, game world rolls over YOU.

Or so I reasoned. That was a propos some playtest file for T5, though. I've no idea how relevant that is for, uhm, the thread in hand.

Quote from: Casey777Which is why I buy GURPS books for info and play using other games. BESM 2e with bits from other Tri-Stat games (margin of success, damage multipliers, etc.) accomplishes much of the same feel I want out of GURPS with a much smaller skill and ad/disad list.

While TriStat was never my favourite system, one of the things they did in TriStat Dx was make it explicit that the costs of skills were dependent, not on how "difficult" they were to learn, but rather on the value the skill had in a particular genre of game.

Still not a perfect system, of course, because games can "shift genres", but I thought it was an interesting twist.  

We now return you to your regularly scheduled thread...

Quote from: Pierce InverarityI once proved conclusively that roll-under is ontologically ass backwards. For, in effect, it is not you who's trying to beat the game world environment by rolling over its obstacleness, using only your wit and skillz as modifiers. But, au contraire, it is your skillz that are the obstacle (target number), and it is the game world that tries to beat them.

In Soviet Game System, game world rolls over YOU.

Or so I reasoned. That was a propos some playtest file for T5, though. I've no idea how relevant that is for, uhm, the thread in hand.

Hmm, that is not how I look at it though. I mean, yes, I agree with the roll over mechanic and it is appropriate in the situation you describe of defeating external elements. However, in a roll under, to me, it means you are attempting to perform within your abilities and thus roll with in your maximum chance for success.

Personally, I do not see it as an "either-or" but more as all inclusive tool to be used where appropriate.

Of course, that is just my take.

Bill

Quote from: ErstwhileStill not a perfect system, of course, because games can "shift genres", but I thought it was an interesting twist.  

I did too until I started running Tri-Stat, and then I considered it a bit headache.  I just gave skills a flat cost and told my players not to buy a skill they don't intend to regularly roll in the game.

Quote from: C.W.RichesonI did too until I started running Tri-Stat, and then I considered it a bit headache.  I just gave skills a flat cost and told my players not to buy a skill they don't intend to regularly roll in the game.

That's a fix that would make really like that system.  I can't believe I didn't think of that.

Quote from: SettembriniThe arrival of Koltar, with his staggering affection for GURPS triggered this thread.

 Staggering affection? Damn I knew I was good in bed  - but only one really had trouble walking afterwards. (She was smiling tho.)

Affection for GURPS?

 An enthisiastic YES!! - but classic TRAVELLER was my first love.  The FASA version of STAR TREK:RPG was a long term friendly mistress.  D&D was always somebody else's girl....and she never appealed to me much.

- E.W.C.

Quote from: Pierce InverarityBut now, as my Traveller fetish has suddenly reasserted itself and I find myself looking at GT Far Trader, some of those templates really do appeal. The Free Trader template would give me a guy who on one hand is a charismatic, gregarious, daring, intuitive J-o-T, and who on the other hand has baroque tastes (alcohol, gambling), dresses extravagantly, is overweight and greedy with a bad rep.

In other words, a guy who's just like this shifty merchant whom Kirk & Co. run into periodically in ST. In yet other words, a really cool dude I'd play in a heartbeat. I just need to buy him baldness, a fez and a couple of tasteless rings to wear (hopefully those are disads), and I'm good to go.

Pierce,
 You really should post a version of that over in the current STAR TREK thread.  Harcourt Fenton Mudd is very possible with the GURPS system. So is Cyrano Jones.

- Ed C.

Quote from: Thanatos02What are you playing anyhow, Set? I mean, when you're not ripping on games other peeps play?

Hm.

Kinda funny that we don't have an answer to that question yet.

I'm not a big GURPS fan...not my thing...but to call it a joke is beyond silly.  The Munchkin RPG?  That's a joke.  Hackmaster?  Sure...one could argue that's a joke.  GURPS?  Not so much a joke.

Quote from: KoltarPierce,
 You really should post a version of that over in the current STAR TREK thread.  Harcourt Fenton Mudd is very possible with the GURPS system. So is Cyrano Jones.

- Ed C.

Those were the guys I'm thinking of! Good to have a live Trek encyclopedia aboard. :D

Quote from: Pierce InverarityThose were the guys I'm thinking of! Good to have a live Trek encyclopedia aboard. :D

 In GURPS terms I might have Eidetic Memory - it just isn't always that reliable. Hell at times I remember some movies in perfect sequence - movies I don't even like. That kind of memory is not always a good thing.

- Ed C.

Alright, GURPS is a joke.

But is it funny "ha ha" or is it funny "uh oh"?

(http://www.gpdesenhos.com.br/imagens/outros/outros/animaniacs/yakko.jpg)

Redfox,
 See my post at #25 :
http://www.therpgsite.com/forums/showpost.php?p=91982&postcount=25

 Like I said , many of us LIKE the joke. Its not our fault if Settembrini doesn't get it.

 For some of us its a Monty Python style joke, others its a George Carlin thing, still others are playing the joke in an Eddie Izzard fashion, and some like to have Whoppi Goldberg or Sarah Silverman tell the joke or maybe Hunter S. Thompson.

- Ed C.

Roll-over or roll-under...it all depends on the game.

The biggest problem that I have with most games based upon roll-over is that it's not necessarily about your skill, but about how many buffs you can bring to bear to overcome the obstacle. After all, there aren't many things that can stand up to a Vorpal Smiting Chainsword of Kewl-Doodness unless the opponent is protected by an Impervium Jockstrap of Buff Negation...at which point you simply whip out your Ultra-kewl Hyperblaster of Infinite Kryptonian Plasma Megadestruction, which is naturally powered by a Zero-Point Chargepack of Anti-Buff Negation. Of course, your opponent just might have...

...and so it goes.

So tell me, what's the substantive difference between, for example, Old Traveller "Roll below your skill level +8 (plus mods)" and GURPS "Roll over your skill minus modifers"?

Seriously. Isn't the mechanic essentially the same either direction? The difference is in the mods - additive for roll over, subtractive for roll under.

Of course, I'm not a mechanics guy for the most part - fluff is my department.

Quote from: WerekoalaSo tell me, what's the substantive difference between, for example, Old Traveller "Roll below your skill level +8 (plus mods)" and GURPS "Roll over your skill minus modifers"?

Seriously. Isn't the mechanic essentially the same either direction? The difference is in the mods - additive for roll over, subtractive for roll under.

Of course, I'm not a mechanics guy for the most part - fluff is my department.

 I think you made a typo.

 BOTH games are a "roll-under" or "Roll-below-target-number" system.


- Ed C.

Quote from: KoltarI think you made a typo.

 BOTH games are a "roll-under" or "Roll-below-target-number" system.

Argh, dammit.

See, I get all tangled up in mechanics and end up looking like a goof.

So what's a roll OVER system then?

There is no difference between roll-under and roll-over, except for blind superstitious prejudice, apparently based mostly on whatever system was the person's first. I started with OD&D and Traveller, so I have no prejudice either way.

Quote from: balzacqThere is no difference between roll-under and roll-over, except for blind superstitious prejudice, apparently based mostly on whatever system was the person's first. I started with OD&D and Traveller, so I have no prejudice either way.

I don't think that's entirely true.  I prefer roll-over systems, because they're more open-ended in scale.  In particular, I prefer systems like Rolemaster, Unisystem and CORPS that allow for open-ended rolls so that no matter how high the difficulty, there's always a slim chance of success...that 'one-in-a-million' shot.  I also find them easier to work with and more flexible, but that's my own preference.

Given the average IQ of users here (Fucktard) I guess I shouldn't be surprised that most of them forgot I'm into gurps as well, despite the fact if I had it to do over again I would not be due to the dickness of some of the game's players (Koltar, paladin) and the assholishness of some of the people at SJG (Andy hackard, steve jackson)

But the fact remains that I like gurps even if I refuse to capitalize it like a true SJG fhanboi and that I've banned SJ himself from participating in any gurps games I run at conventions. So I will speak out on  it's behalf.

There's an old saying about gurps that goes "Gurps is like a cow, you can't possibly eat the whole thing, just take the parts you like!" That's true, there is so much to gurps you can't use it all in any sane of feasible game. I never use magic, for example, so I don't have the magic book. I run SF games so don't have the fantasy book. So the rules for magic anf fantasy settings don't matter to me, but as to the complaint that "I took the fireball spell but couldn't throw it so gurps sucks!" strikes me as wrong. I mean, you have a wizard who spends all his times learning magic by reading tomes and pouring over scrolls, so he learns to form an explosive fireball in his hand.

But because he never learned to throw things or built up his arm muscles, he can't throw the damn thing. Hey, unless the spell allows you to make a self-propelled fireball in your hand, you need to be able to throw it for effect, so learning to throw and maybe building up the arm muscle should be part of if. Don't want to? Then learn to cast lighting bolts instead.

That actually strikes me as very reasonable, if you want to throw fireballs you have to be able to make them, then throw them.

As to the skills, yeah, there are a lot. So? Gurps has to handle all genres, so it needs drive gravcar skill as well as drive oxcart. It needs fusion gun skill along with crossbow skill and it needs computer operation rules as well as scrying rules.

Duh! If a game covers one genre, technology and setting, a'la D&D, it doesn't need skills to cover all time periods. A game that covers all genres and eras needs many times more skills. Duuuuuh!

Also gurps allows you to set various levels of realism into the various genres. Hardcore, cinematic or somewhere inbetween. That gives you more options but takes more rules. Duuuuuuuh!

Also, at least gurps has hit locations and various damage rules for various locations. Most D20 games make those a tucked aside option at most. I like hit locations.

So while gurps may be made by a company I generally hate and played by some people I'd like a chance to spit on, it's still a great system and much better than d20, hero or most other 'universal' systems.

Nox, you like a decent system like GURPS for all the wrong reasons.

Fireball...realism...same sentence...hit locations...oh man.

Well, at least it´s a respite from the same old same old culture war.
It´s actually refreshing.

Quote from: SettembriniWell, at least it´s a respite from the same old same old culture war.
It´s actually refreshing.

I agree. It's a little weird but I like Koltar's joke analogy. I like Nox's defense. I like talking about GURPS. And actually I'd like to start a game going against some of what Nox said. Eat the whole cow, so to speak. Have a game where EVERYTHING is acceptable. Some gonzo wahoo game where a knuckleheaded spell casting cave man goes Cthulu hunting with his ultra tech robotic insectoid archeologist friend from Betelgeuse 5.... maybe.

Quote from: darI agree. It's a little weird but I like Koltar's joke analogy. I like Nox's defense. I like talking about GURPS. And actually I'd like to start a game going against some of what Nox said. Eat the whole cow, so to speak. Have a game where EVERYTHING is acceptable. Some gonzo wahoo game where a knuckleheaded spell casting cave man goes Cthulu hunting with his ultra tech robotic insectoid archeologist friend from Betelgeuse 5.... maybe.

I like the way you think. Don't forget the wisecracking tough as nails but soft and vulnerable female reporter sidekick who knows ju-jitsu.

The real problem is people who don't get GURPS not GURPS itself.  There's a certain design philosophy that people indoctrinated with D&D think (or stupidity as I like to call it) just have trouble getting their heads around.

In GURPS your character can try to do anything.  It doesn't have to be on your character sheet.  People buy these ridiculous shopping lists without any consideration for game effects of the same.  If you want hard to kill + immune to disease + cast iron stomach, you just buy some Health.  GURPS has a pyramidal structure within which you only buy stuff like advantages if you want to specialize beyond what's represented in the attibute.

Similarly the skill list allows tremendous specialization but if you want a broad based fighter buy Dexterity and weapons with few points in them.  If you want Broadsword, Great Sword, and Shortsword, just put the points into Broadsword and use defaults for the others.

Lastly, the old High DX high IQ problem has largely been fixed in fourth edition.  Now you pay 10 / level for ST and HT and 20 / level for DX and IQ though if you strip off the Will and Perception from IQ you can get it down to 10 / level.

Quote from: darI agree. It's a little weird but I like Koltar's joke analogy. I like Nox's defense. I like talking about GURPS. And actually I'd like to start a game going against some of what Nox said. Eat the whole cow, so to speak. Have a game where EVERYTHING is acceptable. Some gonzo wahoo game where a knuckleheaded spell casting cave man goes Cthulu hunting with his ultra tech robotic insectoid archeologist friend from Betelgeuse 5.... maybe.

Actually there is something like that. It's called "Gurps Rifts".

There are 5 steps to it:

1. Get rifts.
2. Get gurps.
3. Tell Kevin Seimbada it's "Too bad." he doesn't like people porting rifts stuff to other systems.
4. Tell Steve Jackson to "Eat shit and die." if he doesn't like people violating KS's wishes about porting stuff to gurps.
5. Port rifts stuff to gurps and play gurps rifts.


BTW, it's Cthulhu.....

Quote from: SettembriniNox, you like a decent system like GURPS for all the wrong reasons.

Fireball...realism...same sentence...hit locations...oh man.

Well, at least it´s a respite from the same old same old culture war.
It´s actually refreshing.

Tiresome bashing on me aside, the spell for fireball says it lets you create a fireball that explodes on impact after you THROW it at your target. So where is it unfair to say that you have to throw it?

I mean, shit, if I sell you a hand grenade do you expect it to throw itself at the enemy?

Being able to make a fireball and being able to throw it are two different things. The example that goes "Gurps sucks because I couldn't throw a fireball after learning to cast it!" is therefore fallacious.

Like I said, if you want a typical weak wizard with no throwing arm, learn to cast lighting bolts or other spells that don't require an effort to throw them.


Please note I'm defending Sean Punch and Dave Pulver here, not the rest of the SJG crew. I'd defending gurps and the people who write it, no one else.

Quote from: Dominus NoxActually there is something like that. It's called "Gurps Rifts".

There are 5 steps to it:

1. Get rifts.
2. Get gurps.
3. Tell Kevin Seimbada it's "Too bad." he doesn't like people porting rifts stuff to other systems.
4. Tell Steve Jackson to "Eat shit and die." if he doesn't like people violating KS's wishes about porting stuff to gurps.
5. Port rifts stuff to gurps and play gurps rifts.

:D My brother bought GURPS to run Rifts.

I remember someone did a bunch of work porting rifts to gurps. Then caught all kinds of highlife from palladium about it. I think the home page is still up somewhere.... here! (http://www.cybergoon.com/games/rifts/)

I love google.

Quote from: dar....... Eat the whole cow, so to speak. Have a game where EVERYTHING is acceptable. Some gonzo wahoo game where a knuckleheaded spell casting cave man goes Cthulu hunting with his ultra tech robotic insectoid archeologist friend from Betelgeuse 5.... maybe.

 Eat the Whole Cow!! I love that motto now.  Really silly catch-phrase for gaming. (Its Doc Rotwang that came up with the cool picture version of that analogy)

 As for those two character suggestions  :

1. Knuckleheaded cave man Cthulu hunter
....and the....
2. Ultra-Tech Robotic Insectoid Archeologist from Betelgeuse 5

 I accept the challenge. Those are the next TWO characters I make with the GCA.

- Ed C.

Quote from: Gunslinger:D My brother bought GURPS to run Rifts.

So, uh, just out of curiousity, did he ever finish and how many sanity points did he have left?

Quote from: KoltarEat the Whole Cow!! I love that motto now.  Really silly catch-phrase for gaming.

Man, I'm gettin' the wrong paycheck.  UnnowhatImean?

Quote from: Dominus NoxSo, uh, just out of curiousity, did he ever finish and how many sanity points did he have left?

No and none.  Though I believe it was more futility that no one wanted to play Rifts regardless of system.  Rifts did not treat our group well.

Quote from: GunslingerNo and none.  Though I believe it was more futility that no one wanted to play Rifts regardless of system.  Rifts did not treat our group well.

Oh, rits is playable, but the system is just so unplayable.....

Gurps rifts is possible, I'm just not much into rifts.

Quote from: darI agree. It's a little weird but I like Koltar's joke analogy. I like Nox's defense. I like talking about GURPS. And actually I'd like to start a game going against some of what Nox said. Eat the whole cow, so to speak. Have a game where EVERYTHING is acceptable. Some gonzo wahoo game where a knuckleheaded spell casting cave man goes Cthulu hunting with his ultra tech robotic insectoid archeologist friend from Betelgeuse 5.... maybe.

Your mad prayers have been answered... but can you truly face what you have willed into being?

http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?t=318193

Another thing I liked about gurps was te fact it offered detail to those who wanted it.

F'rinstance, in most games it's just automatically assumed that hollowpoint bullets do more damage to body tissue but don't penetrate armor very well. The fact is that small calibur pistol hollowpoints often fail to "expand" in the real world due to the lower velocity of the rounds not being powerful enough to cause them to "mushroom".

Gurps gave rules to simulate this in 3e and you can still use them in 4e if you wish. It's a nice touch and shows a little attention to detail that other RPGs missed.

Quote from: Tom BI don't think that's entirely true.  I prefer roll-over systems, because they're more open-ended in scale.  In particular, I prefer systems like Rolemaster, Unisystem and CORPS that allow for open-ended rolls so that no matter how high the difficulty, there's always a slim chance of success...that 'one-in-a-million' shot.  I also find them easier to work with and more flexible, but that's my own preference.

But that is not inherent to roll-over systems. In a roll-under system it can be decided that there's always a minimum possibility of success. For example, in RuneQuest, a 05 or less is always a success, no matter the penalty.

Of course, it hasn't got anything to do with preference, I don't get why some people prefer roll-over to roll-under, or the other way around, when mathematically they're equivalent*, but I respect that. :)

*= The only difference is psychological. In roll-over systems, usually one finds a great variety in difficulties, whereas in roll-under systems, all difficulties tend to be 0.

I think I get it on under vs. over. In D&D you could end up with a roll of 35 needed on a d20 to hit a high hit die monster. Impossible for low level characters but easy for say a 40th level fighter. It's simple and elegant to have an increasing forward/upward march of difficulty.

The same thing can't as easily or elegantly be done with roll under.

Though it strikes me that that upward march becomes an increasingly silly arms race.

what am I missing?

If GURPS is rubbish, then I must be a piece of rubbish, because I love GURPS (I try not to be a fanboy, but still).

Reading what Settembrini thinks about GURPS and how much a piece of crap it is, according to him, I recognize myself when I thought D&D was crap and its players played D&D because they didn't know better. Of course I was full of shit. I may not like D&D, but there are people who do like D&D, they're not retarded, some of them know other systems and even so, they prefer D&D to them. That doesn't mean that D&D (or GURPS, or whatever RPG) is not to be criticized, but stating that, because one doesn't like an RPG, then it must be a joke? :confused: Please! :rolleyes:

Quote from: darI think I get it on under vs. over. In D&D you could end up with a roll of 35 needed on a d20 to hit a high hit die monster. Impossible for low level characters but easy for say a 40th level fighter. It's simple and elegant to have an increasing forward/upward march of difficulty.

The same thing can't as easily or elegantly be done with roll under.

Though it strikes me that that upward march becomes an increasingly silly arms race.

what am I missing?

In GURPS, you can have a -15 penalty to a given roll, almost impossible for a character with a low skill, let's say 12, but easy for a character with a 32 skill. So it can be done, easily and elegantly.

Anybody thinks that's not easy nor elegant? How so?

As I said, the difference is psychological.

Quote from: dar...a knuckleheaded spell casting cave man goes Cthulu hunting with his ultra tech robotic insectoid archeologist friend from Betelgeuse 5...

Hey, they would fit right in the GURPS game that I run. Well...maybe "fit right in" is a bit of a stretch, but they would certainly be possible as PCs.

Well, in any system, you get only four basic results,

• Fuck-up
• Failure
• Success
• Awesome

In principle you could have just two results - success and failure - but almost every game system seems keen to have those four. How you generate that result, all are variations on a theme - the idea is that as your character improves in ability, success becomes more likely, an awesome result more likely, failure and fuck-up less likely.

The simplest system allowing the four results would be "roll 1d4, each number corresponds to one result." But you would probably want to distinguish between "has learned this skill" and "hasn't." So then you might say that the guy without the skill shifts result one down - so the guy without the skill will fuck up half the time, and never get an awesome result; and the guy with the skill shifts the result one up, so he never fucks up, and is awesome half the time. You might want to adjust these a bit, like, "+1 for simple task like driving in a straight line down an empty road," or "-1 for doing it while under fire," and so on. But that's about as simple as you can get, I think, and still get those four basic results.

Roll over, roll under, draw a card are all just means to the same end - those four results. Many games have tried to do more with those numbers, things like, "roll against each-other, the difference between your success levels adds to damage" and so on - but they're usually pretty minor parts of the game system. It all comes down to give us those four basic results.

The actual means to that end, really it's personal taste. For example, lots of people dislike the d4 because it doesn't really roll, and lots dislike the d20 because it bounces around a bit, and often off the table. Some people hate adding dice together for skill rolls, though no-one seems to mind it for damage :D Others hate subtracting one die from another, or having to decide which d10 should be the tens in rolling two of them for d100. Some hate deliberately "different" dice like the dF (d6 marked two sides each +, - and 0).

I think it's mostly personal taste.

I think one flaw that GURPS has, along with other crunchy systems, is that it's hard to glance over a character sheet and get a good idea of what the character's about - it's just a bunch of numbers. Percentiles are often easier to grasp, and descriptive systems like Fate. So GURPS, like all crunchy systems, takes some study for you really to get the most out of it. I guess GURPS (for example) could be said to be roleplaying's chess to d4-d4's (for example) draughts.

Quote from: JimBobOzI think one flaw that GURPS has, along with other crunchy systems, is that it's hard to glance over a character sheet and get a good idea of what the character's about - it's just a bunch of numbers. Percentiles are often easier to grasp, and descriptive systems like Fate. So GURPS, like all crunchy systems, takes some study for you really to get the most out of it. I guess GURPS (for example) could be said to be roleplaying's chess to d4-d4's (for example) draughts.

I don't know, I like the GURPS character sheet and I think it's easy to know what a character is about, as long as there's not a lot of advantages, disadvantages, and skills. I guess your criticism is valid.

My experience is that the number of different traits (Dis/Advantages and Skills) to a GURPS character depends mostly on the GURPS experience of the player.

New GURPS players will tend to choose 10-20 skills, and 2-4 Dis/Advantages. Experienced ones will tend to choose 20-30 skills, and 4-12 Dis/Advantages. So we get the number of traits as newbies with 12-24, and experienced players with 24-42. It doesn't sound like a lot, but with the numbers, can be a bit bewildering when you first look at it. The player who created that characte - and possibly their GM - will find that individual character quite easy to grasp; both because they helped create it and because behind those numbers is a "character concept", some idea or mental image. But if someone else looks at the character sheet, they might have trouble figuring out what they're like.

Consider for example the trait "Truthful." It gives you a game-mechanical penalty to verbal deceit, and says, "you hate to tell a lie - or are just bad at it." Those are two very different things, really. A character who is just bad at lying may recognise that, and just shut up sometimes and let someone else do the talking, if they think deceit is needed. But a character who hates deceit won't be able to be silent, and will speak up and tell the truth. So you can get two players, given a character sheet with Truthfulness (SC12) [-5], might each play the character entirely differently.

Now, in some ways that's a strength of the system - you could have four identical character sheets, and yet have them played four different ways by your four different players; flexibility and openness of play is a strength. In other ways, it's a weakness of the system - as I said, when someone new to the system or the character looks at the sheet, they might not learn much about the character.

In GURPS, I see the character sheet as like a caricature of the character - it's a representation of them, it's recognisably them, but it's not really good as a portrait, it exagerrates some features and ignores others. And if you look at the caricature, you wouldn't learn much about them unless you already knew the character. That's fine in a well-established group, but it means that when you give a pre-generated character to a newbie, they're a bit lost, in my experience. Because of this, it's actually better to have newbies make their own characters. They won't be optimised for anything much, but the newbie will have a better grasp of things than with a pre-gen; this is the opposite of most systems.

Thats what a decent backstory is for.
There is that NOTES section on the GURPS character sheet.

- Ed C.
 (VERY sleepy right now)

Yes but everyone uses that to list their guns and ph4t l3wt.

JimBob: Your reasoning is sound. but flawed. Why?

Why is a percentage roll under always inferiour to a roll+bonus roll (I don´t call them roll over for a purpose).

Because of the way the DMs brain works.

In a dice+bonus environment, you do something. You always have a result ("I got a thirteen!") that is communicated to the GM.

Whereas (especially percentage) roll under systems are producing dialogue like this:

"Roll a spot check."
"I failed."

This is the core of the problem!

Boni, Mali, all are of diminishing importance in a roll under environment. Because the player has a target number, or thinks he has. Whereas in dice + bonus, the GM has the target number in his head an can narrate fractional successes.

Of course, that don´t has to be like this, because it´s mathematically interchangable.

But more often than not, in a roll under environment, the GM doesn´t assign a difficulty and modifiers!

And because of this failing of our primate brains:

Roll under mechanisms structurall suck. It takes a concious effort to overcome this structural and basic suckage.

Quote from: SettembriniWhereas (especially percentage) roll under systems are producing dialogue like this:

"Roll a spot check."
"I failed."

This is the core of the problem!

Mmmm, sorry to slam your example but that not how GURPS general works. It more like

GM: "Roll a spot check"
P: "I missed it by 3"
GM: "Ok you didn't see anything"

While not every roll in GURPS you need to know the degree of success or failure, it happens often enough that we just call it out anyway. While other system have Dice+Adds in GURPS the degree of how much you made your roll is the equivalent.

But, Settembrini, as I said, the difference is psychological, not a real one.

In roll-under systems, you get a result too, for example, two less than the target number, or three more than the target number. And in roll-over systems, you can have a "I success/I fail" situation.

Besides, most people immediately apply their modifiers to the target number in a roll over system to figure out what they need to roll.  Which puts us right back to adding the negatives and subtracting the positives again.

Really roll under under a target number that isn't the character's score is the ultimate solution because it gets rid of the whole human limit as maximum difficulty problem.

Quote from: SettembriniBut more often than not, in a roll under environment, the GM doesn´t assign a difficulty and modifiers!

I assume you can quote statistical studies based on a meaningful sample on the roleplaying population? ;)

I've seen these "over-and-under" arguments on forums for years, but never encountered one at the gaming table. Hence, until someone puts up some independently verifiable numbers on the topic, there is no topic.

:toast:

Quote from: the BromgrevI assume you can quote statistical studies based on a meaningful sample on the roleplaying population? ;)

I've seen these "over-and-under" arguments on forums for years, but never encountered one at the gaming table. Hence, until someone puts up some independently verifiable numbers on the topic, there is no topic.

:toast:

Not a lot to talk about then, since the vast majority of statements about RPGs are backed up only with personal experience and opinion.

Of course no one is going to do a serious study on roll under/over.  It would be expensive - even simple academic surveys cost thousands.  Why not share your experiences and talk about how they differ (or not) instead of pointing out the lack of serious evidence one way or the other?

You actually have me curious on the issue of the equivalence of roll-over and roll-under.  There are a couple of situations that have come up from time to time that I wasn't sure if you could model in normal roll-under mechanics.

In Rolemaster, a PC wants to try some hideously difficult stunt.  One that was theoretically possible, but very unlikely to succeed.  Assigning the appropriate difficulty modifier (equivalent to about -300), he then proceeds to roll open-ended three times to barely succeed.  That's about .01% chance of success.  How would you approach this type of occurrence in GURPS?

(I mis-spoke earlier.  CORPS is a roll-under system, but not a typical one, and it does allow for open-ended rolls.)

in GURPS a 3 or 4 always succeeds and an 17 or 18 always succeeds.  I actually like this better because it means that in these rare cases skill has absolutely nothing to do with it.  Just dumb luck.

Though I never use automatic success and failure mechanics in my own systems.  I believe life is harsh.

Quote from: David Johansenin GURPS a 3 or 4 always succeeds and an 17 or 18 always succeeds.  I actually like this better because it means that in these rare cases skill has absolutely nothing to do with it.  Just dumb luck.

Though I never use automatic success and failure mechanics in my own systems.  I believe life is harsh.

I don't care for automatic successes either.  That's why I like open-ended mechanics.  They also give you a lot more room to fiddle with.

Boy...just a little side comment about how I, personally, am a roll-over addict (though investigating Hinterwelts Iridium is challenging me on that), and the place erupts.

I know it's psychological - and I'm pretty sure I never said otherwise - and for the all of the test cases I've looked at (admittedly limited), you can achieve the same results.  It's purely a mindset thing, for me. You know us boorish Americans - we like to beat things.  For me it's that my mind tends toequate success with greater than as opposed to less than. Can I do the other?  Sure, but when you've become used to thinking about something a certain way (a default), it's often a conscious effort to shift to the other.

And the whole point of the "addict" approach was to lessen it's impact on whether over or under was better while still explaining the reason I, personally, dont' play GURPS - though I'd love to find a game with some experienced folks who could help me get into it.

Quote from: David Johansenin GURPS a 3 or 4 always succeeds and an 17 or 18 always FAILS.  I actually like this better because it means that in these rare cases skill has absolutely nothing to do with it.  Just dumb luck.

Though I never use automatic success and failure mechanics in my own systems.  I believe life is harsh.

Fixed your typo to avoid confusion.

Maybe it's because I got started with AD&D where some times you needed to roll high and sometimes you needed to roll low (saves, as I recall were 'low rolls'. Watch as I completely flub this and make a boob of myself...:p ) but I never really considered much the 'roll high/roll low debate' personally.

I think a couple of years ago I tried to lay out how they work in my own head and realized that there wasn't a real difference or something then moved on. Cue my entry to the online forae of Gaming and suddenly there are wars! WARZ!!!! I tell you... over 'roll over' no, 'roll under'.

I suddenly feel like I"m in a Bud Light Commercial in Bizzaro world.

:what:

Quote from: SpikeMaybe it's because I got started with AD&D where some times you needed to roll high and sometimes you needed to roll low (saves, as I recall were 'low rolls'. Watch as I completely flub this and make a boob of myself...:p ) but I never really considered much the 'roll high/roll low debate' personally.

I think a couple of years ago I tried to lay out how they work in my own head and realized that there wasn't a real difference or something then moved on. Cue my entry to the online forae of Gaming and suddenly there are wars! WARZ!!!! I tell you... over 'roll over' no, 'roll under'.

I suddenly feel like I"m in a Bud Light Commercial in Bizzaro world.

:what:

I have no opinion as to which way is better.  There are systems I like that use both approaches.  I just know that when I discover a system with a roll over approach (especially with an open-ended mechanic), that it's a "plus" for me.

Quote(http://www.therpgsite.com/forums/images/icons/icon1.gif)                       
                                                But, Settembrini, as I said, the difference is psychological, not a real one.

That´s true. but psyche is the larger godess in that arena.

Show me a GM who asks for your exact margin of failure in a roll-under precentage environment.

Quote from: SettembriniThat´s true. but psyche is the larger godess in that arena.

Show me a GM who asks for your exact margin of failure in a roll-under precentage environment.

Me.  I always checked to see how much they succeeded or failed by, in any system.  It lets me determine how well they succeeded or screwed up.

Quote from: SettembriniThat´s true. but psyche is the larger godess in that arena.

Show me a GM who asks for your exact margin of failure in a roll-under precentage environment.

Actually, set, in gurps 4e there are rules to cover the effect of your exact margain of failure, so, um, looks like you take another headshot in this thread. Would you like it to the right or left side, or in the front or back?

Roll over vs. roll under is totally irellevant here. In a roll over system the disadvantageous mods are subtracted to your roll, in roll unders they are  added. No effective difference in actual effect.

As to gurps mechanics, I happen to like the way that the odds of a critical success or failure are not fixed but vary within limits based on the individual's skill and other circumstances.

Basically, lower skilled people have greater chances of a critical failure and lesser chances of a critical success. The reverse is true for more skilld people, which is exactly as it should be.

Also, a d20 gives a flat probability curve, with each result being as likely as any other. A 3d6 system gives a probability curve that keeps extreme results, like 3's and 18's, from occuring as often as a typical result of 10.

I believe I covered my objection to roll-under with the 'can't get excited about rolling a 1' statement.

Additionally, is Iridium the Hinterwelt house system? 'cause man, roll under...you're killing me! I want Romans in lion-drawn chariots fighting the servants of the immortal Han emperor! I want...whatever Nebuleon's about, maybe plasma weapons or something! Roll under! Noooooo! :hissyfit: I'll still get them, of course.

QuoteMe. I always checked to see how much they succeeded or failed by, in any system. It let me determine how well they succeeded or screwed up.

Was it a concious decision to do that?

Quote from: Christmas ApeI believe I covered my objection to roll-under with the 'can't get excited about rolling a 1' statement.

Additionally, is Iridium the Hinterwelt house system? 'cause man, roll under...you're killing me! I want Romans in lion-drawn chariots fighting the servants of the immortal Han emperor! I want...whatever Nebuleon's about, maybe plasma weapons or something! Roll under! Noooooo! :hissyfit: I'll still get them, of course.

Christmas ape, you ignorant moron,  a roll under does not have to involve a d20,  where rolling a 1 is nothing to get excited over as is happens 5% of the time, exactly as often as a 20 occurs.

On a 3d6 system a minimum result (3) occurs once in every 216 rolls, meaning you can go several game sessions without it happening, thus making it a rare and special event.

Not "special" in the same sense you are, of course.

Consider the differences between a d20 and a 3d6 system:

Assume that the average player rolls, say, 20 times in a game session (5x per hour of a 4 hour session, not unreasonable.) he will, using a d20, get a 1 and a 20 on average every session.

Now....

assume the same game in played with gurps, using 3d6 rolls. rolling 20x per session, the average player will see a critical success "3" ONCE in about 21 game sessions, and a critical failure "18" in every 21 or so game sessions.

That makes crits a very rare and special event in a system bases on 3d6, whether or not it;s roll over or under.

You're right that rolling a 1 on d20 is nothing to get excited over where it will happen every session on average, but rolling a 3 on 3d6 is much rarer and makes it more noteworthy.

(PS, just justifiably going off on CA in re to all the times he's attacked me in posts.)

Quote from: SettembriniThat´s true. but psyche is the larger godess in that arena.

Show me a GM who asks for your exact margin of failure in a roll-under precentage environment.

 I also ask for the margin of success number .

  Actually my question is usually a variation of "How much did you make it by ?"  or "Just how gloriously did you succed?"

 If they blow the roll and its more of a failure I ask somethjing like "How much did you miss it by ? "  "Do the other characters need to get a doctor for you  or start laying down cover fire ?"


- Ed C.

Then again, Koltar, my fatbearded internet buddy, you are an exemption t the rule. Which makes you a better GM, but doesn´t take one dry ounce off my argument.

I ask them how much they made or failed it by, too. If you talk to actual GURPS GMs over on the SJGames forum, you'll find that most do so.

I don't know why that matters to you, or what that has to do with roll under vs roll over, but they do in fact ask after what the game calls "margin of success" or "margin of failure."

I disagree with you Settembrini. We have been playing in the same GURPS Fantasy Campaign Setting for going on 20yrs and it shows no signs of ending soon.


Respectfully

QM

Quote from: C.W.RichesonNot a lot to talk about then, since the vast majority of statements about RPGs are backed up only with personal experience and opinion.

Nothing wrong with tales of personal experience. Stating personal opinion as fact is unscientific and does nothing to advance an argument one way or the other. That's why they invented forumspeak like "IMO". :hehe:

QuoteWhy not share your experiences and talk about how they differ (or not) instead of pointing out the lack of serious evidence one way or the other?

I believe there is an example of my personal experiences in my earlier post. Clearly labelled as such, I might add. :keke:

RuneQuest clearly values the degree of success or failure. The system includes criticals (up to 5% of chance of success), specials (up to 20%) and fumbles (up to 5% of chance of failure). That's more granularity than I've seen in any roll-over systems I have experience with. Again, the over/under argument is irrelevant here (except in so far as over&under shotguns are clearly superior to side-by-side :guns: ), because whether or not degree of success or failure matters depends on the individual system.

Now then, onto another point raised more recently: bell curves versus straight-line probability. Both have advantages and disadvantages. Bell curves give you a bigger range for a given number of dice. Staight line probabilities are instinctive and easy to apply in situations not explicitly covered by the rules. :stirthepot:

You know the old saying "I'd rather push a chevy than drive a ford?" Well, I'd rather read gurps than play d20.

I'd rather you read GURPS then play in my D&D game too.

Quote from: Christmas ApeAdditionally, is Iridium the Hinterwelt house system? 'cause man, roll under...you're killing me! I want Romans in lion-drawn chariots fighting the servants of the immortal Han emperor! I want...whatever Nebuleon's about, maybe plasma weapons or something! Roll under! Noooooo!

I'd get Hinter in here to give you details, or go to the Hinterwelt forum...I'm just getting into the system - learning it a little.

But in Iridium, there are parts that are roll over (combat), and parts that are roll under (skill checks) - at least that's the way I understand it.

As I said, I'm no expert...Hinter's the one to show you the way...

Quote from: the BromgrevNothing wrong with tales of personal experience. Stating personal opinion as fact is unscientific and does nothing to advance an argument one way or the other. That's why they invented forumspeak like "IMO". :hehe:

I guess some of us just assume other people aren't stating absolute truths when they post, and instead are sharing their opinion...

Quote from: the BromgrevI believe there is an example of my personal experiences in my earlier post. Clearly labelled as such, I might add. :keke:

:confused: :confused: :confused:

Fuck, I hate that "do you have statistics for that?" line of argument. I know that as gamers we love dice and numbers, but really, come on. It's so absurd sometimes, you can't say a fucking thing without some doofus leaping on you with demands for facts and figures. "Please give me a reference for your assertion that most people have two legs." Then if you do give figures, they quibble with them. "Oh well that's not a representative sample." And if you give a link online, they say, "well that's not peer-reviewed, you can't trust things on the net." Or if you refer to a book, they don't read it anyway. Then a month later you find yourself having the same conversation again with some idiot who thinks the Earth is flat, or that global warming isn't happening, or most gamers don't like rolling dice.

Besides, 78.63% of all statistics are made up. So Bromgrev, drop that line of argument, or you will feel the wrath of JimBobOz. Fear my righteous geek rage!

And don't be a cocksmock.

Everyone knows roll-over players are communists.

:china:

Quote from: C.W.Richeson:confused: :confused: :confused:

Quote from: the BromgrevI've seen these "over-and-under" arguments on forums for years, but never encountered one at the gaming table.

That's a personal experience. :)

Quote from: the BromgrevEveryone knows roll-over players are communists.

:china:

 But are they Godless communists ?
 And does Less Nesman have an emergency plan to account for them ?*

- Ed C.

* Look at my location and it will make more sense for some of you.

Quote from: Thanatos02I'd rather you read GURPS then play in my D&D game too.

I'd rather soak my brain in acid* than play in a game you were running, especially if it were D&D.


*OotS refference here.

I'm going to have to drop out of this thread, as defending gurps in it means I'm basically standing shoulder to shoulder with a huge, slimey toad which is making my skin crawl and my stomach heave.


Could some other gurpser please take up the slack here? I'll be taking a hot bath in listerine and hydrogen peroxide, trying to feel clean again.

So it sounds like the arguement is about GURPS vs D&D. It all depends on what kind of game you are playing.

D&D is, in it's heart of hearts, still the same skirmish-level wargame it has always been; the game focuses upon a small commando that ventures into an enemy-held area and fights its way past the opposition. The individual players each take on a specific role within the commando: the fighter (direct combat), the magic-user (fire support), the thief (scouting), the cleric (combat support). As the opposition is overcome, the PCs gain equipment and abilities that allow them to take on more powerful upponents. Some of these bonuses are direct; others are indirect in that they allow the creation of the direct bonuses. Over the years the game has been modified somewhat and has tried to incorporate a skill system...but even the skills commonly selected are still of either one of the two categories.

In it's defense, however, D&D does sword-and-sorcery skirmish-level combat very well. It is a particularly good system for campaigns based upon the Black Company or the Sword of Shannara setting.

GURPS, on the other hand, is a character-specific system; it is the individual character that is important, rather than the role that he fulfils in a combat team.

Of the three RPG campaigns I am currently running, only one of them is GURPS. That particular one -- modern-day conspiracy/horror -- has been running for about 6 years, and (in my experience) the genre is rather difficult to play effectively in a combat-oriented system such as D&D. Besides, the characters have been in play long enough that do not really convert effectively into a d20 system.

The other two campaigns are D&D...specifically, AD&D 2nd Edition. Not that I have anything overwhelming against D&D 3e...The biggest reason is that I lack the 3e Monster Manual that I would need for a campaign, and have more 2e stuff than you can shake a stick at. However, there are two other reasons why those campaigns use AD&D.

One campaign is a "nostalgia" campaign played by adults who want to relive the kind of campaigns that we enjoyed back in high school. The other campaign is played by teens, and I run it under AD&D 2e partially because the role-based system is fairly easy for them to grasp and partially as a way to eye-poke the handful of "D&D is evil" types that still lurk in our community.

So, as I said, it basically boils down into what kind of game you want to play, and what kind of rule system you want to play it under. The only "stupid" thing would be to attempt to browbeat others into believing as you do simply because you have a bias against one particular system.

Quote from: Tom BYou actually have me curious on the issue of the equivalence of roll-over and roll-under.  There are a couple of situations that have come up from time to time that I wasn't sure if you could model in normal roll-under mechanics.

In Rolemaster, a PC wants to try some hideously difficult stunt.  One that was theoretically possible, but very unlikely to succeed.  Assigning the appropriate difficulty modifier (equivalent to about -300), he then proceeds to roll open-ended three times to barely succeed.  That's about .01% chance of success.  How would you approach this type of occurrence in GURPS?

(I mis-spoke earlier.  CORPS is a roll-under system, but not a typical one, and it does allow for open-ended rolls.)

That cannot be done in GURPS, but not because GURPS is a roll-under system and Rolemaster is a roll-over system. That's not the reason.

The reason is that Rolemaster has open-ended rolls (that is, if you roll 96-100, you can roll again and add both rolls), whereas GURPS doesn't. Let's imagine that GURPS, instead of having a rule for automatic successes, has a rule for open-ended rolls, that is, if you roll 3-4 you can roll again and substract the result, so you could roll negative results. There would be no difference. Of course, you could say that this solution is not elegant, and I would agree. But it can be done.

Quote from: SettembriniThat´s true. but psyche is the larger godess in that arena.

Show me a GM who asks for your exact margin of failure in a roll-under precentage environment.

It depends. When I GMed GURPS, sometimes I asked for the margin of success/failure, and sometimes I didn't, because I only needed to know whether it was a success or not. But the same thing happens with roll-over systems, like Coda, sometimes we only needed to know whether it was a success or not. What difference does it make? :idunno:

Quote from: Christmas ApeI believe I covered my objection to roll-under with the 'can't get excited about rolling a 1' statement.

And that's OK. You admit that you don't like roll-under systems because you, just, don't. You don't state that roll-over systems are better than roll under systems, nor the contrary.

Quote from: James J SkachI'd get Hinter in here to give you details, or go to the Hinterwelt forum...I'm just getting into the system - learning it a little.

But in Iridium, there are parts that are roll over (combat), and parts that are roll under (skill checks) - at least that's the way I understand it.

As I said, I'm no expert...Hinter's the one to show you the way...

Hinterwelt offers a skeleton of the Iridium rules for free, something like GURPS lite.

I wish more companies did this, one would know exactly what one's buying. :highfive:

Quote from: Lord SvengaliSo it sounds like the arguement is about GURPS vs D&D. It all depends on what kind of game you are playing.

It shouldn't be so, there are people who like both GURPS and D&D. I'm not one of them, but well, whatever.

Besides, it wouldn't be a fair comparison in the context of this thread. For example, Sengoku (Fuzion) uses 3d6, just like GURPS, but it's a roll-over system, unlike GURPS. Or Pendragon, it uses 1d20, just like D&D, but it's a roll-under system, unlike D&D. These would be fair comparisons.

QuoteD&D is, in it's heart of hearts, still the same skirmish-level wargame it has always been; the game focuses upon a small commando that ventures into an enemy-held area and fights its way past the opposition. The individual players each take on a specific role within the commando: the fighter (direct combat), the magic-user (fire support), the thief (scouting), the cleric (combat support). As the opposition is overcome, the PCs gain equipment and abilities that allow them to take on more powerful upponents. Some of these bonuses are direct; others are indirect in that they allow the creation of the direct bonuses. Over the years the game has been modified somewhat and has tried to incorporate a skill system...but even the skills commonly selected are still of either one of the two categories.

In it's defense, however, D&D does sword-and-sorcery skirmish-level combat very well. It is a particularly good system for campaigns based upon the Black Company or the Sword of Shannara setting.

GURPS, on the other hand, is a character-specific system; it is the individual character that is important, rather than the role that he fulfils in a combat team.

I could be nitpicky with some of the details, but generally you're very right.

QuoteSo, as I said, it basically boils down into what kind of game you want to play, and what kind of rule system you want to play it under. The only "stupid" thing would be to attempt to browbeat others into believing as you do simply because you have a bias against one particular system.

I'm going to say a lame "I agree" to that.

Quote from: James J SkachI'd get Hinter in here to give you details, or go to the Hinterwelt forum...I'm just getting into the system - learning it a little.

But in Iridium, there are parts that are roll over (combat), and parts that are roll under (skill checks) - at least that's the way I understand it.

As I said, I'm no expert...Hinter's the one to show you the way...

I really need to keep up on these threads. Yes, James has the gist of it. Skills are roll under (get within you skill chance of success) and have critical success, failure base on amount made/failed. Skills advance based on a curve so your first skill buys you more but eventually taking skill ranks means almost nothing. There are level and stat bonuses though which reflect experience and natural ability and their influence on skills over time.

Combat is roll over and based on defeating your opponent's Defense. You have modifiers that raise your attack die total based on stats and skills. Again, you  have critical success/failures.  Defense is based on your opponent's STR, AGL, and CON, essentially his physical ability to move out of the way.

As Claudius and James have mentioned, you can download what I call the Iridium System Core Reference at our site (http://www.hinterwelt.com/ISCR-Ref.html) and look it over for free.

I should mention, as might be shown here, I have no preference on roll over or under. It is all just statistics to me. I am talking with folks about a Iridium V2 and the possibility of a unified mechanic. We will see.

Bill

I don't have a roll over task resolution mechanic that can be dropped into the StarCluster 2 system yet, but I do have optional dice pool, bell curve, and d20 mechanics that work with the standard StarCluster 2 system, along with the standard percentile roll under. I hope to get the StarCluster 2 System Toolbox out this year, along with a free commercial development license. Do you roll over fans really care that much? If so, I'll come up with something you can drop in. I've always held roll under and roll over as functionally equivalent, whereas dice pools, and bell-curve pools are functionally different, so I hadn't bothered.

-clash

Functionally identical, yes. Psychologically identical, no.

I mean seriously, it's not a game-breaker for me. I will in fact play a roll-under system; I like Heroquest, f'rex, and percentile roll-under is in fact largely okay with me. But it is a tiny downer - I just like rolling high numbers. So sue me. I won't deny myself a good game just because it's roll-under, but there's a little tiny black mark in its column. Just how I (excuse the pun) roll, dawgs.

Quote from: Christmas ApeI mean seriously, it's not a game-breaker for me. I will in fact play a roll-under system; I like Heroquest, f'rex, and percentile roll-under is in fact largely okay with me. But it is a tiny downer - I just like rolling high numbers. So sue me. I won't deny myself a good game just because it's roll-under, but there's a little tiny black mark in its column. Just how I (excuse the pun) roll, dawgs.

That's about where I am, though I find it easier to teach roll over systems to folk new to RPGs (which is another plus for them).

Ironically, I'm the one who brought up roll-over/roll-under AND defended GURPS skills from Sett's side-swipe.

Why does it have to be one system or the other?  My ideal would be a roll-over, probably d20 mechanic with the optional detail in skills/advantages/disadvantages from GURPS.  I'm liking Iridium's loose class system coupled with its Skill/XP mechanic.

I'm just trying to figure out how to mush it all together - and then put a computer behind it for complicated math (in theory leaving me without a specific d-type and a load more options to model things).

On Topic - GURPS is not a joke, it's a perfectly good system that supports the fun many people are having.  The fact that Sett seems to be upset and spraying the crowd notwithstanding.

@Clash - yeah, for some reason it does make a difference.  I can't explain it, I know its a mind thing, I know it's easier to do some things in one way and other things in the other.   But for some strange reason...I just prefer roll-over - to the point that I'd probably be more likely to buy a system with roll-over.  Then again, I've been buying GURPS for a couple of editions, just never played it. Don't know what that means for a broader market...it's just my 8 pence...

Incidentally, here's a post by Kromm (http://forums.sjgames.com/showpost.php?p=369148&postcount=22) (Sean Punch, editor of GURPS 4e) where he describes the  adventure fiction "everyman" skills. I quote it in blue below. It makes a minimum of 16 skills... It's interesting for GURPS players, for players of "adventurer" characters in general, and as a look into the philosophy behinds a lot of GURPS 4e's design.
   
Relying on defaults -- whatever the game system calls them -- is rarely fun. In GURPS, I hint that certain skills are necessary for adventurers, true action heroes or not, to keep the story flowing without annoying breaks caused by PCs being incompetent at tasks that adventure fiction commonly treats as "everyman" skills:

• Carousing, Diplomacy, Fast-Talk, or Interrogation -- Eventually, everybody wants to interrogate NPCs. I'm generous about what skills work, but some skill is required.
  
  
  
• Climbing, Hiking, and Stealth -- The party is only as good at these things as its worst party member, and nearly every party has to move around as a unit at some point.
  
  
  
• Driving or Riding -- Travel is vital to adventure, and while "every hero can drive/ride a horse" is often assumed, it isn't automatic in games that have skills for these things.
  
  
  
• First Aid -- Effective bandaging isn't an unskilled activity, AD&D notwithstanding. Non-action heroes often want to do this to "contribute" to party combat effectiveness, so they especially need this skill.
  
  
  
• Gesture -- Sooner or later, communication without making a sound will be vital to almost any party's survival.



• Observation, Scrounging, or Search -- Noticing interesting things takes training, and finding clues and useful items is so central to adventures that no PC should lack at least basic training here.
  
  
  
• Savoir-Faire or Streetwise -- Everybody came from somewhere. It's passing annoying when a player just assumes that her PC would "get on with folks in her element" without having any practical social skills to back up the assumption.
  

I further suggest -- strongly -- that action heroes have this list as well:

• Axe/Mace, Broadsword, Knife, Shortsword, or Staff -- Wielding a stick, knife, or heavy tool to any real effect requires practice. These common improvised weapons are not idiot-proof, trivial, or safe to use without training.
  
  
  
• Beam Weapons, Bow, Crossbow, or Guns -- However easy "point and shoot" looks, it's quite tough in reality. No credible action hero lacks competency at all ranged combat.
  
  
  
• Boxing, Brawling, or Karate -- Fisticuffs are the worst place to be untrained. Your fists are the only weapons you always have, so learn to use them.
  
  
  
• Forced Entry -- No, it isn't easy to kick in a door. Actually, unless you know how, you'll hurt yourself.



• Holdout -- "Concealable" equipment only works if you have skill at concealment, and frustratingly few players realize this.



• Judo, Sumo Wrestling, or Wrestling -- The number of people who think they should be able to grab others automatically is astounding. In fact, this is a difficult feat, trickier than hitting people, and absolutely requires training.
  
  
  
• Throwing -- Whether you're tossing spare magazines to friends or grenades at enemies, this is a trained skill, so it pays to know it.

I think that players would be far less unhappy about surprises if more GMs made lists like this and did everything possible to get players to take them seriously. A PC with Brawling, Fast-Talk, Forced Entry, Holdout, Knife, Scrounging, Stealth, and Wrestling should be able to make and conceal a shiv, overpower a guard, steal his clothes, sneak away from the scene, talk his way past the other guards, and leave through an inadequately bolted back door.[/COLOR]

Quote from: Christmas ApeFunctionally identical, yes. Psychologically identical, no.

I mean seriously, it's not a game-breaker for me. I will in fact play a roll-under system; I like Heroquest, f'rex, and percentile roll-under is in fact largely okay with me. But it is a tiny downer - I just like rolling high numbers. So sue me. I won't deny myself a good game just because it's roll-under, but there's a little tiny black mark in its column. Just how I (excuse the pun) roll, dawgs.

Umm - I didn't say it's bad or anything, dude! I've played roll-over and roll-under and everything in between, and had fun doing it! I just didn't think it was that big a deal. Since it obviously is to some people, I'll come up with something. That's why I asked the question. :D

Thanks, CA! I just wanted to know folks' opinions.

-clash

Quote from: James J Skach@Clash - yeah, for some reason it does make a difference.  I can't explain it, I know its a mind thing, I know it's easier to do some things in one way and other things in the other.   But for some strange reason...I just prefer roll-over - to the point that I'd probably be more likely to buy a system with roll-over.  Then again, I've been buying GURPS for a couple of editions, just never played it. Don't know what that means for a broader market...it's just my 8 pence...

Thanks, James. I appreciate you taking the time to answer the question. I probably should have put it in a separate thread though! :D

-clash

Actually though, GURPS is a joke because it stands for the Great Unnamed Roleplaying System.

Quote from: David JohansenActually though, GURPS is a joke because it stands for the Great Unnamed Roleplaying System.

True that. :)

Quote from: David JohansenActually though, GURPS is a joke because it stands for the Great Unnamed Roleplaying System.

In some ways calling it gurps really was just an attempt at being honest and unpretentious.

Also, it's impossible to confuse the term with anything else.

Nox!  You old softy!  You almost, just about, said something nice about Steve Jackson.

Quote from: JimBobOz

• Forced Entry -- No, it isn't easy to kick in a door. Actually, unless you know how, you'll hurt yourself.

.[/COLOR]

I'm going to have to disagee with this. I've kicked in more than one door in my lifetime- one very sturdy one (with 2 locks one of which was a dead bolt) in very recent memeory (Cold day, had the kids in the car, left my keys inside). I weigh less than 130 pounds. My special skill? big ass steel toe boots.
As for GURPS it's never been for me; I love generic systems, as I prefer to create all my own setting stuff, but GURPS is too complicated for me- so is 3.0/3.5 for that matter, but that is just a matter of taste.

Quote from: JimBobOz

• Gesture -- Sooner or later, communication without making a sound will be vital to almost any party's survival.[/color]
  

Gurps has a skill for gesturing?  We'd better be talking about ASL or street performance or military hand codes here.  Otherwise... yeah.  "Skill: Wipe Your Ass."

Gesture is a skill for being able to communicate complex ideas through gestures.  It's essentially a primitive version of sign language that's broader but less focused.  So, for instance Gesture would be useful in communicating with cavemen where sign language wouldn't be.  Anyone can communicate with gestures, but the Gesture skill is essential to winning at charades.

Even as this thread rages, I'm doing a merc band with the gesture skill for each one to allow silent communication.

If I want beancounting, I go to the pros from Dover:
Harnmaster annd Millenium´s End.

I just don´t see anything adding to the experience in what JimBob cited.

Bean Counting (Per/Hard) This skill is used to win beans in a jar contests but can also be applied to paperclips and pins with a technique.

Quote from: David JohansenBean Counting (Per/Hard) This skill is used to win beans in a jar contests but can also be applied to paperclips and pins with a technique.

*chokes on his Coke* By Sun and Wind, I'm going to have to be careful to not let my daughter know about that one; she'll want to take that skill for her character!

I'm late to this thread, but I plays me alot of GURPS so I thought I should come stick up for it...

The specificity of some of the skills may not be satisfactory to everyone, but the number of skills is necessary to cover as broad of scope as GURPS does. Note that you can specialise in an area of geology if you wanted to, at least in 3e revised.

The skills are as balanced as they are in most systems, IE; no skills are created equal. Pottery is going to come in more useful in a pre-industrial society than in your cyberpunk game for example. The point cost reflects the difficulty of learning the skill in question, and I think it does a pretty good job.

Also ass-wiping is Physical/Easy. If you are trying to wipe an ass other than your own, the target should get an active defense...:haw:

Quote from: SgtSpaceWizardthe number of skills is necessary to cover as broad of scope as GURPS does.

I disagree, plenty of other generic games use a much smaller skill list and don't have any trouble handling the same range of games GURPS does.  GURPS just caters to both players who want a high degree of specificity and those that want broader skills.  The downside to this is all the GMs out there who want to use everything the damn book has instead of picking and choosing.  It may also be a flaw in that the book seems to present such narrowly useful skills as the default - I've not encountered a GURPS GM who uses broader skills.

QuoteThe skills are as balanced as they are in most systems, IE; no skills are created equal.

I consider GURPS balancing to be unique, or at least rare.  I don't know of any other games that sets skill costs based on difficulty to learn through training.  Most games try to narrow skills down to those that will likely see use in the game, that are important to the type of stories roleplaying games tend to tell (stories not about pottery, for instance).  Most games have flat costs, but a few have costs based on the usefulness of a given skill.

C.W. , you've already established in other threads that you don't think much of GURPS.


 So, like Settembrini, you don't GET the joke...or need the punchline explained to you.


 "Biege, I think I'll paint the ceiling biege."


- Ed C.

Quote from: KoltarC.W. , you've already established in other threads that you don't think much of GURPS.

I have no idea what you're talking about.  I have dozens of the books on my shelf, have played in several campaigns, and occasionally pitch the game.  I don't get the joke thing either, sorry.  It must be an in-joke I've missed somewhere here.

If you disagree with one of my points, please explain why.  I'm not perfect, my ideas are often flawed, and I'm always happy to have someone change my mind.

Quote from: C.W.RichesonIf you disagree with one of my points, please explain why. I'm not perfect, my ideas are often flawed, and I'm always happy to have someone change my mind.

I'm not exactly disagreeing, but I am interested in a bit of expansion on a few of the points you made.

Quote...plenty of other generic games use a much smaller skill list and don't have any trouble handling the same range of games GURPS does.

Such as? I can't think off the top of my head of any other generic games that are as versatile as GURPS with a significantly smaller skill list...I'm kind of wondering which ones you have in mind.

QuoteGURPS just caters to both players who want a high degree of specificity and those that want broader skills. The downside to this is all the GMs out there who want to use everything the damn book has instead of picking and choosing.  It may also be a flaw in that the book seems to present such narrowly useful skills as the default - I've not encountered a GURPS GM who uses broader skills.

Most GURPS GMs and players are attracted to the game exactly because of the specificity of the skills.

A short skill list may have the "advantage" of the skills thereon being broadly applicable, but broadly applicable skills have the limitation of being rather generic. An example can be found in a system like Twilight 2000/Dark Conspiracy/Cadillacs & Dinosaurs, where the Melee Combat (Armed) skill allows equal proficiency in everything from knives to swords to spears...three weapons that have distinctive fighting styles.

Most GURPS GMs I know -- myself included -- do indeed pick and choose from among the skills offered. I, for one, seldom if ever use the Art or Sport forms of combat skills unless the player so specifies.

One thing to remember is that in gurps it's easier to design a unique character that is really one of a kind and special. (Not "Christmas ape" special, but the good kind of special)

In d20 characters tend to all look alike, especially with class and level rules.

I like a character that isn't just another thief, fighter, wizard, netrunner, etc.

Quote from: Dominus NoxEven as this thread rages, I'm doing a merc band with the gesture skill for each one to allow silent communication.

I've got to say, that's pretty cool.

QuoteIn d20 characters tend to all look alike, especially with class and level rules.

...except that they are all mechanically different and really, really play in a   different crunchy ballpark.

Actually it´s the GURPS characters who are all alike:

Just a bunch of Skillls you can roll for.

In D&D you´ve got Spells, Items, Feat, Feats, Feats and some more Feats who let you do stuff that is mechanically different.

It´s a shame, Nox: GURPS is a fine system, but your reasons for liking it, are totally ridiculous and show how much you lack in Roleplay-ology.

Quote from: Settembrini...except that they are all mechanically different and really, really play in a   different crunchy ballpark.

Actually it´s the GURPS characters who are all alike:

Just a bunch of Skillls you can roll for.

In D&D you´ve got Spells, Items, Feat, Feats, Feats and some more Feats who let you do stuff that is mechanically different.

It´s a shame, Nox: GURPS is a fine system, but your reasons for liking it, are totally ridiculous and show how much you lack in Roleplay-ology.

:tears: :roofle: :killingme:


Coming from someone who doesn't even fucking know that in gurps you don't roll for anything but buy everything, your criticism of my "Roleplay-ology" really struck my funnybone.

Keep it up, I could use some more laughs, and I find your ignorance amusing.

QuoteComing from someone who doesn't even fucking know that in gurps you don't roll for anything but buy

I did not say that.

Go, read.
And I did start this thread with a critique on the point buy.
Go, read.

Quote from: Lord SvengaliSuch as? I can't think off the top of my head of any other generic games that are as versatile as GURPS with a significantly smaller skill list...I'm kind of wondering which ones you have in mind.

HERO, for example. It has a much shorter list of skills that GURPS. On the other hand, the skill list of HERO doesn't satisfy me as much as the skill list of GURPS does.

I fail to see how in GURPS there are more skills than there should be. If we were talking about Rolemaster SS, well, I'd wholeheartedly agree, but in GURPS.... :confused:

Quote from: Lord SvengaliI'm not exactly disagreeing, but I am interested in a bit of expansion on a few of the points you made.


Such as? I can't think off the top of my head of any other generic games that are as versatile as GURPS with a significantly smaller skill list...I'm kind of wondering which ones you have in mind.

Mainstream games off the top of my head: M&M, HERO and Tri-Stat.

Quote from: SettembriniActually it´s the GURPS characters who are all alike:

Any system with a greater degree of specificity is going to result in characters that look even more different from one another than a system with a lesser degree of specificity.  More interesting options = more diverse characters.  Perhaps in some GURPS games - like modern conspiracy - we'll see a lot of folk take firearms and investigation oriented skills, but even then they'll have a lot of different advantages and disadvantages.  As Nox rightly points out, two first level fighters can look awfully similar.  There are only so many ways to set your character apart at early levels in D&D.

This thread is made out of lame.

Quote from: AosThis thread is made out of lame.

 Yes it might be. Take a look at the original post that started it...your reason for the lameness right there.

- Ed C.

Quote from: C.W.RichesonMainstream games off the top of my head: M&M, HERO and Tri-Stat.

I readily admit that I know little-to-nothing about M&M and Tri-Stat...but isn't HERO the same system that we used for Champions, Danger International, and Justice Incorporated back in college? If so, I wouldn't think of that being necessarily a shorter skill list; the core list of skills may very well have been, but I seem to recall that you pretty much had to expand upon it in order to use the system for anything other than Champions. (Granted, I haven't played it in about 15 years or so, so I could be mistaken.)

Quote from: Settembrini...except that they are all mechanically different and really, really play in a   different crunchy ballpark.

In D&D you´ve got Spells, Items, Feat, Feats, Feats and some more Feats who let you do stuff that is mechanically different.

Are you saying that different characters determine success in different ways?

I don't see how you would be using different mechanics based upon individual characters, since a game's "mechanic" is, as far as I know, pretty much the same as its combat/task resolution system -- which in D&D requires you to roll a d# (usually a d20), add your various modifiers, and compare it to the target number. I don't know of any spells, items, feats, etc that allow you to alter the way the task resolution system works.

If what you say is true, then perhaps I have been playing the game incorrectly for the past 27 years.

QuoteActually it´s the GURPS characters who are all alike:

So what you are saying is that a vampire gunslinger, an ex-Army alchemist, a timelost heavy sniper, a sumo wrestler-turned-luchador, and an albino computer hacker/Savate expert (all characters from my current GURPS campaign) are all essentially identical?

QuoteJust a bunch of Skillls you can roll for.

You don't roll for skills in GURPS any more than you do in D&D, unless you are using the Random Character Generation (which I don't think anyone actually does for anything but idle diversion).

QuoteIt´s a shame, Nox: GURPS is a fine system, but your reasons for liking it, are totally ridiculous and show how much you lack in Roleplay-ology.

"Roleplay-ology"? What's that? If you mean "the art/science of Roleplaying Games", I fail to see why a person's reasons -- ridiculous or otherwise -- for liking a particular RPG system would show a lack in that regard.

C.W.: I, for one, am always confused by systems that scale the difficulty of learning to the needs of the campaign, rather than the more easily graspable :how hard is it to learn: method.  GURPS is not the only system to use that method, but for the life of me I can't remember another off the top of my head.  Oh... Heavy Gear, with it's 'complex skills'... took me long enough.

Quote from: SpikeC.W.: I, for one, am always confused by systems that scale the difficulty of learning to the needs of the campaign

I certainly agree that that aspect of GURPS leads to more realistic skill acquisition.  Realistic by RPG standards, anyway.

Quote from: Dominus NoxOne thing to remember is that in gurps it's easier to design a unique character that is really one of a kind and special. (Not "Christmas ape" special, but the good kind of special)

In d20 characters tend to all look alike, especially with class and level rules.

I like a character that isn't just another thief, fighter, wizard, netrunner, etc.

This, of course, ignores feats and skills, as well as combining classes in different ways.

As far as it is true, it's a good thing [TM]. IMO, the action of a given genre is best carried through a somewhat standardized set of standard required competencies and roles than forcing the GM to haphazardly throw challenges at the players and hope that they have some means to deal with it amongst a set of PCs whose abilities are built up either around whimsy that does not necessarily relate to the genre at hand, or by some hyper-specialized abberation built around a possibly erroneous player assumption about what particular skill sets are going to let them "win" the game.

Quote from: Caesar SlaadIMO, the action of a given genre is best carried through a somewhat standardized set of standard required competencies and roles than forcing the GM to haphazardly throw challenges at the players and hope that they have some means to deal with it amongst a set of PCs whose abilities are built up either around whimsy that does not necessarily relate to the genre at hand...

That depends upon your style of play. I've always viewed telling players "You must include this, that, and the other thing among your characters" is pretty much forcing the players to create characters that conform to the GM's idea of how the game will progress.

Rather, at the start of a campaign, I have already worked out a rough storyline, and I give the players a bit of information that will allow them to create suitable characters. I do not require them to do so, however; most of my players are experienced enough to create characters that will complement each other nicely. As the game progresses, they learn the hard way which skills they are lacking should probably pick up. Even if they don't have a particular skill that is needed to accomplish a particular segment of the adventure, they can usually attempt it at a default; if they find that they need the skill more than once or twice, somebody is bound to learn it. If they absolutely need the skill in order to succeed, with no other means of success open to them, I will usually allow the PC most likely to possess it to spend a character point on the spot to have the skill.

To make more clear what I said before:

If you character consists of only a skill list, then every character is mechanically as boring as the next one.

You can only make skill rolls, all the time.

Whereas D&D, or several other games, have different rules for different character elements.

To wrap my point in a different cloth:

All that makes GURPS so "diverse" is a huge skill list.
We have established that this skill list is not mechanically balanced, it has to be balanced by the DM in charge.

So, if I ported that skill list into D&D, D&D would be more powerful a tool than GURPS. I can port it very easily, as it is not balanced in GURPS, so I don´t have to balance it in D&D.

I just write down one more skill, and voila, it´s more "diverse" than GURPS, by your own logic.

Excuse me, are you saying that any game with a unified resolution mechanic is crap?

That would be an interesting claim, at least.

Sett: That comment is so twisted around it's eating itself, man.

What exactly is BAB? Why... it's nothing more than your character's skill at hitting things.

So, GURPS is a joke because it strips away these subsystems to make actual skills at hitting things, allowing players to decide if their character gets better at hitting things or not?

Where is it said that the GURPS skill list isn't balanced? It is Balanced, it just is 'too big', because you are supposed to pick what you need out of it, rather than try to take everything.  That's not a balance issue, it's a 'buffet' issue. Only take enough to fill your plate. Just because they have Roast Beef AND hamburger doesn't mean you need both.

QuoteExcuse me, are you saying that any game with a unified resolution mechanic is crap?

No. I´m saying any game with just a big list of skills and a simple mechanism for rolling them is not actually diverse, but mechanically bland.

Imagine D20 without feats, spells, maneuvres.
now add a table with X+1 skill.

How can that be "diverse"?

I´m puzzeld why we are not all agreeing here. It is so obvious to me, I can´t even start to wonder what went wrong with communication.

It must be my inability to communicate.
Otherwise you´d all be terribly dumb, which I just can´t imagine.

So please ask specific what is giving you a hard time to grok, and I´ll rephrase. It´s very important to me to transport this, because I´m so shocked not everybody already is of that opinion.

*shakes his head*

I seldom fully understand what Sett says but I will give it a go. ;)

I have observed two big divides in terms of resolution mechanics. The first group has one mechanism for everything. Say, for example, a d20 plus a modifier. This is used for everything from skill resolution to magic. It is always the same and thus, for people interested in the mechanics side, rather dull. Then there are the less unified systems that have a different mechanic for how a cleric casts magic, skill resolution and combat. Folks interested in mechanics often enjoy such games since they are essentially systems within systems.

As it applies to the number of skills, IMO, is that there are different forms of flexibility. The two represented here would be the flexibility of character creation (many skills) vs the variety of system (few or no skills but many sub-systems). In the first, you can take a number of skills but essentially you will resolve your cleric's initiate skill the same way you would a thieves picking locks. Essentially rendering the same "feel" to the different types of characters. In the second case, the sub-system can control a very different "feel" mechanically for that profession. In AD&D your thief picked locks with a % roll, while your mage ticked off the use of a pre-memorized spell.

Personally, I like both and that is why I get hammered in reviews for Iridium. ;)

Bill

So the idea is that because the mechanic is the same, it gives the characters the same feel?

Huh.

Never would have occurred to me. To me what a made a character unique or not was what made up the character/how the character was played. Mechanics were there only to resolve issues that required it. The reason I liked that D&D went from % rolls to d20 for thief skills was it removed something to worry about (is this a % roll or a d20 roll, that is, the mechanical aspect) and allowed for more focus on the character.

Amazing how different people perceive different things...

Quote from: SettembriniNo. I´m saying any game with just a big list of skills and a simple mechanism for rolling them is not actually diverse, but mechanically bland.

Imagine D20 without feats, spells, maneuvres.
now add a table with X+1 skill.

How can that be "diverse"?

So what is it that you think makes d20 "diverse" when you claim GURPS is not? Regardless of whether you are swinging a sword or using a non-combat skill, you have a simple mechanic in which your die roll is modified by the bonuses/penalties incurred by the various feats, spells, and maneuvers that affect what you are doing; the goal is to roll over an "target/difficulty number" that is generally arbitrarily assigned.

It's the same with GURPS...the differences being

• In GURPS, your combat skills are true skills that anyone can acquire and improve individually and usually at any time between adventures, rather than abilities that are tied into a specific role that you portray (fighter, cleric, etc) and can only improve at specified intervals ("level advancement").
• You are rolling against your effective skill (skill level +/- modifiers), with an 18 being a automatic failure of one sort or another.

Quote from: James J SkachSo the idea is that because the mechanic is the same, it gives the characters the same feel?

Huh.

Never would have occurred to me. To me what a made a character unique or not was what made up the character/how the character was played. Mechanics were there only to resolve issues that required it. The reason I liked that D&D went from % rolls to d20 for thief skills was it removed something to worry about (is this a % roll or a d20 roll, that is, the mechanical aspect) and allowed for more focus on the character.

Amazing how different people perceive different things...

And to emphasize that, it is very much the perception and preferences of the player. One person, such as yourself, may wish a more simplified approach, while another craves the crunch. I have run Iridium for several Harn and RM players who decried Iridium as too simple and as a lite system. I would never describe Iridium as lite...heck, I am hesitant to call Iridium Lite "lite" int he classic sense.

So, yes, much of it, as in most matters RPG, it comes down to preference.

Bill

Quote from: HinterWeltAnd to emphasize that, it is very much the perception and preferences of the player. One person, such as yourself, may wish a more simplified approach, while another craves the crunch. I have run Iridium for several Harn and RM players who decried Iridium as too simple and as a lite system. I would never describe Iridium as lite...heck, I am hesitant to call Iridium Lite "lite" int he classic sense.

So, yes, much of it, as in most matters RPG, it comes down to preference.

Bill

And the reason it doesn't bothers me in Iridium (to any great extent other than the OCD side of me rearing it's ugle head) is because there is a good line of demarcation.  I'm not about to perform Knowledge (History) in the middle of combat. So d20 over here (combat), percentage over there (skill).

Though as I'm typing that and thinking about D&D, I can see a thief using hide in shadows or move silently during a combat. And I'm not familiar enough with Iridium, yet, to know how that would play out.

Now back to your thread about GURPS...

Quote from: James J SkachSo the idea is that because the mechanic is the same, it gives the characters the same feel?

Huh.

Never would have occurred to me. To me what a made a character unique or not was what made up the character/how the character was played. Mechanics were there only to resolve issues that required it.

Sett did say something to the effect of "If all there is to the character is what's on the sheet..."

-clash

Quote from: flyingmiceSett did say something to the effect of "If all there is to the character is what's on the sheet..."

-clash

Awww C'mon Clash.  I went through all that trouble to type "how the character was played" after the little slashy dealie and everything. :p

QuoteSett did say something to the effect of "If all there is to the character is what's on the sheet..."

With the word mechanically firmly applied!

Look the variance supplied by outside forces is always the same, a function of the gaming group.


So, the game with few mechanical options is not as diverse as the ones with more mechanical options.

Diversity = V + M

where

V = f(groupskills)
M = mechinacally different options

True, a V might be so large as to make the mere + M irrelevant. But that does not in any way amount to a quality of a game system.

You can say: GURPS inspires me to make XYZ-characters. But it does not, in any way lend you a mechanical hand. because there are not many mechanics.

Compare a warblade to a fighter = huge mechanical difference.
Compare GURPS character A to GURPS character B. Mechanically the same.
A list of skills, with some colour added.

Quote from: SettembriniWith the word mechanically firmly applied!

Look the variance supplied by outside forces is always the same, a function of the gaming group.


So, the game with few mechanical options is not as diverse as the ones with more mechanical options.

Diversity = V + M

where

V = f(groupskills)
M = mechinacally different options

True, a V might be so large as to make the mere + M irrelevant. But that does not in any way amount to a quality of a game system.

You can say: GURPS inspires me to make XYZ-characters. But it does not, in any way lend you a mechanical hand. because there are not many mechanics.

Compare a warblade to a fighter = huge mechanical difference.
Compare GURPS character A to GURPS character B. Mechanically the same.
A list of skills, with some colour added.

So...what...if GURPS added Feats you'd be OK? Otherwise, you seem to be comparing apples and oranges.

QuoteSo...what...if GURPS added Feats you'd be OK? Otherwise, you seem to be comparing apples and oranges.

No-
I don´t want to change GURPS into D&D.
But I want GURPS to be as professional as D&D.

I know GURPS is "just" a big skill list. And it shall remain one. But please, please, please with sugar on top:

Make up your mind on what breadth these skills have!
Balance the fuckers!

That´s why GURPS is a joke:

It doesn´t do what it is supposed to do: Provide equal amount of ability for an equal amount of points.

Or model reality in any meaningful way.

The point I made upthread was to fight some of the ridicolous stuff that Nox posted. My main points are here and in the OP.

Quote from: SettembriniNo-
I don´t want to change GURPS into D&D.
But I want GURPS to be as professional as D&D.

I know GURPS is "just" a big skill list. And it shall remain one. But please, please, please with sugar on top:

Make up your mind on what breadth these skills have!
Balance the fuckers!

That´s why GURPS is a joke:

It doesn´t do what it is supposed to do: Provide equal amount of ability for an equal amount of points.

Or model reality in any meaningful way.

The point I made upthread was to fight some of the ridicolous stuff that Nox posted. My main points are here and in the OP.

Sett, I'm not politically correct. I'm also a racist bigot hatemonger who happens to believe other people have a right to their views even if they're different than mine as long as tey don't force their views on me.

As I wait for the boys to come by and pick me up for our weekly lynching, I will just say you can believe anything you want about gurps, you can even troll and flamebait over it, that's you're business.

Unlike the Oh so tolerant PC koolaid drinkers here, I'm not going to harass and abuse you incessantly for your view even if it doesn't agree with mine.

So think what you want of gurps.

Anyway, the truck's here and we've got some necks to stretch....

Quote from: SettembriniNo-
I don´t want to change GURPS into D&D.
But I want GURPS to be as professional as D&D.

I know GURPS is "just" a big skill list. And it shall remain one. But please, please, please with sugar on top:

Make up your mind on what breadth these skills have!
Balance the fuckers!

Why? Why does it have to be balanced?

Quote from: SettembriniThat´s why GURPS is a joke:

It doesn´t do what it is supposed to do: Provide equal amount of ability for an equal amount of points.

Really I though what a game was supposed to do was be fun and enjoyable by the participants.

Quote from: SettembriniOr model reality in any meaningful way.

Wow. Did you just say GURPS isnt realistic enough? If anything sometimes its to realistic.

Quote from: SettembriniThe point I made upthread was to fight some of the ridicolous stuff that Nox posted. My main points are here and in the OP.

So the rest of it was just you hating on people, and/or a game that you dont like?

Quote from: Lord SvengaliThat depends upon your style of play.

Isn't it always? That is, of course, why the quoted statement is prefaced with IMO.

QuoteI've always viewed telling players "You must include this, that, and the other thing among your characters" is pretty much forcing the players to create characters that conform to the GM's idea of how the game will progress.

Don't get me wrong. I grew up an old traveller GM. Letting players come up with solutions with a variety of approaches is part of my GMing nature.

But there came a point where I realized that the composition of the party played a big part in defining what the game, as a whole, was about. I found that all too often with freeform point-buy games, I was finding the playstyle being too entirely determined by player whim and too little attention being payed to what I was interested in/good at as a GM. So as I grew as a GM, I realized the importance of establishing boundaries and core competencies for the action at hand in producing an enjoyable game.

QuoteRather, at the start of a campaign, I have already worked out a rough storyline, and I give the players a bit of information that will allow them to create suitable characters. I do not require them to do so, however; most of my players are experienced enough to create characters that will complement each other nicely.

Perhaps it's my background, but I've been historically involved with a fluid group of players in the best of time and really couldn't rely on the players arriving at the table with a good enough sense of teamwork to pull that off without some external guidelines, and I seldom considered it worth the time for them to naturally evolve to that state. I've come to find it more convenient to utilize games that set those guidelines in the rules, or gives the GM the tools to do so (the one thing I really disliked about the HERO 5e revision was the gutting of the package deal mechanic.)

QuoteAs the game progresses, they learn the hard way which skills they are lacking should probably pick up. Even if they don't have a particular skill that is needed to accomplish a particular segment of the adventure, they can usually attempt it at a default; if they find that they need the skill more than once or twice, somebody is bound to learn it. If they absolutely need the skill in order to succeed, with no other means of success open to them, I will usually allow the PC most likely to possess it to spend a character point on the spot to have the skill.

And again, this goes back to the post I was replying to: this is really nothing that I couldn't do in d20 in some form. Skills aren't so exclusive in d20 that no class in a well balanced party won't have easy access to any needed skill at some level, and some d20 implementations explicitly support spontaneous use of skills or other abilities (e.g., the feat emulation in the Unearthed Acana action point rules, or the mission training picks or I can swim feat in Spycraft 2.0.)

Assaulting all of D20 like it had no skills & feats like it was C&C (a system that I loathe for the qualities it has that Nox pretends is true of D20 in general) doesn't really say anything about d20 as a whole.

please ignore

@Nox:
And that says what?

That´s no defence of GURPS, just some shotgun snark.

Do I come across PC?
Have I fought for your right of free speech?
Have I insulted you with the implications you made?
Wasn´t it other people who accuse you with that?

The only accusations I made against you, was that you like GURPS for reasons that aren´t in the game. GURPS is a nice thing, and it´s no shame to bne playing it. But the stuff you have attributed it with doesn´t actually exist.

So get off your cross, at least while you are speaking to me.
I´ve got nothing to do with your politics, I don´t care.

QuoteWhy? Why does it have to be balanced?

I...am...staggered.
Is this question serious?

You ask me why a point buy chargen should be balanced in point values?

I can´t be communicating this badly, you must be unbelievably dumb.

Quote from: SettembriniBut I want GURPS to be as professional as D&D.

:confused:

QuoteI know GURPS is "just" a big skill list.

A skill list, an advantage list, a disadvantage list... :rolleyes:

What did the Romans do for us? :D

QuoteThat´s why GURPS is a joke:

It doesn´t do what it is supposed to do: Provide equal amount of ability for an equal amount of points.

Unlike D&D, wherein two same level character have the same ability. :roofle:

QuoteOr model reality in any meaningful way.

Again, unlike D&D, which models reality successfully. :tears: :wtfsign:

Really, are you serious? Fool's day is already gone. :confused:

Jesus, now I know how a D&D fan feels when, in spite of having lots of fun with D&D, he is told that D&D is a substandard game and he's having badwrongfun. :rolleyes:

Well, sorry Settembrini, I don't want to offend you, but this is what I think of this thread:

:lamer:

QuoteAgain, unlike D&D, which models reality successfully. :tears: :wtfsign:

Really, are you serious? Fool's day is already gone. :confused:

You moron.

I talked about "What GURPS wants to be good at".

This is not about D&D. D&D is about shitloads of other stuff.

That´s why there is a need for something like GURPS.

But GURPS doesn´t fulfill any of it´s alleged niche areas of expertise:

Point buy
Realism

It fails miserably in both.

Quote from: SettembriniSo, the game with few mechanical options is not as diverse as the ones with more mechanical options.

Diversity = V + M

where

V = f(groupskills)
M = mechinacally different options

True, a V might be so large as to make the mere + M irrelevant. But that does not in any way amount to a quality of a game system.

For a moment I read the first line as "Diversity = VtM." I thought he had gone over to the Swine there. The horror.

Other than that, this seems to be about aesthetic choices. Which is to say: important choices.

In a recent rpg.net review thread (of AD&D 1E?) it was pointed out that the game had a lot of funky progressions (saves) and subsystems (thieving skills are percentiles)... and besides, what's with using half a dozen different dice when one or two are sufficient, etc. etc.? To which somebody replied that the more you differentiate these elements the more independent weight each one of them has. Thieving is distinct from combat is distinct from spellcasting. A short sword does d6 damage, and not d8.

Fine. Having said that, can't one have both--diversity folded into a (more or less) single mechanic? I know only slightly more about Rolemaster than I know about GURPS--but isn't that a fair description of what it achieves?

All I can say is, when I rolled up a character or two in HARP I was not bored at all.

Quote from: ClaudiusAgain, unlike D&D, which models reality successfully.

I think a fundamental difference here is that GURPS... or at least it's major apologists... purport it as a feature when contrasting it with D&D.

Just an observation of the respective statements. If GURPS works for you, have fun with it.

QuoteFine. Having said that, can't one have both--diversity folded into a (more or less) single mechanic?

There´s people who´d say D20 is just that.
I´d say Battletech games do that way, way better.

But let´s not talk about other games.

Does GURPS deliver any mechical diversity?

No.

And that´s why it remains a joke of a system.

Quote from: SettembriniYou moron.

I talked about "What GURPS wants to be good at".

This is not about D&D. D&D is about shitloads of other stuff.

That´s why there is a need for something like GURPS.

But GURPS doesn´t fulfill any of it´s alleged niche areas of expertise:

Point buy
Realism

It fails miserably in both.

When you say point buy, I guess you mean character balance (because GURPS cannot fail at having a point buy system, it does have it :confused: ). The problem is both Character Balance and Realism are two slippery squirrels, you try to catch them, and when you're near and about to close your hands, they run and you have nothing.

In other words, there are subsystems in GURPS that are lacking regarding Character Balance and Realism, yes, but tell me, which game hasn't got problems with those?

To all you little GURPS-loving fuckers:

I do not hate GURPS.
You can have a ball with it, like you can have with any skill based system. GURPS, BRP, Mechwarrior = it´s all the same basicallly.

It´s one of the oroginal pillars of Adventure Gaming, it´s needed and it is wanted.

But it is not nearly as well done as it should be.
I want the level of sophistication of D&D for any part of the hobby.

I do not want the same kind of sophistication.

QuoteThe problem is both Character Balance and Realism are two slippery squirrels, you try to catch them, and when you're near and about to close your hands, they run and you have nothing.

Which is exactly what happened.

QuoteIn other words, there are subsystems in GURPS that are lacking regarding Character Balance and Realism, yes, but tell me, which game hasn't got problems with those?

Any game that gives fuck about one or the other.

Balance over realism = D&D,
Realism over balance = Harnmaster

Quote from: Caesar SlaadI think a fundamental difference here is that GURPS... or at least it's major apologists... purport it as a feature when contrasting it with D&D.

Of course!! D&D doesn't even try to be realistic. The moment I realized that, I accepted OD&D, AD&D and D&D3 with open arms. D&D is so, asking D&D for realism is like asking a lemon tree for oranges.

On the other hand, that's one of the reasons I'm not much into D&D, realism is not one of its concern. Which is fine, I don't see it as a failure, rather as a feature.

And this is the reason why I'm against Settembrini's opinion. I can understand some of you don't like GURPS, I can understand that GURPS may deserve some criticism, but being told that GURPS is a joke and a failure? :confused:

Quote from: SettembriniI...am...staggered.
Is this question serious?

You ask me why a point buy chargen should be balanced in point values?

I can´t be communicating this badly, you must be unbelievably dumb.

I'm unbelievably dumb? How can you say that with a straight face. Lets take a look at Rifts for a second the discrepancy say between a rogue scholar and a Ley Line Walker. They both have a bevy of skills. But the ley line walker has magic at their disposal making them infinitely more powerful. Yet people seem to be able to play these characters side by side. There are those on this very board that revel in the rogue scholar. And seem to be able to play them well. Even though they are weaker than almost all other classes. Lets look at 3.5 D&D. Lets compare a Bard to a ranger. In comparison the bard is a foppish asshat thats not really good for much. Yet their are plenty of people who play a bard successfully. Theres no reason that a less powerful character cant be played along side more powerful ones. Or played well on their own. It sounds to me like your the ignorant one. Nothing has to be equal, accept in your mind. Just because your to weak to take on a non power gaming character, is not proof that I'm dumb. Only that you are unable to take on challenges. Which would make you a pretty week roleplayer in my opinion.

Quote from: SettembriniAny game that gives fuck about one or the other.

Balance over realism = D&D,
Realism over balance = Harnmaster

Funny that. I take part in a Spanish forum, and one of the most beloved threads is about how much the sorcerer sucks in comparison to a magician.

And I remember, from my times playing OD&D, that the magician at high levels put to shame all other character classes.

Yes, D&D has always been about character balance, but it's an goal it has never fully attained. And I can understand it, it's a really difficult goal.

About Hârnmaster, no criticism comes to my head (it's a game I like), but if I try hard enough, I'll get some. For example, strength hasn't got much influence on the damage a character can deliver.

Ronin, Rifts is not GURPS.

You can play unbalanced systems your whole life, and be happy and healthy. I do so, except when forced to do otherwise. You don´t have to go to extreme ridicolousness in balance like Rifts. Traveller is just as unbalanced.

But they don´t have a point buy system.

What is the purpose of a point buy system?

Please tell me!

Quote from: ClaudiusOf course!! D&D doesn't even try to be realistic. The moment I realized that, I accepted OD&D, AD&D and D&D3 with open arms. D&D is so, asking D&D for realism is like asking a lemon tree for oranges.

To be fair, D&D3.x is realistic in that it is very internally consistant, which is as much as I can really ask for in a game.

Also:

Quote from: RoninIn comparison the bard is a foppish asshat thats not really good for much.

This is mechanically not the case.

Carry on.

Quote from: SettembriniWhat is the purpose of a point buy system?

You're implying that point buy systems are aimed at balancing characters.  In my experience, point buy systems are the easiest to munchkin.  What they give you is an equal opportunity to munchkin.  So in that aspect, they are balanced.

QuoteIn my experience, point buy systems are the easiest to munchkin.  

Because all point buy systems have seen sloppy execution.
I´ll not accept: "It´s always been like that" as an excuse.

Quote from: SettembriniRonin, Rifts is not GURPS.

You can play unbalanced systems your whole life, and be happy and healthy. I do so, except when forced to do otherwise. You don´t have to go to extreme ridicolousness in balance like Rifts. Traveller is just as unbalanced.

But they don´t have a point buy system.

What is the purpose of a point buy system?

Please tell me!

To put together the kind of character that you want. Be it a muchkinized combat monster, or a skilled individual. Or a mix of the two.
To create what you want, with out limiting classes, pigeon holeing you into something.

Why do you need a point buy for that?
You could just write down the numbers you want, if the points aren´t a measure for equality.

Quote from: SettembriniBecause all point buy systems have seen sloppy execution.
I´ll not accept: "It´s always been like that" as an excuse.

I'm just foggy how it's possible to balance a point buy system without the GM or group saying "No".  Show me a point buy system and I'll show you people who have learned to min/max the hell out of it.

QuoteShow me a point buy system and I'll show you people who have learned to min/max the hell out of it.

Which is a data point for my opinion, ain´t it?

Point-buy is really just a granular method of developing characters versus level-and-class based which has typically generated some of your data for you.

Yesterday I didn't answer to this:

Quote from: SettembriniRonin, Rifts is not GURPS.

You can play unbalanced systems your whole life, and be happy and healthy. I do so, except when forced to do otherwise. You don´t have to go to extreme ridicolousness in balance like Rifts. Traveller is just as unbalanced.

But they don´t have a point buy system.

What is the purpose of a point buy system?

Please tell me!

Flexibility.

Quote from: GunslingerYou're implying that point buy systems are aimed at balancing characters.  In my experience, point buy systems are the easiest to munchkin.  What they give you is an equal opportunity to munchkin.  So in that aspect, they are balanced.

No system is immune to munchkining. Point buy systems are easy to munchkin because they are more flexible than other systems.

Is it seriously being said that D&D is heaps hard to munchkin compared to GURPS???

D&D players invented the term, "munchkin". And it wasn't being used to describe players of other systems...

No system's immune to munckining. I learned this when writing one for publication. Defending against munchkins is like defending against burglars - you can't stop the most determined ones, all you can do is to take away the obvious weaknesses and make them really work for it :confused:

*throws hands up in exasperation*

I have come to the conclusion that Settembrini is by far more intelligent and experienced than I am. After all:

• I have absolutely no understanding of how Settembrini is defining "mechanic" or what he means by "data point".
• I'm apparently not proficient enough in English to be able to lace my posts with profanity in order to make my point.
• After playing RPGs in general and D&D in particular for 27 years, and GMing adventures of my own creation at assorted conventions, I have failed to realize that D&D is an accurate reflection of reality.

Quote from: Lord Svengali*throws hands up in exasperation*

I have come to the conclusion that Settembrini is by far more intelligent and experienced than I am. After all:

• I have absolutely no understanding of how Settembrini is defining "mechanic" or what he means by "data point".
• I'm apparently not proficient enough in English to be able to lace my posts with profanity in order to make my point.
• After playing RPGs in general and D&D in particular for 27 years, and GMing adventures of my own creation at assorted conventions, I have failed to realize that D&D is an accurate reflection of reality.

Welcome to theRPGsite :D Once you get used to the random lunacy, is a great place to hang out.

Quote from: SettembriniYou moron.



But GURPS doesn´t fulfill any of it´s alleged niche areas of expertise:

Point buy
Realism

It fails miserably in both.

 Yes, name calling shows how eloquent you are. (wonderful way to welcome people)

 As to those two points??

 I say it succeeds gloriously on both points.
 If all you have been playing games trhat exaggerate reality - then you might have trouble seeing that.

 Its a lot easier to simulate reality with GURPS (If you want to...) than with most other game systems I've seen.  HERO system might get you close, but GURPS is better.

 Again, Settembrini ...if you don't get it - just say so.

- Ed C.

Quote from: ClaudiusNo system is immune to munchkining. Point buy systems are easy to munchkin because they are more flexible than other systems.

Agreed.

Quote from: ClaudiusPoint buy systems are easy to munchkin because they are more flexible than other systems.

*nods agreement and shudders as I remember the sumo wrestler/physicist-turned-luchador that made it into one of my campaigns*

As I said in a similiar post in some other forum :

 GURPS is so flexible that if it was a gymnast, she could have several artistic porn movies centering on her abilities.

 Thats why I LIKE the game system.


- Ed C.

Koltar, only you could/would equate GURPS with porn. :)

Quote from: JimBobOzIs it seriously being said that D&D is heaps hard to munchkin compared to GURPS???

D&D players invented the term, "munchkin". And it wasn't being used to describe players of other systems...

No system's immune to munckining. I learned this when writing one for publication. Defending against munchkins is like defending against burglars - you can't stop the most determined ones, all you can do is to take away the obvious weaknesses and make them really work for it :confused:

Umm, I agree that any system can be munchkinned, but D&D is definitely harder to munchkin than GURPS.  The reason is simple:  Less vectors for min-maxing.

Quote from: Lord SvengaliKoltar, only you could/would equate GURPS with porn. :)

 NOT with porn, but with a  woman.
 Look at the OP , Sett himself says I have a great affection for the game.
 He started the metaphor ....I just went with it.

 The system IS flexible.


- Ed C.

Quote from: RedFoxUmm, I agree that any system can be munchkinned, but D&D is definitely harder to munchkin than GURPS.  The reason is simple:  Less vectors for min-maxing.

Vectors? Ways?

Bollocks. It was D&D players who invented the very term "munchkin." Not GURPS players. GURPS may or may not be easier to munchkin than D&D, but D&D attracts more munchkins to begin with, so it evens out! - No, it doesn't even out - there are proportionally more munchkins in D&D. If even one player munchkins out in a D&D game group, the rest have to, otherwise they'll either be left behind, or the GM offers challenges which are hard for most of the group and easy for the munchkin. GURPS has got a flatter power curve, so it's easier to match challenges to the abilities of the group, even if one guy has munchkined out.

Quote from: Lord Svengali*nods agreement and shudders as I remember the sumo wrestler/physicist-turned-luchador that made it into one of my campaigns*

Wow, made it in?

You mean he wasn't invited?


I want more character's like that!

Quote from: JimBobOzIt was D&D players who invented the very term "munchkin."

That may have been so, but it was GURPS players of my acquaintance who invented the term 'rules-reaming'.

Haha, rules-reaming! :D

Quote from: RedFoxUmm, I agree that any system can be munchkinned, but D&D is definitely harder to munchkin than GURPS.  The reason is simple:  Less vectors for min-maxing.

D&D is relatively easy to munchkin, and for the same reason that Exalted is too, there are lots of options (feats character abilities, magic items) that, although insignificant in themselves (when they're not openly poweful, sometimes they are), produce synergies when combined, leading to powerful combos. D&D3.0 is infamous for this, and let's remember the kobold Pum-Pum.

Quote from: KrakaJakWow, made it in?

You mean he wasn't invited?


I want more character's like that!

The player was invited...but I must not have been paying close enough attention when he submitted his character for approval. One of those "Looks good to me" moments, I guess. I didn't realize that he might be a problem until the character went mano-a-lizard with an allosaurus...and won.

Quote from: Lord SvengaliThe player was invited...but I must not have been paying close enough attention when he submitted his character for approval. One of those "Looks good to me" moments, I guess. I didn't realize that he might be a problem until the character went mano-a-lizard with an allosaurus...and won.

Okay, you've got to explain how that worked.

Quote from: hgjsOkay, you've got to explain how that worked.

It's been about three years since we played that session...but if I remember correctly, it involved the ST 14 character basically crippling the dino's feet/legs with a series of Stamp Kicks and then finishing it off with attacks from behind. He rolled his Dodges well enough that the allosaurus was able to lay claw on him only once, and the damage from that turned out to be minimal (4 points, I believe).

After that, I paid a lot more attention to incoming characters

Game Master Approved or Disapproved.

That is the Ultimate Question

QM

Quote from: TheQuestionManGame Master Approved or Disapproved.

That is the Ultimate Question

QM

:raise:

:what:

Looking over the thread...It appears that many people are okay with GURPS and think it works just fine. Some also appear to like some parts of it and grudgingly admit that .

 Some of the so-called problems appear to be GM /player communication or agreement issues that could happen with ANY game system.

 Also,  as another thread has shown - many people seem to like the gist of the advantages , disadvantages and skills list of GURPS , they just want to tweak it a little.

- Ed C.

Quote from: KoltarSome of the so-called problems appear to be GM /player communication or agreement issues that could happen with ANY game system.

An experienced gamer will take a tool kit game and modify it to their own needs while the inexperienced gamer will suffer with problems because of their inexperience.  Take a game that's focused to help the inexperienced gamer and the experienced gamer will tell you they already do that.  I'm more frustrated that the experienced gamer can't realize the design structure of both styles and incorporate them to the people they are playing with.  The answer is not to search out for people that have similar styles but to find people you enjoy being with and finding something that entertains everybody to keep them coming back.

Quote from: SettembriniThe arrival of Koltar, with his staggering affection for GURPS triggered this thread.

  Oh HELL Yes.

 Just had a customer in the store tonight that reminded me why.  This next will be really shallow  - but I don't give a damn.

 Her name is Christine .

 She is brunette with red tint in her hair. Gorgeous greenish eyes.  she was wearing a skimpy spaghetti-strap tank top.
 If we weren't already debating global warming we'd have yto start - because her smile could melt the icebergs.....

 Any way - you get the idea. Think a young Sandra Bullock with a little bit of Evangeline Lilly in the appearance mix.

 She crouches down to to browse our dice... and says this :

"I just need  three six siders..we're playing GURPS , after all."

 AH!! The Magic words - the other reason she stuck in my memory's recesses from her last visit!! Not only does my temperature rise when she walks into the store  - but she plays  GURPS!!!!!!!

 There is a God!!

...but that God is Loki (or some other god of pranks and mischief)
 Shopping with her - is her boyfriend. And he is pleasant and a nice guy.  (I could TAKE him in a fight- if Only I was a real bastard.)

 So, GURPs is NOT a Joke....and if it is a Joke - then there is at least one DAMN Beautiful participant telling her version of it.

- Ed C.

must...not...post...

Quote from: droogmust...not...post...

I'm very sympathetic to your problem, here.

Quote from: GunslingerAn experienced gamer will take a tool kit game and modify it to their own needs while the inexperienced gamer will suffer with problems because of their inexperience.

Or maybe a experienced gamer will suffer with problems because a "toolkit" game isn't designed very well enough to make running games EASY. If an experienced gamer has to "work with" a game to make it playable, it's a badly designed game.

Why does the above exchange of thoughts make me think of a Jimi Hendrix song that was covered by DEVO?

- Ed C.

Quote from: KrakaJakOr maybe a experienced gamer will suffer with problems because a "toolkit" game isn't designed very well enough to make running games EASY. If an experienced gamer has to "work with" a game to make it playable, it's a badly designed game.

Not at all. For some people part of the fun of GURPS (and HERO, and EABA, and BESM...) is that you've got to work with them. What you see as a bug, I see as a feature.

Quote from: Thanatos02I'm very sympathetic to your problem, here.

Me too.
It´d be badwrong, badwrong indeed.

Quote from: KrakaJakOr maybe a experienced gamer will suffer with problems because a "toolkit" game isn't designed very well enough to make running games EASY. If an experienced gamer has to "work with" a game to make it playable, it's a badly designed game.

As someone who ran a GURPs campaign for a few years, I never felt I had to work with the system to make it playable.

I just had to choose what I was using and what I wasn't.

I don't think it's an ideal system for every genre though, just like I think the other universal systems Ive ran (hero, d20) have their strengths and weaknesses that lend them to certain genre.

But were I to get in the mood for another time travel game, Id likely still do it GURPs.

Its the only game I can think of that has a Kung Fu Fire-breathing Jesus as an illustration in one of its books.

 AND I can actually believe that character could be played in a GURPS campaign.


- Ed C.

Quote from: KoltarIts the only game I can think of that has a Kung Fu Fire-breathing Jesus as an illustration in one of its books.

 AND I can actually believe that character could be played in a GURPS campaign.


- Ed C.

Ok this I have to see, which supplement would it be in?

Quote from: RockViperOk this I have to see, which supplement would it be in?

 Look in GURPS:POWERS for 4th edition GURPS, page 26. The illustration on the lower left hand of the page. The artwork portrays some kind of superpowered team or group of allies. The figure in the foreground in the martial  arts pose that is breathing fire?

 On the SJG forums he has become known as the "Kung Fu Fire Breathing Jesus". Some of us thought of putting him on a T-shirt.

 At one point some people did Filk song lyrics about him in a Country-Western style. Kung-Fu Jesus just screams: "Must have a Country-Western song".

- Ed C.

Thanks for the info.

Quote from: KoltarJust had a customer in the store tonight that reminded me why....brunette with red tint in her hair. Gorgeous greenish eyes.  she was wearing a skimpy spaghetti-strap tank top...her smile could melt the icebergs... ...she plays  GURPS!!!!!!!

I noticed over the years that many of the female gamers that I have known -- including most of the cute ones -- tend to not be as rabidly partisan about the games they play as the guys seem to be. Many of them play AD&D/D&D, of course...it is, after all, the first thing most people think of when they think "role playing game". But nearly all of the ladies that I know who play D&D will also just as readily play other games, from story-based rpgs such as Vampire to crunchy skill-based rpgs like GURPS, and many (especially the cuter ones) actually seem to prefer other games to D&D. Just the ones that I can immediately think of:

• D&D is somewhere between 4th and 6th as my wife's favorite game...after Vampire, GURPS, Traveller and sharing the position with Boot Hill and Gamma World. (D&D's exact position on the list will vary from day to day...)
• One of the ladies in my GURPS campaign DMs a D&D campaign of her own...but only if neither my GURPS campaign nor another friend's Cyberpunk campaign is currently being run and she can't talk either of us into a game of Warhammer 40k.
• My sister, my cousin, and my sister's best friend -- all three former high school and college cheerleaders -- are active in a Dark Conspiracy campaign.
• The girls at the dojo where I used to train played in a Vampire the Masquerade campaign that had a single token male player (me) besides the Storyteller.

All of the ladies listed above rate at least a 7 on the cuteness scale.

Oh yeah...lest someone mistake me for some sort of D&D anti-partisan (or would that be an anti-D&D partisan?), I would like to point out that over the years the D&D has provided us stats for Donald Duck, the Mad Martian, a hamster, and (with a little bit of conversion work) the Lone Ranger. Gotta love a class/level-based game that will do that!

That's why we need d20 GURPS! :haw: Actually, I'm only half-joking. I'd probably buy that. :deflated:

Game combinations that should never be attempted: GURPS Rifts d20. Can you imagine how many books you would need?

Quote from: Lord SvengaliGame combinations that should never be attempted: GURPS Rifts d20. Can you imagine how many books you would need?

 You'd just need ONE book - with some VERY interesting conversion tables in there and 1 of those 3 publishers would have an overly legalistic permission page covering what is allowed and what isn't.

- Ed C.

A sufficiently houseruled GURPS is indistinguishable from RIFTS.

...or so Mr. Clarke  said.

Mr. Clarke never played in my game.

...or Lord Svengali's, or Dar's ....etc.


- Ed C.

I recently contemplated running a GURPS campaign in the Rifts-verse. Then, after about a minute, I decided that attempting to do so would be an exercise in futility, since...
1) I do not possess much in the way of readily-available Rifts material with which to model the Rifts-verse,
2) I've already done something similar with Torg,
3) I'm not interested enough in Rifts to make it worth the effort, and
4) I already have three RPG campaigns running (2 more-or-less weekly and one monthly), as well as an upcoming SCA war for which my household is preparing.

That isn't to say that I would not be interested in looking into it at a later date, when I have the time to do so and have managed to acquire a few of the appropriate books for reference. I even have some players who would probablty be interested in giving it a try. But it is definately a back-burner project...so much so that I don't think it's even in the kitchen at this point.

Well, thanks to this thread I now have YET ANOTHER campaign to plan to run.

Thank you very much. :(


Yup, a good old Gurps book, ultratech, and my collective libarary of madness, all I need.

Hey! Look at that! I have all that already!!!Woot

There is a mechanical difference between roll over & roll under.

Roll under [generally] has a discontinuity where skills approach the maximum on the dice.

i.e. you can get a point where skills cease to change the outcome - eg the difference between 17 & 18 target in GURPS (from my understanding of the rules posted earlier) is negligible.

Also, when skills pass this point such systems seem to run into problems

V.

Quote from: VolkazzThere is a mechanical difference between roll over & roll under.

Roll under [generally] has a discontinuity where skills approach the maximum on the dice.

i.e. you can get a point where skills cease to change the outcome - eg the difference between 17 & 18 target in GURPS (from my understanding of the rules posted earlier) is negligible.

Also, when skills pass this point such systems seem to run into problems

V.

That's just short sighted design, not anything inherent to roll under.

-clash

Quote from: flyingmiceThat's just short sighted design, not anything inherent to roll under.

-clash

Also, there is quite a big point, harder tasks get penalties to your roll, which means that doing something fairly ordinary an 18 skill and a 20 are much of a muchness.  Doing something really incredibly difficult, that 20 is worth having.

Both are incredibly high skills for the system though, so it also doesn't come up much.

In around a decade of running and playing Gurps this was never an issue for my group, it's a classic reader not player criticism that Volkazz is making.

Quote from: BalbinusAlso, there is quite a big point, harder tasks get penalties to your roll, which means that doing something fairly ordinary an 18 skill and a 20 are much of a muchness.  Doing something really incredibly difficult, that 20 is worth having.

Both are incredibly high skills for the system though, so it also doesn't come up much.

In around a decade of running and playing Gurps this was never an issue for my group, it's a classic reader not player criticism that Volkazz is making.

I'm not familiar with GURPS per se, but I am familiar with roll-under systems. That's one of the ways a good designer deals with the situation in question.

BTW - I wasn't saying GURPS wasn't designed well. I was saying that if this is an issue in a game, it's the designer, not the choice of roll-over or roll-under, that's the problem.

-clash

No, I haven't played GURPS, but it was a problem we had with BESM second...

V.

About to tell my group's version of the joke again,..tonight Saturday  May 5th from 5pm to 10pm.

 The players are in the star system of Judice in subsecter District 268...making their way back to Tarsus.

- Ed C.

Quote from: VolkazzNo, I haven't played GURPS, but it was a problem we had with BESM second...

V.

I'm never going to live that down, am I?  

In fairness, WHFRP and Call o' Cthulhus' respective roll-under systems work a lot better IMO.  Though Volkazz and I know someone who breaks them through total flukey dice luck (The man has a 01 to 05 for every occasion).  Having never plaeyd GURPS but looked at it a few years ago, it seemed reasonably playable to me.

I'll stop derailing the thread now.