This being the Internet, there are a lot of people around who argue about stuff. the community of RPG players is no different, and I would imagine it's probably more intense than most in terms of emotional investment because games are little nuggets of pure joy in an otherwise crap world of strife. So, the fights that we have as a community tend to be very passionate.
Right now, I don't think there's a game system as a whole that's more divisive than Fate. (Note that I'm not calling it FATE, because it's not an acronym or initialism of anything, as GURPS is.) Opinions on it tend to gravitate toward the extremes--either it's the fantastically innovative pinnacle of the RPG form, or it's the worst example yet of a mechanical mockery of what RPGs are. I don't know, insert your own hyperbole here.
Personally, having run a game Fate, I will say I don't really like it.
Let me start off with some caveats: I know that a lot of people play Fate and they really like it. I tend to be an open-minded guy, so I am open to the possibility that maybe I was just doing a horrible job GMing the game. I have also heard that some prefer to play Fate Accelerated Edition to Fate Core, which was the version I was running. Again, I'm going to point out that I'm forming my judgments with relatively little experience. I've also not played any Fate games that are heavily intertwined with settings, such as The Dresden Files or Atomic Robo. So it may be possible for me to like Fate, but I'm not going to run a game any time soon.
I ended up starting a campaign that was a story of a group of carnival freak show performers in a steampunk setting; think Victorian-era continental Europe. We played about four or five sessions before I realized that Fate was killing the game. I took the characters and re-built them in GURPS, which was the system we used for the remainder of the campaign.
Let's start with the good part about Fate. When I played Pathfinder and other such games, we tended to build our individual characters and then throw them together with little consideration for each other apart from their function. You know the lines. Who is the healer, who is the "tank," etc. This type of mentality is the first step in a game where you are running a glorified stat block as opposed to an actual character.
Fate forces you to come to the table for an introductory session that plans how the campaign is going to go: GM and characters alike. I knew that I wanted the characters to be members of a freak show, but those were my only conditions. My agenda was otherwise blank, and so we arrived at the steampunk fantasy idea after going around the table and talking about what we all thought would be fun. By our establishment of the Aspects (capitalized to emphasize I'm talking about the Fate mechanic) of the world, I also got a big cue as to what flavor the game was going to have. I realize that any old RPG can have this collaboration session, but Fate incorporating it into the rule book really emphasizes how player consensus is crucial to a campaign's success.
What's even more awesome about Fate is the character creation. The first task you are given is to come up with your High Concept, your essence, your defining phrase. In Fate, you are not just a Rogue, you are a Daring Swashbuckler of Venice, an Infamous Cutpurse, or a Disgraced Turncoat. Because the mechanics depend on descriptive but flexible Aspects, you get a lot more character definition. The same is true of your Trouble, a secondary Aspect that defines your downside. Flawed characters are interesting characters, and even if a character is seemingly perfect, everyone struggles with something.
In order for the game to even function, Fate demands that the characters be fleshed out. This fleshing out ensures that you're not just consulting your array of numbers and modifiers that you just so happen call a character.
As if that weren't enough to generate characters that were more interesting than 90% of D&D characters out there, Fate then calls for the Phase Trio (a name I dislike because it sounds way too ambiguous and theoretical). Essentially, each player comes up with three bits of backstory--at the table alongside everyone else. The first bit starts to establish each individual character's history, but the second and third are stories where the other characters are involved. As a result, the beginning of the actual campaign sees a group of characters that are all interconnected in some fashion. They don't have to form your standard D&D Trope Party, but you likewise don't have a collection of individual lone wolves, either.
(Then there's a whole bunch of skill crap and stuff, which is the remainder of character creation, but I've already addressed the best part.)
I think that the preliminary session of this campaign was one of the greatest, because we already had a good sense of who the characters were going to be as the game progressed. The only downside I can see to this approach is that sometimes I like to ease into a character concept and let it develop over a span of play sessions. Of course, the danger is that the character will forever remain a faceless amalgamation of statistics, which has happened far too often throughout RPG history.
What I got from Fate is the realization that in some form or another, I should approach game creation and character creation from a standpoint of open-endedness and collaboration. There is no reason to come to the table with a game prepared only to discover that no one's interested in playing, and there's no reason that the players have to be a bunch of randos who meet in a tavern.
Next time, I'll discuss what happened when our Fate game got going, and why I had to switch systems. Until then, does anyone read this? Comment if you do.
Showing posts with label GURPS. Show all posts
Showing posts with label GURPS. Show all posts
Saturday, January 9, 2016
Wednesday, December 30, 2015
System Synopsis: GURPS
So I figured I would periodically go through and offer my opinions on different gaming systems out there. This is the first attempt, so we'll see how this goes.
It took me a long time after getting my first roleplaying game books to end up running my first campaign. Despite starting my RPG life by consuming the AD&D 2E books, my first game used Steve Jackson Games' Generic Universal Roleplaying System, or GURPS.
GURPS has been around since the 1980s and is now in its 4th edition. The system does not feature classes or levels. Instead, you're allowed a certain number of points with which to build your character. Virtually every mechanic in the game boils down to a either a skill check or, less commonly, an ability check. In either case, roll 3d6, apply any modifiers, and succeed if you're at or below your character's skill level or ability score.
With such a simple mechanic at its core, the game flows remarkably smoothly. All that is needed is the occasional reference to your character sheet (or notes, if you're the GM) to determine what the roll's target number is.
The potential failure point is when you have to establish the roll's modifier. Often, the case of no modifier is reserved for your average adventuring scenario. (You know, a thief picks a lock in a dungeon.) Players get a bonus for something being easy or low-stress, and a penalty for something being difficult or rushed.
For example, a gun attack is a check against your gun skill, with an additional modifier based on how many yards away your target is. Add another modifier if your target is moving (the modifier depends on its speed), and then another if, say, it's nighttime. It's for this reason that when I GM GURPS, I typically hand-wave modifiers based on how difficult the attempted action "feels" to me.
Additionally, the base target numbers of your skill levels are sometimes a pain to determine due to the math involved at character creation. Fortunately, GURPS Character Sheet is a free software package that will let you build characters with the right point-buy costs, and print everything out to your character sheet.
Some would consider that combat also has an advantage over D&D and similar systems. Rather than Armor Class being the catch-all statistic of how difficult something is to hit, your character has active defenses (dodge and parry, for example), and armor simply takes away a set amount of the damage that's dealt to you. Others would argue that these factors, while more realistic of how combat works, are unnecessary and bog down the combat experience.
In conclusion, I do believe that for any game I wish to run, I could use GURPS if I wanted to. Its default flavor is one of realism, and all the deadliness and grit that that implies. There are also many other ways, outlined in the GURPS material itself, to incorporate certain optional rules and disregard others to tweak the flavor of the game - make it more "cinematic" or "heroic," for example. But all these require up-front preparation on the GM's part. Once the game is underway, though, it's usually a breeze.
As for me, however, I'm something of a game system junkie. I like playing around with different games to see what they have to offer, and choosing a game to run based on what sort of experiences I've come to expect from them, whether I've had those experiences myself, or heard how others have experienced them, or consumed various actual play recordings on the internet. For me, GURPS will be a reliable standby, but usually ignored while I try out everything the wide world of gaming has to offer.
Pros:
One Game to Play Them All - GURPS was designed to be able to handle any genre of game. It doesn't matter whether you want a Western, Medieval Fantasy, Space travel, or whatever. GURPS has some way to accommodate it.
Simplicity through Uniformity - As I mentioned above, there is one simple mechanic with a few exceptions. Roll 3d6 and get under a specified target number. (By the way, the game uses d6's and nothing else. If you're a fan of polyhedrals, this is not your game.) With the simplicity of the underlying game mechanics, you can quickly get past the system and get to telling the story. The system is quite capable of getting out of the way and fading into the background.
Tons of Support - Got a question on how something works? The SJGames forum is incredibly active. If diving right into GURPS seems too intimidating, The Mook has a very informative website, particularly his New To GURPS Series
Cons:
The Reputation - Those who have heard of GURPS but have not played it have probably heard that it was terribly complex. It certainly can be if the GM tries to use all the optional rules. It's better to read How to be a GURPS GM and figure out what kind of game you want to run first. Odds are, things aren't going to be as complicated as GURPS' dreaded reputation would imply. Nevertheless, you might have a hard time convincing some potential players.
Misconceptions about Options - There are a lot of options presented to GURPS players. But just because there's a character point value associated with having an extra limb doesn't mean that your character gets to have one. The GM needs to clear everything to make sure the character concept fits in the game s/he is trying to run. I think it's crucial that the character concepts be determined first, and only then should you start shopping for Skills, Advantages, and Disadvantages.
Time Investment - GURPS can handle any game fairly well, but it will take some time to determine which rules will be used, and to build player characters for the game. The more you want to tweak the feel of the game, the more you're going to have to play around with incorporating the optional rules. If I want to play a specific type of game, I'm honestly most inclined to try a game system that's specifically designed for that type of game than start assembling the system together from the wonderful toolkit that is GURPS.
It took me a long time after getting my first roleplaying game books to end up running my first campaign. Despite starting my RPG life by consuming the AD&D 2E books, my first game used Steve Jackson Games' Generic Universal Roleplaying System, or GURPS.
GURPS has been around since the 1980s and is now in its 4th edition. The system does not feature classes or levels. Instead, you're allowed a certain number of points with which to build your character. Virtually every mechanic in the game boils down to a either a skill check or, less commonly, an ability check. In either case, roll 3d6, apply any modifiers, and succeed if you're at or below your character's skill level or ability score.
With such a simple mechanic at its core, the game flows remarkably smoothly. All that is needed is the occasional reference to your character sheet (or notes, if you're the GM) to determine what the roll's target number is.
The potential failure point is when you have to establish the roll's modifier. Often, the case of no modifier is reserved for your average adventuring scenario. (You know, a thief picks a lock in a dungeon.) Players get a bonus for something being easy or low-stress, and a penalty for something being difficult or rushed.
For example, a gun attack is a check against your gun skill, with an additional modifier based on how many yards away your target is. Add another modifier if your target is moving (the modifier depends on its speed), and then another if, say, it's nighttime. It's for this reason that when I GM GURPS, I typically hand-wave modifiers based on how difficult the attempted action "feels" to me.
Additionally, the base target numbers of your skill levels are sometimes a pain to determine due to the math involved at character creation. Fortunately, GURPS Character Sheet is a free software package that will let you build characters with the right point-buy costs, and print everything out to your character sheet.
Some would consider that combat also has an advantage over D&D and similar systems. Rather than Armor Class being the catch-all statistic of how difficult something is to hit, your character has active defenses (dodge and parry, for example), and armor simply takes away a set amount of the damage that's dealt to you. Others would argue that these factors, while more realistic of how combat works, are unnecessary and bog down the combat experience.
In conclusion, I do believe that for any game I wish to run, I could use GURPS if I wanted to. Its default flavor is one of realism, and all the deadliness and grit that that implies. There are also many other ways, outlined in the GURPS material itself, to incorporate certain optional rules and disregard others to tweak the flavor of the game - make it more "cinematic" or "heroic," for example. But all these require up-front preparation on the GM's part. Once the game is underway, though, it's usually a breeze.
As for me, however, I'm something of a game system junkie. I like playing around with different games to see what they have to offer, and choosing a game to run based on what sort of experiences I've come to expect from them, whether I've had those experiences myself, or heard how others have experienced them, or consumed various actual play recordings on the internet. For me, GURPS will be a reliable standby, but usually ignored while I try out everything the wide world of gaming has to offer.
Pros:
One Game to Play Them All - GURPS was designed to be able to handle any genre of game. It doesn't matter whether you want a Western, Medieval Fantasy, Space travel, or whatever. GURPS has some way to accommodate it.
Simplicity through Uniformity - As I mentioned above, there is one simple mechanic with a few exceptions. Roll 3d6 and get under a specified target number. (By the way, the game uses d6's and nothing else. If you're a fan of polyhedrals, this is not your game.) With the simplicity of the underlying game mechanics, you can quickly get past the system and get to telling the story. The system is quite capable of getting out of the way and fading into the background.
Tons of Support - Got a question on how something works? The SJGames forum is incredibly active. If diving right into GURPS seems too intimidating, The Mook has a very informative website, particularly his New To GURPS Series
Cons:
The Reputation - Those who have heard of GURPS but have not played it have probably heard that it was terribly complex. It certainly can be if the GM tries to use all the optional rules. It's better to read How to be a GURPS GM and figure out what kind of game you want to run first. Odds are, things aren't going to be as complicated as GURPS' dreaded reputation would imply. Nevertheless, you might have a hard time convincing some potential players.
Misconceptions about Options - There are a lot of options presented to GURPS players. But just because there's a character point value associated with having an extra limb doesn't mean that your character gets to have one. The GM needs to clear everything to make sure the character concept fits in the game s/he is trying to run. I think it's crucial that the character concepts be determined first, and only then should you start shopping for Skills, Advantages, and Disadvantages.
Time Investment - GURPS can handle any game fairly well, but it will take some time to determine which rules will be used, and to build player characters for the game. The more you want to tweak the feel of the game, the more you're going to have to play around with incorporating the optional rules. If I want to play a specific type of game, I'm honestly most inclined to try a game system that's specifically designed for that type of game than start assembling the system together from the wonderful toolkit that is GURPS.
Thursday, December 24, 2015
A Level 0 Blogger Appears
Here we go, another blog. At least this time, I've chosen a subject that's not only got my attention, but seems to be holding it for quite some time—tabletop roleplaying games (RPGs). I've written about other stuff that hasn't held my interest as much (baseball), as well as my other passions like photography and chess. However, photography is a giant investment of both time and money, so my involvement occasionally wanes. I am on a long dry spell at the moment, especially since I want to focus on large-format portraiture, which only amplifies the amount of time and money involved. As for chess, I'm just not good enough at it to write with any authority.
The subject of RPGs, however, seems to be a topic that's well-suited to me. I'm naturally a creative person, and I've been involved with them in some manner since the mid-1990's, when I had a copy of the black-border AD&D 2nd Edition Dungeon Master Guide (TSR 2160).
Now, when I say I had a copy of the DMG, I mean just that. I didn't have a copy of the Player's Handbook or the Monstrous Manual because I didn't know I needed anything else to play. In fact, I didn't have any friends to play with either, so it was mostly me sitting at the kitchen table many evenings eating a bowl of cereal and flipping through the book, admiring the artwork and concocting adventures in my head.
Actually, my childhood was not entirely devoid of gaming. I also had the 1991 Black Box set, and I ran my grandma through Zanzer's Dungeon. Or at least the first few rooms of it. She was confused, but a good sport from what I can recall.
Anyway, I didn't get into a real gaming group until college, and that was over AOL Instant Messenger. (Yeah, remember when all that was happening?) With only two exceptions (plus a convention), all my gaming has been online. It's great to have a game, but nothing beats that at-the-table experience. On a side note, please get in touch if the list of games below interests you and you live in or around Ann Arbor, Michigan.
My hope for this blog is to explore topics related to tabletop RPGs, as well as share my thoughts. I've done print publications (zines) for my photography work, and I'd like to explore a more traditional-style zine with my zeal for RPGs. What's encouraging is that the OSR (old-school renaissance) community seems to be quite active in this area. I'm hoping to get a lot of support, if I can think up enough content for such an endeavor. If that sort of thing goes well, I would eventually like to self-publish an adventure or even a series of them. If I sell them online, I could make tens of dollars if enough people like them!
Alright, this has gone on long enough. I wanted to conclude with a list of my RPG pedigree, so to speak, because it will give you an idea of what sorts of games I am likely to talk about on this blog, or at least what I'm fond of at its outset.
Games I've run:
The subject of RPGs, however, seems to be a topic that's well-suited to me. I'm naturally a creative person, and I've been involved with them in some manner since the mid-1990's, when I had a copy of the black-border AD&D 2nd Edition Dungeon Master Guide (TSR 2160).
Now, when I say I had a copy of the DMG, I mean just that. I didn't have a copy of the Player's Handbook or the Monstrous Manual because I didn't know I needed anything else to play. In fact, I didn't have any friends to play with either, so it was mostly me sitting at the kitchen table many evenings eating a bowl of cereal and flipping through the book, admiring the artwork and concocting adventures in my head.
Actually, my childhood was not entirely devoid of gaming. I also had the 1991 Black Box set, and I ran my grandma through Zanzer's Dungeon. Or at least the first few rooms of it. She was confused, but a good sport from what I can recall.
Anyway, I didn't get into a real gaming group until college, and that was over AOL Instant Messenger. (Yeah, remember when all that was happening?) With only two exceptions (plus a convention), all my gaming has been online. It's great to have a game, but nothing beats that at-the-table experience. On a side note, please get in touch if the list of games below interests you and you live in or around Ann Arbor, Michigan.
My hope for this blog is to explore topics related to tabletop RPGs, as well as share my thoughts. I've done print publications (zines) for my photography work, and I'd like to explore a more traditional-style zine with my zeal for RPGs. What's encouraging is that the OSR (old-school renaissance) community seems to be quite active in this area. I'm hoping to get a lot of support, if I can think up enough content for such an endeavor. If that sort of thing goes well, I would eventually like to self-publish an adventure or even a series of them. If I sell them online, I could make tens of dollars if enough people like them!
Alright, this has gone on long enough. I wanted to conclude with a list of my RPG pedigree, so to speak, because it will give you an idea of what sorts of games I am likely to talk about on this blog, or at least what I'm fond of at its outset.
Games I've run:
- Fate Core/GURPS: Easily my most successful campaign, and the only one I've run in person. PCs are members of a travelling carnival freak show in a Steampunk pseudo-Europe. Lasted about 10 sessions before I had to move to start my career. We started in Fate Core, but switched to GURPS after I formed the opinion that Fate was too intrusive on the gameplay.
- Traveller: Online, and only two sessions deep (not counting character generation). Originally intended to be a gritty sandbox, but I learned that sandboxes aren't the easiest things to get off the ground. Needs work before resuming if I ever want to revisit it. (Which may or may not happen because I don't like sci-fi as an RPG genre, I've discovered.)
- Dogs in the Vineyard: Evening-slot con game at UCon 2015. Pretty well-received, it seemed. Never seen such intense roleplaying and player-on-player conflict.
- Legend of the Five Rings: Con game one-shot (Legacy of Disaster) at UCon 2015. Also well-received, albeit with a much different flavor than the DitV game.
- Lamentations of the Flame Princess - gritty system based on B/X, with a heavy focus on weird fiction and horror. I am thinking of making an adventure or campaign set in 1500s Germany during the Protestant Reformation.
- Legend of the Five Rings - One of the players of the aforementioned Legacy of Disaster one-shot expressed interest in a campaign. The L5R system is one that I've wanted to run for a long time, but haven't explored aggressively.
- Dungeon Crawl Classics - A fun game that highlights the more off-the-wall elements of the OSR genre. Huge online community makes this a very interesting and fun game. Not sure a campaign would be the best fit, but it's a system that's got my attention.
- D&D B/X or RC - I am waiting on a custom printing of the Rules Cyclopedia to arrive. I will digest it at leisure and may eventually want to run a loose game based on its rules.
- D&D 5E (ongoing campaign) - Fun game that's much better than Pathfinder/3.5. Still not sure if it's far enough removed from said system for me to want to run it, though. Our GM is awesome and that fact may be hiding potential system flaws.
- Palladium Fantasy 1E (ongoing campaign) - My first Hex Crawl sandbox game. Very old-school feel, although I'm not sure whether or not I like the skill system yet. The game itself really grabs me though.
- Dungeon Crawl Classics - A handful of adventures at a bookstore in Lansing, with a really fun group. Cementing my affection for anything you could call OSR.
- Dungeon World - Very well-run one-shot game that features a very transparent rules system. Has me interested in PbtA games.
- GURPS Horror - First game with my weekly online gaming crew. Although I joined halfway through, it was great because it wrapped up a nice little story arc.
- Pathfinder - interesting campaign with interesting ideas fell apart because it's Pathfinder. We also had a group that was bordering on the too-large (7 people)
- Swords and Wizardry - Con game one-shot. OSR system, but not enough info to determine whether I would like it, especially since I think there were a few house rulings going on.
- Call of Cthulhu - Two con game one-shots. Futility and despair in a crunchy candy shell. Not sure I like it. Feels too much like a haunted funhouse ride because what are you going to do, punch Yog-Sothoth?
- 13th Age - One-shot con game with a D&D-turned-free-form feel. What Pathfinder could have been.
- Star Wars FFG - Various one-shots at conventions. Neat die mechanic, but far too crunchy a system for me. I'm done with feats or anything that looks like them.
See you for the first real post later on.
-D.
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