Fantasy RPG: GURPS or D&D?

[Voadam]

GURPS characters are much more vulnerable.

D&D characters become progressively more powerful at an accelerating rate.

If you want to run a module then D&D.

If you want high magic anime heroism then D&D.

If you want grittier realism and consistent lower power feel then GURPS.

If you want Aragorn charging full into a bunch of orcs and taking them out with Legolas dropping opponents like flies then you want D&D.

If you want to play the hobbits sneaking into Mordor you probably want GURPS.

If you want Gandalf from the books then you might want GURPS.

If you want Gandalf's battle scenes from the movies then you want D&D.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

that can be both a positive and a negative. it's faster, surely, but an NPC with nothing but the four stats, a weapon skill, and some equipment is going to be a bit bland, isn't he? similarly, i could make d20 NPC stats that were nothing more than hit points, an attack bonus, and some equipment and i've have the same amount of detail as your GURPS NPC, in the same amount of time.

Well, of course you can put more effort into it in GURPS if you want to. There are maneuvers - certain "tricks" you can do in combat similar to feats in D&D, but based on skills. There are certain advantages and disadvantages you can give the NPCs to make them more colorful. And there are plenty of options for mages.

But in the end, all these are optional, not hardwired into the system like in D&D. You don't have to give any advantages and maneuvers to NPCs, and in fact, most NPCs likely won't have any of them. But any D&D NPCs will have a number of feats derived from their level and classes, saving throws derived from classes, levels, and ability modifiers, a number of skill points derived from their classes, intelligence modifier, levels...

It's not that the calculations necessary for D&D NPCs are difficult. But there are unfortunately a lot of them. And I tend to feel slightly guilty when I just make up stats for D&D NPCs instead of deriving them in the proper manner.

The rationale for this is that I don't want to "cheat" for NPCs and make them adhere to the same rules that apply to PCs, but I rather suspect that this is a horrible character flaw on my part...

GURPS eases my conscience here - just giving the NPCs arbitrary stats and skills is perfectly legal, as it would be possible to create these exact characters with the point-buy method. The fact that I don't bother counting character points for NPCs is irrelevant.

 

[francisca]

Admittedly I'm an old school d20 guy

That is an oxymoron if I've ever seen one. Kinda hard to be old-school with a system that is just over 3 years old.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

EDIT: D**n double post...

 

[Wombat]

Ummm, I'd choose HarnMaster

or RuneQuest

or Ars Magica

Just personal tastes, but that's where I'd go -- certainly neither GURPS nor D&D on this level.

 

[The Cardinal]

I play and GM both GURPS and D&D - I prefer GURPS for 95% of my games.

Why?
- more character, combat, magic, setting, technology, etc. options


What do I use D&D for?
- ultra-cinematic, power-up, four-color games, inspired by CRPGs and console rpgs.


Example: I've played Midnight d20 and liked it - but then I created a GURPS conversion and *really* liked it. However, for something like Dawnforge I will probably stick to d20.

 

[WizarDru]

I started with the Red Box back in 1980, and then went on AD&D. Then, in 1986, I started playing GURPS. By 1988, we didn't play any other system, and that stayed true until 3e. Since 3e, I have played D&D almost exclusively. My GURPS Fantasy game (which some players have asked me to bring into d20) ran for over 10 years. My GURPS Supers game ran for 8 years. My current D&D game (chronicled in our story hour) has been running for over 3 years.

Both systems have advantages and disadvantages.

First: GURPS and D&D have converged, somewhat. The first thing I thought, when I saw the 3E PHB was "Wow...it's a lot more like GURPS, now." GURPS' biggest strength is it's customizability and flexibility. Don't like the advanced combat rules? Don't use them. Don't like magic? Don't use it. And so on. D&D 3e and 3.5e, doesn't offer as much flexibility, but it offers a much wider player-base and a greater deal of support.

Character advancement varies between the two systems. In D&D characters advance quickly, and become quite powerful at high levels; they become heroes of legend, untouchable by the threats of low levels. GURPS characters advance more laterally, growing in small increments, and while they may become extremely competent, they always will be relatively vulnerable. The range in power is much more condensed, which is a double-edged sword, as it means the PCs are never super-human, but they can also feel like they never truly advance beyond their starting design.

Combat in GURPS can be simplistic or a complicated affair. It allows for much more verisimilitude in body locations, armor factors and the like. You will find much better support for a DEX-based fighter in GURPS, where agile warriors get bonuses to their defense as well. However, GURPS can also degenerate to long series of dice rolls until someone rolls a failure (I specifically recall a rapier duel between two elven princes in my game that ran for a half-hour real-time before someone drew blood). GURPS can be made more heroic...but in the same way that D&D can be made more gritty.

Both systems have excellent support, although D&D's support base is larger and has much more material available. GURPS offers a wide diversity of world settings and many more options for compatability of different options. D&D is much more tightly focused on the fantasy genre, but has excellent support on them.

GURPS offers much better support for a wide range of archetypes, and is much less likely to force you to a particular character design. Want to create Zatoichi the blind swordsman, Frair Tuck or One-armed Jack the Rogue? GURPS makes it much easier. However, GURPS character creation is not more involved than even 3E D&D character creation, and given the system's lethality, this can be off-putting to some (and a boon to others).

Both rules systems have their flaws. The current incarnation of GURPS is over 15 years old, and many feel that it's long overdue for a revision. Both systems have their loopholes, powergamer exploits, vague rules and 'dump stats'. For every 3.5 Trip-cycle, you have a GURPS Eidetic Memory. Each system is an excellent rules set, and each can be used effectively for a variety of ends.

Which do I prefer? D&D. I loved GURPS, but in some ways, it's too mechanical for the variety of fantasy I enjoy. Despite the avowed flexibilty, many characters still end up converging on the same skills and feats, effectively creating 'pseudo-classes'. GURPS even features 'packages' to this end, which are half-feat/half-prestige class. I enjoyed GURPS combat system, but it tended to bog us down, sometimes, as combats could drag on, while in real time, only 5 seconds had passed. The detailed armor, hit-locations and other systems tended to create a great deal more bookkeeping than we enjoy, and the ROI of verisimilitude wasn't worth the perceived lack of fun required to maintain it.

Further, for a fantasy game, we often found that power-levels, relatively, didn't scale well. A competent fighter might become ultra-skilled, but a mage never truly got sincerely more powerful (or indeed, as powerful as most mages from popular fantasy and legend tend to become). Fireballs in GURPS are, for all intents and purposes, wonky arrows.

However, GURPS will serve you just as well for a Fantasy game, if that's your preference. The onus is on what the players and DM/GM enjoy, and what aspects of play are most important to them. GURPS has places where it's verisimilitude can break down as well, but it also is rather nice to know that the barbarian will always be somewhat threatened by orcs...at least orcs with bows, anyhow.

If you have some specific things that do or don't appeal to you, I might be able to tell you which system addresses them better, IMHO.

 

[Tsyr]

Oh, and IMO it is easier to "stat out" enemies in GURPS as well - you just have to give them the four attributes , a weapon skill, and weapons and armor. No fiddling around with feats, other combat-related skills, hit points, class and prestige class abilities, and so on...

It's only slightly harder to do so with D20...

My "cannon fodder" monsters frequently only have the six stats (sometimes only three, depending on what I need them for), three saves, AC, HP, and BAB. Nothing saying you have to make a full statblock for everything. It's not important to me or my players how my goblins get a +5 BAB, only that that's what they have.

 

[troy812]

Don't forget Stormbringer

Smooth combat,
Nice Magic System and don't forget...
Very easy to learn.


T

 

[Azgulor]

I started with the Red Box back in 1980, and then went on AD&D. Then, in 1986, I started playing GURPS. By 1988, we didn't play any other system, and that stayed true until 3e. Since 3e, I have played D&D almost exclusively. My GURPS Fantasy game (which some players have asked me to bring into d20) ran for over 10 years. My GURPS Supers game ran for 8 years. My current D&D game (chronicled in our story hour) has been running for over 3 years.

Both systems have advantages and disadvantages.

First: GURPS and D&D have converged, somewhat. The first thing I thought, when I saw the 3E PHB was "Wow...it's a lot more like GURPS, now." GURPS' biggest strength is it's customizability and flexibility. Don't like the advanced combat rules? Don't use them. Don't like magic? Don't use it. And so on. D&D 3e and 3.5e, doesn't offer as much flexibility, but it offers a much wider player-base and a greater deal of support.

Character advancement varies between the two systems. In D&D characters advance quickly, and become quite powerful at high levels; they become heroes of legend, untouchable by the threats of low levels. GURPS characters advance more laterally, growing in small increments, and while they may become extremely competent, they always will be relatively vulnerable. The range in power is much more condensed, which is a double-edged sword, as it means the PCs are never super-human, but they can also feel like they never truly advance beyond their starting design.

Combat in GURPS can be simplistic or a complicated affair. It allows for much more verisimilitude in body locations, armor factors and the like. You will find much better support for a DEX-based fighter in GURPS, where agile warriors get bonuses to their defense as well. However, GURPS can also degenerate to long series of dice rolls until someone rolls a failure (I specifically recall a rapier duel between two elven princes in my game that ran for a half-hour real-time before someone drew blood). GURPS can be made more heroic...but in the same way that D&D can be made more gritty.

Both systems have excellent support, although D&D's support base is larger and has much more material available. GURPS offers a wide diversity of world settings and many more options for compatability of different options. D&D is much more tightly focused on the fantasy genre, but has excellent support on them.

GURPS offers much better support for a wide range of archetypes, and is much less likely to force you to a particular character design. Want to create Zatoichi the blind swordsman, Frair Tuck or One-armed Jack the Rogue? GURPS makes it much easier. However, GURPS character creation is not more involved than even 3E D&D character creation, and given the system's lethality, this can be off-putting to some (and a boon to others).

Both rules systems have their flaws. The current incarnation of GURPS is over 15 years old, and many feel that it's long overdue for a revision. Both systems have their loopholes, powergamer exploits, vague rules and 'dump stats'. For every 3.5 Trip-cycle, you have a GURPS Eidetic Memory. Each system is an excellent rules set, and each can be used effectively for a variety of ends.

Which do I prefer? D&D. I loved GURPS, but in some ways, it's too mechanical for the variety of fantasy I enjoy. Despite the avowed flexibilty, many characters still end up converging on the same skills and feats, effectively creating 'pseudo-classes'. GURPS even features 'packages' to this end, which are half-feat/half-prestige class. I enjoyed GURPS combat system, but it tended to bog us down, sometimes, as combats could drag on, while in real time, only 5 seconds had passed. The detailed armor, hit-locations and other systems tended to create a great deal more bookkeeping than we enjoy, and the ROI of verisimilitude wasn't worth the perceived lack of fun required to maintain it.

Further, for a fantasy game, we often found that power-levels, relatively, didn't scale well. A competent fighter might become ultra-skilled, but a mage never truly got sincerely more powerful (or indeed, as powerful as most mages from popular fantasy and legend tend to become). Fireballs in GURPS are, for all intents and purposes, wonky arrows.

However, GURPS will serve you just as well for a Fantasy game, if that's your preference. The onus is on what the players and DM/GM enjoy, and what aspects of play are most important to them. GURPS has places where it's verisimilitude can break down as well, but it also is rather nice to know that the barbarian will always be somewhat threatened by orcs...at least orcs with bows, anyhow.

If you have some specific things that do or don't appeal to you, I might be able to tell you which system addresses them better, IMHO.

Thanks for the analysis WizarDru. Probably the biggest appeal of D&D is the HUGE amount of support for it and d20 on the market. Between work, wife, and kid, not having to build from scratch or house-rule everything has a lot of appeal.

My players like a good mix of role-play & combat. Almost every character is "action-oriented" in some fashion. From a play perspective, the biggest benefit that "realism" has provided over the years is fewer debates about ridiculous in-game effects. I rarely encounter such debates when running GURPS. From a player perspective, the vulnerability/threat inherent in GURPS combat keeps the player's tension and excitement high: I get combats that play out more like a movie or novel (wounds & such) and the players seem to have a greater sense of accomplishment when they are victorious.

As far as making D&D more gritty, I did it when I was running AD&D through the use of critical hit tables, thresholds of pain (I guess an early VP/WP type of system), etc. The biggest complaint I had was every wizard had the same spell lists, every fighter used a longsword, <insert your favorite D&D cliche>, etc.

I don't see these problems when I EXAMINE GURPS. However, having never run GURPS for fantasy other than the occasional one-shot, I haven't discovered where GURPS has problems. We've found GURPS combat to be pretty fast-moving and that's using the Advanced Combat system - but it's mostly been Modern or Sci-Fi combat so not a lot of platemail, shields, or swords in the mix. I can see where a duel could take a long time if the participants are of comparable skill and are effective at parrying/blocking.

Taking all of the responses I've received as a whole, GURPS seems to be coming out on top. As a GM/DM, I hate the thought of the campaign stalling if it doesn't click with the players. However, it looks like it's time to just start rolling the dice and see what happens.

I'd like to thank everyone who responded. With gaming time a precious commodity these days, I wanted to make an informed decision without a bunch of trial runs. I think I can do that with the opinions and suggestions you've offered.