d20 vs. GURPS?

[schroederlance]

I've also found that the more GURPS books you buy, the more precarious it is to make characters as the wealth of options becomes overwhelming and you're never quite sure what's b0rken until you actually see it in play, which is usually much too late.

Pretty much like D&D 3.5 with all the feats, spells, classes, etc...

In my experience, GURPS is no more overwhelming than any other well supported game system.

 

[Laslo Tremaine]

GURPS Lite.
http://e23.sjgames.com/item.html?id=SJG02-0004

A good sample adventure.
http://e23.sjgames.com/item.html?id=SJG82-0020

Both are free downloads...

 

[Laslo Tremaine]

I should probably elaborate.

I've played GURPS off and on ever since Melee and Wizard (the Metagame micro-games that are its spiritual ancestors).

I have never been satisfied with it. The crunch factor is much too high for me (and this is coming from an ex-Champions fan boy).

4th edition seems to have addressed a number of my concerns with the system, but if I were to run it in the future, I would use the full books for character generation and just stick with the light rules for actual game-play.

 

[Turanil]

character generation uses up hours on end, and bookkeeping and generally keeping track in combat was exhausting for me as the GM.

Ah! The reason for which I myself abandoned D&D3.5/d20M, and went to Savage Worlds, C&C and True20 instead.

 

[Eternal Knot Games]

I like GURPS, it may be a bit more work but is alot more flexible than D&D.

 

[JRRNeiklot]

I like Gurps in principle, but in practice, I can't stand it. One Second combat rounds blows. I draw my sword. I move 5 feet. And the combat system can get monotonous. I hit, no he made his defense roll, you miss. I prefer my to hit roll being actually a to hit roll.

I love the character creation system, just don't like the combat system.

 

[Silver Moon]

GURPS has some of the best source books of all time

I second that nomination! I would highly recommend that you pick up the GURPS source books for whatever setting you wish to game with regardless of the system you are using just for the source information. The only exception to that would be the western book, where Sidewinder: Recoiled is the definative gaming source book regardless of the western system you are using.

 

[Twowolves]

I have no knowledge of 4th ed, but I do own 1st-3rd. Some reasons I'll never run a GURPS game:

1 second rounds: Seriously, if you use an axe, half of your actions will be "ready weapon". How fun!

3d6 task resolution: This gives a bell shaped curve. As a result, a modifier of "+1" will either swing your chance of success by around 10% if your skill is around 10-11 to as little as 1-2% if your skill is around 17 or 18. A +1 therefore means vastly different things depending on your ability, which is just weird.

point buy: Yeah, it's more flexible, but it's also prone to making one-trick ponies.

Overly complex rules: Roll to hit, roll defense, roll damage, subtract armor rating, multiply by 1.5 if the attack is piercing.... etc etc. And that's ONE SECOND of melee. Phoenix Command musta rubbed off on SJ.

Now, having said that, since the rules use inches, feet, pounds, etc, all the sourcebook "crunch" is written in such a way that converting them to other systems is pretty easy, which is good because the sourcebooks are almost universally excellent.

 

[Eosin the Red]

I am a HERO boy, but since GURPs is a spiritual twin I frequently find myself perusing their supplements for cool stuff that is generally compatible with HERO.

Here is my take:
Detailed point build games tend to require a greater upfront commitment to build your character. Something akin to starting a d20 game with characters at 18th level ~ there are so many things to consider and to weight. Some people get lost in the openness and find the process so frustrating that they would prefer to jam toothpicks in their eyes. I find it pretty easy but have been doing it about 15 years. It is gonna depend on your players and yourself.

GURPs is less open than HERO when it comes to magic but the tools are in place to design a magic system to suit your desires. This is probably a plus.

Combat is less about standing and beating and more strategic minded - like a war game. Again, some are going to dislike this aspect. I have only played GURPs half-a-dozen times so I am no authority on its combat engine. I remember it being a little deadlier than what I was used to at the normal end.

GURPs has an industry wide reputation for producing some of the best written, best researched supplements in the market.

I imagine that GURPs, like Hero lends itself to cannabalizing cool ideas. All RPGs are useful to me as a Hero gamer since the system is designed to to "build things" rather than fill slots (levels, classes, feats, spells). This is a huge bonus to me since I can take a d20 world and easily bridge the aspects I like into the system and ignore those that I don't like.

Overall, I think GURPs is a great choice for an ongoing campaign but not until you try out a few play tests. Snatch a few characters off the net and run the game a handfull of times before you lock into the campaign game or you will find yourself with some wonky builds and crippled characters (in d20 terms, the players may not initially see what is wrong with taking a level of monk, ranger, barbarian, and an EL race when their concept is to become the baddest Druid in the land).

 

[Ashrem Bayle]

So I ran my first "play test" of GURPS....

And I LOVED it. I generated a "warrior", a "rogue", and a "mage" at 175 points each. Myself and one of my players pit them against three goblin warriors and two hobgoblins warriors. The goblins were created with about 90 points, and the hobgoblins had about 110.

It was great. First round resulted in a one shot instant kill from the rogue character's crossbow. Crossbow bolt to the head of one of the goblins. Instant death. It took a little while to get used to things. We had to look up almost everything every round for the first three or four rounds. After that, things started to go pretty fast. Of note, the mage tended to roll pretty badly, so he didn't get to shine. The warrior saved him from a charging hobgoblin by slashing at his legs as he ran by. Crippling shot, sliced through the hobgob's knee. The hobgoblin crippled, the mage had a chance to get to a safe location and build up a fireball that was used to finish off the last enemy.

All in all, it was pretty complex at first, but with a good character sheet and some combat cards downloaded from the GURPS website, we were able to get running pretty quickly.

The biggest issue was the fact that I had misunderstood how hit points work. I had incorrectly assumed that they worked like D&D, below zero hit points, you were pretty much out. WRONG! We had one hobgoblin on his feet and fighting at -30 something hit points. I hadn't expected that from the system. Just goes to show you how dangerous preconceived notions from D&D can be.

Myself and my player really liked it, and it looks like GURPS will be our system of choice for a while. I've been looking for somthing more realistic for a while, and this seems to be it.