d20 vs. GURPS?

[Dannyalcatraz]

<carbon copy of Eosin the Red's post> except that I probably hate GURPS more than Eosin does.

I still buy certain supplements, though!

I'm glad you found what you were looking for. If I may be so bold, let me suggest:

1) pick up things like the Martial Arts books- you'll find them quite useful for more exotic PCs.

2) start a thread about finding other good supplements for a GURPS fantasy campaign- there are a lot of people on these boards who know the system very well (Jürgen Hübert?).

 

[Twowolves]

If I may be so bold...

So I ran my first "play test" of D&D 3.5....

And I LOVED it. I generated a "fighter", a "rogue", and a "wizard" at 5th level each. Myself and one of my players pit them against three goblin warriors and two hobgoblins warriors. The goblins were about 1st level, and the hobgoblins about 3rd.

It was great. First round resulted in a one shot instant kill from the rogue character's crossbow. He rolled a natural 20, then rolled to confirm! 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, drawing an attack of opportunity. Disabling shot,(doing exactly the same ammount of damage as he had hp), the DM described it as if he sliced through the hobgob's knee. The hobgoblin crippled, the mage had a chance to get to a safe location and cast 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 EN World, we were able to get running pretty quickly.

All kidding aside, I'm glad you have found what you were looking for. Different strokes for differnt folks and all.

 

[Max]

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.

Well said.

 

[Acid_crash]

I'm a Gurps fan over D&D, but for a starting GM (like myself as I am just getting into Gurps as well) I am finding that it does require a whole lot more prep time to get a game going, or at least it feels that way since I've been playing D&D since 3.0 came out. So, 5 years plus D&D, just got Gurps 3 months ago, and my head is still reeling a bit.

That said, I love this system. But, like some others have said, it takes a while to learn what to allow somebody and what to say no too. The options are there, and sure enough some players will pick something stupid just because its in the book (and its these same players that argue for something to have even if its on the NO list).

My biggest leap frog of an issue is the creation of my own templates. For you gurps folks who have played for a while, do you like templates, and how do you create them for your games?

Thanks for the links above, they are a big help.

 

[Ashrem Bayle]

If I may be so bold...

All kidding aside, I'm glad you have found what you were looking for. Different strokes for differnt folks and all.

Hardy har har
Yeah, I know the end results aren't too different, by I like how GURPS handles things. Less of it it is up to the DM's descriptions, and more power is put into the hands of the players. For instance, the shot to the knee above. In D&D, it requires the fighter to kill the hobgob in one hit to protect the wizard. In GURPS, it was just a called shot to the leg. The hobgob lived, but the wizard was protected.

Sure, a 5th level fighter can take down a typical hobgob in one hit, but these were of roughly equal power. It'd be like a 5th level fighter dropping a 3rd level hobgob fighter in one hit. Possible? Sure. As likely as a crippled leg in GURPS? No way.

I like that. It's more tactical.

 

[StanTheMan]

My biggest leap frog of an issue is the creation of my own templates. For you gurps folks who have played for a while, do you like templates, and how do you create them for your games?

Thanks for the links above, they are a big help.

I'm a big GURPS fan who has recently started to read d20 stuff (in this case, Modern, Future, and Past, natch). Templates are a good thing, especially as it speeds up character generation, or lets you give the PCs stuff you think they need. For example, I did a Constantine-esque/Cyberpunk thing, with the PCs as members of a "Department 7." I gave everyone a "basic training" template, and then a "standard implant" template for things and cyberware all members are required to have. This speeded up things greatly and let them concentrate on the weird stuff they wanted.

 

[mcrow]

Something else that needs to be mentioned is that while GURPS has some of the best source books of all time (I,like others, use them for all kinds of things) they have few adventures as such. A subscription to Pyramid over at SJGames.com can provide some, but GURPS is a much more labor intinsive effort for the GM if you are used to using a lot of ready made adventures.

Yeah, I don't play gurps but I have a bunch of GURPS books. I really like the ones by Pulver, but they are all pretty good. They have a lot of stuff in them that can be applied to any system.

 

[DungeonMaester]

I guess this is a great spot to plug Rifts.

Rifts does use something like the d20 system, but it is unlike d20.

In Rifts:

-You get 'melees' which are like standard actions but you can choose to use them for attacking, spell casting or movements

-Have a more 'active' system of fighitng that allows players to Dodge, parry or roll with the punch

-Have access to different types of casting rather than one style for all classes

-Have 'Mega Damage' which allows players to do lots of damage even at low levels

-Has Check and balances for all casses to protect them from mega damage

-A balanced fight system that makes K'Oing or 1 shot killing or called shots simple but fair.

-A unconvetional class sytem where you gain all the features at once rather than level by level.

-A compresive skill sytem that gives a player fexiblity in defining his character rather then the easily broken point buy system.

Sub features of the skill list:

-Only way for players to increase ability scores.
-Only way for players to increasue bonuses on attacks
-Makes to Pc of the same class almost compltely different!

Also, its the coolest logo ever

Sorry for any typos in adavnce.

---Rusty