d20 vs. GURPS?

[Ashrem Bayle]

How does GURPS work with miniatures? Does it require them as much as D&D does?

 

[Committed Hero]

That brings up something important - GURPS uses hexes instead of squares, but miniatures can play the same role in the system (that is, plenty or not at all). You do need to worry about facing and so forth, just as much as in a d20 game.

It is a pretty deadly game, compared to higher level d20 stuff.

Character creation is by definition pretty wide open, so the GM needs to alert players as to what the game will involve and what things will or won't be used. A lot of supplements have templates for starting characters that show you what a bare-bones character in a given role will look like.

You should check out sjgames.com, you can still get the Lite versions of the 3rd & 4th edition rules for free. They switched to the new edition in 2004, cleaning up some of the complexities in the older system, but 80% of the sourcebooks are for 3rd edition.

Another thing to mention is that their historical and genre sourcebooks are the best in the business, good even for d20 and other systems. Some of them have even been required reading for college courses! There are books on just about every interesting historical period (India is the conspicuous exception), and every major style of play (maybe a bit thin on post-apocalyptic). As for licenses, if you like Discworld, Hellboy, David Brin's Uplift Universe, and Conan, they all have GURPS versions; as do games like Blue Planet, Conspiracy X, Mage the Ascension, Vampire the Masquerade, Werewolf the Apocalypse, In Nomine, & Deadlands.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I'm a GURPS-hater- I admit this. However, I DO respect it. Both my hate & respect come from years of gaming with a group of players who loved it, and who occasionally did some playtesting of material.

I generally agree with the discussion of the game's mechanics, above. I just don't like its flavor, and I don't think the system is as flexible as, say, HERO. The game has some scaling issues, for instance, and supplement incompatibility.

To illustrate- a telekinetic PC in Basic GURPS has to invest a LOT of points to become strong enough to lift a bowling ball, for instance. But some of the supplements made becoming a powerful TK rather cheap & easy.

This means that PCs couldn't be easily transported across genre- and thus, judging PC power could be a guessing game. A 100 point PC using one set of supplements could be VASTLY more powerful than one using a different set. I found this to be a serious flaw for a game claiming to be the Generic Universal Role Play System.

That said, the current version, I'm told, has improved many of the issues I had with earlier editions. From what I've seen, its a vast improvement, but I'm still not satisfied.

There is also the main saving grace of the game- the historical sourcebooks. They are some of the best in the entire hobby, and their writers tend to do their research. If you want to set a game in a historical locale, you probably won't find a game with more accurate info for your campaign. Despite my dislike of the system, I own several of the GURPS sourcebooks.

 

[kenobi65]

You do need to worry about facing and so forth, just as much as in a d20 game.

Moreso than in d20, I think. "Stock" d20 games, like D&D, don't have any facing rules (unless you consider flanking to be a derivative of facing). GURPS, OTOH, has very explicit facing rules.

 

[Stormborn]

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.

 

[Ashrem Bayle]

Are there any good websites that feature free downloadable adventures?

 

[Stormborn]

Are there any good websites that feature free downloadable adventures?

Sjgames has GURPS FanPages links (at http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/fanpages.html )that might be a good place to start.

 

[bento]

Another bug-a-boo about GURPs is the length of time it takes to create a character. Any GM that likes to stat out complete NPCs will find GURPS to be daunting in this regard.

I read a thread over on RPG.net where a GM recently threw up his hands and decided to instead just provide bare essential stats for his NPCs. There's also some good discussion about GURPS prep:

http://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?t=277526

A couple of other sources I can think of for the potential GURPS GM is first the SJGames Forum (http://forums.sjgames.com/), and the second is a the trait sorter. I stumbled on the trait sorter a year ago when I was getting info together for players in my one and only GURPS adventure. A GM uses the trait sorter to clarify which skills, advantages and disadvantages are allowed, recommended or forbidden in his/her game. They are long lists, but they get to the point on what YOU allow in a character build.

http://www.sjgames.com/gameaids/gurps/sorter/sorter.cgi

 

[Committed Hero]

You might want to check gurpsnet

 

[Ruland]

I gamemastered GURPS for several years, but I will almost certainly never turn back to it. Keeping players from taking painfully senseless traits was a real headache; if they don't want to hear, you have to decide whether to grudgingly accept their choice or banning them from the game (thus perhaps ending the campaign before it starts); character generation uses up hours on end, and bookkeeping and generally keeping track in combat was exhausting for me as the GM.

No, I changed to d20 and later to Storytelling and are now re-won for d20 by True20, but going to continue with Vampire: the Requiem nonetheless.