GURPS 4th Edition Revised Announced

GURPS is getting a revised 4th edition. Steve Jackson Games has quietly announced a revised version of GURPS current edition, with a focus on cleaning up wording and layout. Announced at Gamehole Con and further detailed in this thread on the Steve Jackson Games server, the revised edition will be fully compatible with all existing 4th edition GURPS material, right down to preserving page references in existing books. There will be rule changes in the form of additions that will be added via addenda, with players able to bring in those rules as they see fit to their existing 4th edition games.

GURPS stands for Generic Universal Role Playing System and is intended to be a rules system that can be used for any kind of story or genre. Steve Jackson has long-hinted that a new edition of GURPS was on the way, although it appears that they opted to keep the current edition rather than rebuild the game or make significant changes to its mechanics.

From DouglasCole on the GURPS forums:

Since the GURPS Fourth Edition Revised monkey is out of the sack:

Zero. It won't be years. Most of the work is already done.

1. By far the biggest differences are major changes to physical layout and design. I'm not sure what SJ leaked at Gamehole Con, so I'm not going to go into detail here beyond saying, "The thing will be easier to use and read." It will not look the same, despite #3 below.

2. It is definitively not GURPS Fifth Edition, or even a GURPS Third Edition to GURPS Fourth Edition-level change! It is a GURPS Third Edition to GURPS Third Edition Revised-level change. It will not make edition-level changes to point costs, modifiers, prices, weights, etc. All rules changes will be additions, in clearly marked addenda "chapters," so that people can easily decide what to retcon into Fourth Edition campaigns.

3. Top priority is to preserve page references so that whether you use the Basic Set, Fourth Edition or Basic Set Fourth Edition Revised, an internal "p. 00" or external "p. B00" points you to the same rule. This brooks little to no rewriting outside of the addenda mentioned in #2.

4. Inasmuch as there is some rewriting, as in #3, it will be to remedy some particularly offensive or unclear passages. Not to change rules!

5+. And other minor stuff while we're at it. The above will inevitably change the size, shape, and location of art and quote boxes, so expect art and quotes to change, too. We'll update the credits to reflect additional material in the addenda, and the creatives who created the revised book. I'm sure there are 100 things like that.

#3 is the single most important element in living up to the promise of compatibility. There are literally millions of page references in 21 years of supplements and articles, not to mention community discussions. Invalidating them would mean a huge slap in the face. But #1 is the main reason to do the thing. So, it isn't a conflict . . . it's a visual upgrade that doesn't insult customers, while still providing both enhanced readability AND some extra "best of" addenda.

I can say without shilling or exaggerating that it is far, far more than a new printing. It just isn't a full edition. There are things between the two. A revision is one of those things. If all a reader cares about is the rules . . . well, there will be lots of addenda, but no, not a full revision. However, lots of readers care about readability, sensitivity, design aesthetics, being aware that it's 21 years later, etc. even if not a single rule changes.

Well, that's it for my needless leaks to follow SJ's leaks, but the takeaways:

• Better, more readable layout with different art and quotes.
• Mostly less controversial words, excepting indefinite pronouns (for economic reasons).
• More than 25 pages of "best of" rules skimmed from 21 years of system growth.
• Incidental glitch cleanup (e.g., mistaken "damage" for "injury," or "than" for "that").
• Promise of NO rules or page-reference changes to maintain total compatibility.

 

[stonehead]

In other respects, sometimes I think the real virtue of point build systems is sometimes missed in these discussions (and there's reasons for that): they aren't always as representative of value as they can be (because as note, value can be so campaign dependent) and sometimes a game is putting a thumb on the scale for reasons that don't seem important to some end users (not everyone is all that pumped about whether a given trait is rare in the genre involved or not), but the one thing they do do is set a finite list on character resources and set it for everyone, so if if players A and B want similar characters, either one of them can get there because there's not character gen mechanics that will allow one but not the other to do it. That doesn't mean a build system as fine gradient as GURPS or Hero is necessarily what you want, but it means even if the value comparisons to cost within the system fail, its still serving a purpose.

IMO, the big advantage of point-buy systems is the greater level of flexibility you get. Not just because you don't have to adhere to one of a finite list of character archetypes, but because you can freely determine their strengths and weaknesses. It's basically impossible to build a modern DnD character who isn't good at combat. If you do manage to build such a character, they'll be basically useless.

In GURPS, you can build a pacifist who hates combat, but still meaningfully contributes to the party in other ways. A side benefit of this is that it allows the game to meaningfully focus on other things.

This can also be a flaw. If the party hyper specializes, they can really destabilize the campaign. You're going to want to use your strengths to solve problems, no matter what the nature of the problem is. The classic example is the guy who spends all 200 points on one huge attack, but lots of abilities fall afoul of this. Teleportation, insubstanciability, jumper can even give you time travel.

---

It's interesting that no one has called out what my friends and I consider the biggest advantage of GURPS, which is the enhancements and limitations. Being able to stack all these modifiers on advantages opens up so much room to be creative. You can make a character who chops off his limbs and uses them as minions, or one who transforms into a magic weapon Soul Eater style, or an astrologer, who gets different abilities based on the current star sign.

The most important question for any system to answer is "When would I pay this instead of other systems?" For GURPS, the answer for us is obviously when we want to play a character who couldn't be built in a different system.

 

[Eyes of Nine]

The thing with GURPS, like most other RPGs, is you need a GM to run the show. If a player tries to take a Disadvantage that's not really a Disadvantage, then the GM should say no, but assuming the player is working in good faith, try to work with them to bring their character concept to the table. I don't remember having big problems with it when I used to play GURPS, but it's a subject I've seen brought up since 3rd edition, and an issue SJG has addressed when people wrote them about it. I'm inclined to think it does happen from time-to-time.

Played in a game where there was no Disad limit and all books and rules were on the table except the Martial Arts cinematic rules (because they "broke" the game lol). One player took it as a challenge to create a PC with the most disads.

Welcome the sentient flying carpet.

And yeah, the GM could have poked the various disads; but the player had solved most of the disads with workarounds. For example, they took "Mute" but the PC had telepathy, etc etc.

IIRC, over 200 points of disads for our 150 (175?) point characters.

 

[Nikosandros]

And yeah, the GM could have poked the various disads; but the player had solved most of the disads with workarounds. For example, they took "Mute" but the PC had telepathy, etc etc.

This is explicitly disallowed:

Negated Disadvantages

You cannot take a disadvantage that one of your advantages would mitigate or negate! For instance, if you have Acute Hearing, you cannot take Hard of Hearing.

 

[MGibster]

Played in a game where there was no Disad limit and all books and rules were on the table except the Martial Arts cinematic rules (because they "broke" the game lol). One player took it as a challenge to create a PC with the most disads.

Back in the 3rd edition days, the example SJG used was not allowing Dwarfism and Gigantism to both be taken.

This is explicitly disallowed:

GURPS is so adaptable it can even break the rule about negated disadvantages. In the Wild Cards sourcebook, there was a character with levels in both Attractive and Unattractive appearance. It was a character named Chrysalis whose skin and flesh were transparent showing off her bones, circulatory system, and muscle.