Major D20 Combat Change: Suggestions?

[Sylrae]

I was thinking, and I think I like the Idea of making some big changes to combat. This would mean some large changes.

Here are the proposed chanes and the reasons why. I don't think I plan on using any published versions of these chages, as I looked and dont like them.

1. Piecemeal Armor Rules: The value of your armor is based on the armor type over each location. Different materials will give a different fractional bonus to your total amount of armor, as well as influencing your armor penalties, Dex-based difficulties, Arcane Spell Failure, and the penalty to your stealth (some armor is noisy from movement). There is a chart I have seen in a LARP rulebook with a genderless dummy covered by various locations, worth armor, based on the materials covering them.

This allows players to create their own armor. Normally, for example, leather armor does not include a helmet. Players could get a helmet. Also, Players could have armor made from different materials. You could have Scalemail on your chest and Leather on your arms.

Perhaps, if more compleity is acceptable, you could have no armor on the joints, meaning no Dex Penalties, and just weight, but some other increased risk for not armoring those places (or, those vulnerable places could just be worth more armor, regardless of materials).

2. Armor as DR: Unlike in UA, Armor will be purely DR (or HP). As it will also be Piecemeal, each location will give a fractional bonus to said DR/HP total. If Armor as HP. This variant may work better. However, touch attacks would ignore Armor HP and go directly to real HP. Things like Constriction Damage, (crushing your armor ON to you), will damage both Armor and Hit Points by the same amount. Generally, magic is goign to be touch-attack based.

3. Static, CON Based Hit Points. Hit points do not go up from level changes. Hit Points go up based on your constitution changing. For Undead, these will be CHA Based, maybe. Monster HPs will also be adjusted accordingly.

Hit Points will represent the damage you can take, not your ability to void damage, that will be placed entirely in your defense bonus.

4. Damage output adjusted to match the new, not-rapidly increasing hit points.

5. Class Defense Bonuses: As characters gain levels, they become more adept at not getting hit. AC will be DB (Defensive Bonus) as it's now related to deflecting attacks, and getting out of the way, and does not represent damage absorbing blows anymore.

6. Arcane Spell Failure: Instead of a flat percentage, it will be a check of some sort, with more modifiers than just armor penalties. It will also include: Carrying Load, Spell Level, Nonproficiency Penalties, but your bonus will increase as you gain levels. (either through skills, or through caster levels.)

Armored Mage class features will give an additional bonus to the roll.

7.
Power Attack: Sacrificing DB for Better chance to hit.
Combat Expertise: Sacrificing Chance to Hit for Better DB.
Acrobatic Charge: Use skills to get around obstacles while charging.

These are now core mechanics anyone can do, not feats.

8. I use fractional BAB, and a different system for Saves that gives similar values without goof ups with multiclassing.

9. I'm working on figuring out something liek the trailblazer caster rules, wherein casters use a single spell table for all their combined levels. It will be different than the trailblazer rules in terms of spells known, spontaneous casting, and spells per day. the table will be more complex, and may actually be a series of tables.

10. I'm dropping the LA system. Playable monsters will have an LA 0 base race, and optional racial levels (which will be of equal power to base classes, and will give all level benefits of a regular class, including the benefits to spellcasting). For pissy GMs, they can force the players to take all the racial levels, instead of having them be optional.

I understand that these major changes involve alot of work. Tell me what you think of the ideas, and I'm open to input. As mentioned, this is a fair chunk of work, and involves things such as altering alot of spells (or at least a rule to convert the damage over) etc.

 

[Celebrim]

My suggestion would be to before making all these changes, just play gurps for 3-5 sessions.

At that point, one of two things will happen. Either you'll embrace the greater realism of GURPS and never look back, or else (and I think this more likely) you begin to realize that at some point increased realism just ceases to be worth it.

But anyway:

1) Fractional bonuses don't really work. Once you prove this to yourself, you'll realize that its much more realistic if you are going to the trouble of having peicemeal armor to have a called shot system. A called shot system does work, but it comes at a huge price - high level play becomes insanely lethal and large monsters are inherently pwned.
2) Armor as DR doesn't work either. The problem is the lack of granularity. What you typically discover is that an armor wearer finds himself always in one of two situations, either he's invincible or else his armor is essentially meaningless. You blow out of the water some of the casual realism available at low level play in D20 with armor as DR. The only way to get armor as DR to work is bigger threat ranges and exploding criticals, which, while realistic also tends to make the game much more lethal.
3) Static hit points give players absolutely no buffer against bad luck. One bad throw kills anyone in the game. About 5 fights into any game, you've got dead PC's. Another 5 fights and you've got a TPK. To resolve this, you have to scale back the challenges, which in turn ends up getting your heroes randomly pwned by a goblin bandit.
4) Which in turn will make the armor as DR problem even worse.
5) The problem with 'not getting hit' is that it has no margin for error. It also doesn't deal with things like falling, area damage (an explosion, a collapsing ceiling, etc.), acid baths or other hazards. Games with armor bonuses and vitality points tend to be very swingy.
6) I think this gets unnecessarily complex. While you can think of any number of factors that should effect pretty much any roll you can imagine, if you are dealing with more than two modifiers your system is probably too complex.
7) I've toyed with this myself. Seems reasonable.
8) Cool.
9) Sounds like alot of work.
10) I'm fine with that. I don't like LA either.

 

[Sylrae]

I looked at gurps, and it looked so clunky I couldnt bring myself to try it. Not just at character creation looking clunky, but the whole game. I'm going for something a tad more realistic than standard d20, but more intuitive than gurps. But for now this is just discussion to try to work out if its feasible and how to best approach it.

But anyway:

1) Hmm. Few things: Are there any decent called shot systems out there? Secondly, mayhaps in conjunction with 2) below, Piecemeal Armor could be a decent concept?

2) We play with exploding criticals, that's nothing new, but not the expanded crit ranges. for the Armor as DR possibility, I was thinking something like soak in oWoD. Wherein the DR is there, but it's variable, as in you roll for it. The other thing I thought of (which would introduce more granularity) > is Armor as HP (which is why I mentioned it). It's the system used in the original Final Fantasy Tactics, as well as in the LARP that gave me the Idea for piecemeal armor. Possibly the fractional bonuses would be less of a problem if I used the Armor as HP Variant too. and with nonscaling HP, Armor would still be useful for giving extra HP.

3) Static hit points would not be used in conjunction with the standard monster manual, or standard spells. Possibly weapons either. Monsters would have ajusted HP and damage output before a game got started.

Additionally, The number of hit points would be CON based. something Like Size+Con Score+Natural Armor type of deal. (that's just a suggestion off the top of my head). (Players would have alot more than 5 hit points., you'd probably get 5+ just for being a medium creature).

4) Essentially, level one damage would stay the same, and damage increase per attack by the level would decrease dramatically. This is why I was thinking either randomized DR, or Armor as Hit Points.

5) Hmm. Maybe if attacks weren't boolean (you can fail by X, and only take partial damage, or something) might alleviate the Dodge or Die issue. For some of the things you mentioned, damage would scale down. for others? Well, a 1000 foot drop is likely to kill you.

6) It could be too complex. The main things I'm thinking:
These add to DC (which starts at 0)
If you wear armor youre not proficient in, you take a +4 penalty like with weapons (won't come up much).
If you wear armor that hinders casting, you take a penalty (each 5% easily converts to a +1.)
If you cast a spell, you add the spell level.
and finally, if youre carrying enough to slow your movement, you cant move effectively (basically a circumstance modifier with only one of a couple values, like, 0, +2, +4, +6)

Since its a caster level check, it gets easier as you gain levels.

Armored mage would provide a bonus to this check, based on what kind of percentage chance it gets rid of.


7) These things always seemed like things everyone should be able to do anyways.

8) Thanks

9) Yeah, but the goal is to make multiclass casters not suck, without giving everyone a huge power boost like trailblazer did to do it.

10) YAY! Down With LA! It's a Poorly Done System!

Admittably, these arent completely uninspired changes
The Hit Points Idea is inspired by Whitewolf's nWoD
The armor is inspired by UnderworldLarp.ca
Damage would obviously need to be scaled down to non-infinite increasingness. As for the 1 Bad luck = death, hopefully damage would be scaled down enough that few things would one-shot you.

I like called shot but have yet to see decent rules for it other than: Let the DM Improvise something, which IIRC was what 3.0 did.

You make a good point with 2) > but what do you think of the Armor as HP Idea?

Your DB could work like Evasion and allow percentage damage (IE Half Damage) depending on how much your DB is beaten by, which would make your dodge bonus more than a boolean value. If something barely hits, that will be reflected in the damage dealt.

The DB Could also be used for things like falling, area damage, etc, with the same premise as having it work evasion-y. Being dunked in acid or lava is generally going to kill you. Maybe the amount of damage it deals will be scaled down too, but if youre submerged in acid or lava, unless you have some crazy immunities or resistances, be prepared to die by it.

9 is obviously trailblazer inspired, but I was thinking of keeping the casters closer to their original states in terms of spell levels and spells per day, and spells known, instead of the trailblazer route. Having caster levels added together and spell slots be more class-independent seems like a good Idea to me though.

Oh, a small number of HP could be gained per level, but it would have to be very small to not mess with the ideas here. Probably better to be based on the above (unless you take a feat for extra hitpoints, or something). Something based on old HDs. I know! Class HP Bonus like BAB
d4: (1)/level
d6: (4/3)/level
d8: (5/3)/level
d10: (2)/level
d12: (7/3)~/level

That equates, at level 20 to:
d4: +20Hp
d6: +26Hp
d8: +33Hp
d10: +40Hp
d12: +46Hp

 

[Ilja]

You should probably play a few test games of Grim'n'Gritty 3.3 before you design this system, as they have certain similarities (armor as DR, near-static hit points, class defense). That way you'll get warned of potential pitfalls and maybe get more inspiriation.

 

[Celebrim]

I looked at gurps, and it looked so clunky I couldnt bring myself to try it. Not just at character creation looking clunky, but the whole game.

That's a fair description. However, I'll warn you ahead of time that if you continue to go down this path of non-abstract mechanics you'll get as clunky as GURPS (or worse). The problem is really simple. The more you try to make your game mechanics match the real world action that you are arbitrating, the more you run up into the problem that the real world is complicated and clunky.

But anyway...

1) Hmm. Few things: Are there any decent called shot systems out there?

Yeah, I could design one and I've seen some other attempts. The problem I ran into designing mine was it was only balanced at low levels. Various problems start to happen with called shots at high levels. One is that D&D likes having big impressive monsters. But big impressive monsters depend on having a huge natural armor bonus and massive reserves of hit points to survive and be consistant challenges. What happens when you can target eyes or feet/locomotion of the monster and cripple it so that afterwards, its just a matter of attrition? And you bring into the game one of GURPS worst combat features - the combat death spiral (after the first blow, the longer the combat goes the less equal it is).

Secondly, mayhaps in conjunction with 2) below, Piecemeal Armor could be a decent concept?

I've seen peicemeal armor systems since OA and none of them really work. If you try to assemble the peices into a single score, you quickly run into a problem. Either the contribution of a single peice is so low that it doesn't contribute anything (which means you have the same AC whether you wear it or not) or else if everything contributes its very easy to create a suit with AC that vastly exceeds what you could do with a single whole suit. If on the other hand, you try to avoid this with a called shot system so that you only have to worry about the attributes of a single peice, you risk a situation were the character is crippled by his weakest peice either because you can kill someone by hitting any unarmored part of him ("I strike his foot and deal lethal damage!") or else you can cripple them by attacking and easily disabling their smallest weakest features ("I cut off his hands!").

We play with exploding criticals, that's nothing new, but not the expanded crit ranges.

Armor as DR works essentially as a filter that makes you immune to 'bad hits', but doesn't protect you much against good hits. The combination of frequent criticals and exploding criticals allows armor as DR to represent something other than invincibility. The first problem with this is that you quickly realize armor as AC accomplishes much the same thing more simply. The second problem with this is that it makes the game more swingy.

for the Armor as DR possibility, I was thinking something like soak in oWoD.

One of my least favorite mechanics of all time, precisely because it works just as I've described armor as DR working.

Random DR does help because you can then reduce the randomness in damage and hense the swinginess, but it comes at the cost of adding another die roll and another bit of variable arithmatic and slowing the game down.

The other thing I thought of (which would introduce more granularity) > is Armor as HP (which is why I mentioned it). It's the system used in the original Final Fantasy Tactics, as well as in the LARP that gave me the Idea for piecemeal armor.

D&D flirted briefly with armor as hitpoints in 1e. I think the real problem with it is that it increases the complexity of the game. Now you have to keep track of not just how how much healing you recieve, but how much healing your armor recieves.

Possibly the fractional bonuses would be less of a problem if I used the Armor as HP Variant too.

Yes, it would, because it would give you granularity that you couldn't have otherwise. Of course, on the other hand, armor has HP also abandons realism, in as much as putting on your gloves protects you from blows to the chest.

3) Static hit points would not be used in conjunction with the standard monster manual, or standard spells. Possibly weapons either. Monsters would have ajusted HP and damage output before a game got started.

I assumed that. Doesn't solve the problem though.

Additionally, The number of hit points would be CON based. something Like Size+Con Score+Natural Armor type of deal. (that's just a suggestion off the top of my head). (Players would have alot more than 5 hit points., you'd probably get 5+ just for being a medium creature).

I'm already doing that. You get 8 hit points just for being a medium creature in my game. It does alot to solve the 'House Cat vs. Commoner' problem (also resolved by the fact that the tiny cat's fine claws do natural nonlethal damage to medium creatures), balances smaller creatures with larger ones (medium is the suckiest size to be in the RAW) and makes low level play more survivable. On the other hand, I'm unhappy now that low level characters can no longer kill each other with single blows barring a lucky critical (they can't even reduce the other to dying, much less instant kill them). When average humans have 11 hit points, suddenly the 1d8 damage from a longsword or arrow no longer seems that threatening. It harms the 'casual realism' of the game at low levels, but it seems a reasonable trade off.

4) Essentially, level one damage would stay the same, and damage increase per attack by the level would decrease dramatically. This is why I was thinking either randomized DR, or Armor as Hit Points.

Doesn't really matter. Let's say your average character has 22 hitpoints - period. Maximum damage for a level 1 arrow is 24. Even if we drastically reduce the damage as level increases, we still quickly overwhelm wound points, with the result of making the game more swingy and deaths occuring more unpredictably. I simply don't believe you can change the game enough to prevent 30 to 50 points of damage in a single from being a regular thing at higher levels.

5) Hmm. Maybe if attacks weren't boolean (you can fail by X, and only take partial damage, or something) might alleviate the Dodge or Die issue. For some of the things you mentioned, damage would scale down. for others? Well, a 1000 foot drop is likely to kill you.

Sure, a degree of success system would solve the problem, but it vastly increases the complexity of your mental calculations at each step and would force you to totally revise half of the games feats and combat subsystems. You'd probably also need to make base hit points a multiple of constitution to compensate. And remember how you were complaining about how clunky GURPS is?

6) It could be too complex. The main things I'm thinking:
These add to DC (which starts at 0)
If you wear armor youre not proficient in, you take a +4 penalty like with weapons (won't come up much).
If you wear armor that hinders casting, you take a penalty (each 5% easily converts to a +1.)
If you cast a spell, you add the spell level.
and finally, if youre carrying enough to slow your movement, you cant move effectively (basically a circumstance modifier with only one of a couple values, like, 0, +2, +4, +6)

Or, you could make some assumptions and just simplify things. If the simplier system produces roughly the same number in the overwhelming number of situations, go with the simplier system even if there isn't an intuitive 1:1 relationship between the number and and the factors that contribute to it anymore.

7) These things always seemed like things everyone should be able to do anyways.

They resolve some problems with high level play at the cost of possibly giving everyone more excuse to do math before attacking.

Oh, a small number of HP could be gained per level

I would recommend that. And defense bonus would almost certainly have to mitigate incidental damage in some fashion, otherwise spellcasters (weak hp progression) would benefit to much compared to fighter types.

 

[Michael Silverbane]

You should probably play a few test games of Grim'n'Gritty 3.3 before you design this system, as they have certain similarities (armor as DR, near-static hit points, class defense). That way you'll get warned of potential pitfalls and maybe get more inspiriation.

I would recommend trying out Ken Hood's Grim & Gritty system, as well.

 

[Celebrim]

I would recommend trying out Ken Hood's Grim & Gritty system, as well.

Ken is absolutely one of the best rules smiths out there - amateur or professional.

If your goals match his goals (and Ken always knows what he's trying to achieve), then something by Ken can be a very good choice.

The question then becomes, "Do your goals match his goals?"

Perhaps the first thing I should have asked the OP is, "What are you trying to achieve?"

 

[Sylrae]

As for what I'm trying to achieve: I'm not so much looking to up the lethality drastically. I suppose my goals are:

1) Have a MUCH smaller power gap between levels. (Players will have more comparable hit point totals between say, level 5 and level 10, to choose two numbers.)
2) Comparable Levels of Lethality to standard D&D, though making low levels more survivable.
3) Allow for Custom built armor to player specifications (without me having to design lots of suits of armor)
4) More cinematic choices for players. I'll probably find more feats/class abilities that I think should be standard combat actions.
5) Make damage mean damage, as opposed to damage meaning youre getting more tired.
6) Not Emulate perfect realism, but just be more direct about whats happening. I get hit, and so I take damage. The damage is actually damage.

What I intend to run with it is an Avatar: The Last Airbender type campaign, with asian weapons, different fighting styles and techniques, and Element Manipulation in combat classes.

Plus, that saves me on making all the monsters and spells converted over before I can run a game. eventually I'd probably use these variants in all my games. Essentially I want something a bit closer to the Storyteller system, but with faster combat, the possibility for tactics, and a doable fantasy game. If I make it d20 based, but have similarities to storyteller, then I can try to get the best of both worlds.

I'm pretty sure Grim n gritty is trying to achieve something else, with more realism and lethality.


-Now For my thoughts.

If you use Piecemeal armor, and everything contributes, then full suits of armor go out the window, and instead you would just have individual armor pieces you would buy. So you could theoretically get more than core D&D armor would give you, but that won't make a big difference when the regular Armor is unavailable.

I quickly noticed flat DR was too big for armor, thas why I proposed the random DR. It is extra math though, and would slow down combat.

Armor as hitpoints makes more sense, I think. And yeah, it adds an extra element to the game.

Now you have to either:
A) Repair your armor.
B) Assume your armor gets healed when you do.
C) Armor regenerates over time.

Those are the three things I see extra in complexity.

It does lack the realism of hits & locations, but Thats a layeer of complexity I don't want to track. I dont want separate pools of Hp for different body parts. That's just painful. Unless I have everything being tracked by a computer for all players and monsters automatically, its too much.

Size+Con Score+Natural Armor
Natural Armor is going to just add hitpoints (though more than the armor was worth most likely).

Yes, something like that. However, I'm in favor of players not dying in one hit. Less realistic, but 1 hit kills just suck, and its more cinematic if they can get hit a couple times.

Say a first level unarmored character has an Average of 22 hit points.
An Armored one, like Double that. At first level, they'll never take more than 16 from one non-critical attack.

Critical attacks will usually do double, which can down an unarmored character doing up to 32 damage. If a critical has an x3, it does up to 52 damage. That's assuming the critical doesn't explode (which we only allow on natural 20s). So criticals are dangerous that way, true. That's also assuming I don't lower basic damage.

Lets assume The Str Bonus doesn't get multiplied. max x2=28, max x3=40

Damage could also be lowered. if x3 Damage gets lowered to max at say, 28 (by scaling down weapon damage)(I'd look at the other elements first and then see if scaling down damage is still as necessary), that will help.

In addition, players bleeding to -Size+Con(Hit points - natural armor), or even bleeding to -hitpoints, with the random chance being turned into a FORT save will help that as well.

I may use Paizo's critical hit decks, which tend to make criticals have secondary effects, instead of doing huge damage. (Like giving someone bleed, or ability damage, etc.)

At High Levels, damage should probably average around 25-30, but by then, the player has gotten 15-35 bonus hit points (level 15), and could still be wearing armor.

Say it was half damage if you beat DB by less than 5.

"Would force you to totally revise half of the games feats and combat subsystems."
ossibly

"You'd probably also need to make base hit points a multiple of constitution to compensate."
Why would I need to do this?

Clunky = bad Yeah, so the goal is to make it a bit more realistic, by HP = damage you can take, but streamline the idea as much as possible. I'm not expecting full realism, just trying to remove the concept of hitpoints = avoiding damage, and armor=avoiding damage.

Spell Failure: I suppose. The main issue is I thought having a % chance of error instead of a check/save was silly and too far from D&D mechanics.

Combat Expertise/Power Attack/Acrobatic Charge
It's just a combat action, that anyone can take. Like Charge, or Grapple. Now you can fight offensively or defensively, and you can make cinematic maneuvers in your turn on a charge.

It should be noted that the game I'm thinking about running these kinds of rules with is a game where most of the oponents will be human, base classes will include Kerrick's Project Phoenix Monk, Mayhaps, a Bo9S Fighter, A Roguey class (probably a merger of many Rogue Classes), and Low Magic. Other classes will be available, but these suggestions here will be the 'core' classes.
So the NPCs will have similar mechanics. Monsters won't need to be revised much before I can start playing, because they simply won't come up as often.

 

[LedZeppelin]

My suggestion would be to before making all these changes, just play gurps for 3-5 sessions.

At that point, one of two things will happen. Either you'll embrace the greater realism of GURPS and never look back, or else (and I think this more likely) you begin to realize that at some point increased realism just ceases to be worth it.

HAHAHAHA.. greater realism of Gurps... had to laugh.

Ok NO offense, really, in a good sense. I'm playing.

First, I am one of those guys who are always trying to change D&D combat rules for more realism and less abstraction. I already use a lot of things the OP mentioned, like armor as Reduction, Defense increases, low HP, etc...

Now, the D&D has the rules the way it is for simplicity sake, it's a game of action, lots of combats, so you the rules must be quick to resolve. Take everything that protects you and add it up, thats your defense. Simple, little abstract but simple and it makes sense. Armor protects you, so it goes in the "defense" part, a good weapon is for attack, so it goes in the "attack" part.

Now, Gurps is really really flawed, I'll get to that.
Gurps uses the 3d6 system, you wanna do something, roll 3d6 under you skill "rank" and you're done. I personally don't like systems like that, where you roll against your own number, it looks like everything is the same, it's all the same difficulty. Now, I know the DM can give bonus/penalties, sure, but for me it's..well.. I can't grasp it, it just doesn't work for me. But.. for some people it works fine and they can see the logic in it. But wait, this is just personal taste, doesn't mean the system is broken. For combat it is.
Here is combat in Gurps:

You attack me, roll 3d6, under your attack skill and you hit. Wait, shouldn't my defense make some difference, how well I can defend myself? Sure, now roll the Defense! Uff.. for a moment there I thought all it took for you to hit something was your own skill, unrelated to what you're hitting. Ok, so I roll 3d6, it's under my defense skill and VOI'LA, I'm fine! Doesn't matter what I am defending against.
Wait, what?
So, i'm a gladiator fighting in an arena, my opponent just scored a hit with his massive double axe. I have a 18 defense skill, as long as I dont roll critical failure (3 6's), I'm ok.
Ok.. what if it's a Dire Gigantic Rhinocerous charging against me? Just roll under your 18 skiill defense and don't worry about it.
Wait wait... there's an Ancient Great Wyrm attacking me with house-sized claws!! He's got like... a 1000 Attack sklll and 230 ST!!!!!! Calm down, you got 17 Defense, don't roll critical failure and you come out without a scratch.
But... theres only 1/216 = 0.46% chance of rolling 3 6's! So, either against a gladiator, a charging rhinocerous or an acient dragon my chances of dodgint are the same??? YEP! You're the Untouchable!, change your character name to Steven Seagal!

That's the enormouse flaw of Gurps, attack and defense are unrelated. Not even the degree of success counts, if it did, would solve everything. Which is strange, because it actually drifts away from the basic mechanic of the game. Every other "skill challenge" in Gurps take into consideration degree of success. So, you may have 20 "ranks" in stealth, but getting past through a Beholder with his 30 ranks ins "perception" might be a little difficult! This is great!
Yes, but the combat system doesn't work that way, unfortunatelly. There is no degree of success.

Now don't even think on suggesting to house rule it! If such a complex and realistic system has an enormous flaw like that, I won't house rule anytnhing, it shows how poorly tought it was.
I really really don't like gurps, i've tried many times to, tried to like it, to tell myself it's a nice system.. but I can't. It's so full of itself "Oh, look at me, I am very realistic and complex, it takes 82473732987487 rolls just to climb a tree with a strong wind". "Oh, I have rules for hair cutting and nail trimming!!"
Yeah, and dodging an axe and a dinosaur is the same....

I do love you all !! lol...

 

[Aus_Snow]

GURPS might not suit your play style or preferences, but it is most certainly more realistic as a system than, say, D&D third edition. Or any other brand of D&D. It's one of the design goals, and - to whatever extent - it has been realised. . . relative to many other RPGs, at any rate. Whatever else can be (and is) said about it, that is.

And uh, it seems you have some rather interesting misconceptions about the mechanics of GURPS, in particular combat. But hey, like I said, maybe it's just not for you. It's all good.

/tj