Why Aren't Designers Using The GUMSHOE System?

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I was re-reading Night’s Black Agents by Kenneth Hite and Pelgrane Press for a review for this site, when I was stopped in my reading by what I thought was an important question (which I ask in the headline). Why aren’t more designers making games around the Gumshoe system created by Robin Laws? Robin Laws is a very smart man who thinks a lot about role-playing games. Now, I don’t always agree with where his lines of reasoning take him, as a designer, but that doesn’t take away from the man’s brilliance. I will admit that I wasn’t as impressed with the Gumshoe system at first blush, but as I have put more experience with the system under my belt, that has changed and my appreciation for what Laws did in the rules has grown.

The concept at the heart of Gumshoe is one that has bothered me in a lot of fantasy games that I have run or played over my many years of gaming. That simple phrase: “I search the room.” Forgive my French, but the one thing that I dislike most about RPGs is the tendency towards “pixelbitching.” For those who may not be familiar with this term, it basically applies to having to state that you’re searching every inch of a room and looking out for cracks, crevices and any weirdly discolored patches that you may encounter in the flickering torchlight. It also refers to those “locks” that are pointless mini-puzzle games that require you to figure out the right combination of up-down-up that will unlock a door, or activate device. I hate those things.

One of the central concepts of a Gumshoe game is to get rid of that idea, and let you get to the meat of the scenario at hand. In game design in the 90s, we saw a rise of role-playing games with highly detailed skill systems. Pages and pages and pages of skills, with specialties and sub-skills all detailed. One of the high points of this style of game design would probably be GURPS from Steve Jackson Games. Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t bashing that style of design. I played the heck out of games like GURPS in the 90s. Just about everything that I wanted to play was ported into GURPS via the multitude of supplements that the system had. The problem arose with this school of design in that, while you were still assumed to be creating highly competent characters (at the higher point totals for GURPS characters, at least), the way that the skill systems worked your “highly competent” characters always had a non-trivial chance of failure when a player attempted to do anything.

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As games touting their “realism” became more and more prevalent in the 80s and 90s, this trend for designing skills followed. All of those years of characters trying to do something cool, and instead doing something disappointing. You see this idea made fun of in various D&D memes around the internet, and I think that game design is finally getting around to fixing this idea. Gumshoe isn’t the only one doing this, not by far, but it is one of the only systems that is putting “fixing” investigation in RPGs in the center of the design.

But Gumshoe doesn’t catch the imagination of game designers in the same that Fate or Apocalypse World seems to be doing. I’m not saying that Gumshoe is better than either of those systems, in fact I’m supposed to by playing my first Powered By The Apocalypse game next month. There are always going to be game systems that catch on with designers, and those that get left behind. Gumshoe seems to have a devoted following, and a number of successful games, including the earlier mentioned Night’s Black Agents and Trail of Cthulhu among them. Pelgrane Press has a growing number of Gumshoe powered games, but for a system that has been released under both the OGL and a Creative Commons license it just surprises me that we don’t see more designers chewing on this system for their own worlds, like we do with D20, Fate or Apocalypse World (or any other number of free-to-use game systems out there).
Maybe Pelgrane Press is doing such a good job with their games that designers don’t need to remake the wheel. I know that there was talk of a Ars Magica/Gumshoe mashup at Atlas Games at one point, but I haven’t seen anything about that in a while.

At this point, you’re probably wondering one of two things, maybe even both. First, why does it matter what systems people use? Second, why is Gumshoe so cool?

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The first question has a simple answer for me, and it lies in why I started writing for this site. Diversity in games is always a good thing. I like the idea of having a toolbox of different games, so that I can use the game, or system, that works best with what I want to do. Yes, I can just get a high level of system mastery with one game and use it for everything that I want, but that isn’t really how I roll. You get a different feel for a fantasy world when playing D&D, or when playing Stormbringer, and I like that. I want a game to reflect a world, and I want a world to be a good fit for how the mechanics of a game works. When I play a pulp game with Fate, and one with Troll Lord Games’ wonderful Amazing Adventures, the characters have different feels to them, and how they can interact with their worlds are different. Sometimes those differences are what I am looking for when I run, or play, a game.

Now, why do I like Gumshoe is a more complicated question to answer.

First off, it gets rid of the idea that a competent character has a non-zero chance of failure. That’s a HUGE idea, when you look at the stream of design that hit its height in the 90s (and still shows up at times in more contemporary game designs). If you look at role-playing games from the idea that they are supposed to simulate what you see in the stories/movies/comics that we all read, this brings what happens in a game much closer to what we see in the fictions that we are trying to emulate.

One thing, the “zero to hero” games, which cover a lot of the level-based games out there, most of which draw upon some strain of D&D as their influence, are not a counter argument to why there should be a “whiff” factor in RPG design. You can argue many things about the “heroic journey” of these games, but mostly the idea of them is that your character is on the journey to get to be that competent character. Using a first level D&D character to refute Sherlock Holmes or Tony Stark (sometimes they’re even the same person) isn’t proof that competent characters shouldn’t be doing competent things. It just means that different characters should be able to do different things.

I think that our recent Classic Traveller game would have been more interesting for the players if the game had been designed like Gumshoe. Too many times the momentum of our game was interrupted because a character who should have been able to do some sort of action couldn’t. Definitely not a slam on old school game designs. In most other aspects, the design of Classic Traveller is a hallmark of how simple and elegant older school game mechanics can be. If your idea of fun is overcoming adversity through fumbled dice rolls, then the task resolution of Classic Traveller will be your thing. I just think that, in the case of our group, this held us back in some ways.

So, again, what makes Gumshoe so great? I keep talking about where other games fall down. In a Gumshoe game, characters have what are called Investigative Abilities. But, what does this mean? At the core, the Investigative Abilities in a Gumshoe game let you get to the heart of the matter, because getting a piece of necessary information shouldn’t be dependent on a dice roll. Now, there are still contingencies for getting this information: your character has to be one the scene, they have to have a relevant ability and they have to tell the GM of the game that they are using it. In Night’s Black Agents an example of this is “I use Chemistry to test the blood for silver.” Obviously the character has an important reason to ask this question (perhaps it is a way for people to protect themselves from vampiric attacks, by dousing themselves with silver), and the next step of the characters (and the story) probably hinges on the results. In a game where there are non-zero chances of success, time can be wasted in a game session in rolling the results of this over and over to figure out if the answer given to a character is correct or not. What Gumshoe posits is that, if a character is a chemist, and demonstrates competency in their Chemistry ability, time shouldn’t be wasted in rolling until you get a high enough of a result to be able to tell if the GM is telling the truth or not.

This idea also assumes something important: a role-playing game isn’t a competition between the GM and the players. If the information is important to the story, and the characters have the relevant knowledge, don’t waste time in the reveal. While I’m sure that some gamers have fun with those hours spent in a chemistry lab testing, and retesting blood samples, others would have much more fun getting past the blood tests and getting to the point where they get to fight vampires. I know that I would.

But all of this brings me back to my initial point of this piece. Why aren’t more designers using the Gumshoe rules for their games? Maybe they just aren’t as familiar with the rules, which is entirely possible. But becoming more familiar with these rules is why I wrote over a thousand words for this piece. It does mean that I will, hopefully, have to explain less in my review for Night’s Black Agents, but that is really only secondary. What we see often in gaming writing is people writing what they know, talking about the games that they know and figuring out how to make them fit into other situations. Sometimes, instead of talking about how a screwdriver can be used in different situations, we should talk about why a pair of pliers are also useful.

 

[gribble]

By "expert" you mean someone who has a point in the skill, what another system might call trained in the skill right?
So a gumshoe character turns up at a scene and the player says I use the following skills in which I have a point or more: a, b, c, d, e, f, g what clues do I uncover?
A d20 character turns up at a scene and the player says I am trained in a, b, c, d, e, f, g what do I uncover.

Not really, no. In a d20 system, a character having one rank (or being "trained") in a skill, generally denotes some level of training, but not expertise. That typically requires focus on a skill and/or expenditure of feats (depending on the version of D&D). In 5e, this is a bit less true as training is much more binary, though there are still things like a Rogues "expertise" and feats that differentiate between someone who knows a bit about something and a true expert.

In Gumshoe, training in an Investigative skill represents true expertise, to the level where there is literally no chance for someone to fail to get the important clues in an area of expertise. Again, it models the genre, it doesn't try to simulate "reality". In genre, there really aren't dabblers - you have experts, and you rely on them when it comes to their areas of expertise.

You seem to be completely missing the point. What you propose does a great job at saying "the group will get the core clues, and the experts may get some extra clues" - I don't debate that at all. However, by setting DCs to 0, what you're actually saying is the group will all get the core clues - i.e.: each and every one of them will be able to uncover the core clues and the presence and actions of the experts is irrelevant to whether the group gets the core clues or not.

This is completely different from what Gumshoe does. Yes it is similar in that it also says "the group will get the core clues, and the experts may get some extra clues", but it does this by also saying "the experts, and their presence and actions, are what determines that the group gets the core clues". That is the missing ingredient from your outlined approach for d20. Without that core ingredient, the rolls and skills are completely irrelevant for the core clues. It's all dependent on player actions and not character skill.

And if you try to introduce some dependency on skill, then you necessarily introduce some chance that those skilled characters will fail. Unless you make it dependent on whether or not the character has training (i.e.: at least one rank) in the skill, even if the skill can normally be used untrained. Then you run into a whole new kettle of fish in that some of the party will have no useful investigative skills... (think your 8 Int fighter/barbarian/etc. with 1-3 skill points per level), and hence won't be able to contribute to the investigation at all. Conversely, just by sheer number of skill points rogues and wizards will be the uber characters in the campaign, and the poor fighters/clerics will be relegated to supporting roles. It'll result in very wonky builds, where no-one wants to actually be an expert at anything, and instead would rather spread their skill points around as many different skills as possible, just so they can get a chance to roll. And pity the poor bards, which usually have an ability granting them a bonus to untrained skills... this will be all but unusable in in most investigative scenarios which will now require training, even though logically they should be really good at it. This one "simple" houserule would have a number of knock-on effects.

Now imagine a campaign where a large part of the action is investigation... no thanks, I'll stick to Gumshoe for that sort of campaign.

To get extra info:
The gumshoe player then says I spend a point, do I get more information (they have a limited resource mechanic)
Th d20 character says I roll at +8 and get a 17 do I get more information (they have a chance mechanic)

This bit is different..

I don't think you give the difference enough credit. For Gumshoe, the players get to determine when it is important for them to get additional clues. For d20, it's completely in the hands of chance. This is not only very different for the players, but also for the outcome of the campaign.

It's a bit like saying instead of wizards choosing when they want to cast spells, they *always* have to make a d20 + level + spellcasting stat roll to see if they're able to or not. Certainly makes them feel a lot less like experts, and could have drastic results on the outcome of the campaign (you could easily have a TPK if the wizard failed to cast spells at crucial times, or if the adventure assumed access to certain types of magic and the spellcasting failed).

 

[Umbran]

There are a lot of gamers who actually do try to inject realism (or as much as prudent) in to their games and do not subscribe to the idea that RPGs are an emulation of fiction or narrative.

So, if I don't subscribe to the idea that a Honda Civic is designed to drive on a road, and I take it off-road into the woods, do you think I'll end up with a satisfactory experience?

Whether a particular game is an emulation of something is part of the game design. You don't get to declare that RPGs aren't emulations. You don't even get to declare that RPGs shouldn't be emulations - because you don't rule the world and get to determine what others play. You get to declare that you would prefer not to play or design games that are emulations.

in fact think we're at a point now where games have demonstrated that they work best when they move away from this process of emulation

No, we aren't. Really. Because you cannot say this until you can point to an objective measure of "RPG working well". That is, to significant part, a matter of taste, and there is no measure for that.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

This is completely different from what Gumshoe does. Yes it is similar in that it also says "the group will get the core clues, and the experts may get some extra clues", but it does this by also saying "the experts, and their presence and actions, are what determines that the group gets the core clues".

Out of curiosity, what happens if the expert isn't present? Say, the party split up, and down path A there is totally a clue that any trained botanist would recognize in an instant, but the botanist went down path B? Or what if there isn't even a botanist in the party?

Unless I'm missing something (which is why I'm asking), those seem like pretty obvious failure modes.

 

[werecorpse]

I can see this is futile. You say you can't model expertise in another system and gumshoe has cracked that difficult conceptual nut. Fine. I don't believe it's so hard.

"The experts their presence and action are what determines that the group gets the core clues" -that's the missing ingredient? That isn't modelled? That's the player saying My character has a point in ballistics, chemistry and explosives what clues do I get.

By introducing some dependency on skills you don't have to say there is a chance of failure - the no failure philosophy is IMO the crucial element of the system. No failure can be modelled by just saying if you are an expert in X skill (which I model as being you have a point, 5 ranks, a certain class, a background trait, 50% or more skill, d6 in the skill or whatever your system of choice uses) then you get the clue. It's that simple. It doesn't have to have any knock on effects. Remember the purpose is to give the players the clues - that's what it is all about. That's why the system exists. If you can achieve this in another system you have achieved the goal.

You are right, playing a character with no investigative skills whatsoever in a game revolving around investigation would be less than ideal. But this is a campaign management not game system issue.

I Conceded that there was a difference between rolling to see if you get more detailed clues and being able to choose when to spend the limited resource - it's different. I get that. I don't think it's better or worse. (And your wizard example is off - d20 wizards get some spells that automatically succeed and some that a roll determines success - so do they feel like experts? I reckon they feel more like experts than the guy who can't even cast spells)

I understand that you will stick to gumshoe for investigative scenarios - I will continue to play them in Savage Worlds, BRP and d20 and use the gumshoe philosophy on how to make clues available.

 

[Nagol]

Out of curiosity, what happens if the expert isn't present? Say, the party split up, and down path A there is totally a clue that any trained botanist would recognize in an instant, but the botanist went down path B? Or what if there isn't even a botanist in the party?

Unless I'm missing something (which is why I'm asking), those seem like pretty obvious failure modes.

The advice in Ashen Stars is the GM should consider folding or spindling the scene to allow some other ability to gather the clue.

If the consequence of failure is that a character fails to get a piece of crucial information, success should be automatic provided that the character has the ability in question, and the player thinks to ask for it. (Even at that, you may need to improvise during play if no player steps up to claim the needed clue, bending the details of the scenario so that the same information can be garnered with a different ability, possibly by another player.)

 

[gribble]

Out of curiosity, what happens if the expert isn't present? Say, the party split up, and down path A there is totally a clue that any trained botanist would recognize in an instant, but the botanist went down path B? Or what if there isn't even a botanist in the party?

Unless I'm missing something (which is why I'm asking), those seem like pretty obvious failure modes.

This sort of thing isn't really addressed mechanically, except to say that core clues are typically pretty general information that may apply to more than one skill (and/or may be attainable at more than one scene), and the mechanics encourage a good balance of skills across the group. Much like in D&D you will probably have a hard time if your party doesn't include a cleric (or other leader in 4e), you'll probably have a hard time in Gumshoe if you have a lot of missing investigative skills.

 

[Nagol]

I can see this is futile. You say you can't model expertise in another system and gumshoe has cracked that difficult conceptual nut. Fine. I don't believe it's so hard.

"The experts their presence and action are what determines that the group gets the core clues" -that's the missing ingredient? That isn't modelled? That's the player saying My character has a point in ballistics, chemistry and explosives what clues do I get.

By introducing some dependency on skills you don't have to say there is a chance of failure - the no failure philosophy is IMO the crucial element of the system. No failure can be modelled by just saying if you are an expert in X skill (which I model as being you have a point, 5 ranks, a certain class, a background trait, 50% or more skill, d6 in the skill or whatever your system of choice uses) then you get the clue. It's that simple. It doesn't have to have any knock on effects. Remember the purpose is to give the players the clues - that's what it is all about. That's why the system exists. If you can achieve this in another system you have achieved the goal.

You are right, playing a character with no investigative skills whatsoever in a game revolving around investigation would be less than ideal. But this is a campaign management not game system issue.

I Conceded that there was a difference between rolling to see if you get more detailed clues and being able to choose when to spend the limited resource - it's different. I get that. I don't think it's better or worse. (And your wizard example is off - d20 wizards get some spells that automatically succeed and some that a roll determines success - so do they feel like experts? I reckon they feel more like experts than the guy who can't even cast spells)

I understand that you will stick to gumshoe for investigative scenarios - I will continue to play them in Savage Worlds, BRP and d20 and use the gumshoe philosophy on how to make clues available.

It is easy enough in assign DCs such that an "expert" -- at whatever level you consider expertise starts -- will pick up clues: assign a DC of 1 + (minimum skill to be considered an expert) and a requirement the skill must be trained. An expert will always find a clue; occasionally a hobbyist can succeed as well.

Really, the biggest problem with the d20 system (and most other level gated systems) is that inexperienced characters (with a few exceptions) simply aren't experts.

 

[gribble]

No failure can be modelled by just saying if you are an expert in X skill (which I model as being you have a point, 5 ranks, a certain class, a background trait, 50% or more skill, d6 in the skill or whatever your system of choice uses) then you get the clue. It's that simple. It doesn't have to have any knock on effects.

You are right, playing a character with no investigative skills whatsoever in a game revolving around investigation would be less than ideal. But this is a campaign management not game system issue.

I guess having played and run both systems (including a metric ton of D&D), I just can't agree with your opinion that there is no difference. I can see all sorts of differences. But if you don't, that's fine. Enjoy whichever game(s) you enjoy. I just know that I wouldn't personally use D&D to run a "procedural" campaign. Can you make it work? Sure, but even the relatively simple tweaks you outline I can see having a number of knock on effects, that would IMO have a big effect on the system and campaign. I've outlined a few above.

Why would I try and do that when I have a system that is designed from the ground up to run exactly that sort of campaign?

The "no investigative skills" thing isn't a campaign management issue (unless of course you consider the choice of system part of campaign management, which based on your comment above you don't), it's totally a system issue. D&D is set up to allow characters which have no investigative talent. That's fine, because it's not a system that is designed for telling investigative stories, it's designed for "dungeon crawlin' fools", so any character you can make using the system, without constraints, should be competent for exploring dungeons, fighting monsters and looting their corpses.

Similarly, it is literally *impossible* to make a character in Gunshoe who can't contribute to investigations as well as any other character. It's inherent to the system. Players can make up whatever characters they like, without constraints, and they will be appropriate to play in an investigative campaign, and have a real and meaningful impact on the story and the challenges faced. That simply isn't possible with D&D, without a lot of houserules and careful vetting of character creation and advancement. Again, can you do it effectively enough? Probably, with a bit of effort, but what's the point? If I want to tell that sort of story, I'm much better served by a system which is designed for that sort of story.

And your wizard example is off - d20 wizards get some spells that automatically succeed and some that a roll determines success - so do they feel like experts? I reckon they feel more like experts than the guy who can't even cast spells.

You're confusing the example. I play a lot of D&D, I understand the concept of saving throws and attack rolls for spells. I'm not talking about that - the wizard still has complete freedom to choose an appropriate spell from his repertoire (will saves targeting brutes, fort saves targeting the mages, AoEs targeting the minions, etc). I.e.: he gets the choice of which spells to expend and when.

What I'm talking about is a flat chance that that spell simply wasn't available. Or perhaps a better example would be if, rather than choosing a spell, the caster had to randomly select a prepared spell to cast. I.e.: whether or not he had the ability to bring his powers to bear was dependent on chance, not his choice of which spell to cast. That's the difference between rolling for additional clues or expending resources to choose when to get them.

I can see this is futile. You say you can't model expertise in another system and gumshoe has cracked that difficult conceptual nut. Fine. I don't believe it's so hard.

PS: I didn't say any such thing. What I actually said (really *implied*, but no point in splitting hairs) is that Gumshoe does a really good job of modelling a bunch of investigators, expert in a number of fields, working together to solve a mystery. The d20 system doesn't. Ergo, if you're running that sort of game, the Gumshoe system is a much better choice than d20. So far I've given tons of examples of how the Gumshoe system does this, and tons of counter examples of how the d20 system fails to do it as well (if at all). You're right - this probably is futile.

Ultimately, if you don't like the Gumshoe system, or have a strong preference for the d20 system regardless of the type of campaign/story you're telling, that's fine. That's your opinion and choice, no harm, no foul. I know people like that - hell, I even play with them regularly. You can even twist the d20 system, or constrain your campaign and the choice of the players within it to make it work for a style of campaign it isn't suited to. As long as you're all enjoying that, that's also fine. But please don't come out and say that the Gumshoe system isn't any better suited to that style of campaign than d20. Those kinds of statements are simply not true, at least IME.

 

[werecorpse]

I guess having played and run both systems (including a metric ton of D&D), I just can't agree with your opinion that there is no difference. I can see all sorts of differences. But if you don't, that's fine. Enjoy whichever game(s) you enjoy. I just know that I wouldn't personally use D&D to run a "procedural" campaign. Can you make it work? Sure, but even the relatively simple tweaks you outline I can see having a number of knock on effects, that would IMO have a big effect on the system and campaign. I've outlined a few above.

Why would I try and do that when I have a system that is designed from the ground up to run exactly that sort of campaign?

The "no investigative skills" thing isn't a campaign management issue (unless of course you consider the choice of system part of campaign management, which based on your comment above you don't), it's totally a system issue. D&D is set up to allow characters which have no investigative talent. That's fine, because it's not a system that is designed for telling investigative stories, it's designed for "dungeon crawlin' fools", so any character you can make using the system, without constraints, should be competent for exploring dungeons, fighting monsters and looting their corpses.

Similarly, it is literally *impossible* to make a character in Gunshoe who can't contribute to investigations as well as any other character. It's inherent to the system. Players can make up whatever characters they like, without constraints, and they will be appropriate to play in an investigative campaign, and have a real and meaningful impact on the story and the challenges faced. That simply isn't possible with D&D, without a lot of houserules and careful vetting of character creation and advancement. Again, can you do it effectively enough? Probably, with a bit of effort, but what's the point? If I want to tell that sort of story, I'm much better served by a system which is designed for that sort of story.


You're confusing the example. I play a lot of D&D, I understand the concept of saving throws and attack rolls for spells. I'm not talking about that - the wizard still has complete freedom to choose an appropriate spell from his repertoire (will saves targeting brutes, fort saves targeting the mages, AoEs targeting the minions, etc). I.e.: he gets the choice of which spells to expend and when.

What I'm talking about is a flat chance that that spell simply wasn't available. Or perhaps a better example would be if, rather than choosing a spell, the caster had to randomly select a prepared spell to cast. I.e.: whether or not he had the ability to bring his powers to bear was dependent on chance, not his choice of which spell to cast. That's the difference between rolling for additional clues or expending resources to choose when to get them.


PS: I didn't say any such thing. What I actually said (really *implied*, but no point in splitting hairs) is that Gumshoe does a really good job of modelling a bunch of investigators, expert in a number of fields, working together to solve a mystery. The d20 system doesn't. Ergo, if you're running that sort of game, the Gumshoe system is a much better choice than d20. So far I've given tons of examples of how the Gumshoe system does this, and tons of counter examples of how the d20 system fails to do it as well (if at all). You're right - this probably is futile.

Ultimately, if you don't like the Gumshoe system, or have a strong preference for the d20 system regardless of the type of campaign/story you're telling, that's fine. That's your opinion and choice, no harm, no foul. I know people like that - hell, I even play with them regularly. You can even twist the d20 system, or constrain your campaign and the choice of the players within it to make it work for a style of campaign it isn't suited to. As long as you're all enjoying that, that's also fine. But please don't come out and say that the Gumshoe system isn't any better suited to that style of campaign than d20. Those kinds of statements are simply not true, at least IME.

I find it difficult to respond to your comments, I am not great at cut and paste forum stuff so I am trying to number my responses to address your comments.
1. None of the so called knock on effects to incorporating an auto success investigation method into other systems need exist.
2. You might choose to use the other system with an investigative overlay because you enjoy the other aspects of that system. Equally you might find those other aspects get in the way of your immersion and stick with pure Gumshoe.
3 having or not having investigative skills is IMO campaign management (your bolded absolutes appear as if you beleive you are stating fact). You tell the players this will be an investigative campaign using say D20 or BRP. They design their characters accordingly. Just like you might say this campaign is set on a spaceship, or interacting with royalty while exploring ancient ruins, set in a post apocalyptic New York - all of which they can take on board during character design and advancement.
4. I don't want to focus only on D&D although it is the game I have played the most. IME it can be used for more styles of game than "Dungeon Crawling Fools" but that's up to you.
5. I didn't think in Gumshoe every character must by design be able to contribute as well as every other character. IF they can why does anyone feel special? My experience is that some characters had just chosen the wrong skills - like any other game.
6. I didn't say adding in the auto success into a d20 system won't take a bit of effort, it does. Not much and without any knock on effects IME but it does require a bit of effort.
7. I don't agree that Gumshoe is a much better choice than d20 for running an investigative game- none of your examples established this.
8. Your initial example of the d20 wizard appeared to be to show what it would feel like to not be an expert in d20. This is what I responded to. I don't understand what this example is addressing - that making a "better than basic clue finding system" based on chance rather than on limited resource mechanic is akin to a system where you don't get to choose what spell you use in a particular circumstance? I don't get it.
9 I never said I have a strong preference for d20. I said that the primary element of the gumshoe system can be incorporated into other systems without too much trouble. I have done it.
10. Please don't come out and say that gumshoe is better suited to an investigative style of campaign - oh wait a minute, of course you can its not a fact, its just your opinion. IMO and IME it isn't.

 

[gribble]

I find it difficult to respond to your comments, I am not great at cut and paste forum stuff so I am trying to number my responses to address your comments.

1) Ok, let's pick two examples from the approach you outlined (two examples I gave earlier that have been ignored): your change will encourage players to play rogues and wizards more than fighters and clerics, and your change will encourage players to spread their skill points as thinly as possible. Are you honestly saying that if the players turned up with a D&D party entirely composed of rogues and wizards, and all of them had spread all their skill points out across as many skills as they could, that it wouldn't upset the campaign or the d20 ruleset at all? That you wouldn't have to go through and re-scale all your DCs (because you suddenly had no "experts"), or expect that the party would fail to hit high DCs more often than the system assumes? Or replan combat encounters because you have no tanks or healers in the party? How do you handle the player (we all have one in our groups), who says "I don't care if it's an investigative campaign, I really want to play an 8 Int fighter so I'm going to"?
3) No, in Gumshoe it really isn't. There is no "campaign management" needed. Every PC will have a suitable spread of investigative skills, without any outside management needed. You can't say the same thing about D&D for an investigative campaign. At the very least you need to say to the players "We're going to be playing an investigative campaign, make your characters appropriately", which will (effectively) take a whole swathe of player options off the table. With Gumshoe you just say "make a Gumshoe character" and you can guarantee it'll work and be able to contribute in an investigative campaign. If you don't understand this point, I have to question if you have ever even played Gumshoe, and if you have whether you understood the system.
4) Of course it can - but that is the default campaign mode, what the rules are designed to model, and what they're best at modelling. Just because I *could* run a dungeon crawl with Gumshoe, it doesn't mean I'm under any illusion that it'd be the best system for that type of game, or even that it'd be a good fit for hat type of game (it wouldn't, on both counts).
5) That's like saying "In D&D, I don't think every character should be able to contribute in combat as well as every other character, If they can why does anyone feel special?". It's because although they all contribute *equally* (in terms of impact), they do it in different ways - the fighter by tanking, the wizard by blasting big groups of minions, the rogue by sneak attacking the big bad and the cleric by buffing and healing. It's exactly the same in Gumshoe - just because all characters contribute equally to solving the mystery, it doesn't necessarily follow that they all contribute in the same way. The face talks to people and gathers "human intel", the forensic scientist anaylses the physical evidence, the hacker gathers signals intelligence, and the ex-soldier spots potential hiding places and movements of people. But they all contribute equally (in terms of impact) to solving the mystery.
8) The example was to illustrate the difference between a character being able to choose when to expend effort/resources, vs. being randomly able to do so. Nothing more, and had nothing to do with illustrating expertise. You seemed to think it was a relatively minor thing, but IME it is not.
9) If you think this, then you have misunderstood the "primary element" of the Gumshoe system. Hint: as I've said multiple times, it isn't about the group solving the mystery (or even finding clues) without chance of failure.
10) My position is that a system specifically designed for running investigative campaigns is (shock horror), better for running investigative campaigns than a system that isn't specifically designed for running investigative campaigns (and in fact is designed for very different campaigns). It's hardly a controversial position. You haven't established anything which would make me doubt that position, based on my experience. In fact, all you've done is confirm it.