From: dunkelza@titan.ucs.umass.edu (KEITH C MCCORMIC)
Newsgroups: rec.games.frp.misc
Subject: Re: Burn, GURPS, BURN!
Date: 22 Jan 1993 12:32:33 -0500
Organization: University of Massachusetts, Amherst
NNTP-Posting-Host: titan.ucs.umass.edu

In article <1993Jan21.174827.10057@news.vanderbilt.edu> talbert@athena.cas.vanderbilt.edu (Robert Talbert) writes:
>In article <2266@blue.cis.pitt.edu> seawasp@vm2.cis.pitt.edu (Sea Wasp) writes:
>
>Well, no superhero game is going to accomodate a sci-fi campaign, or a spy
>campaign, or really anything else besides the genre for which it was created.
>GURPS was created to work in *any* genre equally well. And from my roleplaying
>experience, GURPS and otherwise, it does. The rules in the Basic Set have no
>context for which they are to be applied, eg. the Hero "system", so you can 
>paint the mechanics any particular color you wish. 

  Ahah, since GURPS is designed to work equally well with any genre, and
it sucks at superheroic stuff, it stands to reason that it sucks period.

>Another thing about GURPS is that you can lift stuff from other games and
>translate them into GURPS. What I would do is borrow a friend's Rolemaster
>books and take all the spells that are lacking (I don't think any player of
>mine would bitch about having "only" 450 spells, but...), and stick 'em 
>into GURPS. Presto!

  If I catch anyone doing that to my stuff, I'd be sorely tempted to boot
them out of the multiverse. :)


>It is hard to get an 18 in *any* attribute in GURPS. You have to spend a
>*hell* of a lot of points, or take some god-awful disadvantage. And yes, 
>this is realistic -- 18 on the bell curve for 3d6 would correspond to about
>the upper 2% or something like that. People who are *that* smart (using IN
>for an example) generally *can* do lots of things, that or have serious 
>disadvantages (Stephen Hawking, for example). And generally experience in 
>the field of the particular skill is required to obtain the skill. GM's 
>can earmark character points; for example if a player spends a whole adven-
>ture trying to survive in the jungle, the GM can say "OK, you can only spend
>these character points you got on Jungle Survival skill." It's not like,
>*poof* you're a nuclear physicist or anything.

   However, not all of these people suffer severe disadvantages.  3D6?
Sounds like you are using random roll to explain PA.  And, if you look
at some of our movie stars, you'll see that advantage/disadvantage is
completely unrealistic.  Take Arnold Swarzenegger.  He's Strong, he's
rather intelligent (Dispite jokes to the contrary), many people find him
handsome, and so on.  He's rich, he's popular...  His only real 
disadvantages are his accent and that he's a Republican and the pres is a
Democrat.  These would be what, a coupla a points each?

>In GURPS, in *any* genre, the point costs for attributes are the same! Creating
>Arnold Schwarzenegger will be *difficult*! It's supposed to be that way. Just
>like creating somebody who is *really good* at anything is difficult (in real
>life or in GURPS). 

  You can't create Arnie in a modern earth setting.

>>	The much touted "balance" of GURPS is one of its major flaws.
>>Even in the books and movies that draw us into these games, the main
>>characters weren't all built on the same scale. Some people are lucky
>>and have it all. Others just have some things they do DAMN well.

  Random roll takes care of that.
>
>Yeah, but only in silly movies and books are there characters who can 
>do amazing things without having disadvantages to counterbalance them. 
>This is what the balance part is about -- it's *not* about having every
>character start out on the same level. 

  Or in real life.  Many people do not have disadvantages, merely
advantages.  "Some guys have all the luck.".

>Just how many times have you actually *played* (or ran) GURPS, anyway? 
>
>- Robert

   Who cares.  I wouldn't let people know if I did.

   "Hi, I'm Keith, and I play GURPS."?  I don't think so...

Dunkelzahn