You might apply GURPS to play a fantasy campaign , then try a hacker run , then switch to superheroes next . Or you might just have a wizard with a machine gun alongside a psi - mutant cyborg on a Sherman cooler . That ’s the mightiness of GURPS .
GURPS support for Generic Universal RolePlaying System , and maybe it ’s benefited over the years from that vaguely sodding sounding but extremely memorable name . It was first published by Steve Jackson Games in 1986 , with new editions coming out every few years . The most late , fourth version , is still published by Steve Jackson Games .
If you ’re not into RPGs , you might still have heard of GURPS . In 1990 , the GURPS Cyberpunk record book was part of a infamous incident in which the U.S. Secret Service raided Steve Jackson Games , seizing data processor equipment and data file . The reason for the raid was the company ’s association with Lloyd Blankenship , author of GURPS Cyberpunk . Blankenship ran an online BBS service that discussed reckoner civilization , and he ’d consulted with computing machine security experts ( and probably a few hack ) while working on the book . The agents who seized the cyber-terrorist file wereconvinced that it was a real guide to computer put-on .
Now , I ’m going to be totally honest — I ’ve never played GURPS . I ’ve always been intrigued by the idea , mostly by the possibilities for go genres , but I just never incur around to trying this game out . That ’s fine , because I talked to Sean Punch , GURPS line editor , about the plot ’s current edition and all the possibilities ( plus a few limit ) of a universal gaming system .
io9 : GURPS 4th Edition has been around for over ten years now , which seems like incessantly for an variant of a popular RPG these days . What ’s the secret to this variant ’s longevity ?
Sean Punch : GURPSFourth Edition owes its length of service to a combination of factor , the most crucial of which is that SJ Games learns from its successes and failure . While we ’re willing to release new editions when we see that they ’re involve , we prefer not to redo everything from dough . As a result , our games ramp up on premature editions , keeping the good share and growing more solid over time . Here ’s the GURPS - specific version — I suppose you could call it a “ undercover ” — for those who are concerned in the details .
GURPS Third Edition had the largest library of any SJ Games production ever . While that was a good affair on the Earth’s surface , growth was sloppy and direct to more and more rule that were n’t totally compatible or that duplicated effort — the system was like a full-grown pile of roll in some dusty ancient library . When that monumental tower o ’ supplements started to seesaw , we realized that we had to reconcile it all , to consolidate yard of Page of oeuvre . The heap of supplement gave us great deal of great message to pick and choose from . . . but we knew we could n’t put it all in one huge account book !
Since then , we ’ve done our effective to check the first tipple of each new supplement for compatibility with the Basic Set , and not to approve all new subsystem if existing rules could do the job . That ’s my task description , really ! As a termination , Fourth Edition is n’t collapse under the exercising weight of dateless ADHD - ons — the pith continues to knead as a basic biz make on firm creation for gamers who desire only that , while we discharge a steadfast watercourse of completely optional supplementation to keep the system alert and relevant .
io9 : How has the means GURPS handle the idea of being a “ generic ” system change over the eld and through the editions ?
Sean Punch : Mechanically , GURPS started out with a slant toward low - technical school illusion — an unsurprising bias , give the consuming authorization of that genre in RPGs both then and now . For instance , the combat organisation offer a lot more options for whack your opposition with a sword than for shooting them with a torpedo , and early supplement shower far more attention on conjuration and monsters than on technology . The stub to support almost any musical style were always there , and point - build allow the great unwashed to customize closely to personal needs , but there was a systemic diagonal toward elf , knights , and sorcerer .
That situation easy improved as SJ Games bring out GURPS book aimed at other musical style . By the clock time of GURPS Third Edition , it would have been fair to say that there was support for just about any literary genre or style of romp . Still , that was often in a hard - to - find corner of some supplementation — it was n’t in the centre . Fourth Edition make a level playing playing field . It raided the library of earlier editions for rules to support a blanket variety of genres , it updated that content to be more ego - consistent , and it offer the results in their most canonical form right in the BasicSet .
Another mechanically skillful chemise interrelate to this was a change in the rules for designing eccentric . These drifted away from what I ’d call “ set - piece abilities ” and toward custom - designed trait . This did n’t even live in First Edition . It was n’t until Third Edition that you could readily custom - build your character ’s abilities by modifying the introductory building blocks , if you had the right addendum . Fourth Edition allow you do this out of the box , and you could tweak anything that appears on the character sail , if you ’re uncoerced to clothe a little time and energy . I consider this a separate facet because it helps to stick out not only genres ( by appropriate you to create heroes who are a well fit to the genre ) , but also differences in play fashion within a musical genre .
io9 : Of course the cornerstone of GURPS is the power to apply the same rules for any case of game in any musical style or setting . Are there a few setting that GURPS seems to play specially well for ? Did you ever bunk into a genre that really seemed like it would be difficult for GURPS to deal ?
Sean Punch : Though Fourth Edition has shed the bias toward low - technical school fantasy that I mentioned earlier , those stem did n’t go away — we just added funding for other musical genre . Also , definitive fancy is the rife RPG literary genre , so the freelancers who propose and write most GURPS supplements more often than not favor it , whether because that ’s what they like to dally or because they know they ’ll sell more written matter and earn more royal line . therefore , I think GURPS still exercise best in that writing style .
Due to GURPS ’ profound philosophy of starting from realism — that is , because we know and can appraise reality , it works best to start with that and build speculative genres from there — GURPS also works quite well for plot place in the real Earth . Historical and modern - daystories are gentle to tell , and the same goes for activeness , conspiracy , and repugnance variations on those .
send for out difficult genre to cover is knavish , because with enough work , you truly can do anything . When people say , “ GURPS does n’t do disco biscuit , ” what they ’re actually suppose is , “ I ca n’t do X flat out of the boxwood — that take too much effort for my liking . ” Using a definition of “ unmanageable ” that ’s “ requires a circle of work , ” I ’d zero in on two sorting of plot .
First are games where the usual hoagie have a radically different scale or word structure from mankind . By that I do n’t mean androids , rubber - suit foreigner , or nasty hobbitses — I think of behemoth , tiny pixies , or creatures with spare limbs and strange body parts . The character - design organisation is flexible , but its zero - work service line character are humanoids of about human size . A lot of oeuvre is involve if your secret plan needs titans , pixies , or intelligent brute . That last part in special frustrates those who like “ furred ” play .
2nd are games where the focal point is n’t on hero in the usual sentiency at all , but on organisation or domain . We do have rules for cities , pile combat , organization , and other societal phenomenon , but those are brief and biased toward private characters — that is , what you do in the city , how you lead your United States Army or other organisation , and so on . If your setting calls for actually play a power axis , lineage , faction , or whatever rather of an individual , you ’re in for a stack of redundant workplace in GURPS .
io9 : What do you think is the collection of a cosmopolitan RPG system ?
Sean Punch : The ingathering is buying one system rather of several . It ’s the same appeal that a toy like Lego or a pecker like a socket wrench has : you may use it in all variety of way , and youcan total the bits you need without have to pay for the basics over and over again .
That said , there ’s also a small subset of gamers who fuck monkey around for its own sake . For them , an adaptable gunpoint - build system is attractive more because it can be wrick to do all variety of weird and wonderful things than because it ’s a chintzy elbow room to run a wad of fairly ordinarygames .
io9 : What ’s your preferred GURPS anecdote ? Something that hap in a GURPS plot that could n’t have happened with any other system ?
Sean Punch : I ’ve run not one but two campaigns that would n’t have been potential without thedegree of music genre liquidness GURPS whirl .
The first set out out looking like fantasy , but then the Hero memorize that their world was just one of many in a cosmic game where worlds and macrocosm were at stake . They came into striking with some of the forces behind that and finally roll across many setting . I worked in a huge range of a function of hooey , let in a eldritch take on the real populace , Hell , a cyber-terrorist background ( hey , this was a while ago ! ) , space travel , and a few 12 other backgrounds . At one point in time , the player - character radical let in several wizards , a cyborg wraith , a failed ( but not fallen ! ) saint , a shapeshifting alien blob , and a Cold War mad scientist like something from a James Bond movie .
The 2nd started out looking like forward-looking - Clarence Shepard Day Jr. conspiracy with emerging super - powers . As it turned out , the exponent were behind a much big conflict in the galaxy , and metal money with developed ability were doing crazy things with their gifts while combat enemies who did n’t possess such powers and hated those who did . This resulted in an alien intrusion of Earth , withthe heroes using their powers to serve human resistance and ferret out exponent - using collaborators — and at last , things took to the stars . That visit for rules that could handle virtually every kind of superhuman power ever claimed in the legends of any culture , plus musical accompaniment for a broad range of engineering levels .
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