Analysis: Back to GURPS at last...but why?

2016-12-20

Back to GURPS! But why?

First, some background on the lack of GURPS

After almost 3 years of near-weekly GURPSing from 2012-2015, we stopped playing GURPS entirely for about a year. The reasons for that are personal and relate to dreaded Real Life, but suffice to say, it had been a while. I started a GURPS Dark*Matter game around January 2016. It...didn't go well. I tried to use Action templates and didn't fully understand why my players balked at the restrictions. I used Monster Hunters RPM without really understanding the rules. I let a very creative player use RPM for technomagic and maybe accidentally said he could manipulate anything related to matter and energy. Oops.

The game went fine for a while but I was horribly out of practice at GMing and it showed. The game suffered as a result. I simply wasn't ready to jump back in to a game as complex as this one tried to be. Plus we had adjusted or whole gaming schedule and many players were having babies. Not an ideal time. So it fizzled.

Nostalgia and Novelty

So we transitioned to playing the recently released Mutant Chronicles 3rd Edition using the 2d20 System from Modiphius Entertainment. They have done a phenomenal job revitalizing the setting but they did start over with the rules. Unfortunately, the rules turned out not to be a good for for me as a GM. it also took me almost a year to figure this out.

So Why Back to GURPS?

Quite simply, I'm ready again. Actually, that's probably a half-truth at best. In fact I've been giving 2d20 a chance and now it's time is up. The remainder of this post will be about my experiment with a "new age" system and why GURPS just works so much better for me.

What is a "New Age" system?

We are all familiar with the GNS taxonomy (if you aren't, just Google it). For my purposes, a New Age system tries to combine narrativist design concepts with one or both of the remaining concepts described by GNS. In my experience, this leads to disjointed game design.

The 2d20 System

I don't want to make this post all about how I don't care for the 2d20 System. The more interesting discussion is how it's different from GURPS and why that makes such a difference to me.

First, 2d20 System uses something it calls the Threat Pool in each game. In MC3, it's called the Dark Symmetry Pool and it's filled with Dark Symmetry Points. The GM uses the DSPs to make his NPCs effective. Without spending DSPs, the opposition is often entirely ineffective. DSPs are generated when players purchase extra d20s for a DSP each or when a player rolls a natural 20 on any dice used to make a skill check. There are other ways too, but these two are the most common DSP generators for the GM.

How powerful are these DSPs for the GM? Well they can completely turn a fight against the players or turn a weak NPC into a very strong one. The main issue is that the DSP pool sets up a metagame pitting the players against the GM. This would be fine except the system is supposed to be a heroic narrative not a brutal brawl.

A quick example: a PC died because I don't some DSP on an attack. If I hadn't, the fight would have been extremely boring. Instead, a player lost his PC because this game is seriously tilted towards "quick" combat, which can be translated as "unforgiving." Unfortunately, the GM is put in a straitjacket that the system sets up. You can either ignore the DSP pool--which is nearly impossible because it is so integral to the game mechanics--or you can try to make do. I tried for quite a while and found I couldn't just make do.

Why is it a New Age system?

The 2d20 System has a decent core mechanic. Its character generation is strong and it's got serviceable combat rules (if you like highly abstract systems). What ultimately drove me away was the hypocrisy inherent in the DSP mechanic. The GM needs to somehow balance his duties as storyteller and game manager with being a player in his own right. That is really challenging. I'm not even sure it makes sense. The DSP mechanics remind me of board games like Fantasy Flight's Descent or the Mutant Chronicles game Siege of the Citadel But those types of games are meant to be adversarial. In a normal RPG, the players and GM are both acutely aware of the GM's power. Being a good GM is about using that power to craft a fun experience for everyone at the table. But in 2d20 System, the GM must "play" as well as manage. It's a design that doesn't work for me.

A Word on Complexity

A quick shout-out to a friend: GURPS may have a lot of rules, but it doesn't create complexity with needless abstraction. I am finding that many so-called fast-play systems use narrativist elements to "streamline" gameplay but only end up creating an additional layer of often unintuitive abstract gobbledygook. The 2d20 System is quite guilty of this. It uses abstract ammunition weights that break down under ten seconds of critical thought. Its abstract economic system had literally halted gameplay while w try to puzzle out why a PC can't just walk into a store and buy something. And the zone-based range mechanics still make no damn sense.

In the Final Analysis

I'd rather listen to my players tease GURPS for its unnecessarily long skill list than deal with a nonfunctional abstract economic system and variable sized combat measurements (seriously--short range depends on the size of zones not objective length measurements). But more importantly, I'd rather just GM how I've GMd for 20+ years rather than try to figure out an entirely new balance of storytelling, game managing, and playing my own little adverserial mini-game against the players.