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Fhaolan
2010-02-26, 11:13 PM
Hi all,

I've got a group starting up a fantasy GURPS game in the next couple of days. Now, a couple of them have played GURPS before, but it was years ago. One of the others has extensive experience in other game systems, but not GURPS. The other two, they're brand new to the system.

They've already made up characters, so the *hard* part is behind them. :smallamused: But I'm a bit leery of dumping them in the deep end of what is effectively a new system to them. So I was going to start them off with the Basic Combat system, and then slowly introduce the more advanced rules. I'm looking for suggestions as to what rules to introduce first, what order to build them up to using the whole system, and any tidbits of advice you care to give for introducing people to GURPS. I've introduced lots of people to RPGs in general over the years, but GURPS only seems to show up when all the players have already learned the system from somewhere else. :smallsmile:

We're using 3rd edition, mainly because the two people who've played GURPS before have that edition and were very uncomfortable with updating to 4th for a variety of reasons. I have all the 4th edition books in PDF form from e23, but they didn't want to go that route until they could get the books themselves. Ah well.

Kiyona
2010-02-27, 03:52 AM
Aargh, I wrote a long, wordy post, and then my computer chrashed. :smallfurious:

Oh well, I will give you the short version. It is probably better anyway. :smallsmile:

GURPS is in my opinion a easy system to get in to, since there are very few limitations. If the group have only played DnD-like games it might help to tell them that they have much greater freedom. Pretty much anything they can think of, even in battle, they can TRY to do. Maybe throw in a NPC in the first battle just to give them an idea of what they can do.

As for in what order to bring up combat rules, I can tell you how my DM did it. He simply threw us into the campaign, and told us how to do the things we came up with. In other words, the combat rules came up in the order we were using them. If we were to slow in coming up with something, say aiming at specific body parts, he would have an enemy do it, and we would get curios and try it out. It worked wonders in our group, since we have way to low atttention span for him to have just told us the rules before the session started. As long as everyone in the group have roleplayed before I dont think it will be a problem. :smallsmile:

Hm, I think this was all... bah, it got long and wordy still. Keeping it short is not my strong point it seems.

Unwitting Pawn
2010-02-27, 11:55 AM
Kiyona's advice about introducing the rules as the players decide they want to try things out is a good one, IMO. To a certain extent that's how it worked when I first GM'd our tabletop game.

Giving advice on specific rules is harder for me, as I don't know GURPS 3e that well - I have several books but have only ever played 4e. What I will say is that although the 'realistic' rules can be introduced largely as and when the players show an interest in trying those things, you will have to plan ahead for those rules which are 'cinematic'. In fact, you will have to decide where the line between those lies, unless 3e clearly sets that in stone (4e appears quite fluid on that point, leaving it for GM to determine). Much of this depends on the playstyle and 'feel' that you and your players want from the campaign/setting, of course. Those decisions are important though, and go with the GM allowing/disallowing certain traits. This is because it can influence the value of certain traits, if the gameworld 'physics' work differently to player expectation at the time the PC was designed.

As for the 4e vs 3e debate, I would say that you should consider using whatever you as GM prefer, as you'll be doing the brunt of the work. Although it can help if the players have (and know) the rules, my players don't have the books and we seem to get by fine.