Script: What's the point of martial arts styles?

Script: What's the point of martial arts styles?

Another transcript of a video that answers a question that can frequently been seen asked online.

Galactic Havoc: Psychotronics and TL

Galactic Havoc: Psychotronics and TL

As I mentioned in the setting design goals and overview (no, I haven't abandoned it, I'm just doing some other stuff as well), supernatural powers, including psionics, will exist in the setting. Psychotronic devices that emulate or otherwise affect psionic powers are described in GURPS Ultra-Tech and GURPS Psi-Tech, but they are not assigned to any TL - they are just listed as TL^. Splitting them between different tech levels will allow us to create civilizations that have more advanced psychotronics than others or less advanced, which is a good thing, in my opinion.

Script: Different Gravity in GURPS

Script: Different Gravity in GURPS

Another video transcript, this time about gravity rules.

Script: Age in GURPS

Script: Age in GURPS

Lifespan and age is not just background information in GURPS – your lifespan is something you can extend or shorten with certain traits, and your age is also something that you can alter with some advantages. So, let’s talk about the ageing mechanics in GURPS.

My Pyramid Recommendations

My Pyramid Recommendations

If you’re new to GURPS, you might not even know that aside from the main GURPS book line there was, and sort of still is, the line of Pyramid magazines, just like how D&D had Dragon Magazine and Dungeon Magazine. There are four volumes, but volumes 1 and 2 were written for the older editions of GURPS. I haven’t actually read them, I’ve only seen some sample articles that are available on the SJGames website, but it seems that many of them can be easily adapted to the fourth edition of GURPS. Volume 3 is made for the fourth edition and contains 122 issues, plus two compilation releases. Volume 4 also is made for the fourth edition. It was released as part of two kickstarter campaigns in 2021 and 2022 and at this point contains only 6 issues. There is still a lot of material there, and finding something among more than a hundred of issues can be a daunting task even for me. In this post, I will go over the issues and point out articles that have been useful or interesting to me. But you should always keep in mind that GURPS is a generic system and that everyone plays differently, so something that I deemed useless might still be of great use for you.

Sorcery: Create Implausible Material

Sorcery: Create Implausible Material

GURPS Dungeon Fantasy 8: Treasure Tables and GURPS Dungeon Fantasy Treasures 1: Glittering Prizes have introduced the concept of implausible materials, such as solidified lightning, fire, sky, night, and anything else. While you can find such items, your players might ask you a question such as "How were they made? I want to make something like that too." So, let's make a sorcery spell that creates such materials.

Training Animal in GURPS

Training Animal in GURPS

There are many fantasy character archetypes that deal with animals – druids, rangers, hunters, beastmasters from D&D and Pathfinder have animal companions that follow them around. Spellcasters might have familiars, and paladins and cavaliers have their special mounts. I usually treated such animal companions as exceptional Allies bought at character creation. However, there are rules in GURPS Basic Set about buying animals for money, and such skills as Animal Handling may give an opportunity to train such animals or to tame wild animals. Even though the rules are present, they are not very detailed and were not expanded anywhere, and I haven’t even found much in terms of fan works online. So, I will have to do it myself.

GURPS Treasure Generator v0.1

GURPS Treasure Generator v0.1

GURPS Dungeon Fantasy 8: Treasure Tables is an excellent book, isn't it? The only thing that is wrong with it is that it cannot be expanded or changed in any way. So, I had to create a tool for my own use. This is not DF8 as a software, this is something totally different, don't sue me.

Sorcery: Serpentine Spells

Sorcery: Serpentine Spells

Serpents of Legends has arrived to the backers of the Nightmare Fuel campaign, and it's yet another amazing book that has interesting monsters and new rules for serpentine creatures. For example, now you have proper rules for snakes coiling into the "turret mode." Aside from that, there are some new spells. Let's convert them to sorcery! They were... not easy to build with advantages.

Galactic Havoc: Solar Federation Weaponry

Galactic Havoc: Solar Federation Weaponry

What is important in military sci-fi? Weapons are. Creating an arsenal of weapons is a daunting task, especially when you are just starting out. Instead of creating it from scratch, I will cannibalize a weapon set that I made for my previous sci-fi setting and change some names and numbers around. I might need to make some extra description adjustments later. This way, I will have a baseline that I can use to make weapon sets for other factions that, if my intentions come to fruition, will give them a distinct feel.

When looking at this arsenal, you might have some questions, such as "Why are there TL9 weapons?" or "Why are there LC3 and LC4 weapons there?" Space is unfathomably huge, and development is not uniform. On backwater worlds, you might have people using TL9 arms. In the same way, military sci-fi is not always about pitched battles between two armies - you may have rebels using civilian weaponry to overthrow a tyrannical government, or planetary defense forces armed with whatever they could've gotten their hands on. I think leaving these "underpowered" weapons in the set is a good idea.

P.S. Formatting tables on this "new and improved" blogspot is a huge pain in the ass. Just like formatting anything else. Yes, I'm still mad years after the "update".

Script: Aerial Combat in GURPS

Script: Aerial Combat in GURPS

Another video transcript.

Sorcery: New Spell Variants

Sorcery: New Spell Variants

Three new spells for the sake of completionism - aquatic versions of Create Servant and Create Warrior (suggested in Pyramid #4-4) and Create Animated Plant (from Garden of Evil).

Review: Garden of Evil (or how to write a good monster)

Review: Garden of Evil (or how to write a good monster)

Not that long ago, Gaming Ballistic held the Nightmare Fuel kickstarter campaign for three bestiaries for DFRPG. So, I would like to review one of them – Garden of Evil. I do not know if or when the books will be available for purchase outside of the backing campaign, but I hope that they will be. Anyway, this is going to be not just a review, but also a rant on how to make a good monster.