Psi Wars:"Lady" Leylana Grey 1.0

We have two combat characters, now we need a space princess, only GURPS Space doesn't have space princesses.  A spy is more interesting anyway, so we'll make a femme fatale super-spy.

"Lady" Leylana Grey, Super Spy

Drawn into Darkness by Tara Phillips

Attributes

ST 10 [00]
DX 12 [40]
IQ 12 [40]
HT 10 [00]

Secondary Characteristics

Dmg 1d-2/1d; BL 20 lbs; HP 12 [4]; Will 12 [0]; Per 13 [5]; FP 10 [0]; Basic Speed 5.25 [0]; Basic Move 5 [0]

Advantages

Security Clearance [5]
Photographic memory [5]
Social Chameleon [5]
Indomitable [15]
Smooth Operator +1 [15]
Hard to Kill +2 [4]
Status +3 [15]
Honest Face [1]
Attractive [4]
Luck [15]
Combat Reflexes [15]

Disadvantages

Duty (Agency, 12 or less) [-10]
Curious (12 or less) [-5]
Overconfidence (12 or less) [-5]
Secret (Undercover Agent) [-20]

Skills

Area Knowledge (Capital World) IQ+2 [4]-14
Current Affairs (High Society) IQ+2 [4]-14
Law (Galactic) IQ [4]-12
Acting IQ+3* [8]-15
Beam Weapons (Pistol) DX+1 [2]-13
Detect Lies Per [4]-13
Diplomacy IQ+1* [4]-13
Intelligence Analysis IQ [4]-12
Expert Skill (Political Science) IQ [4]-12
Computer Operation IQ [1]-12
First Aid IQ [1]-12
Savoir-Faire (High Society) IQ+1* [1]-13
Fast-Draw (Pistol) DX+1* [1]-13
Judo DX [4]-12
Disguise IQ [2]-12
Stealth DX [2]-12
Connoisseur (Fashion) IQ [2]-12

Gear

Formal Dress: $1500, 2 lbs
Blaster Pistol: 3d(5) Acc 5, RoF 3, Bulk -2, rcl 1; $2200,  1.6 lbs
Tiny wrist-mounted radio: 5 mile range; $50, 0.05 lbs

Notes

No Encumbrance

Dodge: 9, Parry (Judo) 10.

I found Leylana's template similarly constrained and I found it difficult to really give her a sense of character.  So, all of the templates seem too simplistic.  She seems competent enough, though not particularly combat focused, but we expected that.  While she's obviously good at moving among the upper classes, no options existed for actual status or wealth, so I have her merely faking it. Moreover, every "super spy" character out of GURPS Space is going to look almost exactly like Leylana above.  Again, Space has given us a template that's "alright, I guess" but not one that allows for much personalization.

I also note that most of the templates have slightly inflated HP, likely to make them more survivable. 

Psi Wars: Kendra Corleoni 1.1

If we're going to have not-Star Wars, then we need some aliens. Sparriels would be my first choice, especially since they just came out and this would be a great opportunity to plug a great book, but given that I originally said that you should need nothing but the core books, space and ultra-tech, I have limited myself to those books for selecting an alien.  I could roll one up out of Space, but that would take too long to explain, so I'm going to use Felinoids from GURPS Characters (B261).  Everyone loves cat-girls, right? No?  Well, blame Pulver, then.

I chose to make her a bounty hunter because we need another combat character that contrasts with Dun Beltain, an agile, ranged fighter vs his tough, melee focus, and bounty hunters are generally the most badass non-Jedi characters, making her excellence believable.

Kendra Corleoni, Bounty Hunter

Attributes

ST 10 [10]
DX 13 [40]
IQ 11 [20]
HT 11 [10]

Secondary Characteristics

Dmg 1d-2/1d; BL 20 lbs; HP 11 [2]; Will 11 [0]; Per 12 [5]; FP 11 [0]; Basic Speed 6.0 [0]; Basic Move 7 [5]

Advantages

Felinoid [35]
Legal Enforcement powers [5]
Gunslinger [25]
Luck [15]
Danger Sense [15]

Disadvantages

Code of Honor (Pirate's) [-5]
Jealousy [-10]
Greed (12 or less) [-15]
Obsession (Bring in the slavers who took her family) (12) [-5]

Skills

Criminology (A) IQ+1 [4]-12
Law (Galactic) IQ+1 [8]-12
Streetwise IQ+1 [4]-12
Intimidation (A) Will [2]-11
Research IQ [2]-11
Shadowing (A) IQ+1 [4]-12
Brawling (E) DX+2 [4]-15
Beam Weapons (Pistol) (E) DX+4 [12]-17
Fast-Draw (Pistol) DX+2* [2]-15
Computer Operation (E) IQ+1 [2]-12
First Aid (E) IQ+1 [2]-12
Fast-Talk IQ [2]-11

Gear

Tiny wrist-mounted radio: 5 mile range; $50, 0.05 lbs
Two Heavy Blaster Pistols: 4d(5) burn sur, Acc 5, RoF 3, Bulk -3, Rcl 1, (6.6 lbs, $12,000)
Bioplas body suit and light clamshell armor: DR 75/65 (torso), 15/5 elsewhere, (15 lbs, $2400)
Gloves, Boots: 3 lbs, $200

Notes

Light Encumbrance

Dodge: 9, Parry (Brawl) 11.

Kendra was just as constrained with her options as Dun was, but I feel her character makes more sense.  Her disadvantages hint aa a tragic past very suitable for a space Bounty Hunter.  She's suitably epic in combat (Skill 17, with Fast-Draw 15 and Gunslinger), and I suspect she will eclipse Dun, highlighting how problematic Space Knights might turn out to be.  I'm not sure how useful Criminology will be, but we'll see.  I'm also not entirely pleased with Bioplas as an armor, but we'll see how that works out.  Gunslinger is, of course, underpowered with just GURPS Basic.  I'll be using the improved one from High Tech and Gun Fu, which is effectively errata.

EDIT: Kalzazz pointed out a mistake in the character.  She's under by five points (which had previously been in her basic speed).  In keeping with the rest of the Space templates, this has been rectified in a terribly ineffecient manner XD

Psi Wars: Sir Dun Beltain 1.0

For starters, we'll need a Space Knight, because Psi-Wars is nothing without a Space Knight.  Our standard rules for Space Knights will be the 150 point Space Knight template from GURPS Space, paired with 50 points worth of cinematic traits and psionic abilities.

Sir Dun Beltain

Armored by John Gwolf

Attributes

ST 11 [10]

DX 13 [60]

IQ 12 [40]

HT 11 [10]

Secondary Characteristics

Dmg 1d-1/1d+1; BL 24 lbs; HP 12 [0]; Will 12 [0]; Per 12 [0]; FP 11 [0]; Basic Speed 6 [0]; Basic Move 6 [0]

Advantages

Social Regard (Respected) 2 [10]

Trained by a Master [30]

Combat Reflexes [15]

Luck [15]

ESP Talent +1 [5]

Danger Sense (ESP -10%) [14]

Disadvantages

Duty (To the Knightly Order, Extremely Hazardous, 15 or less) [-20]

Honesty (15 or less) [-5]

Pacifism (Cannot Harm Innocents) [-10]

Skills

Force Sword DX+1 [4]-14

Judo DX [4]-14

Pilot (Starship) DX-1 [1]-12

Beam Weapons (Pistol) DX+1 [2]-14

Electronics Operation (Comms) IQ [2]-12

Law (Galactic) (H) IQ [4]-12

Navigation (Hyperspace) IQ [2]-12

Leadership IQ [2]-12

Savoir-Faire (Dojo) IQ [1]-12

Stealth DX [2]-13

Computer Operation (E) IQ [1]-12

First Aid (E) IQ [1]-12

Gear:

Blaster Pistol: 3d(5) Acc 5, RoF 3, Bulk -2, rcl 1; $2200, 1.6 lbs

Combat Hardsuit: DR 100/60; $10,000, 30 lbs

Combat Infantry Helmet: DR 36/25; $2,000, 5 lbs

Force Sword: 8d(5), Reach:1, 2; $10,000, 2 lbs

Notes:

Light Encumbrance

Dodge: 9, Parry (Force Sword) 11, Parry (Judo) 10.

Dun is a rather typical knight. He stands for good and honor and justice, blah blah.  He's pretty competent in combat, though he lacks the typical high-flying martial arts Star Wars fans would expect of a Jedi.  I've given him a hardsuit to compensate for that, and to make him a little more "knightly."  He's also really short on psionic powers.  I found the template rather restrictive, with few options, and some of the requirements were odd.  Why would all space knights know how to Navigate?  Why would they all have Stealth?  Why would they need to have a single (one, no more, no less) Electronics Operation skill?  Also, Battlesuits are an option.  That's... a fascinating idea, but not one particularly well-suited to force sword wielders, as strength is irrelevant for them.  Finally, I took the option for Trained by a Master, but the template includes no options to really exploit it: No Flying Leap, no Power Blow, no Mental Strength or Body Control.

We'll see in the playtest how well he works, but this already suggests to me that the standard templates, while "alright," could certainly stand to be better, especially for a space knight.

Psi-Wars: The First Iteration

First Contact by Adam Burn

A friend of mine once asked me "How do you create complicated settings?"

To which I said "Start simple and work your way up from there."

As promised in my previous post, I want to create a Star-Wars knock-off setting called "Psi-Wars," using the readily available material in GURPS, and that as I create the setting, I want walk you through my process so that if you want to build your own setting, you have a worked example to play with.

The mantra of design is "fail faster." The faster you have a working model you can play with, the sooner you can tinker with it, find out what's wrong with it, and then fix it. Thus, we want something to play with as soon as possible, and we must accept that our first attempt will be flawed.  I also believe that we should not attempt to create the entire setting in one go.  Instead, we should start with a simple core, and then as we iterate, we can add more and more complexity with each cycle until we have iterated enough to have a completed setting. So we're going to build a quick, imperfect setting, one that you can use as soon as you've finished reading this post, and then as this series goes on, we'll make it even better.

For the first step, we'll need GURPS Characters and Campaigns, GURPS Space and GURPS Ultra-Tech.  This will cover everything for this iteration, though you'll quickly see it leaves some gaps in our setting that we'll need to paper over in later iterations.

Thank you, and an announcement

I had a warmer welcome than I expected into the blogging world (I dropped a post on a few places, and I was surprised to see just how much of a lift it gave my blog).  In particular, I want to thank Peter V. Dell'Orto, Douglas Cole and Christopher Rice of Ravens 'n' Pennies for the shout-outs.

Social Media?

Christopher Rice has asked for Social Media buttons, and I've already tried something with "POWr" but I don't seem to have them working yet.  When I get them up, I'll let you guys know.  But I am working on it.

A Change of Schedule

Douglas expressed disappointment that I hadn't chosen to schedule my blog posts on Thursday, or "GURPS Day" as he calls it.  I have no investment in what day I post my posts (I have about a month of posts scheduled to drop at 12 pm, my time, on a particular day. I don't even have to lift a finger to make them happen), and I had chosen Wednesday because it was the day before GURPS books his e23 and it seemed like a nice buildup.  I presume Cole chose Thursday for similar reasons.  And given that it doesn't matter to me when my posts drop, and that it's evidently not a problem for his blog to have them drop on Thursday, I have set my posts to drop on Thursday from now on.

Next Thursday, I begin Psi-Wars in earnest.  You'll have a complete, playable, if simple, setting to tinker with.  I'll see you guys then, and thanks for reading.

Psi-Wars: Don't Convert, Create!

Holy crap, guys!  Star Wars is back in the theaters!  And do you know what that means?  It means star wars gaming!  People crack out their X-Wing minis, or dust off their Dark Forces 2 cds, or scramble for their lost Old Republic password and, of course, pull their Star Wars RPG books off the shelf. And, naturally, some GURPS fan will inevitably ask "How do you convert Star Wars to GURPS?" and a thousand voices will all cry out with their own homebrews.

Stop.  Stop the madness!  Down that dark path there is only frustration and arguments.  I have a better path.  The path of creation.

I had long resolved to kick off this blog again, but alas I never do things by halves, so instead of having articles, I have series.  This will be the first: A worked example of setting and framework building, using the tools readily available to all GURPS fans.  I'll walk you through each step of the process that I take, so you can draw from that was lessons you want.  And, of course, when I am finished, you can run the finished product, or use the process to create your own.

Before I begin, though, I want to explain why I am building the way I am, why I am making an obvious Star Wars knock-off called "Psi-Wars" rather than just converting Star Wars directly.  I often make this call for creation rather than conversion, and I want to make the case for it, because I believe that taking that step away from conversion is the first step towards becoming a genuine RPG author (or, really, any kind of creator).

A New Years Resolution

A New Years Resolution

Blogging is powerful.  I began blogging in earnest professionally, because noting a software technique helped me remember it, and documenting it publicly meant others could use it.  By serving others, I served myself.  But I have also learned that being forced to produce material by a deadline is an excellent way to teach yourself something, and a way to get yourself to finish what you started.

And so, last year, I set a goal for myself to finish up all of my GURPS material that I had lying around, and to publish it in weekly blog posts, to gain the habit of regularly blogging, and today, I kick off the result of that year's worth of labor.  I simply enjoy GURPS, so diving deeply into that topic will be fun for me and will help me build this useful habit.  Next year, I might turn that habit around and put it back into programming, or perhaps I'll expand it into full publications.

So, here's the plan, my few and faithful followers: Every Wednesday of this year, I will make a GURPS blog-post. That's 52 GURPS blog-posts!  This isn't some off-the-cuff New Year's Resolution. I've already worked most of the material out, though it isn't completely finished, I'm afraid, but that's part of the nature of this resolution: Publicly making this promise means I'll revisit it enough to polish it and hand it to you, dear reader.

I also believe it's easier to blog when you've already written the content, so I have written some of my blog-posts in advance.  I already have the first 4 blog posts ready to go, and the first will be up on the 6th of this month.  My topics will include, but are not limited to:

Psi-Wars: An obvious knock-off of Star Wars, a ready-made setting that you can jump right into.  The intent of this series is to create, before your very eyes, a rapidly prototyped setting inspired by a popular franchise. When this series is finished, I hope that in addition to you having your own "It's totally not Star Wars" setting to play with, you'll have an idea of how to go about rapidly prototyping your own "It's totally not Warhammer 40k" or "It's totally not the Lord of the Rings" or whatever else it is that you particularly enjoy.

Cherry Blossom Rain: The famous chambara campaign that my players still won't shut up about.  It'll include a discussion on my design notes, a description of the setting and why I built it the way I did, fully-developed chi powers, templates, and a discussion on how to customize martial arts to get the experience that you want.

GURPS Cabal: Extensive notes on spirits and demons, words of power, template conversions from 3e, historical research and comments on how to run it, and discussions of useful books to help you get started on the path of consulting occultist.

Heroes of the Galactic Frontier: An extensive campaign framework, including templates, rules for running, aliens, starships, civilizations and technology, all for your TL 12^ heroic captain-and-crew gameplay, inspired by works like Star Trek, Farscape, FTL, Masters of Orion, Star Control, Quintet, Artemis Bridge Simulator, EVE, and Endless Space, and many more.

This is the stuff I have prepared.  We'll have to see how far I get, what I can finish off and what I cannot, as I suspect that I have more material than I can unveil in a year.  I hope my results delight you, dear reader, and reward your faithfulness, and I look forward to hearing from you in the comments.

In the meantime, if you just can't get enough Mailanka, feel free to peruse my blog.  There's lots of GURPS material under the GURPS tag.  Have fun!