Thursday REALLY IS GURPS Day!

A validated RSS feed that filters on a tag for GURPS


This is important, because it’s how we’ll scrape your blog for keyed posts. That means that you do have to tag your posts GURPS. It also means you probably have to figure out how to enable RSS in Blogger, WordPress, or whatever you use. You will need to know if you’re using RSS or Atom, but we can figure that out if it doesn’t work – that’s why the email to gurpsday@gmail.com is so important.

What the email looks like

Hi, I’d like to be included in the GURPSDay summaries:
Gaming Ballistichttp://gamingballistic.blotspot.com/Douglas Colehttp://gamingballistic.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default/-/GURPS?alt=rss

That’s it.

Some other forms you might see for RSS feeds:

Blogger

• Atom 1.0: http://www.gamingballistic.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default/-/GURPS
• RSS 2.0: http://www.gamingballistic.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default/-/GURPS?alt=rss

WordPress

http://jeffro.wordpress.com//category/GURPS/feed

Pyramid #3/87 – Low-Tech 3

In a double-whammy of cool, an article I started working on years and years ago finally made it into print! You’ve seen outtakes from this one in The Cutting Edge, back in February two years ago. And I’d been working on the project even before then. But The Broken Blade concepts have worked – and worked well – in play for all that time.

The overall concept was born from a bit of thought that it should be more than weapon weight that mattered, given the arbitrary sizing and strength of GURPS characters.

This article got a lot of “what would Peter do?” treatment, in that I always tried to look for new ways to cut things down to even fewer rules. I didn’t always succeed, and given two years evolution in writing and rules-design thought I might have gone further doing it now.

But as always, this sort of thing started with a pretty massive background of calculation. As it turns out, the cube root of weapon weight (the HP of the weapon) with all sorts of fiddle in it wound up almost always equal to the weapon’s ST statistic, and was hardly ever more than a point off even when it was wrong. So boom – simplification.

This little system should provide a nice, rare but not unheardof stream of replacement swords if people wander around beating their weapons against armor, thick, scaly hide, or walls and doors. That sort of stuff damages weapons in real life, after all.

Anyway, I never could make the stuff in the Cutting Edge (which was the original subject matter of the article) be anything other than a nightmare – I didn’t even have to playtest it to realize that. But the stuff that remained? Solid. 

The Past Is Back, Better Than Ever!

Olden times come to life with new gaming goodness! This month’s Pyramid — the PDF magazine for roleplayers — once again revisits the past, with fresh opportunities to discover intriguing treasures to enliven your pre-modern gaming. This month’s timeless tome contains:

• “The Broken Blade,” an optional look at weapon quality in GURPS. Douglas H. Cole — author of GURPS Martial Arts: Technical Grappling — shows you how to ramp up the table’s tension with the threat of a shattered sword . . . and the possibility of repairing it.
• “Purveyors of the Priceless,” a set of new possibilities that let you explore life as a low-tech trader in GURPS. Now you can barter for some loose gems, use new perks to help you flex your mercantile might, and even have a full-time job as a trader.
• “Medieval Sea Trade,” this month’s Eidetic Memory offering from GURPS Fourth Editionco-author David Pulver. Sail the oceans in search of cargo and passengers, with a system adapted from GURPS Spaceships 2: Traders, Liners, and Transports.
• “Knowledge Is Power,” a look at those who kept the Chinese bureaucracy working. Your guide, Matt Riggsby — co-author of GURPS Low-Tech — shows what’s required to enter the halls of power . . . including how to cheat your way in!
• “The Music Maker,” a primer on the master artisan known as Stradivarius. Discover the history of this unparalleled craftsman (with GURPS stats), revel in the insight about his legendary violins, and unleash the included story possibilities on your heroes.
• “Tempered Punks,” presenting some ideas for keeping would-be inventors from being tooinnovative in bygone days, from GURPS Crusades co-author Graeme Davis. 

This issue also unveils a vignette by Pyramid Editor Steven Marsh set in the new Car Warsuniverse, and a Random Thought Table that gives you permission to break reality. This month’sPyramid shines such an inspiring candle on times gone by, you just might say this is anilluminated manuscript! 

Written by Douglas H. Cole / Matt Riggsby / David L. Pulver / Christopher R. Rice / Graeme Davis / Jon Black / Steven Marsh

I’ll review the entire thing coming Real Soon Now.

Happy GURPS Day!