GURPS:Main Page

This annotation project is intended to provide a cross-referenced source of information about the GURPS 4th Edition roleplaying system. It is not intended to replace the core books, nor should information from the core books be copied to any page on the wiki.

About GURPS

A complete description of the GURPS system can be found on the GURPS page.

About this project

The goal of this project is to create an annotated guide for selection and interpretation of the rules of GURPS depending on the style of game your group wants to play. It was started on 02 June 2005 by Adalger.

How to contribute

Most new pages should fall into one of the following categories:

• Character Points

The heart of character generation in GURPS are Character Points, or CP. Points can be spent to purchase traits for the character. And negative traits can be taken to generate additional CP to make more purchases.

The Game Master of a game decides on how many points players may have to generate characters.

• Attributes

There are 4 basic attributes in GURPS Strength (ST), Dexterity (DX) Intelligence (IQ) and Health (HT). There are sub-attributes as well, Perception (PER), Will (WILL), Hit Points (HP), Fatigue Points (FP), Basic Speed (SPEED) and Movement. Each of these are based on one or more attributes but can be adjusted by spending points or by selling off a sub-attribute to a lower value for the equivalent points.

Example, a character with a DX of 13 and HT of 12 has a basic speed of 6.25. The O.25 has some minor benefits, particularly with regard to initiative, but generally doesn't do much. A player can either raise his basic speed by spending 5 pts per quarter point of basic speed or sell of the excess. In this case he'd recover five points and have a basic speed of 6.0.

Other traits that are attributes in other games are found as either Advantages or Disadvantages. i.e. Charisma.

• Advantages

Advantages are quite simply abilities, traits, or powers that have a positive overall impact on the character. They range from simple (and low-cost) things like improved vision, or hearing, all the way up to Super Powers.

Advantages, like disadvantages are divided into several categories. Physical, Mental, and Social. They are also divided into Exotic, Supernatural, and Mundane. These categories help the referee decide which advantages will be allowed in his campaign.

• Disadvantages

Disadvantages are traits that have a negative impact overall on the character. Some disadvantages have minor benefits. A person who is Honest is restricted from doing illegal acts but can become known for honesty and net a positive reaction bonus for it. For the most part Disadvantages are going to be more restrictive than beneficial and in those cases where the disadvantage does not negatively impact a character it's value can be reduced or even removed.

Disadvantages under 4th edition are somewhat changed. ANY negative cost is now considered a disadvantage now. Under prior rules, Quirks and some amount of Attribute sell off didn't count against any disadvantage limit in play. Under the current rules, they do. In the example above, where excess basic speed can be 'sold off' reclaims points spent on HT and/or DX that don't provide much movement bonus, but it counts against the disadvantage point limit. This allows the player to NOT take five points in disadvantages elsewhere to get those points, which could prove useful.

Disadvantages come in many flavors. How many different ways can things mess up a character's life? Most realistic disadvantages can be classified as Physical, Mental or Social in nature. A person with a bad temper has a Mental Disadvantage, a person missing a leg has a Physical Disadvantage while a convict out on Parole has a social Disadvantage.

In settings where exotic, cinematic or supernatural phenomena exist, even more disadvantages are available to work against characters.

In prior versions of the game, Disadvantage limits were suggested at -40 pts for most games and -100 pts, the GM was the ultimate decision maker for any game. The current rules recommend a total disadvantage limit of half the character's points. A 150 pt character would have up to -75 pts in disadvantages, being effectively a 225 pt character, while a 100 pt character would have a max of -50 pts and effectively be a 150 pt character.

In practice however, high point characters will not have anywhere near their max limit on Disads. Characters start becoming basket cases when enough disadvantages are piled on, no matter HOW powerful the character is based on the positive points. Many players refer to the earlier point limits for disads, -40 for very realistic gritty characters, and -100 for very powerful ones.

Since the game's recommended starting level is 150 pts, -75 pt disadvantage limits are a common middle ground.

• Genres
• House rules
• Magic

GURPS 3rd edition had a number of magic systems built to suit a variety of settings. What was called "Standard Magic" was built for Fantasy genres and deals with casting spells in tactical time units. Standard Magic is little changed.

Spells are skills, are learned and improved as such and work on the premise of an ambient magical energy called mana being around. An Advantage called Magery allows casters to work magic anywhere where mana is available, though mana levels can affect spell skill level and general effects. It also adds to the effective skill of the spell.

Magery is available in levels. As of GURPS fourth edition, there is no upper level for Magery unless a GM sets one for a game. Standard Magic is a prerequisite learning system. For example, to learn the spell Explosive Fireball, which creates a fireball that travels from the caster and expands over an area, you need to first learn the spell Fireball, which sends a single target version of the spell. To learn Fireball, you need to learn two other spells, Create Fire, which produces a magical fire that requires no fuel, and Shape Fire, which in addition to molding fire, is able to animate it. These in turn have their own prerequisite spell either Ignite Fire, the barbecue chef's best friend (pile of charcoal bricks becomes burning pile of charcoal bricks in one second, no fluid needed) or Seek Fire which will let a caster find the nearest source of a fire. These two spells are basic spells, spells that have no prerequisites.

Other magic systems used in 3rd edition have yet to be fully reintroduced into the Fourth Edition.

• Psionics

Psi in 4th edition has changed dramatically. Whereas previous editions had a variety of powers and skills specifically under the psionic umbrella, these powers are now generic in nature, and classified as advantages.

A character designer who specifies a power like mind reading is psionically based takes a minor limitation on the power, reducing it's cost. This limitation makes the power subject to another advantage, Psi Static.

• Powers

To a good extent, Psi is an example of Powers in GURPS. The Appropriately named sourcebook GURPS Powers was released in late 2005 at GenCon Socal and shortly later to stores. This book greatly expanded the Psi Material in the Basic Set and showed how to adapt it to other genres such as Mythic Fantasy, Superheroic and Ultra Science sources.

A Power is defined as a group of advantages that share a common source, such as magic or psionics or life force etc and a focus such as the elements, alien physiology, or holy relics. They likely share common limitations and enhancements as well.

Any given source has a vulnerability to traits that can interfere or nullify it. There are also realistic conditions where the source might have difficulties. Collectively these restrictions amount to a ten percent cost reduction or a limitation of -10%. Thus a character who can fly because of Super powers can suffer the loss of that ability from a power that generates static interference to Super abilities. The character flying via magic will not be affected by this, although anti-magical abilities could.

Some sources provide a greater discount. Morality based powers can be nullified by an anti-morality power (dispel good for example) or realistically stopped by circumstances (the holy warrior enters the desecrated temple grounds of the demon worshippers and on that site is cut off from moral power). He or she also has the burden of maintaining a moral life, or risk cutting off the power by immoral thoughts and deeds.

• Skills

Skills in GURPS 4th are resolved with a 3d6 roll (usually designated 3d since d6 is the only die used in GURPS) against a skill's level or lower. This is modified by circumstances i.e. piloting a damaged bomber). Skills are based on attributes or in a few cases the sub-attributes Perception and Will. Skills are ranked by difficulty. An easy skill is learned at it's governing attribute's level for 1 point, an average skill for two, a hard skill for 4 and a very hard skill for 8.

ALL skills follow the same basic cost path, 1, 2, 4, 8, 12, 16... etc points for each level. In earlier editions of the game, points in skills represented the amount of time and training spent learning the skill. In 4th edition, this has been dropped. While most skill points still indicate training time there is no 'formula' for it and it can be used for exceptionally gifted characters to pick up a skill in very short time, GM's decision.

Most but not all skills have defaults and can be used untrained. Example Broadsword skill defaults to DX -4 so an untrained character with a DX of 13 wields a broadsword with skill 9 or less.

Some skills do not have defaults. If it is studied, the character cannot use it. Computer Hacking is an example of a defaultless skill.

There is a subcategory of skilled called Techniques. In 3rd edition, they were called Maneuvers, but since that word has other uses in the game, the name was changed.

Techniques advance on a cheaper cost rate than skills. They generally default from skills and are specializations of those skills. i.e. 'Arm Lock' for the skill of Judo. This will improve the character's ability to put an opponent in an arm lock without improving the rest of the Judo package of abilities.

Techniques have one problem. The cost of improving more than three of them ends up costing more than improving the base skill, which would improve EVERY technique based on the skill. But it is a way to hone certain aspects of a skill to very high levels for relatively low cost.

• Tactics
• Terminology

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Alternatively, a new page might fall into a subcategory -- e.g., GURPS: Cyberpunk might be a subcategory of GURPS: Genres, and you might want to create a page on Cyberpunk terminology, which would logically be most at home within the GURPS: Cyberpunk category. However, please avoid creating additional subcategories unless there is a compelling reason. If you have any doubt, please solicit discussion on the Talk page for the category where you're considering creating a subcategory.

What to do

A good start would be to pick your favorite genre. If a page for it exists, see if it says everything that needs to be said. If not, start it!

Other things that need to be done:

• Clarifications of rules that you think are hard to understand
• Lists of limitations and enhancements people use, with value modifiers, per skill/advantage/disadvantage
• Observed/common abuses of rules/skills/advantages/disadvantages/enhancements/limitations