The ''Generic Universal RolePlaying System'', or ''GURPS'', is a
tabletop
Tabletop may refer to:
Mountains
* Table Top Mountain in Rangeville, Queensland, Australia
* Table Top Mountain (New York)
* Table Mountain in Cape Town, South Africa
* Tepui, flat top mountains in South America
Places
* Tabletop, New South Wale ...
role-playing game system
A role-playing game system is a set of game mechanics used in a tabletop role-playing game (TTRPG) to determine the outcome of a character's in-game actions.
History
By the late 1970s, the Chaosium staff realized that Steve Perrin's ''RuneQuest ...
designed to allow for play in any game setting. It was created by
Steve Jackson Games
Steve Jackson Games (SJGames) is a game company, founded in 1980 by Steve Jackson, that creates and publishes role-playing, board, and card games, and (until 2019) the gaming magazine ''Pyramid''.
History
Founded in 1980, six years after the cr ...
and first published in 1986 at a time when most such systems were story- or genre-specific.
Players control their in-game characters verbally and the success of their actions are determined by the skill of their character, the difficulty of the action, and the rolling of dice. Characters earn points during play which are used to gain greater abilities. Gaming sessions are story-told and run by "
Game Masters" (often referred to as simply "GMs").
''GURPS'' won the
Origins Award
The Origins Awards are American awards for outstanding work in the game industry. They are presented by the Academy of Adventure Gaming Arts and Design at the Origins Game Fair on an annual basis for the previous year, so (for example) the 1979 aw ...
for ''Best Roleplaying Rules of 1988'', and in 2000 it was inducted into the
Origins Hall of Fame. Many of its expansions have also won awards.
History
Prior RPG history
Prior to ''GURPS'', most
roleplaying game
A role-playing game (sometimes spelled roleplaying game, RPG) is a game in which players assume the roles of player character, characters in a fictional Setting (narrative), setting. Players take responsibility for acting out these roles within ...
s (RPGs) of the 1970s and early 1980s were developed especially for certain gaming environments, and they were largely incompatible with one another. For example,
TSR published its ''
Dungeons & Dragons
''Dungeons & Dragons'' (commonly abbreviated as ''D&D'' or ''DnD'') is a fantasy tabletop role-playing game (RPG) originally designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson. The game was first published in 1974 by TSR (company)#Tactical Studies Rules ...
'' game specifically for a
fantasy
Fantasy is a genre of speculative fiction involving Magic (supernatural), magical elements, typically set in a fictional universe and sometimes inspired by mythology and folklore. Its roots are in oral traditions, which then became fantasy ...
environment. Another game from the same company, ''
Star Frontiers'', was developed for
science fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...
–based role-playing. TSR produced other games for other environments, such as ''
Gamma World
''Gamma World'' is a science fantasy role-playing game, originally designed by James M. Ward and Gary Jaquet, and first published by TSR in 1978. It borrowed heavily from Ward's earlier game, ''Metamorphosis Alpha''.
Setting
''Gamma World'' ...
'' (
post-apocalyptic
Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction is a subgenre of speculative fiction in which the Earth's (or another planet's) civilization is collapsing or has collapsed. The apocalypse event may be climatic, such as runaway climate change; astro ...
adventures), ''
Top Secret
Classified information is material that a government body deems to be sensitive information that must be protected. Access is restricted by law or regulation to particular groups of people with the necessary security clearance and need to know, ...
'' (
spies
Spies most commonly refers to people who engage in spying, espionage or clandestine operations.
Spies or The Spies may also refer to:
* Spies (surname), a German surname
* Spies (band), a jazz fusion band
* Spies (song), "Spies" (song), a song by ...
and secret agents), ''
Gangbusters
''Gang Busters'' is an American dramatic radio program heralded as "the only national program that brings you authentic police case histories." It premiered on January 15, 1936, and was broadcast over 21 years through November 27, 1957.
Histo ...
'' (
Roaring Twenties
The Roaring Twenties, sometimes stylized as Roaring '20s, refers to the 1920s decade in music and fashion, as it happened in Western society and Western culture. It was a period of economic prosperity with a distinctive cultural edge in the U ...
adventures), and ''
Boot Hill
Boot Hill, or Boothill, is the given name of many cemeteries, chiefly in the Western United States. During the 19th and early 20th century it was a common name for the burial grounds of gunfighters, or those who " died with their boots on" (i.e ...
'' (
American Old West
The American frontier, also known as the Old West or the Wild West, encompasses the geography, history, folklore, and culture associated with the forward wave of American expansion in mainland North America that began with European colonial ...
). Each of these games was set with its own self-contained
rules system, and the rules for playing each game differed greatly from one game to the next. Attempts were made in ''Advanced Dungeons and Dragons'' to allow cross-genre games using ''Gamma World'' and ''Boot Hill'' rules; however, characters could only be used in a new genre by converting their statistics. Although GURPS was preceded by ''
Basic Role-Playing
''Basic Role-Playing'' (''BRP'') is a tabletop role-playing game which originated in the ''RuneQuest'' fantasy role-playing game. Chaosium released the ''BRP'' standalone booklet in 1980 in the boxed set release of the second edition of ''RuneQu ...
'' (
Chaosium
Chaosium Inc. is a publisher of tabletop role-playing games established by Greg Stafford in 1975. Chaosium's major titles include '' Call of Cthulhu'', based on the horror fiction stories of H. P. Lovecraft'', RuneQuest Glorantha'', ''Pendragon ...
, 1980) and the
Hero System
The ''Hero System'' is a generic role-playing game system that was developed from the superhero RPG '' Champions''. After ''Champions'' fourth edition was released in 1989, a stripped-down version of its ruleset with no superhero or other genre ...
(
Hero Games
Hero Games (''DOJ, Inc dba Hero Games'') is the publisher of the Hero System, a generic roleplaying rules set that can be used to simulate many different genres, and was the co-developer of the ''Fuzion'' system.
History
In 1981, George MacDon ...
, a system that expanded to multiple genres starting in 1982), ''GURPS'' was the most commercially successful
generic role-playing game system
A ''generic'' or ''universal'' role-playing game system is a role-playing game system designed to be independent of setting and genre. Its rules should, in theory, work the same way for any setting, world, environment or genre in which one would wa ...
to allow players to role-play in any environment they please while still using the same set of core rules. This flexibility of environment is greatly aided by the use of technology levels (or "tech-levels") that allow a campaign to be set from the Stone Age (TL-0) to the Digital Age (TL-8) or beyond.
The GURPS concept
Role-playing games of the 1970s and 1980s, such as ''Dungeons & Dragons'', generally used random numbers generated by dice rolls to assign statistics to player characters. In 1978, Steve Jackson designed a new character generation system for the microgames ''
Melee
A melee ( or , French: mêlée ) or pell-mell is disorganized hand-to-hand combat in battles fought at abnormally close range with little central control once it starts. In military aviation, a melee has been defined as " air battle in which ...
'' and ''
Wizard'' that used a point-buy system: players are given a fixed number of points with which to buy abilities.
(The
Hero System
The ''Hero System'' is a generic role-playing game system that was developed from the superhero RPG '' Champions''. After ''Champions'' fourth edition was released in 1989, a stripped-down version of its ruleset with no superhero or other genre ...
first used by the ''
Champions
A champion (from the late Latin ''campio'') is the Victory, victor in a challenge, Competition, contest or competition. There can be a territorial pyramid of championships, e.g. local, regional / provincial, state, national, continental and w ...
'' role-playing game published two years later also used a point-buy system.)
''GURPS''
' emphasis on its generic aspect has proven to be a successful marketing tactic, as many game series have source engines which can be retrofitted to many styles. Its approach to versatility includes using real world measurements wherever possible ("reality-checking" is an important part of any ''GURPS'' book).
''GURPS'' also benefits from the many dozens of worldbooks describing settings or additional rules in all genres including science fiction, fantasy, and historical. Many popular game designers began their professional careers as ''GURPS'' writers, including
C. J. Carella,
Robin Laws
Robin D. Laws (born October 14, 1964 in Orillia, Ontario, Canada) is a Canadian writer and game designer who lives in Toronto, Canada. He is the author of a number of novels and role-playing games as well as an anthologist.
Career
Robin D. Laws ...
,
S. John Ross, and ''
Fudge
Fudge is a type of confection that is made by mixing sugar, butter and milk, heating it to the soft-ball stage at , and then beating the mixture while it cools so that it acquires a smooth, creamy consistency. In texture, this crystalline cand ...
'' creator
Steffan O'Sullivan.
GURPS history
The immediate mechanical antecedents of ''GURPS'' were Steve Jackson's microgames ''
Melee
A melee ( or , French: mêlée ) or pell-mell is disorganized hand-to-hand combat in battles fought at abnormally close range with little central control once it starts. In military aviation, a melee has been defined as " air battle in which ...
'' and ''
Wizard'', both published by
Metagaming Concepts
Metagaming Concepts, later known simply as Metagaming, was a company that published board games from 1974 to 1983. It was founded and owned by Howard Thompson, who designed the company's first game, '' Stellar Conquest''. The company also inven ...
, which eventually combined them along with another Jackson game, ''
In the Labyrinth'', to form ''
The Fantasy Trip
''The Fantasy Trip'' (''TFT'') is a tabletop role-playing game designed by Steve Jackson (American game designer), Steve Jackson and originally published by Metagaming Concepts. In 2019, ''TFT'' was republished by Steve Jackson Games as ''The F ...
'' (''TFT''), an early role-playing game.
Several of the core concepts of ''GURPS'' first appeared in ''TFT'', including the inclusion of Strength, Dexterity and Intelligence as the core abilities scores of each character.
By April 1984, the core rules for ''GURPS'' (at that point referred to as the "Great Unnamed Universal Role-Playing System") was being playtested in preparation for a GURPS question-and-answer seminar at Origins 1984 in Dallas. The combat system for GURPS was published in 1985 as ''
Man to Man: Fantasy Combat from GURPS'' to meet the deadline for Origins 1985
and was followed up later that year by the adventure supplement ''Orcslayer''.
The ''Basic GURPS'' set was published in 1986 and 1987 and included two booklets, one for developing characters and one for Adventuring.
In 1990 ''GURPS'' intersected part of the
hacker
A hacker is a person skilled in information technology who uses their technical knowledge to achieve a goal or overcome an obstacle, within a computerized system by non-standard means. Though the term ''hacker'' has become associated in popu ...
subculture when the company's
Austin
Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the seat and largest city of Travis County, with portions extending into Hays and Williamson counties. Incorporated on December 27, 1839, it is the 11th-most-populous city ...
,
Texas
Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...
, offices were
raided by the
Secret Service
A secret service is a government agency, intelligence agency, or the activities of a government agency, concerned with the gathering of intelligence data. The tasks and powers of a secret service can vary greatly from one country to another. For ...
. The target was the author of ''
GURPS Cyberpunk
''GURPS Cyberpunk'' is a genre toolkit for cyberpunk-themed role-playing games set in a near-future dystopia, such as that envisioned by William Gibson in his influential novel ''Neuromancer''. It was published in 1990 after a significant delay c ...
'' in relation to
E911
Enhanced 911, E-911 or E911 is a system used in North America to automatically provide the caller's location to 911 dispatchers. 911 is the universal emergency telephone number in the region. In the European Union, a similar system exists known as ...
Emergency Response system documents stolen from
Bell South
BellSouth, LLC (stylized as ''BELLSOUTH'' and formerly known as BellSouth Corporation) was an American telecommunications holding company based in Atlanta, Georgia. BellSouth was one of the seven original Regional Bell Operating Companies afte ...
.
The incident was a direct contributor to the founding of the
Electronic Frontier Foundation
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is an international non-profit digital rights group based in San Francisco, California. The foundation was formed on 10 July 1990 by John Gilmore, John Perry Barlow and Mitch Kapor to promote Internet ci ...
. A common misconception holds that this raid was part of
Operation Sundevil
Operation Sundevil was a 1990 nationwide United States Secret Service crackdown on "illegal computer hacking activities." It involved raids in approximately fifteen different cities and resulted in three arrests and the confiscation of computers, ...
and carried out by the
FBI
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and its principal Federal law enforcement in the United States, federal law enforcement age ...
. Operation: Sundevil was in action at the same time, but it was completely separate.
See ''
Steve Jackson Games, Inc. v. United States Secret Service
''Steve Jackson Games, Inc. v. United States Secret Service'', 816 F. Supp. 432 (W.D. Tex. 1993), was a lawsuit arising from a 1990 raid by the United States Secret Service on the headquarters of Steve Jackson Games (SJG) in Austin, Texas. The ...
''.
The 1995 supplement ''
GURPS Illuminati University
''GURPS Illuminati University'' (1995) (), also called ''GURPS IOU'', is a 128-page softbound campaign setting sourcebook for the ''GURPS'' role-playing game. Page 11 is notably the first printed appearance of Agatha Heterodyne, the star of the ...
'' introduced
Agatha Heterodyne, the character who would go on to star in the popular comic series ''
Girl Genius
''Girl Genius'' is an ongoing comic book series turned webcomic, written and drawn by Phil and Kaja Foglio and published by their company Studio Foglio LLC under the imprint Airship Entertainment. The comic won the Hugo Award for Best Graphic ...
'' in 2001.
A free
PDF
Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems. ...
version of the ''GURPS'' rules was released in 1998 as ''
GURPS Lite
''GURPS Lite'' is a 32-page introduction to the rules of the ''GURPS'' role-playing game based on the core rules in the GURPS 4e Basic Set (mainly ''Characters'').
Contents
''GURPS Lite'' includes basic character creation with advantages, dis ...
''. This limited ruleset was also included with various books such as ''
GURPS Discworld
''GURPS Discworld'' and the related supplements are role-playing game sourcebooks set in Terry Pratchett's ''Discworld'' fantasy universe using the GURPS role-playing game system. GURPS Discworld was designed by Phil Masters (in collaboration wi ...
'' and ''
Transhuman Space
''Transhuman Space'' (THS) is a role-playing game by David Pulver, published by Steve Jackson Games as part of the "Powered by ''GURPS''" (''Generic Universal Role-Playing System'') line. Set in the year 2100, humanity has begun to colonize the ...
''.
Steve Jackson Games released ''GURPS Fourth Edition'' at the first day of
Gen Con
Gen Con is the largest tabletop game convention in North America by both attendance and number of events. It features traditional pen-and-paper, board, and card games, including role-playing games, miniatures wargames, live action role-playing ...
on August 19, 2004. It promised to simplify and streamline most areas of play and character creation. The changes include modification of the attribute point adjustments, an edited and rationalized skill list, clarification of the differences between abilities from experience and from inborn talent, more detailed language rules, and revised technology levels. Designed by
Sean Punch
Sean Punch (born July 27, 1967) is a Canadian writer and game designer. He is the author of the fourth edition of the ''GURPS'' role-playing game. Before he turned to writing he was a student of particle physics.
History with GURPS
After writing ...
, the Fourth Edition is sold as two full-color hardcover books as well as in the PDF format.
Mechanics of the game
Character points
A character in ''GURPS'' is built with
character point
A statistic (or stat) in role-playing games is a piece of data that represents a particular aspect of a fictional character. That piece of data is usually a (unitless) integer or, in some cases, a set of dice.
For some types of statistics, thi ...
s. For a beginning character in an average power game, the 4th edition suggests 100–150 points to modify attribute stats, select advantages and disadvantages, and purchase levels in skills. Normal
NPCs
A non-player character (NPC), or non-playable character, is any character in a game that is not controlled by a player. The term originated in traditional tabletop role-playing games where it applies to characters controlled by the gamemaster o ...
are built on 25–50 points. Full-fledged heroes usually have 150–250 points, while superheroes are commonly built with 400–800 points.
The highest point value recorded for a canon character in a ''GURPS'' sourcebook is 10,452 for the Harvester (p. 88) in ''
GURPS Monsters
''GURPS Monsters'' () is a 128-page soft-bound book compiled by J. Hunter Johnson and published in 2002 by Steve Jackson Games as a supplement for the ''GURPS'' role-playing game system. It contains biographies and gaming statistics for forty-eig ...
''.
In principle, a Game Master can balance the power of foes to the abilities of the player characters by comparing their relative point values.
Attributes
Characters in ''GURPS'' have four basic
attribute
Attribute may refer to:
* Attribute (philosophy), an extrinsic property of an object
* Attribute (research), a characteristic of an object
* Grammatical modifier, in natural languages
* Attribute (computing), a specification that defines a prope ...
s:
* Strength (ST): A measure of the character's physical power and bulk, ability to lift, carry, and do damage
* Dexterity (DX): A measure of the character's physical agility, coordination, and manual dexterity
* Intelligence (IQ): A measure of the character's mental capacity, acuity and sense of the world
* Health (HT): A measure of the character's physical stamina, recovery speed, energy and vitality, ability to resist disease
Each attribute has a number rating assigned to it. Normally they begin at 10, representing typical human ability, but can go as low as 1 for nearly useless, to 20 (or higher) for superhuman power. Anything in the 8 to 12 range is considered to be in the ''normal'' or ''average'' area for humans. Basic attribute scores of 6 or less are considered ''crippling''—they are so far below the human norm that they are only used for severely handicapped characters. Scores of 15 or more are described as ''amazing''—they are immediately apparent and draw constant comment.
Players assign these ratings spending
character point
A statistic (or stat) in role-playing games is a piece of data that represents a particular aspect of a fictional character. That piece of data is usually a (unitless) integer or, in some cases, a set of dice.
For some types of statistics, thi ...
s. The higher the rating the more points it will cost the player, however, assigning a score below the average 10 gives the player points back to assign elsewhere. Since almost all skills are based on Dexterity or Intelligence, those attributes are twice as expensive (or yield twice the points, if purchased below 10). In earlier editions (pre–4th Edition) all attributes followed the same cost-progression, where higher attributes cost more per increase than attributes close to the average of 10.
Attribute scores also determine several ''secondary characteristics''. The four major ones are each directly based on a single attribute:
*Hit Points (HP): how much damage and injury can be sustained, based on ''ST'' in 4e. In previous editions it was based on HT.
*Will (Will): mental focus and strength, withstanding stress, based on ''IQ''.
*Perception (Per): general sensory alertness, based on ''IQ''.
*Fatigue Points (FP): a measure of exertion, tiredness, and hunger, based on ''HT'' in 4e. In previous editions it was based on ST.
The other secondary characteristics (Damage, Basic Lift, Basic Speed, Dodge, Move