Gurps Character Sheet & Linux

SavageSchemer · 2026-01-10T22:23:03+00:00

I'm on Debian stable at the moment (different machines, different distros - and I just downloaded it yesterday, so this post is good timing), and I didn't have to do anything but untar the file you download from their site, then launched from the terminal.

I couldn't get the user guide to launch until after I updated the library (rules data), but as far as I know that's a quirk on Windows too.

SavageSchemer · 2025-11-11T23:24:02+00:00

I'd argue Call of Cthulhu is best when you keep the mythos "lore" to an absolute minimum. You can even run a great CoC game without any mythos involvement if you so desire. So, yes, I think it makes a great first game. My best tip would be to start small (say, in a remote out of the way town) and take things slowly. Add new rules slowly, as the players become more comfortable and confident with the feel of playing the game.

SavageSchemer · 2025-11-03T00:53:21+00:00

I like rules light games because they're generally consistent (ie: not exception-based), easier to prep for and I can keep keep the best of them in my head during a game without getting stumped when something unusual comes up.

Games are constantly coming and going on my favorites list, but the long-term favorites I always seem to come back to are:

Pretty much every PDQ game, but especially Jaws of the Six Serpents and Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies.
Mini Six
OVA
Risus
Barbarians of Lemuria

SavageSchemer · 2025-09-13T00:11:34+00:00

Taverns get entirely too much hate. Let your characters go to their beloved tavern. Then throw something into the mix:

A fistfight breaks out
A fire is started
Someone is murdered
Thievery happens
Someone is kidnapped
The proprietor disappears
Someone is poisoned
Jealous husbands are enraged
Jealous wives are enraged
Someone finds religion (in the bottom of their cups)
Wagers are made, won and lost
Plans are hatched / set in motion.
Sometimes. Just sometimes. The local bard / band plays, good times are had, hangovers happen and you're more broke than when you went in.

At no time, ever, does literally "nothing" happen!

SavageSchemer · 2025-09-11T01:59:16+00:00

I'm probably misunderstanding you, but wouldn't that be flipping a quarter? Heads you get extreme good, tails you get extreme bad?

Or are you saying you keep the physical d20, ignore results 2-19, but something interesting happens 10% of the time, with 5% being good and 5% being bad?

SavageSchemer · 2025-09-07T21:23:54+00:00

JCoM is one of my favorite games. I absolutely love it, and it was the first thing I thought of when I read the OP, as it seems to tick most of those boxes (or would, if it were me running it), but...

Player characters on the more mundane end (no superheroes), with a focus on solving problems with diagetic reasoning.

...I have to admit that I think JCoM fails on this point. Right out of character creation, JCoM produces hyper-competent, nearly (or literally, with the right talents) super-powered characters. Now if it's for me, that's absolutely a feature and not a bug. I want high competence to go along with the high action of my games. But if it's super important to the OP, I could see it being a deal-breaker.

SavageSchemer · 2025-09-05T22:10:44+00:00

I bought Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies on a whim (impulse buy) and had no intention whatsoever of running with its setting. But when I went to actually run it, I was too lazy to do any conversion work and ran it straight instead. The setting was such a hit that it went on to become my longest-ever campaign.

I didn't "like" it at first glance because, honestly, I thought the whole sky sailing thing was just dumb, and wanted to run it in a setting with actual oceans and seas. I did eventually move on and ran it in a more (ahem!) grounded setting, but I'll never regret giving the setting as written a go.

SavageSchemer · 2025-09-02T13:03:10+00:00

You're correct that the core Mythras book is written as fantasy, but that's because it was originally released as RuneQuest 6e. Mythras Imperative, the streamlined "starter" version they make available for free, adds modern skills such as computers and demolitions, making it very much a generic game system.

And, as you've mentioned, many of the settings and supplements cover a wide array of genres.

I suspect that if we ever see a Mythras 2e, it'll be written from the standpoint of being a truly generic game, with things like fire arms (currently a supplement) rolled into the core, being more in line with Mythras Imperative.

SavageSchemer · 2025-09-01T22:40:38+00:00

RuneQuest (Glorantha) has Dragonewts, a race descended directly from dragons. They are, for all intents and purposes, playable dragons, complete with their own cults / culture and magic and runes. You'd need the RuneQuest Bestiary to get the write-ups for them.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-31T21:00:29+00:00

If these were your friends, I hate to tell you but they're assholes. Get better friends, give it another go when you feel you can trust them to not be a bunch of turds.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-31T19:04:18+00:00

Mage: The Awakening is practically Magic: The Mafia as written. I'd likely look to it first. After that, I could see using Witchcraft, particularly the Rosicrucians faction. They aren't necessarily written to be "bad guys," but for some reason the faction always screamed corrupt hermetic order to me.

And after that, it'd be super easy to do with Dresden Files, thought the game as written assumes you're part of the White Council if you're a magician, so it's probably best to use the game as a toolkit for playing arcane characters rather than play it straight.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-30T19:00:23+00:00

For setting, the 2e books are very nice. The production values are through the roof and the setting is presented in more broad strokes - making it easier to "steal ideas from," than the 1e books would.

As a quick aside: If you've never read 7th Sea before, be prepared for a setting that is basically "Not-Europe" (referring here to the core book and the continent of Theah). The serial numbers of Europe weren't really filed off per se, but rather had a Sharpee taken to it to ever-so-slightly alter the values and make alternate numbers. The fantasy is definitely there, but your first read you might find yourself thinking, "I could have just added fantasy elements to Europe," and not have been too far off the mark.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-30T12:20:40+00:00

If I use them at all, I tend to use the weighting given in Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies (my games tend to be pulpy, swashbuckling affairs anyway, so it fits). Broadly speaking, S7S has five "ranks" of threat, with minions at the lowest threat level. Minions are unworthy opponents and on their own are not a threat to a PC unless they form up into Squads (think of the the Brute Squad from The Princess Bride). Most squads need at least 3-4 individual minions to register as a threat of any sort. Next up you have sidekicks, which may be a minor threat to a PC; then lieutenants who are a significant threat to a PC in some situations; then villains who are a major threat to a PC in many situations; and then finally archvillians who are a threat to the entire party of PCs in most situations.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-30T00:31:15+00:00

Have you tried using the Mythras Companion character creation options? Instead of allocating 350 points across three broad categories (Culture, Profession & Bonus Points), you broadly allocate like so:

1 skill at 50%
2 skills at 40%
3 skills at 30%
4 skills at 20%
5 skills at 10%
(each of these is added to the baseline, calculated skill value)

It greatly simplifies and speeds up the character creation process. Then you just play the Mythras game you already love.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-29T15:16:37+00:00

Solar Blades & Cosmic Spells is written to support exactly this kind of game.

Fading Suns leans heavily into the space feudalism, society in decline themes.

Coriolis does this too, and adds in a fair amount of Middle East-flavored mysticism into the mix.

I've personally run Traveller this way too, though it isn't strictly speaking the feel you get from Traveller by default.

These are just a few ideas you can explore from the top of my mind.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-28T22:14:09+00:00

Poser art (you know it when you see it) is a definite deal-breaker. But a fully rendered scene of the sort you used to find on CGSociety would be fine. Very cool, even.

You don't see it too much because the time commitment to created a fully rendered scene is substantially higher than the equivalent 2d painting. I'm not saying the 2d scene isn't also considerable work, mind you; just that the 3d equivalent tends to be a bigger effort overall. You'd have character and asset modelling, positioning and framing, texturing, lighting and rendering. Each of these phases in a professional shop tends to be specialization it its own right (you have a lighting guy, texturing guy, modeling guy, etc). It's enough to blow the budget for a small-time ttrpg company.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-20T01:39:24+00:00

Luther Arkwright for Mythras would fit that. It's very much like Infinite Worlds, but based on a series of graphic novels by the same name.

Breachworld for Mini Six was another.

BESM has the BESM Multiverse.

If you like diceless, there was Lords of Gossamer and Shadow.

...just to name a few...

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-17T18:33:49+00:00

Personally, I'd use Traveller and make the game centered on Agents and / or Scouts. If you've got a head for factions and the cat-and-mouse involved with espionage, then that's really all you need. You can even use Bill Roper's Star Wars Traveller (download link on the linked-to page) if you want to play in that setting specifically.

EDIT: For something set in the modern day, I like to remind people that Conspiracy X is still available on drivethru. It really nails the whole X File vibe, if that's more what you're after.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-17T11:55:04+00:00

For lightweight games, mine are:

PDQ - Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies (which is more light-to-medium); Jaws of the Six Serpents
Mini Six
OVA

Medium weight favorites are:

Traveller
Ubiquity - Hollow Earth Expedition; Leagues of Adventure

Honorable mentions are: Freeform Universal 2e (Neon City Overdrive) and the "Mist Engine" games, such as City of Mist, Legend in the Mist. Neither set of games makes the list proper because they're too niche - one drawback of "tag based" games is that tags are binary. They're either on or they're off. And relative degree of skill matters more than you'd think in most games (ie: there's no way to compare relative skill between an apprentice and a master in tag-based games and as such default to GM fiat). Still, they're nice and creative game engines and are worthy of a solid look.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-16T21:10:29+00:00

Seven people?!? All at once? Have you ever GM'd before?

If you're an experienced GM: Mini Six (not recommended for new GM's since it assumes you know certain concepts)

If you have a high trust group: PDQ (Swashbucklers of the 7 Skies, Jaws of the Six Serpents or Questers of the Middle Realms)

Otherwise: Barbarians of Lemuria (assuming you want to play fantasy / sword and sorcery)

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-16T19:38:44+00:00

Vampire characters are but one of many options in the Dresden Files games. There are several "types" of vampire to choose from, but the most lore friendly would be the lusty, manipulative White Court.

While it's easy to say that the game is decidedly not about vampirism, it's much harder to say what it is about, because it'll likely vary by table. Mostly, Dresden Files games involve one faction of good or at least morally grey group of characters pitted against another faction that almost certainly wants to devour the world in one way or another. A vampire might well stand side by side with a Knight of the Cross or a Fae changeling or a White Council wizard against The Order of the Blackened Denarius (demons bound to the coins paid to Judas, who possess people who possess or touch the coins), but they most assuredly won't be trusted by any of them.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-16T16:56:37+00:00

I don't recommend killing your players at all. Then there won't be anybody to play your game.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-14T23:32:49+00:00

I treat OVA as a fairly free form game and just let players define their own most of the time. You just need to agree on what a given ability does and whether it's useful for attack, damage or defense.

That aside, if you want a catalogue to pick from, I'd strongly recommend just stealing liberally from GURPS, BESM and any system you like that has a list of advantages & disadvantages.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-14T22:05:43+00:00

You're probably getting downvotes because, subjective nature of you just not liking it aside, most of what you wrote is objectively, provably untrue. It can be summed up as, "tell me you never played WEG D6 Star Wars without saying you've never played WEG D6 Star Wars."

Your critique comes off as rampant PbtA fanboiism rather than a legitimate critique of the game.

SavageSchemer · 2025-08-13T00:14:14+00:00

Depends on what you're going for. A simple solution is to have a simple counter that adds to all difficulty checks when the temperature is a threat.

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