GURPS Discworld?
Dave!
wondering if anyone had opinions about the recent GURPS product. I saw
it on the shelf but was a little frightened by the price tag. Is it
worth the $26.95 (or something like that)?
Dave!
Bruno Chevalier
If you are a gamer, defintively yes! Lot of informations, aventure
seeds, NPCs, and advices to handle a discworld game. I paid it around
35$ in France, and I dont't regret it.
Bruno
Phil Masters
> Perhaps this isn't the ideal forum for this question, but I was
> wondering if anyone had opinions about the recent GURPS product. I saw
> it on the shelf but was a little frightened by the price tag. Is it
> worth the $26.95 (or something like that)?
I would answer this in detail, but I could accused of a little bit of
bias...
That said; while $26.95 is the list price, I suspect that you might be
able to find it cheaper. (Price in UK shops certainly varies a bit.) As
to content; well, it's the best guide to RPG'ing the Disc that we could
manage. That, I like to think, makes it a decent guide to the Disc for
other purposes. It's had some decent reviews. And it's got oodles of
Paul Kidby artwork, which I will impartially say makes in worth twice
the list price...
--
Phil Masters
Baroquon - RPGs, Cambridge (UK), 1999 -
http://www.philm.demon.co.uk/Baroquon/Main.html
Dave!
>
> I would answer this in detail, but I could accused of a little bit of
> bias...
>
> That said; while $26.95 is the list price, I suspect that you might be
> able to find it cheaper. (Price in UK shops certainly varies a bit.) As
> to content; well, it's the best guide to RPG'ing the Disc that we could
> manage. That, I like to think, makes it a decent guide to the Disc for
> other purposes. It's had some decent reviews. And it's got oodles of
> Paul Kidby artwork, which I will impartially say makes in worth twice
> the list price...
Hey, wait a minute... You have the same name as the guy on the cover!
Dave!
Phil Masters
> Hey, wait a minute... You have the same name as the guy on the cover!
I'm tempted to make a Death/Bill Door crack here, but that's too easy.
Otherwise, the answers are (a) Yes, (b) Yes, (c) Very nice, but we
mostly collaborated by e-mail, (d) Most of the jokes are Terry's, but
I'm proud to take credit for the sample player-characters, and (e)
Eventually, I hope, but it depends on a lot of things.
--
Phil Masters
Scott Hadley
Dave! wrote in message <36A455...@psu.edu>...
>Perhaps this isn't the ideal forum for this question, but I was
>wondering if anyone had opinions about the recent GURPS product. I saw
>it on the shelf but was a little frightened by the price tag. Is it
>worth the $26.95 (or something like that)?
>
> Dave!
Bruno Chevalier
>
> What is GURPS?
>
GURPS stands for Generic Universal Role Playing System.
For more informations, take a look at http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/
GURPS Discworld was written by Terry Pratchett and Phil Masters.
see http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/books/Discworld/
Bruno
Phil Masters
<sc...@skhadley.freeserve.co.uk> writes:
> What is GURPS?
A role-playing games rules system, designed to be usable for as wide a
range of game settings as possible. *GURPS Discworld* is primarily a guide
to running games set on the Disc, using these rules.
(It therefore perforce can be used as a guide to the setting, even for
non-gamers. GURPS rules mechanics are intended not to be intrusive, and
much of the book is taken up with descriptions of people, places, and laws
of nature.)
--
Phil Masters
* Home Page: http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/Phil_Masters
* Membership Secretary, BAROQUON, the independent UK RPG convention, 1999:
http://www.philm.demon.co.uk/Baroquon/Main.html
Mark Haanen
<ph...@philm.demon.co.uk> wrote:
>Dave! wrote:
>> Perhaps this isn't the ideal forum for this question, but I was
>> wondering if anyone had opinions about the recent GURPS product. I saw
>> it on the shelf but was a little frightened by the price tag. Is it
>> worth the $26.95 (or something like that)?
>
>I would answer this in detail, but I could accused of a little bit of
>bias...
>
[snip]
Let me answer it then. The book is a perfect background for anyone
wanting to try role-playing in a Discworld setting. Even if you do not
want to use the GURPS system I'd wholeheartedly recommend it.
Too bad it hadn't arrived at my bookstore when PterryOBE was
in the Netherlands at halloween...
Phil has (most graciously) put the bits that didn't quite make it
into GURPS Discworld on his website. If you want a sample
of the book, I recommend you go there. It also features another
RPG system about British Education -- The Skool Rools.
Mark Haanen
haa...@xs4all.nl
Paul Johnson
<ph...@philm.demon.co.uk> writes
>I will impartially say makes in worth twice
>the list price...
Yeah. I've got it, and I like it. Lots of good stuff. I got it
because I've always wanted to GM a game in the DW, but I might have got
it even without that. I got GURPS Basic Set ages ago because GURPS DW
was going to be out "any month now", and I've been waiting ever since.
(Regular readers may recall my appeal for news of where I could buy a
copy. I finally found one in our new branch of Ottokars).
Which brings me to a question. I've had a few ideas and invented one or
two things, like the inside of the Temple of Small Gods and rules for
faith healing. I'd like to make these things generally available,
possibly by posting here. Is that OK, or am I likely to cause copyright
problems? I suspect that at least some of this crosses the border
between fan fiction and literary comment. Would I be better off
submitting it to www.lspace.org? Any views?
Paul.
--------------------------------+---------------------------------
Paul Johnson | Protect Privacy: PGP Fingerprint
Email: Pa...@treetop.demon.co.uk | 878F 2B72 C89D 4864 69E4 23EF
paul.j...@gecm.com | CB1D A36F 8DFE 8B69
Phil Masters
<Pa...@treetop.demon.co.uk> writes:
> ... I've had a few ideas and invented one or
> two things, like the inside of the Temple of Small Gods and rules for
> faith healing. I'd like to make these things generally available,
> possibly by posting here. Is that OK, or am I likely to cause copyright
> problems? I suspect that at least some of this crosses the border
Yes, that's a fuzzy borderline at the best of times...
I don't speak for Steve Jackson Games or for Terry, who are the interested
parties here, but the rule of thumb would be that game-mechanical stuff is
generally fair game; new rules for this sort of thing are forever being
bandied about the 'net and other fan media, and so long as you don't
reproduce chunks of copyrighted rules, companies such as SJG regard that as
positive (it may help their sales) rather than a problem. And fragmentary
references to fiction within such notes ("this is how I handle Discworld
voodoo witches...") are not terribly problematic; that's just chat *about*
existing books.
Substantial setting and character material, on the other hand, is trickier.
If we were talking about a world of a games company's creation, you could
expect them to be fairly relaxed about it - games material is designed to
be expanded upon. Something like the Discworld, on the other hand, is a far
touchier issue, for extremely good practical purposes. (Basically, if a
writer knows that fan fiction set in his world exists, and doesn't act
*against* it, there's a danger of horribly messy disputes further down the
line.) My GUESS is that the occasional casual reference ("here's a
character I play in a Discworld game") would be okay, but once you start
developing substantial ideas ("the Temple of Small Gods is organised
thus"), you're going over the line and treading on Terry's toes.
As to where to post this sort of thing (assuming that it's in the
"acceptable" region) - it might be considered slightly off-topic on a.b.p,
but okay on a.f.p. I'd also suggest cross-posting to rec.games.frp.gurps,
which is the place to go with any queries or ideas about the game-system.
BUT - posting to newsgroups is inherently transient, and substantial
postings are heavy on bandwidth. If you've got some 'Web space available
(and all Demon customers have), that's where to put stuff you want people
to be able to read at will. You can then announce the URL on the
newsgroups, and let anyone who's interested go looking.
(All the above is my opinions only. I'm not a lawyer, and I've never even
played one in a game, that I remember. Though a lawyer character could be
an interesting option in a Discworld game.)
Terry Pratchett
<Pa...@treetop.demon.co.uk> writes
>Which brings me to a question. I've had a few ideas and invented one or
>two things, like the inside of the Temple of Small Gods and rules for
>faith healing. I'd like to make these things generally available,
>possibly by posting here. Is that OK, or am I likely to cause copyright
>problems? I suspect that at least some of this crosses the border
>submitting it to www.lspace.org? Any views?
I've read Phil's reply to this and it's a pretty good answer.
Until someone does something dumb, I look at it like this: creation and
'extrapolation' of DW situations and locations is, pretty much, fan
fiction.
Authors are increasingly twitchy about fan fiction because of some dumb
things that have happened in the States. Once upon a time everybody
knew the unwritten rules. Now they have to be spelled out.
I don't actually object to fan fiction, which by its very nature uses
copyrighted and trademarked material, provided that it's put somewhere
where I don't trip over it (so not to a.f.p. or a.b.p, please) isn't
done for money, and isn't passed off as 'official' in any way. I can't
really object to people writing their own DW scenarios, etc, for other
gamers -- the problems would only begin if they got too proprietorial
about them.
Everything works if people are sensible. Mind you, someone did once
submit to a publisher a complete DW novel they'd written. They said that
it'd have an assured readership and I probably wouldn't sue. The
publishers, fortunately, lived on planet Earth.
--
Terry Pratchett
Trent Hill (Mountaineer)
Scott Hadley wrote in message <788tnd$ch4$1...@news5.svr.pol.co.uk>...
>What is GURPS?
>
Something that I just payed twice the price for apparently.
<Sigh>
Mountaineer
--
AFP Code 1.1a AE-AU d s++: a- UP R++ F+++ o
h++ P- OSD++: !C M pp--- L+>++ c B Cn: PT++ _/^\_
Pu62- 5 !X MT+ e-->+ r++ y++ end |_WWW_| Road
ICQ# 13434886 |WWW| Kill
Afpiance to the incredible Dilesj /_/-\_\ Hedgehog
David Brain
tprat...@unseen.demon.co.uk (Terry Pratchett) wrote:
> The publishers, fortunately, lived on planet Earth.
Aha. So if I submit my manuscript to /Ack-ack ack/ on Mars I'll be safe?
--
David Brain
The Millennium Bug: An inability to spell the word "millennium" correctly
Chris McCubbin
You might want to submit your stuff as an article to Pyramid, SJ Game's
online magazine. Presumably the contract between Pterrry and Psteve covers
stuff like that, so you'd be out of the loop in the unlikely event of any
lawyer stuff happening, plus you'd get paid (I think Pyramid still pays).
Paul Johnson wrote in message ...
>In article <36A4D5...@philm.demon.co.uk>, Phil Masters
><ph...@philm.demon.co.uk> writes
>
>>I will impartially say makes in worth twice
>>the list price...
>
>Yeah. I've got it, and I like it. Lots of good stuff. I got it
>because I've always wanted to GM a game in the DW, but I might have got
>it even without that. I got GURPS Basic Set ages ago because GURPS DW
>was going to be out "any month now", and I've been waiting ever since.
>(Regular readers may recall my appeal for news of where I could buy a
>copy. I finally found one in our new branch of Ottokars).
>
>Which brings me to a question. I've had a few ideas and invented one or
>two things, like the inside of the Temple of Small Gods and rules for
>faith healing. I'd like to make these things generally available,
>possibly by posting here. Is that OK, or am I likely to cause copyright
>problems? I suspect that at least some of this crosses the border
>between fan fiction and literary comment. Would I be better off
>submitting it to www.lspace.org? Any views?
>
Phil Masters
<cmcc...@incanmonkey.com> writes:
> (I think Pyramid still pays)
Yep. Basic rates, perhaps, but decently promptly.