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The World of Georic 1989-Present

Friday, August 28, 2015

#RPGaDAY2015 Day #28: Favorite Game You No Longer Play

Those of you who have followed this all month for #RPGaDay now that I rarely get to role-play anymore, so I had a LOT of contenders for Favorite Game You No Longer Play. 

For all the options it offers, all the crunchiness I crave, and all the prep time that no longer exists, I grant today to GURPS.

I love GURPS.  The realism, the logic (even the logic and math of putting together a vehicle/robot/mecha). 

We used to have numerous incarnations of GURPS Fantasy (hardcore and gritty, think Warhammer Fantasy Role-Play, with the potential for less mud).    Horror seemed to work alright, and one of the greatest campaigns I ever played in used GURPS-Humanx.   Of course, I've numerously mentioned my "Napalm Death" multi-genre campaign, mixing Red Dawn, Mad Max, and whatever tickled my fancy.  

GURPS fell out of favor with me by the late 90's.  Despite a healthy employee discount for all the awesome sourcebooks that were coming into the store, I just didn't have time to put something together that wasn't D&D.  The points-based systems were also the domain of socially inept ne'er do wells that I didn't wish to associate with.    By the time the 4th Edition hardbacks came out, most of my books had gone the way of con auctions or eBay. 

The final nail in the coffin was at the same moment I planned on resurrecting the system.    After we wrapped up our long running Hackmaster campaign and a number of players (myself included) were leaving the area, we planned on doing a "fun" campaign by forum, e-mail, text, carrier pigeon, whatever worked.    Everyone immediately gravitated to Illuminati University, and I set about creating GURPS characters for their Freshthing.

First was Hoyce.  What did he want to run?

A talking ex-astronaut chimpanzee with a love of golf and tweed.

While a 100-point version of Mr Bipp does exist somewhere, the problems with character creation with a man who was interested in the process did not bode well for the other players who were not system attuned.  We ended up turning things over to Risus, where it's served us well.

If I want a gritty dark ages game, a special ops scenario, or some obscure historical game without Mythos I may turn to my 3rd Edition rulebook that I have left.  Maybe in a year or so I can set up Imperial Rome and gladiators for the girls.  But for now, GURPS lies dormant, sleeping.

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