Past blurbs from the “Hear Ye” sidebar section. Announcements too trivial for a full blog post. Minor side thoughts of the sort that used to go to Twitter before its Fall (call it prelapsarian Twitter). Any such town crier missives, now collected here.

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2024-12-02: As I understand it, SJ Games’ Munchkin line doesn’t just take on funny tropes and licensed properties (MARVEL, Batman, Oz, etc.); it riffs on RPG systems, too. There’s Munchkin Pathfinder, Munchkin Starfinder, Munchkin Warhammer, Munchkin D&D (by way of Munchkin & Mazes, if my understanding is correct), Munchkin Shadowrun… but no Munchkin GURPS! What!? 
What’s the holdup there, SJ Games? Trouble cutting a deal with the GURPS IP holders? : )

2024-11-28: Tactically, All-Out Attack is a worse maneuver in melee than its description lets on. Not only do you lose all active defenses, but – extra hidden pitfall! – every one of your melee foes is entitled to respond with a Telegraphic Attack free of drawbacks, as the +2 bonus on active defenses it’d normally hand you becomes moot when you have no active defense. In short, choosing AOA means you shed all active defenses and you hand all melee foes a free +4 (!) bonus to hit you back. Might as well be standing stock still while wearing a weapon-attracting homing device!
What if… instead of denying active defenses, AOA meant a -4 penalty to active defenses? That’s still really harsh – it’s as bad as being stunned! But it’d remove the staid predictability of “this guy can’t defend”, letting a berserker surprise foes with the occasional (rabid, snarling) parry or dodge. It’d do away with “free” Telegraphic Attacks against said berserker, as such attacks will meaningfully lessen the target’s active defense penalty from -4 to -2. And it’d give all characters incentive to toss exciting AOAs into the combat mix more often.
(For compatibility with Martial Arts‘ Committed Attack, add these provisos to our modified rule on AOA and defense: “The attacker cannot parry with the hand(s) he used to attack, block if he attacked with his shield or cloak, or dodge if he kicked. He cannot retreat.”)
This has long been on my “want to test in a long-running game, not just in gladiator battles” list. Anyone out there who’s tried this?

2024-11-19: As our world nudges up against the (predicted) switchover to GURPS Tech Level 9, how we doin’ on the actual gadgetry? Well, we’ve ably surpassed the acceleration and range predicted for electric autos by Car Wars and GURPS Autoduel, and – needless to say – have blown away many games’ predictions involving the capabilities of computers and related gadgetry. But how about, say, the running speed of robots? While I need to dig into game supplements to see what was predicted, I’ll note that bipedal bots have just hit a new running speed record (wearing actual sneakers!) of 3.6 meters per second – a near-exact GURPS Move 4. Like you or me with Light encumbrance, maybe? (Or me even without, probably.)
Expect TL 9 to herald the arrival of Move 5 and faster ‘bots. (And thanks to AI, a ‘bot will lace up its sneakers with an understanding of the old joke that it doesn’t need to outrun the bear, it just has to outrun us.)

2024-11-17: Last entry I pondered alternate names for the “Nature’s Strength” force that powers the Druidic Arts. For ideas, I turned to… ChatGPT.
I’ll relate my prompt, the full results, and more in a future blog post about AI. For now, an excerpt of AI’s suggestions:
–Prana: In Hindu philosophy, it represents the cosmic energy that permeates the universe, also known as “life force” or “vital energy.”
-Numen: In Roman religion, it signifies a divine presence or spirit, often connected to natural locations.
-Sylva: Inspired by the Latin word for “forest,” symbolizing nature’s inherent magic.
-Anima: From Latin, meaning “soul” or “spirit,” often used to describe the living essence of natural things.
-Verdantra: A combination of “verdant” (green, lush) and “mantra” (sacred word), suggesting the chant-like flow of nature’s power.
–Natura Flux: Latin-inspired, meaning “the flow of nature,” suggesting a mystical energy that emanates from the natural world.
-Tellura: From “Tellus,” the Roman goddess of the Earth, representing the earth’s hidden magical forces.
And many more. Wow. Enough suggestions to pick an alternate name for Nature’s Strength, and even finer aspects of it, should a game have use for those.
Crazy stuff, this AI. More on that later.

2024-11-09: DF/DFRPG: I’m fine with the concept and the workings of Nature’s Strength, the force that powers Druidic Arts. I’m just not so crazy about the name. It feels like there should be some perfect word out there, in the vein of “mana” or “chi” or “sanctity”, that succinctly names this power of nature. Let’s see… “Quintessence” isn’t quite right. Nor is “Aether”. And “the Force” is taken, I hear.
Actually, DF/DFRPG writers do a fine job of naming things, so I fully expect they sifted through a lot of possibilities, found them lacking, and settled on Nature’s Strength for good reason. But I think I know a place to get some suggestions. Back soon…

2024-11-03: An addition to the previous thoughts on DF/DFRPG anti-toxins: As I noted, GMs should avoid dungeons featuring nothing but “instant” fantasy poisons, as these leave anti-toxin concoctions, spells, and medical skills no chance to do their thing. But there are a couple of ways to keep anti-toxins (and the druids that brew them) useful even in the face of such poisons:
1) Let the right anti-toxin partially protect against a specific “instant” poison if imbibed beforehand. I’m still playing with specifics, but something like half damage, and/or +2 to resistance rolls, for 10 minutes after drinking… Hmm, should that protection remain in full force for the whole 10 minutes, or just protect against one poisoning during that period, or something in between, like three poisonings? Still pondering that…
2) If PCs want to prepare an anti-toxin against an “instant” poison and drink it after getting poisoned… Well, the rules may say that this does nothing, but give the PCs something, I say. Let the concoction undo a point or two of poison damage (maybe 1d-3, similar to First Aid), or halve any ongoing non-damage effects (like nausea). Just a little reward for a perfectly reasonable action.
Tweaks like these make it smart to prepare anti-toxins for any poisons that PCs anticipate!

2024-11-01: Addendum to yesterday’s entry: DF and DFRPG are packed with “fantasy poisons” that have instant, one-and-done effect. All good and fun, but those poisons give anti-toxins, spells like Neutralize Poison, and skills like Pharmacy and Esoteric Medicine nothing to do. (I may have overlooked an entry or two, but in DFRPG Monsters I see only one entry, Slime, that features a poison slow enough that anti-toxin might lessen its effects.)
So try to add slow-acting poisons to the dungeon’s hazard mix. Gaming these can be as simple as rolling poison damage as always, but meting it out at a point per minute or per hour or whatever is slow enough for anti-toxins and other measures to be of some aid.
This is a good way to boost druids’ usefulness in dungeons, as they’ve got access to the right spells and skills for treating slow toxins and crafting low-cost anti-toxins. (And while druids’ medical spells are subject to penalties for Nature’s Strength, their Esoteric Medicine skill always works, something clerics can’t claim.) Also, as I noted yesterday, slow-acting poisons provide another incentive for researching dungeons beforehand, to stock up on the right concoctions for anticipated monsters’ poisons.

2024-10-31: Here’s one of those little side rules GMs concoct to add a bit of color:
Druid-brewed anti-toxins in DF and DFRPG halt the effects of one specific venom or poison. They’re a nice low-cost thing to stock up on, especially when the PCs have properly researched a dungeon and learned what toxins to expect.
But when a colleague is turning purple and the PCs don’t have – or don’t know whether they have – the right anti-toxin for the right emergency, there’s fun to be had by letting them throw a Hail Mary and try whatever concoction they do have on hand. Roll 1d and hope for the best:
———
1: It works! Treat as the “correct” anti-toxin.
2 or 3: It works partially, halting effects in 3d6 (instead of 1d6) minutes. Or it doesn’t halt effects, but lessens them (half damage, or +2 bonus on further resistance rolls, or other GM call).
4 or 5: No effect.
6: The concoction makes things worse! Have fun, GMs…
———
Mods to this d6 roll: -1 if the anti-toxin is close to being right (giant insect venom anti-toxin vs giant spider venom); +1 if the anti-toxin seems way off the mark (dungeon fungus poison anti-toxin vs manticore venom). The mod is a GM call, of course, but a PC who rolls vs Poisons or Esoteric Medicine could ask the GM to reveal it beforehand.

2024-10-19: A shirt or other piece of silk cloth won’t stop an arrow or sword from piercing its target, but it’ll neatly encase the weapon, traveling along with it into the target. To extract the offending object, just pull on that tough, un-penetrated silk cloth, and it’ll carry the object out with it; no messy surgery needed!
You’ve probably heard that one, a common (?) bit of gamer knowledge. The idea even appears in games with detailed treatments of armor, as seen on GURPS Low-Tech p. 104 and the related vignette (and art) on p. 97.
But is it true? YouTube channel Tod’s Workshop tested it with arrows vs silk-covered meat – and sadly found that, at least under its test conditions, silk might as well be dainty taffeta. Arrows just plow right through. Oh well. It’s not your fault, silk; we shouldn’t have stuck you with impossible expectations.
But. A silk aficionado might hope that the material can still perform its cool trick if hit by a weak shot, such as an arrow with its momentum nearly spent by distance or armor, something the video’s testing didn’t try. I think it’s possible to accept the video’s reality check and keep the modest protective effects given in Low-Tech, by limiting the special effects (those other than +1 DR) to attacks that deliver, say, just 1 or 2 hits of penetrating damage.

2024-10-15: How to Dungeon Master Parenting: A Guidebook for Gamifying the Child-Rearing Quest, Leveling Up Your Skills, and Raising Future Adventurers is an upcoming book. CNN takes a look at its message: D&D teaches kids teamwork and empathy, and even provides insights into parenting, says the author. (A D&D-based guide to parenting? That’s quite a sign of just how mainstream and normal RPGs are becoming.)
I have to raise this quibble: there’s nothing presented in the article that’s specific to D&D! I’d rather see the book and CNN look at the insights that many RPGs (D&D included) can offer into childrearing and life in general. By stepping outside a single fantasy game, the book could show how some RPGs can let a history or sociology class experience the Silk Road or the French Revolution, how some games’ science-informed worldmaps bring dull geography lessons to life, or how countless games’ forays into hard sci-fi, steampunk adventures, literary classics, prehistoric settings, and so on can spark whole new areas of interest in kids.
Oh well. When there’s an 80-ton gorilla in the hobby, it’s bound to soak up all the attention it deserves, and then some. Also, the book’s not even out yet; maybe it does go beyond the singular world of beholders and barbarians to uncover lifehacks and educational opportunities in other RPGs. Either way, while I can’t say it sounds like a must-buy for me, I’ll check it out if I get a chance.

2024-10-04: The DF/DFRPG druid template has no single required disadvantage – not even Sense of Duty (Nature). That disadvantage is included among the core choices offered, and no doubt turns up in a lot of character builds, but your druid PC doesn’t have to feel any need to protect and serve Mother/Father Nature!
That surprised me for a moment… but, yeah, it tracks. After all, Nature itself embraces the animate and inanimate alike; it snuffs out life as readily as it nurtures it. Nature is a green forest of maples and bunnies; Nature is also a pyroclastic flow that burns said forest and buries the remains under meters of lifeless stone. Druids, too, could adopt that same (somewhat unnerving) neutrality.
Sure, druids will have an interest in preserving the Nature’s Strength that powers their abilities; many nature spirits and the like would as well. But does Nature itself care about the state of its own health and strength? Sounds like a deep topic for druids to ponder in their meditations on Theology (Druidic).

2024-10-01: The Divine Favor advantage in GURPS Powers: Divine Favor is unusual in that it starts at level 4 (“levels 1-3 do not exist”). That’s reasonable, as the cleric makes a 3d roll against Divine Favor to catch the god’s attention. But I see no reason why levels 1-3 couldn’t exist (perhaps with costs of 5, 7, and 10 points). These levels would simply mean that petition roll bonuses are crucial to any chance of success. And levels 1-3 would work just fine as prerequisites for low-power learned prayers (e.g., any learned prayer with an advantage cost no higher than [5] in the case of Divine Favor 1 [5].)

2024-09-28: Again, I link to an interesting post by Enraged Eggplant: Divine Favor, Pulling Rank, Agency, and Investment. I rather like the GURPS Powers: Divine Favor clerical magic system. But EE gives it a fair lashing: its core mechanic – on a good roll, the GM creates some miracle that saves the day – is fraught with unpredictability and vagueness, and, most importantly, can reduce player investment to “Hey GM, solve this for me”.
I can’t blame EE for disliking that! But I’ll counter-argue that some players might want that. Some players might enjoy all kinds of in-game fun – the social stuff, the PC-building, whatever – but not the tactical “gotta work my way out of this situation” part. Even to the point of paying a ton of points for the ability to fob that work off on the GM? [shrug] It’s not my bag, but a gamer wants what a gamer wants…
So I’m good with Divine Favor. But it’s important that GMs and players know in advance that the system carries the meta-game effects that EE describes, and that’s where the linked post offers a very welcome caution.

2024-09-11: There’s a nice post by Enraged Eggplant reminding GURPS players that skills unique to alien or fantasy races are fertile ground for imagination.
New skills are fun all around. I’ve come up with a few of my own, like the Cartography (Underground) and Unnaturalist skills that differentiate weird dungeon delvers from normals who learn mundane Cartography and Naturalist. But special racial skills? Hmm…
I have Change Control, a skill that lets blobby creatures push the envelope of their limited shapeshifting powers, perhaps to halve the time of a shapeshift or to squeeze through an unusually small opening. That was created specifically for a GURPS version of Star Frontiers‘ Dralasites, but I’ve opined that it’d be a fine skill for any shapeshifter. (Specialized, likely: Change Control (Dralasite), Change Control (Werewolf), etc.))
For any nifty racial ability, ask: Is this a thing that could potentially be practiced, pushed, or adapted to circumstances? Something that might have picked up its own body of techniques and lore and niche uses over a race’s history? If so, a unique skill may be a great complement. (The in-game use is simple and welcome: any situation lying between “yes, your ability can do that” and “no, your ability can’t do that” becomes a case of “make a roll!”. And that encourages players to explore.)

2024-09-02: Lots of recent and upcoming GURPS releases: see the latest news here. And publisher Gaming Ballistic is at it again with an already-successful campaign to fund a new DFRPG adventure, Warlock Knight.
Go make that Scrounging roll to find some coppers behind the sofa cushions.

2024-09-01: Shield size can matter for more than just protection; for example, shield DB becomes an attack and DX penalty for the shield-bearer in close combat. A couple more ideas along those lines:
・Use multiple Blocks from Martial Arts p. 123. But instead of the suggested cumulative -5 penalty, use a penalty of -(3 + shield DB), making smaller shields more agile. (Earlier suggested here)
・By the rules, the penalty to strike a shield-bearing arm or hand is doubled from the usual -2 or -4, to -4 or -8. Alternate rule to make shield size matter: Instead of doubling, worsen the penalty by (shield DB) to hit the arm, or by (shield DBx2) to hit the hand.
There’s lots more you can do make shield size interesting. Check out this and this for starters.

2024-08-25: Addendum to yesterday’s entry: It can seem difficult to remember where the per-die damage bonuses and ST bonuses of Boxing, Brawling, Karate, Sumo Wrestling, and Wrestling kick in. (DX? DX+1? DX+2?) It’s actually easy: All of these bonuses are +1 with 4 points spent on the skill, +2 with 8 points spent. And that’s that. (Just remember that Brawling alone gets nothing extra at 8 points. And that this rule doesn’t fit Forced Entry’s bonuses from skill.)

2024-08-24: Observation out of the blue: In GURPS, it’s easy to underestimate the impact of the damage bonuses from Boxing, Brawling, and Karate, especially for characters of unremarkable ST. At ST 10, a bare-handed punch delivers 1d-3 dam – just 0.5 dam on average. Spend 4 points on one of those skills, though, and the punch improves to 1d-2 dam, or average 1.67 dam – over three times the hurt! Make that 8 points in Boxing or Karate, and you get 1d-1 dam, or average 2.5 dam – five times that of the unskilled punch! (Gotta wonder: Is there any other RPG as wildly generous with its damage bonuses for fighting skills?)

2024-08-09: DF/DFRG: Three suggestions to make the Heroic Feats cleric/holy warrior Holy ability a bit more fun:
1) As suggested recently, replace the +1/+2d rolls with flat +4/+8 mods for faster play (thanks to easy one-time calculation of effects – especially for Heroic Vitality).
2) It’d be nice to let PI and Holiness have some effect on Heroic Feats! Adding PI/Holiness directly to the Heroic Feats boost is far too generous. But, assuming you’re rolling the boost, letting PI/Holiness serve as the minimum roll on each die ensures meaningful bonuses, without increasing their top end.
3) An alternate way to let PI/Holiness do something: Add it directly to the 3d roll for duration. (I mean, why not? Most battles will end before that anyway…)
Choosing one of these makes for a nice little boost. Each flouts RAW, and strictly speaking, should probably increase the cost a bit. But for a once-per-session Big Power-Up Moment, meh, let it slide…

2024-08-04: I like the DF/DFRPG Shield Mastery advantage just fine, but man, it’s expensive. So I’ll note that, looking at its build in Dungeon Fantasy 11, you could drop the +1 DB it adds to Dodge vs ranged attacks (i.e., limit that +1 DB to blocks only); that’ll cut the cost from [15] to a mere [6]. Maybe use that as a “starter version” before upgrading to the full advantage?

2024-07-20: Quick DFRPG tip for a very minor situation: Heroic Feats, a cleric/holy warrior Holy ability, boosts ST, DX, or HT by +1d or +2d. That’s fine – but during character creation, allow the option of letting this ability instead confer a flat (and slightly generous!) +4 or +8 bonus. 
The benefits are solid bonuses (rolling “+1 ST” on your big, once-per-session invocation of Heroic Might is boring) and quicker play. Sure, a randomly rolled Heroic Grace DX bonus presents no particular hassle in play. But rolling a Heroic Might ST bonus requires checking new damage, Basic Lift, encumbrance, and HP for every random result; by contrast, a flat +4/+8 is a “compute ’em once and write ’em down” affair. Likewise, a random Heroic Vitality HT boost means calculating new Basic Speed, Dodge, and Basic Move every time; a flat +4/+8 means a dead-simple +1/+2 boost to each of those stats. Much easier!

2024-07-17: Interesting video in which two well-known weapon YouTubers run a big bunch of sword-vs-spear matches. Spoiler: The spear pretty much rules (except when failing miserably in one-handed use). Some aspects of the battles look well suited to GURPS combat, while the one-handed spear trials (maybe) support my idea that the Spear and Staff skills really should be One-Handed Spear/Staff and Two-Handed Spear/Staff. (Then again, an off-hand comment by Lindybeige suggests differences between the skills of two-handed spear and quarterstaff, though unfortunately no detail is given.)

2024-07-14: In the vein of my last post here, the Generic Universal Eggplant blog‘s post “Ode to GURPS” is another fine overview of the system that might hold power to persuade D&D-only players. As a fan’s personal love letter to the game, it’s naturally full of opinion – but many of those assertions do carry a ring of truth.

2024-07-11: I clicked on the video What If D&D Was ACTUALLY as Flexible as the Community Thought?, curious as to what it had to say about D&D. Surprise, it’s a video about GURPS – and one of the better intros to the game I’ve seen online. The enthusiastic presenter avoids the weakness of so many videos by not getting all bogged down in Basic Speed calculation or skill costs or dice mechanics (well, there’s not too much of the latter). Instead, he goes for the Big Picture of what the system is really about: building your own game, creating whatever sort of character you like, and… well, I won’t spoil his interesting conclusions, so give the video a watch. This may be a good vid to show D&D stalwarts who are reluctant to give something else a try.

2024-07-06: My “Ally Roster” RSS feed aggregator, reporting on the doings of other gaming blogs, was long silent… now, it’s back! (Scroll down a while, and you’ll see it in this sidebar.)
Let’s see how long it lasts before technical difficulties crop up again…
(Oh, and do tell me if you’ve got a gaming blog that I should add to this list of feeds.)

2024-06-19: Many a time, I’ve found the highly detailed GURPS (and its offspring) to be a step ahead of me on some clever idea.
Just now, I was writing up some curse effects for a game, and had a brilliant thought: “You know, shouldn’t properly cleansing a curse work like treating a disease, in that you have to diagnose it first to avoid a -5 penalty on treatment? Maybe using something like Occultism to ‘diagnose’ the curse?” “Absolutely!”, I answered myself, and began jotting notes for testing.
But then I saw a little rules bit I’d missed on DFRPG Exploits p. 67: “Curse-like ones might call for Remove Curse, at -5 without an Occultism roll.”
So, the game beat me to it. (Then again, that text specifically addresses curse-like diseases. Maybe I still have a good idea in that any curse, unless its nature is already obvious, should call for an Occultism-based or other “analysis” to reveal clues to the curse’s nature and to avoid a -5 penalty on any follow-up cleansing spell or skill.)

2024-04-17: Over on the forums, I ask for point cost gurus’ input on a question of minor interest: What’s a fair cost for a generic +/-1 to be hit in combat? Come weigh in with any and all thoughts!

2024-03-06: The industrious easyGURPS YouTube channel offers a short overview of GURPS on square-grid and no-grid maps – including a lovely introduction to the official GURPS product of my own creation, the freebie GURPS Range Ruler (page on this site)/(download on Warehouse 23). Which I guess I can now advertise with “As seen on YouTube!“!
Oh, and look, there’s a nice intro to the Range Ruler on the Japanese-language GURPS Wiki. It’s an international phenomenon!

2024-03-06: There was a lovely RSS feed here in the sidebar. It’s gone now; a broken (I assume?) update to the widget was doing to the site layout what a purple worm does to a 1st-level D&D party (hey, I’ve seen it happen). I’ll reinstate the RSS feed as soon as the problem is fixed.

2024-02-29: My apologies if you’ve recently had troubles viewing the site. Service has been spotty as the hosting service runs through an unusual number of upgrades and maintenance outages.
And it’ll no doubt happen again in the future, so your patience is appreciated. (Hey, it’s not like there’s some flood of new content to keep up with…)

2024-02-21: Support for the Dungeon Fantasy Roleplaying Game waxes on. SJG recently released The Devil’s Workshop, which sends heroes to a Black Tower to battle demonic forces. And publisher Gaming Ballistic has just launched an already-successful campaign to fund Saethor’s Bane, a DFRPG adventure for either solo or group play.
Adventures await. Have at ’em!