GURPS Pokemon Bestiary First Pass

by on November 4, 2016 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: GURPS

For the past little while, Pseudonym has been posting various Pokemon moves as GURPS Sorcery spells whenever he gets stuck for something else to say.

Along with Smudge’s continuing Pokemon Go adventures, and now the both of us playing the more recent 3DS games, it’s left me wondering just how to emulate the game relationships in a more full fledged system. It’s not too hard for GURPS: each Type is a meta-trait that defines the vulnerabilities and resistances, and then the moves get a type Power-modifier to hook into that.

To keep things from getting absolutely humongous, this is just my general thoughts on how to get the creatures to work, without trying to figure out a proper campaign framework. Don’t expect to see a second pass.

The general Pokemon meta-trait looks like this:

IQ -2 [-40], Hard to Kill 1 [2], Hidebound [-5], Social Stigma (Valuable Property) [-10] = -53

This gives an average Pokemon an IQ of 8 (a bit slow or simple, but quite able to understand what all these humans are doing), and a 6- roll to come up with something new (which is fine out in the wild, where instinct is all you need, but in a Poke-battle against a new opponent you want a trainer calling out instructions). Hard to Kill helps with generally ‘non-lethal’ nature of Poke-fights, but if you want to emulate the setting, you should use as many non-lethal ‘switches’ as possible (no bleeding, no crippling… and possibly rule everything automatically falls unconscious at 0 HP; the TV series especially is a Bonk-only universe).

The brute-force method is to define a meta-trait for each Type with Injury Tolerance: Damage Reduction (2) (Occasional) for each Type ‘not very effective’ against it, and Vulnerability, x2 (Occasional) for each Type that is ‘super effective’ against it, which are worth 20/-20 points each. To emulate the fact that Pokemon are better at moves of their own Type, the meta-trait should also have two levels of [Power] Talent (5 points/level) for the appropriate Type. So a Type is worth 10 points + (very effective – super effective)*20. (As a quick example, Fire Type is 2 levels of Fire Talent [10], Damage Reduction vs Bug, Fairy, Fire, Grass, Ice, and Steel [20 x 6], and Vulnerability to Ground, Rock, and Water [-20 x 3], for a total of 70 points.)

This reverses the normal situation in GURPS, where the limitations on a Power are usually built into the power modifier, but here the meta-trait defines what you’re vulnerable to. While this does get most of the effects (immunities would still be part of the power modifier), they can also be modeled by more general ideas, though they may not be as systemic as this.

The obvious reworks are that Normal Type shouldn’t be a meta-trait at all—they’re just ‘normal’—and Ghost Type includes Insubstantial (Affect Substantial, +100%; Always On, -50%) [120], and most power modifiers include ‘Affects Insubstantial’ for +20%. And the Ground power modifier gets ‘Accessibility: Target is on the Ground, -20%’ (as opposed to ‘Not Flying Type’, which would be the normal way to represent an immunity in the brute-force approach). The odd part is that Ghost Type attacks can’t affect Normal or Fighting (which seems like Insubstantial Only) but do affect everything else, so that’s ‘Affects Substantial (Not Normal, Fighting), +35%’… and have fun explaining it.

Another obvious idea is to have Fighting Types use an actual unarmed MA style, but that’s beyond my GURPS knowledge. Going further, you can start representing a lot of these effects by making sure to build them into the abilities, like representing the vulnerability of Flying Types to Ice simply by making sure that all Ice abilities cause problems for flight (reduced visibility, Side Effects that shut off Flying from icing up, etc.), but that would be relatively tricky.

Purely physical moves (Tackle, Pound, etc.) should be represented with some innate unarmed skill. Moves with low PP scores should cost an FP to use (or more). Optionally, all moves can cost Fatigue (akin to Sorcery), but that’s probably a bit much (and would demand the use of Energy Reserve and the like).

And then the fun part is figuring out the game-stats all the wildly varying physical forms of Pokemon out there. So here’s some sample writeups, that don’t try to account for differences in the in-game stats like speed and attack power:
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161 Arctic Crossroads

by on October 31, 2016 at 1:00 pm
Posted In: ASL

For our latest ASL game, Patch and I decided to try out the first scenario in Hakkaa Päälle. “Arctic Crossroads” is an unusual scenario in multiple ways. First, it’s happening in the polar night/dawn, and instead of the usual LV that might imply, the scenario has you use a subset of the Night rules, with no cloaking, or straying, or jitter fire, but there is a permanent 4-hex NVR that keeps things isolated. Also, it uses the new light woods terrain, where woods are a Hindrance rather than an obstacle to LOS. Moreover, they’re only +1/per hex instead of the normal +2.

As to the actual forces involved, the Finns start with seven squads, with a couple of MGs defending a couple ART that the Russians are trying to capture. (They also have a fairly nasty .30-cal AA mount with 8 IFE.) The Russians have eighteen squads, but look like something out of the original Squad Leader, with only three leaders, none of which is better than 8-0, with a MMG, a couple of LMG, and a light MTR (with a minimum range of 3 hexes, and max sighting is generally 4…). Overall, the Finns (who can self-rally) have better leadership, and the Russians are only ELR 2. On turn 4 (of 10) the Finns get another seven squads (with a HMG towed along on the new Akhio), which should enter behind the advancing Russians. The Russians need to end the scenario on turn 9 with 12 EVP past the setup line for the ART, and can get 3 extra VP for each one whose Location they Control.

I had the Russians and started out trying to set up on the wrong side of the board (I didn’t notice that the setup area excluded the edge where the Finns later come in). I then set to advance down the middle of board 17, with woods and brush on the flanks, but clear terrain in the center. I tried to force the extreme east flank of Patch’s line, but but his first shot was a 2KIA to eliminate my first squad. My second move generated a PTC that I passed, but it activated his Sniper who then broke the squad. The third squad broke to a NMC.

My fourth squad passed a 1MC. By that point, however, it was obvious I wouldn’t be forcing my way close to anything. I started lining up at and just beyond extreme visual range (4 hexes), and lost another HS to residual (and then the remainder disrupted on a HoB), and then another squad to further fire.

161-1r
Situation, Russian Turn 1, showing the full board. North is to the left.
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The Legend of Bold Riley

by on October 27, 2016 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Comics

I grabbed this graphic novel at APE a few weeks ago, and it’s pretty good. It’s a collection of six stories, each with a different artist, but the same writer. Each story makes a good whole, so the graphic novel is overall episodic in structure.

Rilavashana (Riley) is a princess of the fictional Indian kingdom of Prakkalore, but is seriously smitten with the wanderlust bug, and so goes off on adventures far from home in the best Sword & Sorcery tradition. The stories are actually more traditional folk-tale in tone and structure, and use a fair amount of narration like Marvel’s old Conan stories (well, not quite that much). Generally, Riley rides into a new locale where there is a preexisting problem, and with a combination of foresight, cunning and swordplay, works her way to the center of the problem, and a solution.

While I’ve certainly seen (and enjoyed) worse, I found the art to be ho-hum to a bit below average most of the time. The main exceptions are the cover by Brinson Thieme, and “The Wicked Temple” by Konstantin Pogorelov. Even that last can take some getting used to, but it’s the middle of a monsoon, and everything looks wet and sleeting rain. Best of all is his two-page spread establishing the temple, which was so striking it pushed me over the edge to buying the book.

Overall, it’s good but not great. The writing is clever but remains a bit distant, and most of the art isn’t what I go for. But neither is it bad, and I’ll certainly consider getting a second volume with more stories should one come out.

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Dungeons & Sorcery Spells 2

by on October 23, 2016 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: GURPS

Here’s another set of ten spells adapted from AD&D to add to my Dungeons & Sorcery system for GURPS. I’m still concentrating on 1st Level spells, though more of these are from Unearthed Arcana/2e Players Handbook, and branch out into illusions.

Chill Touch (C)
Necromancy, Somatic, Verbal
67 points + 66 points/level
Casting Time: 1 second
Casting Roll: Innate Attack
Range: Touch
Duration: Instantaneous

This spell tries to drain some of the life force out of a creature. If the caster hits a living creature with a chill touch, it feels a chilling sensation and takes 1d-1 of damage (crushing, DR protects as normal, but there is no blunt trauma or knockback). Assuming the attack penetrates DR, the target makes an unmodified HT roll and loses 1 point of ST for a number of minutes equal to his MoF. Further successful attacks will drain more ST!

If chill touch is used on an undead creature, it takes no damage, but may gain a Dread of the caster (with an 11 yard range) as its link to the Negative Material Plane is disrupted. Do a quick contest of the caster’s Will+Talent vs the target’s HT, and the dread will last for MoS minutes.

This spell has no effect on inanimate objects, nor creatures animated by magical means (such as golems). Each level of the spell adds a -1 penalty to the HT of the target.

Innate Attack, 1d-1 (cr) (Accessibility: Living Creatures, -10%; Link, +10%; Melee Attack, C, 1, -20%; No Blunt Trauma, -20%, No Knockback, -10%; Requires Gestures, -10%; Requires Magic Words, -10%; Sorcery, -15%) [0.2×4] + Affliction 1 (HT; -1 ST, +5%; Accessibility: Living Creatures, -10%; Cumulative, +400%; Follow-Up, -20%; Requires Gestures, -10%; Requires Magic Words, -10%; Sorcery, -15%) [4.6×10] + Affliction (HT; Disadvantage: Dread, Caster, 11 yards, +40%; Accessibility: Undead, -35%; Based on Will, Own Roll, +20%; Link, +10%; Malediction 1, +100%; Requires Gestures, -10%; Requires Magic Words, -10%; Sorcery, -15%) [2.0×10]
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Blocks of Napoleon

by on October 19, 2016 at 12:00 pm
Posted In: Boardgaming

Mark came over Saturday for some quick FtF gaming, and finally introduced me to Commands & Colors: Napoleonics. I was aware of the big change from C&C:A, that combat dice are largely dependent on the number of blocks in the unit, but of course the little things got me, mostly in how the card deck is different. (I missed the ‘draw two and discard one’ bit of a Scout card the first time I played one, and the two different ‘move something in each section’ cards got me too.)

Hunting around for something that looked introductory, we ended up playing Zehdenick from the Prussian expansion. This turned out to be a highly unusual scenario, with only one unit of infantry in the entire thing. I had the Prussians the first time, and started with two Mounted Charge cards, so I sent in my Light Cavalry against his, and started a melee that claimed his Lights, while I only lost one unit.

Both sides have almost nothing on their respective right flanks, and that’s apparently where most of Mark’s cards were. He moved up the Heavy Cavalry on that flank just before I Attacked Left, moving up my Heavies on that flank, and my Light Infantry. The latter reached firing range of his Heavy, and wiped it out in one very lucky volley. That was the high point of my luck during the game, but Mark’s was poor throughout and the final score was 4-1.

We reset and traded sides, and Mark didn’t do a whole lot better, still managing to draw cards for his empty right flank. That said, it still went better for him, and if he’d managed to get more use out of his left flank, it could have gone much worse than the final 4-2 score when I smashed the center again.

After that, we traded to the Austrians, and played a game of Haslach-Jungingen with me as the French. This started well for me, with a strong initial showing on the left-center, occupying Bofinger. I was worried about the strong Austrian line there, but my cavalry forced a couple units into square (or Battalion Mass), and then I slid down a little so a combined arms battle with my Heavy Cavalry and Foot Artillery could finish off a unit.

While Mark managed to pick off a Line Infantry unit at my extreme left, things really went south on the right. I had initially figured I had a superior force over there, and hoped to gain a couple banners over there once the center stabilized, but Mark charged in and destroyed most of that flank, though I held on in the church. I finally pulled out a 6-5 win by managing to destroy the second infantry unit in square, which Mark had yet to rescue, though he had destroyed the Light Cavalry that had been part of the initial advance.

haslach-mark

(A very confusing bit in this scenario is that you get a temporary banner for occupying more of the three town hexes near the middle of the board, without explaining that by ‘town hexes’ they also mean the church adjacent to one town…. I’ve only figured it out now by looking at the annotated map on the CC:N.net site.)

We spent a lot of time talking and catching up on things, so that’s all the gaming we really had time for, but it was a very good intro to the Napoleonic branch of the series, and was a great time as usual. The various Napoleonic wrinkles seem to work very well, so I hope I get a chance to play some more before I forget just what all those wrinkles are!

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