Taught GURPS Combat Lesson Teaching it

Some lessons teaching GURPS combat. I really should run a sample combat for newbies. 

• 1 Combat of 4 elements, 3 vs 1 took 1 hour. One newbie. 
• I had to explain so it took longer than normal. 
• Organize and Visualized the Options by Maneuvers > Attack Options (see White Board)
• This way they can intuitively grasp the options. First Choose a Maneuver THEN (if an attack) Choose Attack Options. 
• Its much better when there is terrain
• Trees provide Cover B407, But surrounding hexes have Bad Footing. 
• Dotted Terrain has bad Footing. -2 to attack, -1 to defend. Must roll DX when sprinting or Move&Attack through for every hex stepped. Because of this, I wish i wrote down the Jump stats. 
• Foliage Provides Soft Cover. 
• Have a Tape measure out its faster than counting Hexes. 

Despite how hard it may be to teach, GURPS combat IS THE simulationist system. My Brother could use a dead Orc as cover against Ranged attacks, after sticking a Glaive through the other Orc.

Advanced Concepts we were able to Tackle

• Quick Shooting (there was an Orcish Archer while Two orcs converged. 
• Called Shots
• Cover
• Committed Attacks

I wish I can run modern combat, since my Vampire Level Bones: Reaper Minis have Marines figs. It would teach people some Airsoft Tactics. For modern, i'll have some "Ruins" for Hard cover. I should have bought some Clear Xelophane for "Saved" terrains for Combat only Games. 

More on Haven

More on Haven if you want to imagine living there:

• Developed world standard for Middle Class describes $7200-21,600USD Cost of Living Annually and describes the top 5%. They meet developed world standards for Education, Job Security, and can find work anywhere in the world but in Haven they are the "Wealthy" population. Housing makes up half and healthcare varies, because its a emerging market (aka 3rd World), they have a middle class life expectancy of about 70s, which is unlike developed worlds which have about x2-x3 the CoL and have a life expectancy of 100s. 
• Pretty much as busy and varied as the Middle Class of Dev.World. 
• Wealth: Comfortable are Upper-Bands of the Middle Class.
• Struggling Class $3600-$7200USD Cost of Living in Dev. World; but considered Comfortable by the Haven Standards. If your single and doesn't have any expensive vices, you can pretty much live like Middle Class. 
• Poor - $1440-$3600USD anualy this is the "Working Class" 
• Dead Broke. Surprising GURPS deadbroke can accommodate the UN and Economist definition of less than $1 a day. There are a lot of people in the world that still operate without Money but live on squatting or "rented" housing, and scrounging or "subsidized" food and necessities by the Political or Criminal "Houses" to maintain Vote Dominance and 
• Some very powerful individuals have started using these as labor and votes producing assets, housing them in Vessels creating Floating Towns. The population shift back to the Politico's lands during Elections.   
• Wealth and Filthy Rich (Status 1-2) - these are people pretty much the middle management of the ruling elite as well as their Idle Family. 
• Millionaires (Status 3-6) - "the Taipans". Modern day Kings would envy the way these families and patriarchs (and a few matriarchs) live.    

Any public service is terrible, public infrastructure never serves the public it serves one of the many factions in haven (as a monoploy or an excuse to charge taxes). In game terms, when it comes to a public service, expect crap. it costs x3-x10 more in time or money. 

Local Expertise is a valuable skill. 

Your Local Area Knowledge can be used as streetwise at -2 penalty. Area knowledge allows you to survive "Police Traps". So if you have it high, understand that you have points well spent. You can substitute Area Knowledge-3 for Navigation as in RAW. 

The skill allows you to cancel out "Noise" from living in there, there are many scams and spammers living in Haven, it takes some skill to sort out the "Noise" from the "real thing". 

Most Public Services that are decent come from the "Factions" and are 2-3x the price, especially necessities. Non-Necessities, Luxury Goods, are 1/2 the price as compared to the rest of the world. If you are part of the Weapon Specialized Factions, certain lethal goods can be cheaper. 

Special Note on Weapons 

Some Very Old Weapons have flooded the weapons market because their license to produce is un-enforcable. You will notice Modernized WW2 weapons being available and half their GURPS listed cost. Despite modernization the sweat shops that produce these guns are poor in skill. 

G44s, 40s, 42, MG42s. 

There are some "Diesel Punk" equipment to be found.  

Players are free to make up other Factions/"Houses"/Corporations. Note that this is a Cosmopolitan Country, factions is bizarrely any ethnic or cultural background.

Despite "Ethnic" profiles listed, expect 1/3 of all ethnic groups as mixed ethnicity. Despite the ethnic diversity, intolerance is healthy and strong in Haven. 

Modern Fantasy Setting: Haven

Taken from Digger2000 from campaign cartographer

here is the Roll20 map
Country population 150Million
Land Area: 300,000 sqkm or 114,000 sqmiles
Wealth: Poor (Middle Class CoL is $7200USD a month - including HOUSING)
Health: Poor (except for Gated Communities in Central Business Districts).
Metropolis Pop Density: 30,000 pop per square km or 68,000 pop per sq mile
Industry: Mining, Light Manufacturing and BPO,
Government: Publicly Democracy (realistically Plutocracy)
Settled Ethnicity: 40% African, 15% Western, 10% Middle Eastern, 10% Indian, 8% Asian and a small minority of various other cultures.
National Language: English, Havani
Culture: American and African
Religion: 60% Christian (protestant), 20% Muslim,
Law Levels: No Lethal Weapons Allowed (very poorly enforced).

Basic History.
One of the Spanish assets lost to the US-Spanish War of the turn of the 20C. This little gem is a large island east of Madagascar, discovered by the Spanish on their return from circumnavigating the globe.

Features:
Walled Cities. Prior to the 2009 recession, there was hyper infrastructure projects that created a property bubble. When the recession hit, this bubble created so many mega-residential towns that had no buyers. Eventually squatters moved in and several dynasts and triads seized the land and created their own micro-towns.

Floating Shantie Towns. Ships that were being given away for scrap has found themselves new services as Triad Factories. Many Cargo haulers and mega freighters find themselves as personal "fiefs" of many crime families.

Traffic Notes. (Driving +4 routine mundane task; crit failure is accident)
Rush Hour 7am-10am, 5pm-8pm (monday to saturday) 10 min / 1 mile.
Medium or Light Train is 5 mins / 1 mile. (because of the Line and not the train)
Non-Rush Hour 5 mins / 1 mile.
Empty Hour 1am-6am  2 min / 1 mile

Commuting is x2 the amount of time vs Driving.

To speed up use Hasten Rules, -1 per -10%, Crit Failure is an accident. Heavy Bikes and Scooters have +2, and Light Bikes have +3.

Area Knowledge to Commute or Navigate

Economic outlook.
Corruption is rampant and more powerful than local law-enforcement. The triad power-levels have risen but there are many and they are thoroughly balkanized. This equal and almost homogeneous criminal and corrupt element has made the area effectively free trade.

Many speculate the Triads are going to go to war eventually, but right now economic prosperity has allowed everyone to live and let live.

Personal Notes.
Love Walled Cities and Ship Towns - they basically are modern dungeons basically the GMs can fire up the dungeon generator and VIOLA a modern day encounter LOL!

Some more basic Archer Notes

Edit: Check out +Mark Langsdorf in Skirmish Archer Tactics, which provides advice in how DF archers can take full advantage of Heroic Archer and Weapon Master Bow.

Regarding the Pregens
You cannot hope to hit or be effective in GURPS archery even with all the Heroic Archer and Weapon Master Bow. Even when you bring your self to 99.999% chance to hit from 10-15 (-4 to -5) yards (will take mostly 2 seconds to reach you if you were standing still, but your not) you still have a success rate based on your opponents defenses. Regular Mooks have a (Base 3, Shield 6, DB 2) 11-12 thus they have a 60-75% chance to defend with their shields.

as DC points out your damage CP vs damage output is expensive paying 20cp in strength for 1dmg improvement

This is where Horse Archers Come in, with horse archers you don't shoot just anyone, you shoot who ever turns their back to you... why would they do that. It is because you used your superior mobility to get to the flank while your slower and more melee powerful allies move in from what ever direction they were coming from in the first place.

If you dont have horse archers, stealth and running allow the archer to get to flanking position on time. Since this a maneuver too far from tactical coordination you use Strategy instead even if it is a small force. First of all, you cannot communicate so you need to PLAN and tell the ally a set of parameters that will help best in the situation.  Up to the GM actually, but I find the penalty of -6 tactics to strategy default very very weird because in my Strategy studies, people keep moving back and forth between the two so often in many situations. subject for another post.

At that point, you need to be able to shoot at a range a -4 to -5, from a 17 plus 3 accuracy, you have a 15-14 to hit, and you can still make a called shot to the leg or vitals.

As Vaclav has observed Leg is my favorite target because the options are very generous and the penalty is relatively light -2.

With leg shots

• Chance to knock someone prone - that would put them out of the game for 2 seconds. You can focus on other enemies while this one is out. 
• Easy chance to half their move ability and thus affect their dodge. Like above, but using superior mobility, move combat to an area this character cannot go into. 
• Easy chance to give them bad footing penalty
• plus all the regular Major Wound and Stunning rules. 

One you have movement superiority you can dictate where the fight is going to be by moving away from slower weakened allies, moving to stronger defend able terrain while they follow, or coordinate formations with allies as the enemies react slowly.

As compared to arms hits, they can still be threatening with their shield arm used to bash, knock down, or Aided Defense to their ally.

I am biased to mounted combat because of Mount and Blade, and my own desire to own and ride a pony for both athletic activity and simulations of endurance and military operations.

In Mount and Blade, the range penalties are harsher because opponents can use shield as cover, my shield as cover is a house rule, so I don't know if other game tables use it as such. When they use shield as cover I target the feet, because they cannot see where I am aiming. On Horse back, its quite a feat in Mount and Blade to shoot the feet since it is a FPS-like game but factoring your own horses velocity and the movement of the opponent using intuition gained from practice.

Pregens for GURPS Modern Fantasy

I hate how revealing GURPS chargen can be. 

Anyway I've pretty much finished the pregens for the game, which can be found here: 
Speedy programmer http://goo.gl/eBohF
Savy Biz Man http://goo.gl/cQy6n
Modern day Prince http://goo.gl/exciD
Action Star http://goo.gl/VAfDu
+
Bartender  
Gunslinger 

Hope some of those who want to play can meet me pre-game to discuss tactics, rules, and expectations. One of the things I want to discuss is what images and movies evoke the mood they are looking for. 

For those with pregens, a chance to customize and bit and to see the combos. 

The Disadvantages are the story

This is applicable to any game system. 

TL:DR merits of sitting back and letting Players make the material. 

Begin by requiring players to flesh out characters with "complications" or a simple paragraph explaining how all the disadvantages tie together. This is a great exercise for getting into the PCs to communicate their own expectations regarding enforcing disadvantage rules and in how the GM will use the character's background. 

There has been discussion about Low-Prep games, sandbox games where players have every direction open, but they have to take initiative. This is an Overlay for sandbox game, the Disadvantage driven Introduction. 

Basically, the GM gets the Disadvantages in the mail and reads up on it. He ties everyone disadvantage into a story that hits all the "ducks that are in a row" then begins with this story for the sandbox. All the Players have done half the work for the GM, and everyone gets a spotlight because it is their disadvantages that are pushing forward. 

The "script" was basically provided by the players, and the GM merely obliges. 

"You have a secret, good the first session is that secret might get out."

"You have an enemy, good that person is out to get you and your team."

"You have an obsession/ambition, well look at this, an 'opening' came up"

"You have family, they are involved."

"You have principles, well they are challenged by one of the methods needed to 'skin-this-cat'."

...etc...

It may be as bare and nakedly transparent a ploy, but that is a GREAT thing. Its something everyone saw coming, and they should have prepared for. It is an opening, that is challenging and they have to trust the GM to be a great "moderator" in keeping the pressure hot enough to exciting but not too hard to be frustrating. 

The GM shifts to the "Facilitator" role, and draws ammo from the PCs own disads. This might make the game about "Changing" or overcoming the disads. already a great start because the overall goal becomes "development" and change. Its about personal demons and internal conflicts.

Best of all, the GM does not have to do as much work. He can specialize in being receptive and processing what the players put into the game, and worry less about making stuff up. 

In fact the posts in-between games can be opportunities of the players to feed the GM other avenues and solutions. Solutions he will shape to fit the narrative if the players can make a coordinated successful maneuver towards that end.

GURPS Melee on a budget

Melee on a Budget - gaming the combat system. 

Basics, you want the most bang for buck for badguys and your good guys. These are some helpful GM notes I've accumulated since I've been playing a lot of combat intensive games and I've prepped for my own games. 

Armor and Defenses

TLDR: armor is heavy even with the lighter realistic rules. most bang for buck defense are shields. beging with Front Torso armor only to half the cost and weight. 

You begin with your budget which is your BL which is 20 for ST10 and about 4-5lbs per additional ST above 10. Already factor in some basics : Clothes 2lbs and Shoes 2lbs

Torso Front Only Armor. The most common is cloth armor $25, 3lbs and for combantants with ST11 and up, they can have Light Scale $160, 8lbs. Wealthier characters can possibly get Light Plate which is at 4lbs. 

Typical Break down. 

Torso armor front only *0.5

Pot Helm *0.2 + $10 and 1.2lbs

Medium Shield $45, 7lbs

----------------
Torso *0.7 factor and +$45 and +8.2lbs

Your best bang for buck Helmet is the Cheap Light Plate Pot Helm at $110 weighting 2.8lbs at DR2+1.  

"Full" Armor are for ST13 and up characters, even then they still need to cut down to essentials. Most of the armor's rear protection have been removed. 

The Front only Torse formula is good for up to ST10-12. The best armor you can give limbs are Fine Light Leather LT104 (not in the armor table). Used as Arms + Front legs is about 3.3lbs and $360 for DR1* (+1 vs cutting). Reinforced 4.125lbs at $450 (for +2 vs cut). 

Next is Padded Cloth 6lbs and $50 for padding the arms and front legs. 

Weight is one of the biggest barriers. Fortunately Imp damage vs limbs loses its damage multiplier and protecting against cutting attacks is the next best priority. 

To be fully armored despite being ST10-12
Torso armor front only *0.5
Leg armor front only *0.5 (light leather or padded cloth)
Arms armor *0.5 (light leather or padded cloth)
Gauntlets *0.1 (light leather or padded cloth)
Sollerets *0.1 (light leather or padded cloth)

You can use the same system for Characters with ST13 and up. Using Light Mail and Scale for limbs OR staying to the lightest armor for limbs (light leather or padded cloth) and using medium armors Front only for torso. 

Weapons 

TLDR: spears, axes, and polearms are cheaper and more bang for buck than swords. 

The Iklwa counts as a Short Spear is at $30 and 2lbs. At Fine and Balanced its merely a (CF 1, +4 balanced, +2 Fine) x7 CF of $210 for something that now deals skill+1, thr +2 imp, thr+1 cut. Cheaper than a Cheap Broadsword. 

Spear, Axe, and Mace are versatile weapons being allowed to be used 2h and 1handed. they are at about $40-60 each making them balanced and fine x7 to as much as $420 (cost as much as a shortsword, $400) and axes at Fine and Balanced are (CF 1, 9 fine, 4 balanced) $700 the cost of a good longsword or a bastardsword.

After playing an archer in two games, I realized that if I want the combat over for us to RP more then I better go melee. Tactical Melee with the Telegraphic attack rules allow for better Flanking maneuvers.  

Combat Resolution

TLDR: Max out Feint Technique, Counter-Attack sucks, Brawl is essential, Skills should be at least 14 for secondary attack skill and 16 and up for primary.   

Combat Slows down a lot when defenses are above 8. Good Combatants like 150cp warriors have defenses of 12 without shields, and up to 15-18 with large shields (and shield wall training). Find a way around these obstacles are important in character designing. 

ways to lower others defense: 

1. Mobility go to flank or rear. you need Acrobatics: Evade or Judo: Evade and good mobility at least move 8. 
2. Feint. In a combat intensive Game all major opponents and PCs should have maxed out Feint. 
3. Flanking with Allies. (see one). 

Counter attack Sucks for 6cp I reduce defenses by 1 compared to Feint. Evade has more bang for buck because it allows you to get behind an opponent. The cost is too high and you have to put yourself in harms way by parrying first. I think it should be seriously considered for a re-write.     

The best bang for buck feint is Brawling (with kicking bought off). Because you can have Reach 1 with Kick and Feint with a brawling to improve your attack. Brawl also lets you GRAB and initiate a lot of things depending what you grab- grab shield, grab weapon arm, grab attacking arm etc. 

Brawl is also your close quarter defense allowing you to strike with knees and elbows. Note that brawl is a complimentary skill as it tactically gives a lot of options for the character, giving him a way to find a weakness in the enemy's fighting style. 

Brawl DX+2 [4], Feint (H) Brawl+4 [5], Kick (H) Brawl [3]

Brawl or unarmed skills are so effective that you can make them the primary skill while bringing your weapon skill high enough to hit at your preferred rate. 

My rule for heroes is that Primary needs to be high enough for stunts while secondary is high enough to hit. So at least 13 to hit often enough (8 cp invested), and Primary is 16 or greater (30cp invested). 

If you want combat to end pretty fast, that there is enough time to do other things in the game then effective skills should be 14 and up, while defenses can be lowered to less than 8.