GURPS, Narrative, and the 5E Experience

I play BX, and it feels like "a dungeon game." I obey the strict dungeon exploration turn order, mark off the turn record sheet, let the burned torches flicker out and light a new one, and roll diligently for wandering monster checks. This is what 5E wants to forget: the minigame that is dungeon exploration.

This is why we play.

I love counting off turns, the resources ticking down, the creative use of equipment, the problem-solving, the XP for GP, avoiding fights, cheating the monsters, and getting the creatures in the dungeon into no-win fights.

Our lives are on the line here; we are not looking for a fair fight! Where 5E players are playing "king's chess," BX players are "backstabbing mobsters and cutthroats."

And unlike 5E, we can't sit quietly for ten minutes and heal a spear thrust impaling someone's face. The healing game in 5E is beyond stupid, and it is World of Warcraft. If you die, you might as well "respawn at town" to finish the gameplay dynamic.

Just be honest about what your game is. If death is impossible, just write that into the rules.

I am mostly done with mainstream 5E. The game is too heavy, too complicated, a mess of designer good intentions, and it keeps breaking when I try to get the system to do what I want. 5E is a wannabe narrative story game wearing AC, hit points, and a level system that the designers think will excite you, but every level, it ends up disappointing you more and more, with nothing to look forward to, and it's a waiting game to get the next power to make you more invincible and even more powerful.

I tried liking 5E many times. Every time I played, I got bored, and the character sheets ended up a dozen printed pages long. I can't support that, nor play it alone. If I am playing a game that deep, GURPS will win since I get more out of it than I put in. And a thousand-point character in GURPS is only four pages long. I start to get recycling anxiety around printing 5E character sheets on paper.

I am a better "game designer" than 5E designers, especially with a character I know by heart. I know their exact powers. I know the skills they have. I know this character and the design team are not "telling me" who my character is or what they can do.

I am not fitting my character concept and abilities around "what the game tells me my character knows."

In GURPS, I am fitting my character concept and abilities around "what I know."

The 2024 version of D&D removed all the ranger's "soft powers" around exploration and focused on combat abilities, mainly because those are the easiest to support in a (failed) VTT. So, what, now? My ranger is stupid when it comes to survival. Or is that just "flavor text" that the game doesn't supply rules for anymore? In GURPS, I get my ranger abilities back, I can pick exactly what they are, and improve them to super-heroic levels if I want.

My GURPS ranger is so skilled that he can build an igloo McMansion and survive for years on an ice sheet. It is a two-story house with a grand bedroom and an ice piano in the foyer. It even has a heated swimming pool that we have no idea how it doesn't freeze or melt through the ice shelf.

That may seem so over-the-top and stupid that it seems impossible.

But there is a way to do that in GURPS.

That survival skill is going to be loaded up with so many custom modifiers (or the easiest way is a custom Cosmic modifier at +50%) that the skill itself will be prohibitively expensive to level, but hey, where there is an idea, there is a way in GURPS.

In 5E? Forget it, you are stuck with what the book gives you. Or doesn't give you.

Your ranger in 5E is stuck with an overloaded Hunter's Mark and is freezing to death.

My GURPS ranger is sleeping in his ice canopy bed, perfectly warm, and looking forward to a breakfast stored in the refrigerator that never needs power.

GURPS is the better fit. My beat-up softcovers are well-loved and on my play shelf. There is nothing like a dog-eared and shopworn copy of GURPS; every bump, nick, and crease is an adventure had. You know this book lived a great life and provided endless adventures - and it still has a long life ahead! Dinged books aren't imperfect; they have character and are signs of love and use.

And, honestly, GURPS is the better narrative game. We have advantages and disadvantages here that directly impact character actions and the story. 5E has nothing except a very weak inspiration mechanic that is really only useful for combat or avoiding consequences. I can play rules-light GURPS, just "skills and 3d6," and have a far more engaging and immersive narrative experience than 5E. The only thing 5E supplies is a pre-made framework of fantasy superpowers based on class templates. That does not replace strong narrative tools and systems.

Where GURPS Shines for Me

The specific. The details. Every little thing matters.

Knowing the rules. The hex-grid. Facing. Movement.

Building towards a mathematical advantage.

To me, this is where GURPS shines. The heart of GURPS is not point-buy or the best design system in gaming; it is the hard math between the hex grid, movement, carried weight, and using your skills to push your playing piece around that grid to achieve specific story objectives without dying.

Like The Fantasy Trip, the heart of GURPS lies in the same place. GURPS just lets you go so many more places than TFT. You can run a purely narrative game with GURPS, sure, and it works amazingly well. You can do theater of the mind with GURPS, and again, it works well. GURPS just does whatever it wants, and it does it well.

High fantasy or low? 5E doesn't even do low fantasy, and the last time they tried it broke the setting. Limit the gear of martial classes to wood, bone, and bronze, and the magic-based characters walk all over them by level five. In GURPS, oh yeah, this is good. The difference between a move of 3 and 4 could kill you.

GURPS is far, far better than 5E because you are not beholden to the whims of a game designer who tells you how you should build your character. You are the game designer. You design your character for what you want them to do.

Some games have a tight, highly tuned, very enjoyable gameplay loop, such as BX or Shadowdark. You play these games for that gameplay loop. I still enjoy the BX style of play, the counting down six exploration turns that a torch lasts, the regular wandering monster rolls, the forced rest turns, and encumbrance versus movement. That is a classic gameplay loop, and I enjoy it like a fine wine. It is very structured, and it clashes with today's narrative superhero fantasy games to the point that they are not even the same game.

The classic BX exploration, turn, and combat round game loop is very similar to a Car Wars Classic game. Every turn matters. You stay in that framework the entire session, tick off a time-tracking sheet, and never break out of it unless you shift into travel mode.

For the most part, in a dungeon, you are doing the exact same thing as you do in the one-second turns of GURPS, but you are in the 10-minute exporation framework of BX. You burn torches and oil for light. Lose your light, and that is like a SCUBA diver losing their air. It becomes a fight to survive when that resource runs low.

GURPS does that, but not really for the structured exploration turn. You can do that if you want, and you have experience running exploration turns. But that structure isn't in the game, and assumes you will port it in if you like it a lot. GURPS is that shapeshifter that will impersonate other games when it wants to, but you need to have experience in BX within that structure to know it even exists.

This is the invisible problem with GURPS: it is often a role-playing game you go to after other role-playing games that you like fail terribly. Maybe there are parts of them that you like, such as the BX exploration turn and the combat rounds, but you are expected to preserve those parts and translate the rest into GURPS.

That can be hard for players who don't have the concept, especially new players. They will see GURPS and look at all the math, the lack of structure outside of combat, and say, "Why bother?" GURPS assumes you BYOB for game mechanics that you love and cherish, but you have to have a B to BYO. The BX exploration turn is my B. I can bring that into GURPS, and even keep the wandering monster checks and strict light rules, and things become amazing. I can eliminate the resting turns and use fatigue instead, keeping that inside GURPS.

Every little thing matters again, but I have a bit of structure that forces it to matter.

Why do you have a move of two? You are killing us back there. Hand some junk off or drop it, we need to be able to move! The structure of the exploration turn will turn overloaded characters into liabilities quickly. 5E, and truthfully, some OSR games ignore encumbrance entirely and break the exploration turn framework, and they go full "combat action game." I can't play those, since that relationship between movement and weight defines us as humans, especially on vacation, in air travel, or on hikes.

GURPS can be relaxed and tell you, "Do theater of the mind, I do not care." The world is like a movie, and nothing matters except what happens on the screen.

Or GURPS can drill down like a second-by-second man-to-man wargame and give me the grit and blood of an epic fight. Or it can fall anywhere between, and shift identities like a chimera, giving you the exact level of simulation you need at the moment. Stay drilled down for an entire session and count the seconds. Or zoom out and say a month passes.

And GURPS can simulate that BX game loop, and kill you with encumbrance and light. Or you can ignore it. You have the freedom, since GURPS is freedom.

But with a little structure to force certain things to rise to the top, GURPS can be incredible.

Fun with GURPS Ultra-Lite

I copied the text from GURPS Ultra-Lite, pasted it into a LibreOffice document, and made a one-page rules version of the game. This was one of the best ideas I've had in a while, and it makes a perfect "GURPS on the go" game that replaces a bunch of rules-light games, such as FATE, Index Card RPG, BX, and others. I keep this by my computer, along with my dice, and I can quickly test ideas in GURPS and run short scenarios with minimal time investment.

Yes, it is not "full GURPS," but it does not need to be. Ultra-Lite works with the full GURPS rules. I can sit here with a printed-out copy of the referee's screen and pull in tables, modifiers, and as many rules from the full game as I want. I can convert between the UL "levels" and CP pretty easily, so I can use the advantages and disadvantages in this rules-light system.

If an idea really clicks, I can graduate this to full GURPS and bust out my character sheet program.

If it doesn't, hey, at least I played GURPS today, kept in the mindset, and had a little fun.

Ultra-Lite also works great alongside GURPS for quick NPCs. Need a quick Battletech pilot, 40K marine, or Car Wars driver for a roleplaying moment, but you don't want or need a full RPG for the system (if there is one)? And you don't want to haul out the full set of GURPS books and force players to go through a session zero? Ultra-Lite will fill that need perfectly, and you can have instant characters, keep in the GURPS mindset, and play whatever scenario comes into your head with the system.

If it gets interesting, start pulling in a few more GURPS rules to cover situations, like fatigue points, fright checks, critical hits, reaction rolls, or other systems from full GURPS.

If you really start to love the idea, upgrade the game to full GURPS and start that campaign!

But try starting an idea with Ultra-Lite first. You can even stay here, making up systems as you need them, and pulling in character and tables from other games to fill in the gaps. Let's say you run a BX-style dungeon game using Ultra-Lite. I would make "magic user" and every other class a skill. You can use the charts of Vancian magic if you want, too, or just come up with a quick FP cost for spells and handle it more like GURPS. Thief skill? You can do thief-ing things with that and use thief weapons to make attacks. Cleric skill? Cleric stuff, religion, influencing followers, and divine magic.

It all works.

In fact, Ultra-Lite is my best "NPC and monster" generator for my full GURPS games, and few know I even use it that way. The giant spider? It has the "Giant Spider" skill at a +3, and can use that for combat, spinning webs, entanglement attacks, leaping, setting ambushes, and other spider stuff. Zombies, ghouls, skeletons, goblins, orcs, mimics, medusae, and others all have "monster skills" that I use in my games, much like a GURPS "bang skill," but these also cover special attacks and powers. When in doubt, make an opposed roll against a GURPS attribute.

The one-page sheet sits by my computer every day, giving me a quick and fun way to play GURPS whenever I want.

Handling Disadvantages

Disadvantages with self-control rolls can derail a session, but that is not a bug; it is a feature. You got the character points, so you paid the price. A good yardstick is one to three rolls per session, but only when the disadvantage is relevant. If a disadvantage is not relevant, it is not a disadvantage, such as a "fear of deserts" in a game that happens on an ice world, or "angry with orcs" on a fantasy world with no orcs. It is also easy to go overboard in calling for rolling in mildly relevant situations.

This is sort of how we always handled disadvantages, being fair while keeping them meaningful. You got the points; it has to mean something, but a disadvantage shouldn't be used punitively against a player or their character.

But one to three rolls (per session) seems fair; this is how we handled them, and you don't always have to trigger the disadvantage during a session or adventure. My rule is that the disadvantage must be meaningful in the story. If a disadvantage would cause a delay, change plans, derail the story, or result in some other serious consequence, it is worth considering. Situations that matter need dice rolls.

If it is minor and does not matter in the context of the current story, like "likes to live the high life" and the character is on vacation, fine, don't roll, just spend a little more money to cover it.

And players can elect not to roll and just indulge or succumb to the motivation! This is good roleplaying, and it saves the game from being subservient to the dice. Give the player a CP award for good roleplaying at the end of the adventure, especially if it made the entire situation more difficult, memorable, or more fun.

Roleplay over rolls!

Some self-control rolls have durations, such as once every 10 minutes. A "party animal" at a party will need to keep making rolls, or they will join in. If they are trying to get something important done, like sneak into an office and sort through a file cabinet, they will need to keep making rolls every so often as long as they are there.

When you can use a self-control roll to increase tension, forcing periodic checks, use it if it makes sense.

Do not use self-control rolls or disadvantages to make a character unplayable. There is such a thing as a horrible design in GURPS, with a character taking 10 different disadvantages with self-control rolls, and them becoming unplayable due to the amount of distractions they need to roll for; moderation is key. But a character should not be punished for taking one and then "having it constantly used against them." This requires a good handle on refereeing and fairness, and not overusing a disadvantage by forcing the player to roll for things that aren't important or by constantly forcing checks.

Also, be fair and apply disadvantages equally. It is easy to fall into a habit of "picking on the most fun character" with the iconic disadvantage, but other players made these picks too, and you should not favor one over the other. You get characters that will stand out and "be the most fun," but resist the urge and give everyone's disadvantages time to impact the game.

Also, I always throw a secret "reaction roll" in any failed self-control roll. How bad is it? In a critical failure, things could go completely sideways, but there is a chance something good could come of it. A critical success may mean our gambler, who gave in to an urge, gets invited to the "high stakes room" where a contact is made, or they meet a fellow gambler who turns out to be a valuable NPC to know.

The advantage-and-disadvantage system is one of the best parts of GURPS, which makes it so different and more fun than 5E, and we loved it because it gave our characters realistic mental and physical traits that impacted the story. Today's games are more concerned with "power builds" and what a level system can give a character at every level.

GURPS cuts differently, and we loved this system. It always made our games more than "just playing through an adventure," and the characters' reactions changed depending on who they were. That room with the gold goblet? A greedy character would take it for themselves, while a pious one would donate it to a church. A normal character may take it for gear and supplies. A character uninterested in wealth would ignore it. The pious and greedy make a grab for the goblet first, and the shiny treasure may make them forget to check for the trap that will trigger when it is taken, or it may incur a penalty since the gleam of gold is so distracting.

This stuff matters.

In a d20 game? That goblet and trap are there, and a part of the room description. The characters, be they paladins or thieves, really don't matter since they are all the same inside their heads. The "best player syndrome" makes my thief extra careful and incurs no penalty for my paladin, considering the danger it may cause. My paladin can't even "search for traps" in a modern game, as it isn't a skill the designers typically give them.

GURPS makes it all matter.

GURPS: Battletech Gothic

I like these sorts of spin-off, alternate-universe, and one-off games. For one, I am not so beholden to decades of Battletech lore, and I can make most of the universe up myself. This gives me freedom and latitude when telling stories here that the official universe just does not have. I can play in this universe with a box-set mech-combat game, and use GURPS for the role-playing game, and nobody will care. This is what GURPS does best: take a random idea and turn it into Random Idea: The RPG!

Battletech Gothic is on the table today.

Some called this game "discount Warhammer 40K" and that is sort of inane. You can not like the idea, but it is cool to see new, imaginative, different stuff from companies from time to time, and see them take creative risks. Even as a "discount 40K," this is a cool world. I love the look, feel, and style of this entire set. Warhammer 40K does not own the grimdark future, style, look, or feel. This is also a fun starting point for Battletech that isn't the full universe with hundreds of mechs and factions to deal with, nor will it ever get that deep and complex. It also has room to add your own lore and aesthetics to!

And I know, the Battletech community is split over this, with many so deep in timelines and lore that they lose the universal language of the game. There have been spin-off games in this universe before, and I hope they continue the Gothic line.

I like Battletech Gothic. As a one-off alternate-universe game with a limited set of mechs, it is fun.

Battletech Gothic Universe Primer, p. 63.

I love the mechs, and the entire vibe of bio-tech horrors meets battle-tech was a game my brother and I played back in the 1980s and 1990s, with an alternate Clan invasion by bio-engineered aliens. We had a story going where the clans that fled the galaxy bioengineered themselves to the point of mutation, merging with alien DNA "from beyond" and becoming hyper-violent bio-tech killers. It was a cool story, fit our idea of the Clans at the time, and it was cool to see the traditional houses fighting real aliens rather than "just more humans in mechs."

So, yeah, we were doing BTG back in the 1990s. I like the story here. It hits home for me.

Plus, I can play really interesting stories with GURPS. We have an entire GURPS Bio-Tech book that is perfect for this setting! That, plus GURPS Horror, and a touch of Ultra Tech, and we have ourselves a complete BT Gothic RPG. I have the conversions for GURPS skills to BT on my conversions page, so the wargame rules can stay as-is.

Given that there are no magic elements in the BTG universe, the game being a one-off could mean I could do whatever I want with the setting. While bio-tech should be the power source, there is nothing stopping me from weaving the dark powers of elder space demons and gods through the setting to whisper in the darkness, provide evil divine rituals, and summon forth terrors from beyond time and space. Keeping arcane magic out of the setting and only including a divine power source may be an interesting twist that provides a much-needed mystery and spooky horror, much like Cthulhu, with corruption mechanics and dark incantations to summon horrors. Perhaps there is a "purity of the light" which is humanity's defense against the night, and we allow light-based divine powers to shine.

Doing this weakens the entire "bio-tech brings on corruption and insanity," and the setting becomes more of a "bio-tech opens the door to evil forces."

A better alternative would be to use psionic powers as the game's power system, and this would meld with the bio-tech theme a little better without introducing too many mystical elements. This is a bit more plausible if you keep it mysterious and strange, like the mind is being twisted and warped in ways that no one understands, and powers manifest that are special and rare. Bio-tech plus psionics is a stronger combination and does not introduce godlike elements. Plus, psionics go with science fiction like peanut butter and chocolate, and are one of the best power systems for the genre.

Psionics could introduce a wrinkle into mech fights, since those powers could get through tons of armor easier than weapon fire could. How you approach this will affect the power of the mind, and potentially unbalance the wargame side of the game. You could say there is shielding, or the strong electromagnetic forces interfere (negative modifier) with psionic attacks going into a mech at the pilot. This should be seriously balanced as it may render the entire mech game inconsequential to a powerful psionic, but those wielders of such power may be so rare that it is a special case (and thus, cool).

This is the classic "adept on foot stops a mech cold" movie scene, and that should not be taken away from a player if the moment calls for it, and the attack was successful. Use your judgment, the rule of cool, and don't let it get out of hand. That said, mech weapons are likely lethal to a psionic on foot, so one lucky hit or area-of-effect weapon, and the question will be moot in a cloud of red mist.

Horror will also be a part of the setting! This is the easiest part to forget, but bio-horrors mutating innocents afflicted with the virulent mutagen will force horror rolls in viewers, and there will be insanity and corruption spread by these forces. Normal humans could morph into monsters in a few minutes, but the process may take days as they slowly go insane and grow horns and claws.

There will be a lot of misinformation, fear, mystery, and "dark powers" floating about in these "space dark ages," and the horror rules should be used to spread a sense of fear and a lack of understanding of what they are "really" dealing with.

Horror becomes more important once you introduce mystical and magical elements. Horror and science work in a 1950's "what has science done" sort of way, but the metaphysical, the afterlife, and the nature of the human soul cut much deeper. If the nature of abominations is Satan, witchcraft, black magic, and the actual rise of Hell upon the universe, then Horror will strike much harder in the hearts of players.

The bio-tech and mutations should be created by mad science, and there should be a fear of "what have we unleashed?" The entire "Gothic" aesthetic and worldview from the Dark Ages should be incorporated, and one of the best ways to do so is to sidestep 40 K's influence and go straight to the historical source. We have an excellent guide with GURPS Middle Ages I, and the idea of adopting the chivalric titles, the aesthetic, the power of the church, and even "witchcraft" (as psionics) is a cool idea.

This is one of the things that would make me lean more towards magic than psionics, having actual space witches present in the setting with dark, evil powers. This also pushes the idea that the abominations are beasts from actual Hell, leaning more on quasi-religious Doom tropes than adopting the entire "mad science and psionics" theme, which can also feel overdone and Saturday-morning cartoonish. Though, in all honesty, they could call psionics witches, and it would be functionally similar in use and meaning.

Having abominations side with witches and warlocks, even though they could crush them physically, is such a cool trope that it is worth using, and it makes that other side much more "evil" and "servants of chaos and discord." The idea of space knights and inquisitors rooting out witches and evil within the masses of poorly-educated space peasants who work in Gothic factories is such cool "RP fodder" that it is worth using. Secretive underground cults corrupting the people and nobility are cool ideas, especially when brought into the Battletech universe.

Back in the day, Battletech had a strong medieval theme of knights and warhorses, nobles and houses, and lately it feels more like Call of Duty meets Soldier of Fortune than it did in its original chivalric roots.

I do like going with the idea of nobility, titles, a strong Church, heraldry, and the power of witchcraft and demons being the "great unknown." Purity of faith, body, and mind becomes a defining feature of knights and the warrior class, while giving in to base desires and power will lead a man down the road to Hell. Draw upon the stories and tales from the Bible. Ignore 40K and "out 40K" them.

Adding witchcraft to BTG changes the game. It makes the abominations more magical creatures pulled from Hell and beyond. I suppose you have two choices here:

• Bio-Tech + Psionics
• Bio-Tech + Magic

The settings art and feeling are more the "mutants and mayhem" sort of vibe, which aligns well with Bio-Tech + Psionics. My gut feeling is don't do magic, and do psionics. Leave "demons" and other mythical beings as whispered mysteries, or things twisted minds pretend to be.

Bio-Tech and Psionics, it is then.

Both will use GURPS Middle Ages I for the "look and feel" and to pull civilizational facets from. It is so easy to fall back into Mechwarrior norms, but keeping the setting tech level high, while the "everyday life" tech level is far lower, may give you the contrast you need to make the setting work. There should be a conflict between the destitute, poor, indentured life of peasants and the house nobles, knights, and the other "warrior elite."

Battletech Gothic Universe Primer, p. 54.

I would almost paint everyday life as something out of 1984, where the average person needs to go to a "broadcast center" to watch TV communally, and the difference between rich and poor is very stark. Most days would be spent working on farms and in factories, with long periods of forced labor, and entertainment would be either communal broadcasts or live sporting events. Most of the population would be growing food in fields or hydroponic centers. Huge factories would churn out the machines of war, choking the skies with smoke. Thousands of laborers would come in and go in massive, around-the-clock shifts to keep the industry of war cranking along. Strip mining, oil rigs, deep mining, forestry, salt mining, and other massive resource mining operations would scour the land.

Take the Industrial Age grit and grease, the strip mining and expansionism of the Railroad Era, the myth and fear of the Middle Ages, the savagery of World War I, the hopelessness of Orwell, the creatures of Lovecraft, and blend that with Battletech. Add to that, plenty of mutations and strange deformities among the population, and morphed races of new kin, and you have an interesting "Battletech Mutants" setting that would work well.

That description above is far different from the 40K aesthetic, which has really morphed into something else these days. The 40K world tends to be more "World of Warcraft"- like and self-referential these days, reflecting the modern world, while grounding Battletech Gothic in a sense of history would give it a unique identity and feeling. Cranking BTG back to historical reality would give it a leg up on what 40K had morphed into, and honestly, leave 40K to be 40K; it is fine as is and has plenty of fans.

Battletech Gothic Universe Primer, p. 24.

BTG can be something different and special.

GURPS Middle Ages I and the Bible are your "holy shield" against the idea being called "discount 40K," since you are going back to the source era and material, drawing on the stuff that 40K ripped off. Don't copy, but go back to the source code and rebuild. This is why history is so important, and we should not rely on "cultural recycling" to base our ideas upon. They don't own the history, look, or aesthetic. They just put giant plastic shoulder pads on it and made it smell like model glue. I love you, 40K, but you are not the be-all and end-all on the idea.

This is a fun universe, small enough and limited enough to not overwhelm a conversion, compatible with a translation layer between GURPS skills and the wargame, and with plenty of room to create my own lore. I can add psionics and mutant races to the setting, like dragon and serpent people. I can flavor the world as a mix of Braveheart, Mad Max, OG TNMT, and 1984. I can have mutant mayhem-style characters and personal battles, adding mutant powers like personal armor, tails, horns, and other powers to my GURPS character builds.

Yes, this is not Battletech.

But it doesn't have to be to have potential.

It's fun.

It is strange.

It is off-putting.

But most of the cool things I first encountered were all of those things.

I've Played 5E Science Fiction

I saw the Traveller 5E Backerkit today, and I did not pull the trigger on that. It is a pricey set of books: $350 for the core books, and $1,000 for the all-in. The cost for these 5E crowdfunding projects is very high these days, and this won't ship until October of 2027. That is a long time to wait for books, nearly a year and a half.

And for $1,000, I can buy nearly every GURPS PoD book ever printed.

I played 5E science fiction: Esper Genesis and the Level Up Void Runners Codex. There is also Ultramodern5, a total conversion mod of 5E into cyberpunk and science fiction. The only thing 5E science fiction has going for it is monster compatibility, which I honestly never use. While the gee-whiz powers (psionic or techno-mage, typically) are cool, I never found 5E science fiction all that interesting. The last best version of "level-based science fiction systems" is Starfinder 1e, which was the last big set of 3.5E level-based science fiction gaming.

So, 5E science fiction has been done a few times, and what Traveller 5E brings to the table is the universe, the ships, and the entire Traveller feeling. I bought the original LBBs at the store. To me, Traveller will always be a game played with two six-sided dice.

All of these games play mostly the same, and you fall into a "space adventurer" motivation. You play to level, and you level to play. That MMO factor is the fun of the game, where you are buying abilities, gearing up, collecting powers, and buying that next feat or unlocking that next power. It is the exact same motivation as 5E; preplanned character power drives you.

All my level-based science fiction campaigns typically start off with a lot of energy but fall apart quickly. I get the first few levels, and the huge mountain to climb quickly discourages me, and I realize that levels are not why I play science fiction.

There is a mental break for me here; levels do not equal motivation in science fiction. In fact, they feel like more of a reason not to play, an unnecessary mountain to climb, an artificial game construct to hold you back rather than enable you. I feel I can't do things because I am not at a high enough level to, and I don't feel this in fantasy.

The original Traveller and Star Frontiers games never had levels, nor did they ever need them. For me, fantasy games are where level-based systems, the almost video-game-like tiered progression, and the hero's story shine. I could make a similar argument that the GURPS-style "no level" fantasy is more compelling and better at supporting stories than the level systems of 5E and most OSR games.

What drives me in science fiction stories is the classic themes of exploration, commerce, war, discovery, mystery, and interpersonal character arcs. GURPS does all these the best, and removes the "level chase" from the equation, leaving me just with characters and story.

There was a GURPS review once where the writer said, "GURPS is a game where your scientist character feels just as powerful as the soldier with the machine gun." That is exactly what I want in a science fiction game! I don't want this "combat progression arc" to hang over my head, and make some characters better than others in combat, or having to bolt-on combat powers to science characters just to give them combat parity.

While yes, that machine gun soldier will be able to kill hordes of alien bugs, there will be moments in this adventure where the scientist's findings will be critical for the success of the mission. Perhaps the scientist will be able to identify the resonance of the colony reactor causing the bugs to attack and devise a solution to dampen it and make the bugs peaceful again. The team will need to reach the reactor via an ATV crawler to set up the dampers; the driver will deal with all sorts of hazards, and the engineer will need to be guarded as they install the system. The doctor will be tending to wounds. Everyone is ultimately critical to the mission's success.

Everyone is important, and no artificial combat balance is needed. No "magic science powers" need to be invented to achieve class parity; adding rules and complexity to a genre that does not need them.

I prefer a more cerebral, story-based game where power and levels are not the driving force behind why I play. I like putting the brakes on progression and enjoying the character build I create, and GURPS gives me the best character building in all of tabletop gaming. Plus, my GURPS character sheets are far shorter than 5E, which can run 12-20+ pages at level ten and higher. Even with special powers and 1,000 points, my character sheets in GURPS run 4-6 pages, and that is being generous with spell lists.

Oh, and we will need VTT or a character creation software written and supported for Traveler 5E, which is the Achilles heel of the system. Without software, forget creating characters; it's always an extra digital purchase and subscription. With GURPS, we have great character creation programs, both paid for and community-supported (please support the GCS creator!)

And GURPS gives me a far better selection of powers. I can use "space magic" or do full psionics. I can do bio-tech powers or space crystals that give superpowers. I can wield divine power systems granted by elder space gods. I have as many powers as GURPS can provide, and those power sources can be anything I can imagine. GURPS, like Champions, is, at its heart, a superhero game, and those are the best for magic and powers.

Nothing beats a point-buy superhero game. I can create any space monster or space power I want. I am not limited by the books, nor do I have to wait for expansions and new crowdfunding books.

And while most 5E games depend on powers for the flashy abilities, GURPS does a no-power science fiction game perfectly. While classic Traveller (and Space Opera) was psionics only, Star Frontiers had no powers. A lot of these 5E science fiction games "bake in" a power system that the game depends on, and it is intrinsic to character balance and gameplay. You are stuck with it if you play that version of 5E science fiction. With GURPS, I can easily have no power systems, one that supports the setting, or all of them.

Trying to mod a 5E game is painful, since you are telling players "don't pick these classes" and playing a game that feels like less than the full experience. Also, balance issues will come up if you use a 5E game that depends on magic for combat mechanics and balance, and you remove it to play hard science fiction.

I can also customize the power system to make it "depend on spice" or "channel the power of ancient aliens" or whatever I want in GURPS, so players will experience a unique and referee-curated mystery of how that power works and is sourced from, if the true secrets are even revealed at all. Once you spoil the secret, the power system loses its mystery, like linking The Force to space bacteria.

I like the concept of Traveller 5E as a "5E sandbox space game," and I wish them well. For 5E players, this is a much-needed break from D&D. I find the price to be very high, and the nearly 2-year wait to be excessive. But GURPS is my science fiction game of choice, and Traveller will always be that lightweight 2d6 system that we loved in the late 1970s.

And GURPS will be the best way to play it.

Or any science fiction game I can imagine.

GURPS: The Cepheus RPG

There is a print-on-demand book containing only the original Cepheus Engine RPG (CE-RPG) rules, which reprints the original game's SRD at cost. This is a basic, no-art, reference guide for the rules, but there is a simplicity and beauty to that presentation. While the more flashy editions get a lot of attention, I find this version of the game captures the original "little black book" aesthetic, leaving the universe up to me, and staying out of the way for the most part, and letting my imagination have room to explore.

The book this compares to is the original Traveller Book, which is also available as a print-on-demand title, and the two are similar in their tone and coverage of science-fiction adventure. The only downside to Traveller is the upside: the Traveller universe and the Imperium. If I am going this far, then I will just play GURPS: Traveller and have it all in one book. Once you start to pull in Traveller, you need to pick a flavor, and I have always had a soft spot for the original little black books and universe. It is very easy to start pulling in the modern material, but it just does not feel the same to me.

I don't want Traveller seen through a 2020's lens, I want Traveller seen through that 1970's lens. There is a massive difference between the original Traveller, which felt like the movie 2001, and modern Traveller, which feels like "2026 in space." The role and size of computers being one huge factor, in OG Traveller, computers were room-sized mainframes with tons of flashing lights, and you could not carry a supercomputer around in your pocket (like you can today). In CE-RPG, they have TL 10 1-kilogram portable computers that can run programs, like the classic Star Trek tricorder or even a modern tablet. There is a middle ground here; you can flavor it however you like.

But even then, GURPS: Traveller is huge. There are 30 PDFs covering nearly the entire original universe, and you can pull in the classic library data and sector guides. While I love having that much, a part of me just wants a simple core rulebook, and I want to create the rest myself.

Another option is the Cepheus Deluxe rulebook, available from Lulu or Amazon. This is the older edition of the game, but I like the black-and-white presentation much better than the newer version (with the garish full-color pages). Ships in this game go up to 10,000 tons (versus 5,000 in CE-RPG), and the ship design system uses percentages based on tech level versus the older A-Z drive types. In general, CD is a patched and streamlined version of CE-RPG with a few more charts and improvements, plus a few more high-tech weapons options (pulse rifles, blaster pistols). This is another excellent option for driving a GURPS sci-fi game.

There are plenty of other Cepheus games, but I just want a simple, softcover, non-flashy, black-and-white book that runs the random charts and starship game. GURPS will handle the rest. Either of these books does a fine job of running a science-fiction framework behind the scenes for GURPS and providing a working model of a universe to start with.

But the Cepehus RPG lets me use the ships, gear, and universe-creation rules for any universe I want. I can play a TL 10 lo-fi Star Frontiers by just adding a few races and using the GURPS rules as my core game engine. Star Frontiers is less about the gear than it is the four races and the story of meeting on a new homeworld and exploring the universe from there. You don't even need the OG Star Frontiers map, just the first planet where they come together, and you can randomly generate the universe from there.

We did this back before Knight Hawks was released, where Traveller's little black books ran our starship game for the role-playing game. Traveller and Knight Hawks are very close in compatibility, with ships offering 1G to 6G acceleration and similar jump systems. There are no "grav plates" like there are in Traveller, which have always felt too high-tech for the Traveller setting, especially before TL 13.

If you read the Star Frontiers lore, these races came together from "off the map" and ended up here, much like the Mass Effect Andromeda game. The original homeworlds are left undefined and are not even in the game, and they could have all woken up from generational ships and built the first world. You could start your campaign on the first world, and start exploring planets from there, and more generation ships are following, and you need to find worlds for them to settle on. The entire universe could be randomly generated, and your GURPS characters are the first ones out in the starships being built to explore the surrounding stars. Trouble is soon to be discovered, given the original game's lore.

In this case, using Cepheus as the game's starship and tech book works, and gives you the clunkier weapons list, where laser weapons need to be connected to backpack power units. You can also simulate a TL 9 to 12 campaign progression in this system (with TL 13+ items treated as artifacts and treasures), and have the ship designs gradually reflect improvements in design and technology.

The jump drives would start at 1 and increase slowly to 3, so the range to explore the randomly-generated map would slowly increase, and you could say most all planets within jump-1 are settled, with a few outliers on the ends of the frontier available to explore. Since jump-2 opens at TL 11, that is two huge arcs of "adventure paths" you would need to complete in the jump-1 worlds before the exploration rush begins.

My TL 9 adventures would be space pirates, planetary cartels, and exploring the tiny jump-1 universe of nine worlds. The Volturnus adventures could be inserted as a "special event" to be found somewhere on the map when the time is right, perhaps on that planet isolated by exploration difficulties. My TL 10 adventures would be the first Sathar invasions. TL 11 would be the jump-2 exploration rush. After that, the Second Sathar War would kick off and end with TL 13, grav plates, and jump-4. Past that, the stars are the limit.

The core "guts" of the game is watching the universe slowly expand, the technology increase, and the ships build in capability and exploration range. The TL 9 ships will be old junkers leaking radioactive fuel by the end of this game, well-used and beaten up, junkyards parked on moons filled with memories and rust, but that is the charm of watching the "space race" in conquering the galaxy. The TL 9-12 ships are a logical progression of the "stacked decks" design theory without artificial gravity, and the TL 13-15 ships change the game, moving into the modern-style "TV science fiction" artificial gravity era.

One of the most frustrating things about introducing artificial gravity too early is that it does not force a paradigm shift in starship design, and the layout of starships never changes. It is a lazy choice, and I prefer that early-era starships reflect the absence of artificial gravity, and later ships force everyone to upgrade and improve to account for the new technology. This is just like the shift in airplane travel from propeller-driven aircraft at low altitudes to jet-powered aircraft with pressurized cabins flying at high altitudes. Some important TL 12 ships may be retrofitted for artificial gravity at TL 13, but their designs will still reflect that stacked-decks style, and they will be permanently stuck between the eras.

Early artificial gravity is the biggest tonal mistake Traveller makes in design and technology, and it makes all the starship designs blend together with no major design shifts at a waterfall tech moment.

GURPS drives everything else: characters, personal combat, and all the game's ground rules. For ship combat, cargo determination, encounters, and map creation, I will use Cepheus Deluxe (or Engine).