RoleMaster, to HARP ...to GURPS

I have played a lot of games, and from time to time, pull them out, play the latest version, and reflect. RoleMaster is still a solid system, needlessly complex in some ways, and far worse at required math and character sheet complexity than even GURPS is. The biggest attraction of RoleMaster is the crit charts and the simulation of different weapon types versus armor types, and the charts get into gruesome detail with the threat of exploding dice. Your "class" determines how much each skill costs.

But RoleMaster is a lot of work for one character. There is a spreadsheet app that makes it easier, but GURPS is still far better supported by tools and character creation apps. We have the "weapons versus armor types" rules built into the game, along with advanced rules such as Armor Divisors and Penetration Modifiers (B378) and Flexible Armor and Blunt Trauma (B379).

The only thing we don't have are the "medical grade crit charts," but these are nothing imagination can't dream up, and a skilled referee can't apply on the fly, given GURPS and the rules for Hit Locations and Major Wounds (B399). In GURPS, major wounds can cause knockdown and stunning, and there are even rules for bleeding (B420). Crippling injuries are covered on B421. We have most everything in the RoleMaster crit charts, codified into universal rules, except some of the more detailed descriptions of "joints, spines, and spleens."

Some of these detailed injury results are best left to the referee's imagination, and repeat chart results start to get silly, like cutting off two noses in a fight.

Inevitably, RoleMaster's complexity gives way to HARP, the easier version of the game, but we start to lose the "weapon versus armor types" and the "detailed crit charts" of the original game. I still love both games, but GURPS is easier and gives me similar results without all the complexity, just by adding a few optional rules. I can play with them, or without them, and the complexity of my game is under my control.

The character sheets are far easier and more straightforward in GURPS. If I am playing a solo campaign with four characters, GURPS will be more manageable than RoleMaster, HARP, or even 5E at higher levels. As one-off games to remember the 1990s, RoleMaster and HARP are fun distractions. If I want a modern game where I can control complexity and manage a small party by myself, GURPS is far easier and more manageable.

In other games, the rules are why you play the game, and thus, not optional.

I still love my ICE games, and HARP and RoleMaster are classics. Palladium games are in the same boat; I love and cherish them, and they are more for the memories than regular play. For my "daily driver" role-playing game, GURPS wins over all of them.

Every rule is optional in GURPS. You can play the game very rules-light, with just skill rolls, damage, DR, and minimal combat rules. GURPS is easier than a d20 system, especially since it lacks the complex action types of 5E and interrupt-based play. The character sheets in GURPS are far easier than a 5E sheet, which can run over a dozen printed pages at higher levels.

GURPS just does all this more easily, with one set of rules to learn and master, and optional levels of complexity all the way down to the most detailed results. If I want a "medical grade" fantasy game, GURPS does that. If I want a rules-light game, GURPS does that. If I want any genre, from 5E fantasy superheroes to RoleMaster realistic fantasy, GURPS can handle it.

And I am not mentioning science fiction and modern games, where I get all that, too, without having to learn and support yet another game.

All with one set of rules.

GURPS = Easiest Realism Fantasy

The common theme of many realism fantasy games is how hard they make everything, especially character creation. I took a trip into Rolemaster recently, and while the charts and game are cool, the character creation bogs the system down with a lot of unneeded math and crunch. GURPS is relatively straightforward in comparison.

Realism fantasy is different from deadly or gritty fantasy because there is an assumption that combat will be detailed with realistic effects of damage applied. Shadowdark is a deadly and gritty fantasy game. Still, since it uses the 5E engine, Shadowdark is not necessarily realistic, and it takes more work and referee assumptions to get there since the game does not give you the simulation systems you need for a realistic fantasy game.

Shadowdark is very gritty and deadly, but it does not give me the tools to run a game with a high amount of realism, nor does it give the players that much to work with in terms of skills and combat options to have the things they need to reciprocate and solve problems realistically.

Shadowdark is more of a board game than a simulation. GURPS is more of a simulation.

There is some cosmic war between Rolemaster and GURPS, of which I am unaware. Regardless, the system's goals in the fantasy genre are very close to providing gritty, deadly, realistic, skill-based fantasy play. GURPS has better combat options and fewer charts, whereas Rolemaster has the crit charts. GURPS can be played from a character sheet, whereas Rolemaster can't.

Rolemaster makes these internal assumptions that guide certain races and heritages, making certain professions and skills easier for those backgrounds. The game builds a "hidden" set of best paths and ideal combinations into character creation and advancement methods. In a sense, this is the game's "traditional fantasy cred," where dwarves don't make great wizards, and the other sets of fantasy tropes are created through the game's character system.

GURPS has none of that. You play as a zero-based human or a racial fantasy template and begin designing for it or adding templates until you are done. Unless you put them in there, the game has no internal assumptions of who can be the best at what. If you wanted dwarves to be unable to use arcane magic, put that in the dwarven racial template for your world as a disadvantage.

Playing a gritty, realistic fantasy game is far easier in GURPS than in any other system. The "critical effects" can be mostly made up on the spot and become readily apparent with high damage rolls. Do 20 points of damage to a head with a warhammer, and it is easy to describe what happens without flipping through 50 pages of charts. The same goes for melee critical misses, and spell critical hits and failures.

And for spell corruption, I could tag that system as a Modifier as a Limitation, tag it with Unreliable (16+ for -5%, or just say critical misses), and then put a corruption (or divine disfavor) mechanic on there for another -15%, and take -20% off the cost of all spells and spell-like powers (non-serious and temporary effect would likely reduce this down to a -10%). Or I could "say it is so," ignore the design system, and say this is like GURPS Horror. There are dozens of ways to do this, all of which are valid if you are consistent.

I have an imagination; I don't need all these charts. Are they inspiring? Yes. Are they required to play? No, and the character can limit your imagination by making you dependent on them.

Psychological limitations and those internal battles also play a considerable role in realistic fantasy, and GURPS delivers those with the game. The social factors play into the game as much as the skills and abilities, giving me a much stronger game than just providing characters and crit charts. Of course, Rolemaster is more than just those parts; GURPS has all the pieces I need built into the game's core, and they work the same for any genre or setting.

GURPS gets me to realistic fantasy nirvana more easily than any other game. Once people understand character creation, everything else is easy and flows logically. I don't need to learn a new system to do this, either, or support a game like Dungeon Crawl Classics that requires a few dozen dice to play and players constantly asking, "What do I roll?"'

With GURPS, I have that game.