That's just what it is: a simple summary of ways to handle this matter in character/creature design. Short and sweet.

Two notes:

1) A recent tech upgrade borked all links to ancient (static HTML) GURPS Diner material. Should be working again now.

2) The site's new graphic theme offers a lot more potential for content placement and other customizations than the previous one. But, yes, it needs some clean-up first. It looks very... busy. Will improve things.

There's been a big outpouring of thoughts and sadness over the passing of D&D creator Gary Gygax. The words put down by other writers are far better than I can summon, so I'll add a very short note:

As the RPG world moved beyond the foundations Gary built, it's been all too easy to cast stones at the "clunky" rules and strictures of his original creations and their direct descendants. "THAC0? Alignments? Classes? Ha, that stuff's crazy..."

I, too, like today's more modern, streamlined games. But I've always kept respect for the D&D world, whether I play the game any more or not. Like so many, many others, I point to D&D as my start as a gamer. And throughout any temptation to poke fun at the game's outdated points, I've always returned to one key thought:

Question: Did we have fun with the game?

Answer: Hell, yeah, we did.

That single truth trumps any and all dismissal of the game, and is the highest form of thanks that a game's players can return to its maker.

To have turned a clever idea into a whole new genre of gaming – wow, few of us messing with game-related design or writing will ever make a smidgen of that impact.

I never met Gary, despite a couple visits to GenCon and even a trip to the original TSR store in Wisconsin. I wish I had. He did great things.

I'm glad that 4e now incorporates something as simple and basic as a size for characters! SM, what took you so long?

My friendly little quibbles with SM as s/he stands (Basic Set p 19) are as follows:

DECIDE has been a busy little topic for discussion. In the spirit of designer's notes, here are additional notes not on the idea behind it, but on the specific implementation I used.

More under-the-hood musings for fellow monkey-wrenchers.

"What's a role-playing game?"

Who among us hasn't responded to that question by the uninitiated, or enjoyed a good reply put forth by other gamers?

Actually, I don't know how many versions of the latter I've heard or read. "An RPG is a form of collaborative storytelling... " "It's a kind of play-acting..." "Remember back when you played Cowboys and Indians..."

And so on – a hundred ways to start out explaining. RPGing is nothing overly complex, as we know, but it is one of those things that's easy to demonstrate in person, hard to describe otherwise. (My gaming group started its RPG career playing D&D profoundly wrong, as the text's "how to RPG" instructions just didn't work for us.)

I forget what spurred this topic – it was probably some comment on a gaming forum – but I'll add my take here on what a role-playing game is, simply because I don't think I've ever written it down. It's nothing special in the least, and for all I know, has been used almost verbatim by someone(s) long before me. But anyway, just for fun:

I ran across a GURPS page – "lens" as it's called – on Squidoo.

http://www.squidoo.com/gurps/

The first link given is to my GURPS Diner, for which I'm grateful, but it's the old defunct address. I'd like to request an update to the link, but there's no owner listed for this "lens", and no way that I can find to locate an unnamed Squidoo "lensmaster".

If you know (or are) the "lensmaster" for that GURPS page, please give me a shout! – end –

A post made to the SJG forums: as an attribute or skill rises in level, should each additional +1 cost more or less than the previous level? There's a good argument either way. Read on.

Okay, here's a topic I've yabbered about enough on my site and in forums, but it still pops up often as a frequent GURPS player question. I'm going to post a one-stop overview here, which I can point to when the topic next comes up.

Why do ranged and melee TH use different rules in GURPS? What happens when a weapon is really big compared to the target? What happens when combatants are odd-sized? Does SM apply in melee? If so, how can two tiny combatants possibly strike each other? Why can't ranged weapons get a bonus for really close range? And if they can't, again, how can tiny shooters ever manage to blast each other?

All is answered: there exists a GURPS Unified Theory of Hitting Stuff (or GURPS Unified TH System; it's GUTHS either way). Read on.

Ben Finney (author of GURPS Metric) has a great pair of posts at Treasure Tables on his successful session with some GURPS newbies. Check it out for a detailed look at the special prep he made to accommodate the new players (including a nifty "here's all the rules you need" intro to GURPS), and a thorough review of what worked. Plenty of good ideas for an experienced group, too. http://www.treasuretables.org/2007/05/introducing-rpgs-to-new-players-part-1 -end-