• general

    Daily Houserule tweets: July 2022

    From February 1, 2022 to January 31, 2023, I posted an entry a day to the @gamesdiner Twitter account, using the hashtags #TRPG, #GURPS, and #DailyHouserule. The concept: Make tweets out of a bunch of minor GURPS houserule items, GM/player advice tidbits, and other tips & tricks, to have a bit of fun engaging with other gamers and get the #GURPS tag out there more. (See the initial announcement here.) The year is up! I’m now posting those tweets to this site, a month per page. Links to all 12 months are below. Do forgive the overly abbreviated and janky writing. These were tweets, so the text is full of…

  • general

    Daily Houserule tweets: June 2022

    From February 1, 2022 to January 31, 2023, I posted an entry a day to the @gamesdiner Twitter account, using the hashtags #TRPG, #GURPS, and #DailyHouserule. The concept: Make tweets out of a bunch of minor GURPS houserule items, GM/player advice tidbits, and other tips & tricks, to have a bit of fun engaging with other gamers and get the #GURPS tag out there more. (See the initial announcement here.) The year is up! I’m now posting those tweets to this site, a month per page. Links to all 12 months are below. Do forgive the overly abbreviated and janky writing. These were tweets, so the text is full of…

  • general

    Daily Houserule tweets: May 2022

    From February 1, 2022 to January 31, 2023, I posted an entry a day to the @gamesdiner Twitter account, using the hashtags #TRPG, #GURPS, and #DailyHouserule. The concept: Make tweets out of a bunch of minor GURPS houserule items, GM/player advice tidbits, and other tips & tricks, to have a bit of fun engaging with other gamers and get the #GURPS tag out there more. (See the initial announcement here.) The year is up! I’m now posting those tweets to this site, a month per page. Links to all 12 months are below. Do forgive the overly abbreviated and janky writing. These were tweets, so the text is full of…

  • general

    Daily Houserule tweets: April 2022

    From February 1, 2022 to January 31, 2023, I posted an entry a day to the @gamesdiner Twitter account, using the hashtags #TRPG, #GURPS, and #DailyHouserule. The concept: Make tweets out of a bunch of minor GURPS houserule items, GM/player advice tidbits, and other tips & tricks, to have a bit of fun engaging with other gamers and get the #GURPS tag out there more. (See the initial announcement here.) The year is up! I’m now posting those tweets to this site, a month per page. Links to all 12 months are below. Do forgive the overly abbreviated and janky writing. These were tweets, so the text is full of…

  • general

    Daily Houserule tweets: March 2022

    From February 1, 2022 to January 31, 2023, I posted an entry a day to the @gamesdiner Twitter account, using the hashtags #TRPG, #GURPS, and #DailyHouserule. The concept: Make tweets out of a bunch of minor GURPS houserule items, GM/player advice tidbits, and other tips & tricks, to have a bit of fun engaging with other gamers and get the #GURPS tag out there more. (See the initial announcement here.) The year is up! I’m now posting those tweets to this site, a month per page. Links to all 12 months are below. Do forgive the overly abbreviated and janky writing. These were tweets, so the text is full of…

  • general

    Daily Houserule tweets: February 2022

    From February 1, 2022 to January 31, 2023, I posted an entry a day to the @gamesdiner Twitter account, using the hashtags #TRPG, #GURPS, and #DailyHouserule. The concept: Make tweets out of a bunch of minor GURPS houserule items, GM/player advice tidbits, and other tips & tricks, to have a bit of fun engaging with other gamers and get the #GURPS tag out there more. (See the initial announcement here.) The year is up! I’m now posting those tweets to this site, a month per page. Links to all 12 months are below. Do forgive the overly abbreviated and janky writing. These were tweets, so the text is full of…

  • general

    Tiny DFRPG idea: A better Green Thumb

    Following up on Tiny GURPS/DFRPG idea: A better Outdoorsman, let’s take a brief peek at the somewhat wan Green Thumb advantage in the Dungeon Fantasy Roleplaying Game (DFRPG). in GURPS, this 5-point Talent boosts a nice five skills: Biology, Farming, Gardening, Herb Lore, and Naturalist. In DFRPG, a shortened skill list means means fewer boosted skills: just the trio of Herb Lore, Naturalist, and Pharmacy (the skill of making mundane herbal medicines). These are good skills, but the DFRPG advantage has a wilted feel. Let’s give it some water and sun. Cultivating Green Thumb I’d like to see a more verdant Green Thumb that rakes in two more skills to…

  • general

    Game design musing: “Sims” (with a sample sports sim for GURPS)

    In this post, I muse that it’d be interesting to see examples of ways to game a sporting match in GURPS (or whatever game you like). By which I don’t mean some per-second simulation of every dash and tackle and kick by every player on the pitch, a la RPG combat. (Lordy, just imagine trying to play out a combat turn-based simulation of two 40-minute game halves. “Okay! We begin with Turn 1 of 4,800!”) No, I refer to some abstract simulation that resolves a complex activity in far less detail than what RPGs typically lavish on combat systems, while offering more of interest than a simple “Roll vs your…

  • general

    Rules Bit (GURPS/DFRPG): Better Aim

    Intro This tiny little rules tweak that I use is one so small that I can’t come up with any clever-ish title or subtitle. It’s so trivial that I tend to forget it’s a house rule, not official rules-as-written.  With that lack of ado, here it is: The rule Change the TH bonus for the Aim maneuver to +1 per second of aiming (up to +3 for 3 seconds). Reworded, that’s nothing more than “add +1 to the Aim bonus”. Do that, and the bonus now ranges from +1 to +3 instead of the official +0 to +2, before the addition of weapon Acc. Notes  By the book (Basic Set…

  • general

    Why GURPS defenses use half skill: A half-baked idea

    Continuing the Games Diner’s fine tradition of bringing you the most inconsequential gaming gab out there… Why does a Parry or Block in GURPS – figured as 3 + half your skill with your weapon or shield, respectively – use half skill, something seen pretty much nowhere else in the game? I asked that question in FEND, a bit of fun with rolling defenses like anything else, using full, normal skill. There, I opine that GURPS‘ use of half skill is simply a matter of making defenses play well: with their range flattened by the halving and the resulting too-low score boosted by the +3, the final defense scores are not…