The Biblical figure of Samson (or “Sampson”) from the Book of Judges (chapters 13 to 16) is an interesting guy. Basically, he’s the Christian version of Heracles (and has interesting ties to that particular mythological figure as well). He did some pretty cool things, things which any PC in any campaign would love to do. […]
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Boil and Bubble: How to Build a Spell Thief
Recently, Shieldbunny from the Steve Jackson Games forums asked: I’ve been kicking around the idea of building a character based off of the spellthief class in That Other Game. For those of you that don’t know, the idea is a stealthy character that steals the spells from her enemies minds to cast herself. After some […]
Continue readingGamemaster’s Guidepost: Monster Hunters Campaign – The Broken Night
Today’s Gamemaster’s Guidepost is yet another departure from the standard fare I’ve been producing. In fact, it’s a radical from anything I’ve ever posted on my blog. This is something that I’d normally held in reserve for a Pyramid article. But I decided that I have so much already in that grouping that it was […]
Continue readingGamemaster’s Guidepost: You Need a +2 or Better Weapon
…I used to hate hearing my DM tell me that phrase. What do you mean this awesome weapon I’ve worked hard for can’t do diddly and squat (and diddly left town with Bo). Oh, it used to make me so mad. I remember actually keeping weapons I’d never use if they were a +3 or better weapon […]
Continue readingGURPS101: Will as HP
Over on the forums, Anders asked: A special type of undead are gastar, who consist entirely of psychic energy. This means that their HP = Will, and each time they get damaged they lose Will as well. And when they reach 0 they are destroyed. The second part is easily covered, but what about them […]
Continue readingBoil and Bubble: Latin Isn’t the Only Magical Language
During a recent character creation session, two of the three players choose a name based on a Latin word or phrase. One ended up discarding his choice later and the other mixed his up so it was a bit more different. But this made me think, “Why is Latin the first thing that pops up […]
Continue readingBoil and Bubble: Spell Kits for Casters – Cryomancer
Fire tends to be the “go-to” element for spellwork that damages the target. But what of ice? Cold can kill just as easily as heat can. It’s the extremes of temperature that kills…so why don’t we see more “cryomancers” in fiction or RPGs? They can make the ground slippery, preserve a corpse, silence an alarm […]
Continue readingGamemaster’s Guidepost: Bringing Newbies to GURPS
JMD (who, by the way, is one of my absolute favorite people I’ve met on the forums – he’s the mad genius doing the GURPS Calculator) started this thread asking about why people don’t like GURPS. If you can read through some of the bullshit, check out the Reddit thread. I rather like this little […]
Continue readingGURPS101: Hordes, Hives, and Human Minds
I like to poke my head outside of my own bubble and work on topics that I might not otherwise pick. I think that if you’re going to keep your mind flexible the best way is to solve a problem someone else gives you rather than one you decide needs solving. Over in this thread, […]
Continue readingGamemaster’s Guidepost: Mini-Location – Fantasy Smithy
Sometimes you just need to drop a location into your game that’s already ready to go. It doesn’t mean a GM is ill-prepared, but he can’t predict every player character action. So what’s he to do? Well, GURPS has quite a few supplements out there that can detail specific locations, but what about smaller areas? […]
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