Reflections After Six Sessions of the GURPS Psi-Wars Campaign

by mshrm

I have this notion that a year-long campaign can be considered a success. We play once a month (since adult responsibilities have long since eliminated the days of 18 hour games every single weekend) so that works out to 12 sessions, nominally. Thus, after six sessions, we’re halfway there, making this a good time to look back and reflect.

Is ST Overpriced?

Might as well tackle the elephant in the room first: Is ST overpriced in a high TL game? Keeping in mind that every group and every campaign is going to be different, when it comes to this campaign with these players doing this kind of stuff… no, I wouldn’t say so.

I have not observed anyone using ST as a dump stat. Quite the opposite, in fact: we have one character whose whole concept is wrapped around being big, strong, and weird. A couple of characters have Lifting ST to offset encumbrance, and about half the group has put points directly into ST. As I understand it, one of the PCs might be putting points towards picking up ST 11, intending to improve grappling performance.

We’re only now getting to where PCs are using advanced tech to combat personal encumbrance. As the group retreated to the ship during the prison break, Davin picked up one of the combat robots’ gatling blasters, which is really intended more as a mounted weapon than something a person would really carry. Now he’s in the market for a gravitic compensator (UT 152). There has been sporadic conversation about upgrading Davin to some kind of powered armor, but so far, they haven’t really felt the need to go “full military”. Half the time, Davin can’t even wear his current full suit of armor for social reasons. (For instance, as of the end of last session, he’s riding a gheap, wearing his battleweave Underoos, while his armor flies away on the ship.)

Wrasslin’

I try to set up situations with the drama of combat, without actually going to maximum firepower and scorched earth every time. Last session’s was the wrestling match between Suzal and Hull. I feel it’s poor form to have one character fighting while everyone else stands around, but I also wanted to ease the players into using the rules from Fantastic Dungeon Grappling.

Historically, my players have been oddly reluctant to engage in grappling, possibly because the default rules from the Basic book are pretty boring. At this point, though, we have several players with an interest in real-life technical grappling, and the FDG rules add a lot of detail without a lot of weight, so I feel it’s worth adding to the toolkit.

Also, I think some of my players have realized that some day they might need to dogpile a bad guy, pin ’em down, and wrestle their helmet off their head, to be able to take ’em out. Lots of earned character points have been going towards Judo and Wrestling lately, it seems.

Equipment

This is the first time we’ve ever dived in to TL 11, really. We’ve hit TL 9 with rare instances of TL 10, and we’ve had Supers games with the occasional gadgeteer, but that’s it. Over the course of the first few sessions, everybody learned something about the technology. In the first session, only a few PCs had wrist communicators, and it quickly became clear that they were a requirement, not a luxury.

One PC started with a personal force field, before realizing that nobody in the setting was using slug guns, because of the availability of personal force fields. Now I’m seeing more interest in force shields, to get that bump to active defenses.

This is a game of loadouts, more than any game I can readily recall. The players seemed a bit startled to be invited to a fancy social event, but once the surprise wore off, everybody got into dressing up their characters and figuring out where to conceal weapons. Davin, especially, is constantly varying his equipment to suit the mission at hand.

Setting and Character

Beyond the technology, there’s also the lore. The Psi-Wars setting is deep and rich, full of detail, and I know I am not doing it anything resembling justice. It has taken a while for everyone to get the big factions straight. It’s taken a while just to introduce NPCs with names and agendas. Most of our previous games, they only asked the name so they knew what to put on the tombstone.

It feels like it took a while for the players to get comfortable with their characters. Lakota has grown into more of a detective and unraveller of conspiracies, and what started as a simple Quirk has seemingly grown into a full-blown case of Honesty. Suzal went from not believing in the supernatural, to embracing it with both hands. Davin has started pursuing True Communion and psionics.

Speaking of, most players avoided psionics due to the complexity. Ironic, when “psi” is right there in the setting name. Only Lenny and Suzal have any psi, and in both cases, they have powers without much complexity to them. Even so, cheat sheets have become involved.

Impulse Buys

We’re out of practice using the Impulse Buys rules, and it shows. Most of the time, the free per-game points never get spent. On one occasion, Suzal dropped a point to get 25 Fatigue, which then fed into Extra Effort for their psychokinetic strength. Nearly every other point spent has been to buy a success on a roll after Luck didn’t do the trick.

What’s Hot

Sleep disorders. Out of seven PCs, four have some kind of issue with sleep. If it’s not Insomnia, it’s Sleepwalking, or Nightmares, or Slow Riser. An awful lot of their drama happens in the middle of the night.

Danger Sense. Of the seven, four have some form of Danger Sense, psionic or “wild”. Also Gunslinger; three of the group have at least a limited form.

Force swords. Lenny has her traditional dueling force sword. Ka Soh has his unconventional force tonfas. Harket and Davin seem to both be interested, since they each collected one of the fallen Imperial Knight’s damaged swords.