Learning GURPS 7: My Dungeon Fantasy Wizard

Back in September, I began a series entitled, “Learning GURPS” which ended after I ran one of the best pair of sessions of any roleplaying game I have ever experienced. Once the first adventure was done I was left craving more but also waiting for the arrival of my copy of the GURPS Dungeon Fantasy boxed game. When it didn’t arrive in time for the next game, I bottled prepping a new adventure and ran some Dungeons & Dragons (5e).

The D&D game was fine and, the following session, one of the players asked if he could give being Dungeon Master a go. I bowed out and the group continued playing… right up until about two weeks ago, when their adventure finished. Since then, the guys have been floundering around.

As the half-term holiday has arrived, I decided to (finally) take a good look at my copy of the GURPS Dungeon Fantasy boxed set. Recent word on the web is that this will be a “one and done” product in physical terms, which is a bit of a shame, but it is still available as a collection of .PDF booklets which I wished I’d pledged for at the start – largely because it would have stopped me bottling out after the aforementioned first dungeon adventure.

Yesterday, I plumped for the .PDFs too, telling myself that I can put a printed copy of the rules in a big folder in my classroom. Why did I really buy them? I did it because I have been incredibly impressed with the quality and utility of the GURPS Dungeon Fantasy boxed set. I did it because I want to share that game with my friends, students, and anyone else who’ll listen.

GURPS Dungeon Fantasy is going right up there alongside Mythras Classic Fantasy as one of the greatest fantasy roleplaying products I’ve ever seen. I would wholeheartedly agree with Rikhard von Katzen when he writes (elsewhere on this blog) that:

Classic Fantasy to me is basically ‘taking D&D seriously’. Much like Dungeon Fantasy from GURPS it allows you to take the assumptions and tropes of the insular D&D fantasy world and explore ‘what would that actually be like?’

In truth, I’ve decided to develop a GURPS Dungeon Fantasy game and give it a home-brew setting that I can enjoy both solo and in face-to-face play. The game set is such a good and solid presentation of the original fantasy roleplaying concept that I want to share it with those players at the school club. On top of that, I want to scratch the creative itch that I wrote about in my last post and discover the kind of fantasy world that is hiding in my subconscious imagination.

Creating Character

Opening the box reveals some gorgeous booklets…

First steps into any game (at least for me) involve creating one or more characters. For exploring GURPS Dungeon Fantasy in more depth I’ve decided to begin with a character type that I’ve been wanting to play for a long time: a Wizard.

This article is a summary of the process that I am about to begin so that you can see how the game works.

Having printed off a copy of the Dungeon Fantasy character sheet, I cracked open the “Adventurers” booklet and read through the first twelve pages. Having reminded myself of the basics of GURPS, I was ready to grab a pencil and begin to spend the 250 character points which you get to begin with.

GURPS Dungeon Fantasy’s first big strength is that it presents a selection of eleven Character Templates which guide the player through building a heroic character who also has a strong role in the adventuring party, niche protection in place. They are not really the same as “Classes” in other games because they are not anywhere like as restrictive in an absolute sense… but the templates do perform a similar function in providing a structure around which to build your hero.

Gandr the Wizard

The templates are easy to follow…

I choose the Wizard template and, armed with 250 Character Points, set about spending them. A quick flip forward to Chapter Three tempts me with the Racial Templates but I choose to stick with a Human and keep things simple.

In my head, the “town” that the Exploits booklet talks about is going to be Whitegrave – thousands of years in the past from the Whitegrave that I previously wrote about, but basically the same place. For my game, Whitegrave is a small town on the river built through the co-operation of the Human tribes who survived the Mana Wars (events that happened long ago) and the Dwarven King’s generosity. The wooden buildings with thatched roofs and packed-earthen streets are surrounded by the white stone wall which the Dwarven King gifted to the Mannish Jarl in return for sanctuary for his people and the plot of land upon which stands the Temple of the All-Father.

Following the horrors of the Mana Wars, many of the people of Taran turned their back on Wizardly magic. Over time, however, the fear subsided and the Bards were allowed to sing their arcane lyrics in the halls of the Human Thanes and Jarls. It was the writings and preachings of the philosopher Havamal, whose great works include his treatise on the Nine Noble Virtues, which began to change the hearts of Men towards learning the arcane mysteries.

Havamal reasoned that, like all the gifts of knowledge, arcane magic was not an evil in itself but rather a tool in the hands of mankind: if a man be evil, then certainly his magic will be used for evil deeds; yet, if a man be virtuous, then surely his magic would also be used for virtue. Havamal founded the College of Wizardry in Whitegrave and students of the arcane have learned there ever since under his patient tutelage.

Thus, my character has been learning the arcane craft at the College of Wizardry in Whitegrave. Although most folk stay clear of the place, glad that the strange noises and occasional explosions which occur do so inside the walls of the college, Gandr has always had a fascination with magic.

Wizards begin with Strength (ST) 10, Dexterity (DX) 12, IQ 15, and Health (HT) 11. Having looked through the template, I decide to keep things simple and not play with IQ and the Magery advantage too much. That gives me Magery 3 and Energy Reserve (Magical) 3 to begin with. From the Advantages list, I spend the extra 30 points to buy Luck [15] and three Languages – Ancient (spoken), Dwarven (spoken/written), and Reptilian/Draconic (spoken/written).

For Disadvantages, I choose to take Frightens Animals [-10] (maybe a big part of why he’s a loner) and Skinny [-5] from the first list. To those, I add Obsession (Become the world’s greatest wizard) [-10], Oblivious [-5], and Loner [-5]. Both the Obsession and Loner have control rolls of 12 or less.

Apart from the 10 skills that all Wizards get, I choose the Staff and Innate Attack (Projectile) combat skills. The latter allows me to throw ranged spells of that type with some accuracy. For my nine extra skills, I select Body Sense, Cartography, Climbing, Fast-Draw (Potion), First Aid, Gesture, Hiking, Scrounging, and Stealth.

Next comes choosing 30 spells in which I get to invest 1 point each – that makes an IQ/Hard spell (most of them) 16 or less, and IQ/Very Hard spells 15 or less. After having a fairly lengthy flip through the Spells book, I opted for the following (organised by Magical College). Note that spells in GURPS Dungeon Fantasy have prerequisites which often include other, simpler spells. I’m listing them in the order I took them:

• Protection & Warning Spells: Shield, Armor, Missile Shield
• Movement Spells: Apportation, Deflect Missile, Haste, Levitation, Flight, Lockmaster, Slow Fall
• Light & Darkness Spells: Light, Continual Light, Colors, Glow, Sunlight, Mirror, Sunbolt
• Knowledge Spells: Detect Magic, Identify Spell, Analyze Magic
• Healing Spells: Lend Energy, Recover Energy
• Fire Spells: Ignite Fire, Create Fire, Shape Fire, Fireball, Explosive Fireball, Deflect Energy, Extinguish Fire, Heat

To finish, I had the standard $1000 to spend on gear – for the uninitiated, $1 = 1 copper coin. I bought a fine, balanced quarterstaff, some light cloth armour, a potion belt with a few potions, and some basic gear. With just 5 copper left in his pouch, Gandr is ready to play.

You can see the scanned character sheet here: Gandr the Wizard

Game on!