House Rules
I would recommend that one person play a mage as it does open up alot of story lines for the game, but it's not a requirement.
Dont worry about the low mana for the kingdom you are starting in, it will not be a significant factor, the freelance wizard template has an IQ of 14 and magery 3. Meaning effective IQ for spell casting is a 17!. Even with the -5 you will not have an enourmous difficulting casting spells, plus I will allow you to somewhat offset the low mana with your own reserves, for an extra FP spent on casting a spell you can get a +1, for an extra 2 FP you can get a +2 (thats the cap, no more than +2)
Here is how character creation will work: My intention is that we will do this together at the table, I will send your stuff in advance so you can begin thinking about what you want to play.
Please do not use character generation software as the world does add a few things, and the racial templates will not be correct. Plus I honestly feel that using the software slows down the process by adding needless complications.
Pick your template, most cost 150 points, some are cheaper. Build your character from that, do not deviate from the template. I am not allowing he Underground Engineer template for reasons primarily of story and flavor. These templates are really nice because they greatly speed up character creation, and generally force a balance of power.
IF your template costs less than 150 points, you can use the difference to either purchase a racial template, or add more skills and advantages. The skills and advantages listed in the template that you did not choose you can take freely, anything that is "off template" must be cleared through me.
If you want to add a racial template, you can do so, but you must offset its cost with additional disadvantages. Again you can choose from the template disads however you want, anything off template must be cleared through me, playable races are: Elf, half-elf, human (no template), goblin, halfling, gnome, dwarf, and half-orc
After you have done that you may further customize your character slightly. You may purchase an additional 15 points of stuff, but for every point you spend, you will need to offset it with a new disadvantage. Again stuff from the templates is fine, anything offtemplate must be cleared through me.
Note that you may not alter your attributes, they are what the template says they are (unless modified by a racial template). You can alter them later with earned character points.
Martial arts: I was asked about a martial artist, the Martial artist template is 150 point template, there is a 100 point add on that adds all sorts of powerful and cinematic stuff. I will not allow this at character creation time, but I will allow you to slowly build up to this by spending earned character points.
When it all said and done if you add up all your points and subtract all your disads, you char must equal 150 points when done creating your characters.
I may assess an unusual background for some off-template purchases. This is generally for something that is either unbalancing in some way, or as a counter to anything that reeks of "special snowflake".
MY HOUSE RULES FOR THIS GAME:
Any disadvantage that does not actually cause you problems doesn't count for points (you are immune or extremely unlikely to ever feel its effects). (This isn't a house rule, it’s a GURPS rule, just restating it for truth)
Many advantages that are normally impossible (or difficult) to add after character creation, can be done so in a high fantasy setting. While normally it would not be possible to add the “Elf” advantage after character creation, there are certain magics that can make this possible, however such advantages purchased later may need to wait for a matching in-game story component to become reality, work with me on this, if you want to add something major, plan ahead so that we can work together to time it,so that it’s entry into the game is as close as possible to when you earn the necessary points. This applies rarely. In 95% of the cases you can spend your points as soon as you earn them by contriving some excuse that is plausible. “I have been stabbed, slashed, and beaten so many times that my threshold for pain has naturally improved.”, “I have always been an amateur astronomer, you didn’t know that?”, or “It was so weird, that time last week when I almost died before the cleric healed me. I saw angels and my dead grandmother, and now I just seem to have a sixth sense regarding danger.” Just validate it with me before you do it. Well in advance is preferred so as not to cause you a substantial delay in spending your points. Spells are an obvious exception.
Anywhere in the books where you see "The GM may wish too..." check with me before you assume.
Enemies and Dependents: Can only be bought with an appearance of 6 or less. When a disadvantage NPC arrives that NPC isn't just going to pass you in the street and say "hi dad" his or her appearance will cause you a problem (it is a disadvantage). You may see your child in every session, but only on that roll of 6 or less will you have to rescue her from a pack of brain-washing cultists.
Allies/Enemies/Dependents/Patrons/other NPC's: If you have spent (or gained) points for an NPC, simply send me the point break down. His or her name, the nature of the relationship, and one short paragraph of description, also anything special that this NPC absolutely has to have. I will build the NPC, it is unlikely you will ever actually get to see that NPC's character sheet;
I will tell you what you would know about this NPC. Additionally I will level the npc up as time goes on.
Example: Ellan Davenport, Squire (22 points. Ally and Dependent, %50 of my value, Ally 15 or less, 6 or less for dependent)Ellan is the eldest son (16, male) of lord Davenport who is a minor noble. Ellan's duties generally involve taking care of my horse, weapons, and armor. As well as learning to one day become a Knight himself. Ellan is partially trained so he can help out in a fight, but I prefer for him to try and stay out of harm’s way since his father would be very cross with me were anything untoward happen to the boy, this is made difficult by the fact that he is both loyal and brave. Ellan is skilled at training horses, and he really wants to be a Knight.
Replace the Ally base cost table with the following:
Ally/PC build CPs - Cost to PC25% or more - 2%50% or more - 4%75% or more - 6%100% or more - 10%150% - 20%
Example: Your power level is 200. (200 character points). You want a 100 point ally that is 50% so the cost is 4% of your value. So this ally's base cost is 4% of 200 or 8 cp. If you think the price is too high, then maybe what you are looking for is not an ally, perhaps it’s a contact, patron, or dependent. If you are unsure, talk to me. Allies are quite powerful, when an ally’s activate roll hits, he or she is basically there to help you in whatever fashion you intended.
Weirdness Magnet: Only one player may take this disadvantage (otherwise the game becomes all about dealing with everyone’s weirdness magnet), be forewarned this disadvantage is neither cute nor harmless, you WILL get your -15 points worth, and it WILL compound the parties (and your) problems and put everyone in mortal danger from time to time. The description in the book makes it sound cute and harmless but it isn't, this is a fairly nasty disadvantage, and it will be in more or less constant effect. If you want it to be cute and harmless, take it as a quirk, by no means does anyone have to take this disadvantage. If anything it is underpriced. I do NOT treat this disadvantage as comic relief, and I probably will be annoyed that you took it.... YE BE WARNED!
Enthrallment skills require an usual background, otherwise they are simply too inexpensive for what they do.
When using the Temporary Enchantment spell (from GURPS Fantasy and Magic), multiply the energy cost of the enchantment by (Uses)/(Uses+6), rounding up. So a wand that can cast Fireball 30 times costs (30/36), or 84% of the normal energy cost to enchant.The idea behind Temporary Enchantment is a good one, but why make it impossible (or ridiculously expensive) to make an item with a dozen or more charges? This makes a one-shot item cost the same (15%), while allowing for as many uses as you want.
SHOT CLOCK: If you cannot declare your action within 20 seconds your round is declared as Do Nothing and we move on. (this will be waived for the first few combats of a new player or new character) This is 20 times as long as your character has to decide what he or she is going to do. KNOW WHAT YOUR CHARACTER IS CAPABLE OF DOING.
CP awards: Every session there are 2 points available to most every player (some sessions may be worth more or less). There are several
actions that can cause you to lose a character point (or points) (GMs discretion as always)1. Using Ultimate Player knowledge, dungeon telepathy, any other form of meta-gaming.2. Ignoring your disadvantages3. Making a will roll to avoid having a disadvantage go off [1]4. Abusing Allies and Dependents (see those traits for details)5. Not showing up to the session (no points if the player is not present, even if the character is lurking in the background)6. Taking actions that seem strongly out of character.
[1]: In my mind you should not be rolling to prevent your mental disadvantages from going off except where the penalty for them going off is a strong likelyhood of death. Failing the bad temper roll against the town watch that will result in a night in jail would not be a qualified exception. Failing the bad temper roll against the emperor and slugging him which will result in summary execution IS a qualified exception. There will be very few qualified exceptions.
Also if you have any unspent character points you can use those as a get out of death free card.you can spend a cp to reroll something, or force the DM to reroll something. You can only do this once per session.
I will allow you to somewhat offset the low mana with your own reserves, for an extra FP spent on casting a spell you can get a +1, for an extra 2 FP you can get a +2 (thats the cap, no more than +2)
I do not like the way the influence roll rules are written. It will still be a quick contest, the margin of victory (or defeat) will be applied to the reaction roll.
DOWNTIME COST OF LIVING:
I want to keep this fairly abstract as it is basically a money sink.
Everyone has a cost of living they must pay while in town, the cost depends on status, for Status 2 it is $3000/month, for status 0 it is $600/month.
For everyone, when you are away travelling, you dont have to pay the full cost of living, but if you want your stuff to remain untouched while you are gone, You will need to pay about 60% of the cost of living even while out adventuring. That is $360 for most of you. If you are in town only for a few weeks, you can prorate this out.