Cyberpunk GURPS Quickstart

GURPS is a reasonably complex system at a glance, however it is built on a few foundational rules that are then reiterated and reused in a number of creative ways. And so understanding these foundations should be all you need to understand all that happens from there.

Basic Mechanics

Success Test

Any time the outcome of a given action or attempt is not to be taken for granted, a Success Test is made against a given target.

This is performed first by identifying the target number, and how it might be modified by the given circumstances. A Dexterity Success Test for instance will have its target as the character's Dexterity attribute. Situational modifiers can modify this target further as things that make the action easier or harder shift the relative skill needed to reliably succeed.

Afterwards, roll 3 six-sided die. In GURPS nomenclature, we refer to all six-sided die simply as 'D' as there are no other dice used by the system, so in this case one is rolling 3D. We then total the results of these 3 dice, and if they are equal or below the target, the character succeeds. In general, it is best to indicate by how much one succeeded - victories by 4 or even 10, are often far more notable than a victory by 0.

Automatic Results

Some specific die rolls might have a slightly different effect than the roll against target might suggest.

• 3 and 4 are always a Critical Success
• 5 is a Critical Success if the target is 15 or higher
• 6 is a Critical Success if the target is 16 or higher
• 17 is a Critical Failure, unless your target is 16 or higher which makes it an ordinary failure
• 18 is always a Critical Failure

Contests

Many times multiple characters will be working against each-other in some way - this happens in almost every situation where someone is doing something to someone else. An attack against someone's defence, an attempt at persuasion against someone's objectives, etcetera.

1. The person performing the action rolls appropriately. They take note not only if they succeed or fail, but their margin of success or failure. If the person performing the action fails - the task they were attempting to accomplish fails.
2. The person resisting or opposing the action rolls as well. They take note of their own success and failure.
3. These steps are then compared. If both parties succeeded: The party with the higher margin of success is said to win by the difference of their margins of success. In the case of a tie, the defender wins. If the defender wins - the action is prevented. If the attacker succeeds, but the defender fails: The attacker wins with their margin of success.

Note that the implication for the actor failing their roll, is only that their action fails. A character attempting to hide from another, for instance, might fail at hiding - but this does not automatically mean they are seen by everyone and announced their position; other characters may still have to roll to perceive them anyway as the situation dictates.

Characters

A given character is defined by only three major details - their attributes, their skills, and any qualities they may have.

Attributes

Every entity in Niyala has the same attributes. The average human or huvarin lacking in either exceptional ability or weakness will range between 8 and 12 on these with an average of 10. These are the attributes that are often rolled against directly in cases where a person's skills and expertise matter far less than the sheer quality of their body and mind. Attributes are important, however, as most skill rolls will involve adding a relevant skill level to an attribute. Of course, some types of entities might have 'N/A' values for these - a box has a 'physique' but certainly nothing else, and a spirit might have everything except a physique.

• Physique (PH): A measure of the character's overall physical construction, including muscle power, mass, volume and brawn - this is the structural side of what makes a character 'healthy'.
  • Physique is important for anyone wanting to lift heavy objects, wield heavy weapons, break heavy joints, or endure heavy combat. Be strong.
  • Note: (Renamed from Strength due to how some rules do or don't interact with the statistic in our customised system).
• Dexterity (DX): The character's fidelity and range of movement, from their natural untrained balance to their skill with fine movements.
  • Dexterity is important for anyone wishing to hit with attacks, avoid attacks, handle delicate equipment and never trip on a ledge. Be smooth.
• Intelligence (IQ): General problem solving and cognitive ability, from their ability to learn to their ability to parse and extrapolate information.
  • Intelligence is important for anyone that wants to solve problems, whether that's hacking a data-vault, formulating a spell, or solving a mystery. Be smart.
• Health (HT): An overall representation of the character's physiological wellbeing and fitness - their health systems, immune system, etc. This is the functional side of what makes a character healthy.
  • Health is important for anyone that simply wants to survive anything from gunshot wounds and broken limbs, to poisons and radiation. Be tough.
• Charisma (Cha): Social and emotional intelligence, expression, and intuition - their natural ability to communicate with and understand people.
  • Charisma is important for anyone wishing to not only trick and deceive their peers - but understand their motivations and resist their games alike. Be cunning.
• Perception (Per): The mind and body's combined ability to perceive and process sensory information.
  • Perception is important for anyone seeking to find every opportunity, from the hidden assassin in the corner to the unnatural timbre of someone's voice. Be keen.
• Willpower (Wil): A reflection of the character's resistance to external influence and cognitive endurance, concentration, and focus.
  • Willpower is important for anyone whom wishes to maintain strength in the face of danger, and focus in the face of distraction - magical or mundane. Be firm.
• Neural Interfacing (NI): A custom attribute expressing the character's underlying ability to interface with artificial technology on a neural level.
  • Neural Interfacing is important for anyone that intends to use a lot of neural cyberware to the best of its ability, and resist attacks through it. Be adaptive.

There are also some minor attributes that serve a more narrow purpose, often relating to gameplay mechanics; these are typically mathematically derived from other attributes, and are instead recorded to save time calculating things repeatedly.

• Basic Speed (Spd): The character's reaction speed, used to determine turn order and influencing dodging ability. It is based on Dexterity and Health.
• Basic Move (BM): A reflection of the character's movement speed, expressed in meters per second, at a sustainable run. It is based on Basic Speed.
• Basic Lift (BL): The character's ability to carry load, expressed in kilograms; unmodified BL reflects what a character can carry, one handed, without strain. It is based on Physique.
• Fatigue Points (FP): A measure of the character's energy for extensive physical exertion, a resource that is spent to perform physical feats. It is based on Health.
• Resilience (Res): Serves as an indication of the character's natural resistance to physical trauma, used in injury and injury recovery calculations alone. Separate to damage reduction which reduces the chance of the body being damaged in the first place. It is based on Physique.

Skills

While attributes reflect the general traits of a character outside of their education, training, and expertise - skills focus upon their aptitudes whether of the oft-nebulous talents or of gruelling study in academia and the school of hard knocks alike. Skills will account for the vast majority of your gameplay rolls!

Skills in this campaign are based around the concept of trees, ranging from the broadest classification of a 'trunk' as a group of skills around a theme, to the narrowest leaf reflecting a single use case of a single skill. This allows a character to have a mixture of broad skills and steadily narrowing specialisations. When a skill is rolled, it uses the sum of all relevant levels, and adds these to a provided attribute! These skills come in four classifications.

• Trunks are large, broadly defined groups of skills or general aptitudes that represent general knowledge of a collection of related skills. These can be such things as 'Animals', or 'Vehicles', or 'Melee Combat'. Trunks are the most expensive, but affect a large range of 'branches' - so much so, some activities might benefit cumulatively from multiple trunks. It is unlikely a character would train in a trunk for how broad they are, but instead steadily become more experienced with a trunk as they study and use its branches and acquire knowledge that can apply to the entire field.
• Branches are true skills that resolve around a general methodology and system of actions, such as something someone might train in to build their expertise and skill. This includes such things as 'Knife', 'Guns', or 'Animal Handling'.
• Twigs take the place of specialisations and narrower-focused forms of a given branch, but still with reasonably wide application. This could include such things as training with a specific type of animal in the form of 'Animal Handling (Canines)', or a firearm format in 'Guns (Longarms)', or with a particular spell form within a more general spell.
• Leaves form the smallest and narrowest component of this hierarchy, where they represent dedicated practice and training with something within a branch or twig; such as the 'Arm Lock' manoeuvre from wrestling, or a 'Barrel Rolls' technique for a driver. With this a character can try and offset specific task penalties.

A character can skip levels within reason - a character does not need to learn a Trunk or Branch to be able to learn a Twig, if they wish only to have a narrow font of knowledge and experience suitable for their character, and to save points. But be aware that while knowledge does transfer up in complexity, such that someone's broad knowledge from a trunk also applies when they use a branch, adding together to improve the final total - this does not happen backwards, and knowing a leaf gives no knowledge or use outside of that leaf, except the broadest of incidental knowledge and awareness that would be insufficient for a bonus in most cases.

When the GM asks for a roll against a skill, he will generally identify both the situation the skill is resolving, and the skill being asked for - you can always suggest an alternative skill if you believe it appropriate, whether because you have a narrower specialisation that might be useful to get extra levels, or because you believe other skills you have might be able to contribute!

Qualities

The final component of a character is the collection of finer aspects that define things outside of their natural and educated abilities - qualities. These can be beneficial or harmful, so minor as to be nothing more than an accent, or so significant as to define the character's entire existence.

A character may have any number of qualities, though be aware that many induce some amount of complexity or added material to keep up with - while others simplify modify an attribute or a roll, or give you a new action to perform. Racial Qualities are those that are included as part of your chosen species - some of these will always be required, while others might be optional.

Notably, Qualities can be earned and lost during play both through intentional purchase by the player - or by the natural side effects of the campaign at play. Every quality has its own rules and implications, and many can also accept additional modifiers called Enhancements or Limitations that further tailor both the cost and effect of the quality.

There are too many to list, but here are some significant examples, picked from those that are going to be common.

• Combat Reflexes: The character has highly tuned reflexes for combat. They gain a bonus on defence tests, and never suffer penalties for being surprised.
• Magician: The character has learned the required practices to perform magic - can only by learned by those with the Manablooded trait.
• Code of Honour: The character holds strongly to a structured and defined personal oath or conviction. This is a disadvantage, as it limits the character's options. Common examples are the Physician's Oath, the Paladin's Code, or even the Way of the Ninja.
• One Arm: The character has only one arm, and cannot wield two-handed weapons. Common for characters with cybernetic arms - in this case the character has One Arm, but the cybernetic limb is temporarily offsetting it... As long as it isn't hacked, disabled, destroyed, or trashed.

Additionally, there are Perks and Quirks. Perks are extremely narrow bonuses to fine tasks; while Quirks rest almost entirely as roleplay prompts and agreements, earning some extra character points for defining their character and sticking to it in a way a GM might be able to use.

• Example Perks: Resistance (Bonus against very specific drug), Weapon Bond (Bonus when using specific weapon), Passive Smile (Always using 'Diplomacy'), Standard Operating Procedure (Always assumed to have performed a certain beneficial action, even if not stated).
• Example Quirks: Likes [Thing], Dislikes [Thing], Intolerance (Minor penalty when dealing with specific group), Gullible (Penalty to resist Fast-Talk).

Self Control Disadvantages

Some disadvantages are labelled as Self Control disadvantages. When purchased, a character buys these at a level that indicates how difficult it is for them to resist this disadvantage. The assumption is that a *player* usually won't opt to roll, as this is mostly a role-playing and character-decision disadvantage that offers some points towards it, and a mechanism to resist it when deemed truly necessary. Failing this roll means the character succumbs to the disadvantage. A character with Phobia runs from the source of their phobia, a character with Honesty can't muster the will to lie before an investigation.

Combat

Combat in GURPS is turn-based and cyclical, and roughly approximates 1 second of activity each turn - it is defined by very short, individual actions that are designed to be resolved reasonably quickly rather than multiple actions or instant resolutions of sequences of events. This means that sometimes your turn is nothing but a setup for later. For those coming from D&D or other similar systems where you might obliterate an enemy or three in one turn thanks to cleaves or instantly cast fireballs, this might take some getting used to.

The general design premise in this regard is that by having a character do less each turn - other characters get to do something more often, and you get to react to complex situations more fluidly rather than being suddenly surprised when half of a team is killed.

Turn Order

Combat goes in a simple order - the person with the highest Basic Speed goes first, and passes on to the next slowest, over and over until the last person has acted; and then it repeats. In cases of ties, the person with the higher Dexterity goes first, then the highest IQ, then the highest Destiny (an optional quality), and finally a simple die roll.

Actions on a Turn - Manoeuvres

On a character's turn, a character chooses a specific type of action to take. These are described as manoeuvres, and indicate the type of action to be taken, how much movement can be performed, and any implications on the character's ability to defend themselves. Any implications of a manoeuvre apply until the character starts their next manoeuvre. While there are other manoeuvres, most are simple variations of those below.

Manoeuvre	Action	Movement	Defence
Attack	Perform a single attack	One step	Normal
All-Out Attack	Perform an attack with a chosen bonus	Up to 1/2 Basic Move	None permitted
Move	Take no action	Up to Basic Move	Normal
Ready	Perform a physical action	One step	Normal
Concentrate	Perform a mental action	One step	Normal
All-Out Defence	Take no action	One step	Double, or with +2 to chances.

Movement

On a given turn, a character may move as far as their manoeuvre allows. If your manoeuvre says you may take a 'step', then you may only move 1m but may also freely change your orientation. Otherwise, every point of movement lets you move 1m forward, and end up in a direction reasonably forward relative to the end of your movement (there are rules for this, but common sense applies). Some situations may make movement cost more - stepping backwards is 2x cost, etc.

Attacks

The attack process works in four phases, progressing to the next only if there is continued chance of danger.

Attack attempt

When a character performs an attack, they designate a target that is within the reach of their weapon (for melee), or within line of sight and the maximum range of their weapon (for ranged). The character rolls against their weapon's skill level - this is usually equal to (DX-5) + Relevant Skill. If they succeed at this roll, they have potentially hit. Common modifiers to this roll are for things such as range, posture, or the decision to aim at a specific part of the target (the 'torso' is the assumed default).

If the attack misses - nothing generally happens. When appropriate there are cases where one might determine what happened to the missed projectile if it was a ranged attack, but for a basic overview, we will ignore this.

Defence attempt

If you are subject to an attack, you may make what is called an Active Defence Test. This is a roll against your Dodge statistic, or one of your own melee attacks' Parry or Block statistics. If you succeed at this roll at all, you successfully defend the attack and may stop here.

Damage resistance

If the attack was not successfully defended against, now the effect of it must be determined. In most cases, this is rolling the damage for the attack, and comparing it against the subject's Damage Resistance. This interaction is usually purely subtractive - if a character deals 10 damage, but the subject has 5 damage resistance, then the subject takes 5 damage. Some damage resistance may only apply against certain attacks. If all of the damage is resisted, you may stop here.

Resulting injury

In GURPS with this system (known as Conditional Injury), characters do not have hit points that can be ticked away - instead, they have an overall health condition or status, that might or might not worsen based on the severity of attacks and their current health. This means characters are much more durable, and that having an existing injury doesn't radically increase your chances of death.

GM's Note: Most of this will be automated and simplified in a UI - but understanding the underlying details is useful.

Based on the character's Resilience, each character will have a table that correlates the amount of damage to a severity of injury - the higher their resilience, the more damage required to reach each severity of injury. When damage is received, it is compared against this table. To help with understanding this, an example table for the most common Resilience score, 10 (as found in an unmodified human) is shown below.

Threshold	Res 10 Example	Trauma	Shock Penalty	Survivability	Lasting Condition
< Res x 0.1	0	Harmless			Unharmed
>= Res x0.1	1	Scratch	-1	+5	Superficial
>= Res x0.2	2	Minor	-2	+4	Sore
>= Res x0.3	3	Severe	-3	+3	Hurt
>= Res x0.5	5 - 6	Major	-4	+2	Injured
>= Res x0.7	7 - 9	Major	-4	+1	Reeling
>= Res	10 - 19	Greivous	-4	+0	Fading
>= Res x2	20 - 29	Mortal	-4	-1	Dying I
>= Res x3	30 - 39	Mortal	-4	-2	Dying II
>= Res x4	40 - 49	Mortal	-4	-3	Dying III
>= Res x5	50 - 59	Mortal	-4	-4	Dying IV
>= Res x6	60 - 109	Fatal			Dead
>= Res x11	110+	Fatal			Destroyed

When the character receives damage, they go through the following steps in sequence:

1. Using the damage that they've received, look up which row reflects the injury they received.
2. Adjust this up or down based on the damage type received and hit location (these are covered in notes below) if needed.
3. Follow the rules for the Trauma received, and apply the Shock Penalty to all actions until the end of your next turn in combat. (High Pain Threshold negates this penalty!)
4. Record the new condition of your character from the same row, and compare it to your pre-existing condition
   If it is worse than your existing condition - set it to this new condition.
   If it is equal or less severe than your existing condition - roll against your Wound Resistance with a bonus or penalty equal to the injury's Survivability. If you fail, your condition worsens from its current value by one step.

Trauma Effects:

• Scratch: Does not accumulate unless caused by ongoing damage (poisons, toxins, environmental damage, etc).
• Major: The character immediately rolls HT vs Knockdown and Stun. If the hit area can be crippled - it is crippled.
• Grievous: Immediately roll HT vs Unconsciousness. If the hit area can be crippled - it is destroyed or severed as appropriate.
• Mortal: Immediately roll HT vs Instant Death, then roll HT vs Unconsciousness as for a Grievous wound.
• Fatal: Instant and irresistable death. (Note, this requires suffering 6x your maximum hit points by normal game rules all in one singular hit)

Condition Effects:

• Reeling: 1/2 Move and Dodge.
• Dying: Start of every turn, unless taking 'Do Nothing' and did not defend since last turn, roll vs HT or fall unconscious at penalty equal to Deadly level. If reaching or worsening this level as a result of an injury that didn't have a HT roll vs Death, roll HT vs Death.