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What Is It?
GURPS Fourth Edition rolled out of the gate with the ability to build anything from a normal human to a superhuman to truly exotic things like possessed cars and sentient computer programs. Defining what a character is is easy. GURPS Powers attempts to help better define what a character can do.
It does this by adding hundreds of new modifiers for the advantages in GURPS Characters, the core book, along with a few new advantages to plug the (admittedly small) holes in the system. Extra clarification is given to how abilities work, as well. It also expands into the concept of "powers", a new framework for GURPS in which a character buys a set of related abilities which all share the same source and focus. There are also new rules for using "powers", tons of examples, and a lot of genre advice. I'll take them in that order, instead of in chapter order, as I think it best fits the review format.
Now With Extra Crunchiness
Chapter Two, "Building Abilities", is what makes this book feel like "GURPS Characters, Part Two". This chapter is nonstop advice on how to create an ability that you want -- finding the right advantage(s), modifying them if necessary, and tweaking it all to fit your vision.
The first part of the chapter makes up its bulk. Every advantage that can be used in a conscious manner (and many, many passive ones as well) has a writeup consisting of:
1. Briefly, what sort of character might have this advantage, and how it can be justified for different genres and settings. For example, Mind Control can represent anything from hypnotism to drugs to pheromones to subsonics, so each of these gets not only a mention, but a list of what modifiers would be best to simulate this. Several advantages also have rules clarifications or variants as well, such as "Oracle (Digital)", which lets AIs and savants glean hidden meaning from vast amounts of data, and several new forms of Injury Tolerance.
2. Alternatives. Are you sure this is the advantage you want? Each one includes a discussion of what other advantages perform a similar function, in case one of those might suit your concept a little better. Or you might want both!
3. New Special Modifiers. Most of the advantages include one or more new modifiers, so you can better customize the way an advantage works. Wanted to make a 2D character, but didn't want him to be vulnerable to light? Add the new "Light Insensitive" enhancement. There are far more enhancements than I'd care to list, but none feel superfluous or unnecessary, and many of them let you make a character concept that might have otherwise been very difficult to figure out without this book.
4. Powering Up. Specifically for use with the "powers" rules (below), this is a quick rundown of what sort of powers this advantage might fit into, and how Talent will interact with it.
After that, we are treated to a few new advantages. Each one is highly generic (moreso than the average advantage in Characters), with lots of advice on customization. In order, they're Control (allows you to manipulate matter, energy, or force -- everything from making stone flow like water to altering the gravitational force in an area), Create (just what it sounds like, can be temporary or permanent), Illusion (I was surprised this one wasn't in the core book; has rules for telepathic mental illusions as well as holographic ones), Leech (draining HP, with options for draining FP, attributes, even youth!), Neutralize (just an expanded version of the one in Characters which can neutralize other things besides psi), and Static (like Neutralize, this is an expanded version of Psi Static). There's also a new advantage at the very end of the chapter, Energy Reserve, which works like Fatigue Points that can't be drained, don't make you tired, and are only used to fuel special powers.
A full section on modifiers follows, with both detailed discussion (and often variants) of existing modifiers and a bunch of new modifiers that are appropriate for many different advantages. Among other things, Accessibility gets a lot more examples along with a "Percentage of Availablity to Limitation Value" chart, and Uncontrollable can now be triggered by the presence of an item instead of just stress (perfect for werewolves).
After this, the chapter goes into "special effects" -- the things that make your power unique without changing its cost (e.g., what it looks like when you use it) -- and "finishing up", a quick checklist to make sure you got it all and advice on naming it and writing it down.
The final section is all special cases. You get specific advice on emulating certain genres (e.g., how to build cybertech, what abilities fit a horror game best, etc.), on benchmarking ("I want to be able to spit magma. How much damage should that do?"), and on absolutes -- unerring attacks, instant-death attacks, stopping time, invulnerability, etc. To its credit, Powers delves into all of these normally ungameable topics and offers ways to (at least partially) simulate all of them -- in some cases (such as for invulnerability) it offers multiple ways to do it.
Clarifications: The first half of Chapter Four, "Powers in Action" goes into a great deal of detail on how abilities work (whether in a "power" or not). Active versus Passive; Always On versus Switchable versus Transient; when abilities can be activated, deactivated, etc.; how abilities and skills interact; and such things are all covered in great detail. These sections didn't make for riveting reading, but any GM will find them invaluable when a player needs to do something slightly unusual with an ability.
What Was That Title, Again?
GURPS Powers introduces the "power". Well, sort of. Actually, GURPS Characters has already done so, in its chapter on psi -- this book just expands it to cover darn near anything. Chapter One, "Building Powers", sets down the ground rules:
A power is the ability to channel some sort of energy (known as your Source) to produce a certain kind of effect (known as your Focus). For example, classic Telepathy is the ability to channel ones psychic energy (Source: Psionic) to affect the minds of others (Focus: Sapient Minds). In a fantasy game, clerics might have a Holy Fire power, as they're empowered by their flame God (Source: Divine) to wield the force of fire in His name (Focus: Heat and Fire).
The power framework is actually pretty simple. First, the GM needs to look at the Focus and determine which advantages fit it. For example, with Telepathy, you've got the obvious ones like Mind Reading and Telesend, along with the less obvious such as Social Chameleon and Xeno-Adaptibility. For Holy Fire, you'd have things like Burning Attack, Control (Fire), and Temperature Tolerance.
Next, the GM looks at the Source and how much it affects the power's usefulness. Most Sources imply an inherent restriction or two. For example, if your power is psionic, that means that Anti-Psi abilities and psychotronic devices can stop it (in most games). If your power is divine, there usually won't be any specific countermeasures, but your God has the ability to take your power away from you if you don't behave properly. Chapter One has rules to evaluate this, and also goes into details for several suggested Sources (Biological, Chi, Cosmic, Divine, Elemental, Magical, Moral, Nature, Psionic, Spirit, and Super) the restrictions implied by each Source, and what sort of Power Modifier that leaves you with.
The Power Modifier is a modifier, usually a limitation (most are -10%), that gets added to every advantage in the power that you buy. This (A) gives you a point break to reflect the inherent restrictions involve with your Source and (B) marks the advantage as being part of the power. For example, if I'm building a cleric with the Holy Fire power, I would buy any advantages that I wanted from the list provided, and add the limitation "Holy Fire, -10%" to reflect the fact that my God can take my power away from me if I don't act devoutly.
Finally, there's the Talent, almost always 5 points/level, that adds to every roll made to use the abilities in your power. If I bought Holy Fire Talent +3 (for 15 points), I would get +3 to my attack rolls for Burning Fire, +3 to my HT rolls if my Temperature Tolerance gets exceeded, etc.
The second half of Chapter Four, "Powers in Action", goes into all sorts of special rules for powers, labelled "Stunts". For example, users of the same Source can link their powers together, whether it be a psionic gestalt or a magical circle. For a Fatigue cost, a power wielder can add temporary enhancements to an ability. With a decent Will or HT roll and a significant Fatigue cost, one can even pull off the old "stunt" rules from the Marvel Superheroes RPG and use one ability as though it were a totally different one! ("Ah, if only we could reach them! Wait, I know! I'll modulate the frequency of my Lightning Blast to make it act as a crude radio -- it just might work!")
Several optional rules are also provide which work equally well for "wild" (i.e., normal, not bought as part of a power framework) advantages as they do with powers -- it's up to the GM if they're available to non-powered characters. Rules are provided for things from extra effort to coordinated attacks (from "Let's all hit him at once!" to the classic Fastball Special). Many optional drawbacks are detailed as well, such as suggested Fatigue costs for long-term power usage and penalties for multiple feats and repeated attempts.
Wow. How Did You Do That, Again?
Yep, that's a lot of stuff (and I've only mentioned half the chapters so far), but fortunately Chapter Three, "Examples", brings honor to its accurate name. First, we get full writeups for dozens of "powers". Each power has a description of what it's supposed to be, the Focus and a full list of what advantages that Focus encompasses, a rundown on what Sources (and thus what Power Modifiers) are appropriate for that Focus, and the price of the Talent. It's a pretty exhaustive list, too, covering every important power from every genre out there. GMs can just match Source to Focus and have a complete power framework for any game.
For example, the Focus of Death power is (obviously) death and the dead. Chapter Three suggests that, for that Focus, the best Sources are either "divine", "magical", or "spirit". The GM decides to allow it as a magical power in his game -- characters with this power have a natural magical affinity for necromancy. The writeup reminds the GM that "magical" implies a -10% Power Modifier (the discount you get for the fact that your abilities won't work in no-mana zones and can be dispelled), so the GM notes that down and presents this power to his players.
The second half of Chapter Three focuses on sample abilities, not just for powers, but for anyone. The writeups cover implanted guns (having a pistol hidden in your forearm costs 23 points), elemental attacks, supernatural attacks (curses, death touches, etc.), poisons (from the realistic to the fantastic), defenses, movement abilities, mental abilities (various forms of communication, influence, information, and sensory abilities), and physical transformations (from morphing to phasing to healing). There's easily over a hundred sample writeups here, for everything from Rubber Body (think Mr. Fantastic) to Astral Projection. Players are encouraged to just write down the name and price on their character sheet to keep things simple. I'd say if you've ever seen an ability in a book or movie and thought, "I wonder how I'd write that up in GURPS?" there's a reasonable chance that it's in this chapter.
Oh, You Want to Run a Game?
Chapter Five, "Power Games", tackles the hard questions. How do you know what the power level of the game should be (i.e., how many points)? How do you keep the characters with mystical abilities from outshining those without? How do unusual abilities and powers interact with other things such as spells and cinematic chi skills? What powers should I allow? Where and when should I set my game? How do I challenge a 1,500 point super? For that matter, how do I challenge any group with a decent precog? Or teleporter?
Lots of advice is provided, on everything from keeping your games challenging and entertaining to reigning in "plot stoppers" that can ruin a game or campaign. Guidelines for player control are presented, both suggested rewards for good roleplaying and suggested ways to subtley encourage PCs from getting too far out of line and setting themselves up as living gods.
Chapter Six, "Empowered Genres", covers all of the main setting types in which characters with abilities beyond those of mortal men feature prominently. First, Mythic Fantasy (demigods and the greatest men of men walking the earth, doing mighty deeds) is covered, with sideboxes on classic "low" fantasy, "wuxia fantasy", and Victorian fantasy. Modern Adventure (mainly "action-adventure", but also covering pulp and pulp chi, martial arts, monster hunters, and technothrillers) is next, with its tropes such as terrorists and mad scientist bad guys. Secret Powers covers the Illuminati / X-Files / classic underground "psionic" games, along with a nod to settings like In Nomine and GURPS Voodoo. The idea here is that keeping the powers hidden is always a secondary goal alongside whatever the campaign focus is. Psionics gets its own section, with several backreferences to the previous one, but it goes into all of the cliches of psi stories (the metaphors for adolescence, the rogue psis, the government conspiracies, etc.) as well. Futuristic SF delves into all of the sci-fi genres, from soft space opera to hard transhumanist sci-fi; a lot of discussion is given to aliens, whether the aliens or humans or both should have powers, and their role in any sci-fi game.
Finally, Supers gets twice the page count of any other section, if only because it needs it. A discussion of the many different styles of superheroic roleplaying is presented (from four-color to gritty vigilantes to horror to cosmic games to self-referential postmodern settings). The text goes into the different common classifications of supers, super teams and the role each character plays in one, headquarters, bad guys and the "villian team", and what sort of challenges and encounters a GM can throw at the supers to keep things fun. It has some good suggestions for brazenly stealing plot ideas from other sources, as well.
The book wraps up with a glossary and well-done index. Unlike most GURPS books, the bibliography is on the website -- see below for why.
Is It Any Good?
Oh hell yes. At the risk of coming across as exaggerating... as far as pure content goes, I wish I could give this a "6". The expanded modifiers, advantages, and rules for existing ones are worth the price of admission alone. GURPS Powers is the "Director's Cut" add-on for GURPS Characters and GURPS Campaigns -- it expands, clarifies, and makes use of the content in the Basic Set.
Then throw in the very well-written and in-depth advice for GMs (who often have more problems running high-powered games than any other), the new "power" framework which works just as well (if not better) in fantasy and wuxia games than in straight-up supers, and all of the optional rules to make gaming in a certain genre feel like that genre, and this is a solid "5" for Substance, if not greater.
Style, on the other hand, could be better. In all fairness, the book went over word-count, and Steve Jackson Games announced that they couldn't cut it down any further without losing useful stuff, so they were going to completely redo the layout and use smaller art pieces to squeeze in the extra words. (So, from what I've heard, we're getting the equivalent of 260-265 pages in these 240 pages.) This is also the reason why the bibliography was moved to the website -- since it's not something you'll need during play (plus, they linked in all of the Amazon pages for whatever was available!)
So I'm trying not to hold the small sizes of the artwork against it, because I'm darned happy that I get such a packed book. The quality of the artwork itself ranges all over the place, though. It suffers from a lot of the "I made this in Poser then painted over it in Photoshop" syndrome that has plagued many GURPS books. Not a bad book, artistically, but definitely not great. The layout is very well done, though, which redeems it, and I'm impressed with how little you notice that it's got fewer square inches of art than a normal GURPS product. I'm going to be generous because of the situation involving this book and give it a "4" for Style; if I wasn't aware of the reasons behind the reduced amount of artwork, I would have given it a "3".
Final Words
GURPS Powers is not the "GURPS book for supers" -- it will be useful for any game that features characters with abilities beyond those of normal men. The rules within are as applicable to robots, wuxia martial artists, mages, fantasy clerics, psis, aliens, dragons, and more as they are to superheroes and their ilk. The introduction says it best: Think of this as Basic Set: Powers. Unless your game involves nothing but realistic humans dealing with realistic humans, I'd recommend this for any campaign.
