How not to learn a game.
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gurps, one of the more common types of post is the rules question. GURPS is a complex game, after all, and nobody can be expected to master all of it on the first pass.
So I wasn't too surprised when I saw a post asking Okay, what are we doing wrong?
I found my copy of the Campaigns book, and set about answering his questions. However, as you can see in my reply, I was getting frustrated. He kept asking about rules that weren't just obviously placed, but were in bold text, in clearly-labeled boxes, and in their own sections with Large Titles Showing That the Relevant Rule Was Here.
In frustration, I asked if the poster had bothered to read the rules.
He hadn't. Instead, he had read the combat rules in GURPS Lite. Which take up 5 pages. And then tried to run a full on tactical combat using all the bells and whistles without reading the complete combat rules.
Those take up 61 pages, more or less.
Let me repeat that: this guy didn't even skim the full combat rules. Then has the gall to complain when trying to run a full combat leaves them scrambling for the rulebook every other second. And since he had never looked at the full rules, of course things were difficult to find.
To give an idea of the gulf here for my non-gamer friends, it'd be like trying to build an online store with Flash animation and a secure order page after skimming HTML for Dummies.
Yes, I got a little snarky in my response, but when it became obvious to me that this person had never cracked the book, I got a little pissed. Therefore, I present to you Doug's Fifth Law:
Asking For Aid When You Haven't Taken The Most Basic Steps To Educate Yourself Will Result In Scorn Being Heaped Upon You
gurps, one of the more common types of post is the rules question. GURPS is a complex game, after all, and nobody can be expected to master all of it on the first pass.So I wasn't too surprised when I saw a post asking Okay, what are we doing wrong?
I found my copy of the Campaigns book, and set about answering his questions. However, as you can see in my reply, I was getting frustrated. He kept asking about rules that weren't just obviously placed, but were in bold text, in clearly-labeled boxes, and in their own sections with Large Titles Showing That the Relevant Rule Was Here.
In frustration, I asked if the poster had bothered to read the rules.
He hadn't. Instead, he had read the combat rules in GURPS Lite. Which take up 5 pages. And then tried to run a full on tactical combat using all the bells and whistles without reading the complete combat rules.
Those take up 61 pages, more or less.
Let me repeat that: this guy didn't even skim the full combat rules. Then has the gall to complain when trying to run a full combat leaves them scrambling for the rulebook every other second. And since he had never looked at the full rules, of course things were difficult to find.
To give an idea of the gulf here for my non-gamer friends, it'd be like trying to build an online store with Flash animation and a secure order page after skimming HTML for Dummies.
Yes, I got a little snarky in my response, but when it became obvious to me that this person had never cracked the book, I got a little pissed. Therefore, I present to you Doug's Fifth Law:
Asking For Aid When You Haven't Taken The Most Basic Steps To Educate Yourself Will Result In Scorn Being Heaped Upon You