Sounds like you guys are really cooking.

300-400' would only be equivalent to Earth's Hyperion redwood range which I believe is 375'. If that was the average tree in the average forest, with the reduced gravity compelling a 20-40% growth boost for the topend to be around 500', with a red-aesthetic themed (Alizarin is the name of a red/crimson dye and we're associating the planet's primary aesthetic with that as a cue) suped-up Pacific Northwest vibe, that should be a sufficiently pre-historic vibe with the flora beastly enough to match the fauna and to hopefully not lose the many opportunities for storytelling up in the lush maple-red canopies. The main trees in question could be fatter regardless of height, an evolutionary defensive reaction to trampling megafauna that would otherwise knock every damned thing over. I think that's a good medium; shorter trees can still work if we just make them twice the diameter of a typical comparable height Redwood.  Remember the Unique Terrain thing on the Traveller procedural maps I sent? There's an opportunity to potentially put something even more massive there. Perhaps more junglefied, less mega herbivores, less trampling, more ancient growth left to sprawl, more vicious smaller predators for close-in threats.

In reply to Drake Steele (msg # 178):

Sounds about right. But we should take this discussion into the game...

Perhaps, but others were enjoying partaking/watching a setting come together through logical leaps of scraps of data :)

In reply to Drake Steele (msg # 180):

I hope we were not just spamming them!

It's the perfect board for sharing prep of GURPS campaigns :)

I have enjoyed reading about it anyway ... likely no surprise.

I'm certain I saw Mass Combat rules for Wild West elements somewhere out there, probably in a Pyramid article somewhere. Am I imagining things? Because I can't find any mention of that anywhere anymore.

We're you looking for modern army vs modern army? I.e Mexican-American war?

Or modern army versus native population? I.e Chiricahua, Texas-Indian, etc?

I could have sworn I'd read an article that detailed Mass Combat element stats for cowboys (I think I remember them being low quality troops), Indians (braves, archers, and horse-archers), US Army (including artillery pieces), Mexican Army, the lot. It's hazy enough that I could believe I'm imagining things, but enough details are there that I can't help thinking it exists somewhere.

To actually answer your question though, I'm thinking specifically mundane troops that would make sense for 1870s American Indian Wars.
This message was last edited by the player at 23:51, Sat 07 Mar 2020.

Pyramid 3/74 has some old west stuff but not that. I'll keep looking.

In reply to Rockwolf66 (msg # 187):

I appreciate the effort Rockwolf, thanks very much. I've picked up every bit of Mass Combat and Old West related piece of GURPS and Pyramid looking for these stats, and I've come up with nothing - at this point I'm fairly convinced it was all a dream or something, but I live in hope. In the meantime I've started trying to put together my own Elements, with what I might charitably describe as "mixed success", so I hope something official exists out there somewhere.

I still can't commit to anything until early-to-mid April, but in the interest of getting a headstart on preparation: any interest around here for an Old West Action game (with or without Mass Combat)?

EDIT
Without wanting to derail the Lounge at all, I'll copy/paste that last part into the proper forum. My apologies.
This message was last edited by the player at 13:53, Thu 12 Mar 2020.

The 3ed Old West book might have something... I'll look but don't think I own that one.

In reply to Aethulred (msg # 189):

Way ahead of you there my friend, nothing doing. I appreciate you checking though.

Howdy all.

I'm still looking to put up that Wild West game I was talking about earlier, but I've run into a(nother) snag I'm hoping someone here might be able to lend a hand with. Someone convinced me I'd best shake off the cobwebs before actually launching the game properly, and I'm very glad they did because I wasn't anticipating this kind of problem.

So, I like to think of "the Old West" as being TL 5, done and done. Normally I don't like to fuss about specific years, but it seems to me TL 5 generally (and the Wild West specifically) has a bit of a weird jump in the equipment list.

Let me show you what I mean:



So here's my questions:

- Those stats come from three different sources, two official and one I'm not sure of. Looking them over, does anything strike you as being the "right" source to go off (assuming you wanted to have a single source)?
- Bit of a follow up, those prices have a pretty wide variance; in GURPS Old West terms (i.e., cost conversions, dollar values, etc.) is $40 or $400 a more reasonable price for a rifle?
- Were you to run a game set in "the Wild West", would you specify a hard year ("no guns after 1865 are available") or would "anything from TL 5" be enough for you, and would you unpack why?

As always, any thoughts or opinions are much appreciated.

Hope everyone is staying well.

A great question.

I consider myself a novice at best concerning historical matters in that period, but I figured I would give my opinion at least.

Depending on where you in North America in any particular year throughout the 19th century, you could deal with a staggering array of weaponry, accoutrements and logistics. This is still, especially early in the century, an age of independent gunsmiths, not withstanding the arms manufacturing boom surrounding the American civil war. Even then, equipment could vary wildly by military unit and region.

It's entirely possible to have Native American tribes using smoothbore muskets, bows, arrows, lance's, war clubs (stone, steel or gunstock), hatchets, knives, etc.

European firearms of all sorts were still filtering in through Mexico, Canada and the Caribbean.

A western mountain man might prefer the utility of a large bore plains rifle, where he could pour his own balls, use bulk powder of varying qualities and not worry about complicated mechanisms, rifling wear or repairs.

A military man coming out of the large cities of the east might have a break action revolver, replete with brass cased (practically waterproof) ammunition, a repeating rifle and a saber designed for combat rather than dress.

His contemporary might have a cap and ball version, and prefer a dress small sword or dagger to a full sized, cumbersome saber. Given the lack of standards, he might be a militia officer for example, self equipped and elected by his community peers.

But the former might have to wait months for a box of ammunition to arrive via rail, as it's only made in New York let's say.

And then you get into things like shotshell construction (paper, all brass, multi-part) , the mini-ball revolution, and the post war rise of industrial manufacturing.

Firing caps, black powder, breech action, bolt action, break action, lever action, pump action...etc

You can get pretty deep with it
This message was last edited by the player at 16:35, Fri 20 Mar 2020.

Just a quick fact note. $400 in that era was equivalent to something like $800. The $40 price tag is accurate to the era, per inflation.

I think I can help...

The top listing is likely a real cost (if not a bit too high) in 1867 or there abouts, $20 was a LOT of money back then.

The $400 price has to be in a different time frame, as that was enough to buy a small house in 1867.

I went to KNUCKLE DUSTER Fire Arms for some original prices...they list the Winchester Model 1873 repeater in .44-40 at $25 new. Ammo was $1.38/100

Ah Ha! ... Winchester 1866 "Yellowboy" Repeater in .44 rim Fire was $30 new in 1866-67 (Brand New design).

So even the $40 price is high, unless you are in a boom town where prices could easily be double or triple normal for everything.

In 1866 the most common revolvers are either cap and ball from the recent civil war (Surplus and likely cheap at $3 to $5) or cartridge conversions for rimfire cartridges which would double or triple the price. Center fire revolvers date from around 1873-75.

Rim fire revolvers had a problem with the back of the case blowing out from the pressure and case quality issues (inability to make the cases of a defined thickness given the technology of the day). This was seldom an issue in .22, .32 weapons a slightly greater issue in .36/.38 weapons and became increasingly serious as the bullet size went up. It was a problem in .44s and encouraged the adoption of center fire cartridges.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:36, Fri 20 Mar 2020.

Either use the wiki (I wouldn't) or use the books.  Do not mix and match unless you are willing to convert.  Also the wiki tends towards a lot of errors (hence why I wouldn't use it).


GURPS $ aren't 'real world' dollars.  So the "$400" price is in GURPS bucks.


I go 'hard year' because there are some radical jumps in technology with guns.  In some cases this is down to propellant, a change in bullet length, and even manufacturing quality.

In this case the jump from 3d+1 pi from 2d+1 pi is due to cartridge change, the '1866' was firing .44 rimfire Henrys, the '1873' had switched over to the .44-40 centerfire, a more powerful cartridge.  The reload speed change is a switch from underbarrel front loading tube to side-gate.

I also put limits on what weapons can be taken, by requiring the Early Adopter Perk for all equipment that is younger than 5 years of game date start.

I grew up in a small town in the west, and I'm something of a history buff, so for me dates are a really important part of the setting. They influence so much more than just which guns are available. The date influences where the trains are, where the telegraph lines are, and what sort of populations you're using. Each decade has a different feel. Also, I like to have a specific location, at least in a general sense, because Arizona is not new Mexico is not Wyoming.

In reply to jonasthered (msg # 196):

Price wise, as has been mentioned, GURPs $1 equates to "the amount of local currency needed to buy a loaf of bread or equivalent staple - not with historical U.S. dollars" (B27).

Not sure about bread, but flour was 3c/lb and milk 4c/quart in 1860...see http://www.choosingvoluntarysi...ions-dry-goods-more/

Hence, being very conservative, if a loaf of bread was 5c, then the price in GURPs $ is about 20 times the price in US$ at the time, so the $450 rifle would cost $22.50 in the dollars at the time! Hence, no contradiction...just decide on your currency!

Okay, from the looks of things I'm better off using the official sources (thanks for the insights all), but now I'm having trouble understanding GURPS bucks. If I can ask your continued indulgence, would you mind if we dig into this a bit?

I'll take tiny steps, because I'm not a clever person and I'll need to go slow if I'm to have any hope of actually learning something.



Does this mean:



And that, as a general guideline, I should reduce any cash rewards etc. (like from bounty hunter posters, payroll robberies, buried treasure, whatever) by 22% from whatever I have in mind? Like if I want to give them the equivalent of $10,000, I should actually award $2,200? Or $500 ($10,000/20)?

I realize these questions may seem dumb, but I'm a bit lost just now. Also, I'm terrible at math. Like, really bad.
This message was last edited by the player at 02:01, Sun 22 Mar 2020.

This message was deleted by the player at 01:22, Sun 22 Mar 2020.

Actually 5000/22= $227.27 roughly, so that's the way I would play it.
The Horse is $54.55 (remember that that 55¢ is serious money now).
The rifle is $18.18  ...   Just divide all amounts by 22.

Obviously these amounts can go up or down based on availability or how new and fancy something is ... I am sure that the first 1873's went for a fair mark up until they were common.

Also, Black Powder (The only powder in 1873-75) is damned corrosive, so guns will go to crap if not cleaned after any shooting and for several days thereafter. It will also foul the gun after a lot of shooting (say 24 shots with a revolver, maybe 50 or so with a rifle) and just jam up.

In reply to Aethulred (msg # 200):

Divisor means to divide by 22, not 22%. So these are pretty similar.