June 27, 2006: Off To The Printers

A couple of things flew off to the printer last week. For those keeping score at home, here's the details:

GURPS Bio-Tech

The Future is Alive

"Who needs chrome, pal? Meat is where it's at now. Mother Nature always did it best – she just needed a little help. Get down to the black clinic, old-timer, and you can be 15 again. That is, if you still want to be human at all."

It's the technology of the posthuman age: biotech! Upgrade your old body with steroids and smart drugs, transplants, and viral nano . . . or just get a new one. Maybe you don't think being human is so great? Then improve on nature with eugenics and gene-fixing. Or just go parahuman: if you love cats, become one! The technology's changing fast, but you'll have lots of time to get used to it – death is only a temporary inconvenience with cryonics and immortality drugs. And who needs silicon and steel? Vatbrain biocomputers are where it's really at!

But it's not just about the future. GURPS Bio-Tech includes a full range of 19th, 20th, and 21st-century medical equipment, from early vaccines to surgical robots, along with game stats for the world's most deadly diseases.

GURPS Bio-Tech also includes a complete set of character templates for biotech professions, rules for biotech magic, and two original campaign settings: an alternate Earth ruled by a clone of Alexander the Great, and a a living starship on its way to colonize an alien world!

Say goodbye to your old body. Have you upgraded your genetics this year?

This is the second edition of GURPS Bio-Tech. It has been revised to the GURPS Fourth Edition rules and expanded to cover medicine, drugs, magic, and new technologies. Some entries were introduced in GURPS Space, GURPS Robots, and the Transhuman Space series.

240 pages. Hardback. Stock #01-0103, ISBN 1-55634-752-9. $34.95.


GURPS Magic (Reprint)
Completely revised and updated for GURPS Fourth Edition, this full-color hardcover combines the spells from the Third Edition GURPS Magic and GURPS Grimoire, plus dozens of all-new spells, for the ultimate tome of magic!

Within these pages, crackling with mystic energies, you'll find:

• The core magic system for GURPS, expanding on the material presented in the GURPS Basic Set, Third Edition, Revised . . . rules for learning magic, casting spells, enchanting magic items, and more!
• Complete alchemy rules . . . creating magical elixirs, using them, and even researching new ones . . . with an extensive list of known elixirs and their powers.
• Alternatives to the core magic system, including complete, updated rules for improvised magic and rune magic. There are also guidelines for the GM who wants to change how magic works in particular worlds in a multi-world campaign.
• Plus special material from the GURPS Magic Items series and GURPS Wizards.

This is a powerful book, indeed. Use it wisely.

240 pages. Hardback. Stock #01-0101, ISBN 1-55634-733-2. $34.95.


GURPS Fantasy (Reprint)
Create a world that could never be! GURPS Fantasy is the complete toolkit to let you build a campaign of heroic deeds and wondrous magic. It discusses the genre in depth -- with all its subgenres and inspirations (myth, novels, movies, etc.) -- allowing you to handle any kind of fantasy.

GURPS Fantasy gives detailed, concrete advice for assembling fantasy settings -- from the basics of the landscape itself, through its inhabitants and cultures, to the details of believable histories and politics. It also examines the nature of supernatural forces, and discusses the impact of wizards, monsters, and gods. And, of course, it looks at the many different ways that magic and users of magic can work in a fantasy world.

And, perhaps most importantly, it advises GMs and players alike on the kinds of characters appropriate to fantasy -- including ordinary folks, people with fantastic powers, and nonhumans.

Whether your model is Tolkien, Jordan, or Leiber, this book will let create a town, a country, or an entire world. Like all Fourth Edition books, it's a full-color hardcover.

(This is not an update of the Yrth setting presented in the old GURPS Fantasy. We gave that world its own book, GURPS Banestorm.)

240 pages. Hardback. Stock #01-1001, ISBN 1-55634-519-4. $34.95.

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