Review: GURPS Tales of the Solar Patrol
Aug. 5th, 2008 09:47 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jeriendhalTitle: GURPS Tales of the Solar Patrol
System: GURPS 4th Ed.
Genre: Old School Sci-Fi
Author: "Lizard"
Publisher: Steve Jackson Games
Format: 51 page PDF.
Price: $9.95
Introduction: GURPS Tales of the Solar Patrol (TSP) is Steve Jackson Games’ attempt to create a viable RPG setting using inspiration from the old series of juvenile (what we call Young Adult these days) sci-fi novels published from the 1940’s through the 60’s. The most famous author of these, Robert Heinlein, produced about a dozen unconnected novels, ranging from Rocketship Galileo to Podkayne of Mars, but there were also notable contributions by Isaac Asimov (the "Lucky Starr" series) and Jack Williamson (various). In general they featured young heroes, often backed up by wise older mentors, clear cut morality, and (if set in our solar system) a healthy but not choking dose of space science (at least as it was understood back then.)
TSP successfully recreates the basic feel of these stories, though for the sake of drama it does throw out most of the science for rubber physics and inserts at least one Flash Gordon style villain. The titular Solar Patrol is the primary focus of the book, whose inspiration is quite clearly RAH’s Space Cadet, though there is room to be found for explorers, traders and even space pirates if your players are in the mood for a little taste of the wrong side of the law.
The World: TSP is set in the far flung future of 2066. Electronic computers are never funded by the US government and Bell Labs turns away from the concept of the transistor, leaving vacuum tubes supreme and the ‘infomat’ (large, mainframe computers of the sort that take up entire rooms) the greatest achievement of computing technology. However, one major advancement was the discovery in the early sixties of the lost notes of Nikolai Tesla, leading to the creation of the "Tesla Coil" which provides unlimited power taken from "the ether", at least inside the orbit of Jupiter.
Generally speaking, the "feel" of the world is definitely in the optimistic mode of the original stories that inspired it. Computers are clunky, leaving human beings responsible for solving problems, spaceships are shiny, smooth and have fins, and the rest of the equipment likely has protruding rivets. There are great threats out there, but the Solar Patrol’s brave men and women * are willing to stand up and fight it, even at the cost of their own lives. There’s good, there’s evil, and almost no gray in between (handsome/beautiful Space Pirates excepted).
Scope: TSP is somewhat limited in what it covers. Likely in an attempt to keep the page count reasonable, for technobabble reasons the ether that powers Tesla coils only extends to the orbit of Jupiter. Within that limits there’s plenty of room of action. One reason is because TSP holds onto the 40’s and 50’s view of the Solar System, with Mercury being tidal locked to the sun, giving it a small habitable area , Venus covered in swamps, dinosaurs and a pair of squabbling sentient races, Mars dry but with canals and Jupiter with habitable moons. Going to Saturn and beyond would just be overkill, especially with the multitude of threats the Solar Patrol has to deal with already. Such as...
The Mind Masters of Mars: Telepathic squids in tin cans who control of the surface of Mars, forcing their slave races to battle each other for their amusement. Fighting them is difficult, as any large scale attack risks being thwarted by the Mind Masters taking control of friendly vessels. So it’s up to small, very isolated groups of Solar Marines to try and build a resistance movement among the slaves.
The Overlord of Jupiter: With a literal iron fist he rules over the four inhabited Jovian moons. With his Gaze of Disdain he can fry an impertinent enemy on the spot. With his deadly fleet he very nearly destroyed the Solar Patrol twenty years ago, until he was beaten back at great cost. Now he sits in his Iron Fortress and sends forth a thousand plots to undermine the Patrol and Earth’s government, to keep them occupied while he rebuilds his fleet for the inevitable conquest That Is His Destiny.
Also, he looks cool in a cape and is perfectly willing to battle an enemy hand-to-hand if they’re polite enough to ask.
The Red Hive: A group of Marxists, fascists, fundamentalists and general malcontents who attempted to take over Luna and begin an era of Perfect Order. Along the way they bombed Earth with nega-weapons, killing hundreds of millions of people. After a hard struggle, the surviving hard core Hive members, no more than a few dozen people, fled beyond the orbit of Jupiter, where no doubt they died once their Tesla coils quit functioning.
Really, they must have…
Asteroid Pirates: A disorganized bunch, most of the pirates menacing the spaceways have polite gentleman’s agreement with the Patrol. Generally they steal from cargo vessels, disabling the target ship and activating a beacon so the crew can be rescued. That way they get a fat payoff but avoid murder charges. The not-so-polite pirates are as bad as any from the days of Age of Sail, murdering and plundering to their heart’s content, at least until the Patrol catches up with them and send them to Mines of Mercury for some hard labor (average lifespan of a prisoner in such an environment is about five years).
Conclusion: If you cut your sci-fi teeth reading Robert Heinlein and his contemporaries, there’s a lot of comfort reading to be found here. Holding onto the supplement’s style might prove difficult, unless you can find a group of players willing to set aside the usual PC bloodthirstiness in favor of the more Boy Scout style morality to be found in the stories that inspired the game.
* The polite misogyny of the old stories, where most women (RAH’s stories excepted) were reduced to the role of "decoration, plot device, or reward" has not been carried over, fortunately.
System: GURPS 4th Ed.
Genre: Old School Sci-Fi
Author: "Lizard"
Publisher: Steve Jackson Games
Format: 51 page PDF.
Price: $9.95
Introduction: GURPS Tales of the Solar Patrol (TSP) is Steve Jackson Games’ attempt to create a viable RPG setting using inspiration from the old series of juvenile (what we call Young Adult these days) sci-fi novels published from the 1940’s through the 60’s. The most famous author of these, Robert Heinlein, produced about a dozen unconnected novels, ranging from Rocketship Galileo to Podkayne of Mars, but there were also notable contributions by Isaac Asimov (the "Lucky Starr" series) and Jack Williamson (various). In general they featured young heroes, often backed up by wise older mentors, clear cut morality, and (if set in our solar system) a healthy but not choking dose of space science (at least as it was understood back then.)
TSP successfully recreates the basic feel of these stories, though for the sake of drama it does throw out most of the science for rubber physics and inserts at least one Flash Gordon style villain. The titular Solar Patrol is the primary focus of the book, whose inspiration is quite clearly RAH’s Space Cadet, though there is room to be found for explorers, traders and even space pirates if your players are in the mood for a little taste of the wrong side of the law.
The World: TSP is set in the far flung future of 2066. Electronic computers are never funded by the US government and Bell Labs turns away from the concept of the transistor, leaving vacuum tubes supreme and the ‘infomat’ (large, mainframe computers of the sort that take up entire rooms) the greatest achievement of computing technology. However, one major advancement was the discovery in the early sixties of the lost notes of Nikolai Tesla, leading to the creation of the "Tesla Coil" which provides unlimited power taken from "the ether", at least inside the orbit of Jupiter.
Generally speaking, the "feel" of the world is definitely in the optimistic mode of the original stories that inspired it. Computers are clunky, leaving human beings responsible for solving problems, spaceships are shiny, smooth and have fins, and the rest of the equipment likely has protruding rivets. There are great threats out there, but the Solar Patrol’s brave men and women * are willing to stand up and fight it, even at the cost of their own lives. There’s good, there’s evil, and almost no gray in between (handsome/beautiful Space Pirates excepted).
Scope: TSP is somewhat limited in what it covers. Likely in an attempt to keep the page count reasonable, for technobabble reasons the ether that powers Tesla coils only extends to the orbit of Jupiter. Within that limits there’s plenty of room of action. One reason is because TSP holds onto the 40’s and 50’s view of the Solar System, with Mercury being tidal locked to the sun, giving it a small habitable area , Venus covered in swamps, dinosaurs and a pair of squabbling sentient races, Mars dry but with canals and Jupiter with habitable moons. Going to Saturn and beyond would just be overkill, especially with the multitude of threats the Solar Patrol has to deal with already. Such as...
The Mind Masters of Mars: Telepathic squids in tin cans who control of the surface of Mars, forcing their slave races to battle each other for their amusement. Fighting them is difficult, as any large scale attack risks being thwarted by the Mind Masters taking control of friendly vessels. So it’s up to small, very isolated groups of Solar Marines to try and build a resistance movement among the slaves.
The Overlord of Jupiter: With a literal iron fist he rules over the four inhabited Jovian moons. With his Gaze of Disdain he can fry an impertinent enemy on the spot. With his deadly fleet he very nearly destroyed the Solar Patrol twenty years ago, until he was beaten back at great cost. Now he sits in his Iron Fortress and sends forth a thousand plots to undermine the Patrol and Earth’s government, to keep them occupied while he rebuilds his fleet for the inevitable conquest That Is His Destiny.
Also, he looks cool in a cape and is perfectly willing to battle an enemy hand-to-hand if they’re polite enough to ask.
The Red Hive: A group of Marxists, fascists, fundamentalists and general malcontents who attempted to take over Luna and begin an era of Perfect Order. Along the way they bombed Earth with nega-weapons, killing hundreds of millions of people. After a hard struggle, the surviving hard core Hive members, no more than a few dozen people, fled beyond the orbit of Jupiter, where no doubt they died once their Tesla coils quit functioning.
Really, they must have…
Asteroid Pirates: A disorganized bunch, most of the pirates menacing the spaceways have polite gentleman’s agreement with the Patrol. Generally they steal from cargo vessels, disabling the target ship and activating a beacon so the crew can be rescued. That way they get a fat payoff but avoid murder charges. The not-so-polite pirates are as bad as any from the days of Age of Sail, murdering and plundering to their heart’s content, at least until the Patrol catches up with them and send them to Mines of Mercury for some hard labor (average lifespan of a prisoner in such an environment is about five years).
Conclusion: If you cut your sci-fi teeth reading Robert Heinlein and his contemporaries, there’s a lot of comfort reading to be found here. Holding onto the supplement’s style might prove difficult, unless you can find a group of players willing to set aside the usual PC bloodthirstiness in favor of the more Boy Scout style morality to be found in the stories that inspired the game.
* The polite misogyny of the old stories, where most women (RAH’s stories excepted) were reduced to the role of "decoration, plot device, or reward" has not been carried over, fortunately.
