Tag: The Vorkosigan Saga Sourcebook and RPG

Wow. They’ve *finally* released GURPS Vorkosigan.

Well, OK, they’re calling it the Vorkosigan Saga Sourcebook and Roleplaying Game for GURPS Fourth Edition (official webpage here), but a lot of us in the gaming community have been waiting for this supplement for an appreciable fraction of a decade now.  Still only in electronic form for right now, but I can hold out for the print version.  I sort of have to: that’s half a month’s ‘pay’ for me.

If you’re wondering what a ‘Vorkosigan’ is… well. Start here and work your way through; there’s some background on Lois Masters Bujold here.  Nobody will judge you for your lack, I swear.

GURPS Vorkosigan for April 2009?

Steve Jackson Games is saying precisely that, and it’d be nice to see.  Oh, they’re calling it “The Vorkosigan Saga Sourcebook and RPG,” but that’s so that people who are Lois McMasters Bujold fans first and roleplaying gamers… pretty much not at all… will buy the blessed thing.

If you are not a Bujold fan, or a Vorkosigan series fan, then I suggest that you rectify this error at your earliest possible opportunity.  It’s good space opera in general, but what elevates it to something special would have to be  some of the characters: they’re some of the best-crafted that you’ll ever encounter in science fiction, and Bujold herself has a refreshing willingness to treat her created societies on their own terms, and not necessarily ours.  Plus, she hates idiot plots*.  That’s worth something right there.

Moe Lane

*Defined as “any plot narrative that can only work if nobody ever takes five minutes to ask three or four simple, straightforward questions of anybody else.”  Distressingly common.