GURPS 101: A Complete and Illustrated Guide to Being Legolas

The cinematic archer is a staple in fantasy fiction. This article looks at some options from GURPS Basic Set and GURPS Martial Arts that let us emulate the stereotype. In essence, the defining trait is the (aptly named) Heroic Archer advantage, but to make full use of it, options from Martial Arts should be employed.

Step A: using the Basic Set only

The Basic Set only approach is quite simple, if only limiting in what you can accomplish. You will need the following traits:

• Skills:
• Bow: Lets you be proficient in the use of the Bow. Otherwise you would be firing one at DX-5
• Fast-Draw (Arrow): A bow usually takes one turn to draw an arrow, plus one more to draw the bow. You may fire on the third turn. Fast-Draw lets you draw an arrow instantly, meaning it takes a single turn to draw arrow and draw the bow, allowing you to fire on the second turn. Let's see the reloading routines for a bow. A comma separates each turn; a bracket indicates the need for a skill roll:
• Standard: Fire, draw arrow, draw bow, fire again. Shots 1(2)
• Fast-Draw: Fire, [draw arrow] and bow, fire again Shots 1(1)
• Under the Basic Set you may only ready one arrow per turn.
• Zen Archery: Lets you reduce range penalties to ranged attacks if you take enough time. Requires Weapon Master. 
• Advantage:
• Weapon Master: in the Basic Set only approach, it increases your damage with the bow and allows for the use of Zen Archery. Neat, but not nearly as useful as when using Martial Arts (see below). So, a ST 12 archer using a regular bow (ST 12) does 1d imp without WM, and 1d+1 with it at skill DX+1 and 1d+2 at skill DX+2.

That’s pretty much what you can do with the Basic Set only. You can mitigate range penalties, draw an arrow faster and shoot accurately. So, let’s take at look at the baseline performance of our Basic Set cinematic archer with the above traits:

Step B: adding Martial Arts

Martial Arts is where things really start to shine. There are multiple combat rules and traits that suit our archer. Let’s look at them.

Any character may use the following additions to Maneuvers:

• Expanded Ready Maneuver - Multiple Fast-Draw (MA103): regarding Arrows, you may Fast-Draw multiple arrows at once, making a single roll at -2 per arrow. E.g., 3 arrows for a single Fast-Draw roll at -6. 
• Expanded Move and Attack Maneuver - Acrobatic Attack (MA107): this lets you shoot your bow while sliding down banisters, tumbling over a table, spinning around etc., at a penalty equal to Bulk plus an extra -2 to Bow skill.
• Expanded Move and Attack Maneuver - Flying Attack (MA107): this lets you add a jump to the end of moving, and then attack, at a penalty equal to Bulk. 

Acrobatic Attack

Flying Attack

The following options may be used with ranged attacks:

• Ranged Attack Option - Quick Shooting Bows (MA119): whereas Fast-Draw shaves one second from the bow reloading routine by making the draw arrow part instant, this option shaves one second by making the draw bow part instant, if you make Bow roll at -6, and then lets you fire with another Bow -6 roll. Let’s see the reloading routines:
• Standard: Fire, draw arrow, draw bow, fire again - Shots 1(2)
• Fast-Draw: Fire, [draw arrow] and bow, fire again – Shots 1(1)
• Quick-Shooting: Fire, draw arrow, [draw bow] and [fire] – Shots 1(1)
• Fast-Draw & Quick-Shooting: Fire, [draw arrow] and [draw bow] and [fire] – you can shoot every turn! In this last example, the rolls would be Fast-Draw, then Bow -6 and again Bow -6.
• Ranged Attack Option - Prediction Shots (MA121): This is effectively a Deceptive Attack for Ranged Attacks. 
• Ranged Attack Option - Ranged Feints (MA121): Although singled out under Ranged Attack Options, this is technically an Expanded Feint Maneuver. This is effectively a Feint for Ranged Attacks.

Quick Shooting Bows

The following technique is cinematic:

• Dual-Weapon Attack (Bow) (MA83) - This allows you to shoot 2 arrows at once from a bow, at two different enemies if you wish! Make two attacks at -4 each.

Dual-Weapon Attack (Bow)

And finally, Advantages and Perks:

• Heroic Archer (MA45): The defining trait. It improves your efficiency in all of the above and more:
• When attacking, you add Acc, no need to Aim
• Ignore Bulk when in Close Combat and when you Move and Attack – don’t add Acc, though
• Ignore Bulk when using Flying Attack
• Ignore Bulk and the extra -2 when using Acrobatic Attack
• Halve penalties for Quick-Shooting Bows (-3)
• Halve penalties for Dual-Weapon Attack (Bow) (-2)
• Halve penalties for Multiple Fast-Draw, and round in your favor. 
• Weapon Master (MA48): In addition to the benefits under the Basic Set, it also allows:
• Halve penalties for Quick-Shooting Bows (-3)
• Halve penalties for Multiple Fast-Draw
• Heroic Archer + Weapon Master: The sinergies between these two allow:
• Reduce penalties even further for Quick-Shooting Bows (-1)
• Divide by 4 the penalties for Multiple Fast-Draw
• Strongbow perk (MA51): this lets you use a Bow of higher ST than your own from ST+1 to ST+2.

So how does a cinematic archer under the Martial Arts rules, with Heroic Archer, Weapon Master and Strongbow stacks up?

So as we can see, Martial Arts really opens up many more possibilities. If you wish to read more on how to be an effective archer, check this Reddit post which also cover these traits and this Dungeon Fantastic post, which goes into detail regarding arrow types and target selection - two just as important aspects as character creation. If desiring to go the "magic" route, there are also options to be found on Imbuements and spells. 

Finally, if there's something to be added to this list, feel free to leave a comment.

Ah! As a nice bonus, a character may use an arrow in melee: that’s reach C, thrust-1 damage, max 1d-4. See Low-Tech p63.

Cooling the Dice

As cool as the rules under Martial Arts are, if pursuing a cinematic game, the "-1" per each qualifier to a a task works quite well, instead of remembering all of the rules as written. So, to fire two arrows (-2) sliding down the banister (-1), standing up (-1), would result in a -4 modifier, not too far from the RAW - if you have Heroic Archer and Weapon Master, that is.

Cheers!