In the first post in this series I briefly covered the process I have considered for one method of implementing the often magical abilities of WUSHU Martial Artists. There are many other methods, but that one has the benefit of being fundamentally simple. The drawback is it requires a ton of discretion from the GM. It also does a sub-optimal job of representing abilities and group abilities that are tropes of the genre. To address some missing ground I’d suggest using Ritual Path Magic as a basis, and as an alternative overall system I would suggest the theory of magic as powers using similar praxis (and as an overall baseline) psionics.

To cover the use of paper talismans, “Formations”, and the much slower magic I suggest using Ritual Path Magic. Its here to represent the sorts of efforts that has one or more characters retreating for a time to cast the magic or in the background powering up or otherwise completing a complex ritual. Much like in the first post, we will have to start by going scorched earth with all the Paths in Ritual Path Magic. This is actually the sort of thing that the system itself recommends to customize it to new settings and doing so its much less painful because spells aren’t built discretely. There is a lot of good advice in both Ritual Path Magic and How to be a GURPS GM: Ritual Path Magic which more than adequately covers the overall methodology. I would suggest limiting adept to prodigies, gating it, or eliminating it altogether unless your setting isn’t Magic for the fast abilities. Ritual Path Magic alternative systems such as Effect Shaping may be more appropriate for some settings.

Psionics as a basis for an entire power system for WUSHU may not seem like a good fit, but the bones of psionics will allow the same sort of coverage that Magic and Ritual Path Magic has been demonstrated to be capable of. Since its built off of powers it will allow a very systemic approach to making abilities which will result in more consistent results and keeping characters better in line with each other at similar point values. It will also allow the systemic creation of magic using Meta-Tech, and for it to behave better in a campaign that includes other magic as power systems. I wont detail how in this post. Its part of the epiphany I had.

Prior to this I was very much for the only real good option to represent these sorts of abilities in GURPS was Magic as Powers and specifically straight up abilities without the sort of formatting that psionics or sorcery provides. That is still very viable but doesn’t fit in well with styles, and thus doesn’t fit in the best with Dojo or style focused play without 0 point feature requirements and a lot of extra gatekeeping of abilities that is best handled by mandatory styles.