My educated opinion is that the system is secondary to the GM and players, when it comes to the enjoyment of the game. Sure, some system emphasize some things over others, and that certainly has some effect, but ultimately part of the beauty of role-playing games is that the players make it their own. I've hardly played any GURPS myself, but it looks like a fine system, very flexible. The fact is that D&D (at least as it is currently played by most people) has the option for non-combat-related experience points. If that's the way you want to play, do it.
I will say, however, that everything I've read about Gygax's personal DM-style, is that he was a combat-oriented DM. D&D was much more about tactical situations from him than it was about improv theater. I've been running my wife and kids on one of his old modules (Village of Hommlet) for the last couple of years, and it certainly involves a lot of killing things and taking their stuff. I certainly wouldn't go so far as to call it a "Hobgoblic Holocaust," though.
(Though that does remind me of the time when our party of bloodthirsty elves went through an orcish settlement, killing every man, woman, and child in sight with lightning bolts and such.)
Well, that was incoherant. Oh well. Sorry.
