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PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-06, 05:59 PM
I'm thinking through some setting design things and would like input. A common complaint/issue brought up on these forums is dissonance between setting and mechanics. What forms of this have you seen and how annoying were they?

Please mention the setting name and the system, as I'm sure most of them are unknown to me. The more specificity you use, the more useful it will be to me. Thanks!

Cluedrew
2017-10-06, 07:02 PM
D&D always had an issue with escalation for me. Reading story and similar that had power escalation there is always a matter of "where did these people come from?" as the power increases. What were they doing before? Why haven't we heard of them? I've gotten a similar feeling from some of the D&D games, although the have some explanation for it, it isn't quite enough.

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-06, 07:28 PM
D&D always had an issue with escalation for me. Reading story and similar that had power escalation there is always a matter of "where did these people come from?" as the power increases. What were they doing before? Why haven't we heard of them? I've gotten a similar feeling from some of the D&D games, although the have some explanation for it, it isn't quite enough.

Is this less of an issue if the play area widens strongly as play continues? That is, if you're at Local McLocalTown (a town in the sticks) for the early levels, then it makes some sense to me that the major players aren't well known (except maybe through rumor and myth). I can see this as a major problem if you start out in say Baldur's Gate and then stay there, but what about an outward spiral of locations?

Telok
2017-10-06, 09:58 PM
"Magic is dangerous, difficult, and takes years to master."

WotC D&Ds blow that away with their 3 to 8 encounters a day and 10 to 15 encounters per level. In theory in a large city chatacters could zip from 1 to 20 in under six months. Then the magic gets easier and safer to use with every edition. It's to the point now where even if a wizard is wrestling three people, on fire, and being stabbed every time he opens his mouth, you can't make him fail to cast a spell. Even creatures that were resistant or immune to magic have been reduced to just being somewhat better at making saving throws.

AMFV
2017-10-06, 10:10 PM
D&D always had an issue with escalation for me. Reading story and similar that had power escalation there is always a matter of "where did these people come from?" as the power increases. What were they doing before? Why haven't we heard of them? I've gotten a similar feeling from some of the D&D games, although the have some explanation for it, it isn't quite enough.

That can be a big problem... if the DM didn't do proper foreshadowing. Like when you're the low level people investigating a setting then it's important to note that the DM should be hinting at more powerful things you'll be encountring throughout that you just aren't either because you're below their notice or because you haven't gotten to them yet.


"Magic is dangerous, difficult, and takes years to master."

WotC D&Ds blow that away with their 3 to 8 encounters a day and 10 to 15 encounters per level. In theory in a large city chatacters could zip from 1 to 20 in under six months. Then the magic gets easier and safer to use with every edition. It's to the point now where even if a wizard is wrestling three people, on fire, and being stabbed every time he opens his mouth, you can't make him fail to cast a spell. Even creatures that were resistant or immune to magic have been reduced to just being somewhat better at making saving throws.

I think that's one of the reasons why system awareness is critical. Also it's important to note that PC experience isn't representative of experiences on the whole, in 3.5 at least. I like to consider it that players are the main characters in a story about developing heroes, I mean compare and contrast how much the young boys in Wheel of Time developed and how rapidly to the more static older characters in the story. That's the kind of story I think that 3.5 is best at representing. But you are correct it isn't always the sort of story you want.

NichG
2017-10-07, 05:15 AM
In general, anything that makes me ask the question 'should fluff trump mechanics here?' or vice versa is annoying. Vampires in D&D 3.5ed not actually needing or feeling any compulsion to consume blood, for example (though that matters mostly when a PC wants to play one).

In general, my preference is something like 'fluff with teeth' - systems where if you consider the fluff to be mechanically binding (as in, any mechanic or lack of mechanic which would end up rendering the fluff false would be overriden), the result is reasonable and still runs okay.

Zombimode
2017-10-07, 05:41 AM
Vampires in D&D 3.5ed not actually needing or feeling any compulsion to consume blood, for example (though that matters mostly when a PC wants to play one)

3.5 Vamires have an Inescapable Craving for life force and are Diet Dependent on blood.

oxybe
2017-10-07, 06:12 AM
3.5 Vamires have an Inescapable Craving for life force and are Diet Dependent on blood.

not in my monster manual

AMFV
2017-10-07, 09:51 AM
In general, anything that makes me ask the question 'should fluff trump mechanics here?' or vice versa is annoying. Vampires in D&D 3.5ed not actually needing or feeling any compulsion to consume blood, for example (though that matters mostly when a PC wants to play one).

In general, my preference is something like 'fluff with teeth' - systems where if you consider the fluff to be mechanically binding (as in, any mechanic or lack of mechanic which would end up rendering the fluff false would be overriden), the result is reasonable and still runs okay.

Well the mechanics are also abstractions, so it's worth noting that every part of how the world works would be represented by the rules. And once you make that assumption it helps a lot. Like since PCs aren't vampires, the game doesn't to worry about how often they need to consume blood, and presumably the DM will incorporate their dietary needs when he's putting them in the game. Or he'll decide that they don't often need to consume blood, because like Strahd, they're horrible brooding people.

I think that once you start doing things the rules don't expect (PC vamps) for example, then you have to look into how the fluff and rules interact and add houserules as needed.

Note: I'm not disagreeing with you, I'm more expositing on my opinions about that particular thing.

NichG
2017-10-07, 02:24 PM
Well the mechanics are also abstractions, so it's worth noting that every part of how the world works would be represented by the rules. And once you make that assumption it helps a lot. Like since PCs aren't vampires, the game doesn't to worry about how often they need to consume blood, and presumably the DM will incorporate their dietary needs when he's putting them in the game. Or he'll decide that they don't often need to consume blood, because like Strahd, they're horrible brooding people.

I think that once you start doing things the rules don't expect (PC vamps) for example, then you have to look into how the fluff and rules interact and add houserules as needed.

Note: I'm not disagreeing with you, I'm more expositing on my opinions about that particular thing.

Yeah.

I think, in my mental model, the most valuable thing rules can provide is to act as a promise about how certain things will render out. That lets players attempt to correctly reason about things like the feasibility of plans without having to be in communication with the DM about each stage of planning. So when things are contradictory to how they will be run, that's bad since even if you house-rule it, it's something you're going to have to find the time to clarify in advance of when it could be relevant.

This is a lot easier for rules the characters would not know yet, since then an inconsistency is just a character making a wrong assumption.

Anonymouswizard
2017-10-07, 04:00 PM
The one that annoys me is when spaceships are assumed to have infinite fuel, even when they're described as rockets (and the associated 'arbitrary top speed for spaceships').

I mean, I know it applies to most vehicles, but with spaceships it's the most annoying for me.

I get why some things that should exist in setting aren't including, such as limited acceleration for spacecraft, but it can be annoying when they do it to 'make things more fun' and forget that it can be fun doing it the opposite way. A different type of fun, but still fun. I get why it's done, less bookkeeping, but it still makes me sad.

I've come across others, but can't remember them right now. I'll post them if I remember them in the morning.

AMFV
2017-10-07, 04:04 PM
The one that annoys me is when spaceships are assumed to have infinite fuel, even when they're described as rockets (and the associated 'arbitrary top speed for spaceships').

Probably because spaceships running out of a fuel has been a plot point in multiple science fiction series. In Star Trek they've had multiple issues with dilithium crystals and trilithium crystals breaking or needing to be found (particularly in Voyager). The Firefly episode "Out of Gas" isn't strictly running out of fuel but it's a close example. I would definitely support rules for including that.

Also many settings have space derelicts and without fuel to run out of, that doesn't always make as much sense.

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-07, 04:38 PM
"Magic is dangerous, difficult, and takes years to master."

WotC D&Ds blow that away with their 3 to 8 encounters a day and 10 to 15 encounters per level. In theory in a large city chatacters could zip from 1 to 20 in under six months. Then the magic gets easier and safer to use with every edition. It's to the point now where even if a wizard is wrestling three people, on fire, and being stabbed every time he opens his mouth, you can't make him fail to cast a spell. Even creatures that were resistant or immune to magic have been reduced to just being somewhat better at making saving throws.

I don't see current versions of D&D making that claim (that magic takes years to master). I may be missing things. I find that settings that have persisted between editions of D&D (especially) suffer from dissonance--each new version is different enough that normal things from one are abnormal (or dissonant) in another.


In general, anything that makes me ask the question 'should fluff trump mechanics here?' or vice versa is annoying. Vampires in D&D 3.5ed not actually needing or feeling any compulsion to consume blood, for example (though that matters mostly when a PC wants to play one).

In general, my preference is something like 'fluff with teeth' - systems where if you consider the fluff to be mechanically binding (as in, any mechanic or lack of mechanic which would end up rendering the fluff false would be overriden), the result is reasonable and still runs okay.

I'm curious, do you have examples of systems/settings that do the 'fluff with teeth' thing?


The one that annoys me is when spaceships are assumed to have infinite fuel, even when they're described as rockets (and the associated 'arbitrary top speed for spaceships').

I mean, I know it applies to most vehicles, but with spaceships it's the most annoying for me.

I get why some things that should exist in setting aren't including, such as limited acceleration for spacecraft, but it can be annoying when they do it to 'make things more fun' and forget that it can be fun doing it the opposite way. A different type of fun, but still fun. I get why it's done, less bookkeeping, but it still makes me sad.

I've come across others, but can't remember them right now. I'll post them if I remember them in the morning.

I understand this one, especially if they're trying to be "hard science" types of settings. I'm fine with handwaved explanations if the system isn't about the technical stuff. If it's all about the technical stuff, and then you do stupid crap like this, it irks me.

Cluedrew
2017-10-07, 04:57 PM
Is this less of an issue if the play area widens strongly as play continues?It helps yes, but you also need reasons why there aren't stronger people from the other areas wandering through. It can be done, but often is not. I know a few areas that explicately had "off the map" areas for some time before the heroes travelled to them (which they did when they became the strongest of the mapped area of the setting).

tensai_oni
2017-10-07, 05:43 PM
All cyberpunk systems I can think of (Cyberpunk 2020, Shadowrun, etc).

Setting: lightly armed, mobile protagonists sneak through corporate facilities to sabotage or steal The Man's secrets. Shootouts are an inevitability but also the last resort because the corporations are simply more heavily armed. Act fast, think even faster, or you'll be dead. Cybernetics are useful but beware not to lose your humanity!

Mechanics: players are walking tanks, armed and armored with the heaviest, most conspicuous weapons and implants they can get their hands on. Forget subtlety, sneaking around, or non-combat options in general, it's simply more efficient to level the whole building block with your 60d6 damage missile launchers and then dig through the ruins. If you didn't replace 90% of your body with cybernetics yet it's not because you are afraid of becoming less than human, you simply didn't have the money (yet), or are playing a character whose skills mesh poorly with augmentations, usually the one with magic/psionics-equivalent.

All White Wolf systems are extremely poorly designed and balanced as far as character creation/advancement options go.

Setting: you're playing a powerful supernatural being. Even a starting character stands higher than any normal mortal can accomplish, and it only goes up from there.

Mechanics: as a starting character you have two options. You're more or less well rounded but not extraordinary in anything, just an average human being with a supernatural cantrip or two. OR, you are good at one, two things, and extremely inept at everything else. Especially visible in Exalted, where your character is supposed to be hero material even before their exaltation.

For extra points, mundane or mechanically useless but flavorful options are more expensive than outright supernatural ones.

Anonymouswizard
2017-10-07, 05:47 PM
Probably because spaceships running out of a fuel has been a plot point in multiple science fiction series. In Star Trek they've had multiple issues with dilithium crystals and trilithium crystals breaking or needing to be found (particularly in Voyager). The Firefly episode "Out of Gas" isn't strictly running out of fuel but it's a close example. I would definitely support rules for including that.

Also many settings have space derelicts and without fuel to run out of, that doesn't always make as much sense.

Yeah, this is why Mongoose Traveller has one of my favourite shipbuilding systems. Simple enough to use, but it includes everything that I want including limited fuel (even moreso if you use reaction engines, which I am as a spaceship isn't a spaceship without a rocket exhaust). The standard reaction drive rules use a simple formula of 2.5% of your ship's mass per hour of acceleration at 1g, ships are always assumed to thrust in full multiples of g (which is easy to adjust, you'll really be tracking the burn points of six minutes at 1g, and you can just divide if you want half a g or something).

NichG
2017-10-07, 06:06 PM
I'm curious, do you have examples of systems/settings that do the 'fluff with teeth' thing?

Nobilis is the extreme example, where its almost at the level where the mechanics are actually written as 1st person point of view fluff. Most systems have some degree of this, usually when the designers want to specify something that isn't really easy to represent with numbers - for example right now I'm in a Changeling: the Lost campaign, and there are a number of Contracts (spells) which do things like 'reveal what the target fears most'. So in that case, there isn't a set of mechanics to e.g. decide what NPCs fear and what knowing an NPC's fear would let you do, but the Contract certainly does't do nothing just because it isn't mechanically formalized.

Or, similarly, there's a merit in that system that lets you be on a first name basis with some minor aspect of nature and so you can make promises to it in exchange for favors. While there are some mechanical boons you can get with this kind of thing, its also much more open-ended, as long as its consistent with the fluff - if you're making a deal with the New Moon, it might e.g. let you perform a ritual that works on the night of the new moon even at a different time even if there isn't an explicit mechanic for it, because the merit means that the New Moon essentially almost becomes an NPC for you, which you can (sorta) interact with in limited ways. And in the same system, there's a merit for running a stall at Goblin Markets, which in turn lets you trade things that normally can't be physically grasped such as someone's luck or the sound of their voice. Even though its just specified in terms of fluff, it definitely 'does something'.

In 7th Sea, the Sorte stuff is so abstract (manipulating general fortunes of wealth/love/etc of NPCs) that it tends to be run more as fluff than specific crunch (though again there are more concrete mechanical uses of the abilities like conferring bonus dice and so on).

Good 'fluff with teeth' manages to set boundaries and provides the relevant information to run it while still maintaining the kind of flexibility that you can't get with a formal rules-based system. Where it can go wrong is if the fluff itself doesn't do a good job of establishing where those boundaries should be. For example, the contracts-with-natural-forces in Changeling does have the potential issue that outside of a rough scheme of rating how big different favors are, it doesn't really bound how crazy the deals could get. My character has a contract with the tides - with the idea of mostly using it to mess with runs of luck. But, if I promised something that the tides really really wanted, would they drown a city for me? It's hard to say what the answer should be - yes is interesting, no would be completely reasonable. Probably the GM should actually render out the tides as an NPC and have the answer depend on how good our past deals have gone for it, but the section on these things doesn't quite go into describing how the other side of these deals benefits or thinks or whatever so there isn't much guidance.

It's also a GM-dependent thing in some ways. For example, if I had two GMs running FATE, one might interpret the Aspect 'Can Fly' to mean something like e.g. if the character is trying to get up a wall to a high place they can tag 'Can Fly' and get a bonus on that activity, whereas another GM might interpret the situation as 'well you have an aspect that says you can fly, so you just go up there'. The second GM is running in a fluff-with-teeth style.

RazorChain
2017-10-07, 10:16 PM
All cyberpunk systems I can think of (Cyberpunk 2020, Shadowrun, etc).

Setting: lightly armed, mobile protagonists sneak through corporate facilities to sabotage or steal The Man's secrets. Shootouts are an inevitability but also the last resort because the corporations are simply more heavily armed. Act fast, think even faster, or you'll be dead. Cybernetics are useful but beware not to lose your humanity!

Mechanics: players are walking tanks, armed and armored with the heaviest, most conspicuous weapons and implants they can get their hands on. Forget subtlety, sneaking around, or non-combat options in general, it's simply more efficient to level the whole building block with your 60d6 damage missile launchers and then dig through the ruins. If you didn't replace 90% of your body with cybernetics yet it's not because you are afraid of becoming less than human, you simply didn't have the money (yet), or are playing a character whose skills mesh poorly with augmentations, usually the one with magic/psionics-equivalent.


Cyberpunk like many systems have a lot to do with restrictions. Just because there exists a 12.7 mm machine gun doesn't mean you can have one. But ultimately I have to agree with you because in the end Cyberpunk didn't try to impose any restrictions and that could clearly be seen in the Night City source book where the typical poserganger had 9 or 10 in reflexes and a ridicilous gun skills and equipment.

But when run by a good referee and some common sense the setting gets better. I sometimes think they at R.Talsorian just had to make everything bigger, guns and all.

Arbane
2017-10-08, 04:12 AM
White Wolf's Vampire: The Masquerade was a notable offender for this: The game was supposed to be personal horror about your doomed character's slide into inhumanity just to survive, but in practice it often ended up being 'Superheroes with Fangs'.

Exalted has the opposite problem: the PCs are supposed to be the Returned God-Kings that will change the destiny of Creation... which is filled with established ubercharacters who could squash even an experienced PC like a bug.

IIRC, the old West End Star Wars Game had a distinct problem if you wanted to play big heroes like the movie characters, as they were built on so many points that your characters could play for years and still not be as skilled as them.

Floret
2017-10-11, 02:36 AM
A rather easily fixed, but nonetheless annoying one:
Poorly made sample-NPC statblocks. Shadowrun 5th edition is the worst offender I can think of here.

Basically, when you stat out part of your setting (Corporate security, City watchmen, the high mage of whatever), that should represent a certain level of strength... and a well-made PC (or even an averagely made one) wipes the floor with the supposed elite in terms of efficiency. When the NPCs seem to lack options that PCs have easy access to (see: why would the mafia not have basic ware in their muscle goons?).
In short, know your system, know how to build efficiently within, and make sure statblocks intended to be threats are actually threats.
(The reverse, a supposed weakling that'll wipe out PCs would be just as bad, but i've never met that. Some of the same considerations should also apply to making sure sample PCs for quick starts hold up against what can be done in the system- again, SR5 takes the cake in terms of "What were they thinking")

hymer
2017-10-11, 03:28 AM
I understand this one, especially if they're trying to be "hard science" types of settings. I'm fine with handwaved explanations if the system isn't about the technical stuff. If it's all about the technical stuff, and then you do stupid crap like this, it irks me.

I don't know if you're talking sublight rockets here, or if there's some sort of warp speed involved. Because once you move faster than light, you'll start getting more and more drag from whatever particles are moving at the speed of light. Much like how a car standing still in the rain makes it easy for the windshield wipers to let you see, but once you start driving faster and faster, you get more and more water. And you'll tend to move many, many times the speed of light, meaning a maximum sustainable speed makes sense. Maybe the hull can only take so much stress, or your shields can only withstand a certain amount of particles, or simply the engines can only overcome so much drag.
But once we're into hyperspeed, nothing really needs to make sense according to current physical theory, so I'm not so sure that's what you're annoyed about.

Anonymouswizard
2017-10-11, 04:02 AM
I don't know if you're talking sublight rockets here, or if there's some sort of warp speed involved. Because once you move faster than light, you'll start getting more and more drag from whatever particles are moving at the speed of light. Much like how a car standing still in the rain makes it easy for the windshield wipers to let you see, but once you start driving faster and faster, you get more and more water. And you'll tend to move many, many times the speed of light, meaning a maximum sustainable speed makes sense. Maybe the hull can only take so much stress, or your shields can only withstand a certain amount of particles, or simply the engines can only overcome so much drag.
But once we're into hyperspeed, nothing really needs to make sense according to current physical theory, so I'm not so sure that's what you're annoyed about.

Eh, if you've solved the impact energy problem interstellar hydrogen is dense enough to cause problems at relativistic speeds, it comes up in Revelation Space at least. Although I was mainly referring to subrelativistic reaction drives (i.e. no theoretical maximum, but you can't hold enough fuel to get there).

If we're talking about FTL, then it depends on the variation used. I have a setting I'm developing which uses the 'distances are shorter in hyperspace' variation, but hyperspace is filled with a gaseous substance that absorbs all light, thus giving the friction require for 'constant thrust will achieve a constant velocity'. Newtonian acceleration to past lightspeed will give you massive problems with interstellar hydrogen, while an inertia and relativity cancelling Bergenholm will have a top speed of roughly 'how long can you accelerate before interstellar hydrogen stops you dead'. For Warp Drives there's a couple of variations, but you're generally travelling at subrelativistic velocities within your warp bubble. For jump drives, wormhole drives, and similar devices you're not actually moving through the in between space.

Generally a spaceship's maximum velocity is a factor of it's acceleration and fuel capacity, which means once you've hit top speed you'll want all your remaining fuel to slow down to a stop at your destination. In some cases it might be limited by your hull's ability to withstand damage, in which case you will have extra fuel for manoeuvres, but that's assuming you can carry the fuel to get to the point where that's a problem.

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-11, 06:45 AM
I don't know if you're talking sublight rockets here, or if there's some sort of warp speed involved. Because once you move faster than light, you'll start getting more and more drag from whatever particles are moving at the speed of light. Much like how a car standing still in the rain makes it easy for the windshield wipers to let you see, but once you start driving faster and faster, you get more and more water. And you'll tend to move many, many times the speed of light, meaning a maximum sustainable speed makes sense. Maybe the hull can only take so much stress, or your shields can only withstand a certain amount of particles, or simply the engines can only overcome so much drag.
But once we're into hyperspeed, nothing really needs to make sense according to current physical theory, so I'm not so sure that's what you're annoyed about.

I was more concerned with the "infinite fuel" problem (especially for reaction rockets). I'm ok with FTL drives doing funky things, but I've started to prefer jump-point/tram-line style (each system is connected to 1 or more other systems by jump points which take minimal time/energy to transit between. No other interstellar travel (except the slow way) is possible). That's a soft preference though.

One method I thought of (probably based on some book) was that going FTL puts light-speed (and the transition to normal space) as the thing that requires significant energy expenditure. You can go effectively infinitely fast, but the faster you go the more fuel/engine capacity is required to slow down so you can transition back to normal space. This puts a maximum speed based on braking capacity (fuel + thrust/mass ratio, etc), rather than being an intrinsic part of the interstellar medium. Basically any FTL (or even high-relativistic) drive would require some kind of shielding--a grain of sand is really really bad even at 0.5c.

Psyren
2017-10-11, 07:42 AM
"Magic is dangerous, difficult, and takes years to master."

WotC D&Ds blow that away with their 3 to 8 encounters a day and 10 to 15 encounters per level. In theory in a large city chatacters could zip from 1 to 20 in under six months. Then the magic gets easier and safer to use with every edition. It's to the point now where even if a wizard is wrestling three people, on fire, and being stabbed every time he opens his mouth, you can't make him fail to cast a spell. Even creatures that were resistant or immune to magic have been reduced to just being somewhat better at making saving throws.

I agree.

However, it's possible in D&D (at least 3e/PF) to reintroduce some of this hazard/unpredictability to magic. They just don't make it baseline for fear of turning off new players; spellcasters can be complicated enough without mechanics like this. By all means, for an experienced group you should consider reactivating this.


not in my monster manual

Eh, it's not relevant in core because Vampires are NPCs there, so they get thirsty when the plot demands.

Anonymouswizard
2017-10-11, 09:02 AM
I was more concerned with the "infinite fuel" problem (especially for reaction rockets). I'm ok with FTL drives doing funky things, but I've started to prefer jump-point/tram-line style (each system is connected to 1 or more other systems by jump points which take minimal time/energy to transit between. No other interstellar travel (except the slow way) is possible). That's a soft preference though.

My soft preference is 'instantly jump a certain distance along your current vector' jump drives, like ZTT drives from the Night's Dawn Trilogy, but I also have a soft spot for hyperspace. I am more than willing to deal with jump point/gate systems that limit your ability to depart or arrive in a system by physical location as well. What I'm absolutely not willing to deal with is 'FTL in realspace' methods, I just don't like them at all.

Heck, my next Traveller game is using 'spend a burn point and make a difficult piloting roll to line up your vector, then you can jump for free'. Your Astrogation check tells you how accurate your vector was, your piloting check tells you how closely you stuck to it. Jump up to once a day without damaging anything, with the highest rating available being Jump-6 (the PCs will begin in a standard Jump-1 ship), and it takes 2d6 minutes to charge up.

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-11, 09:19 AM
My soft preference is 'instantly jump a certain distance along your current vector' jump drives, like ZTT drives from the Night's Dawn Trilogy, but I also have a soft spot for hyperspace. I am more than willing to deal with jump point/gate systems that limit your ability to depart or arrive in a system by physical location as well. What I'm absolutely not willing to deal with is 'FTL in realspace' methods, I just don't like them at all.

Heck, my next Traveller game is using 'spend a burn point and make a difficult piloting roll to line up your vector, then you can jump for free'. Your Astrogation check tells you how accurate your vector was, your piloting check tells you how closely you stuck to it. Jump up to once a day without damaging anything, with the highest rating available being Jump-6 (the PCs will begin in a standard Jump-1 ship), and it takes 2d6 minutes to charge up.

I'm not sure what qualifies as 'FTL in realspace.' Would that be the equivalent of Star Trek warp drive (where you're not really in a separate universe, just distorting space around you)? I like the Honorverse "hyper bands + fixed currents" idea (so you can control your speed and smaller craft can go faster than larger ones but arbitrary travel is slower than following fixed routes).

As game mechanics, I don't play much sci-fi RPGs. I feel like allowing arbitrary FTL travel ends up making things like ambushes really hard to set up (if they can come from anywhere, anywhen). This makes pirates (a staple of such fiction) basically impossible. That's a reason I like the jump point idea. Allows fortifying a star system against incursion--blockade the jump points. Or, you know where the merchants will come from, so you can lie in wait. That, or have a hyper-limit--can't jump from within X distance (possibly depending on the size of the gravity well) of a star/planet. Too much crunch can get annoying, I'm sure.

LordCdrMilitant
2017-10-11, 09:50 AM
With regards to spacecraft navigation and operation...


I one time thought it would be creative to plot the transfers. Then I realized 2 things:
1: It looked like my homework. I don't want to be doing more homework.
2: Nobody else can do it, and/or nobody else wants to read my textbooks to learn how do it.


In the end, it's not really setting dissonance if you don't describe it at all, so "you go from Planet 1 to Planet 2" works just fine.




With traveller, I think what struck me most was a line about the nuclear damper projecting a "series of nodes and antinodes that cancels out the nuclear strong force." My immediate reaction was "what does that even mean?"

Anonymouswizard
2017-10-11, 10:09 AM
I'm not sure what qualifies as 'FTL in realspace.' Would that be the equivalent of Star Trek warp drive (where you're not really in a separate universe, just distorting space around you)? I like the Honorverse "hyper bands + fixed currents" idea (so you can control your speed and smaller craft can go faster than larger ones but arbitrary travel is slower than following fixed routes).

Star Trek and other Warp Drives (which, even if they don't harm the ship, have massive side effects for their destination if you're not careful), as well as things like EE Smith style interstellar travel.

Not read any Honorverse stuff yet, it's on my list though.


As game mechanics, I don't play much sci-fi RPGs. I feel like allowing arbitrary FTL travel ends up making things like ambushes really hard to set up (if they can come from anywhere, anywhen). This makes pirates (a staple of such fiction) basically impossible. That's a reason I like the jump point idea. Allows fortifying a star system against incursion--blockade the jump points. Or, you know where the merchants will come from, so you can lie in wait. That, or have a hyper-limit--can't jump from within X distance (possibly depending on the size of the gravity well) of a star/planet. Too much crunch can get annoying, I'm sure.

I'm not a massive fan of space pirates, although they are possible in the universe I'm running next (just, you have to be a long way from a planet or star in order to jump), although that game's also using Fate so I'm more concerned with drama and story than realism.

LordCdrMilitant
2017-10-11, 11:15 AM
I'm not sure what qualifies as 'FTL in realspace.' Would that be the equivalent of Star Trek warp drive (where you're not really in a separate universe, just distorting space around you)? I like the Honorverse "hyper bands + fixed currents" idea (so you can control your speed and smaller craft can go faster than larger ones but arbitrary travel is slower than following fixed routes).

As game mechanics, I don't play much sci-fi RPGs. I feel like allowing arbitrary FTL travel ends up making things like ambushes really hard to set up (if they can come from anywhere, anywhen). This makes pirates (a staple of such fiction) basically impossible. That's a reason I like the jump point idea. Allows fortifying a star system against incursion--blockade the jump points. Or, you know where the merchants will come from, so you can lie in wait. That, or have a hyper-limit--can't jump from within X distance (possibly depending on the size of the gravity well) of a star/planet. Too much crunch can get annoying, I'm sure.


I've justified convoy raiders as having a devices which causes ships to drop out of Warp. I think it's mentioned in Sanctus Reach as being utilized by Kaptin Badrukk.



I've been thinking of how to set up a combat-time system for controlling spacecraft.

I was thinking that the best way might be to have a ship accumulate changes in velocity, and track it's velocity as the sum of all the delta-v's it's accumulated each turn. However, this seems both needlessly complex and cannot support more than maybe a dozen turns, after which you have a dozen little delta-v vectors taped together and it's become incredibly unwieldly.

JeenLeen
2017-10-11, 12:09 PM
What bugs me most is when mechanics make things that would make sense IC to be detrimental.

For example, in oWoD Mage, we used the standard rule that getting backgrounds costs xp. This meant that it was actively detrimental to us to get a weak talisman, since it would cost xp to have, but IC there was no good reason not to keep it. We wound up having one time when, OOC, we were debating who should get the penalty of keeping our artifact. This led to a fluff change below:

We eventually agreed with the DM that, although mages don't know why, they realize that there is something about having multiple magic artifacts that tends to make your progress slower in other areas. Maybe magical energies interact, or something with the soul? Who knows. But it gave an IC reason to justify not wanting to collect artifacts.

DM also ruled we could have talismans at base, for later trade or use, without paying xp for them. I think we had a weak Forces 2 shielding talisman that we basically used to store extra Tass.

---
One thing I disliked about D&D, especially 3.5, was that it was hard to be really competent at skills at low-level, due to how swingy d20 rolls can be.

Anonymouswizard
2017-10-11, 12:13 PM
I've been thinking of how to set up a combat-time system for controlling spacecraft.

I was thinking that the best way might be to have a ship accumulate changes in velocity, and track it's velocity as the sum of all the delta-v's it's accumulated each turn. However, this seems both needlessly complex and cannot support more than maybe a dozen turns, after which you have a dozen little delta-v vectors taped together and it's become incredibly unwieldly.

You only need to track one velocity vector, which can be noted in Cartesian notation if that's easier for you. So on my turn I move my velocity vector, say (5, 8), and my ship spins and applies thrust to give me an acceleration vector, say (-4, 1), which I also move. I then add my velocity and accelerations together, getting (1, 9), which becomes my new velocity vector.

If needed you can add your vectors together before you move, and you don't have to stick to Cartesian notation (I forget what the angle and magnitude one is, but it's much better if you want detailed movement). Facing is a little weird, as if you've accelerated you face in the direction you accelerated in, otherwise you can face whatever way you want, but you don't have to include it as part of your system. Planetary bodies and moons will add additional acceleration vectors to ships within their gravity wells, but they just act like normal acceleration vectors (and are added to your velocity vector in the same way). So you don't need to tape together your delta-v vectors, at most you need to define an axis as 0, grab a protractor and a ruler, and be able to read off the angle and distance, no trig is actually required.

A real problem is going to be that your delta-v will tend to get higher as you use reaction mass. This isn't a problem for reactionless drives, and can be handwaved because honestly I don't think the maths is completely worth it.

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-11, 12:27 PM
What bugs me most is when mechanics make things that would make sense IC to be detrimental.

For example, in oWoD Mage, we used the standard rule that getting backgrounds costs xp. This meant that it was actively detrimental to us to get a weak talisman, since it would cost xp to have, but IC there was no good reason not to keep it. We wound up having one time when, OOC, we were debating who should get the penalty of keeping our artifact. This led to a fluff change below:

We eventually agreed with the DM that, although mages don't know why, they realize that there is something about having multiple magic artifacts that tends to make your progress slower in other areas. Maybe magical energies interact, or something with the soul? Who knows. But it gave an IC reason to justify not wanting to collect artifacts.

DM also ruled we could have talismans at base, for later trade or use, without paying xp for them. I think we had a weak Forces 2 shielding talisman that we basically used to store extra Tass.


That makes sense. The XP penalty comes from balance concerns, but it's not explained in-universe at all. That's strange to me, because from my limited exposure OWOD tends to tie things strongly into the setting (since the mechanics and the setting are inseparable in that system).



One thing I disliked about D&D, especially 3.5, was that it was hard to be really competent at skills at low-level, due to how swingy d20 rolls can be.

This (to me) is due to a strangeness in how skills are interpreted in that edition. The game system is presented in a way that makes you think that the whole in-universe reality follows those rules (as opposed to the rules being a UI for game interaction only). This means that representing realistic skills becomes a problem once you've settled on a d20 (or any other single-die resolution mechanic), because farmers (level 1 commoners) shouldn't fail most of their farming checks. If, as 5e does, you change the attitude to "skills are adventuring-related things. Don't roll unless failure is interesting," having low success rates (and relatively limited mechanical skill growth) makes more sense.

That is, a low level character should fail routinely on interesting, adventure-related tasks. That's what being low-level means. Uninteresting and/or non-adventure-related tasks should just happen. High level characters can a) attempt harder tasks that low level characters can't do at all and b) succeed on those interesting, adventure-related lower-difficulty tasks more reliably. To be a true expert, you need class features (rogues, bards, and one cleric domain).


There are a few classes of tasks--




Trivial
Challenging
Impossible


Boring failure
Auto-success
Auto-success (possibly with a time penalty)
Success impossible, no roll


Interesting failure
Roll determines degree of success
Roll normally, DC set by intended difficulty for non-proficient character
roll determines degree of failure

BRC
2017-10-11, 12:41 PM
Abstracted Hit Points in general.

Like, it works great in a pitched battle, where dealing damage can be abstracted as a combination of inflicting physical wounds and wearing down your opponent, but you reach a point where somebody is just Getting Stabbed In The Neck.

I was in a D&D Game once, we had captured an enemy, tied him to a chair, and I had a crossbow pointed at the back of his head, ready to pull the trigger if he tried anything.

Seems pretty straightforward. A crossbow, fired at the back of the skull from a distance of three inches, should be fatal. I didn't pull the trigger, but the GM pointed out that, mechanically, it wouldn't do much.
This was 5e, which doesn't have rules for Coup de Grace, which means that I would just be making an attack roll at advantage, dealing 1d8+Dex damage against a foe with 60+ HP.
Were this 3.5, I would have dealt a Coup de Grace, automatically hitting for 16 (8x2) damage, as a Maximum Damage Crit.

Now, if that trigger had been pulled by the party Rogue, it would have been deadlier, since the rogue's Sneak Attack (Which makes perfect sense in a pitched battle, where it representing exploiting openings to strike at vital targets) allows that crossbow bolt (Fired directly at the back of the skull from 3 inches away) to deal a few additional d6 of damage.
We were, I believe, 3rd level at the time. So, the most damage this crossbow could have dealt would be 35 damage, assuming the rogue pulled the trigger, critting for maximum damage (2d8+4d6+3 dex). That's not insignificant damage at 3rd level, but it's hardly "We just fired a crossbow bolt into your head from three inches away" damage.

Honest Tiefling
2017-10-11, 12:49 PM
Systems where archers don't need strength. I know why its there for balance/thematic reasons, but a tiny widdle elfy with a big ol' long bow just irks me. Maybe I am just biased to crossbows?

Anonymouswizard
2017-10-11, 12:56 PM
Abstracted Hit Points in general.

Like, it works great in a pitched battle, where dealing damage can be abstracted as a combination of inflicting physical wounds and wearing down your opponent, but you reach a point where somebody is just Getting Stabbed In The Neck.

I was in a D&D Game once, we had captured an enemy, tied him to a chair, and I had a crossbow pointed at the back of his head, ready to pull the trigger if he tried anything.

Seems pretty straightforward. A crossbow, fired at the back of the skull from a distance of three inches, should be fatal. I didn't pull the trigger, but the GM pointed out that, mechanically, it wouldn't do much.

I've seen them work out okay. I remember in Shadowrun 5 a completely unaugmented character can survive a headshot with a light pistol from about three centimeters away, as long as that character a) pumped body to the maximum value allowed and b) is a troll. Plus the taking a penalty every three points of damage is an okay way to represent minor scrapes building up.

Airk
2017-10-11, 01:22 PM
Systems where archers don't need strength. I know why its there for balance/thematic reasons, but a tiny widdle elfy with a big ol' long bow just irks me. Maybe I am just biased to crossbows?

Elves aren't actually "teeny" or "widdle" or necessarily even lower in strength than anyone else. So you are probably getting bothered for nothing. ;)

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-11, 01:29 PM
Abstracted Hit Points in general.

Like, it works great in a pitched battle, where dealing damage can be abstracted as a combination of inflicting physical wounds and wearing down your opponent, but you reach a point where somebody is just Getting Stabbed In The Neck.

I was in a D&D Game once, we had captured an enemy, tied him to a chair, and I had a crossbow pointed at the back of his head, ready to pull the trigger if he tried anything.

Seems pretty straightforward. A crossbow, fired at the back of the skull from a distance of three inches, should be fatal. I didn't pull the trigger, but the GM pointed out that, mechanically, it wouldn't do much.
This was 5e, which doesn't have rules for Coup de Grace, which means that I would just be making an attack roll at advantage, dealing 1d8+Dex damage against a foe with 60+ HP.
Were this 3.5, I would have dealt a Coup de Grace, automatically hitting for 16 (8x2) damage, as a Maximum Damage Crit.

Now, if that trigger had been pulled by the party Rogue, it would have been deadlier, since the rogue's Sneak Attack (Which makes perfect sense in a pitched battle, where it representing exploiting openings to strike at vital targets) allows that crossbow bolt (Fired directly at the back of the skull from 3 inches away) to deal a few additional d6 of damage.
We were, I believe, 3rd level at the time. So, the most damage this crossbow could have dealt would be 35 damage, assuming the rogue pulled the trigger, critting for maximum damage (2d8+4d6+3 dex). That's not insignificant damage at 3rd level, but it's hardly "We just fired a crossbow bolt into your head from three inches away" damage.

That's something I actually thought about in my setting--making sure that that sort of thing makes sense. It doesn't make sense if you assume that (real-world human) == (fantasy human). I posted about it over in the world-building forum (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?538462-Making-the-setting-fit-the-system-Hit-Point-edition).

TL;DR version--HP represents an actual store of vital energy available to a soul to repair injuries. That repair process is very fast, leaving people who aren't at 0 HP (0 reserves left) still able to function normally. Sleeping and/or magic can refill these reserves. More powerful people have larger reserves (more HP) because their soul is stronger (more experienced).

BRC
2017-10-11, 02:04 PM
That's something I actually thought about in my setting--making sure that that sort of thing makes sense. It doesn't make sense if you assume that (real-world human) == (fantasy human). I posted about it over in the world-building forum (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?538462-Making-the-setting-fit-the-system-Hit-Point-edition).

TL;DR version--HP represents an actual store of vital energy available to a soul to repair injuries. That repair process is very fast, leaving people who aren't at 0 HP (0 reserves left) still able to function normally. Sleeping and/or magic can refill these reserves. More powerful people have larger reserves (more HP) because their soul is stronger (more experienced).

Eh, I think there is a better way to do it than turning everybody into Wolverine.

The systems that handle such things the best are those that have linked, but separate trackers for Wounds (Representing physical trauma) and some generic HP (representing energy, fatigue, ect what have you). This system is certainly more complicated than just a single, abstracted HP system, especially since abstracted systems work fine 98% of the time. But, in situations where you can't defend yourself, Damage is just Happening To You Right Now, can be modeled by inflicting Wounds.

Honest Tiefling
2017-10-11, 02:11 PM
Elves aren't actually "teeny" or "widdle" or necessarily even lower in strength than anyone else. So you are probably getting bothered for nothing. ;)

But many are, and most archers tend to dump strength if they don't need it, making widdle teeny cute adorable elves with bows taller than then.


Eh, I think there is a better way to do it than turning everybody into Wolverine.

I agree with this...If one is trying to make a low-fantasy or semi-realistic setting. However, it could be a unique quirk of that particular setting and if interwoven with the fluff could be interesting. If pummeling someone didn't actually impair them for long periods of time, what effect would that have on attitudes towards violence? Would it make a war like society because lesser disputes could be handled with a bit of rough and tumble? What happens when people are granted larger souls and walk off things that would be fatal to a normal person, such as getting kicked by a horse?

For some reason, I'm imagining a society of boisterous bruisers that try to tame anything, since they don't need to worry about getting injured by their pets.

BRC
2017-10-11, 02:18 PM
I agree with this...If one is trying to make a low-fantasy or semi-realistic setting. However, it could be a unique quirk of that particular setting and if interwoven with the fluff could be interesting. If pummeling someone didn't actually impair them for long periods of time, what effect would that have on attitudes towards violence? Would it make a war like society because lesser disputes could be handled with a bit of rough and tumble? What happens when people are granted larger souls and walk off things that would be fatal to a normal person, such as getting kicked by a horse?

For some reason, I'm imagining a society of boisterous bruisers that try to tame anything, since they don't need to worry about getting injured by their pets.

Oh yeah sure. Turning everybody into Wolverine is certainly an OPTION, but it's hardly generally applicable.

Like, "In this setting, everybody is Wolverine" is an interesting trait for a system/setting, but it should be a somewhat core feature, not just a solution to the HP problem.


"This world is exactly like the real one, except that everybody can tap into an internal reserve of power to swiftly heal their wounds. Mechanically, this is represented by a single abstracted HP pool".


It's like solving the Archers Don't Need Strength problem by saying "In this world, friendly ghosts handle pulling back bowstrings for you, so you don't need strength to use a bow. All that matters is coordination"

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-11, 02:35 PM
Oh yeah sure. Turning everybody into Wolverine is certainly an OPTION, but it's hardly generally applicable.

Like, "In this setting, everybody is Wolverine" is an interesting trait for a system/setting, but it should be a somewhat core feature, not just a solution to the HP problem.


"This world is exactly like the real one, except that everybody can tap into an internal reserve of power to swiftly heal their wounds. Mechanically, this is represented by a single abstracted HP pool".


It's like solving the Archers Don't Need Strength problem by saying "In this world, friendly ghosts handle pulling back bowstrings for you, so you don't need strength to use a bow. All that matters is coordination"


But many are, and most archers tend to dump strength if they don't need it, making widdle teeny cute adorable elves with bows taller than then.



I agree with this...If one is trying to make a low-fantasy or semi-realistic setting. However, it could be a unique quirk of that particular setting and if interwoven with the fluff could be interesting. If pummeling someone didn't actually impair them for long periods of time, what effect would that have on attitudes towards violence? Would it make a war like society because lesser disputes could be handled with a bit of rough and tumble? What happens when people are granted larger souls and walk off things that would be fatal to a normal person, such as getting kicked by a horse?

For some reason, I'm imagining a society of boisterous bruisers that try to tame anything, since they don't need to worry about getting injured by their pets.

My goal was to take a fixed system (D&D 5e) and make a setting where it basically fits. That is, fix the fluff, not the crunch.

In this case, most people aren't wolverine, because most people never develop very far. Each spark has an innate limit on how much they can handle. For the common folk, this means that they end up very mechanically similar to real humans. It's only at the far end that people get "superhuman" capabilities. This also explains why powerful people are powerful. All of the abilities (including magic) fuel off of this. Inflicting injuries still hurts, it just doesn't cause lasting damage as long as there's reserves available.

That is, it also explains how 5e's pseudo-vancian magic works (spell slots are actual pockets in the tri-part soul that you fill with energy to resonate with the ambient anima), how beasts with "magical" abilities (dragons' breath, etc) work, why casters (who don't focus on the spark-body connection as much) have lower HD than martial types. And how barbarians can tank damage using nothing but their bare skin and rage.

This allows me to represent powerful people (high HD, level, whatever) as innately more capable of sustaining damage, explains magical healing, and allows the more heroic-fantasy game I'm going for. If I wanted a gritty, death-is-easy feel, then a two-track system would work better. But I don't. I want more heroic, high-flying, epic fantasy feel.

That is, I feel that my explanation turns a bug into a feature.

Frozen_Feet
2017-10-11, 02:41 PM
That's less a problem with HP itself, and more an issue of damage values being oddly calibrated to HP values. I run lot of low-level OSR games, where a point-blank shot for automatic max damage of 8 is more than scary enough when average hitpoint values hover around that amount.

The quirkiness largely happens in various versions of D&D when characters increase in levels and HP, but damage doesn't. Coup de grace and massive damage rules in d20 were largely functional "fix".

Arbane
2017-10-11, 04:30 PM
Oh, there's one for D&D! (At least 3rd ed and derivatives.) "Playing a fighter is worthwhile at higher levels."

LordCdrMilitant
2017-10-11, 04:49 PM
You only need to track one velocity vector, which can be noted in Cartesian notation if that's easier for you. So on my turn I move my velocity vector, say (5, 8), and my ship spins and applies thrust to give me an acceleration vector, say (-4, 1), which I also move. I then add my velocity and accelerations together, getting (1, 9), which becomes my new velocity vector.

If needed you can add your vectors together before you move, and you don't have to stick to Cartesian notation (I forget what the angle and magnitude one is, but it's much better if you want detailed movement). Facing is a little weird, as if you've accelerated you face in the direction you accelerated in, otherwise you can face whatever way you want, but you don't have to include it as part of your system. Planetary bodies and moons will add additional acceleration vectors to ships within their gravity wells, but they just act like normal acceleration vectors (and are added to your velocity vector in the same way). So you don't need to tape together your delta-v vectors, at most you need to define an axis as 0, grab a protractor and a ruler, and be able to read off the angle and distance, no trig is actually required.

A real problem is going to be that your delta-v will tend to get higher as you use reaction mass. This isn't a problem for reactionless drives, and can be handwaved because honestly I don't think the maths is completely worth it.

Well, here's what I was thinking:

Each vessel has at least a Empty Mass, Specific Impulse, and Fuel Mass.

At the beginning of movement, declare intent to spend a number of Fuel Mass units up to the maximum allowed by the engine. Then, multiply the number of fuel mass units you intend to spend to get the Thrust. Then, divide the Thrust by the Total Mass [Empty Mass + Current Fuel Mass] to get the change in velocity. Make a little arrow that long and tape it to the end of your current V vector [pointing the right direction, obviously], then move your ship to the end of the vector and reduce your fuel mass by the amount you spent.

If specific impulse is sufficiently high [or the expenditure of fuel mass sufficiently small], the reduction in mass due to fuel consumption can be neglected.

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-11, 04:53 PM
Oh, there's one for D&D! (At least 3rd ed and derivatives.) "Playing a fighter is worthwhile at higher levels."

I.E. fluff says that fighters (standing in for non-spellcasters) remain major powers at high character levels. Mechanics say that (except for particular, highly specialized builds) spell-casters do everything they can do, easier and better. So why are the kings and leaders all martial types and rarely spell-casters?

I've seen settings that make nods in the direction of fixing this--

* Dark Sun says "yes, all the big rulers are magic users. But it's not so easy--arcane magic users are rare and nobody likes them because they drain the life out of the world"
* Eberron says "NPCs don't get to high levels, so the disparity doesn't show up as bad"
* Mystara (spelling?) says "yes, there are lots of sorcerer-kings running around" and basically accepts that as setting fact.

I'm ignoring PCs here for a minute because PCs are hard to fit nicely into non-railroaded settings. They interact with the setting, often with huge changes, but (in published settings, anyway) rarely have lasting effects on the setting. Event X 100 years ago wasn't caused by Billy Bob's character (played 6 years ago in a game in another city), it was caused by NPC group Y. I understand that The Dark Eye does this explicitly with a heavy, constantly progressing metagame in which the players are always play bit parts but never influence the major events, but I may be wrong.

In addition, "worthwhile" is a highly subjective thing. That seems to me to be more of a "this system is ill-suited to my purposes" than a discrepancy between setting and fluff, at least as far as it applies to PCs.

Honest Tiefling
2017-10-11, 06:55 PM
I'd wonder how many people would object if spellcasters above a certain level ran the risk of impotency/infertility. It'd easily explain why the king is never a spellcaster, since they can't perform a vital role.

Also be funny if higher level spellcasters tended to produce non-human (or whatever race) offspring, depending on what sort of spells they favored. Evokers could produce genasi, polymorphers...Get something, and clerics often produce aasimar. Cast a single evil-ish spell, and you get a chance of a tiefling child, which would be regarded highly with suspicion. And you'd have to learn to diaper it around the tail!

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-11, 07:19 PM
I'd wonder how many people would object if spellcasters above a certain level ran the risk of impotency/infertility. It'd easily explain why the king is never a spellcaster, since they can't perform a vital role.

Also be funny if higher level spellcasters tended to produce non-human (or whatever race) offspring, depending on what sort of spells they favored. Evokers could produce genasi, polymorphers...Get something, and clerics often produce aasimar. Cast a single evil-ish spell, and you get a chance of a tiefling child, which would be regarded highly with suspicion. And you'd have to learn to diaper it around the tail!

That's an interesting thought.

One of the recurring side-lights of my setting is that new races are born mostly through magical experimentation. Humans? Mutated goblins. Orcs? Humans mutated in the attempt to create a race of super-soldiers. Dragonborn--a second, more successful attempt at creating a race of soldiers. Yuan-ti? The result of an empire of high elves that were a little loopy for snakes and changed their servant races to imitate them. Halflings? The result of exposing goblins to the magical equivalent of nuclear-bomb level radiation as a side effect of a continental-level civil war. I just introduced a race of ape-human hybrids (which I haven't formally named yet) that are the descendants of a "science" experiment.

I could see something like this happening (to one degree or another). Probably over the course of generations, not suddenly. The magic you invoke does change your soul, after all...

Anonymouswizard
2017-10-12, 04:52 AM
Well, here's what I was thinking:

Each vessel has at least a Empty Mass, Specific Impulse, and Fuel Mass.

At the beginning of movement, declare intent to spend a number of Fuel Mass units up to the maximum allowed by the engine. Then, multiply the number of fuel mass units you intend to spend to get the Thrust. Then, divide the Thrust by the Total Mass [Empty Mass + Current Fuel Mass] to get the change in velocity. Make a little arrow that long and tape it to the end of your current V vector [pointing the right direction, obviously], then move your ship to the end of the vector and reduce your fuel mass by the amount you spent.

If specific impulse is sufficiently high [or the expenditure of fuel mass sufficiently small], the reduction in mass due to fuel consumption can be neglected.

Sounds good, although honestly? I'd just end up recording my velocity and acceleration on a piece of paper anyway.


I.E. fluff says that fighters (standing in for non-spellcasters) remain major powers at high character levels. Mechanics say that (except for particular, highly specialized builds) spell-casters do everything they can do, easier and better. So why are the kings and leaders all martial types and rarely spell-casters?

I've seen settings that make nods in the direction of fixing this--

* Dark Sun says "yes, all the big rulers are magic users. But it's not so easy--arcane magic users are rare and nobody likes them because they drain the life out of the world"
* Eberron says "NPCs don't get to high levels, so the disparity doesn't show up as bad"
* Mystara (spelling?) says "yes, there are lots of sorcerer-kings running around" and basically accepts that as setting fact.

An interesting idea I had was that we know that high level wizards tend towards researching magic, and the most magical places in the universe are the other planes of existence. So most higher level wizards leave the material plane for other planes of existence, only returning occasionally to check up on their friends. Those interested in ruling other people tend to be the sorcerous overlords that groups of adventurers deal with just before going their separate ways.

At the same time, gods call their most powerful followers to them to undertake mighty tasks on other planes of existence, so Clerics leave the world for long periods of time. This leaves them with little free time available to run countries and organisations on the material plane. This is, of course, assuming the gods definitely exist and have use for Clerics of 12th-20th level as active agents.

Who does that leave? The Fighters and Rogues. It's not that they're more powerful than the spellcasters, it's rather that they tend to stay on the same planes of reality most adventurers are roving around, and thus they're the ones ruling the domains. If you see a powerful wizard at the court chances are he's either visiting his friend, looking for a new student, or both. Powerful priests disappear for months to years at a time to serve their gods elsewhere. But the Fighters and Rogues are here, and therefore they're the ones to organise people into nations.

oxybe
2017-10-12, 09:47 AM
Eh, it's not relevant in core because Vampires are NPCs there, so they get thirsty when the plot demands.

I meant that nowhere in the 3.5 monster manual it says vampires have any sort of craving for blood or feeding requirements. It's just a thing they can do.

Also: core 3.5 has rules for playing/generating a vampire at the end of the monster entry (no different then, say rolling up a custom kobold or hobgoblin) and includes Level Adjustment in the statblock, something that is only relevant to PCs, as otherwise the GM uses the CR adjustment for his NPC adversaries.

Psyren
2017-10-12, 11:57 AM
Oh, there's one for D&D! (At least 3rd ed and derivatives.) "Playing a fighter is worthwhile at higher levels."

Wanting the challenge can be a thing, especially if one of the derivatives you're thinking of is Pathfinder.


I meant that nowhere in the 3.5 monster manual it says vampires have any sort of craving for blood or feeding requirements. It's just a thing they can do.

I know what you meant, my response still applies.



Also: core 3.5 has rules for playing/generating a vampire at the end of the monster entry (no different then, say rolling up a custom kobold or hobgoblin) and includes Level Adjustment in the statblock, something that is only relevant to PCs, as otherwise the GM uses the CR adjustment for his NPC adversaries.

(1) The GM still has to allow it, so they need to figure out if blood drinking is a thing they want you to worry about or not before they do so.

(2) I view it as like being a werewolf - sure it's your character, but the change in outlook means that the GM should have input to your actions, or even dictate them altogether.

Cosi
2017-10-12, 12:10 PM
People not bothering to think about the implication of (particularly non-combat) abilities. One of the few examples of this in D&D is Complete Warrior's consideration of the effect of magic on tactics (which is probably the coolest thing in the book). Shadowrun also does alright because they've made an effort to ensure their magic system has predictable effects that respond well to analysis. The sad thing is that this usually wouldn't even be terribly difficult. Many magical techniques do things like "improve crop yield" and "increase transportation efficiency", and since we have invented technologies to do those things, we have a pretty good grasp on what happens when you do them.


Seems pretty straightforward. A crossbow, fired at the back of the skull from a distance of three inches, should be fatal. I didn't pull the trigger, but the GM pointed out that, mechanically, it wouldn't do much.
This was 5e, which doesn't have rules for Coup de Grace, which means that I would just be making an attack roll at advantage, dealing 1d8+Dex damage against a foe with 60+ HP.
Were this 3.5, I would have dealt a Coup de Grace, automatically hitting for 16 (8x2) damage, as a Maximum Damage Crit.

Not trying to start an edition war, but this seems more like a problem with 5e than with abstract hit points. In 3e, the blow would very likely be lethal -- even if he survived the damage, the enemy would have to make a DC 20+ Fort save to survive -- so the lack of lethality seems more a function of 5e's decision to remove that mechanic, rather than any inherent flaw in abstract hit points.

That's not necessarily to say there's no reason to object to the idea of hit points as an abstract value, just that this specific example flows out of other mechanical decisions.

Velaryon
2017-10-12, 12:34 PM
Got a couple to add to the list:

In Star Wars d20 (not Saga Edition, the one before it), you could exploit the hyperspace travel rules to travel back in time. IIRC, there was a chart that gave base travel times from one region of the galaxy to another, which was then modified by factors such as how recent your astrogation data was, and how fast of a hyperdrive you had. After that, you could shave off a certain amount of time depending on how good your Astrogate check was. With the right hyperspace jumps, a fast ship, and a good Astrogate check, it was entirely possible to get your travel time down to a negative number, which by RAW would mean you arrived a few hours before you left.


And not to pile on White Wolf even more, but the Aberrant system had some fairly big dissonance as well. In theory, you're playing in a world where superheroes suddenly spring up out of nowhere, and then over time are corrupted/mutated/driven crazy by accumulated Taint. In practice though, many of the powers were so incredibly lethal that anyone without max Mega-Stamina and powers to improve their soak would never live long enough to accumulate much more Taint than they started with. It's not only possible, but quite easy for characters to die in one hit from someone focused on damage-dealing powers.

Cosi
2017-10-12, 12:51 PM
In Star Wars d20 (not Saga Edition, the one before it), you could exploit the hyperspace travel rules to travel back in time. IIRC, there was a chart that gave base travel times from one region of the galaxy to another, which was then modified by factors such as how recent your astrogation data was, and how fast of a hyperdrive you had. After that, you could shave off a certain amount of time depending on how good your Astrogate check was. With the right hyperspace jumps, a fast ship, and a good Astrogate check, it was entirely possible to get your travel time down to a negative number, which by RAW would mean you arrived a few hours before you left.

(What follows is based on half-remembered and probably misunderstood accounts of fairly advanced topics in physics and is largely intended for humor rather than accuracy.)

See, that's just good world-building. Per relativity, faster than light travel implies causality violation, so the designers are just showing off their physics chops by baking it into the game itself.

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-12, 01:19 PM
(What follows is based on half-remembered and probably misunderstood accounts of fairly advanced topics in physics and is largely intended for humor rather than accuracy.)

See, that's just good world-building. Per relativity, faster than light travel implies causality violation, so the designers are just showing off their physics chops by baking it into the game itself.

Applause. Well done.

Anonymouswizard
2017-10-12, 01:22 PM
See, that's just good world-building. Per relativity, faster than light travel implies causality violation, so the designers are just showing off their physics chops by baking it into the game itself.

Unless I'm completely mistaken, even if it doesn't allow for physical time travel it violates causality due to how information works. Physical time travel is slightly easier to set up and much more reliable if you have portals and relativistic travel.

But yeah, a good reason for limiting your science fiction games to the solar system is so the physicist at the table doesn't grind the game to a halt by exploiting the FTL device somehow. If you're lucky they'll only do it once, if you're unlucky they'll do it in five different ways.


In Fate it is possible to sprint with a missing leg because the designers forgot to put in all the rules (which can be easily extrapolated). In short, significant damage or consequences is expressed as temporary negative Aspects, which work as Aspects normally do, which includes allowing you to do stuff. Now the rules never spell out that if an Aspect, which is always true, would logically stop you from doing something then you lose permission to do it, you can only work it out by looking at the rules for permissions. Thus, RAW, a consequence does not hinder you at all unless someone spends a Fate Point to invoke it, although the designers have specified this is not how the rules are supposed to work.

In Legends of the Wulin you are explicitly allowed to run across the rooftops with both your legs broken, you just take a penalty unless you work the negative condition into your actions. Which on the one hand can lead to more awesome or hilarity if you do work it into your narration (I go into a handstand, and then with a mixture of throwing my body, grabbing dangling ropes, and knowledge of the wind, chase the fleeing villain), on the other hand trying to wield your sword with all your limbs and your lower jaw missing only gives you massive penalties.

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-12, 01:51 PM
Unless I'm completely mistaken, even if it doesn't allow for physical time travel it violates causality due to how information works. Physical time travel is slightly easier to set up and much more reliable if you have portals and relativistic travel.

But yeah, a good reason for limiting your science fiction games to the solar system is so the physicist at the table doesn't grind the game to a halt by exploiting the FTL device somehow. If you're lucky they'll only do it once, if you're unlucky they'll do it in five different ways.


Any FTL setting is going to have to look significantly different than the real world--causality violations aren't something that can be worked around easily. Or you can handwave the more intricate consequences. This is one of the big things I have to ignore when reading science fiction that allows FTL.

I'm not too hung up on following all the consequences of physical changes, exactly because the setting will then have to diverge strongly at the most fundamental levels from what we know. Allowing causality violations (or turning off relativity, which is much the same) reduces to a much different universe than what we know. I'd rather compartmentalize and consciously ignore that issue so I can play with fun things (like FTL travel). Same goes for fantasy--if you actually followed all the consequences of having magic, things go screwy fast.

Sure, you have to watch out for the obvious glaring consequences and adjust for them, but the 2nd and 3rd order (which are actually larger than the obvious ones, just not obviously so) consequences aren't so important for me. I care more that there's a fun setting that hangs together under at least a cursory inspection rather than a fully-detailed setting that's no fun to play in (or is just real life).



In Fate it is possible to sprint with a missing leg because the designers forgot to put in all the rules (which can be easily extrapolated). In short, significant damage or consequences is expressed as temporary negative Aspects, which work as Aspects normally do, which includes allowing you to do stuff. Now the rules never spell out that if an Aspect, which is always true, would logically stop you from doing something then you lose permission to do it, you can only work it out by looking at the rules for permissions. Thus, RAW, a consequence does not hinder you at all unless someone spends a Fate Point to invoke it, although the designers have specified this is not how the rules are supposed to work.

In Legends of the Wulin you are explicitly allowed to run across the rooftops with both your legs broken, you just take a penalty unless you work the negative condition into your actions. Which on the one hand can lead to more awesome or hilarity if you do work it into your narration (I go into a handstand, and then with a mixture of throwing my body, grabbing dangling ropes, and knowledge of the wind, chase the fleeing villain), on the other hand trying to wield your sword with all your limbs and your lower jaw missing only gives you massive penalties.

Are either of those systems simulationist at all? Do they make the claim that the rules mimic the fiction? I know FATE doesn't even try to, so shouldn't the player have to show why running without a leg is no harder (rather than the reverse)? That is, the fiction constrains the mechanics not vice versa in such systems. But yes, they should have included such rules if they included other rules of similar type (different negative aspects). Being comprehensive is hard. But doing it half-way is no good either. Either leave it open-ended ("if you have an impairment, figure out how it affects the scene") or be comprehensive (a la GURPS/Rolemaster).

Anymage
2017-10-12, 02:16 PM
Unless I'm completely mistaken, even if it doesn't allow for physical time travel it violates causality due to how information works. Physical time travel is slightly easier to set up and much more reliable if you have portals and relativistic travel.

But yeah, a good reason for limiting your science fiction games to the solar system is so the physicist at the table doesn't grind the game to a halt by exploiting the FTL device somehow. If you're lucky they'll only do it once, if you're unlucky they'll do it in five different ways.

The real issue is that the very idea of "simultaneous" depends on your speed. Similar to other relativistic wonkiness, two people can't necessarily agree that two events happened at the same time, or even which happened before the other. This isn't just an artifact of light taking time to get to the observer, it's part of spacetime not giving a toss about our intuitions. The only thing two observers can agree on is that if they work out some equations, they can agree on something called the event's spacetime interval.

Due to the math, while it's possible for you to watch a FTL object that still goes forwards in time, there exists some perspective that will see that trajectory as going back in time. If you want to waste a good chunk of the day, make your head hurt, and maybe get a little closer to making sense of it, obligatory wiki link (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spacetime).

Although the digression brings up an interesting point. I'm willing to look the other way if the way the game plays isn't too jarring compared to what's claimed. What stands out to me more are things like how WoW spent many expansions saying that they were working hard to make triage healing a thing, only for healers to wind up spamming their big heals shortly after. Or how older D&D talked a good game about being a low magic world ... where magic items where everywhere (partially to incentivize players with more loot, more so that their enemies could have their math work out), and where every mid-sized settlement had at least a mid-level caster to break out in case of player shenanigans.

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-12, 03:10 PM
The real issue is that the very idea of "simultaneous" depends on your speed. Similar to other relativistic wonkiness, two people can't necessarily agree that two events happened at the same time, or even which happened before the other. This isn't just an artifact of light taking time to get to the observer, it's part of spacetime not giving a toss about our intuitions. The only thing two observers can agree on is that if they work out some equations, they can agree on something called the event's spacetime interval.

Due to the math, while it's possible for you to watch a FTL object that still goes forwards in time, there exists some perspective that will see that trajectory as going back in time. If you want to waste a good chunk of the day, make your head hurt, and maybe get a little closer to making sense of it, obligatory wiki link (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spacetime).

Although the digression brings up an interesting point. I'm willing to look the other way if the way the game plays isn't too jarring compared to what's claimed. What stands out to me more are things like how WoW spent many expansions saying that they were working hard to make triage healing a thing, only for healers to wind up spamming their big heals shortly after. Or how older D&D talked a good game about being a low magic world ... where magic items where everywhere (partially to incentivize players with more loot, more so that their enemies could have their math work out), and where every mid-sized settlement had at least a mid-level caster to break out in case of player shenanigans.


Side note: I have a PhD in Physics (Computational Quantum Chemistry). I've done the math for FTL mechanics. It doesn't just break simultaneity, it breaks a whole bunch of normal principles. Basically, if FTL is possible (without games like warping space-time) we end up having to change a lot of our basic equations of reality. Travelling in normal space at v > c makes a bunch of things go complex (as in "have imaginary components"). That's why I say that it's better to leave real-world physics out of things beyond the surface. Otherwise, bad things happen.


I agree about the jarring-ness of claims that aren't met at all (or are anti-met). I don't like when systems claim "it's low magic" but casters are everywhere and magic items can be bought in every store (or are absolutely required to make the math work). That's why I like 5e's bounded accuracy, which doesn't require magic items for balance. I don't play low magic, but...

And yeah, WoW did a bad job of making heals even more boring and annoying than it was. WoW has all sorts of numerical problems. Shows that theorycraft balancing is an unstable equilibrium.

Cosi
2017-10-12, 03:20 PM
I don't like when systems claim "it's low magic" but casters are everywhere and magic items can be bought in every store (or are absolutely required to make the math work).

I think this is to some degree due to a lack of agreement on what "low magic" means. Does it mean that there is a small amount of magic, or that magic is not very effective? Because I think you can argue that both of those are "low magic", but if you expect one the other will be quite jarring.

BRC
2017-10-12, 04:05 PM
Low Magic could mean that magic is rare, weak, or both.

In a Mundane World, you want to go from one town to another, you hitch some mules up to a cart, hire some dudes with swords to protect you from bandits, and set off.

In a "Low Magic" World, you hitch some mules to a cart, hire a dude with a sword, and a dude who can cast Magic Missile, and set off.
Magic exists, but it doesn't dramatically change out things work. A Magic Sword is just a Sword, but better at being a sword. Magic Missiles are nice, but they don't dramatically reshape the battlefield.

In a "Low Magic" world you hitch some mules to a cart, hire some dudes with swords, and set out. Meanwhile, a hundred miles away, there is a single Wizard capable of wiping out you, your cart, your mule, and your bodyguards in the blink of an eye.


Part of the problem with "Magic is Rare" settings, especially in RPGs, is that often Magic, as rare as it is, IS available to the PC's, who can choose to play as one of the very few magic users, Which means that while Magic may be Rare, the PC's are constantly exposed to it, so it doesn't FEEL rare, especially since players often gravitate towards all the shiny things you can do with Magic. Also, whether it's a DM or an Author, they don't put Magic in the setting unless they want to USE it, so the PCs/Protagonists often run into magic pretty frequently, and without spending much time with the rest of the world, the rarity of Magic doesn't quite come across.

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-12, 04:36 PM
I think this is to some degree due to a lack of agreement on what "low magic" means. Does it mean that there is a small amount of magic, or that magic is not very effective? Because I think you can argue that both of those are "low magic", but if you expect one the other will be quite jarring.


Low Magic could mean that magic is rare, weak, or both.

In a Mundane World, you want to go from one town to another, you hitch some mules up to a cart, hire some dudes with swords to protect you from bandits, and set off.

In a "Low Magic" World, you hitch some mules to a cart, hire a dude with a sword, and a dude who can cast Magic Missile, and set off.
Magic exists, but it doesn't dramatically change out things work. A Magic Sword is just a Sword, but better at being a sword. Magic Missiles are nice, but they don't dramatically reshape the battlefield.

In a "Low Magic" world you hitch some mules to a cart, hire some dudes with swords, and set out. Meanwhile, a hundred miles away, there is a single Wizard capable of wiping out you, your cart, your mule, and your bodyguards in the blink of an eye.


Part of the problem with "Magic is Rare" settings, especially in RPGs, is that often Magic, as rare as it is, IS available to the PC's, who can choose to play as one of the very few magic users, Which means that while Magic may be Rare, the PC's are constantly exposed to it, so it doesn't FEEL rare, especially since players often gravitate towards all the shiny things you can do with Magic. Also, whether it's a DM or an Author, they don't put Magic in the setting unless they want to USE it, so the PCs/Protagonists often run into magic pretty frequently, and without spending much time with the rest of the world, the rarity of Magic doesn't quite come across.

A clarifying distinction I've made in the past is between the prevalence of powerful spell-casters and the prevalence of magic items. There can be a high-spell-caster world (where individual spellcasters are strong or common) but with few magic items. Vice versa is rarer (in my experience). Or both can be rare.

I put together a graph showing this (and trying to roughly place the D&D settings I'm familiar with on this grid). If I were going to remake this, I'd label the horizontal axis "Presence of Powerful Spell-casters" instead of "Presence of Magic":

http://www.admiralbenbo.org/images/magic-levels.jpg

I think that to be clear we have to specify both dimensions. If we want a low-magic game, we'll also need a system that can handle it (doesn't depend on magic items to keep math going, doesn't assume that all high-power creatures cast spells, etc).

My own setting is medium-high casters, medium-low items. Casters of 1st and 2nd level spells are, if not common, at least not rare. 3-5 are nation-level (maybe 10-15 per medium country), and 6th+ are legendary. Items require a portion of an intelligent soul to make, and so are most commonly found in dungeons/ruins. New custom items are very few and far between (and usually require rare components to make). No magic item economy (magic-marts, etc) exists.

Anonymouswizard
2017-10-12, 04:57 PM
Just remember that past a point 'powerful spellcasters' becomes a superhero game, and 'common magic items' just gives you technology.

Of the two I'm much more likely to do the latter, and I'm considering it for a Fate game using the Aether Sea setting. Actual casters who dabble in magic or focus on a part of it are rare, but weak magic items are relatively common. Most people carry a wand of fire or lightning as their sidearm, for extra money your clothes can be enchanted as armour, and most Aethercraft come with turret mounted staffs rather than windows to for spells and arrows out of. It's all got to the point where yes, it for look like a standard space opera except for the flavouring, but there's some things easier in this setting than in my science fiction settings.

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-12, 05:03 PM
Just remember that past a point 'powerful spellcasters' becomes a superhero game, and 'common magic items' just gives you technology.

Of the two I'm much more likely to do the latter, and I'm considering it for a Fate game using the Aether Sea setting. Actual casters who dabble in magic or focus on a part of it are rare, but weak magic items are relatively common. Most people carry a wand of fire or lightning as their sidearm, for extra money your clothes can be enchanted as armour, and most Aethercraft come with turret mounted staffs rather than windows to for spells and arrows out of. It's all got to the point where yes, it for look like a standard space opera except for the flavouring, but there's some things easier in this setting than in my science fiction settings.

Right. Arthur C Clarke's dictum (and the corollary). I can see the advantages of doing space opera "honestly" with magic instead of hand-waved technology.

Cosi
2017-10-12, 05:06 PM
I disagree somewhat. People do care about the aesthetics of their settings, and there will be differences in appeal between "Iron Man" and "Iron Man, but everything is magic". Also, it's definitely possible to get a setting with ubiquitous magic that doesn't feel like a modern setting -- the key is to not have magic exactly replicated the exact technologies of the industrial revolution in the exact order they emerged.

Honest Tiefling
2017-10-12, 05:14 PM
That's why I feel like calling it flavoring isn't far off the mark. Mechanics will decide a lot of tone, but so does the little aesthetic touches. Much like how in a pasta dish you need to make sure the pasta is of good quality and make sure it's cooked, but if you substitute cheddar for parmesan and chili powder for oregano...That's a pretty big difference, even if the pasta itself is unchanged.

So magic for technology can be the same mechanically in a lot of ways, but probably isn't going to convince sci-fi fans to enjoy it if fantasy isn't their thing.

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-12, 05:22 PM
I disagree somewhat. People do care about the aesthetics of their settings, and there will be differences in appeal between "Iron Man" and "Iron Man, but everything is magic". Also, it's definitely possible to get a setting with ubiquitous magic that doesn't feel like a modern setting -- the key is to not have magic exactly replicated the exact technologies of the industrial revolution in the exact order they emerged.


That's why I feel like calling it flavoring isn't far off the mark. Mechanics will decide a lot of tone, but so does the little aesthetic touches. Much like how in a pasta dish you need to make sure the pasta is of good quality and make sure it's cooked, but if you substitute cheddar for parmesan and chili powder for oregano...That's a pretty big difference, even if the pasta itself is unchanged.

So magic for technology can be the same mechanically in a lot of ways, but probably isn't going to convince sci-fi fans to enjoy it if fantasy isn't their thing.

Agreed. The aesthetics are significantly different unless the designer took extreme (and probably convoluted) measures to make it just a rename-job.

Sort of on topic--
I'm blanking on the name of the series and author, but I read a science fantasy series where one side uses normal tech + passive magic (more like Jedi without the flashier powers) and the other uses magitek (including space-ships and magical AI) and more direct magic (these were more ritual in nature).

Cosi
2017-10-12, 05:56 PM
I'm blanking on the name of the series and author, but I read a science fantasy series where one side uses normal tech + passive magic (more like Jedi without the flashier powers) and the other uses magitek (including space-ships and magical AI) and more direct magic (these were more ritual in nature).

Maybe Weber's Hell's Gate (https://www.amazon.com/Hells-Gate-BOOK-MULTIVERSE-Multiverse/dp/1416555412)? I know it's "magic" versus "tech + psionics", but I don't think the magic goes up to space-ships and AI (though I haven't read it).

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-12, 06:02 PM
Maybe Weber's Hell's Gate (https://www.amazon.com/Hells-Gate-BOOK-MULTIVERSE-Multiverse/dp/1416555412)? I know it's "magic" versus "tech + psionics", but I don't think the magic goes up to space-ships and AI (though I haven't read it).

No, that wasn't it. This is more mystic. As I remember, the more Jedi mages were called adepts while the others were called circle mages (maybe?). The basic tech was similar, and the two sides could learn the other way but usually didn't die to philosophy. I believe the author was female, but I could be wrong there.

Anonymouswizard
2017-10-13, 02:57 AM
I disagree somewhat. People do care about the aesthetics of their settings, and there will be differences in appeal between "Iron Man" and "Iron Man, but everything is magic". Also, it's definitely possible to get a setting with ubiquitous magic that doesn't feel like a modern setting -- the key is to not have magic exactly replicated the exact technologies of the industrial revolution in the exact order they emerged.

Well yes, but that doesn't mean you can't have something similar. I'm purposefully avoiding an identical industrial revolution anyway, there's still a massive boost in manufacturing and agriculture but I'm working out an alternative reason for it than mechanical mass production (which exists in the setting I'm creating, but only appeared recently).


the two sides could learn the other way but usually didn't die to philosophy.

they finally made philosophy safe?

Frozen_Feet
2017-10-13, 03:03 AM
Planescape and Old World of Darkness are some of very few setting I know of where philosophy can directly kill you. :smallamused:

PhoenixPhyre
2017-10-15, 06:09 PM
No, that wasn't it. This is more mystic. As I remember, the more Jedi mages were called adepts while the others were called circle mages (maybe?). The basic tech was similar, and the two sides could learn the other way but usually didn't die due to philosophy. I believe the author was female, but I could be wrong there.

I found it! It's the Mageworlds (https://www.amazon.com/Price-Stars-Book-One-Mageworlds-ebook) series (7 main-line, 3 prequels) by Debra Doyle and James D Macdonald. I may have to go back and read them again, see if they've held up. It's been a long time...