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  1. - Top - End - #1
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    Default Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    In my Star Wars rpg, I am a scientist working in a lab on an Outer Rim planet. What am I researching or trying to create?

    Rules are

    1. No teleportation
    2. No time travel
    3. No matter replication

    I'm not trying to make Star Wars like Star Trek. In the canon Disney universe, the first and second are thought to be "impossible" and the third one is a plot hole that may or may not exist in some form. What's something I could be working on in a galaxy where faster than light travel is commonplace and advanced artificial intelligence is nothing special?

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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    Quote Originally Posted by Maximum77 View Post
    In my Star Wars rpg, I am a scientist working in a lab on an Outer Rim planet. What am I researching or trying to create?

    Rules are

    1. No teleportation
    2. No time travel
    3. No matter replication

    I'm not trying to make Star Wars like Star Trek. In the canon Disney universe, the first and second are thought to be "impossible" and the third one is a plot hole that may or may not exist in some form. What's something I could be working on in a galaxy where faster than light travel is commonplace and advanced artificial intelligence is nothing special?
    Ooooh! That means that you can be researching any of the goodies from the novels that are no longer Canon. I'd go for the Sun Crusher, gravity manipulation, a la Centerpoint Station, or biological research on unique species like the ysalamiri.

    You could also be researching improvements to existing tech. Faster cloning, more deadly assassin droids, better fuel for turbo lasers, stronger micro-thrusters, etc.

    New ideas would be great too. hyperspace sensors, anomaly grenades, neuro-cortical stimulators, gamma projectors, trididium armor plating, barometric polymers, argon resistant visors, a cambium-action blaster, bio-molecular superconductors, isobaric manipulators, or any other sciencey sounding garbage.

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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    reducing the level of sass in droids
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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    *stellar kyber/kaiburr/however-you-spell-it mining tech

    *Cybernetic telepresence. Teleportation may be impossible but they have the tech to make cybernetic limbs that work ans respond as good as real ones and the technology to comminucate over long distances. combine them and you have something that's just as good as teleportation if not in some circumstances better
    Last edited by Bohandas; 2017-11-09 at 01:32 AM.
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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    You could be researching the reproduction of a specific plant that just grows on that planet. For some reason, it refuses to reproduce when transplanted elsewhere.

    You could be researching supernova from other galaxies. Since you have hyperspace travel, scientists can report that a supernova has happened and then go to another location in hyperspace so they don't miss the first light of the nova.

    You could be researching processes to make droids more intelligent so they can do useful science themselves.

    You could be researching claims made by some that spending too much time near shields is unhealthy, so you have lots of small rodents near shields of different strength with similar control groups without shields near their cages.

    Not all science is glamorous, the vast majority is very mundane.

    (There's a secondary minor issue with this being the Star Wars universe which is that is a universe where the tech level seems to be nearly 100% stagnant except for better weapons. This is never really explained.)
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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    Quote Originally Posted by JoshuaZ View Post
    (There's a secondary minor issue with this being the Star Wars universe which is that is a universe where the tech level seems to be nearly 100% stagnant except for better weapons. This is never really explained.)
    This was explained in various ways in the Legends canon (though the OP is using the Disney canon). Notably that many essential technologic principles did not originate with the current humanoid spacer culture that dominates the galaxy but with the pre-Republic Rakata civilization and the Republic was never able to really advance beyond them in a consistent fashion in large part because they were reverse engineered from Force-based methods.

    To the OP, a useful framing question is: who are you working for? Very few scientists are truly freelance. In the Outer Rim few will have academic backing - due to the general lack of universities - so corporate sponsorship is most likely. Most Outer Rim Corporations are interested in resource extraction - the Outer Rim is a colonial frontier after all - so the focus of research is probably related to that in some fashion.

    Also, its useful to consider party role. In Star Wars games a 'scientist' character most commonly fills the role of party medic. If this is the case, then your character is most likely researching something biology related, such as adapting non-native lifeforms to new plants for use in colonization or researching emergent diseases in colonial populations - plague was a significant feature of the Legends continuity.
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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    the obvious answer would be researching force artifacts. something that can be observed but is incomprehensible for the vast majority of the galaxy, a convenient macguffin, not to mention most of them are unique.
    Last edited by Jackalias; 2017-11-12 at 11:41 PM.

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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    Quote Originally Posted by Maximum77 View Post
    In my Star Wars rpg, I am a scientist working in a lab on an Outer Rim planet. What am I researching or trying to create?

    Rules are

    1. No teleportation
    2. No time travel
    3. No matter replication

    I'm not trying to make Star Wars like Star Trek. In the canon Disney universe, the first and second are thought to be "impossible" and the third one is a plot hole that may or may not exist in some form. What's something I could be working on in a galaxy where faster than light travel is commonplace and advanced artificial intelligence is nothing special?
    One thing to remember is that Star Wars is a Fantasy Setting with SciFi trapings.
    That means when you think about the role of a scientist in this Setting, think Fantasy, not SciFi.

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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    In the movies the only technology that ever seems to advance is bigger guns, so maybe weapons; apparently that's what everyone else is working on.
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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    I believe that in the star war expanded universe there was engines that made energy from nothing(due to how they do not want to have to manage fuels) which would mean that if there is ways to turn energy into matter(which might be possible in the star wars universe if physics is invariant by translation since it is supposed to happen in the real universe but very far away and a long time ago) then you could create unlimited amounts of matter with enough time.
    However the star wars expanded universe had a lot of silly things(like how the dark emperor is able to create black holes)
    Whenever the generators can run forever or not is impossible to guess in the Disney star wars.
    Last edited by noob; 2017-11-15 at 03:17 AM.

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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    Develop proper obstetrics.

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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    Quote Originally Posted by VoxRationis View Post
    Develop proper obstetrics.
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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    I think moisture farming could use some improvements. If the process was less work intensive desert planets could have more people working other jobs, like breeding cubed pigs (which you bioengineered), or forming a local water cycle out of imported water (using nabooforming techniques you developed) which would really help their economy.
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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    Terraforming techniques. Lots of Star Wars worlds are barely habitable, you could be researching better methods of terraforming.
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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    Quote Originally Posted by lightningcat View Post
    Terraforming techniques. Lots of Star Wars worlds are barely habitable, you could be researching better methods of terraforming.
    Except there's not really an economic motive for terraforming. While lots of Star Wars worlds are barely habitable there are tons of habitable worlds that could host far larger populations (and also a number of ridiculously overpopulated urban dystopias). It's much easier and cheaper to find some new bountiful world and dump billions on it than it is to try and terraform. Also note that worlds that appear as barely habitable to humans may be perfectly fine for someone else. Example, in TOR you go to Hoth, which humans can't stand but the Ortolans are quite eager to colonize and the Talz appear to think is some kind of paradise.
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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    Quote Originally Posted by Maximum77 View Post
    In my Star Wars rpg, I am a scientist...What am I researching or trying to create?
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    Serious Answer: Anything real-world scientists would research (e.g., astrophysics, genetics)? Or, anything universe specific (e.g., how the Force works, how to create a force field for lightsabers, duplicating the Force, how to travel faster through hyperspace)? Or, basic building blocks that went into pre-existing technology? For instance, maybe the Death Star technology was originally the equivalent of a futuristic Large Hadron Collider that was later co-opted for nefarious means.

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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    Quote Originally Posted by Zombimode View Post
    One thing to remember is that Star Wars is a Fantasy Setting with SciFi trapings.
    That means when you think about the role of a scientist in this Setting, think Fantasy, not SciFi.
    As a tangential aside to this, why do you think it is that Star Wars always gets called out on the matter of actually being fantasy rather than science-fiction, but Star Trek rarely gets called out on it despite being even worse in this regard?

    Think about it. The number of people with supernatural powers in the original Star Wars trilogy can be counted on one hand (Luke, Yoda, Obi-Wan, Vader, and Palpatine. That's exactly five.), but in Star Trek you can't swing a dead cat without hitting a deity (Apollo, Charile X, The Q, Trelane, the Organians, the Pah-Wraiths, the Wormhole Aliens, etc) or a psychic (Spock, Tuvok, Diana Troy, etc) or a spirit (Trelane, Redjak, etc) or a creature from another plane of existence (The Q, Species 8472, etc.)

    EDIT:
    Plus let's also not ignore the fact that First Contact was essentially about someone trying to conquer the world with an army of zombies
    Last edited by Bohandas; 2017-12-01 at 05:27 AM.
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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    Quote Originally Posted by Bohandas View Post
    As a tangential aside to this, why do you think it is that Star Wars always gets called out on the matter of actually being fantasy rather than science-fiction, but Star Trek rarely gets called out on it despite being even worse in this regard?

    Think about it. The number of people with supernatural powers in the original Star Wars trilogy can be counted on one hand (Luke, Yoda, Obi-Wan, Vader, and Palpatine. That's exactly five.), but in Star Trek you can't swing a dead cat without hitting a deity (Apollo, Charile X, The Q, Trelane, the Organians, the Pah-Wraiths, the Wormhole Aliens, etc) or a psychic (Spock, Tuvok, Diana Troy, etc) or a spirit (Trelane, Redjak, etc) or a creature from another plane of existence (The Q, Species 8472, etc.)
    Thats not a useful metric for differenting Fantasy and SciFi. Both SciFi and Fantasy is fiction. That it includes Things that don't exist in the real world is part of that.

    The difference between SciFi and Fantasy lies in the Outlook and themes of the stories told. SciFi is rooted in the real world. It is concerned wíth questions that People here and now have about what is to come. Thus the future is the natural Setting for a SciFi Story. The method is to extrapolate from the present and then add additional ingrediences to formulate the desired "what if" Scenario.

    Fantasy on the other Hand does not concern it self with questions about the future of mankind. That is not to say that Fantasy can not be about important questions. Our very own Rich Burlew once expressed a Notion that fiction that doesn't tackle issues of our present existence is pure escapism and he finds no worth in writing it (implying that OotS is about issues that People in the here and now are facing). But this is optional for Fantasy. Exploring a set of conditions and the resulting intricacies without concerns of their realworld applicability and for the excersise alone is a hallmark of Fantasy. A classic would be the "What if" Scenario - set in the past. Using a Tokienesque Setting is another effective method for framing a Fantasy Story: it Severs neatly the Connection tó our present and our Futur by making the Setting "not our world anyway".


    Applying this understanding on StarWars and StarTrek we see that StarWars clearly a Fantasy Story and Star Treck mostly SciFi.

    Star Wars: First it is set in "A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away". If that isn't enough, Star Wars does not tackle any questions about the future of mankind. Elements like AI and FTL are just there. They exist, they form the backdrop of the Setting, but they are not discussed in their Relations to our Society. They can't since our Society is not even present in the star wars universe. Instead different Society is created and the narrative follows the consequences and Problems of this other Society. Star Wars is clearly a Fantasy Story.

    Star Trek on the other Hand IS set in our future. The Society of the Setting is defined in relation to the present (that is a necessary condition for a Utopia), sometime it is even defined in-universe in relation to the present. The other Elements like FTL and AI are part of this "what if" look on our future. Some of the recurring themes of Star Trek: the nature of Life, what it means to be conscious, and the applicability of rights derived by such qualities, are discussed with essentially the same asumptions we in the present have about these Topics*.
    So, the General Outlook of Star Trek is that of SciFi.

    Now, moreso then Star Wars, Star Trek is more then one Story. Each episode and movie could be seen as its own story. And thanks to beeing written by a large number of different authors it is not surprising that no all Star trek stories would qualify as SciFi. The majority of Deep Space Nine (especially the Story Arc episodes) are prettty much Fantasy: they explore the intricacies and political interations of the fictional world for those interactions itself and with no concern for our present. That the same world can be used to tell a SciFi Story is irrelevant.
    Many TNG episodes on the other Hand are clearly SciFi.


    Please note two Points here:

    1. This is not about "good" and "bad", or "enjoyable" and "not enjoyable". I love Star Wars, I love Star Trek. I enjoy DS9 for its Story Arc etc.
    2. At no point my distinction between Fantasy and SciFi relies on supernatural Elements. That is the reason I have not touched Jedi or the Things you mentioned for Star Trek.


    And, as a closing remark: the way I'm using the Terms here is hardly universal. There are other models of categorizing works of fiction. One model I'm also familiar with is to categorize fiction into "speculative fiction" and "non-speculative fiction" and use the Terms "Fantasy" and "SciFi" only to describe aesthetics (or trappings).With this model in my undestanding Star Wars would be non-speculative fiction with SciFi aesthetics. Star Trek would be mostly speculative fiction with SciFi aesthetics and anything from Asimov would be purely speculative fiction with SciFi aesthics.

    *There is a difference in questioning, say, the nature of the Soul from a persepctive that Matches our own, or from a persepective that includes additional author-defined rules about the nature of the Soul. For instance a Story about the nature of the Soul set in Setting using the classical D&D ontology has no bearing on real-world questions about the nature of the Soul because the results are influenced by rules the author made up.

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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    Quote Originally Posted by Bohandas View Post
    As a tangential aside to this, why do you think it is that Star Wars always gets called out on the matter of actually being fantasy rather than science-fiction, but Star Trek rarely gets called out on it despite being even worse in this regard?

    Think about it. The number of people with supernatural powers in the original Star Wars trilogy can be counted on one hand (Luke, Yoda, Obi-Wan, Vader, and Palpatine. That's exactly five.), but in Star Trek you can't swing a dead cat without hitting a deity (Apollo, Charile X, The Q, Trelane, the Organians, the Pah-Wraiths, the Wormhole Aliens, etc) or a psychic (Spock, Tuvok, Diana Troy, etc) or a spirit (Trelane, Redjak, etc) or a creature from another plane of existence (The Q, Species 8472, etc.)
    In addition to Zombimode's excellent points, there's also an important difference in ethos. At no point in Star Trek is there any doubt in the overarching narrative that the superpowerful deity like beings are actually powerful or very strange aliens (the one real exception is that the Bajorans believe that the beings in the wormhole are deities but even Sisko who is their Emissary doesn't think that). In contrast, the Force is generally inherently mystical, least until Episode One where they added Midichlorians. But even that shows the difference in approach; fans were furious about Midichlorians, but when Beverly Crusher mentions specific proteins and molecules associated with telepathy, fans don't really mind at all. Similarly, when the right sort of technobabble particle beam turns out to be fatal to the wormhole aliens because of their nature, no fans had any issue with it. Star Trek is ultimately an explicable universe, and that helps push it much further into the scifi category.

    A tangent on the tangent: The lines between scifi and fantasy are very blurry, and many categories in life have inherently blurry boundaries (heck even for whether or not two creatures are the same species is a really difficult problem), and it isn't necessarily productive to have conversations about such blurry boundaries because they often say more about one's personal intuition than much else. In so far as it is useful, it is important then to acknowledge that one can have many different aspects some of which point in one direction and some of which point in another, and it may then be helpful to then see what direction most of the weight lies.
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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    Quote Originally Posted by Bohandas View Post
    As a tangential aside to this, why do you think it is that Star Wars always gets called out on the matter of actually being fantasy rather than science-fiction, but Star Trek rarely gets called out on it despite being even worse in this regard?
    In fantasy, the hero beats the villain by being morally superior: braver, more honorable, more loyal, less corruptible. Luke beats Vader and the Emperor by not giving in to fear and anger, by choosing forgiveness over revenge. The Fellowship beats Sauron through determination, loyalty to each other, and resisting temptation and corruption.

    In SciFi, the hero beats the villain by being smarter and coming up with a cunning plan or a new technological exploit. The crew of the Enterprise defeat the enemy by realigning the deflector array to reverse the polarity. They cleverly exploit a loophole in a treaty or regulation to avert a diplomatic disaster. They think more moves ahead in the 3D chess game.

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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    The fact that we've been making jokes about how there are no scientists in Star Wars probably has something to do with how we doubt its science-fiction status. The Star Wars media depict a setting where sentient robots can be created trivially, where faster-than-light ships are no rarer than big shipping trucks in our world, and you can carry some sort of plasma or laser projector that makes a stable, non-atmosphere-igniting blade that can melt-cut through feet of solid metal in seconds, and has a power supply that is basically inexhaustible, yet nobody develops new technology in thousands of years in any way more meaningful than "make it bigger," machine sentience is rarely imbued into anything other than conveniently human-sized robots (all those point defense turrets are manned, rather than automated for better efficiency), and those miracle laser projectors are some of the oldest technology of it all. To top it off, in an industrial setting with all this technology, there are still gaps that allow prominent personages with lots of money and connections to die in childbirth. No explanation is ever given for this stagnation. This puts the focus of the work on interpersonal relationships, high drama, and the ways of fate and the mystical Force.

    In Star Trek, by contrast, we see a world where science definitely develops and is used. The different series of the show depict different time periods, and within a literal human generation, they develop new technologies that radically transform life. TOS didn't have replicators, but TNG did, and that makes a huge difference in what the crew of the respective Enterprises can accomplish. Newer ships are faster, sleeker, more comfortable, yet are fully combat-capable beyond their predecessors.

    Moreover, to make a Star Trek joke in the middle of a comparison, Trek has data while Wars has lore. If you want to learn something in Trek, you can ask the ship's computer and it will readily tell you everything your civilization has learned about the subject. If you seek knowledge in Star Wars, you have to travel to wizened old masters in secluded places who answer mostly in riddles and koans. (The Jedi Archives are little-covered, and are not portrayed as effective in their single film appearance.)
    Last edited by VoxRationis; 2017-11-30 at 02:11 AM.

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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    Quote Originally Posted by VoxRationis View Post
    The fact that we've been making jokes about how there are no scientists in Star Wars probably has something to do with how we doubt its science-fiction status. The Star Wars media depict a setting where sentient robots can be created trivially, where faster-than-light ships are no rarer than big shipping trucks in our world, and you can carry some sort of plasma or laser projector that makes a stable, non-atmosphere-igniting blade that can melt-cut through feet of solid metal in seconds, and has a power supply that is basically inexhaustible, yet nobody develops new technology in thousands of years in any way more meaningful than "make it bigger," machine sentience is rarely imbued into anything other than conveniently human-sized robots (all those point defense turrets are manned, rather than automated for better efficiency), and those miracle laser projectors are some of the oldest technology of it all. To top it off, in an industrial setting with all this technology, there are still gaps that allow prominent personages with lots of money and connections to die in childbirth. No explanation is ever given for this stagnation. This puts the focus of the work on interpersonal relationships, high drama, and the ways of fate and the mystical Force.

    In Star Trek, by contrast, we see a world where science definitely develops and is used. The different series of the show depict different time periods, and within a literal human generation, they develop new technologies that radically transform life. TOS didn't have replicators, but TNG did, and that makes a huge difference in what the crew of the respective Enterprises can accomplish. Newer ships are faster, sleeker, more comfortable, yet are fully combat-capable beyond their predecessors.

    Moreover, to make a Star Trek joke in the middle of a comparison, Trek has data while Wars has lore. If you want to learn something in Trek, you can ask the ship's computer and it will readily tell you everything your civilization has learned about the subject. If you seek knowledge in Star Wars, you have to travel to wizened old masters in secluded places who answer mostly in riddles and koans. (The Jedi Archives are little-covered, and are not portrayed as effective in their single film appearance.)
    These are all really good points, especially the last paragraph. Luke Skywalker is someone that Rey thinks is a "myth" even though the events he was involved in happened only 20-30 years before.

    Another related thought: Part of what is different is also the sorts of stories that are told. Not only is Star Wars full of destined chosen ones (ok, Star Trek has the Sisko but even that is interpreted and played with by DS9), but they occur in families. To a large extent, Star Wars is the story of the Skywalker family which is full of special destined people. In contrast, when they did Star Trek: The Next Generation, despite its name, no one on the crew is descended from an original series character. Picard isn't Kirk's son or grandson, or even at all related.
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    Default Re: Scientist in the Star Wars universe

    To re-rail (is that a term?) the thread:

    It would be an interesting if the scientist was studying how midichlorians actively fight nano-technology, in the same way a white cell fights against a virus.

    It would make for some interesting in-universe theory while providing an answer for the relative stagnation of technology.
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