Science and Magic

[badger2305]

One of the great aspects of D&D is that you can add whatever you want to the game, right? But I'm reminded of the article the James Ward wrote in The Dragon #1, where he talks about the mix of magic and science:

I believe it is a real mistake to think that just because there is
a world created by D & D type thinking where magic and magical
monsters exist, there is no room for technological type devices
and all they imply. Many times while discussing rules with other
judges and players I have heard statements like “magic and its
uses denies science and its uses.”

Mind you, in the rest of the article Ward seems to be talking about science fictional elements (what might be referred to in GURPS as Science! skill related stuff), more than the use of the scientific method and technological development from a medieval base. But the starting point for discussion is worth paying attention to.

How much science fictional element can you add to a setting before it gets in the way? Do you prefer the isolated "dungeon" of Expedition to the Barrier Peaks, or would you allow on-going elements of this stuff in your game? Can you have a "sword and blaster" game and still keep it as D&D?

[Zulgyan]

I usually incorporate science in my games in two ways:

1. Things that are left abandoned and ruined for about 1000 years ago. This may be stuff found in dungeons, or ruins lost in the wilderness. This things are in bad state and usually not fully functional.

2. This case is much more rare: Some kind of fully functial robot or small spaceship arrives from an outer planet to fullful a special mision or is just totally lost and arrived to the planet by chance.


Science is not normally sold in the open market but very rearly some special vendors might have something an adventurer sold them.

In the campaign about 1 out of 5 "magic items" or "special treasures" are high-tech.

[sham]

In the past I've taken a few different approaches. In my younger Arduin-inspired days, we had Technos and Engineers, who belonged to guilds which closely guarded their tech secrets. As a player advanced in levels, he could learn how to use higher tech devices. We had some very detailed ironmongery and explosion rules, but things tended to get out of control a bit.

Later, I removed such rampant tech and favored a more S3 type approach, with occasional futuristic or ancient civ tech encounters or adventures, but all of it was essentially fancy wands, dressed up like guns, with limited ammo/energy (charges).

Most recently, I favored a pure Greyhawk type approach, dubbed Classic AD&D, using nothing more than the three hard covers.

Now, I am approaching my current campaign setting with very light touches of tech, and all of it extremely rare and deep within the underworld. I am considering more tech elements than actual items, ala Gamma World mutations and the like.

I do believe a "swords and blasters" D&D setting would be great, and really Star Wars could easily be D&D with swords and blasters, and The Force as it's universal magic.

[driver]

I'm fine with blasters, sixguns, robots, Martians, and all that stuff in OD&D. I think the inclusion of that sort of thing is very much in line with the original "kitchen sink"/"spitwad" design philosophy, as well as the way the game was actually played early on.

I don't think there's anything wrong with keeping a consistent S&S, high fantasy, quasi-medieval, or whatever kind of setting tone one likes that would preclude all the high-tech science-fantasy weirdness, but I think that's a later development and not necessarily the default mode for OD&D.

Magic doesn't deny anything unless the referee says it does. My embryonic sword-and-planet influenced campaign will likely feature both magic and "Science!"

[coffee]

I tend to stick to the basic, quasi-medieval setting implied in the rules.

Eberron, for 3.5, with its "magic as science" or "magical steampunk" attitude got a bit ridiculous in my opinion.

It seems to me that each successive edition tries to pull D&D further from it's medieval roots.

* D&D has Plate Mail, a late medieval armor

* AD&D has Full Plate Armor (a later development)

* 3.x has clearly leans toward the Renaissance, where less armor is more the likely. The plate armor extant is so heavy you can barely move, but there are a variety of light armors that work out better in game terms for your character.

* Eberron takes it up to the Industrial Revolution, with trains and skyships and whatnot.


That being said, I don't mind a bit of science (or even Science!), in a "what the heck is this thing?" sort of way. But I really don't want the players to ever be able to rely on science. (Whereas, in a science fiction game, science would be the thing they could rely on.)

And, of course, robots make great opponents, so there will always be room for robots in any D&D I run.

[Thigru Thorkissen]

Apr 30, 2008 9:33:47 GMT -6 coffee said:

That being said, I don't mind a bit of science (or even Science!), in a "what the heck is this thing?" sort of way. But I really don't want the players to ever be able to rely on science. (Whereas, in a science fiction game, science would be the thing they could rely on.)

For me, this is the key. "Science" can be be a part of the game, but it needs to be "super science" to the point that it is essentially like magic--that is, you can make things work, but you can't create them. Thus, no firearms as once their existence is known, they can easily be copied. However, the odd "ray gun" or even weirder stuff (like the cyborg wizards in Thundarr the Barbarian) can work as players can only use (or be a victim of) such technology for awhile before it fails, explodes or goes inert. At some point, the difference between science and magic becomes only a matter of flavor, but that's okay with me.

thigru

[gsvenson]

In our original Blackmoor games we had a Sci Fi element in our games. We had two visits to Blackmoor by space ships, one of which crashed leading to the Temple of the Frog and City of the Gods adventures. At least one of the original players was a 20th century man who had passed into Blackmoor through a dimensional portal who arrived with a revolver, which we called a lightning bolt thrower. Later a number of these became available (strictly controlled by the DM, Dave Arneson).

[jrients]

I use a sprinkling of superscience type stuff in my game, like the time I ran a dungeon that was actually a TARDIS haunted by shoggoths.

[kesher]

I ran a dungeon that was actually a TARDIS haunted by shoggoths.

Okay, now, if that doesn't end up in Fight On!, a grave miscarriage of cosmic justice will have occurred...

[calithena]

Yeah, really. It doesn't get any better than a shoggoth-infested TARDIS. Sounds like it could be Uber High Level too, which one can always use more of...

[driver]

I've considered making the "sword and planet" PCs, at least the initial party, a group of Civil War veterans a la John Carter of Mars.

I've even considered making the players the initial party, as in original Villains and Vigilantes chargen. Hearing your friends rate each other's Intelligence and Charisma is entertaining. Hearing them rate yours is instructive.

[bert]

There was, back in the days when White Dwarf was worth reading, a nice series of articles on space travel for D&D based on the loopily plausible inverse cube law of gravity. This allowed planets to be flying saucer shaped (a bit like discworld) and you could sail of the edge if equipped with airtight armour and a few useful magical adjuncts.

This ended in a fun adventure involving an invasion by tentacled things in tripods and a counter invasion by wizards in pointy hats and soldiers in plate mail.

The whole concept was revisited by TSR with their Spelljammer campaign, but this got a bit too techy IMO.

And let us not forget that one the great inspirations for D&D was Jack Vance - who can forget the amazing tale of Rhialto the Marvellous involving a flying wizard's manse, half a neutron star and Archmagi sozzled on embalming fluid?

When playing AD&D I also allowed the PCs to get hold have ray gun equipped shootouts when facing Cthulhoid monstrosities like Old Ones and Mi Go, but these were just Wands of Lightning more or less.

And then there is Tekumel where the magic wands ARE ray guns, the monsters ARE genetically modified mutants and the dragons ARE laser equipped space fighters (possibly).

[philotomy]

When I was younger, I shunned science or sci-fi elements in D&D. That's no longer the case; I like that kind of thing, now, although not as the dominant element. But the occasional robot, android, crashed spaceship/meteor, ancient ruined city with mysterious tech artifacts, or enclave of psionic sub-creatures worshiping Old Ones from the stars....all of that is just fine.

I've been going through 1e Gamma World and the original Empire of the Petal Throne for inspiration, lately. I've also been reading a lot of sword & planet stuff (Paizo's "Planet Stories" line, and some of my old paperbacks).

[murquhart72]

My campaigns assume a Masters of the Universe approach; in which the world as a whole is Sword & Sorcery, but there's some ancient technology that may be used by characters involving science-fiction elements.

[hackman]

I really like the idea of technology in D & D, not as a total domination of the setting though. I hope that the shoggoth dungeon is printed at some point, that's one great thing about Tunnles and Trolls, Shoggoths are listed in the monster stuff. I was thinking about having a big dungeon with genetically modified animals, dog with bat wings flying around for example. Then it turns out that some scientist with the US Government has contracted the local wizard somehow via dimension travel to do experiments in a lab in the dungeon. Even have soilders with m 16's and stuff. Of course, this would be deep in the labyrinth somewhere.

[Melan]

In my campaigns, high technology has been a steady background element - not something most ordinary denizens encounter in their lives, but common enough that player chatacter types will find them sooner or later. Just like magic, high-tech shouldn't become a stand-in for player creativity, and preserve its special role - say, even if your millieu is a fallen modern civilisation or a planetary romance environment, there should be a reason why lasers and highly advanced war machines don't squeeze out swords and bows.

I have been toying with the idea of a full planetary romance campaign inspired by The Book of SKAITH (and other sources such as Transarctica or, well, the anime CRPG Chrono Trigger), but haven't found an opportunity to run it yet. As a note of caution, it has to be realised that what I have in mind wouldn't feel like "D&D" to most fans. The play style and assumptions of the campaign could be very close to OD&D's (oddly enough, I consider Systema Tartarobasis my most OD&D-esque creation), but I think to feel like the beloved ODD, or even D&D, people want more of the tropes - spellcasting PCs, Tolkienesque races, a "fantasy"-like fantasy world and all that.

[Stonegiant]

Hey Melan have you checked out this game? LINK Go to the what link and go down to The Moons of Zoon link. I have the game and give it a 3-4 out of 6 stars at the very least.

[Melan]

No, I was completely unfamiliar with it. Thank you!

[driver]

I'm posting here so I remember to come back to the thread later. melan, I'm working (off and on) on a heavily sword-and-planet influenced setting for either OD&D or the upcoming Deluxe BRP -- a pastiche of the various "planetary romances," Gamma World, OD&D, Zothique, Dreamlands, Worm Ouroboros, etc. I'm even cribbing from War of the Worlds and the Shaver Mysteries for the mastermind bad guy race, with their torture farms, ray generators, fungal wonderlands, and subterranean sea filled with intelligent goo.

I've posted briefly about it on this board, but maybe I'll do a full "setting blurb."

I'm leaning towards OD&D at this point. I'd love to hear your ideas, as I'm a Leigh Brackett fan, and I think your Wilderlands work is ample evidence that we share many influences.

[driver]

May 13, 2008 23:43:39 GMT -6 Melan said:

I think to feel like the beloved ODD, or even D&D, people want more of the tropes - spellcasting PCs, Tolkienesque races, a "fantasy"-like fantasy world and all that.

I'm a huge fan of several non-standard settings, especially Tekumel, but am often put off by the learning curve for new players. "Standard D&D" is a useful shorthand to get people into the game. But I also like weird stuff. I've been kicking this around a little bit, and decided on a potential kludge.

I believe I'm going to start with a fairly traditional, albeit a bit eldritch and dark, fantasy campaign setting, with tweaked but essentially standard OD&D tropes -- classes, races, magic, and so on. However, at some point in the setting's history, the planet was invaded, War-of-the-Worlds style, by aliens with an affinity for goop and pseudo-scientific gadgets. Humanity won and endured (possibly after a period of alien rule), but there's still pockets of extraterrestrial weirdness out there -- impact craters, flabby mushroom forests, big pools of slurry -- and aliens stalking around here and there.

The "alien" stuff could be isolated in a few locales, or in pockets all over the setting.

So, maybe an alien invasion as the source of the weird tech, slimes, fungi, vermiforms, and spongiforms I love to stuff into fantasy settings. The "science" would function mostly like magic, but would be fairly creepy and non-intuitive for humans -- probably fungus-based. This also provides a reason to have a variety of Tekumel-style alien things slurping around in dark thickets.

This way, I have the "standard" OD&D stuff that players can identify with, with the weirdness and high-tech I get jazzed about.

[badger2305]

May 16, 2008 8:19:51 GMT -6 @driver said:

However, at some point in the setting's history, the planet was invaded, War-of-the-Worlds style, by aliens with an affinity for goop and pseudo-scientific gadgets. Humanity won and endured (possibly after a period of alien rule), but there's still pockets of extraterrestrial weirdness out there -- impact craters, flabby mushroom forests, big pools of slurry -- and aliens stalking around here and there.

Aside from having a vaguely similar idea for using some high-tech and Science! in my own D&D campaign, I was actually thinking about something similar for a Gamma World (Mutant Future?) campaign. The idea sprang from the fact that I have a hard time wrapping my brain around the Gamma World setting (too much Morrow Project as a kid). The cause of civilization's collapse (and in fact for much of what makes the setting what it is) was a war with aliens that went badly. Hmmm. Gotta think about this more.

[driver]

The idea of using alien invasion as an alternate catalyst for collapse in Gamma World is very cool.

I think the original War of the Worlds still holds up very well as inspirational material ... the fluid-sucking WotW Martians with their tripods, heat rays, and alien vegetation carpeting the landscape? Creepy as heck.

I'm cribbing from other sources (the Mythos, Gamma World, Burroughs, Zothique, Mars Attacks!, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, and even the Brothers Grunt) for alien trappings, but WotW will definitely rear its ugly tentacles in my "influence bank."

[badger2305]

May 16, 2008 9:18:03 GMT -6 @driver said:

The idea of using alien invasion as an alternate catalyst for collapse in Gamma World is very cool.

I think the original War of the Worlds still holds up very well as inspirational material ... the fluid-sucking WotW Martians with their tripods, heat rays, and alien vegetation carpeting the landscape? Creepy as heck.

I'm cribbing from other sources (the Mythos, Gamma World, Burroughs, Zothique, Mars Attacks!, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, and even the Brothers Grunt) for alien trappings, but WotW will definitely rear its ugly tentacles in my "influence bank."

I agree completely. If you are going to do that, you might want to crib from other stuff by Wells - his description of tanks in The Land Ironclads might be rather interesting for use in a game somewhere, for example. And don't forget the Tripods series by John Christopher, which is not quite the same as Wells, but definitely inspired by him.

[geoffrey]

Driver, your ideas sound great.

I did something similar with my science-fantasy Carcosa campaign (kind of a hybrid of AD&D and 1st edition Gamma World). As time went on, though, I noticed that the campaign naturally kept tugging in the direction of Gamma World. Recently we've just been playing Gamma World instead.

For science-fantasy campaigns, I prefer Gamma World to D&D with high-tech mixed in. Plus it's so much easier to carry the 46-page GW book around rather than all the assorted A/D&D books that made their way into my Carcosa campaign.

Gamma World: a science-fantasy game in which the "science" consists of high-tech artifacts, and the "fantasy" consists of the mutants.

My next D&D campaign, a Holmes-only campaign, will be pure fantasy with no sci-fi elements.

I would like to referee a third campaign as well: Encounter Critical, which is clearly science-fantasy.

So three campaigns:

1. Gamma World, for dark and serious

2. Holmes D&D, for bright and serious

3. Encounter Critical, for gonzo craziness

And each campaign's rulebook is nice and thin!

[driver]

I remember reading about your Carcosa campaign way back on DF and thinking we probably have a lot in common in terms of gaming influences and affinities.

[Melan]

Uh-oh. Today, the players erased a major city from the face of the world and returned the race of Perfect III.* humans in their stead.

In other news, high technology is back on Fomalhaut. Also, a player asked for an empire for this service (but one useful for a wandering fighter), and essentially got a well-armed A-G vehicle.

More to follow... Came as a bit of a surprise that the adventure ended this way, but then...


_______
*Perfect III., unlike Perfect I. and Perfect II., is perfect without a margin of error. Imagine a level of eugenics where there is nothing to go but down, and where beauty and perfection evokes more alienation and dread than attraction.

[Melan]

May 16, 2008 9:18:03 GMT -6 @driver said:

The idea of using alien invasion as an alternate catalyst for collapse in Gamma World is very cool.

I think the original War of the Worlds still holds up very well as inspirational material ... the fluid-sucking WotW Martians with their tripods, heat rays, and alien vegetation carpeting the landscape? Creepy as heck.

I think old science fiction often works much better because the authors allowed their minds to go on wild flights of fancy. There is something about THE INTERNET and "DNA" that doesn't go over so well with fantasy elements as the old "evil computers", "hypnotic rays" and fungi from outer space. I am still trying to identify the qualities that do it. Maybe visualisation is the key; I can't imagine THE INTERNET in Otusvision (TM).

[driver]

Clouds of nanites sure have potential, though ... I can see some legendary nanotech-based "accursed vapor" causing hapless victims to collapse in a boneless pile, or burst forth in fast-growing ropes of cancer and cystic masses.

[irdaranger]

I love Science!, but really - is there any meaningful difference between a Terminator and a Flesh Golem under the effect of a Geas? I think D&D's got it covered, in a Clarke's Third Law sense. Black powder weapons and steam engines never really find a place in my game though, mostly because Wizards keep using Burning Hands or Summon Fire Elemental to make them explode. Very unstable.

I'm definitely down with magic Gates allowing Sword & Planet adventures though. Awesome.

[jcstephens]

Here's an idea: Magic is associated with Chaos, Science with Law. In places and times where Chaos prevails, Magic rules. Science is dominant in Lawful times and places. On the borders and in times of conflict, both co-exist. And of course, there can be Lawful Magic-users, and Chaotic Scientists.