# Worlds of Design: Is There a Default Sci-Fi Setting?



## Marc_C (Apr 16, 2021)

I usually prefer using published settings when it comes to sci-fi, which is the complete opposite of what I do for fantasy. We played: Star Frontiers, Star Wars, Eclipse Phase, Ashen Stars, Coriolis, The Expanse.

The only time I created a sci-fi setting the campaign started 'today', the PCs slowly discovered there were many alien races and went to space exploring the galaxy. I allowed re-training to learn new sci-fi skills. I was using d20 Modern and d20 Future.


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## payn (Apr 16, 2021)

I have not made my own setting but in Eve Online they basically mastered cloning so adventuring is just a financial decision as far as longevity is concerned.


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## John R Davis (Apr 16, 2021)

A futures in space RPG has so many more options than medieval+tolkien it is impossible to have a default, and therefore it will never be as popular as a fantasy one.


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## Ulfgeir (Apr 16, 2021)

Have started on my own setting for a convention-scenario I was writing (lots of work still left.

I had included jumpgates (fixed gates where ships could come though after traveling through hyperspace). Some ships could jump themselves without the need of such gates (like certain exploration-ships and military ships, but it costa huge amount of energy). To set up a new gate, you needed to travel though dangerous areas in Hyperspace, and then build the gate. I had included tachyon-based communications, and certain weapons of mass destruction (such as anti-matter bombs and singularity-creators).


Other than that I think you tend to have a couple of different sets of SF, each with their own defaults.

*Near future (Cyperpunk)*
You might have some cyberware, flying cars, AR/VR-technology, and in some cases AI's and droids. Longevity maybe for the ultra rich (probably on an experimental stage).

*Near future (Hard SF)*
AR/VR-technology, emerging AI's, generation ships, robots exploring planets.

*Retro future*
For most parts technology as it existed at the depicted time, with some more modern things like television-based screens for communication. Some much more advanced things might exist such as space ships and bases on the moon or other planets.

*Far future (Space Opera)*
Space ships (and dogfights with them), droids of various level of automation and intelligence, aliens, hand-held energy weapons. Faster Than Light travel and communication, terraformed planets, cloning might exist.

*Post apocalyptic*
Basically current technology, but nothing that requires computers or cell-phones (or even electricity). Radios might exist.


Might be more types, but these are the ones I can think of now.



Edit:

*Alternate history*
Take one thing in the past, and change it, then keep everything else the same and then forward how the world world look different. This is related to the Near Future (Hard SF). Often donr to make philosophical/political points about something.


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## MarkB (Apr 16, 2021)

Science fiction stories, especially short stories, tend to be about exploring how some particular change or advancement is likely to affect the human condition, so they often tend to leave other things aside from that one factor unchanged, even when it's unrealistic to do so.

Larger franchises tend to have a broader range of changes, but even then they want to remain relatable.

One thing you tend to see a lot of in terms of 'abventurers' is small groups taking on covert-ops style missions with far-reaching consequences, counterpointed with large fleet-based naval maneuvers that often hinge upon the outcomes of those smaller operations. You can see this in everything from the old Lensman series to Star Wars to Mass Effect.


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## Ralif Redhammer (Apr 16, 2021)

Were I to try to baseline the generic sci-fi setting, I'd look at the places where Star Wars and Star Trek match up. Lasers (that can be set to stun), warp drive, intergalactic travel, diverse alien lifeforms, advanced communications tools. Lightsabers would be out, but if you classify the Force as a form of psychic power, yeah, psychic powers. It's not perfect, but I think, like Tolkien, it helps identify the base assumptions.


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## Davies (Apr 16, 2021)

I think the closest thing to it might be what TVTropes refers to as the Standard Sci-Fi History, with _Traveler_ and _SpaceMaster_ both using it as a model.


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## Laurefindel (Apr 16, 2021)

Another very common, almost "default" element of sci-fi is, directional (and scalable) gravity. Ships are made with an obvious "up" and "down" and their occupants more or less ignore the effects of acceleration (including negative or lateral accelerations), not unlike our seagoing vessels.

Also, time-dilatation is rarely taken into account.


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## Stacie GmrGrl (Apr 16, 2021)

I think the original Alternity rpg has come the closest to being a generic sci-fi toolkit rpg.


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## CleverNickName (Apr 16, 2021)

For us, it's Star Trek.  Focus on exploration and frontier expansion, political strife, and "strange new worlds, new life, and new civilizations."  I'm not sure how it fits into the five categories that @Ulfgeir provided, though.


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## Ulfgeir (Apr 16, 2021)

CleverNickName said:


> For us, it's Star Trek.  Focus on exploration and frontier expansion, political strife, and "strange new worlds, new life, and new civilizations."  I'm not sure how it fits into the five categories that @Ulfgeir provided, though.



I think I would put it mostly in the Far Future (Space opera) - camp.


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## Dire Bare (Apr 16, 2021)

John R Davis said:


> A futures in space RPG has so many more options than medieval+tolkien it is impossible to have a default, and therefore it will never be as popular as a fantasy one.



Fantasy stories can be as diverse as sci-fi stories, but they do evolve pre-Tolkien from European fairy tales and folklore, which got locked into a romanticized medievalesque setting as the Industrial Revolution got underway in the mid to late 19th century. Then Tolkien's Middle-Earth stories came along and had a huge impact in defining and popularizing the genre . . . fantasy has yet to escape J.R.R.'s shadow (not that I'm complaining).

Despite the impact of Star Wars and Star Trek, arguably the most popular and well-loved sci-fi settings (or really, sci-fantasy settings) . . . the sci-fi genre hasn't had it's "Tolkien" and so the more diverse stories compete for our attention . . . making it harder to define a "sci-fi default".

I think certain elements of sci-fi have become "generic" . . . . laser guns, FTL, plethora of sentient aliens . . . . but nothing that could be considered a coherent default setting.


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## Dire Bare (Apr 16, 2021)

Laurefindel said:


> Another very common, almost "default" element of sci-fi is, directional (and scalable) gravity. Ships are made with an obvious "up" and "down" and their occupants more or less ignore the effects of acceleration (including negative or lateral accelerations), not unlike our seagoing vessels.
> 
> Also, time-dilatation is rarely taken into account.



You're right, of course, but I think it's broader . . . . treating space-going vessels as simply naval vessels traveling in a different medium. Spaceships are boats, essentially, in much sci-fi and sci-fantasy.


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## imagineGod (Apr 16, 2021)

We all cannot even agree on a default Science Fiction genre to begin thinking of a default setting for role play.


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## Ed_Laprade (Apr 16, 2021)

imagineGod said:


> We all cannot even agree on a default Science Fiction genre to begin thinking of a default setting for role play.



"Science fiction is what I point to when I say it." Can't remember who said it, but it is still true today for the most part.


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## Ixal (Apr 16, 2021)

Sci-Fi adventures are tricky.
I have the impression that 30 or so years ago there was a lot more Science in it than today (excluding things like Star Wars). See for example the Traveller RPG.
Today most Sci-Fi settings are basically fantasy in space. And that is most visible in the societies shown in them. Most of those societies do not even use advancements which are common even now. Surveilance cameras? Only used rarely. Health insurance and public health care that can cover most injuries (especially in real Sci-Fantasy settings like Starfinder)? Don't exist. Weapon Laws are extreme wild west instead of there being a form of gun control like everywhere in the world besides the USA. And police does not exist because they would steal the spotlight from the PCs.

Modern Science-Fiction settings for RPGs imo drop the science completely and settle for medieveal-ish fantasy with more neon lights. Mass Effect tried at first, but defaulted to fantasy too in later iterations.



Dire Bare said:


> You're right, of course, but I think it's broader . . . . treating space-going vessels as simply naval vessels traveling in a different medium. Spaceships are boats, essentially, in much sci-fi and sci-fantasy.




Its especially bad when they include submarines into this and that you can play hide and seek in space when in reality its impossible to hide yourself in space over a longer time.


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## dragoner (Apr 16, 2021)

Doing the index on my near future hard SF setting right now, ~3000 entries. bleh 

Because of the rule systems I am using, Cepheus Engine right now, M-Space in the future, I have a tendency not to want to change the rules too much. I am looking at a 5e version, which of course would have to have me making spacecraft, and planetary system generation.


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## GMMichael (Apr 17, 2021)

Ed_Laprade said:


> "Science fiction is what I point to when I say it." Can't remember who said it, but it is still true today for the most part.



Supreme Court justice Potter Stewart, if I'm not mistaken.

Our default setting should have some standard features, like telekinetic powers, androids, blasters, LST (ludicrous speed travel), and of course, Spaceballs.


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## Morrus (Apr 17, 2021)

John R Davis said:


> A futures in space RPG has so many more options than medieval+tolkien



The problem is that the initial premise is 'medievel+tolkien'. We don't say 'future+startrek'. It's self-fulfilling. 

A future+star wars doesn't have many more options than medieval+tolkien. A future+startrek doesn't have many more options than medieval+tolkien.

The comparison isn't 'medieval+tolkien', it's 'fantasy'. And there's a lot of fantasy out there. The _Forgotten Realms_ don't resemble _Conan _doesn't resemble_ Game of Thrones,_ doesn't resemble _Discworld _much. And those are just some well known properties. There's tons of wildly varied stuff out there.


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## J.Quondam (Apr 17, 2021)

In fantasy RPGing, D&D has long effectively been  the "default" game, so it effectively defines (or baselines) the "default" setting.

For sci-fi, though, is there a comparably dominant "default" RPG? 
Not really. So there isn't a comparable  "default" sci-fi setting.


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## Laurefindel (Apr 17, 2021)

Dire Bare said:


> You're right, of course, but I think it's broader . . . . treating space-going vessels as simply naval vessels traveling in a different medium. Spaceships are boats, essentially, in much sci-fi and sci-fantasy.



Indeed, space is the ocean of sci-fi.

Even with more « hard » sci-fi like The Expanse, with their vertical ships and Newtonian approach to space travel, naval parallels are obvious (and fully assumed).


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## MGibster (Apr 17, 2021)

Dire Bare said:


> Fantasy stories can be as diverse as sci-fi stories, but they do evolve pre-Tolkien from European fairy tales and folklore, which got locked into a romanticized medievalesque setting as the Industrial Revolution got underway in the mid to late 19th century. Then Tolkien's Middle-Earth stories came along and had a huge impact in defining and popularizing the genre . . . fantasy has yet to escape J.R.R.'s shadow (not that I'm complaining).



I think fantasy stories escaped Tolkien long, long ago.  There are plenty of Tolkien imitators, but there's plenty of fantasy literature that's not derivative of his work.  But for most role playing game enthusiast, I think fantasy gaming pretty much starts and ends with D&D.  And before anyone takes umbrage to my statement, I realize there is a cornucopia of fantasy role playing games that aren't a pastiche of D&D, but for many people it's pretty much D&D or some derivation thereof.  So there's a fairly cohesive vision of what a fantasy RPG is going to be for most people.  Unless you're totally new to gaming, when you sit down for a fantasy RPG experience you'll expect dwarfs, elves, orcs, wizards, knights, etc., etc.  About the only thing that's changed in the last 30 years is that an entire younger generation are accustomed to orcs being viable good guys.  

But for whatever reason, we don't have a generic science fiction setting role playing games.  Maybe if Gygax, Arneson, and company had been playing science fiction war games things would be different today.  We'd be asking why there wasn't a standard fantasy default instead?


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## Davies (Apr 17, 2021)

J.Quondam said:


> For sci-fi, though, is there a comparably dominant "default" RPG?




Yes. For forty-three years, almost as long as D&D.


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## Von Ether (Apr 17, 2021)

Surprised no one mentioned TSR's _Alternity, _as they tried to specifically create a set of generic sci-fi species - if not a generic setting.

Closest I've seen to generic elements in sci-fi are:

A method of FTL travel and communication
Starships that tend to ignore physics for cinematic purposes
A 50/50 chance of robots or AIs
Warrior species/culture
Telepathic species
Bad guy bug species
Tech/science specialist
And humans
Or any combination of the species above.


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## MGibster (Apr 17, 2021)

Davies said:


> Yes. For forty-three years, almost as long as D&D.



I don't know if I'd describe Traveller as a dominant RPG.  It's a good one though.


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## Dire Bare (Apr 17, 2021)

Davies said:


> Yes. For forty-three years, almost as long as D&D.



Nah.

Traveller is a great game, one of the best. But's it not the "default" sci-fi RPG, there isn't one.


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## Hussar (Apr 17, 2021)

Morrus said:


> The problem is that the initial premise is 'medievel+tolkien'. We don't say 'future+startrek'. It's self-fulfilling.
> 
> A future+star wars doesn't have many more options than medieval+tolkien. A future+startrek doesn't have many more options than medieval+tolkien.
> 
> The comparison isn't 'medieval+tolkien', it's 'fantasy'. And there's a lot of fantasy out there. The _Forgotten Realms_ don't resemble _Conan _doesn't resemble_ Game of Thrones,_ doesn't resemble _Discworld _much. And those are just some well known properties. There's tons of wildly varied stuff out there.



I disagree.  There are a lot more points of similarity between Forgotten Realms, Conan, Game of Thrones and Discworld than there are differences.  For example:


All set in a pre-industrial, Ren Faire style medieval world.
No, or at least very understated, gunpowder and the consequent changes
Castles exist as the main settlements
Multiple races living concurrently
Magic is real and is an exploitable (to varying degrees) resource
Gods exist

And that's just off the top of my head.  That's far, far closer than say, Star Trek, Blade Runner, Dune and, say, Stephen Baxter's Xeelee series.

The problem is, SF is very much not defined by trope.  Nowhere near as well as fantasy generally is.  Quest for Fire, despite being set thousand of years in the past, with zero robots or laser guns, is an SF story.  As is Flowers for Algernon.  That's why @lewpuls' list above is so vague.  Unlike fantasy, where you have a very large body of work all directly descended from a couple of sources, SF is all over the place.


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## MGibster (Apr 17, 2021)

Hussar said:


> I disagree. There are a lot more points of similarity between Forgotten Realms, Conan, Game of Thrones and Discworld than there are differences. For example:



And R.E. Howard based his character Conan off of Pratchett's Cohen the Barbarian.


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## Twiggly the Gnome (Apr 17, 2021)

The Alternity setting Star*Drive did a pretty good job of being the sci-fi version of the kitchen sink fantasy world...





... it was even popular fanon that the Orion Frontier was the setting of the older Star Frontiers game.


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## aramis erak (Apr 17, 2021)

I think there are now (but not until the mid 00's) two default settings...

Star Trek (Hard Space Opera/soft Sci-Fi)
Star Wars (Soft-Space Opera/ space fantasy)

Anything other than those two really needs explanation to players. And that explanation can either be in rules or in a licensed property's films/tele/books.


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## aramis erak (Apr 17, 2021)

Twiggly the Gnome said:


> The Alternity setting Star*Drive did a pretty good job of being the sci-fi version of the kitchen sink fantasy world...
> 
> View attachment 135672
> 
> ... it was even popular fanon that the Orion Frontier was the setting of the older Star Frontiers game.



As a Traveller fan, I noticed the tropeset was pretty much spot on for Traveller.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 17, 2021)

Traveller is as much a default setting for science fiction as D&D is for fantasy.

I’ve never understood why some game designers can’t see that. Traveller is a generic science fiction RPG, while the default Third Imperium setting is also similar to the vanilla fantasy of Forgotten Realms, in effect. You can do a different sci-fi tale each week as you travel around a diverse galaxy of encounters. You can incorporate concepts from Star Trek, Star Wars, Firefly, as well as classic writers such as Asimov or Heinlein and, in later editions, a fair sprinkling of cyberpunk and biotech ideas too.


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## jasper (Apr 17, 2021)

The trouble with sf rpg is logic is harsh trip wire.  I was running a T20 Traveller game. I was going to strand them on a desert island. Um A planet with only one mining company with min star port. I got them crashed halfway across the planet. My plot line was meet the natives. Party with the natives. Discover the natives have access to Tech 14 or what ever the magic tech level was.  Logic defeated me as. One player point out the tech level I set of the mining company who had access to weather/com stats. And two air to space ships.


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## Laurefindel (Apr 17, 2021)

TrippyHippy said:


> Traveller is as much a default setting for science fiction as D&D is for fantasy.
> 
> I’ve never understood why some game designers can’t see that. Traveller is a generic science fiction RPG, while the default Third Imperium setting is also similar to the vanilla fantasy of Forgotten Realms, in effect. You can do a different sci-fi tale each week as you travel around a diverse galaxy of encounters. You can incorporate concepts from Star Trek, Star Wars, Firefly, as well as classic writers such as Asimov or Heinlein and, in later editions, a fair sprinkling of cyberpunk and biotech ideas too.



Traveller is most likely the most generic sci-fi RPG, in the sense that there’s probably a place in it for whatever you think of.

but it isn’t default.

i know next to nothing about it, but I could easily be dropped in a Star Trek or Star Wars game without intensive briefing.

« Default » fantasy setting is late-medieval plus Tolkien because there was little competition for a pop-culture fantasy reference. Also, late medieval is something we know about, if only in a highly romanticized way. Fantasy references are getting more diverse now, so the initial assumption of medieval+Tolkien is getting less and less true.

sci-fi references were more diverse to start with, or should I say, there were more competition in pop-culture in sci-fi in the late 70s mostly because of TV. Star Trek and Star Wars fared the best, and so has Aliens, Blade Runner, and Lost in Space (although the latter is not really a « setting »)

Traveller has inherited more from Asimov and Philip K. Dick’s literature, but those lacked a consistent, specific setting to refer to. Asimov’ s three law of robots is probably his greatest contribution to pop-culture, but not enough to compete with Han Solo, lightsabers, Spock’s pointy ears and William Shattner’s overacting. And since the to two Star Trek/Wars are mostly incompatible, a default sci-fi could never emerge


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## Ulfgeir (Apr 17, 2021)

aramis erak said:


> I think there are now (but not until the mid 00's) two default settings...
> 
> Star Trek (Hard Space Opera/soft Sci-Fi)
> Star Wars (Soft-Space Opera/ space fantasy)
> ...



I would disagree with calling Star Trek "Hard space opera". Filling things with technobabble does not make it hard.


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## Mark Sabalauskas (Apr 17, 2021)

Comparing this article to the fantasy list really makes clear that there isn't anything at all like a baseline assumption for SF RPG. 

Which isn't surprising. SF itself is naturally broader and more varied than fantasy--you can at least  imagine a generic high fantasy novel. or a fantasy novel that pushes back again the standard  worldbuilding conventions.  Nothing similar exists in SF, which is a constellation of subgenres,  And, if focus on a technological conceit is common, there is no "typical" choice as to what that conceit is, nor how advanced or different it is from our present reality.

And within the broader culture the world building assumptions of popular stuff vary all over the place.  The technology and material culture of the setting for Star Wars is unlike Close Encounters is unlike Star Trek is unlike 2001 is unlike Alien is unlike Bladerunner is unlike Metropolis and the ArchAndroid is unlike the Expanse. 

Now certainly one could push back and say that fantasy is, in reality, far more complicated than the generic assumptions of DnD/LoTR, and that it is easy to point to very popular things that aren't like that. Buffy's urban fantasy horror vibe is nothing like "generic high fantasy", nor does Harry Potter share many setting/world building assumptions. But if a "default" fantasy is absurd (outside of of DnD's market share in the narrow cultural footprint of TTRPGs) a default science fiction setting is_ even more absurd._


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## Stacie GmrGrl (Apr 17, 2021)

GMMichael said:


> Supreme Court justice Potter Stewart, if I'm not mistaken.
> 
> Our default setting should have some standard features, like telekinetic powers, androids, blasters, LST (ludicrous speed travel), and of course, Spaceballs.



Spaceballs is pretty great.


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## Stacie GmrGrl (Apr 17, 2021)

Mark Sabalauskas said:


> Comparing this article to the fantasy list really makes clear that there isn't anything at all like a baseline assumption for SF RPG.
> 
> Which isn't surprising. SF itself is naturally broader and more varied than fantasy--you can at least  imagine a generic high fantasy novel. or a fantasy novel that pushes back again the standard  worldbuilding conventions.  Nothing similar exists in SF, which is a constellation of subgenres,  And, if focus on a technological conceit is common, there is no "typical" choice as to what that conceit is, nor how advanced or different it is from our present reality.
> 
> ...



It's interesting you mention sci-fi subgenres because in some of those we can see default settings.

Cyberpunk and Post-Apocalyptic both have strong defaults. 
If we think Supers, the default could (maybe) very well be the Marvel Universe now after a decade of the MCU). 
If we say Space Opera, then I think most of us see Star Wars. 

Perhaps the thing about Science Fiction is that there can't be a generic Sci-Fi because there never was one in the first place. It evolved through its subgenres over the last hundred years. 

If the genre had its moments to evolve a true Tolkien equivalent it would have been Frank Herbert's Dune, Lucas' Star Wars or Roddenberry's Star Trek. Dune was the first hugely popular sci-fi novel that broke through the barriers that were holding sci-fi back at the time. I don't think either Star Trek/Wars would have done as well without Dune's popularity. 

But for a lot of writers and game designers today, Star Wars is one of THE biggest influences on us. We wouldn't have Mass Effect or The Expanse or Babylon 5 or nearly the hundreds of imitators writing their own space opera novels over the last 4 decades. 

I say we had 3 Tolkien equivalents in Sci-Fi... And the 3 are just different enough that each became it's own thing. You can definitely see Dune's influence more in Star Wars than Star Trek though. 

If we were to go back a hundred years though, the grandfather of sci-fi as we see it today could be Barsoom and the John Carter of Mars series.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 17, 2021)

Laurefindel said:


> Traveller is most likely the most generic sci-fi RPG, in the sense that there’s probably a place in it for whatever you think of.
> 
> but it isn’t default.
> 
> ...



Traveller has been around for more years than the interim period between its original release in 1977 and the time of Asimov and Phillip K Dick (which is a huge span of difference in science fiction terms in itself). It has incorporated ideas from Star Wars, Star Trek and all the rest since. It is entirely able to do so because it is a generic science fiction game, and carries no more defining characteristic tropes than D&D does for fantasy and can be adaptable to any influence. Heck, it even referenced Star Wars in 1977!

It is the default science fiction RPG in exactly the same way D&D is. D&D has had just as many pop cultural before and after its release - it was never just medieval + Tolkien. It always referenced a whole plethora of fantasy authors too.


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## Tonguez (Apr 17, 2021)

Hussar said:


> I disagree.  There are a lot more points of similarity between Forgotten Realms, Conan, Game of Thrones and Discworld than there are differences.  For example:
> 
> 
> All set in a pre-industrial, Ren Faire style medieval world.
> ...




Quest for Fire meets all of your points of similarity too, including multiple races living concurrently in a pre-industrial world. Its as much fantasy as Conan which isnt medieval world and has no races other than human (And possibly snakemen)

It seems too that OPs discussion puts too much emphasis on Space-based Sci FI which needs to be distinguished from Near future Sci Fi whether its AI domination in _Dream House or Robocop_ or the post apocalyptic futures of _Mad Max or Planet of the Apes_

Then theres the question of where do Superhero, Timetravel and Steampunk fiction sit on the contunuum.


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## J.Quondam (Apr 17, 2021)

Default fantasy has the advantage of being fairly well bounded by some nebulous part of human history that involves stone castles, steel swords, and powerful kings, with the monsters and magic of myth/folklore layered on as part of that reality. Designers turn knobs like "acceptable anachronism", "power of magic", "historical culture" to change the flavor of a setting. But the core of fantasy remains basically the same: castles, swords, kings, alongside magic and monsters.

The key point is that *it's fairly easy to riff and subvert to get from one fantasy setting to another.* Crank the knobs to transform longsword to khopesh, magic to mage-tech, Greek gods to elder gods, high fantasy to sword & sorc, humans-only to anthropomorphic animals.

Sci-fi doesn't have any of this. It's not bounded in the way that fantasy is, not least because it's about the future-- all the history that hasn't been written yet.

To be fair, there is a sort of a default: when you say "sci-fi" most people think about spaceships, lasers, and robots. So those are fair to incorporate into the notion of "default" sci-fi RPG setting. By riffing and subverting that default you can get from Star Wars to Babylon 5 to Alien to Starship Troopers to Buck Rogers to Battlestar Galactica to Star Trek. It covers a fair bit of common sci-fi ground.

The problem comes in when you want to do _other_ sci-fi. There's a world of well-known sci-fi worlds & concepts that have little or nothing to do with space: The Matrix, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, Bladerunner, Quantum Leap, and so on. But it's not straightforward to "crank knobs" to get from Star Wars to Fantastic Voyage, for example, even though they're both sci-fi. *You can't arbitrarily riff and subvert your way across sci-fi settings*, like you can with fantasy. Admittedly, of course, people don't immediately think about this at first when they think "sci-fi", but they DO realize it pretty soon; these aren't obscure niches of sci-fi, after all.

Sci-fi is simply too big. That's why there's no "default" sci-fi setting, at least not without first specifying some tighter bounds on the world or subgenre.


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## Ixal (Apr 18, 2021)

I do not think that Traveller is the Sci-Fi default as it differs in several ways from what people expect from Sci-Fi today.

1. The FTL system is pretty unique (1 week travel in an alternate miniature universe bubble. The drive only modifies the distance you can travel in a week)
2. Reliance on fuel. This is mostly ignored in Sci-Fi settings but in Traveller most ships are 50% fuel tank.
3. No instant communication. Messages have to be physically carried and communication can often take months thanks to 1.
4. No "naval and air" physics in space. for spaceships and fighters.

Something I also noticed, older Sci-Fi settings often used anthropomorphic animals as aliens. See Traveller (Aslan, Droyne, etc.), the Kzinti (Ringworld and Star Trek which also has Gorn and Cathar), Kilrathi (Wing Commander), several races from Master of Orion, etc. Today that has gone out of style. On the other hand several Star Trek races have become default other races are always compared to, especially Klingon which are de facto definition of honourable warrior race in Sci-Fi


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## dragoner (Apr 18, 2021)

New traveller has sort of doubled down on the age of sail in space, which is fine if one wants to play 18th century age of empires, except yeah, I don't think many would see that as the default of sci-fi. To me, there is intellectual space opera, Star Trek, a very clean universe, dirty space fantasy Star Wars, and the more careworn blue collar Alien universe; Alien/Outland and such is what I like, Expanse included. I mean if we are turning SCE to AUX, that's my default.


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## Stacie GmrGrl (Apr 18, 2021)

The only sci-fi rpg (without using a universal, genre less book like Gurps or Savage Worlds) that can do just about any sci-fi is TSR Alternity. 

It can do everything from Post Apocalyptic to Cyberpunk to Space Opera to Space Truckers. It has options for Psionics, Mutations and Cybernetics and with Dark*Matter and the Beyond FX books, a lot of supernatural and mysticism so you could include things like X-Files, Urban Fantasy, and Street Level Supers to the list of possible settings. 

The only thing that held Alternity back is its game engine, which isn't the most intuitive to learn. Plus WotC buying TSR pretty much ended Alternity.


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## MattW (Apr 18, 2021)

"Fantasy" is stories about stuff that does not exist in the real world.  There are many possible settings, but we choose to set most Fantasy RPGs in a low-tech world that vaguely resembles medieval Europe.  Let's call this choice "Heroic Fantasy" (although Thud and Blunder might be a good name). 

 I'd like to repeat that this is a CHOICE.  Heroic Fantasy in a low-tech, medieval/feudal society is something we accept because of D&D, Tolkien and other writers.  It's not the only option.  It's just an easy stereotype

In contrast, "Science Fiction" is stories about stuff that MIGHT exist in the real world.   Unlike Fantasy, there isn't an agreed-upon type of setting for RPGs.  Why not?  Well, perhaps there isn't anything or anyone with the same dominance that D&D and Tolkien exert over the fantasy genre.  

TLDR: I agree with some of the earlier posts.  I don't believe that it is possible to have a default setting for a Science Fiction RPG.  You might get a default for something like Cyberpunk, or Space Opera, or Time Travel, but not for the whole of Science Fiction


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## Hussar (Apr 18, 2021)

I look at it like this.  The iconic Fantasy is Tolkien.  Yes, there are other fantastic works of fantasy, but, when you boil it down, if you say, "I want to watch a Fantasy movie", by and large you're thinking swords, horses, castles and wizards, not The Dresden Files.  Because, well, Tolkien is THE icon of fantasy.

SF, though, doesn't really have that.  Take the three most well known SF properties - Star Trek, Star Wars and Doctor Who.  Yup, there are some similarities between them, but, far, far more differences.


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## Tonguez (Apr 18, 2021)

MattW said:


> "Fantasy" is stories about stuff that does not exist in the real world.  There are many possible settings, but we choose to set most Fantasy RPGs in a low-tech world that vaguely resembles medieval Europe.  Let's call this choice "Heroic Fantasy" (although Thud and Blunder might be a good name).
> 
> I'd like to repeat that this is a CHOICE.  Heroic Fantasy in a low-tech, medieval/feudal society is something we accept because of D&D, Tolkien and other writers.  It's not the only option.  It's just an easy stereotype
> 
> ...




I wonder if its just that Science Fiction has become a default term for anything thats not High Fantasy, and indeed while Heroic Fantasy may be the popular version of fantasy that most default to, its not the only possibility.
The discussion of Jules Vern got me thinking out just how we categorise things - While its considered to be a Sci Fi classic when 200000 Leagues Under the Seas was written it wasnt ‘Sci Fi’ it was the same genre of *Voyages extraordinaires* of his other novels like Around the World in 80 Days and while the Natilus took the Submarine to levels of speculative technology, I am reminded of other technological marvels like Chittychittybangbang (and Herbie) that take speculative technology down a fantasy track. Pixars Cars universe is fantasy despite featuring modern anthropomorphised machines and yet Transformers is sci fi (though that does bring in the space aliens dynamic too)

Then you have games like Burrows and Bunnies (and Watership Down) or  In Nomine or Dresden Files which are fantasy but set in some real world context entirely removed from medieval castles, kings and tolkienesque races.

So while I accept that High Fantsy is overwhelmingly the most popular of genres in Western Markets, I dont think there is a single default fantasy setting anymore than there is a default sci fi setting, simply because those terms arent clearly defined and everything sits on a continuum


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## Fenris-77 (Apr 18, 2021)

The variety of human experience puts the lie to this plus that arrangements. Even working from a limited OSR palette I managed something new and interesting, and I didn't strain any mental muscles. Anyway, not a thing.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 18, 2021)

MattW said:


> "Fantasy" is stories about stuff that does not exist in the real world.  There are many possible settings, but we choose to set most Fantasy RPGs in a low-tech world that vaguely resembles medieval Europe.  Let's call this choice "Heroic Fantasy" (although Thud and Blunder might be a good name).
> 
> I'd like to repeat that this is a CHOICE.  Heroic Fantasy in a low-tech, medieval/feudal society is something we accept because of D&D, Tolkien and other writers.  It's not the only option.  It's just an easy stereotype
> 
> ...



Again, I don’t know how anybody can reach this conclusion.

In the last few decades, ‘Fantasy’ has included such prominent things as Harry Potter, The Sandman and His Dark Materials, none of which are anything like ‘medieval with Tolkien'. There is less of an agreed-upon type of setting in fantasy than there is in science fiction. The fact is that science fiction itself is a _subset_ of fantasy, which is proof enough of that point.

In the case of what is the ‘default’ science fiction setting, or the dominant one akin to Tolkien, it’s already been mentioned - Star Trek, Serenity, or even Doctor Who all adhere to the same model - that of a crew traveling in some sort of craft to different worlds that are diverse in geographical, technological, evolutionary/biological or sometimes cultural/social ways. It is the standard default for science fiction that most audiences understand and expect. Star Wars has a melodramatic ’saga’ overlaying it, but it still has the same tropes. So does Flash Gordon, Guardians of the Galaxy, Starship Troopers, Foundation, Alien or even Dune (albeit tending to focus more on one significant planet in the books). Some authors vary the ‘hardness’ of the science in their stories, but even things like 2001: A Space Odyssey, Planet of the Apes or Interstellar feature crews journeying in spacecraft towards different destinations. In Bladerunner, a definitive cyberpunk movie set in a future Los Angeles, they still make reference to people traveling to ‘off world colonies’.

For RPGs, it is the model presented by Traveller since 1977 - and it still is. The fact that there are 'Technological Levels’ that allow for great diversity and the capacity to travel a vast number of uncountable worlds gives huge variety to the model.

In Traveller alone you can:

visit a high tech, low life, mega-corporation controlled world, wearing cybertech and VI devices - just like in cyberpunk.
travel vast distances in space and get into melodramatic adventures - just like in space opera.
travel to worlds still in prehistoric or historic or futuristic times, or find high tech wonders that circumnavigate time-space, just like in time travel.
You could do the same in other sci-fi RPGs too, but this just reinforces the fact that the sci-fi tropes are obvious.

So far from there not being a default model  - it is patently already there.


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## MGibster (Apr 18, 2021)

TrippyHippy said:


> So far from there not being a default model - it is patently already there.



I think Traveller is a great game with a rich setting just pregnant with possibilities.  But it's not popular enough to be considered the "default" science fiction role playing game.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 18, 2021)

MGibster said:


> I think Traveller is a great game with a rich setting just pregnant with possibilities.  But it's not popular enough to be considered the "default" science fiction role playing game.



That it is still going strong today after nearly 35 years would suggest it is reasonably popular still, even though the release of West End Games’ Star Wars affected its market share from nearly 25 years ago (when it was released).

Moreover, it is way beside the point. The _model _provided by Traveller is what is being referred to here is the point - the same model is generally used in other science fiction games too - be they Star Wars, Star Trek, Doctor Who or whatever. You have a vessel to travel to different worlds in - and you use this to get the crew into adventures. It’s the default model.

It’s like claiming that Champions isn’t the default model of superhero gaming because Mutant & Masterminds is more popular. They both represent the ‘default’ superhero standard.


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## Mark Sabalauskas (Apr 19, 2021)

Traveler is a really fun game, and I've spent endless hours in it designing ships and systems.  It is a great that it endured, just like it's great that that Glorantha has endured.

But it is clearly just one of many SF games at the moment, likely to be mentioned if someone asks about a SciFi game,but almost always mentioned or upvoted less frequently than Stars Without Numbers, or Scum and Villainy, or Starfinder.  And Traveller's status as "just one SF game among many" is typical of its history.  Overshadowed time and again by whoever had the Star Wars license, by Star Frontiers, by Shadowrun, by generic systems sci-fi source books, by Mechwarrior.   If it was ever the most important SF game, it was in the late 70s, and only if you squint to avoid looking at Gamma World.

The notion that Traveler set some of "model" for science fiction games staggers belief. The model for sci fi games is sci fi media and sci fi books. A Doctor Who game is inspired by Doctor Who, and secondarily by decades of sci fi stories. It is hard to imagine anyone, with a moments reflection, seriously believing that "going places in a vessel" is a debt that is owed to Traveler. Traveler isn't George Bailey, Sci Fi RPGs would almost certainly be the same if it _never_ existed. 

Traveller is a fun game, It is an early game. It is great that it still exists. It is not a_ significant_ game.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 19, 2021)

Mark Sabalauskas said:


> Traveler is a really fun game, and I've spent endless hours in it designing ships and systems.  It is a great that it endured, just like it's great that that Glorantha has endured.
> 
> But it is clearly just one of many SF games at the moment, likely to be mentioned if someone asks about a SciFi game,but almost always mentioned or upvoted less frequently than Stars Without Numbers, or Scum and Villainy, or Starfinder.  And Traveller's status as "just one SF game among many" is typical of its history.  Overshadowed time and again by whoever had the Star Wars license, by Star Frontiers, by Shadowrun, by generic systems sci-fi source books, by Mechwarrior.   If it was ever the most important SF game, it was in the late 70s, and only if you squint to avoid looking at Gamma World.
> 
> ...



I’ll refer you to the Traveller entree in Green Ronin’s authoritative *Hobby Games: The 100 Best* from industry professionals to refute everything you say here. You are merely conflating the points being raised with the question of who is a current market leader. That is not the question being discussed which is asking about whether you can have a ‘default sci fi setting’.

Traveller is, most certainly, a significant and seminal RPG, that inspired all sorts of other games that followed. In its early years it had sales that eclipses most new games released today too. You’ll note that Traveller’s nomination to the all time 100 Best Hobby Games list came from Mike Pondsmith, who accredits Traveller as an influence on Cyberpunk. Star Wars didn’t get a license till 10 years after Traveller came out, and it was released at that point because the Star Wars brand was considered at the time to be fading. Even then, you can see Traveller’s influence in WEG’s Star Wars, Cubicle 7s Doctor Who and other games, including all the ones that you mentioned. 

Claiming Traveller isn’t an influential game is like claiming that Joy Division isn’t an influential rock band. They may not have sold more than other bands but their _influence_ is immeasurable.

But again, all this is irrelevant and a diversion:

We are talking about whether there can be a ‘default sci-fi setting’. Traveller showed that you *could* make such a RPG nearly 35 years ago, and _that_ is the point. Sadly, this never happened to follow up:





     ....but it illustrates that if you replicated Traveller’s design the other way, it could capture the default sci-fi _and_ fantasy setting tropes. Traveller’s 'default' is to science fiction what D&D is to fantasy.


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## MattW (Apr 19, 2021)

There is a difference between "default setting" and "default rules system".   Yes, Traveller could be used as a rules system for lots of sub-genres. It's versatile, because it's a simple system.  I can see it being a good choice for "Lost in Space", "Sliders", "The Expanse", or "Dollhouse".  You could even do something like "The Handmaid's Tale" or "Dark Angel"

BUT

Those are all Science Fiction, but they are very different settings.  Sometimes, the rules system can be less important than the world that we play in.


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## Dire Bare (Apr 19, 2021)

Mark Sabalauskas said:


> Traveler is a really fun game, and I've spent endless hours in it designing ships and systems.  It is a great that it endured, just like it's great that that Glorantha has endured.
> 
> But it is clearly just one of many SF games at the moment, likely to be mentioned if someone asks about a SciFi game,but almost always mentioned or upvoted less frequently than Stars Without Numbers, or Scum and Villainy, or Starfinder.  And Traveller's status as "just one SF game among many" is typical of its history.  Overshadowed time and again by whoever had the Star Wars license, by Star Frontiers, by Shadowrun, by generic systems sci-fi source books, by Mechwarrior.   If it was ever the most important SF game, it was in the late 70s, and only if you squint to avoid looking at Gamma World.
> 
> ...



Yup, well said. 

I would say that Traveller is a significant game, but not a "default" sci-fi setting, or a "default" sci-fi RPG game or rules system.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 19, 2021)

Dire Bare said:


> Yup, well said.
> 
> I would say that Traveller is a significant game, but not a "default" sci-fi setting, or a "default" sci-fi RPG game or rules system.



Great, but until you actually provide any argument then I’ll have to dismiss your claims too.

Traveller’s model of science fiction - that of a crew traveling from one planet to another via a spacecraft and getting into encounters  - is the default model of science fiction gaming. It is as much a default model as D&D’s adventuring party in a pseudo-medieval setting is. The point still stands, because you’ve not countered it. I’m not entirely sure that these few last posts even understand what the argument is.


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## Dannyalcatraz (Apr 19, 2021)

Hussar said:


> I look at it like this.  The iconic Fantasy is Tolkien.  Yes, there are other fantastic works of fantasy, but, when you boil it down, if you say, "I want to watch a Fantasy movie", by and large you're thinking swords, horses, castles and wizards, not The Dresden Files.  Because, well, Tolkien is THE icon of fantasy.
> 
> SF, though, doesn't really have that.  Take the three most well known SF properties - Star Trek, Star Wars and Doctor Who.  Yup, there are some similarities between them, but, far, far more differences.



Godzilla- and his antecedents and homages- would like a word.

Yeah, it’s out there as a pretty divergent branch, but the “kaijuverse“ is clearly a genre of scifi, and a pretty big and famous one.  (Pun intended.)


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 19, 2021)

Hussar said:


> I look at it like this.  The iconic Fantasy is Tolkien.  Yes, there are other fantastic works of fantasy, but, when you boil it down, if you say, "I want to watch a Fantasy movie", by and large you're thinking swords, horses, castles and wizards, not The Dresden Files.  Because, well, Tolkien is THE icon of fantasy.
> 
> SF, though, doesn't really have that.  Take the three most well known SF properties - Star Trek, Star Wars and Doctor Who.  Yup, there are some similarities between them, but, far, far more differences.



Star Trek, Star Wars and Doctor Who all clearly have the same science fiction tropes in common:  that of a crew of a space traveling vessel going from location to location - each with diverse geographies, creatures, cultures and societies - getting in adventures. So do things like Serenity, Flash Gordon, Farscape, The Expanse, Traveller and all the other science fiction games and settings that all do _exactly the same thing_. That is the default. It is just as much a regular trope as a Tolkienesque or D&D fantasy, and there are far more variations in fantasy than in science fiction when you consider things like Harry Potter, The Sandman or His Dark Materials.


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## Hussar (Apr 19, 2021)

TrippyHippy said:


> Great, but until you actually provide any argument then I’ll have to dismiss your claims too.
> 
> Traveller’s model of science fiction - that of a crew traveling from one planet to another via a spacecraft and getting into encounters  - is the default model of science fiction gaming. It is as much a default model as D&D’s adventuring party in a pseudo-medieval setting is. The point still stands, because you’ve not countered it. I’m not entirely sure that these few last posts even understand what the argument is.



But, Traveller hardly invented that model.  That's called, well, fiction.  A group of protagonists go around and have encounters describes fiction. As in, nearly all fiction.  By that token, Ocean's 11 is the model of Science Fiction and Fantasy.


> Star Trek, Star Wars and Doctor Who all clearly have the same science fiction tropes in common:  that of a crew of a space traveling vessel going from location to location - each with diverse geographies, creatures, cultures and societies - getting in adventures. So do things like Serenity, Flash Gordon, Farscape, The Expanse, Traveller and all the other science fiction games and settings that all do _exactly the same thing_. That is the default. It is just as much a regular trope as a Tolkienesque or D&D fantasy, and there are far more variations in fantasy than in science fiction when you consider things like Harry Potter, The Sandman or His Dark Materials.




Umm, nope.  Well, maybe tropes, but, who cares about tropes.  Those tropes exist in all sort of fiction.  What differentiates Star Trek, Star Wars and Doctor Who is theme.  That's why Star Wars is probably closer, thematically, to fantasy than SF.  Standard Hero's Journey stuff.  Whereas Trek and Doctor Who actually make social commentary, which, at it's heart, is what SF is all about.

Your model of Traveller is simply fantasy written into a SF trope setting.  It's not SF at all.  Space ships and robots don't make SF.  Again, I point to Flowers for Algernon, Quest for Fire and 1984 for examples of SF that contains virtually none of the tropes you talk about.  

There's a reason that SF doesn't really have a single, big, iconic work.  SF isn't about the tropes.  The tropes don't matter.  It's the themes that make a story an SF story.  Which, frankly, don't translate well into an RPG.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 19, 2021)

Hussar said:


> But, Traveller hardly invented that model.  That's called, well, fiction.  A group of protagonists go around and have encounters describes fiction. As in, nearly all fiction.  By that token, Ocean's 11 is the model of Science Fiction and Fantasy.



I didn’t say Traveller invented the model. However, it was the first RPG to establish what the default science fiction model was in the hobby.


Hussar said:


> pG to
> Umm, nope.  Well, maybe tropes, but, who cares about tropes.  Those tropes exist in all sort of fiction.  What differentiates Star Trek, Star Wars and Doctor Who is theme.  That's why Star Wars is probably closer, thematically, to fantasy than SF.  Standard Hero's Journey stuff.  Whereas Trek and Doctor Who actually make social commentary, which, at it's heart, is what SF is all about.
> 
> Your model of Traveller is simply fantasy written into a SF trope setting.  It's not SF at all.  Space ships and robots don't make SF.  Again, I point to Flowers for Algernon, Quest for Fire and 1984 for examples of SF that contains virtually none of the tropes you talk about.
> ...



To be blunt, this is all just wooly thinking waffle.

It’s not _my_ model. It is the model of science fiction utilized through all the sources mentioned - Star Trek, Star Wars, Doctor Who, Serenity, etc are all different but all carry the same underlying tropes of travelling around diverse settings in a spacecraft of one sort or another. If you don’t care about tropes in genres, then it makes the entire conversation meaningless.

As far as I am aware, nobody has tried to adapt Algernon, Quest for Fire or 1984 to science fiction gaming, but again, if we are going to pull names out of a hat, then Harry Potter, Conan, Alice in Wonderland, the Wizard of Oz, Gilgamesh, Wuxia, Howl’s Moving Castle and Amber are all far removed from Tolkien’s default fantasy model too. Tolkien’s work isn’t a single unifying work of fantasy that all others follow - heck, even D&D doesn’t follow it that much. You seem happy to rally all of fantasy to one single work, yet cannot rationalize the same for a narrower genre - Star Trek, Star Wars and Doctor Who are all as recognizably iconic as Tolkien is.


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## Campbell (Apr 19, 2021)

Using games that explicitly call out Traveller as their most significant source of inspiration in their forewords to say Traveller is just one science fiction game out of many is a little rich.


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## Tonguez (Apr 19, 2021)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> Godzilla- and his antecedents and homages- would like a word.
> 
> Yeah, it’s out there as a pretty divergent branch, but the “kaijuverse“ is clearly a genre of scifi, and a pretty big and famous one.  (Pun intended.)



Is the Kaijuverse sci-fi though? Godzilla has his nuclear origins, but in the end she’s a dragon. Kong is a lost world ancient god. Does that mean that the Lost World ‘Journey to the Center of the Earth’ and the ERBs Pellucidar series are also sci-fi due to featuring dinosaurs?

How is giant monsters wrecking cities not fantasy?


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## Dannyalcatraz (Apr 19, 2021)

Tonguez said:


> Is the Kaijuverse sci-fi though? Godzilla has his nuclear origins, but in the end she’s a dragon. Kong is a lost world ancient god. Does that mean that the Lost World ‘Journey to the Center of the Earth’ and the ERBs Pellucidar series are also sci-fi due to featuring dinosaurs?
> 
> How is giant monsters wrecking cities not fantasy?



It’s at least as Sci-fi as Star Wars.  If you want to call SW science-fantasy- as some do- I’m OK with that for Kaiju.

But we have sci-Fi elements such as:

1) technology far in advance of our own, including interplanetary  travel, weapons, bioengineering, giant robots

2) sentient aliens,

3) holding a mirror up to current day society as a teaching/introspective moment.

Re: gods

Other big sci-Fi franchises also had beings mistake worshipped as gods.  See Star Trek ans Stargate.


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## CleverNickName (Apr 19, 2021)

A while back, the Extra Credits channel released a series called "Extra Sci Fi," which walked through the history and origins of our modern science fiction.  I highly recommend it.

In a nutshell, they claim (and I agree) that science fiction began with Mary Shelly's _Frankenstein._  Check it out.

Episode 1: Frankenstein


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## dragoner (Apr 19, 2021)

And Frankenstein is thinly veiled criticism of British situation of colonizing Ireland iirc. Philip K Dick said he liked sci-fi because it played the "divine fool" that said things in ways that could not be said otherwise. Which I always thought that the time of past, legends, switched to the future, because of historical work locked out the time of legends, or fantasy. A lot of fantasy, like D&D, depends on folklore, which sci-fi lacks.


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## Dire Bare (Apr 19, 2021)

Campbell said:


> Using games that explicitly call out Traveller as their most significant source of inspiration in their forewords to say Traveller is just one science fiction game out of many is a little rich.



Except that's not what we're talking about.

We're not talking about which sci-fi games or settings are significant or influential. We're talking about whether there is an over-arching "default" sci-fi setting. Some claim Traveller is that setting, or represents it very closely. Others disagree (including me).

If you asked me to list important, significant, and influential sci-fi games . . . Traveller would definitely be on that list! But it's setting and rules do not represent a "default" sci-fi setting, because there isn't one for the sci-fi genre (IMO).


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## Tonguez (Apr 19, 2021)

Dire Bare said:


> Except that's not what we're talking about.
> 
> We're not talking about which sci-fi games or settings are significant or influential. We're talking about whether there is an over-arching "default" sci-fi setting. Some claim Traveller is that setting, or represents it very closely. Others disagree (including me).
> 
> If you asked me to list important, significant, and influential sci-fi games . . . Traveller would definitely be on that list! But it's setting and rules do not represent a "default" sci-fi setting, because there isn't one for the sci-fi genre (IMO).



Um isnt the default setting Space? Or more a Starship travelling through Space. Trippyhippy’s argument wasnt that Traveller is the default but rather that a Starship in space travelling between planets is a default - kinda


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## Dire Bare (Apr 19, 2021)

Tonguez said:


> Um isnt the default setting Space? Or more a Starship travelling through Space. Trippyhippy’s argument wasnt that Traveller is the default but rather that a Starship in space travelling between planets is a default - kinda



Huh? Is the default of sci-fi "space travel"? Or even some sort of FTL (faster-than-light) space travel? That's certainly a pretty common element, but I'd hardly call that a setting.

I'm not referring to any arguments/points @TrippyHippy made upthread, didn't respond to or mention them, but rather the OP, the topic of this thread.


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## Tonguez (Apr 19, 2021)

CleverNickName said:


> In a nutshell, they claim (and I agree) that science fiction began with Mary Shelly's _Frankenstein._  Check it out.



That was he argument put by British author Brian Aldiss in his History of Science Fiction.
However there are older stories as far back as the second century AD that includes journeys to an inhabited moon.


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## J.Quondam (Apr 19, 2021)

Tonguez said:


> That was he argument put by British author Brian Aldiss in his History of Science Fiction.
> However there are older stories as far back as the second century AD that includes journeys to an inhabited moon.




But isn't the argument that Mary Shelley was (arguably) the first to marry the _science_ to the fiction? Hence this new genre called "science fiction".
_Science_ didn't even exist in the second century, much less science fiction.


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## CleverNickName (Apr 19, 2021)

Tonguez said:


> That was he argument put by British author Brian Aldiss in his History of Science Fiction.
> However there are older stories as far back as the second century AD that includes journeys to an inhabited moon.



Yep, there are stories that go back more than a thousand years about space travel.  What we call Science Fiction has a very narrow focus and a formulaic structure, though--it's more than just "a story that happens in space."  I think that most of these early (and ancient) works are fiction, but they aren't_ science fiction_.   (EDIT:  What @J.Quondam just said.)

At some point these stories transitioned from broad, general fiction to _science _fiction. which is much more narrow and formulaic.  And I think that Mary Shelly's _Frankenstein _was the book that set a lot of those rules (tropes?) that sci-fi still uses today.


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## Campbell (Apr 19, 2021)

I was mostly responding to the idea that the popularity of Stars Without Number, Scum and Villainy, Firefly, et al was a knock against Traveller as the trope namer of sci-fi gaming since they pretty much are Traveller games.


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## dragoner (Apr 19, 2021)

CleverNickName said:


> Yep, there are stories that go back more than a thousand years about space travel.  What we call Science Fiction has a very narrow focus and a formulaic structure, though--it's more than just "a story that happens in space."  I think that most of these early (and ancient) works are fiction, but they aren't_ science fiction_.   (EDIT:  What @J.Quondam just said.)
> 
> At some point these stories transitioned from broad, general fiction to _science _fiction. which is much more narrow and formulaic.  And I think that Mary Shelly's _Frankenstein _was the book that set a lot of those rules (tropes?) that sci-fi still uses today.



A lot of science fiction is what is called speculative fiction, stuff like magical realism, or Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse 5, which much of the earlier stories could be placed there as well. Most modern writers would put Verne and Wells as firmly the progenitors of modern sci-fi, at least their books one can say that they are absolutely science fiction.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 19, 2021)

Tonguez said:


> Um isnt the default setting Space? Or more a Starship travelling through Space. Trippyhippy’s argument wasnt that Traveller is the default but rather that a Starship in space travelling between planets is a default - kinda



Correct.

It is worth noting that the original Classic Traveller release in 1977 didn’t have a setting. It had an _implied_ setting like D&D had. The Third Imperium was built on later, like Forgotten Realms for D&D. Along with the original release of Classic Traveller there were included suggested stats for diverse characters from sci-fi media - Luke Skywalker, Captain Kirk included.

The point is that Traveller captured the default setting of science fiction, in it’s space travelling format, and showed it could be a viable setting in the roleplaying game format, in the same way how D&D showed how it could be done for fantasy. Other roleplaying games followed on from the design precepts of these pioneer games.

And just to reiterate, Traveller was hugely successful as a commercial and critical hit in its first 10 years. It appealed to Star Wars and Star Trek fans, as well as other works of science fiction. It was primarily the release of WEGs Star Wars in 1987, along with Cyberpunk to a degree, that saw Traveller’s status diminish as a market leader in the sci-fi genre. The Star Wars game was _easier _to reference, and arguably to play than Traveller (and much easier in terms of the ‘science’ to understand), while GDW also made some marketing errors in its release of MegaTraveller which never sold as well as the simpler design of the original game. Yet, the Traveller game and fanbase still endures with successful new editions and released (just not to the market leader status of Star Wars anymore). The situation is not dissimilar to how Champions’ position as market leader for the Supers genre has largely been supplanted by Mutants & Masterminds in recent decades, yet Champions still sells today also.

When people make comparisons of Traveller to D&D and the 'default fantasy setting’ in terms of the comparative size of their market, what they forget is that 'D&D’ was the first RPG as a sales point, and is largely synonymous with RPGs to many people still. D&D nearly lost it’s market leader status a couple of times too (in the 1990s when TSR got sold off and also the whole 4E/Pathfinder split) so its position is not invulnerable. It also has a much looser relationship to Tolkien - as a ‘default setting’ than people keep suggesting here. The reason why various Middle Earth-based RPGs have not eaten away at their sales in the same manner Star Wars did to Traveller was because it is actually a narrower setting than what is on offer with D&D. While Star Wars is an easier game than Traveller for a casual fan, The One Ring is a more complex one to get into than D&D.


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## MattW (Apr 19, 2021)

I think everyone can accept that there is a strong argument for "Traveller captured the default setting of science fiction, _in it’s space travelling format_" (my emphasis) but that's not the only way to look at Science Fiction.

Just a few examples that don't involve space travelling

"The Handmaid's Tale" is Science Fiction (Dystopia).
"The Man in the High Castle" is Science Fiction (Alternate Universe)
"Terminator" is Science Fiction (Time Travel/Robot Uprising)
"Pacific Rim" is Science Fiction (Alien Invasion and GIANT ROBOTS)
"The Island of Doctor Moreau" is Science Fiction (early Biopunk)
"Waterworld" is Science Fiction (Seapunk?)
"Mad Max" is Science Fiction (Post-Apocalypse)

And so on, and so on, and so on.  IF you define Science Fiction as just being "Group travels around in starship" (let's call it Space Opera) then, yes, Traveller is a good choice.  However, "Space Opera" is NOT the default setting for Science Fiction.  True, it's a powerful and well-represented sub-genre, but it does not have the same level of influence that High Fantasy does in Fantasy RPG games design.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 20, 2021)

MattW said:


> I think everyone can accept that there is a strong argument for "Traveller captured the default setting of science fiction, _in it’s space travelling format_" (my emphasis) but that's not the only way to look at Science Fiction.
> 
> Just a few examples that don't involve space travelling
> 
> ...



Again, I feel we keep on having the same arguments again and again, because people are not reading.

_As far as roleplaying games are concerned_, the default for science fiction gaming is the model presented by Traveller back in 1977 in the same way the default for fantasy gaming was D&D.

Yes, science fiction can be a diverse genre, but actually the spacefaring model still can incorporate a lot of the ideas presented in your list above by simply having different technological levels and a diverse range of planets or encounters. If you want time travel or giant robots fighting aliens then you can incorporate the ideas through technology levels. If you want Mad Max or Waterworld then visit planets where this is the situation. The rules as written include all this as possibilities.

Fantasy is not just Tolkien based either. D&D barely resembles Tolkien really, because it incorporates lots of different types of fantasy media too. You can also do a long list of titles that doesn’t involve the sort of things presented in D&D:

Harry Potter is fantasy
The Amber Chronicles is fantasy
The Dresden Files is fantasy
His Dark Materials is fantasy
Game of Thrones is fantasy
Alice in Wonderland is fantasy
It’s a Wonderful Life is fantasy
Le Morte D’Arthur is fantasy
The Princess Bride is fantasy
Chronicles of Narnia is fantasy
Gilgamesh is fantasy
Spirited Away is fantasy
Monkey (The Journey to the West) is fantasy
Conan the Barbarian is fantasy
King Kong is fantasy
The Wizard of Oz is fantasy
Highlander is fantasy
The Divine Comedy is fantasy
The Sandman is fantasy
Time Bandits is fantasy
Fellini’s 8 1/2 is fantasy
The poems of William Blake is fantasy
Metamorphosis by Kafka is fantasy
Being John Malkovich is fantasy

None of these are exactly replicated by D&D, but _as far as gaming goes, the_ _default model for fantasy_ is presented by D&D. The same is true for Traveller as the default model for science fiction, and latterly as a market leader, by the Star Wars RPG which often bares little resemblance in play to many of the movies, in fact, because the gaming default model is different to the specific saga presented in the movies.


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## aramis erak (Apr 20, 2021)

Ulfgeir said:


> I would disagree with calling Star Trek "Hard space opera". Filling things with technobabble does not make it hard.



Trek tries to keep to plausibility in ways Wars never bothered with. At least, prior to JJ-Trek.

It's space opera, and it's near the border with proper sci-fi.


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## aramis erak (Apr 20, 2021)

MattW said:


> I think everyone can accept that there is a strong argument for "Traveller captured the default setting of science fiction, _in it’s space travelling format_" (my emphasis) but that's not the only way to look at Science Fiction.



The argument looks pretty weak, to be honest. 

Star Trek is rather different than Traveller.
Trek: we don't see much money. we don't see small crews on small ships doing serious trade runs (but we do see small crews on medium-big ships, panamax sized). We see only zapguns in protagonist's hands; while we see a few slugthowers, they're only badguy or holodeck items.

Traveller: We see money at every turn. We see 5-15 man crews on freighters, and freighters are fairly small (panamax sized ships can carry up to about 72kTd of cargo; Traveller bulk freighters are in the total displacement of 20kTd, in the GTU up to 100kTd - differences due to system cost breakpoints and economies.) The primary weapons are slugthrowers.

Trek and Wars are closer to each other than either is to Traveller.


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## Hussar (Apr 20, 2021)

TrippyHippy said:


> snip
> 
> None of these are exactly replicated by D&D, but _as far as gaming goes, the_ _default model for fantasy_ is presented by D&D. The same is true for Traveller as the default model for science fiction, and latterly as a market leader, by the Star Wars RPG which often bares little resemblance in play to many of the movies, in fact, because the gaming default model is different to the specific saga presented in the movies.



To which I would answer:

Gamma World - certainly as well known as Traveller and as often played.  No spaceships at all
Metamorphasis Alpha - Yup, A spaceship, but, certainly not in the vein of Traveller.
Battletech - certainly as popular as Traveller, no focus on space travel.
Twilight 2000 - SF gaming.  Very much NOT in the Traveller vein.
Paranoia - although, to be honest, that's very much it's own thing. - But, you did state that NOBODY tried to do 1984 in gaming.

The notion that the "default model" of SF gaming is space opera is easily disproven.  There are easily a number of SF RPG's which are as popular as Traveller and have similar pedigree.


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## Tonguez (Apr 20, 2021)

MattW said:


> I think everyone can accept that there is a strong argument for "Traveller captured the default setting of science fiction, _in it’s space travelling format_" (my emphasis) but that's not the only way to look at Science Fiction.
> 
> Just a few examples that don't involve space travelling
> 
> ...



I’d personally question if Handmaidens Tale or Mad Max/Waterworld are Sci-Fi as there’s nothing particularly Science about them other than being a speculative future. 
After all we also learn that The Shannara series is set in a post apocalyptic earth. The presence of vehicles needing gas can also be discounted as Pixar’s Cars is fantasy too.

Robot uprisings seem to fit until we remember that automatons likeTalos and Galatea and the Golem are from centuries old stories.

which leaves us with vivisection and space travel as potentially sci fi


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 20, 2021)

Hussar said:


> To which I would answer:
> 
> Gamma World - certainly as well known as Traveller and as often played.  No spaceships at all
> Metamorphasis Alpha - Yup, A spaceship, but, certainly not in the vein of Traveller.
> ...



To which the simple retort is another list of fantasy games that don’t fit the D&D model:

Ars Magica
Amber
RuneQuest
King Arthur Pendragon
The Dresden Files
In Nomine
Everway
Changeling: The Dreaming
Blades in the Dark
Nobilis
Legend of the Five Rings
Deadlands
Castle Falkenstein
The Extraordinary Adventures of Baron Munchausen
Bunnies & Burrows
Toon

If you are going to argue that there isn’t a default model for science fiction roleplaying, then the same is true of fantasy roleplaying.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 20, 2021)

aramis erak said:


> The argument looks pretty weak, to be honest.
> 
> Star Trek is rather different than Traveller.
> Trek: we don't see much money. we don't see small crews on small ships doing serious trade runs (but we do see small crews on medium-big ships, panamax sized). We see only zapguns in protagonist's hands; while we see a few slugthowers, they're only badguy or holodeck items.
> ...



All of them are closer to each other than Harry Potter is to Tolkien is to D&D.


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## dragoner (Apr 20, 2021)

Spacecraft and aliens pretty much says you are in sci-fi territory, similar to how magic and monsters, one thinks of fantasy. Other trappings are largely chrome, those seem to be the core elements of each genre. One could reduce it by half, having only spacecraft, or some other high technology and still have it be SF, same as having magic only and it being fantasy.


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## aramis erak (Apr 20, 2021)

TrippyHippy said:


> All of them are closer to each other than Harry Potter is to Tolkien is to D&D.



Not really. ABout on par with. The key trope of each differ just as much.


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## Dire Bare (Apr 20, 2021)

MattW said:


> I think everyone can accept that there is a strong argument for "Traveller captured the default setting of science fiction, _in it’s space travelling format_" (my emphasis) but that's not the only way to look at Science Fiction.



Everyone, huh? Nope.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 20, 2021)

aramis erak said:


> Not really. ABout on par with. The key trope of each differ just as much.



Well, even if that is the case (and I would say the variations in the fantasy genre are much broader), then why single out the science fiction genre as not having a default when it is the assumption with fantasy? They either both do or both don’t - from your own stance here.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 20, 2021)

Dire Bare said:


> Everyone, huh? Nope.



There is always one.


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## Enevhar Aldarion (Apr 20, 2021)

I have played Traveller since just a couple of years after it's original release, and from then until the end of the 20th century, it was Traveller and then everything else for sci-fi games. That has changed in the past 20 years, as other games have come out and Traveller had it's lulls and edition and ownership changes. And now there are multiple versions of the game and I don't even know which version is the most popular.

As for sci-fi, anything set in the future from now, and includes technology that does not yet exist in the real world, is sci-fi. Space travel not required.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 20, 2021)

Enevhar Aldarion said:


> As for sci-fi, anything set in the future from now, and includes technology that does not yet exist in the real world, is sci-fi. Space travel not required.



And by the same token, swords and wizards are not required for something deemed to be of the fantasy genre.  

So why is the argument that there isn't a default setting for science fiction when there is for fantasy?


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## John Lloyd1 (Apr 20, 2021)

Traveller, Doctor Who, Star Trek, etc are really externally focused. It is not so much about the space ship that they are on. But, rather, the different worlds they visit each week and is similar to monster of the week type tropes. This would explain why it doesn't feel like it has a strong setting.

On the issue as whether Traveller is a strong default setting, the thread has completely confused me about what that means.


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## aramis erak (Apr 20, 2021)

TrippyHippy said:


> Well, even if that is the case (and I would say the variations in the fantasy genre are much broader), then why single out the science fiction genre as not having a default when it is the assumption with fantasy? They either both do or both don’t - from your own stance here.




No, because your making a false equivalence here. 

The similar distance from each other on the tropes and setting elements don't make up for the difference in visibility, nor in those being widely accepted as defaults.

Fantasy has a much lower bar for verisimilitude in many people's views. It is  my experience that Fantasy fans are more accepting of multiple fandoms than sci-fi fans, and that this because they don't get verisimilitude in many subgenres.

The thing is that with sci-fi, the franchises are much less overlapping. Only Europeans have broad exposure to Perry Rhodan, only the UK to Starblazer (comics), only anime fans to the Japanese series Star Blazers (anima and manga, unrelated to the UK comic)...

Many genres' fans are fans of the genre as a whole. That's less true of Sci-Fi, since it has become a clade, a catch-all for a bunch of very different genres. Military SF is disctintly different from Trek/Orville, or from social SF like much of the early Cyberpunk short stories....

Fantasy is also a clade. But by not taking the standard, almost defining, trope of being in Terran History's future, Fantasy frees itself from many verisimilitude breaking constraints.


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## Enevhar Aldarion (Apr 20, 2021)

TrippyHippy said:


> So why is the argument that there isn't a default setting for science fiction when there is for fantasy?




Virtually all sci-fi games have a specific setting to go with their rules system, while D&D is a system with many separate settings. So D&D is not the default fantasy setting, but rather a default rules system. For it to be a default setting, people would have to say that the Forgotten Realms, or one of the others, is THE default fantasy game setting. That may not answer any questions, but that is the way I see it. For all we know, with the popularity of the streaming games, more newer players may soon consider the Critical Role setting to be the default fantasy setting.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 20, 2021)

aramis erak said:


> No, because your making a false equivalence here.
> 
> The similar distance from each other on the tropes and setting elements don't make up for the difference in visibility, nor in those being widely accepted as defaults.
> 
> ...



It’s not a false equivalence, it is double standards.

You could break down every single fantasy sub-genre in exactly the way that you have chosen to do with the sub-genres with science fiction here. We have done this several times on this thread already. Here is a list of the Top 10 Fantasy movies by the American Film Institute:

#FilmYear1_The Wizard of Oz_19392_The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring_20013_It's a Wonderful Life_19464_King Kong_19335_Miracle on 34th Street_19476_Field of Dreams_19897_Harvey_19508_Groundhog Day_19939_The Thief of Bagdad_192410_Big_1988

So what underlying similarities do you find in these movies that is more than what you have outlined for science fiction? How does D&D cater for all of them as a default setting choice?


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 20, 2021)

Enevhar Aldarion said:


> Virtually all sci-fi games have a specific setting to go with their rules system, while D&D is a system with many separate settings. So D&D is not the default fantasy setting, but rather a default rules system. For it to be a default setting, people would have to say that the Forgotten Realms, or one of the others, is THE default fantasy game setting. That may not answer any questions, but that is the way I see it. For all we know, with the popularity of the streaming games, more newer players may soon consider the Critical Role setting to be the default fantasy setting.



Traveller has been a game system with many separate settings - Judge Dredd, Strontium Dogg, Hammer’s Slammers, Mindjammer, 2300AD, and a number of diverse third party settings. The default setting for Traveller is the Third Imperium as with D&D’s Forgotten Realms. They are both pretty generic, all inclusive settings for their respective genres and game systems.


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## Hussar (Apr 20, 2021)

Tonguez said:


> I’d personally question if Handmaidens Tale or Mad Max/Waterworld are Sci-Fi as there’s nothing particularly Science about them other than being a speculative future.
> After all we also learn that The Shannara series is set in a post apocalyptic earth. The presence of vehicles needing gas can also be discounted as Pixar’s Cars is fantasy too.
> 
> Robot uprisings seem to fit until we remember that automatons likeTalos and Galatea and the Golem are from centuries old stories.
> ...



That's because you make the mistake of defining genre by trope.  Neither fantasy nor SF is defined by the tropes, which may appear in either form, as you rightly point out.  There are space ships in fantasy stories and magic in SF.  

That's not what differentiates the genres.

And, frankly, Fantasy is pretty much Tolkien first, then everything else.  There is no equivalent iconic work in SF.  There just isn't.  Yes, fantasy is more than Tolkien, but, as far as iconic goes, Tolkien is it.  It's the one work that you can pretty much guarantee will be top of every single fantasy list.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 20, 2021)

Hussar said:


> That's because you make the mistake of defining genre by trope.  Neither fantasy nor SF is defined by the tropes, which may appear in either form, as you rightly point out.  There are space ships in fantasy stories and magic in SF.
> 
> That's not what differentiates the genres.



Round and round we go. Tropes are precisely what defines a genre:


> In the arts, a *trope* is simply a common convention in a particular medium. ... That's all a *trope* is: a commonplace, recognizable plot element, theme, or visual cue that conveys something in the arts. Every *genre* has distinct *tropes* of its own. Taken from www.yourdictionary.com.






Hussar said:


> And, frankly, Fantasy is pretty much Tolkien first, then everything else.  There is no equivalent iconic work in SF.  There just isn't.  Yes, fantasy is more than Tolkien, but, as far as iconic goes, Tolkien is it.  It's the one work that you can pretty much guarantee will be top of every single fantasy list.




Star Wars and Star Trek and Doctor Who are just as iconic as Tolkien is in the minds of the general public. In terms of an equivalent piece of literature to Lord of the Rings in science fiction, there is Dune. 

And Lord of the Rings wasn’t at the top of AFI’s fantasy list. The Wizard of Oz was. Consider yourself refuted.


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## Hussar (Apr 20, 2021)

Sigh.  You can quote dictionaries all you like.  No, tropes do not define genres.  Granted, there are some genres that are strongly associated with tropes, but, no, tropes do not define genre.  

The American Film Institute?  That's our go to for iconic Fantasy?  Ok.  Yeah.  I'm out.  This is pointless.  I'm tired of arguing with people with no background or education in the subject.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 20, 2021)

Hussar said:


> Sigh.  You can quote dictionaries all you like.  No, tropes do not define genres.  Granted, there are some genres that are strongly associated with tropes, but, no, tropes do not define genre.
> 
> The American Film Institute?  That's our go to for iconic Fantasy?  Ok.  Yeah.  I'm out.  This is pointless.  I'm tired of arguing with people with no background or education in the subject.



I’d say the American Film Institute is a lot more authoritative on understanding genre than you are.

So you want to reject dictionary definitions, authoritative bodies that get to define genres and frankly, any rational argument to stick rigidly to your views? Good luck with that superior background or education you claim to posses - better luck with winning an argument next time.


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## Ovinomancer (Apr 20, 2021)

Sci-fi is about changing something fundamental about how we live and then examining how the human animal deals with this change.  They are "what if" stories that feature some technology that alters the status quo in a distinct way.  Star Trek is a great example of sci-fi, using numerous tech changes to ask what if stories, largely focusing on what it means to be human in these situations.  Star Wars, on the other hand, is not a good sci-fi story, because it doesn't ask "what if" with the technology changes, but instead is a pretty straightforward story about good vs evil.  And I say this as a die-hard Star Wars fan.  I've seen "space opera" tossed about in this thread, but not in the way it's meant to be used.  "Space opera" is a story about good vs evil, or other 'outside the ken of men' forces vying for control with the trappings of sci-fi.  They don't ask "what if," they just use some technology fantasy to tell a story about these contesting forces.  Space travel does not equal space opera.

As for the trope/genre discussion, sci-fi has so many conflicting tropes that it's very, very challenging to pick central or shared tropes like space travel as definitional.  If any tropes are definitional, they are the "what if" focus of the tale, and also that some technology is altering the human condition that does not exist at the time the story is told.  

Traveler is a great example of a sci-fi game, because it's focus is really on life in a changed universe, using technology to affect that change.  However, that said, the sci-fi-ness of a given Traveler game is going to be up to the table, not really the rules or the setting.  Traveler enables sci-fi, it doesn't define it.


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## Emerikol (Apr 20, 2021)

lewpuls said:


> *Your Turn: Have you devised a campaign setting for science fiction role-playing? *



I haven't ran a full blown sci-fi campaign.  I've played in a few.

I would think though that science fiction encompasses two large a gap to be just one default but a rules set may force you into a default.

So I'd say there might be near-tech which is an Expanse like setting.  

But there is also space opera which spans galaxies with FTL travel.   Is that travel slow or fast though?  Is it Star Trek/Star Wars style fast travel or is it Asimov/Traveller style travel.   

So yeah, I've noticed GURPS space makes none of these decisions for you.  So you can "make" any game you want.   Whereas a game like Star Wars or even Star Finder imply a technology setting.


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## Umbran (Apr 20, 2021)

Hussar said:


> I'm tired of arguing with people with no background or education in the subject.




Not agreeing with you does not mean folks don't have background or education.


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## Hussar (Apr 21, 2021)

Ovinomancer said:


> Sci-fi is about changing something fundamental about how we live and then examining how the human animal deals with this change.  They are "what if" stories that feature some technology that alters the status quo in a distinct way.  Star Trek is a great example of sci-fi, using numerous tech changes to ask what if stories, largely focusing on what it means to be human in these situations.  Star Wars, on the other hand, is not a good sci-fi story, because it doesn't ask "what if" with the technology changes, but instead is a pretty straightforward story about good vs evil.  And I say this as a die-hard Star Wars fan.  I've seen "space opera" tossed about in this thread, but not in the way it's meant to be used.  "Space opera" is a story about good vs evil, or other 'outside the ken of men' forces vying for control with the trappings of sci-fi.  They don't ask "what if," they just use some technology fantasy to tell a story about these contesting forces.  Space travel does not equal space opera.
> 
> As for the trope/genre discussion, sci-fi has so many conflicting tropes that it's very, very challenging to pick central or shared tropes like space travel as definitional.  If any tropes are definitional, they are the "what if" focus of the tale, and also that some technology is altering the human condition that does not exist at the time the story is told.
> 
> Traveler is a great example of a sci-fi game, because it's focus is really on life in a changed universe, using technology to affect that change.  However, that said, the sci-fi-ness of a given Traveler game is going to be up to the table, not really the rules or the setting.  Traveler enables sci-fi, it doesn't define it.



I really, really have to figure out how to do this.  You are saying pretty much exactly the same thing I've said in this thread, but, I get nothing but pushback and arguments and you get a thumbs up.  

And, @Umbran, that's true.  But, arguments from dictionaries, on points that are woefully misinformed are pretty good indicators of a lack of background in the subject matter.  If you have to point to a dictionary definition to make your point, you've already lost the argument.


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## Von Ether (Apr 21, 2021)

As a more practical answer, the difference for most RPG groups is that you only have to ask, "Where do the elves and dwarves live on your world map?" And once that is answered, the players move on and roll dice.  

Yet in SF, there  are no immediate questions of why they live there or how they live there unless the DMs make it a point to mention it because it (should) change the world in a significant way. 

Tolkien is in the High Fantasy subgenre with recognizable tropes (and I find that D&D is almost become a subgenre of High Fantasy at this point.) On that level,

When it comes to sci-fi, geeky judgement comes out much more quickly as the participants try to line up the SF world next to their favorite franchise, most often a Space Opera, which also has it's own recognizable tropes.


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## Umbran (Apr 21, 2021)

Hussar said:


> And, @Umbran, that's true.  But, arguments from dictionaries, on points that are woefully misinformed are pretty good indicators of a lack of background in the subject matter.




For someone who supposedly knows the subject, you seem to have forgotten a cardinal rule - know the audience!  

If folks need to meet some minimum subject mastery to speak with you, a public messageboard is not the place for that conversation.  Next time take it somewhere else.  Because what you did here was incredibly rude.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 21, 2021)

Hussar said:


> And, @Umbran, that's true.  But, arguments from dictionaries, on points that are woefully misinformed are pretty good indicators of a lack of background in the subject matter.  If you have to point to a dictionary definition to make your point, you've already lost the argument.



No. If you start arguing against dictionary definitions it means you’ve lost the argument. If you start resorting to argumentum ad verecundiam or ad hominem you’ve lost the argument. If you actually lost the argument but can’t admit it, you’ve lost the argument.

You lost the argument.


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## John Lloyd1 (Apr 21, 2021)

There is a whole Wikipedia article on defining science fiction.

My favourite quote is:



> Andrew Milner. 2012. Science fiction "is a selective tradition, continuously reinvented in the present, through which the boundaries of the genre are continuously policed, challenged and disrupted, and the cultural identity of the SF community continuously established, preserved and transformed. It is thus essentially and necessarily a site of contestation."




This whole thread is an example.


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## Hussar (Apr 21, 2021)

TrippyHippy said:


> No. If you start arguing against dictionary definitions it means you’ve lost the argument. If you start resorting to argumentum ad verecundiam or ad hominem you’ve lost the argument. If you actually lost the argument but can’t admit it, you’ve lost the argument.
> 
> You lost the argument.



The argument that you just agreed with?  That's the argument I lost?  Ok, you win.  I completely agree with the person you agree with.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 21, 2021)

Hussar said:


> The argument that you just agreed with?  That's the argument I lost?  Ok, you win.  I completely agree with the person you agree with.



Nope. You can’t spin your way out of it either. Your comments are here for all to see, you’ve been censured by a moderator and made a fool of yourself in the process. Have a better one, next time.


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## Emerikol (Apr 21, 2021)

Hussar said:


> And, @Umbran, that's true.  But, arguments from dictionaries, on points that are woefully misinformed are pretty good indicators of a lack of background in the subject matter.  If you have to point to a dictionary definition to make your point, you've already lost the argument.



Yes but when you start mid-way contextually without explanation and just assume everyone on the thread is right where you are at then that is not ideal.  Even if someone mistakenly understands the term as you or someone else is using it, the polite thing to do would be to say "This term has taken on a new meaning in gaming analysis or this term is popularly used this way in this gaming style"  etc....   Instead of arguing about what a word means because the guy with the dictionary wins on general meaning.


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## dragoner (Apr 21, 2021)

One can have cross-overs like spaceships in fantasy without it destroying the genre. In a scientific analysis, if you have 100 samples, and one is somehow an outlier, it is common to just discard that result, as it is within an acceptable margin of error.


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## Emerikol (Apr 21, 2021)

dragoner said:


> One can have cross-overs like spaceships in fantasy without it destroying the genre. In a scientific analysis, if you have 100 samples, and one is somehow an outlier, it is common to just discard that result, as it is within an acceptable margin of error.



I would say you can have practically anything but if a popular choice it takes on it's own identity as a genre all it's own.


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## dragoner (Apr 21, 2021)

Emerikol said:


> I would say you can have practically anything but if a popular choice it takes on it's own identity as a genre all it's own.



If one had 100 samples, and 50 came back same as the outlier, then its more than just an outlier. So yes, sword and blaster is sort of its own genre, and that is the space fantasy of Star Wars. I would still say that the hallmarks of SF are spacecraft or some other tech and aliens, which most post apocalypse games have as well. Given that the fantasy of surviving a nuclear war would be like mad max, and not Threads, which would not be as fun an RPG setting.


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## Hussar (Apr 22, 2021)

TrippyHippy said:


> Nope. You can’t spin your way out of it either. Your comments are here for all to see, you’ve been censured by a moderator and made a fool of yourself in the process. Have a better one, next time.



Sorry, no red ink there bud.  No censure.  Just a friendly poke to tell me to tone it down.  Which I most certainly will take to heart.  

But, when you agree with someone who says exactly, virtually word for word, the same thing that I said, and then disagree with me, that doesn't exactly make for a winning argument.  

Anyway, back to the actual discussion.

Let's see if I can do this without annoying people.  Would be a nice change.  

I don't think it's terribly controversial to say that D&D is the iconic fantasy RPG.  Heck, for a lot of people it's the only RPG, but, even among us gamers, D&D is the iconic fantasy RPG.  Anyone want to take a swing at that?  Can I say that without a great deal of argument?  Now, if we presume that to be true, that D&D is the iconic fantasy RPG, again, I don't think it's controversial to say that no single work of fantasy has as much impact on D&D as Tolkien.  Whether it's the playable races, the iconic monsters (remember orcs actually had White hand clans and they still worship a one eyed god), or whatnot, Tolkien looms pretty large over the game and is largely inescapable.  That's not to say that there aren't other influences. There are.  There's been lots of ink spilt talking about them.  But, again, no single writer looms larger in the D&D zeitgeist than Tolkien.

SF RPG's OTOH, don't have the same figure.  Sure, we can talk about the impact of Star Wars or Star Trek on Traveller, presuming that Traveller is the iconic SF RPG.  Star Wars I'm not so sure, considering Traveller came out in 1977, only a year after Star Wars was released.  And, it's not like you have Storm Troopers or X-Wings in Traveller.  And, thematically, Star Wars doesn't really fit since Traveller is all about exploration and discovery, rather than opposing an evil empire.  Star Trek might be a better source, but, again, it doesn't really fit.  Star Trek, even TOS, was about a flying city - the ship was huge compared to the typical Traveller ship.  And, it's not like Traveller really fits with the whole Federation thing, nor Star Fleet.  Traveller characters aren't necessarily part of any larger organization with rank structures and whatnot.  Better influences might be things like the Lensman series, or even Buck Rogers or some of the earlier Heinlein stuff.

And, really, can we talk about iconic SF without Asimov?  But, Foundation bears little resemblance to Traveller and AFAIK, there are no Three Laws of Robotics in Traveller.  Granted, Traveller incorporates elements from all sorts of SF works and that's fantastic, but, we're talking about a default setting.  An iconic setting so ingrained into the genre that it's easy to envision.

Heck, how can we really talk about iconic SF without going back to the grandaddies of the two biggest streams of thought in SF - Wells and Verne.  Wellsian SF with it's cautionary tales of technology and science where the loss of humanity comes with the rise of technology (see the Morlocks of the Time Machine or the Martians of War of the Worlds) isn't really represented in Traveller which is far more Vernian in approach.  Technology and science are things to be celebrated.  They let us travel around do these wonderful things, and learn and explore.  It's a very positive take on the genre.  

So, no, I don't see a "default" setting in SF.  I don't see it like I see one in fantasy because there is no single author that stands so large in SF as Tolkien does in fantasy.  SF RPG's will incorporate all sorts of elements from SF, of course.  But, a given SF RPG will tend to incorporate a selection of genre works that fit with the general theme and tone of that particular SF RPG.  So something like Sufficiently Advanced incorporates Trans-humanist elements.  The latest version of the Star Trek game looks almost exclusively at Star Trek and doesn't really incorporate anything else.  So on and so forth.  

Two fantasy RPG's, unless they are deliberately working against trope will tend to share a very large number of fantasy tropes.  Two SF RPG's will only share similar tropes if they are creating similar RPG's - exploration style like Traveller, or much more story telling style like the Doctor Who RPG.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 22, 2021)

Hussar said:


> Sorry, no red ink there bud.  No censure.  Just a friendly poke to tell me to tone it down.  Which I most certainly will take to heart.
> 
> But, when you agree with someone who says exactly, virtually word for word, the same thing that I said, and then disagree with me, that doesn't exactly make for a winning argument.
> 
> ...



Having a protracted ramble, where you attempt to reinvent everything said on this thread, doesn’t make you right either. I have ‘liked’ other people's posts on the points they made, that you didn’t. Y’see, I don’t have to agree with everything others say to respect them.

You may also want to check a dictionary as to what ‘censure' means too. You were not just told to ’tone it down’. You were told that a specific comment was rude, unwelcome and objectionable. I’ve yet to see anything approaching an apology, so I have little interest in anything else you have to say, and they haven’t proven to be particularly insightful on this thread anyway - just rehashing the same stance in increasingly verbose ways.


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## John Lloyd1 (Apr 22, 2021)

It seems to me that you are using the term "default setting" differently than I've seen it elsewhere. Usually, I've seen Forgotten Realms or Greyhawk described as the default setting for D&D with Third Imperium as the default setting for Traveller. You are invited to make up your own universe for the RPG, but they have provided this one and the adventures they have written occur there.

Do you mean something closer to "influence"? D&D is heavily influenced by Tolkien with its use of elves, dwarves, hobbits, orcs and goblins. But, it is also heavily influenced by Conan, Vance (magic), Cuthulu, ancient history and myth, etc. While Traveller was influenced by Tubb, etc.

Tolkien is certainly a big name out of all the other influences combined. A lot of these others have fallen back into relative obscurity.


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## Hussar (Apr 22, 2021)

Think of it another way.

If we were to draw Venn diagrams of genre works that fit within specific parameters of settings, what would it look like.  For example, if we were to draw a Venn diagram of Fantasy works where the setting is pre-industrial, vaguely European, feudal with monsters and magic of varying degrees, that would cover a LOT of the genre.  That circle, while there are works outside and overlapping, would be a very big circle.

OTOH, if we were to do the same with SF, and draw a circle that is set in space, far future, impossible (by current standards) technology, that would be a big circle, without a doubt.  There are a lot of genre works that fit in that space.  But, it would by no means be as big compared to other circles as our Fantasy circle.  There are simply too many other kinds of SF out there that are just as popular as space opera. 

So, if the question is, what is the "default" SF setting, I'd have to ask for a clarification.  What kind of SF are you talking about?

And, @TrippyHippy, I keep trying to move past this, but, you keep dragging it up.  So, again, I told you you were 100% right.  I totally agree with the post that you agree with.  You completely win the argument.  I 100% defer to your judgement in this.  You are completely, and absolutely, without a doubt, right.  Here is the point that we completely agree on on more time:



			
				Ovinomancer said:
			
		

> As for the trope/genre discussion, sci-fi has so many conflicting tropes that it's very, very challenging to pick central or shared tropes like space travel as definitional.  If any tropes are definitional, they are the "what if" focus of the tale, and also that some technology is altering the human condition that does not exist at the time the story is told.




Now, since you agreed with this point, I have zero idea what you're actually arguing with me about, since this is exactly what I've been saying all the way along.  About the only point of disagreement might be that I would call the "what if focus" a theme and not a trope.  But, at the end of the day, I'm not going to die on the hill of that level of pedantry.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 22, 2021)

Hussar said:


> And, @TrippyHippy, I keep trying to move past this, but, you keep dragging it up.  So, again, I told you you were 100% right.  I totally agree with the post that you agree with.  You completely win the argument.  I 100% defer to your judgement in this.  You are completely, and absolutely, without a doubt, right.



Good. Now apologise.

And, for the record, that was not the point of disagreement.


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## S'mon (Apr 22, 2021)

lewpuls said:


> The science fiction default setting is less clear than the “Late Medieval plus some Tolkien” fantasy default, but let’s talk about it.
> 
> View attachment 135088
> Picture courtesy of Pixabay.​
> ...




I think 'RPG SF' has some pretty clear space opera defaults.

*Automation - intelligent robots, but little automation in view; even starship guns are often manually operated.*​*Transportation - flying cars, space ships are common.*​*Communication - traditionally no FTL communication; this seems to be changing as 1980s Star Trek brought in real time videoconferencing, and this has been followed in eg new Star Wars.  It does cause plot issues enough that Traveller type no-FTL-coms remains popular. *​*Adventurers - uncommon but not unheard of.*​*Aliens - lots of widespread alien intelligent species, at least some humanlike.*​*History & Change - as with fantasy settings, tends to be slow.*​*Technology - restricted to familiar analogues. Artifical gravity that looks like real gravity.*​*Warfare & Military - restricted to familiar analogues, in particular naval (starship) combat; aerial (starfighter) & ground combat to a lesser extent. RPG & fiction writers may work hard to come up with reasons why ground combat is still significant.*​*Demography & Habitation - most people live on planets, most of which have terrain similar to Earth.*​*Longevity - radical life extension is not the norm.*​__________________________​These are the kind of familiar defaults from TV and film that players assume, that don't need explaining. Deviations such as in Transhumanist games do need explaining.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 22, 2021)

S'mon said:


> I think 'RPG SF' has some pretty clear space opera defaults.
> 
> *Automation - intelligent robots, but little automation in view; even starship guns are often manually operated.*​*Transportation - flying cars, space ships are common.*​*Communication - traditionally no FTL communication; this seems to be changing as 1980s Star Trek brought in real time videoconferencing, and this has been followed in eg new Star Wars.  It does cause plot issues enough that Traveller type no-FTL-coms remains popular. *​*Adventurers - uncommon but not unheard of.*​*Aliens - lots of widespread alien intelligent species, at least some humanlike.*​*History & Change - as with fantasy settings, tends to be slow.*​*Technology - restricted to familiar analogues. Artifical gravity that looks like real gravity.*​*Warfare & Military - restricted to familiar analogues, in particular naval (starship) combat; aerial (starfighter) & ground combat to a lesser extent. RPG & fiction writers may work hard to come up with reasons why ground combat is still significant.*​*Demography & Habitation - most people live on planets, most of which have terrain similar to Earth.*​*Longevity - radical life extension is not the norm.*​__________________________​These are the kind of familiar defaults from TV and film that players assume, that don't need explaining. Deviations such as in Transhumanist games do need explaining.



Yep. 

And for the point of an example, Paizo found it easy enough to establish the Starfinder game as a science fiction counterpoint to Pathfinder for fantasy.


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## Ixal (Apr 22, 2021)

TrippyHippy said:


> And for the point of an example, Paizo found it easy enough to establish the Starfinder game as a science fiction counterpoint to Pathfinder for fantasy.




Because Starfinder isn't really Science Fiction but fantasy with neon lights. But that can apply to most SciFi RPG settings. The only reason they call themselves SciFi are the textures (it looks technological) and the presence of spaceships. But other than that nothing in the setting is SciFi. The societies look and behave like from a pure fantasy setting and all the technological possibilities a SciFi setting would give you (and in many cases possibilities which already exist in real life) are not used because they would be a hindrance to adventurers or make things more complicated.

As an example in Starfinders Signal of Screams campaign book 2:


Spoiler



The PCs have found out that a evil corporations wants to send a mind controlling/horror signal through its mobil app. Think Kingsman. In order to find out more they need to infiltrate the HQ on the cyberpunk planet of the setting.

The HQ is in the middle of the city, but has been quietly abandoned as the corporation moved to its evil lair. When the PCs enter the building they are hit by a lethal trap on the front door. Because that is not suspicious at all and it can in no way happen that some civilian wants to enter the HQ of a corporation which is about to launch a heavily advertised app.
Then the PCs have to fight through security robots and zombified workers to have a boss fight with a bigger robot in the server room where they can get more information.
Do any alarms go off or other people notice that there is a shooting, possibly with heavy explosive weapons in the middle of the city? Does the police or other emergency services arrive at the scene? Are the workers that have been zombified missed by someone prompting an inverstigation? No.

And later in the book after the raid the PCs are attacked multiple times on the open street by snipers, guys with grenades and also receive mail bombs in the place they stay. Does anyone find it suspicious that the PCs are involved in so many incidence within just a few days? Are they brought in for questioning and put under surveillance? No. The need for adventure trumps the setting.


Just imagine how society can look like in SciFi setting. Or even a modern one. Weapon laws which are at least nominally tracked (the way the US handles it is a exception, not the rule), camera surveillance coupled with other means of identifications ranging from futuristic like DNA scanner to simple ones like social security numbers and licenses.
Then there are other things like health care and insurance which might benefit the player characters in a modern or futuristic setting which are also ignored a lot. Or even worse, all those possibilities exist and are used from time to time as background flavor, but never when they matter or affect the PCs.

Some settings are better than others. Shadowrun features most of the things mentioned but things like Star Wars of Starfinder ignore those completely in favour for a fantasy setting pretending to be SciFi.
I guess the big question is "How much science (correct or wrong) must be in something to be considered science fiction"?


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## Hussar (Apr 22, 2021)

TrippyHippy said:


> Good. Now apologise.
> 
> And, for the record, that was not the point of disagreement.



Ok, now I'm really confused.  Considering you had to drag out dictionary quotes of what trope means and whatnot, what were you disagreeing with me about then if it wasn't about the notion of genre being defined by trope?

I get the feeling that we were having two very different conversations and neither of us were even remotely understanding each other's points.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 22, 2021)

Hussar said:


> Ok, now I'm really confused.  Considering you had to drag out dictionary quotes of what trope means and whatnot, what were you disagreeing with me about then if it wasn't about the notion of genre being defined by trope?
> 
> I get the feeling that we were having two very different conversations and neither of us were even remotely understanding each other's points.



Nope. You apologise first - then we’ll continue.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 22, 2021)

Ixal said:


> Because Starfinder isn't really Science Fiction but fantasy with neon lights. But that can apply to most SciFi RPG settings. The only reason they call themselves SciFi are the textures (it looks technological) and the presence of spaceships. But other than that nothing in the setting is SciFi. The societies look and behave like from a pure fantasy setting and all the technological possibilities a SciFi setting would give you (and in many cases possibilities which already exist in real life) are not used because they would be a hindrance to adventurers or make things more complicated.



Which is always the point of concern from science fiction fans. However, as _far as the RPG general public are concerned_, _the tropes of science fiction gaming are clear._ It is the reason why games like Starfinder can find a market external to that of Pathfinder. Whether people like it or not, _in the minds of the general gaming public_, Starfinder is science fiction. So is Star Wars.

Now, as a Traveller fan, I would say that I prefer my science fiction to be more grounded in reality and scientific plausibility, but as far as _default science fiction gaming_ is concerned, the fans follow the tropes to identify the genre they seek. Those tropes are what we have outlined here several times before - space travel, high tech, aliens, robots, psionics, etc.

But the same is true of fantasy roleplaying too. Tolkien is supposedly the default for fantasy, as per the opening premise - but it isn’t. D&D doesn’t really resemble Tolkien’s works outside of some observable tropes, while the genre of fantasy as a whole includes a far wider range of media sources too. If Groundhog Day and The Wizard of Oz are considered to be fantasy movies - and they are - then it suggests that the default for fantasy in gaming also struggles to address the nebulous nature of its own genre.

It is a double standard, therefore, for gamers to consider that fantasy has a ‘default’ but science fiction does not.


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## Hussar (Apr 22, 2021)

Where is your evidence that Starfinder is finding an audience (or much of an audience) outside of Pathfinder players?  

And, again, you are pointing to SF and Fantasy _movies _from a list compiled by movie makers as the archetypes of fantasy, while ignoring the vastly larger number of written works.  And you are seriously downplaying the impact of Tolkien on D&D and the genre.

There is no "double standard".  It's simply that SF does not have a single seminal work like The Lord of the Rings which dominates so much of the genre.  It's really that simple.


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## TrippyHippy (Apr 22, 2021)

Hussar said:


> <snip>



No apology. No discourse.


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## Stacie GmrGrl (Apr 22, 2021)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> Godzilla- and his antecedents and homages- would like a word.
> 
> Yeah, it’s out there as a pretty divergent branch, but the “kaijuverse“ is clearly a genre of scifi, and a pretty big and famous one.  (Pun intended.)



Size does matter in some things. This is true.


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## Stacie GmrGrl (Apr 22, 2021)

MattW said:


> I think everyone can accept that there is a strong argument for "Traveller captured the default setting of science fiction, _in it’s space travelling format_" (my emphasis) but that's not the only way to look at Science Fiction.
> 
> Just a few examples that don't involve space travelling
> 
> ...



I know a sci-fi rpg that can do all those that's not Gurps or Savage Worlds or Hero System. It's not Traveller either.


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## Stacie GmrGrl (Apr 22, 2021)

TrippyHippy said:


> It’s not a false equivalence, it is double standards.
> 
> You could break down every single fantasy sub-genre in exactly the way that you have chosen to do with the sub-genres with science fiction here. We have done this several times on this thread already. Here is a list of the Top 10 Fantasy movies by the American Film Institute:
> 
> ...



Hey, bringing logic and reason and real world facts into the argument isn't fair. We're talking about make believe in RPG's... not other fictional real world stuff. 

I do have a question for the group.

What do we mean by default as far as RPG's are concerned? It seems that the assumption that D&D is the default fantasy game is the default because it's the fantasy rpg that most people flock to because it's the one the majority of people flock too even though it has no real world equivalence beyond its own settings novels or comic books. 

Is it which rpg designed for the genre can handle the most tropes that fall within the genre? If that's the case than TSR Alternity wins and Traveller and Stars Without Number are tied for second. All are generic sci-fi rpgs that can handle many different sub-genres. 

If we also take into consideration the Cepheus Engine, which is an OSR Traveller game, then combined the Traveller system could be number one. I've seen a wild west game using the Cepheus Engine. 

But if we look at default as just being the most popular rpg, than D&D wins the fantasy argument and sci-fi is still waiting.

If we think of default as which IP/game has had the greatest impact on culture and which was the greatest influence on others, then for much of the western world that's Tolkien and D&D for fantasy and for sci-fi it's... Well, even in pop culture we don't have a definitive number one but I'd put Star Wars as having the biggest impact on everything that followed it, even if Star Wars is more space samurai fantasy than sci-fi and was itself inspired from Dune and John Carter of Mars and samurai movies. 

I also don't think we'll find a default sci-fi equivalent because every world culture also has its own distinctive take on sci-fi that is their own default sci-fi. Sci-fi seems to be as much a cultural identity of where it comes from than the idea of it being sci-fi in general. 

So what does default mean?


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## Morrus (Apr 22, 2021)

TrippyHippy said:


> Nope. You can’t spin your way out of it either. Your comments are here for all to see, you’ve been censured by a moderator and made a fool of yourself in the process. Have a better one, next time.



And guess what — you now have also been censured by a moderator. With this and your later comments, you are not coming across the way you think you are. I need you to drop it.


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## Snarf Zagyg (Apr 22, 2021)

Stacie GmrGrl said:


> Hey, bringing logic and reason and real world facts into the argument isn't fair. We're talking about make believe in RPG's... not other fictional real world stuff.
> 
> I do have a question for the group.
> 
> ...




IMO, the issue is even simpler ... yet more complicated.

D&D is not the default _fantasy _TTRPG. D&D is the default TTRPG, period. Which can complicate things.

To be explicit- for almost anyone who does not play TTRPGs, if you ask them about it, they will understand TTRPGs as being, well, D&D. That's what a TTRPG is to them.

And even within the universe of those who play TTRPGs, the majority of people who play, right now, today, are playing D&D. And if you throw in all the editions of D&D, and all the editions of Pathfinder, and all the clones of D&D, and all the games that provide a "D&D" experience using an alternate rule system, we are starting to get close to a very strong majority of TTRPGs.

And if you add in the fact that almost all players that are currently playing TTRPGs, are familiar with D&D and likely have played it ... well throw all of that into a blender, and eventually you get to the point where it is not sufficient to call D&D the default fantasy setting, but the default setting for a TTRPG. 

In a weird way, Warcraft FRPG, CoC, Traveler, the new Alien, BiTD, Star Trek Adventures, whatever ... they all have in common that they are not D&D (or a D&D equivalent). 

In a certain way, I think that the original question is misleading; there is no default sci-fi (Star Wars, Star Trek, Alien, Battletech, Paranoia, Ghostbusters are all sci-fi, yet all different TTRPGs to use an easy example, just as early Gamma World and Star Frontiers were both sci-fi, yet different), but everything ends up measured against the 800lb gorilla.


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## dragoner (Apr 22, 2021)

I agree that DnD is the standard for ttrpg's in general, and comparing it to other games is not always relevant. In part of the question about SF rpg's, I would say the most popular is Stars Without Number, followed by FFG Star Wars, Star Finder is still up there, but its popularity is falling. Limited bias as well as I am mostly a Traveller GM/player. So "default" if the metric is most played would probably be SWN; however, I also sort of feel that the variety of sfrpg's is a feature, and not a bug.


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## Snarf Zagyg (Apr 22, 2021)

dragoner said:


> however, I also sort of feel that the variety of sfrpg's is a feature, and not a bug.




Completely agree on that one.

If anything, the utter domination of D&D in the overall TTRPG-space has made it harder for any other fantasy TTRPGs to gain real traction (depending, I guess, on how you define CoC). 

Science fiction is wide open; the main way I look at the various systems is whether they are based on some other IP (Star Wars, Star Trek) or whether they are not (SWN, Gamma World).


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## Marc_C (Apr 22, 2021)

Snarf Zagyg said:


> IMO, the issue is even simpler ... yet more complicated.
> 
> D&D is not the default _fantasy _TTRPG. D&D is the default TTRPG, period. Which can complicate things.



QFT. 

Over the last 40 years I always had problems getting my players to try games other than D&D. When they did, they usually wanted to go back to D&D after 2-3 games. It is only recently that I have found group that refuses to play D&D.


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## Stacie GmrGrl (Apr 23, 2021)

Marc_C said:


> QFT.
> 
> Over the last 40 years I always had problems getting my players to try games other than D&D. When they did, they usually wanted to go back to D&D after 2-3 games. It is only recently that I have found group that refuses to play D&D.



Yep. Can say this has happened to me too. It's one of the few reasons why I despise D&D 5e so much. 

In a hobby and industry of creativity, imagination, and near infinite potential of expression for one game to be played by over 50% of the entire player base and the many hundreds of other options are left in the dust shows just how little imagination is really being exercised. It also demonstrates the tribalistic nature of human neurology and psychology. The amount of D&D gamers who will only play D&D is unfortunately more common than it probably should be when we take into consideration the grander potential of human expression and creative power not being exercised, which sci-fi requires more of IMHO. 

I think it's interesting that there has never been a sci-fi rpg equivalent to D&D. But maybe part of it is sci-fi is really about "What If" and puts a greater emphasis on imagination, sense of wonder and suspension of belief. We don't know, for sure, what the future holds. Heck, there is still so much of our own world we don't really know. 

I didn't start with D&D as my first rpg. My first rpgs were Battletech, WEG Star Wars, Shadowrun, and Heroes Unlimited. My first pure fantasy rpg was Earthdawn. I started with sci-fi and supers rpgs. 

I think how we get introduced into the hobby leaves a huge impression on us. I am thankful I didn't start with D&D.


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## Marc_C (Apr 23, 2021)

Stacie GmrGrl said:


> I didn't start with D&D as my first rpg. My first rpgs were Battletech, WEG Star Wars, Shadowrun, and Heroes Unlimited. My first pure fantasy rpg was Earthdawn. I started with sci-fi and supers rpgs.
> 
> I think how we get introduced into the hobby leaves a huge impression on us. I am thankful I didn't start with D&D.



Agreed. Not starting with D&D has a huge impact. I'm envious!


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## Neonchameleon (Apr 26, 2021)

dragoner said:


> I agree that DnD is the standard for ttrpg's in general, and comparing it to other games is not always relevant. In part of the question about SF rpg's, I would say the most popular is Stars Without Number, followed by FFG Star Wars, Star Finder is still up there, but its popularity is falling. Limited bias as well as I am mostly a Traveller GM/player. So "default" if the metric is most played would probably be SWN; however, I also sort of feel that the variety of sfrpg's is a feature, and not a bug.



This. D&D overshadows the entire hobby. If we look at the Roll 20 statistics back from 2019 and the pre-COVID days D&D 5e on its own made up approximately half of all games.
*


*
Traveller by contrast? 0.09% It's an also-ran.

And if you asked me off the top of my head to name an SF RPG setting I'd start with Shadowrun, 40k, Star Wars, and possibly Cyberpunk and Stars Without Number. I'd probably get to Gamma World before I remembered Traveller. Traveller might have been a default setting in the 70s - but these days it is very very niche, and mostly of interest to the old and historians. It's hard to be a "default setting" if the majority of people these days don't even know you exist.

And count me as someone else who started with something other than D&D - WFRP and GURPS in my case.


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## Fenris-77 (Apr 26, 2021)

Traveller is a great game, but it lacks identity in the current market. Unless someone told you it's great, you aren't buying in as opposed to say, _Stars without Number_, or whatever. Plus the genre divisions in Sci Fi are a little more obvious that Fantasy - you have, just to pick some, Post Apoc, Cyberpunk, Space Opera, and gritty hard sci fi - none of which are likely to be adequately handled by a single rules set. My Sci FI default is SwoN, followed by Alien, and Scum and Villainy. Three very different rules sets for three very different desired sci fi gaming experiences.


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## Ruin Explorer (Apr 26, 2021)

Neonchameleon said:


> This. D&D overshadows the entire hobby. If we look at the Roll 20 statistics back from 2019 and the pre-COVID days D&D 5e on its own made up approximately half of all games.



Whilst this is undoubtedly true, it's worth noting that particularly pre-pandemic, there was little/no reason to use Roll20 unless going for a fairly crunch-heavy game, or one where you're using a particularly large number of handouts, and Roll20's support for certain systems wasn't great (and still isn't), so whilst I'm sure D&D would be #1 by a huge margin, I'd be very skeptical about any games listed after that being even close to in the correct order. Not that you're saying they are, of course. But you mention Traveller is on 0.09%, and I doubt that is actually reflective of the percentage of gamers using it for SF games.

Also re: sci-fi RPGs, I wouldn't put Shadowrun, 40K, or Star Wars down as those are all solidly space-fantasy, particularly SR and 40K (you could potentially argue the Force as weird science not that much more bizarre than some forms of FTL and so on, but not SR's magic, which is explicitly non-scientific, nor 40K's Chaos/Warp).

As for a default sci-fi setting I don't think there is one, but I think we creep closer to one every year, as more and more sci-fi stuff appears on TV and in games and certain commonalities emerge that weren't present when it was more commonly a literary or movie genre. Specifically, I'd say a "default" sci-fi setting is gradually emerging which is basically "cyberpunk with spaceships", or perhaps you could say cyberpunk elements are gradually colonising most other SF (this extends back to the '90s to some extent - there are a couple of Deep Space 9 episodes which are pretty cyberpunk, bizarrely enough - it's much more common now though).


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## Neonchameleon (Apr 26, 2021)

Ruin Explorer said:


> Also re: sci-fi RPGs, I wouldn't put Shadowrun, 40K, or Star Wars down as those are all solidly space-fantasy, particularly SR and 40K (you could potentially argue the Force as weird science not that much more bizarre than some forms of FTL and so on, but not SR's magic, which is explicitly non-scientific, nor 40K's Chaos/Warp).



When you've taken out Star Wars, Star Trek (how many gods are there in TOS?), and a few others I'd say you've beaten SF so far back that it's barely a meaningful genre.


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## meltdownpass (Apr 26, 2021)

Ixal said:


> Just imagine how society can look like in SciFi setting. Or even a modern one. Weapon laws which are at least nominally tracked (the way the US handles it is a exception, not the rule), camera surveillance coupled with other means of identifications ranging from futuristic like DNA scanner to simple ones like social security numbers and licenses.
> Then there are other things like health care and insurance which might benefit the player characters in a modern or futuristic setting which are also ignored a lot. Or even worse, all those possibilities exist and are used from time to time as background flavor, but never when they matter or affect the PCs.
> 
> Some settings are better than others. Shadowrun features most of the things mentioned but things like Star Wars of Starfinder ignore those completely in favour for a fantasy setting pretending to be SciFi.
> I guess the big question is "How much science (correct or wrong) must be in something to be considered science fiction"?




Just because we currently live in an evil dystopia doesn't mean that all sci-fi worlds need to be one.

Personally I think it's perfectly okay that we can handwave away certain things in order to tell certain stories. If we weren't able to do that, then every sci-fi game would have to credibly grapple with the problems of how monetary policy is used as a system of control and how centralized technology facilitates systems of control. Basically means you could play sci-fi games set in a worst-of-all-worlds 1984/BraveNewWorld setting, or Dune.


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## Ruin Explorer (Apr 26, 2021)

Neonchameleon said:


> When you've taken out Star Wars, Star Trek (how many gods are there in TOS?), and a few others I'd say you've beaten SF so far back that it's barely a meaningful genre.



If I'd done that, I'd agree. But you're doing that not me, and attributing it to me is extremely silly at best.

Star Trek doesn't have any supernatural gods or supernatural forces I'm aware of. There's weird science by the boatload, but that's fundamentally different to Shadowrun and 40K, which are _explicitly_ anti-scientific in how their magic works. Star Wars, as I mentioned, is in a bit of a grey area because at times the Force has been explained in weird science ways (albeit at the moment it's largely a mystical thing), but it's regarded as the poster-child for science fantasy, hence I wouldn't have immediately classed it as a particularly relevant one for sci-fi.

Star Trek is clearly sci-fi. It has a rational explanation for virtually everything (barring the odd meta wink) and posits that there is one out there for difficult stuff, they just haven't found it yet. This is particularly explicit with the various "gods" who never actually are. Whereas in 40K they absolutely are, and the nature of the warp/Chaos is explicitly that it's not scientific or subject to laws (hence: Chaos).


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## dragoner (Apr 26, 2021)

The differences are what make them different, except the commonalities such as spacecraft and aliens, make Star Trek, Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, Killjoys, 2001 A Space Odyssey, Alien, and The Expanse all similar. Not to say something outside of spacecraft and aliens can't be sci-fi, because it can, but for most sci-fi games these are common tropes as well. Even Gamma World one rocketed up to a Space Station and fought plague zombies.


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## Stacie GmrGrl (Apr 26, 2021)

dragoner said:


> The differences are what make them different, except the commonalities such as spacecraft and aliens, make Star Trek, Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica, Killjoys, 2001 A Space Odyssey, Alien, and The Expanse all similar. Not to say something outside of spacecraft and aliens can be sci-fi, because it can, but for most sci-fi games these are common tropes as well. Even Gamma World one rocketed up to a Space Station and fought plague zombies.



There is a Star Wars novel that had zombies in it.


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## Neonchameleon (Apr 26, 2021)

Ruin Explorer said:


> If I'd done that, I'd agree. But you're doing that not me, and attributing it to me is extremely silly at best.
> 
> Star Trek doesn't have any supernatural gods or supernatural forces I'm aware of.



Then we have very different understandings of certain Star Trek TOS episodes, Q and the Q Continuum, the Bajoran Wormhole Prophets, and quite a lot of other aspects of Star Trek. Trek may occasionally pay lip service to there being rational explanations - but it's normally skin deep at best.


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## Ixal (Apr 26, 2021)

meltdownpass said:


> Just because we currently live in an evil dystopia doesn't mean that all sci-fi worlds need to be one.
> 
> Personally I think it's perfectly okay that we can handwave away certain things in order to tell certain stories. If we weren't able to do that, then every sci-fi game would have to credibly grapple with the problems of how monetary policy is used as a system of control and how centralized technology facilitates systems of control. Basically means you could play sci-fi games set in a worst-of-all-worlds 1984/BraveNewWorld setting, or Dune.




Does having a social security number or driver licenses already mean a dystopian society? Sometimes I wonder what peoples definition of that are.
Some kind of control and tracking is required for modern of futuristic societies, for example to assign property, certify education, etc. But even those things are missing in some science fiction (fantasy) settings.


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## meltdownpass (Apr 27, 2021)

Ixal said:


> Does having a social security number or driver licenses already mean a dystopian society? Sometimes I wonder what peoples definition of that are.
> Some kind of control and tracking is required for modern of futuristic societies, for example to assign property, certify education, etc. But even those things are missing in some science fiction (fantasy) settings.




Don't want to get too deep in the weeds at risk of derailing the topic, but any kind of sci-fi setting that has even present-day level technology is going to have to grapple with what life looks like in a world of omnipresent surveillance & tracking of virtually all financial activity. Even in near-future this is dumped into central databases pored over by ML/AI of state-corporate entitities monitoring and even predicting behavior using that data.

These things are all designed to make life more _manageable _from a certain perspective, which could also be described from another (storytelling) perspective as removing _adventure_.

Star Trek, which traditionally assumes a moral evolution of humanity such that the dystopian implications are no longer relevant, -- Even Star Trek tends to operate on the fringes of the Federation where the usual rules don't apply. Firefly, which is less fantastical in its treatment of human nature, explicitly has to put its heroes and _adventures_ on the fringe of the tyrannical Alliance.

While I can imagine stories set inside an honestly-treated sci-fi setting, they generally tend more towards P.K. Dick's _Minority Report_ or Kafka's _The Trial._ I certainly don't want to discourage anyone from playing such games if they are capable, but in my experience a social experience like RPG gaming is heavily weighted to lighter adventure games and not deep social commentary.


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## S'mon (Apr 27, 2021)

meltdownpass said:


> Don't want to get too deep in the weeds at risk of derailing the topic, but any kind of sci-fi setting that has even present-day level technology is going to have to grapple with what life looks like in a world of omnipresent surveillance & tracking of virtually all financial activity.




The usual handwave is that planets may be like that, but not in SPAAACE.
One reason it's really important not to have routine FTL comms.


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## Ixal (Apr 27, 2021)

meltdownpass said:


> While I can imagine stories set inside an honestly-treated sci-fi setting, they generally tend more towards P.K. Dick's _Minority Report_ or Kafka's _The Trial._ I certainly don't want to discourage anyone from playing such games if they are capable, but in my experience a social experience like RPG gaming is heavily weighted to lighter adventure games and not deep social commentary.




Why would it be social commentary when futuristic world have the same capabilities as the real world has right now? And that does not mean China level of tracking but just people having a form of ID and licenses for driving and weapon possession and cars (spaceships) are registered to someone and it is possible to find out who that person is and for example if there are any warrants attached?
Even such basic things are ignored in some scifi settings, especially the fantasy inspired ones.

Then there are modern institutions and systems which are simply missing, yet would be of great value for adventurers. Health care for example. Even when you use the US kind of private health care it would change a lot of a PC could, after contracting some disease or getting shot up simply go into a hospital and be treated there for example.
Yes, that would make attrition based adventures near civilization hard to write, which is probably the reason why it and many other modern achievements are ignored, but I rather would have "different" adventures from generic hero story than playing a supposedly futuristic game where the societies are structured like in medieval fantasy times.


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## meltdownpass (Apr 28, 2021)

Ixal said:


> Why would it be social commentary when futuristic world have the same capabilities as the real world has right now? And that does not mean China level of tracking but just people having a form of ID and licenses for driving and weapon possession and cars (spaceships) are registered to someone and it is possible to find out who that person is and for example if there are any warrants attached?
> Even such basic things are ignored in some scifi settings, especially the fantasy inspired ones.
> 
> Then there are modern institutions and systems which are simply missing, yet would be of great value for adventurers. Health care for example. Even when you use the US kind of private health care it would change a lot of a PC could, after contracting some disease or getting shot up simply go into a hospital and be treated there for example.
> Yes, that would make attrition based adventures near civilization hard to write, which is probably the reason why it and many other modern achievements are ignored, but I rather would have "different" adventures from generic hero story than playing a supposedly futuristic game where the societies are structured like in medieval fantasy times.




More or less, it isn't credible in any future world that has cameras, identifiers on people and things, and has databases, that this type of information won't be made centralized and cross-referenced by the world's power institutions. Once that happens, the genie is out of the bottle. This information control will be used by bad actors leading to dystopian results. (The shade of dystopia of course depends on how rose-tinted your personal glasses may be.)

All of that is pretty much inevitable as a consequence of bog-standard tech that's been available for decades. What happens if we advance time by fifty or a hundred years... ? And that's without even positing anything of the sci-fi tropes like robots, AIs, trans-humanism, and other genre features.

Of course I'm only talking about trying to really grapple with what technologies in the game world are likely to do. A game ought dispense with setting-internal-consistency as much as it wants to story-consistency and enjoyment. The real trick is to avoid introducing elements into a game that won't later have negative downstream consequences to take players out of the narrative -- Players expect a little more consistency from industry & technology than from magic, so a sci-fi gizmo that does something awesome requires more forethought than a magic item in a fantasy setting.


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## Bohandas (Apr 29, 2021)

Ixal said:


> Its especially bad when they include submarines into this and that you can play hide and seek in space when in reality its impossible to hide yourself in space over a longer time.




Tell that to all the space junk and the uncataloged asteroids


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## Ixal (Apr 29, 2021)

Bohandas said:


> Tell that to all the space junk and the uncataloged asteroids



If those space junk (which we can track in orbit btw.) and asteroids had a drive and needed to maintain life support telling them would be no problem as they were clearly visible to the edge of the solar system.


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## Ovinomancer (Apr 29, 2021)

Ixal said:


> If those space junk (which we can track in orbit btw.) and asteroids had a drive and needed to maintain life support telling them would be no problem as they were clearly visible to the edge of the solar system.



Um, not really.  There's tons of junk in near orbits that we don't know about, and, depending on the drive, it would be hard to locate very far away due to many issues.  Running systems aboard would be even harder to locate.  Energy dissipates according to the inverse cube of the distance.  This means that even powerful drives can quickly fall below the background noise of the universe. Most "sensors" in sci-fi are technobabbly magic.  The last season of the Eclipse had a great sequence of trying to track a ship -- they had to know precisely what it's vector was when it left so that they could scrounge that volume of space to see if they did something like change course.  Even with this, they couldn't actually locate the ship, they could just math out it's course and hope that they saw it if they did light off their drive.  This was pretty good stuff, because it acknowledged that they needed to know exactly where to look to see if the ship turned on it's pretty powerful drive because otherwise it would just be lost in the noise and hugeness of space.


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## Ixal (Apr 29, 2021)

Ovinomancer said:


> Um, not really.  There's tons of junk in near orbits that we don't know about, and, depending on the drive, it would be hard to locate very far away due to many issues.  Running systems aboard would be even harder to locate.  Energy dissipates according to the inverse cube of the distance.  This means that even powerful drives can quickly fall below the background noise of the universe. Most "sensors" in sci-fi are technobabbly magic.  The last season of the Eclipse had a great sequence of trying to track a ship -- they had to know precisely what it's vector was when it left so that they could scrounge that volume of space to see if they did something like change course.  Even with this, they couldn't actually locate the ship, they could just math out it's course and hope that they saw it if they did light off their drive.  This was pretty good stuff, because it acknowledged that they needed to know exactly where to look to see if the ship turned on it's pretty powerful drive because otherwise it would just be lost in the noise and hugeness of space.



No, not really. We can see the Voyager probe at the edge of the solar system which basically runs on a car battery in low power mode by now. No matter how low the emissions, against the backdrop of nearly empty space it stands out. And scanning the entire solar system does not take all that much time either.
I assume you mean the Expanse and not Eclipse? Either way, television shows are not a good source for science.
Here is a good article about it (when you can stand the 1980 web design)





						Detection - Atomic Rockets
					






					www.projectrho.com


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## Ovinomancer (Apr 29, 2021)

Ixal said:


> No, not really. We can see the Voyager probe at the edge of the solar system which basically runs on a car battery in low power mode by now. No matter how low the emissions, against the backdrop of nearly empty space it stands out. And scanning the entire solar system does not take all that much time either.



Sigh.  We can see the Voyager probe because we know exactly where to look and exactly what to look for.  It's not because it's easy (or even very hard) to find, it's because it's impossible to find without the knowledge of precisely where to look.



However, do not mind me, I'm only an electrical engineer specializing in communication systems.


Ixal said:


> I assume you mean the Expanse and not Eclipse? Either way, television shows are not a good source for science.
> Here is a good article about it (when you can stand the 1980 web design)
> 
> 
> ...



Wait, you claim that a great example of good science in the Expanse (you are correct here) should be discounted because it's just a TV show, and then put out a link to a site which is dedicated to and often cited novels, tv shows, and other fiction works as it's raison d'etre?   I mean, really?

Now, I  happen to like that site, but it does some odd things, namely try to discuss different topics from different points of view or assumption sets without making it clear.  For example, it notes that active sensors degrade at 1/r^4, which is the perfect case if I can send my signal out in a single line (no spread) and the target reflects perfectly.  I, above, said 1/r^3, and that was for passive detection of a spherically radiating target, and this is because the energy density is being spread into that sphere, and so loses power accordingly.  With an active detector, you have more power loss than 1/r^2 in one direction because the signal has a spread.  We use the 1/r^2 and 1/r^4 terrestrially because it's a pretty good approximation for the very limited distances here, but, in space, distances are huge and this spreading factor quickly takes on importance.  Still, in the beginning of the article, they call this out as important, but then hide the issue in the later section under passive sensors by imagining a sufficiently powerful computer that will crunch the enormous data (we can't even scan much of the sky at once now, like a degree of arc or less at a time, and it takes weeks and we miss lots and lots of stuff!).  This pea, hidden under the mattress, is often overlooked -- it's a monumental problem that was swept under the rug in a single sentence!

So, then, how do we detect Voyager?  Well, we know where to look, and Voyager is sending us a signal, using an antenna capable of a tight beam transmission, precisely aimed, so it's suffering as little spread loss as possible.  Even then, that beam is wider than the Earth when it arrives here, much wider.  But, it drags that loss down much closer to 1/r^2 rather than 1/r^3, and that makes a huge difference.  In other words, we can detect Voyager only because we know where to look, and then we only see it when it's shining it's very bright flashlight at us, the one with all the mirrors that focus all the light in one direction.


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## Ixal (Apr 29, 2021)

Ovinomancer said:


> Sigh.  We can see the Voyager probe because we know exactly where to look and exactly what to look for.  It's not because it's easy (or even very hard) to find, it's because it's impossible to find without the knowledge of precisely where to look.
> 
> 
> 
> ...





Again, all of this is addressed already in the link. Every ship would send signals much brighter than the 20 watts voyager probe everywhere because of all the system it needs to keep running. And not knowing where it is just adds 4 hours to scan the entire solar system and have a computer check for bright dots.


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## Ovinomancer (Apr 29, 2021)

Ixal said:


> Again, all of this is addressed already in the link. Every ship would send signals much brighter than the 20 watts voyager probe everywhere because of all the system it needs to keep running. And not knowing where it is just adds 4 hours to scan the entire solar system and have a computer check for bright dots.



I mean, sure, okay, you've read an internet page, so clearly I should defer to you on this matter.  Ships radiate much more power than a dedicated transmitter designed to be heard across interplanetary distances, and it only takes 4 hours to scan the entire sky and pick out a ship radiating 20 watts at interplanetary distances.  I mean, the fact that the power loss is 1/r^3, at the distance of Mars from Earth at it's closest point, a ship radiating 200 watts of waste power in a single spectrum (because, I mean, why wouldn't it radiate all of it's power in the same spectrum, right?) would have that signal knocked down to.. lemme see, 200 watts is 200 kg*m^2/s^3 divided by 5.5 x10^6 meters cubed (or roughly 125 x 10^18 meters) would reduce that signal strength by a factor of.... will you'll need to use SI notation because there isn't a name for that small a thing yet.  And the background cosmic radiation strength is higher than that, even outside the microwave range.

So, perfectly, a ship radiating 10 times as much energy in a narrow spectrum at the distance of Earth to Mars is lost in the background. 

The bit about finding Voyager is hiding a lot of information for the purposes of a poor argument on the webpage.  Yes, the Green Bank telescope picked out Voyager in 1 second, but this is eliding the fact that it took a second for a telescope to even see the light from a dedicated and focused active transmitter when it both knew the frequency to look for AND was pointed right at it.  It didn't scan the entire sky and detect the bogey, it was given precise instructions where and what to look for and it still, with some of the best algorithms for detection of anomalous signals, took a second to do it.  With a 100m parabolic antenna dish.

Recall that your source webpage is intended to provide science-fiction writers some top cover for realism in their stories, where they can postulate lots of things that are near true or fantastical but lampshaded.  It is not a scientifically accurate webpage, it's just a close enough for sci-fi webpage.  It also makes a number of assumptions about things, like what a torchship is, an uses those assumptions throughout.

Let me unpack a bit about how we "see" Voyager.  For one, the assumption set in that is that the signal falloff is much better approximated by 1/r^2 rather than 1/r^3.  That means the signal will be a whatever the magnitude of the distance is times stronger from Voyager than from a similar signal evenly radiating into space.  This makes a big difference.  Secondly, Voyager is radiating on a specific frequency, meaning all of it's power is focused into that one frequency.  This make detecting that signal much better.  To give an indication, it's like everything's an even dull white color (random frequency background radiation) and I shine a red light at you from in this, it will stand out better because it's a specific color.  Similar concepts here.  So, Voyager is doing us some favors -- it's radiating using a focusing antenna that massively improves effective strength of the signal, it's doing it in a narrow frequency band, and we know where it is in the sky.  This allows us to detect Voyager.  And by "detect" we mean "hey, there's a strange signal there along this line of bearing."  Contrast this with a ship, even assume you can say how much more power it radiates, that power will be radiating all around, so you won't get the favorable gain of a focused transmitter.  Secondly, that power will be across a wide range of the spectrum -- so will be radio bands (and that's a huge band), some will be visible light, and some will be heat (infrared), so even if you say it's emitting a lot of power, you can't look across the entire spectrum because it doesn't add together like that.  In any given spectrum you're searching, the actual radiated power will be much less.

Finally, given you place so much stock in the webpage, why does it say that the maneuvering thrusters of the space shuttle, which put much more power than anything we're talking about here, would only be detectable out to the asteroid belt?  This is a specific, much higher power release, nominally in a relatively narrow spectrum, and yet your webpage of choice is saying that, when looking for it specifically, you'd only see it within a few AU?  That, alone, should give you pause to consider exactly what set of assumptions that article is using.  Everything they say could be true, if you unpack all of their unstated assumptions.  The reality is that many of those assumptions are perfect for their examples and propose things that wouldn't actually be the case.  Like stealth in space -- very, very doable, but not perfectly doable, and their point here is that perfect stealth is impossible, which is a rather facile argument to make to begin with.


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## Ixal (Apr 29, 2021)

And as predicted, Nocill's Law is in effect


> It is a truth universally acknowledged that any thread that begins by pointing out why stealth in space is impossible will rapidly turn into a thread focusing on schemes whereby stealth in space might be achieved.




You are free to post your calculations on rec.arts.sf.science (or whatever replaced usenet groups) as mentioned and be celebrated to be "the one" who figured out stealth in space.


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## Ovinomancer (Apr 29, 2021)

Ixal said:


> And as predicted, Nocill's Law is in effect
> 
> 
> You are free to post your calculations on rec.arts.sf.science (or whatever replaced usenet groups) as mentioned and be celebrated to be "the one" who figured out stealth in space.



Ah, I see.  You've read a webpage, and so have the understanding that you think you can assign homework (and it's the wrong homework problem, even) to others that point out your failings of understanding?  Interesting tack to take.  And I say you're assigning the wrong problem because it's the wrong problem.  The methods of stealth in space are actually quite well discussed.  The primary issue is masking of RF signals, as these are most easily detected.  This is done in the modern military, and similar methods apply.  The big issue is waste heat, which you have to vent.  That's also been discussed, and usually involved cooling systems that allow you to direct heat venting, so you can vent away from where you think the people looking for you are.  Given there's no atmosphere is space to absorb and reradiate, merely pointing it away from your opponents makes it very, very hard to detect (you have to hope that something crosses the transmission path and reradiates, like a moth caught in a spotlight beam briefly becomes very bright).  These aren't new concepts.

Defeating active sensors again looks very much like it does today -- either capture the signal so it can radiate back, or make sure that you redirect the signal away from the source.  

I mean, this isn't new stuff, it's just stuff you haven't been exposed to, but you feel that since you've read a webpage, I'm the one saying ridiculous things because it doesn't align with your layman's understanding of highly technical concepts that were glossed, very briefly and with lots of hidden assumptions, on a webpage you like.

I mean, whatever, right?  I'm just now off to continue troubleshooting a satellite radio system, dealing with a known set of frequencies and a fixed geosync satellite, but where we're having a devil of a time figuring out why our signal strength is bouncing around between not seeing it at all, seeing it but not strong enough for comms, and good comms.  It's not like I know anything.  I'll just go cry with my spectrum analyzer  about how badly I misunderstand how easy it is to find things in space.


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## Ovinomancer (Apr 29, 2021)

So, yes, recall when I said that webpage has some hidden assumptions -- here's a big one:


> However, this counterexample is not true stealth.  For something to count as stealth, it must be capable of making detection difficult even for a serious opponent in an operational context.  A B-2 is stealthy because it is difficult to detect even for a serious opponent while on an operational mission.  A B-52 is not stealthy even though it could fly over your house on a day without contrails without you spotting it.  While there are many story and/or tactical possibilities in dealing with inadequate sensor networks, the lesson of this section is that sensor networks in space are both easy to create and extremely effective compared to similar networks on Earth.




They've defined "stealth" as very invisible even to a dedicated opponent while I a fully operational environment.  This means they're defining "stealth" as "you are at or near full engine burn, at a range where releasing weapons is in progress or an immeninet danger and/or a critical bit of intelligence is at risk, and the opponent is both technologically sophisticated and very dedicated to locating you, presumably because of the whole weapons thing."  This is a ridiculous assumption set, and is, as designed, of course impossible.  However, "stealth" doesn't actually mean this, else the current militaries of the world would not be having great success with "stealth" that does not meet this definition.


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## Bohandas (Apr 29, 2021)

Ixal said:


> No, not really. We can see the Voyager probe at the edge of the solar system which basically runs on a car battery in low power mode by now. No matter how low the emissions, against the backdrop of nearly empty space it stands out. And scanning the entire solar system does not take all that much time either.




We can see the Voyager because we already know where it is, and it's designed to phone home intelligibly. If there were a random Voyager sized object in an unknown place we'd have little hope of finding it.


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## Bohandas (Apr 29, 2021)

Neonchameleon said:


> Then we have very different understandings of certain Star Trek TOS episodes, Q and the Q Continuum, the Bajoran Wormhole Prophets, and quite a lot of other aspects of Star Trek. Trek may occasionally pay lip service to there being rational explanations - but it's normally skin deep at best.



And in addition to gods there's also magic. You can't swing a dead cat in Star Trek without hitting a psychic, or a shapeshifter, or a guy who makes gems appear by waving a magic wand. In one episode the villain put a curse on the Enterprise by burning a model of the Enterprise, and it worked, and it was explicitly described as sympathetic magic.


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## Ovinomancer (Apr 29, 2021)

Reading more on that page, there's good stuff, but, they are heavily weighted towards sensors.   They baseline assumption is that sensor nets will be cheap, effective, and have good efficacy when dispersed liberally.  Effectively, they're argument against stealth is that they'll have too many eye watching.  The few formulas mentioned are not well sourced (their links just go to where they're mentioned, and no explanation of the constants or how they are derived is provided, much less units -- dear god, the units are all over the place meaning the constants need to have some heavy units attached to balance an equation that otherwise delivers ton-meters per second into kilometers.  There's no support to explain how these constants are derived (and they can be, I just can't easily follow it).  I'm guessing there's an assumption of how much energy in watts (newton-meter per second or kg m^2/s^3) is "detectable" which isn't stated (but may very well be right).  There's a nice guest article towards the end that discusses practical stealth, to which the rebuttal is "but this isn't really stealth."  Again, the definition that you can hide while effectively shooting and under full burn rears it's head and establishes the "impossible" angle.


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## Bohandas (Apr 29, 2021)

We don't even know how many PLANETS are in the solar system. In addition to there almost certainly being more dwarf planets there's also some limited evidence (based on the orbits of other astronomical bodies) that there may be another big planet but we have no idea where it is.


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## dragoner (Apr 29, 2021)

Many times I read that stealth equals invisibility, which it does not, even here on Earth; nevertheless, perfect detection does not exist.


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## aramis erak (May 1, 2021)

John Lloyd1 said:


> It seems to me that you are using the term "default setting" differently than I've seen it elsewhere. Usually, I've seen Forgotten Realms or Greyhawk described as the default setting for D&D with Third Imperium as the default setting for Traveller. You are invited to make up your own universe for the RPG, but they have provided this one and the adventures they have written occur there.
> 
> Do you mean something closer to "influence"? D&D is heavily influenced by Tolkien with its use of elves, dwarves, hobbits, orcs and goblins. But, it is also heavily influenced by Conan, Vance (magic), Cuthulu, ancient history and myth, etc. While Traveller was influenced by Tubb, etc.
> 
> Tolkien is certainly a big name out of all the other influences combined. A lot of these others have fallen back into relative obscurity.



Tolkien's Middle Earth is probably the single most read and read about setting, and definitely one of the most watched, worldwide, settings. Even some amusing Soviet Films. I think Narnia and Winnie the Poo are pretty close, and Peter Pan not far behind. All of which are 20th C fantasies. (I highly recommend the soviet films Винни Пух and Хобит. They are very different interpretations of the source than the US adaptations, and while crudely shot, are effective none the less.)
D&D is a cadet off of Tolkien. It's closeness to Tolkien in setting tropes helps with its dominance. It ignoring the severe limitations Tolkien embedded into the various "races" is part of its appeal as well... add that it's the first, and is backed by one of the biggest toy companies in the world, and it's current domination is easily understood. 

The thing many don't grok, however, is that it's a Genre engine. It's an engine tuned for one subgenre, with a variety of settings available, but all sharing most of the core D&D tropes.  


Ixal said:


> I guess the big question is "How much science (correct or wrong) must be in something to be considered science fiction"?



One author mentioned an SFWA guideline from the 1950's... no more than three breaks from known physics.
GIven 


Neonchameleon said:


> When you've taken out Star Wars, Star Trek (how many gods are there in TOS?), and a few others I'd say you've beaten SF so far back that it's barely a meaningful genre.



TOS, not counting TAS, we get Apollo, Trelane (albeit immature), the gang in Plato's Stepchildren, the Exca;bians...
TAS adds Kulkulkan.
Of those, only Apollo and Kulkulkan are confirmed to have been gods to Earthmen; Plato's stepchildren seem to have been transplanted from Greece and culturally fossilized. Trelane (and his parents) are clearly god-level power, but Trelane is not aware of lightspeed time lag, and his information is by observation from distance.
And that's not counting the 3 computers masquerading as gods.
Star Trek V is well summarized as "Kirk meets God. Kirk Wins."
TNG adds the Q. They are god-level beings. And the Dowd. Also god-level beings.


Ruin Explorer said:


> If I'd done that, I'd agree. But you're doing that not me, and attributing it to me is extremely silly at best.
> 
> Star Trek doesn't have any supernatural gods or supernatural forces I'm aware of.



It has literally over a dozen episodes across 6+ series where beings who match the abilities of the gods of the classical era. TOS has two who explicitly are previously-worshipped as gods beings of great power. (see above.)
I think there are at least 6 episodes with Q in TNG alone. One dowd. The Traveller (in two episodes).
DS-9 has the Prophets (wormhole aliens). It also has a Q episode.
Voyager has a couple Q episodes. And Kes ascending to incorporeal being. 



Bohandas said:


> We can see the Voyager because we already know where it is, and it's designed to phone home intelligibly. If there were a random Voyager sized object in an unknown place we'd have little hope of finding it.



The Voyagers have a net signal less than the average cellphone.

The S-IV-B put out a signal many thousands of times more powerful, but in a less clear band... and one that radio telescopes cannot pick up well. There's little doubt that if an S-IV-B happened to ignite the engines in Mauna Kea's infrared field of  view at an AU, it'd be visible... as a bright point source. The question isn't if the scope would capture it; the question is if it would be noticed. Given that someone found a couple asteroids this year by examining old telescope images... it's the making sense of the raw data that is the hard part.



dragoner said:


> Many times I read that stealth equals invisibility, which it does not, even here on Earth; nevertheless, perfect detection does not exist.



QFT!
Stealth is simply making your signals (generated and returned) look like something to be ignored.


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## Ixal (May 1, 2021)

aramis erak said:


> One author mentioned an SFWA guideline from the 1950's... no more than three breaks from known physics.
> GIven



That was the 1950s. Today this is probably a per page guideline.


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## Ruin Explorer (May 1, 2021)

aramis erak said:


> It has literally over a dozen episodes across 6+ series where beings who match the abilities of the gods of the classical era. TOS has two who explicitly are previously-worshipped as gods beings of great power. (see above.)
> I think there are at least 6 episodes with Q in TNG alone. One dowd. The Traveller (in two episodes).
> DS-9 has the Prophets (wormhole aliens). It also has a Q episode.
> Voyager has a couple Q episodes. And Kes ascending to incorporeal being.



Yup, and I discussed that. The point is they don't regard them as supernatural and constantly point out that they aren't real gods, just super-beings.


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## S'mon (May 1, 2021)

Ruin Explorer said:


> Yup, and I discussed that. The point is they don't regard them as supernatural and constantly point out that they aren't real gods, just super-beings.



The Trek metric seems to be 'is scientifically explainable' - so in a universe where everything is scientifically explainable, by definition the super-being is not a 'real god'. 

But IRL we have religions, esp 19th & 20th century ones, with part of the belief system being that the God or gods are scientifically explainable. Some of these religions even have words like 'Science' in their name.


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## Ruin Explorer (May 1, 2021)

S'mon said:


> But IRL we have religions, esp 19th & 20th century ones, with part of the belief system being that the God or gods are scientifically explainable. Some of these religions even have words like 'Science' in their name.



< pushes 10' pole against this > "I'm pretty sure it's a trap guys, get the trap-testing chickens ready!"


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## S'mon (May 1, 2021)

Ruin Explorer said:


> < pushes 10' pole against this > "I'm pretty sure it's a trap guys, get the trap-testing chickens ready!"




I was trying to hopefully-not-trappily make the point that "explainable" and "divine" are not always seen as exclusive. That this is a feature of the Star Trek worldview. So it's understandable that some people would say that Q has all the necessary features of a 'god' in-universe, and some people would say he/it doesn't.

I haven't watched a ton of DS9, but I got the impression that this was a theme of the show - Star Fleet sees the Wormhole Prophets as 'Super Advanced Aliens', the Bajorans see them as 'divine'. But that the Bajoran belief does not depend on them being scientifically inexplicable. A Star Fleet officer can't pull back the curtain, scientifically explain the Prophets, and expect the Bajorans to go "Oh, I guess we were wrong then!"


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## Bohandas (May 1, 2021)

S'mon said:


> The Trek metric seems to be 'is scientifically explainable' - so in a universe where everything is scientifically explainable, by definition the super-being is not a 'real god'.
> 
> But IRL we have religions, esp 19th & 20th century ones, with part of the belief system being that the God or gods are scientifically explainable. Some of these religions even have words like 'Science' in their name.



It goes back way further than that. Epicurius taught that gods and the soul were both material and made of atoms.

Furthermore, religions in general believe that their gods and spirits have real concrete existence. The only definite exceptions to this that I can think of are The Church of the SubGenius, and LaVeyan Satanism



S'mon said:


> I was trying to hopefully-not-trappily make the point that "explainable" and "divine" are not always seen as exclusive. That this is a feature of the Star Trek worldview. So it's understandable that some people would say that Q has all the necessary features of a 'god' in-universe, and some people would say he/it doesn't.
> 
> I haven't watched a ton of DS9, but I got the impression that this was a theme of the show - Star Fleet sees the Wormhole Prophets as 'Super Advanced Aliens', the Bajorans see them as 'divine'. But that the Bajoran belief does not depend on them being scientifically inexplicable. A Star Fleet officer can't pull back the curtain, scientifically explain the Prophets, and expect the Bajorans to go "Oh, I guess we were wrong then!"




Exactly.

I like this, you explained it better than I did.


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## Ruin Explorer (May 1, 2021)

S'mon said:


> I haven't watched a ton of DS9, but I got the impression that this was a theme of the show - Star Fleet sees the Wormhole Prophets as 'Super Advanced Aliens', the Bajorans see them as 'divine'. But that the Bajoran belief does not depend on them being scientifically inexplicable. A Star Fleet officer can't pull back the curtain, scientifically explain the Prophets, and expect the Bajorans to go "Oh, I guess we were wrong then!"



Sure, but at other times Starfleet officers have at least attempted precisely that, with varying levels of success, and DS9 goes to great lengths to make the Prophets not be demonstrably divine, and to offer various explanations for their powers, which are clearly not magic.

This stands distinct from something like Shadowrun which goes to some lengths to say "This is magic and it doesn't follow scientific rules or necessarily any rules, it is supernatural". Whether something has a physical presence doesn't measure whether it's supernatural or not either, I think that's a bit of a mental cul-de-sac.


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## Ixal (May 1, 2021)

Ruin Explorer said:


> This stands distinct from something like Shadowrun which goes to some lengths to say "This is magic and it doesn't follow scientific rules or necessarily any rules, it is supernatural". Whether something has a physical presence doesn't measure whether it's supernatural or not either, I think that's a bit of a mental cul-de-sac.



Ehm, in Shadowrun magic is science. Or rather, the hermetics treat is as another law of nature like gravity and they research it as such while shamans treat it more of a divine gift from spirits. And there are also proponents of a unified magical theory to combine those two paths.


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## Ruin Explorer (May 2, 2021)

Ixal said:


> Ehm, in Shadowrun magic is science. Or rather, the hermetics treat is as another law of nature like gravity and they research it as such while shamans treat it more of a divine gift from spirits. And there are also proponents of a unified magical theory to combine those two paths.



They're objectively wrong, though. This has been expressed at some length in older SR magic-related books. So that's a weird thing to bring up. Hell basic laws of physics are destroyed by countless aspects of SR magic, especially some of the larger-scale aspects of the universe and history and so on.


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## Ixal (May 2, 2021)

Ruin Explorer said:


> They're objectively wrong, though. This has been expressed at some length in older SR magic-related books. So that's a weird thing to bring up. Hell basic laws of physics are destroyed by countless aspects of SR magic, especially some of the larger-scale aspects of the universe and history and so on.



You make the same mistake like many people, no matter the system, to think that magic is not part of the basic laws of physics. Magic in pretty much all RPG systems always produce the same results, thats why you have standardised spells, and thus scientific methods can be applied to it. In Shadowrun this is an accepted fact, which is why you have magic being researched according to modern methods and have patents on spells.

In other settings both creators and players often ignore the science behind magic because, for some reason, people think something can only be magical when it is not a science and they pretend that this is the case, even when magic in the game functions like a law of nature and always works the same way.
Its ok when the characters in the game don't think that it is science, the same way how smithing was once considered magic because involved chemistry people did not understand. But in the end in nearly all settings magic is no different than physics.


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## Bohandas (May 2, 2021)

Ruin Explorer said:


> Sure, but at other times Starfleet officers have at least attempted precisely that, with varying levels of success, and DS9 goes to great lengths to make the Prophets not be demonstrably divine, and to offer various explanations for their powers, which are clearly not magic.
> 
> This stands distinct from something like Shadowrun which goes to some lengths to say "This is magic and it doesn't follow scientific rules or necessarily any rules, it is supernatural". Whether something has a physical presence doesn't measure whether it's supernatural or not either, I think that's a bit of a mental cul-de-sac.




Even the "not necessarily any rules" part doesn't necessarily put it outside of physics. If you follow the copenhagen interpretation of quantum physics, which is espoused by a plurality of physicists, there are trillions of processes going on every second that are every bit as random as a Rod of Wonder; the outcomes may be weighted (again, like the Rod of Wonder) but the choice between them is ultimately random. Whether you'll find Schrodinger's Cat alive or dead when you finally open the box is completely arbitrary according to the most prominent understanding of physics.



Ixal said:


> You make the same mistake like many people, no matter the system, to think that magic is not part of the basic laws of physics. Magic in pretty much all RPG systems always produce the same results, thats why you have standardised spells, and thus scientific methods can be applied to it. In Shadowrun this is an accepted fact, which is why you have magic being researched according to modern methods and have patents on spells.
> 
> In other settings both creators and players often ignore the science behind magic because, for some reason, people think something can only be magical when it is not a science and they pretend that this is the case, even when magic in the game functions like a law of nature and always works the same way.
> Its ok when the characters in the game don't think that it is science, the same way how smithing was once considered magic because involved chemistry people did not understand. But in the end in nearly all settings magic is no different than physics.




This. It's clearly knowable and predictable on some level because otherwise you'd never be able to cast a spell except by accident.

EDIT:
As a tangential aside, here is a legitimate science documentary that literally talks about turning lead into other elements:


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## Neonchameleon (May 4, 2021)

Ruin Explorer said:


> They're objectively wrong, though. This has been expressed at some length in older SR magic-related books. So that's a weird thing to bring up. Hell basic laws of physics are destroyed by countless aspects of SR magic, especially some of the larger-scale aspects of the universe and history and so on.



Basic laws of real world physics are destroyed by countless aspects of Star Trek _technology_.

But if we're talking about in-universe laws of physics approached from an in-universe perspective then no they aren't, by definition. The laws of physics are the laws of the universe _as we understand them_. And if magic is a part of the universe then science needs to account for that. In normal physics most of the time we treat the earth as flat because in local areas the curvature is so small that it effectively is. Newtonian Physics is not _wrong _even if Einstein corrected it and things get really weird at quantum levels.

If magic can have repeatable and reliable effects then it can be approached by the tools of science. There aren't two domains because science is a set of tools, not a set of results. And if the definition we're using is "regularly and gratuitously breaks real world physics" then Star Trek does so and the window dressing they put on things like trickster gods to pretend they are scientific (which honestly isn't much better than DC's fifth dimensional imps) is just window dressing.


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