Hard Science....easy descriptions.

[ParitySoul]

I find Hard Science games to be hard to sell becasue most players don't want to worry about gravity, air pressure, etc when they game.

 

They want drama, romance, gun fights, etc.

 

Now, how in the past have you as GMs taken elements of Hard Science into your game but not overwhelmed your players with it? How do you sell this idea to your players? What is the upper limit on real life vs. game life you can use?

 

Thanks.

[Cancer]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

The problem with science fiction game worlds is that to stick with real physics, you have to live with the point that Einstein is right and FTL is impossible.

 

When there's no FTL, any interstellar travel is a generation(s)-long process.

 

Interplanetary travel is also slow and beastly expensive. By expensive I mean energetically expensive, never mind monetary.

 

"Terraforming" is, right now, nothing but fantasy. The least implausible candidate now is Mars. But to make Mars liveable requires importing a huge amount of mass (if my back-of-the-envelope is right, about 10^16 tons) to build an atmosphere that humans (and other terrestrial animals) can live in. That takes a while, at least; you'll need to capture and deposit several hundred thousand comets (and that's a few tens of thousands years' worth), or move a largish KBO inward to Mars's orbit and deposit it gently on the surface. We can't do either of those things now, interplanetary travel being what it is, and orbital mechanics being what it is (changing orbits is another beastly expensive thing). That's assuming that those sources are purely the stuff you want, which isn't so. It took 2 Gyr or so for cyanobacteria to turn the early Earth's atmosphere from CO2-dominated to O2-dominated. (The N2 probably hasn't changed a great deal, but that's harder to be sure of.)

 

Ocean-floor activities seem much less far out to me, but that may be just ignorance on my part.

 

The SETI Project is far from complete, but we can rule out the "N is large" idea. In other words, there are not many thousands of technological civilizations out there (if there were, we would have found them already). So that rules out a lot of science fiction involving alien races, too.

 

What's left to you, then, from common sci-fi world visions are mostly dystopic situations. Those where humans never leave Earth, and technology is harnessed to concentrate wealth and power into the hands of a small group, and the bulk of the population never quite gets down to medieval serf level, but Dickensian misery and squalor and Orwellian political and social control is the rule. And that's just a fun-happy world to live in.

[austenandrews]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

It depends on how you define "hard SF." If hard SF focuses on science by definition, and your players don't want to focus on science, then you're out of luck. But if you want hard science without the need to focus on it, there's no reason you can't structure a Star Trek-like setting with hard science and most of the usual adventure tropes.

[keithcurtis]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

I ran a fairly hard science campaign for years. It took place entirely within the solar system. Granted, I did have Nivenesque fusion drives, which are near magical in their efficiency.

My suggestion would be to do all of the math and hard work yourself, behind the scenes. Then present your characters with options based on those calculations.

I had developed a spreadwheet that calculated travel times based on fuel/acceleration/decelleration/current planet positions, but I again admit my exhaust speeds were nigh magical to get a reasonable travel time. Like riding particle cannon. But again, it works for Larry.

 

Keith "Solar Colonies" Curtis

[ThothAmon]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

To a certain extent roleplayers come to play the game to escape from reality. If your group wants that escape and you don't, you may be heading for trouble.

 

There's no reason why you can't have gunfights, romance and suchlike alomgside concerns such as pressurization, gravity, reaction mass, lengthy travel times et al. They are not mutually exclusive.

 

Hard science SF is a possibility. First you have to decide the upper boundary where hard science becomes rubber science. The upper limit usually comes when considering such things as FTL travel, FTL communications, anti-gravity, inertia dampening, hyperspace, force fields, matter transmission, alien species, super-hydroponics and time dilation.

 

Star Trek is a shining example of how not to do hard SF with big topics. Better examples are found in SF literature e.g. The Web Between The Worlds, Moon Is A Harsh Mistress, Singularity Sky, Broken Angels, Red Thunder, Fall Of Moondust. There are one or two good movie/TV examples, often flawed B movies rather than blockbusters e.g. Pitch Black (gloss over the universal batteries and the weird conjunction), Firefly (zero-G was obviously too expensive to produce), Total Recall (decompression? nah!), UFO (future space chicks will wear purple wigs!) and of course 2001.

 

Players generally don't want to be bothered with the small things that would be vital in a hard SF world - radiation shielding, vac suit maintenance, low-G movement restrictions. That's easily dealt with via appropriate background skills, and problems in these areas can then be saved for dramatic purposes.

 

Hard SF space combat is a fantastic source of fun - good gunnery experts are mathematicians who sweat probabilities, the best pilots are healthy specimens who can resist high G without blackout and a good sensor ops man is worth his weight in meteoric diamond. Other good plot bits can come from survival scenarios, first contacts and so forth.

[Reality]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

I just finished reading the Heritage Universe stories by Charles Sheffield, a (now deceased) scientist and sci-fi writer. He pointed out in his synopsis of this series that there is currently nothing in known physics that explicitly forbids matter from disappearing from one location and reappearing in another (the non-local nature of the universe) and that quantum physics actually leans towards this idea. So while nothing can move faster than light while traveling via acceleration and velocity, ships could vanish from space and simultaneously reappear elsewhere without violating physics. His novel-sized paperback Borderlands of Science is a good resource for writing hard sci-fi, too.

 

I actually want to incorporate his books into a Star Hero campaign, and plan to use his "Bose Network" of vanish/reappear points as the only means of "FTL" travel. This basically amounts to Teleportation with Megascale, a la wormholes, but with a different special effect. Time is tight, right now, though, with me trying to break into the real estate biz, but I'll find the time, I'm sure.

[austenandrews]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

Star Trek is a shining example of how not to do hard SF with big topics.

Naturally, by "a Star Trek-like setting" I meant an armed, widely-traveled spaceship in a spaceborne frontier society with an ensemble of protagonists comprising the crew. Of course that's such a ubiquitous arrangement these days, maybe "naturally" is no longer appropriate.

[Curufea]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

Characters (and players) don't need to know hard science to play a game.

 

How many computer users do you know that can build a computer out of parts? Can they even design the circuit boards and read the values of resisters?

[bigdamnhero]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

I can think of several different ways to answer this, depending on what you’re really saying:

 

 

Q1: I want to run a campaign that is focused on science and discovery, but my players just want to shoot things.

 

A1: You have a disconnect between what you want and what your players want. Not dissimilar from someone who wants to run a 4-color Champions game when his players want to play Dark Champs vigilantes. Not much you can do but have a long conversation and agree on something everyone (including you) can enjoy.

 

 

Q2: I want to run a campaign that is grounded in realistic science, but my players just want to shoot things.

 

A2: As ThothAmon rightly points out, the two are not mutually exclusive. No worries.

 

 

Q3: I want to have a large number of non-Earth-like planets and non-humanoid aliens, but my players want to romance green-skinned Orion slave girls. (Who doesn’t?)

 

A3: The science you want to use doesn't allow the types of stories your players want to play. This is a harder one. I prefer to keep my science on the believable end of the spectrum, but truly Hard Science is extremely limiting in terms of the types of stories you can tell. So I normally try to keep most things realistic, while introducing a certain number of rubber science concepts – as few as I can get away with and still tell the stories we want to tell. The trick is to make the rubber science elements seem as realistic as the real elements, which mostly means thinking it through so that there are a set of consistent guidelines for how things work. Again, you probably need to have a talk with your players. The advantage of RPGs (over film or TV) is that the characters can all be wearing full suits without slowing the story down, and blobs of space jelley can have every bit as much personality as any other NPC.

 

 

Q4: I want to have a lot of “technobabble†in my game (whether real or rubber science), but I have a bunch of poets & lovers who aren’t interested in learning that stuff.

 

A4: So you've got a disconnect between how much science you want the players to know/use and how much they're interested in. I agree with Keith – do all the hard work yourself and slip them little bits as they become relevant to the plot. I like to develop brief summary sheets on “Here is how ____ works.†Their primary purpose is to make sure I have it all straight in my mind, but I can also make them available to the players to read (in between sessions) if they’re interested. If your players aren’t interested, then you’ll probably have to keep doing most of the heavy lifting. But in my experience most players eventually get tired of the GM saying “You can’t do that because I said so†and want to figure out how it works for themselves.

 

 

Hope one (or more) of these helps.

 

 

bigdamnhero

“Is this gonna be a standup fight, sir, or another bughunt?â€

[Guest WhammeWhamme]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

Q3: I want to have a large number of non-Earth-like planets and non-humanoid aliens, but my players want to romance green-skinned Orion slave girls. (Who doesn’t?)

 

 

It helps if you make some of the "aliens" altered humans; even the hardest of sci fi can allow for genetic manipulation, right? (I mean, that seems almost an inevitable development in a world with glowing green rabbits...).

[Zeropoint]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

One race of beings in my Star Hero games is the genetically engineered Nekojin--catgirls (and catboys, of course).

 

They have cat ears and tails, and tend to be more agile than the average human, as well as somewhat more attractive. They also tend to have a generally playful and somewhat childlike demeanor.

 

Under the laws at the time of their creation, they were not considered human beings, and were used (in fact, created for) the sex industry. They have subsequently been emanciapted, but still face prejudice based on their nature and origin.

 

Basically, I just wanted an excuse to have catgirls in my universe.

 

Zeropoint

[Chiba Bob]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

I never like the predominance of bumpy headed alien humanoids throughout the universe. I think aliens should be something you want to instinctively shoot first, determine if was harmless or intelligent later. I use deep sea creatures for my inspiration but the problem is how do you roleplay a floating jellyfish-like alien which communicates with smell by emitting differed mixtures of methane gas. While, a know a few players who would fine it amusing to play such an alien for a time, but after awhile, playing such a creature would grow stale. Moreover, using such a creature as a major villain ...well lets face it, their soliloquies would just stink ("THE HELL WITH THE UNIVERSAL TRANSLATOR ... JUST SHOOT IT BEFORE I PUKE!!!") They are good for adding background color to a campaign but generally players what to play and interact with something more humanoid.

 

So, in my crunchy, Star Hero campaign I have been working on and off over the years, I surmised that in the coming "Genetic Age", there is a group called "Splicers" who are similar to "Hackers" during the Information Age. Instead of computer shenanigans, Slicers cook-up monsters in their basements or even create catgirl boy toys. I am sure this use of genetic technology would be highly illegal, everywhere, but if the technology exists, there are going to be those who are going to abuse it, some for financial gain and some because they can. In my campaign, Caninoids are not a race of evolved dogs, but are animalized humans known as Werewolves, sporting a gangbanger pack mentality and a predisposition toward piracy and in pillaging small colonies. Armed with a little imagination and a good rational, even rubbery bits of sci fi can be hardened.

[assault]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

My approach to Hard Science games is to keep the Science offstage. Apart from anything else, that helps conceal any rubberyness that slips in.

 

That means that the PCs don't generally have to worry about stuff the players don't want to have to worry about. The "ship's computers" handle most of it. And it's more realistic too! After all, ships' weapons, for example, if any existed at all(!), wouldn't be manually controlled.

 

There are some pieces of rubber science that are convenient to slip in. FTL may or may not be one of this - it's optional. Artificial gravity is another - it's extremely useful, if only on a limited basis. But, of course, by definition, an SF setting can and probably should include a certain amount of "future technology", so slipping in a bit of what is useful is OK.

 

Incidentally, a lot of what is often regarded as "Hard" SF literature can more realistically be regarded as Space Opera. Larry Niven is a particularly fine example of this. His stuff is classic gimmick/science driven SF - but is scientifically complete nonsense. And don't get me started about his human societies...

[keithcurtis]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

Incidentally' date=' a lot of what is often regarded as "Hard" SF literature can more realistically be regarded as Space Opera. Larry Niven is a particularly fine example of this. His stuff is classic gimmick/science driven SF - but is scientifically complete nonsense. And don't get me started about his human societies...[/quote']

Precisely. He works from a mathematical perspective. He figures out how long it would take to get from point x to point y with acceleration and deceleration of 1g, and then hadwaves the engineering. There is just a drive that does this, OK?

He has stasis fields that slow down time. He's worked out the implications of it. How does it work? It just does, OK? ditto teleportation, macromolecules, superconductor cloth, etc. Somebody built a black box that does this, OK? Now on with the story!

 

Keith "Wants to try stepping disks" Curtis

[Chiba Bob]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

There are some pieces of rubber science that are convenient to slip in. FTL may or may not be one of this - it's optional. Artificial gravity is another - it's extremely useful' date=' if only on a limited basis. But, of course, by definition, an SF setting can and probably should include a certain amount of "future technology", so slipping in a bit of what is useful is OK.[/quote']

 

Artificial gravity is the rubbery point of my campaign too so I base all my propulsion around it. The assumption being that graviton and antigraviton particles exist and can be generated with the right equipment, something like the generation of electromagnetic fields. Mass attracts graviton particles, the more mass, the more gravity. If I can generate graviton particles, then such things a gravplates are possible.

 

Inertial dampers are another rubbery point in my campaign but they are based on artificial gravity. If I can generate antigraviton particles, negating the gravitons, I can reduce inertia. My inertial dampers are not perfect, the flux created as new gravitons attempt to replace those negated by the antigraviton particles produces an inertial drag on the mass as it moves. Moving through space at high velocities using normal propulsion methods is more like atmospheric flight. This limits maximum velocities well below light and allows more cinematic space battles which are Hero System friendly.

 

FTL travel is takes place through naturally occurring wormholes created during the Big Bang. They are very numerous and are naturally attracted to the masses between stars. The aperture of the wormhole normally closed to any mass approaching it but a ship equipped with an inertial damper (producing antigravitons) can enter. I like wormhole based FTL, as a GM, because I only have to map those stars the players can travel to.

 

In my campaign, I have made a few compromises to make space travel more feasible and to make gameplay more friendly but still trying to give it a hard science feel. Otherwise, I am trying to base the rest of the technology using current endeavors of research such as portable laser weapons using micro explosively pumped flux compression generators as a power source and the like. I use magazines such as Popular Science as a source of inspiration which paints a very optimistic picture (still no flying cars) of possible future technologies.

 

Somebody built a black box that does this' date=' OK? Now on with the story![/quote']

 

As Keith has pointed out , to a writer, the story is the thing. As a GM, not only is the story important but gameplay is as well. Hard science shouldn’t get in the way of the players having some fun.

 

 

[Nyrath]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

As Keith has pointed out ' date=' to a writer, the story is the thing. As a GM, not only is the story important but gameplay is as well. Hard science shouldn’t get in the way of the players having some fun.[/quote']

But sometimes one can incorporate the science into the gameplay.

http://www.herogames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=30643

[bigdamnhero]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

But sometimes one can incorporate the science into the gameplay.

http://www.herogames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=30643

"You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to Nyrath again."

 

Thanks for reposting that thread - I'd missed it the first time around!

 

 

bigdamnhero

Sheridan: “So you believe all this?â€

Sinclair: “I believe it.â€

Marcus: “If Entil'Zha believes it, I believe it.â€

Ivanova: “I'll be in the car.â€

[Cancer]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

"You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to Nyrath again.", as well.

[Peregrine]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

Interplanetary travel is also slow and beastly expensive. By expensive I mean energetically expensive, never mind monetary.

 

Not necessarily. I refer you to references on the Interplanetary Superhighway: http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/lagrange.html#end. Summarized, it is an extension of the same gravitic principles that brought us the LaGrange points in various orbits (Earth-Sun, Earth-Moon, etc.) See: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/genesis/media/jpl-release-071702.html for NASA's precis.

 

The energy cost is in getting out of Earth's gravity well. After that... at current, travel times make these trajectories less practical for interplanetary journeys. Still, they are currently in use for solar system explorations by unmanned craft. And as they are better understood and defined, they may become more practical for manned flight.

[Cantriped]

Re: Hard Science....easy descriptions.

 

even rubbery bits of sci fi can be hardened.

must... resist... tacky... Wouldn't those olive skinned slave girls actually help make the "rebbery bits" harder? *cowers in terror from the inevitable mob with monomelecular pickforks and fusion torchs*