Steampunk Campaign Ideas

[BoneDaddy]

So I figured I'd start a thread for Steampunk campaign ideas, because I had one and I want to share it, and I'm interested in other folks ideas about how to make a good steampunk setting.

 

"Wollop!": A Steampunk Campaign. This takes place in the year 2166, 168 years after the fatefull invasion Martian invasion that conquered the world (as reported by noted journalist Sir Richard Burton), and the reinvasion that followed a year later (unreported). Aliens with Antibiotics are a terrible thing.

 

In the following century, the English regrouped under the leadership of a visionary former artilleryman, and went underground. While the aliens ruled the surface and the people who stayed above, the underground movement hollowed out great cities and created a new society deep underground, safe from the predations of the tripods.

 

The players are the elite fighting force of this cautious, spartan, militaristic society. They will be the first in two generations to go above ground, back to the surface, to begin the takeover of the surface world.

 

Why Steampunk in 2166? Technological development was stunted, but necessity mothered much invention. Under England there is plenty of coal, and plenty of water, so coal, natural gas, and steam powered the underground world.

 

(I'm looking for the artwork, I'll add it later if I find it...)

[tkdguy]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

What's the quality of the air down below? Sounds like pollution could be a problem. But it sounds like a great idea.

 

Also, have the humans been able to steal or copy any Martian technology? Anything that will give them an edge will help. I wouldn't give them the heat ray, though. Let that be one of the Martians' most closely guarded secret. But the humans may have developed a "lightning cannon" to counter the heat ray.

 

If you have the Castle Falkenstein sourcebook Steam Age, you'll find a lot of interesting ideas there.

[BoneDaddy]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

Air is filtered and carefully vented, and reasonably clean.

 

A lightning cannon might be in the offing, but I would expect greater advances in direct fire technology.

 

For the surface world, I'll borrow liberally from The White Mountains trilogy (which I recommend heartily).

[Flames]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

My steampunk idea is similar to Deadlands, in that the course of human history is changed dramatically by the discovery of a material.

 

In my version, a series of meteorites crash-land on Earth in the mid-19th Century, and these meteorites, what's left of them, anyway, contain a mysterious otherworldly rock-like material that responds to being submerged in salt water by heating up almost instantly to fantastically high temperatures, causing water around to it boil. The larger the chunk of this alien rock, the the larger the volume of water it can boil.

 

The rock never seems to lose any of its own mass, and pieces of it are regularly being found all over the globe, where they are jealously guarded by locals who fail to realize, in their savage ignorance, how important it is that the material find its way into the responsible and capable hands of the British Empire.

 

The material, the rock, or whatever it ends up being called ("Fultonite" would be a cute name for it, based on its ability to generate massive and limitless amounts of steam pressure), is the focus of the setting... finding it, buying it, trading for it, stealing it, and so on. Competent and brave adventurers can find limitless and shamefully lucrative employment seeking the material, securing it, and bringing it back to England or America.

 

A piece the size of a pea can provide steam heat for a large building, and a piece the size of baseball can power a massive ocean-liner-size ship. The largest piece found is the size of a soccer ball, and it provides steam-electric power to most of Great Britain.

 

As the campaign rolls along, larger and more incredible machines are built, and wars begin to be waged over excavation sites where the material has been found.

 

The exact origin of the material is unknown, of course, and finding out the origin would probably shake up the campaign world quite a bit. Most people believe it to be a gift from their deity of choice, but it could turn out to be a fuel substance created by an alien species, and the fragments that fell to Earth could be pieces of one of their ships. Maybe they want it back, all of it.

[BoneDaddy]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

The material, the rock, or whatever it ends up being called ("Fultonite" would be a cute name for it, based on its ability to generate massive and limitless amounts of steam pressure), is the focus of the setting... finding it, buying it, trading for it, stealing it, and so on. Competent and brave adventurers can find limitless and shamefully lucrative employment seeking the material, securing it, and bringing it back to England or America.

I recommend Phlogiston.

[Flames]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

I recommend Phlogiston.

 

Wasn't there some mention of that idea in the ST:TNG episode where Data loses his memory and is living on a primitive planet?

 

The people in my steampunk world would argue over calling it Phlogiston, since the space-rock reacts with salt water by producing heat, rather than reacting to heat by losing mass.

 

The characteristics of the rock would be hotly debated (no pun intended) by the thinkers of the day, whilst industrialists and military leaders brush scientific arguments aside in favor of exploiting the rocks for the good of the Empire.

 

When it comes to steampunk as a genre, I'm more into the idea of an alternate history that relies on what we know of physics today, rather than, say, Space 1889, which goes along with radical and, by today's standards, ludicrous science of the 19th Century.

 

I would like to run a steampunk campaign, but I shy away from it, since I would want to use HERO System, which I think is diminished by application to a genre where personal superpowers aren't going to happen, and also because the genre itself is so intensely visual and speculative in nature. To really get the feel of it would require a lot of florid description, along with players who don't mind being lectured to about shiny rivets and clacking clockwork.

 

Would a steampunk campaign be diminished if PCs were superheroes or spellcasters of some ilk?

 

How could I incorporate higher-powered PCs into the steampunk world I've envisioned?

[tkdguy]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

I've played (or rather GMed) Castle Falkenstein, where magic is as common as steamtech, so I wouldn't say the campaign would be diminished. There weren't any superheroes, but the dragons and some Faerie Lords came pretty close to it.

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

In the good old days (stupid automated retrieval system), the University of British Columbia had its entire _Engineering_ collection going back to 1871 on the open shelves.

Some ideas:

i) We're running out of fertiliser? No problem: the coal seams of England have lots of fossilised dinosaur, er....doodies in them. All we have to do is dig it out, mulch and spread it around. Of course, who knows what else is down there with it, or what kinds of seeds might survive.

ii) Train tracks are expensive, but there's these "endless tracks" that loop around tractor wheels. Why not land trains to penetrate the wilds of Canada/Australia/Africa?

iii) New miracle explosives such as "cordite" can change the world! For example, we could cut a channel into the interior of Australia/the Sahara and create an inland sea and an entirely new Mediterranean coast. And sail places where only the Tuareg go now. But it is a reasonable geographical supposition that those seas have existed before. Surely urban civilisation was not invented in the Middle East (I say "surely" because if I filled in the assumptions of the 1890s I would sound like a Nazi). What lost cities await on reborn coasts for the first intrepid steam-explorer, full of artefacts for archaeologists to plunder?

iv) The great scientists of the age are constantly working on new steam valves and drive cycles, as well as novel high tensile alloys of steel for engine components, using exotic elements such as chromium and nickel. A sufficiently powerful steam engine could generate almost unimaginable amounts of energy, especially if radium were substituted for coal. For example, a sufficiently powerful "electromagnetic" could veritably fling an sealed vessel into the airless void of space. A visit to Mars (which will be reaching its conjunction with Earth in 1897), might reveal the truth behind the "canals."

Yes, I know iv) has been done, a lot. I just think that all this talk about aether flyers underrates just how _practical_ people thought these plans were in the 1890s. They didn't have to imagine antigravity because the real world technology seemed to be almost in their grasp.

[Guest Celt]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

Recommended reading for any pulp GM or science character is Scientific American's column 50, 100 AND 150 YEARS AGO. They sometimes have some crazy stuff.

[Ravensfeld]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

I think the key to pulling off any setting well is to know what elements truly belong in it. Research is probably the biggest key to success. I spent about a month already just digging up things that I thought were appropriate for the realm and seeing if they should be incorporated to into the world.

 

The first thing to think about when writing a Steampunk setting is to define what it means to you. To me Steampunk setting involved the incorporation of Fantasy and Technology in cooperation with one another. This meant more than just guns and magic being mushed together. After a friend of mind added some much needed input and research of our own we decided to go for a Victorian world with literal steam driven engines similar to those found in the era of the British Industrial revolution. The important common themes we both came up with every time we sat down and thought about Steampunk were easy to define:

 

Industrialism

Imperialism

Capitalism

Democracy

Urbanization

Mass Transportation

Magical and/or Non-Magical Communication(telegraphs, and postals systems)

Duality of Nature vs. Technology

 

and the list goes on...

 

I thought I'd throw this post out to help anyone that was struggling with getting started because I know how frustrating and tedious it can be to write a new setting sometimes.

 

Hope you all enjoy. I'll be posting more as I finish the setting I'm working on so I'm hoping to get some feedback as I add more to the realm.

[eternal_sage]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

also, i would add that just doing a wiki search for the timeperiod and some of the concepts brought up a lot of that research (me being the friend which aided fair Ravensfeld there).

 

i think the biggest hurdle to jump is defining the term as it applies to YOUR setting. do you want something like Iron Kingdoms or League of Extrodinary Gentlemen (movie, have not read the graphic novel), which is more Victorian in setting and feel, and touches (and draws from) the problems and concerns of the era, something like the Vinci from Rise of Legends (RTS game for computer) which are clockwork and draw more upon the 1600's Italy, or something like Eberron, which is basically just a mishmash of fantasy and tech, which glosses over some issues, and leaves others to find buried (like when i figured out that the houses are basically monopolistic corperations). or maybe your idea takes you somewhere completely different.

 

whatever you decide, i think that is really where the work starts. once you move toward a certain theme, mood, etc, you can really start fleshing out the world with real life references (if they exist and that is your preference) or otherwise crafting the ideas the setting is based on. it all really rolls downhill from there.

 

for the world the two of us are working out, we are going somewhat towards FF6 (thats Final Fantasy 6 for you geezers ) in that the steam that powers these engines (at least the good ones) is magical in nature, a fire elemental trapped in a crystal. lesser engines (one's outside the Empire) still use coal and what have you, but the magical engines are becoming all the rage amoung the elite of society (who are all that can afford them, naturally). the Empire presses on, using advanced tech to demolish the opposing forces of primitives, and are slowly conquering the globe. unfortunately, always being the best slowly enforces laxity, and the Empire's gains over the last several centuries are waning, while the crown does not even notice, being to caught up in the petty affairs of high society and celebrity. now, around the globe, other groups have reverse engineered the magical means to the empire's tech, and are building versions for themselves (or, in the case of a certain group of elves, studying a special magic that grants them an advantage, especially in the polluted and raveged lands that are left from the Empire's conquest.

[Ravensfeld]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

Right you are Sage. I have to admit that this a big hurdle to cross, and few people take the much needed time to create a world. I found that the only problems I found in other settings that exist (think settings like Eberon) get started on the right foot, but it refuses to make the whole leap and admit that it really is Steampunk at heart.

[Mirgos]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

I am just beginning to design my own campaign based on steampunk at the moment & the best thing I can think to do is read as much literature as possible from the period - this not only gives ideas for stories but also immerses you in the language of the time.

[Kristopher]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

Yesterday, I was watching a friend play the video game Victoria: Revolutions and heard the train-whistle sound effect for when a province's rail system was finished, and I had a sudden vision of late-1800s Europe, and an elven woman in a long high-collared coat, hat, and boots boarding a train in some snow-covered central or eastern country, probably in the Balkans.

 

I didn't even think of it as "steampunk" until this morning, and I had been using the name "Victorian Fantasy" in my head, to distinguish the idea from medieval fantasy or modern/urban fantasy.

 

I don't know if it would be steampunk, really, because that usually seems to imply something closer to a kind of "strange tech" setting, at least to me. Things like the Sons of Ether from the Mage game, or giant steam-powered Babbage engines, or hulking bronze walking war machines spewing steam out the back as they lumber into battle. Girl Genius.

[tkdguy]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

The Arcanum video game is a Steampunk fantasy. The only problem is that it mixes many different eras too freely (armored knights walking around in Victorian cities).

[AmadanNaBriona]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

The Artilleryman's dream, from the Webcomic...

 

Just in case you hadn't seen it

[Shadowsoul]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

Yesterday' date=' I was watching a friend play the video game [i']Victoria: Revolutions[/i] and heard the train-whistle sound effect for when a province's rail system was finished, and I had a sudden vision of late-1800s Europe, and an elven woman in a long high-collared coat, hat, and boots boarding a train in some snow-covered central or eastern country, probably in the Balkans.

 

I didn't even think of it as "steampunk" until this morning, and I had been using the name "Victorian Fantasy" in my head, to distinguish the idea from medieval fantasy or modern/urban fantasy.

 

Victorian and early modern fantasy is certainly an interesting idea. Especially because of all the complaints about 'generic medieval fantasy'.

You might want to look into the Chrestomanci books, the White Crow series or Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell for some interesting ideas for this neglected subgenre.

I myself have several projects touching on this - a supernatural victorian mystery campaign, an early modern fantasy campaign

and a short story. I might start posting write-ups of the early modern campaign so you're welcome to crib ideas or, (even better), make suggestions.

A key element of this sort of fantasy would be alchemy and the high magic of the renaissance onwards. Also fey beings lurking on the edges of man's world and the way that other races relate to men. Would dwarves have advanced technology such as cordite or electricity which gave them an edge over other societies? Or perhaps man's industrial revolution and the technological and economic explosions it generated has allowed him to finally challenge the might of the mystical elves? Are humans now too numerous and well equipped to be trifled with?

I do rather like the idea of musketeers or riflemen engaging hordes of demons and monsters while artillery batteries hammer away at the tower of the Dark Lord tm.

[BoneDaddy]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

The Artilleryman's dream, from the Webcomic...

 

Just in case you hadn't seen it

Webcomic? Gimme linkee!

[AmadanNaBriona]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

Webcomic? Gimme linkee!

 

http://www.darkhorse.com/zones/wotw/wotw_popup.php

 

there ya go.

[AmadanNaBriona]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

It's not a bad comic adaptation, but the direction of the thread just popped the image of the British Fighting Machines into the front of my head, so I figured that page needed to be posted.

 

Thinking about it, Michael Moorcock's Hawkmoon setting has a lot of neat weird sceince that'd probably fit in well with this idea.

[Kristopher]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

http://www.darkhorse.com/zones/wotw/wotw_popup.php

 

there ya go.

 

Thanks for posting that.

[AmadanNaBriona]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

Thanks for posting that.

 

No worries. Lots of WotW geeks here to appreciate it

 

I'm sure I'm not the only one who hears Sir Richard Burton's voice when reading the narration...

[rmccarty4]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

Surfing off BoneDaddy's Hanging Monasteries post (for which, props & Rep), I saw the following, which I didn't see cited elsewhere in the Pulp Hero threads:

 

Steampunk Art Update

 

Some really spiffy stuff there. I especially dig the Necropathic Spectregraph (vacuum-tube-powered Ouija board?) & Panzermecha (which is what it sounds like).

[Ravensfeld]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

There was one game that I found that gave me heaping mounds of inspiration for the realm that my current gaming group is working on. If anyone has ever played the game Siberia, then you're in for a treat. The game is an old-school style point and click adventure. Siberia had many underlying themes such as modernism, commercialization, and the notion of "do machines have feelings or a soul?" hidden underneath its trappings. While the game itself isn't entirely steampunk its automatons and rustic feel were a great inspiration point that I thought I'd share with everyone.

[Curufea]

Re: Steampunk Campaign Ideas

 

From the Anachrotech LJ group-

 

http://www.steampunkmagazine.com/

http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/9094/voyages.html