Fantasy Races vs Sci Fi Species. Different or not?

[MGibster]

I think that's more down to the writers' choice of expression than the genre. Penny Dreadful is in a setting of traditional monster horror, which is closer to fantasy than scifi, and it addressed the theme of depression through allegory. Horror has been doing this for a long time, actually. Real world ancient mythology has allegories for many things, and is arguably the original source of modern fantasy (it inspired works like Middle Earth, Conan, D&D, etc).

I don't really consider horror to be fantasy but I'm not sure I want to go down that particular rabbit hole. But, yeah, mythology is rife with stories designed to teach us a lesson or represent something to the audience. I just don't think most modern fantasy writers do that as much as science fiction writers do.

 

[aramis erak]

Do you think there is any significant difference between the two? Do (or would) you tend to treat them differently in how you play or GM a campaign? Are there implications of being a fantasy race that are not true of a sapient alien race or vice-versa?

Given that you're conflating (Geo Lucas' self-defined) "Space fantasy" (Star Wars) with Space Opera Sci-fi (Star Trek),,,

And I don't.
Star Wars is fantasy in space.
Star Trek is on the border of Space Fantasy and Space Opera Sci--fi.
Dune is a form of Sci-Fi, Social SF.

the difference? Most of the Trek races are plausible with a huge dose of "Parallel Evolution" and "Panspermia.
Most of the Star Wars races are just "X animal tuned sentient"

Serious Sci-Fi has few/no playable species other than humans.

It's a wide spectrum.

 

[AtomicPope]

By Sci Fi species, I'm referring to sentient and sapient species, for example the major races in Star Trek and Star Wars (Vulkans, Klingons, Mon Calamari, Wookies, etc)

Do you think there is any significant difference between the two? Do (or would) you tend to treat them differently in how you play or GM a campaign? Are there implications of being a fantasy race that are not true of a sapient alien race or vice-versa?

Or are they identical concepts in your mind?

Sci-Fi species have an origin founded in science. Fantasy races do not.

Races in D&D were created by gods, primordials, devils, demons, or even formed from the dreams of powerful beings that escaped their minds.

The origins are completely different, and that's not the only place where the differences begin or end. In D&D a place where many people bring their prejudices and it fails them is in the concepts of good, evil, law, and order. In D&D these concepts are building blocks of the universe. In science fiction they're ideas to explore or comment on. In D&D, there are creatures who are the living embodiment of dark emotions like the Sorrowsworn. In D&D, darkness is a force, and not merely the absence of light. Races like Shardar Kai are the Elves of Shadowfell, who changed from both their environment and worshipping a non-Elven diety. Because this is true in D&D, there are also races like the Yuan-Ti who were once human. They turned into snakes not because of magic spells, evolution, or potions but because they devoted themselves to an evil snake god. The act of worship in Sci-Fi will not turn your entire race into snakes. The list goes on and on.

So I'd say the real differences are in the framework of the genres. Sci-fi, at a minimum, has the veneer of science. Fantasy sets its own rules for the universe and then fits creatures, creations, and worlds into it, or visa versa. Fantasy is not bound by natural laws found outside of its own pages.

 

[Tonguez]

Vulcans are elfs and Klingons are Orcs, Yoda is some kind of goblin

so yeah they’re the same really

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

If we’re talking about fantasy works teaching about human society like Sci-Fi often does, The Chronicles of Narnia is full of lessons to be learned. That’s probably the biggest one out there.

Earthsea also teaches a few things along the way.

 

[Umbran]

Serious Sci-Fi has few/no playable species other than humans.

That's... a pretty hefty claim on an undefined category of "serious sci-fi" One that, assuming some pretty typical uses of those words, I cannot agree with.

There is tons of very serious sci-fi literature with loads of species that would be playable in a game.

 

[Umbran]

I can put forth another really simple way that I consider them differently.

Fantasy races have, traditionally, wrapped significant cultural aspects into them - D&D has, in the past, had separate "races" that were humans from different cultural regions in the Forgotten Realms, for example. And while I can see the point in moving away from that, I don't reject that model outright.

I wouldn't generally accept that model in an sci-fi RPG - there, I generally consider "species" to model biological differences.

 

[aramis erak]

That's... a pretty hefty claim on an undefined category of "serious sci-fi" One that, assuming some pretty typical uses of those words, I cannot agree with.

There is tons of very serious sci-fi literature with loads of species that would be playable in a game.

There are very few sci-fi games that take the science part seriously, and fewer still that do so for a species basis.

The ones coming to mind are several GURPS settings (Vorkosigan, Transhuman Space), BTRC's SpaceTime, High Colonies....

Space Opera isn't "serious Sci-Fi" IMO. But I also finely divide genres; anything that has FTL and alien intelligent hominins just doesn't take the science seriously. And there's nothing wrong with Space Opera, and I really don't appreciate you your insinuation I was dissing it.

The aliens in High Colonies weren't presented as playable... In part because they cannot survive our shirtsleeve environments.

 

[Maxperson]

I can put forth another really simple way that I consider them differently.

Fantasy races have, traditionally, wrapped significant cultural aspects into them - D&D has, in the past, had separate "races" that were humans from different cultural regions in the Forgotten Realms, for example. And while I can see the point in moving away from that, I don't reject that model outright.

I wouldn't generally accept that model in an sci-fi RPG - there, I generally consider "species" to model biological differences.

What about that model on a larger scale? In the Realms it was different countries/cultures. In space if could be different planets where humans from 1000 years ago settled and different gravity or other environmental factors caused physical and/or mental differences. That would be the equivalent of fantasy humans from different cultural regions being different races.

 

[Umbran]

In space if could be different planets where humans from 1000 years ago settled and different gravity or other environmental factors caused physical and/or mental differences. That would be the equivalent of fantasy humans from different cultural regions being different races.

I'm not going to argue about specific hypotheticals as if they should impact my general position.