Why does a SciFi RPG "need" skills?

[Sunseeker]

I'd argue that the narrative space equal to a hyperdrive isn't a riddle or a puzzle, it's the magic. Both technobabble and magic are the same thing: fictional stuff that does stuff we can't understand.

I think this fits for certain "far future" settings, Star Trek, Star Wars, etc. It doesn't matter how the science actually works, even when they go into great detail about it on a regular basis, it's still essentially magic. Replace dilithium crystals with frogs tongues and you haven't actually changed anything.

But I don't think this applies to near sci-fi, for modernist post-apocalyptic, yesterday's tomorrow settings, those rely on much more "real" science, especially if they're centered around earth and the near solar-system. If you're more likely to encounter machine guns than phasers I think the game places itsself under a much more stringent sci​ than fi.

 

[Umbran]

I'd argue that the narrative space equal to a hyperdrive isn't a riddle or a puzzle, it's the magic. Both technobabble and magic are the same thing: fictional stuff that does stuff we can't understand.

Well, trope-wise, there's a frequent difference between science fiction and fantasy - knowledge vs intrinsic ability.

In sci-fi, the difference between being able to do something, and not, is usually just knowledge. In theory, anyone can learn to be a pilot, or can learn hyperspacial mechanics, or what have you.

In many forms of fantasy, well, if you're a muggle, you will never be able to use magic, no matter how long you study.

 

[Umbran]

You can invent a riddle or physical puzzle in a fantasy game and have the players solve it. You can't ask/challenge a player to fix a broken hyperdrive, because both the problem and the solution are completely fictional. It's BS all the way down.

Having played an engineer in a live-action game for several years, I beg to differ. Your ability to ask a player to solve a puzzle to represent fixing technology is limited only by the GM's imagination.

"The computer is till operational, so rerouting power to the hyperdrive is really easy. The only problem is the workstation is locked down with a complex access code. Here's a sudoku puzzle - if you complete it correctly, you get access and can reroute the power." Is pretty much equivalent to having a sphinx ask a riddle, or having the players work through a basic single-substitution cypher to learn the command word for the Great Magic McGuffin.

 

[Mallus]

I'd argue that the narrative space equal to a hyperdrive isn't a riddle or a puzzle, it's the magic. Both technobabble and magic are the same thing: fictional stuff that does stuff we can't understand.

That's a fair point.

Both magic and technobabble are ways of doing stuff in-game. You can make them skills with checks (like later D&D), raw ability checks (like the informal systems in earlier D&D), or a limited number of quantized "I win" tokens (like D&D spells). Or a mix. Or something I'm not thinking of at the moment.

It comes down to what gives the player the best a) feeling of genre-emulation, and b) set of tactical choices.

I think SF as a genre(s) lends itself best to a fairly detailed skills system --which I usually don't like, come to think of it. But there's no reason you couldn't abstract SF-inal skills the same way, for instance, D&D does spells.

 

[Mallus]

Having played an engineer in a live-action game for several years, I beg to differ. Your ability to ask a player to solve a puzzle to represent fixing technology is limited only by the GM's imagination.

Speaking as a frequent GM... the limitation is both imagination and free time!

"The computer is till operational, so rerouting power to the hyperdrive is really easy. The only problem is the workstation is locked down with a complex access code. Here's a sudoku puzzle - if you complete it correctly, you get access and can reroute the power." Is pretty much equivalent to having a sphinx ask a riddle, or having the players work through a basic single-substitution cypher to learn the command word for the Great Magic McGuffin.

Sure, this is great if you can find a chump --I mean a kind, committed soul-- willing to custom-design and/or find & steal interesting puzzles to challenge players with on a continuing basis. I've seen it done, but only in a convention/tournament setting. It also takes a very specific audience, willing to hand-solve those kinds of puzzles. They're very time-consuming.

It's also very game-y, and can drag some players out of the millieu/genre: "Why does is the mega-corps top-level security protocol look like Sudoku? It's a case where abstraction is less immersive than being concrete.

 

[Morrus]

Well, trope-wise, there's a frequent difference between science fiction and fantasy - knowledge vs intrinsic ability.

In sci-fi, the difference between being able to do something, and not, is usually just knowledge. In theory, anyone can learn to be a pilot, or can learn hyperspacial mechanics, or what have you.

In many forms of fantasy, well, if you're a muggle, you will never be able to use magic, no matter how long you study.

Sure, but that's not the case with the main games (D&D and PF) we all tend to talk about online; plus I'm not sure the origin story has any narrative effect on the game in-play. Whether you can cast magic missile because you're a sorcerer and were born with the talent, or a wizard because you learned it, that's all just fluff. The important point is that you're playing a character with the ability to use magic missile or reroute a hyperspace anomoly.

 

[Janx]

Having played an engineer in a live-action game for several years, I beg to differ. Your ability to ask a player to solve a puzzle to represent fixing technology is limited only by the GM's imagination.

"The computer is till operational, so rerouting power to the hyperdrive is really easy. The only problem is the workstation is locked down with a complex access code. Here's a sudoku puzzle - if you complete it correctly, you get access and can reroute the power." Is pretty much equivalent to having a sphinx ask a riddle, or having the players work through a basic single-substitution cypher to learn the command word for the Great Magic McGuffin.

well, thats one interpretation of presenting a single specific problem and single solution to a player.

I think the answer of can a puzzle work or is it more like "magic" is "it depends"

In my field of technology, I can usually think of three different ways to solve any problem because I intrinsically understand all the parts, technologies and opportunities. Unlike a mechanic, who simply troubleshoots to find the broken part and replace it, I am often able to invent a solution to the problem.

In a sci-fi RPG, I expect my engineering character to be able to do the same. However, because the hyperdrive engine does not really exist, and does not actually operate on known science, neither the GM nor the player is qualified to say what is and is not a viable solution to a problem.

Thus, the GM might try to get all technical with his Sudoku puzzle to unlock the screen, because he can't fathom how the console actually relates to the hyperdrive controller, the power source or the hyperdrive resonance chamber. Whereas, all I really needed to do is disconnect the console, and connect my tablet to the debug jack on the hyperdrive controller assembly and open a RSH connection to send commands to it directly as a TTY client.

 

[Janx]

I think it's to do with realism. We know that jobs in the modern world are becoming increasingly specialised, and increasingly dependent on specialised training. This tends to lend itself to a skill-based rather than class-based system.

However...



There's really no reason why not. If you look at the characters in "Stargate", for example, there's a pretty clear distinction between the two 'warrior' types and the two 'academic' types that could readily fit a class-based system (as, in fact, in the Stargate RPG). Likewise, for all that Star Trek would seem to have very specialised roles, the main characters always seem to have a very wide range of transferrable skills - and indeed your classes could easily be "Red Shirt", "Blue Shirt", "Gold Shirt".

So, to a certain extent, I think it may well just be a matter of taste: the people responsible for writing sci-fi RPGs have just largely favoured skill-based systems over class-based ones, and so that's what we have been given.

I think this illustrates the OP's point.

In both Star Trek and SG-1, pretty much all the characters could handle a gun, or even steer the ship if need be. Like the Enterprise traveling at the Speed of Plot, the characters had all the skills they needed, hitting the bad guy when it was plotfully useful.

In some ways, every PC can do "anything" if needed, but each PC is better in specific areas. So if Kirk and Bones end up in a doctoring contest, Bones should win. But if Kirk and Spock beam down to a planet and Spock gets hurt, Kirk can heal him.

 

[Umbran]

Speaking as a frequent GM... the limitation is both imagination and free time!

Fair point - but he same holds true for using them for magic as well.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

In some ways, every PC can do "anything" if needed, but each PC is better in specific areas. So if Kirk and Bones end up in a doctoring contest, Bones should win. But if Kirk and Spock beam down to a planet and Spock gets hurt, Kirk can heal him.

Or not, if the needs of the plot outweigh the needs of the characters...

If you really look, however, what goes on in Old Trek is relatively well distributed. Everybody can shoot a phaser? Sure- everybody in the US armed forces gets weapon training, and a phaser is a lot simpler to fire accurately the a gun.

All branches use tricorders, all bridge officers learn to operate bridge systems...

But when Jerry-rigging a phaser or tricorders to do something other than its intended purpose, usually, its in the hands of a science officer or engineer...sometimes with help or tools from one of the other branches. Or a bystander.