Do you mix high fantasy and sci-fi?

[DrunkonDuty]

I'd agree it's a flavour issue mostly. I'd love playing in a Thundarr based game complete with techno-magic. And I'm a big Shadowrun fan. SO yeah they can mix very well. But some styles of fantasy don't mix well with sci-fi and vice versa. WHo'd sign on to a Traveller game and then be happy when wizards started showing up? Different games have different expectations from the market/audience. Comes down to how the game is presented in the first place and does it deliver.

 

[WayneLigon]

I mix in a little, sometimes, but it's usually not actually 'science fiction' equipment; it might be something like Chaositech where it kinda sorta operates like a machine but really isn't one.

 

[ivocaliban]

Depends on the campaign.

This is true for me as well. I used to be fantasy purist. Never let the peas touch the mashed potatoes sort of fellow. I still prefer fantasy to science-fiction, but I'm no longer so troubled about the two crossing paths.

I'm more in favor of campaign settings like the Wilderlands of High Fantasy, that scatters science-fiction elements about and buries or blends them into the fantasy world, than I am of say Eberron where the science-fiction elements become commonplace (Lightning Rail, sentient golems, and so on).

 

[JoeGKushner]

How about I've mixed them a few times depending on the campaign but it's not necessarily the standard?

For example, Dragon Mech has it as the standard. Spelljammer, if you're full on with the Giff, can have it as the standard but doesn't necessarily.

I've run Gamma World via the AD&D rule set and Palladium tieing into Rifts.

I've had Melniboniean Battle Barges sailing 'Chaos Space' where the ship mates had to battle demons and various entities that guarded the million spheres using all sorts of odd technology and magic.

Heck, Star Wars is a pretty good example of a space opera campaign that has a pretty good D&D vibe to it or Thundar the Barbarian. (Man, I remember an old tech item, Force Sword, that did 2d8 points of damage a hit. Good days...)

 

[ruleslawyer]

IMHO, the key here is "high fantasy."

In a sword-and-sorcery campaign, I think sci-fi elements fit in fine. The rollicking, anything-goes, don't-explain-it-just-get-to-the-action style of much S&S blends fine with just about any other action genre. While Conan may never have encountered a genuinely "sci-fi" race or entity in the REH stories, I could easily see it happening; even more so for Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser (and what ARE Ningauble and Sheelba anyway if not potential sci-fi aliens?).

For high fantasy: No thank you. I currently run a more or less straight up campaign in FR featuring much intrigue, deep lore, lost magics, and elegiac setting elements, and having a blaster or the like feature (except possibly as the punch-line for what magic truly is in the world, etc.) would disrupt the feel of the game.

Incidentally, I never saw Spelljammer as science fiction, nor did I play it that way. Spelljammer always struck me, with its phlogiston and strange gravity laws and baroque ship design and the like, as being of the Baron Munchausen or Gargantua genre; true space fantasy of a style arguably more antiquated than that of LotR or the like.

 

[Kheti sa-Menik]

Ugh, no way. I prefer my genres separate. I am generally against psionics in fantasy, but I might lean toward allowing them in modern or scifi games.

But I despise the genres bleeding together. Odd then, that I like the flavor of Rifts, with its technology, magic, psionics, fantasy tropes all thrown together.

 

[The Green Adam]

As I've stated in other threads, I'm a bit of a genre-snob. I not only prefer to keep my genres seperate but I love to play up and even exaggerate certain cliches. That said, I have no problem with a game designed to be multigenre from the start. Superhero campaigns, Medieval Giant Robots and other RPGs like those are cool by me. Weird huh? I wouldn't allow Scifi in a D&D game or magic in Traveller but Shadowrun is fine with me.

I simply have to wrap my mind around the idea before I begin. This is going to be a medieval superhero campaign, this is a wild west horror game, etc.

AD

 

[Ahnehnois]

I've done time travel significantly, and I even had the PCs fight some kind of future-y cyborg once. The party druid had Transmute Metal to Wood. Sigh.

I assume that my setting has a universe with other planets and "aliens" and stuff, but I don't really make that part of the game very often.

 

[Voadam]

I've mixed in some sci-fi in my D&D though I avoid guns in general. One of my current groups has a character whose concept is a damaged big technomagic/psionic robot. We used the warforged as a base for stats, made it size large and added an LA onto him.

 

[Philotomy Jurament]

I think it depends on the campaign. I wouldn't want sci-fi in a High Fantasy game, but I like it just fine in my swords-n-sorcery. The source material (i.e. S&S fiction) is loaded with sci-fi elements.