Technobabble In RPGs

Sometimes you need to produce spontaneous scientific jargon in your game. Your PCs need to oscillate the anterior nadion actuator or invert the ambient access manifold. Maybe it's important that somebody harmonise the magnetic flux stabiliser. Technobabble, a feature of Star Trek and Doctor Who, can inject some atmosphere into your game. The following table uses a d66 (roll d6 twice, the first being 'tens' and the second being 'ones') to randomly generate one of 46,656 different combinations.

Read in the format alpha the beta gamma delta.

Taken from What's OLD is NEW
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[smiteworks]

I've had to harmonize the microscopic polaron accelerator before. That's no fun at all.

 

[Umbran]

I say, jokingly - this chart cannot have you "reverse the polarity of the neutron flow", and is therefore defective.

 

[Connorsrpg]

This is awesome. I'd love to stay and chat, but I have to go and connect the phased particle converter to the nucleonic plasma inversion.

Oh, and yeah, the flux capacitor is there too.

 

[jrowland]

We need a Bio-Babble chart:

"Dammit Jim! We need to Destabilize his Metabolic Midichlorian Mechanism!"

 

[Morrus]

I say, jokingly - this chart cannot have you "reverse the polarity of the neutron flow", and is therefore defective.

I deliberately excluded it! Time Lord tech is way beyond this.

 

[Morrus]

We need a Bio-Babble chart:

"Dammit Jim! We need to Destabilize his Metabolic Midichlorian Mechanism!"

I have a medical one, too.

Excise the inflamed pituitary cluster!

Replace the infected berylite genome!

Cauterize the misaligned synaptic gland!

I'll post it if folks like this one. I also have tables for alchemy, herbalism, and computers.

Herbalism -- Soup of the lotus-fig bean.
Computers -- Recompile the auxiliary data kernel.
Alchemy -- Dilute limestone in a sapphire goblet.

 

[Jester David]

I say, jokingly - this chart cannot have you "reverse the polarity of the neutron flow", and is therefore defective.

This was the first thing I looked for as well.

 

[DMFTodd]

Cool table. I've added it to the RandomTableWiki. You can use this link to roll it:

http://randomtablewiki.paladinpgm.com/rolltable.rtw?RollRequest=[Thing/Technobabble]

And this link to edit the table:
https://sites.google.com/a/paladinpgm.com/randomtablewiki/randomtables/thing/technobabble

And since the table can be edited, "reverse polarity of the neutron flow" is now a possible result

 

[Galladrick]

This is useful in a pinch, but don't rely on it if you can avoid it. Internal consistency, even for things that the PC's don't necessarily use, creates a sense of immersion. How will they master the Asymmetrical Tachyon skill tree? What does that offer? Who else knows that skill and is there a need to train or can you merely study (or get a brain weave or whatever)? It only takes a moment to jot down or type up your thoughts and hit save. Little things add up.