the blending of magic and technology

[thol]

here's the question.

what is the maximum amount of technology that can be inserted into a D&D campaign world without ruining the fantasy flavor?

too many times have i played in a game world of one type, only to have it ruined with the introduction of too many elements from another type of game.

my campaign world is based on an ancient elder elven space vessel getting stranded on the planet. the ship remains floating above a vast desert, and is referred to in legends as a floating castle. it's people settled the lands and cultivated the infant races. their queen then mysteriously vanished, and they slowly became extinct in favor of the other races. now the truth is lost to time, but some artifacts remain, such as robots (golems) and other small items in deep, dark ruins.

i am wondering how much technology may be too much, and how to handle the magic vs. technology issue. is technology just machines imbued with magic? how do they affect each other?

very simple guns and mechanical machines are not strangers to the campaign world, as the gnomish engineers of Gond are diligent in their pursuit of knowledge.

does anyone have any thoughts?

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

Well, for a successful merging of magic and technology, you could take a look at GURPS Technomancer, which has plenty of ideas for technomagic. Different system, I know - but there is still lots of stuff that can be, er "borrowed"...

But if you want to merge magic and technology and want to keep the "D&D flavor", you could deal with technology in a way similar to Fading Suns - technology is the product of a bygone age that left plenty of technological artefacts, but which are ill-understood now. Modern technological inventions are clunky patchwork items that malfunction as often as not. Instructions are written down in arcane languages that have been translated into several other languages.

In short, make the creation of new technologies as difficult as the creation of new spells... and as eccentric.

 

[brymeister]

The biggest downside I've experienced with having magic and technology side by side is when they reproduce each others affects. What good is a fly spell when you have jet packs? That sort of thing.

Otherwise, they can go hand in hand fairly well. Damage for modern weapons can sometimes become either laughably unrealistic or else devastating to a campaign, after all who wants to be able to kill the dragon with one pull of a trigger? Likewise, who can suspend disbelief when your rogue just shrugged off an autocannon round to the head?

In my experience the best blending is to have one be much more common than the other (generally magic being more common) and have the technology rare and unreliable either due to age or lack of compentancy.

 

[thol]

well, the way i have it now is that magic is the de facto standard in terms of wonderous effects, although in the main kingdom the PCs live, work, and adventure in, it is slightly less than common, and more so as you get further from civilization.

the ancient technology is barely even known, and the very few who do know of it have no idea of its origins, other than it is from the era of the elder elves. there are perhaps only two or three individuals in the world who can decipher the smallest bit of the ancient runic script, so nothing is really known of that time.

i want the basis of the campaign to rest in fantasy, and introduce only small amounts of "technology" into the campaign.

for example, one of the player characters, an elf, was taken from his homeland (another plane? another dimension? he doesn't know). he awoke with a mysterious tattoo (a barcode) among the seafaring wind elves, who taught him their language and of his new world. this barcode gives him the power of a barbarian-like rage, except he has no real control when entering, and has no idea of his actions upon coming out of it. unknown to him, it is somehow connected with the AI of the Silver Citadel, the ancient space vessel that floats above the Burning Lands.

i imagine items such as laser guns and such will be limited. most tech items would duplicate a spell effect and be subject to dispelling and anti-magic preventions. they would be pseudo-magical in their construction, and treated as such.

dragons could use spell resistance to counter such effects, and magical armor would be effective against less advanced projectile weapons.

also, i am still working out what kind of role psionics should play in all of this as well.

 

[Azure Trance]

My opinion is a Victorian style era. I think of it as a time when Technology is still advanced enough past the middle ages, but not something that's current and modern like what we know of today.

Nothing against it, I think. It just irks me in a Shadowrun Elf/Dwarf/Human/Orc with guns and cyberwar type war, which if I wanted I would play SR, not D&D.

I've just been tinkering with a setting, and I figure this:

The most important technology in my victorian style era would have firearms (flintlocks, as a wild guess), steam engines (and as a result, railroads), and electricity (which powers telegraphs). So the biggest changes would be that people would have access to powerful firearms, mass transportation, and instant communication across continents.

None of it to me seems unbalancing though. Firearms, while powerful, wouldn't be a commonplace sight. The Dwarves, who mine the 'gunpowder,' are also the worlds best gunsmiths. (So if you want an exceptional rifle, at least you know who has a reputation for making them). Those would at least severely limit the amount of firearms in the world. I don't think steam engines by itself is bad either - they would have more of a background role for the characters; same with the telegraph.

It's not a technology vs magic world - magic would still rule supreme. Shield would block bullets, and no gun can have the same effect as disintegrate. But if you combine the two, you get the optimal effect - steam-powered war golems like Calibretto from BattleChasers! (Hmmmzt). Or enchanted rifles with ammunition that can actually harm magical creatures (Jacketed Hollow Point? Dargonhide Armor Piercing?), magically powered railroads (for the rich ones who don't need coal or wood). etc...

I just believe that with the added factor of technology it would create something new ... in the newspaper, gnomish railroads have a pricewar with the human railroads, stocks are down, steel is in great demand, the creation of the indutrial underclass - marxism could be a popular underground belief - , gas lights in the city at night, or - perhaps coolest - a dwarven tower with a gatling gun firing into the orcish horde to prevent them from overrunning the mountain pass.

 

[Chaldfont]

Read Perdido Street Station by China Mieville for an excellent blend of magic and technology. I can't recommend this book enough--if you don't say "Cooool." out loud several times while reading it then you are a robot.

I also really like the setting of the Thief computer game series.

 

[Sidran]

Perhaps my favorite two books that show "magic" in a technological world are Daybreak 2250 AD, by Andre Norton, and The Eternity Road, By Jack McDevitts


both are after the world has burned itself to an end.

Neat features in Daybreak were the adventures through a Ruined New york and the adventuring around the city, Not to mention the Monsters were creapy.

Eternity Road is a typical fantasy quest, the Characters are searching for a lost repository of ancient goods, books, and other lore ( in the case of the Eternity Road a repository of the Literary classics such as Twain, Poe, Churchill, and the like)

Notable scenes take place on a ruined bridge, near a Skytram system that still runs ( makes the Characters think oh great dragons or evil beings) And a intelligent computer wishing to be shut down due to to much time alone.

=Notable tech was the hot air bloon, the Steam Engine, and The Telegraph, oh also the Printing press.

Notable traps in the book where gas pockets in old sealed rooms coming against torches (flashback fires) and moving electronics

Both had a hgh level of magical quality to them as in psionics, or Scholarly sciences

 

[scpna]

Just some ideas

I am presently working on a tech / fantasy world and in my opinion as long as the tech is handled properly there is really no limit to how much a fantasy world can have while still seeming like fantasy.
With your idea of an elven spaceship, I would suggest having at least a high enough tech level (in the form of buried caches and ruins of the elven settlements / smaller crashed ships[could be a good tie in for introducing the whole elven ship theme to the PCs]) where space travel seems justified. If elves use the technology, then IMHO it should be magic-based machines (after all elves are commonly wizards, so why have them invent machinery when they can just use spells to make magic missile launchers that any one can use).
Another idea, come up with lots of very-specialized constructs. This could be a big part of what remains of the techiness of the elves. I would suggest having everything from specialized stationary sentries to agricultural and mining golems. (It could be an interesting encounter when a group of PCs comes upon a whole group of golems working in a garden)

 

[Moe Ronalds]

The biggest downside I've experienced with having magic and technology side by side is when they reproduce each others affects. What good is a fly spell when you have jet packs? That sort of thing.

But what good is a fly spell when you've got yourself a pair of "Boots of Flying" either?

 

[mroberon1972]

I'm working on the same thing...

I'm working on the same thing...

I came to the basic idea that technology is not anything but the efficent use of a world's natural laws and resources.

If you wan t see how I'm handling it, try these stories:

http://enworld.cyberstreet.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=30428

The first one discusses a negitive result of advanced magic and technology, then next we have a classroom discussion of the evens that lead to the mass production of technology. The last is a continuing story of a druid in the city, and she runs a vet clinic in the poor section of a major city. See if you can catch the handwaves in this one!

Mr. Oberon
"A GOOD story is worth a thousand pictures."