What's out there for d20 Future?
- Thread starter Olive
- Start date
ukgpublishing
First Post
UKG Publishing also has a rang of d20f and general sci-fi pdfs available at RPGNow.
Check out http://www.rpgnow.com/default.php?manufacturers_id=510&Src="ENWorld" for details.
Also you can get our free starship at
http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=3600&Src="ENWorld"
John Milner
UKG Publishing
http://www.ukg-publishing.co.uk/
Check out http://www.rpgnow.com/default.php?manufacturers_id=510&Src="ENWorld" for details.
Also you can get our free starship at
http://www.rpgnow.com/product_info.php?products_id=3600&Src="ENWorld"
John Milner
UKG Publishing
http://www.ukg-publishing.co.uk/
jester47
First Post
The problem I have with the BT universe is that it is only half baked. Granted it is supposed to be fun Sci Fi, but I was thinking that the way things are done don't really match the way science works.
A good example is the transit from jump point to planet might take longer to do.
It takes a good 6 months to get to mars. Given improved tech, it might drop to 6 weeks. I think 3 months is a fair estimate. So if a planet is in the same place as mars is in the solar system, it would take a year to get there even in a good case scenario assuming neato technology. In truth, a solar sail (what the jump ships use to move around the assorted systems) would take 2 years to reach mars. Yup, in the ten years that it takes a Mechwarroir to get to the surface he is going to be able to log a lot simulator time...
That totally screws up the time line for the sucession wars. I have yet to find a setting that really does space transport right.
Not to mention the AI and computers needed for navigation. Those jump ship/HPG AIs must be insanely smart. With all the AI, materials science (nanomaterials), networks, communiocations science, transport technology (i.e. interstellar travel), biotech, etc that would have been learned and lost, you completely have to redefine the mechs.
Now don't get me wrong, I like the concept of the BT universe. I like the idea that there is this dark age where people have lost the technology and reverted back to a tech level about equal with that of earth in the early 21st century. I like the big mechs.
Whatgets me in BT and other future games are some of the assumptions. There is a lot of science left out that makes it really cool, scary, advanced, and gritty all at the same time. Certain extrapolations and such just don't get done.
I would love to see a future game that takes into consideration the Transhuman Space angle, the physics of space warp angle, the mecha angle (in a realistic and non-anime style), the biotech angle, the communication info network angle, the religion angle (ala Dune) and the interstellar war angle.
I imagine pilots interfacing with their machines in such a way that the machines become an extension of themselves, I imagine a planet having a year to prepare after the hostile starship fleet appeared at jump point, I imagine people bioengineered for specific purposes in war, I imagine religous fanatics at all levels, I imagine military hackers trying to break into the the sytems of mecha, I want nanotech involved...
I mean can you even have an interstellar empire? I am not sure. Just the problems we have on this planet alone, I think colony planets would be more isolated. Wars would be on planets and between planets rather than by over arching governments. Its the tranist times from jump point to invasion not to mention the resources from other worlds in the system. No system that would have difficulty sustaining a population would be a system to colonise, so it would not get colonised an a mass scale. There might be some mines and research stations in remote barren systems, but any system that has the resources to carry an earth sized population would find it difficult to have a reason to go to war. Why enslave someone in another solar system when you can enslave the guys on the other planet? That make it impractical. Wars would be planet and system wide, but rarely between two systems. However, trade, transit, migration and communication between different systems would be common.
So the stucture I am coming up with after thinking about this is somthing that uses Transhuman Space for the way things operate in a system and how people have changed in the light of advanced technology, Traveller to come up with the form of the systems inhabited, Mecha d20 SRD for the mechs and other vehicles, Blood and Space for the stuff revolving around star ships, D20 Future, Apocalypse and Modern SRDs for the rest of it. Maybe some Grim Tales for characters. Borrow the concept of the HPG from BT and change it to the WPG (warp pulse generator). At that point you have a really updated and blended version of Battletech/Cyberpunk/and Traveller. I would have had humanity bouncing around these places for about 10-20,000 years before the fall, so there's all sorts of weird stuff to find and do (nothing more boring than recently inhabited planets). It also allows for really weird religions...
About aliens: According to mathematical probability, the chances of us meeting an alien race indicates that it would have had to have been in existance for hundreds of thousands if not millions of years. So I would have one race, and I would have them in contact with us, but I would have them see us like we see monkeys. Thus occasionally they saunter by, do somthing, and then leave, but contact is minimum. If I were to use them.
Aaron.
A good example is the transit from jump point to planet might take longer to do.
It takes a good 6 months to get to mars. Given improved tech, it might drop to 6 weeks. I think 3 months is a fair estimate. So if a planet is in the same place as mars is in the solar system, it would take a year to get there even in a good case scenario assuming neato technology. In truth, a solar sail (what the jump ships use to move around the assorted systems) would take 2 years to reach mars. Yup, in the ten years that it takes a Mechwarroir to get to the surface he is going to be able to log a lot simulator time...
That totally screws up the time line for the sucession wars. I have yet to find a setting that really does space transport right.
Not to mention the AI and computers needed for navigation. Those jump ship/HPG AIs must be insanely smart. With all the AI, materials science (nanomaterials), networks, communiocations science, transport technology (i.e. interstellar travel), biotech, etc that would have been learned and lost, you completely have to redefine the mechs.
Now don't get me wrong, I like the concept of the BT universe. I like the idea that there is this dark age where people have lost the technology and reverted back to a tech level about equal with that of earth in the early 21st century. I like the big mechs.
Whatgets me in BT and other future games are some of the assumptions. There is a lot of science left out that makes it really cool, scary, advanced, and gritty all at the same time. Certain extrapolations and such just don't get done.
I would love to see a future game that takes into consideration the Transhuman Space angle, the physics of space warp angle, the mecha angle (in a realistic and non-anime style), the biotech angle, the communication info network angle, the religion angle (ala Dune) and the interstellar war angle.
I imagine pilots interfacing with their machines in such a way that the machines become an extension of themselves, I imagine a planet having a year to prepare after the hostile starship fleet appeared at jump point, I imagine people bioengineered for specific purposes in war, I imagine religous fanatics at all levels, I imagine military hackers trying to break into the the sytems of mecha, I want nanotech involved...
I mean can you even have an interstellar empire? I am not sure. Just the problems we have on this planet alone, I think colony planets would be more isolated. Wars would be on planets and between planets rather than by over arching governments. Its the tranist times from jump point to invasion not to mention the resources from other worlds in the system. No system that would have difficulty sustaining a population would be a system to colonise, so it would not get colonised an a mass scale. There might be some mines and research stations in remote barren systems, but any system that has the resources to carry an earth sized population would find it difficult to have a reason to go to war. Why enslave someone in another solar system when you can enslave the guys on the other planet? That make it impractical. Wars would be planet and system wide, but rarely between two systems. However, trade, transit, migration and communication between different systems would be common.
So the stucture I am coming up with after thinking about this is somthing that uses Transhuman Space for the way things operate in a system and how people have changed in the light of advanced technology, Traveller to come up with the form of the systems inhabited, Mecha d20 SRD for the mechs and other vehicles, Blood and Space for the stuff revolving around star ships, D20 Future, Apocalypse and Modern SRDs for the rest of it. Maybe some Grim Tales for characters. Borrow the concept of the HPG from BT and change it to the WPG (warp pulse generator). At that point you have a really updated and blended version of Battletech/Cyberpunk/and Traveller. I would have had humanity bouncing around these places for about 10-20,000 years before the fall, so there's all sorts of weird stuff to find and do (nothing more boring than recently inhabited planets). It also allows for really weird religions...
About aliens: According to mathematical probability, the chances of us meeting an alien race indicates that it would have had to have been in existance for hundreds of thousands if not millions of years. So I would have one race, and I would have them in contact with us, but I would have them see us like we see monkeys. Thus occasionally they saunter by, do somthing, and then leave, but contact is minimum. If I were to use them.
Aaron.
I never really pondered the sci much farther than that.
RodneyThompson
Explorer
Though it doesn't help you out now, The Game Mechanics are releasing a Future Player's Companion written by, well, me.
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