D&D General Who put all this Sci-Fi in my soup!?

[Edgar Ironpelt]

As others have pointed out, sci-fi artifacts and elements in D&D and in fantasy in general has been a trope for a very long time. It's not a trope I particularly like, and it's one I leave out of my own settings and games. But I can't call it either a new intrusion or a wrong thing. It's a matter of taste and varying mileage.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Always been there more in background I suppose.

Did come up today. 5E has power armor!!

Been there a while - Lost Laboratory of Kwalish before they redid Barrier Peaks. It’s not very good though.

 

[Zardnaar]

Been there a while - Lost Laboratory of Kwalish before they redid Barrier Peaks. It’s not very good though.

Never seen the Kwalish thing.

Didn't know much about barrier peaks for years. Early on we used what we had and no FLGS. 1993-95 roughly.

Essentially what we found in mates brothers closet. B2-4, X1, rules cyclopedia, and photocopied book etc.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Never seen the Kwalish thing

It was one of their Extra Life charity things.

 

[Olgar Shiverstone]

First time?

OD&D was a gonzo mashup of sci-fi and fantasy. Most of the sci-fi elements weren't purged until 2E (and then returned in Dark Sun and Spelljammer).

I generally don't like those elements -- I hate psionics with the fiery passion of a sun gone nova -- but they've always been there.

 

[Koloth]

Most definitely not a new thing. Played several D&D/Traveller crossovers before D&D had versions. Between planar travel, gates and miss jumps, fairly easy to provide an in game explanation for D&D characters suddenly appearing on the bridge of a Scout ship or said Scout ship setting down outside of a D&D town. Plus TSR had Star Frontiers. Character conversions were done. Doesn't take much imagination to re-image a Star Wars droid as a type of iron golem or light sabers as magical force swords. And more then one Ogre(SJG type) made tracks across a D&D setting as a giant metal monster. And Tinker Gnomes. Can't forget tinker gnomes.

 

[TiQuinn]

As others have stated, it’s not a new thing. It goes back to the beginning of the game.

I think part of the problem is that if the game is limited to just the Tolkien/quasi-European medieval fantasy vein, it just feels old to me. There’s not much new under the sun there because people really like their Tolkien fantasy or their Martin fantasy elements to the point they feel very samey-same.

 

[Parmandur]

Generic fantasy get pretty boring after a while, you have to mix up the genres to keep it interesting.

But, in the 22 years since the movies, Tolkien has been passing out of fashion in pop culture, and is being incorporated into high culture instead. And I think modern fantasy is itself moving away from Tolkienesque worlds. The last fantasy novel I read was Cinder Spires.

Brandon Danderson has a three generation (might be fourth generation by now) model for Epic High Fantasy in particular:

• First Heneration: J. R. R. Tolkien
• Second Generation: folks riffing off of Tolkien's fresh yake
• Third Generation: Writers reacting against the tired tropes of the Tolkienesque writers

 

[BookTenTiger]

It wouldn't interesting to have a setting in which a traditional fantasy realm has been impacted by explicit sci fi influences.

So, for example, you'd have your traditional mountain / forest / city people with their proto-European medieval settlements and conflicts. But then your have a fourth species that are aliens who crash landed hundreds of years ago and have had to adapt using the remains of their scavenged technology.

 

[Corinnguard]

Something like Dragonstar or Starfinder have sci-fi elements with tons of space fantasy.

The Dragonstar setting needs to be updated for 5e.