I've always had a little sci-fi (but no SF!) in my D&D fantasy.
My homebrew, the not-quite-right World of CITY, is currently ultratech, alien, and spaceship-free. However, quite of bit of madcap quasi-Victorian steampunk technology has crept in. It started innocently enough with one PC's clockwork cat familiar.
Last session featured a bad guy covering his cohorts escape --by submarine-- with a portable cannon equipped with Prismatic Spray shells while an enraged samurai dueled the party's steam-powered robot knight --who's actually piloted by a tiny pneumatically-driven robot lemur that sits in the head.
Been something of a downward spiral, it has...
For the record, I can't quite understand the problem in modeling contemporary weapon damage in D&D. Or futuristic weapon damage, for that matter. The key is D&D models damage extraordinarily badly.
This is a system where a naked PC of mid-level can get shot in the chest with a longbow, at point blank range, or cracked across the face with a maul, or thrown off a 100 ft. cliff onto pointy rocks, or soaked in flaming oil with nary the chance of him being knocked out, let alone grieviously injured...
Make guns and lasers touch attacks (unless you have modern armor), give them high damage and big threat ranges, treat mortars like fireballs... simple stuff, really.
Why should damage from a technological source be treated any differently from other types, ie, with even the slightest nod towards realism?
My homebrew, the not-quite-right World of CITY, is currently ultratech, alien, and spaceship-free. However, quite of bit of madcap quasi-Victorian steampunk technology has crept in. It started innocently enough with one PC's clockwork cat familiar.
Last session featured a bad guy covering his cohorts escape --by submarine-- with a portable cannon equipped with Prismatic Spray shells while an enraged samurai dueled the party's steam-powered robot knight --who's actually piloted by a tiny pneumatically-driven robot lemur that sits in the head.
Been something of a downward spiral, it has...
For the record, I can't quite understand the problem in modeling contemporary weapon damage in D&D. Or futuristic weapon damage, for that matter. The key is D&D models damage extraordinarily badly.
This is a system where a naked PC of mid-level can get shot in the chest with a longbow, at point blank range, or cracked across the face with a maul, or thrown off a 100 ft. cliff onto pointy rocks, or soaked in flaming oil with nary the chance of him being knocked out, let alone grieviously injured...
Make guns and lasers touch attacks (unless you have modern armor), give them high damage and big threat ranges, treat mortars like fireballs... simple stuff, really.
Why should damage from a technological source be treated any differently from other types, ie, with even the slightest nod towards realism?