Let me first start this off with a simple statement:
Large scale ANYTHING is a pain to say the very least.
Now lets elaborate some on this.
Last week, after a bout of end of semester finals (our psych major having to go through a stretch of presentations and thus indisposed) combined with fuel problems for some players, meant that no one really knew enough after a longer than a month break outside the GM that it was time to start over. So the great question was put forward, what do you want?
It is amazing how this question can drag an entire group to a dead stop. Shocks me every time. I guess coming from the point of view of being a long term GM, I always have a clue on what I want but I also know the pain of trying to run what I want and getting no tangible reply from the players, who are mostly just treading water till something grabs there attention. Too many years of just through the storytelling equivalent of a commercial fishing drag line of plot hooks out has taken it's toll.
So, the five of them are staring at each other and then look right back at me. With the eyes that say 'Tell us what we want...'. Well, I was not going to do that this time for them. I have done that for them for years upon years and the campaign that was supposed to be my vacation collapsed so it fell back on me to run something. This time, I wanted their opinion. We all sat there quietly for like an hour... oh, there was chatting and some music playing to keep the mood positive but no gaming was discussed.
I partially blame that on the fact that I am very punctual and have a very strict time table and we were going to see the Hobbit so the moment I have my pocket watch out, it means we are have an agenda... so it derailed some of the planning. In the waning hours before departure, talks finally broke out.
So what did they tell me?
They wanted a Renascence/Age of Exploration sailing/pirate game. And they wanted it with DnD (Pathfinder actually but same genetic lineage here). With airships and floating islands and black powder because... well... they know I like steam punk and Napoleonic/Victorian era type things. Literally, half my gaming miniatures are pirates or people in Victorian/Napoleonic garb or specific NPCs in the past with very little in the area of the general traditional fantasy game roles. So they know I like and that is ships and particularly the age of sail.
So here I am, scrambling to get something put together and I try to get an idea of how to really make the Age of Sail interesting. To try and recreate a right and proper frigate or a galleon or ship of the line.
That is when I realized... even the best rules in DnD (or any of it's derivatives) are sub-par the moment anything like a vehicle shows up.
What if I do want to recreate an engagement along the lines of USS Constitution vs HMS Guerriere. It becomes quite a pain to really recreate a roughly 205' (175' at the waterline) x 45' with four decks and all it's rigging. Mind you, I know the numbers are off of Constitution (it is a nice middle range heavy frigate with well documented stats) but I rounded to easy to grid out for a game map 5x5 squares. A first Rater wouldn't be much bigger than Constitution (Victory being only 225' long and 50' wide if I rounded to use a simple game mat) but with so many many more guns.
Okay, that is good for the big navy guys... you know, the 'good guys' or major villains. But my players want to be pirates. So that means Sloops and maybe something a massive as say The Queen Ann's Revenge. Still mind boggling compared to the average dnd ship in scale. 105' (103 actually but rounding, remember) by 25' (24.5' but again, rounding here). 3 decks not counting cargo hold. All that rigging. Plus the 30 guns.
Okay, they can't always have the Queen Ann's Revenge... so we go to the 3 masted sloop. Still 100' in length and 30' wide. Only really the upper deck, the gun deck, and the cargo hold with only 16 guns now. Okay, starting to enter the range of ships that the game can FINALLY recreate without becoming cumbersome
Yeah... and they want these things to fly... They want a Skies of Arcadia-esque game.
Joy.
Oh, how I long for a good game of Legend of the Five Rings, 7th Sea, or Castle Falkenstein now.
Sunday, December 23, 2012
Saturday, April 14, 2012
I want a steam engine!
A recent post over on the Tao of D&D about steam power reminded me of a good deal of ideas that players have put forward over the years across various editions of the game to get a steam engine to work within the framework of D&D. Now, assuming that the idea of a steam powered vehicle does come to mind... lets look at some of the technical limitations that can be bypassed with the wonders of magic and not need any form of super advanced metallurgy to be perfected.
Okay, so we need a boiler with a pretty standardized shape. I know it is from 3.x D&D, we have the Shape Metal spell. Like it's cousins for stone and metal, it can do a good deal for getting a perfect weld between two metal pieces far more efficiently than rivets. Hey, we can even get the water and steam lines in this way.
Metals not strong enough to keep pressures contained? Again, 3.x gave us a spell that doubles the strength and sturdiness of the materials used. This is assuming that using common metals like iron or primitive steel are used and not some of the more fantastic metals, like Adamantine, renown for it's strength in setting. Heck, that spell goes a long way towards keeping metals that can handle fatigue well across the machine... though it would take experimentation to find which parts need the refinement and reinforcement.
Sustainable heat? Well, assuming that you don't have a ready fuel source and are wanting to stay magical, we have the fun spell of Heat Metal. Through either refinement or a permanency spell, you can keep the metal at a constant state of searing... what ever searing counts as. I am shooting for honestly what I consider searing (IE, from cooking) of 150* C (300* F) Min to about 350 F. Ouch. This will get water boiling pretty good. That would be a good means
Now that a heat source has been secured, how to control the heat? It can't exactly be held now... A ceramic (IE: magically enhanced bricks) covered platform with mechanical controls to lower and raise the platform into contact with the boiler.
A constant supply of water can be supplied by either... well, making sure water is available or if staying with magic being used and not needing a network of water towers everywhere or keeping track of where all lakes and rivers are... we have our classic stand by of one or more decanters of endless water. That is one of the single most useful items ever.
There are a few more problems that will need to be fixed over time and experimentation... like a steam release valve... or actually figuring out how to harness this great new concept! Someone will come along soon with ideas like blowing the high pressure steam across a light weight water wheel. Refining it till you have a primitive turbine, Mithril comes in wonders here... since the water wheel and the wind mill seems to be understood in a DnD setting more than a piston engine. It won't be efficient but it is a good leap forward in giving mechanical power for crafting.
Will it be cheap? No. Will it be common? Not till someone figures out how to refine it and make it cheaper. Will it be revolutionary and bring about the industrial revolution? Probably not change the setting in a single day or even a few years. But it could be fun.
Eeeeeeh... just a few ideas. Just wanting to toss them out in the open.
Okay, so we need a boiler with a pretty standardized shape. I know it is from 3.x D&D, we have the Shape Metal spell. Like it's cousins for stone and metal, it can do a good deal for getting a perfect weld between two metal pieces far more efficiently than rivets. Hey, we can even get the water and steam lines in this way.
Metals not strong enough to keep pressures contained? Again, 3.x gave us a spell that doubles the strength and sturdiness of the materials used. This is assuming that using common metals like iron or primitive steel are used and not some of the more fantastic metals, like Adamantine, renown for it's strength in setting. Heck, that spell goes a long way towards keeping metals that can handle fatigue well across the machine... though it would take experimentation to find which parts need the refinement and reinforcement.
Sustainable heat? Well, assuming that you don't have a ready fuel source and are wanting to stay magical, we have the fun spell of Heat Metal. Through either refinement or a permanency spell, you can keep the metal at a constant state of searing... what ever searing counts as. I am shooting for honestly what I consider searing (IE, from cooking) of 150* C (300* F) Min to about 350 F. Ouch. This will get water boiling pretty good. That would be a good means
Now that a heat source has been secured, how to control the heat? It can't exactly be held now... A ceramic (IE: magically enhanced bricks) covered platform with mechanical controls to lower and raise the platform into contact with the boiler.
A constant supply of water can be supplied by either... well, making sure water is available or if staying with magic being used and not needing a network of water towers everywhere or keeping track of where all lakes and rivers are... we have our classic stand by of one or more decanters of endless water. That is one of the single most useful items ever.
There are a few more problems that will need to be fixed over time and experimentation... like a steam release valve... or actually figuring out how to harness this great new concept! Someone will come along soon with ideas like blowing the high pressure steam across a light weight water wheel. Refining it till you have a primitive turbine, Mithril comes in wonders here... since the water wheel and the wind mill seems to be understood in a DnD setting more than a piston engine. It won't be efficient but it is a good leap forward in giving mechanical power for crafting.
Will it be cheap? No. Will it be common? Not till someone figures out how to refine it and make it cheaper. Will it be revolutionary and bring about the industrial revolution? Probably not change the setting in a single day or even a few years. But it could be fun.
Eeeeeeh... just a few ideas. Just wanting to toss them out in the open.
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
This has been bugging me,
I know it should not but it does...
Someone made a stupid post on a certain forum board. The post was to ask about how to get to a modern style world from a generic fantasy world to a modern world in only a few generations. No. Just no. I know that The Tao of D&D has gone very in depth into such things as the impact of technology and development of the modern world from the fantasy. He has done so much in depth work into it...
But...
Players always seem to ask this question though. They are used to a modern world. They want modern marvels and conveniences. Their knowledge about fighting tends to be influenced by the modern world. So of course when given the choice to be 'creative', they try to bring what they know forward.
I wish they would stop trying to be 'creative'. I am running a mid to high fantasy world... I am not running Warhammer 40k, not running Star Wars, Blade Runner, Ghost in the Shell, Battletech, Shadowrun, or what ever else they want to rather be playing but don't tell me. Trust me, I love hard and soft sci-fi just as much as I love high fantasy. I will run a Conan the Barbarian low fantasy world just as likely as I will run a 'steampunk' Victorian sci-fi game... because Jules Vern was a fantastic inspiration and I love comics like Girl Genius for a modern take on the era. They just need to ask me honestly.
But please... Stop trying to bring blasters, mechs, the industrial revolution, tanks, guns, and the such to a fantasy game. Or at least do your homework, figure out all the steps... and I mean ALL the steps... and make a proposal that makes some form of sense, shows a realistic progression of thought from one step to the next, and a plan to get there... and maybe we can talk.
Just coming to me to ask 'I want a Ford Mustang' when no one else has a car and the next best thing might be magic wagon wheels that move at a modest speed without horses but don't explain where the rubber wheels, the cast metal engine blocks, the body panels, the seats, and so on and so forth came from or where your character got the idea for a '98 ford mustang and I will probably just face palm and say go away.
Someone made a stupid post on a certain forum board. The post was to ask about how to get to a modern style world from a generic fantasy world to a modern world in only a few generations. No. Just no. I know that The Tao of D&D has gone very in depth into such things as the impact of technology and development of the modern world from the fantasy. He has done so much in depth work into it...
But...
Players always seem to ask this question though. They are used to a modern world. They want modern marvels and conveniences. Their knowledge about fighting tends to be influenced by the modern world. So of course when given the choice to be 'creative', they try to bring what they know forward.
I wish they would stop trying to be 'creative'. I am running a mid to high fantasy world... I am not running Warhammer 40k, not running Star Wars, Blade Runner, Ghost in the Shell, Battletech, Shadowrun, or what ever else they want to rather be playing but don't tell me. Trust me, I love hard and soft sci-fi just as much as I love high fantasy. I will run a Conan the Barbarian low fantasy world just as likely as I will run a 'steampunk' Victorian sci-fi game... because Jules Vern was a fantastic inspiration and I love comics like Girl Genius for a modern take on the era. They just need to ask me honestly.
But please... Stop trying to bring blasters, mechs, the industrial revolution, tanks, guns, and the such to a fantasy game. Or at least do your homework, figure out all the steps... and I mean ALL the steps... and make a proposal that makes some form of sense, shows a realistic progression of thought from one step to the next, and a plan to get there... and maybe we can talk.
Just coming to me to ask 'I want a Ford Mustang' when no one else has a car and the next best thing might be magic wagon wheels that move at a modest speed without horses but don't explain where the rubber wheels, the cast metal engine blocks, the body panels, the seats, and so on and so forth came from or where your character got the idea for a '98 ford mustang and I will probably just face palm and say go away.
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