How does d20 sci Fi work?


General Discussion


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

My science fiction rpg experience all tends to be a certain style.... battletech, gurps, shadowrun (never a big fan of magic). My modern and superheroes was normally gurps.

I didn't really like leveled games until pathfinder. I think I was a good RIFTS GM, but even though that has levels it has nothing like wealth per level or CR, and guns really equalize levels. That suited me.

What is d20 sci fantasy like? How does it play? What sort of design choice have previous designers made to make aspects of the system synergize with the setting?


There's a lot of answers to this. Spelljammer, Dragonstar, d20 Modern, d20 Future, too many third party Pathfinder things. They all play something different based on what they modify and drastically depends on setting information. If history is consistent, mechanically it will be almost identical but with wakier content and a different means of dealing with equipment.


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber

I have never really played a sci-fi with near demigod PCs like I'm willing to do in pathfinder. If I ever am going to do it, this post doom new id game where you Essentially A demigod is the time for it.


If its hard to imagine think of cosmic Marvel comics or Saga.


I HUNGER!


I played star wars d20 before. In a lot of ways it's similar since it was 3e. But, obviously time marches on and one of the big differences was lack of spells.

I would say it overall worked and was fun and enjoyable. One of the things the edition we ran had was a "jump" speed for certain types of jetpacks and jet boots. Let me tell you, that saved my life. The rest of the party was constantly in trouble, I would just leap away from. Or leap into and crit shoot. :3

I think the most important part though was a stronger emphasis on mundane gear. Actually, in a lot of ways the above point ties into this. You didn't NEED magical gear. Well, partly because they don't exist in Star Wars. As a result, the rules were a lot more robust for basic weapons and modifications. I wouldn't mind magical weapons sticking around, but I would like tech to evolve as it's own way to customize the wealth balancing factor.


Pathfinder Roleplaying Game Superscriber
Malwing wrote:
If its hard to imagine think of cosmic Marvel comics or Saga.

Hmm. I don't like those.


Gah Lak Tus wrote:
I HUNGER!

Speaking of which, LPJ Games is putting out an adventure called 'Crisis of the World Eater'. When it fully comes out I'm adapting it to Starfinder where you go from planet to planet searching for ways to keep the thing from eating your home world.


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Gah Lak Tus wrote:
I HUNGER!

Beware I Live!

Sorry, I heard the wrong "I hunger" there...


BobTheCoward wrote:


What is d20 sci fantasy like? How does it play? What sort of design choice have previous designers made to make aspects of the system synergize with the setting?

In order:

Horrible.
Badly.
Haha. None.

d20 modern and d20 Star Wars were crazy bad bouts of copy-pasta married to systems that didn't function with guns or powers/spells that didn't match the setting in any way at all (and no attempt was made to do so). In SW attempts specifically, force powers were either laughably bad (and, inexplicably, life draining for the user), or horribly OP or useless with nothing in between.

I'm curious to see what Paizo does with it, but if it is simply 'Pathfinder in Space,' it has a lot of room and precedent to be an utter trainwreck.

Scarab Sages Developer

There's a lot of d20 scifi available, from fairly easy conceptual matches such as the d20 Gamma World game to science-fantasy settings ranging from Starjammer to Dragonstar, to full-on conversions of existing properties such as the Star Wars Saga Edition (which won Gold ENnies in 2008 for Best Rules, Best Game, and Best d20/OGL Product, in addition to Silver for Product of the Year) and d20 Star Fleet Battles books.

Just as Pathfinder (and d20 in fantasy general) doesn't handle all aspects of all potential fantasy settings and stories equally well, no one d20 scifi book can handle every aspect of every potential scifi plot or campaign. And that's fine. Thousands of players have had near-endless fun with d20 scifi books for 16 years. We'll obviously work to make the best possible version of such a book, and ensure just as the Pathfinder RPG supports and works well with the Golarion setting, that the Starfinder rules and setting work well together.

Liberty's Edge

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Dragonstar for me is what I think of when someone ask for a Fantasy game set in a scifi universe. ITs got Lasers its got Dragon 'Gods' running Star Empires. It has strange races. It never had a huge player base but it certainly was different.

As Owen said above Gamma World has been through many incarnations.

I am quite excited by this. Science Fantasy generally has a smaller player base within the realms of gaming but if this ends up just being a single book Ill definetly look at picking it up.


Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:


Just as Pathfinder (and d20 in fantasy general) doesn't handle all aspects of all potential fantasy settings and stories equally well, no one d20 scifi book can handle every aspect of every potential scifi plot or campaign. And that's fine. Thousands of players have had near-endless fun with d20 scifi books for 16 years. We'll obviously work to make the best possible version of such a book, and ensure just as the Pathfinder RPG supports and works well with the Golarion setting, that the Starfinder rules and setting work well together.

Owen,

As a GM I found my old Alternity RPG to be a good "baseline toolbox Sci-fi core rulebook" as to what should cover at a minimum to create good science fiction RPG games and d20 Future I found to be a great "comprehensive toolbox sci-fi core rulebook" that lays a solid foundation for creating all kinds of different science fiction campaigns.

For us GMs who prefer to use our own campaign setting materials, how supportive will Starfinder be as a "toolbox" for creating our own stories? (In a similar matter as how PFRPG core rules is setting neutral and allows for a huge freedom to create fantasy RPG stories)

Liberty's Edge

Giorgo wrote:
For us GMs who prefer to use our own campaign setting materials, how supportive will Starfinder be as a "toolbox" for creating our own stories? (In a similar matter as how PFRPG core rules is setting neutral and allows for a huge freedom to create fantasy RPG stories)

I believe they have already announced that the core book will not be setting-neutral; in contrast to the PF RPG core, the SF core will integrate a setting into the core book and - potentially, at least - the mechanics as well.


I mean, I imagine that you could simply file the serial numbers off and that's it. It's not hard to convert things, even stuff tied to a setting.


I'm curious as to what will make Starfinder distinct from any other Scifi D20, or from Pathfinder itself for that matter.

Scarab Sages Developer

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Giorgo wrote:
As a GM I found my old Alternity RPG to be a good "baseline toolbox Sci-fi core rulebook" as to what should cover at a minimum to create good science fiction RPG games and d20 Future I found to be a great "comprehensive toolbox sci-fi core rulebook" that lays a solid foundation for creating all kinds of different science fiction campaigns.

I am a fan of both of those, and I wrote for both of them. And I agree they are good baselines as starting points. But neither, for example, does a good job of handling things like using whole planets flown at faster-than-light-speeds as weapons in a space battle, or focusing the entire power of the Sun at a single target, or having such a perfect understanding or everything that is happening now that you can perfectly predict the future, just to mention a few things from the classic Lensman series.

Now that's *fine*. Most people inspired by Lensmen want to be psychic star cops, not agents in massive battles with billions of soldiers. But it's an example of things that could be common in an sf setting that a game might not handle well.

Giorgo wrote:
For us GMs who prefer to use our own campaign setting materials, how supportive will Starfinder be as a "toolbox" for creating our own stories? (In a similar matter as how PFRPG core rules is setting neutral and allows for a huge freedom to create fantasy RPG stories)

Starfinder is not setting neutral. The campaign setting is going to be an integral part of the core rules, and our first concern will be to have a game that presents THAT setting in as satisfying and robust a manner as we can.

That said we're going to be looking to tackle a lot of scifi tropes. If you were creating your own worlds with Alternity, I can't imagine you'll have difficulty doing the same with Starfinder. James Sutter has talked more than once about loving the act of creating new worlds, and even whole regions of space, and how every new planet is essentially a new campaign setting. He's also talked about how excited he is to give GMs the opportunity to do that for themselves. So I foresee creating this game with an eye for doing the kinds of things you're talking about.

But we're much too early in the process for me to give any kind of definitive answer on how easily a GM could divorce the setting and rules, or use the rules for a more "generic" scifi campaign. I suspect the closer your campaign idea is to Starfinder the easier it'll be, but that certainly doesn't mean more off-model ideas will be difficult. We just don't know yet.


Owen K. C. Stephens wrote:
using whole planets flown at faster-than-light-speeds as weapons in a space battle

Now I really want to see rules for that in Starfinder. I would love to see "mythic" Starfinder high level characters that go full on Lensmen level of stuff.


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Babylon 5 seemed to start getting mythic around Season 3...Sheridan wasn't just a Naval officer anymore, he was a legend who went to Z'Ha'Dum and lived to tell about it.


Matthew Shelton wrote:

Babylon 5 seemed to start getting mythic around Season 3...Sheridan wasn't just a Naval officer anymore, he was a legend who went to Z'Ha'Dum and lived to tell about it.

"lived"... Its a technicality but i suppose we could call it that.

Sovereign Court RPG Superstar 2011 Top 32

I've said this on other threads, but it's really tough to do a "setting neutral" sci-fi RPG because we don't have a "default" expectation like we do with fantasy. Fantasy RPGs can rely on Tolkien ideas and tropes and still appear "setting neutral" because we have internalized those assumptions - there is really no sci-fi equivalent. A true setting-neutral sci-fi RPG would have no set races, no set tech level, no assumptions about FTL, no assumptions about the direction of future technology, "take it or leave it" systems for magic and psi, and so forth. It would be more of a toolbox for crafting one's own setting than a stand-alone RPG.

Such toolboxes exist; GURPS and Savage Worlds come to mind. But the impression I get is that Stafinder is not going to be such a toolbox. Can it be easily warped to fit another (similar) setting? Almost certainly. But it will be pretty far from setting-neutral, I expect.


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Lord Mhoram wrote:
Gah Lak Tus wrote:
I HUNGER!

Beware I Live!

Sorry, I heard the wrong "I hunger" there...

*Panics and looks around for a titanic fanged skeletal lion face flying aournd eating starships*

Lord Mhoram wrote:
Now I really want to see rules for that in Starfinder. I would love to see "mythic" Starfinder high level characters that go full on Lensmen level of stuff.

The problem with a Lensman style campaign is the eons it takes to beat the bad guys.


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My answer is Marvel comics that take place in outer space. One of the better tastes of this outside of comics is the movie Guardians of the Galaxy.


The Thor movies actually did a kind of interesting thing where Asgardians view their abilities as magic but humans as a technology based society view their magic in terms of technology. Something similar could work here, effects can basically be the same in practice and just achieved through multiple means.

Dark Archive

The whole problem is everyone participating across scale.
I loved Star Wars D6 and tried to convert the rules to fantasy. I discovered a lot of issues.
D6 is my favourite system but it's best for things on a human scale. The aliens are slightly stronger, smarter or faster, have telepathy or such, but on the whole they have the same power level as humans. Shoot them once or twice, they get hurt, a few more times, they fall.
For vehicle sized things, D6 used the same rules but shifted scale and generally you couldn't hurt a vehicle unless you had another vehicle. Likewise with starfighters, capitol ships and so on. Everyone could contribute at every scale. The rules broke down when your character wanted to fight a creature the size of a vehicle, or when your starfighter went against capitol ships.

Pathfinder/D&D rules handle scale better, but unrealistically. You stab the 10th level fighter twenty times with a dagger and she still doesn't fall. But that also means she can take on the vehicle sized dragon. Hit points, while unrealistic, allow for better interactions of scale.

Ultimately, I loved Dragonstar. Not only did the setting unite sci fi and fantasy sublimely, but instead of being sci fi with magic, it was fantasy with technology.
You could take low level characters with laser rifles hunting wyverns or fighting back ogre cavemen. And the rules worked well.
But put someone in a starfighter and the rules collapsed. The Pilot Class who had been useless all game now took over and the other characters did nothing or died trying. Whereas in D6, all the characters could contribute because they were all the same scale.

My takeaway from all this is to make sure all characters can contribute all the time. Fighters, wizards, rogues, clerics all have their part to play in creature combat at high and low levels. Make sure they all have their part to play in vehicle and starship combat too.


The only thing I wasn't too sure about with Dragonstar was each planet worshipping the same pantheon under different names. I loved the 'spellbook phablet' idea though, the Negotiator and Thug classes, the setting-specific races, etc.


BobTheCoward wrote:

My science fiction rpg experience all tends to be a certain style.... battletech, gurps, shadowrun (never a big fan of magic). My modern and superheroes was normally gurps.

I didn't really like leveled games until pathfinder. I think I was a good RIFTS GM, but even though that has levels it has nothing like wealth per level or CR, and guns really equalize levels. That suited me.

What is d20 sci fantasy like? How does it play? What sort of design choice have previous designers made to make aspects of the system synergize with the setting?

I think your answer is going to end up being: Pretty much like RIFTS. There's going to be levels with some custom classes that add the sci-fi to it, but the guns will be there to equalize levels just how you like.


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BobTheCoward wrote:

My science fiction rpg experience all tends to be a certain style.... battletech, gurps, shadowrun (never a big fan of magic). My modern and superheroes was normally gurps.

I didn't really like leveled games until pathfinder. I think I was a good RIFTS GM, but even though that has levels it has nothing like wealth per level or CR, and guns really equalize levels. That suited me.

What is d20 sci fantasy like? How does it play? What sort of design choice have previous designers made to make aspects of the system synergize with the setting?

Games that have gone this route...

D20 Future

D20 Star Wars in at least 2 Editions.

Mutants and Masterminds..

Dragonstar by Fantasy Flight games, publoished during the waning days of 3.0, canceled when 3.5 came out.

And Spelljammer should be given the honorable mention as space without the science.

If you examine these games you'll find that each had a different yet valid answer to the question. I would expect that given it's genetics, that Starfinder will echo the atmosphere of Pathfinder, especially since the latter had plenty of pulp sci-fi in it's blood.

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