Appendix N - the Reading List

[Hitdice]

thejeff wrote:

Fardragon wrote:

The main thing that seems to differantiate D&D and it's decendents compared to many other rpg systems is it's focus on combat and loot. Thus I expect Starfinder to be more focused on combat and loot than other SF RPG systems.

Other than that, I don"t see any distiction between psionics, the Force, and magic spells.

So, the only real distinction you expect between say Traveller and Starfinder is more combat & loot?

I expect the difference to be far more like the difference between Cyberpunk 2020 and Shadowrun.

Not the difference between Traveller and Pathfinder? (Sorry, couldn't help myself.)

Vurt by Jeff Noon is good, and it sure as hell ain't Hard SF!

[Fardragon]

MMCJawa wrote:

Fardragon wrote:

MMCJawa wrote:

Fardragon wrote:

I think you really need to differentiate between a Science Fiction reading list and a Science Fantasy reading list. Quite a few authors on that list, whist well worth reading, are far too po-faced for Starfinder inspiration (it's very similar to the list in the first edition Traveller manuals). And for Science Fantasy it should really have "anything by Dan Abnett" right at the top.

Arthur C Clarke and spell casting rat people really don't belng together.

If you are adding Dan Abnett, you are not really adding literature, your adding another game system that happens to have fictional books written in it.

Dan Abnett has written all sorts, not just for "another game system". Reciently I have read "Rocket and Groot steel the Universe" full text novel and "The Silent Stars Go By", an original Doctor Who novel, both of which are a) awesome and b) ideal for adapting to Starfinder.

So he has written stories set in...other developed properties

Dan Abnett still wouldn't be the example of reading there, it would be Dr Who in general (which often very much has a major fantasy component) and the cosmic side of Marvel comics (which also includes quite a bit of magic mixed in with future tech).

The reading list was presented "by author" rather than "by IP". Abnett, Zahn and Alan Dean Foster have all written for a range of different IPs, but most of their output can by characterised as Science Fantasy or Space Opera, and could easily be adapted to Starfinder.

Really, the main requirment for being on the Starfinder reading list should be "does the novel incude anyone fighting with ray guns or laser swords at any point?"

[MMCJawa]

thejeff wrote:

MMCJawa wrote:

thejeff wrote:

Stuff

While quite a bit of science fiction doesn't have "literal" space elves, plenty of fictional settings have races that might as well be space elves. The Minbari from B5, the Vulcans/Romulans from Star Trek, and the Tymbrini (sp?) from the Uplift novels by David Brin are just a few examples off the top of my head. Same thing with magic; people might give it a fancy name like psionics, but that is just reflavoring.

It's one of those things where it's very hard to draw neat hard lines that clearly divide the two, but the differences are generally pretty clear between "soft SF" or "science fantasy" and actual science fiction/fantasy cross-genre works.

You can point at Star Trek or Uplift and make arguments about why they really should be considered the same thing as Starfinder, but I really suspect you'll be disappointed if you expect Starfinder to play like any of the traditional soft science fiction stuff. Even if they do have vague psychic powers.

I suspect the system will provide enough flexibility to steal ideas and inspiration from those settings.

I mean if we are going to be strict in our definition, Pathfinder is a pretty poor direct emulator for most fantasy fiction as well. The game, and players, might take inspiration from books such as Lord of the Rings, Conan the Barbarian, H.P. Lovecraft, and Game of Thrones, but the game itself would provide a really poor direct emulation of either of those fantasy works. Similarly, I expect Starfinder to be a pretty poor emulator for the Uplift series, Revelation Space, or Star Trek, but I expect that there will be nods and aspects of those settings in the Starfinder setting or in certain elements of rules play, whether that be actual mechanics or just items and races.

So what do you want from an Appendix N? inspirations, or something that will be directly emulated by the game.

[EltonJ]

MMCJawa wrote:

So what do you want from an Appendix N? inspirations, or something that will be directly emulated by the game.

Inspiration. At least for me. I'd rather read stuff that inspires me to make a great Starfinder campaign rather than something emulated by the game.

[thejeff]

MMCJawa wrote:

thejeff wrote:

MMCJawa wrote:

thejeff wrote:

Stuff

While quite a bit of science fiction doesn't have "literal" space elves, plenty of fictional settings have races that might as well be space elves. The Minbari from B5, the Vulcans/Romulans from Star Trek, and the Tymbrini (sp?) from the Uplift novels by David Brin are just a few examples off the top of my head. Same thing with magic; people might give it a fancy name like psionics, but that is just reflavoring.

It's one of those things where it's very hard to draw neat hard lines that clearly divide the two, but the differences are generally pretty clear between "soft SF" or "science fantasy" and actual science fiction/fantasy cross-genre works.

You can point at Star Trek or Uplift and make arguments about why they really should be considered the same thing as Starfinder, but I really suspect you'll be disappointed if you expect Starfinder to play like any of the traditional soft science fiction stuff. Even if they do have vague psychic powers.

I suspect the system will provide enough flexibility to steal ideas and inspiration from those settings.

I mean if we are going to be strict in our definition, Pathfinder is a pretty poor direct emulator for most fantasy fiction as well. The game, and players, might take inspiration from books such as Lord of the Rings, Conan the Barbarian, H.P. Lovecraft, and Game of Thrones, but the game itself would provide a really poor direct emulation of either of those fantasy works. Similarly, I expect Starfinder to be a pretty poor emulator for the Uplift series, Revelation Space, or Star Trek, but I expect that there will be nods and aspects of those settings in the Starfinder setting or in certain elements of rules play, whether that be actual mechanics or just items and races.

So what do you want from an Appendix N? inspirations, or something that will be directly emulated by the game.

That's a fair point. I think I've actually made it before :)

Still, I'd like to see at least some focus on things more directly connected than just "general science fiction". This being explicitly cross-genre, I'd expect you could also easily keep drawing inspiration from the more straight fantasy in the original Appendix N or Pathfinder's version.

Edit: I'd like to see what they were actually inspired by and thinking about when coming up with Starfinder. Precisely because I don't have a lot of good models for this kind of genre. Plenty for more straight science fiction.

[Bluenose]

Fardragon wrote:

I used to play FASA Star Trek rpg. So there was no loot, and (in theory) the emphasis was on finding diplomatic solutions. But that didn't stop my GM pitting my starship captain against Dracula.

Based on the comic where the Enterprise encounters Dracula and a haunted house in space, perhaps? Of course Captain Kirk encountered 'Apollo' and 'Abraham Lincoln', a planet of nazis and a planet of gangsters, and plenty of other bizarre things. I've always wondered whether his reports to Starfleet Command were a big source of laughs, or whether other starships were regularly having similar encounters.

[Fardragon]

Me, I'm looking for plots to steel. Which is pretty much what writers have always done: "It was the dawn of the third age of mankind".

[Fardragon]

Bluenose wrote:

Fardragon wrote:

I used to play FASA Star Trek rpg. So there was no loot, and (in theory) the emphasis was on finding diplomatic solutions. But that didn't stop my GM pitting my starship captain against Dracula.

Based on the comic where the Enterprise encounters Dracula and a haunted house in space, perhaps? Of course Captain Kirk encountered 'Apollo' and 'Abraham Lincoln', a planet of nazis and a planet of gangsters, and plenty of other bizarre things. I've always wondered whether his reports to Starfleet Command were a big source of laughs, or whether other starships were regularly having similar encounters.

Regular occurence if my experience is anything to go by.

The same GM put me up against "Alien" in Traveller. My Zhodani spy was exposed when he psi blasted a face hugger.

[MMCJawa]

thejeff wrote:

MMCJawa wrote:

thejeff wrote:

MMCJawa wrote:

thejeff wrote:

Stuff

While quite a bit of science fiction doesn't have "literal" space elves, plenty of fictional settings have races that might as well be space elves. The Minbari from B5, the Vulcans/Romulans from Star Trek, and the Tymbrini (sp?) from the Uplift novels by David Brin are just a few examples off the top of my head. Same thing with magic; people might give it a fancy name like psionics, but that is just reflavoring.

It's one of those things where it's very hard to draw neat hard lines that clearly divide the two, but the differences are generally pretty clear between "soft SF" or "science fantasy" and actual science fiction/fantasy cross-genre works.

You can point at Star Trek or Uplift and make arguments about why they really should be considered the same thing as Starfinder, but I really suspect you'll be disappointed if you expect Starfinder to play like any of the traditional soft science fiction stuff. Even if they do have vague psychic powers.

I suspect the system will provide enough flexibility to steal ideas and inspiration from those settings.

I mean if we are going to be strict in our definition, Pathfinder is a pretty poor direct emulator for most fantasy fiction as well. The game, and players, might take inspiration from books such as Lord of the Rings, Conan the Barbarian, H.P. Lovecraft, and Game of Thrones, but the game itself would provide a really poor direct emulation of either of those fantasy works. Similarly, I expect Starfinder to be a pretty poor emulator for the Uplift series, Revelation Space, or Star Trek, but I expect that there will be nods and aspects of those settings in the Starfinder setting or in certain elements of rules play, whether that be actual mechanics or just items and races.

So what do you want from an Appendix N? inspirations, or something that will be directly emulated by the game.

That's a fair point. I think I've actually made it before :)...

I mean I would guess that an Appendix N will basically amount to "movie/books/TV shows that are science fictional that we enjoy/think are good" Sort of like how the Appendix for Horror Adventures had a TON of well regarded or important horror movies, but very few of them actually involved epic fantasy elements that Pathfinder is built around

[Fardragon]

Also relevent are novels which combine magic with an advanced technology setting. Shadowrun has been mentioned, but I would like to suggest Ben Aaronovich's "Rivers of London" series, featuring an apprentice wizard in the metropolitan police of modern London. Did you know that casting spells causes mobile phones to burn out?

[thejeff]

MMCJawa wrote:

I mean I would guess that an Appendix N will basically amount to "movie/books/TV shows that are science fictional that we enjoy/think are good" Sort of like how the Appendix for Horror Adventures had a TON of well regarded or important horror movies, but very few of them actually involved epic fantasy elements that Pathfinder is built around

That does seem to be the direction most of the lists have taken it.

It's just that I don't see Starfinder as a straight science fiction game, even as much as Pathfinder is a straight fantasy game, so I'd rather see a list that would be different than those found in something like Traveler.

[McBugman]

Owen KC Stephens wrote:

I have a pretty big science-fantasy reading list. Everything I thought of before now I offered for any reading list Starfinder might include, but I *think* I missed these few, so I'll offer them up here.

...

Roger Zelazny, Lord of Light

A planet and situation like in Lord of Light could be a fantastic high level module, Aroden lives again! Well.. sorta..

[thejeff]

McBugman wrote:

Owen KC Stephens wrote:

I have a pretty big science-fantasy reading list. Everything I thought of before now I offered for any reading list Starfinder might include, but I *think* I missed these few, so I'll offer them up here.

...

Roger Zelazny, Lord of Light

A planet and situation like in Lord of Light could be a fantastic high level module, Aroden lives again! Well.. sorta..

I actually had a campaign (partly) worked out (in my head) for doing a take on Lord of Light in Pathfinder rules - using Psionics in place of magic and Technology Guide stuff under religious control. The whole thing structured so the PCs would start as basically normal (if heroic & powerful) schmos, believing in the pantheon, just like everyone else, then gradually working up to the revelation that the gods are frauds and basically the villains of the piece.

I think it could work pretty well, since you're relying on the base assumptions of fantasy RPGs to keep the players accepting the same things their characters believe.

[Set]

thejeff wrote:

For an addition to the Starfinder list, I'd propose Roger Zelazny's Lord of Light and Creatures of Light and Darkness. Both play around with mixing SF and fantasy in interesting and different way. One involving a colony world where the crew of the colony ship have developed psychic powers and set themselves up as Hindu gods. The other involves Egyptian gods who've survived into an interstellar civilization.

Lord of Light feels to me more relevant for a Starfinder reading list, as it includes powerful PC-like folk interacting with an alien-ish world and / or lots of non-powered 'NPCs.'

Creatures of Light and Darkness, or Isle of the Dead, feel more 'Mythic' in scope, as the protagonists are more like super-heroes than typical fantasy RPG player characters.

[thejeff]

Set wrote:

thejeff wrote:

For an addition to the Starfinder list, I'd propose Roger Zelazny's Lord of Light and Creatures of Light and Darkness. Both play around with mixing SF and fantasy in interesting and different way. One involving a colony world where the crew of the colony ship have developed psychic powers and set themselves up as Hindu gods. The other involves Egyptian gods who've survived into an interstellar civilization.

Lord of Light feels to me more relevant for a Starfinder reading list, as it includes powerful PC-like folk interacting with an alien-ish world and / or lots of non-powered 'NPCs.'

Creatures of Light and Darkness, or Isle of the Dead, feel more 'Mythic' in scope, as the protagonists are more like super-heroes than typical fantasy RPG player characters.

The Lord Of Light protagonists are pretty damn uber-powerful too. God-like, in fact.

Though I guess Creatures is even another step up the ladder.

[moon glum]

Starfinder is, IMNSHO, outre science fantasy space opera. As such, I would recommend:

Graphic Novels and Comics:

Saga, Image Comics. Television headed robot princes, sexy spider assassins, Wings vs. Horns. A ghost nanny. Civil war, sorcery, parenting, sex, drugs, romance writers.

ODY-C, Image Comics. Fight your way home across psychedelic, heroic light years.

The Kree-Skrull War, Marvel Comics. Deep sleeper 5th columnists who have been hypnotized into polymorphing themselves into cows. Earth is a little tactically beneficial island in the long game.

Literary Fiction:

Nine Fox Gambit, Yoon Ha Lee. The calendrical system that a faction adopts determines the cosmological rules in which various super science technologies may operate.
Also, Conservation of Shadows, Yoon Ha Lee. Weird supernatural psychic metaphore intersects superscience space opera.

Cordwainer Smith: The Instrumentality of Mankind. Especially the stories 'A Game of Cat and Dragon', and 'The Ballad of Lost C'mell.

Rodger Zelazney, 'Lord of Light, Shadow Jack.

Movies (asides for the obvious Star Wars, Guardians):

5th Element

Jupiter Ascending

Chronicles of Riddick

All of the movies above are visually influenced by European fantasy art, e.g. Moebius, so I should add such works as Incal, Heavy Metal Magazine, Metal Hurlant, etc..

TV: Lex, Farscape, Firefly

[thejeff]

I do see Star Wars as by far the closest parallel to Starfinder. There's certainly things to be extracted from a lot of those works, even if I doubt Starfinder will actually look much like them.

And I can't help but back the plug for Cordwainer Smith, even if I doubt SF will be much like his work. But then, there really isn't anything else like Cordwainer Smith.

I'll also repeat this from an earlier thread on the topic: Elizabeth Bear's Jacob's Ladder trilogy. Set on a crippled generation ship, it plays with a lot of fantasy reworked in a sci-fi setting. A dysfunctional ruling family - near immortal and with special powers due to nanotech. AI "Angels" - shattered remnants of the computer that once ran the ship - now at war with each other for control. Necromancers calling up digitally preserved memories of the dead - or even reviving them in brain dead bodies. Intelligent suits of armor and "magic" nanotech that cripple other nanotech items.

[McBugman]

Vernor Vinge's Zone's of Though books, mainly Fire Upon the Deep and A Deepness in the Sky.

Also the Expanse tv show, based on the books by James S. A. Corey, are really good.

So I tend to lean towards the hard or more realistic sci-fi more often than not. BUT I really see Starfinder being a great game medium for that as well. Honoring scientific laws isn't exclusive to having magic in a world. Since the harder side of sci-fi is speculative at it's core and an intelligent attempt at depicting something we don't fully understand, letting that fiction be the magic and giving it concrete boundaries, laws, etc let's it fit in my opinion.

Think of all the strict rule gamers out there, they make a science out of the fantasy game. Kind of the same argument from the other end.

[Fardragon]

It's not just the inclusion of magic in Starfinder that makes it not really suitible (imo) for serious SF role playing. It's the deliberate inclusion of every space opera trope and cliche ever invented. I don't see how it would be possible to play with a streight face. So it would have to be Red Dwarf rather than The Expanse (which was boring as hell anyway).

There are already serious SF RPGs on the market.

[Bluenose]

thejeff wrote:

I do see Star Wars as by far the closest parallel to Starfinder. There's certainly things to be extracted from a lot of those works, even if I doubt Starfinder will actually look much like them.

I'd argue that WH40K or perhaps 30K is likely to be a closer match, though that's without seeing the SF rules. More explicit magic, strange tech, elves, demons, cults, and ridiculously epic warriors.

[McBugman]

Fardragon wrote:

It's not just the inclusion of magic in Starfinder that makes it not really suitible (imo) for serious SF role playing. It's the deliberate inclusion of every space opera trope and cliche ever invented. I don't see how it would be possible to play with a streight face. So it would have to be Red Dwarf rather than The Expanse (which was boring as hell anyway).

There are already serious SF RPGs on the market.

That seems more like a GM distinction than something cemented into the system itself. The troupes are there for those who want to use them, but as all campaigns have unique build rules I think Starfinder will be able to statisfy anything from serious to pulp.

Speaking on the Paizo Starfinder campaign setting specifically, I totally agree with what you said. Since the playable pre-written material at launch will be an AP section and 3ish scenarios I expect there to be a LOT of homebrews emulating people's favorite books, films, and shows as we're all just wanting to dig into the game as much as we can.

But to stay on topic,

Alfred Bester, The Stars My Destination
Jerry Pournelle and Larry Niven, The Mote in God's Eye and The Gripping Hand
Iain Banks, The Culture Series
William Gibson, Sprawl trilogy (Think this might have been mentioned before?)

[MMCJawa]

Fardragon wrote:

It's not just the inclusion of magic in Starfinder that makes it not really suitible (imo) for serious SF role playing. It's the deliberate inclusion of every space opera trope and cliche ever invented. I don't see how it would be possible to play with a streight face. So it would have to be Red Dwarf rather than The Expanse (which was boring as hell anyway).

There are already serious SF RPGs on the market.

You could apply that same argument for Pathfinder and how it doesn't allow "serious fantasy roleplaying"

[thejeff]

McBugman wrote:

Fardragon wrote:

It's not just the inclusion of magic in Starfinder that makes it not really suitible (imo) for serious SF role playing. It's the deliberate inclusion of every space opera trope and cliche ever invented. I don't see how it would be possible to play with a streight face. So it would have to be Red Dwarf rather than The Expanse (which was boring as hell anyway).

There are already serious SF RPGs on the market.

That seems more like a GM distinction than something cemented into the system itself. The troupes are there for those who want to use them, but as all campaigns have unique build rules I think Starfinder will be able to statisfy anything from serious to pulp.

Speaking on the Paizo Starfinder campaign setting specifically, I totally agree with what you said. Since the playable pre-written material at launch will be an AP section and 3ish scenarios I expect there to be a LOT of homebrews emulating people's favorite books, films, and shows as we're all just wanting to dig into the game as much as we can.

I think it depends on what they mean by "serious SF". I'd say it's likely to be as well suited for serious games as PF is for serious games. Not like PF doesn't have huge piles of pulpy tropes & cliches.

If they mean "hard SF" games, then I'd say they've got a better point. It's likely to be about as well suited for such as PF is for serious historical fiction - you might be able to bash it into shape, but it's not the right tool for the job. It's a science fantasy with magic cross genre game. That's what it's aiming for, not hard SF.

[Fardragon]

Agree, Starfinder can do Babylon 5 serious, but it can't do Clarke serious, because it presupposes that aliens, advanced technology, and interplanetary travel are commonplace. You aren't going to intrigue players about first contact with aliens when they have a lizard man, a bug man, and a rat man standing next to them.

Which is really where the reading list should come in. If your idea of SF is defined by Clarke, you really need to read some space opera to see how a Starfinder universe works.

[Fardragon]

@McBugman:

For novels that are technically space opera (intersteller travel, advanced technology and aliens are commonplace) but have the serious literary tone of "hard" SF you should check out Iain M Banks "Culture" novels. "Excession" is a first contact story in a space opera setting.

Back on strange things to include, why "I am Legend" on the list? A story that boils down to "in a world of vampires the vampire hunter is the monster" seems as relevant to Starfinder as War and Peace.

[McBugman]

Fardragon wrote:

@McBugman:

For novels that are technically space opera (intersteller travel, advanced technology and aliens are commonplace) but have the serious literary tone of "hard" SF you should check out Iain M Banks "Culture" novels. "Excession" is a first contact story in a space opera setting.

Yes! We're on the same page then..

McBugman wrote:

But to stay on topic,

Alfred Bester, The Stars My Destination
Jerry Pournelle and Larry Niven, The Mote in God's Eye and The Gripping Hand
Iain Banks, The Culture Series
William Gibson, Sprawl trilogy (Think this might have been mentioned before?)

I could see them do a Clarke-esk module. Hear me out..

It'd be a pregen and you'd play as a completely alien race that is coming into first contact with the Pact Worlds.

[Fardragon]

The difficulty I see in doing that is the players. The characters may never have encountered aliens before (or elves or orcs or intellegent monsters) but the players will have a good idea to expect.

An Excession scenario, where the aliens are even more super-advanced than the norrm, and therefore have the means to remain inscrutable, seems a more practical approach. Or a Darmok scenario, where there is something odd about the aliens that the players need to figure out in order to establish communication.

[moon glum]

Fardragon wrote:

@McBugman:

For novels that are technically space opera (intersteller travel, advanced technology and aliens are commonplace) but have the serious literary tone of "hard" SF you should check out Iain M Banks "Culture" novels. "Excession" is a first contact story in a space opera setting.

Back on strange things to include, why "I am Legend" on the list? A story that boils down to "in a world of vampires the vampire hunter is the monster" seems as relevant to Starfinder as War and Peace.

I love the Culture novels, they are especially good for inspiration for starship names, for which Banks is legendary, e.g. 'Gunboat Diplomat', 'Undesirable Alien', 'Never Talk to Strangers', 'Funny, It Worked Last Time', 'Resistance is Character Forming', 'No More Mr. Nice Guy', ...

[JohannVonUlm]

moon glum wrote:

Nine Fox Gambit, Yoon Ha Lee. The calendrical system that a faction adopts determines the cosmological rules in which various super science technologies may operate.
Also, Conservation of Shadows, Yoon Ha Lee. Weird supernatural psychic metaphore intersects superscience space opera.

Cordwainer Smith: The Instrumentality of Mankind. Especially the stories 'A Game of Cat and Dragon', and 'The Ballad of Lost C'mell.

As OP, I've restrained myself from comments for a few days because it felt like we strayed off topic from where I really was interested. Which was good science fiction book recommendations to fill the time between now and Starfinder release. This one excites me because it's an author I would not have found on my own. Thank you. I look forward to reading this one.

[Fardragon]

Why not say that then? Since the reason some RPG books have reading lists is not to recomend things to fill in the time befere the book containing the list is published.

[Set]

Fardragon wrote:

An Excession scenario, where the aliens are even more super-advanced than the norrm, and therefore have the means to remain inscrutable, seems a more practical approach. Or a Darmok scenario, where there is something odd about the aliens that the players need to figure out in order to establish communication.

There's lots of potential for a 'Darmok' situation, not just in linguistic differences, but even with races using different forms of language.

"Sir, the organic ship is launching some sort of missile at us!"

"Relax, it's a communication drone. Let it through to dock with the hull."

"Sensors say it's full of volatile chemicals."

"Yes, they communicate by scent. We've got a chemical reader in storage that can analyze the various odors they are sending us, and figure out what they want. Mostly. Sometimes the translator gets it wrong..."

Later, another race;

"Uh, now it's just spouting numbers, in another language?"

"'Fects have three languages. One for polite discourse, one for technical lingo and one for intimate family. That's why you have that ugly comprehend languages earring, try to keep up."

[JohannVonUlm]

moon glum wrote:

Nine Fox Gambit, Yoon Ha Lee. The calendrical system that a faction adopts determines the cosmological rules in which various super science technologies may operate.

I wanted to say that I read this book and for the most part enjoyed it. The calendrical system threw me early in the book, which made it hard to really get into. But I appreciate the recommendation.

BTW, if you wanted an example of a sci-fi translation of the Pathfinder Spiritualist, this book has a good one.

If anyone is interested in discussing books more. I've got a really small time blog on RPG Geek. I just posted my book report on this book there. Feel free to check it out (or not) at:

https://rpggeek.com/blog/5368/geeks-reading-list

[JohannVonUlm]

Found a couple more newer titles I'd recommend for consideration for anyone looking for Pathfinder inspiration.

Perilous Waif, by E. William Brown - Female main character - does not "Lois Lane" her storyline either. Lot's of AI and cyborg-like tech.

and

Bug Hunt, by Isaac Hooke - post military mercenary group. Parallels to an adventuring group. Tends to use technology in smart tactical ways without overpowering the characters.

Both are good reads.

[Paris Crenshaw]

Owen KC Stephens wrote:

I have a pretty big science-fantasy reading list. Everything I thought of before now I offered for any reading list Starfinder might include, but I *think* I missed these few, so I'll offer them up here.

Debra Doyle and James D. Macdonald, Mageworlds series

Eric Flint and David Drake, Belisarius series

Peter F. Hamilton. The Void Trilogy

John Varley, The Gaea Trilogy (Titan, Wizard, Demon)
John Varley,Mammoth

David Weber and Linda Evans, Multiverse Series

Roger Zelazny, Creatures of Light and Darkness
Roger Zelazny, Eye of Cat had Native American Gods in a far-future setting.
Roger Zelazny, Jack of Shadows
Roger Zelazny, Lord of Light

Thanks for this list, Owen! The Void Trilogy is up next on my Audible listening list.

[SnowHeart]

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned the Star of the Guardians series by Margaret Weis.

Less surprised but I still quite enjoyed the Forbidden Borders Trilogy by W. Michael Gear.

[IonutRO]

The Outlander (2008) movie.

[Reynard]

McBugman wrote:

Vernor Vinge's Zone's of Though books, mainly Fire Upon the Deep and A Deepness in the Sky.

I just started the audiobook of "Fire Upon the Deep" and immediately recognized it as perfect for the general tone of Starfinder. Lots of aliens in both the "humans with funny foreheads" and "what the hell is THAT" categories; a broad variability in individual worlds' tech levels that doesn't preclude interaction between them; monstrous Elder Things in the Outer Dark Better Left Unknown. All sorts of goodness in this one.