Quote from: Zevious Zoquis;984813You don't even need an rpg to do it.  You just need a group of people who want to tell a story.  Sadly, the vast majority of gamers are not actually very good writers and while they might like the idea of exploring deeper themes, they don't actually have the creative chops to pull it off in any non-lame manner.

So you've read works by the vast majority of gamers,  have you?

Getting together to play a game sounds like fun. Getting together to "tell a story" and "explore deeper themes" sound like a bad assignment in Creative Writing 101 taught by Professor Failedwriter.

An RPG 'story' doesn't have to meet the same standards of a piece of prose anymore than a film script has to be a novel or song lyrics have to be equal to verse poetry. They're different (but related) forms.

And it is not some impossibility to integrate some thought into an RPG adventure, several CoC adventures touch successfully on race, class, colonialism, political oppression and other themes. There are D&D adventures that have elements of satire and even ideas about politics (eg. Vote the Goat!), racial conflict (Night's Dark Terror) and religion (Vault of the Drow, Ogres of the Blinding Light, Circle of Darkness).

Just because those themes are present doesn't mean the games need to be po-faced and grim, although there's nothing the matter with that upon occasion either.

Quote from: jeff37923;984803Suicide is too good for you.

You must take all of your creations and translate them into the Cepheus Engine rules and then republish them. Only by this act of atonement shall you be forgiven.

So Say We All!

Brute! You would have me compound my sin!

Quote from: flyingmice;984823Brute! You would have me compound my sin!

You say the sweetest things!

Quote from: Spike;984804Bad flyingmice, bad, BAD flyingmice!!!!

Don't try to convince me you weren't priming your sarcasm gland!

When all you know how to do is bang in nails, every tool is a hammer!

Quote from: jeff37923;984824You say the sweetest things!

I bet you say that to all the bats!

I'm a big believer in covering more than combat in an rpg and I think the topic is valid.  Cyberpunk 2020 has a humanity rating that is diminished as more cybernetics are installed.  Shadowrun has essence in essentially the same role but making magic weaker.  Fading Suns had measures for various issues relating to special powers.  The psychics developed a shadow that would eventually become a physical doppleganger / evil twin.  The priests hubris could eventually cause the death of worlds.  My own theory on the fading suns is that it's the hubris of the church as a whole.  I'm not real familiar with White Wolf's Trinity but I would bet just about anything there were personal stakes built into the system.  Traveller V even has a Sanity mechanic that ensures that all scouts are a little crazy.

So, conceptually the influence of change on humanity has been done in sfrpgs.  I haven't done much with it in mine.  Personality as it influences skills and attributes, though that never stayed in the core.  The apocrapha of Galaxies In Shadow would be a book on its own.

And Clash, you need to grow up and move away from science fiction.  The world needs a soccer rpg and a football rpg and a going camping with your friends and a case of beer the summer after high school rpg.

Quote from: David Johansen;984833So, conceptually the influence of change on humanity has been done in sfrpgs.  I haven't done much with it in mine.  Personality as it influences skills and attributes, though that never stayed in the core.  The apocrapha of Galaxies In Shadow would be a book on its own.

I saw it and thought that book was Hero 5! :O

QuoteAnd Clash, you need to grow up and move away from science fiction.  The world needs a soccer rpg and a football rpg and a going camping with your friends and a case of beer the summer after high school rpg.

Working on soccer RPG WITH MYTHOS and football RPG WITH MYTHOS and going camping with your friends and a case of beer the summer after high school RPG WITH MYTHOS as e speak, David!

Quote from: Itachi;984772...

So, thoughts? Are there genres the tabletop medium can't really do? If so, should we accept this fact and move on, or is worth trying to find a way to do it?

I don't get it. You've made some HUGE assumptions here. You can play an RPG that explores the effects of technology on humanity. It can even include action and combat. You can play an RPG about anything. There's literally nothing preventing it. Well, except your inane assumptions. Crap. I'm sorry. Now you got me making assumptions!

So, you know that long conversation you had with yourself after you finished that bowl and the large pizza? Where in your drug-induced fever you laid some brilliance down on yourself? Perhaps you could fill in a couple of the missing details on how you went from "wow, sci is awesome" to "I like RPGs" to "Oh SHIT they can't do that!"? Cause there's like a couple thoughts missing in between there. I'm seriously interested in this topic. I think. I can't really decide yet since it's missing all the substance. Awww SHIT there I go again making assumptions again! Fuck this thread has me all spun around. *ahem* My Apologies.

Maybe you could elaborate on specifically how RPGs can't emulate sci-fi? In your mind? Be more specific...

Pro tip: consider turning on a digital recording device the next time you binge-toke. This way when you have your "Epiphany" and decide to "discuss" it here, you can include some pertinent details.

Quote from: flyingmice;984825Don't try to convince me you weren't priming your sarcasm gland!

I never need to prime my sarcasm gland, I'm an overproducer... however, my snark gland seems to have failed me in this thread somewhat.  I blame the OP: that was some weak sauce.

It's a people thing more than a game thing.

See, a lot of people like playing for escapist fantasies, from psycho murder hoboes all the way up to wandering heroes.  But the key element is that the 'individual' (and by that I mean the entire party) making a 'change' in the setting.  Whether it's killing a vampire overlord, it's a lasting change to a lot of player's minds.  And in a fantasy setting, one can do just that.

Science Fiction however, especially those that claim such things 'hard science fiction' as a thing, have a lot of stuff common with the real world.  There are laws, regulations, limitations, power structures in place that are visible and stifling.  And no matter how future you go, those things are still going to be 'there'.

Now, some players can get past that, either by bending or even overcoming that perception, but more commonly, people would rather play escapist fantasies, even if it means getting eaten by a cthuloid monstrocity half way through the game.




Count down until someone comes in and insults most of the people in here by indirectly calling them booger eating morons in 5...  4...  3...  2...  1...

Since it may be uniquely qualified to be the game the OP needs (as long as it doesn't suck), The Expanse is becoming a RPG produced by Green Ronin.

Quote from: Christopher Brady;984851It's a people thing more than a game thing.

See, a lot of people like playing for escapist fantasies, from psycho murder hoboes all the way up to wandering heroes.  But the key element is that the 'individual' (and by that I mean the entire party) making a 'change' in the setting.  Whether it's killing a vampire overlord, it's a lasting change to a lot of player's minds.  And in a fantasy setting, one can do just that.

Science Fiction however, especially those that claim such things 'hard science fiction' as a thing, have a lot of stuff common with the real world.  There are laws, regulations, limitations, power structures in place that are visible and stifling.  And no matter how future you go, those things are still going to be 'there'.

Now, some players can get past that, either by bending or even overcoming that perception, but more commonly, people would rather play escapist fantasies, even if it means getting eaten by a cthuloid monstrocity half way through the game.

The second to last Traveller campaign I ran had an adventure arc where the PCs ran into some Medusae in a gas giant's atmosphere. They then did research and some safari work only to find that the medusae were intelligent, and thus did some first contact play. The gang loved it, because not only did I steal a concept out of an Arthur C. Clarke novella, but they got to play in a RPG campaign that had little to no combat. In an oblique way, they got to see humans through the funhouse mirror of the Medusae.

It can be done, but you as GM have to do your homework on giving the players a puzzle or a mystery that is good enough for them to sink their teeth into. I really do hope to be able to run something like that again for an equally interested group of players.

Everyone here is a booger eating moron.





Actually I do find it fascinating how many Sci-Fi settings are built around the assumption that there is no frontier out there.   Find some new, unexplored planet in Traveller? Its got a sentient human population (or alien, but mostly human) that's been there for eons.  Fading Suns?  Good luck finding jumpkeys that lead outside of explored space. Star Wars? Man: The Republic/Empire IS the Galaxy.  Star Trek? See Traveller, except its Always Aliens... or really human aliens.


Man! Say it with me.

Space.
Is.
BIG.


And poltical instability, conflicts between states and all that jazz should be a regular feature of a good sci-fi setting, not the omnipresent 'Federation/Imperium/grand-poobahs' that we so constantly get.

Quote from: Spike;984854Everyone here is a booger eating moron.





Actually I do find it fascinating how many Sci-Fi settings are built around the assumption that there is no frontier out there.   Find some new, unexplored planet in Traveller? Its got a sentient human population (or alien, but mostly human) that's been there for eons.  Fading Suns?  Good luck finding jumpkeys that lead outside of explored space. Star Wars? Man: The Republic/Empire IS the Galaxy.  Star Trek? See Traveller, except its Always Aliens... or really human aliens.


Man! Say it with me.

Space.
Is.
BIG.


And poltical instability, conflicts between states and all that jazz should be a regular feature of a good sci-fi setting, not the omnipresent 'Federation/Imperium/grand-poobahs' that we so constantly get.

The thing is, a lot of space travel is relegated to 'Space Opera' or even 'Space Fantasy', and a LOT of people think of near future when they think Sci-Fi.  Simply because they don't want to 'What if...?' too hard to the point where it might seem like fantasy elements.  Like is there life out there?  What would they be like.

Also, this just hit me, very few of us have the scientific backgrounds to make it believable anyway, so a lot of the time, they don't even try.