Thinking about delving into the world of steampunk?  Need some advice, input, etc. as you develop your plot or setting?  Then you've found the right place.

No body got any Steampunk games goin' on? D:
This message was last edited by the GM at 12:31, Thu 24 Feb 2011.

I've been debating a Victorian Expedition style setting..

I'm thinking of running an OGL Steampunk game but it won't be ready for a few months on account of (a) I'm running a Scion Hero game face to face, (b) I've contracted to provide some spoken word programmes for an indie music station, and (c) my band just put out a single and we need to promote it.

What is OGL?  I would love to do a Steampunk game.

Open Gaming License, but that doesn't clear it up for me anymore either :P

Mongoose (I think it was mongoose) did a steampunk RPG under the OGL, compatible more or less with D&D3.5.  I have a copy at home.  It's rather splendid and relatively easy to run, although sadly, nobody produced any supplements for it, so it'd have to be homebrew... not a problem though as I'd set it in the real world, more or less.

I'm thinkin' GURPS, you get to build exactly what you're out to replicate concept-wise, and there's enough supplements to cover the breadth of equipment possibly involved, even if it goes from Victorian to Steampunk, because there's a Steampunk supplement, albeit 3E.

I've got a homebrew setting I've been toying with for the last few years, as I want to write a story set in a fantasy/steampunk world, but I haven't made a lot of progress; I've also thought about running an RP game with it, but not sure on the system.  I tend to let myself get bogged down with minutia.

One of the things I'm including is the synergy between magic and technology (steam trains that run off of magical fires, things like that), and why one or the other hasn't become dominant and forced the other into the dark corners of society, but finding the perfect balance is rough. :D

I did something like that in a face to face steampunk game set on Toril about 300 years after the setting for Forgotten Realms in D&D3.5.  The trains used magic and steam together but the party went down into the underdark via an elevator and went around with flashlights powered by everlasting batteries.  And then they had to walk.

If magic existed and could be analyzed as such, it would BECOME technology.

People would figure out the most efficient ways to do things regardless of whether that involves engineering, wizardry, chemistry or good ol' fashioned sweat. All a matter of how easy it is to invoke magic and what effects can reliably be produced.

If the only magic effect that can easily be produced is say... Force, you'd end up with force powered airplanes, force powered electrical plants, force powered engines, etc. so long as force is cheaper to generate than burning coal. Maybe it's more efficient in small scale to use force engines but it's a better economy of scale to burn coal for electricity, etc.

If you could magically generate electricity directly, how cheap would that be compared to burning coal and spinning turbines? If I can create magic fire, is that cheaper than burning gasoline in my car?

:D

There's also the innate conservatism of technology.  When steam engines were invented in Alexandria around 200 AD, they did not catch on because steam gave no massive advantage over slave power.  Instead, steam engines were used exclusively as children's toys.

When gunpowder was invented in Medieval China, it was used for making fireworks.  It was not until the Turks got hold of it that anybody thought of making Cannon.

When photography was invented in fifteenth century Italy, it met with no demand apart from with the forgers of the Turin shroud.

When Guns were introduced into Japan toward the end of the sixteenth century, the Shogunate made them a state monopoly and charged such a hufge amount for them that they became ceremonial weapons while the sword and bow remained important weapons of war.

When Babbage invented the difference engine, he could not get the funding to build it.

The Clipper, the fastest and heaviest sailing ship ever built was developed AFTER the steamship had already made it obsolete.

The last use of the longbow in war was at Dunkirk in 1940, when Captain Jack Churchill (no relation to the Prime Minister) ran up and down the beach taking potshots at the Germans, and no doubt terrifying them (there's something primal about eight inches of wood suddenly sticking out of your leg).

Nikola Tesla wrote patents in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century for maglev, broadcast power and flivvers.  All have yet to catch on.

Other things that took a long time to catch on are: the Stirling Heat Engine (invented in 1816 and now used in some solar power stations because it is more efficient at converting solar heat to energy than are solar power cells); and the Fax machine (which was demonstrated at the Great Exhibition of 1851 but not manufactured commercially until the 1970s).

Exactly my point. People will naturally choose the most cost effective method available. That is not always the most technologically advanced. Sometimes trying to use advanced technology would reduce their profits, something that no company (or person) would do lightly.



However, to address the "conservatism" of technology, I respectfully disagree. I feel your examples are anecdotal or examples where newer technology allowed the improvement of older technology. I can offer plenty of counter-examples.

The first heavier than air flight was in 1903 and we landed on the moon in 1959. Twenty years ago, the internet didn't exist. I now have a computer in my pocket which is more powerful than the one that flew the astronauts to the moon.

There are a number of working maglev trains, Sony now has a patent on a TV with no wires at all and I'm not sure what a flivver is. ^^;;

Niche or not, I applaud note of those notes Alcuin.  On a personal note, I have designs for stirling engines which I was going to put forth in Kenya when I was planning a trip to coordinate some sustainable community development with the Masai peoples there :)

In reply to Alcuin (msg #12):

Cell phone technology was around since early 1970s, but FCC kept all the frequencies reserved for TV. It wasn't until Japanese made cell phones available to the public in mid 1990s that US even attempted to implement them. Something similar happened to the internet.

Videophones were introduced in Moscow in 1968 but then withdrawn when there were no customers.

Anyone familiar with Diaspora? It occurred to me the other day that doing a steampunk version of Diaspora would be interesting.

Wouldn't a punked up Diaspora need to be more cyber than steam?

That's why I wrote "steampunk version of Diaspora". Say ironclad starships on steam power. What else would we need?

In reply to Tzuppy (msg #19):

Oooo.  Interesting!