I love the concept of Steampunk Star Wars, I really do. It blends two styles that I really love: Space Opera and Jules Vernes’ Victorian setting. As I already talked about, blending two cool things together can result in an explosion of cool.
I mean, just look at the Spork! (Credit: Graham)
For instance, look at the work of this guy (found through Wired’s Geekdad blog and appearing here and there on the blogsphere). It’s just so full of awesome! He also does Gaslight Justice League.
Had I the time to do it and the interest of my player, I would totally make a Steampunk Star Wars mini-campaign using the SW Saga rules.
Add the artwork of this other genius and you have all the visual fluff you need to start planning a game.
I’d use the rules as is, I’d also change the names of the technology and place the action on just one planet (possibly Earth).
Each planet of the SW universe would become a country and the Hyperdrive could become Supersonic flight (Star Destroyers becoming Armored Airships). Alternatively it could be ocean going ships with FTW (faster than wind) drives as proposed by Phased Weasel in my 1st Steampunk post. 🙂
Coruscant would be based on a gaslit New York/Gotham City equivalent, Tatouine would become be based on Marakesh. Hoth would be an Arctic Base surrounded by Yetis!
Sprinkle some more cool like Victorian Genetic engineering and you can have Velociraptor mounts and Steam-armored Diplotocus Based AT-AT walkers!
The Empire would span most of the Civilized portion of the planet and possibly a few of the planet’s moons… The rebellion would occupy ruined cities and the wilderness.
The Deathstar would be this huge analytical engine capable of destroying an entire country!
Add Vampires and Hollywood-typed Werewolves and you have Sithlords and Wookie or maybe use actual aliens.
The possibilities are endless.
One key question would be the Force. Would I keep it as is? Make it more like magic? Could it be harnessed in object and help explain the advanced technological feat using steam-powered machinery?
Man… screw D&D! I want to play this!
Sigh…
What’s really cool about being a gamer is that you don’t need George Lucas’ permission to create games like that. You can borrow what you damn well please, steal plots, tropes, concepts and ideas and create your perfect game.
Also, by mixing two familiar elements like the SW universe and the Victorian era, you can create a completely new gameworld with enough reference points to allow players to build solid backstories and GMs can build adventures based on both Sci Fi and industrial era tropes (Like the rebellion being made up of members of the nascent industrial Unions being brutally repressed by the Empire).
Anyone doing a Gen Con Steampunk World Wars game? I want in!
You have any other cool ideas that should make it in a theoretical Steampunk SW book? (It’s never going to see the light commercially, but your ideas could help a DM/GM create his own binder).
Edit:
Reader-proposed ideas so far:
- The Earth’s moon as an ancient Deathstar or as the actual Deathstar
- The Force = Manipulation of the Ether
- Jedi = Etheromancers
- Sith = Mad scientists looking for Global unifying theory
- Light Sabers = Glowing Blades of Plasma encased in Ether… (Controlled by a Jedi’s mind?)
- The Force = Electromagnitism
- Nicola Tesla = Jedi Electromancer
- The Order of the Tesla Knights!
- The Force = Psionics (Perfect Body control, + Telekinesis)
Simply put: WoW!
Very nice work indeed… i would play that kind of game as well… just looking at the figurines makes me all thrilled.
Man…. make us a game session of it, my dear Chatty, and i would play right now!! 🙂
Don’t tempt him… He’s 1 project away from spontaneous combustion…However, it’d be interesting to see if Evil Overlords are resistant to fire or not.
I’m a big conspiracy nut, and one of the most thrilling conversations I’ve heard echoing out of the AM radiowaves at odd hours of the night, is that our moon, the most overly perfect body in our heavens, the fact that it is there, and it is so perfect makes it spooky in itself. But according to some, the moon is in fact an ancient space station that has been there for so long that the metal body of it has weathered to the gray powdery substance that it is today.
There is enough evidence to back up this claim. While placing the American flag, the astronaut reported that the moon rang, like a bell . . . for four days. A few satellite passes that have been released from NASA show what can only be described as enormous smoke stacks. Why HAVEN’T we gone back to the moon? Perhaps, we were told to leave by something that lives there?
For a public funded organization, I definitely find it highly strange that they can classify materials, but that doesn’t really belong here. Nor the fact that this is probably just silly business, but it IS interesting, and in a Role Playing world, stuff like this happens every day.
So you see, Chatty, the Deathstar is already out there, and it’s watching you right now as you read this. . . I hope you’ve combed your hair!
RIP
Ripper X’s last blog post..Creating Mysteries part 2
Ok. When I first saw this post my reaction was simple. I laughed and grinned from ear to ear. And yes, that’s a good thing. Unless you mix a bit too much modern Alice into your gaslight and then perhaps it’s a bit disturbing. But nonetheless!
The Force… hmm… This is just my knee-jerk response but if you wish it to function like it tends to in the space opera then one of the more fun things is to make it slightly more object based. I say more because it’s already objectified in lightsabers (I know, it comes from the other direction but it’s enough of a link to spin tales with). Make the Force run on ether. Your jedi become ethermancers with intricate experience in pseudo-hydrodynamics. You can use the use the relationship between modern chemistry and alchemy or astronomy and astrology here for pointers if you wish. Sith can be hardline Occam’s Razor types who want nothing more than a single unified field theorem to explain everything in nature via simple laws. To discover these universal truths they need the resources of nations funneled into eccentric experiments.
Oh. I should probably say something about light sabers. They’d be a rod or maybe a thin tube of some odd metal with a high resistance to heat. When on, the rod would be surrounded by a thin shell of plasma fire as the ether burned.
To sum up:
jedi = artistic renaissance (wo)men who focus on hydraulics and ether tech
sith = coldly logical bastards with a less mystical and more scientific bent – your typical mad scientist but with more class
Force powers = ether powered gadgets used by both – alternately add a bit of alchemical mysticism for flavor instead
This is just 5-10 mins of random gobblydegook. Pick my brain for more ideas if this sounds interesting. I always seem to have an easier time of sparking creative ideas from other people’s stuff than just coming up with games and adventures to run myself.
Force powers are easy-Electromagnetism and Nikola Tesla.
Trask, the last Tyromancer
Have you seen the anime Last Exile? The airships and such made me think of that.
And Tesla would be a force master without doubt.
Normally I am not a Steampunk fan, but those figures are amazing, and your translation of Star Wars to steampunk is very enticing. I have to say I too would play something like that.
Perhaps you should throw together a one-shot and try it out and see what floats. I would play it between events at GenCon.
DNAphil’s last blog post..Weekend Update– 14apr2008
@Mike and PM: This one shall remain at the idea stage for the time being. As PM so succinctly puts it, I have no wish to cross the project-triggered self-ignition threshold.
@Rip: Dude, how can we know that it rang like a Bell if Armstrong did his thing on a Soccer field in a hangar?
http://strangemaps.wordpress.com/2008/03/24/260-youll-never-moonwalk-alone/
But yes… The Moon as an ancient Deathstar that the Empire and their Sith Allies have reversed engineer to build the Mark 1 Analytical Engine! I can totally buy that in a RPG.
@Lanir: This is golden stuff. I like your ideas! I too am more of an ideas guy than someone that can lead an idea to it’s logical end.
@Trask: Having seen The Prestige, I can totally imagine how Tesla would be the archetype of the Jedi Electromancer and the Force being a mix of Ether/Electromagnitism. David Bowie: Jedi Knight… It sure beats David Bowie: Goblin King…
However, the risk of going that way is that you may clash strongly with player’s sense of verisimilitude because geeks actually know how electricity works. Heaven forbid I should start spinning force theories based on electro-magnetism around a tableful of electrical engineers (Much like I groan whenever I read about Genetic Engineering fiction).
@David: Welcome on the Blog. No, I have not seen it. I’ll Google it and ask my buddy PM if he has it in his collection. I have seen Castle in the Sky many many times and I totally dig the Airships in those! The Pirate’s Wasp pods would make great Imperial Bike Speeders!
@DNAPhil: Nooooo! Don’t tempt me man! My head will explode!
If the idea is still gnawing at me come summer, I may do it. But I make no promises. Heck, since Lucasfilm seems to own Gen Con now, chances are we’d get raided by Imperial Lawyers as soon as we sat down to play that game!
@All: I added the ideas you proposed so far into the post! Feel free to chime in with more!
you could easily just use the psionics rules for the force and bang, all set.
-Ben.
Ben’s last blog post..Design Log: The Black Art of High APL Encounters
@Ben: I could, however, rules wise, I’d probably go with the Force rules in Star Wars Saga Edition. What I’m pondering is the Forces’ fluff.
The thought experiment of Steampunk SW is how to transpose the rules of a Science Fiction/Space Opera game into Victorian Steampunk and maintain the players’ suspension of disbelief (helped a lot by the Rule of Cool).
My assumption is that clever Fluff can handle it fine.
When I was looking at converting SAGA to Firefly, I essentially had the Force more like advanced psychic power, ala River. The way I portrayed it was that she didn’t have superhuman powers, it was that her mind could calculate the exact trajectories, predict your moves, analyze data like shifts in the air or smells, etc to allow her to do exactly what she needed to do at exactly the right moment. Kind of like her mind going into overdrive. I think I explained that well.
Anyhow, to do that I had to adjust Force powers, eliminate some. Play with classes, etc. Some powers became martial arts like moves. In my Firefly world, the Operative was essentially a Jedi. Same powers as river, but under control. Not a PC class. (I know, Boo!)
I eliminated dark side points, but in Firefly’s case it was insanity checks. Every time the character used certain powers she had to make a check with a cumulative penalty, if she failed she would snap and treat all targets as opponents until the end of the encounter.
Never got a chance to play it, but the idea of a hyperconscious brain that calculated you to death might be a way to look at the force in a steampunk setting too.
Although admittedly I really like the Tesla idea, and it may be a better fit for this steampunk style. I just wanted to share my experience with fiddling with Force rules.
The Order of Tesla Knights? Sign me up!
Edit: LOL I sent the links of just the pics to some of my friends, and one of my players immediately replied “Can we do an RPG of this, please!”
“Ah, Chatty…take up that system, strike down 3.5 and your journey to the 4E-side will be complete!”
😉
-Ben.
Ben’s last blog post..Design Log: The Black Art of High APL Encounters
@Shadow: Thanks for your insights on adaptation. The Tesla thing is becoming a runaway idea that I like more and more (and a definitive Copyright dodge! he he he). Plus it makes the Sith lightining so much more in flavour (Self generated Electrticity!)
@Ben: Instead of answering like Luke, I’ll answer like Anakin: ” Sure, where do I sign up?” Good one Ben!
Hi, I’ve done it. I’m running a steampunk campaign using a converted SAGA system
http://industrianocturne.blogspot.com/
TarlSS’s last blog post..Corporations
Now, my ol’ lady has some Star Wars source books, and I have access to lots of them for cheap, but I honestly really stray away from movie related games. I honestly don’t know why, I was a typical 70’s-80’s kid who lived, breathed, and worshiped Star Wars. There was just something about getting in a pool that mandated that everyone inside of it had to pretend that they had jumped into the Deathstar trash compacter, that snowy days required at least 6 Hoth battles, and every scrap of playground equipment transformed into the Millennium Falcon.
I can kick anybodies butt while playing Star Wars Trivial Pursuit! But as far as role-playing games go . . . man. I just don’t know! It’s easy to believe that your playing an important role in home-brewed D&D games. But Star Wars? The mecca of all that is good and wonderful about the world?
Let’s not even go to the fact that it’s hard creating a little village, much less an entire planet. No Thank You! This is why I always avoided Planescape, it’s just too massive to wrap my little mind around.
As cool as this idea is, how playable is it? I’ve heard my share of over-powerful worlds that looked great on paper, but once you test play the things, they fall apart faster then a pro wrestling leper.
I do like the time that this takes place, but one thing that puts a bad taste in my mouth is modern inventions in places were they don’t belong, and this just SCREAMS bad movie. In my own game, one of my players threw me an idea about a steam powered gun that shoots wooden stakes . . . UGH!!! I think that those were my exact words. What is so hard about using a mallet? The guy is laughing like a madman who discovered a way to take over the world, and I’m feeling irreplaceable braincells exploding inside of my head like popcorn.
This could easily devolve into a bad Wil Smith movie. Star Wars is sacred ground, I personally don’t think that anything that I can do could improve it.
Ripper X’s last blog post..Mining the Unearth Arcana
@TarlSS: Welcome on the blog! I will definitively have a look. How did it work out for you? How did players embrace it. As Rip mentions, SW bears a heavy emotional burden in fans so I’m curious how it would play out.
@Rip: Yup a lot of emotional/nostlagia baggage in SW. I was 5 when I first saw Empire Strikes back (and I’ve played a thousand Hoth battles too!), 10 when I saw New Hope and 12 for Return (which was my favorite BECAUSE I was 12).
One of the reason why I would prefer to play a transposed SW game is just so we can let go of the Cannon itself and forge new heroes with a different storyline so they can get out of the shadows of Skywalker, Solo and Leia.
Also, I wouldn’t tackle the whole world. I’d go at it much like the movies in that you only create a few scenes in different settings for the purpose of an adventure.
New Hope: Fregate, Tatouine Moisture Farm, Mos Eisley, Death Star, Rebel base. That’s 5 locales for a multitude of scenes.
But since we’re talking about just one planet, a DM with players that decide to get creative can rely on his historical knowledge of the victorian Era to create a random city scene or Jungle encounter.
Now you all have me thinking about how to fit the Tesla idea in. The easiest way to do this would probably be to pair off tropes. I think. So your jedi might practice something like eastern mysticism mixed with ether powered weird science while the sith practice more western philosophy and pseudo sciences. Keeping the “science” well off the beaten path is best. Like in many comic books the ultimate power is more in the person than the device (ether, for example would scare the bejesus out of most people because it’s not stable, lights up rather easily and makes a big kaboom – at least in a fantasy world). If you have a copy of Mage laying around you might get some ideas from the Sons of Ether and some of the Technocracy guys.
However you did the flavor text I think you’d probably get more mileage out of modelling dark side jedi or sith off of Count Duku (yes I misspelled that… I think Lucas spells names by whacking his head against a wall until he sees stars and then jotting down whatever letters the funky shapes look like). Vader is great in the earlier movies but you can do dark and sinister anywhere. Duku has actual period style you can use.
A good way of keeping lightsabers in the hands of the Tesla/Jedi/Siths is that it requires mastery of the Force to handle at all. Otherwise it explodes…
I totally see Count Dooku as a Prussian-like Jedi nobleman turned toward the Siths because of some perceived slight by the ‘western’ courts.
Man, The Girl Genius Storyline is full of those counts and Western European crazy Sparks that side with the ultimate evil just to oppose the very lawful neutral Magnificent bastard that is the Baron.
Darth Tesla, master of Lightning. ‘Nuff said.
Oh, my players absolutely love it. I’ve completely gutted the flavortext, so there’s no “Gee, this is Star Wars!” feeling at all. I’m currently on my 15th game, going strong. I’ve been running it since January.
The players are 2 wizards, an engineer and a noble Prince embroiled in the middle of national intrigue involving the tiny nation of a Vampire count.
The idea is that combustion beyond steam technology never took off, and everything is based off of electrical power. I’ve removed lightsabers from the game, allowing Jedi/Wizards to choose their ‘weapon of choice’ to perform fancy manuvers with. So far the most popular has been a baton or wand. We have one of our wizards likening himself to a dark Harry Potter sort, while the other is a traditional Jedi-Gish type.
Please, read the blog (And look at last year’s posts) for further rules and information. I’ve created my own world with Prussian/French/Russian/English/Chinese idealogues, but you can apply the system to anything in the genre.
As for Tesla, I haven’t incorporated -him- so much as his philosphy (And electrical inventions) are pervasive throughout the whole game. Two of the villains are actually evil geniuses, one is the brother of the Gish wizard, who is crippled and bitter and uses automatons. The other is a Tesla-like Engineer that is the teacher of the PC engineer, who’s accomplished electrical background is delving closer and closer to using supernatural and paranormal power sources for engaging in nefariuous superscience!
And of course there’s Airpirates! and Betrayal! and the players ride around in zeppelins! alot.
TarlSS’s last blog post..Corporations
The Centennial Falcon, one of the fastest zeppelins above the Atlantic.
TCDm’s last blog post..Nomenclature, Part Deux
Definitively… With the whole Final Fantasy Baggage.
It does sound like a very cool idea. The link below (The Steam Wars a.k.a Star Wars 1877) is to someone who has been trying to create something like this too in case you’re interested:
http://forums.gleemax.com/showthread.php?t=991025
Hey Ostar: Welcome to the blog and thanks for the link… What’s great (and disappointing at the same time) about the Internet is that no matter how cool an idea grips you, someone, somewhere already has a Website and /or forum post about it already!
Great resource!
Death Star as a Giant flying dirigible fortress capable of vaporizing an entire city using the focused rays of the Sun!
Set up the final battle with the rebels in steam-powered gliders using large-calibre handguns firing armor piercing bullets to puncture the steamball that powers the Death Star.
Fun idea, this Steampunk Star Wars.
What’s great (and disappointing at the same time) about the Internet is that no matter how cool an idea grips you, someone, somewhere already has a Website and /or forum post about it already!
Nice. An even more genericized version of rule 34.
Michael Phillipss last blog post..Reading Little Brother. And other Things
@Carl: I like your version of the Death Star… On the forum that Ostar linked to, the guy uses the Fighter Planes from Crimson Skies… quite cool although I’d use them more in a WWII/Star Wars crossover.
@Michael: I had to look that up, can you believe it? And please for the love of god don’t tell me there is Steampunk Starwars Porn available…
(and if there is I bet that Phil Foglio drew it!)
It does seem horribly possible that there could have been a Steam Punk Star Wars parody Xxenophiles story, doesn’t it?
Michael Phillipss last blog post..Last little brother post for a bit.
Oh wow. Just that image is amazing. The bulkiness of R2D2, the absurdity of Vader’s appearance, and the astoundingly classy look of it all makes it all work.
Regarding the ideas, I think this kind of twist is probably a major step in being able to run any setting with the serial numbers filed off.
.-= Sam Erwin´s last blog ..The People of Cwena Scire =-.
@Sam: Still digging in the archives I see. Yes, being willing to take a setting and transpose it outside of it’s canon (or even universe) is one of the coolest I’ve discovered in World Building. I did it (with partial success) with mixing Ptolus with Iron Heroes.
As much as I think this idea is great, there’s one big thing against it: the fans. Many people come to the Star Wars roleplaying game solely with the intent of playing in the Star Wars universe as depticted in the films and everything else.
We’re fans first, gamers second. Yes, it would be cool, but will anyone play? I seriously doubt if I could convince anyone in my group on this.
Maybe on a smaller scale, have a steampunk planet, then we’ll see.
.-= Katana Geldar´s last blog ..We’re not exactly dealing with Vogons here: (Bureaucracy Part 1) =-.
Actually Katana, with all due respect, I disagree with you.
Not all geeks are Star Wars fans. Or at least not hardcore ones. I’m actually a gamer first and a fan second. So I see no trouble creating such a concept and I’m pretty sure my gaming group would be game.
However, I do agree that I would not try to sell this (irrespective of the actual IP issues). Much like I would not try to sell a Forgotten Realms adventure set in a Cyberpunk world.
But I’m the kind of guy that likes to slay Sacred Cow and cook sacred burgers. At least, when it comes to hacking setting and fiction elements.
Cyberpunk Planescape
Steampunk Star Wars
ChtuluMecha
Dungeon Reality Shows
D&D adventure based on boardgames
Trade your Magic Sword for 2 Sheeps and a Wood?
Peace!