Gravity and Pressure
And why game design is so easy
This Week’s post is about gravity, but not really.
Trinary Stars
In writing the setting for Intergalactic Bastionland I feel pulled between the gravity of three stars:
Reality - What would it really be like to be in space as we understand it today?
History - What are some interesting equivalents to mine from actual history?
Fantasy - Yeah but what if this weird thing was out there??
I suppose it’s like simultaneously pulling from the present, past, and imagined future. This applies to a lot of space-based settings, but is by no means universal. I’ve done all three of these, and you can see their impact on its wobbly orbit.
Let’s take travel times as an example, a staple concern of space TTRPGs.
A realistic approach involves looking at real distances between stars, and thinking about travel times if we assume near-lightspeed. Remember to consider how much of a pain it is to get a big vessel up from a planet and out of its orbit.
A historical approach considers what would be the equivalent, probably sailing between continents. We’re talking weeks or months depending on how far back we go. What was life like on these voyages?
A fantastical approach imagines infinite possibilities, perhaps with a view to (lowers voice) make the game work a bit more easily. Yeah, we have a way to go faster than light, but you can’t do it too much because... erm.. It’s just how the ship’s special drive works, okay?
The mass of each of these stars will differ within your own personal trinary system of influences. Even if you’re drawn to one in particular, the other two are sure to be warping your orbit in less obvious ways.
I’m dropping the star analogy now because I just spent too long reading about trinary star systems.
The goal is to weave these three influences into something that feels internally consistent, characterful, but still recognisably beneath the sprawling umbrella of science-fiction.
Shit, now I’m onto umbrellas. Abandon blogpost.
Elsewhere
Personable Thoughts looks at the easy and hard parts of designing a game.
The Solo Roleplayer’s Podcast kindly hosted me to talk about playing Mythic Bastionland solo.
The Doom of the Dark is a Patrick Stuart and Amanda Lee Franck collaboration currently funding, which should be sales pitch enough to check it out!
Coming Soon
Over on Patreon I talk about pressure, but not that sort.
What pressures do you face as a Head in the top 10% of a thousand crew starship in Intergalactic Bastionland?
It comes down to what each other crewmember might want from you, and how they might ask for it.
Expect the full post here and on the blog next week.
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