"How much Handwavium in your Sci-Fi?" Topic

On a scale of
0 – My sci-fi is so hard it makes experienced NASA engineers whimper.
1 – Cutting edge speculative interplanetary tech.
2 – Elon Musk dreamed this up after a long toke, but maybe it's doable.
3 – The Expanse
4 – Niven-verse: Interstellar slow boat transport
5 – Interstellar thin-edge of physics FTL (Alcubierre, NASA Eagleworks, Interstellar, etc.)
6 – There's a psuedo-physics explanation, but I'm pulling it out of my dilithium crystals. (Star Trek, Stargate, Babylon 5)
7 – It's got spaceships and aliens. So shut up. (Doctor Who, Alien-verse)
8 – Physics? We don't need no stinkin' physics! (Battlestar Galactica TOS)
9 – We took a fantasy setting and put it in SPAAACEEE! (40K)
10 – Gandalf with a jet pack (aka Star Wars)
11 – I do ‘em all!!!

My rule in my GASLIGHT universe was that if Science hadn't disproven it yet, it was valid. It wasn't applied even minimally.
Thus there was no need to worry about the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics. As if anyone would have, but I was vaguely concerned.
Basically, if you built a cool model, and your stats weren't outrageous, it worked as stated.
Does that make it come in on a 6?

I like all types of sci-fi, from heavy handwavium to hard sci-fi stories. The Expanse is in the sweet spot for me.

I don't game sci fi, but I generally prefer 6.

Also I did enjoy 25. Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy.

6.

Where does Traveller fall? Six I guess

It would appear that 7 and 8 are virtually indistinguishable, as are 9 and 10 for that matter (as opposed to anti-matter).

I do 30k n 40k so 9, maybe some 8.

1-8 and 10

Parzival, I would have put Bab5 at a 5, they were much more solid on their physics than Trek or BSG.

Winston, I'd call yours a solid 6, maybe even a 5.

As to the question, well, I have gamed SFB and Bab5Wars, so that puts me in the 5-6 range, but I also play 40k. Infinity is probably a 6 as well.

Overall, I think I prefer something in the 3-6 range.

30K and 40K same as Uesugi Kenshin but also some Infinity in a modified background which takes place entirely on Earth, so maybe 4? No FTL, but there are aliens in a generational ship.

Traveller, 2300, The Expanse, Firefly: All handwave propulsion, but are otherwise pretty grounded. I'd call them all 4 and put Niven-verse at 3.

Mostly 6 (Star Trek) but sometimes 3 (Firefly, the Expanse)

13 – FTL travel, and Anti-Grav propulsion.

Nyet on the "transporters" like in Star Trek though.

"Red Chicken Rising"-- need I say more.

3-6 range on Handwavium. For proper space opera, sometimes you've just got to fire up the Bergenholms and pop into Chernekov Drive. But you know Barsoom is composed largely of Narativium, and I go there every chance I get.

The transporter is certainly an invention of the Devil. So is the holodeck.

Remember, it's a scale. So don't add, but interpret.

(Okay, I'll allow Hitchhiker's as an add. But its number on the scale is obviously 42.)

Lion, B5 is where it is for "hyperspace jumpgates," which I can't see as having any basis in reality. Even Star Trek's transporters have a direct connection to actual physics. B5 had spin gravity (done wrong), and that was it when it came to realistic explanations for anything on the show. Hence its place on the handwavium scale as higher than Trek.

Niven-verse is at 4 for interstellar colonization via fusion ramjets. Nice idea, but won't work. Also, it has somewhat ridiculous alien life concepts, not to mention space dolphins(!).

I interpreted The Expanse as having fairly reasonable ship propulsion concepts, though admittedly, I'm not familiar with what the concept is behind them. Plus, it's an interplanetary society with no aliens.

Firefly is really an 8. Pretty much they make no explanation of anything scientific on the show; it's all just there to move the plot, even though they keep the apparent tech low. But if they want flying anti-grav islands or space skyscrapers, they've got ‘em. They don't need physics, they're just cowboys in space. (Not that there's anything wrong with that!)

If I was going to write a story, I think I would stick to the 5-7 range; for gaming, add a couple of points; it's usually better in game terms to have a wrong answer now than the right one in a half hour, after everyone's wandered off.

Ron

P.S. If I was running an RPG, I would be very reluctant to allow players access to any game-breaking tech, such as a matter transporter or a smartphone.

Atomic Rockets Forever!

Ron

B5 get "hardcore" credits mostly for the newtonian physics on the star furies and the spinning on earth tech.

But all the alien ships are just as magic as any trek ship.

And there is far less explanation about how it works.

On B5 JMS also specifically states that everything moves at "the speed of plot". What he did try to do was keep things consistent – Earth and Narn were at the low end of the tech scale, Centauri a bit higher, Minbari a bit higher still, and Vorlons and Shadows being at the top and the Old Ones being even higher then that.

The type I read, or the type I write? :)

Reading, I'll take almost anything as long as it's a good story and the science (or lack thereof) doesn't ruin that story.

Writing, I tend toward the hard end of the scale, but again, the story comes first.

I forgot the main question. I like anything as long as it is internally consistent.

Different levels for different campaigns.

A few in the 1-2 range.

Several in the 5-6 range.

The plurality in the 8-10 range. Space Patrol space opera games.

Interestingly, most of my NASA and other space professional colleagues tend more toward games in the 6-9 range.

5-6 typically.

Interestingly, most of my NASA and other space professional colleagues tend more toward games in the 6-9 range.

Probably because anything harder is too close to work!

I prefer a "modicum" of "reality" in my Sci-fi. E.g. Hammer's Slammers vs 40K. IMO, 40K is more Sci-fantasy than Sci-fi …

Somewhere about 5 and 6. A sensible extrapolation from current tech ( And let's face it, some modern tech is pretty unbeleiveable to the "not thouroughly educated in that field" person* ) will get a pass from me :)

* Have to use that phrase, because as a scientist I come of to some people as setting myself up as some unassialable authority in a secular oligarchic structure if I say "layman" :/

11 baby! Freakin' 11…

Babylon 5 had good physics in its space battles. A fighter, for example, would get on a vector parallel to a target ship, then cuts its engine, spin to point its guns at the target, then shoot a line down the target ship as it passed. They didn't move like airplanes in an atmosphere with strong gravity. They moved like things in the vacuum of space.

Varies between 0 to 3. I like to use as much physics as possible, but I have to make allowances so space battles and the like are possible.

Mostly 6 (Trav, Expendables), lurching up to 10 (Star Wars) occasionally! Have done 0 but I'm not sure it counted as sci=fi more ultra-modern. All campaign dependant obvs'.

Not sure how I'd score Cyberpunk.

Around 6.

Somewhere around 3 and 4, sometimes kinda 5-ish.

This one goes up to 11…

I don't scale my handwavium, I just have to go with the plot that some aliens will have higher tech than others. Let's face the facts if you're going to have FTL and aliens you're going to have some fantasy elements in there, there is no escaping it.
However I've been basing my sci-fi around more like that of the Lensman or even Legend of the Galactic Heroes. So I don't bother with technical explanations as those tend to bore people and eyes roll.

So weapons are as powerful as the need of the tech level and plot. But there's going to be one alien force at the top of the food chain, and all have to deal with it sooner or later.