• Registered: 2008-12-09
  • Posts: 3

Topic: Industrial fantasy

As I get more into reading Defiance: Vital Ground, I am starting to think about how I want to approach creating forces and which of my miniatures I want to create D:VG forces for.  I was initially thinking of using a separate rule set for my fantasy forces and D:VG for my sci fi; however after looking at the Army of Sun force created by Jouni, I am and wondering about the viability of Defiance for non-science fiction.

Is the game viable for any setting that has firearms? For example, a number of fantasy games are essentially set early renaissance.  Would it be viable to use D:VG for such settings?

For example, Confrontation miniatures wield firearms and such, as do Warmachine, and even Warhammer Fantasy.  In cases where firearms are not wielded, ranged weapons are.  Would one simply use the techno fantasy genre setting?  Perhaps use psychic powers and supernatural presence as alternatives to magic?

Also, how would one handle non-gunpowder weapons, such as bows and crossbows, or artillery?

Or would this require so much, that it would be better to look at a fantasy rule set?

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Along another line, let us say I wanted to re-create an imperial guard army, from 40k, for Defiance.  Would it be better to create a "generic" force and then have augmentations that created "doctrines" as it where ... or would it be better to just write a unique force list for any given imperial guard force?

  • Registered: 2005-03-28
  • Posts: 416

Re: Industrial fantasy

Well, I was consciously trying to push the D:VG envelope a bit with Project Industrial Fantasy. It's a still ongoing -- albeit extremely slowly -- attempt to "simulate" a type of currently popular (in literature) fantasy with what is essentially a modern/science fiction game. Incidentally, the up-and-coming Defiance expansion likely contains another, fairly different take on the subject in the form of a new genre modification. I obviously used only what was in the original book.

IIRC Demian says somewhere that you can sensibly expect to get balanced results for periods extending from sometime in the 19th century on to the future. I should think this would indicate periods where firearms truly dominate the battlefield. D:VG wouldn't necessarily work as well for games in settings where close combat is the order of the day and a determined straight-out charge against ranged combat troops can still be considered a viable tactic. Or even where majority of the troops still only use hand weapons, regardless. Technically, it would be possible of course but the mechanic isn't meant for that so balance likely suffers.

Not a problem in itself with an industrial fantasy setting, of course.

As to using other ranged weapons than firearms, I don't think it's impossible in any way but you'll need to allow for them not being "realistic" in performance when compared to the future tech of TL3 stuff. Compared to early firearms, bows and crossbows (at the abstraction level used by D:VG) aren't necessarily much if at all inferior, performancewise. I do believe it was largely logistics that dictated the rise of rifles and you really can't factor all that much logistics into a D:VG force, aside of limiting the availability of certain troops.