Development Info Putting the science back in Wasteland 2's science fiction

[almondblight]

It's hard reading shit, yes. So it's good if those designers can use their training but if that training is missing it's useless to ask for advice from someone with that training? Great mentality. And then cry about boring settings, enemies and quests.

Yeah, humans can't download the sum total of someone's knowledge into their brain. So a scientist would be helping a designer by giving them a synopsis of scientific information. You don't need to hire a scientist for that; science writers and journalists do that regularly, and the breadth of knowledge available from them is going to be much, much more than what's available from a PhD. A PhD is trained to specialize, which is very useful for doing what they have to do (pushing boundaries), not so useful when you want a lot of scientific information that doesn't go over your head.

 

[Wavinator]

A game is a game. You can't catch a large dose of radiation, drop down with fever, bleeding out of your arse, and die a week later. You have to have things like Rad-Away and Rad-X. The player should be able to catch some radiation every now and then to remind the player that he is exploring a post-nuclear war America, but the effects should be downplayed unless the player can't read and ignores repeat warnings. The player should be able to continue adventuring and bravely disregard nausea, fever, and headache, because they don't exist in games. Well, maybe he gets -1 or -2 to Con to show that this shit is serious, but in 99% cases it's an inconvenience, nothing more. So, the question is, do you need a scientist to design radiation as a poison-like cloud plus an item that detects it, an item that increases your resistance, and an item that lowers the current level?

This right here. So we say the game world has radiation, and understanding of radiation has become common enough that we know the general effects. So we don't need an expert to tell us it can make us sick and outright kill us. There's unlikely to be some novel effect that arises out of radiation (radical, physics defying gigantism) that will suddenly bring new life into gameplay if what we're talking about is a hero's journey fantasy set in an anarchistic, deadly world. If we were talking about a civilization game modelling nuclear war, or a survival game, maybe or even the same game set in a less familiar domain (a nanotech apocalypse, the sun going red giant) then sure. But this has stopped being rocket science.

 

[Vault Dweller]

You have to have things like Rad-Away and Rad-X.

Which both come from science!

Just because a real life item was invented by scientists doesn't mean that you need a scientist to implement it in a game or even tell a designer that such items exist. I have no idea (nor do I care) if there are equivalents of Rad Away and Rad-X in real life. It doesn't matter. They are standard game devices - if there is a harmful effect, there are items/spells/abilities that raise your resistance to this effect or cancel the effect. It's that simple.

Well, I guess it's hopeless. The idea is INSPIRATION. Not knowing in order to add it directly in but as inspiration.

Game design is where it's at.

If I didn't know about or think of head rotation I'd not make that cool NPC. The one who seems like the only normal one in the village, who suddenly rotates his head completely around.

And? What does it add to the gameplay? If the game is isometric, is it even noticeable? If the game is first person, what purpose does a rotating head serve? Would it look good animated or not? If it looks bad because human bodies don't really mean to have rotating heads, what are you going to do? Say that owls do that? Add another NPC that says "hey, he's been bitten by an owl and now he does the head thing" for extra realism? Would the animation effort be better spend doing something more interesting?

In other words, it's a highly hypothetical example that hasn't passed the game design test yet. And no, you can't support your position by inventing hypothetical examples that may or may not work.

So I give this example, and again you just say "no". Well sorry, but you are just wrong, and you are proven wrong.

sigh

Proven wrong by what? The rotating owl head? You give me an example of some specific knowledge that few people would know and proudly say "here, look, science!", as if the argument was whether or not there is something a game designer doesn't know and you win by digging up some obscure knowledge.

 

[Wavinator]

Therefore - we can conclude that realism is not a bad thing to be avoided when creating any kind of fiction. Just by itself.
RIGHT?

Wrong. If realism collides with and occludes the mythology of the setting it can harm the fiction and should be avoided. If it cuts out entire possibilities that would enhance the fantasy and fantasy is more important than fidelity for the impact of the creation then it has no place other than to ground the audience in the common language of a shared experience.

If realism collides with and occludes

This is a problem of eventual implementation. VD has been taking you on voyages into the future eh?

I said ...the mythology of the setting
They said ...giant crabs
That's suggested implementation. No time travel required.

If it cuts out entire possibilities

Why would it? after all.... I AM NOT FUCKING ARGUING ANYTHING SHOULD BE COMPLETELY REALISTIC!

I would take it as self evident that some approaches, creatively speaking, deny realms of possibility. If realism to fantasy is considered a continuum, the closer you get to realism the more your possibilities are constrained. You're mapping from a less constrained set of ideas to a more constrained set of ideas. That's just logical. The exception to this, as I noted earlier, is when the domain of knowledge hasn't been deeply mined yet-- alien worlds, quantum mechanics, post-biological existence, the deep past or future, etc.

the fantasy and fantasy is more important than fidelity

Not if its stupid and affects the internal coherence and consistency of any given setting. feel free to go any enjoy ass effect, FO3, or dragon Age2.

Replaying Starflight right now, but thanks for the suggestion.

Its a strawman VD and the rest of you keep thinking about and throwing in because you are not capable of thinking in anything more than simpleton binary extremes.

Actually, brain studies suggest that strong emotion sharply diminishes reasoning capacity. I don't think I'm nearly as emotionally engaged in this as you are.

It's pointless if their input imposes constraints that wouldn't exist without them.

Again - thats a problem of eventual future implementation of any specific detail you might be thinking about.

Also - we bloody well know for a fucking FACT that inXile designers simply wont use or accept anything that impose constraints on wasteland setting.
And we also know that is not what Thwacke guys are attempting to do - at all.

These are the FACTS.

Crabs are still underwhelming. Scientific crabs even moreso.

Take an example from hard science fiction: Current trends in computation suggest that a future of humans exploring strange new worlds (or doing much of anything) is a highly improbable colonization/cowboy fantasy.

No it doesnt. Idiot.

You know, I don't think you're an idiot, but then I don't have enough history in this place to know if you're trolling, childish, earnest or what-- but do you seriously imagine refuting every point that offends you with "idiot" really helps strengthen your argument? Nobody can be that stupid. (So you've GOT to be trolling. )

Automation and mechanization have been decisive trends since before the Industrial Revolution. There are no signs it is reversing. Space agencies in the US and Europe are affected by this and have to frequently justify the exponential costs associated with manned versus unmanned endeavors, particularly when the return on investment is little more than national pride or science as opposed to economic.

We will be on both Moon and Mars in the next 20 years.

Sure, all things are possible, but not all things are likely. Gerard K. O'Neill, famous space colonization proponent, thought we'd be there by now, and the world he lived in was far more optimistic (and maybe knowledgeable) in the role of science in society than we are now.

As for interstellar travel... current science merely claims it will be very difficult to do with current technology (to put it very simply) not - highly improbable - which is something you just invented. I.e. - a lie.

Lie's a pretty strong categorization and another indicator of emotional investment. Don't take it so seriously, bro.
These things are facts: Machines have been farther in the universe than any human has. Biological existence is geometrically more difficult to support in space than mechanized existence. Machine computation is growing. Human civilization is becoming more dependent on technology. And space offers an exceptionally steep energy and resource barrier.

All these facts blended together don't do the cowboy colonization fantasy well. If we become a post-scarcity society, as nanotechnology holds the promise of making us, and an energy liberated society as could happen with the development of technologies as simple in concept as solar power satellites, why go anywhere. Throw in high fidelity simulation (is this where games are going?), increasing control over neural activity (deep brain stimulation treating depression is one example of a burgeoning tech) and what seems to be technology's capacity for muting natural selection in humans and the future starts looking less like Star Trek and more like Skynet or the Borg.

And the whole damn point of all that is to say... hew too close to hard reality and bye bye warm, fuzzy, emotionally comforting fantasy.

But that plausible projected reality does violence to the mythology of most futuristic fiction.

No it doesnt - because it doesnt. I mean - your fucking starting premise is not true.

The affairs of robots and even post-biological humans simply don't carry nearly as much passionate concern for us as flesh and blood people.

Err... what?

Try this, it might help: http://arxiv.org/pdf/astro-ph/0506110.pdf

If your drive to expand is based in biology, and we become LESS biological over time, what will become of your drive. (The paper tackles this in reference to the Fermi Paradox).

Consultants would seem to be pointless in the domain where that reality is so well uncovered and understood as to be relatively common knowledge (e.g, a mostly modern take on Earth).

What is this "modern take on Earth"? What does it encompass? What technologies... what science branches... architecture? environment? ship building? exploration of space? ecology? astronomy? medicine? chemistry?

My assumptions of their fictional world come from what I've read of here and in their docs of the type of world the game will take place in.

Moreover they seem to be even more pointless if they would constrain all the cool, possible things you could get from a coherently designed fantasy.

If you dont design your fantasy based on reality - you design insane garbage.

Example?

 

[Moribund]

The crative process isn't to look stuff up on wikipedia or just make up random nonsense. It's to make something interesting, that has a point.

 

[St. Toxic]

To make something interesting, like a giant crab, you need scientist fanboys of Fallout 3 on staff.

 

[Moribund]

That's why you have to hope they don't suck, looks like they do.

 

[hiver]

This is a problem of eventual implementation. VD has been taking you on voyages into the future eh?

I said ...the mythology of the setting
They said ...giant crabs
That's suggested implementation. No time travel required.

Look moron... it doesnt matter that you said "mythology of the setting". The issue was whether realism collides with and occludes a fantastical setting - which it doesnt. idiot.
You posed your stupid sentence in a very generic and all encompassing manner, talking about how realism collides and occludes fantasy - which is factually wrong. Dumbass!!!
It is wrong because it depends on how you use it.

But, since you mention the crabs NOW - the FACT is that giant crabs DO NOT colide or occlude the mythology of the setting. IN FACT this idea is completely in line with mythology of the setting.

muahahahaha...

I would take it as self evident that some approaches, creatively speaking, deny realms of possibility.

No - unless you make it so - intentionally. Moron.

If realism to fantasy is considered a continuum, the closer you get to realism the more your possibilities are constrained. You're mapping from a less constrained set of ideas to a more constrained set of ideas. That's just logical. The exception to this, as I noted earlier, is when the domain of knowledge hasn't been deeply mined yet-- alien worlds, quantum mechanics, post-biological existence, the deep past or future, etc.

No imbecile... that logic works only on presumption that realism is used to achieve actual complete realism.

Which i have ALREADY TOLD YOU NOBODY IS ARGUING FOR except you few retards who are not capable of thinking in any other terms but your fucking stupid binary extremes.

the fantasy and fantasy is more important than fidelity

Not if its stupid and affects the internal coherence and consistency of any given setting. feel free to go any enjoy ass effect, FO3, or dragon Age2.

Replaying Starflight right now, but thanks for the suggestion.
[/QUOTE]
I just gave you a few very nice examples in which someone used that same stupid logic to design games. That was the actual point.

Its a strawman VD and the rest of you keep thinking about and throwing in because you are not capable of thinking in anything more than simpleton binary extremes.

Actually, brain studies suggest that strong emotion sharply diminishes reasoning capacity. I don't think I'm nearly as emotionally engaged in this as you are.

[/QUOTE]

Is this your smart way of avoiding to understand what is someone saying to you and answering it? its not working.


As for diminished reasoning capacity...well, its funny you should mention this.... because you seem totally incapable of understanding anything except in some binary extreme manner.
Or actually answering things that im saying to you.

It's pointless if their input imposes constraints that wouldn't exist without them.

Again - thats a problem of eventual future implementation of any specific detail you might be thinking about.

Also - we bloody well know for a fucking FACT that inXile designers simply wont use or accept anything that impose constraints on wasteland setting.
And we also know that is not what Thwacke guys are attempting to do - at all.
These are the FACTS.

Crabs are still underwhelming. Scientific crabs even moreso.

You were not talking about crabs up there. AGAIN. You were talking about how supposedly realism creates constraints on fantastical settings. AGAIN.
Not only that but how it imposes constraints.

Whether Crabs are underwhelming is a different matter.
So... someone who answers my answer with "crabs!" can only be called a bloody retard. And an imbecile.


Especially since crabs literally prove that scientific input did not create any motherfucking constraints on the setting in question.

Take an example from hard science fiction: Current trends in computation suggest that a future of humans exploring strange new worlds (or doing much of anything) is a highly improbable colonization/cowboy fantasy.

No it doesnt. Idiot.
[/quote]

Automation and mechanization have been decisive trends since before the Industrial Revolution. There are no signs it is reversing. Space agencies in the US and Europe are affected by this and have to frequently justify the exponential costs associated with manned versus unmanned endeavors, particularly when the return on investment is little more than national pride or science as opposed to economic.

And that doesnt give you any right to come to insane definite conclusions on whats going to happen in the future.

AND IT ESPECIALLY DOES NOT MEAN ANYONE IS FORBIDDING YOU TO JUST WHOOP UP A SETTING WHERE COWBOYS ARE COLONIZING THE UNIVERSE!

Sure, all things are possible, but not all things are likely. Gerard K. O'Neill, famous space colonization proponent, thought we'd be there by now, and the world he lived in was far more optimistic (and maybe knowledgeable) in the role of science in society than we are now.

What does that have with definite answers about what you cannot know?

As for interstellar travel... current science merely claims it will be very difficult to do with current technology (to put it very simply) not - highly improbable - which is something you just invented. I.e. - a lie.

Lie's a pretty strong categorization and another indicator of emotional investment. Don't take it so seriously, bro.

No, a lie is what you had blurted. And it is nothing but a lie.
Or a stupidity - at best.

These things are facts: Machines have been farther in the universe than any human has. Biological existence is geometrically more difficult to support in space than mechanized existence. Machine computation is growing. Human civilization is becoming more dependent on technology. And space offers an exceptionally steep energy and resource barrier.

All these facts blended together don't do the cowboy colonization fantasy well. If we become a post-scarcity society, as nanotechnology holds the promise of making us, and an energy liberated society as could happen with the development of technologies as simple in concept as solar power satellites, why go anywhere. Throw in high fidelity simulation (is this where games are going?), increasing control over neural activity (deep brain stimulation treating depression is one example of a burgeoning tech) and what seems to be technology's capacity for muting natural selection in humans and the future starts looking less like Star Trek and more like Skynet or the Borg.

And the whole damn point of all that is to say... hew too close to hard reality and bye bye warm, fuzzy, emotionally comforting fantasy.

Again... THERE IS NO MOTHERFUCKING REASON TO IMPOSE COMPLETE REALISM ON FANTASTICAL SETTINGS, IMBECILE!
Nobody is arguing for that! You merely think its what it comes down to - because youre a moron who thinks in binary extremes!

Its your stupid brain thinks that if anyone even mentioned realism or science - that must mean all fantastical settings would be destroyed.
That nobody could use anything else but what we know is realistic or possible.

For your information - we can just start to build the setting based on existence of some "magical" FTL capabilities. Use that as a foundation and then extrapolate what that would mean and explore effects of it on humanity or individuals.
You know... like half of science fiction does...

The affairs of robots and even post-biological humans simply don't carry nearly as much passionate concern for us as flesh and blood people.

Err... what?

Try this, it might help: http://arxiv.org/pdf/astro-ph/0506110.pdf
If your drive to expand is based in biology, and we become LESS biological over time, what will become of your drive. (The paper tackles this in reference to the Fermi Paradox).[/QUOTE]


Fuck your drive and fuck Fermi paradox. We dont see any signs of Alien civilizations because civilizations do not last long enough. They either self destruct, get destroyed or change into something that doesnt need any bloody radio signals - if they ever used that stupid tech anyway.
We havent been sending stupid radio and tv signals more than a century and we could go out any minute.
Bilogical weapons, nuclear weapons, freak Sun Flare, asteroids, comets, a "close" Super nova, hell even a Nova would wipe us out...
and what good would all our "signals" do? There will be some miniscule wave of our radio and tv signals traveling through universe until it gets distorted and scrambled into white noise by interference from stars.
And there can be millions of similar civilizations arising throughout the universe in the meantime that will never be there in the right place and the right moment to catch it.

My point was that i dont see what this has to do with our actual discussion and that is - how realism is supposedly constraining and suffocates or destroys fantastical elements and fantastical settings.

Consultants would seem to be pointless in the domain where that reality is so well uncovered and understood as to be relatively common knowledge (e.g, a mostly modern take on Earth).

What is this "modern take on Earth"? What does it encompass? What technologies... what science branches... architecture? environment? ship building? exploration of space? ecology? astronomy? medicine? chemistry?

My assumptions of their fictional world come from what I've read of here and in their docs of the type of world the game will take place in.[/QUOTE]
Who the fuck are you talking about? Thwacke? inXile? They are not working on modern world setting.

For fuck sake... my answer was meant to elucidate that you cant just state "hey you dont need scientific consultants for the modern world because we know the modern world!" - Because the "modern world" contains too much for one person to know.

You can always use an expert for any of the numerous fields, technologies or sciences our "modern world" contains. Because there is nobody that knows it all.

Moreover they seem to be even more pointless if they would constrain all the cool, possible things you could get from a coherently designed fantasy.

If you dont design your fantasy based on reality - you design insane garbage.

Example?[/quote]
Example? There is no fucking examples because it is completely impossible!
Thats the bloody point!

 

[St. Toxic]

I hear Prosper is doing some groundbreaking work in this field. Maybe he should hire a scientist or two to help him out?

 

[hiver]

It would be a shame to loose some good scientists.

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

It would be a shame to loose some good scientists.

Yep. Gotta keep 'em caged up!

 

[Infinitron]

It is truly shocking to see Vault Dweller's jaded and reductive attitude towards the art of game design. To be honest I find it quite depressing which is why I no longer wish to participate in this discussion.

"cool blobs of loot, XP, and hp"? This is the attitude of a man who creates worlds?

That's what a career in marketing will do to you, folks.

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

That's what a career in marketing will do to you, folks.

Or a life's worth of disappointment, apparently.

 

[Brayko]

It is truly shocking to see Vault Dweller's jaded and reductive attitude towards the art of game design. To be honest I find it quite depressing which is why I no longer wish to participate in this discussion.

"cool blobs of loot, XP, and hp"? This is the attitude of a man who creates worlds?

That's what a career in marketing will do to you, folks.

I know right for a game developer you'd think he'd have a more open mind of development decision, even by Codex standards. And now that it's confirmed that this costs very little and the tradeoff of a few science experts(?) for increased focus on gameplay from the developers, makes you look even more of a retard for arguing against it.

 

[Vault Dweller]

It is truly shocking to see Vault Dweller's jaded and reductive attitude towards the art of game design. To be honest I find it quite depressing which is why I no longer wish to participate in this discussion.

"cool blobs of loot, XP, and hp"? This is the attitude of a man who creates worlds?

That's what a career in marketing will do to you, folks.

What's depressing about seeing things for what they really are. Take Gothic 2, for example. It's a pretty good game, one of the best "open world" games. The landscape is filled with monsters who just stand there until you come close enough for AI to kick in, play different animations, and send them to attack you. You kill them, earn XP and loot. You can make one creature attack the other, but that's the extend of it. These creatures exist for one simple purpose - for you to grind levels. At certain intervals they are "restocked" because you will need to gain more levels.

What role do the goblins play in that world? What the fuck do they do other than "dancing" around campfires in caves? I'll tell you. They play the role of fast and agile enemies who swarm you. They provide a different combat experience, nothing more.

This is what I'm talking about. The art of game design it's not (and for the record, monsters and the focus on grinding are the weakest aspect of the Gothic/Risen games).

Anyway, if you want to withdraw from the debate, why tag me? And why quote me without providing your own perspective? So, you disagree that creatures aren't just "cool blobs of loot, XP, and hp". Ok. What are they then?

As for "this is the attitude of a man who creates worlds", I hope you've noticed that there are no creatures in the demo - no rats patiently waiting for you in some basements, no orcs and dire wolves roaming outside the walls and causing problems that only you can solve, etc. We are focusing on fellow men, their motivations and role in the world.

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

Yeah man. Fuck rats.

 

[General Maxson]

It is truly shocking to see Vault Dweller's jaded and reductive attitude towards the art of game design. To be honest I find it quite depressing which is why I no longer wish to participate in this discussion.

"cool blobs of loot, XP, and hp"? This is the attitude of a man who creates worlds?

That's what a career in marketing will do to you, folks.

What's depressing about seeing things for what they really are. Take Gothic 2, for example. It's a pretty good game, one of the best "open world" games. The landscape is filled with monsters who just stand there until you come close enough for AI to kick in, play different animations, and send them to attack you. You kill them, earn XP and loot. You can make one creature attack the other, but that's the extend of it. These creatures exist for one simple purpose - for you to grind levels. At certain intervals they are "restocked" because you will need to gain more levels.

What role do the goblins play in that world? What the fuck do they do other than "dancing" around campfires in caves? I'll tell you. They play the role of fast and agile enemies who swarm you. They provide a different combat experience, nothing more.

This is what I'm talking about. The art of game design it's not (and for the record, monsters and the focus on grinding are the weakest aspect of the Gothic/Risen games).

Anyway, if you want to withdraw from the debate, why tag me? And why quote me without providing your own perspective? So, you disagree that creatures aren't just "cool blobs of loot, XP, and hp". Ok. What are they then?

As for "this is the attitude of a man who creates worlds", I hope you've noticed that there are no creatures in the demo - no rats patiently waiting for you in some basements, no orcs and dire wolves roaming outside the walls and causing problems that only you can solve, etc. We are focusing on fellow men, their motivations and role in the world.

Will there be creatures or monsters at all in AoD?

 

[Vault Dweller]

Three non-human creatures.

 

[Jaesun]

But are those three creatures Scientifically plausible?

 

[Infinitron]

What's depressing about seeing things for what they really are.

Are you familiar with the expression "more than the sum of its parts"?

 

[Vault Dweller]

What's depressing about seeing things for what they really are.

Are you familiar with the expression "more than the sum of its parts"?

Yes. Does it change the fact that individually monsters are blobs of XP and loot that are there to be killed and provide entertainment?

 

[Gord]

Yes. Does it change the fact that individually monsters are blobs of XP and loot that are there to be killed and provide entertainment?

Might as well treat games as a black box that's triggering the serotonin response of your brain.

Sometimes I think, despite (or rather because of?) your tendency for very analytical deconstructions of other people's games games, you follow an, ultimately, relatively simplistic mechanical approach to gaming.

 

[Infinitron]

What's depressing about seeing things for what they really are.

Are you familiar with the expression "more than the sum of its parts"?

Yes. Does it change the fact that individually monsters are blobs of XP and loot that are there to be killed and provide entertainment?

In a word, yes.

You said it yourself - "provide entertainment". What sort of entertainment is that? What entertainment do you derive from killing blobs of XP and loot?

For most of us here, who aren't Diablo players, escapism is part of our entertainment. Which means that we have the incredibly ability to suspend our disbelief and see those monsters as more than just blobs, when we want to.

 

[Wavinator]

Look moron...

:D Hahaha seriously? That's really the best you can do?

We got derailed into a specific scientific discussion about the future of space exploration because I used it as an example to frame the idea that science can constrain the possibilities open to someone when creating a fictional world. The specific example I used was how current trends and understanding affect the depiction of space colonization. My original statement was

Take an example from hard science fiction: Current trends in computation suggest that a future of humans exploring strange new worlds (or doing much of anything) is a highly improbable colonization/cowboy fantasy.

Keep in mind I said "suggest." Your spittle-flecked, hyperbolic responses of

No it doesnt. Idiot.

We will be on both Moon and Mars in the next 20 years.

As for interstellar travel... current science merely claims it will be very difficult to do with current technology (to put it very simply) not - highly improbable - which is something you just invented. I.e. - a lie.

We dont see any signs of Alien civilizations because civilizations do not last long enough.

along with "fuck fermi" and whatnot seemed not to understand that. (It's funny that you feel utterly confident making completely unsubstantiated, baseless assertions about the future of space travel 20 years from now. What was that about voyages into the future?)

Or as you would say

And that doesnt give you any right to come to insane definite conclusions on whats going to happen in the future.

Now in case you're STILL missing what this has to do with the original point, the parallel to Wasteland is the construction of a fictional world--the putting the science in the science fiction-- and how the possibilities of WHAT goes into that world get constrained by science. As I've attempted to explain to you before there is a continuum when you construct futuristic worlds. At one end lies "hard science" which limits WHAT goes into the milieu to only what is plausible based on current scientific understanding. At the other end lies "science fantasy" which is completely unconstrained by scientific understanding and can put anything it wants in the world.

If you look at the history of science fiction (again, relevance to Wasteland == science fiction game with science fiction universe) going back to the Golden Age and before you will see a trend: Rising scientific knowledge in any area began to limit the possibilities of depiction in that area. Take Venus and Mars, popular destinations for planetary adventure in the past. If you wanted to depict a dying Martian civilization networked by ancient canals, as Bradbury once did, or the dense jungles of Venus, as Isaac Asimov and many others once did, it's a harder sell the more your audience cares about fidelity. You could do it, but it wouldn't be putting the science in the science fiction because those possibilities have now become constrained.

Now in case this point about a continuum continues to escape your grasp, try to understand what we are talking about is NOT a binary proposition. You're free to create a milieu which has hard scientific limits, for example for delta V governed Newtonian space travel, and still throw in light speed constant violating FTL travel. Part of your construct can be hard science with exceptions and there are many "hard SF" authors that do this today.

But, since you mention the crabs NOW - the FACT is that giant crabs DO NOT colide or occlude the mythology of the setting. IN FACT this idea is completely in line with mythology of the setting.

muahahahaha...

You're confusing the point. Science told them hermit crabs for a water logged environment from a subset of presumably all scientifically valid possibilities. That subset of possibilities is smaller, by its very nature, than the possibilities you could get for a water logged environment unconstrained by scientific accuracy. Given the Wasteland cannon (the mythology of the setting), it sounds MUCH smaller, leading to the question of the value of scientific input in the context of such a fantastical game. Even worse it's weakened by what depictions in games have come before it.

Is this your smart way of avoiding to understand what is someone saying to you and answering it?

No, it's my smart way of telling you to take a chill pill, bro.

AND IT ESPECIALLY DOES NOT MEAN ANYONE IS FORBIDDING YOU TO JUST WHOOP UP A SETTING WHERE COWBOYS ARE COLONIZING THE UNIVERSE!

You didn't even read that paper, did you? "Fuck fermi." Yeah man.

My point was that i dont see what this has to do with our actual discussion

Above all else, THIS you have made painfully clear.

For fuck sake... my answer was meant to elucidate that you cant just state "hey you dont need scientific consultants for the modern world because we know the modern world!" - Because the "modern world" contains too much for one person to know.

You can always use an expert for any of the numerous fields, technologies or sciences our "modern world" contains. Because there is nobody that knows it all.

Whether you can use them and whether you need them is the core of what you don't seem to understand about what I am saying.

 

[Infinitron]

Wavinator
Wasteland is really not that "fantastical". It's a game about fighting against evil robots in a Mad Max-style post-apocalyptic world. This is not the height of originality and creative thinking.

It may have been a bit more whimsical than the grimdark stuff we're used to today, but it was nothing special back in the 80's.