hi hi
As someone who comes from a hard science background, and is really more of a tourist to the forums than a regular, I might not have any standing here. But at the risk of writing about something entirely out of my element, I have a few cents I might share.
Space magic does seem to be baked into the Star Army setting, and I don't think that is necessarily a bad thing, especially if there is narrative reason for it. There are lots of things that make telling a certain story possible that wouldn't work without breaking physics. Off the top of my head.
- Faster than Light travel breaks causality in reality, but having a galaxy spanning story that takes place in a reasonable time frame with regards to people requires it.
- Reactionless drives break thermodynamics and conservation of momentum with regards to energy expenditures being different depending on one's frame of reference, but make piloting a spaceship something that doesn't require lots of math to determine a deltaV budget.
- Access to infinite free energy is also access to infinite free mass, thanks to mass-energy equivalence, but finding a way to avoid galaxy consuming singularities can certainly be worth not having to worry about the narrative coming to a halt because the heroes forgot to pack enough energy cells.
It has been said that a fundamental difference between hard sci fi and soft sci fi is that the former tries to imagine a world to fit the science, while the latter tries to fit the science to an imagined world. In that sense, the explanations are there to support the look and feel of the universe, then the question becomes what is this thing trying to accomplish in the setting?
From a narrative perspective, a large part of what makes a story interesting is a need. The characters need something to happen, or need something not to happen. If it is a deeply personal need, so much the better. And as the dramatic tension ratchets up, the need becomes more pressing and more difficult. It sounds like part of the concern here might be that using super science to casually handwave problems away could create the unintended consequence of trivializing the drama.
It seems like the moderators already have a handle on the issue of people wanting something that is arbitrarily better for their character specifically than anyone else's, or are at least aware of the issue.
From a suspension of disbelief perspective, a large part of what makes a story believable isn't accuracy but sensibility. Someone might think flying in an airplane is terribly scary even if air travel is incredibly safe, for instance. Unfortunately, one cannot control the preconceptions people come into the setting with. The other biggest thing that will break suspension of disbelief is a lack of internal consistency. Something might break physics, but does it break what is already established in setting? Does it require ruling by fiat to avoid some unintended consequence?
Based on what I've read in the wiki so far, it seems like the setting has a relatively solid foundation based on what technology can and cannot accomplish.
From a perspective of providing guidance to new players, most people aren't going to have a firm understanding of real-world high-concept physics, or the fictional physics that govern the game universe. (I know I had the hardest time conceiving of a character with all of those super science powers until I figured that she was basically a magical girl in a civilization of peers.) Whether it makes sense in reality, or just makes sense in-universe, what is important to them is that it makes sense somehow.
I've found, as I try to get a feel for the universe, that the pages with in-character examples of the technology in use (that don't require reading through an entire in-character thread) have been some of the most helpful; especially with regards to how important or trivial the technology is to the people using it, and how I might describe its use in prose.
Anyways, if you made it this far, thanks for humoring me.
