Guns in fantasy

Yay or nay? When or how to do it? Do they break world building and make fights more stale or do they add more dynamism?

Other urls found in this thread:

youtube.com/watch?v=BYwoeW2DIgQ
youtube.com/watch?v=tVi_fs2oz3E
youtube.com/watch?v=k_AyMkoyiFM
youtube.com/watch?v=BYwoeW2DIgQ&list=PLTSvG2hhfYVuCtuK5omIyqHLuHQvxNbLO&index=12
my.mixtape.moe/ydhghd.webm
novelupdates.com/series/when-a-mage-revolts/
novelupdates.com/series/release-that-witch/
twitter.com/NSFWRedditImage

Get out

Pocket dimension that the US Gov drops ammo into that all military and police guns are linked to that provides near infinite ammo with no reloads.

Someone should write a book like that. It would be epic.

Don't know why is there people shitting the thread, its a legit question

Oh well, memers gotta meme I guess

What if... Instead of swords... It was guns... and the main character... He does a cool move where... He fires the guns funny and... The bad guy dodges... And fires his own cool gun attack...

Wow... I think it would be fucking epic OP... Imagine... HBO's smash hit Game of Thrones series... But with guns... So fucking epic...

just do what movies do

an m47 has 900 bullets in its clip and a ak16 has no recoil

Its your world decide how you want the guns to operate and then see for yourself

You can have a risky one time use hand cannon, if that makes things easier for you

Daily reminder that if you bend your fingers in the shape of a gun and point them to someone you can be jailed. Now I'll let you guess the country.

Holy... I want more...

Then you would have to bring your whole world to where instead of emulating medieval times it would have to emulate colonial times. Or at the very least have a cool explanation of where the guns are coming from. The possession of gun has a lot of implications on your society, and you can not just ignore those things.

But yeah, I see no reason why not. Just as long as you don't indeed come from the angle of "GAME OF THRONES BUT WITH GUNS!!!!"

Uk or Germoney?

yay. definitely sick of swords. they don't have to be ak-47s, a flintlock is perfectly acceptable. you can make them fancy, too. just google flintlock pretty. they look like fantasy weapons already.

...

Mark Twain already did it...

Depends on the setting, but I feel like it makes everything more shitty, because guns are always superior to swords unless you nerf them

They could work better in a hyper-fantasy setting like The Matrix, where people could just dodge or reflect bullets like nothing, but if your fantasy is actual fantasy and not urban shit I would not try it personally

no guns AT ALL

just hearing about guns makes me sick, ever mind reading about them

a device with literally no other purpose but to attack other people? and not just that but something that exists and kills people in the real world and is a real issue?

the mind boggles.

Kek. But swords are ok right?


I like the way Abercrombie used them, or gunpowder, rather. He introduces it as a foil for the transformative nature of the setting. In the first few books, it's basically just used for bombs/siege works. As time goes on there are small advancements, and by the fourth or fifth in the setting, bombards and handgonnes are being tested and developed.

Oh yes, guns are definitely a few step down from fantasy weapons such as the claymore, which has many practical applications, including slicing the crust off sandwiches and opening tightly-sealed plastic packages.

You fucking brain dead moron, piss off back to /pol/

Are you really world-BUILDING if you use the same “Mideval England but with magic and also elves” tropes that a billion other writers have used?

Try something totally unique. If that means trying to write guns in your story, by all means...

/lit is for the discussion of literature.
r/books is that way -->

Gate - Thus the JSDF Went There! more or less already did that.
>modern military btfo stupid medieval fantasy army

Guns add versatility in an aspect you can create magic guns, magic bullets, legendary pistols that kill super OP things

But the problem is they also limit a lot of your action scenes, with swords you can describe fights more intensely, while guns usually are less effective for doing that since action scenes become more simple and fast, you can't really spend a lot of time with people shooting each other, and using swords in a world where guns are a thing also needs a lot of working around, why would someone put themselves in danger and using a high skill weapon when a gun is safer and more deadly? High risk low reward doesn't make sense

Tried to go for a futuristic-medieval setting in a side-novel I'm working in, but guns were either shit or OP, so yea, I do not recommend

Any ideas how to introduce guns x magic? why would someone use a gun when magic exists or vice-versa?

Seconding this question, I'm stuck because I can't see how guns work together in a world with magic, angels, demons and mages, either they are trash or everybody uses them which destroys all the fun.

If the magic is a substance like Spice it works with guns

WAZZOCK
A
Z
Z
O
C
K

Understand, but this means that everybody would carry a colt with themselves? Isn't that a bit anticlimactic?
Whats the point of mastering swordsmanship or being a powerful mage, if a bullet just kills you?

Gunfights can be interesting, read WWII memoirs, but they're necessarily less dynamic. Your point on arms races works both ways. Melee combat still happens, you try not to let it, but since guns are so effective people shoot from trenches or buildings, and people fight there, and so on. Maybe an enchanted trench mace.

There is a severe shortage of fantasy OPERATORS clearing rooms.
youtube.com/watch?v=BYwoeW2DIgQ

Muskets.
They must be low tech, slow, and prone to breaking down.
Also expensive.

>Whats the point of mastering swordsmanship or being a powerful mage, if a bullet just kills you?
Mastering swordsmanship becomes less important. Learning how to aim and take cover becomes more important. Depending on what magic did before, maybe powerful mages already fought like that, and now they carry a Colt to save on MP so they can use the big stuff on tanks. You haven't even talked about enchanted bullets, charmed by enslaved sensitives at the factory to shun your side and thirst for enemy hearts, but the slaves hate you and occasionally mix up the charm on purpose, so you never know if your next shot will kill you...

guns existed in western armies before plate armor was even invented you choad

there is literally no reason not to add them if your setting has magic since magic will already be more powerful than guns anway

Warhammer and wow has guns just fine and the flaws wow has has nothing to do with guns

Also add inaccurate to the list.
They don’t necessarily have to conform to thr modern gun definition.
Take a look at the earlies gunpowder weapons from china, those were spears with gunpowder boxes attached to them.

None the guy you replied to, but you have any example of a book that plays with magic and gunfire? Not urban fantasy obviously, it doesn't necessarily needs to be medieval shit

The universe I have in mind, was originally contemporary, but now I'm going back to a more steampunk/medieva but technological with computers and stuff, but adding guns still looks like a bad idea because I can't balance them out ( even if it sounds retarded to have computers and electricity but not guns )

The Powder Mage books have Napoleonic-era tech with some mages who can do telekinesis and shoot fireballs fighting soldiers who can snort gunpowder for focus and shape the explosions with their minds. The second Mistborn trilogy has a cowboy lawman who can magic up his pistol shots so they shoot harder. Both are pretty pleb.

As far as "balancing" magic - you don't need magic to compete with any technology. It's a different sort of thing. If you're intent on anime swords you could just have people be immune to bullets while they're in wedding dresses or something.

I recommend 20th century aesthetics every time though.

I don't even like guns in movies. They're fucking stale, gunfights are not exciting in the least.

>clip

Thanks for your time user, really appreciate it, gonna meditate on some ideas for a while now

Weis and Hickman did include weapons into their "darksword legacy" saga. I liked the way they included it (albeit it was not that original), but I enjoyed the clash of worlds that it is presented... I can't assure that you would like it as I read it when I was young

>As far as "balancing" magic - you don't need magic to compete with any technology. It's a different sort of thing. If you're intent on anime swords you could just have people be immune to bullets while they're in wedding dresses or something.
>people be immune to bullets while they're in wedding dresses or something.

Why do you people always treat fantasy writing as just ''LOOOOOOOOL DUDE JUST MAKE ANYTHING YOU WANT LOOOOOOOOOOOL''

We may be writing about Dragons, Elfs, Vampires, Angels, Demons, Orcs, Fairies and everything else of supernatural in a fucking multi-dimensional world, but some of us still want to keep a consistent semi-realistic lore, saying ''dude just drop anti-gun magic magnetic shelves for everyone'' isn't helping.

That's not what I'm saying at all. I'm not saying drop anything in there and since it's magic it works, I'm saying drop it in there and work out the ramifications. I'm working from a real-world magical belief, that wearing women's clothing makes you immune to bullets. What if the things African child soldiers believed were real? Would it change the way combat works? Maybe you'd spend less time shooting at each other with your rusty Soviet rifles and more time hacking with machetes.

I was working with user because he obviously didn't want guns. I like guns and when I write fantasy I include them because firefights can be very interesting, you don't need people having conversations while fencing.

Here's what you should actually be getting mad at - anons ITT treating magic like it's a video game, like you use 50 mana points to shoot a fireball and so that's obviously better than a tank, right? That's not magic at all. That's just weird physics. If you're going do write a video game just write a litrpg, don't act like it's real fantasy.

Can guns and bows coexist somehow?

an universe with monsters and shit, guns use magical infused ammo to take on magical creatures I guess

Guns change the dynamic of offense and defense compared to the usual fantasy tools. The technology level of the guns also varies their implementation. They increase power projection to a potentially impressive range, but lower the global defense of all combatants by being so effective.
The usual close range combat in fantasy stories tends to emphasize the closeness of a single moment of fighting, but guns cannot do that. Guns remove most of the intimate factor of battles, focusing better on the fleeting properties of a life vanquished so suddenly and the terrifying power that comes with the ability to do so.
Battle magic, if done well, often will work similarly in fantasy stories which use it, as it is an overpowering element of combat which redefines the rules of the battlefield.

If they can coexist in the real world, which they did and do, then they can definitely coexist in fantasy.

Eh, it can work.

They did for approximately 250 years in Europe and even longer outside of it.

well you see the elite class uses magic, and the poor under class uses guns. guns don't take away from your story at all unless you are describing battle. If everyone has a gun the novel takes a more plot based approach. It's a more enjoyable book than just stupid fights imo. The reader knows that people have a way to end everything if they make the decision to, it's more psychological

Britain

>why would someone use a gun when magic exists
Same answer as to "Why even use a sword when magic exists?" Usually not everyone has the necessary aptitude to use magic in these stories.

>or vice-versa?
Because magic is FAR more versatile than guns. With guns you can shoot stuff. With magic you can do all kinds of crazy shit, make yourself invisible, enhance any of your natural attributes, heal people, give yourself skin made of rock or steel, whatever shit you can come up with. If magic actually existed, do you think nobody would use it since it's easy to pull a trigger than master the spell to shoot fireballs? Magic would be hot shit. Wizards would merely specialize in spells that can't be subsituted by guns which ought to be most of spells.

Just do what you want. It's your setting, you don't have to follow any "rules"

Bows will always be quieter than guns.

Is it one that exists only in your tiny ideologue brain?

Can any of you share some excerpts of a good written fight, possibly with magic and swords included?

gunfights I mean, not just regular confrontations

Also making arrows is less expensive than bullets

Magic and guns could only work together in the same universe if there was a severe disadvantage to using the guns. like if they were muzzle loaders or if the story is set in a dystopian future; the ammunition could be shoddy and unreliable.

The most popular fantasy franchise in contemporary culture has "guns" and other advanced technology.
I'm talking about Star Wars of course

>Baseless assertion is baseless
What if instead guns were becoming so powerful they were outstripping the need for magic (which is so often portrayed as being the tool of an elite caste of people who have devoted their lives to the craft while simultaneously needing an inherited talent for it) and because of this masses of non magic commoners, warlords, or institutionalized states are able to marginalize the once invaluable magic user. And this caste if magic user is in this struggle to either confound this exponentially growing instrument of destruction or convince society he in necessary regardless of his waning monopoly on power. You know a metaphor for our contemporary struggle to find the place for organized religion in an exponentially secularizing society of science and technology.

Oh shit I just posted a central theme to star wars here

Or it could be that guns are just better than magic

No he meant like the magazines would draw the ammo from the pocket universe

youtube.com/watch?v=tVi_fs2oz3E
Pardon the anime but guns can be part of something more complex as demonstrated here

source me OP

If all you're saying is that it could work in the reverse where magic is dying off and guns are becoming more powerful then I would agree with you but god damn are you autistic. Do you actually expect people to talk to you when you act like that?

Guns by itself are pretty OP because they don't require skill to use, and if people can just enhance guns and bullets to kill anything, really makes tricky to keep the world/fights interesting and dynamic

Not at all because the more op something seems the more magnificent it becomes when it loses or is even equally challenged. Drama and suspense is stronger when the odds seem impossible instead of perfectly balanced opposing forces.

>Being this mad you aren't as creative as you thought

i can see low fantasy colonial america with salem witches versus lads with muskets or something desu

>gets BTFO
>y-you're autistic for caring about what I said

>they don't require skill to use
They don't require skill to pull the trigger, but there are a million ways you can be stupid with a gun/around guns.
youtube.com/watch?v=k_AyMkoyiFM

I think he was getting at the contrast between something like magic or archery that take years of relentless practice to get decent at. A historically accurate point in relation to archery. A trained English long bowman would've had greater rate of fire, accuracy, and range than any muzzleloading foot soldier but an long bowman would've needed expensive training for many years to achieve this level of efficiency whereas a commoner could be trained with a musket and be on the battlefield within less than a year.

Yeah, I get that, my point was there's a broad range of skill levels and disciplines with regard to gun usage. I'm responding to the second point, or actually more the point other anons were trying to make about gun combat being less interesting than melee combat.

Of course not setting limits to what you can magick up is a recipe for a bad story, but that doesn't necessarily mean magic+guns is a bad story.

Even just guns = magic or bows = magic isn't scratching the surface of what you could do with fantasy, to be honest. Imagine a setting where, say, killing a child dooms you to a painful, violent death in the next few months, it sets your fate and there's nothing you can do about it, and your character is a cop responding to a school shooting.

Yeah the guy who said gunfights or guns have to be boring is a dumb d&d fag who's never spent serious time creating or thinking of an original fantasy world.

>The whole purpose of the thread is discuss how make a gun vs magic world works, because most people struggle with that
>''That guy is retarded for not understanding that''

So whats the point of swords, hammers, mauls, knifes, daggers and bows if guns exist?

...

To be honest I can't recall any written examples, I'm absolutely positive I've read some though.

This playlist
youtube.com/watch?v=BYwoeW2DIgQ&list=PLTSvG2hhfYVuCtuK5omIyqHLuHQvxNbLO&index=12
has a lot of examples of dramatized gunfights on film, not as realistic as helmet-cam footage of course but those are generally pretty boring anyway.

>When or how to do it?
Like this
my.mixtape.moe/ydhghd.webm

I wish I had examples, but truth be told I have never read a specific fight scene with swords and the related which has been up to snuff.
I cannot remember the page, but in the book Kidnapped, by Robert Louis Stevenson, there is a protracted sword fight on a sailing ship which is well written involving the use of sabers and flintlocks. From what I recall, it stuck with me because the sword fighting emphasized what I said before: the intimacy and willpower required to succeed in a sword duel (though 1v5 is hardly a duel even if the 1 wins). In the same passage a blunderbuss is used to prevent a rush of the flank. Its use is, again as mentioned before, more of an emphasis on the sudden and violent results of using a blunderbuss and the frightening power which accompanies.
If you want to read that passage it should be no further than 1/3 the way into the fairly short and old story, near the end of the piracy chapters. It should happen just after the Chevalier is brought aboard. The siege of the roundhouse, probably one of my favorite passages in literature.

Forgot to add that in the blunderbuss parts there was quite an emphasis on the shot men, moaning in painful death. Being shot before it was the primary means of combat was stressful and mortifying often for both parties involved, as the majority of combat prior to firearms focused on disabling and routing the opponent more than outright killing him.
Remember that guns are magnificent psychological weapons too: loud, violent, powerful, very easy to operate.

Do this, but ditch the medieval.

The government has a pocket dimension that is basically just a barren wasteland. They use it to hide dirty weapons, people with dangerous information, and basically any other shit they don't want to ever be found. They also drop in all sorts of crazy sci-fi shit, since they have access to other dimensions you can get crazy with the technology. Maybe even throw in the Roswell Aliens or some shit too.

Spend the first part of the novel establishing the society these highly intelligent and dangerous people the government doesn't ever want found have built for themselves. This premise allows the characters to have some really interesting backstories that you can get very creative with.

After establishing the characters and their relationships, the conflict comes from the Chinese government also finding and gaining access to this dimension. So the tensions between Chinese Gov, US Gov, and the people in the dimension drive the story. And all the groups have their own internal tensions as well.

ayy i love this movie, this scene, along with the entire film, was so fucking excessive

Thanks user, gonna work out with some ideas I have

pls tell me (s)hes not a trap

>guns work out really well with magic and generate good fights and engagements
>examples? got none

>Wants to be creative author
>Is desperate for a precedent
Why would it hasn't been done mean it can't be done? Especially in a world of fantasy where you can literally write the rules.

Who are you quoting?

Anyway you should read Bands of Mourning, it's about your speed.

novelupdates.com/series/when-a-mage-revolts/
novelupdates.com/series/release-that-witch/

>Originality/uniqueness = Quality
By your logic, pouring shit in a cup of coffee may be the next big hit since nobody ever tried this before

Guns and magic barely works in urban/sci-fi fiction, anything else below that for a reason or another doesn't run smoothly, all I can see is people theorycrafting how it could bake a good story but nobody actually showing the cake

Who is this

Yeah, I guess it must be impossible to combine these two plot elements to make a good story then. Show's over, guys. Everybody pack up and go home.

Bouncing off from this question. Would it be possible for these to coexist in a setting if there were certain restrictions added to "Even out" the powerlevel of sorts? Something simple like, demon creatures being vulnerable only to weapons that were blessed in the past or are holy by nature while still necessitating normal weaponry when dealing with other human factions?

How would a general idea like this work out? Boring, cliched, ok if done well, bad even if?

I have no examples because fantasy stories with both magic and guns never use either well, especially in conjunction. That being said, I have read plenty of stories which lightly involve guns or magic but focus on neither. From those I have determined to take the strengths of both to make them one. A critic does not have to be an artist too in order to see your perfect circle is shakily drawn.
If you want titles which influenced my thoughts on this, for magic try some Terry Pratchett or something derivative like Mogworld, both of which treat magic kind of like nitroglycerin: highly dangerous and useful, mostly in certain circumstances.
For guns you could look through Kidnapped at the siege of the roundhouse, just a good passage anyway, but my title throwing ends at that because I can't remember the names of those overly-american Iraq war based books I read when I was younger. The better ones focused less on the action and more on the duress caused by gunfighting, primarily the aforementioned power and speed of shooting a man and the emotional response which everyone feels a bit differently.

I do not thing guns would invalidate those weapons, well at least not immediately. Guns didn't really take their place until self loading mechanics were implemented, some 300ish years after guns were invented.
The battlefield, even in literature, is like a chess board. Sure, the pawns are weaker than the bishops, but each piece has its respective strategy which shines brilliantly when employed.
To avoid guns being overpowered some balancing may prove helpful, an excellent way to do so being the rules idea you mentioned. After all, folklore has this in spades. For the werewolf the silver bullet, and such. Maybe in your world vampires cannot be shot, but a garlic pounding mallet will strip their flesh with a light tap.
If that isn't enough, there are always other factors which could limit their use. Maybe ammo is very expensive or in short supply. Maybe rearming a regiment with guns rather than pikes is just too expensive in supplies and training. It is really only constricted by your ability to bullshit your way out of the problems like these, as it is your story to tell however you like it.

Magic bows.

...

Yes thats exactly how I'm writing it in my story thats why I gave that exact example. Wendigos are impervious to most bullets but enough firepower or a lucky shot on their singular eyeball can incapacitate/kill them, but other things like Pale Shadows cant be harmed by anything not sanctified

>cant be harmed by anything not sanctified
>implying you can't sanctify things on an industrial scale

Not when the industry is ruined you cant.
And I meant of course not sanctified by any old random guy that took a course online and is now officially a priest.

"The industry is ruined" is a good enough reason to not have enough bullets anyway.