How would you set up a setting like Sapphire and Steel, Veeky Forums? How would you portray the Time or it's minions? How would you portray the Elements even?
Sapphire and Steel
Robert Rodriguez
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Wyatt Hill
Bumping with images.
Ryder Cruz
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Jordan Ward
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Blake Cook
Buddy, great idea. Too bad all of 4 dudes actually know about this show.
What the fuck is a trans-uranic element anyway?
Jeremiah Wilson
The fuck show is this? Is that the guy from Man From UNCLE? Looks like him but I'm blanking on the name.
Cameron Johnson
Something that goes past Uranium on the Periodic Table.
Adam Scott
he's quite dead.
Basically you have to understand that in the 70s and 80s, the UK essentially had 3 TV channels: BBC1, BBC2, and ITV - ITV wasn't state funded and got its money like a regular TV channel via commercials.
Also, they kept trying to compete with the BBC in terms of programming, this included an attempt to make a "Doctor Who" equivalent show, which was Sapphire & Steel.
One of the Emma Peels and Hans Solo from TMfUNCLE were agents of something or other who were human shaped elementals with unique powers whose job was to stop Time and weird creatures from the beginning and end of time from fucking up the present.
To fuck up the present the evil Time monsters looked for "weak spots" to break through into the present, these weakspots were anachronisms from the past that people paid too much attention to, and as a result created haunted houses, which Sapphire and Steel had to then defeat using their elemental gimmick powers.
Its premise was so convoluted that it left no time in the programme to actually explain what the fuck was every going on.
Ayden Bell
Lots of Sapphire and Steel, which by the way is one of the first sci-fi shows I ever saw as a child and was hugely formative for me, so thanks for bringing it up, runs off complete nonsense. FATE is what you need to run said nonsense. Powers should be narrative and vague, broad in scope, rather than hyper specific - also, a lot of the weird trippy threats they face could be represented in a more abstract way through Aspects and environmental effects rather than as actual enemies.
As for actual gameplay and GMing, Sapphire and Steel is an investigative show. Every adventure, the primary focus shouldn't be fighting Time, but working out HOW to fight Time, by indentifying how it's fucking up reality this time, and countering it's plans.
Benjamin Lewis
This sounds a lot like TIME WIZARDS!!!
Christopher Harris
Fuuck, never even seen a still of this before, but this does bring back memories. Some time before/at the start of elementary school my friend once told this series and how scary it was. So even if I never saw it, his wild tales still managed to haunt my little mind for years.
Austin Baker
I learned a lot in this thread.
From OP's thumbnail, I just assumed this was one of those Adult Swim shows that's a parody of bad 1970s sci-fi.
I also didn't know that Britain allowed commercial television in the 1970s.
Daniel Jackson
>From OP's thumbnail, I just assumed this was one of those Adult Swim shows that's a parody of bad 1970s sci-fi.
Instead, it was the thing being parodied.
Andrew Parker
Correction - FANTASTIC 1970s sci-fi.
Connor Evans
Since I first watched this when it aired, I have always depicted Time as evil. Time travellers beware, time will get you. I treat it much like Death from the Final Destination movies, you can't see it, you can't feel it, but it will get you.
As for Sapphire and Steel, it's a shame it got cancelled on such a clif hanger!
Brody Rivera
It happened a lot to british shows back then. The Prisoner with Patrick McGoohan is another good example.
Some people would say so was Blake 7, but these people are kidding themselves.
Basically a lot of these shows don't have endings, although leaving things on a cliffhanger usually implies that some ITV execs don't like people trying to coerce them into another season.
Personally, if I were to base something on one of these shows, I'd either go for the Man from UNCLE or I'd reach for one of Gerry Andersons beloved properties, like Captain Scarlet or Stingray.
Before you ask, yes, there were non-beloved Gerry Anderson properties, but the british isles have all to a man repressed those memories.
Like, for example, how Space 1999 only has one season.
Kayden Reyes
>Some people would say so was Blake 7, but these people are kidding themselves.
There are like 3 show endings to Blake's 7, as they apparently thought they were getting cancelled after every season after the 1st.
>Like, for example, how Space 1999 only has one season.
I tried to watch that, but thought it was pretty dumb and only got maybe 5 episodes in. The theme was pretty awesome though: youtube.com
Nathan Young
ALL of Gerry Anderson shows have awesome themes. Space 1999 is at the low end, with Joe-90 and Fireball XL5.
Top Tier is Thunderbirds and UFO. Although a strong argument can be made for Stingray.
Justin Torres
Pretty much, the two main characters (Sapphire and Steel) are agents for some godlike force guiding our universe who were human shaped elementals possessing unique and rather odd powers whose duty was to stop the twisted, demonic, and straight up malign force of Time and it's minions from breaching in and annihilating reality. Time and it's minions looked for weak spots in the veil that would allow them to break through into the present, these weakspots had a tendency to be things that ordinary humans either onced over, ignored, or straight up abused, and this made the veil weak enough for Time to break in. It was very fucking surreal, had the weirdest premise, and the absolute strangest monsters and villains of any show, even to this day.
Lincoln Rogers
You know what, I don't need much of a cassus belli to post these. Here.
My dad loves the drums on this one. But the ending theme lets it down. We're all thinking it.
youtube.com
Not the best the intro in the group buuuut...
youtube.com
That end theme, complete with illustrations tho
youtube.com
JOE-90 is a concept I'm not entirely sure about.
>"So, I'm incredibly rich and intelligent and have friends in a secret vaguely american/british spy agency!"
>"Let's implant skills and knowledge into my 12 year old sons brain and see if above agency want to use him as a superspy!"
I mean, who exactly was this aimed at, audience-wise?
youtube.com
Okay. Is it me, or is that guitar riff straight-up taken from Led Zepplin? Not complaining. UFO is basically the show that XCOM is based on, complete with the cataclysmically high rookie deathrates and poor accuracy.
youtube.com
OH SHEET THE NOSTALGIA. My childhood memories tell me this was good, but I have no idea if that holds up. Still, "SPACE-COPS" is a good concept with legs.
No idea what this is.
Christopher Nguyen
fucking loved this show when i was a kid. parents inflicted it on me and it was glorious.
you'd probably do well looking at the recent Doctor Who roleplaying systems, or even the older ones (which aren't half bad desu). Seeing as Sapphire and Steel are pretty much two timelords doing horror shit.
Colton Smith
actually, when it's not being shit scp foundation is a good place to get ideas on what your sapphire and steel end up doing.
difficult question is if you do a sapphire and steel, how do you make sure your players have not shit names.
Cameron Russell
>Space 1999 is at the low end
Having just listened to all the themes you've mentioned, I have to disagree. The only serious competition it has from the bunch, I think, is UFO, and I still think it edges that out. The Space 1999 theme goes from dramatic orchestral to ridiculous funk, and back to dramatic orchestral, before finishing up with ridiculous funk and dramatic orchestral mixed together. It's hard to compete with that. Also, supermarionation creeps me out. It's one step below Clutch Cargo on the scale of things that should not be ( youtu.be
Chase Wilson
Speaking of Doctor Who and TV themes, it's hard to find a better one. Tom Baker had the two best versions, in my opinion, sharing the first with Pertwee and the second with Davison. Really, I think of the first as the Tom Baker theme, and the second as the Peter Davison theme.
Baker Open: youtu.be
Baker Close: youtu.be
Davison Open & Close: youtu.be