Do you suppose Technomancy could ever be expanded upon in D&D that doesn't try to be some shitty Shadowrun clone (and...

Do you suppose Technomancy could ever be expanded upon in D&D that doesn't try to be some shitty Shadowrun clone (and by that I mean REAL WOLRD but magic)

What sort of setting could be made using technomancy from the UA as a basis?

A post apoc setting where people have lost all but the most rudimentary knowledge of magic and technology.

Various magic AIs still exist and some try to corral humanity back into something akin to civilization but are blocked by others who think Man should figure it out on their own.

Dungeons consist of old lab facilities, sunken cities, military bases and other places of high technology where people scrounge for weapons and knowledge of the past.

Destiny Meets Dune I guess.

I think a better option might be to go for the Barrier Peaks route. Have strange alien technology showing up in the world, and Technomancy is a school of magic that got invented/expanded heavily upon in order for people to try and interact with it.

Ancient magitek aliens? I could get behind that

NANOMAGIC SON

Yeah. I think having aliens works out better since then it's a school of magic that's still taking things from 'outside' to work. Kind of like how fire magic has the plane of fire and Necromancy has ties with the underworld and stuff like that.

It also means the tech can be so advanced that reverse-engineering it or trying to make it widespread and modernizing is unlikely to work out, and that anything technomancy related is probably going to pretty rare and hostile, putting it out of the reach of most people.

You'd have your regular technological advances but I imagine if we're doing a bog standard medievel setting then maybe not too advanced and then you have things that they learned from the technology and then there are things that they simply can't replicate.

Hell, let's take it a step further and go the Transformers route. Two alien ships a fighting it out in the atmosphere of [standard fantasy setting here]. They both crash land but the aliens inside survive and basically act as the arbitors of their own technology because they are using the races on this world to help them fight their rivals who crash landed elsewhere.

Adding in survivors of the crashers would certainly allow for more possibilities with adjusting the tech. If one of them is also a faction of robots, then that would give Technomancy even more ways to shine by shutting them down.

I guess it's also a matter of how much you want things explained. Whether the locals see this as some strange form of alien magic, or if they have it explained or sort out that it's simply advanced tech

Here's how I'm seeing it

-The aliens don't really give a shit about trying to uplift us. If we're down with their interest then they share tech otherwise it's either stolen or copied in some manner or another.

-Since it's D&D they use the same sort of magic except where the races of fantasy land use have mage colleges, cultist, druid cirlces and shit the aliens channel their magic through their technology. Or, to better put it, they primarily use technomacy (the school) and get introduced to different schools of magic from their interaction with us. After all at that point it's a matter of optics how it looks.

-Having the aliens be around doesn't mean everyone is living in Midgard. You can still have loin cloth wearing barbarian villages and more sophisticated cities for various reasons or another although I think the barbarians would be more like Aloy from Horizon Zero Dawn

Probably the Aliens arn't very well received even if one of them is willing to play nice with the humans.

Throw in something like their ships leaked magic jet fuel into the evironment and caused various monsters and animals to mutate/come into being as a resultt.

Probably one side is trying to do that on purpose even.

I get the feeling that outside of mage colleges and their allies, the aliens would be viewed in a similar way to most other monsters. Maybe akin to neutral demons, more or less.

Barbarians probably wouldn't care much for them outside of knowing their metal is really, really good, but probably wouldn't be making,much outside of crude bombs with anything else.

I like that idea as well, since it allows for the aliens to have a larger impact without having to toss around drones and laser guns everywhere

yeah, leave laser guns and robots to a minimum. If anything whatever the various races of the world use would be their own stuff augmented by the alien magitek so maybe early rifles or, if that's too jarring repeating tacticool crossbows. After all, nothing says their understanding of the world automatically changes with the arrival of the aliens and just like you said "Oh hey, this metal is really good for making armor and weapons out of and if you jiggle this thing just right it goes boom!

>I think a better option might be to go for the Barrier Peaks route. Have strange alien technology showing up in the world, and Technomancy is a school of magic that got invented/expanded heavily upon in order for people to try and interact with it.

You guys might like this. Hang on a second and I'll see if I can extract the article as a pdf that will fit on Veeky Forums.

Nope, gotta do it the old-fashioned way one page at a time

Basically this is a traditional generic AD&D campaign setting that has space robots crash land on it.

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This is why I wish D&D would be more daring with it's settings instead of sticking to bog standard fantasy settings.

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Are you saying you like this or you don't like this

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tl;dr spacerobots crash on D&Dworld and self-replicate, become constant problem that has to be weeded back by special technowizard hunter PCs

I"m saying I do. I hate the fact that all of D&D's settings have been standard fantasy settings when they leave so much room for different sorts of worlds or planes of existence.

I feel this way even more now that I'm listening to a podcast where a group reskinned Curse of Strahd into an Innistrad game.

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The last time D&D had daring settings it imploded because it balkanized the consumerbase.

>all of D&D's settings have been standard fantasy settings
Dark Sun
Al-Qadim
Kara-tur
Birthright
Jakandor
Eberron

yeah, so when's the last time you've seen them brought up or revised again? At the very least we may see Dark Sun and Eberron but they don't get near the lime light as Greyhawk/Dragon Lance

Well that just speaks volumes about the players although that doesn't excuse a poorly wrtten setting.

>yeah, so when's the last time you've seen them brought up or revised again?
Forgotten Realms and Dragonlance have always been cashcows for D&D and Greyhawk has a pedigree.
The problem is that when you sell a setting you're mostly selling it to DMs, a small fraction of the total playerbase. WOTC would rather have 3rd party publishers eat the costs of creativity (Nyambe was pretty awesome btw)

>Well that just speaks volumes about the players
Does it? I mean it kinda makes sense. If we're playing Oriental Adventures/Kara-tur I don't need to buy th FR, DL, or GH splats. If I'm playing Dark Sun then anything with standard dragons or wizards is an easy pass. And if I don't like psionics then I can pass in the Handbook and all the DS Monstrous Compendia.

There's a god like Hephaestus that grants humans technology to use, but they have to be devout worshippers of him if they want the technology to be obedient and loyal to them.

(Computers)
Arcane runes that can be networked into communicating with each other.
Alternatively, lesser (originally suggested undead but this is not exclusively required) minions that can follow simple commands and, depending on how the command is given, repeat them or give alternate commands.
Triggered runes that cast illusion spells, or minions that activate wands of an illusion spell, can make holo-monitors.

(Advanced automatic ritual machines)
A circular device with horizontal and vertical rotating segments that can interchange runes, stored material components, or magic circle structure with the turn of a crank, or maybe even easier depending on what other devices you're managing.

(Nanites)
There is rarely explicitly stated a downward size limit on what elementals can achieve in fantasy, only what can be encountered. Explore that.

(Space Travel)
So long as you have access to your magical source, most systems and settings have casters capable of conjuring food, drinking water, and breathable air. Couple this with levitation magic, and/or someone managing gate/warp-like spells, and you bypass many of the engineering feats needed for inter-planetary travel. Alternatively, housing your soul in a golem cuts back on the life support needs placed upon you. Alternatively alternatively, consider controls that can be manipulated by astral projections.

(Ethereal Machines)
Devices who serve a purpose, but are generally composed of only magical sources or focal points supplying constantly active magic. These magics or spells each have a different task, and each form something of a machine that is immaterial and can be extremely complex without taking up much space at all.

(Hydraulics)
Even if things like atoms and such aren't generally accepted to be fact in some fantasy settings, concepts like water pressure still are often true, and as such, hydraulics running off of alternating create water/dispel magic spells, or similar concepts, should be manageable.

Replicating modern day conviences with mass produced magic items like lamps that cast a low level version of dancing lights.

communication devices that allow you to speak with people telepathically through some kind of mental encryption to avoid ease dropping.

Wizards who decide to have their mind/souls transferred into giant vessels to become their control OS.

Villages outside of the safety of the walled cities having elementals bound to generators to provide power and having to deal with creatures who may be attractied to them.

Demons who use their magic to create basilisk style programs to warp peoples minds. Devils who reach out to people with targeted emails to offer them deals for their souls and Celestials who materialize in digital form to fight Demon/Devil Viruses.

Being a Paladin a part of a motorcade detail with your living construct motorcycle to protect the king from would be assassins.

Rangers who bond with cyber animals who receive magical implants

Druids who live in alleyways covered with vines and flowers.

Sorcerers who live in the bad part of town ostricized because of their powers

Clerics doing webcast sermons to their faithful followers

Gentlemen, there's so much untapped potential.

there certainly is. I always wonder about why there aren't more higher-tech fantasy stories, they make for great material. Say what you will about Korra as a show, but the exploration of integrating magic into the mundane nature of a culture with advancing technology was rad, and similar for Xam'd.