The Planetary Romance: 100 Years Later (Diversicon Panel)

These are my prep notes for Saturday's panel:

Cover by Jon Foster

Panel: The Planetary  Romance, 100 Years Later: How is Mars Holding up These Days?  2012 saw the release of the movie John Carter, close to a century after the publication of Edgar Rice Burroughs’ A Princess of Mars. Let’s talk about the film and the novels on which it was based, and about the genre—the planetary romance—unto which it helped to give birth.  John Everett Till, mod.; Eleanor Arnason, Edward E. Rom, Mark Tersteeg    


Planetary Romance - John Clute's definition from the Encyclopedia of Science Fiction:  


"Any sf tale whose primary venue (excluding contemporary or near future versions of Earth) is a planet, and whose plot turns to a significant degree upon the nature of that venue... it cannot simply be set upon a world...cannot be used for a tale set upon a planet whose mysteries are solvable in hard sf terms... In the true planetary romance, the world itself encompasses - and generally survives - the tale which fitfully illuminates it."


Gary K. Wolfe in Critical Terms for Science Fiction and Fantasy: "broadly, an adventure tale set on another, usually primitive planet."     


'"Swords and Planets" has also been used to describe this kind of fiction.   


Authors:


Clute cites Clark Ashton Smith as one of the earliest authors to write in this vein. Others include Edgar Rice Burroughs and Otis Adelbert Kline. C.L. Moore (Nortwest Smith), Jack Vance (Big Planet, Planet of Adventure), Leigh Brackett (Mars and Skaith), Bradley (Darkover), Moorcock's "Kane of Mars", Farmer's World of Tiers, Silverberg (Lord Valentine's Castle), and even (at least partially) Gene Wolfe's The Book of the New Sun provide other examples. I suppose even Niven's Ringworld owes a big debt to the planetary romance.


Game publisher Paizo Publishing has reprinted a number of the early examples (Kline, Brackett, Moore) as part of its Planet Stories imprint.


A recent example of the planetary romance is  Chris Roberson's Paragaea (2006).      


Tabletop RPGs:

• Stunningly Original
• M.A.R. Barker's Tekumel
• Skyrealms of Jorune
• Sincerest Form of Flattery
• MARS: Savage Worlds Edition
• Distant Worlds: A Pathfinder Campaign Setting Supplement - Provides an entire solar system of planetary romance adventure where the conventional high fantasy world of Golarion is just the third planet from the sun     

From the lips of the exquisite Dejah Thoris:


To the Tharks: 

"Why, oh why, will you not learn to live in amity with your fellows, must you ever go on down the ages to your final extinction but little above the plane of the dumb brutes that serve you [i.e., the thoats, the Green Martian's mounts]! A people without language, without art, without homes, without love; the victim of eons of the horrible community idea. Owning everything in common, even to your women and children, has resulted in you owning nothing in common."
-A Princess of Mars, The Library of America edition (2012), p. 92.       


So, Dejah rather neatly recapitulates the entirety of 19th Century White racist discourse about the native peoples of North America, while adding in a decidedly early 20th C. fear of communism.  


At the same time, Burroughs repeatedly describes the Green Martians as "human," so what gives?  And he wrote them to be a LOT more interesting (if less sexy) than the Red Martians.


Notable New Publication:


Under the Moons of Mars: New Adventures on Barsoom, ed. John Joseph Adams (2012).

Cover by Mark Zug

         

The Politics of Steampunk (Diversicon Panel)

I will be making a post today and tomorrow on panel discussions I am moderating at Diversicon 20 here in the Twin Cities, Minnesota. These are my own reference notes going into the panel. I hope people find them interesting - but if you don't, have no fear. We resume our normal FATE SF programming on Monday. 


"The Politics of Steampunk" panel description: Does steampunk as a genre have a politics? Is it just light-hearted fun? Is it even science fictional? Does it perpetuate or challenge our ideas about science, technology, labor, race, gender, and empire?  John Everett Till, mod.; Catherine Lundoff, Mark Tersteeg               

Steampunk history and definition:

• Term coined by K.W. Jeter; derived from cyberpunk
• First creative circle consisted of Blaylock, Powers, and Jeter
• "The Difference Engine" probably the first big work in the field
• Wide range of precursors and influences from Dickens and Stevenson, to Baum's Oz, to Wells and Verne, to Moorcock's "The Warlord of the Air"
• Definition includes some or all of the following:
• 19th Century setting (often Victorian London, but sometimes U.S.A.)
• Gaslight Fantasy (e.g., inclusion of fictional characters such as Dracula, Sherlock Holmes, etc.)
• May play with period popular literary themes ("penny dreadful"), events (Jack the Ripper), heroes and villains (see Jess Nevins' "Encyclopedia of Fantastic Victoriana")
• Anachronistic technology
• Urban fantasy elements, period fantasy influences (e.g., ghosts, spirits, werewolves, vampires), horror, detective literature, paranormal romances, erotica
• May be set in a post-apocalyptic or other world setting (e.g., Airship Pirates RPG and China Mieville's Bas-Lag novels)
• May also refer to costuming, LARPing, Roleplaying, music

So, does Steampunk have a politics or is it just fun?

• Is steam powering this, or methane? Steampunk or Flatulopunk?
• Science vs. handwaves? - awareness of history and science
• History of SF's development as a field - awareness that not everything here is new
• Problematic themes re race, class, gender, empire, colonialism, imperialism

Non-Fiction Resources:

Henry Mayhew's London Labour and the London Poor (1851) was a major influence on Blaylock, Powers, and Jeter and inspired the steampunk they wrote

Frederick Engels' The Condition of the Working Class in England (1844)  is another classic expose

The Intersection of Race and Steampunk by Jaymee Goh (aka Jha)

Silver Goggles by Jha

Bryan Thao Worra's blog has numerous posts on steampunk, including efforts to imagine a Lao steampunk

Steampunk Magazine - an online magazine that has also been anthologized; offers fiction, DIY articles, political analysis, reviews, and more

Fiction:

The Steampunk Bible by Jeff Vandermeer and S.J. Chambers (an anthology of art, fiction, and more!)


Perdido Street Station, The Scar, and The Iron Council by China Mieville. The Bas-Lag novels.


Morlock Night and Infernal Devices by K.W. Jeter. Just republished by Angry Robot Books.


What Lies Beneath the Clock Tower (2011; Combustion Books) by Margaret Killjoy - a steampunk choose-your-own adventure type game/novel.


Catastrophone Orchestra (2011; Combustion Books) by Margaret Killjoy. Short stories set in 19th C. New York's Lower East Side.


Clementine by Cherie Priest. Visit her Clockwork Century website. A white ex-Confederate woman spy travels on an airship with an African American captain and crew. 


The Bookman, Camera Obscura, and The Great Game by Lavie Tidhar. Srries published by Angry Robot Books. Karl Marx is a character. 


Gaslight Dogs by Karin Lowachee. Fantasy 19th C. European Americans attempt to colonize fantasy Alaska natives. Well-received.


Tabletop RPGs:


Victoriana, Second Edition (Cubicle 7). A system where social class really matters for your character build; problematic treatment of race.


Clockwork & Chivalry. Strictly speaking, not Victoriana or Steampunk. More like Clockpunk. The English Revolution with Cromwell's mechanical warmachines on one side, and the King's Alchemists on the other. Also see their Airship Pirates alt history time travelling steampunk RPG, based on the band of the same name.


Etherscope (Goodman Games). Alt history Victoriana meets spiritualism and cyberpunk head on! Set in a hyperindustrial, gritty version of Manchester, so you know this one is for  the proles - and with a good soundtrack.

Calling All Minds

http://www.economist.com/node/21527030

I have begun compiling a General SF Links page for the FATE SF blog. My intent is to catalog SF RPGs, blogs, websites, and resources that are useful or inspirational for science fiction gaming - resources not connected to the FATE system, but possibly connected to other RPG systems, or to none at all (such as relevant science texts).

I am not interested in SF literature, TV SF series, or movies, although items such as John Clute's Encyclopedia of Science Fiction, Barlow's Illustrated Guide to Extraterrestrials, Terran Trade Authority art books would all be considered germane to this project.

Please make your own suggestions in the comments!

Barsoom

I am reading A Princess of Mars to prepare for a convention panel this weekend: "A Princess of Mars: 100 Years Later". It's actually a bit short of a hundred years, since Edgar Rice Burroughs' book was published in 1917. But even so, with the recent John Carter movie, it's definitely time to talk!

http://www.davewindett.com/blog/2012/03/01/
a-princess-of-mars/

So, we'll be doing a short series on Barsoom here, since Burroughs' Mars was after all the world's first SF sandbox.

Schiaparelli's Notebook (1888)
http://www.brera.inaf.it/hevelius/galleria.html

To start, we'll stat out The Solar System circa 1866 (the year John Carter first goes to Mars), and then in a subsequent post we'll take a closer look at the planet Barsoom itself.

A Map of Barsoom,  http://barsoom.wikia.com/wiki/Barsoom 

OGL MECHANICS

The Solar System in 1886

• T -2: Industrialization*
• E 3: Two garden worlds and one hostile world**
• R 0: Sustainable
• ASPECTS:
• Verdant water world hidden beneath the clouds (Venus/Amtor/Cosoom)
• The Age of Empire - Iron ships and wooden men (Earth/Jasoom)
• A dying desert planet preserved by ancient machines (Mars/Barsoom) 

*There are pockets on T-1 technology on Barsoom, such as the radium rifles that are in broad use. Note that the radium here denotes the metallic content of projectiles fired by the rifle.'

**We consider Barsoom to be a hostile world since water is scarce and the atmosphere is maintained only by ancient machines. Earth and Venus are garden worlds.

I'm Awarding FATE Points!

Just for a change of pace, I'm awarding some Fate Points to recognize a few people who have made important innovations in FATE and SF gaming.

Two are pretty recent innovations, and one is THE ORIGINAL SF RPG.

These will do as FP!
http://www.thehistoryblog.com/page/2

So here they are:

+1 FP to Jeremy Whalen. In response to my post on the Forerunner alien artifacts known as Enigma Boxes, on the Diaspora listserv, Jeremy gave his own example of an alien artifact. He statted out a psychically active alien artifact with its skills, stunts, and aspects - and then went on to comment that he'd give something like this Fate Points. 

Maybe someone has written down that idea before, but I couldn't think of any instances today. But it makes perfect sense to do this given how the FATE fractal works: person -->ship --> organization can all be statted in similar ways. So, why not artifacts-as-characters, too, complete with their own Fate Points so they can make declarations and offer their own compels to the PCs? One more tool in the GM's arsenal!


+1 FP to Chris Kutalik at Hill Cantons. He has been running a very interesting series called Space Cantons. You can start here and read forward, but I would also recommend downloading his "Space Cantons House Rules and Setting Information" which he has set up a link for from his blog in this post. So what am I going on about?

Space Cantons is a Traveller campaign. You are probably with me so far. It is also a re-imagining of a Traveller setting. Not the Imperium. Something completely different. This is very much a thought experiment in what people like Victor Raymond has been discussing for a while: that Traveller the game  existed before Traveller the (Imperial) setting. Space Cantons shows us one way to get back to that.

And there are interesting things going on in this setting. Like bolos as in the book bolo'bolo. The concept emerged from German and Italian autonomist thought of the late sixties and seventies, filtered through the lens of antropology. Bolo'bolos are in essence local utopian cooperatives with the capacity to link up in non-hierarchical ways with other collectivities. 

And what does this have to do with gaming? Well, a lot, if you want to let it! It was either Fredric Jameson or Clint Burnham, the author of The Jamesonian Unconsciousness who pointed out what makes the protagonists of the Reservoir Dogs so appealing.

In a nutshell, the argument is that the Reservoir Dogs' protagonists are like a bolo'bolo, I mean a PC party. They are an autonomous collective out to pool their resources, make some money, and control their own destiny. So kudos for Chris for putting all this in there without any ideological heavy-handedness. It's a welcome and fun diversion from the typical libertarian assumptions of so much SF.

+1 FP to Jim Ward, creator of The One, The Only Metamorphosis Alpha. This was one of the first RPGs I owned. It was the first published SF RPG too.

I loved this game as a kid. And after downloading it today from DTRPG, I can honestly say I love it again! You can also get a print copy from Lulu.

I don't think as kids that we ever played this game set on a runaway generation ship, but I certainly worked on deck plans for my own version of the setting. At 30 pages, it was and still is a very complete RPG. You could run it out of the box or as a supplement to Rogue Space.

New Kepler 22-B Content Up on Strange New Worlds

Sector I-5 content that is unique to the Strange New World blog has just gone live over there.

Check it out! 

Some FATE-specific follow-up content for this post that will be published on FATE SF later this week. Stay tuned for more!

Something Fishy In New Manila Bay

The Bituin Expedition's shore party to Hex 180.73 has carried out detailed soundings of New Manila Bay. Shortly after launching their first mapping torpedoes, the crew discovered a strange anomaly. The Bay is radioactive.

The shore party used the mapping torpedoes to triangulate radiation's source. It is located several kilometers out into the Bay. The radiation spike is coming from four cuboid objects on the ocean floor.

Each of the four structures is one cubic meter in size. Round megavacuoles circulate, fuse, and divide within each cube. Spectrographic analysis indicates that the objects are primarily silicate structures.

http://www.eoearth.org/article/Archaea

No function has yet been determined, but it is probable that these are Forerunner artifacts. Their radiation signature is similar to the emitter buoys found in orbit around the ancient, deadly, and abandoned worlds of the Coreward Mapping Region. Their coloration and vacuoles also resemble the datatroves found within the Rim waystations abandoned by the Sphinx culture. Time will tell whether these objects warn of great danger or herald an archive containing ancient wisdom.

OGL Mechanics

I thought I'd stat this artifact out using Starblazer Adventures, since it is WeirdTech.

Enigma Boxes - Ancient alien artifacts based on ubiquitous Forerunner technologies; used by many ancient spacefaring cultures and by a few highly advanced contemporary spacefaring cultures; common formats include: emitter buoys to warn of hazards to navigation or life; datatroves archiving massive amounts of alien data over millions of years; stasis boxes storing hazardous or valuable materials within secure vacuoles.

• Scale 1 (Tiny/Smaller than a human)
• Power/Skill Level: Fantastic +6 (Typically these devices have one primary skill, such as Store and Retrieve Data, or Warn Away Intruder)
• Improvements:
• Alien Technology (Players will need the Engineering stunt Weird Science to attempt to understand or operate the device)
• AI Control OR Conscious
• Hair Trigger (emitter buoys and datatroves can self-destruct at discretion of controlling AI or machine consciousness)
• ASPECTS:
• Biomimetic Forerunner machine
• It was here first
• Don't get to close, the radiation could cook you
• It is a warning, an archive, or a gift box - or maybe all three
• Too tempting to ignore