Takes years to train a mage. Takes a week to train a musketman.
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That’s Stars Arisen (Stars Arisen Developer Diary) btw 
Could lead to a cool parallel with England where there’s a culture based around training mages from very young like they did with archers, guns being the crossbows in this comparison. At least, this works if mages aren’t just stupidly powerful as they are in some fantasy so guns still have a use with a sheet number advantage. Not really worth fielding and supplying an army with food and equipment if a mage can wipe them out solo (at least for battles; occupying areas is still useful and likely not feasible with one person).
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Or just make your monsters too strong for guns. Godzilla’s creator didn’t want him to go down to a handgun and so he made that clear in the story.
Or in Men In Black, you got some laser weapon that pierce through a car but barely bother the local threat.
No? I think you’re confusing ‘Fantasy’ with ‘Medieval Fantasy’.
Take centuries to develop the musket.
If you live in a world where people can just lift house sized marble blocks, developing any tools to lift like a crane is extremely unlikely even if it take years to train. Same reason we wouldn’t have knives if we had claws or a stronger jaw.
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And it takes weeks of training just to shoot straight with an assault rifle, months to use it properly and years to learn how to fight with it.
I wonder why people expect to see fire arms as weapons of “mass destruction” in any not modern/futuristic fantasy setting, while forgetting that fire arms didn’t become that until middle/late XIX century.
First “portable” fire arms (XV/XVI century) were more something like this:
Ehi you! Take this big beast of modern weapon (and the stick to place it for use it)! It doesn’t have a long range neither a good accuracy (and the smoke make it even worse). It has just one shot and takes an eternity to reload. If not use properly it might not shoot or even blow up in your face.
PS the smoke and might not even shoot parts, lasted even in the XIX century.
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Never love conflict in form of Technology vs Magic, why do not have Technology + Magic instead? I can understand when it has a good explanation, like in Harry Potter, where magic society is isolated from non-magical (and still they borrow some things, like trains), or Arcanum (2001), where magic and technology just don’t work if they around (engines stops near wizards, spells fails near factories, etc), or World of Darkness where technology is literary another form of magic created by Order of Reason (and sustained by Technocratic Union).
Mage (or any other supernatural being) with a gun cooler that one without it. At least because they have another tool to use.
Also, since CoG released four games in VtM setting, should we await others World of Darkness / Chronicles of Darkness branches? It would be really a shame if contract limited only by VtM.
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Not that I agree with the original comment, but fantasy doesn’t need to be medieval to be inspired by history (gaslamp fantasy is even a subgenre. Which, incidentally, probably includes guns).
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I actually like the no gun thing in Wayhaven. It’s a bit silly, yeah, but I think it makes the action scenes more interesting. It would either be boring, because all it would be is someone shooting someone else, or everyone would be stupidly incompetent with the gun, drawing it out. Whereas the no gun thing seems more creative and interesting to me
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Beside, being a Detective doesn’t mean you can shoot willy nilly anyway. But writing scene where you don’t shoot anything, ain’t as easy as it seem lol I know that from experience…but let me tell you this: The opposite is true as well! lol
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They transformed warfare long before that. The biggest impact was from cannon (on fortifications and army tactics) but pike and shot formations were displacing other infantry formations long before the 1800s. @comradelenin is totally right that worlds based on high medieval and early modern Europe ought to have gunpowder much more consistently than they do.
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I hate when the MC goes out of their way to play match maker for supporting characters. I don’t care about your love life, leave me alone
I feel like it’s better to give people a choice to either say “LEMME BE!!” and “Ya’ll look cute, You should try and date” since it adds to the immersion, and those choices SHOULD make a difference, Like how the above discussion says, Choices that don’t exactly matter shouldn’t be added. (When I say don’t exactly matter, I don’t mean they should add more personality stats or relationship stats but also give some character building)
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Incidentally, a minor bit of worldbuilding in a thing I’m writing involves how mages can’t carry electronics because their latent magic powers violently short out the circuitry and cause the electronics to self-combust. Likewise, while they CAN use guns, they have to choose between using magic OR using guns, because trying to channel magic through a firearm will cause said firearm to explode in their hands, which has been a primary cause of injuries in the past and necessitated a firm warning from upper command for all mages to keep their weapons holstered when using magic because the expenses to replace the damaged firearm(s) and see to the medical care of the wounded mage is way too high for a problem that some application of common sense can easily avoid.
Anyhow, that’s my last input on the gun thing, I feel like we’re gonna get told to pack it in soon again. XD
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People develop shit, even when it’s not strictly needed, all the time. The presence of wizards just means we need an equalizer.
Agreed. Why pick gun or enchanted sword when I could have an enchanted gun?
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It should be said that, traditionally, disciplines we could call scientifical would be grouped together with esotericism in the ancient and medieval world. The hard divided between magic and technology is largely a post-Enlightenment phenomenon, so yeah, feel free to include ancient, enchanted boomsticks in your works guys, it would really be more authentic.
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If magic is real in the setting, I have to wonder if both that and traditional science both count as wizardry. If it’s real, it makes sense that it’d be grouped with stuff like chemistry and physics.
“Lord Merlin was known for many inventions, his most famous being the orb of foresight, and the wheel lock musket.”
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If magic is real in the setting, I have to wonder if both that and traditional science both count as wizardry. If it’s real, it makes sense that it’d be grouped with stuff like chemistry and physics.
In my works it does. The difference between a “magical” and a “scientifical” worldview is not one of techniques and inventions, but one of philosophies. The magical worldview percieves the world as animated and ruled by ultimately trascendent patterns humans interact with, either in submission or in order to gain mastery over them. If the rituals and techniques lead to demon summoning or guns is simply irrelevant: what matters is the mindset behind:
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Intriguing.
Something that bothers me (especially in Shonen) is when there’s hundreds of chapters and shit, but the characters just don’t age. Like why did all that shit in My Hero Academia happen in one year? Would have been way cooler and better paced to stretch it out over 3. Plus, it would have been cool to see Deku’s progression via 2 more School Festival/Tournament arcs. Dragon Ball has had like 10 and they all feel different (shout-out to the Tournament of Power for being a multiversal Royal Rumble x Survivor Series).
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Isn’t alchemy basically just chemistry anyway?
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Ok, I took my time for the answer but now I think I can write it down without being unintentionally aggressive or turn it into a history lesson
Ok, here I need I small explanation: by “high medieval” you mean after 1000 AD? Because in my country the names are inverted (high is before 1000, low is after).
Anyway my point wasn’t that fire arms didn’t become a thing until 1800s, my point was that early portable fire arms (I wasn’t talking about artillery) were more something like this one:
The average range of this beast is around 50 m, for the picture a football (soccer) field is between 90-120 m. It’s true that in 1600s they already replace most of the weapons, except polearms, for infantry; but for them to become a real terror of death, you have to wait the 1800s. And even in the 1800s some drawback (one shot, long reload time, it might not shoot…) remain until the modern retro charge rifle, first prototype the needle gun of the Prussian Army.
Back to the tropes, I can accept some form of guns in a low medieval fantasy setting, but they have to be the awesome but impractical first models, not the modern muskets, otherwise you are either trespassing into a sort of steampunk (I don’t know how else name it) or you are cheating.
Another concern I have: Even if you have both in any fantasy setting, how and why they both coexist? I’m not closing the door to the idea but you have to be good in writing the coexistence between them
Moment of hypocritical self deprecation
All this is brought by a men who is writing a fantasy where coexist:
Medieval realms with the first introduction of cannons and bombards
A steampunk Empire who has railways, balloon airships, mortars, field cannons, fort cannons, unintentionally anti aircraft cannons, steam powered ships and an élite corps who use revolvers and carbines (even if they are rare); while their infantry fight like the ancient Romans, with different non medieval cavalries
Pirates who use stolen technological prototypes (revolvers, carbines and “alchemical engine”).
A religious “not magical” order who has technology like computers, mechas, spaceships and could use weapon like energy cannons and blasters (in theory).
Others cultures and races with different life styles and mentalities.
All this mixed with various form of occultism and mysticism around the world.
Now I really sound like an hypocrite and someone who doesn’t even now what he’s saying. nervous laugh
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I feel like that’s just in a lot of action movies though. There are plenty of ways to make a fight scene with guns interesting, and one of those ways is through describing the tension that a deadly weapon has on the scene (or the surprising lack there-of in regards to some supernaturals to show how resilient they are) or having whoever is facing down the barrel have to be smart about their next move. In any scene where a deadly weapon is present, there should be at least some kind of tension, because… well… you’re bringing in a deadly weapon. So there are definitely ways to write it where it wouldn’t be boring!
Absolutely. Firing your weapon should be a last resort choice, which is why I always choose not to in the beginning of Wayhaven. But even then, there was still that tension and that “oh crap” moment when it didn’t work. But since it’s a last resort option, that then gives reason enough for whoever the gun is pointed at to show off their competence, either as you as the MC, the enemy trappers or supernaturals, or anyone else.
Maybe you’re facing a quite fragile supernatural and you have your gun trained on them, but uh oh! They quickly knock out the lights because they can see in darkness, or they turn invisible! Suddenly, that gun is now a threat to you because they have an upper hand in disarming you and using it against you.
This isn’t all to say that I think guns have to be present; absolutely not. Sera has every right to leave guns out of the game, and I don’t necessarily think it makes the games any less enjoyable! But, this is to just give examples of how writing a situation with firearms involved, in my opinion, should almost always be filled with some sort of tension. From my experience, that is a very good way to handle writing gun combat.
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