Ep.21: Sci-fi Wrapup
Episode 21 closes our sci-fi season with a debrief: what we learned when theory met the table. We revisit the systems we ran—Coriolis, Freemarket, CBR+PNK, Mothership, Twilight Imperium among others—and pull out the through-lines that surfaced across very different design priorities, moving between genre, system, and setting.
Across the season, certain levers kept showing up, including Dark Points and panic clocks. Downtime becomes a design layer, not just a breather. Tech and transportation aren’t just stylistic; they’re constraints you can plan around, exploit, or get trapped inside. Memory and transhumanism come into focus too: what happens to stakes when identity is modular.
One question kept circling throughout the season: what makes something science fiction at the table? Vibes matter, but so do the costs the rules make visible—risk, logistics, scarcity, and human limits. The boundary gets tested against fantasy: when is “sci-fi vs. fantasy” a productive restriction, and when is it an empty category you paint over with aesthetic? No single answer lands, but a few useful ways to frame the problem emerge.
If you’ve been with us all season, this is the after-action report. If you’re new, it’s a fast way to see how we read mechanics as part of story structure.
For more on the discussion of System and Style check out our written articles and Scott’s additional thoughts on specific systems on our YouTube channel.
Topics discussed:
00:00:45 Talk of Genre
00:29:00 What we played
00:45:00 Heroes and the Everyman
00:01:00 Media Touchpoints
01:05:00 Downtime and Resource Management
01:19:15 Games we didn't play
01:52:30 Season Favorites
