Let me start off by saying my group and I (GM) have played about nine sessions or so, and have a blast every time. We’ve stuck to the Burning Wheel rules and try to keep everything abstract and fast-paced. We’ve shunned the “Fight!” mechanics as well as “Duel of Wits.”
On our first session, we burned characters, I laid out the setting and basics of gameplay, and we went at it. Everyone had a great time. No playing a demo or messing with the system in-depth.
I’ve integrated a little hook that has intrigued all of them: the concept of time-travel. While our first few sessions have taken place in 10th century England, we’ve jumped into the 12th. Not a distinguishable change in the setting of the world, but the relationships they forged during their time have had a huge impact, and now they’re seeing the repercussions of their actions.
That said, this time-travel thing has been brewing in my head, and the real story I’ve had building up is set in a sci-fi era. I wanted to treat this fantasy setting as the tutorial for everyone to get their feet wet, but keep the same characters, same story, same setting, and hurl it into the future at least a thousand years.
Since Burning Wheel remains a primarily fantasy role-playing system, I did some (minor) research and saw that Burning Empires was the same mechanics my group fell in love with, just in a sci-fi setting.
I purchased the book, and after going through it a bit, I see that the Vaylen are a huge part and seemingly integral in gameplay. I’m not too sold on it. While I can work something like that in a sub-plot, I want the story to be very character-driven, since everyone is loving the personas they embody. I really was looking for more material on creating new planets, ideas for governing bodies, and ways to integrate technology and firefights. I looked at those chapters more extensively than the rest, and it seems I can integrate them, but am I doing it for the wrong reasons? Can I just use the world, alien-species, and technology burner for my own purposes? Will it be broken? Or is there somewhere I can find something using the core BW system with some sci-fi elements that I can add on?
Burning Empires seems to be an entirely different game that I’d definitely be interested in tackling in the future, but there’s so much to be done with our campaign for now. While the question still remains as playing without the Vaylen, any tips on transferring a fantasy BW game to a sci-fi setting would be helpful.
Thanks in advance guys!