Harry Potter+Narnia=Me Caring

[tussock]

If y'all just played as children of an era when you were children, so you can relive your own school traumas with 19x0's technology, that would suit the Potterverse very well. And also be somewhat easy to remember.

I mean, that's the real objection to ipods here, right?

Guns are just a thing where there's an easy no-defence spell that kills people who shoot guns at you. Reverso Bulleto Perpetua.

[Chamomile]

I mean, that's the real objection to ipods here, right?

I turned 11 in 2001. By my senior year in high school (which is technically one year older than a seventh year, but close enough) I was plugged into a music player almost constantly. I probably still would be if mine hadn't broken. So, no. The objection to iPods is that you never saw a Sony Walkman in Harry Potter. Or, y'know, a television.

[Voss]

Sounds like trying to stick too closely to the deficiencies of the inspirational material to me. Imagine the usefulness of prepaid cellphones while they were poking aimlessly around Britain looking for soul fragments. You know, the ones that actually existed and were available at the time.

[Chamomile]

It is absolutely true that it would make logical sense for the Harry Potter characters to have used more modern technology. But the series still built its vibe around not actually doing that. Recreating that vibe starts with finding a reason why modern technology is only available in very limited amounts in the Notnia, including the Earth colony. Because at the point where Hogwarts has mini-fridges and microwaves, you are no longer making Hogwarts in Narnia, you are making a Bakuhatsu High campaign. Which is great, but Bakuhatsu High already exists. If what you want is the game Frank is describing, the extent of the effort required is sending a thank you note to Koumei.

[RadiantPhoenix]

Because at the point where Hogwarts has mini-fridges and microwaves, you are no longer making Hogwarts in Narnia, you are making a Bakuhatsu High campaign.

Hogwarts wouldn't have microwaves and mini-fridges on-screen even if they had them off-screen because the food preparation is never on-screen, and the kids don't prepare their own food anyway.

Given that all the food is prepared by expert chefs who love to work all the time, it's not even clear that they would have much use for such things.

On the other hand, modern teenagers are used to having cell phones and music players. The lack of something that replaces the former means either increased screen-time for cell-phones, as characters bitch about having to run around for hours trying to find someone to talk to them, or a loss of verisimilitude.

[Chamomile]

On the other hand, modern teenagers are used to having cell phones and music players. The lack of something that replaces the former means either increased screen-time for cell-phones, as characters bitch about having to run around for hours trying to find someone to talk to them, or a loss of verisimilitude.

Thing is, I am perfectly okay with the former. In fact, that sounds pretty awesome. Culture shock was pretty prominent in the first Harry Potter book, was still a fairly big deal in the second, and showed up sporadically throughout the whole series. It's weird that Hermoine didn't have a short readjustment period every time she came back, being that she was from a totally regular muggle household (whereas it made perfect sense for Harry because he spent every summer wishing he were back in magic land). You would expect Hermoine and other muggleborns to wish that Hogsmeade had a movie theater so they could go see Independence Day, or that it stocked muggle books so they could read that one book their friends wouldn't shut up about. And one muggleborn totally did have posters of his favorite Soccer players.

JK Rowling gets in the habit of flat-out ignoring the culture shock after a couple of years which, really, makes a certain amount of sense: Barring brief readjustment periods, muggleborns who spend nine months straight in Hogwarts are eventually going to get used to it. So it should be with the player characters. By the time they've reached their seventh year, they are probably more used to Notnia than to Earth. Cell phones will cease to be something they take for granted, and will, in fact, be something they probably never fully adjust to having when back on Earth.

[Fuchs]

That sort of - stupid - adjustment won't work for player characters since they won't be holding the idiot ball.

[RadiantPhoenix]

IMO, the "correct" answer to the cellphone question is, "When you get to level 3, you are taught Whispering Wind. Until then, you have the shorter-range Message."

[Username17]

So the arguments in favor of having some kind of crazy bullshit anti-tech fields you'd have to explain the physics of at great length are:

• JK Rowling doesn't really talk about technology very often, and even purposefully comes up with one-use magical replacements for technology when she remembers to (but sometimes cars, light switches, and radios just happen with no explanation at all and no one has any problem using the London Underground or electric doorbells or anything).
• If regular modern technology exists, the young children who are the protagonists will get Apache Helicopters!!!11!! Because as you know, all middle school children have successfully flown an attack helicopter that they personally own with their vast fortunes that they have full control over despite being minors.
• The setting is "modern Earth children go to the magical world to go to school and have adventures, not Shadowrun. So weird magic-tech hybrid science fiction equipment is not supposed to be on the table.

That's seriously all the arguments presented, and they are all garbage arguments. The first one kills itself, because of course Wizards in Harry Potter land do use whatever technology JK Rowling forgets is actually electrical such as lights and doorbells and it ain't no thing. The second one is so hyperbolic as to be basically insane. Children don't have access to attack helicopters because they are fucking children and are too young to join the air force or get a pilot's license. And attack helicopters aren't even something normal people can buy in any simple way even if they had the literally $18 million that they cost. And the third one is actually an argument the other way. Because every thing that you have to do to get around restrictions on using mundane tech is by definition creating science fiction hybrid tech. The magic/electrical hybrid radios that Hogwarts kids use are Shadowrun devices, whether they are sculpted to look like 1940s retro radios or not.

The point, literally the entire point, of putting modern children into a magical situation is that they can draw upon modern knowledge and modern problem solving techniques. When you are writing your own book, the point is that the characters from the modern world can ask all the questions your modern children reader would ask so you have an excuse to drop the info dumps they need. But an RPG is fucking different. The other players have read the damn book and are contributing to the fucking story.

Dangling out modern solutions to problems by letting the players play characters who have read The Way Things Work and then shitting on them by having vaguely defined STFU fields prevent them from actually using that information is just a shitty MC power trip. If you don't want the players to use modern problem solving techniques, don't make them be modern characters in the first place. It's that fucking simple.

-Username17

[RadiantPhoenix]

On the other hand, Frank's arguments keep making me want to stick it to the anti-tech-field people in exactly the same way that I want to stick it to antimagic fields.

EDIT: I think it's because I dislike, "your powers don't work here," in general.

[Whipstitch]

It's probably because such bullshit often reeks of Mother May I?. I like to know right away whether we can be yankees in King Arthur's court or if I'm supposed to avoid inventing cordite. It avoids a lot of inane slap-fights.

[Username17]

JK Rowling gets in the habit of flat-out ignoring the culture shock after a couple of years which, really, makes a certain amount of sense: Barring brief readjustment periods, muggleborns who spend nine months straight in Hogwarts are eventually going to get used to it. So it should be with the player characters.

That sort of - stupid - adjustment won't work for player characters since they won't be holding the idiot ball.

Pretty much this. Since you're playing a role playing game and not writing your own story, the player characters can't be "relied upon" to do idiotic things to move things forward. Moreover, the "adjustment" isn't about characters it's about literary devices.

In a book, the children come from our society to the magic society so that they can ask the questions the reader would ask and give the reader the infodumps they need in the form of answers to those questions. In a long running series, the reader only needs each infodump once, so the characters stop being surprised by magic world stuff (at least, on camera) because the question and answer infodump literary device is no longer needed. In a role playing game, that literary device is never needed in the first place, because players can and will read the setting and also can and will ask out of character setting questions to the MC.

Indeed, the "modern character goes to magic land" is useful for an entirely different literary device in a cooperative storytelling game. Rather than being an excuse for the author to tell the outsider character things and thereby transmit that information to the reader, it's an excuse for the player to smuggle their own knowledge and prejudices into the story. You're not using the "outsider needs infodumps" trope, you're using the "Mary Sue insertion" trope, and it fucking has different rules because it's a different fucking thing.

You can get people to use quills instead of pens, but only by producing an incentive of some kind to use the fucking quills. You can say something like "The rune script writing for making magical scrolls that they teach you in fifth year requires special ink and special quills to enchant properly, so they make you use quills early on in your studies to get you used to the system." And then people will have quills and use them in class. This will make sense to people and not anger them in the way that telling them that felt tip pens don't work because diffusion doesn't happen in magic world definitely and obviously would.

-Username17

[hyzmarca]

Magical children with teleportatation spells can totally pull an Iron Eagle and steal military vehicles. I'm just saying. I'm opposed to the anti-tech field because that's cool if used sparingly.

[Starmaker]

That's seriously all the arguments presented, and they are all garbage arguments. The first one kills itself, because of course Wizards in Harry Potter land do use whatever technology JK Rowling forgets is actually electrical such as lights and doorbells and it ain't no thing.

JK Rowling forgets this technology is actually electrical because it does not bother her for entirely arbitrary reasons. Other electrical (and sometimes even Bronze Age) technology makes her and "creatively anachronistic" people like her pop a rage boner, again, for entirely arbitrary reasons. Now, why exactly eg. plumbing [citation needed] is of the devil but the hay baler is a-okay is a separate question, but the fact stands that there's a demographic that's bothered by a sharply delineated group of lolrandom appliances.

This demographic comprises people as different as sexually frustrated teenagers writing Harry Potter porn and sexually frustrated old men in bathrobes who think they're sorcerers IRL and mention Borges, Gumilev and Moaning Myrtle in a single sentence without a shred of irony. If you so much as mention an ipod around those people, or, Bob forbid, bring a non-idiot character to a Harry Potter roleplay, they will call you a troll and hand you an undisputable ban until 2038, or, alternatively, explain that they're emulating a genre and don't you go around questioning genre conventions. And in three years in "the fandom" (housing problems, it's not like I had a choice) I never saw a single [Russian] Harry Potter fan who wasn't a member of this demographic. Now, you might ask how they manage to solve problems and make logical decisions for their characters without any sort of underlying logic or consensus reality. Well, they have a consensus reality, it runs on mind caulk and turtles all the way down, and what's this problem-solving, are you playing to win, you munchkin?

TL;DR: this is not a random stupid argument but a distinct wish of a probably numerous group of people that a hypothetical RPG designer might want to cater to.

[Fuchs]

Now, why exactly eg. plumbing [citation needed] is of the devil but the hay baler is a-okay is a separate question, but the fact stands that there's a demographic that's bothered by a sharply delineated group of lolrandom appliances.

Hogwarts plumbing played a major role in book two, the Basilik traveled through the pipes for its attacks as I recall, which led to the discovery of the entrance to the chamber of secrets in a bathroom.

[erik]

Magical children with teleportatation spells can totally pull an Iron Eagle and steal military vehicles. I'm just saying. I'm opposed to the anti-tech field because that's cool if used sparingly.

Heh, now there still might be the difficulty in actually making use of said stolen wares.

[edit: add spoiler cuz img big]

[Tumbling Down]

Heh, now there still might be the difficulty in actually making use of said stolen wares.

Not as long as you can mind-control someone who comes with those skills.

[sabs]

You mean, use one of the unforgivable curses?
If mind control is black magic that doesn't get taught in wizard school. Then the chances of it happening are approaching nil.

And if all of the people willing to learn the Imperiatus curse are ludites who think that Magic is the One True Way. Then that solves a lot of issues too.

[erik]

And this raises another good set of issues.

• What should magic be able to do? More importantly, what can it not do?
• What is forbidden magic?

While using the Unforgivable curses straight up might not be desirable, it is not unlikely that some things will be against da rules.

Will there be a governing body of mortal magic (Harry Potter or Dresden), or will there be no formal universal rules (Narnia, D&D)?

[Username17]

TL;DR: this is not a random stupid argument but a distinct wish of a probably numerous group of people that a hypothetical RPG designer might want to cater to.

Sure. But the only way to cater to it is to not nail anything down. Because each of these assholes has a completely arbitrary and unique list of items that will trigger their whinging. For one person it's velcro, for another person it's zippers, and if you try to ban everything on everyone's ban lists pretty soon no one can wear pants. And you know what? That triggers people too! Because these fuckers don't just have completely arbitrary ban lists, but they also have equally arbitrary lists of "must includes" for people to feel properly school boyish. It's an absolute no win situation. The only way to keep those fuckwits happy is to take no special position on technology at all, and let everyone fill in their own set of anachronisms in their own mind.

[*] What should magic be able to do? More importantly, what can it not do?

Well that depends. If you're trying to placate chamomile and deanrule with their horseshit demands about how there has to be exactly the right amount of technology in their magic peanut butter and there are totally arbitrary things that are not in any way discernably different from things on the allowed list that are on the banned list and vice versa - then you obviously can't have hard and fast rules about how magic works either.

Basically, just like with the technology where you constantly walk on eggshells when describing things and when someone throws a hissy fit about air fresheners or pencil sharpeners or some fucking thing you placate them by backing up and retconning the offending item out of the scene description, you free form the magic until someone calls bullshit. Everyone can do "stuff," and whenever it hits peoples' totally baseless and personal limits of willing suspension of disbelief, they get veto power. That's the only way to cater to these assholes and their incoherent and inconsistent demands.

If on the other hand, you wanted to have an actual shared world story with actual answers to questions where players could actually solve problems using their knowledge of how the setting worked in some sort of consistent fashion, then obviously you'd want regular physics to function normally and magic physics to have sharply delineated rules that players could actually know.

-Username17

[codeGlaze]

Aren't most of the children who attend Hogwarts FROM the wizarding world, and therefore not exposed to most modern tech?

Aren't Hermione and Harry distinctly semi-freakish for being outsiders and not familiar with the wizarding world?

So, theoretically, wouldn't that limit cross contamination a lot as well?

[erik]

Aren't most of the children who attend Hogwarts FROM the wizarding world, and therefore not exposed to most modern tech?

You're committing to an assumption not yet granted. The tech level is in wizarding world is not well defined at all. There's no computers or cell phones mentioned in wizarding world, but there's no computers or cell phones when Harry is in muggle world either. There is modern transportation (car, bus, train) in both. For all I know the story is set in the 1960's.

Whatever the level of divide between worlds, there likely is modern tech and sensibilities from muggle world that has not made it to wizarding world, but other than rubber chickens I have no idea what else hasn't made it to wworld from mworld.

To your larger point that you wanted to make though, yes, the modern world people are supposed to not be the norm in Notnia and that would limit cross-contamination. I did not realize that was even in question.

[codeGlaze]

To your larger point that you wanted to make though, yes, the modern world people are supposed to not be the norm in Notnia and that would limit cross-contamination. I did not realize that was even in question.

Seems to me that pretty much nips a lot of the bullshit arguing in the bud.

The wizarding world (as far as I can tell) so far in the books did not make use of Telephones or Televisions.

They make limited use of any automated mode of transportation. The bus, train, the one motorcycle and one car.

I would make the logical assumption that Wizards would at least resist the notion of computers invading their space. In favor of spells replicating their book keeping endeavors... or something.

The source material all suggests that children who are quarantined to the Wizard world would not, generally, be subjected to modern "stuff". So cross-contamination really is basically the heart of a lot of the ongoing argument.

Because:
Children who grew up in the wizarding world would not think of using cell phones.
Leaving muggleborn wizards to think of that. But even then in places like Notnia and Hogwarts (the in-between world place thing) wizards seem to actually resist the influence of modernity.
The only place muggleborn kids would be able to introduce the inbred-wizards to the internet, cell phones and on-demand porn would be adventures in the muggle world. Which doesn't seem to be the main focus of the game. Even then I imagine most adventures in the muggle world would be specifically devoted to fucking aroudn with every day toys, or be so narrow in scope (like a specific mission) that they wouldn't necessarily need to worry about exposure to tech.

Of course, there's a wiki about this shit.

Cracked distilled some HP'verse non-sense for us.

[RadiantPhoenix]

Magical children with teleportatation spells can totally pull an Iron Eagle and steal military vehicles. I'm just saying. I'm opposed to the anti-tech field because that's cool if used sparingly.

Heh, now there still might be the difficulty in actually making use of said stolen wares.

[edit: add spoiler cuz img big]

This was mentioned in book 4 when Harry considered summoning a diving suit or something for the second task.

[hyzmarca]

My solution to that has always been to use animate object like effects to give the vehicle rudimentary sentience.

But pulling out the attack helicopters is really part of a godzilla threshold event, where the PCs have to discard previous conventions and do something insane in order to survive.

Narnia isn't good at having a constantly advancing Godzilla Threshold. It starts with the kids fighting Jadis, who is metaphorically The Devil, and ends with them fighting Tash, who is literally The Devil, but there's not a steady escalation in the middle. In fact, they fall back heavily in Prince Caspian and its sequels, fighting normal dudes.

On the other hand, Harry Potter has a great advancing Godzilla Threshold. The enemy becomes steadily more powerful and more entrenched. The good guys become steadily more desperate. Things that are unthinkable in one book are normal in the next.