What are your preferences?

Which of the following "technological ages" do you find most interesting for a game setting?

post-apocalypse nomad

post-modern, non-apocalypse

modern (meaning now)

middle ages (meaning Europe post dark ages to renaissance)

pre-history nomad

I am new to the site but not the least bit new to TTRPGs or PbP. I am wanting to gather interest information in the hopes of running a game using my own system. Hopefully this is posted in the correct location. Thanks for your reposes.

I personally have a soft spot for modern era games...

Modern as in starting in the 1500s? I suppose anywhere from modern to post-modern non-apoc.

post-apocalypse

🤓 Um actually Anachronistic refers to something being incorrectly represented in a given time period, such as streetlights or watches in older eras.

But to answer your question, I enjoy Post-Modern Semi-Apocalypse (Cyberpunk settings after massive destruction and war), and Faaaaar Future (Dying Earth, Vaarn, etc). Most of my experience, though, is in Faux-Middle Ages.

Thanks all, so far.
1500s is Middle Ages to me, but I studied this history more than 40 years ago. I am not trying to be overly technical.

@cowleyc: I consider us to be anachronistic, vicariously through our characters. I played Cyperpunk a few times. The concept reminds me of DIcken's novels, except Oliver Twist.

This tendency in the current responses is not what I was expecting, which makes me glad I asked.

Don't middle ages go from 500 to 1499?

Anyway, my interest normally lies from around 1700 to 2101 as the baseline. I could see some antiquity-era settings as interesting, and some further future ones, with caveats. Middle ages I tend to shy away from because most of those are set in West Eurasia; I could probably be more curious if the era outside Eurasia was proposed as a setting.

Depends on your definition. I like Brittanica's:
So the Middle Ages would end first in Moorish Spain, then Italy, then spread to central Europe, and hang on in dark areas of Eastern Europe until finally driven out by the true hallmarks of modern civilization . . . guns and factories.

I also play primarily DnD for the larger community of players and friends (and not having to learn new systems for each new game) but my favorites are systems that have a strong flavor and identity, rather than by time periods. So Bushido, En Garde, but also Aftermath or Shadowrun.

I should have phrased the title "want to be" instead of "are you," but it is really moot. The periods are meant to be generalizations from my perspective, which everyone seems to be following, anyway. I suppose that I am really trying to determine the preferred level of technology. It is also helpful to know the level of magic interest. Should it be equal to technology, less than, or of greater significance. After all, any setting can be made to high fantasy or not.

With magic, it can vary depending on setting design and still be good. Some examples that come to mind:

• Low fantasy, low magic: Pendragon I guess?
• Low fantasy, medium magic: Golden Sky Stories.
• Low fantasy, rare but powerful magic: World of Darkness.
• Low fantasy, high magic: Technomancer (the TTRPG, not the CRPG).
• High fantasy, probably no magic: Flying Circus.
• High fantasy, low magic: Dishonoured, 7th Sea.
• High fantasy, high magic: Exalted, Eberron.
• Ambiguous fantasy, no/low/medium magic: Hearts of Wulin.

All of those seem cool in different ways, though there are some that I tried and drifted away from.

I'm not sure how any setting can be made high fantasy or not; I do see how a low magic setting can converted to high magic regardless of whether it's high or low fantasy.

You should find interest in all of those time periods / tech levels -- many of us here play and run in those and many more. Round these parts we tend to also tend to look hard at genre, vibe, system, the fiction we're trying to model, etc.

I like all of them except cyberpunk. I just never saw the attraction.

I do have a soft spot for anything post-apocalypse.

I love the range of catastrophic, world-altering disasters which destroy civilization that people come up with.

The Australian version.

"Bunnies, why did it have to be bunnies? The nukes and the biological weapons had decimated the earth, leaving only the land down under as surviving relatively unscarred but those able to fly or sail who could get through flocked there as well. Now with almost 10 times the population as before the day, every square inch of arable land that could be cultivated was put into crops. But, then came the bunnies and the cropped were eaten before they could grow. And so the survivors fought a harsh war of cunning, traps, and weapons, man v. bunny with survival of their respective species on the line."

That badbaron is awesome! The first line catches you and the final outcome is brilliant and very funny!

ROFL... Of course, I am getting visions of the vorpal bunny from Monte Python.... and then there is start of one of John Cusack's movies from back in the 80s. I cannot remember which.

Pretty sure that's One Crazy Summer with the "Cute and Fuzzy Bunnies"

I personally feel that middle ages have been overdone and it needs something more to stay interesting. The D&D Eberron setting is an example of a middle ages fantacy with added magic-tech.

post-apocalypse nomad and pre-history nomad stories are usually focused on survival with little room for epic stories that I enjoy the most.

post-modern, non-apocalypse There is a difficult balance of keeping the sci-fy believable without being overwhelming (I'm looking at you tazer-facer-laser-gun-implant) but when its pulled off, I like it.

modern (meaning now) add some magic to it, so we hit the Urban Fantasy check box, and we have my favourite setting.

This seems to be a sad fact of how narrow ideas of prehistory gaming seem to be. If someone went for prehistory, it would be cool to see other genres represented in that era: political intrigue as a bunch of acolytes are struggling to be named the successor to a tribe's shaman; romcom; occult research; diplomacy and strategy among leaders of adjacent tribes; rivalries in cultural events and physical games (what usually falls under the 'sports' and 'music' story genres in modern stories).

Must admit I rarely play romcom stories. Probably both because writing about sex can be embarrassing but also because there are so many tripwires in gender identity and sexuality and if you play it completely CIS, you can get in trouble for that too.

As for prehistory game, I completely agree with vicky_molokh. Think about this. Of the great adventure stories, Gilgamesh, the Illiad, the Oddessey, and Beowolf were all oral epics long before they were written down. Heroes with weapons facing down great challenges doesn't require any documentation. And not having those bloody wizards around firing fireballs can only be a good thing!

Ah, you're talking about Sword & Sorcery! A warrior's worth is determined by the might of his sword arm, and magic is corruptible and dangerous, best left to evil wizards (and the occasional scholarly acolyte). I love the Sword & Sorcery (and also Sword & Planet) genres!

Actually, talking about the most famous oral epics of prehistory. Depending on how you define it, there was quite a bit of sorcery in some of them. In the Iliad, Achilles was immune to weapons, the gods kept showing up and protecting their favorites, and they made a point of how the Trojans refused to listen to their seer and it was a contributing factor in their loss. The magicians didn't usually throw spells (well, Circe) but magic was used to signify the role of the divine.

That reminds me that Green Ronin put out a Trojan war setting book some years ago. Never did get it to the table. Yet.

You're talking Ancient History with the Greeks, Sumerians, Egyptians and such. So yeah, super fertile ground for gaming!

Still, Vicky's comment stands -- there can be all kinds of cool stuff to do in the Paleolithic, Mesolithic, and Neolithic Ages as well...

It seems from my question that most agree with you. Hopefully I can learn to use this site better and I will try to develop a setting more agreeable to the current interest.

Now you are speaking my language. This is my favorite. I had been running a campaign for the previous 10 years on another site that was an amalgam of ideas like Apocalypto, 10,000 BC, the Scorpion King, etc. The other site became so overloaded with advertising that it crashed and reset about every 3 minutes. I have tons of material for this.

I could not agree more. I despise romcom.

I will say that even middle ages is not overdone if you don't set it in Europe (or Japan). Islamic Empire, pre-English colonial India, Monkey King era China, pre (or alternative) Amerind, MesoAmerican, or Incan, Bantu conquest, South Pacific sea exploration works as well.

It's a decent volume that I, also, have never had the opportunity to run.

For me, Prehistory falls into the same trap as something like Numenera. There are fewer inspirations to draw on, and then you begin to wonder what’s within theme. The time scale is a little too far on either side to really know what is and isn’t on the table.

One day I'll run this - it goes quite deep into gathering resources and using them to do things. Scarcity is the thing! Your items are fragile and need repairing. A stone cutter is a precious thing!

But it isn't just about survival, I think it can lend itself to a wide range of stories and situations.

Famous last words! 😅

What I think it'd be cool to run right now (sadly I'm an absolute failure as a GM), would be an updated Paranoia campaign where climate change has driven everyone into the tech billionaires' underground bunkers and the population lives at the whim of their AI overseer (be it Claude or GPT).

Oh wow, this is exactly the same setting as the world created for The Untamed Wilds. It is basically what I have been running for the previous decade.

Paleomythic sounds cool! I may have to get a copy! And the cover reminds me of one of my favorite comic series, Turok, Son of Stone. In fact, Turok and Andar are in a lost valley deep in my homebrew world.

Then you must (or should) be excited for Fossilized Violence!

In Fossilized Violence, early humanity risks everything to fight back against evolving dinosaurs on primeval Pangeon. As you hunt, you’ll unlock 140+ pieces of equipment to give your cavemen a chance of surviving long enough to become an elder.

I think I’ve got 3-4 Stone Age RPGs kicking around. I have Paleomythic, Würm (more grounded), Primal Quest, Blood & Snow…

I ran PQ at one point, but it didn’t seem to resonate with my players, or me.