Add Sci-Fi Elements to Your 5E D&D Games

July 26, 2022

The more I see artificers in fifth edition Dungeons & Dragons the more I feel it is possible to add a lot of extra elements to my games. For years Eberron has shown us mixing fantasy and science fiction can be a lot of fun. Magic trains and fantasy sentient robots easily mix into our 5E D&D games and offer us some new options for games and stories. I have lots of new thoughts and ideas not typically explored as fantasy quests. I want to share some of those with you.

Anything science can do magic can too!

The first concept is the idea of a fantasy version of the Holodeck from Star Trek. At first my mind bucked at the concept but the more I think about it the more I really like this idea. I can think of many ways I might be able to use such a concept in my games.

For starters the origin of a city in one of my recently started campaigns lies in artifice, which offers new technology to the city and the world at large. One of the players really wants an arena. In a city of artifice instead of a normal arena it is a place capable of altering the terrain and surroundings on a round by round basis. The battlefield could change to offer unique challenges as needed. When I add in this concept of treating like a Holodeck it means the options become even greater.

When I look at this concept I have to figure out how it is created first. Looking at this initially it seemed too much — until I took a closer look at illusion magic in 5E D&D. There are some spells that hold up to touch as if it were real. Seeing these made it so much easier to create from if a building could be powered and operated the same way. Whether you make this building a dungeon, a coliseum a bar or any other place you could make it whatever you need it to be at any given time.

I used this very concept for my Dungeons & Delving campaign. The campaign premise is a futuristic game show where teams of adventurers compete against other teams for fame and prizes. You can watch the original story over on the Nerdarchy Live channel here and we’re looking ahead towards season two some months from now over on our regular Youtube Channel. We shared some insights into the campaign here on the website in another post too.

Imagine a tavern offering entertainment via any kind of illusion imaginable. Imagine an inn being able to repeat the same fantastic performance every single night without fail. Magic, mystery, music or any number of other great productions. Inspired by the spell magnificent mansion what if the inn had as much food of any variety you wanted. Explore any flavor palette — at a premium cost of course.

Imagine an arena where warriors could fight beasts of legendary skill all without fearing for their lives. You could use terrain effects that change each round to anything or just to escalate the peril. For example water begins to pool on the ground. Nothing at round one, difficult terrain by round two, swimming only at round three and start drowning by round four. This introduces some crazy stakes, right? You might also consider incorporating such a place into your games to function as a training ground for adventures to prepare against threats of the world but without consequence of their impending deaths.

These are a few ideas I wanted to share. I have some other sci-fi elements I plan to explore in a future post. As always, thanks for reading and until next time, stay nerdy!

*Featured image — Interested in more science fiction RPG stuff? The Expanse RPG applies the fast-playing, stunt-powered AGE system to spaceships, solar colonies, adventure, and intrigue in the far-future, where the actions of the characters may change the course of history. Discover more in another post at Nerdarchy the Website here!