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The Book of Random Tables: Science Fiction $4.99 $3.99
Average Rating:4.4 / 5
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The Book of Random Tables: Science Fiction
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The Book of Random Tables: Science Fiction
Publisher: dicegeeks
by Roscoe W. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 04/17/2023 23:21:28

I've somehow ended up running a sci-fi fate core campaign, despite the fact that the original star wars movies are about the only sci-fi I've ever seen. This has been extremelt helpful for idea generation, especially as someone with almost no previous media to reference!



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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The Book of Random Tables: Science Fiction
Publisher: dicegeeks
by Shane F. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 04/18/2022 13:35:22

In my opinion this is a disappointing product. There are some gems in here but also a lot of padding. Good tables are things like Space Station Names and six tables of various encounters. The rest in my opinion are so specific as to be pointless, e.g. items in a desk, drink names, metals, etc.



Rating:
[3 of 5 Stars!]
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The Book of Random Tables: Science Fiction
Publisher: dicegeeks
by Jim B. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 02/01/2020 08:29:59

You get 26 d100 tables. A few of them are effectively d200 tables, spread across two d100 tables.

The Encounters, Jobs, and Rumors section is good for brief ideas. You get short phrases, not details: Space Encounters, Planetary Exploration Encounters, Urban Encounters, Jobs, Rumors From the Spaceport Bar, and Spaceship Mechanical Problems. You might encounter a smuggler ship, hear about increased pirate activity, or have a fire in the engine room. If you prepare an adventure in advance, you could use these tables to come up with the initial hook and to create some challenges along the way. If you create meandering story threads during play, these tables could give you the tie-in to the next stage. If you use these tables for random encounters during play, prepare for improv. For example, an entry that says "Smuggler Ship" doesn't tell you anything about the ship, the crew, their current activities, or anything else. If that phrase is enough for you to work with, you're in luck.

Several tables in the Items & Things section seem to be an invitation to roll up piles of miscellaneous pointless stuff: Items in a Desk, Items in a Government Office, Computer Files, Items in a Warehouse, Items in a Cargo Hold. The introduction tells you not to roll those up until game time to avoid wasted preparation, but I consider it a waste to roll up irrelevant stuff during play. I prefer the Chekhov's Gun principle (playwright Anton Chekhov: "If in the first act you have hung a pistol on the wall, then in the following one it should be fired. Otherwise don't put it there."). Players are good at coming up with their own red herrings, so adding piles of random stuff slows down the session instead of keeping things interesting. Instead, I might roll up ONE item from one of these tables, in advance, and declare that it's somehow significant. I make it prominent or noteworthy. Maybe I won't decide how it's signficant until we're playing. Maybe I'll be flexible about where the PCs find it. Maybe I'll roll up three items and decide that they all hint in the same direction (see the Three Clue Rule from the Alexandrian blog). Or I'll roll up two things and decide they're relevant for two different story threads. In other words, these tables aren't useless to me, but I don't use them to crank out random assortments. Finding out how many batteries and spare cuff links are in a desk just isn't interesting ... unless they're signficant.

Some tables are good for putting a name to something when you don't want to settle for generic terms: 100 Space Stations, 100 Book Titles, 100 Drink Names, 100 Poisonous Plants, 200 Infectious Diseases, 100 Metals, and 200 Alloys. Those tables are just the names -- no descriptions. The two Code Tables are useless. Do I really need two d100 tables to pick code strings like Q29XF? Would anyone in a technologically advanced setting think that a five-character code string is useful?

The Stars & Planets section is helpful. Types of Stars and Types of Planets use real astronomical terms, but without any descriptions. Prepare to spend some quality time with Wikipedia to find out what Luminous Blue Variables and Mini-Neptunes are. The Civilization Levels table offers 19 levels from Stone Age to Interstellar Age (without description).

The Illegal Drugs table is the only table that offers any detail. It lists 100 fictitious drugs. The drug gets a street nickname (e.g. Dragon's Breath, Feather Shot), how it's taken, a qualitative description of intended effects and side effects, and a percent chance of becoming addicted. It's up to you to figure out what the effects mean in your game system.



Rating:
[4 of 5 Stars!]
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The Book of Random Tables: Science Fiction
Publisher: dicegeeks
by A customer [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 07/16/2018 13:24:12

There where more just random name tables then I expected. It was not really what I was looking for. The job tables and Encounter tables feelt light in a way. Would want it to be more filled out tables with twists and not just a straight message about "Stage a Coup". It would have been a better book if all the table was more like the Illegal Drug tables.



Rating:
[2 of 5 Stars!]
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The Book of Random Tables: Science Fiction
Publisher: dicegeeks
by Blake P. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 06/19/2018 11:06:52

Wow this book of Science Fiction tables is sorely needed and very high quality (not cheesy or silly like a lot of "random generators", especially those for Science Fiction). Provides many much needed system agnostic events, items, and more for sci fi settings (even names of books, there are so many of these for fantasy settings but have not seen it yet for sci fi). Definitely worth the low price I love it. Great work from the author and I really hope to see more Science Fiction resources from Dice Geeks soon.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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