PDA

View Full Version : [3.5] What knowledge would be modern science?



LibraryOgre
2009-11-06, 12:14 PM
Just an idle thought spawned by the "I have 10 levels to defeat a dread wraith" thread: If someone has studied the natural laws of our universe extensively, what 3.5/PF skill would you use to represent that? My gut says "Knowledge: Nature", but I get the feeling their idea of knowing nature is a bit different from my own.

Sallera
2009-11-06, 12:17 PM
I'd be tempted to put it under Planes. It already covers all the odd ways the laws of etcetera work on other planes, so one should be able to extend that to the Prime Material.

erikun
2009-11-06, 12:20 PM
Which science?

If you're talking biology or health sciences, then Kno: Nature or Heal would be the best. Alchemy/Kno: Arcana would probably cover chemistry, as it's the closest to dealing with chemical reactions. Kno: Dungeoneering for geology, Kno: Planes for astronomy, Kno: Religion for... theology, I guess.

Of course, they'd all have higher-than-normal DCs, primarily because chemical reactions or human physiology isn't exactly common knowledge in D&D. (unless it is)

Lapak
2009-11-06, 12:21 PM
In my opinion?
Profession: Physicist.

Kalirren
2009-11-06, 12:32 PM
If you're talking about the idea of teleporting ahead of the dread wraith to a polar region where it's still light, probably Knowledge: Planes for the astronomy given default flavor of D&D settings.

Depending upon the advancedness of the society at large, Knowledge; Geography might also work.

Saph
2009-11-06, 12:36 PM
Astronomy could be covered by Knowledge: Arcana, Knowledge: Planes, or maybe even Survival for navigation.
Biology would be Knowledge: Nature (at a heavy penalty).
Chemistry would be Craft: Alchemy (at an even heavier penalty).
Physics wouldn't be covered by any of the D&D knowledges at all as far as I can see.

Telonius
2009-11-06, 12:37 PM
Knowldge (Physics).

Pathfinder SRD (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/skills/knowledge):

Below are listed typical fields of study.

Emphasis added. You can have knowledge in anything, as long as you put the ranks into it and the DM agrees.

IMO, Knowledge (Physics) and Profession (Physicist) are not the same thing.

Nerd-o-rama
2009-11-06, 01:05 PM
Yeah. If you couldn't make up skills like Knowledge (Quantum Physics), you wouldn't be able to make such classic, irreplaceable D&D characters as "guy who summons anti-Osmium to blow up the planet for the lols".

That's a very popular character archetype, you know.

infinitypanda
2009-11-06, 02:19 PM
It is quite clear to me that you have done something there, and I am able to see what it is.

SurlySeraph
2009-11-06, 02:28 PM
Yeah. If you couldn't make up skills like Knowledge (Quantum Physics), you wouldn't be able to make such classic, irreplaceable D&D characters as "guy who summons anti-Osmium to blow up the planet for the lols".

That's a very popular character archetype, you know.

I think the thread was removed in the archive purge, but I remember a discussion involving from wizard optimization that involved teleporting giant blocks of iron into orbit and having some magical device he'd designed fling them at things on the ground. The OP insisted that it was a practical and fair idea until someone eventually said "Alright then, ask your DM 'Please, please can I take Knowledge (astrophysics) so I can make orbital strikes on dragons?' See how it goes."

Book Wyrm
2009-11-06, 02:57 PM
Mechanics, that is the part of physics that was mostly developed by Newton and excludes electricity and magnetism, could be mostly covered by a Knowledge (Architecture and Engineering) check. It kind of covers the modern understanding of gravity, forces, and structural engineering. To the best of my knowledge nothing in D&D really covers the physics of motion, machines, or moving parts all that well. Maybe a Disable Device check, since if you can take it apart you should have some idea of how it works.

Eloel
2009-11-06, 03:33 PM
Not that hard, really.

Knowledge: Modern Science

Below are listed typical fields of study.
You can have a Knowledge skill on anything that looks like a field.

Rappy
2009-11-06, 03:39 PM
Alternatively, you could just port in the appropriate d20 Modern skills and save yourself some time.

taltamir
2009-11-07, 06:12 AM
a single knowledge skill replicating all our science and technology? I think not.

knowledge:
general chemistry, organic chemistry, biochemistry, general physics, theoretical physics, quantom physics, general biology, genetics, anatomy, physiology, pathophysiology, microbiology, etc etc etc... There is a reason why it takes years to get a degree; and why degrees are so specific. and unless you are specifically playing D20 modern then there is no way you can have access to all this knowledge.

Cieyrin
2009-11-07, 02:46 PM
a single knowledge skill replicating all our science and technology? I think not.

knowledge:
general chemistry, organic chemistry, biochemistry, general physics, theoretical physics, quantom physics, general biology, genetics, anatomy, physiology, pathophysiology, microbiology, etc etc etc... There is a reason why it takes years to get a degree; and why degrees are so specific. and unless you are specifically playing D20 modern then there is no way you can have access to all this knowledge.

Sure you could, though it would involve spelljamming to different crystal spheres that are more technologically advanced or planeshifting to the personal library of a God of Knowledge, like Boccob or Thoth, or finding a part of the lost Illumian library. There's ways to do it, just none of them are common and they require questing, which should be your default answer, rather than "No".

Them's my 2 coppers. Take as you will.

DragoonWraith
2009-11-07, 03:24 PM
I think if you wanted to do it, you'd have to create a character background similar to, say, Euclid, where he decided "screw it, enough, I'm just going to start from the basics and do this right," ignoring the kind of traditional explanations for things and instead deriving everything logically (in the case of Euclid's geometry) or empirically (in the case of modern science). If you did that, I'd say you'd have a Knowledge (field of study) skill, but you'd really be starting from the very basics.

I think that, unlike normal Knowledge skills (where you roll to see if you happen to know a given fact), the most reasonable (though time-consuming to set up) way to do it would be to have set DCs for learning certain things, and limit to how many you can learn as you gain ranks in the Knowledge skill. Because it's not a matter of having studied others' work, you're pioneering here. Which is important for anything approximating modern sciences, because in D&D by default nothing like them exists (though in some settings they probably do).

So something like Knowledge (Physics) as it relates to gravity
{table=head]Ranks | Thing you can learn
2 | Objects fall down
5 | Objects fall down at the same speed regardless of their weight. Heavier objects instead fall harder. I will call this property the "force" of the object.
7 | Repeated experiments have shown that objects accelerate downwards at approximately 5.5 ft/rnd/rnd (or whatever it is in D&D)
10 | "Force" is equivalent to weight of an object times its current acceleration (note: this is incorrect, it's mass times acceleration; weight is, itself, a force. But sometimes scientists get things wrong when they don't have all the information). Thus, "force" is in units of "lbs ft/rnd/rnd" (does anyone actually know what Newton called his units of force? I assume he didn't call them newtons...)
13 | Rather than strictly down, objects are attracted to other objects, and objects are attracted more strongly by more massive objects.
15 | Experiments show that the attraction of one object on another is proportional to the product of the two masses divided by the square of the distance between them if they are treated as point-masses placed at their own center. Unclear if this treatment is valid, but it seems to be.
17 | "Force" is not dependent on weight! Having plane shifted to a plane with lower gravity, it becomes abundantly clear that weight changes based on gravity, but the force of an object moving at a given acceleration remains the same. There is an underlying quantity, which I will call mass, which causes weight, which is in fact a force. (it is good to correct one's mistakes)
20 | (requires 16 ranks in Knowledge (Mathematics)) I have demonstrated through the new calculus that I have invented that using the square of the distance between the centers of objects is logically valid.
23 | The gravitational constant appears to be approximately 0.00000005 ft3/lb/rnd/rnd.[/table]
Making up those lists will get difficult, though, and you'll need rules for how many things you can learn per rank...

taltamir
2009-11-07, 03:30 PM
Sure you could, though it would involve spelljamming to different crystal spheres that are more technologically advanced or planeshifting to the personal library of a God of Knowledge, like Boccob or Thoth, or finding a part of the lost Illumian library. There's ways to do it, just none of them are common and they require questing, which should be your default answer, rather than "No".

Them's my 2 coppers. Take as you will.

problem with allowing them to do that via "god of knowledge"... is that they now know how to make gun powder, guns, cars, trains, etc...

Unless you WANT the players to start an industrial revolution in your world (which necessitates changing the system, because swords and armor just don't work in a gun world), then the answer must be no.

Cieyrin
2009-11-07, 05:06 PM
problem with allowing them to do that via "god of knowledge"... is that they now know how to make gun powder, guns, cars, trains, etc...

Unless you WANT the players to start an industrial revolution in your world (which necessitates changing the system, because swords and armor just don't work in a gun world), then the answer must be no.

Who said it'd be easy to get such? Y'think any upstanding Knowledge deity is gonna let some wet behind the ears adventurers storm and loot his library? I think not.

Also, whose to say it'll even be decipherable by the PCs? It's unlikely it'll all be conveniently in Common or even all be in the same language through out the text. It could easily be a dead language or in code or any number of things.

What I mean by questing for stuff is you gotta balance the gains with appropriate challenge and not against the party's abilities but against what the knowledge is actually worth. If any of this stuff was easy to gain from any of my previous examples, wouldn't some NPC already done so and caused the industrial revolution? We're talking stealing from at least Intermediate Deities, which is definitely not in the power range of low to mid level adventurers.

What it comes down to is that many things are possible, as long as the players understand that there will be different levels of challenge to accomplishing certain rolls and that player knowledge != character knowledge. Just because you have Masters in Theoretical Physics doesn't mean your character does.

Them's my 2 coppers. Take as you will.

oxinabox
2009-11-07, 05:25 PM
I've allowed knowledge "Natural Sciences" before,
Basically simple physcs, minor chem (synergy bonus with alchemy)
On of the players wanted it so he could reason out in character how to use a ring gate to suck the water out from bellow boats, and dump it out on top of them

vrellum
2009-11-07, 05:27 PM
I think if you wanted to do it, you'd have to create a character background similar to, say, Euclid, where he decided "screw it, enough, I'm just going to start from the basics and do this right," ignoring the kind of traditional explanations for things and instead deriving everything logically (in the case of Euclid's geometry) or empirically (in the case of modern science). If you did that, I'd say you'd have a Knowledge (field of study) skill, but you'd really be starting from the very basics.

I think that, unlike normal Knowledge skills (where you roll to see if you happen to know a given fact), the most reasonable (though time-consuming to set up) way to do it would be to have set DCs for learning certain things, and limit to how many you can learn as you gain ranks in the Knowledge skill. Because it's not a matter of having studied others' work, you're pioneering here. Which is important for anything approximating modern sciences, because in D&D by default nothing like them exists (though in some settings they probably do).

So something like Knowledge (Physics) as it relates to gravity
{table=head]Ranks | Thing you can learn
2 | Objects fall down
5 | Objects fall down at the same speed regardless of their weight. Heavier objects instead fall harder. I will call this property the "force" of the object.
7 | Repeated experiments have shown that objects accelerate downwards at approximately 5.5 ft/rnd/rnd (or whatever it is in D&D)
10 | "Force" is equivalent to weight of an object times its current acceleration (note: this is incorrect, it's mass times acceleration; weight is, itself, a force. But sometimes scientists get things wrong when they don't have all the information). Thus, "force" is in units of "lbs ft/rnd/rnd" (does anyone actually know what Newton called his units of force? I assume he didn't call them newtons...)
13 | Rather than strictly down, objects are attracted to other objects, and objects are attracted more strongly by more massive objects.
15 | Experiments show that the attraction of one object on another is proportional to the product of the two masses divided by the square of the distance between them if they are treated as point-masses placed at their own center. Unclear if this treatment is valid, but it seems to be.
17 | "Force" is not dependent on weight! Having plane shifted to a plane with lower gravity, it becomes abundantly clear that weight changes based on gravity, but the force of an object moving at a given acceleration remains the same. There is an underlying quantity, which I will call mass, which causes weight, which is in fact a force. (it is good to correct one's mistakes)
20 | (requires 16 ranks in Knowledge (Mathematics)) I have demonstrated through the new calculus that I have invented that using the square of the distance between the centers of objects is logically valid.
23 | The gravitational constant appears to be approximately 0.00000005 ft3/lb/rnd/rnd.[/table]
Making up those lists will get difficult, though, and you'll need rules for how many things you can learn per rank...

If you're discovering this stuff yourself, instead of studying someone else's work you should multiple the DC by 2 to 4. You've made it pretty trivial to calculate the gravitational constant and that would be very difficult to do. Especially by yourself with no one else working on techniques or equipment to help you.

DragoonWraith
2009-11-07, 05:30 PM
If you're discovering this stuff yourself, instead of studying someone else's work you should multiple the DC by 2 to 4. You've made it pretty trivial to calculate the gravitational constant and that would be very difficult to do. Especially by yourself with no one else working on techniques or equipment to help you.
I completely agree, the DCs are not realistic. They are, however, playable in non-epic play, which I consider important.

Also, realize I said they were keyed off of ranks, not effective check. No d20 roll, no ability modifier or bonuses, just ranks. Ability modifier and bonuses, I was imagining, would be involved in determining how many things you can learn, but your options are limited by your ranks.

LibraryOgre
2009-11-07, 05:40 PM
Now, to add a PF spin to it:

Bards (at 5th level) may take 10 on any knowledge, take 20 on any knowledge 1/day, and add half their level to all knowledge skills. Thus, a 6th level bard can reliably pull out a 13+Int Bonus knowledge check, and a 23+Int Bonus once per day.

Given that information, how could a bard exploit this?

(Note for those who remember I'm playing a hobgoblin bard in a PF game: I'm not actually going to do these things. I am, however, going to threaten my DM with them, because it's funny.)

taltamir
2009-11-09, 07:27 PM
Who said it'd be easy to get such? Y'think any upstanding Knowledge deity is gonna let some wet behind the ears adventurers storm and loot his library? I think not.

Also, whose to say it'll even be decipherable by the PCs? It's unlikely it'll all be conveniently in Common or even all be in the same language through out the text. It could easily be a dead language or in code or any number of things.

What I mean by questing for stuff is you gotta balance the gains with appropriate challenge and not against the party's abilities but against what the knowledge is actually worth. If any of this stuff was easy to gain from any of my previous examples, wouldn't some NPC already done so and caused the industrial revolution? We're talking stealing from at least Intermediate Deities, which is definitely not in the power range of low to mid level adventurers.

What it comes down to is that many things are possible, as long as the players understand that there will be different levels of challenge to accomplishing certain rolls and that player knowledge != character knowledge. Just because you have Masters in Theoretical Physics doesn't mean your character does.

Them's my 2 coppers. Take as you will.

if they can't read the texts, how are they taking skill ranks in it?
and ok, its hard to get and the god of knowledge is after them... they still shared a bunch of modern tech with the world and now it is getting industrialized, time to convert the gameplay system.

Another_Poet
2009-11-10, 11:37 AM
None, as D&D knowledge skills aren't good analogues.

But if you want to do it I'd say:
Astronomy & Physics: Kn (Nature)
Geology: Kn (Dungeoneering) (I know Nature would fit too, but can't give too many things to one skill)
Biology: Divided up based on creature type - most real world creatures would either be Kn (Nature) or Kn (Dungeoneering); microbiology might be Heal.
Engineering: Kn (Architecture & Engineering)
Chemistry: Craft (Alchemy)
Oceanography: Profession (Sailor)
Medical science: Heal
Computer Science: Some combination of Craft (electronics) for hardware and Speak Language (Code) plus Gather Info and/or Craft (Code) for software. (Pathfinder would represent this better with a rank of Linguistics to learn code and a single Linguistics check to write it or run it).
Linguistics: Decipher Script
Psychology: Sense Motive
Archaeology: Knowledge (History) plus Knowledge (Geography) plus Search
Anthropology & Ethnic Studies: Knowledge (Local) (with maybe some Knowledge (Religion))
Meteorology: Survival
Skeptics/Debunking: Failed Knowledge (Arcana) check

I think that covers mostly all of it.

Cieyrin
2009-11-10, 05:34 PM
if they can't read the texts, how are they taking skill ranks in it?

They aren't, apparently, given that they probably can't read the texts unless they Decipher Script or some such.


and ok, its hard to get and the god of knowledge is after them... they still shared a bunch of modern tech with the world and now it is getting industrialized, time to convert the gameplay system.

The other problem here is you assume that all this stuff is going to instantly catch on and that NPCs will be able to make use of it easily. People of genius level intellects are hardly understood in their own time, let alone decades later. Also, NPCs aren't necessarily available that would understand what kind of crazy theories you're even talking about and would probably write it off as magic, anyways. Having knowledge of advanced science != being able to implement them in the world, as that takes time, money and manpower that could take years to implement. It's not instantaneous by any means. The advancement of science in our world took centuries to reach the levels they're at, it's not anything you could initialize rapidly by any means.

Them's my 2 coppers. Take as you will.

ShneekeyTheLost
2009-11-10, 07:07 PM
Knowledge (Metagaming) or Profession (McGuyver) should do it

Heliomance
2009-11-10, 07:20 PM
Not that hard, really.

Knowledge: Modern Science

You can have a Knowledge skill on anything that looks like a field.

Knowledge (Meadows)

Bakkan
2009-11-10, 08:11 PM
For advanced understanding of most scientific fields, a good understanding of theoretical mathematics is helpful to necessary.

If your D&D world happens to operate on the Rich Burlew idea of magic (see the intro pages to Dungeon Crawlin' Fools - essentially, magic is very similar to physics in nature), then theoretical mathematics could fit in to Knowledge(Arcana) fairly well. If not, then I would introduce Knowledge(Philosophy), which would include mathematics and logic.


Knowledge (Meadows)

EDIT: Epic win