How much real-world science from things like biology physics and chemistry should be brought into fantasy worlds?

[RainingFish]

Should everything we know about reality be valid in fantasy settings? For example, should everything be made from the same atoms on our periodic table, and should chemistry work the same way? Should Newtonian physics work the same way? Should the conservation laws, such as the law of conservation of energy, work the same way? What real world scientific knowledge do you like to apply to fantasy worlds?

 

[Empress_Omnii]

Just needs consistency. And if the magic system is the primary aspect of the story? I want it to be very developed, but I don't care how scientific it's made.

 

[RepresentingWrath]

Depends on what kind of story you want to make. For example, if it's about cool magic fights, get science out of my story. If it is some kind of knigdom building more science is usually better.

 

[Thraben]

There needs to be consistent biology, physics, chem in fiction, even if it differs heavily from IRL. Anime nonsense is nonsense and I don't want to read it. Hentai logic is nonsense and I don't want to read it. 'He's 250lbs of pure muscle but this 5'4 twink doesn't flinch from his punch' is nonsense and I don't want to read it.

 

[CarburetorThompson]

As always it depends on the story you are trying to tell. Certain themes lend themselves better to a certain level of anchoring in the real world.

Are you writing a ASOIF or a Discworld, something in between or something different altogether.

Personally to me it doesn’t very much matter as long as the world building/ systems are consistent and the story is good

 

[SternenklarenRitter]

Generally speaking, its not actually possible to write a story where science works in a vastly different way than for reality. The worldbuilding may SAY reality works different. But soon enough an attentive reader will find that many of the things and places that exist, as well as the way characters interact with their world and each other, simply assume that their reality works just like ours. Hand-wavey "because its magic" actually ends up more realistic than saying its because science doesn't apply; its easy to consider magic a high-energy state whose decay mechanisms exlusively require interactions with mind/life/soul.

 

[LiteraryWho]

I cast my vote, but technically if you check off too many of those boxes, your story becomes a Sci-Fi story.

 

[CharlesEBrown]

Whatever makes the most sense for the story.

 

[Deleted member 84247]

I just want it to be believable. If you established rules, don't be breaking them for your MC power up. That's all. Unless it's a satisfying break of your rules. Which 99 percent of the time, it won't be.

 

[Woolen_Monkey]

As long as its constant and doesn't fell out of place as much as is needed for the story. Though I am a dumpster reader so don't trust too much of what I say.

Spoiler: Gift

?

 

[AMR]

The best way to is to have some base rules for your magic or any system you choose to implement and then keep to those rules, IMO it makes the world more immersive.

 

[lambenttyto]

I couldn't care less. I want fantasy and I want it to be fantastical. As long as I'm interested in the story and like the characters, I don't care if there are "mistakes" that I perceive in the writing.

I think Brandon Sanderson is a terrible fantasy writer. His magic "systems" are pseudo science disguised as magic, and there's nothing mystical or fantastical about what he writes.

 

[Arkus86]

Personally, I don't care much if magic can ignore real-world science, but there's a point where it breaks suspension of disbelief. An example of such a point are commonly System stories, notably HP values combined with rigid damage system. If I lop off your head, you're dead, I don't care that my sword only does 12 damage and you have 10,000 HP.
I do dream of magic that is loosely based on real-world science, but as what others said, the most important part is consistency - pick a set of rules for your fantasy, and stick with it.

 

[laccoff_mawning]

I think the main problem re-writing physics is the cost to satisfaction ratio. If I say that humans have a magic organ just below the heart that allows them to use magic. Or maybe we could change the periodic table to merely fire, water, earth, air, and aether.

But the more detailed we go, the more likely you're going to end up with something that's dubious.

I will say, though, I generally dislike when people assume the laws of physics are the same in a fantasy world. If magic exists, you can't assume the periodic table also exists, because you can't assume everything is made up of the same types of matter we have if there's very clearly different physical interactions going on than we know of.

 

[ThrillingHuman]

None. Zilch. Nada.

 

[Ai-chan]

If your story involves people riding on swords to the far corners of the universe without a spacesuit and without care for inertia or gravity, living on continents of floating rocks and fighting gigantic gods made of darkness, you will be forgiven for giving up on science completely.

 

[beast_regards]

Same as our world until noted.

Usually, the plot of the average fantasy story doesn't require any substantial level of scrutiny.

Of course, the portal fantasy is a thing, and if it involves a person from our world attempting "one man's industrial revolution" things could get, uhmmm... "sciency" .... but not "too sciency" as we also want the protagonist to have the cake and eat it too, i.e. achieve things in the manageable timeframe.

 

[Bitmaker]

I mean, if we consider conservation of energy and laws of thermodynamics apply, that just kinda prevents most magic (cus you're somehow getting stuff from a state of lower entropy to higher one).
At the end of the day, how much science you use depends on what sort of story you wish to tell, your preferences, your knowledge level and how much you are willing to research.

 

[EldritchCoomer]

Depends on what kind of story you want to make. For example, if it's about cool magic fights, get science out of my story. If it is some kind of knigdom building more science is usually better.

I'll have to disagree having more science in the first example would make breaking it for magic effects and understanding how that works and keeping it consistent within the world that much easier. If you remove the science entirely that's just random bullshit go with no cohesive thoughts about why it should work like that.

 

[RepresentingWrath]

If you remove the science entirely that's just random bullshit go with no cohesive thoughts about why it should work like that.

I didn't write remove science entirely. By removing science I didn't mean you should set your whole story in a black hole that is heated to such a degree that physical laws ain't working anymore. I meant that the vast majority won't care how fireworks work, people just want to see them explode. Should fireworks work in a weird way? No. Should you explain the full process before you light them? No once again.