Imagine a world without Motorcycles

[Leviathan of Maddoc]

So when we played Holistic's Fading suns we had to do a lot of imagining of vehicles in the absence of detailed rules. One of the things I decided was that the Motorcycle was a novelty that didn't survive the First Republic in my games. Harsh I know but I'll explain more. In the Revised edition we have motorcycles but I'd like to make some arguments for why they wouldn't be very common.

1. They're a bit of a fluke. Motorcycles didn't come into being out of engineering need. They were an early motorized vehicle based on popular bicycles. They were never very safe or practical but they returned to fashion time and again because of a romanticism we have with the idea of the motorcycle. I know we have more than a few motorcycle riders who are gamers, as I'm one of them. but lets be honest. If we started our technology over again with what we know now, would we ever ride a vehicle with two in-line wheels? If we want a dexterous off-road vehicle for hunting or scouting we could have trikes or quads that are more stable and allow easier transport of tack. If we want an agile efficient city transport for messengers or food deliveries we could make monowheels that use less fuel and are safer.

2. They're a recreational vehicle in a utility world. Motorcycles aren't practical. They can't carry much cargo. They're difficult to idle with. It's difficult to manage a passenger on one. They offer no protection from the elements. The working class of Fading Suns wouldn't choose them if they had a choice. When we imagine them, motorcycles are typically either being used to cruise stylishly with your gang on or race/perform stunts on. Both of those tasks are mostly the pastime of Nobles and they have much cooler vehicles to play with. Motorcycles in Fading Suns slip into the gap between not utilitarian enough and not cool enough.

3. They're more expensive and more of a hassle than a Horse. Fading Suns' cities are built to accommodate beasts and their riders. A horse runs off grass, can handle any terrain and makes a lot less noise. The point of a mechanical horse would just seem silly to most known worlders and on many levels a motorcycle is an attempt to mechanize the horse.

So I created two personal vehicles. The first was the Myule. It was a 4-wheel open top Autocoach about the size of a modern off-road quad. Myules aren't fancy. They're made for dirty work. They have an engine strong enough to tow a loaded cart or plow a field or power a well pump. Myules are the kind of vehicle that you'd find pulling cargo at a spaceport or working a Scraver excavation site. The Second was a Ring Bike. Ring Bikes are monowheel racers with a saddled engine that rides inside of a single semi-rigid wheel. They're difficult to handle except on flat roads and take some time to accelerate but they're very fuel efficient and can travel and very high speeds. Ring Bikes are the kind of vehicle messengers or package delivery people would use in large cities.

As always your world your way, but I thought I'd share some of my reasoning as to why Motorcycles wouldn't be very common and some of the ways personal conveyance could evolve in your game worlds.

[Angelman]

Very interesting stuff, Leviathan of Maddoc. I think there are room for Leisure vehicles in FS, although you do make some good arguments. (Also, I think Holz might have something to say about this ).

[Bogie]

I could imagine a world without motorcycles but I am not sure if I want to.

Lot's of good points there. A lot of transportation modes rise out of a problem to resolve and the easiest means to do so. I tend to agree with you though, that during the First and Second Republics so many other modes of transportation would have evolved that it would be less likely to "reinvent" the motorcycle.

Were I writing a game similar to Fading Suns from the ground up, I'd probably have gone even farther and not even had hydrocarbon powered vehicles anymore. During the thousands of years of high technology my assumption would be that batteries and portable fusion generators would have completely replaced the need for it. After the collapse the church and nobility were actively keeping technology suppressed.The Guild would be more interested in maintaining what they could rather than reinventing a whole new infrastructure. Worlds that reverted to true primitivist ways would probably be subsistence hunter-gatherers using remnants of whatever they could find, or small farming communities centered on the ruins of Second Republic worlds.

That would be my take on it anyways.

[Holz]

I agree and disagree.

Maybe on a society were everything is high tech we might see motorcycles as leisure or high end sports, but I believe there is a reason why the motorcycle will survive in the year 5000+. It's cheap!

Motorcycles are dirt cheap to build, maintain and anyone can ride.
Yes, there are restrictions on how many people and cargo it can carry. But we always see images from poor countries like India, China or South East Asia with tons of cargo and people. Even here in my country (Brazil), in the slums or small country towns it is easy to see 4 on a motorcycle or carrying dangerously near the limit. Has these people lost common sense? Nope, it is just cheaper that a car. When you earn so little, cheap is good.

When WW2 was over, Japan was devastated, with very little industry left. Honda Motors and Yamaha Motors owners had a chance to provide the population with cheap, easy and reliable way of movement, a 2 stroke engine of 100cc, on a simple frame and a few liters of gas. Not the best motorcycle, yet it would take you where you wanted. Nowadays both companies are dominant of the world market.

There is another thing people forget. The great advantage of the motorcycle is how agile it is. It's great for scouts, patrols, running away in the traffic and avoiding the tree line.

Of course, a land lord won't give his serfs each a motorcycle. Yet freemen, noble, guilds and churchmen would easily use.
Imagine an Orthodox Priest, going village after village in his small scooter. Fast, nimble and easy to fix. Bet chewing gum fixes 50% and duct tape 100%

Well... hope I did not drifted too much on the post. Below are a few examples of motorcycles being wrongfully over capacity.

[Tupteq]

I'll add my two cents to discussion.

Motorcycle fuel doesn't have to be a fossil fuel, it can easily work on methanol (like speedway bike) or even ethanol which is extremely easy to make even in low tech areas. Small moonshine factory should suffice, motorcycles don't "drink" too much

[Bertjammin]

The first session in my recent campaign was set up around a noble joust (with the PCs as guests and the entourage of an NPC) with the twist being that the noble had got a set of skimmer bikes as mounts instead of horses or other beasts.

It was all very gimmicky and done for "japes" - most of the nobility there (bar the Al-Malik guests and the noble himself) had never ridden such marvels and not that many even managed to connect with their opponents.

[Bogie]

[Leviathan of Maddoc]

India reminds me of something I wanted to ask Fading Suns players.
Most of the Fading Suns worlds seems to be about Victorian technology and crushingly poor. Much of rural India is the same. India has a lot of trains and a lot of bicycles. Fading Suns has a number of trains in it's cannon but I haven't seen any reference to the bicycle. Does it make sense to you all that bicycles would be all over the Fading Suns roads? Is there a reason in the fluff that we wouldn't see them.

[Angelman]

I think that makes excellent sense. From now on, bicycles will be a thing in my FSR games

[Bogie]

I don't see why someone wouldn't reinvent the bicycle. I am sure there were all types of personal transportation devices during the Second Republic that resemble nothing of what we have today but with a mistrust of technology and a need to travel around, bicycles would probably make a comeback.

Also, motorcycles still rock.