Nasuverse FSN + SAO: j-jam it in!
- Thread starter daniel_gudman
- Start date
Dead Players
Hm... I've gotten a lot to think about. Some of my assumptions ("Kayaba must keep [Dead Players] from communicating with everyone, not just the [Live Players]") have gotten challenged and I realized I didn't have a thought for why I assumed so.
Trigger On: Gilgamesh
I have definitely given some thought to this already.
In particular... if you think about the three NPs that Gilgamesh actually, personally used in the game, these are the ones that come to mind:
1) Ea
Shirou totally can't reproduce, so it's irrelevant.
2) Enkidu
Shirou only saw this in UBW route, so it's irrelevant.
3) That damn Keyblade thing
The actual treasure that opens the Gate. Probably also what allows him to automatically retrieve what's used; probably also what he uses to hold them in place and launch 'em like bullets. Cost-of-use is probably dependent on personal wealth. But, either way, the high cost of keeping the "Gate" open was Gil's most expensive ability in terms of prana consumption--right up there with his armor.
Shirou explicitly described this one in Fate route.
So... the one that Gil actually had the most "skill" at using, the Key of Babylon, is recorded in Emiya's Database.
...In terms of costs and benefits, using the Key is comparable to deploying the UBW, right? I haven't thought about the specifics too much.
In-game Magic System: Elementalism
So, right now, I've got two [Elemental] Spells that Players can learn:
Psychogenesis and Telekenesis.
Honestly, I made these up entirely. They're not canon at all. However, they exist to fill a "gap" in canon, call it, [Elemental Magecraft] as opposed to [Physical Magecraft]. The thing is, I wanted to pull together Tokiomi's "Wall of Fire" with the various wind-blasts that Rin and Caster use under one "tent", as well as other stuff. I wanted to make a list of basic "elemental" abilities that can be used for any element equally.
My decision was to make them much, much more limited in scope than [Physical Magecraft], but on the other hand, the effect compared to the prana cost is also much higher.
To compare Psychogenesis and Projection, or Gradation Air specifically:
Psychogenesis can only create the pure element, while Projection can create whatever you can imagine. The element only lasts as long as you pay for it to last, but the Projected thing lasts until it's erased by the world. But you can create 100s of kilograms with Psychogenesis compared to 1 kilogram with Projection, and the "mass ratio" of Pschogenesis is highly sensitive to user skill.
The third spell in this series, will be, call it,
3) Paratopeization
Changing the physical properties of an element (without changing the element, although you might get synergies between elements).
For example, Caster changing the air around Saber into a jelly that she could be trapped in, like fruit suspended in jell-o, would be an example of Paratopeization. (This is the example that made me realize I needed a third spell).
Etymology: in the spoiler tag (if you care).
Name subject to change if somebody has a more elegant solution; I'm not in love with this one.
In-game Magic System: General
Actually, Haperry asked a pretty good question in the Preview thread, one I want to think about a little more extensively.
This question got me thinking about what kinds-and-categories of [Magecraft] will exist in the game.
Right now, here's basically everything we've seen:
Physical Magecraft:
1) Reinforcement
(+Runic)
2) Alteration
3) Projection (Referenced)
Elemental Magecraft:
1) Psychogenesis
2) Telekenesis
3) Paratopeization (Just in this post)
Mental Interference: Mystic Eyes of Binding
Mental Enhancement: Trigger On
Witchcraft?: Beer Potion of Elemental Identification
Kayaba-style Spiritual Interference: Circuit Activation (Part of the game, not inside it)
Kayaba-style Spiritual Interference: Circuit Creation (Ditto)
...And that's basically it. Rin did a spiritual synchronization ritual with Ilya but that was crossing the "boundary" of the game world.
In-Game Magic System: Future
It's just a grab-bag or wishlist, but here's a list of spells (and entire categories of spells!) that will be used in the story, or will :
Bounded Fields
Alchemy (Transmutation and/or Transmogrification)
Contracts (Familiar and Geas types)
-Silica's "Beast" Element will involve a lot of this stuff.
-Grimlock knows a lot, related to his Crest.
Curses
-Especially in the "unfair or unreasonable contract" direction.
Mental Interference
Enchantment
-Creation of Mystic Codes etc
Are there any others you can think of?
...Especially, now that I think of it, "Ability Tree" kinds of things where there's a few broad effects that are similar-but-different.
Hm... I've gotten a lot to think about. Some of my assumptions ("Kayaba must keep [Dead Players] from communicating with everyone, not just the [Live Players]") have gotten challenged and I realized I didn't have a thought for why I assumed so.
Trigger On: Gilgamesh
I have definitely given some thought to this already.
In particular... if you think about the three NPs that Gilgamesh actually, personally used in the game, these are the ones that come to mind:
1) Ea
Shirou totally can't reproduce, so it's irrelevant.
2) Enkidu
Shirou only saw this in UBW route, so it's irrelevant.
3) That damn Keyblade thing
The actual treasure that opens the Gate. Probably also what allows him to automatically retrieve what's used; probably also what he uses to hold them in place and launch 'em like bullets. Cost-of-use is probably dependent on personal wealth. But, either way, the high cost of keeping the "Gate" open was Gil's most expensive ability in terms of prana consumption--right up there with his armor.
Shirou explicitly described this one in Fate route.
So... the one that Gil actually had the most "skill" at using, the Key of Babylon, is recorded in Emiya's Database.
...In terms of costs and benefits, using the Key is comparable to deploying the UBW, right? I haven't thought about the specifics too much.
In-game Magic System: Elementalism
So, right now, I've got two [Elemental] Spells that Players can learn:
Psychogenesis and Telekenesis.
Honestly, I made these up entirely. They're not canon at all. However, they exist to fill a "gap" in canon, call it, [Elemental Magecraft] as opposed to [Physical Magecraft]. The thing is, I wanted to pull together Tokiomi's "Wall of Fire" with the various wind-blasts that Rin and Caster use under one "tent", as well as other stuff. I wanted to make a list of basic "elemental" abilities that can be used for any element equally.
My decision was to make them much, much more limited in scope than [Physical Magecraft], but on the other hand, the effect compared to the prana cost is also much higher.
To compare Psychogenesis and Projection, or Gradation Air specifically:
Psychogenesis can only create the pure element, while Projection can create whatever you can imagine. The element only lasts as long as you pay for it to last, but the Projected thing lasts until it's erased by the world. But you can create 100s of kilograms with Psychogenesis compared to 1 kilogram with Projection, and the "mass ratio" of Pschogenesis is highly sensitive to user skill.
The third spell in this series, will be, call it,
3) Paratopeization
Changing the physical properties of an element (without changing the element, although you might get synergies between elements).
For example, Caster changing the air around Saber into a jelly that she could be trapped in, like fruit suspended in jell-o, would be an example of Paratopeization. (This is the example that made me realize I needed a third spell).
Etymology: in the spoiler tag (if you care).
To stick with the pseudo-Greek name:
"para" for near,
"tope" for place, (got the idea from nuclear "isotope", which is "same+place", referring to the periodic table.)
"ize" not "ise" for "change into" (because I'm an American) to verbify it,
and
"-ation", for "action of (verb)", because of course a suffix from Latin into Middle English by way of Old French, how ever else would you remember the Norman Conquest.
...Compared to the other two nothing really obvious jumped out at me, and since I wanted to stick with the pseudoscientific nomenclature, I was stuck thinking up my own jargon.
"para" for near,
"tope" for place, (got the idea from nuclear "isotope", which is "same+place", referring to the periodic table.)
"ize" not "ise" for "change into" (because I'm an American) to verbify it,
and
"-ation", for "action of (verb)", because of course a suffix from Latin into Middle English by way of Old French, how ever else would you remember the Norman Conquest.
...Compared to the other two nothing really obvious jumped out at me, and since I wanted to stick with the pseudoscientific nomenclature, I was stuck thinking up my own jargon.
In-game Magic System: General
Actually, Haperry asked a pretty good question in the Preview thread, one I want to think about a little more extensively.
This question got me thinking about what kinds-and-categories of [Magecraft] will exist in the game.
Right now, here's basically everything we've seen:
Physical Magecraft:
1) Reinforcement
(+Runic)
2) Alteration
3) Projection (Referenced)
Elemental Magecraft:
1) Psychogenesis
2) Telekenesis
3) Paratopeization (Just in this post)
Mental Interference: Mystic Eyes of Binding
Mental Enhancement: Trigger On
Witchcraft?: Beer Potion of Elemental Identification
Kayaba-style Spiritual Interference: Circuit Activation (Part of the game, not inside it)
Kayaba-style Spiritual Interference: Circuit Creation (Ditto)
...And that's basically it. Rin did a spiritual synchronization ritual with Ilya but that was crossing the "boundary" of the game world.
In-Game Magic System: Future
It's just a grab-bag or wishlist, but here's a list of spells (and entire categories of spells!) that will be used in the story, or will :
Bounded Fields
Alchemy (Transmutation and/or Transmogrification)
Contracts (Familiar and Geas types)
-Silica's "Beast" Element will involve a lot of this stuff.
-Grimlock knows a lot, related to his Crest.
Curses
-Especially in the "unfair or unreasonable contract" direction.
Mental Interference
Enchantment
-Creation of Mystic Codes etc
Are there any others you can think of?
...Especially, now that I think of it, "Ability Tree" kinds of things where there's a few broad effects that are similar-but-different.
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Divination? Formalcraft? I thought Argo was going to learn Formalcraft to get around her lack of circuits until our hero taught her how to make temporary ones? And didn't you claim Kirito was going to learn Numerology? How about Geomancy? After all, Leylines are kinda important in the [real world], and Kayaba should know about them because aren't they the reason the Holy Grail War was set where it was?
Maybe some bits of what he's learned of Onmyoudou type magic, being as it is used in Japan so he might have found info on it..
Nothing else I can think of at the moment.
Maybe some bits of what he's learned of Onmyoudou type magic, being as it is used in Japan so he might have found info on it..
Nothing else I can think of at the moment.
Another way to ask 'What kind of magic will players develop' is to ask 'What effects in other games are useful enough that someone would want to replicate them'.
For example, take final fantasy. The Spell/Ability [Auto Life], which is a status effect that casts Life on you when you die... even if they can't duplicate coming back to life, a healing spell that you can cast on someone before a battle, that triggers when they get hurt to heal them.. wouldn't that be useful?
Or for MGLN, we've already seen that things like Intelligent Devices are possible in Nasuverse, even if the group isn't going to come up with anything as good as Ruby, but what about Divine Shooter and other guided shot type attacks? Energy packets that you can control with your mind, and fly fast enough to break bones.. well, I might try to copy that if I was in there.
Or, looking at it by the way of 'I know basic physics, how can I abuse that.', what happens when someone tries trapping some air in a magic airtight bubble and then squeezing it.. until Nuclear Fusion starts? (Or water or whatever)
I'm sure you, and other people, can think of more things in games that people might try to duplicate.
For example, take final fantasy. The Spell/Ability [Auto Life], which is a status effect that casts Life on you when you die... even if they can't duplicate coming back to life, a healing spell that you can cast on someone before a battle, that triggers when they get hurt to heal them.. wouldn't that be useful?
Or for MGLN, we've already seen that things like Intelligent Devices are possible in Nasuverse, even if the group isn't going to come up with anything as good as Ruby, but what about Divine Shooter and other guided shot type attacks? Energy packets that you can control with your mind, and fly fast enough to break bones.. well, I might try to copy that if I was in there.
Or, looking at it by the way of 'I know basic physics, how can I abuse that.', what happens when someone tries trapping some air in a magic airtight bubble and then squeezing it.. until Nuclear Fusion starts? (Or water or whatever)
I'm sure you, and other people, can think of more things in games that people might try to duplicate.
Honestly the best way of doing it would probably frame it in video game references. After all, they are in one, and even if it's a simulation of real world in some parts, the ultimate goal is to beat the game. Which means beating the end boss.
Hence everything is going to be geared towards combat. The players are going to think in those terms.
Pets, status effects, elemental attacks. Pets in particular are going to be a big draw since they are expendable.
The crafters are going to think "How do I protect" and "How do I help people kill"
So, my suggestion is to have a lot of the spells cribbed heavily off of video games. That's what the players are going to think.
Hence everything is going to be geared towards combat. The players are going to think in those terms.
Pets, status effects, elemental attacks. Pets in particular are going to be a big draw since they are expendable.
The crafters are going to think "How do I protect" and "How do I help people kill"
So, my suggestion is to have a lot of the spells cribbed heavily off of video games. That's what the players are going to think.
Regarding the Gate of Babylon:
- If you take CCC as canon, there's a separate Noble Phantasm inside the Gate that retrieves fired NPs
- Supposedly, the primary cost to using the GoB is opening it (though no indication is given as to how high this cost is); actually firing things takes relatively little prana. This is probably what the orphan factory was used to power, so take it as you will
- The contents of the Gate depend on the user's wealth
I believe the general reasoning is that Shirou would be able to project it, but he would get his own vault with nothing in it. It's not like hammerspace is useless, though.
At any rate, this stuff is a mix of unverified information and my personal interpretation, so take it with a grain of salt.
- If you take CCC as canon, there's a separate Noble Phantasm inside the Gate that retrieves fired NPs
- Supposedly, the primary cost to using the GoB is opening it (though no indication is given as to how high this cost is); actually firing things takes relatively little prana. This is probably what the orphan factory was used to power, so take it as you will
- The contents of the Gate depend on the user's wealth
I believe the general reasoning is that Shirou would be able to project it, but he would get his own vault with nothing in it. It's not like hammerspace is useless, though.
At any rate, this stuff is a mix of unverified information and my personal interpretation, so take it with a grain of salt.
1) Actually, given the...File-size of Shirou's attempts at tracing Noble Phantasms, it would make sense for him to reach a point where he can emulate Ea's effect (actually, Enuma Elish's effect) in-game.
2) I doubt that there is anything inside the game with a divine enough attribute for Enkidu to be more than a waste of prana, anyway.
3) Shirou can probably use telekinesis on swords inside SAO, but the auto-retrieve function may trip him up. Perhaps while being a blacksmith, he makes a "holder type" sword, in the vein of [money pouches], [backpacks] or [quivers], and then he works his way up form there...to distribute swords faster, of course. He doesn't want to be like the King of Carelessness.
2) I doubt that there is anything inside the game with a divine enough attribute for Enkidu to be more than a waste of prana, anyway.
3) Shirou can probably use telekinesis on swords inside SAO, but the auto-retrieve function may trip him up. Perhaps while being a blacksmith, he makes a "holder type" sword, in the vein of [money pouches], [backpacks] or [quivers], and then he works his way up form there...to distribute swords faster, of course. He doesn't want to be like the King of Carelessness.
To me the most important bit was [Gil's Actually Good At Something! Skill Bonus!] to sword-related [Telekinesis].
Weapon Crafting
Okay here's the crafting system I made up for weapons. It will be similar to the system for crafting equipment like armor, and there will be some Venn-diagram overlap between this and [Building stuff].
So in canon, or rather, on Lisbeth's character sheet, the skills I'm thinking about right now are:
[Slash Weapon Forging]
[Thrust Weapon Forging]
[Blunt Weapon Forging]
[Metal Refining]
(This is where the Venn overlap with the [Building Stuff] rules comes into play: both [Metal Refining] and [Smelting] (from 6.1) can be used to turn Metal Ore => Metal Ingots (or whatever); but [Smelting] is like 1,000x more productive in time/results ratio, while [Metal Refining] can be used to improve the quality of Ingots).
(Liz also had [Metal Equipment Repairing], [Light Metal Armor Forging], and [Heavy Metal Armor Forging], but I'll set those aside for now).
Player Inputs
When designing a weapon, Players designate:
1) Applicable Skill
Which [Weapon Skill] the weapon is intended to be used with. Used by Cardinal's procedural generator system as an input.
2) Length
The overall length of the weapon. Deviation from the "default" value based on the input [Weapon Skill] is a function of [Forging Skill(s)]. Inter-related with [Mass].
3) Mass (with inputs)
How much the weapon weighs, or more precisely, how much it masses. Deviation from the "default" value based on the input [Weapon Skill] is a function of [Forging Skill(s)]. Inter-related with [Length].
The player has to drop an appropriate amount of material (Iron, Bronze, Stone, wood, whatever) into a composition window to produce the weapon. As a limit, no more than 255 different items can be used as inputs, and their total mass (incremented in milligrams) has to add up to total mass of the weapon.
There are a few "recipes" available from NPCs, and a few well-known common pitfalls; if an appropriate fraction of a spear or axe isn't wood or some other "handle material", or the player hasn't increased the mass ratio relative to the length, then the result won't be a failure... technically. It'll have weird proportions. But in general you just put in the best-quality metal you can.
...In the beta the playerbase had just started finding "magical" metals that could make your weapon fire-aspected, or gave a bonus to stats, but those materials have all been disabled by Kayaba (although creating such materials is a valid use of [Magecraft]).
Something like [Low Quality Iron] has a weight in your inventory, so you can decrement it and, like, shave off a few milligrams for a weapon.
...Because Shirou has maxed out his Structural Grasp until it's so hax he's basically cheating, he can even look at the underlying randomly-generated properties of the input items. This he could theoretically have an item input window that lists like, twelve different pieces of [Low Quality Iron] in arbitrary-looking fractions, but that's because he's min-maxing the "impurities" to get exactly the right percentages that he needs; just like IRL, the goal is to get the perfect wt% of adjutants rather than making your iron "pure". He'll even commit the heresy of using [Ultra Pure Iron] and [Low Quality Iron] at the same time, for that reason.
4) Parameters
Just like they could have chosen from five different values for [Weapon Enhancement] before Kayaba threw that out, (and still can do so with [Reinforcement] and similar spells), Weapon Smiths designate the following five attributes as a percentage (default 20% each):
Sharpness
Quickness
Accuracy
Heaviness
Durability
These are what the weaponsmith chooses as being "important" or "distinctive" about the weapon.
(I got the idea for that from a throwaway line that Liz focused on Sharpness + Accuracy originally to max out DPS so battles would end faster, but balanced with Durability after Kirito broke her best sword so that her blades wouldn't fail her customers when they needed them; I wanted a system that made such things clear and concrete).
Distinction: While "Mass" represents how much the item weighs, high "Heaviness" compared to that implies, to me, a longer moment arm on the weapon, so that it has higher rotational inertia. This is, on inspection, also exactly what "Quickness" is measuring?
5) Once all the design inputs are selected, the Player materializes an "ingot", whacks it ten times with their [Hammer] (each whack is a [Skill Check] vs the [Forging] Skill), and then after that, out pops the weapon!
...During one of the [Floor Patches], a new pop-up was added at the end, so that Smiths could replace the [Autoname] with whatever input they wanted; any player with [Metal Equipment Reparing] can pull that back up to re-name an item, but all previous names are retained and can be discovered with [Appraise] Skill or [Structural Grasp].
...Shirou will number all swords he produces sequentially, unless a customer ordering a bespoke sword has a preference. By contrast, Liz accepts the [Autoname] unless something better occurs to her. It's a rule at [Takachan's Emporium] that all guild members will rename any item for free (NPCs charge), as a way to get customers in the door.
Anecdote Time
Also, this might just be related to the "research" I did for Part 6.1, but while playing Minecraft, after I dug up my first iron ore, I was like, "okay! Obviously I have to convert this to iron, probably by feeding it into a blast furnace or something." (Really you just use that oven thing).
Then when I got my iron, I immediately cooked it again (this time with charcoal, because charcoal burns hotter than wood, and a higher-temp burn means I could up the Carbon Monoxide content with oxygen starvation, which made me wonder if Minecraft has asphyxiation rules because I was doing this in an enclosed space), because obviously I wanted to make STEEL.
Well, that didn't work. "I know! I'll try and build a BESSEMER CONVERTER."
Well, that didn't work.
Finally in disgust I went to google to find out how to make steel in Minecraft.
Spoilers: You DON'T.
Anyway,
This is your Mind, on Steel
In the next section I want Shirou to be the one to "invent" [Steel] as a material by adding a carbon-source (he'll drag Liz off and start a forest fire or something), but that only works if Shirou is in the same place as me mentally: OBVIOUSLY the next step is to add a carbon impurity to your high-purity iron... but it's not obvious to anyone else at all.
So proximately, I want to ask:
When I described the "mass-fraction" way to make swords, did you immediately think "oh! Then I should add 2 %wt charcoal to my iron to make STEEL", or not? Because that gag with Liz won't work unless most people didn't immediately think "STEEL TIME."
Weapon Crafting
Okay here's the crafting system I made up for weapons. It will be similar to the system for crafting equipment like armor, and there will be some Venn-diagram overlap between this and [Building stuff].
So in canon, or rather, on Lisbeth's character sheet, the skills I'm thinking about right now are:
[Slash Weapon Forging]
[Thrust Weapon Forging]
[Blunt Weapon Forging]
[Metal Refining]
(This is where the Venn overlap with the [Building Stuff] rules comes into play: both [Metal Refining] and [Smelting] (from 6.1) can be used to turn Metal Ore => Metal Ingots (or whatever); but [Smelting] is like 1,000x more productive in time/results ratio, while [Metal Refining] can be used to improve the quality of Ingots).
(Liz also had [Metal Equipment Repairing], [Light Metal Armor Forging], and [Heavy Metal Armor Forging], but I'll set those aside for now).
Player Inputs
When designing a weapon, Players designate:
1) Applicable Skill
Which [Weapon Skill] the weapon is intended to be used with. Used by Cardinal's procedural generator system as an input.
2) Length
The overall length of the weapon. Deviation from the "default" value based on the input [Weapon Skill] is a function of [Forging Skill(s)]. Inter-related with [Mass].
3) Mass (with inputs)
How much the weapon weighs, or more precisely, how much it masses. Deviation from the "default" value based on the input [Weapon Skill] is a function of [Forging Skill(s)]. Inter-related with [Length].
The player has to drop an appropriate amount of material (Iron, Bronze, Stone, wood, whatever) into a composition window to produce the weapon. As a limit, no more than 255 different items can be used as inputs, and their total mass (incremented in milligrams) has to add up to total mass of the weapon.
There are a few "recipes" available from NPCs, and a few well-known common pitfalls; if an appropriate fraction of a spear or axe isn't wood or some other "handle material", or the player hasn't increased the mass ratio relative to the length, then the result won't be a failure... technically. It'll have weird proportions. But in general you just put in the best-quality metal you can.
...In the beta the playerbase had just started finding "magical" metals that could make your weapon fire-aspected, or gave a bonus to stats, but those materials have all been disabled by Kayaba (although creating such materials is a valid use of [Magecraft]).
Something like [Low Quality Iron] has a weight in your inventory, so you can decrement it and, like, shave off a few milligrams for a weapon.
...Because Shirou has maxed out his Structural Grasp until it's so hax he's basically cheating, he can even look at the underlying randomly-generated properties of the input items. This he could theoretically have an item input window that lists like, twelve different pieces of [Low Quality Iron] in arbitrary-looking fractions, but that's because he's min-maxing the "impurities" to get exactly the right percentages that he needs; just like IRL, the goal is to get the perfect wt% of adjutants rather than making your iron "pure". He'll even commit the heresy of using [Ultra Pure Iron] and [Low Quality Iron] at the same time, for that reason.
4) Parameters
Just like they could have chosen from five different values for [Weapon Enhancement] before Kayaba threw that out, (and still can do so with [Reinforcement] and similar spells), Weapon Smiths designate the following five attributes as a percentage (default 20% each):
Sharpness
Quickness
Accuracy
Heaviness
Durability
These are what the weaponsmith chooses as being "important" or "distinctive" about the weapon.
(I got the idea for that from a throwaway line that Liz focused on Sharpness + Accuracy originally to max out DPS so battles would end faster, but balanced with Durability after Kirito broke her best sword so that her blades wouldn't fail her customers when they needed them; I wanted a system that made such things clear and concrete).
Distinction: While "Mass" represents how much the item weighs, high "Heaviness" compared to that implies, to me, a longer moment arm on the weapon, so that it has higher rotational inertia. This is, on inspection, also exactly what "Quickness" is measuring?
5) Once all the design inputs are selected, the Player materializes an "ingot", whacks it ten times with their [Hammer] (each whack is a [Skill Check] vs the [Forging] Skill), and then after that, out pops the weapon!
...During one of the [Floor Patches], a new pop-up was added at the end, so that Smiths could replace the [Autoname] with whatever input they wanted; any player with [Metal Equipment Reparing] can pull that back up to re-name an item, but all previous names are retained and can be discovered with [Appraise] Skill or [Structural Grasp].
...Shirou will number all swords he produces sequentially, unless a customer ordering a bespoke sword has a preference. By contrast, Liz accepts the [Autoname] unless something better occurs to her. It's a rule at [Takachan's Emporium] that all guild members will rename any item for free (NPCs charge), as a way to get customers in the door.
Anecdote Time
Also, this might just be related to the "research" I did for Part 6.1, but while playing Minecraft, after I dug up my first iron ore, I was like, "okay! Obviously I have to convert this to iron, probably by feeding it into a blast furnace or something." (Really you just use that oven thing).
Then when I got my iron, I immediately cooked it again (this time with charcoal, because charcoal burns hotter than wood, and a higher-temp burn means I could up the Carbon Monoxide content with oxygen starvation, which made me wonder if Minecraft has asphyxiation rules because I was doing this in an enclosed space), because obviously I wanted to make STEEL.
Well, that didn't work. "I know! I'll try and build a BESSEMER CONVERTER."
Well, that didn't work.
Finally in disgust I went to google to find out how to make steel in Minecraft.
Spoilers: You DON'T.
Anyway,
This is your Mind, on Steel
In the next section I want Shirou to be the one to "invent" [Steel] as a material by adding a carbon-source (he'll drag Liz off and start a forest fire or something), but that only works if Shirou is in the same place as me mentally: OBVIOUSLY the next step is to add a carbon impurity to your high-purity iron... but it's not obvious to anyone else at all.
So proximately, I want to ask:
When I described the "mass-fraction" way to make swords, did you immediately think "oh! Then I should add 2 %wt charcoal to my iron to make STEEL", or not? Because that gag with Liz won't work unless most people didn't immediately think "STEEL TIME."
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I'll admit that 'Steel time!" didn't come immediately to my mind, but it probably would of if I'd been thinking of it long enough.. of course, if it takes a high amount of Structural Grasp to know what the % things are, I'd call it fair to claim that he's the only blacksmith who's got it high enough to see that stuff yet...
I take it that the blacksmithing and other "trade skills" are also going to gain more realism as time goes on? After all, it'd be pretty bad if the SAO survivors ended up in the real world, only to realize that the blacksmiths can't actually craft and enchant the swords like they had trained themselves to do in game due to the fact that they don't know how to actually forge a sword.
Still, it is an interesting idea for Shirou to begin getting the blacksmiths into doing more experimenting with their weapon forging just by introducing them to creating steel rather than carbon. Strangely enough, Shirou's knowledge on metallurgy is probably obscenely advanced thanks to him having the material compositions of Noble Phantasms sitting in his head. He could look at the blueprint for Monohoshizao and know exactly how it was forged and do his best to make a mundane equivalent of it. Should definitely prove interesting.
As for the joke, I don't get it, but then again I only knew that Steel was created by mixing various metals and other elements. Still, I think rather than focusing on that being how to make steel, you should instead focus on the aspect that Shirou acts like everyone should know that formula to make steel in the first place.
Still, it is an interesting idea for Shirou to begin getting the blacksmiths into doing more experimenting with their weapon forging just by introducing them to creating steel rather than carbon. Strangely enough, Shirou's knowledge on metallurgy is probably obscenely advanced thanks to him having the material compositions of Noble Phantasms sitting in his head. He could look at the blueprint for Monohoshizao and know exactly how it was forged and do his best to make a mundane equivalent of it. Should definitely prove interesting.
As for the joke, I don't get it, but then again I only knew that Steel was created by mixing various metals and other elements. Still, I think rather than focusing on that being how to make steel, you should instead focus on the aspect that Shirou acts like everyone should know that formula to make steel in the first place.
I was under the impression the Gate and the Vault are separate things.
The parameters are probably mostly for the Sword Arts - Accuracy doesn't make much sense to me otherwise. With that in mind, I'd guess Heaviness would be something like the weight/force behind a blow (e.g. hammers would have high Heaviness), which Quickness is speed of execution (e.g. daggers/rapiers would have high Quickness).
On a related note, will the Sword Arts disappear at some point? Maybe they'd be disabled when on or above a certain floor? It seems likely they'd at least lose their bonus damage.
The parameters are probably mostly for the Sword Arts - Accuracy doesn't make much sense to me otherwise. With that in mind, I'd guess Heaviness would be something like the weight/force behind a blow (e.g. hammers would have high Heaviness), which Quickness is speed of execution (e.g. daggers/rapiers would have high Quickness).
On a related note, will the Sword Arts disappear at some point? Maybe they'd be disabled when on or above a certain floor? It seems likely they'd at least lose their bonus damage.
It would probably be smarter to actually leave that decision to the players themselves. Like, after a patch suddenly the player have access to a slider.
Right now the players have Full System Support making it so that the players deliver their SA's perfectly just by "chambering" the attack, like in canon. However they suffer from a couple of downsides. Namely the downtime between SA's that Shirou hates oh so much and Kirito's downfall during his second duel against Heatcliff in SAO canon : once launched, you can't cancel your SA, you have to carry it out to the end useless staggered, so if you misjudged the target you're fucked.
From there you can slide the System Support down. The less support you have, the more you have to direct the attacks yourself, making it much harder. On the Other hand, the downtime is proportionally reduced and you can now actually get the fuck out of dodge if you misfired.
Also, probably some bonus damages too. Kabaya is trying to teach the players how to fight after all so some further encouragement to let of the training wheels can only help.
That's how I think it should be handled.
Right now the players have Full System Support making it so that the players deliver their SA's perfectly just by "chambering" the attack, like in canon. However they suffer from a couple of downsides. Namely the downtime between SA's that Shirou hates oh so much and Kirito's downfall during his second duel against Heatcliff in SAO canon : once launched, you can't cancel your SA, you have to carry it out to the end useless staggered, so if you misjudged the target you're fucked.
From there you can slide the System Support down. The less support you have, the more you have to direct the attacks yourself, making it much harder. On the Other hand, the downtime is proportionally reduced and you can now actually get the fuck out of dodge if you misfired.
Also, probably some bonus damages too. Kabaya is trying to teach the players how to fight after all so some further encouragement to let of the training wheels can only help.
That's how I think it should be handled.
Cool. It would actually be interesting if using that Trigger caused Shirou to cross his arms over his chest, and assume a superior attitude that looks down upon his opponents.
I'm not suggesting that he would become totally like Gilgamesh, but that his attitude would become more like Gilgamesh's. Just as his attitude became more like "Sasaki's", allowing him to benefit from Assassin's "Peaceful Soul" as well as his unrelated sword techniques.
Cool.
I like this explanation for why Kirito was able to so easily shatter her best work. But by throw-away line, do you mean a line that you wrote, or something official?
Lisbeth: "Why do you do that, Shirou? All of your work is so beautiful. How can you put so much care into making them and yet care so little as to simply number them?"
Shirou: "Do you name each strand of hair on your head, or every cell in your body? If my body is made of swords, these swords are just small parts of me; a handful amidst infinite weapons."
That sucks, man.
I'm reminded of what Extra Credit said just this week about Negative Possibility Space and similar disappointments of player expectations.
AWESOME.
I'm afraid my chemistry/metallurgy isn't up to understanding this.
But someone shouting "STEEL TIME" and getting fired up about SCIENCE is funny and cool.
I'm not suggesting that he would become totally like Gilgamesh, but that his attitude would become more like Gilgamesh's. Just as his attitude became more like "Sasaki's", allowing him to benefit from Assassin's "Peaceful Soul" as well as his unrelated sword techniques.
Cool.
I like this explanation for why Kirito was able to so easily shatter her best work. But by throw-away line, do you mean a line that you wrote, or something official?
Lisbeth: "Why do you do that, Shirou? All of your work is so beautiful. How can you put so much care into making them and yet care so little as to simply number them?"
Shirou: "Do you name each strand of hair on your head, or every cell in your body? If my body is made of swords, these swords are just small parts of me; a handful amidst infinite weapons."
That sucks, man.
I'm reminded of what Extra Credit said just this week about Negative Possibility Space and similar disappointments of player expectations.
AWESOME.
I'm afraid my chemistry/metallurgy isn't up to understanding this.
But someone shouting "STEEL TIME" and getting fired up about SCIENCE is funny and cool.
@: will shirou charge?
Good question. Shirou has enough practical sense to know that altruistics need to eat, and practicing crafting skills (especially more than one, if he decides to diversify) will not only eat into his money-farming time, but also his existing funds.
He will at least require his customers to pay the cost of materials (with some exceptions), though he may be generous with the price he puts on his time and effort. But that price may be affected by Ilya's demands on his time and energy.
Next question: We know that Shirou's "swords" can include armor (or was the exact term "defensive armaments", which might refer to shields?), so will Shirou branch out into protective products, or focus exclusively on weapons?
Good question. Shirou has enough practical sense to know that altruistics need to eat, and practicing crafting skills (especially more than one, if he decides to diversify) will not only eat into his money-farming time, but also his existing funds.
He will at least require his customers to pay the cost of materials (with some exceptions), though he may be generous with the price he puts on his time and effort. But that price may be affected by Ilya's demands on his time and energy.
Next question: We know that Shirou's "swords" can include armor (or was the exact term "defensive armaments", which might refer to shields?), so will Shirou branch out into protective products, or focus exclusively on weapons?
"Armament" only. Shields are still, technically, blunt weapons. They can be use offensively, whereas armors are entirely defensive. Ergo, they're not "armaments".
Speaking of : MAN AT ARMS.
Speaking of : MAN AT ARMS.
Shirou has dozens or even hundreds of masterwork weapons created during the Age of Legends from all over the world and accumulated by the King of Kings in his treasury. What he has is not just the weapons, but the complete history starting from the basic concept the weaponsmith started with before even picking up tools. He has perfect blueprints and assembly instructions without any missing steps for production of one kind of Precursor Technology, basically.
I guess my point is, if he spent 10 years synthesizing that huge mass of data into knowledge (possibly if he was forced to use them as references to create his own swords in a situation where he can't just reproduce them), then...
He could kinda, single-handedly recreate one corner of the Age of Legends, couldn't he?
It's something Reki wrote, although I don't know where. Or rather, I looked around a little bit, and don't remember where I found it.
...Everybody hold on to your mortarboards, because once again, it's
Science Time
"wt %" means "weight percentage" or "percent by weight"; so, 2 wt% means that for every 100 grams of steel, 2 grams would be carbon. Since carbon and iron have different sizes they occupy different amounts of space in the molecular lattice, so the molar percent (percent of total atomic count) or the v% (percent by volume) are both different.
If you have a pound of water and a pound of steam, they'd each be 50% by weight, but since air is like, 900 times less dense, the same system of a pound of water and a pound of air would be better than 99% air (by volume).
That's why even though percentage is a dimensionless quantity (since it's always the ratio of two values with the same units, the units cancel to zero), it will often be expressed (in engineering use) with a dimensional value.
Chemists sometimes use a "Mass concentration" or "Percentage Solution" value that's mass (solute) / volume (solvent), but that's technically a density (with implicit units!), not a percentage.
"Steel" is iron, a crystalline metal with several phases. These phases are different geometric arrangements of the iron atoms in the lattice, with different metallic bonding properties associated with them. Impurities in the chrystal can be dislocations between phase grains, or inclusions of foreign (non-iron) atoms. Well, having other atoms sprinkled through the crystal changes the lattice structure, and some of these are beneficial from our perspective; silicon, carbon, vanadium, chromium, in the correct amounts these will stress and distort the lattice in ways that actually improves its macroscopic properties.
Well, I've only taken a couple courses, if you're interested, you could go get your doctorate studying this kind of stuff and then become a professor of metallurgy for the rest of your life learning more.
"Damascus Steel" usually refers to a Wootz steel, which is a martensite/pearlite matrix, with a pattern of banding or sheeting of micro carbides. (That much I had to look up on Wikipedia). To this day we don't know how exactly it was produced, but the metullurgy is pretty well understood.
"Martinsite" and "Pearlite" are two different crystalline phases of steel; Martinsite is the hardest while Pearlite is softer (therefore tougher). The layering increased the flexural strength without sacrificing the surface hardness, which is pretty much the single governing factor for sharpness.
...My point is, that compared to modern industrial steels, what's called "Damascus Steel" isn't anything special or remarkable. You can buy stuff with better properties by the ton.
...It's hard to machine, so we don't use it for cutting blades, but the stuff used for industrial rock pulverizers, called Mangalloy or "high manganese steel", (10 - 13 wt% Manganese), is three times as hard as regular high-carbon steel and as tough as medium-carbon steel. Well, what that means is, it's got the properties ascribed to "adamantium" in myth.
I guess my point is, there's a lot of places where scientific knowledge has demoted "Magic" to "Regular Magecraft"; I'm pretty sure a lot of the ones relating to metals count.
Well, leaving aside all that, I think I have a better idea of how I want to write the next bit.
Personally I have a lot of respect for John Clements as a historian and researcher.
...Glazing people's eyes while carrying on about metallurgy, that shouldn't be too hard for me.
...As for Shirou's cost, he'll keep doing it for free, or rather, he'll send you on a fetch quest to gather materials for your own sword (because of the myth bonus for doing so), unless you complain about the quest being too dangerous. But Ilya and Liz will definitely give him a hard time about doing everything gratis, to the point "sneaking past Liz" is explicitly part of the [Quest] listed in Argo's Guide.
He might pull an Olivander and have a bunch of prototypes laying around, and he'll stick one in your hands and say "swing it", and then use his OP Structural Grasp to determine what would be the best fit for you, then go make it.
...Or rather, he might just snap his fingers and create prototypes with [Projection], and then [Alter] that until he has a perfect plan.
I guess my point is, if he spent 10 years synthesizing that huge mass of data into knowledge (possibly if he was forced to use them as references to create his own swords in a situation where he can't just reproduce them), then...
He could kinda, single-handedly recreate one corner of the Age of Legends, couldn't he?
It's something Reki wrote, although I don't know where. Or rather, I looked around a little bit, and don't remember where I found it.
...Everybody hold on to your mortarboards, because once again, it's
Science Time
"wt %" means "weight percentage" or "percent by weight"; so, 2 wt% means that for every 100 grams of steel, 2 grams would be carbon. Since carbon and iron have different sizes they occupy different amounts of space in the molecular lattice, so the molar percent (percent of total atomic count) or the v% (percent by volume) are both different.
If you have a pound of water and a pound of steam, they'd each be 50% by weight, but since air is like, 900 times less dense, the same system of a pound of water and a pound of air would be better than 99% air (by volume).
That's why even though percentage is a dimensionless quantity (since it's always the ratio of two values with the same units, the units cancel to zero), it will often be expressed (in engineering use) with a dimensional value.
Chemists sometimes use a "Mass concentration" or "Percentage Solution" value that's mass (solute) / volume (solvent), but that's technically a density (with implicit units!), not a percentage.
"Steel" is iron, a crystalline metal with several phases. These phases are different geometric arrangements of the iron atoms in the lattice, with different metallic bonding properties associated with them. Impurities in the chrystal can be dislocations between phase grains, or inclusions of foreign (non-iron) atoms. Well, having other atoms sprinkled through the crystal changes the lattice structure, and some of these are beneficial from our perspective; silicon, carbon, vanadium, chromium, in the correct amounts these will stress and distort the lattice in ways that actually improves its macroscopic properties.
Well, I've only taken a couple courses, if you're interested, you could go get your doctorate studying this kind of stuff and then become a professor of metallurgy for the rest of your life learning more.
"Damascus Steel" usually refers to a Wootz steel, which is a martensite/pearlite matrix, with a pattern of banding or sheeting of micro carbides. (That much I had to look up on Wikipedia). To this day we don't know how exactly it was produced, but the metullurgy is pretty well understood.
"Martinsite" and "Pearlite" are two different crystalline phases of steel; Martinsite is the hardest while Pearlite is softer (therefore tougher). The layering increased the flexural strength without sacrificing the surface hardness, which is pretty much the single governing factor for sharpness.
...My point is, that compared to modern industrial steels, what's called "Damascus Steel" isn't anything special or remarkable. You can buy stuff with better properties by the ton.
...It's hard to machine, so we don't use it for cutting blades, but the stuff used for industrial rock pulverizers, called Mangalloy or "high manganese steel", (10 - 13 wt% Manganese), is three times as hard as regular high-carbon steel and as tough as medium-carbon steel. Well, what that means is, it's got the properties ascribed to "adamantium" in myth.
I guess my point is, there's a lot of places where scientific knowledge has demoted "Magic" to "Regular Magecraft"; I'm pretty sure a lot of the ones relating to metals count.
Well, leaving aside all that, I think I have a better idea of how I want to write the next bit.
Personally I have a lot of respect for John Clements as a historian and researcher.
...Glazing people's eyes while carrying on about metallurgy, that shouldn't be too hard for me.
...As for Shirou's cost, he'll keep doing it for free, or rather, he'll send you on a fetch quest to gather materials for your own sword (because of the myth bonus for doing so), unless you complain about the quest being too dangerous. But Ilya and Liz will definitely give him a hard time about doing everything gratis, to the point "sneaking past Liz" is explicitly part of the [Quest] listed in Argo's Guide.
He might pull an Olivander and have a bunch of prototypes laying around, and he'll stick one in your hands and say "swing it", and then use his OP Structural Grasp to determine what would be the best fit for you, then go make it.
...Or rather, he might just snap his fingers and create prototypes with [Projection], and then [Alter] that until he has a perfect plan.
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Well, I know there are some games where armor (specifically, gauntlets) increases the damage of unarmed attacks...
But Armorsmithing wouldn't really fit Shirou anyways. And it's not like Shirou has seen a bunch of magic armor.
Since it looks like he's going to be working closely with Liz, maybe they'll do something where he focuses on Arms and she focuses on Armor?
But Armorsmithing wouldn't really fit Shirou anyways. And it's not like Shirou has seen a bunch of magic armor.
Since it looks like he's going to be working closely with Liz, maybe they'll do something where he focuses on Arms and she focuses on Armor?
I've said that repeatedly, across various forums.
It's really something of a tragedy that Shirou would sooner be an Enforcer for the Clocktower than one of its researchers (especially post-UBW). Though maybe Rin will browbeat him into doing something less dangerous, so as to not leave her a widow.
He might actually be more likely to follow this path after Heaven's Feel, as he should still have all of those swords in his mind/soul, but he can't quite manifest his power (or fight as well as before) due to how he's changed and what happened to him. Using his knowledge to produce real swords would be a good way to equip himself for protecting his family, while also building up a business that will support his family.
Sakura might become a new "lady of the lake", the gentle, feminine figure that bestows amazing weapons upon heroes, whereas Shirou is the unseen and unsung forge-master below the lake who actually makes the swords.
Makes sense.
Hahaha, cool.
Shirou and Argo can't meet soon enough.
ARGH, I just tried to do that the other week!
I had transcripted over half the Ollivander scene into a text-file so that I could adapt it into a "Shirou's armory" scene, but the text file closed before I could save!
Now I have to start all over again!
...But the scene will definitely have a lot in common, since Shirou could forge "awakened" swords in that Gabriel Blessing ascribes to Murasame and Masamune.
Just as Ollivander's wands choose their wizards, so will Shirou's swords.
It might still involve handing the weapon to the person, having them swing it, and then snatching it out of their hand to make an adjustment before handing it back.
Shirou can perfectly understand a sword, but that doesn't mean he perfectly understands a person or what sword works best for them. It just means that, after he figures out what they need, he can provide it.
Seriously, Ollivander was my favorite scene in the book. Still gives me pleasant chills to read it. I've been wanting to adapt it to Shirou and swords for YEARS now, and still haven't gotten around to it.
It's really something of a tragedy that Shirou would sooner be an Enforcer for the Clocktower than one of its researchers (especially post-UBW). Though maybe Rin will browbeat him into doing something less dangerous, so as to not leave her a widow.
He might actually be more likely to follow this path after Heaven's Feel, as he should still have all of those swords in his mind/soul, but he can't quite manifest his power (or fight as well as before) due to how he's changed and what happened to him. Using his knowledge to produce real swords would be a good way to equip himself for protecting his family, while also building up a business that will support his family.
Sakura might become a new "lady of the lake", the gentle, feminine figure that bestows amazing weapons upon heroes, whereas Shirou is the unseen and unsung forge-master below the lake who actually makes the swords.
Makes sense.
Hahaha, cool.
Shirou and Argo can't meet soon enough.
ARGH, I just tried to do that the other week!
I had transcripted over half the Ollivander scene into a text-file so that I could adapt it into a "Shirou's armory" scene, but the text file closed before I could save!
Now I have to start all over again!
...But the scene will definitely have a lot in common, since Shirou could forge "awakened" swords in that Gabriel Blessing ascribes to Murasame and Masamune.
Just as Ollivander's wands choose their wizards, so will Shirou's swords.
It might still involve handing the weapon to the person, having them swing it, and then snatching it out of their hand to make an adjustment before handing it back.
Shirou can perfectly understand a sword, but that doesn't mean he perfectly understands a person or what sword works best for them. It just means that, after he figures out what they need, he can provide it.
Seriously, Ollivander was my favorite scene in the book. Still gives me pleasant chills to read it. I've been wanting to adapt it to Shirou and swords for YEARS now, and still haven't gotten around to it.