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Frierenverse mages' shields are specifically optimized against Zoltraak, so they would be unlikely to work nearly as well against Hysh magic that they have never encountered before.

Qual comments that the shield spell is attuned to Zoltraak, and during the first test in the first class mage exams Richter explains that making the shield spell defend against all kinds of attacks would make it too slow to cast, which is why modern mages have diversified their arsenal (Fern gets around this issue just by being really fast at spamming Zoltraak to overwhelm their defences).

There's also Cython's breath weapon to consider.
The shield spell is best against Zoltraak, but it works pretty well against everything else we see it block, from blood magic attacks to light arrows to rock bullets to lightning zappies to black hole rock shots. It won't last forever against Cython's attacks, but it doesn't need to, because Fern would defeat Cython with Zoltraak before that could happen.

Honestly, you made my argument for me: Cython fights like modern mages, which is a build that Fern's decisively defeats.
 
I have never ignored that argument of yours. Every single time you made that argument, I addressed it.

I'm not accusing you of ignoring me, I'm saying that your statements about what would happen continue to treat taking out Cython as equally easy to taking out a human mage, and that your evidence for that is very shaky at best. Cython is a giant dragon who can probably take a cannonball to the chest and survive, assuming that force sufficient to take out human mages will take him out quickly is a huge assumption you are making with very little to support it.

You have addressed my arguments in the sense of responding to them, it's absolutely true. I don't find your responses particularly convincing, and am noting that your entire chain of reasoning is based on some grounds I and others do not find compelling.
 
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The shield spell is best against Zoltraak, but it works pretty well against everything else we see it block, from blood magic attacks to light arrows to rock bullets to lightning zappies to black hole rock shots. It won't last forever against Cython's attacks, but it doesn't need to, because Fern would defeat Cython with Zoltraak before that could happen.
I don't recall Fern's shields surviving anything other than Quall's mega-beam that I would call comparable to the kind of Hysh Battle Magic that Cython could throw out, or the breath weapon of an Emperor Dragon.

Honestly, you made my argument for me: Cython fights like modern mages, which is a build that Fern's decisively defeats.
By that definition, any mage in fiction who doesn't use Zoltraak (ie all of them not from Frierenverse) fights like modern mages and thus loses to Fern. You cannot establish an equivalence between them on such broad and shaky grounds.

Also, Fern defeating modern mages is not a matter of "build". Frieren didn't train Fern for the purposes of beating modern mages, she trained her to fight demons, Fern is just so good that she can still beat modern mages with an archaic style of only using Zoltraak and shields.
 
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The lack of a Bretonni Hedgefolk tradition is actually a bit puzzling either way, because the Bretonni had no magical tradition until the 1000s and they seemingly came with the pre-Imperial tribes. Where might we look for a possible hidden Hedgefolk population in Bretonnia? Maybe some sort of village elders with a knack for folk medicine and 'esoteric pursuits'? Maybe in some dark corner of Bretonnia? Maybe someplace shrouded in pig-related mystery?
The alternative is that the Damsels were much more effective in rooting out the Hedgewise.

Certainly, if the Fey are that much more effective at bringing in magic-potential children, then that could have starved the Hedgefolk of proper Blessed Few for long enough that the tradition only exists as some esoteric potion knowledge at this point.
 
The alternative is that the Damsels were much more effective in rooting out the Hedgewise.

Certainly, if the Fey are that much more effective at bringing in magic-potential children, then that could have starved the Hedgefolk of proper Blessed Few for long enough that the tradition only exists as some esoteric potion knowledge at this point.
It's also possible that they were subsumed or evolved into the damsels rather than just destroyed or outcompeted. Not something that would make much material difference after this long, but if the theories about the Lady being Haletha's deciding sibling are correct, maybe they started out in similar situations.
 
So to move the topic to something else, we should 100% have a date on our new ship...possibly a "I can show you the world" moment. It would be so nice.

Agreed, but let's be honest: an airship is about as unfriendly to the jade wind as the hush pyramid is to ulgu. Nothing growing, no contact with earth or water, nothing that resonates with seasonal cycles.

It'd be like her taking us on a date to a choral music performance by the lights done at noon in a place without shadows.
 
Agreed, but let's be honest: an airship is about as unfriendly to the jade wind as the hush pyramid is to ulgu. Nothing growing, no contact with earth or water, nothing that resonates with seasonal cycles.

It'd be like her taking us on a date to a choral music performance by the lights done at noon in a place without shadows.

You can 100% put a garden on an airship, especially one as enchanted as this.

Oh, that could be the date.
 
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Agreed, but let's be honest: an airship is about as unfriendly to the jade wind as the hush pyramid is to ulgu. Nothing growing, no contact with earth or water, nothing that resonates with seasonal cycles.

It'd be like her taking us on a date to a choral music performance by the lights done at noon in a place without shadows.
Water is an aerial lifeform. There's weather up there.
 
Agreed, but let's be honest: an airship is about as unfriendly to the jade wind as the hush pyramid is to ulgu. Nothing growing, no contact with earth or water, nothing that resonates with seasonal cycles.

It'd be like her taking us on a date to a choral music performance by the lights done at noon in a place without shadows.

Hardly that hostile, we'd have to make it a flying mausoleum to make it as hostile to the Ghyan as the Pyramid is to Ulgu. There is a different between 'not resonant' and actively opposed. Azyr does not oppose Ghyan on the wheel, Shysh does.
 
I don't think the ship will need that much power. Maybe an Azyr orbs for the flight or one for a large scale weapon. But I can't think of what we would need eight for.
Azyr: Flight
Hysh: Emergency speed boost/giant laser
Aqshy: Flame thrower vs Swarms
Ulgu: Stealth Mode/Burning Shadows on the ship
Ghyran: Self repairing wooden hull
Shysh: Purple Sun Gun/other long ranged AOE
Chamon: Durability enhancement, Self repairing metal parts
Ghur: Crew enhancement/bird scouts
 
Azyr: Flight
Hysh: Emergency speed boost/giant laser
Aqshy: Flame thrower vs Swarms
Ulgu: Stealth Mode/Burning Shadows on the ship
Ghyran: Self repairing wooden hull
Shysh: Purple Sun Gun/other long ranged AOE
Chamon: Durability enhancement, Self repairing metal parts
Ghur: Crew enhancement/bird scouts

Only the Shysh, Hysh and maybe Ulgu enchantments sound like they would need an orb rather than a single powerstone.
 
I found that one of these differing properties is an ability to adhere to a strand of solidified Wind that makes up a Power Stone, expanding the stone and lengthening the strand. The effects begin to reverse themselves if cut off prematurely, but if allowed to reach the threshold that is the size of the Orbs of Sorcery we are familiar with, then the change becomes permanent and it stops being able to grow in this manner."
@Boney
I have a question: If the growth of a power stone only stabilize permanently at the « size » or « power level » of an orb of sorcery would it be possible to find a higher level of stability while trying to grow an orb of sorcery ?
 
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