Robinton
Probably petting Schrödinger's cat
- Location
- Scientifically proving a miracle
@Nigerian Duck, your write-in succeeded nicely. Would you rather give everyone a hefty bonus to movement research through the end of Advanced Movement (which will be the next Movement Research option) or give the Forest your choice of Bone (Novice) or Flesh (Novice) plus an upgrade quest?
(Note that the Forest already has upgrade quests running for Steam/Vapor and Life.)
There are two main variants that I know of:
One is typically around a normal IRL household light-bulb's illumination, and is based on Ancient-Tech. There is a finite supply of these, and a fairly high demand, and they occasionally break. That said, literally billions of them survived the Cataclysm, so you can always pick one up with a hefty cost.
The other is a custom-order, from one of a very small list of Archmages, and typically insanely expensive. That said, they can brightly light something the size of a cathedral. They're based on - though I'm not sure the Forest has run into the concept yet - nuclear fission or fusion. Or maybe Portals in the case of Archmage Nexari.
If you want to absorb sun from the surface to direct Light underground... I'm tempted to suggest you research methods of using Lenses to result in the desired outcome. That's probably you best bet, yeah.
If you want something like electricity - then something like a solar panel might be available, maybe, if you roll well.
"Physics Textbooks" are on the list.
I believe I've specified, but while modern-to-hypertech printing options are functionally nonexistent, Printing Presses were rebuilt from first principles pretty much everywhere within a decade or two, which really helped with knowledge retention. Also, Magic can be used to bulk-copy books, though Printing Presses are typically cheaper.
There's nothing stopping - let's say - a Legendary of Ink from copying a thousand books a day. That said, do you know what else a Legendary of Ink could be doing? Saving the world.
Keep it up continually for continuous knowledge-suppression!
This is guaranteed to not be absolute, but given that your enemy has already been shown to have finite knowledge, you should expect it to be notably helpful.
Though any sane (and non-arrogant) enemy will be more wary of your Forest, for better and worse.
Mr. Tavish says, when asked: "It's possible to study Malice (and similar) without yourself being corrupted, but a lot of people have thought they'd be fine and only realized they were in trouble after killing someone they loved or some such. You can sometimes still work your way back, history shows, but a lot of people don't. ... Maybe three quarters of attempts lead to at least a minor tragedy? Even some of the most carefully planned ones fail, though planning does help. ... 'Those who call for Malice will find that it comes.'"
Materson says, when asked, "Would the Forest be safer than average?" answers: "Maybe. Probably. Somewhat. The one brief time I was stupid - and desperate - enough to study the stuff, I had a friend keeping more than half an eye on me, and I'd vowed to stop all research the moment anything seemed off, to either of us. It sort-of worked." He pulls a face of significant distaste and quite a bit of regret, and waves a hand back and forth in a "so-so" motion.
Time is hilariously dangerous, though not corruptive. Just likely to lead to you blowing yourself up in concerning ways. Historical tests were mostly held deep in the void of space, much like antimatter tests or ultra-virulent disease trials. With multiple light-minutes between the test and any observers, and a light-hour or so from any planet or star, it was considered fairly safe actually.
Sure 99% of attempts resulted in the test-station disintegrating or vanishing or retroactively ceasing to exist, but that's fine.
Once they got the hang of it, well, then they could do stuff on inhabited planets and such.
And some Time spells were actually fairly resistant to failure if you had been well-instructed! Even for beginners!
Technically, I should have "Someone messes with Time and it goes wrong" to the list of horrible things that could happen. Thankfully, by far the most common result of such is "bye-bye caster" with an occasional "everything within a few hundred yards dies," so damage to the continent/planet is very rare.
VERY rare for planetary damage.
Though it has happened.
Certain naturally-occurring Time powers and/or effects exist. Throne of Time in Dwarven lore, for example. Or the Caerbannog Rabbits, which bend Time to attack as long and hard as they want, while everything else is paused.
Those seem to just do their thing and work.
Unless disrupted; then they just stop working.
A Darkness wielder who has essentially fallen to their Element is generally creepy but not evil.
Which is not generally true of Death, and even that is pale reflection of what falling to Malice would do to you.
(I haven't decided on the proper terminology for "fallen to their Element." That might just stay as-is, or it might be revised.)
You could research Sickness/Disease though. The main danger there is waking up from a fascinating dream to find you've invented COVID-23 or something, and since the Forest is much better than your average budding pyromancer at not starting accidental fires, you're probably relatively safe. Any "Create disease XYZ" project critfail will still go just as terribly wrong as you'd expect, though.
"Then, well, Dads sometimes ain't who you wanted them to be.
"And in the middle of that, some ice-gal wanted to 'preserve me forever' by freezing me into a glacier.
"I, well, Fire/Water wasn't my first Negacion. Just a bit safer.
"I was really hungry when I got back. And still on fire, actually. Freaked a few people out something fierce."
He smiles; apparently that was a good memory.
(You catch a flash of reference to something called "The Imperishable Flame" along with "Those won't go out" at some point in his thoughts.)
(And consider refreshing your browser cache or some such?)
(Note that the Forest already has upgrade quests running for Steam/Vapor and Life.)
I'll tally them in the same area for now.
Your Lesser Fire Salamander has Fire at, effectively, Expert rank.
Finish Monster Energy for more information.
Yes, though they're expensive and in short supply.
There are two main variants that I know of:
One is typically around a normal IRL household light-bulb's illumination, and is based on Ancient-Tech. There is a finite supply of these, and a fairly high demand, and they occasionally break. That said, literally billions of them survived the Cataclysm, so you can always pick one up with a hefty cost.
The other is a custom-order, from one of a very small list of Archmages, and typically insanely expensive. That said, they can brightly light something the size of a cathedral. They're based on - though I'm not sure the Forest has run into the concept yet - nuclear fission or fusion. Or maybe Portals in the case of Archmage Nexari.
If you want Growth, use Leaves.
If you want to absorb sun from the surface to direct Light underground... I'm tempted to suggest you research methods of using Lenses to result in the desired outcome. That's probably you best bet, yeah.
If you want something like electricity - then something like a solar panel might be available, maybe, if you roll well.
I will try to get you all the list of buy options soon.
"Physics Textbooks" are on the list.
I believe I've specified, but while modern-to-hypertech printing options are functionally nonexistent, Printing Presses were rebuilt from first principles pretty much everywhere within a decade or two, which really helped with knowledge retention. Also, Magic can be used to bulk-copy books, though Printing Presses are typically cheaper.
There's nothing stopping - let's say - a Legendary of Ink from copying a thousand books a day. That said, do you know what else a Legendary of Ink could be doing? Saving the world.
Possible future Gustav: "I have the best wife in the universe swing!" ;D
Empty Veil, with 1+ Elder Void Tree, explicitly has info-suppressing effects.
Keep it up continually for continuous knowledge-suppression!
This is guaranteed to not be absolute, but given that your enemy has already been shown to have finite knowledge, you should expect it to be notably helpful.
Though any sane (and non-arrogant) enemy will be more wary of your Forest, for better and worse.
Materson says, when asked: "Don't spend too much time pretendin' to be evil."
Mr. Tavish says, when asked: "It's possible to study Malice (and similar) without yourself being corrupted, but a lot of people have thought they'd be fine and only realized they were in trouble after killing someone they loved or some such. You can sometimes still work your way back, history shows, but a lot of people don't. ... Maybe three quarters of attempts lead to at least a minor tragedy? Even some of the most carefully planned ones fail, though planning does help. ... 'Those who call for Malice will find that it comes.'"
Materson says, when asked, "Would the Forest be safer than average?" answers: "Maybe. Probably. Somewhat. The one brief time I was stupid - and desperate - enough to study the stuff, I had a friend keeping more than half an eye on me, and I'd vowed to stop all research the moment anything seemed off, to either of us. It sort-of worked." He pulls a face of significant distaste and quite a bit of regret, and waves a hand back and forth in a "so-so" motion.
Death is significantly safer than Malice, though more dangerous than Fire. I think I've written out a comparison somewhere.
Time is hilariously dangerous, though not corruptive. Just likely to lead to you blowing yourself up in concerning ways. Historical tests were mostly held deep in the void of space, much like antimatter tests or ultra-virulent disease trials. With multiple light-minutes between the test and any observers, and a light-hour or so from any planet or star, it was considered fairly safe actually.
Sure 99% of attempts resulted in the test-station disintegrating or vanishing or retroactively ceasing to exist, but that's fine.
Once they got the hang of it, well, then they could do stuff on inhabited planets and such.
And some Time spells were actually fairly resistant to failure if you had been well-instructed! Even for beginners!
Technically, I should have "Someone messes with Time and it goes wrong" to the list of horrible things that could happen. Thankfully, by far the most common result of such is "bye-bye caster" with an occasional "everything within a few hundred yards dies," so damage to the continent/planet is very rare.
VERY rare for planetary damage.
Though it has happened.
Certain naturally-occurring Time powers and/or effects exist. Throne of Time in Dwarven lore, for example. Or the Caerbannog Rabbits, which bend Time to attack as long and hard as they want, while everything else is paused.
Those seem to just do their thing and work.
Unless disrupted; then they just stop working.
Darkness is technically very marginally tainted, though the suspicion is that it's mostly "Darkness and Deceit" going together, plus being the opposite of "Sunlight and Cleansing/Hope".
A Darkness wielder who has essentially fallen to their Element is generally creepy but not evil.
Which is not generally true of Death, and even that is pale reflection of what falling to Malice would do to you.
(I haven't decided on the proper terminology for "fallen to their Element." That might just stay as-is, or it might be revised.)
Yes.
You could research Sickness/Disease though. The main danger there is waking up from a fascinating dream to find you've invented COVID-23 or something, and since the Forest is much better than your average budding pyromancer at not starting accidental fires, you're probably relatively safe. Any "Create disease XYZ" project critfail will still go just as terribly wrong as you'd expect, though.
"I'd just been told that the Ancients thought that even the stars would die eventually.
"Then, well, Dads sometimes ain't who you wanted them to be.
"And in the middle of that, some ice-gal wanted to 'preserve me forever' by freezing me into a glacier.
"I, well, Fire/Water wasn't my first Negacion. Just a bit safer.
"I was really hungry when I got back. And still on fire, actually. Freaked a few people out something fierce."
He smiles; apparently that was a good memory.
(You catch a flash of reference to something called "The Imperishable Flame" along with "Those won't go out" at some point in his thoughts.)
Feel free to try!
(And consider refreshing your browser cache or some such?)
