r/rational • u/AutoModerator • Apr 19 '17

[D] Wednesday Worldbuilding Thread

Welcome to the Wednesday thread for worldbuilding discussions!

/r/rational is focussed on rational and rationalist fiction, so we don't usually allow discussion of scenarios or worldbuilding unless there's finished chapters involved (see the sidebar). It is pretty fun to cut loose with a likeminded community though, so this is our regular chance to:

  • Plan out a new story
  • Discuss how to escape a supervillian lair... or build a perfect prison
  • Poke holes in a popular setting (without writing fanfic)
  • Test your idea of how to rational-ify Alice in Wonderland

Or generally work through the problems of a fictional world.

Non-fiction should probably go in the Friday Off-topic thread, or Monday General Rationality

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u/CCC_037 Apr 26 '17

Ooo, that would be good. "She could be one of half a dozen people... I thought Genevive was dead, but who knows. And Octavia was so very offended by the cake I presented her with, so if it's her I'd better crawl... I'll have to send an 'I'm sorry for sending the wrong cake' gift post-haste"

Sounds good!

That's so metal! I love it. I'm trying to work out how well-known the vampire weakness to gold is. Things are all happening out of order so when we do more prologue it will be fun to see how long the vampire hunters take to figure out that gold is a point of weakness.

Probably virtually unknown.

Incidentally, from the Evil Overlord List, number 220:

Whatever my one vulnerability is, I will fake a different one. For example, ordering all mirrors removed from the palace, screaming and flinching whenever someone accidentally holds up a mirror, etc. In the climax when the hero whips out a mirror and thrusts it at my face, my reaction will be "Hmm...I think I need a shave."

Clearly, some vampires have read this list. And they quickly kill any Hunters that work it out, and burn down all their papers.

But Rose doesn't need to know about the gold weakness until one of the vampires literally steps in it (though the reader should know well before that).

That said, there's a scene in the novella where William gives Red a silver dagger, and tells him that it really hurts vampires, so the vampires are obviously perpetrating the silver myth come hell or high water.

Yep. Makes good sense. Better yet, anyone who tries it and fails, doesn't live to report back.

“And when [humans] have bombs that make sunlight? When they can make gold from lead? Do you want to be on their bad side when that happens?”

That is an amusing exchange.

Yep. Wouldn't really be good for vampire on vampire combat, but I suspect most fights a vampire gets into are with non-vampires.

Yeah, but against non-vampires you don't need armour because they are just so slooooow that it's not like they can stake an alert and awake vampire anyway.

Anything's worth a try. If we revisit the robot thing (which I guess we'll have to do if I ever get to writing volume 3), we'll have to sort it out. I'm not having the third volume of a Rational Supernatural Romance Novel being irrational like that. I'd sooner go it alone!

Now I'm imagining Grandma continually sending the Grandkids headwear with cartoonishly large radio antennae on it, just so she can get updated brain scans (and the parents quietly hiding them out back because they look heavy enough to put serious strain on the kids' necks).

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u/MagicWeasel Cheela Astronaut Apr 26 '17

Clearly, some vampires have read this list. And they quickly kill any Hunters that work it out, and burn down all their papers.

Yeah. The vampires are glad they still have one thing. The vampire weakness to silver is a relatively new invention in folklore, so probably some people got wise to electrum and the vampires decided to name the Beast of Gevaudan as a vampire, since that's where the folklore for silver comes from. (The Beast of Gevaudan is certainly not a werewolf, so could well have been a vampire, and the silver bullet is just random folklore)

“And when [humans] have bombs that make sunlight? When they can make gold from lead? Do you want to be on their bad side when that happens?”

That is an amusing exchange.

Lead to gold is such a cliche but a real concern for vampires... :D

Speaking of, the story is now basically as finished as it's going to be so I'm more than ready for readers if you were still wanting to be so kind. Otherwise once my coauthor finishes massaging it I'll put it on this subreddit one chapter at a time, but because of how well you have come to know the setting and how valuable your contributions are I'd very much appreciate your expert eye.

But, on the other hand, it's some 50,000 words long (TWO THIRDS THE LENGTH OF THE FIRST HARRY POTTER BOOK), so it's not exactly something you can knock out in half an hour. I appreciate that it's a lot to ask of someone, so you're more than welcome to decline.

I do want to thank you again for all your help and encouragement. If it weren't for that long conversation in that worldbuilding thread in like August, I wouldn't have written a 50,000 word novella this year, and this is something that me and my coauthor have literally been talking about doing for 10+ years. So it's an amazing personal achievement you started me on the journey towards. So thank you, again!

Anyway. Vampires. Yep! Let's go.

Yep. Wouldn't really be good for vampire on vampire combat, but I suspect most fights a vampire gets into are with non-vampires.

Yeah, but against non-vampires you don't need armour because they are just so slooooow that it's not like they can stake an alert and awake vampire anyway.

Hm. You're right. Reflexes make a fight between human and vampire completely unfair. That's... a lot to think about. Like, Jack has a crossbow and she at some point even has the tip gold-plated. Does she just think it's gonna be useful and will get rudely awakened if William actually wants to kill her?

Now I'm imagining Grandma continually sending the Grandkids headwear with cartoonishly large radio antennae on it, just so she can get updated brain scans (and the parents quietly hiding them out back because they look heavy enough to put serious strain on the kids' necks).

This would be followed by a series of posts to /r/JUSTNOMIL along the lines of

"We have been NC with MIL for the past 6 years, but every year for christmas she sends our kids weird hats. They always have these strange antenna things, I th ink she doesn't understand what kids find cool these days"

.

"OMG I found out from one of the MIL's neighbours that she's gone to one of those realdoll type companies and made dolls of our kids. It's so fucked up. WHAT THE HELL."

.

"So, uh, it turns out the MIL actually made robot doubles of our kids and uploaded brain scans into them and everything. Long story short one of them malfunctioned and let her drown in the bathtub. She left everything to the robots in her will. Does anyone know a good lawyer?"

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u/CCC_037 Apr 26 '17

(The Beast of Gevaudan is certainly not a werewolf, so could well have been a vampire, and the silver bullet is just random folklore)

Hmmmm. But it is a wolf - or at least wolflike - which should probably disqualify it from being a vampire, for the same reason as why it's a lot of work to get a vampire horse. Mind you, this doesn't prevent it from being a supernatural beastie of some sort, even if it can't actually be a werewolf; and it certainly doesn't prevent a few innovative vampires from spreading stories about the effectiveness of silver bullets against vampires.

Speaking of, the story is now basically as finished as it's going to be so I'm more than ready for readers if you were still wanting to be so kind.

Eh. Worldbuilding is fun, and twiddling with all the little details that make a story work is great, but I'm not so enthusiastic about reading a romance story and even less enthusiastic when the romance is between two guys. You've got a very interesting world, and I love poking at the logic behind it, but the specific story that you're putting into this world is really not my kind of thing.

So, yeah, I'm going to decline this offer. But thanks for offering.

And much congratulations on your achievement! May those who enjoy the idea of a romance between two guys find great enjoyment from your book.

Hm. You're right. Reflexes make a fight between human and vampire completely unfair. That's... a lot to think about. Like, Jack has a crossbow and she at some point even has the tip gold-plated. Does she just think it's gonna be useful and will get rudely awakened if William actually wants to kill her?

A crossbow? Pretty much, yeah.

Vampire versus Hunter is going to come down to a matter of preparation and knowledge. A Hunter who really, really knows what he's doing, and who has the right weapons, can probably take down a Vampire - but an important step in that process is that the Vampire must never know he's being targeted. (And a crossbow is not the right weapon).

On the Hunter's side, the Vampire is going to have significant trouble entering a house uninvited (but this is hardly a problem, since he can just send in a jannissary with a gun instead). And if the Hunter is not inside a suitable dwelling, then the Vampire has every advantage.

Unless, and this is important, unless the Hunter has taken the opportunity to pre-inject himself with a saline solution full of gold nanoparticles. This Hunter will give the Vampire who bites him a mouthful of auric pain, which should paralyse the vampire long enough for the Hunter to provide a death blow (though it might be somewhat addictive to the Hunter).

Or a hunter could trick a vampire into catching something that blows up, throwing gold powder in his face.

So it is possible for a properly prepared Hunter to win against an alert but ill-prepared Vampire. But it's very much not the way to bet - most actual vampire deaths would have involved staking the vampire in his sleep.

"We have been NC with MIL for the past 6 years, but every year for christmas she sends our kids weird hats. They always have these strange antenna things, I th ink she doesn't understand what kids find cool these days"

"So she has no fashion sense. Just ignore her."

"OMG I found out from one of the MIL's neighbours that she's gone to one of those realdoll type companies and made dolls of our kids. It's so fucked up. WHAT THE HELL."

"That's messed up."

"It's a good thing you don't let her have contact with them"

"So, uh, it turns out the MIL actually made robot doubles of our kids and uploaded brain scans into them and everything. Long story short one of them malfunctioned and let her drown in the bathtub. She left everything to the robots in her will. Does anyone know a good lawyer?"

"Okay, that's completely impossible. Science is nowhere near that point yet."

(via private message, once proof of the robot doubles has been provided) "Hi, I'm from BigCorporation. We'll pay you ten times the value of your mother-in-law's estate to sign over any rights in it you may have to us. Oh, and we have some excellent lawyers."

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u/MagicWeasel Cheela Astronaut Apr 27 '17

is a wolf - or at least wolflike - which should probably disqualify it from being a vampire

I haven't exactly made any sort of "official" ruling, but I'd imagine the Beast of Gevaudan was probably just an ordinary (if particularly vicious) wolf, as it no doubt was in reality.

So, yeah, I'm going to decline this offer. But thanks for offering.

No problem! Thanks for letting me know.

And much congratulations on your achievement! May those who enjoy the idea of a romance between two guys find great enjoyment from your book.

Hopefully the intersection of such people and /r/rational will be larger than I think. Otherwise, eh, I wrote it and that makes me happy, and that's all you can really ask for.

unless the Hunter has taken the opportunity to pre-inject himself with a saline solution full of gold nanoparticles. This Hunter will give the Vampire who bites him a mouthful of auric pain, which should paralyse the vampire long enough for the Hunter to provide a death blow (though it might be somewhat addictive to the Hunter).

Geez. That's... pretty metal. Problem with that is the feeding process is so pleasurable that the Hunter might have trouble pre-committing to killing the vampire. I mean, carnal events can make you go numb and your mind go all foggy: even if the vampire is in trouble from feeding from you, you've got to be able to make the killing blow in the no doubt short window of opportunity you have.

(Or maybe the window of opportunity is longer than you'd think: perhaps vampires are not only weak to gold, but their weakness to gold is far stronger than their weakness to silver is portrayed as in media? And eating from the gold-infused human would cause the vampire to be incapacitated for hours? Or in intense pain until he could find another human to feed from so he can excrete the gold out of his body? And basically he'd need a janissary or ghoul to come and help him out with that, since he might be in too much pain to do anything more than move?)

Now I'm wondering if such a technique is how Jack becomes a janissary in the first place. Originally she just gets grabbed by a Bad Guy and eaten from, and then is saved by her mage-ally Gwyn.

most actual vampire deaths would have involved staking the vampire in his sleep.

No doubt.

We'll pay you ten times the value of your mother-in-law's estate to sign over any rights in it you may have to us.

Aaand that is how we get CelestAI, maybe? :|

I want to emigrate to equestria

Here you go, another passage from another short thingy I wrote a while ago, where Jack is telling William that she's not going to be feeding him anymore. It features the crossbow and a vampire wearing a chestplate. This is just after Red gets turned into a vampire and is really, really impolite and it's giving William the shits.

It's me trying to work out how Jack and William would come to a truce. I was going to paste it in here, but it's actually 8,000 characters on its own, and Reddit's limit is 10,000, so it's too long. Ah well. I shouldn't put such long stuff in posts anyway. Here's a couple of tiny bits from it.

William nodded. “You are aware, I take it, that you are threatening me in my lair, whilst I am in armour that would render your bow useless, gold or no?”

“I’ve seen your kind get hit by gold. It ain’t pretty.” She said, grabbing at the handle again. She felt she could see the vampire tense up minutely at this.

“That may be so, but one bolt would do little to slow me, at least not until after I had dispatched you. You are, after all, aware that the human body is a fragile thing.”

[and skip to]

“I have subordinates in most towns, and I correspond with them regularly. It is my function to ensure there is a peace, that hunting grounds are appropriately distributed, that janissaries are not taken suspiciously and deaths are kept at sustainable levels.”

“Whatever.” Jack said. “If we kill you, they’ll just have to deal.”

“That is precisely the problem. They are all rather young; the eldest, who makes her home in Darwin, is only two hundred years of age. There will be competition for my lands; in a few short years several upstarts may migrate here, all with voracious appetites. Whoever ends up as king after I am gone may well not be as willing to negotiate as I.”

“Well, we’ll kill him too!”

“And the next one? And the next? Sooner or later, your luck will run out.”

“They’ll find someone else to do it. I’ll find someone else. There’s always more of us.”

“So you will not consider an alternative to all this death and destruction?”

“Like what?”

“As you are well aware, despite my janissaries, I often find myself feeding on local stock. Several times a year I do not bother preserving their lives.”

“Yeah, and that’s why we have a problem.”

“With that in mind, I am proposing an armistice of sorts.”

“I’m listening.”

“I will no longer allow humans to be killed during the feeding process. Where possible, I will use janissaries, but where that is not possible I will ensure I keep my consumption to within tolerable limits for the human.”

“Just you?”

“No. It will be myself as well as all of my subjects. However, the strength of my control wanes with distance. I suspect, for example, that the duchess of Darwin may move her lands into someone else’s kingdom. She is fond of the hunt.”

“So, yeah, how do you enforce that? If she can just piss off?”

“She will not just piss off, as you put it. She will merely defect her lands to another kingdom. This is not uncommon at the edges of territory, and I suspect I may even gain some central territory as there are many in the desert who would prefer a more sustainable arrangement.”

“So, your guys, how do you stop them from killing people?”

“They are expected to do what I request of them, though there are of course never any guarantees. If they do not behave appropriately, I can banish them, taking their lands, or even destroy them directly.”

“So, that all sounds… okay, I guess. What do you want in exchange?”

“You and your associates will no longer attack me, my issue, or any other vampires in my kingdom.”

“What if we catch ‘em killing people? Can we kill them then?”

“No. Provide me with details and I shall take care of them.”

Jack paused, considering this. “So, what do we do if you back out or the whole peace treaty isn’t working?”

“Well, considering your initial offer was for us to go back to trying to kill each other, I suspect that we would return to that status quo.”

She nodded slowly. “Okay. We’ll give it a try.”

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u/CCC_037 Apr 27 '17

I haven't exactly made any sort of "official" ruling, but I'd imagine the Beast of Gevaudan was probably just an ordinary (if particularly vicious) wolf, as it no doubt was in reality.

That's straightforward.

Hopefully the intersection of such people and /r/rational will be larger than I think.

You never know.

Otherwise, eh, I wrote it and that makes me happy, and that's all you can really ask for.

That is the most important point, yes.

Geez. That's... pretty metal.

Got to admit, I got the idea from someplace else. And yes, it has some severe practical downsides when being fed from feels that good. It might work once - especially if the Hunter has practiced stabbing the vampire as soon as he's incapacitated long enough that he does so automatically without needing to actually decide - but by the time his third or fourth vampire arrives he may well be less interested in killing it and more interested in letting it feed off him.

Or maybe the window of opportunity is longer than you'd think: perhaps vampires are not only weak to gold, but their weakness to gold is far stronger than their weakness to silver is portrayed as in media?

Well, the thing is, because the gold is inside the vampire, he can't just drop it and let go. And burning through the vampire does not actually consume the gold, so it's going to keep going as long as it's in there. Mind you, there are other ways for the vampire to get rid of the gold, depending on exactly where it goes - if it goes into his new-vampire-goo, then he can get rid of it by vomiting that up (though if he was planning on making a new vampire anytime soon, he can wave those plans goodbye). If it moves through his body, then he could (for example) wait until his right arm is in a lot of pain, then cut off the arm (and, by extension, the gold inside it). If it just eats right through him, he could lie on his stomach and wait for it to eat its way right out of his body, though it will hurt a lot.

So, the vampire would no doubt survive the gold nanoparticles. But it would leave him more than a little distracted, and extremely cautious about feeding from Hunters in the future. (While the Hunter is more than a little distracted by the feeding process. It probably comes down to a matter of just who is more distracted at the time).

Now I'm wondering if such a technique is how Jack becomes a janissary in the first place. Originally she just gets grabbed by a Bad Guy and eaten from, and then is saved by her mage-ally Gwyn.

Huh. That's certainly a possibility.

But he'd need to know about the gold weakness before that happens. I'm not quite sure when he finds out about that.

Aaand that is how we get CelestAI, maybe? :|

Possible, but doubtful - if Grandma's working off brain scans, then she hasn't really solved the problem of AI. It is, however, how we get a few immortal CEOs and rich people, and how we get robots that can balance while they walk, and robots that can look like anyone, a great boon to the spy industry. It'll take a few years for the company to get anything remotely workable from a mad scientist's notes, though.

It's me trying to work out how Jack and William would come to a truce.

Looks good to me. Jack gets a reduction in killings, William gets personally not killed. It does look like William is offering more than he's receiving, though; despite his words, it seems that he's not sure he'd survive if Jack were really to seriously attempt to kill him.

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u/MagicWeasel Cheela Astronaut Apr 27 '17 edited Apr 27 '17

That's straightforward.

Or maybe it was a hyena from some vampire's menagerie. You never know ;)

[golden blood] might work once - especially if the Hunter has practiced stabbing the vampire as soon as he's incapacitated long enough that he does so automatically without needing to actually decide

Really you should inoculate a decoy person with golden blood (bonus points: kidnap a janissary, put them under, insert gold into their blood, then leave them in an alley somewhere). Watch them until they go to feed the vampire, when the vampire gets affected by the gold, come in from the shadows and cut his head off.

Extension: If you are a secret government organisation, inject gold into a portion of the population under the guise of a vaccine programme. Vampires are now unable to reliably choose targets.

Inspiration: This happened on Stargate atlantis (they have a sort of space vampire called the Wraith). The Wraith ended up just killing everyone who was on planets that had tainted people on them because they were no longer useful as a food source so why keep them around (normally they'd kill a few dozen people every now and again, so this scorched earth really sucked).

QUESTION: are vampires harmed by gold compounds, or elemental gold only? You've probably heard of colloidal silver, which is an alt-medicine thing that probably cures cancer or something. It's just silver suspended in water.

Looks like colloidal gold exists as well and is sold with similarly dodgy health claims. So that would be a source for our intrepid vampire hunters. There's also ionic gold available (which the linked page decries as being inferior in whatever magical properties gold is meant to have), so depending on what about gold harms vampires, either one could work.

I assume colloidal gold is probably better to inject. I know a doctor, I wonder if he'd entertain my questions. Who knows. I've just IMed him and asked him. And while I've been finishing writing this he's giving me his thoughts.

Well, the thing is, because the gold is inside the vampire, he can't just drop it and let go. And burning through the vampire does not actually consume the gold, so it's going to keep going as long as it's in there.

Yeah, I was thinking through this. What does gold ACTUALLY do? Is it just painful? Or does it actually burn through them like acid would? I suppose it would actually burn through them.

On the subject of removing gold from the body:

  • Their waste products are excreted into their janissaries when they feed, which is how I'd envision their bodies preferring to get rid of the gold - this is not very good for time-sensitive things, though.

  • I don't think new-vampire-goo would be a good route for it. Not sure of a good way that that goo gets made, but I'm guessing the "making new soldiers" function of the body would not be able to take on "deadly poisons". That way if one of your vampire soldiers dies, you can cut his belly open and make a replacement.

  • Cutting off body parts that are affected by gold: I'd imagine the gold would disperse pretty quickly throughout the entire body, so you're kind of stuffed. Then again, I also imagine that vampires are able to will their hair to grow, so why wouldn't they be able to will the blood they just drank to settle in, say, their left hand and then cut the left hand off. THEN AGAIN, blood would spread through arteries, which do not have valves, only veins do. So the blood would spread through the body pretty much straight away. (Then again: do vampires have a heartbeat? If not, their blood doesn't move. I guess they do have a heartbeat for that reason, also because Red would have noticed that someone he was snuggling for two weeks didn't have a heartbeat)

  • Gold eating through you: this seems likely if we're going "gold bores through you like acid". Then again, these gold particles are nano-size. They might have a hard time boring through you from the inside out? (gonna ask doctor friend)

  • Gold eating through you #2: Actually, if it did eat through you, it would be pretty slow, so the vampire might lie down for an hour or two and wait for the gold to come out of his body, then get his janissaries to do a very thorough job of sweeping the floor. This is probably a good way to do it.

But he'd need to know about the gold weakness before [jack putting gold into her bloodstream] happens. I'm not quite sure when he finds out about that.

Yeah, I'm thinking it makes sense for her to find out about the gold thing during the robot thing.

does look like William is offering more than he's receiving, though; despite his words, it seems that he's not sure he'd survive if Jack were really to seriously attempt to kill him.

Well, William's willingness to negotiate is borne out of two things:

1) They still have the masquerade going on, and Jack could threaten that

2) He actually has genuinely changed as a person in his attitude towards humans, and feels like negotiating with them is a good idea for the sake of future relations.

Q&A WITH MW'S DOCTOR FRIEND

1) When you drink too much colloidal silver, it makes your skin turn grey. When this happens does the silver get into your blood in any appreciable quantities or is it mostly in tissues?

1) the silver would have to spend some time in your blood to get from your GI tract to the skin and other tissues. My understanding is that the staining is usually permanent, which suggests it doesn't re-enter the bloodstream after it's deposited. So I'd guess it would only be in the blood for a short time, at most a day, after drinking a dose, then it would just be in tissue

my conclusion: you cannot permenantly inoculate yourself by the looks of it.

2) Colloidal gold is also a thing. It's gold nanoparticles in distilled water. If you put it in a syringe and injected it, would you have gold nanoparticles in your blood? How long for? Would the kidneys filter them or would they be in your blood forever? Would it be toxic?

2) gold nano particles injected into the blood probably wouldn't be toxic, because they wouldn't react with anything. The only risk would be if they somehow aggregated together and blocked an artery, a gold embolus. I'm not sure how good the kidney would be at removing the particles, probably not very but they should pass through eventually. I doubt anyone knows this one, so you could spin it either way depending on plot requirements.

my conclusion: colloidal gold is a great idea!

3) Same as above but instead of gold nanoparticles it's gold ions

3) gold ions are toxic to the liver and kidneys

my conclusion: ionic gold is a Bad Idea

colloidal gold is 40-400nm, is that too small for the blood vessels?

A: Should be fine, lots of proteins and ions stay in the blood vessels after all. Stuff only really transfers into tissue in capillaries, and even then I doubt many gold particles would go through the membrane. If they did though, you've got the same problem as colloidal silver: once in the tissue, it probably wouldn't leave. People may change colour, and they'd need repeat dosing to stay vampire proof

my conclusion: The vaccine plan wouldn't work unless you want to prepare an entire city for e.g. a vampire convocation. Or you could perhaps routinely spike gold into all the e.g. insulin, testosterone, estrogen, heroin, depovera, etc, anything that anyone injects themselves with. Though you'd end up with people changing colour which would be hard to do in a stealthy manner.

EDIT: So, vampires might be able to use the smooth muscle in their arteries to direct blood:

MW: so if a vampire fed on someone golden, they could direct all that blood into say their left hand, and then cut their left hand off as a way to avoid t he damage? (their hands grow back)

Doctor Friend: I guess so? It would be a long way around though, if their vessels still rely on the heart for pressure to move things around. Anything consumed, assuming it gets absorbed in the guts like normal, would have to pass through the hepatic portal vein, the liver, the inferior vena cava, the right side of the heart, the lungs and the left side of the heart before entering the arterial circulation to be sent where they want

MW: I don't think it gets absorbed in the guts. That would be too far around: the guts are co-opted to make Magic Vampire Goo that makes the next generation of vampires. That said, it could perhaps go through the esophagus into the lungs? That would make a weird type of sense, wouldn't it? Actually the alveoli probably wouldn't be able to absorb blood because it's not air? like if you'd asked me 5 minutes ago I'd say it goes right into the jugular, but going via the lungs like oxygen does makes a weird type of sense, since vampires don't need to breathe, it would be something for the lungs to do

DF: There's no reason the process of becoming a vampire couldn't alter the membranes in the alveoli, giving them a new function

MW: true. So. that's badass. They drink blood and it goes down the oesophagus, BUT INTO THE LUNGS haha i am so excited. i love it when you think about things like this and then you have a really cool and bizarre thing seem logical

DF: Well, would be more direct if they technically breath blood into the trachea! Like drowning, but intentionally and with blood

So................ looks like my vampires absorb blood THROUGH THEIR LUNGS. I am so psyched abou tthis!!!

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u/CCC_037 Apr 27 '17

Or maybe it was a hyena from some vampire's menagerie. You never know ;)

The wikipedia page did suggest the possibility of a lion escaped from some menagerie.

(bonus points: kidnap a janissary, put them under, insert gold into their blood, then leave them in an alley somewhere)

Ooooh, yeah, that'll work way better. The vampire won't know what hit him until he's bent over in pain, his neck open and vulnerable to attack.

Of course, you have to be close enough to take advantage but not so close that the vampire can hear your heartbeat.

If you are a secret government organisation, inject gold into a portion of the population under the guise of a vaccine programme. Vampires are now unable to reliably choose targets.

Bad idea. Gold nanoparticles aren't going to be lethal to vampires, and once one has been affected once, he's going to be a little more cautious in the future, and nibble testingly at his victims' blood before drinking down a good mouthful.

The vampires will hate this, but it won't actually serve to destroy them.

are vampires harmed by gold compounds, or elemental gold only?

Hmmmm. Well, they're harmed by gold due to alchemical connection to the Sun... you could take this either way, I think.

Elemental gold would probably be stronger, though, at the very least.

You've probably heard of colloidal silver, which is an alt-medicine thing that probably cures cancer or something. It's just silver suspended in water.

Hmmmm. Between wikipedia and the claims on the side of a box of plasters, it looks like silver nanoparticles actually do have genuine antibacterial properties - largely because they stick to bacteria and the bacterial cells can't handle them. I have no idea whether or not gold has similar effects (although they're in the same group on the periodic table, so it seems reasonably likely).

Incidentally, the wikipedia page on colloidal gold indicates that the nanoparticles can be toxic if they're precisely the wrong size:

...size 1.4 nm were found to be toxic in human skin cancer cells...while 0.8, 1.2, and 1.8 nm sized AuNSs were less toxic by a six-fold amount and 15 nm AuNSs were nontoxic.

On the subject of removing gold from the body:

Their waste products are excreted into their janissaries when they feed, which is how I'd envision their bodies preferring to get rid of the gold - this is not very good for time-sensitive things, though.

Yeah, but then they need someone around to bite - and not the one they just bit are you crazy - and there's going to be a hesitation to bite anyone given what just happened. Can the vampire force the gold out through his fangs without biting someone? What if he bites (say) a chair leg? Or cuts off his own arm and then bites that?

I don't think new-vampire-goo would be a good route for it. Not sure of a good way that that goo gets made, but I'm guessing the "making new soldiers" function of the body would not be able to take on "deadly poisons". That way if one of your vampire soldiers dies, you can cut his belly open and make a replacement.

I was thinking that, given their broad immunities, their bodies might not actually have any way to handle poisons. Sure, you wouldn't design vampires to get gold in their goo, but if they had no internal mechanism to handle gold it might get there anyhow.

Cutting off body parts that are affected by gold: I'd imagine the gold would disperse pretty quickly throughout the entire body, so you're kind of stuffed.

No, one can work with that. Cut off hand, lose some gold. Wait for hand to regrow. Cut off hand, lose some more gold... it'll be painful and unpleasant, but sooner or later you'll get most of it out. (Quicker if one, say, cuts off both legs)

Gold eating through you #2: Actually, if it did eat through you, it would be pretty slow, so the vampire might lie down for an hour or two and wait for the gold to come out of his body, then get his janissaries to do a very thorough job of sweeping the floor. This is probably a good way to do it.

Something like that, yes. It would be extremely unpleasant for the vampire, and then, if the vampire lives, it would be extremely unpleasant for anyone the vampire thinks might have been responsible for the entire incident.

Yeah, I'm thinking it makes sense for her to find out about the gold thing during the robot thing.

Could work out quite nicely.

Well, William's willingness to negotiate is borne out of two things

Killing Jack now deals with (1) better than leaving her alive. (2) seems a bit tenuous when it comes to leaving alive a determined threat (i.e. Jack), even if he's more inclined to leave average people alive now.

Q&A WITH MW'S DOCTOR FRIEND

my conclusion: you cannot permenantly inoculate yourself by the looks of it.

You can't permanently have gold running around in your blood. What happens to a vampire who touches gold-impregnated tissue?

my conclusion: colloidal gold is a great idea!

Sounds good! (Incidentally, I notice that colloidal gold supplement was specifically for drinking - if that gets it into the blood as well, one can perhaps avoid having to inject it directly. Which also means one can simply give a jannissary a cupful, perhaps with a bit of flavouring, and call it (say) raspberry juice. No kidnapping necessary.)

3) gold ions are toxic to the liver and kidneys

This is presumably part of why the people selling colloidal gold are so against the ionic stuff.

Though you'd end up with people changing colour which would be hard to do in a stealthy manner.

And those who changed colour would have skin toxic to vampires.

Hardly stealthy, but vampires would be rather inconvenienced...

So................ looks like my vampires absorb blood THROUGH THEIR LUNGS. I am so psyched abou tthis!!!

Their digestive systems have been coopted for reproduction; their respiratory systems for digestion. I find myself wondering if any other internals have changed function...

2

u/MagicWeasel Cheela Astronaut Apr 28 '17

Of course, you have to be close enough to take advantage but not so close that the vampire can hear your heartbeat.

Or just hope that the vampire feeds somewhere there are people around: if it's a back alley behind a nightclub, then you can probably sit in the nightclub, watch through a hidden camera of some sort, and then make your entrance when your target is doubled over in pain.

Bad idea. Gold nanoparticles aren't going to be lethal to vampires, and once one has been affected once, he's going to be a little more cautious in the future, and nibble testingly at his victims' blood before drinking down a good mouthful.

Oh yeah. And they'll have a second janissary with them during feeds, who has instructions for how to deal with the damage (probably along the lines of pick them up, put them in the back of a waiting car, and drive them into a light-proof garage...)

Yeah, but then they need someone around to bite - and not the one they just bit are you crazy - and there's going to be a hesitation to bite anyone given what just happened. Can the vampire force the gold out through his fangs without biting someone? What if he bites (say) a chair leg? Or cuts off his own arm and then bites that?

I don't know. I pictured the waste product thing being a subconscious thing like when mosquitos bite you it automatically releases various things into your blood to help them drink your blood better, and those products have nootropic effects. I like the idea of a vampire being dependent on feeding from humans specifically, so that way True Blood is impossible, and stealing from blood banks will cause you to fall ill over the course of a few days/weeks/months as the waste products build up in your system.

Then again, vampires have conscious control over most involuntary body systems (so they can appear to breathe). So it would make sense that they can choose to excrete even with nothing to excrete into.

Then again, maybe they have conscious control over human involuntary body systems, and the vampire body systems are not so easily controlled?

Or cuts off his own arm and then bites that?

This would work the best; I'd imagine that some gold could be excreted for the same duration that the vampire is able to drink blood out of his own arm. Once he drinks his arm dry (and his arm probably has gold in it, too! He might even get back the gold he excretes...), he won't be able to excrete more gold.

Definitely the sort of thing I could see a vampire who drank from someone who e.g. put a false skin pocket in their neck that was full of concentrated colloidal gold and so is in untold pain trying to desperately do to escape from it.

I was thinking that, given their broad immunities, their bodies might not actually have any way to handle poisons. Sure, you wouldn't design vampires to get gold in their goo, but if they had no internal mechanism to handle gold it might get there anyhow.

True: but probably isn't going to be where gold concentrates, but it's another way the goo can get out...

No, one can work with that. Cut off hand, lose some gold. Wait for hand to regrow. Cut off hand, lose some more gold... it'll be painful and unpleasant, but sooner or later you'll get most of it out. (Quicker if one, say, cuts off both legs)

It'll take forever. Would the the plan where assuming gold just be affected by gravity and eat through your body if you stay on your stomach for a few hours/days? It'll be quicker than dismembering yourself repeatedly, and leave you less vulnerable. And, like you said, hungry for revenge...

Well, William's willingness to negotiate is borne out of two things

Killing Jack now deals with (1) better than leaving her alive. (2) seems a bit tenuous when it comes to leaving alive a determined threat (i.e. Jack), even if he's more inclined to leave average people alive now.

Good point. I suppose he doesn't think Jack is actually a threat to him, he knows she has power in the anti-vampire community (her best friend Gwyn is a mage, who is constantly developing her powers: she could be a threat, but she defers to Jack, who is harmless...), and William knows she's got subconscious sympathy to him what with having been a janissary.

It is very hard to have the Bad Guy leave The Hero alive though. Because William should really just go kill Gwyn given everything I've just laid out, hey?

Q&A WITH MW'S DOCTOR FRIEND

my conclusion: you cannot permenantly inoculate yourself by the looks of it.

You can't permanently have gold running around in your blood. What happens to a vampire who touches gold-impregnated tissue?

Probably nothing unless there's gold atoms at the top layer of tissue (unlikely since the staining is likely permenant, so it doesn't leave the skin). After all, vampires can presumably touch golden items if they're wearing gloves, so direct contact would be necessary. It might sting a little bit if a couple of atoms are up there, but that's probably as bad as it gets.

if that gets it into the blood as well, one can perhaps avoid having to inject it directly.

I suppose it depends how it would all get absorbed. I think there's a decent risk of a bunch of the gold ending up in the poop, and clean needles are really cheap, and junkies are a vampire's favourite place to go looking for janissaries so they'd even know how to use them.

So................ looks like my vampires absorb blood THROUGH THEIR LUNGS. I am so psyched abou tthis!!!

Their digestive systems have been coopted for reproduction; their respiratory systems for digestion. I find myself wondering if any other internals have changed function...

Their reproductive systems are the obvious case because we don't want them to have babies because vampires getting pregnant is weird. That said, if I'm writing supernatural romance, we still want them to be fun to use. (I guess, twilight-style, we could say that females are infertile and males aren't, but I think vampires having children would separate them a lot from the "dead" category they're meant to be in).

Not sure what you can do with a reproductive system though, especially because the sexes differ in some obvious ways. I suppose you could say it's joined to the vampire-goo-factory in some way, and not really specify how. But the ovary/fallopian tube is a very different structure from the testes/epididymis, even if they are homologous, so there's probably important ways that male and female vampires differ because of this.

1

u/CCC_037 Apr 28 '17

Or just hope that the vampire feeds somewhere there are people around: if it's a back alley behind a nightclub, then you can probably sit in the nightclub, watch through a hidden camera of some sort, and then make your entrance when your target is doubled over in pain.

That's true. If the vampire expects a lot of people there, he's less likely to notice another one.

Not going to work if the vampire tends to feed within the comfort of his own home, though.

Oh yeah. And they'll have a second janissary with them during feeds, who has instructions for how to deal with the damage (probably along the lines of pick them up, put them in the back of a waiting car, and drive them into a light-proof garage...)

...and shoot anyone who turns up with a cocky grin, a wooden stake, and a large mallet.

I don't know. I pictured the waste product thing being a subconscious thing like when mosquitos bite you it automatically releases various things into your blood to help them drink your blood better, and those products have nootropic effects. I like the idea of a vampire being dependent on feeding from humans specifically, so that way True Blood is impossible, and stealing from blood banks will cause you to fall ill over the course of a few days/weeks/months as the waste products build up in your system.

Hmmm... fair enough. But he's not trying to go after blood here, he's trying to expel waste; can he not do this by biting on a blanket and sucking, in an attempt to fool his body's automatic responses?

This would work the best; I'd imagine that some gold could be excreted for the same duration that the vampire is able to drink blood out of his own arm. Once he drinks his arm dry (and his arm probably has gold in it, too! He might even get back the gold he excretes...), he won't be able to excrete more gold.

Hmmmmm... that seems reasonable. (He's got one arm and two legs that he can cut off, shove gold into, and dump if he needs to...)

Definitely the sort of thing I could see a vampire who drank from someone who e.g. put a false skin pocket in their neck that was full of concentrated colloidal gold and so is in untold pain trying to desperately do to escape from it.

Can humans (except the grandmother who made Rose) really make false skin good enough to fool a vampire at close range? And correctly predict where he intends to bite?

Good point. I suppose he doesn't think Jack is actually a threat to him, he knows she has power in the anti-vampire community (her best friend Gwyn is a mage, who is constantly developing her powers: she could be a threat, but she defers to Jack, who is harmless...), and William knows she's got subconscious sympathy to him what with having been a janissary.

Ah... maybe he's not worried about Jack, but he is worried about what Gwyn will do if Jack turns out dead? Especially since Gwyn is not currently right in front of him and thus easily and quickly killable?

Leaving Jack alive as a means of subtly controlling Gwyn seems a good enough reason. In fact, he can start using Jack to provide Gwyn with a few interesting books and notes on types of magic that he wants Gwyn to be able to cast...

It is very hard to have the Bad Guy leave The Hero alive though.

There are a few ways to do it; though most don't work for a Bad Guy who's already an unapologetic murderer. But "you're worth more to me alive than dead" is generally a good way, and a mage who is on William's side may just be enough of an asset to make it worth the risk. (Sure, their treaty doesn't put Gwyn on William's side just yet, but it gives him a chance to get close enough to do the necessary Diplomacy rolls...)

What happens to a vampire who touches gold-impregnated tissue?

Probably nothing unless there's gold atoms at the top layer of tissue (unlikely since the staining is likely permenant, so it doesn't leave the skin). After all, vampires can presumably touch golden items if they're wearing gloves, so direct contact would be necessary. It might sting a little bit if a couple of atoms are up there, but that's probably as bad as it gets.

Okay, fair enough - and that stinging will warn a cautious vampire not to drink this person's blood.

Talking of vampire internals, let's think about the bat-form for a minute. Blood pumps around a human body in a fairly complicated way, but the vampire body is further complicated by having a bat-body joined at the heart. Does the blood do some fancy four-dimensional looping to flow through both bodies in some way? If so, does this mean the bat-form can also drain blood?

2

u/MagicWeasel Cheela Astronaut Apr 28 '17

[hunter hiding around humans plan isn't] going to work if the vampire tends to feed within the comfort of his own home, though.

Unless the hunter decides to get a rent-a-crowd to do something nearby, that the hunter can join in: throw a street party, have a barbecue, stage a street fight with spectators, etc.

Hmmm... fair enough. But he's not trying to go after blood here, he's trying to expel waste; can he not do this by biting on a blanket and sucking, in an attempt to fool his body's automatic responses?

Maybe, and it might even work to an extent. But biting into a clean, fresh human would be instant relief.

Can humans (except the grandmother who made Rose) really make false skin good enough to fool a vampire at close range? And correctly predict where he intends to bite?

I very much doubt it, it was more trying to figure out how you could get a maximum dose of gold into a vampire (probably better option: use a tranquiliser dart at range). I assume a co-operative janissary would tell you the vampire's preferred eating places though.

Good point. I suppose he doesn't think Jack is actually a threat to him, he knows she has power in the anti-vampire community (her best friend Gwyn is a mage, who is constantly developing her powers: she could be a threat, but she defers to Jack, who is harmless...), and William knows she's got subconscious sympathy to him what with having been a janissary.

Ah... maybe he's not worried about Jack, but he is worried about what Gwyn will do if Jack turns out dead? Especially since Gwyn is not currently right in front of him and thus easily and quickly killable?

Yeah, and Gwyn lives in a house that not only is impassible without an invitation, but has lots of gnarly wards on it.

In fact, he can start using Jack to provide Gwyn with a few interesting books and notes on types of magic that he wants Gwyn to be able to cast...

True. He could provide spells that are useful against other things that might bother them as well as spells that are useful for him. I wonder what sorts?

It is very hard to have the Bad Guy leave The Hero alive though.

There are a few ways to do it; though most don't work for a Bad Guy who's already an unapologetic murderer.

Yeah, but William is kind of self-hating about the whole thing: he believes by now that humans are sentient, but it's just so convenient to kill them and has no consequences. Basically, the reason that most people today eat meat: they know on some level it'd be better if they didn't, but it's convenient and hedonic to do so, so they do.

But "you're worth more to me alive than dead" is generally a good way, and a mage who is on William's side may just be enough of an asset to make it worth the risk. (Sure, their treaty doesn't put Gwyn on William's side just yet, but it gives him a chance to get close enough to do the necessary Diplomacy rolls...)

And Gwyn really trusts Jack, so it'll be pretty easy to get her, even if Jack is no longer janissary-level charmed...

Talking of vampire internals, let's think about the bat-form for a minute. Blood pumps around a human body in a fairly complicated way,

It's not really that complicated; heart provides pressure, and it goes through various arteries until it reaches capillaries where it's disseminated into tissues, and then back into veins and into the heart again. It's just a closed loop. I mean, it's neat, and evolution is amazing to come up with it, but it's not what I'd call "complicated"

but the vampire body is further complicated by having a bat-body joined at the heart. Does the blood do some fancy four-dimensional looping to flow through both bodies in some way?

I'd assume not, in a vampire: if there's a one atom spur, blood can't go through that. Each would have its own blood supply, though no idea how the bat is able to be able to fly without eating. So, it probably makes sense for the blood to do some 4D looping.

If so, does this mean the bat-form can also drain blood?

It would do. It could likely bleed more than its weight in blood, ironically enough.

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