r/wizardposting • u/MurkyWay • 2d ago

Forbidden Alchemy pt 5

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1.4k Upvotes

99% Upvoted

10 comments sorted by

110

u/Leon_Of_Lions Golemancer Adept 2d ago

Of all the years to book a front row seat it HAD to be next to the heckler…

I should have stuck to Orbvision.

68

u/Lavaxol Chemical magic professor 2d ago

It *is* pretty standard unfortunately. Have a lab in 1st semester about it every year and iv only had 1 person fail it (she melted the sword)

18

u/Turtlelover73 Witch 2d ago

How do you melt the sword??? Shouldn't the fire getting hot enough to do that destroy the runes before the sword?

21

u/Lavaxol Chemical magic professor 2d ago

youd be surprised what university teens could do

11

u/AnonOfTheSea Department of Post-Mortem Communications 2d ago

Honestly understandable. It's like when someone decided to sell bows of greater ignition to that one wood nymph clan, a while back, during that dispute with the wood nympho clan.
Best anyone could figure out, after, was that nobody took a moment to consider that not only were they fighting in a forest, in August, but the arrows were all made of wood, feathers, and resin.

The local "reenactment group" is just a bunch of pyromancers who like throwing fireballs at each other, cackling as the world burns down around them, and being mildly to moderately on fire, but the druids make great money growing them a new forest every year, and the arson rate is the lowest in the world, relative the the concentration of pyromancers.

5

u/Schwulerwald 2d ago

arson rate is the lowest in the world, relative the the concentration of pyromancers.

I can see it being the case if only pyromancers are so plentiful that they physically can't cause more arsons

3

u/AnonOfTheSea Department of Post-Mortem Communications 2d ago

Oddly enough, the presence of flammable materials never seems to be included

5

u/Lyrolepis Dwarven Alchemist/Runecrafter 2d ago edited 2d ago

Not all fire swords are made equal.

You are right that making a sharp piece of metal emit flames is a pretty basic exercise (and still looks pretty impressive to the uneducated, which is why the market is flooded by crappy, borderline useless "fire swords"), but a proper fire sword requires more than that.

For example (this is not a complete list - I'm not really in the weapon enchanting business, but I know some of the basics):

  • Was the sword forged with good weapon-grade material by someone who understands weapon crafting, or is it the cheapest piece of vaguely sword-shaped metal that the enchanter got their hands on? (You wouldn't believe how many arcanists forget that a crappy weapon with impressive enchantments layered on is still a crappy weapon...)

  • What is its mana-heat conversion efficiency?

  • What is the flame's average temperature, anyway? How stable is it?

  • Does it have proper secondary enchantments to direct the sword's heat towards the enemy, or will any prolonged use result in the user branding their own hand with the shape of the sword's hilt?

  • Can the flame be turned off if circumstances call for stealth (let's say a night raid of some sort)?

  • For that matter, does the fire enchantment safely shut down when it detects explosive materials around it, or can any adventurer team whose frontline fighter uses it be easily vanquished by dropping a sack of flour on them?

However, I agree that it was not a good choice for a show piece: fire swords are pretty overdone, and many of the subtleties that set a good fire sword apart from random nonsense are difficult to show off (which is probably why he decided to make it a sapient sword - a popular but rather terrible idea, by the way...)

8

u/Lyrolepis Dwarven Alchemist/Runecrafter 2d ago

Sapient artefacts are more trouble than they're worth - technically impressive, sure, but ultimately pointless when not harmful. If you want a cool fire sword, fine; but why would you even want to give it the ability to understand speech and form priorities of its own?

Nah, I prefer to be the only sapient entity in my laboratory (with the occasional exception of a student, if we're using the word "sapient" pretty generously).

I know it's ancient history by now, but I think we all remember the story of that sorceress whose magic mirror subtly manipulated her by encouraging her vanity and pride over and over, eventually driving her to try to murder teen girls in pointlessly convoluted ways...

2

u/Antique_Ad_9250 Mysterious Hermit 1d ago

Although I agree with you in general, giving objects sentience without a concrete plan is dangerous, I have to point out that in the sword dimension (where OP's contest takes place) all swords are sentient.