One question I cannot answer.

That would work, actually, but you'd better do it perfectly or you're likely to eat shrapnel (alternatively, be out of range). And you've got it exactly right, you need an energy input source which is usually thermodynamic.

Unfortunately, it's still easier to just directly apply your heat source to the ice, and use a substantially weaker (and easier) spell to focus all the heat into it. Explosive energy is hard to control.

But you're thinking small scale, and yes, you can do that. You can even turn air into gold (if you have the energy required to rebuild atoms like that, which, shal we say, is quite substantial for any notable amount). You an do bigger things too, think weaponized thunderstorms. Create a supercell to "eat" your enemies with a large tornado? No problem.

....

One thing to remember is that in this world, no one plays nice. This is not a nice world to live in, by any measure of it. You can't be nice either, if you're nice you die, generally. There's no organization like the UN, wars with >80% casualties are common, chemical weapons are frequently used, biological weapons are sometimes used but they're not near the engineered nightmares we have. Nuclear weapons are used fairly often but not as often as their magical versions (No one likes radioactive fallout), cities and massed armies are extremely soft targets if not shielded properly. Insert instant sunrise here.

Remember, they're as advanced as we are (and more so in some fields), but while our planet has 195 nations this one has almost 1200. Most are small, <100,000 square miles and <10 million pop. however there are a few larger ones. The 17 largest ones, however, are pretty much constantly at war with each other, enough so that they really can't pick off the smaller ones. Except Verheas, who goes around systematically assimilating smaller nations.*

*

^{If an insurgency develops later on in a few decades (or sooner?) regardless, they do it again and again, and again as needed until they get the message. They don't besiege cities, they just pull back about 40 miles and reduce the region to ash. If your nation looks like Mordor for a few years after being conquered by them, you got off lucky.}

*

^{It should say something that I'd rather be on the receiving end of a viking raid then a Verheasian army group(ignore the scale difference there, k?). Especially considering they dispose of all those corpses by adding them into an undead labor force for more simple, dangerous things like filling shells and mining. I know it's cliche, but I could think of no reason why not. Bonus points: You'd be completely aware and have 0 control over yourself if they hadn't stolen your soul yet.}

Naturally, you can guess who the evil guys are. Verheas is lead by an evil, completely batshit insane 400 year old elven wizard who has made a deal with one of the greater daemon lord from the Abyss to supply said daemon lord with lots of souls in return for, what is essentially crystals made of pure energy.*

Why's he kill everyone but humans then? Because humans are easiest to manipulate through fear*

^{Elves, Dwarves and Orcs tend to fight to the death faced with a situation like that, and everyone else is usually too stupid to follow orders properly in a timely manner.}

, and he does need manpower for his armies and war factories. To sum it up: Picture a very expansionist China ruled by a legit evil overlord who keeps his Evil Overlord List very close, is extremely Genre Savvy, and very trigger happy.

Now that you've got a general idea of how shitty this world is in, and should have a general idea of how said magic interacts with said technology... any questions? :P Besides "why haven't the Dwarves glassed Verheas?" Well, they tried, the missiles and bombers didn't get through. Not one.

edited 28th Aug '11 9:36:43 PM by Lessinath

"This thread has gone so far south it's surrounded by nesting penguins. " — Madrugada

So this is that world with the extensive naval battle that you were asking about a while ago on World Building?

Shinigan (Naruto fanfic)

Yes. The exact time period I mentioned here, however, is slightly earlier (by about 10 years) then that battle.

edited 28th Aug '11 10:03:13 PM by Lessinath

"This thread has gone so far south it's surrounded by nesting penguins. " — Madrugada

Is this story being posted anywhere? From snippets, it sounds quite interesting. I found the naval battle especially compelling, but this is also cool.

Shinigan (Naruto fanfic)

...It occurs to me that turning a nitrogen/oxygen mix into iron will actually release energy, if you can somehow overcome electromagnetism.

This would be bad, IMO.

Da Rules excuse all the inaccuracy in the world. Listen to them, not me.

Ah, I have a massive trouble with this as well. It's just that my verse is set in a near future, around 2020's, where magic and science have developed alongside. Needless to say, I'm considering scrapping the idea.

I'm a (socialist) professional writer serializing a WWII alternate history webnovel.

It's been tried. It worked on a small scale just fine, and the energy released could be used to continue the process.

But, then they tried it on an industrial scale and the containment failed. And thus, you can find an island on older maps that you cannot find on newer maps.

I've got bits up on a private forum, been considering putting it somewhere public but don't want bots getting it. I'm still in the early draft phase, so it's not THAT good, but the potential is certainly there.

It's an interesting concept, but it's not easy to work with. It's hard to make it seem like the characters are important, too.

edited 29th Aug '11 7:31:47 AM by Lessinath

"This thread has gone so far south it's surrounded by nesting penguins. " — Madrugada

So, the containment failed and caused a huge explosion that terminated the process. The containment did not fail and turn the entire atmosphere into iron atoms.

Shinigan (Naruto fanfic)

Well, no, it didn't start the atmosphere on fire, so yes, the process was terminated when it failed... but... it was still an 82 megaton explosion - the setup had 60 tons of oxygen/nitrogen mixture in it, it was just starting a batch. Fortunately, not all of it got the chance to undergo fusion before the containment failed*

, or it would have been a lot bigger than 82 megatons.

End result: A crater larger than the island (most of the island was within the radius of the fireball), a moderate tsunami, and people receiving thermal burns on the coastline 115 miles away. Originally, it was thought to be a weapons test, but it was later discovered to be an accident.

edited 29th Aug '11 7:59:21 AM by Lessinath

"This thread has gone so far south it's surrounded by nesting penguins. " — Madrugada

From the sounds of it, your Magi Tech is safer and easier to use than regular magic. That is enough reason to put it in. Also, guns > swords/bows not because they're more deadly, but because almost any idiot can pick them up and learn to point and dakka.

I don't think there's been any historical war with casualties that high. In fact, the only reason to push for genuine Kill Them All is if every race has some justification for genocide of whoever they're at war with. Kill rates that high mean your opponents will never surrender, because they're facing either a guaranteed death in battle (where at least they might take you with them) or a guaranteed death by slaughter (accomplishing nothing).

Any nation that evil destructive is swiftly going to be on the receiving end of a coalition. After all, he can only take out so many smaller nations before he's horning in on the other large nations ... at which point, they would likely take a breather from their infighting to cut off the new guy at the knees.

You have that backwards. Originally, it was an accident, but in hindsight, it was a most excellent weapons test.

That’s the epitome of privilege right there, not considering armed nazis a threat to your life. - Silasw

Inb4 Moar Dakka.

It is safter for the most part, unless you're going into large-scale stuff.

For real wars, localized casualties that high have happened, yes, but overall, no.

It's pretty much exactly that. Pretty much, in general, whoever wins kills a large fraction of whoever is left. Your chances of survival are generally higher when fighting.

But I should reword that. "Wars with >80% casualties on one or both sides are not uncommon enough to be considered very exceptional." Even with wholesale slaughter, 80% is on the upper end. If it breaks 82 or 83%, then people start thinking you're exceptionally cruel.

Except, he overthrew the government of an already large and powerful nation - it was about the size of France, which is quite large indeed for this world, so he never really was the "little new guy who needs stepped on". It went from "Verheas is not really very exceptional, even if they're large and mean" to "Who overthrew the Verheasian government? Them? Oh shit."

They did try to form a coalition, some 30 nations even. Verheas won, they're sitting on some high quality natural resources that had not really been developed that well until they started cranking out tanks.

60 tons is not a deliverable warhead.

But, yes, the Elves used this knowledge to make (modestly clean, actually) pure fusion bombs. And the Dwarves, in standard Dwarven fashion, used it to build a bigger (still dirty) bomb.

Unfortunately for them both, missiles are too easy to shoot down, and that nasty Verheasian wizard? Yeah, he figured out how to cause earthquakes*

...

"This thread has gone so far south it's surrounded by nesting penguins. " — Madrugada

...which is why the majority of your reaction mass is the target itself.

Da Rules excuse all the inaccuracy in the world. Listen to them, not me.

I have a question: if your magic is only limited by the mass you can put into it, why don't you just take all the mass from the enemy soldiers? Or, if you can't take it from a living organism, out of the enemy's weapons or fortifications?

Still Sheepin'

Well, first of all, it doesn't have to be anything specific as long as there is energy potential there (be it chemical, physical or nuclear or whatever it is). You CAN take it from living things, but that is not something that is easy to do and it's easy to stop (in fact, there's a simple spell to protect against just that which will pretty much cause you to in a shower of gore if you try*

...

They'd still probably shoot it down.

In fact, sometimes, in a spectacular waste of ordnance they'll use birds flying at high altitude for target practice.

edited 29th Aug '11 9:56:49 AM by Lessinath

"This thread has gone so far south it's surrounded by nesting penguins. " — Madrugada