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Scotty

STORY: Wednesday April 27, 2016

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50 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

Because she can only summon ONE thing, duh ... while we never get canon set of rules, it make sense that crossbow and arrow would be two things. Also, the force needed to fire the arrow would likely make it vanish.

Two words

 

Laser Pistol.

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34 minutes ago, Drasvin said:

True, though thrown weapons could work, such as javelins or throwing axes.

Good point! Unfortunately most thrown weapons are rather weak. Knives are both unreliable and do very little damage. Throwing axes do more damage, but has to hit just right or they'll bounce off. Javelins and spears are probably the best throwing weapons, but they do take a lot of training and strength to be effective. More effective thrown weapons such as the atlatl requires two parts to work.
 

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1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

Because she can only summon ONE thing, duh ... while we never get canon set of rules, it make sense that crossbow and arrow would be two things. Also, the force needed to fire the arrow would likely make it vanish.

I would think that if the bolt was already loaded in the crossbow, it'd count as one weapon, then again, with the way magic likes to do things like making the fairy doll run off Susan's subconscious or Elliot merging with his phone, I wouldn't be surprised if the summon spell lets a crossbow or bow fire energy projectiles.

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1 hour ago, InfiniteRemnant said:

The resemblance existing as justification for explaining the No-Children limitation makes more sense than introducing that limitation solely to find a way to circumvent it later.

Aha! I've been trying to figure out why I dislike them so much as well (beyond them being brought up for everyone and their dog), and I think this is it, at least in part.(Edited it and added emphasis to make it more clear what parts I agreed with and why).

4 hours ago, hkmaly said:

I would also like to see summoned ranged weapons, but I'm not sure if it's possible. (It's not possible with Susan's spell, of course Diane can get different one ...)

The latter part is important to remember in all this. Also...is there any reason we're talking about magic weapons as if they are all summoned? That's what Susan has, yes, but they're not completely guaranteed to be the same, right? Maybe Diane can multiply a weapon many times (ex: shooting an arrow and it actually shoots 5 at a time), or the legendary sword Excalibur glows with fire in her hands and shoots lightning blades out with each swing when wielded by her, or something.

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31 minutes ago, Matoyak said:
1 hour ago, InfiniteRemnant said:

The resemblance existing as justification for explaining the No-Children limitation makes more sense than introducing that limitation solely to find a way to circumvent it later.

Aha! I've been trying to figure out why I dislike them so much as well (beyond them being brought up for everyone and their dog), and I think this is it, at least in part.(Edited it and added emphasis to make it more clear what parts I agreed with and why).

Well there's also the fact that the theory assumes the no-children limitation is a biological problem that can be worked around by introducing foreign biology.

for all we know it could be a magical problem that acts like a curse; preventing/terminating ANY offspring regardless of the method used to produce them.

Raven is smart and has worked with Edward before. he didn't say can't have children normally, he said can't have children. He seems awfully certain.

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15 hours ago, ProfessorTomoe said:

Truth be spoken here. What would be worse? The biological father had a divorce, kept Susan but gave up Diane, remarried, and later left Susan with his second wife. This sounds like the kind of spin that Dan would put on the story. ;)

The more common theory is that the Pompons were already married when Mr. Pompons and Miss Blondie conceived twins. Mr. Pompons tried persuade Mrs. Pompons to adopt both, but she would only go for one - and never learned that her husband was the biological father.

This theory does not have significant supporting evidence. However there's no evidence at all against it.

4 hours ago, CritterKeeper said:

I would think it would only possibly be relevant if one parent were the birth parent and the other was not.  If they adopted her together, then it really wouldn't have any bearing at all.

Succumbing to a moment of weakness and committing adultery is one thing. A 4+ year history of adultery - such as would be shown if Mr. Pompons claimed to be his adopted daughter's biological father - wouldn't help in the custody battle and would result in a divorce settlement/alimony payment more in Mrs. Pompons' favor.

4 hours ago, Cpt. Obvious said:

Um... Please remind me why this isn't possible? All I remember is that the original mark allowed her to summon a copy of whatever was placed in the appropriately marked box. I don't remember that there were any limit on what could be summoned other than it had to fit inside the box.

According to Susan's description of her original spell:

  • One object at a time.
  • I think she said that a container does not automatically come with contents. That logically would include ammo pouches, magazines, etc. At the extreme, it would be a no-moving-parts rule.
  • A summoned magical weapon is good for ONE sharp blow, then it unsummons. If summoning a loaded firearm were possible, firing it would unsummon both the gun and the bullet.

However, we know that the one-object-at-a-time rule has been relaxed - at least in regard to fairydolls. And that a separate spell for fairydolls is not absolutely required (since she first summoned one the evening before she was awakened). So that restriction may be gone - which would allow her to use a projectile-launching device (bow, gun, slingshot, etc.) provided that the launch itself does not constitute a sufficiently sharp blow to unsummon the projectile.

(Now I have some additional experiments I want Susan to try...

  1. Put an object in the box. Summon a copy of it. Remove the original from the box. See if the copy is still around. Investigate its properties.
  2. If #1 does not cause the summoned copy to unsummon, put it in the box and summon a copy of it. Look in the box to see if the "original" is still there. Investigate the properties of the copy-of-a-copy.
  3. Variant on #1: instead of removing the original from the box, erase the mark on the box.
  4. Have Ellen copy her and then see if Ellen can summon objects from the box - or can mark her own box to summon objects from.
  5. Summon a fairydoll and see if it can summon objects from the box.)

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3 hours ago, Scrapyard_Dragon said:
4 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Because she can only summon ONE thing, duh ... while we never get canon set of rules, it make sense that crossbow and arrow would be two things. Also, the force needed to fire the arrow would likely make it vanish.

Two words

 

Laser Pistol.

For that to work, there needs to be a laser pistol. She can only summon things that are in a marked box. (or could anyway. She may have a better version of the spell now)

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Given that she can apparently summon more than one fairydoll now, it seems likely that summoning more than one weapon (part) would come around the same time.  Also, summoning the Hammers is a different spell, based on the one Jerry set up, and she often used that one to summon two or more Hammers at once when it was through Jerry.  Seems likely she can summon more than one item at a time with the Hammer spell, too.

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The fairy summon seems to have become a spell of it's own instead of being a quirk of the initial magic item summoning spell she got when she was marked. It makes sense considering she summoned Lil' Nase often enough after awakening so she was able to gain a new spell specifically for the fairy. Though based on the end of Playing with Dolls, even though she summoned 3 of them, the mechanic of having the dolls Nanase made in the chest may still have been in play. Though it was implied that the new spell could have allowed her to create fairies that looked like anyone without the need for premade dolls. Susan needs to tell someone about it so we can know for sure. ;)

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2 hours ago, Scrapyard_Dragon said:

All this talk about summoning has made me realize that all the magic users need a spell that summons their spellbook.

I wonder if Susan kept her spell book in her chest with the weapons and fairy dolls, she could summon it as well, and would it let her read it?

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19 hours ago, Matoyak said:

The latter part is important to remember in all this. Also...is there any reason we're talking about magic weapons as if they are all summoned? That's what Susan has, yes, but they're not completely guaranteed to be the same, right? Maybe Diane can multiply a weapon many times (ex: shooting an arrow and it actually shoots 5 at a time), or the legendary sword Excalibur glows with fire in her hands and shoots lightning blades out with each swing when wielded by her, or something.

The ability is supposed to be kind of summoning ability, so ...

17 hours ago, Wildcat said:
20 hours ago, Scrapyard_Dragon said:

Laser Pistol.

For that to work, there needs to be a laser pistol. She can only summon things that are in a marked box. (or could anyway. She may have a better version of the spell now)

Technically, only problem with Laser Pistol is that you need power supply. Like, battery won't make it. AC power socket won't make it. What you need will be closer to what railway uses. You don't want to have cable like that attached to something you hold in your hand.

... and the cable won't fit into Susan's container.

10 hours ago, Scotty said:

The fairy summon seems to have become a spell of it's own instead of being a quirk of the initial magic item summoning spell she got when she was marked.

Agree. She may get spell for summoning more parts later, but only if she will have use for it.

57 minutes ago, Scotty said:
3 hours ago, Scrapyard_Dragon said:

All this talk about summoning has made me realize that all the magic users need a spell that summons their spellbook.

I wonder if Susan kept her spell book in her chest with the weapons and fairy dolls, she could summon it as well, and would it let her read it?

Based on what we know about Susan, she likely got at least half of ideas we do and TRIED most of them. Pity we don't know the results.

 

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1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

 

Technically, only problem with Laser Pistol is that you need power supply. Like, battery won't make it. AC power socket won't make it. What you need will be closer to what railway uses. You don't want to have cable like that attached to something you hold in your hand.

... and the cable won't fit into Susan's container.

 

All I have to say is that at some point Susan Might be able to fully conjure more things out of nothingness (she can do that with the hammers already) rather than just from a box, and as a star trek fan a laser gun seems like the sort of thing she would use. Tbh I probably should have expanded on my line of thought in that first post on my laser idea.

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1 hour ago, Vorlonagent said:

Could graphene capacitors give Susan a laser with a few meaningful shots and portability?

can they store multiple gigawatts in an infantry-portable scale unit without becoming volatile? because to be practical, it needs to have a damage output equal to or greater than a medium caliber solid projectile, and a reasonable magazine capacity, in an infantry portable scale.

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4 minutes ago, Scrapyard_Dragon said:

All I have to say is that at some point Susan Might be able to fully conjure more things out of nothingness (she can do that with the hammers already) rather than just from a box, and as a star trek fan a laser gun seems like the sort of thing she would use. Tbh I probably should have expanded on my line of thought in that first post on my laser idea.

Rewatch the TNG. Laser guns appear very sparsely in Star Trek. The thing they usually use is called phaser.

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11 minutes ago, InfiniteRemnant said:

can they store multiple gigawatts in an infantry-portable scale unit without becoming volatile? because to be practical, it needs to have a damage output equal to or greater than a medium caliber solid projectile, and a reasonable magazine capacity, in an infantry portable scale.

 

What are you defining as a "medium-calibur solid projectile"?  I wouldn't think you'd need the output of a nuclear reactor to power the laser equivalent to a 9mm pistol...

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1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

The ability is supposed to be kind of summoning ability, so ...

Susan's spell is, yes. But their affinity is just for magic weapons, not summoning or summoned magic weapons.

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19 minutes ago, Matoyak said:
2 hours ago, hkmaly said:

The ability is supposed to be kind of summoning ability, so ...

Susan's spell is, yes. But their affinity is just for magic weapons, not summoning or summoned magic weapons.

Susan's TALENT was described as natural talent for spells that create objects out of magic and spider vampire talks about Diane summoning the bane one day.

22 minutes ago, Vorlonagent said:

I wouldn't think you'd need the output of a nuclear reactor to power the laser equivalent to a 9mm pistol...

You don't need nuclear reactor. Coal power plant would suffice. But those tend to be not exactly portable either.

You can compare laser to wielding torch. Both are tools which can cut things and can be doing it as long as you keep providing energy to them. Thing is, storing the energy in form of chemical which is going to be burned like acetylene is much more efficient than batteries. In fact, if you will be able to convert the heat to electricity (or light) effectively enough (which is not exactly possible with portable devices), you could power the laser with acetylene-based battery.

Or, if we move from the analogy back to real devices ... hydrogen fuel cell will be more believable energy source for portable laser than normal battery. I suspect you can't make pistol with that ... but it will be something you can drag behind you on wheels.

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11 minutes ago, Matoyak said:
17 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

Susan's TALENT was described as natural talent for spells that create objects out of magic and spider vampire talks about Diane summoning the bane one day.

Then we've got conflicting info: http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=2185

Nanase might either not remember exact description or she is leaving out details to get to the main point quickly.

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1 hour ago, InfiniteRemnant said:

can they store multiple gigawatts in an infantry-portable scale unit without becoming volatile? because to be practical, it needs to have a damage output equal to or greater than a medium caliber solid projectile, and a reasonable magazine capacity, in an infantry portable scale.

One alternative would be if Tedd could build a single shot version. Throw it in the box and she can summon a new copy after each shot. It would tie in nicely with the single use magical weapons she's got now.
 

A single shot laser could even be chemical, if a high power chemical laser is easier to make than a xenon discharge or solid state laser capable of pumping out the same wattage.

A bit if laser physics: A laser can be powered in several ways, some of which isn't immediately obvious. The most common lasers we see are using a light emitting laser diode. Lasers that's used in laboratories are often powered using a glorified xenon flash tube, the lasers that were suggested for satellites in the fabled Star Wars program were to be powered with a small nuclear detonation, making them powerful one shot weapons. There was another program where the lasers were to be carried in large airplanes. These were to be chemically powered as a capacitor bank capable of powering some kind of discharge pumped laser would be way to heavy, A chemical laser is effectively a one shot weapon that needs to be take to a lab to be reconditioned and rearmed after each shot. It's possible the entire laser tube has to be replaced, I'm a bit foggy on the details here.

At least that's what I remember about them. As I remember it this was the latest and greatest info on lasers as of about twenty years ago, well all but the LED lasers as those weren't really that common or powerful back then. Heck ordinary LED's were way less common and no where near as powerful back then...

Note that this info may be dated or plain wrong. But it's the best I can come up with without firing up google and end up spending the better part of a day getting sidetracked...

 

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46 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

Susan's TALENT was described as natural talent for spells that create objects out of magic and spider vampire talks about Diane summoning the bane one day.

You don't need nuclear reactor. Coal power plant would suffice. But those tend to be not exactly portable either.

You can compare laser to wielding torch. Both are tools which can cut things and can be doing it as long as you keep providing energy to them. Thing is, storing the energy in form of chemical which is going to be burned like acetylene is much more efficient than batteries. In fact, if you will be able to convert the heat to electricity (or light) effectively enough (which is not exactly possible with portable devices), you could power the laser with acetylene-based battery.

Or, if we move from the analogy back to real devices ... hydrogen fuel cell will be more believable energy source for portable laser than normal battery. I suspect you can't make pistol with that ... but it will be something you can drag behind you on wheels.

I understand about the limits on battery storage vs weight.  I understand how a chemical reactant holds more energy in less space and how nuclear power holds orders of magnitude more energy for the same space.

I was talking about graphene capacitors because batteries aren't viable and there's only so many practical and portable options.  A capacitor might not be as good as a chemical solution ("lasing a stick of dynamite" if you will) but perhaps good for a reasonable shot or two...

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33 minutes ago, hkmaly said:
45 minutes ago, Matoyak said:
50 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

Susan's TALENT was described as natural talent for spells that create objects out of magic and spider vampire talks about Diane summoning the bane one day.

Then we've got conflicting info: http://www.egscomics.com/index.php?id=2185

Nanase might either not remember exact description or she is leaving out details to get to the main point quickly.

Summoned weapons ARE magic weapons, Susan's ability doesn't let her teleport a weapon out of her chest, she summons a magic copy of it, hence why they're only good for 1 solid hit. So both references are correct.

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