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      Welcome!   03/05/2016

      Welcome, everyone, to the new 910CMX Community Forums. I'm still working on getting them running, so things may change.  If you're a 910 Comic creator and need your forum recreated, let me know and I'll get on it right away.  I'll do my best to make this new place as fun as the last one!
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Main Wed April 25 2018

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1 hour ago, ijuin said:

That is, of course, assuming that typical autocannon ammunition is capable of breaching a dragon's scales. It might take something heavier, such as high-explosive 155mm shells, to down a dragon.

Armour has a tendency to be as heavy as needed to protect its wearer. It has to do with practicality among other things. A thousand years ago mankind possessed few weapons even approaching the penetrative and destructive power of even common armour piercing bullets. A dragon that was all but invulnerable then might be far less so today. I give as an example the demon from season two of Buffy the Vampire Slayer that was so powerful that it took armies to bring it down. Two thousand years ago, that is. Buffy brought it down quite nicely with a common rocket launcher.

And even magic has limits. If "make yourself invulnerable to mortal weapons" was a common spell, that handgun would not have represented a threat to Raven in the mall. Don't fall so in love with magically invulnerable beings that you start to attribute protection levels that strain suspension of disbelief levels established for the world in question.

6 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

Also, as I keep repeating, the bulldog dragon is not exactly typical dragon

Please give a baseline for the typical dragon in the EGS-verse and give links to your sources.

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Just now, hkmaly said:
Just now, Douglas said:

With how the Will of Magic described the minimal changes as none, and many, my guess is that someone had figured out some of the more fundamental system-independent principles underlying magic, used those to design Kevin, and ran into a system-specific block that was part of keeping another system inaccessible.

That might also be what happened. Although I'm not sure if it's actually that much different from my hypothesis.

But how would someone be able to cast a spell from a older system if they couldn't learn it in the first place? If it had been hundreds of years since the system change, and Kevin and Magpie were made more recently, then no one who'd ever used the previous system would be alive to create them. It doesn't make sense for someone to read about spells from an older system and it's like "yeah you can cast the spell now, but because it's incompatible with the current system it won't actually do anything, and you won't even know if you did cast it."

It makes more sense that when a system changes, people could only learn spells from the new system. And I don't think Seers would be able to make wands and such using the old system either, they'd just automagically convert all their spell knowledge to the new system.

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5 hours ago, Scotty said:

But how would someone be able to cast a spell from a older system if they couldn't learn it in the first place?

That's not what I meant. Think of it this way: Magic operates kind of like a computer, and "taken at its most technical" how magic works is the operating system, like Windows. A specific magic system is then a program, let's say a word processor, that runs on the computer. The current system is Microsoft Word, and an older one (which is now forcibly prevented from running) is OpenOffice. The researcher discovers that Microsoft Word uses a particular Windows system call to display text. He tries to do something else (or rather, make something that does something else) with that Windows system call, but what he tries coincidentally happens to be something that OpenOffice did (and Microsoft Word does not), so Windows rejects the call even though it's technically valid.

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15 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
17 hours ago, ijuin said:

That is, of course, assuming that typical autocannon ammunition is capable of breaching a dragon's scales. It might take something heavier, such as high-explosive 155mm shells, to down a dragon.

Armour has a tendency to be as heavy as needed to protect its wearer. It has to do with practicality among other things. A thousand years ago mankind possessed few weapons even approaching the penetrative and destructive power of even common armour piercing bullets. A dragon that was all but invulnerable then might be far less so today. I give as an example the demon from season two of Buffy the Vampire Slayer that was so powerful that it took armies to bring it down. Two thousand years ago, that is. Buffy brought it down quite nicely with a common rocket launcher.

That assumes humans was the most dangerous threat dragons needed to protect against. Which is unlikely ; I propose the most dangerous threat against dragons were other dragons. Therefore, their scales are likely resistant against claws sharp and hard as metal and against fire.

BTW, are you aware that the synthetic fibers current "bulletproof" vests are made from are still not as good as spidersilk?

15 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
15 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Also, as I keep repeating, the bulldog dragon is not exactly typical dragon

Please give a baseline for the typical dragon in the EGS-verse and give links to your sources.

Sigh. We were already talking about this. You know exactly what I mean.

NO dragon is shown to be typical in EGS. You can't have "typical" from one and half example. When I talk about typical dragon, I'm talking about literature in general. It's a speculation which I'm JUST making (in that post you quote) - speculation which is indirectly supported, but not proven by EGS - that the buldog dragon is not typical in EGS just like it isn't typical in literature in general. And I did provided one example of type of dragons I'm speaking about in the rest of post you didn't bothered to quote.

(PS: There may be multiple candidates for typical dragon in literature, however the buldog dragon is none of them.)

However, you appear to prefer the idea that all the people in Magus universe, including Magus whose power we already saw, are unable to deal with threat on level of few buldog dragons without the advantage of being re-summoned every time they are killed. Maybe they should learn from Noah? :)

Do you have something against dragons? Because I don't remember you complaining about any other speculation as much as in case of dragons.

12 hours ago, Scotty said:

It makes more sense that when a system changes, people could only learn spells from the new system. And I don't think Seers would be able to make wands and such using the old system either, they'd just automagically convert all their spell knowledge to the new system.

No, seers knowledge would not be automagically converted. Seers alive at the time of reset are perfectly aware of both systems. And seers ability to analyze magic and the way Tedd was using it imply they are able to create spells based just on their knowledge, without copying it from anyone. We don't know if this is limited to seers or if any wizard can do that, but that's not important. We know there are two seers missing from the meeting who found out seers second purpose. It's perfectly possible one of them, while researching old texts, tried to make spell based on what he read and ended up with something which was blocked by same blocks which blocked previous magic system. Maybe researching why Kevin doesn't work was the thing which later lead him to discovering seer's second purpose.

6 hours ago, Douglas said:
12 hours ago, Scotty said:

But how would someone be able to cast a spell from a older system if they couldn't learn it in the first place?

That's not what I meant. Think of it this way: Magic operates kind of like a computer, and "taken at its most technical" how magic works is the operating system, like Windows. A specific magic system is then a program, let's say a word processor, that runs on the computer. The current system is Microsoft Word, and an older one (which is now forcibly prevented from running) is OpenOffice. The researcher discovers that Microsoft Word uses a particular Windows system call to display text. He tries to do something else (or rather, make something that does something else) with that Windows system call, but what he tries coincidentally happens to be something that OpenOffice did (and Microsoft Word does not), so Windows rejects the call even though it's technically valid.

You have bonus points because unlike serious operation systems, Windows are full of undocumented kludges and workarounds (mostly to keep old programs running despite actually being buggy) so it's perfectly possible something will not work because of hitting some backward compatibility hack despite the fact it SHOULD work according to documentation.

It also reminds me how I was coding program - completely from scratch - and suddenly got error message saying "OS/2 is not supported" from VMWare. Apparently, I randomly did something which OS/2 was doing and it either was too hard to support properly or VMWare authors didn't liked OS/2. (Ah, yes ... found the notes from 2001 about that. 16bit stack segment.)

However, it's not that magic operates that much as a computer. It's just that computer is one of the few systems capable of running algorithms we have experience with.

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2 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

No, seers knowledge would not be automagically converted. Seers alive at the time of reset are perfectly aware of both systems. And seers ability to analyze magic and the way Tedd was using it imply they are able to create spells based just on their knowledge, without copying it from anyone. We don't know if this is limited to seers or if any wizard can do that, but that's not important. We know there are two seers missing from the meeting who found out seers second purpose. It's perfectly possible one of them, while researching old texts, tried to make spell based on what he read and ended up with something which was blocked by same blocks which blocked previous magic system. Maybe researching why Kevin doesn't work was the thing which later lead him to discovering seer's second purpose.

To use Tedd as an example, he made the wand that had FV5+clothing resize on it, if magic changed that wand would no longer work, it'd be inert, if he then remade the wand with the same spell, it'd be using the new system to work, not the old one, it's unlikely that Tedd would have been able create the wand with the previous system. If someone found old texts that mention spells, the best they could do is be like "oh hey this spell looks kinda like this spell I already know or know someone who knows" there would be similarities, but they'd be using the current system's spells to get an approximate effect and not the old magic. But having the old magic becoming available again shouldn't "fix" any imperfections of another system, someone with the knowledge of both systems would be more likely to "patch" things to make it work.

14 minutes ago, hkmaly said:
6 hours ago, Douglas said:

That's not what I meant. Think of it this way: Magic operates kind of like a computer, and "taken at its most technical" how magic works is the operating system, like Windows. A specific magic system is then a program, let's say a word processor, that runs on the computer. The current system is Microsoft Word, and an older one (which is now forcibly prevented from running) is OpenOffice. The researcher discovers that Microsoft Word uses a particular Windows system call to display text. He tries to do something else (or rather, make something that does something else) with that Windows system call, but what he tries coincidentally happens to be something that OpenOffice did (and Microsoft Word does not), so Windows rejects the call even though it's technically valid.

You have bonus points because unlike serious operation systems, Windows are full of undocumented kludges and workarounds (mostly to keep old programs running despite actually being buggy) so it's perfectly possible something will not work because of hitting some backward compatibility hack despite the fact it SHOULD work according to documentation.

Disco Wizard said with regards to the system change that "it will be the magical equivalent of someone seuddenly changing the operating systems on everyone's computers." so it wouldn't be like trying to open the same file in either OpenOffice or Word, it'd be like you've been using Windows all your life and suddenly you need to learn Linux (I'm talking early Linux where you had to compile everything yourself instead of a program coming with an automated install)

Could also equate it to the times when Minecraft redid their engine and broke everyone's mods (happened 2 or 3 times now) to the point where entire versions went without any major mod development because it took that long for modmakers to decypher the changes and adapt.

What's happened with all systems being open now is like being able to run emulators for past OSes, the main OS that you boot with is the current system and stuff like DOSbox would be whatever system the golem was made in.

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26 minutes ago, Scotty said:
53 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

No, seers knowledge would not be automagically converted. Seers alive at the time of reset are perfectly aware of both systems. And seers ability to analyze magic and the way Tedd was using it imply they are able to create spells based just on their knowledge, without copying it from anyone. We don't know if this is limited to seers or if any wizard can do that, but that's not important. We know there are two seers missing from the meeting who found out seers second purpose. It's perfectly possible one of them, while researching old texts, tried to make spell based on what he read and ended up with something which was blocked by same blocks which blocked previous magic system. Maybe researching why Kevin doesn't work was the thing which later lead him to discovering seer's second purpose.

To use Tedd as an example, he made the wand that had FV5+clothing resize on it, if magic changed that wand would no longer work, it'd be inert, if he then remade the wand with the same spell, it'd be using the new system to work, not the old one, it's unlikely that Tedd would have been able create the wand with the previous system. If someone found old texts that mention spells, the best they could do is be like "oh hey this spell looks kinda like this spell I already know or know someone who knows" there would be similarities, but they'd be using the current system's spells to get an approximate effect and not the old magic. But having the old magic becoming available again shouldn't "fix" any imperfections of another system, someone with the knowledge of both systems would be more likely to "patch" things to make it work.

I'm actually saying that yes, if the magic reset happened, Tedd would still be able to create another wand with FV5 + clothing resize on it and it wouldn't work.

If you don't agree with that, we must agree on disagree ; the best canon argument for it to work that way is the existence of Kevin, so if it's not enough for you I don't have anything better to convince you with.

26 minutes ago, Scotty said:

Disco Wizard said with regards to the system change that "it will be the magical equivalent of someone seuddenly changing the operating systems on everyone's computers." so it wouldn't be like trying to open the same file in either OpenOffice or Word, it'd be like you've been using Windows all your life and suddenly you need to learn Linux (I'm talking early Linux where you had to compile everything yourself instead of a program coming with an automated install)

Compiling everything isn't hard nor obsolete and can be automated.

Running windows programs on linux is possible.

And with binfmt_misc, you can actually do that without special syntax.

However, I wouldn't be surprised if Disco Wizard didn't knew that.

26 minutes ago, Scotty said:

Could also equate it to the times when Minecraft redid their engine and broke everyone's mods (happened 2 or 3 times now) to the point where entire versions went without any major mod development because it took that long for modmakers to decypher the changes and adapt.

That may be better example. Except, not sure about Minecraft, but generally it IS possible to provide multiple versions of API at once.

Note that seers are developers here ; normal magic users can't adapt to reset by themselves, they need seers to tell them the new rules apparently. Or, maybe they can get new spells in new system randomly if they are lucky but need seers for anything specific.

26 minutes ago, Scotty said:

What's happened with all systems being open now is like being able to run emulators for past OSes, the main OS that you boot with is the current system and stuff like DOSbox would be whatever system the golem was made in.

What's happened is that the situation became SIMPLER, not more complicated. It's not like suddenly older magic systems are being emulated. Instead, they were ACTIVELY BLOCKED from working before. And that's said by Will of Magic itself.

So, it's like there is API with overabundance of system calls, and some of them were blocked in previous systems, different set every time. Now, all are available. And most likely, part of the API was always available because it's too basic to hide. Seer abilities, for example, seem to not change - by design.

(In addition to the blocks, some variables likely changed as well. However, there are limited ways to configure the default system of magic. The number of ways how to build an API is only limited if you want some limit on minimal size of request. Magic is definitely more limited than Minecraft programmers in how different can the magic systems be.)

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1 minute ago, hkmaly said:

I'm actually saying that yes, if the magic reset happened, Tedd would still be able to create another wand with FV5 + clothing resize on it and it wouldn't work.

If you don't agree with that, we must agree on disagree ; the best canon argument for it to work that way is the existence of Kevin, so if it's not enough for you I don't have anything better to convince you with.

The thing about that is though, Tedd, as a Seer, needs to be able to make wands with spells that work in the new system in order to teach others how to use the new system, and the only way he can do that is by using the spells he's learned in the old system, the knowledge of the effects would carry over but not the actual system the were originally learned in.

5 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

Ordinary users would need to be taught how to do that, if you have an office with 100 computer users, and one day it was determined that the OS needed to be replaced, chances are the building's IT department (Seers) would be called on to teach everyone how to use the new system.

9 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

That may be better example. Except, not sure about Minecraft, but generally it IS possible to provide multiple versions of API at once.

Minecraft doesn't really have an API, there's pseudo API's out there (the Twitch Client, Technic Launcher, AT Launcher, etc) but modders are reliant on someone being able to de-obfuscate Minecraft's Java code and create the Minecraft Coders Pack (MCP), the guy that was originally able to do that eventually got a job at Mojang to help speed up the process.

23 minutes ago, hkmaly said:

What's happened is that the situation became SIMPLER, not more complicated. It's not like suddenly older magic systems are being emulated. Instead, they were ACTIVELY BLOCKED from working before. And that's said by Will of Magic itself.

So, it's like there is API with overabundance of system calls, and some of them were blocked in previous systems, different set every time. Now, all are available. And most likely, part of the API was always available because it's too basic to hide.

The WoM stated that people would continue to learn spells base on the current system, the only way they'd be able to learn the magic of older systems would be if they were exposed to those kinds of magic and were able to study it, Tedd might be able to "look" at Kevin now and determine if the magic used to create him was current or something he'd never seen before much like Kevin didn't recognize the Golem's aura. Of course, if Kevin was created in an older system, Tedd would then know how that older system worked and be able to create another wand like Kevin.

Maybe Kevin is similar to the Dewitchery Diamond in that it was originally created in an older system, then repurposed later, and now the magics from both systems have mixed to give it sentience.

 

 

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1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

That assumes humans was the most dangerous threat dragons needed to protect against. Which is unlikely ; I propose the most dangerous threat against dragons were other dragons. Therefore, their scales are likely resistant against claws sharp and hard as metal and against fire.

You are assuming. You are assuming that these other ancient dragons were more powerful than modern weaponry is today. I see absolutely no reason why that assumption should be true. A dragon of a thousand years ago could have armouring much weaker than modern bullet resistant metals and still be impervious to most human weaponry. Plate armour of the fifteenth century gave such good protection against weaponry extant at the time that trained knights were quite difficult for common foot soldiers to kill. They most commonly died when pulled down by being surrounded, held down and stabbed through cracks in the armour.

1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

BTW, are you aware that the synthetic fibers current "bulletproof" vests are made from are still not as good as spidersilk?

Indeed. Are you aware that when water is left in the open at temperatures above freezing, it will evaporate and turn into moisture or steam sooner or later? I assure you, that is equally relevant.

That is to say, not at all.

1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

Sigh. We were already talking about this. You know exactly what I mean.

Yes. I do indeed. "I have absolutely no idea what I am talking about, but if I spout balderdash about a nonexistent baseline, perhaps no-one will notice." Thank you for your obtuse condescension, but I have seen it done better. Next argument, please.

1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

When I talk about typical dragon, I'm talking about literature in general.

Indeed. And in literature in general, dragons range from unstoppable engines of death and destruction to small inoffensive swamp creatures that accidentally explode if they get a bad case of hiccups. We have no idea which if either extreme applies to EGS.

1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

(PS: There may be multiple candidates for typical dragon in literature, however the buldog dragon is none of them.)

*snicker* Yes it is. EGS is part of the published literary body, your denial notwithstanding. And ironically it is the BEST example we have for EGS because it is the ONLY example we have.

1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

However, you appear to prefer the idea that all the people in Magus universe, including Magus whose power we already saw, are unable to deal with threat on level of few buldog dragons without the advantage of being re-summoned every time they are killed. Maybe they should learn from Noah? :)

You must really get rid of that odious habit of setting up a position that your discussion partner has never taken and then pretend it is his in a feeble attempt to make your opponent defend it. You may think it lends you an air of spurious cleverness. In truth, it only makes you appear the pathetic buffoon.

Dragons could readily exist that were still bigger and more powerful than the bulldog dragon without being your astounding wet dream of monstrosities with armour plating to match or outperform that of modern battleships. And also I said nothing of numbers. Even the bulldog dragon type would be a considerable threat if it came in swarms numbering dozens or hundreds. Or more. You also assume that all people in Magus' home universe have his or nearly his power level -- a tall assumption. He is in a battle mage school. Even assuming that a battle mage is a common soldier in that world, that would limit their numbers to a quite small percentage of the population. We know that the Terra of his world is more powerful than he is but she is the equivalent of Tedd whom we know has an impressive amount of power among users of magic.

More, exactly because dragons are considered a threat, we know that the humanity are not the unfettered masters of their planet the way h. sapiens sapiens is of ours. They may have a smaller population. Creatures like dragons or related threat levels might make ressources less freely available than they are here. They rely on magic to a degree that may have hampered the development of technology. I note that for all his bragging about power, Magus has not made one boast of his world's technology. And if they in fact had weaponry to match ours, why even the battle mages?

2 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Do you have something against dragons? Because I don't remember you complaining about any other speculation as much as in case of dragons.

No. I have something against poor reasoning and ill faith arguments. I suggest you work on both of these areas, you have a lamentable tendency to stumble into both of them in a desperate attempt to retain dominance of a discussion.

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4 hours ago, Scotty said:
4 hours ago, hkmaly said:

I'm actually saying that yes, if the magic reset happened, Tedd would still be able to create another wand with FV5 + clothing resize on it and it wouldn't work.

If you don't agree with that, we must agree on disagree ; the best canon argument for it to work that way is the existence of Kevin, so if it's not enough for you I don't have anything better to convince you with.

The thing about that is though, Tedd, as a Seer, needs to be able to make wands with spells that work in the new system in order to teach others how to use the new system, and the only way he can do that is by using the spells he's learned in the old system, the knowledge of the effects would carry over but not the actual system the were originally learned in.

No, I don't agree that's the only way.

In fact, new system may be different enough - and the seer exposure to previous magic system limited enough - that nothing in new system resembles old one ; AND even the seers which don't know about magic AT ALL are given informations to teach in new system. That suggest some sort of info dump from Will of magic which doesn't have anything to do with what the seers already knew beforehand.

4 hours ago, Scotty said:

Ordinary users would need to be taught how to do that, if you have an office with 100 computer users, and one day it was determined that the OS needed to be replaced, chances are the building's IT department (Seers) would be called on to teach everyone how to use the new system.

Ordinary users usually need to be re-taught when the position of icons on screen changes with upgrade from version 4.3 to 4.4. So, yes.

4 hours ago, Scotty said:
4 hours ago, hkmaly said:

That may be better example. Except, not sure about Minecraft, but generally it IS possible to provide multiple versions of API at once.

Minecraft doesn't really have an API, there's pseudo API's out there (the Twitch Client, Technic Launcher, AT Launcher, etc) but modders are reliant on someone being able to de-obfuscate Minecraft's Java code and create the Minecraft Coders Pack (MCP), the guy that was originally able to do that eventually got a job at Mojang to help speed up the process.

(Reading ...) ... seriously? The game known for modes has no official API and mods are basically hacking the game and only MCP licence is protecting from abusing that? ... didn't expected that sort of shortsights from developers.

Sure, wouldn't be first time where game got more popular after being hacked with new functionality, but that was essentially abandonware ; and in fact there is a famous web server NAMED by the fact it was originally distributed as patch to other server, but that was long ago and is no longer true.

4 hours ago, Scotty said:

The WoM stated that people would continue to learn spells base on the current system, the only way they'd be able to learn the magic of older systems would be if they were exposed to those kinds of magic and were able to study it, Tedd might be able to "look" at Kevin now and determine if the magic used to create him was current or something he'd never seen before much like Kevin didn't recognize the Golem's aura. Of course, if Kevin was created in an older system, Tedd would then know how that older system worked and be able to create another wand like Kevin.

My explanation is that if you are seer, you can get "exposed" to old magic by reading some instructions made by previous seer. But, yes, this is speculation not well supported by EGS.

4 hours ago, Scotty said:

Maybe Kevin is similar to the Dewitchery Diamond in that it was originally created in an older system, then repurposed later, and now the magics from both systems have mixed to give it sentience.

Actually, Dewitchery Diamond being repurposed is still fan speculation at this point ; the EGS canon doesn't make that certain.

However, regarding Kevin, note that he was NOT WORKING AT ALL before the not-reset. And that the sentience is EXACTLY the feature which needed to be coded recently to explain his modern knowledge.

3 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
5 hours ago, hkmaly said:

That assumes humans was the most dangerous threat dragons needed to protect against. Which is unlikely ; I propose the most dangerous threat against dragons were other dragons. Therefore, their scales are likely resistant against claws sharp and hard as metal and against fire.

You are assuming. You are assuming that these other ancient dragons were more powerful than modern weaponry is today. I see absolutely no reason why that assumption should be true. A dragon of a thousand years ago could have armouring much weaker than modern bullet resistant metals and still be impervious to most human weaponry. Plate armour of the fifteenth century gave such good protection against weaponry extant at the time that trained knights were quite difficult for common foot soldiers to kill. They most commonly died when pulled down by being surrounded, held down and stabbed through cracks in the armour.

I explicitly said that I DON'T think they are more powerful than guided missiles. However, you are right that everything we know about dragons from Magus world is that they are considered serious problem, everything else is speculation.

3 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
5 hours ago, hkmaly said:

BTW, are you aware that the synthetic fibers current "bulletproof" vests are made from are still not as good as spidersilk?

Indeed. Are you aware that when water is left in the open at temperatures above freezing, it will evaporate and turn into moisture or steam sooner or later? I assure you, that is equally relevant.

That is to say, not at all.

It's not THAT bad. We ARE talking about armor and this would be relevant in the "yes, this kind of armor can be made from natural materials" kind of way.

3 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
5 hours ago, hkmaly said:

(PS: There may be multiple candidates for typical dragon in literature, however the buldog dragon is none of them.)

*snicker* Yes it is. EGS is part of the published literary body, your denial notwithstanding. And ironically it is the BEST example we have for EGS because it is the ONLY example we have.

EGS being published literary body only makes Buldog dragon one of examples of dragon in literature. He can't become typical because he's wastly outnumbered, being SINGLE example.

3 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
5 hours ago, hkmaly said:

When I talk about typical dragon, I'm talking about literature in general.

Indeed. And in literature in general, dragons range from unstoppable engines of death and destruction to small inoffensive swamp creatures that accidentally explode if they get a bad case of hiccups. We have no idea which if either extreme applies to EGS.

Note, however, that just because you think those "inoffensive" swamp creatures are less dangerous than buldog dragon it will not make him typical. Most it can say is that his level of power is not lower than the low end of power of dragons.

And, frankly, I can imagine swarm of creatures likely to chain-explode to be danger justifying special dragon sirens. Special mages for fighting them, less so.

3 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

Dragons could readily exist that were still bigger and more powerful than the bulldog dragon without being your astounding wet dream of monstrosities with armour plating to match or outperform that of modern battleships. And also I said nothing of numbers. Even the bulldog dragon type would be a considerable threat if it came in swarms numbering dozens or hundreds. Or more. You also assume that all people in Magus' home universe have his or nearly his power level -- a tall assumption. He is in a battle mage school. Even assuming that a battle mage is a common soldier in that world, that would limit their numbers to a quite small percentage of the population. We know that the Terra of his world is more powerful than he is but she is the equivalent of Tedd whom we know has an impressive amount of power among users of magic.

That's true. I'm not sure how that big swarms would be possible - like, what would they be eating - and I don't understand your comparison with battleships - those definitely withstand MUCH more than gatlings - but I must agree that group of dragons more powerful than bulldog dragon OR same powerful but with numbers in hundreds could be danger special group of battle mages needs to be trained against even if you only need several hits from gatling gun to take them down.

(Note that Magus is STUDENT. I would assume professor in said school is more powerful than him OR Terra.)

I still think that resistance to gatlings is necessary if single dragon is expected to be danger, but I agree that we don't have that confirmed.

3 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

More, exactly because dragons are considered a threat, we know that the humanity are not the unfettered masters of their planet the way h. sapiens sapiens is of ours. They may have a smaller population. Creatures like dragons or related threat levels might make ressources less freely available than they are here. They rely on magic to a degree that may have hampered the development of technology. I note that for all his bragging about power, Magus has not made one boast of his world's technology. And if they in fact had weaponry to match ours, why even the battle mages?

Not only he's not boasting of his world's technology, he seem to have problem with understanding how car work. On the other hand, the university didn't looked THAT historic and the uniform they wore looked quite modern too. There were quite big improvements in loom technology in 1733 and 1785.

Ford, the first company mass-producing cars, was found in 1903. First automobile was created in 1885. In comparison to that, gunpowder was developed in 9th-century China and spread into Europe on the end of 13th century. Oldest university was founded in 1088. Sirens were invented sometime before 1799.

I find more likely that Magus's world technology level is similar to something like 18th or 19th century that than they didn't developed gunpowder yet.

Of course, that is just speculation ; our information about Magus word is very limited and it might be even worse if Dan didn't actually though about it in level of details we do. If you consider more likely it's something like 12th or 13th century, I'm not aware of anything in the comics which would disprove it, because it's true that comparing level of development of two civilization is hard and can't be done with single number.

3 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
5 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Do you have something against dragons? Because I don't remember you complaining about any other speculation as much as in case of dragons.

No. I have something against poor reasoning and ill faith arguments. I suggest you work on both of these areas, you have a lamentable tendency to stumble into both of them in a desperate attempt to retain dominance of a discussion.

I really don't see how my comment about dragons could bring me any special level of dominance of a discussion. Compared to, say, other comments I'm making and which you don't react so aggressively against.

And I remember how big was the argument started when I talked about "real dragons" and didn't added the smile to establish it's a jab against the buldog dragon not expected to be interpreted literally and not expressing the idea fully with all disclaimers and full explanation.

(Although I'm glad you don't react this way on everything I say. Posting stuff like this post takes LOT of time. Quick speculating is quicker and more fun, although it's true that sometime it can lead to being less reasoned than I think when writing it. AND I really don't know how to respond to posts like this quickly ; OF COURSE I can't provide those sources when you formulated it in way which has nothing to do with how I meant it.)

EDIT/PS:

3 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

More, exactly because dragons are considered a threat, we know that the humanity are not the unfettered masters of their planet the way h. sapiens sapiens is of ours.

Actually, this is speculation: we don't know for sure those are LOCAL dragons making that problem.

It is possible people on Magus's earth control whole planet, BUT the dragons are arriving there either from other planet, other half of the planet in same sense Griffins used, or from other universe / plane of existence.

(The explanation of it being local dragons seems simplest in terms of occams razor, but every universe having other half is established in EGS canon, so them being from other half of Magus's Earth would be close second.)

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On 4/25/2018 at 0:08 AM, partner555 said:

And the wand is built during the current system, it just didn't work before tonight. I'm assuming that it's because the creator thought the rules from a previous system applied.

My assumption was that wands that will provide tutoring are something that either did not exist when Keven was created, or were usually much simpler, and so creating something like Kevin required a lot of trial and error. Kevin was likely just one experimental prototype in a series of experiments; it's possible that later they succeeded with a different device. Even prior to today's comic, I suspected that it was the Dewitchery Diamond's explosion (and the subsequent evaporation of its pieces) that activated Keven and the other artifacts; apparently the magic it unleashed fixed something in Kevin.

Based on what we know, I can see two likely possibilities: One, Kevin requires a lot of power, more than his creator(s) could provide him, and the Dewitchery Diamond powered him up. Two, magic-based AI is difficult to create, and the same ability which allowed the Diamond to create sentient beings like Ellen allowed its' shards to provide Kevin's mind what it was missing (it might even have given Kevin a soul, if that's something the Diamond was responsible for).

On 4/26/2018 at 0:17 AM, The Old Hack said:

For all we know, Dragons might have the ability to enter the immaterial plane and that was where the scene took place. They might still be around, only extremely leery of showing themselves due to the possibility of an encounter with a rocket launcher or a Gatling anti-aircraft gun...

Or Dragons might have the ability to shapeshift into a human-like form, and the dragon population is currently mostly in hiding among the human population. There might even be people with dragon blood in the main or secondary cast...

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1 hour ago, ChronosCat said:

Or Dragons might have the ability to shapeshift into a human-like form, and the dragon population is currently mostly in hiding among the human population. There might even be people with dragon blood in the main or secondary cast...

Also the dragon we see in the background behind Pandora might be only a handful of yards away from her and be no bigger than a pony. That would make it easier for it to hide.

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34 minutes ago, The Old Hack said:

Also the dragon we see in the background behind Pandora might be only a handful of yards away from her and be no bigger than a pony. That would make it easier for it to hide.

Cute Shoulder Dragon is usually a +2 for males, +4 for females.  I think that's a Cute Shoulder Dragon...of Doom.

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1 hour ago, Vorlonagent said:

Cute Shoulder Dragon is usually a +2 for males, +4 for females.  I think that's a Cute Shoulder Dragon...of Doom.

"It's all rubbish." Lady Sybil sniffed. "Oh, it sounds nice, I'll grant you. Then they realize it means soot-burns, frizzled hair and crap all down their back. Those talons dig in, too. And then they think the thing's getting too big and smelly and next thing you know it's either down to the Morpork Sunshine Sanctuary for Lost Dragons or the old heave-ho into the river with a rope round their neck, poor little buggers."

-- Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!

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5 hours ago, ChronosCat said:

Based on what we know, I can see two likely possibilities: One, Kevin requires a lot of power, more than his creator(s) could provide him, and the Dewitchery Diamond powered him up. Two, magic-based AI is difficult to create, and the same ability which allowed the Diamond to create sentient beings like Ellen allowed its' shards to provide Kevin's mind what it was missing (it might even have given Kevin a soul, if that's something the Diamond was responsible for).

The "require lot of power" is definitely option. The "diamond somehow fixed Kevin" is something I would consider less likely than that it was the magic reset.

5 hours ago, ChronosCat said:
On 4/26/2018 at 6:17 AM, The Old Hack said:

For all we know, Dragons might have the ability to enter the immaterial plane and that was where the scene took place. They might still be around, only extremely leery of showing themselves due to the possibility of an encounter with a rocket launcher or a Gatling anti-aircraft gun...

Or Dragons might have the ability to shapeshift into a human-like form, and the dragon population is currently mostly in hiding among the human population. There might even be people with dragon blood in the main or secondary cast...

So, are you with me on the topic of "Dragons are not weaklings"? :)

Yes, they may be able to shapeshift and use it to hide between population. However, I don't think they would be hiding from themselves, and main character hiding something like that from us would be weird. (Of course, little dragon blood is possible.)

Secondary cast is more likely but I still don't see anyone specific who would be likely to be dragon. After all, CATALINA ended up just marked with cat spell despite being foreshadowed heavily.

3 hours ago, The Old Hack said:
5 hours ago, ChronosCat said:

Or Dragons might have the ability to shapeshift into a human-like form, and the dragon population is currently mostly in hiding among the human population. There might even be people with dragon blood in the main or secondary cast...

Also the dragon we see in the background behind Pandora might be only a handful of yards away from her and be no bigger than a pony. That would make it easier for it to hide.

Based on his tail on previous picture I would expect he's bigger, unless Dan is bad at perspective :)

1 hour ago, The Old Hack said:
3 hours ago, Vorlonagent said:

Cute Shoulder Dragon is usually a +2 for males, +4 for females.  I think that's a Cute Shoulder Dragon...of Doom.

"It's all rubbish." Lady Sybil sniffed. "Oh, it sounds nice, I'll grant you. Then they realize it means soot-burns, frizzled hair and crap all down their back. Those talons dig in, too. And then they think the thing's getting too big and smelly and next thing you know it's either down to the Morpork Sunshine Sanctuary for Lost Dragons or the old heave-ho into the river with a rope round their neck, poor little buggers."

-- Terry Pratchett, Guards! Guards!

Yes, using living dragons as shoulder pads is bad idea. You are supposed to use dragon summon.

Snadhya'rune Vel'Sharen and her dragon summon

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1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

The "require lot of power" is definitely option. The "diamond somehow fixed Kevin" is something I would consider less likely than that it was the magic reset.

Considering that Kevin didn't show up until the Diamond was destroyed, and he was created during the latest magic system, I think it more likely it was the Diamond's destruction that activated him than the reset. I suppose we'll need to wait for Word of Dan or confirmation in the story to know for sure, though.

1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

So, are you with me on the topic of "Dragons are not weaklings"? :)

That depends on the dragon and who/what you're comparing it to. :)

There are some reptilian fire-breathing creatures which are fairly weak (but still strong enough to be dangerous to an unarmed human lacking superhuman strength or abilities), such as Alefgard's Wyverns, or Pern's Fire Lizards, though those aren't usually actually called dragons. Often times even dragons referred to as such can still be slain by a well equipped and experienced human warrior with a skillfully wielded sword or well-placed arrow  (for instance, the dragons of Alefgard or Middle Earth). Then there are god-like dragons like Shenron, but even they have their limits - Shenron was once killed by King Piccolo, and presumably the likes of Super Saiyans, Frieza, and other beings of similar or greater power could kill him if they were so inclined (he's even afraid of Beerus, the God of Destruction).

I'm sure there are more powerful dragons than Shenron (I seem to recall you mentioning them before), but as I haven't encountered them myself, I can only assume they're in the minority.

1 hour ago, hkmaly said:

Yes, they may be able to shapeshift and use it to hide between population. However, I don't think they would be hiding from themselves, and main character hiding something like that from us would be weird. (Of course, little dragon blood is possible.)

I was specifically thinking the Dragons might have bred with humans, leading to descendants with only a little dragon blood and no knowledge of it (except perhaps a family legend no one believes).

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6 hours ago, ChronosCat said:
7 hours ago, hkmaly said:

The "require lot of power" is definitely option. The "diamond somehow fixed Kevin" is something I would consider less likely than that it was the magic reset.

Considering that Kevin didn't show up until the Diamond was destroyed, and he was created during the latest magic system, I think it more likely it was the Diamond's destruction that activated him than the reset. I suppose we'll need to wait for Word of Dan or confirmation in the story to know for sure, though.

The magic reset caused him to work. He still needed to be powered to activate.

6 hours ago, ChronosCat said:
7 hours ago, hkmaly said:

So, are you with me on the topic of "Dragons are not weaklings"? :)

That depends on the dragon and who/what you're comparing it to. :)

I was commenting that dragons who have shapeshifting abilities are usually considerably stronger than ones which doesn't (because it's not only ability they have).

6 hours ago, ChronosCat said:
7 hours ago, hkmaly said:

Yes, they may be able to shapeshift and use it to hide between population. However, I don't think they would be hiding from themselves, and main character hiding something like that from us would be weird. (Of course, little dragon blood is possible.)

I was specifically thinking the Dragons might have bred with humans, leading to descendants with only a little dragon blood and no knowledge of it (except perhaps a family legend no one believes).

Therefore the sentence in parenthesis.

Yes, I can imagine say Nanase having some dragon blood. It would be superfluous, as her having some fairy blood would be enough to explain her abilities, but if there would be some good reason for it ...

And yes.  "What, did you though her charisma 32 goes away when she takes human form?"

However, that's sideefect. If it's supposed to be hiding, it means there are some dragons (or people with enough dragon blood to be able to shapeshift to dragon form) still alive.

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11 hours ago, hkmaly said:

I was commenting that dragons who have shapeshifting abilities are usually considerably stronger than ones which doesn't (because it's not only ability they have).

Perhaps, but it's not strictly speaking necessary. All that's really required is a human-like intelligence (in order to properly pose as human) and a good shape-shifting spell. I suppose unless it's a hereditary ability it is unlikely they'd have only the one spell, and such an advanced one at that, so they might need to be a powerful and skilled magic user to do such shapefhifting - but just because they have a lot of magical power does not necessarily mean they're also an unstoppable juggernaut physically. Bringing things back to EGS (while remembering that in fiction most Dragons are tough but not so much so that they can't be killed by a protagonist with medieval weaponry), if Adrien Raven was in danger from a gun, I don't see why a Dragon Mage couldn't be too.

...Hmm, I just had a thought. Perhaps the reason Dragons are such a concern in Magus' world, but appear to be extinct or in hiding in the main EGS world is that the dragons in Magus' world are considerably stronger than the ones that live(d) in the main world.

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8 hours ago, ChronosCat said:
20 hours ago, hkmaly said:

I was commenting that dragons who have shapeshifting abilities are usually considerably stronger than ones which doesn't (because it's not only ability they have).

Perhaps, but it's not strictly speaking necessary. All that's really required is a human-like intelligence (in order to properly pose as human) and a good shape-shifting spell. I suppose unless it's a hereditary ability it is unlikely they'd have only the one spell, and such an advanced one at that, so they might need to be a powerful and skilled magic user to do such shapefhifting - but just because they have a lot of magical power does not necessarily mean they're also an unstoppable juggernaut physically. Bringing things back to EGS (while remembering that in fiction most Dragons are tough but not so much so that they can't be killed by a protagonist with medieval weaponry), if Adrien Raven was in danger from a gun, I don't see why a Dragon Mage couldn't be too.

While true, human level inteligence and being skilled magic user is more than lot of dragons have. And the true danger of dragons is magic - both their flying and fire are usually magic. Stories confirm this: while being physically stronger isn't related to intelligence, there seem to be big correlation between intelligence and dangerousness of dragon in fiction. Those stupid but physically unstoppable juggernauts might be the ones who died on food poisoning.

Adrian Raven didn't have any scales. We can debate the effectiveness (how much), but I would consider obvious that scales raises resistance to bullets. He was also close, not in air and not aware of the attack, which lowered his ability to evade. Obviously, dragon mage WOULD be in big danger from a gun while in human form.

8 hours ago, ChronosCat said:

...Hmm, I just had a thought. Perhaps the reason Dragons are such a concern in Magus' world, but appear to be extinct or in hiding in the main EGS world is that the dragons in Magus' world are considerably stronger than the ones that live(d) in the main world.

Sounds obvious, doesn't it? Sure, there are alternative explanations, but even if the reason they became concern was different, they likely got stronger due to both evolutionary adaptation and normal (training) adaptation. (Hmmmm ... wait. Training would have bigger effect. Evolution is too slow to be measurable on scale of human history and dragons usually live longer ... on the other hand, evolution is more effective the more of affected population is dying from evolutionary pressures ...)

 

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11 hours ago, hkmaly said:

(Hmmmm ... wait. Training would have bigger effect. Evolution is too slow to be measurable on scale of human history

Not really.  One of the first obvious examples is dogs -- we've created and altered hundreds of dog breeds, a number of the current breeds only existing for a single human lifetime.  Going from wolves to wolf-like dogs may have happened long ago, but turning those into Papillons was much more recent.  Dog breeding was a Victorian craze and many modern breeds were developed then.

A clear example in the modern world is the Peppered Moth (Biston betularia) in England.  They started out very light-colored, with occasional dark mutations.  When the Industrial Revolution filled the cities with smoke and soot, tree trunks they perched on started getting darker.  During the worst of the pollution, the vast majority of these moths were dark, with occasional light mutations.  When environmental regulations and improvements cleaned up the air, and thus the tree trunks, the moths went back to being a light colored species.

A similar color change is actually happening right now with Tawny Owls in Finland, which come in brown and grey. They used to be mostly grey, which blended into snowy winter landscapes better. As winters have gotten shorter and less snowy over the last fifty years, the owls have become majority brown.

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8 hours ago, CritterKeeper said:
19 hours ago, hkmaly said:

(Hmmmm ... wait. Training would have bigger effect. Evolution is too slow to be measurable on scale of human history

Not really.  One of the first obvious examples is dogs -- we've created and altered hundreds of dog breeds, a number of the current breeds only existing for a single human lifetime.  Going from wolves to wolf-like dogs may have happened long ago, but turning those into Papillons was much more recent.  Dog breeding was a Victorian craze and many modern breeds were developed then.

Ehm. I meant for humans. Sorry, I see I wasn't clear on this.

Generally, the shorter the "generation" of species is, the quicker it evolves. Bacteria can evolve a lot in just few years (and that's not counting horizontal gene transfer). Dogs reach sexual maturity around six months and are only pregnant for two months. (Also, deliberate breeding is quicker than evolution.) Humans reach sexual maturity around 13 years (and often postpone having kids further, but that's really recent).

Of course, even if dragons live longer than humans, they may start reproducing sooner, giving them quicker evolution. However, even the Komodo dragons take 8 to 9 years to mature - that's shorter but not by much. Tyrannosaurus reached sexual maturity at 20 years according to one study.

8 hours ago, CritterKeeper said:

A clear example in the modern world is the Peppered Moth (Biston betularia) in England.

One generation per year.

8 hours ago, CritterKeeper said:

A similar color change is actually happening right now with Tawny Owls in Finland, which come in brown and grey.

Tawny owls pair off from the age of one year.

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