Cyberpunk Fantasy Heartbreaker: Magic and Technology

General questions, debates, and rants about RPGs

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Post by Username17 »

DSMatticus wrote: and it makes the most sense for him to just magically ...
That word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

There are three things in a water molecule:
  • An Oxygen Atom
  • Two Hydrogen Atoms
  • Two Free Electrons
Now the free electrons could be combined with the hydrogen atoms to make hydrogen gas, but I don't see how that makes any more "sense" than having the electrons dispersed into ionizing some of the remaining water or something.

The real question is simply whether the byproduct of "bubbles of flammable gas" is cooler than the byproduct of "turning water to acid". And I submit that it is not. Especially because in deep water, those bubbles will spend hours or days floating up before they actually get to the surface where their flammability will make any difference.

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Post by ...You Lost Me »

First off, the oxygen carried by hemoglobin is O2, not O--. If we carried O-- in our blood, we wouldn't be carrying out respiration.

You have two scenarios with the water molecule here, because those electrons need to go somewhere: (1) The deep ones are making H2 gas, (2) The deep ones are shooting free radicals out of their body.

Shooting free radicals into water will just make hydrogen gas somewhere else in the water, or will kill tissue in some sort of sea creature. But if you want acid, you need to make O-- ions, which will not allow the creature to breath.
DSMatticus wrote:Again, look at this fucking map you moron. Take your finger and trace each country's coast, then trace its claim line. Even you - and I say that as someone who could not think less of your intelligence - should be able to tell that one of these things is not like the other.
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Post by angelfromanotherpin »

Question - if you can teleport elements out of compounds, doesn't that step on the toes of the magic traditions which have transmutation and disintegratation staked out?
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Post by Vebyast »

The "acid" being actual acid is just a detail. It could easily be a cloud of other hideously toxic junk, say, water loaded with O-- radicals.
Last edited by Vebyast on Wed May 16, 2012 9:32 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by fectin »

Actual research (vice half-assed recollections) agrees that hemoglobin transports O2. Which is weird, because I could have sworn it worked by oxidizing the iron.

Nevertheless, if regular deep ones can coalesce oxygen from their surroundings, it's not that big of a step to coalescing O--. Free radicals largely give you wierd cancers and make your children deformed. That really doesnt seem like a bad thing with cthonic deep ones (was there already sword for being stressed into NPC domain? I forget).
Vebyast wrote:Here's a fun target for Major Creation: hydrazine. One casting every six seconds at CL9 gives you a bit more than 40 liters per second, which is comparable to the flow rates of some small, but serious, rocket engines. Six items running at full blast through a well-engineered engine will put you, and something like 50 tons of cargo, into space. Alternatively, if you thrust sideways, you will briefly be a fireball screaming across the sky at mach 14 before you melt from atmospheric friction.
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Post by ...You Lost Me »

Vebyast wrote:The "acid" being actual acid is just a detail. It could easily be a cloud of other hideously toxic junk, say, water loaded with O-- radicals.
There's no hideous junk. The O-- doesn't exist as an ion if you expect the deep one to actually use it to breath. You will be evolving H2 gas before respiration and that's it.

The worst thing that happens if they use Krebs Cycle to breath is released CO2, which can become H2CO3 in water, which is a very weak acid that can cause damage over prolonged periods of time, but won't make a deep one slimy and gross when they step out of the ocean.
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Post by CatharzGodfoot »

fectin wrote:Actual research (vice half-assed recollections) agrees that hemoglobin transports O2. Which is weird, because I could have sworn it worked by oxidizing the iron.

Nevertheless, if regular deep ones can coalesce oxygen from their surroundings, it's not that big of a step to coalescing O--. Free radicals largely give you wierd cancers and make your children deformed. That really doesnt seem like a bad thing with cthonic deep ones (was there already sword for being stressed into NPC domain? I forget).
Actually, presence of large numbers of free radicals can reduce DNA damage by strongly activating repair mechanisms. And the iron is oxidized.
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Post by ...You Lost Me »

It's easy enough to say that there are no repair mechanisms or that they don't work, because we've seen that the genome can be screwed with very easily. You'd need to remove some sort of DNA from a sperm and egg, and then you're gold.
DSMatticus wrote:Again, look at this fucking map you moron. Take your finger and trace each country's coast, then trace its claim line. Even you - and I say that as someone who could not think less of your intelligence - should be able to tell that one of these things is not like the other.
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Post by Taishan »

FrankTrollman wrote:
There are three things in a water molecule:
  • An Oxygen Atom
  • Two Hydrogen Ions or Hydron
  • Two Free Electrons

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Balanced that equation for ya :)
Last edited by Taishan on Thu May 17, 2012 1:27 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by Taishan »

fectin wrote:Actual research (vice half-assed recollections) agrees that hemoglobin transports O2. Which is weird, because I could have sworn it worked by oxidizing the iron.
My wiki skills shows that its not just O2 being transported but superoxide anion. Which kind of blows my mind cause that's really freakin' reactive.
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Post by Username17 »

If you dump two moles of hydrogen ions and two moles of free electrons into some water, you will evolve some hydrogen gas, but mostly you'll just have a really strong acid. One mole of hydrogen ions in a liter of water brings that water down to pH -1 (100 times more acidic than gastric acid), but there are still fifty five moles of water that could be ionized instead of evolving hydrogen gas in that same liter.

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Post by ...You Lost Me »

Ionized water is inherently unstable, in a way that H2 gas is not. You will initially have a very strong acid, and then as stuff bumps together the way molecules are wont to, moles of gas will come out equivalent to the limiting reactant. So you might have water with an extra electron for fractions of seconds, but that will release an H atom and a hydroxide molecule (OH-), whereupon two H will bond and make H gas. Then H+ and OH- in the solution will recombine to make water, and the net reaction is the same.

Also, Frank, I do believe your math is a bit off. pH is -1*log([H+]), and 1 mol/L gives -1*log(1) = 0 pH. You would need 10 moles of hydrogen ions get a pH of -1.
DSMatticus wrote:Again, look at this fucking map you moron. Take your finger and trace each country's coast, then trace its claim line. Even you - and I say that as someone who could not think less of your intelligence - should be able to tell that one of these things is not like the other.
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Post by Username17 »

...You Lost Me wrote: Also, Frank, I do believe your math is a bit off. pH is -1*log([H+]), and 1 mol/L gives -1*log(1) = 0 pH. You would need 10 moles of hydrogen ions get a pH of -1.
Yes. 1 Molar Hydronium is only ten times more acidic than gastric acid.
Ionized water is inherently unstable
Well, sort of. There's 0.6 molar negative ions in ordinary sea water. Without an electrical pole, hydrogen gas does not evolve out of an acidic solution very quickly.

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Post by ...You Lost Me »

I don't actually know where .6 molar negative ions came about, or exactly how it would signify the spontaneity of HOH- to break apart.

Even if it does signify something, bear in mind that the constant will be present in sea water when the deep ones respire, and Le Chatlier's Principle applies, which means hydrogen gas should still be evolving rapidly (especially if there's a decently large group of them).
DSMatticus wrote:Again, look at this fucking map you moron. Take your finger and trace each country's coast, then trace its claim line. Even you - and I say that as someone who could not think less of your intelligence - should be able to tell that one of these things is not like the other.
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Post by Grek »

Do we really care about the specifics of the chemistry involved? It should be enough to write in "some deep ones are able to draw extra oxygen from the water around them using astral magic. This process releases hydrogen ions that turn the water near the deep one into a potent but quickly denaturated acid."
Last edited by Grek on Thu May 17, 2012 10:01 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by fectin »

It's possible this also means deep ones are producing fuel for fuel cells, which could make them really popular in the same way as the Middle East's oil.

If they're the energy breadbasket, no-one is going to nuke them ever.
Vebyast wrote:Here's a fun target for Major Creation: hydrazine. One casting every six seconds at CL9 gives you a bit more than 40 liters per second, which is comparable to the flow rates of some small, but serious, rocket engines. Six items running at full blast through a well-engineered engine will put you, and something like 50 tons of cargo, into space. Alternatively, if you thrust sideways, you will briefly be a fireball screaming across the sky at mach 14 before you melt from atmospheric friction.
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Post by kzt »

fectin wrote: If they're the energy breadbasket, no-one is going to nuke them ever.
Lock them into small cells for the rest of their lives instead?
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Post by Korgan0 »

kzt wrote:
fectin wrote: If they're the energy breadbasket, no-one is going to nuke them ever.
Lock them into small cells for the rest of their lives instead?
That means you have to get them first, which, given their magical abilities might be troublesome.

Regardless of the realities of the matter, would it be a good idea to give the deep ones access to some really valuable resource, like rare earths or something? Maybe that explains how they have access to the kinds of hardware they do: corps know that their hardware will probably be used against them, but since the deep ones are the only beings that can access these rare earths or hydrogen or what have you they don't have a choice. Alternatively, perhaps not all deep one states are sponsors of terrorism: you have the legitimate states that trade rare earths for certain manufactured goods, and then you have the rogue sponsors of terrorism; some of the legitimate states might funnel some hardware to the terrorist deep ones under certain conditions or something, which allows for interesting political interactions that the players can involve themselves in. Also, underwater eldrich cities populated by amphibious mages are cool as shit, and it might be a good idea for players to be able to legitimately adventure in them without having to align themselves with terrorist deep ones.

Thoughts?
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Post by Endovior »

Interesting point. Deep Ones are human, after all. Perhaps we could extend the Muslim analogy, and throw in a bunch of secular, progressive Deep Ones; far less dogmatic and hostile than the rest, and open to trade with the surface nations. Of course, just because they're moderates doesn't mean they're good guys; many of them are still ultimately on-board with the end goal of awakening the elder gods and ending the world... they just don't particularly believe that's something likely to happen within their lifetimes, and so instead occupy themselves in useful economic ventures, to raise money and equipment to further the cause.

So even among the evil believers, they'll still be folks willing to deal fairly honestly with surface merchants, as a long-term strategy. And, of course, there will also be plenty of Deep Ones that aren't crazy cultists... after all, just because they prefer to live underwater, amongst their own kind, doing work that their physiology makes them more suited for, doesn't also mean that they're fanatically devoted to the cause of awakening Cthulhu.
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Post by OgreBattle »

Endovior wrote:Interesting point. Deep Ones are human, after all. Perhaps we could extend the Muslim analogy, and
DEEP ONES HOSTING INTERNATIONAL GRAPPLING TOURNAMENTS
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Post by Dean »

Endovior wrote:just because they prefer to live underwater, amongst their own kind, doesn't also mean that they're fanatically devoted to the cause of awakening Cthulhu.
I agree with the first part of your post. But I think that in the Lovecraftian Mythos it actually does mean your fanatically devoted. The Deep One change is pretty intense. It's not just getting soggy and tacking on some cosmetic changes. I think you really are a total believer the moment you get fishy.

Still I think there would be merchants and shit like you were saying. Just not Deep Ones who are "actually pretty cool".
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Post by Username17 »

There are plenty of Deep Ones who are born into human families on the surface and simply live in cities and possibly just take long baths. They are, after all, playable characters.

They are the most hated of all standard demihumanity, because R'lyeh and Y'ha-nthlei are dickish rogue states that openly support pirates. But they are still "people" and they can become Buddhists or whatever if they want.

As for the analogy of the Middle East: sure. There are vast reserves of methane ice at the bottom of the sea which were being harvested by corporations before the phase-in countries showed up and Y'ha-nthlei bushwhacked all the undersea miners in the North Atlantic. And now, if you want to get those methane deposits, you need to bargain with Y'ha-nthlei.

Helheim can be kind of a bag of dicks about people getting North Sea Oil, but no more or less than Polaris or Scandinavia can. But if you want to drill or mine on the sea floor of the north atlantic, you must go through Y'ha-nthlei.

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Post by Endovior »

Okay... so what does going through Y'ha-nthlei look like?

Assume that I am a negotiator with Standard Oil; trying to get access to those yummy off-shore resources. Since this is important, I'm probably a Deep One; it is explicitly my job to open a dialogue with Y'ha-nthlei, to figure out what they'll accept in exchange for actually letting us set up shop in their yard. This should be described in detail, since it'll set the tone for any other non-hostile interactions with the Deep One states.
FrankTrollman wrote:We had a history and maps and fucking civilization, and there were countries and cities and kingdoms. But then the spell plague came and fucked up the landscape and now there are mountains where there didn't used to be and dragons with boobs and no one has the slightest idea of what's going on. And now there are like monsters everywhere and shit.
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Post by kzt »

Endovior wrote: Assume that I am a negotiator with Standard Oil; trying to get access to those yummy off-shore resources. Since this is important, I'm probably a Deep One; it is explicitly my job to open a dialogue with Y'ha-nthlei, to figure out what they'll accept in exchange for actually letting us set up shop in their yard. This should be described in detail, since it'll set the tone for any other non-hostile interactions with the Deep One states.
Same deal, but the other alternative is to have deep ones with the equiv of buckets and wheelbarrows to do the collection for you, so you don't have to set up shop and just provide them "stuff".
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Post by name_here »

The most obvious things for Deep Ones to want are things which can't be easily made underwater. If the process for making things involves setting them on fire, it'd probably be easier to import them from the surface world than set up an underwater air bubble. Also, surface organic materials. Alloys are also likely candidates; while melting metal does not strictly require oxygen fires Deep Ones are not dwarves and probably don't have all that many magma forges.

It seems pretty likely, though, that the Deep One states will simply extract their own oil and sell it to refiners. This has the added bonus that the oil in transit would be relatively safe from Deep One terrorists. Not entirely, though, as presumably some of them will attack Y'ha-nthlei for not being sufficiently religiously pure.
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