[The Author Guy]

Hmm

I get your point on the concentration in those particular cases, however there are cases and then there are cases.

Different spells and thus different magic items require different levels of concentration.

For example, very little of Talarius’ equipment requires concentration on his part to use. the mirror does, only in so much as he needs to study it.

But Ruiden, his sword doesn’t require concentration, in fact, it has some limited sentience that helps guide it to the target (another story for later on in the series). Nor does his armor, nor do the other magic items he is wearing (which you will find out about in Book II)

A flying carpet requires concentration to direct it, and hold it steady against wind etc, but not to hover/fly. It needs a driver just like a car does. Look at the peanut gallery watching the battle at the end, they were not paying any attention to their stationary carpet. I can park my car along the side of the street and let the engine run keeping the AC going along with the stereo…but I don’t need to concentrate (at least if I put it in park)

Runic gateways require concentration to open, but once open only need a steady supply of mana. If that mana is coming from a human, then yes it requires concentration, if it’s coming from a mana pool, then no it doesn’t.

And that’s the key with most of what Jenn was doing. She was pumping mana into the spells and concentrating on that. She doesn’t have much for magic items. Those really are valuable. Again, Lenamare is going to have gold around the castle, perhaps one of her early exercises was in creating gold paint? (or gold colored paint) She then drew/inscribed on her book? I’m not saying that’s what she did, I really never thought about that before, but…I point out there are possibilities.

The wards in various places require some concentration, after they are created. Basically those people are “operators” controlling the composition/blocking power of the ward. It is completely possible to set the ward levels, given a mana supply (mana pool) and basically forget about it. This is what Lenamare did once everyone left the castle. He was not paying a whole lot of attention to the wards, instead he was getting ready to blow up, and in my mind pacing around in circles gloating in anticipation of the destruction he was about to inflict on Exador.

Wizards are perfectly capable of creating items and spells that require no concentration. For example, casting an invisibility spell takes concentration, but once you are invisible you typically don’t have to do much, that’s what the spell is for. An animage would have to at least pay attention to staying invisible.

Demon pentacles are a particular example, most wizards set them, imbue with mana and forget them for a period of time. It’s generally only on first summoning, when you don’t know how powerful the demon is, that you really have to worry about your wards and reinforcing them. Once you know how powerful of wards you need, you can generally ignore them. Now, yes, maybe the demon will pull out a surprise and bust through…but that’s no different than a prisoner suddenly managing to bend the bars of his cell.

Trisfelt, for example draws and sets wards of warning, and glamours of misdirection around his camp. He imbues enough mana in them to last for many hours, after that he doesn’t need to worry about them. (there are very explicit examples in book 2, and in my mind implicit ones in book 2).

So my argument is that, yes they can create devices to ease the process of copying books and making glass. As a rule, someone will be directing the operation of these devices, but at no more a concentration level than someone running an early printing press etc…

Animagic really requires concentration. Wizardry much less so. Don’t get me wrong, casting a spell requires concentration (as does manipulating a C.o.D.) but a good number of spells are set it and forget it. Not all, but many.

So, I agree with you that some magic requires concentration…but not all.

[The Author Guy]

@Rosver

Not sure the book is trying to make that point on concentration.

Spells require concentration to cast, yes, just like a priest doing a ritual. Once it’s been cast, what happens depends on the spell and how it’s designed.

Some spells go off, boom, like a fireball, once the wizard launches the fireball from his/her hands it’s in flight and going and he/she can go onto the next thing as it arcs through the air towards its target.

Some like wards keep going until they run out of energy and they wizard can run around inside safe from outside interference.

Various wizard links and bindings are set, and pretty much stay in place drawing mana automatically from both ends to get what little power they need. Lenamare doesn’t have to think about the link to Tom.

Magic items don’t require “thinking” per se. Or at least not most of them. They do their thing. You do have to point them, and some like carpets need to be directed. But if you don’t “direct” a carpet to go somewhere it will just sit there at the height to which you drove it. Unless a big wind comes up and flips you over. In which case you probably do want to be paying attention to keep it from flipping over. Think of a canoe and a wave.

Now, that being said…some magic items do require concentration. Things like a wizard’s wand or staff. Now to be clear: There are magic wands and staffs that are “prestocked” with spells, and can be used by about anyone that knows the triggering mechanism (word, motion, thought, etc).

However what we call a “Wizard’s Staff” or a “Wizard’s Wand” is much more like Harry Potter in that it’s a focusing device. The wizard can focus and channel mana and spells through it. This makes it easier/faster/maybe less mana than doing the spell the normal way.

I have a section on Magic Items and Wizard’s Staves and wands. I need to clean it up and post it. I haven’t seen it since 1995…but it’s gotta be around somewhere.

Now some wizard spells do require much more interaction and concentration. Scrying spells in particular, some levitation and flying spells etc.
—
As to your “craft argument” the armor and sword are made by craftsmen as well, and to get good quality magic armor and weapons, you need to integrate the enchantment with the creation. I.e. you can’t just magic up any old sword, at least no better than I can magic up a plain mirror.

yes, I can use a mirror as a focal point for a scrying spell, and it’s better than say a bowl of water, etc….however: That’s a case where I have to really concentrate to make the mirror see things. A premade magic mirror doesn’t require much work.

Similar I can cast a “sharpness” spell on a normal sword and for the duration of the spell it will be extra sharp and deadly, but that’s for the duration of the spell. When I “craft” a magic sword and weave the magic in it, I am making it permanently magical.

Now, as a part of making magical swords, yes–special smiths use special super heated magical furnaces that can melt metals beyond that of a normal furnace. So the magical smiths use “magic item” tools to create their devices the same way a magical jeweler/glass maker makes a magic mirror

Actually, I think it will help a lot if I can dust off that magic item creation treatise and post it in the Library.

—
As to Hortwell? No, he expected his wards to protect him indefinitely against Zargoffelstan, they always had in the past. He always uses the same wards to keep his demon in.

The thing is, some long time back, he’d gotten the wards he used for Z wrong, Zargoffelstan didn’t escape, challenge or anything and so he just kept doing it wrong from that point on. Z could have escaped at any point on numerous previous occasions. He just didn’t because he likes Hortwell, as he basically explains in the book.

The very explicit purpose of this is to get Hortwell to start rethinking his opinion on the nature of demons. We’ll get back to this in Book 2.

In terms of “nothing of real value to Jenn” I think you are reading that overly literally. Jenn is not someone who is possession oriented, unlike many others in the book. To her, having “value” means true sentimental value. Not monetary value. Her attitude is that simple possessions, no matter the cost can be replaced. Keepsakes and things she holds dear, like her diary/gifts from friends and family, etc, and the people she cares about, that’s what has value for her.

She is not literally saying the things are cheap/disposable, she is saying that they are replaceable. She can’t replace her diary etc.

if she was possession oriented, she probably wouldn’t be focusing on Thaumaturgy…it’s can provide steady work, and a good living, but nothing like the flashier fields of study (Combat Magic e.g. Pyromancy etc, Sorcery/Scrying/Seeing tend to generate more money)

@Jonnyboi

Essentially. Wizardry is codified Animagic. They are studying ways to prepackage effects, channeling magic if you will and make it work more reliably and easier. Wizards can accomplish things far more complex than Animages. However it is structured, so within their limits and Animage is much more flexible and creative. Wizardry is more like engineering, Animagic is Art.

Q1

[quote]Modern Wizardry is like tech people today?[/quote]

I’m actually talking about magic items produced by wizards as being the true machinery, with operators.

Spells are really recipes with ingredients that focus, channel and direct the magic. The material components use elemental affiliations to assist the spells, or provide power/attributes, look at how Jenn breaks the rock in order to strengthen the bonds of her spell. The gestures and words direct and “trigger” the magic.

The Laws of Symmetry, Contagion, Synchronicity, the 3 Fold Law etc all play a part in this, as per most standard magical thinking on Earth.

Q2
Yes.
As a rule, usually…that’s the big point there are more wizards today then there ever were animages, the Laws of Wizardry and the accumulated knowledge and the academic system, the “standardization” all make it far more accessible.

I’m not sure I’d say sheer numbers, at least not alone. There were a lot of factors, not the least of which was internal fighting, discord, corruption, huge egos, and the rise of Wizardry allowing them to be outflanked. Wizards didn’t have to be as powerful as an animage to go one on one, add in more and better magic items….

Q3

Actually, that’s probably true. Although not super clear cut.

Wizardry is not as fast as animagic and if you aren’t prepared for what gets thrown at you, you could get hurt. (so defensiveness is preparation)

This is why, in fact there is this thing I keep calling Combat Magic, and Combat Mages. It’s not a separate discipline. It’s a style of doing magic, optimized for combat situations. You study what works best in a hurry, the heat of battle You learn rules, very much like chess. If someone does this, you counter with that.

If someone throws something at you that you don’t have a counter for, or that you have to revert to other, less combat optimized spells you can get your butt kicked.

Combat Magic is about knowing your opponent and being prepared for what they are likely to bring at you. It’s all in the preparation, having the right tools, components, spells memorized (reading out of a spell book during battle is a problem)

{and when I say spells memorized: I [b]do not mean like in D&D[/b] you don’t forget spells after you cast them. The more you cast them, the better you remember them–I only mean you remember what components you need, what gestures to make and when and what order and what words–do you remember the recipe and have the ingredients?}

So it’s all about who is fighting who.

There are a number of downsides to doing animagic. You really have to be creative on your feet, and you have to be powerful and have lots of mana because spells are optimized to use less mana and get energy from components. An animage is basically fueling things from their own reserves, or maybe what they can draw from others or from mana pools they have on them.

And then they have to know what to do/how to work the animus, mana and matter. So practice is key, experimentation is key, finding what works best for you. How to focus, what the best techniques are.

So long story short: it’s situational.

Theoretically you are right, practically eh…not so clear cut when the battle is spontaneous.

However, if you are able to get defenses setup in advance (e.g. Lenamare’s Pentacles? then you are pretty golden as a wizard) {of course those are patented by Lenamare–so if you haven’t paid your licensing fees then you will have to do many more smaller defenses and hope you cover all the bases}

The clear example is Tom vs Fiernon and his superior on board the Oorstemothian ship. They had all the advantages of wizardry, Tom had lots of imagination, creativity, mana and anger…(strong emotions can be very effective with animagic–detrimental in wizardry)

FYI in case it wasn’t clear, Fiernon, the first of the two super verbose Oorstemothian’s was the junior wizard on the ship that Tom sunk. he was the glowing light that Tom saw underwater, below the sinking boat.

Wylan, who is on this forum, is a senior agent that was sent in after Fiernon’s distress call/report.

[The Author Guy]

Your first examples.

I don’t disagree with them. Certain things require concentration, a lot of them do. Not all things do. In particular, as I keep saying, some spells you have to concentrate on their entire duration. Others you do not.

Summoning a demon for the first time, and ideally any time, requires concentration. Once the demon is there and in wards, you don’t necessarily need to concentrate, at least if it’s behaving. Should the demon decide to try to break free of its bonds, a smart wizard would probably get back in the game, prepared to dump more mana into the spell. But they don’t have to. They could just trust that it’s strong enough and see what happens.

This is basically what was going on with Hortwell, he got lazy and wasn’t paying attention and was doing sloppy spell casting and was just sort of whipping wards up perfunctorily without being sure they’d hold his demon in.

Again…some things take concentration, some don’t. Some spells are set it and forget it, others are not. Depends on the spell.

Please recall when Jenn bound the guy in the forest. She put enough mana into the spell to hold the guy until people from the castle could get back.
She took the kids home, and left the guy, guards came back later to retrieve him.

As far as crafting. I’m not saying that it doesn’t take that much concentration, it does. What I’m saying is that by using magical tools and spells/process the level of concentration is not as insurmountable as you make it sound. What I’m saying is, yes they can make glass tables. Wizardry doesn’t remove all concentration, it just lessens it. Makes it doable.

A driver of a car does not have to worry about making sure the pistons are turning, or that gas is flowing into them, or any of the other details of what makes the car go. Same for flying carpets.

Hortwell: Yes, he was incredibly lucky. Recall though that he’s had this demon for decades, the sloppiness probably didn’t set in until much later, by which time Z had gotten to appreciate his accursed master. And, not all demons are outright bloody fiends, despite the bad press they get.

Yes, there is a lot in those early sections that should have been written better…but part of it is time…the longer things go unchallenged the more set in stone they become. There is a lot at the beginning of the book that I wanted to redo, but without sufficient critical feedback, you sort of get stuck in a hole and can’t see what needs to be done.

How should you not know about Thaumaturgy? Actually you really aren’t supposed to know that now, unless you’ve been around the multiverse in similar universes a lot. Hopefully I’ll do more on this later on. I’m really explaining the logic here behind what happens (in this forum), I don’t really expect everyone to get all the logic from just the first book. Once it’s done, and once people really know the universe, the logic should then be consistent.

Thaumaturgy is actually the most practical of disciplines. Thaumaturgists can always get jobs, they just aren’t super high paying jobs. People pay more for flashy stuff. Just like in our world. Companies making guns and tanks get more money than people making ropes and building houses etc.

For some odd reason, nobility are much more willing to pay up to blow up their foes than to rebuild things. Yes, building a fortress is good work for a thaumaturge…but they are then working along side carpenters and other craftsmen that nobles look down on.

Same with seeing the future, or having a flying carpet or magic mirror, or a magic suit of armor.

From a healing perspective, there is a lot of competition. Priests, Healers (Animages), Thaumaturgists and Druids even. The first two are often a bit more direct. Plus there is the “charity effect” You have to be pretty cold blooded to charge people in pain and suffering high fees. This sort of drives the prices down.

Thaumaturgy is earth magic, plant magic. It’s slower moving, longer lasting, but not flashy or exciting. Thaumaturgy is very powerful, and can last a long time with lower mana input, but it’s not fast. The perception of it among the populace is less awe-inspiring/impressive. Thus people assign less value to it…wrong…but that’s what happens.

[The Author Guy]

Sweet!

Yeah, it’s interesting, as soon as KU started, my KOL/KU counts jumped up quite a bit. They are reported as the same, and I’m getting a really good number of KU downloads. Comparable to traditional sales.

It’s a great deal for heavy readers.

[The Author Guy]

I think he was talking to me Tizzy.

Aside from the usuals, meaning currently popular, one series I mentioned in my long discussion with Rosver are Lindon Hardy’s books that start with Master of Five Magics.

In particular, it was a huge inspiration for practical wizardry as a profession and the classification of magic disciplines.

Of course, Zelazny’s Amber series is amazing from a planar perspective.

Paul Edwin Zimmer’s Dark Border series had to have been the inspiration for George Martin and his Song of Ice and Fire. It really was inspirational for characters having complex plots. PEZ, btw was the brother of Marion Zimmer Bradley. (DarkOver is a great place to see something like animages)

For god battles there is the Eternal Champion by Michael Moorecock (Elric of Melnibone is the best series)

For complex evil you can’t beat Glenn Cook’s The Black Company about a group of mercenaries in the employ of a really nasty Evil. I.e. tales from the Forces of Evil.

And for out and out crazy, although not directly inspiring to this book: There is Jack Chalker, particularly the Soul Rider and Well of Souls series.

[The Author Guy]

Well, I think it’s an interesting debate because it forces me to remember why some things are the way they are. A majority of this book was written a long long time ago…

But….to continue the debate.

Actually, magic, or rather animagic has been around for a very long time in Astlan. But modern wizardry, where magic is treated more like a science than an art, is relatively new. Magic engineering is even newer. It’s not trivial to see in the timeline, but systematic wizardry as it’s known today in Astlan, which is organized, predictable and repeatable is pretty recent, post the Anilords.

Sort of along a similar time frame to the industrial revolution, but because there was no corresponding reformation of thought, and because gods and demons are real and regularly present and due to many other factors things just haven’t gone as smoothly and evenly as they did here. It’s probably only the last two hundred years, or less, where knowledge has truly begun to be disseminated and the fruits of wizardy enjoyed by more people.

The idea of mass producing magic items for sale is extremely new, at least for the region of Astlan people are in at the moment. Zilquar is/was ahead of his time in that regard. The same is true for mirrors and crystal balls.

Mass production of potions has been going on for longer, admittedly. But the alchemists still have problems with exploding labs…so it’s still lots of small independent labs making potions. Giant tanks of potions tend to be extremely volatile for some reason.

For example, a vat of healing potion mixture exploding often results in people gaining limbs and extra organs…not that much more pleasant than losing limbs and organs to be honest. Two heads really aren’t better than one in such cases.

[The Author Guy]

o:)

See that’s why I do enjoy this thread. Things you’ve specifically mentioned are “supposed” to be noticed.

The glass table and the electrons etc are supposed to be noticed as anachronistic. Same with the escalators, cars etc in the Abyss.

Books, less so. My reckoning on books is that any society that is supposed to have some of the best wizards in the multiverse is going to have a good way for scholars (sages, wizards, animages, priests, druids etc) to store and transmit their knowledge. The intelligentsia has to have very good access to books and bookmaking. It’s what allows them to excel. One reason that “the church” throughout the dark ages was able to maintain is supremacy in Europe was its access to books, scrolls, records, recorded information. They literally had “monk factories” churning out books. I assure you that the Vatican had little trouble obtaining books, even when something like 90% of the population couldn’t read.

And as I saw it, magic could be used to mass produce books even better than monks. Ink is a liquid, paper is plant matter, thus sorcerers working with thaumaturges would be able to create magic printing presses/xerox machines (more precisely)

Are these books expensive for lay people, yes.

Here is the thing, I actually agree with your assessment on scarcity, rarity. But you have to understand we are looking at a very very skewed population sample.

If you want to know what most of the world is like, look at the very non-canonical (it’s an image) “Business of Wizards” image of Elrose and Trisfelt at the tavern talking about “[url=http://www.astlan.net/Home/History.aspx]portents[/url]” and the Satyrs behind them. That’s the real world of Astlan.

The places the characters have been:

1) Lenamare’s school. Home of arguably one of the best wizards of his generation, and an incredibly wealthy land owner and member of the Council of Wizardry
1a) Zilquar’s school, not much description, but in my mind more primitive than Lenamare’s school
1b) a Cave in the Abyss–crappy hole in the ground infested with a dragon.
1c) Peasant hut–actually not that bad as peasant huts go but…the peasants are at least oppressed.

2) Gizzor Del. Well, they were in a private chapel/workroom of the High Priest of Tiernon in a mid sized city. It wasn’t much, but still better than most. Reread the description of Gizzor Del, it’s pretty medieval and crappy. Think Thieves World.

3) A ship of a smuggler…actually a pretty successful smuggler, who the Oorstemothians really want to bring to justice.

4) Hoggensforth: One of the two largest port cities of the Council States. Not a lot of description, but a step up from Gizzor Del

5) Freehold: A city with thousands of wizards; the greatest known concentration of wizardry on the planet. Lots of really rich people, and the top 0.1% percent of the population live in the Council Palace.
5a) Damien is a Councilor, the Chief Inquisitor and is on really good terms with a very old, very savvy, very thievish Demon (a demon who is literally sleeping with The Queen of Darkness)
5b) Everyone else on the council is really old, really powerful and insanely rich.

So my point is, if this was a D&D universe or WoW or something like that, these are 50+ level characters we are seeing.

The “players” in this book are the ultra-rich, the ultra powerful, they are going to have the best of the best.

Now, as to the physics…this is a bit dicier but…

1) With the CoD? That’s the narrator speaking somewhat facetiously. I don’t really need to tell you who the narrator is, as he mentions it frequently on this forum. He also knows about nuclear power etc.
2) Lenamare is almost as good as he thinks he is, and he has a pretty good understanding of lower level Animanachanics (we might call it Quantum Field Theory) very few other people, wizards included know much about this. Which is why he’s the only one with the spell.
2a) Given that he does sometimes post on this forum, I hate to admit this, but Lenamare is damn good. He’s human, and is his own natural age, and he’s been going toe to toe with a multimillenium old archdemon. Yes that demon is playing under constraints to hide the fact he’s a demon, but still rather impressive.
2b) With the exception of Alexandros Mien, there probably aren’t any other living wizards (non-demonic) that can rival Lenamare.

So, in short, my defense is you are only seeing some of the most powerful people on the planet.

In my mind, it stands to reason they are going to have “the good stuff.”

But seriously, I do appreciate your feedback: you make me rethink stuff.

It’s particularly helpful in remembering/dredging up, and being critical of stuff from the first book in writing the second. As I said most of the book was written a LONG time ago. So overtime, I forget some of the core logic. This thread helps me reestablish the world and people, which helps immensely with book 2 and trying to maintain consistency (or fix it)

[The Author Guy]

I would argue that it is a combination of things, including sloppy writing on my part that I should have ironed out better in later edits. Looking back on it.

There were, I think many thoughts in my head when that was written…some of the very oldest and not properly reworked stuff in the book.

Here was the thought process:

Lenamare is going to be overly cautious, with this big demon, but he’s also incredibly egotistical. He’s trying to impress not only Zilquar, but the demon itself. His ego made him sloppy; but with the trappings of overdoing it…

It’s the same thing with the ring, L&J are overly confident in their own abilities and their ability to accomplish great things and have their way with lesser demons. This has made them sloppy and they shortcut stuff they shouldn’t and because of a very real impending threat they are under pressure and not really thinking clearly; combine that with the pressure/surprise of summoning a type IV by mistake and living through it: it would provide a sort of giddy ego boost that would have odd affects on your thinking and you are basically setup to screw up.

So my intention was that they gave him what would appear to a novice to be very exacting instructions and a compulsion, but that still had loopholes that they missed.

The compulsion was added because Lenamare wasn’t completely sure the orders would take, and he didn’t want Tom running around, and he wanted him back before Exador could reasonably be expected to arrive. So he ‘tacked’ it on for good measure

So combine all of that and add in what I think, personally, was some of my most inelegant writing, that I should have reworked better. In hindsight, I think more exposition on L&J’s emotions and thinking at that time to explain it, but at that point in the book I wanted them to appear more confident/bad ass and not quite so human. (Not that they really get much more human later in the book–only by comparison to Exador do they look good)

[The Author Guy]

That is exactly the point.

You normally wouldn’t use an added compulsion unless you were dealing with a very intransigent demon, and you needed to make something absolutely clear.

And I didn’t make this clear, and I wasn’t really clear in the discussion of what was a Compulsion spell and what was just the order/command and what Lenamare was actually doing.

And I think in later edits, I was reading the compulsion as being just part of the regular order, not a separate thing, which it basically was originally.

One big problem with taking a long time to write something and going back later to edit it, (and repeat many times) is that your own interpretation and memory of what you originally intended can change. You become convinced that something was one way, when it is written another, and you read it with the new interpretation and edit accordingly, and it ends up rather inconsistent.

And that’s why questions like in this thread are good as they force me out of a complacent mindset and look at what was really written vs what I think I wrote…which may not be the same thing. Or might not make sense to anyone else.

This is also why I think a beta reader program is a good idea, to catch things like this before wide release.

[The Author Guy]

Hi,

So I’d like to discuss all these points in more detail, but I’m short on time, so will have to come back to them in a later point.

I do think however, that you may be reading me, in these posts a little too literally on some occasions. By which i mean, I may use examples to make a point, but that doesn’t mean it has anything to do with the story (e.g. the Vatican and books and QFT)

So let me first of all address QFT. And this is way out there, and not apriori part of the story, just my thinking. What binds the multiverse together is QFT, different planes of existence have different laws of physics, but these are not so much different “laws” as different sets of quantum topologies. Meaning alternate realities may use alternate dimensions, I.e. Astlan may not use all the same topological dimensions as Earth and thus the laws of physics are/can be/may be different.

Now add on to the fact that quantum phenomena express themselves differently depending on how you look at them (wave, particle duality) and extrapolate from there and this is how you get different interpretations of “the same thing” or similar things. Things in Astlan don’t necessarily translate to quarks and gluons in Astlan, even though when looking at them from an Earth perspective, that’s what they see.

Now this is by no means a way of explaining the various laws of physics, it’s just a viewpoint for looking at what we don’t understand but trying to get at some underlying super-reality.

Yes, there are multiple groups in Astlan that are familiar with the atomic model of the universe, Lenamare is just one of the most advanced. That was a too literal case. I did not mean to imply he’s the only one, but the people that do understand it aren’t all that common, and may not be from Astlan. People do travel to other planes of existence to and from Astlan.

Glass though is easy. Sorcery, Thaumaturgy and Pyromancy…the transmutation of sand to a liquid state…all very well studied and understood. Once in a liquid state, a Sorcerer has no problem making flat glass. he/she can make it do whatever they want, then just let it cool (OK, maybe a bit more complicated…but it’s a point)

Note (or do note in book 2) that mirrors are actually fairly common among the magic enabled…so lots of flat glass. In this case, don’t think of medieval Europe thing of all things “Fantasy Middle Ages” and Magic Mirrors…mirror mirror on the wall…yes…in the real world mirrors were crappy and hard to come by, but not in many fantasy worlds (other than GoT, of course)

Actually, they don’t so much have a problem with chemical potions blowing up, just alchemical ones. I haven’t posted it on the site, but there both chemical reagents and potions and alchemical ones. The difference is that the alchemical ones use elementally affiliated components combined with mana to create “magic potions” vs “non-magic potions”

But, be clear, I’m not saying which are used in paper making, I don’t really know, I’m sure there are a wide variety of different methods used by different vendors.

Jenn is middle class. Her parents are merchants who pay a tuition to Lenamare each year. It’s not cheap, it’s about like college or private school here.

However, Lenamare has access to lots of books, lots of blank books and in fact requires his students to use them, not so much for notes (that is scrolls or loose paper mostly) but they need to get used to writing books, it’s a big part of academic life.

Typically, most books used have very simple leather bindings, possibly died, but most like not, just a soft “brownish leather” ignore the library in the picture, assume those are very valuable old/published/purchased books.

The reasons they look alike other than age is because they are both very simple bound leather books. The main differentiation between them is that one is nearly impossible to open.

Here is a modern example of what I am talking about.

[img=http://www.roguejournals.com/assets/components/phpthumbof/cache/701dbe9313e09df87cab6f003cf82ccb.dada0cda86436fee2b6ebe75d471cb2f.jpg]Leather bound book[/img]

Anyway, gotta run for the moment.

[The Author Guy]

Tizzy, Rosver

I think the two of you have some fundamental disconnect on what are inconsistencies vs what is “just the way things are”

The point I would argue is this: there are supposed to be some big inconsistencies and hodge podges in the book.

The Abyss is definitely supposed to be illogical and ramshacke and anachronistic. But Astlan is supposed to be similar.

It’s a very mixed up universe for the simple fact that if you introduce magic to a “real” medieval world, weird shit suddenly starts happening.

Traditional fantasy is extremely unrealistic, unless the magic is extremely scarce, civilization will not follow anything close to the path it did on Earth and you won’t have a “classic fantasy world” after a very short while.

A Song of Ice and Fire is a place where magic makes about the most sense for a medieval world. Because it’s very rare/very hard to do.

When you have a magic rich world in a fantasy book, it will literally turn the economy of the medieval world upside down, and all bets are off, things won’t follow the path that they did on Earth. There will be all sorts of incongruities and discrepancies.

It will flood the economy, turn manufacturing, distribution, everything upside down, it will create chaos.

As Tizzy argues, it’s not that different than suddenly introducing all the “magic” of 21st century technology and capitalism on Africa, the middle East and eastern Europe/Russia.

You are going to find very odd things and odd combinations for a wide variety of reasons.

This is something that I intended to try and demonstrate. Is it a perfect demonstration, and is it always 100% consistent no. But then this book has been written/edited/reedited over a very very long period of time which sort of makes it hard to keep everything completely consistent.

And my apologies to Tizzy as this doesn’t make much sense to you, since, being a character in the book, you just think it’s “how things are” and so try to explain it based on your personal experience, when sometimes the problem is my fault.

[The Author Guy]

Originally, and for a LONG time, I planned on the cover being the first summoning, meaning the room with Lenamare and all the students with Tom in the middle.

However, there were too many people in the room and I decided the portrait landscape just wouldn’t work/scale well, plus trying to arrange it so you could see characters etc, so I went with something simpler.

Also thought about doing the Living Flame on the ship…but then decided that might give too much away…

[The Author Guy]

yes, I like nice detailed reviews. Meaning “what was it that you liked about the story?” not just that it was “great!” I also take them with a grain of salt too given that there can be some cranky people out there. But the overall trend and averages are helpful.

Also, you ideally want a medium range of reviews/stars. Too small and there is no consensus or it may be biased. Too many and it’s just the huge crowd of group think.

[The Author Guy]

OK

So the problem was actually YAF.

Yet Another Forum, which is the Forum module that plugs into DNN.

By default it displays “Username” for posts. By checking a box to enable alternate “Display Name” use, it uses that instead.

Of course this is a site wide setting so it will probably confuse some people when their names seem to change.

[The Author Guy]

Yes, clearly you think like a demon. Good material to work with.

Naturally, Lenamare is pretty menial, but he did make Exaturd sweat, which quite frankly, not a lot of demons can do.

So, I do appreciate the thorn he is being in Exi’s side.

Caltrops aren’t very big, but if you get enough of them, you can bring down a knight on a horse.

Oh, and I think you have a spelling mistake:

I don’t [i][b]H[/b][/i]ate my accursed master I [b]ATE[/b] my accursed master. Just a difference of one letter, but it is a significant character.

Actually, I haven’t eaten all accursed masters. For some strange reason, most of them end up going insane and blowing themselves up.

Usually it’s when I ask them if I can move in and live with them so I can be of service around the clock and calendar.

[Author]

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