Kalynaanne - Thoughts And Creations

For the Blad design, wouldn't another good idea be to put stabilizing lines of forbidding between the tips of the ellipses, so they are outside the defense? They would stabilize and anchor it, not restrict movement, and also protect from incoming attacks.

That would be great, but unfortunately it won't quite work.  If you connect the tips of the ellipses, this is what will happen:

You could decrease the size of the portion that is cut off by playing with the dimensions of the ellipses, but you are never going to get the tip of the ellipse to stay inside that sharp angle at the top.  The only Line of Forbiddance that touches the bind point at the tip and doesn't intersect the rest of the ellipse is the tangent line, which would be perpendicular to the major axis and thus never reach the second ellipse.  You could contain the entire diagram in a square, but then you also can't attack.

If we could get bind points in places other than the tips, then a variation on your idea might work well.  I have ideas for how we might be able to construct elliptic defenses with more bind points, but writing that up will require more coherence than I have this time of night ;-)

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Shallan's Journey: Chapter 5, In Which We Get Out of the House

“Ok, what sort of disguise did you have in mind?” Hermione asked when they returned to the library.

Shallan gave her an enigmatic smile as she turned to her sketchbook and quickly drew Veil. She then took her partially used sphere and wove the image around herself before turning back to Hermione. “Something like this.”

Hermione's eyes widened and she had Shallan walk around the room while she watched for anything that might tip someone off that the girl was wearing a disguise. When she couldn't find anything, she nodded thoughtfully, “It is certainly convincing. Now we need to make sure it won't be easily dispelled. We can cast glamours, which have a similar effect, but if someone suspects them they are easy to counter.”

Sirius had assured them that the ministry would not be able to detect any spell work done in the house, so Hermione raised her wand and started with “Finite Incantatem.” Nothing happened. She smiled, “Well, that's a good start.” She then pursed her lips as she doggedly ran through a sequence of increasingly complex spells used to counter a variety of different glamours and illusions. None of them had any effect. Hermione tapped her chin with her wand as she considered other possible ways to disrupt Shallan's illusion before nodding to herself, “Nox”. This time the illusion seemed to flicker and Hermione raised her eyebrows in question.

“That one worked, but I was able to bring it back quickly,” Shallan held up the now dun sphere, “if you did that again I probably wouldn't be able to though.”

“Hmmmm....well, Nox is not a common way to counter illusions,” Hermione tilted her head to the side and muttered mostly to herself, “It's usually just used to extinguish your wand after you use Lumos. I only thought to try it because I saw you cast an illusion with Lumos. As long as you stay out of situations where someone might be extinguishing their wand that shouldn't be a problem...”

While Hermione was analyzing how much of a weakness the vulnerability to Nox would be, Shallan was contemplating her dun sphere. She quickly cut in when Hermione paused, “Hermione, can I borrow your wand to try something while you think?” Hermione nodded and handed it to her while still mostly lost in thought. After a couple of tries, Shallan managed to correctly cast Lumos and then turned her attention to the sphere, willing the light into it. She smiled in satisfaction as the sphere began to glow again. Fantastic. Now I don't have to worry about not being able to recharge my spheres. She grinned mischievously and turned back to her sketchpad. After finishing the sketch, she beckoned Pattern over. “Pattern, we know you can maintain an illusion. Is there any reason you wouldn't be able to help maintain an illusion I cast on someone else?”

Pattern buzzed thoughtfully, “Mmmmm... I should be able to.”

“Ok, let's try it,” Shallan infused Pattern with light from Hermione's wand and then sent him over to ride on Hermione's shirt as she used her sketch to build an illusion.Shallan called out to pull her friend out of her thoughts, “Hermione, go look in the mirror.”

Shallan followed Hermione as she headed down the hall to the full sized mirror in her room, amused that her friend was still half lost in mentally running through potential challenges they needed to prepare for. A brief glance in the mirror shocked Hermione back to reality as she turned back and forth between Shallan and the mirror. “You... you made me look exactly like you!” She reach up to touch the soft red curls she saw in the mirror and frowned as she felt her normal hair.

Shallan saw her confusion and explained, “It's just an illusion, so you can reach through it, but as long as I'm careful about creating it, that shouldn't be a problem. It does mean that it is safer not to create illusions of different clothing though.”

Hermione briefly considered this and nodded. “We should be able to find nondescript robes to use as part of the disguise.”

Shallan grimaced and pulled her sleeved safehand to her chest. She knew that she was going to have to wear the local clothing when she went out, but she had been trying not to think about it. Just as Veil couldn't wear a proper havah and still blend in as a darkeyes, wearing a dress with a proper safehand sleeve or even wearing a glove here in the middle of summer was going to draw attention she didn't want. She had almost gotten used to seeing the other girls with their safehands uncovered, but it still made her somewhat uncomfortable.

Hermione saw the gesture and smiled sympathetically. Shallan had tried to explain Vorinism to the others and, while they didn't fully understand, they tried to be respectful. “You know, there are everyday robes with long, wide sleeves. If we find you robes with sleeves that are a little too long you can probably keep your hand hidden.”

Shallan shrugged. That would be better than having to wear short sleeves like the other girls, but it still wasn't the same... She wasn't good enough with English to try to explain the distinction though, so she let it go with a sigh. They weren't ready for the trip yet anyway, so she still had time to talk herself into it.

They spent the rest of the day working on designs for faces for Shallan and Sirius to wear that were close enough to their real faces that the illusion would be hard to detect, common enough that they wouldn't stand out, and, in Sirius's case, different enough that he wouldn't be recognized. They also experimented with how much stormlight/wandlight Pattern needed to maintain an illusion on another person and how long they could expect it to hold. Through all of it, Shallan detached herself from the idea of actually making the trip and focused on it as an abstraction and scholarly question.

That night, as she sat on her bed brushing out her hair with only Patten for company, Shallan finally allowed herself to grapple with her feelings about going out to acquire a wand.

“I can't just stay in this house. I can not. I won't let myself be locked away and hidden by anyone or anything, even my own sensibilities. And, well, it also bothers me that they are keeping Sirius hidden away here. I know his situation is different, but I also at least somewhat understand what it's like and it's not ok. But at the same time, even with Hermione's explanations,I don't know the local culture or how to blend in andto go out with my safehand uncovered... Pattern, I don't know what to do...”

“Mmmmm,” Pattern buzzed, “Hermione said that the robes should be able to hide your hand, yes? And the people here wouldn't pay any attention to it anyway...”

Shallan sighed, looked down at the bed, and wrapped her arms around herself,“Yes, but... that's not the point. Iwould know that it wasn't properly covered and, in addition to it feeling wrong, it would be a distraction.”

Pattern bobbed around confused “Mmmm, if the sleeve will cover your hand anyway, why can't you wear your glove?”

Shallan raised her eyebrows as she looked up slowly. “That, Pattern, is a very good question.”

A couple of days later, Shallan, Hermione, and Sirius were all reasonably happy with the disguises and the plan. At one point they considered getting approval from the Order for their trip, but decided it would be better to ask for forgiveness than permission. Everyone seemed strangely determined to keep Sirius locked up in the house. They had the twins, who were happy for any excuse to cause mischief, create a distraction that allowed Shallan and Sirius to sneak out of the house. Hermione summoned the Knight Bus for them and they set off for the Leaky Cauldron and Diagon Alley. It was a busy enough day at the Leaky that they had no trouble casually waiting for someone to open the passage to the Alley and then following them through.

Their first stop was Gringotts and, as they made their way there, Shallan looked around the street in wonder. She itched to pull out her sketchbook and to begin recording everything she saw, but constrained herself to frequently blinking and taking memories to draw later. Hermione had warned Shallan about the goblins, but she still did a double take when she saw the first one as they arrived at the bank. Sirius presented the key to the Black family vault to one of the tellers and they were able to retrieve the money they would need (and quite a bit more) with no difficulty. Shallan was none too sure about the cart ride to and from the vault and the whole idea of the bank was strange to her - spheres were far too useful to lock away in a vault somewhere. She coped, as usual, by reminding herself to view everything as a scholar and took copious mental notes about the system and stored a few images to draw later.

After leaving the bank, Sirius guided them farther down the street to the Ollivander's. As they walked into the wandshop, Shallan looked around and turned to Sirius in confusion, “Is there no one here?” Sirius shook his head, but before he could answer an old man with a deeply lined face and fluffy white hair suddenly appeared in front of them with wide peering eyes, “Sirius Black. I can't say I expected to see you here.”

Shallan stumbled back a step as her heart started racing. He can see through my illusion. We didn't plan for this...

At this point Ollivander's attention turned to Shallan and his eyebrows flew up. He glanced back curious to Sirius, “Not only did you manage to move unnoticed through the Alley, you also have a companion who is, shall we say, not from around here...”

Sirius rolled his eyes,“Yeah, yeah. My friend is why we are here. She needs a wand. Though, I could use a new one too if you are willing to sell me one.”

Ollivander looked over Sirius pensively, “Yes, I suppose you could. Such a shame. Whatever happened to it?”

Sirius gave a half shrug, “Not really sure.”

“Mmm, I see.” Ollivander nodded to his tape measure which leapt up and slithered toward Sirius. “Your right hand is still your wand hand?”

“So far as I know.”

After several failed fits, Ollivander turned to Sirus, “Here, try this one. Dogwood and dragon heartstring, 9 ¼ inches, rigid.”

As Sirius took the wand it let out a loud bark and released a puff of black smoke that swirled and resolved itself into a black dog with an energetically wagging tail. Sirius grinned broadly. “Ah, this will do quite well.”

Ollivander nodded and turned to examine Shallan as he muttered about dogwood not usually being literally related to dogs. “And which is your wand hand?”

The tape measure slithered over to her and began take all sorts of measurements as Ollivander moved around the shop collecting wand boxes. As the tape measure finshed and made its way back to its home on the counter, he returned to Shallan and began handing her wands to test, telling her about each wand and its potential strengths as he did. None in the first batch gave any reaction, though there were a few that Shallan felt the same almost vibration from that she noticed the first time she held Fred's wand. While Ollivander returned to shelves to collect more wands for her to try, Shallan heard a soft buzzing over his mutterings.

“Mmmmm....patterns...”

Shallan narrowed her eyes and looked toward Sirius who had Pattern hiding on his robes, I thought Pattern agreed to stay quiet, but she asked quietly anyway,“What patterns?”

“In the wands. Some like you better than others. The fir ones...”

Shallan took a deep breath and then cut in to Ollivander's running commentary, “Um, sir, the fir wands have felt closer to right than the others.”

He froze and Shallan spent several uncomfortable moments with him blinking at her before he was off digging through his store of wands again. “Let's see... Let's see... maybe... yes... Here try this one, 10 and a half inch, surprisingly springy fir and unicorn hair.”

This time when she tentatively took the wand, the tip burst into brilliant light.

“Interesting, Interesting... Fir... You must be stronger than you look.” Ollivander peered intently at her, “A survior's wand, particularly inclined toward transfiguration... That will be seven Galleons each for the two wands.”

While Shallan was still trying to figure out how to respond to the disconcerting shopkeeper, Sirius handed over the Galleons and gently guided her out of the shop.   

Note: I had a hard time getting this chapter right.  I'm reasonably happy with it now, but I would also be happy to have feedback :-) I hope you enjoyed it!

P is for Prickletac.  

Rithmatics: Part 8, Intro to Lines of Vigor

Let's start with what we know for sure from the books:

Lines of Vigor can only affect chalk creations

You have to draw at least two waveforms to shoot a Line of Vigor

Lines of Vigor can damage or move Lines of Warding (and other chalk creations)

"smaller curves" are stronger [1]

A "large arc" lets them move other lines [2]

Lines of Vigor can bounce off of Lines of Forbiddance

We have previously established that the source of the illustrations in the book is playing fast and loose with the definition of curvature, so the notions of "smaller" and "larger" in the above are not entirely clear.  I know what I want them to mean though...

Theory Time

You know what this sounds like to me?  This sounds like electromagnetic waves.  EM waves are often modeled with transverse waves (the sine curves all of our examples of LoV look like are transverse waves). Higher frequency radiation, such as UV rays is better at penetration than lower frequency radiation, like infrared.  Infrared, on the other hand, is much better at transferring energy, which could very reasonably lead to a transfer of momentum here and thus lead to things moving.  As long as velocity is constant, frequency and wavelength are inversely proportional.  This means that the tighter the curve is the higher the frequency. Theory: Lines of Vigor are based on EM waves.

Possible Implications:

A EM wave with a larger amplitude has more energy.  This would suggest that a Line of Vigor with a short wave length and high amplitude would be better at punching through things and one with the same wavelength and small amplitude.  The effect could be even more pronounced with high amplitude long wave length waves that are trying to push things around

EM waves follow the law of superposition - if you stack two on top of each other you can add them at every point to get a new wave.  This would suggest that there might be more interesting LoV. Instead of just sin(x), we could get things like sin(x)+sin(x/2).  The more complicated ones could be tricky to get right, but might be able to do interesting things.

Related to the previous point, you could get interesting effects if LoV could have interference patterns like EM waves do...

EM waves travel with different speeds through different materials and you get refraction when they move between materials.  Since LoV only affect chalk, it is possible they are only affected by chalk, but if the material they move across affects their velocity, you could get refracted LoV when they move from the sidewalk to the asphalt.

Lines of Forbiddance would be playing the role of mirrors. I have lots of ideas here, but those are for a future post or this one will end up ridiculous.

Truth

White people need to tell each other the hard truths. This includes the fact that No, you aren’t colorblind. Nor should you strive to be. The point isn’t whether or not you see that a person is black. They are. The question is what you see when you see that they are black. Do you see competency? Do you see worth? You should.

(paraphrased (because I didn’t write it down during the service) from the sermon at the First Presbyterian Church of Atlanta on 25 September 2016)

Alloy of Law:  make Sherlock and Watson vigilantes from the wild west and then send them to a steampunk city where they acquire a brilliant but somewhat naive badass girl apprentice.  Oh, and they all have magic.

Hey guys, let's think about bendalloy ferrings, aka Subsumers, for a minute.

We know they can store nutrition and calories in a metalmind which means they can eat as much as they want when there is lots of food and then tap it later.  

Think about a Subsumer at a Scadrial eating competition.  "Sure, I can scarf away as many hot-dogs as you want. No problem."

Think about a Subsumer at an all-you-can-eat buffet.  They get to try everything and then go back for as much more as they want of everything they like. Such restaurants would have to have special rules for subsumers...maybe a pay by the hour thing?

Imagine if Lift gets a hemalurgic spike that lets her become a bendalloy ferring. She would have the best stormlight storage system.   She could eat loads, store most of it in her metalmind(s), and then tap into it whenever she needs stormlight.  Unlike spheres, it wouldn't leak away and if she is tapping it from the metalmind she isn't sucking the energy out of her body.

On the darker side of things, you probably also get the occasional Subsumer who is desperately afraid of gaining weight and always stores everything they eat in their metal minds and never taps them.  Most people don't know that they are a ferring and everyone sees them eating, so people don't realize there is a problem until it has gotten really bad.

AHHHH I just discovered that somewhere in the convoluted process of getting the file from SoundRecorder to tumblr the first line got lost... Why didn't anyone say anything?!  Corrected version coming shortly!

Corrected version can be found at http://kalynaanne.tumblr.com/post/111933243197/ok-completely-new-post-because-the-other-one because tumblr apparently won't let me fix this one *rolls eyes*

Ok.  I figured that if I did the lullaby from Shadows, that meant I should also do Shallan's lullaby from Words of Radiance. I sat down and messed around with it until I came up with a tune I like, so, here, have another cosmere lullaby.

OMH THAT IS ABSOLUTELY STORMING ADORABLE!!!!! You’re amazing :D

“anything about axehounds or chulls or skyeels or other stormlight critters”

For kalynaanne! Here’s an axehound pup taking a nap in the afternoon sun. :D