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Half Centaur
Jun Member 2010

Half Centaur

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@IXavior, I actually really like that.

I compared runes to batteries of malleable energy for spell casting- which would be functionally the same, with the rune altars as a conduit to fill the energy.

But you propose that runes are more like magnets- with the altars as the 'parent' magnet to magnetize the runes. Honestly, I don't know enough about magnetism to extend the analogy, but I like it- though I sense there would be problems with explaining how we use up runes- but don't use up the rune altars (or at least, extremely slowly- which may play on the GOP idea of the altars being destroyed eventually).


Interesting change of perspective on the idea- though they would function the same way, it would seem. Either way, I do agree, the difference between us lowly rune users and more magical beings, is that they pull runic energy directly from the environment- not with the use of a rune catalyst.


Hmm...

Maybe magnetism is a better way of thinking about runes... I'm not sure... It might fit the idea of them being a catalyst better.
Maybe without them- large groups of humans would be needed to siphon runic energy, or it would take weeks, months, even years to make a certain spell on ones own- which explains the ritual aspect of some magic- since to draw on deeper, more strange forms of runic energy to manipulate- they can't be simply drawn out with a 'magnet'.
"We call it being a hero"
"That's interesting, we call it utter stupidity"

14-Sep-2015 00:41:12

Penny Drakis

Penny Drakis

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Half Centaur said :
@IXavior, I actually really like that.

...

But you propose that runes are more like magnets- with the altars as the 'parent' magnet to magnetize the runes. Honestly, I don't know enough about magnetism to extend the analogy, but I like it- though I sense there would be problems with explaining how we use up runes- but don't use up the rune altars (or at least, extremely slowly- which may play on the GOP idea of the altars being destroyed eventually).


I have been a fan of the runes as batteries theory, but lore coming from the lunar clan and explicit denials from the Jmods about the battery comparison always rubbed that theory the wrong way. Anyhow, onto magnets.

Magnets can actually be "used up". The thing that makes (solid) magnets able to do the wonderful things they do is a mostly orderly arrangement of magnetic moments of all the magnetic subdomains in the magnet. In each subdomain, the moments are all aligned one way, but each subdomain may have a different relative alignment. The more ordered that all the moments in the whole magnet are in relation to eachother, the more powerful the magnet is.

"Aha!" says the Saradomist, "Strength through order! Magnets are blessed things!" But order can only store power; it is useless and meaningless power if it cannot be exploited and allowed to descend into chaos. "Yes!" says the Zamorakian, "Strength through Chaos!" But a magnetic solid in an utterly chaotic state has no strength, except in its mass.

Heavy use of a magnet will actually cause it to heat up. Heat is extremely chaotic and will sap a magnet's strength. That is why the magnets at the LHC have to be cooled by liquid helium -- to carry the heat (and chaos) away. In this way, magnets can be used up. Inductive heating is a crazy fascinating thing.

Also, the best magnetic materials have a quantum spin state imbalance so pp**bbbt to you post-Guthixians too.
Humility is self-destruction, pride is the destruction of all else. And He said, "
Let there be light.
"
And then there were none .

14-Sep-2015 04:34:08

Penny Drakis

Penny Drakis

Posts: 789 Gold Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
And as for the rune altars being used up, well, when a parent magnet is used to magnetize a smaller magnet, some heat is generated in the process. The order induced in the smaller magnet comes at the cost of some chaos induced in the parent, and it isn't an equal exchange either, since chaos almost always increases in a system. But it is such a minute change compared to how strong the magnetic interaction is that it is hardly noticeable. A magnet with a slightly stronger magnetism than Earth's own can already do amazing feats.

And yes, every time we use a magnet for anything we weaken earth's field a bit, but as weak as the Earth's field is, the size of the Earth is so great that the amount of energy bound up in the planet's field is frightening to consider. And the sun? Even more so. And the galaxy? The numbers bleed into meaninglessness lest you go mad from the thought.

Supposedly the anima is more fragile than that, but when will the altars run out of potential energy to give out? Who knows. Jagex probably hasn't decided and magical science probably hasn't progressed far enough canonically for any NPC (besides the elder goddesses) to give us a meaningful answer, just a bunch of hypothetical hoohaw.

edit to alter the spelling of altar
Humility is self-destruction, pride is the destruction of all else. And He said, "
Let there be light.
"
And then there were none .

14-Sep-2015 05:03:43 - Last edited on 14-Sep-2015 05:06:55 by Penny Drakis

Half Centaur
Jun Member 2010

Half Centaur

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Penny Drakis,

You went way over my head there and I haven't known how to respond for a while :P .

Unfortunately I don't think that Jagex will ever go that deep into the meat of it- or perhaps, the wizards of the wizard's tower won't. They probably see magnets as trivial to them anyway- they'd be more apt to explain magnets using magic theory, rather than the other way around :P .


Anyway, I like to think now that the rune altars were built in magic 'poles' if you will. Which is why the individual location of the altars are important (so V and his followers didn't just make a row of them on the Lunar Isle or something). Also explains the apparent influence of the area with the altar (blood altar in Morytania, fire in Al Kharid, etc.)

Unlike Magnetism, where there's only two pole- Magic, I'd say, consists of the various runic elements, which act as different brands of energy (which influences spell-casting, when determining what sources of energy to draw upon to influence the world in the way you desire).


Now, I'd say the Anima Mundi creates these runic energies more as a byproduct of anima, itself. Or perhaps runic energy is in some way important to the growth of anima. (Somewhere in there the laws of thermodynamics are probably broken, but whatever, magic had to happen somewhere)
"We call it being a hero"
"That's interesting, we call it utter stupidity"

19-Jan-2016 21:23:46

Half Centaur
Jun Member 2010

Half Centaur

Posts: 6,959 Rune Posts by user Forum Profile RuneMetrics Profile
Okay... so this thread could use a lot of updates after CoM kinda revealed some things about how the energy works in Mahjarrat, and to an extension God's like Zaros and Seren.

Also- I still stick by most of what I've said here so yeah. Bumping this so chewey doesn't eat it.
"We call it being a hero"
"That's interesting, we call it utter stupidity"

08-Dec-2016 20:45:24

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