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View Full Version : Hydromnemotics [Feat and alchemy]



Eldan
2012-11-01, 11:36 AM
This came from a pretty weird skype discussion.

Hydromnemotics. Not a common field of study, not at all. I first came across it, of course, in the brain coral domes of Mnemosynia. A good friend of mine who shall remain anonymous and therefore be called S. here, asked me to go there and retrieve a vital memory he had lost on an unfortunate spelunking trip to the Caverns of Iviran the previous year.
Now, as I entered the domes, I was still recuperating from a hippocampus race I had been challenged to on my way as a bet with an annoyance of rather impolite steam mephits who had wanted the plans for my isolation suit for an expedition to the deserts of Pelion and...
Hmm? Oh, yes. Hydromnemotics. As I approached the domes, I only became aware of the situation when a young and rather comely mermaid tackled me aside, before warning me that I had been in the process of swimming into an area of water currently under song by one of their aquaharmonicians, trying to create memory water.
A later discussion with the expert question, as well as a practical demonstration where he showed me the proper harmonics to multiply a rather excellent brandy let to my notes and theories on the subject, which I will present in an article which I will present to the Imperial Society of Ember next week.
-Findelwald Tungsten, Professor of Quasi-Fluidic Memory Harmonics, Caligo Polymagic University

Hydromnemoticians have mastered the art of inducing special harmonic vibrations in a body of water, that causes the water atoms in the substance to turn into a swarm of microscopic water elementals, which can then perform specific tasks on items mixed into the substance. Creating a gallon (one dose) of memory water takes 12 hours and one gallon of ordinary sea water. Each application costs a certain amount of gold, which must be paid in rare herbal ingredients and uses up the memory water.

Multiply Gold cost: market price of the item to be multiplied.
You can mix up to one gallon of any liquid substance (even magical potions, alchemical items or poisons, though you can only multiply one single dose, vial or flask of these at a time) into the memory water and ask it to turn into a second dose of the item in quesiton. After one hour of singing and stirring, the liquid has seized being memory water and has become a second dose of the liquid in question.

Antagonize: Gold cost: 25 gold pieces
After mixing any liquid substance that deals elemental (fire, electricity, acid or cold only) damage or any poison into the memory water, you can tell the elementals to synthesize a counter-agent to that substance. This either produces a vial of antitoxin (as the alchemical item, but specific to that poison) or an alchemical item that gives resistance 5 to that energy type for one hour.

Distill: Gold cost: market price of the item to be distilled.
You mix one dose, vial or flask of any potion, poison or alchemical item with the memory water and ask the water elementals to analyze and improve the effectiveness of the item. If the item has a caster level, that caster level is increased by +1. If it has a save DC, that DC is increased by +1. If the item deals any kind of damage (even ability damage), that damage is increased by 1 point per die of damage that would normally be dealt (so an item dealing 2d6 points of ability damage would now deal 2d6+2 points of ability damage).
An item already distilled can not be distilled again.

Dissolve and Memorize: 100 gold pieces
You immerse any solid item in the memory water and tell the elementals to dissolve it on an atomic level. This turns the memory water into acid (as acid flask alchemical item) for the next hour, dealing 1d6 points of acid damgae per round to the time. If it is not dissolved within one hour, the water reverts and the item can be retrived.
After the item is dissolved, the elementals memorize its structure and keep it's compound atoms stored, making the memory water cloudy. Cloudy memory water can not be used to perform any operation other than retrieving the item. In a process that takes another hour, the elementals can reassemble the item into its original, fully functional form. However, any magical properties the item might have had are lost.

Craft Memory Water

Prerequisites: Perform (Singing) 4 ranks, Truespeak 2 ranks, Craft (Alchemy) 4 ranks, Knowledge: the planes 4 ranks, must speak Aquan
Benefit: You can create memory water. Creating one dose of memory water takes you 12 hours to create and one gallon of ordinary water. For further applications, see the description of memory water, above.

Amechra
2012-11-01, 12:49 PM
Interesting...

I think it should have some more unique effects, but eh, it's got some pretty neat fluff.

I do think you should state what happens if someone should drink it.

Also, it should totally let you synthesize material properties, but only with liquids; not sure how this would work, but you should be able to make it boil water or whatever.

Eldan
2012-11-01, 01:10 PM
Hmm. Good point. The elementals can already make acid, in a way. So, other applications: turn liquid into acid, freeze liquid, boil liquid, purify liquid...

That's going away from the original concept a bit, but all still works with the fluff.

Drinking... I'm imagining damage of some kind. How much damage does the slam of a swarm of microscopic water elementals deal?

Amechra
2012-11-01, 01:15 PM
How many HD does the swarm has? That would tell you the damage.

Eldan
2012-11-01, 01:22 PM
Ah. Well. Assuming water atoms are the same size as water molecules in our universe...
One gallon is about 3800 grams...
so about 211 moles of water...
Times Avogadro's number...
1.3*10^26 water elementals in the swarm.

I have no idea how many HD that gives us.

Eldan
2012-11-01, 01:32 PM
Alternatively, there are 7500 gallons in a ten foot cube. So, the gallon is one 7500th of a swarm.

Amechra
2012-11-01, 06:10 PM
Just give it 1d6 damage, and call it a day.

It would be neat if there were some feats that you could take that would allow you to, just maybe, add some more damage (you can rile the elementals to a higher level of rage, thus letting you base the damage off your HD), or letting you apply this form of "alchemy" to water in different states (I'll leave you to figure out the effects of steam and ice hydromnemotics. :smallwink:)

Eldan
2012-11-01, 06:16 PM
Steam would get weird. Very weird. Ice sounds very immobile.

Amechra
2012-11-01, 06:30 PM
Well, maybe not steam; but I can see ice as the water elementals just holding onto each-other, letting you order them around to restructure the ice.

So it would probably end up being something like shapesand in utility.

Eldan
2012-11-01, 07:38 PM
That sounds pretty cool. A variant on "multiply" maybe. Show them a solid item, and they make a copy of it out of ice.

Amechra
2012-11-01, 07:50 PM
...with the potential to break back into memory water on a command word?

Maybe a "contingent" effect, so you could, say, have it duplicate the properties of fresh water, put it into a fishbowl, and then turn into a gel if it breaks, for example?

And "steam" memory water could be used to refract light to generate the effects of a visual illusion spell... It would be too dispersed to slam any creatures in it's radius...