Creating a Database out of Magic

[deathbymanga]

So, my DM is running a very roleplay/social heavy campaign, and I'm playing an Archivist. the campaign is set in a sorta metropolis filled with different churches and businesses. My character is planning on creating an Archivist guild dedicated to creating a unification of all churches through common understanding and the transference of knowledge. To do this, I'd like to be able to build the equivalent of an Access or Oracle Database that stores scriptures for my guild to organize and categorize.

This will of course take a lot of time and money, but until then I'll be using a Library storage system.

[Ruethgar]

Lucid Dreaming DC 20 to change the buildings in your dreamscape to be books or have writing on them for the specific purpose of religious knowledge, or Wee Jas knowledge, or Pelor, or whatever. Autohypnosis DC 15(need +14 to the check) to memorize it all. Use a language that doesn't need a lot of words like truenaming to cut down on time spent memorizing and remembering. You now have an infinite library of knowledge to record in your books.

If you would prefer, you could simply record information in the dream with a guild member permanently asleep and astral projecting. Build a portal there and you have a base. That way you aren't simply dreaming knowledge into being but you are putting it in a place where you or others can easily will yourselves to a section of accumulated knowledge to do your research.

There is also a spell to instantly read a book which, if you make it big enough, could cover all knowledge you need. Then just make several portals to it as small as a hand or so so people can touch it.

[Milo v3]

I made computers out of low-level spells + custom item creation rules as a Wonder Tome and Wonder Glove (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?423026-Manapunk-Items), in PF but it should all work in 3.5e.

[Bullet06320]

Dragon Magazine 327 pg 66 Modern Magical article
slate folio, its a pdf you can link 5 books too
has a couple other nifty modern type magic items, might be what your looking for, or at least a basis to build up from

[deathbymanga]

Dragon Magazine 327 pg 66 Modern Magical article
slate folio, its a pdf you can link 5 books too
has a couple other nifty modern type magic items, might be what your looking for, or at least a basis to build up from

Slate Folio looks cool, but it can only hold 100 pages. how might you go about rigging muiltiple Slate Folios to a single Slate Folio to create a network Database

[Bucky]

You could have a database 'table' implemented with stacks of standardized inscribed tiles, that you search with Locate Object effects.

[deathbymanga]

Hmm, what if I go Slate Folio, but I add a Telepathic Bond into the mix when Crafting to link multiple Slate Folios together?

[Bullet06320]

basically just start with the slate folio as a base, increase its cost appropriately as you add abilities and increase its capabilities

[Jormengand]

Use a language that doesn't need a lot of words like truenaming

Weirdly, truespeak isn't a language and no-one actually speaks it. Plus, the words are stupidly long: names like kyeithiel-cramuothan-praduvashedeo and words like yich'tho-pratanuul-khadaash (meaning "Sharpen").




But anyway, a database. This is an interesting challenge.

Essentially, a database is a way to store and retrieve lots of bits of knowledge. You'll need to search the database - for example, all scriptures from Thor, or all scriptures written in Common. Finally, you'll need to be able to retrieve said items.

With a big enough Bags of Holding, you can have a decent-sized extradimensional space. Better to use a Handy Haversack if you can fit that many books in. In fact, what you can do is fill a handy haversack with search results. For every possible combination of searches, such as "All books in common about Thor" or "All books in Elven about artifacts", you can make all of the searches retrievable as a move action.

Another thought is to have a bunch of Secret Page spells with different command words: by secret paging the same book multiple times, on every page, you can have an entire book which can be viewed as any one book in the collection . To view a specific page, you need to speak every other command word but the one relevant to that page. Obviously, this is a pain, so set up Magic Mouths to respond to names of books with different sets of command words. To access the actual information in the database, then, you draw the correct search - which is always at the top - out of the database. Then, you tell the magic mouth the name of the book you're looking for, and it spouts a string of truespeak gibberish at the book until it shows the right page.

Okay, so here's the master plan. You will need:
A small bit of honeycomb and jade dust worth 10 gp, per holy book in the database.
Wizard level 9th or equivalent.
One book, plus one more book to rip pages out of with gay abandon, costing 30 GP total
Probably not a great deal more than one vial of ink, costing 8 GP.
One pen, costing 1 sp.
One Handy Haversack worth 2000 GP
1000 XP per holy book in the database.

Total: 2038.1+10n GP, 1000n XP (or 500 XP and one thought bottle, or 0 XP, some variable number of GP and one cleric if you use the level drain+restoration method, or others), 1 Wizard.

Modus Operandi:

- Get Book.
- Get Wizard.
- Get Wizard to cast Secret Page on the book repeatedly, until the entire book is covered in altered pages detailing the Tale of Thor's Deeds on Earth. Make the command word to remove the alteration Doh.
- Get Wizard to cast Secret Page on the book repeatedly, until the entire book is covered in altered pages detailing the The Book of Freya. Make the command word to remove the alteration Ray.
- Get wizard to continue this process until all holy texts have been written in.
- Get wizard to cast Magic Mouth (probably on the book's cover) that triggers when a creature says "Tale of Thor's Deeds on Earth" which then spouts "Ray Me So La Tie" but not Doh, thus removing (temporarily) all of the page alterations except the ones which turn the book into a copy of Tale of Thor's Deeds on Earth.
- Get wizard to cast Magic Mouth (probably on the book's cover) that triggers when a creature says "The Book of Freya" which then spouts "Doh Me So La Tie" but not Ray, thus removing (temporarily) all of the page alterations except the ones which turn the book into a copy of The Book of Freya.
- Do the same for all of the rest.
- Dismiss Wizard.
- Get Book 2
- Rip pages out of book 2 with gay abandon.
- On each page, write the results for a possible search query that returns at least one result.
- Chuck all the pages in a handy haversack, perhaps along with Book.
- Wear book 2's cover as a hat.

To search:

- Attempt to pull out the piece of paper with your search query on it.
- If your attempt fails, your search returned no results.
- Otherwise, read the piece of paper.

To get a book:

- Say the book's name.

There's an alternative method, but using it could get unwieldy if there are enough texts to fill more than one handy haversack. Essentially, this method involves dumping searches in the handy haversack as before, but also dumping the books themselves in. The problem is that each haversack can only carry so many books - 26 in the main compartment and 6 in each side pocket - meaning that finding the book you're after is a nightmare if there are enough to bear making a database out of them.

[Inevitability]

1. Find an Elan, hereafter to referred as 'the database'.
2. Cast Mindrape on the database. Command it to permanently become Fanatic in attitude towards you, and add memories of it reading books containing everything you want it to know.
3. Command the database to sustain itself using its daily power points.
4. Cast Telepathic Bond on the database and cast a Permanency spell immediately afterwards.
5. Place the database in an iron coffin with a Necklace of Adaption and a bunch of Farspeaking Amulets. Give the Amulets' charms to the leaders of several major churches.
6. Bury the coffin somewhere safe (a few miles beneath the surface should do it). Ward the area with a Forbiddance spell to prevent teleportation immediately afterwards.
7. Whenever you need to update the database, do so through your Telepathic Bond.

You now have a database accessible by anyone you've given an Amulet, plus everyone able to cast Sending. These people could theoretically all add to the database, but you might want to command it to run everything it receives past you first, just to be sure. The database itself is secure. Using teleportation to reach the database won't work, and mundanely digging for it will be tricky, too.

Finally, there's an added benefit for you. Everything anyone tells the database will be conveyed to you, so you essentially become one of the most knowledgeable people on the planet, all while appearing to be a generous sharer of knowledge.

And yes, this method technically does involve warping an innocent mind, placing it in an iron box for all of eternity, and making it nothing more than a device designed to share information. But hey, you wanted a database, you got one.

[Piggy Knowles]

You can basically build a functioning computer out of the undead, given enough time and space. Zombies and skeletons can follow simple commands.

Build a vast series of catacombs beneath the city filled with undead given instructions that basically turn them into logic gates. Basically you can set up circuit boards that are rooms within the catacombs, where each undead has a flag that they can hold up or down to represent 1 or 0, with other undead traveling between rooms to pass on calculations, etc. If you've read Three Body Problem they talk about how to make a functioning advanced computer out of an army of 30 million following extremely simple orders - this is basically what you're doing here. With a large enough network of undead, you could easily create an actual fully functioning database to keep track of everything you need.

EDIT: That said, if all you need is storage and recall, you can do that with a single individual with the scholar's touch spell (which allows you to instantly read a book per round) and a buffed out Autohypnosis check (which allows you to memorize and later perfectly recall something you've read for the low low price of a DC 15 Autohypnosis check each time for approximately 800 words per check). You'll need to make a LOT of Autohypnosis checks to memorize every religious text in the city, but luckily they don't require an action and instead are considered part of the action required to read the text in the first place, which thanks to scholar's touch is only a round. Just make sure your scholar has a +14 Autohypnosis modifier (or a +5 modifier and the ability to take 10) and you should be good to go.