Random Banter #239 - Now 50% more tangible!

[enderlord99]

I bought a powder that you're supposed to mix with water to make your cells absorb the water more quickly.

I tried combining it with an energy drink.

It works. Very awake after five minutes. Caffeine normally takes thirty for me.

[tyckspoon]

Absolutely. Without a question. Not sure how one would pronounce it otherwise, honestly.

More along the lines of 'taco', possibly. Or Mystic Muses' seems valid, which I think would make it rhyme with Waco (TX) instead?

.. Thwack-ow >.>

[Peelee]

McWane Science Center downtown has their third floor done up as a dragon-themed exhibit. It's pretty aweome, I gotta say.

[Jasdoif]

So it turns out the achievement for completing Bioshock on the highest difficulty without ever dying reviving at the Vita-Chamber is named "I Chose the Impossible". I can't decide if that's clever or trite.

[Rater202]

Pet Peeve: Harry Potter fanfiction that depicts Dementors as being weak to fire, especially if the OC/MC-in-name-only is being depicted as brilliant for trying to use fire on them.

Like, god damn they're dark creatures that look like corpses whose very presence makes people feel cold. Fire is the first thing people would have tried.

And people would have tried, becuase they're born from despair and feed on souls and happiness, leaving people either as empty shells with no awareness or else driven utterly made by the loss of any feeling other than fear and depression and the loss of every memory that was even remotely happy. Trying to destroy them would be the rational response.

The fact that they still exist, let alone are appeased by giving them the wizarding world's criminals, suggests that whatever exploit you came up with for destroying them probably won't work. Even people who haven't an ounce of logic would have tried "kill it with fire, "hit it with the beam of instant death," "send them through the portal to the afterlife that kills any living creature that goes through it," or "transfigure them into an inanimate object and burry them somewhere."

[Keltest]

Pet Peeve: Harry Potter fanfiction that depicts Dementors as being weak to fire, especially if the OC/MC-in-name-only is being depicted as brilliant for trying to use fire on them.

Like, god damn they're dark creatures that look like corpses whose very presence makes people feel cold. Fire is the first thing people would have tried.

And people would have tried, becuase they're born from despair and feed on souls and happiness, leaving people either as empty shells with no awareness or else driven utterly made by the loss of any feeling other than fear and depression and the loss of every memory that was even remotely happy. Trying to destroy them would be the rational response.

The fact that they still exist, let alone are appeased by giving them the wizarding world's criminals, suggests that whatever exploit you came up with for destroying them probably won't work. Even people who haven't an ounce of logic would have tried "kill it with fire, "hit it with the beam of instant death," "send them through the portal to the afterlife that kills any living creature that goes through it," or "transfigure them into an inanimate object and burry them somewhere."

In fairness, unlike the Dresdenverse, weaponizing fire seems like a fairly specific and little done thing in the potterverse. Off hand I actually cant think of any spells that spit great gouts of flame at something without getting entirely out of control. Dumbledore does it once in a very specific manner I think, but it was kind of implied to be a very advanced magic, at which point why not just use a Patronus anyway?

[Qwertystop]

Maybe not the death archway, it's in a fixed location and you might not want to bring something so dangerous into somewhere so sensitive and important, especially since it seems likely neither is very well-understood so it's a big gamble. What if one spooky floating fearcloth and the other spooky hanging deathcloth ready positively to each other and now you've got a super-dementor that has the same killing property as the veil?

[Rater202]

In fairness, unlike the Dresdenverse, weaponizing fire seems like a fairly specific and little done thing in the potterverse. Off hand I actually cant think of any spells that spit great gouts of flame at something without getting entirely out of control. Dumbledore does it once in a very specific manner I think, but it was kind of implied to be a very advanced magic, at which point why not just use a Patronus anyway?

In the Movie it's depicted as Albus creating a huge storm of fire but in the book it was a pretty simple whip.

According to supplementary materials, the "shooting sparks at each other" that's alluded to when Draco challenges Harry to a duel in the first book is an offensive spell that will burn someone on a direct hit. It's a spell with a couple of variations(mostly color related) taught in DADA that's essential "baby's first hex" with the intent of being something bright and hot to spray at something that's trying to hurt you in the hopes of burning it or scaring it off.

The "red sparks" and "green sparks" spells that get used as emergency flares a couple of times in the books are apparently the same spell.

The Bluebell Flame spell, while it doens't really "burn" things and is cool enough to be carried around in a jar, also has offensive capabilities—namely Hermione using it to set Snape on fire when she thought he was cursing Harry and later using it to fight off the Devil's snare(the movie changed both scenes.) Spin-off games often use it as an offensive spell against certain enemies that the standard knock-back spell won't work on.

So using fire as a weapon might not be super common but it's not an alien concept in-universe either.

In particular, it's said to be the standard method of dealing with Inferi—corpses reanimated by dark magic—so it is something that people consider.

[Keltest]

In the Movie it's depicted as Albus creating a huge storm of fire but in the book it was a pretty simple whip.

According to supplementary materials, the "shooting sparks at each other" that's alluded to when Draco challenges Harry to a duel in the first book is an offensive spell that will burn someone on a direct hit. It's a spell with a couple of variations(mostly color related) taught in DADA that's essential "baby's first hex" with the intent of being something bright and hot to spray at something that's trying to hurt you in the hopes of burning it or scaring it off.

The "red sparks" and "green sparks" spells that get used as emergency flares a couple of times in the books are apparently the same spell.

The Bluebell Flame spell, while it doens't really "burn" things and is cool enough to be carried around in a jar, also has offensive capabilities—namely Hermione using it to set Snape on fire when she thought he was cursing Harry and later using it to fight off the Devil's snare(the movie changed both scenes.) Spin-off games often use it as an offensive spell against certain enemies that the standard knock-back spell won't work on.

So using fire as a weapon might not be super common but it's not an alien concept in-universe either.

In particular, it's said to be the standard method of dealing with Inferi—corpses reanimated by dark magic—so it is something that people consider.

I mean, knowing it exists is a far cry from being able to weaponize it effectively, especially against something that passively makes it hard to focus and is actively trying to kill you. I want to say its mentioned once that Dementors dont like light and heat, and presumably being set on fire would suck, but short of hitting them with a burning torch or throwing a lantern at them, I dont know that the wizards can really do that conveniently.

[Mystic Muse]

We are quick approaching the end of the thread, someone whose turn it is should make a new one.

[Rater202]

I mean, knowing it exists is a far cry from being able to weaponize it effectively, especially against something that passively makes it hard to focus and is actively trying to kill you.

I'm just saying, people logically would have tried to destroy them before they settled on "appease them and try to limit the conditions in which they 'breed*"

And fire would have probably been one of the first things someone considered when trying to come up with ways to kill them. They're cold, they're associated with darkness, death, and decay, and they look like rotting corpses. It's not some huge leap of logic to assume fire, seeing as how fire is warm, bright, and is commonly used to burn out decay or dispose of corpses.

so Genius Fanfic Protagonist being a genius for setting the dark, cold corpsemen on fire is just kind of irritating.

(Per supplemental materials they can't be killed or destroyed. They just are. If Poltergeists are spirits of chaos and mischief, Dementors are spirits of death and depression. It is implied that they'll eventually 'die' off, in a manner of speaking, if you limit the conditions in which they thrive but they also spontaneously manifest wherever conditions are right, just growing out of the ground like a fungus.)

[Keltest]

I'm just saying, people logically would have tried to destroy them before they settled on "appease them and try to limit the conditions in which they 'breed*"

And fire would have probably been one of the first things someone considered when trying to come up with ways to kill them. They're cold, they're associated with darkness, death, and decay, and they look like rotting corpses. It's not some huge leap of logic to assume fire, seeing as how fire is warm, bright, and is commonly used to burn out decay or dispose of corpses.

so Genius Fanfic Protagonist being a genius for setting the dark, cold corpsemen on fire is just kind of irritating.

(Per supplemental materials they can't be killed or destroyed. They just are. If Poltergeists are spirits of chaos and mischief, Dementors are spirits of death and depression. It is implied that they'll eventually 'die' off, in a manner of speaking, if you limit the conditions in which they thrive but they also spontaneously manifest wherever conditions are right, just growing out of the ground like a fungus.)

Would they have though? I mean, wizards by their own admissions know very, very little about any nonhuman sapience. Its very easy to imagine the wizards just herding them into Azkaban and just leaving them there in their box... and heck, thats basically exactly what happened. Its not like the wizards secretly were trying to exterminate them and just couldnt figure out how, after all. They just assumed they were the smartest ones in the room and that they cleverly manipulated the dementors to serve their own ends.

Theres no real reason to assume that the wizards tried and failed to burn the dementors out when A: they dont appear to have a ready ability to weaponize and deploy fire without destroying everything else too, and B: they already had a specific spell to fight them.

[Rater202]

Would they have though? I mean, wizards by their own admissions know very, very little about any nonhuman sapience. Its very easy to imagine the wizards just herding them into Azkaban and just leaving them there in their box... and heck, thats basically exactly what happened. Its not like the wizards secretly were trying to exterminate them and just couldnt figure out how, after all. They just assumed they were the smartest ones in the room and that they cleverly manipulated the dementors to serve their own ends.

Theres no real reason to assume that the wizards tried and failed to burn the dementors out when A: they dont appear to have a ready ability to weaponize and deploy fire without destroying everything else too, and B: they already had a specific spell to fight them.

You're operating on the assumption that the Patronus Charm was invented first and that Azkaban was the first solution floated to the problem of "immortal embodiments of depression and death that feed on human souls."

I find that to be an odd assumption, given Wizardkind's habit of destroying dangerous creatures that make themselves a threat to humanity.

On fire: they do have spells to weaponize fire. According to the wiki there are 63 known magics that involve fire in some way and just a cursory look at the list shows plenty of ones with offensive uses(the blasting curse, which causes a fiery explosion, seems pretty basic.)

On The Patronus Charm... Given that the Fantastic Beasts book establishes that his charm also works on Lethifolds, which are mundane ambush predators, and the books depicts the Patronus as just running up and knocking the mentor around until it leaves rather than some "radiates repulsive magic" effect like in the movie I'm not sure that the Patronus was something someone invented to deal with Dementors and more something someone just threw at the wall and figured out worked. Regardless, there's no indication that it was the first thing anyone tried.

(Especially given that PAtornuses are literally made of something that Dementors eat.)

[Fyraltari]

rational response.

There's your problem.Nothing in the Wizarding World makes any kind of sense.

[Anonymouswizard]

There's your problem.Nothing in the Wizarding World makes any kind of sense.

Wait, you're saying Harry Potter doesn't use Sandersonian Magic?


Honestly, it's possible or even likely that fire works to at least drive them off. Set up a barrier of fire and it's feasible they won't cross it. Set one on fire and you now have a flaming dementor, which probably just burns stuff near it (particularly if it panics). But I don't see it being more effective against them than against humans, their coldness is the feeling of death.

The Patronus, as I understand it, is concentrated life/soul essence, and counteracts their aura when present. It hurts them in the same way that a rampaging cow can hurt a human. But it's a relatively advanced and specific spell, wizards probably had a less effective method of driving them off before developing it

[Rater202]

The problem, mainly, is that these kinds of stories portray the protagonist as being so god-damned clever for setting the damn things on fire.

As if they were the first person to think of something so obvious.

when nine times out of ten you can just assume that people have already tried the obvious solution.

[Keltest]

The problem, mainly, is that these kinds of stories portray the protagonist as being so god-damned clever for setting the damn things on fire.

As if they were the first person to think of something so obvious.

when nine times out of ten you can just assume that people have already tried the obvious solution.

A point is made in the first couple books that wizards are, as a group, complete morons. A logic puzzle was considered to be a defense equal to not one, but two different giant death monsters, and everything about Hagrid with the Chamber of Secrets was a complete disaster, both times.

[Anonymouswizard]

The problem, mainly, is that these kinds of stories portray the protagonist as being so god-damned clever for setting the damn things on fire.

As if they were the first person to think of something so obvious.

when nine times out of ten you can just assume that people have already tried the obvious solution.

Oh yeah, I agree, that's stupid. If I had a magic wand and was facing an aggressive monster setting it on fire would be like the second thing I tried.

A point is made in the first couple books that wizards are, as a group, complete morons. A logic puzzle was considered to be a defense equal to not one, but two different giant death monsters, and everything about Hagrid with the Chamber of Secrets was a complete disaster, both times.

To be fair the house of supposed clever clogs apparently can't see the issues with locking the dormitory behind an ever changing trivia question. Or the fact that most wizards don't know what guns are despite living alongside muggles. Or the unnecessarily enchanted books. The list goes on.

EDIT: Huh I'm eligible, workshoping thread titles now

[LaZodiac]

So it turns out the achievement for completing Bioshock on the highest difficulty without ever dying reviving at the Vita-Chamber is named "I Chose the Impossible". I can't decide if that's clever or trite.

It's Bioshock the answer is yes, full-chested and with pride.

[Rater202]

A point is made in the first couple books that wizards are, as a group, complete morons. A logic puzzle was considered to be a defense equal to not one, but two different giant death monsters, and everything about Hagrid with the Chamber of Secrets was a complete disaster, both times.

Hermione says that wizards don't have an ounce of logic... But Hermione is 12 at the time and her know-it-all syndrome is a noted flaw of hers that recurs through the novels.

As it is, in the context of the later books it seems that the challenges guardian the stone wasn't... Meant to be defenses. The going consensus I've seen is that they were meant to either 1: Feed Tom's ego and convince him that the Mirror of Erised was another puzzle to be solved, insuring that he'd be ensnared by it like almost happened to Harry and, per Dumbledore, happened to many in the past who wasted away starring at it or 2: Given that Harry seems to think that Dumbledore wanted to give Harry a chance to figure things out on his own, possibly tests of Harry's abilities, or those of whatever friends he'd make.

I mean... Look at it this way, Albus knows that there's a prophecy that says that Harry or Tom will have to kill each other. Albus's goals in the book are 1: Get rid of Tom for good and 2: find some way to defeat Tom without having to sacrifice Harry or, barring that, give the boy as long and happy/normal a life as he possibly could give the circumstances.

Knowing if Harry is an adventurous and heroic boy who will need to be trained up and educated to fight Tom when he's old enough or an ordinary boy who will need to be protected from Tom is important information to have, as is what his aptitudes are.

And well, it's an awful coincidence that the mirror of Erised was somewhere where Harry could stumble across it at the same time Albus decided to return the Invisibility Cloak to Harry. And no reason at all to have Hagrid pick up the stone from the bank at the same time as he was helping harry do his school shopping when Albus presumably could have had someone pick it up at any time.

Regarding the second book... I mean, Fudge is incompetent and corrupt. That's pretty transparent throughout his major appearances in the series. That's just one guy.

And fifty years prior, well... He was keeping a powerful and dangerous dark creature as a pet. Even if there hadn't been attacks in the school he probably would have been expelled over it. And that's pretty much all that happened, he was expelled but there's no evidence of criminal charges being filed against him. Combine that with racism against half-breeds and of course nobody is going to think twice about blaming him for the "accident."

[Keltest]

Hermione says that wizards don't have an ounce of logic... But Hermione is 12 at the time and her know-it-all syndrome is a noted flaw of hers that recurs through the novels.

Counterpoint: The invisible book of invisibility. Not only did somebody made the bloody thing, but people actually bought them.

[Rater202]

Counterpoint: The invisible book of invisibility. Not only did somebody made the bloody thing, but people actually bought them.

1: We don't know if people bought them, only that the bookstore stocked them.

2: given that it's a single one-off line by an exasperated clerk, it may have been a joke.

[Keltest]

1: We don't know if people bought them, only that the bookstore stocked them.

2: given that it's a single one-off line by an exasperated clerk, it may have been a joke.

I mean its obviously a joke, but its a trend. Aggressive or useless textbooks, flying on brooms instead of, you know, anything more comfortable, the logic puzzle, their complete and utter apathy to things that they quite literally live next to...

Wizards, as a whole, are not ever portrayed as anything other than a bunch of fools who kind of lucked into their current level of comfort.

[Anonymouswizard]

New thread over here, hopefully not a duplicate.