[Magic] A Pound Takes Up 2 Cubic FEET?!

[Fred Brackin]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

Right, so no actual rule, just a feeling. Understood.

I'll note, I once had a group of Characters spend 6 years of game time enchanting in preparation for a mission... so two-hundred days isn't a "limiter" in any manner.

Suppose you had 6 PCs spending 6 years on nothing but a S&S Hideaway and you'd still only up to 131 lbs. You can try and maintain that there is no absolute limit on how ridiculous a thing can exist but that is not a reasonable proposition.

I had a set up where PC commisoned Enchntments were done off-screen by a circle of dragons drinking gallons of paut and I still limited things to 2000 pts. That's a 20 hour Q&D ritual even if the energy is available. There's a limit to how much even dragons will do for gold.

I had some bags of holding witrh D&D-like capacities but those were based on Permanent Gates to pocket dimensions.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

Suppose you had 6 PCs spending 6 years on nothing but a S&S Hideaway and you'd still only up to 131 lbs. You can try and maintain that there is no absolute limit on how ridiculous a thing can exist but that is not a reasonable proposition.

Okay, I'll grant "it takes a really long time" is a limiter, but it's certainly no hard cap, and there are no rules saying "100 pounds maximum on Hideaway", which was the thrust of my point.

[scc]

Originally Posted by malloyd

This is absolutely false. Virtually everything transported is *less* dense than water, simply because most freight moves by ship and if you load a ship so it is more dense than water, it *sinks*.

You normally assume general freight is between 25 and 50 lbs/cf (0.4 to 0.8 times the density of water). Though if you are designing a ship to carry ore or liquified natural gas you may be outside that range, and you should check your design for stability for the 0-25 range, since the buyer may someday want to move it with empty holds and will probably sue you if you didn't mention he needed to add ballast before doing that.

LOL, no. The average density of the entire ships must be less then water, but ships will have plenty of dead space and crew quarters to offset dense containers, and containers will also have dead space inside them. Consider a car, over all it's density might be less then water, but for any given part (Something that your far more likely to want to put inside a Hideaway) the density is going to be grater then water

Originally Posted by evileeyore

Right, so no actual rule, just a feeling. Understood.

I'll note, I once had a group of Characters spend 6 years of game time enchanting in preparation for a mission... so two-hundred days isn't a "limiter" in any manner.

Originally Posted by Fred Brackin

Suppose you had 6 PCs spending 6 years on nothing but a S&S Hideaway and you'd still only up to 131 lbs. You can try and maintain that there is no absolute limit on how ridiculous a thing can exist but that is not a reasonable proposition.

I had a set up where PC commisoned Enchntments were done off-screen by a circle of dragons drinking gallons of paut and I still limited things to 2000 pts. That's a 20 hour Q&D ritual even if the energy is available. There's a limit to how much even dragons will do for gold.

I had some bags of holding witrh D&D-like capacities but those were based on Permanent Gates to pocket dimensions.

Originally Posted by evileeyore

Okay, I'll grant "it takes a really long time" is a limiter, but it's certainly no hard cap, and there are no rules saying "100 pounds maximum on Hideaway", which was the thrust of my point.

My 200 days is assuming a circle of 25 enchanters and no time off, and I think this highlight the problems with using S&S. For your 6 years enchanting how are the characters finding time to work to eat? What happens if one of their enemies attacks them? What happens if they burn out?

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by scc

My 200 days is assuming a circle of 25 enchanters and no time off, and I think this highlight the problems with using S&S.

That it takes time? Yes, that is the drawback to S&S enchanting.

For your 6 years enchanting how are the characters finding time to work to eat?

Do... do you think they wouldn't eat? Do you think that someone on the clock 9 to 5 never eats and never gets to do anything else during their day? That it's somehow some 24 hour workathon?

Or are you questioning how Enchanters could possibly have enough money to afford food?

What happens if one of their enemies attacks them?

Then they'd have dealt with it, which they did. You do realize there are rules for skipped or interrupted S&S work days?

What happens if they burn out?

Never occurred so it wasn't something they needed to deal with. However, if it had, they'd have had to deal with it.

[scc]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

That it takes time? Yes, that is the drawback to S&S enchanting.

My point was that taking a S&S job means no time off, how would you feel about taking a job that offered no time off and no ability to quit?

Originally Posted by evileeyore

Do... do you think they wouldn't eat? Do you think that someone on the clock 9 to 5 never eats and never gets to do anything else during their day? That it's somehow some 24 hour workathon?

Or are you questioning how Enchanters could possibly have enough money to afford food?

I was thinking unless these enchanters where privately wealthy they'd need some form of income in the mean time.

Originally Posted by evileeyore

Then they'd have dealt with it, which they did. You do realize there are rules for skipped or interrupted S&S work days?

I was thinking more one of the group was killed or injured such that he could no longer contribute.

EDIT: Or whatever they're enchanting is destroyed, or something else that prevents continuing.

Originally Posted by evileeyore

Never occurred so it wasn't something they needed to deal with. However, if it had, they'd have had to deal with it.

For a real job like that it would be MAJOR problem.

[Rupert]

Originally Posted by malloyd

This is absolutely false. Virtually everything transported is *less* dense than water, simply because most freight moves by ship and if you load a ship so it is more dense than water, it *sinks*.

You normally assume general freight is between 25 and 50 lbs/cf (0.4 to 0.8 times the density of water). Though if you are designing a ship to carry ore or liquified natural gas you may be outside that range, and you should check your design for stability for the 0-25 range, since the buyer may someday want to move it with empty holds and will probably sue you if you didn't mention he needed to add ballast before doing that.

For centuries the rule of thumb has been that a ton of general cargo takes up about 100 cubic feet, to the point that 'tons' when referring to merchant ships for a very long time mean 'useful cargo hold volume in 100 cubic foot units'. Water has a density about three times this.

Originally Posted by scc

LOL, no. The average density of the entire ships must be less then water, but ships will have plenty of dead space and crew quarters to offset dense containers, and containers will also have dead space inside them. Consider a car, over all it's density might be less then water, but for any given part (Something that your far more likely to want to put inside a Hideaway) the density is going to be grater then water.

Aside from dense bulk cargo (ore, grain), cargoes are almost never denser than water. Even a full standard container has a maximum weight that puts them slightly under the density of water (and as they're fairly watertight, they float just at the surface and lost containers are quite a hazard for smaller ships and boats). Tanks are denser than water, cars and trucks are not (until they fill with water, but that's not relevant to storing them in a Hideaway).

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by scc

My point was that taking a S&S job means no time off, how would you feel about taking a job that offered no time off...

If the pay was right, I'd be ifne with it. had one of those once, made the mistake of losing it before I was ready to quit.

...and no ability to quit?

Except they can quit, they just can stop working on the item and walk away.

I was thinking unless these enchanters where privately wealthy they'd need some form of income in the mean time.

So? There circumstances were their circumstances. They were privately wealth and burned through billions getting done what they 'needed' done. but that's neither here nor there.

Your average Enchanter get paid to enchant. That's his job. He doesn't need to be privately wealthy to do his job.

I was thinking more one of the group was killed or injured such that he could no longer contribute.

EDIT: Or whatever they're enchanting is destroyed, or something else that prevents continuing.

I don't see what that has to do with what occurred in my hame. Is that a threat? Yes, a very real one. And it makes S&S enchanting risky, but it's still not a hard limit.

For a real job like that it would be MAJOR problem.

And yet people spend years at the same job, day in day out. I'm not about to tell them how to live their lives or demand they get burned out if they don't.

[scc]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

Except they can quit, they just can stop working on the item and walk away.
-Snip-
Your average Enchanter get paid to enchant. That's his job. He doesn't need to be privately wealthy to do his job.

But the person commissioning the item won't pay until they get their item. So if you quit one year into a two year project, you're probably not getting paid for that years work, and neither is anyone you where working with

Originally Posted by evileeyore

I don't see what that has to do with what occurred in my hame. Is that a threat? Yes, a very real one. And it makes S&S enchanting risky, but it's still not a hard limit.

Your right, but it is very risky, and I doubt many people are prepared to risk it, both enchanters and people buying items.

Originally Posted by evileeyore

And yet people spend years at the same job, day in day out. I'm not about to tell them how to live their lives or demand they get burned out if they don't.

Not with no breaks but. I think you and several other people, including the author of Magic, don't realize that you don't get weekends or other public holidays off, and while tolerating that for a couple of years straight out of uni is possible, for your entire professional life it won't be.

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by scc

But the person commissioning the item won't pay until they get their item.

The smart enchanter gets half up front. Or even all of it if they have the reputation to leverage such a demand. Or the power of a guild behind them/

Not with no breaks but.

Except they can take breaks. Between commissions.

This is where a guild shines. As a guilder, you work on teams until a specific project is complete, take a break, then pick up a new project when you return. The guild is continuously working on enchantments so is continuously making money and spreading out the risk and rewards across the guild members.

[Anaraxes]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

The smart enchanter gets half up front

As in typical in the modern day for building contractors, at least in my area. That's mostly (at least theoretically) for materials, though, so the worker isn't out of pocket.

Anyone rich enough to afford an enchanted item could likely also pay on an installment plan, should the enchanter be worried about covering weekly or monthly expenses. The price may be listed as one number, but that doesn't mean that's the way it has to be paid. That kind of social convention is up to the setting, not the game rules. (It's not like the Traveller rules, with their built-in mortgage interest rates and periods...) There's no requirement for the enchanter to be self-supporting for a year or two.