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Old 08-31-2015, 12:55 AM   #11
vicky_molokh
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Default Re: RPM, path of chance, entropy rituals

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Originally Posted by ericthered View Post
The problem to me is a lot of those effects sound like control energy, not control chance.
Whenever people start to talk about Control Chance, someone says it's actually Control Matter/Energy/Life/Mind/etc. I've seen it happen in MtA with their own version of the Entropy Sphere.
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Old 08-31-2015, 05:18 AM   #12
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Default Re: RPM, path of chance, entropy rituals

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what does the manipulation of entropy look like? what sort of real world effects could there be? i think that entropy manipulation would nudge up against path of energy and path of matter at some point. once again, i don't know anything about the science, but it seems like "entropy" covers a pretty wide range of topics.
Actually I think you could make a case it covers an almost uselessly narrow one if you were to really insist on a separation from energy.

I'd certainly want to allow manipulating heat *flows* - you could build a refrigerator, heat pump or perfect insulator. Other reasonable effects might be to make something perfectly efficient (triple your gas mileage, slash your electric bill, make your lamp oil last 7 times as long), change the polarization of light, magnetize or demagnetize something, remove noise from a communications channel, destroy information (erase electronic storage, drown a channel in static etc.), build a shaped charge with any profile you like, crystalize anything made of glass (it goes bang and turns to silica dust), unmix things (separating wheat from chaff or needles from haystacks is easy), or deaden sounds (randomizing ordered vibration, turns them to a fairly negligible amount of heat) .
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Old 08-31-2015, 03:39 PM   #13
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Default Re: RPM, path of chance, entropy rituals

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Originally Posted by malloyd View Post
Actually I think you could make a case it covers an almost uselessly narrow one if you were to really insist on a separation from energy.

I'd certainly want to allow manipulating heat *flows* - you could build a refrigerator, heat pump or perfect insulator. Other reasonable effects might be to make something perfectly efficient (triple your gas mileage, slash your electric bill, make your lamp oil last 7 times as long), change the polarization of light, magnetize or demagnetize something, remove noise from a communications channel, destroy information (erase electronic storage, drown a channel in static etc.), build a shaped charge with any profile you like, crystalize anything made of glass (it goes bang and turns to silica dust), unmix things (separating wheat from chaff or needles from haystacks is easy), or deaden sounds (randomizing ordered vibration, turns them to a fairly negligible amount of heat) .
I can see un-mixing (i.e., negating entropy), or controlling the rate of entropy increase (so making an insulator, or slowing the rate of diffusion). Another possible effect is reversing irreversible processes (restoring from ash a letter that had been destroyed, for instance). What I can't see is it adding energy to a system, and I'd be leery of situations where efficiency is greatly increased -- bad side effects of decreasing entropy in a vehicle might include much lower performance in spite of the excellent fuel economy -- without greater effects.

I rather liked the suggestion of destroying data. I can image a form of data encryption using "entropic encryption/decryption," which would be sort of cool. Another thought is to use entropy as a measure of information content, which, much as the encryption suggests, could have some very interesting consequences (destroying the functioning of a language in a given area or person).

Where this overlaps with energy, body, mind, etc., these are simply different ways to get the same effect (without getting too technical and fancy).
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Old 08-31-2015, 04:00 PM   #14
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Default Re: RPM, path of chance, entropy rituals

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Originally Posted by malloyd View Post
...
How I would rule:

Path Of energy or matter:
manipulating heat *flows* - you could build a refrigerator, heat pump or perfect insulator.
crystalize anything made of glass (it goes bang and turns to silica dust),

Maybe Path of Chance, maybe something else:
change the polarization of light,
magnetize or demagnetize something,
build a shaped charge with any profile you like

Definately appropriate:
remove noise from a communications channel,
make something perfectly efficient (though it will depend on the exact effect)
destroy information (erase electronic storage, drown a channel in static etc.),
unmix things (separating wheat from chaff or needles from haystacks is easy), or
deaden sounds (randomizing ordered vibration, turns them to a fairly negligible amount of heat)
Another possible effect is reversing irreversible processes (restoring from ash a letter that had been destroyed, for instance).
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Old 08-31-2015, 04:29 PM   #15
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Default Re: RPM, path of chance, entropy rituals

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Originally Posted by ericthered View Post
Another possible effect is reversing irreversible processes (restoring from ash a letter that had been destroyed, for instance).
If you can do that then you can build a perpetual motion machine of the second kind, but not one of the first kind.
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Old 08-31-2015, 06:19 PM   #16
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Default Re: RPM, path of chance, entropy rituals

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Originally Posted by ericthered View Post
How I would rule:

Path Of energy or matter:
manipulating heat *flows* - you could build a refrigerator, heat pump or perfect insulator.
crystalize anything made of glass (it goes bang and turns to silica dust),
Thus the problem. These are two of the clearer instances of entropy on this list - in fact the entropy change pretty much *defines* the glass to crystal transition, with the calorimetric glass transition temperature being defined as the point where delta-S would be zero.

Entropy as a physical concept is quite intertwined with energy, at least as much as momentum or work or temperature are.
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Old 08-31-2015, 06:22 PM   #17
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Default Re: RPM, path of chance, entropy rituals

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If you can do that then you can build a perpetual motion machine of the second kind, but not one of the first kind.
If you go with the common definition of reverse, you may even be able to build one of the first kind. If you can unburn a letter *without* heating the ashes to glowing first, well....
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Old 08-31-2015, 06:38 PM   #18
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Default Re: RPM, path of chance, entropy rituals

I always interpreted this as "bad fortune", without the ability to clearly specify what kind of bad fortune, at least not without other abilities. Or good fortune.

That entropy stuff fits well for a modern game, but just feels anachronistic if it's intended for a non-technomancer.

So I prefer reading and twisting the strands of fate to bring together or split apart two things. Or determine things' role in the great stories of history. "My heart forebodes that Penfold still has a part to play in these matters. 'Ere the moon rises over Parador, that crystal shard shall come to your hand. Blessed be he who leaves these stones, and cursed be he who moves my bones."
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Old 08-31-2015, 07:24 PM   #19
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Default Re: RPM, path of chance, entropy rituals

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I always interpreted this as "bad fortune", without the ability to clearly specify what kind of bad fortune, at least not without other abilities. Or good fortune.

That entropy stuff fits well for a modern game, but just feels anachronistic if it's intended for a non-technomancer.
Entropy is a nineteenth century concept; it evolved out of scientific studies of steam engines. Having a mage in AD 1700 or AD 1250 or 500 BC even talk about "entropy," let alone having a category of spells for it, is anachronistic.
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Old 09-01-2015, 02:54 AM   #20
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Default Re: RPM, path of chance, entropy rituals

Surely some of the other stuff magic does also feels anachronistic. Because magic can provide knowledge that was not available in earlier times without magic.
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