Sea Skimmer wrote:The tangible beats the intangible any day of the week…
Anyway, sufficiently advanced technology is magic for all intents and purposes, and that’s what I go by for debates. Good enough tech beats magic; you don't need magic to beat magic.
And vice versa.
Course, better magic would beat inferior technology.
What I hate are mindless idiots who insist even the slightest bit of magic makes someone immune to technology-based weapons. Shit like "No normal sword can slay him, so neither can a 155mm shell" piss me off to no end, especially when they cant answer my followed up "So what makes weapons which can slay him magic, how they are built?" question. For all they know the fact that it’s a higher grade of steel is why…
In any other debate, such leaps of logic normally result in a great deal of mockery.
"This cult of special forces is as sensible as to form a Royal Corps of Tree Climbers and say that no soldier who does not wear its green hat with a bunch of oak leaves stuck in it should be expected to climb a tree"
— Field Marshal William Slim 1956
Agreed, Skimmer. But truly powerful defenses, beyond simple immunity to mortal-forged swords, like the Prismatic spells, go well beyond that. It flat out states it can shrug off any kinetic, energy, extradimensional, etc, attack. Sufficiently advanced tech could probably dissassemble it(You need only mimic the spells in the right order), but thinking brute mechanical force will win over truly powerful magic is silly.
Manic Progressive: A liberal who violently swings from anger at politicos to despondency over them.
Out Of Context theatre: Ron Paul has repeatedly said he's not a racist. - Destructinator XIII on why Ron Paul isn't racist.
SirNitram wrote:Agreed, Skimmer. But truly powerful defenses, beyond simple immunity to mortal-forged swords, like the Prismatic spells, go well beyond that. It flat out states it can shrug off any kinetic, energy, extradimensional, etc, attack. Sufficiently advanced tech could probably dissassemble it(You need only mimic the spells in the right order), but thinking brute mechanical force will win over truly powerful magic is silly.
Perhaps, though many magical worlds seem to have energy handling limits on there magic, otherwise people would be completely invincible and the world not to interesting. I woundn't aruge a nuke barrage could kill such, but when you start to bring Gridfire or similer insanely power level weapons into it, very well might.
Anyway, I rarely have problems with such high level magic, since I almost never get involved in debates that involve such.
"This cult of special forces is as sensible as to form a Royal Corps of Tree Climbers and say that no soldier who does not wear its green hat with a bunch of oak leaves stuck in it should be expected to climb a tree"
— Field Marshal William Slim 1956
SirNitram wrote:Agreed, Skimmer. But truly powerful defenses, beyond simple immunity to mortal-forged swords, like the Prismatic spells, go well beyond that. It flat out states it can shrug off any kinetic, energy, extradimensional, etc, attack. Sufficiently advanced tech could probably dissassemble it(You need only mimic the spells in the right order), but thinking brute mechanical force will win over truly powerful magic is silly.
Perhaps, though many magical worlds seem to have energy handling limits on there magic, otherwise people would be completely invincible and the world not to interesting. I woundn't aruge a nuke barrage could kill such, but when you start to bring Gridfire or similer insanely power level weapons into it, very well might.
Anyway, I rarely have problems with such high level magic, since I almost never get involved in debates that involve such.
Gridfire is an extradimensional attack, as it is basically opening a section of the Grid to reality. On the upside, it can penetrate almost all normal defenses. On the downside, a number of spells prevent extradimensional attacks. Hell, a Dimensional Lock should force a Culture ship to shut down entirely, as it would lose it's connection to the Grid.
Manic Progressive: A liberal who violently swings from anger at politicos to despondency over them.
Out Of Context theatre: Ron Paul has repeatedly said he's not a racist. - Destructinator XIII on why Ron Paul isn't racist.
The Domination isn't really an empire-it's more of a time period. It refers to the roughly 400 year period when the dark demi-god known as the Dominator rose to power.
He enslaved ten mighty sorcerers and made them the Ten Who Were Taken; his wife, Lady, was only slightly less powerful than he. Although not much is known about the period, he did single-handedly wipe out at least one kingdom, and rising to complete dominance over an entire continent is no mean feat.
When finally defeated by the first White Rose, he was imprisoned in the Barrowland.
Speaking of the White Rose...
...The second White Rose could likely topple the Netheril Empire with a hundred soldiers - the reason being that magic does not work within several kilometres of her.
The above characters can be found in Glen Cook's Black Company books.
So, how does anyone think the Draegaran Empire would fare in a fight against the heavyweights of magic and tech?
The End of Suburbia
"If more cars are inevitable, must there not be roads for them to run on?"
-Robert Moses
"The Wire" is the best show in the history of television. Watch it today.
Sea Skimmer wrote:The tangible beats the intangible any day of the week…
Anyway, sufficiently advanced technology is magic for all intents and purposes, and that’s what I go by for debates. Good enough tech beats magic; you don't need magic to beat magic.
And vice versa.
Course, better magic would beat inferior technology.
What I hate are mindless idiots who insist even the slightest bit of magic makes someone immune to technology-based weapons. Shit like "No normal sword can slay him, so neither can a 155mm shell" piss me off to no end, especially when they cant answer my followed up "So what makes weapons which can slay him magic, how they are built?" question. For all they know the fact that it’s a higher grade of steel is why…
In any other debate, such leaps of logic normally result in a great deal of mockery.
They would be totally wrong about that. But there are certain creatures in almost every scernio that is immune to non-magical attacks. And I'm not talking about swords or arrows. look at rifts or deadlands hell on earth for good examples.
I think magic often has the advantage against science becuase its more firepower with less baggage. However it tends to dip off between magic cultures and gods. Most magic worlds would get blown up from orbit.
SirNitram wrote:
And yes. I fear the Creator Race. The only thing I fear more than them is Moander's Avatar. And possibly, POSSIBLY, the Tarrasque.
Nah the Tarrasque is not that dangerous unless some high level
spellcaster has used magic jar or a similar spell against it. High up
demons and ancient dragons are far more dangerous.
In general, magic has the edge over technology because it can break the laws of reality. Take the vampires from Rifts, for example: they could be struck directly by a heavy turbolaser blast without any harm. The same vampire can be killed with a squirtgun (running water hurts Rifts vampires.) Totally illogical? Yes, but that's how magic works. When you get into *specific* examples it would be case-by-case.
Sea Skimmer wrote:The tangible beats the intangible any day of the week…
Anyway, sufficiently advanced technology is magic for all intents and purposes, and that’s what I go by for debates. Good enough tech beats magic; you don't need magic to beat magic.
And vice versa.
Course, better magic would beat inferior technology.
What I hate are mindless idiots who insist even the slightest bit of magic makes someone immune to technology-based weapons. Shit like "No normal sword can slay him, so neither can a 155mm shell" piss me off to no end, especially when they cant answer my followed up "So what makes weapons which can slay him magic, how they are built?" question. For all they know the fact that it’s a higher grade of steel is why…
In any other debate, such leaps of logic normally result in a great deal of mockery.
Ya know, Buffy made fun of that with the Villain "The Judge", he was immune to any forged weapon...so Buffy pulled out a rocket launcher.
Judge: "What's that do?"
BOOOM!
I tend to agree with you. "Can only be defeated by" garbage is just that...garbage. My opinion on the whole thing is summed up in a quote
"Energy is Energy, be it created by Magic or Science"
An Immortal can only be killed if I chop his head off, eh...What happens when I vaporise his entire body? He dies!
What would be very cool would be a combination of Magic and Science. Magic probably providing a power source for a really cool, transportable uber-weapon.
ISARMA: Daikaiju Coordinator: Just Add Radiation Justice League- Molly Hayes: Respect Hats or Freakin' Else! Browncoat Supernatural Taisen - "[This Story] is essentially "Wouldn't it be awesome if this happened?" Followed by explosions."
Reviewing movies is a lot like Paleontology: The Evidence is there...but no one seems to agree upon it.
"God! Are you so bored that you enjoy seeing us humans suffer?! Why can't you let this poor man live happily with his son! What kind of God are you, crushing us like ants?!" - Kyoami, Ran
Majin Gojira wrote:I tend to agree with you. "Can only be defeated by" garbage is just that...garbage. My opinion on the whole thing is summed up in a quote
"Energy is Energy, be it created by Magic or Science"
An Immortal can only be killed if I chop his head off, eh...What happens when I vaporise his entire body? He dies!
What would be very cool would be a combination of Magic and Science. Magic probably providing a power source for a really cool, transportable uber-weapon.
Unfortunately magic sometimes work this way.
The Rifts Magic system for example has a spell "impervious to energy". It doesn't matter how much energy you pump into the target, it will get NO damage at all ( kinetic attacks work ! ).
The Rifts SF Szenario ( called Phase World / Three Galaxies ) contains a group of planets called "United Worlds of Warlocks". They use magic to fly between the stars and have built a spacefighter which is protected by the spell I mentioned above. It doesn't matter if you have the "I can kill a galaxy with one shot" laser/energy weapon, it will do no harm to the fighter.
Majin Gojira wrote:I tend to agree with you. "Can only be defeated by" garbage is just that...garbage. My opinion on the whole thing is summed up in a quote
"Energy is Energy, be it created by Magic or Science"
An Immortal can only be killed if I chop his head off, eh...What happens when I vaporise his entire body? He dies!
What would be very cool would be a combination of Magic and Science. Magic probably providing a power source for a really cool, transportable uber-weapon.
Unfortunately magic sometimes work this way.
The Rifts Magic system for example has a spell "impervious to energy". It doesn't matter how much energy you pump into the target, it will get NO damage at all ( kinetic attacks work ! ).
The Rifts SF Szenario ( called Phase World / Three Galaxies ) contains a group of planets called "United Worlds of Warlocks". They use magic to fly between the stars and have built a spacefighter which is protected by the spell I mentioned above. It doesn't matter if you have the "I can kill a galaxy with one shot" laser/energy weapon, it will do no harm to the fighter.
So....wouldn't a railgun rip through it then?
ISARMA: Daikaiju Coordinator: Just Add Radiation Justice League- Molly Hayes: Respect Hats or Freakin' Else! Browncoat Supernatural Taisen - "[This Story] is essentially "Wouldn't it be awesome if this happened?" Followed by explosions."
Reviewing movies is a lot like Paleontology: The Evidence is there...but no one seems to agree upon it.
"God! Are you so bored that you enjoy seeing us humans suffer?! Why can't you let this poor man live happily with his son! What kind of God are you, crushing us like ants?!" - Kyoami, Ran
[quote="HRogge"]
Unfortunately magic sometimes work this way.
The Rifts Magic system for example has a spell "impervious to energy". It doesn't matter how much energy you pump into the target, it will get NO damage at all ( kinetic attacks work ! ).
[quote]
The problem with this is that kinetic energy is just as much energy as radiation, it's just in a different form, and that line is blurred when you get to things like infrared/heat energy. Would those shields stop a ball of plasma or not?
That's the problem with magic, it often relies of semantic definitions that have little relation to the real world, making it inconsistent/illogical, which makes "extreme" magic impossible to have a coherent debate about.
SirNitram wrote:
And yes. I fear the Creator Race. The only thing I fear more than them is Moander's Avatar. And possibly, POSSIBLY, the Tarrasque.
Nah the Tarrasque is not that dangerous unless some high level
spellcaster has used magic jar or a similar spell against it. High up
demons and ancient dragons are far more dangerous.
Its called "flying" or another levitation based spell and many many many elemental magic attacks. And Tarrasque is dead. Very very dead.
Majin Gojira wrote:I tend to agree with you. "Can only be defeated by" garbage is just that...garbage. My opinion on the whole thing is summed up in a quote
"Energy is Energy, be it created by Magic or Science"
An Immortal can only be killed if I chop his head off, eh...What happens when I vaporise his entire body? He dies!
What would be very cool would be a combination of Magic and Science. Magic probably providing a power source for a really cool, transportable uber-weapon.
Unfortunately magic sometimes work this way.
The Rifts Magic system for example has a spell "impervious to energy". It doesn't matter how much energy you pump into the target, it will get NO damage at all ( kinetic attacks work ! ).
The Rifts SF Szenario ( called Phase World / Three Galaxies ) contains a group of planets called "United Worlds of Warlocks". They use magic to fly between the stars and have built a spacefighter which is protected by the spell I mentioned above. It doesn't matter if you have the "I can kill a galaxy with one shot" laser/energy weapon, it will do no harm to the fighter.
RIFTS! Finally someone brings it up.
"An Immortal can only be killed if I chop his head off, eh...What happens when I vaporise his entire body? He dies!"
Rifts vampires can ONLY be killed by NATURAL sunlight and running water (a supersoaker is the best weapon here, seriously, though it will take a while to kill one with it, and these things come in pack). Gold, silver etc will knock them down, but not for long. A Rifts vamp can go from skeleton to fully recovered in under 15 seconds. From vapourised state is barely 1 minute.
Oh and any Vampire Intelligence will completely own you and your ISDs.
HRogge wrote:Unfortunately magic sometimes work this way.
The Rifts Magic system for example has a spell "impervious to energy". It doesn't matter how much energy you pump into the target, it will get NO damage at all ( kinetic attacks work ! ).
The Rifts SF Szenario ( called Phase World / Three Galaxies ) contains a group of planets called "United Worlds of Warlocks". They use magic to fly between the stars and have built a spacefighter which is protected by the spell I mentioned above. It doesn't matter if you have the "I can kill a galaxy with one shot" laser/energy weapon, it will do no harm to the fighter.
So....wouldn't a railgun rip through it then?
Yes, Railguns are deadly to this fighters.
gravity wrote:The problem with this is that kinetic energy is just as much energy as radiation, it's just in a different form, and that line is blurred when you get to things like infrared/heat energy. Would those shields stop a ball of plasma or not?
That's the problem with magic, it often relies of semantic definitions that have little relation to the real world, making it inconsistent/illogical, which makes "extreme" magic impossible to have a coherent debate about.
Impervious to Energy means all forms of energy EXCEPT kinetic energy.
The spell would stop the heat of a plasma burst, but it would not stop the kinetic energy of it.
So as long as you use some kind of matter as a weapon they would not be completely useless.
"Impenetrable wall of force" is another spell ( one of the most powerful defense spells rifts have ).
The wall block all physical attacks, including energy and kinetic attacks without taking damage. Except for extradimensional attacks there is no direct way to shoot through the wall be technological means. If large enough it would maybe block a DS blast.
weemadando wrote:
RIFTS! Finally someone brings it up.
"An Immortal can only be killed if I chop his head off, eh...What happens when I vaporise his entire body? He dies!"
Rifts vampires can ONLY be killed by NATURAL sunlight and running water (a supersoaker is the best weapon here, seriously, though it will take a while to kill one with it, and these things come in pack). Gold, silver etc will knock them down, but not for long. A Rifts vamp can go from skeleton to fully recovered in under 15 seconds. From vapourised state is barely 1 minute.
I was refering to Highlander Immortals.
ISARMA: Daikaiju Coordinator: Just Add Radiation Justice League- Molly Hayes: Respect Hats or Freakin' Else! Browncoat Supernatural Taisen - "[This Story] is essentially "Wouldn't it be awesome if this happened?" Followed by explosions."
Reviewing movies is a lot like Paleontology: The Evidence is there...but no one seems to agree upon it.
"God! Are you so bored that you enjoy seeing us humans suffer?! Why can't you let this poor man live happily with his son! What kind of God are you, crushing us like ants?!" - Kyoami, Ran
Oh, sorry, but I'm assuming that a similar thing may occur. Though over a much longer period of time, months, even years perhaps as all of the component molecules find each other again.
I know that I hit a Rifts Vampire horde with a Gigaton yield nuclear tip missile from my power armour (one of the reasons I love Rifts) and it was less than a minute until they had all reformed, and my god were they angry.
Read the FAQ on Palladium's website: that nuke should have done NO damage to the vamps other than blowing off any clothes and armor they might have had on. On the other hand, a fire truck would have been that horde's worst nightmare as long as your water supply held out. I love Rifts too: you've got to love a system where a laser PISTOL can blow the turret off a 20th century tank. Plus the magic vs. technology thing is very interesting... if we were just debating Rifts and not magic and tech in general, I'd say it's a pretty even contest. Shadowrun's similar: high end tech and magic are both pretty fearsome in that setting.
Personally I think the GM just did it to piss off the n00bs in our group, you know the kind of people who are first level wearing light armour and standing up in the middle of a battle between the coalition and the federation of magic screaming "screw you all mutha-fuckers" and firing his light laser pistol at the (rapidly) advancing SAMAS's.
