I’ve been unable to make a new thread in 1e, and 2e lore might be different, but...
Akatas are a potential source of noqual (if you can control them; admittedly a big “if”), but I was wondering if we have any other canonical “renewable” sources of various skymetals in the same vein of akatas for noqual.
I know each skymetal is different, but where do they really come from, and how are they formed?
Noqual: byproduct of akatas.
Adamantine: (presumptively) exotic star-action creating hyper-dense/hard metallic material (akin to dense iron somehow not radioactive; possibly magic byproduct); though considering its in planets and elemental earth it might be a byproduct of planatery/earth action. (This is entirely guesswork; I don’t know and would prefer canonical correction.)
Others: ?
Does anyone know? According to the wiki, Abyssium is rumored to come from the Abyss, but the wiki doesn’t mention the Akata connection, so it may just be rumor and guesswork. Anyone know?
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I'm not finding any origin for the other skymetals other than abysium, which is from asteroids passing through thin boundaries with the abyss.
I'll look into other sources in a bit though.
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Since noqual is akata poop just go through the Alien Archives and find aliens that might poop out the other skymetals and go from there.
Although, Spaceman Spiff might have been even more hesitant to face off against the hideous Zorgs of X-12 if he'd known about the djezet squirts.
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...monster poop is a valued item now?
...monster poop is a valued item now?
I mean, it depends on the monster, and on the poop.
If it functions like excellent metal (but lighter than steel), doesn't contain persistent germs that infect you or the environment (from what you can tell), and resists magic? Probably treated as pretty valuable scat.
(Though actually, in this case, the captain is being a bit facetious. It's less "poop" and more that they create cocoons of the stuff around themselves when they'd face starvation in order to hibernate for extended periods. They then eat/claw/something their way out, leaving behind scraps of the cocoon.)
True Creation and Create Armaments can both turn diamonds into anything.
Fabricate, Create Armaments, or Pellet Blast with False Focus can create adamantine (or any material for the first two) from nothing.
Fabricate is a trick I am well familiar with! That said, as potentially “not the GM” (or as the GM, but with players who don’t love mages) I’m looking for good in-character resources based on lore to generate renewable resources rather than rules-legal tricks (which I like, but my sometimes fellow GMs are not always fond of).
Heck, 100 gold -> 1g/rnd magic item (well, that and the 1.8k*9*5=45k+36k=81k for at-will word-activated fabricate magic item) generating 8*60*10=4800g per day (presuming eight hour days); it may take 81 days, and may take 20 more to pay for itself, but that’s effectively infinite profit - and even if something silly happens (like a local economic collapse due to arbitrarily large amounts of skymetal), skymetal is the nearly perfect substance to replicate, because it’s more fungible than steel, given its demonstrable superiority in every way (either adamantine or mithril applies, but so does noqual and djezet; it may be possible to have too much horicolcum or abysm, admittedly, but they’re likely to always be useful).
And, you know, while everyone and their brother would want such an item (and would kill for it), intentionally building in flaws or weaknesses, and various requirements - onerous and specific enough to require you, personally to be the one it works for and none other - and you’ll guarantee yourself a place in whatever government forms for about forever (unless you get the suuuuuuper unreasonable types: which is why you allied with a band of misfit heroes in the first place.
...monster poop is a valued item now?I've been making fine jewelry for years, apparently.
Heh. Oh, Zoidberg. You so cray-cray.
Well True Creation, Create Armaments and Limited Wish/Wish (which I forgot to list) are supposed to do that turning diamonds into whatever thing. With planar travel, diamonds are infinite in PF: The Plane of Earth is "effectively limitless" and filled with gems (The whole being infinite thing makes one question how they have value, but PF and economics don't mix).
Right. The wish and true creation effects are the most direct and widely accepted - the former even has a whole section in the GMG encouraging GMs to think through the consequences, but allow magic items to be made (if by SLA). Limited wish starts getting into that fuzzy territory (in my experience; table variations obviously apply) where GMs start looking at you funny, even if there are several ways in which it “should” easily function. Create armaments being a PFism is one I’m less familiar with (having literally had less time with it!), though it has the limitations of needing the material you’re starting with (though I’m presupposing you’re handwaiving that through limited wish), which, admittedly, you can get a manufacture going - effectively kickstarting the process with “just a bit.” None of those are really things I’m denying, though, but because those are explicit rule-based elements requiring you to have access to the spells in question - a barbarian, bard, druid, fighter, monk, Paladin, ranger or rogue need not apply (unless they follow magic items). Basically, I’m just looking for where these things are supposed to come from “in character,” with the presupposition that rules-specifics can happen later.
Is the plane Infinite, though? I know in 3.x and 4e settings they were, but I was under the impression that planes were not Infinite in PF (though arbitrarily large, relatively speaking, so it may kind of be a moot point for most).
I mean, even within infinity (though for any given individual you’d have N/I, instead; bothersome finity shackles on our actions~! *shakes fist*) you can have relative scarcity where a particular subset of that infinity is much “smaller” compared to the whole. In certain “regions” of that infinity, it might be plenteous, but in any given locality it shrinks dramatically.
By way of extreme example, consider the difference even within a set of infinity compared to “numbers divisible by 3” and, “numbers divisible by googleplex.” While each results in an uncountable large - “Infinite” - set of numbers within a set of infinite numbers, the latter is clearly and demonstrably less, as you’d have many vast hordes of the former on your way to acquiring the first of the latter. In this way, economics of scarcity and value can arise, even within relative infinities (and, for that matter, in post-scarcity society).
But, uh, this is rather heavily off-topic. Also, I’m half asleep writing on an iDevice, so... not my best. Anyway! Thank you for the notions!
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Where does it say what the cocoon is made out of? I'm not seeing that in your link.
Where does it say what the cocoon is made out of? I'm not seeing that in your link.
Hah! Well, I’ll be. Hm. There are at least two places, but one of those is a spoiler for an AP, and one of those is Starfinder (whose rules are slightly different). I don’t know about 2e.
...monster poop is a valued item now?I'm going to start selling owlbear coffee.
Heh. That was my first thought, but I didn’t want to mention it...
Where does it say what the cocoon is made out of? I'm not seeing that in your link.Hah! Well, I’ll be. Hm. There are at least two places, but one of those is a spoiler for an AP, and one of those is Starfinder (whose rules are slightly different). I don’t know about 2e.
Which AP?
That’s the spoiler!
Still, in as vague and non-spoiler-y as I can get,
In the Second Darkness AP, there is a plot element related to their cocoons, or, rather, the shards thereof. You’re trying to get the noqual before others do. Mind, I have not run the AP and have been trying in vain to avoid spoilers myself, but this is part of that lore. For more explicit statements, the Starfinder entry outright says it, but the hardness is different (because that system works differently) and maybe the hp as well.
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Is the plane Infinite, though? I know in 3.x and 4e settings they were, but I was under the impression that planes were not Infinite in PF (though arbitrarily large, relatively speaking, so it may kind of be a moot point for most).
"effectively limitless" is how Planar Adventures described it.
Diamonds are renewable in the real world, you can make them from the extremely common carbon, though the tech is a fair bit beyond what PF normally has.
Very true! Diamonds are also of artificially inflated value IRL, due to monopolization - I think their actual relative scarcity is low, IIRC, but that would play weirdly with people, so the game presumes them fairly rare/valuable. Though with spellcaster literally burning them for various spells, they probably are more limited/valuable, so.
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Which AP?Where does it say what the cocoon is made out of? I'm not seeing that in your link.Hah! Well, I’ll be. Hm. There are at least two places, but one of those is a spoiler for an AP, and one of those is Starfinder (whose rules are slightly different). I don’t know about 2e.
Incident on Absalom Station, page 25; "The noqual fragments of two more akata cocoons (like those found in area C3) are scattered throughout engineering".
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Funny enough, this is the very first time I noticed this wasn't in the Starfinder forums.
Funny enough, this is the very first time I noticed this wasn't in the Starfinder forums.
Legit! :D