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Thoughts on Obsidian Crafting

Discussion in 'Release 28 Feedback Forum' started by Sara Dreygon, Apr 3, 2016.

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  1. charlesvon03

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    [​IMG] [​IMG]
     
  2. Roper Docholiday

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    after testing we did when we first made both weapon and suit..... non of the stats related to obsidian were working. killed 3 different obsidian creatures and only got 12-14 damage per hit. nothing that a 200% bonus modifier would look like.

    armor stats from the obsidian portion of making it are not showing up on the stat sheet in game and are not applying to your avatar in combat. so the suit while looks cool all the stats coming from the obsidian just are not working. (or were not as of a week ago or so that when i did my last testing)
     
  3. charlesvon03

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    [​IMG]Full Set of Obsidian Armor thank you guys for HELPING "[​IMG] [​IMG]
     
  4. Time Lord

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    :eek:~Hunting Knives Please!~:oops:
    Hey obsidian crafting gang, I just wanted to mention that I will always be looking for ingame crafted "Hunting Knives" which are different than daggers. I've seen and use some crafted daggers and they're great, yet after finding a Hunting Knife on a corpse in "Approaching the Eye" , I went back again to get another one for my duo blade wielding Avatar... "yet I haven't ever found any for sale that have been player crafted".
    FYI: I use duo knives as a skill strategy because they eat up exp points faster than any other weapons, thus adding to my skills advancement.

    I know that's a bit OT from the OP, but keep me in mind aye? :D Daggers are better when they are crafted, and I can't wait to see how our hunting knives can show their full flavor... and besides that, "they look cool!" :p

    Thanks allot for keeping me in mind on that obsessed obsidian issue'... ;)
    ~Time Lord~:rolleyes:
     
  5. Bowen Bloodgood

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    I know.. late response.. But I want to point out here that New Britannia obsidian is simply not Earth natural obsidian. Even if you set Ultima lore aside (in which case we're talking blackrock here.. the Obsidian Forge is evidence enough of that as it's the base of a blackrock pillar right out of Ultima IX.. glyphs and all).. obsidian in SotA has strange magical properties and if it were so brittle then by extension obsidian golems should be weak. :)
     
  6. Beli

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    Not sure you gone and fought any Obsidian Golems, but I can attest they are weak and go down rather quickly at least for me.
     
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  7. Bowen Bloodgood

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    They're not weaker than any other golem/elemental. What level are you again?
     
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  8. FrostII

    FrostII Bug Hunter

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    Hail Bowen.

    Ok, I'll grant you that obsidian in SotA many well have "strange magical properties" (which we will apparently see at some point in the future) but its' relation to Obsidian Golems (in your reference) I find to be a bit odd .

    As Beli mentioned, Obsidian Golems are not especially tough (as mobs go) - which I believe takes us back to my observation that this new "obsidian made" armor has VERY limited durability (as the OP stated, 10 to 20).

    Earth's obsidian may or may not be relevant in this regard, but it's pretty clear so far - that obsidian makes armor that doesn't appear to last very long.... Hence my reference to "brittle". :cool:

    P.S. Obsidian Golems..... I have them for a snack before lunch. :)

    ** Edit ** I could certainly see armor with obsidian properties, having very high earth resistance - as Obsidian Golems do.
    And weapons with obsidian properties, doing higher earth damage.

    Just sayin'......... :cool:
     
    Last edited: Apr 17, 2016
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  9. Bowen Bloodgood

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    And what level are you again? As I hoped I was clear earlier.. compared to other golems/elementals they're not especially weak. The original statement was not intended for them to be considered in relation to the player but other mobs of equal level. I can kill them too.. that doesn't make them especially weak in relation to their elemental cousins. Which, if obsidian was brittle by nature.. you would expect the golems to be noticeably weaker than they are.
     
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  10. redfish

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    @Bowen Bloodgood, yea, and in Ultima, blackrock was said to be nearly indestructible and only able to be molded into shapes by magic.

    But why suppose the hardness of Obsidian is due to always-present properties, and not brought out by a tempering process which the Forge allows, and which can be also summoned in similar cases in which the natural material is enchanted; ie Obsidian creatures ? After all, the Obsidian that fell from the creation of Daedalus break up into shards, and we have obsidian chips, so we know it has similar properties to real world obsidian and glass. We know Obsidian will break; we don't know under what conditions its strong, and under which conditions its weak. There might be forms in which the Obsidian is "dead", and other times in which its imbued with a reservoir of wild magic and is strong.

    That perhaps makes it a little different from obsidian on Earth, though all the gems and metals in Novia have real magical properties that they don't really have on Earth, except in lore. In real world lore, obsidian was thought to be a focus for psychic energy, because of its use in scrying and prophesying given its mirrored surface.

    What will be more interesting is to see more of the "wild magic" properties of Obsidian in weapons or armor. So, for instance, will it be a means to bind daemons, like we saw in the case of binding Arcadion to blackrock? Will they be tools of Chaos magic?
     
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  11. Bowen Bloodgood

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    That's one of the interesting things about blackrock. While it obviously follows a set of rules, those rules were/age still largely unknown. So it could be whatever it needed to be. Partly because it was mysterious and partly because it was rare.

    Technically speaking, blackrock had nothing to do with the binding of Arcadion. Arcadion was first bound his mirror.. and then to the gem used to break that mirror. It was Arcadion's own power that fused the gem to the blackrock sword to make it a balanced and usable weapon.

    I could speculate here that the brittleness of obsidian so far may be a result of an imperfect forging process. Recall the blackrock sword was initially forged by a master wizard under the magic rules of old Britannia.. and the final tempering was also done with a presumably magical forge of that wizard's making. I'm unsure of the origins of the blackrock gear in Ultima IX. I'm not sure that was ever properly explained which perhaps is a good thing.

    However, the Obsidian Forge is an entirely different thing than the summoned forge on the Isle of Fire and the crafters using it are not employing any kind of magic themselves to shape the obsidian. Rather they are relying on the magic of the Obsidian Forge itself. The obsidian then does not undergo the same process as the blackrock gear in Ultima. Which is a good enough explanation for me for the vast different in quality and function between Ultima's blackrock items and SotA's obsidian.

    The physical properties of natural blackrock are never really described to my recollection as being particularly brittle or strong.. but being highly susceptible to magic for good or ill. I doubt however that raw blackrock was indestructible as it was being mined in U VII.
     
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  12. Bowen Bloodgood

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    Actually I forgot I wanted to comment on Obsidian creatures.. and on reflection maybe my earlier comment about the golems was a bit off. A bit off topic but semi-related and interesting I think. It seems obvious to me that the 'obsidian' variety of creatures are not actually obsidian. This would include golems. Rather I would describe them as being tainted.. or otherwise somehow altered by obsidian. So obsidian golems.. are likely such a variety of earth elemental. At least until such time as Portalarium gives them a unique appearance and set of abilities. For now, like all other creatures, it's just a tougher version of the earth elemental.

    hmm ok is it obsidian golem or elemental? I've been getting those two confused quite a bit lately. Guess I can go look.
     
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  13. redfish

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    Yea, I didn't remember the whole process that went into binding Arcadion. :D Rereading it, though, it sounds like the soul gem was necessary for you to use the full power of the sword. The mirror part is slightly interesting, though probably tangential in intention, since obsidian can also be used, and once was used, as a mirror.

    We also do know Obsidian has connection to Chaos magic, which is also used to summon daemons, and also that blackrock had some connection to the ether; ie the obelisk tip that made the Avatar the Titan of Ether and it can turn into a gateway.. and then, on the other hand, can block ether.. so it has a kind of dual nature in which it can either be used to focus, or to block magic. The state probably depends on the type of magical energy running through it.
     
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  14. redfish

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    @Bowen Bloodgood,

    Also, another interesting link is that we know in the Ultima universe that mirrors can be used as gateways, such as in the case of Lord British's mirror. Its the same purpose that blackrock is used for in creating the black gate.

    Its also not absolutely clear to me that there's no relationship between the Orb and the Moons, or moonstones in general, and blackrock, since they're black.
     
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  15. Bowen Bloodgood

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    I don't recall that bit anywhere. The power of the blackrock sword was really Arcadion's power. The sword itself never acted as much more than a conduit, even after Arcadion is set loose.

    I don't think I'd read too much into that necessarily. I would suggest the daemon bit is more coincidental. Most or all of the schools summon something. If there was a chaos Chihuahua the chaos school might summon that instead. Rather the chaotic nature of the daemons I think is what makes them summonable through the chaos school. Not necessarily being tied to obsidian.. but who knows. Perhaps that is a discussion best left to magic theorists. :) And on that subject I may even go so far as to suggest that blackrock/obsidian is the likely source of the ether. But again.. something for magic theorists..

    I've always thought the orb was blackrock.
     
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  16. redfish

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    Obsidian was commonly to make mirrors in real life; obsidian mirrors are what Nostradamus and John Dee used for prophecies, but they were also used just as looking-glasses. It needs to be polished to produce the reflective finish.

    Obsidian mirror,
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]

    The reflective quality of obsidian is where the association of obsidian with magic comes from in real Earth lore. The name most likely comes from the Greek opsianus, meaning it reflects images.
     
    Last edited: Apr 17, 2016
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  17. Bowen Bloodgood

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    I thought we established that real obsidian and SotA obsidian are two different things entirely.
     
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  18. Time Lord

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    :eek:~Oh My Aching Neck~:confused:
    Obsidian mirrors are what Nostradamus and John Dee used for prophecies...
    It's been long suspected by astrologers that these obsidian mirrors and balls were used by these men and other prophets because looking up at the stars and measuring where they are within any constellation can put a crick in your neck... therefore using these as reflectors, because most of the planets (stars to astrologers) are the brightest things of the night sky, thus becoming filtered by their reflections within obsidian from the other more dim stars in the sky, making observations and quick references more easy.
    Just an interesting FYI of history...
    ~Time Lord~:rolleyes:
     
  19. redfish

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    Its not clear they're entirely different things -- it breaks into shards like obsidian glass. In Novia, it has magical properties that don't exist on Earth, and its the magical properties that may account for the differences.
     
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  20. Bowen Bloodgood

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    And how exactly do we know it breaks into shards under normal conditions? Because there are giant shards and little chips? Two moons collided. I don't think that counts as normal conditions. What else?

    Any crystalline structure can be said to break into shards. It's hardly conclusive. We don't even know if SotA obsidian can be polished.. though most any mineral can be.

    Apart from name I don't see anything they have uniquely in common.
     
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