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Continued brainstorming SPOILERS (Patreon)

Published:
2023-09-13 18:00:38
Imported:
2026-06

Content

I went through and read all the comments and will pluck out a few I resonated with and weigh them and ask questions of you.1: One of the most common threads of thought was that once he makes a table of essences, he should be able to mix-match them at will, using Abun'zaul's ultimate flexibility to produce exactly what he needs to cast anything. combine this with an AI that can predict the effects, and he can make any spell effect on demand. This IS perry's ultimate goal, and something he's working towards, but it's kind of a capstone event that prevents Perry from ever having to come up with his trademark clever workarounds ever again. In short, achieving it will most likely be the end of the crafting aspect of the story, and maybe the beginning of the end of the series as a whole.is there a believable way to limit it/should we limit it? If we don't is there a way to shift the focus of the story in such a way that it is still entertaining? Can we shift to handwavy  spell-effects while still being entertaining? As in there's no defined number of times he can cast things, just magic that happens, and he's a certain amount of tuckered out after each cast? I know stories can work like that, but they require a lighter hand than I've had thus far. It would be a bit of a shift and tough for me to acclimatize to, but it might have to happen.2: What do you want the 3-D shape of the Essence map to look like? @Red Viking mentioned it looking like a nebula, and i took it one step further. My first thought was it looked like a galaxy, with distinct arms leading toward a central point, you could apply different kinds of magic to all the arms, as they lead towards a central point.Or maybe have it look like Yggdrasil? similar thing with branches and roots going up/down to define different kinds of magic. Might even look like The Tide, who knows?3: (SPOILERS, SERIOUSLY) As for chekov's guns, we've got Solaris, who's been (or will be) infected with an aggressive form of dementia by a bio-type tinker. The virus itself can/has been cleared up by turning into light, but the effects themselves tipped a domino that will will slowly compound and lead him to becoming an obstacle Perry will have to surmount.Another chekov's gun I just recently thought of is the dream-visiting spell that Perry got in...was it book 2? it was never used, and seems like it might come in clutch Vs. either Tyrannus or Solaris...I mean, assuming Solaris still sleeps.4: the soul-surgery equipment seems like it'll be instrumental in measuring essence wavelengths to find their common patterns and organize them. It'll just be refined and recalibrated to watch a few spells happen in realtime. Furthermore, the soul-surgery equipment seems like it would offer Tyrannus the opportunity to do what Perry refused to do, and custom-design his own powerful demonic servants by butchering their souls into twisted devotion. 5: I'm getting a general consensus that we'd like to be present for baby time, then maybe fast forward a couple years until the little one is able to shriek words and be actual character?6: Any thoughts on new perks for level 15? We might be getting there sooner rather than later.

Comments

SaltyC

Damnit stupid me ignoring the spoiler warning and getting slapped with the biggest spoiler yet lol. Stupid monkey curiosity

Thomas Issa

💯should get the dimensionalist perk

Eden

Regardless, I absolutely 100% believe that his dad put a massive amount of xp behind becoming a dad. Idk how, but he did

Thomas Issa

Oh definitely, getting heirs to the line warps so many people’s lives

PlasmaticPi

For limiting the essence table part, I would say there is definitely a way to limit its usability in the short term via computational limits. I mean you are talking an ai able to come up with infinite uses for magic. That's gonna need a lot of power, both computational and electricity wise. And you give an ai lots of power and magic and its obviously gonna get a little crazy and rebellious.

Daedalus

I’d imagine any kind of dimensionally complex Periodic Table of Essence would have multiple different projections. So if you look at it one way it’s a Mandelbrot set, another way it’s a galaxy, a third yddgrasil, etc

Thomas Issa

Might be as dangerous as astronomy

PlasmaticPi

For the shape of the essence table, whatever you do, you need to include fractals. And why limit it to 1 shape? Its something that should have enough data affecting its shape that its at least 4 dimensional and therefore should change its 3 dimensional shape depending on the data used for the 4th dimension.

Joshua Gunty

Thinking for limitations it is reasonable to think that Perry will Eventually become extremely powerful and able to handle the throughput that unlimited spell combinations would require but currently he is still mortal and his strength is finite. Maybe he gains an AI capable of whipping up anything he needs in the moment but after casting double the number of spells he has been able to in the past he notices his HP taking a hit, literal spell aneurysms every time he pushes past a certain point and his limits increase exponentially with increases to whatever stat you feel makes the most sense/his general level/whatever.

Tate Browder

If you have the essence table on 4 or even 5 dimensions, then you can have a wildly complex system that is so difficult to model that even Perry’s AIs struggle, and he needs to independently test and design spells like he has in the past even with the new flexibility. It also allows him to risk it to attempt new spells on the fly, which could be a super awesome or super dangerous trump card when he’s under the gun

Tate Browder

I really hate the fact that Solaris is afflicted with dementia when we haven’t seen it at all in story. He seems better as a warlord who is holding together his city rather than an enemy, and it would be a lot more fun if he stayed that way. You could do a civil war plot if you wanted, but alas I enjoy Solaris as a supporting ally rather than an enemy.

Phsteven

Tbh, I expect Solaris to be a minor villain in the sense that Perry needs to be able to capture him to cure him while trying not to die.

Phsteven

I think that you already have the limiting factor of Perry's infinite spell options already in the story. Abonzul (or however it's spelled) will get too powerful and consume Perry if he over does it with the magics.

Kasper

For the essence table, one potential could be to have limited ability to substitute one essence for another, based on "proximity" or being adjacent. IE the equivalent of iron being a valid substitute for manganese, cobalt or rhodenium (on the real periodic table). Increase in capacity/power over time being more steps on the table, or the ability to go perpendicular etc

Fucking Shracc

1. is there a believable way to limit it/should we limit it? you can always have it not be the ultimate breakthrough in magic making on demand magic harder to do 2. the most magical choice would be a 3d fractal, since 2d fractals are already magic to most people

Nederdeader

1. Have the use mix matching essence tied to abunzaul becoming more ravenous. Only offset by one of his stats.

RainbowCatTopHat

Ok, I was thinking about #1 a bunch and I'm just going to throw all my ideas down. Ok so the table of essences letting Perry cast ANY spell? I agree that that's a bit too powerful for the story right now so I was thinking about different limitations you could place on the ability. My first thought was that it would be highly limited by his soul space, basically he has slowly regenerating pools of every essence that let him cast any spell he wants. However once he has depleted some of the pools his casting flexibility takes a temporary hit until he regenerates those essences (presumably this would be mid combat). The second idea I had though (and the one I think is cooler) is that Perry makes a table of essences and can hypothetically cast any spell, at this point he makes an AI to design any spell he needs, BUT the AI needs training data to figure out every tiny detail about freeform spell casting (which I imagine to be a cosmically difficult task). Effectively what I'm imagining is that when Perry tries to cast a specific spell he gets a random effect instead, like trying to cast a spell to evaporate water instead animating every chair in a mile radius. You can have each failure slowly train the AI eventually getting Perry to the point where the spells he casts eventually are more accurate to the intended effect, like attempting to cast a fireball instead casting a firewall or an iceball. The reason I like this idea is I love the idea of Perry casting semi random effects throughout a battle that both combatants then have to adapt to. Now that I'm thinking about it maybe this could be used in the fight with Tyrannus, the sort of "you can't predict my moves if they are 100% random" play.

Sam Ellis

Like others here I would suggest multiple lay outs with different ones focusing on different relationships. i.e. Yasdraisal lets you more easily see Hierarchical relationships, a galactic style where the nebula represent magical elements, fractals for cyclical relations like the Asian idea 5 elements making it easier to see how essence support, shape, or counter one another. For Limiting Perry it is going to take time to build the spells out even with an AI to help also even then he still takes time to produce the specific essence he needs, the table helps by letting sub other essence in but again we could see it balancing different sub combo having slight alter effects. a fireball radius is reduce, not the power just the AOE. a frost spell spreading differently then expected.

Enzo Elacqua

To limit it you could simply have it that the AI simply cannot work as well with magic as an actual person, like it requires high attunement or something. Pushes Perry to have to focus more on nerve to be able to replace it. Also let’s him keep having to focus on installing convenient spells since it would still be faster cash that way

Enzo Elacqua

Doesn’t mean the ai can do the math of what goes best for him, just that he still has to actually cast it

Blackneoshifter

For limiting the universal spell system, I'd say it's best to look at industrial systems. All the sleek systems that run continously all produce a very specific range of outputs, anytime there is a system that produces a range of outputs it gets more clunky. The more variety there is, the clunkier and more intermittent the process ends up being. With all the essence that Perry will want to convert from the universal type, even with the combined knowledge base he now has, depending on how many essences you are thinking of it's going to be a rube Goldberg machine that will require constant maintenance and revisions. You can just make a base system for now that can convert between a range of essences, with ones further from the universal type (or more easily separated, can't remember if the abunzul essence is all the essences blended together or a separate type that can become any other like a stem cell) on the 'table of essence' being harder to separate and outside of what his setup can do until he levels up and gets more space allowing it not to be too over powered. The harder and easier essenses can just be what ever the plot demands to maintain the story. You can then limit the number of uses by having to purge the systems to prevent contamination with an argon essence equivalent, possibly a unique one discovered by Perry during this partnership. I'm imagining a series of pipes and tanks that are ridiculously interconnected and intertwined with loads of soul machinery surrounding it that would take load of time to reset for another spell. Once he has more space and levels he can get bigger 'essence pumps' and reserves of the new inert essence to clean the system faster as well as more redundancy so he can use different spells while another section is cleaned. There could also be reserves of common essences so he can cast some old favorites faster or more often somewhat similar to the current setup. Hopefully something in these ramblings is useful or at least contributes to something.

Gerald Monroe

Is the accurate model of essence on any way a cognitohazard in itself, similar to looking through a telescope at the alien entity that grants powers? Knowing every possible essence doesn't get you every spell, humans have known every accessible element except a few crucial ones for over a century, and once we found plutonium we haven't really found much of use since then. Yet our technology still has many orders of magnitude more to go, we have no AGI or self replicating nanobots even though we know they are possible by some combination of the elements we know of. Even if we had an agi it couldn't build just anything either, it would need to experiment. Perry can only make so many essences per second, hardly up to industrial scales

Sam Ellis

I like both of your ideas and suggest that it could be a combination of both any spell that is locked in can be cast no problem but the essences are finite the more freeform the spell the more the Ai struggles to get everything right due limits on it training data that improves with time.

Treeman4

As far as unlimited magic being shown and limited in a way thats beleiveable. Has anyone in setting ever had that much abillity to spell cast? Maybe it could be another attunement based limit that the more spells he has built on demand is okay, but the number he can actually cast is still limited by the size and flexabillity of his soul as measured by the stat. So while he may have a bullet to fix many problems, there is still a very limited amount

Red Viking

A way to limit the power of his magic could be for Perry to only be able to produce essences at a set rate (maybe to do with Perry's soul strength in relation to Abun Zaul and giving him too many weakpoints to poke through?) which could then be influenced by Perry's stats. Those essences could go into reservoirs linked to a sort of magic mixer where they can be combined into spells. He'd have access to unlimited types of essences, but be limited to what he can store and produce, with everything upgradeable. Also, don't know if this is feasible lore wise, it might be an idea for Perry to work with Nat to forge and graft pieces onto his soul instead of scooping out and replacing bits and pieces.

Kote's chronicles

Do we want baby trunks like android saga or kid trucks like but saga?

Heedless

1. The simplest way to stall Perry on his journey to ultimate power is to have something spook Terran us into a betrayal after they've made a meaningful breakthrough but before the periodic table of essence is fully systematized (Perry leveling, someone from back east doing some thing precipitous, etc.). That way, Perry gets more flexibility and power, but doesn't become one punch man. Also, there are already numerical limits on his ability tocast, so I see no reason why those couldn't generalize to a more flexible casting system – his borrowed soul gets depleted, loses rigidity, deforms, whatever. 2. Make it a fractal. General categories of essences are categorized positionally, then more specific sub types are grouped around them in a pattern that reflects the overall arrangement, and then even more specific essences are grouped around each of the sub essences in the same pattern yet again and so on and so forth. That allows both for Perry to fill in the larger pattern based on what he already knows and allows for more specific targeting the better the overall pattern is understood.

nugitoBambino

i feel like perry should get the table of essenses but (i) not always have perfect information on how they would create a spell effect and (ii) not have all of them. It would become an incredible tool in his toolkit and help him theorize/create new spell effects but they wouldn't be guaranteed to work. then the crafting component would be that he (a) still has to come up with spells and test them and (b) he has to go around finding the key essenses that allow that effect to occur. like in chemistry where having the table of contents doesn't mean you know how to create a given compound or have the actual materials on hand - in fact a lot of research chemists spend their lives figuring out how to go from a handful of elements and molecules to a new compound. Some of them would even be theoretical and out of perry's reach to verify (like several elements). maybe he can use Abun'zaul to create the 'elements' between two essences' he has access to, but if the spell list is big enough, and in more than three-dimensional space it would increase his flexibility without being him immediately overpowering.

David Burchfield

I kind of what him to have to create a magitech AI (and take the ai tinker class) in order to implement the theory (he gets something workable but the details require inhuman (even for something like a meta) levels and precision in calculation. Problem is the Tide can mess with AIs, so he needs to study it more to find a way to shield it (or base it in a dimension the tide does not effect). I would love to see Solaris get cured rather than killed after getting defeated.

Jeanean

Here are some of my thoughts: 1. His spell system doesn't have to be completed. Sure, he could get to the point that he can freely mix and match essences however he wants, but there can still be many limitations. For one, the AI part could be left out. SUre, it could be a future improvement, but for a start, he can still be limited by the fact that he has to create spells himself. (Or get them from a book) Another limit is space. There is only so much space in his soul for infrastructure, and thus only a limited amount of essence, and number of different essences, he can have access to. That way, he could have a larger number of different spells, but would still be far away from complete freeform casting and practical omnipotence. In a sense, it would actually just put him at the same level of anyone else with a normal symbiotic spirit, as they have access to a number of different essences, which they can then freely mix and match. 5. Yup, that seems like the best in my opinion. 6. Before we get to the Lvl 15 perks, I would enjoy it if Perry could actually start using his spatial sense to its full potential. Until now, he has only used to to sense Souls and essences, but to my undertsanding, it should also allow him to bend space for "bigger on the inside" armor, or even teleportation. And if that was never meant to be the purpose of that perk (even if it sounded like that) then I would enjoy if he could go in that direction at Lvl 15, since it could be a way to solve problems like the limit to Soul-infrastructure I mentioned in #1. Also, it would allow him to stuff a LOT more power and armor into his armor. SUre, he can still look and act like he is normal sized, but actually, his armor could be a meter thick in all directions, making it significantly more durable, and allowing him much more space for weapons and gadgets. He could also start creating more Tinker-style weapons, maybe in cooperation with Nat through some kind of perk, as he moves his magic into his Soul, making space for less magical alternatives. (This could also keep the crafting going, and cooperation with Nat could keep the crafting magical via Nats spirit smithing. Just changing it from "mechanizing spellcasting" to "making tools and weapons by using materials with magical properties".)

Kurt A

For the level 15 perks I would suggest both Bio-tinker perks(design/make essence creatures), UNLESS Perry becomes able to generate essences without a sample beforehand. To limit the flexible spellcasting, he should be limited in how many of the flex spell slots he can have in his soul based on his Stability just like normal slots(though maybe make them a lot bigger and needing more stability per slot?) and make them have a significantly slower recharge rate, with it scaling ridiculously with the power of the cast spell/generated essences. So casting a dragon essence powered spell(without getting the essence beforehand) would need to wait till he was like level 16 or 17, or else he would be locked out of his flex spell slot for like a hundred years. It should be a trump card that could win any fight, but not every fight. So if Perry hears about Solaris degrading, he would be torn between using it on Tyrranus or Solaris since he can only beat one of them.

Kurt A

Also, even if its still too OP(like maybe he just uses it to generate dragon essence and cast Invulnerability without caring for the cooldown), there’s always the Manita Arc where he could enter after a 20 year 5 level timeskip and still struggle. Tons of story potential there.

Panzer

I lile the idea of his soul size being a hard limit on what infrastructure he can fit inside. I also think magic should have limits on the type of things a person can do based on their soul. Nat gets the forge stuff because it fits her soul. I think since magic is multidimensional, it would make sense for a person to only be able to do/use magic that aligns with a field projected by their soul onto that table. Like the difference between what colors can be displayed on a screen vs all know colors. Some people will have more emotional depth to their magic and others will have greater command of a type of magic. Like solaris has a lock on light power so strong that he could never branch out. It would also give more meaning to meta powers, they have a broad slice/cone of the table that is all used a little to make the effects. Shit i just realized thats essentially what your other series does rofl

Kurt A

I think the Book should contain within it a primer on Dragon essence(meant for dragon children) and a small amount of Elder Dragon essence, maybe with a vision of how Tyrrannus’s bio parent died?

Michael Presley

I’ve always liked the balance factor between the spirit and the system. One way to balance it that opens up a lot of interesting options is to have every magical augmentation, spell creation, essence use, etc. strengthen the spirit. It applies a limiter on what Perry can do but with the option for him to take risks to use spells that push him closer to insanity or takeover. So then he has to start figuring out how to strengthen the system if he’s going to keep up with the dragon, which opens up lines for him taking speciality perks he wouldn’t normally in order to stay “in balance”. If some of the perks/tech he needs to develop are people focused it could tie into the Solaris angle as well, suddenly his foreign influence scanner starts pinging on the most powerful super in the world.

Nathan Quitugua

Well one way to limit it is like the actual periodic table and the fact he has to use a filter to get the correct essence. So he makes a filter that can create the essence he needs for spells through abaunzul but that filter degrades consistently and has to be replaced often. The degradation goes faster or slower depending on the essence needed much like how you wanna stay away from the lower half of the periodic table cause they are extremely radioactive and proximity can kill you.

Infinate Fail

This sounds great. He could use this improved space in the armor and much better knowledge of essences to have a lot more spell capacity and strength, using his suit to store materials as a spell book of sorts like in other stories. It would also make his suit seem less disposable and actually have a purpose again, as lately at least its just been used for mobility and protection, while whatever new thing he has is hand held or a soul stored spell, making his suit not have as much agency as before. It used to be part of his whole identity, and a new version coming out seen as a large powerup and a large source of his power projection, but its fell to the wayside as of late. His core identity was a technology/magic fusion tinker that combined both to reach new heights for both fields, so making basically hulk buster armor but spatially compressed and filled to the brim with magic would be a great way to bring it back around.

Infinate Fail

He could complete his essence table, but not be able to make certain ones, and the ones he can are only produced very slowly since its artificial, so there is still a matter of scarcity. Those essences he's not yet able to make could be critical to making the stronger spells, so he has to do some janky thing as a placeholder/workaround (allowing for creativity in the story still), causing the spells to work, but weaker, and damage the device that was used to cast it as magical backlash or something, so they have to be used in key moments. Something else is he could figure out how to preserve pieces of his soul outside his body, so he can put a spell into his soul, then carve it out and put in another one, like swapping out a loadout, but doing so causes some stress of course so he cant do it frequently, but it would bring a lot of versatility, and make it so he can cast spells that consume their components.

austin kutz

You could make it so that if he wants to do free-form magic, he can only use N+1 essences in it, where N is the number of chambers in his soul purpose built to transform essence. He can use any essence in any proportion, so long as the number of essences doesn't surpass the number of chambers he's created in his soul. There could also be a comprehension requirement. If he doesn't have sufficient comprehension of a given essence, he couldn't be able to freely use it. For example, it should be fairly easy for him to use water essence or space essence, but more abstract essences like travel essence or nirvana essence should be more difficult. Maybe some essences are almost completely restricted without full comprehension. It stands to reason that Perry can't use Dragon essence unless he can reasonably call himself a master of all things dragon. That said, Perry's mimic soul should be used to steal that comprehension. It would make sense to me that he should be able to comprehend essences by devouring them. Maybe he eats momma dragons corpse to steal the dragon essence and suppress the dragon. I wouldn't even call that end game material. He still needs to become a god and beat the metaphysical pants off that prick, doesn't he? From what I've seen, becoming a God in this universe basically requires stepping into the 4th dimension or extending your power in the direction that doesn't exist, or whatever similar terminology you'd rather use.

Fervent Fiend

If Perry does make some form of magical essence index (which should be obscenely difficult) I wouldn’t be surprised if he got some absurd amount of experience. I remember the description of his grey goo system talking about how it represented the power of potential in a direct manner from an indirect direction, or something to that effect. Creating a system, even a spotty one, would be such a massive boon to his future endeavours that I wouldn’t be surprised if he went up by 2 or 3 levels. As for the ease with which he can make this magical essence table… well, Marie Curie won a Nobel Prize for finding 2 elements. She got it for other things, mostly radiation and such, but the work she spent years on and ultimately died achieving was only 2 elements.

alice's writing

(I don't think I've ever commented on a patreon post before so sorry if this is formatted poorly) re:2: What do you want the 3-D shape of the Essence map to look like?, personally, I think a fractal would make the most sense. I'm not the best mathematician so I can't say precisely what would be the intuitive choice but the bifurcation plot of the logistic map forms a 3d fractal (well i think it's technically a 2 different 2d fractals interlaced, mandelbrot+logistic map?). Otherwise, if you don't want to play with infinity, I feel like some of the more esoteric 3d shapes would be the most fun. If the essences are mapped by the various ways a dodecahedron rotates it would imply essence conjunction in a funny way. Or, just a hyperbolic surface if you want to just make it mindmelting.

Sdff

I'm very confused by what Perry is. And think that Tyranus should just get "accidentally" stuck in between The Eldritch Mimic(AbuZual,) The Grey Goo(Dad's Tinker Soul,) The Young Mimic/Tinker(Perry's Soul.) getting stuck in an eternal fight for control of a shapeshifter/power mimic's soul is some fun X-Men's Legion shit, and could be fun Krtptonite for interesting horrozontal powerscaling to prevent things from getting Number Go Up📈🆙⬆️👆⤴️☝️tedious. Also fake stock/science advice from a dragon would be funny, and seeing a 4 way brawl of souls for every level up could be fun.

Robert Apgar

So for 1. As far as power scale goes Perry regularly encounters people that even with the handwavyiness it would barely tickle them (Gods and those higher dimension beings). I dont think you want to make all other enemies irrelevant though, also even with a predictive AI he doesnt really have control of his super essence so you could gate that. I think the big win from the table of essence could be having a formulaic way to churn out new spells for himself. Like calculating viable chemical compounds but much harder. He could then have to reformat pieces of his flexible essence or available essences and then use different methods to refine it into a spell form?

Robert Apgar

For 2, if the map wasn't static that seems appropriate to explain the odd steps behind creating spells, they would be the methods you changes a variable essence into a fixed value.

Robert Apgar

Skipping to 6 since I dont have much input on the rest. His level 15 perks could have more of an emphasis on a merger/symbiosis between his nanobots and Abun'zaul. Like more of them are affected by affinity and eventually everything offered scales off affinity. Making his own symbiotes would be pretty neat for the next line of power armors, scales off body or something could be fun? Something involving spacial movement is easy-to-use as well.

Roeland

For 2 it might be difficult but I don't think you should limit yourself to pure 3d.Essences seem to exist in multiple dimensions already. Might be too hard but maybe a galaxy e yes but one where each time you change the viewing angle you get a new tree. So that like the periodic table relationships are there and gaps and essences in them can be inferred. However it is nearly infinite or at least a few hundred inter relations per essence and only a supercomputer or someone like paradox or a dragon can ever remember the angles/super positions that lead to a certain tree and connections at any point on the table. Makes me think of the long Mars from Terry pratchett.

Roeland

I stopped reading after 2 because of the big SPOILER word thanks for that.

Thomasaurus Rex

I think it would be pretty cool if Perry and the Dragon didn't fight. Like at some point the dragon is going to stop treating Perry like a squishy human and start treating him more like a dragon and they just work together after parry impresses him enough. As for question 2 above though, i though it should be like a tesseract, where whatever "element" you look at is like the center of a ball structure, and moving to any other element changes the whole structure so the new element is in the center and the rest sorta of juggle around the edges to fit, like a map where going off one edge leads to the other or basically have there be no edge, like a 4x game with north/south and east/west wrap