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Alloy of Law Excerpt (Updated with Ch3)

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ulysses sword:
I see two possibilities with pulling an item crossing a speed bubble, both of which say (almost) nothing happens.

1. It cannot happen, the bubble warps itself to either include or exclude any discrete item.  This could have the side effect of deflecting and changing the speed of moving objects, like bullets.

2. The large change in momentum would increase the amount of force needed to move the table (that sticks out of a Bendalloy bubble).  I think it would be about 100x as hard (assuming 100x speedup of time) to accelerate an outside object (or part of one) from inside of the bubble as outside of it, because it would be moving that much faster in the outside world.  most objects are not that strong, so they would break at the edge of the bubble.

I'm not sure about either of these ideas, especially with such limited information to go off of, but I think #2 is better at least.

CabbyHat:

--- Quote from: ulysses sword on August 13, 2011, 08:17:53 AM ---I see two possibilities with pulling an item crossing a speed bubble, both of which say (almost) nothing happens.

1. It cannot happen, the bubble warps itself to either include or exclude any discrete item.  This could have the side effect of deflecting and changing the speed of moving objects, like bullets.

2. The large change in momentum would increase the amount of force needed to move the table (that sticks out of a Bendalloy bubble).  I think it would be about 100x as hard (assuming 100x speedup of time) to accelerate an outside object (or part of one) from inside of the bubble as outside of it, because it would be moving that much faster in the outside world.  most objects are not that strong, so they would break at the edge of the bubble.

I'm not sure about either of these ideas, especially with such limited information to go off of, but I think #2 is better at least.

--- End quote ---

Yeah, I agree with #2; it makes a certain amount of logical sense. And there's the fact that Wayne has enclosed both himself and Wax in a bubble while they were sitting on a couch, which would seem to be an awkward position to maneuver a bubble around without intersecting the couch or one of its occupants. As an aside, did he say if the bubbles have to be perfectly spherical?

jacobfake:

--- Quote from: ulysses sword on August 13, 2011, 08:17:53 AM ---I see two possibilities with pulling an item crossing a speed bubble, both of which say (almost) nothing happens.

1. It cannot happen, the bubble warps itself to either include or exclude any discrete item.  This could have the side effect of deflecting and changing the speed of moving objects, like bullets.

2. The large change in momentum would increase the amount of force needed to move the table (that sticks out of a Bendalloy bubble).  I think it would be about 100x as hard (assuming 100x speedup of time) to accelerate an outside object (or part of one) from inside of the bubble as outside of it, because it would be moving that much faster in the outside world.  most objects are not that strong, so they would break at the edge of the bubble.

I'm not sure about either of these ideas, especially with such limited information to go off of, but I think #2 is better at least.

--- End quote ---


Yeah #2 does sound better, as it would seem to require less Scadriel-Laws of Physics-distortions, but it would still seem to bring up a couple things that would seem important for Wayne.

The ones that I can think of are that if you ever caught somebody's sword only halfway in a speed bubble (Vin was using a sword taller than she was in one of the books) and it wasn't mid-swing, having their sword suddenly become 100x heavier would basically ruin them. Of course that's probably not a super common situation but also, if you were fighting in a speed bubble (to make it harder for outsiders to interfere) then any halfway-in objects, instead of being thrown out of the way, would basically work the same as walls and make pins, headsmashes, etc. so much more effective in a way that you couldn't really ignore. Also if somebody was pushing something large or holding onto somebody falling off the edge of the cliff, catching all of them but only half of the object or person would make it basically impossible for them to push the object, and magnify the force of gravity (since that's what is really holding any of these objects in place in the first place) to pull the cliff-dangling guy out of his rescuers hands or, if the rescuer didn't let go, to pull him with him.

Also, for that matter, what about catching a person half-in, half-out? If #2 really holds true, the effect on their internal seems like possible death, or failing that the effect on their perception would at least be incredibly disorienting.

Since those are just like throwing some out there off the top of my head, it just seems that any way you spin it the edge of the speed bubble has to have a bunch of minor implications that cumulatively add up to being fairly major.

Inkthinker:
Don't forget that a speed bubble lasts, to an outside observer, for a fraction of a second. It slows down time to the perception of the people inside it, but outside the bubble time proceeds normally.

For instance, when Wax and Wayne had their little side conversation during the interview with Steris, the bubble lasted for several minutes on the inside, but on the outside it was barely a second or so (look to the left, look back. That's how long it lasted).

So to an outside observer, a bubble is a *blip*. Not a lot of time for people on the outside to try and push things in or pull them out.

ulysses sword:
In #2, I meant that an object's apparent mass (resistance to changing velocity) would be increased, I don't think that the weight (downwards force due to gravity) or that the acceleration of gravity changes inside or out, it is still 9.81 (or whatever) metres per (local) second squared.


--- Quote from: jacobfake on August 14, 2011, 09:47:07 PM ---The ones that I can think of are that if you ever caught somebody's sword only halfway in a speed bubble (Vin was using a sword taller than she was in one of the books) and it wasn't mid-swing, having their sword suddenly become 100x heavier would basically ruin them.

--- End quote ---

I think it would have 100x the mass, but the same weight. Following this, it would just get stuck in the edge, not be pulled down.  This would still be pretty bad, but still recoverable.

I'm still trying to figure out what would happen if you caught an arrow halfway in.

EDIT: as for catching someone halfway in, I can't imagine that they could be used as a (instantly fatal) weapon like that, so...people follow theory #1, and are always in or out, unlike inanimate objects?

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