Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Slayerhero90]

They also violently react with almost anything they come into contact with. So giving your dwarves lithium FRANCIUM armour will result in vaporised armourers.

FTFY.

[Putnam]

They don't explode as violently as you'd think, either...

[GoombaGeek]

I can only see them being used for science or as a potential crime against goblinkind (molten sodium sounds like a pretty good siege weapon).

[GreatWyrmGold]

What does any of this 15-century technology nonsense have to do with alkali metals, and why does it matter?

Toady says that technology in DF will never exceed what there was in the 1400's, or maybe 1400, or maybe 1400's Europe.
Alkali metals weren't extracted until the 18th century or so.
Therefore dwarves cannot extract alkali metals.

This is also why they cannot refine bismuth (first described 1546, in Germany) or nickel (first isolated and identified 1751, also in Germany). They are also incapable of making nickel silver, which was developed in China and was only replicated in Europe in the 1770s. What's more, platinum is completely inaccessible to the dwarves, as platinum was only brought to Europe from South America in the year 1557, and even if they were to acquire some platinum, it would be completely impossible to refine it into bars, as its melting point is very high and it was only first worked through a three-step process involving aqua regia, ammonium chloride and burning the resulting ammonium chloroplatinate. All of these described technologies are totally inaccessible to the dwarves as a result of the strictly enforced tech level.

I agree, those should be removed too. In fact, I argued pretty vocally about aluminum and platinum in particular a while back. Want a link?

No, that's pathetic.
Really, the point here is that rigorously sticking to a tech level for no reason, thinking nothing about how fun or useful the additions are, is just boring. The examples were that Toady isn't a ginormous hardass for tech level 100% of the time, not that omg we should totally remove pre-existing and perfectly acceptable to almost anyone content for the sake of realism.

Well, what do alkali metals really add?
And it's entirely possible that Toady was not aware that smelting platinum or nickel or whatever was impossible in the Middle Ages.
Besides, it's one thing to add in smelting metals that you can't smelt before the 1400's. It's another to add metals that you can't keep from burning or exploding before the 1400's.

[GoombaGeek]

Yeah, Toady is well known for never doing research and leaving realistic aspects out of his game. He probably just forgot to look up nickel and platinum when he was calculating their breaking points in four different ways. And smelting nickel was possible, but identifying and isolating pure samples of it took more effort.

The alkalis are an important part of reducing aluminium while keeping it a noble metal, and what don't metals that burn in water add to the game? Cook up a vat of molten potassium and dump it onto goblins. Use it to burn away and cleanse nasty poisons in the hallways. Get enough of it and it's like a more versatile and more deadly magma.

[Putnam]

Yeah, Toady is well known for never doing research and leaving realistic aspects out of his game. He probably just forgot to look up nickel and platinum when he was calculating their breaking points in four different ways. And smelting nickel was possible, but identifying and isolating pure samples of it took more effort.

Code: (From the inorganic_metal.txt) [Select]

Was 1080000, but just using 3.5x tensile multiples for everything until better numbers are available, which might not be likely

The alkalis are an important part of reducing aluminium while keeping it a noble metal, and what don't metals that burn in water add to the game? Cook up a vat of molten potassium and dump it onto goblins. Use it to burn away and cleanse nasty poisons in the hallways. Get enough of it and it's like a more versatile and more deadly magma.

1. How are you to make it molten?
2. Isn't aluminum reduction an 18th-19th century invention?

[CaptainArchmage]

They also violently react with almost anything they come into contact with. So giving your dwarves lithium armour will result in vaporised armourers.

It depends on what is in the atmosphere or nearby environment. If dwarf fortress had corrosion and atmosphere modelling, the alkali metals would oxidize rapidly. In contact with water, you would get bases. It would require protective gear to hold the material without being injured.

[GoombaGeek]

Yeah, the reduction's too advanced...

I assumed that they could be melted just like lead, when we get that type of siege equipment implemented, since they have really low melting points. I'm not sure if they'd ignite when melted in air, though, I haven't looked into it.

[Vattic]

I wouldn't mind some of these metals being the result of magic/alchemy, but wouldn't want electricity in the core game, I'd love it if something like that was moddable, however.

In China, fewer records survive, and likewise Egypt, and yet we have found all kinds of relics that make no sense for their period. There is evidence for working batteries thousands of years ago in the Arabic world (the MythBusters did an episode on that).

The so called baghdad battery would only work as a battery if it was heavily modified. In it's unmodified form it is also almost identical to other artifacts known to be used for storing scrolls. Also what other relics have we found?

[Putnam]

Something like that is moddable. I've already shilled it in this topic multiple times

[dwarf_sadist]

@GoombaGeek: Not quoting your post.
Did people actually do anything remotely like that in the 1400's? Because, in theory, an Australopithecine could have made stone knives (even with ground edges!) worked wood or something into a circle, punched out the middle, used a stock for an axle, make four wheels and two axles, laid some more sticks down on that, bound it all with sinew or vines or something, and had a cart long before any existed.
But it didn't happen, so having an Australopithecus using such a cart would be an anachronism.

I think the point he's trying to make is that such things were possible in the 1400s. Did people do such things? No, because of the dark ages. I would bet that if there wasn't a period of time where the people in charge were actively destroying knowledge itself, in all corners of the world, then having alkali metals and aluminum would not be out of the question.

I doubt it.
I highly doubt that your claims are anything but exaggeration. The Renaissance started in the 14th century, a century or two before the 1400's cutoff; surely anything that would let those 1400'sers get alkali metals would have let them do so after a century or more of Renaissance or else would have been known before that time where "the people in charge were actively destroying knowledge itself, in all corners of the world." And the cutoff isn't the 1400's in a world with no Dark Ages, it's the 1400's in our world. So, no dice there.

I would just like to point out that you are wrong. The start and spread of the Renaissance dates usually start around the collapse of the Byzantines, in 1453 AD. Most of the scientific, military and cultural advancements the renaissance was known for did not start until around the mid 1400s.

Other dates that are pretty important that 'just' pass the cutoff line: Battle of Agincourt is fought, with massed archer formations forbidden city is built in China (1420); Joan d'Arc is executed for heresy and treason (1431); Incan empire is formed (1438); the 100 year war ends (1453) printing press is made, make the spread of writing easier (1457, Gutenberg Bible; 1490, Torah); war of the roses ends and England is unified (1485); star-forts start becoming built en-masse (1486) and Charles VIII develops 'modern' siege train techniques and the first mobile siege weapon (1498), making sieges possible within days instead of years against the current forts in existence; 'Late' middle ages ends with the new world being discovered (1492), Venice and the Ottoman as hegemonies (~1500), England unified under the Tudors and so forth. THEN the renaissance starts.

You also miss a whole bunch of artists, scientists, philosophers, explorers, political reform, economic reform, religious reform, military reform, tactics, strategy, military leaders and nation states rise to power, all within 1453-1509AD. Leonardo da Vinci, Niccolò Machiavelli, Nicolaus Copernicus, Michelangelo were all born around 1470. Without them, there would of been no renaissance.


As a further note, the 1400 cutoff limit is to prevent steam punk and magitek from entering the game, even though gunpowder, cannons, and petards are already in heavy use before this time. Think of the 1400s as an 'atmospheric cutoff' as opposed to a hard technology limit. So, a compound bow (1966 AD) could easily have been made in the 1400s, but no one thought up the idea because of the gun being made more effective in between those times. Likewise, steam ducks such as the ones in the bathhouses of Rome (~300 AD) may have been around, but they may not fit into the style of DF.

[Orange Wizard]

steam ducks

Are they some kind of Trojan Horse, but a duck, and steam powered?

[Vattic]

Something like that is moddable. I've already shilled it in this topic multiple times

I meant having the electricity needed for a lot of these processes being moddable. As things stand I suppose we could turn coal into an item called electricity that all these reactions require in different amounts, but it's not really ideal.

[Putnam]

I just have batteries being made from the millstone (which requires power to run).

[GreatWyrmGold]

@GoombaGeek: Not quoting your post.
Did people actually do anything remotely like that in the 1400's? Because, in theory, an Australopithecine could have made stone knives (even with ground edges!) worked wood or something into a circle, punched out the middle, used a stock for an axle, make four wheels and two axles, laid some more sticks down on that, bound it all with sinew or vines or something, and had a cart long before any existed.
But it didn't happen, so having an Australopithecus using such a cart would be an anachronism.

I think the point he's trying to make is that such things were possible in the 1400s. Did people do such things? No, because of the dark ages. I would bet that if there wasn't a period of time where the people in charge were actively destroying knowledge itself, in all corners of the world, then having alkali metals and aluminum would not be out of the question.

I doubt it.
I highly doubt that your claims are anything but exaggeration. The Renaissance started in the 14th century, a century or two before the 1400's cutoff; surely anything that would let those 1400'sers get alkali metals would have let them do so after a century or more of Renaissance or else would have been known before that time where "the people in charge were actively destroying knowledge itself, in all corners of the world." And the cutoff isn't the 1400's in a world with no Dark Ages, it's the 1400's in our world. So, no dice there.

I would just like to point out that you are wrong. The start and spread of the Renaissance dates usually start around the collapse of the Byzantines, in 1453 AD. Most of the scientific, military and cultural advancements the renaissance was known for did not start until around the mid 1400s.

...I said 14th century...dang...I meant 1400's. My bad.

As a further note, the 1400 cutoff limit is to prevent steam punk and magitek from entering the game, even though gunpowder, cannons, and petards are already in heavy use before this time. Think of the 1400s as an 'atmospheric cutoff' as opposed to a hard technology limit. So, a compound bow (1966 AD) could easily have been made in the 1400s, but no one thought up the idea because of the gun being made more effective in between those times. Likewise, steam ducks such as the ones in the bathhouses of Rome (~300 AD) may have been around, but they may not fit into the style of DF.

Do alkali metals somehow fit well enough into a fantasy world like DF's despite not being discovered for centuries after the hard cutoff?