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[MoonyTheHuman]

join the others. "Now that i think about it, if we want toget ANYWHERE near things like electronics and enhanced mechanical systems, we will need to work on refining of metals and other materials, what do you all think?" Wait for the opinion of the others. If communal yes(51% or more yes) then work on material refining, namely electrolysis first. Else if No (51%. No) work on basic electromechanical (transformers and relays) electronics , else if Tie (50-50%) flip a coin and choose randomly.

[TheBiggerFish]

"...Well that's something you can do, and something I probably have data on..."

Produce data for Moony.

[Amperzand]

The limit upon the Canteen's production is not available energy, although it does use a notable amount of power, but the fact that it has a finite volume and takes time to imbue the contents.

The PEA produces a wealth of seemingly relevant information. You spend some time transcribing the more useful parts onto paper for the use of others, presumably not wishing to hand the irreplaceable datapad to Moony or the locals.

[TheBiggerFish]

Improve the charge rate of the flask, then.

[Amperzand]

{Above post converted to a different format, with more information.}

Improving the Canteen's capabilities is feasible, but likely difficult and potentially hazardous. The object was originally created in poorly controlled and unpredictable circumstances, as a result of a spell which you had lost control of. The enchantment would have to be reverse engineered before any alteration. You could fairly readily create a bulkier thaumotechnical system to produce the same effect. With help from the Dam's electricity, such a thing might even avoid draining the geothaum heavily, but it would take time and resources to construct. Perhaps rather than water treatment, which runs into issues with the inherent magic-damping effects of water, you might build a cloth-pressing machine to produce more storable enchanted bandages?

{You did make some enchanted bandages, but you did it by hand and in small quantities.}

[TheBiggerFish]

We could, however, seriously use such a system.  So at least take a look-see at the enchantment, to see if there are any insights, before starting work on the reproducible electrical variant.

[Amperzand]

{Edited my post again because many ideas, sorry.}

You also spend time analyzing the Canteen. Its magic is plainly rather organic, or self-made, almost wild. Poorly controlled spells behave very oddly here, almost with a mind of their own, and this one no exception. You think you see why it works, but you don't see a good way to reproduce it intentionally, it being paradoxically both too chaotically complex and too wonderfully simplistic for your taste. As you wind down your arcane senses, you realize you have developed a severe headache. That's unusual.

You turn to considering the design of a system for automatically imbuing objects with a healing algothaum.

One of the weapons engineers pestering Murdoc notices your scribbling and, seeing something that looks like a burst of flames or light in a diagram around an automatically enchanted glyph, asks, excitedly, if you can make things ignite with a little magic like that.

[TheBiggerFish]

"Yes.  What do you need it for and how many?"

A headache?  Indeed, very unusual.  With a mind of their own, you say?  Why not look at it as if I'm trying to read a mind?

Get the guy a schematic for magic pilot lights.

[MoonyTheHuman]

Work on advanced material processing, like mass electrolysis, better ore processing, etc. set personal goals for processing as gaining access to advanced metals like cobalt  nickel germanium silicon etc.

[Gwolfski]

Work on machines for metal working, and look into suggestions of usage for the engines.

[chaotic skies]

Spoiler: Amp (click to show/hide)

  Try to "hear" or understand the buzz if there is anything to be heard.

Continue working on machine tools, and look into the research done on runes in any free time.

[Amperzand]

The engineer enthusiastically informs you that if he can use magic to ignite powder with fewer moving parts, they would have a much easier time manufacturing and supplying some varieties of firearms, possibly all of them to an extent. Evidently the priming compounds in use are toxic and expensive, causing issues for mass production.

He seems less utterly enthused with the notion of a continous-flame pilot light, but takes the design off happily enough to show his small group of mechanics, chemists, and acolyte sorcerers.

You are not much of a telepath, but you set up to scan the canteen via a mental sense spell. Your impression is of sapience, of mindless writhing, of static remnants, like the solidly-frozen body of an earthworm, of pain as your spell attempts to explain the truth of the thing to you. You hastily tear the spell down before it gets any worse. Something very odd is going on with uncontrolled magic here. It is much wilder than you have been lead to expect should be the case in any universe where your form of magic works at all. The headache appears to have gotten worse.

Moony, despite some not-insignificant suspicion from the engineers he goes to work with, (Evidently his former indiscretions have not been forgotten), sets in to work on ore processing. It would appear, weirdly, that the rock under the caverns is a striated mess of ores, providing access to a myriad unusual materials in some concentration, once they have been teased apart.

Methods of rare-element extraction chemical, electrical, thermal, and mechanical are discussed, with the notes provided by Patham's pocket computer proving of great use. Getting the various methods down to systems which can be built locally will take some time, but is quite doable in many cases.

The effort to produce machine tools and automated forging systems is ongoing handily. A prototype lathe is already being constructed, and with a mix of a crude steam boiler to provide hydraulic pressure and a heavy piston, a crude auto-hammer has already been set up in the cavern-level forges, in a new section of their fence-enclosure near the Dam. Ideas flow freely, and all work in this area looks to do is provide more and more ideas. Soon, the fortress will have a wealth of crude powered tools, and by the time mass-production plans for any technology can be decided upon, its needs will be met. Patham is able to provide some useful notes in this area as well.

Gwolfski recruits a local engineer to help him scan the Book of Engines for handy designs and offer suggestions for their use. The Book is very large, and very dense, making even a cursory scan time-consuming, but ideas already begin to flow. Systems which seem especially practical and simple are copied off by a helpful clerk who came with the new caravan and distributed to the other research teams.

Chaotic Skies' research into runes in the evenings and during meal-times, sketching ideas and reading more of Patham's notes, draws the attention of the other student-sorcerers, who offer their own ideas and seem eager to learn as well. Progress is made, if not especially quickly.

Spoiler: Chaotic Skies (click to show/hide)

Once, as it grows especially strong, you attempt to focus on the psychic hum, to look for meaning. It is complex, more akin to the nonsense-crackle of turning a radio to every frequency at once than a simple sine-wave whine, but there are fragments to be found. Anger, pain, the dull communication of information and the desperate request of prayer. Chaotic noise and ordered processions of tones. You realize, somewhat sickeningly, that you, along with most of the fortress population, if not the world are hearing the total psychic emission spectra of a war, seemingly amplified to the audibility of the mundane by some force. A ripple shakes it, worsening matters for a moment. You realize that the ripple was a word, and the speaker, by some quality of its unvoice that you have difficulty finding a description for, is surely in possession of some fragment of Godhead.

The whole of it, the entire maddening silent roar of it, has an undertone, an unnatural "Carrier wave". The dull droning buzz of misery. Of inevitable decay and of unfailing nauseous order.

It does not make for pleasant listening, and you find your mood to be rather the worse for hearing it more plainly, not that it was helping to begin with.

[Amperzand]

{I have decided to assume that Fish's provision of assist-notes is a standing action and it will be offering a flat bonus to all reasonable research actions' success unless otherwise noted.}

[MoonyTheHuman]

Work with the engineers to start enhancing and redesigning the process of ore processing, personally work on a prototype distiller and electrolyser to purify oxygen and hydrogen if possible. Direct the miners to work on mining out said ore, and sorting it. Forbid using said ore for normal smelting. (note: centurylink is doing a bad job at giving us internets, and I'm having to use WAP2 support on bay12. thus spoilers don't work and i see everything inside them whether i want to or not. I'm trying my best to ignore them. [sarcasm] please give centurylink a angry letter about giving some of its customers 728 bytes per second. kthx[/sarcasm type="about everything but the 728 bytes per second"])

[TheBiggerFish]

"Does anybody else have any strange headaches due to magical weirdness?  Because I do and it is frankly quite unnerving.  Or maybe we need a priest.  ...Are there any of those about?"