You know what, sure, I'd like to see what we could do with Life. If it can get us healing magic, that could be a pretty significant advantage.
I'm not sure about the alchemy experiment. It could be good, but I'd rather work Form in there somehow, given that we have Mastery in that meaning, and will therefore get more information about why the results do what they do. Like, we know that having the middle rune in an alchemy recipe causes it to effect the blood (except in the case of Form Form Form, which makes paint)- I'd like to see what happens when the first or last rune uses Form. Probably the first, since we know that using Form as the first rune has special effects in other styles; it might do something in alchemy as well? If not, it's more likely to work together with a Chant or Spell, at least.
So, I'd tweak the suggestion to this:
Runic System Experiment - Alchemy [Form(Fire), Shape(Earth), Control(Shadow)]
E: I was re-reading some early posts, and this caught my attention:
"With our mastery of water we have gained an insight into our Recipe, Swan’s Black Blood. The poison produces an imbalance in the elemental balance of the victim, an excess of Water.
Perhaps it would even protect them from fire, though the side effects make use of such protection impractical."
So we do actually know where to start with a fire-resistance elixir. We just need to turn either Swan's Blood or Dragon's Lethargy from a poison to an elixir.
So if we took Black Dragon's Lethargy:
[Ward(Earth), Form(Water), Attack(Fire)]
And changed the last rune to Ward (as in Earth Elemental's Fortifying Elixir):
[Ward(Earth), Form(Water), Ward(Fire)]
We might get an elixir that both boosts endurance and protects from fire? Maybe?
If this worked, it would be very useful, obviously. In fact, I think it'd be worth delaying the other experiment to the Design phase (such that if the elixir works, we could design something using it).
Runic System Experiment - Alchemy [Attack(Fire), Shape(Earth), Control(Shadow)]: (1) Rockeater
Runic System Experiment - Alchemy [Form(Fire), Shape(Earth), Control(Shadow)]:
Runic System Experiment - Alchemy [Ward(Earth), Form(Water), Ward(Fire)]: (1) NUKE9.13
Investigate - Life meaning: (2) Rockeater, NUKE9.13