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[profit]

A weapon coated in iridium would never rust though.. and would look sweet when seen from a distance as the colors refract and dazzle off of it..

[Zorbeltuss]

Do note that hardness isnt the only property that makes a material suitable to cut things/people up with. Hardness is merely the amouth of force needed to deform a material, not when that material loses edge or breaks.

Irirdium would be very unsuitable for a weapon. It would not only be unhandlable due to being allmost twice as dense as lead, but also very prone to breaking. Thats what hard things do, and also why we didnt make swords out of stone or glass. That and its impossible to forge iridium due to its hardness and high melting point.

First, a heavier weapon is mostly a problem with long weapons like longswords and two-handed weapons, at a weight of 1.1 kg ordinarily a short sword will weigh 3.15kg or around 7 pounds which is less than things in the same size i've handled like one, it gives me ache and makes me tired, but i have weak arms too...
About how brittle it is... well i have not had any breaking of iridium not that i've handled that much, but it didn't seem that brittle to me.

Also, alloys arnt as simple of taking an avarage of each ingredients 'stats'.

I was quite close to taking metallurgy as the main subject in chemistry at the university, and as I checked it out first, i so now things like that, but thanks for the thought...

Of course im not telling you to not mod in iridium, it could be fun ingame to make some weird alchemical metals. Im just had to say it would be useless for weapon making in reality.

Maybe pure Iridium would be, i will check just how brittle it is... but the weight is not a limiting factor for short swords and such weaponry (maybe axes and maces as i don't know even an example weight of such weaponry...
Also if the brittleness will be a huge problem for weapon smithing i will probably focus more on iridium alloys...
A big problem however is the temperatures needed... but i have thoughts about that too...

A weapon coated in iridium would never rust though.. and would look sweet when seen from a distance as the colors refract and dazzle off of it..

It would most likely not be destroyed by any corrosive substance either... but the dwarf holding it most likely will be...

/Zorbeltuss

[marcusbjol]

The only RL use for Iridium is its inherent corrosion resistance, high melting point, and as an alloy material.  All modern uses focus on that.  Non are mentioned for any other purpose.  With that in mind, all other applications are better served by a different material.

Alloys - We currently do not have a real alloy system.  No bronze is not 1 part copper for each part tin.

Its brittle. Any edge will not stand repeated combat use.  Then again, obsidian shortswords exist. 

[Zorbeltuss]

The only RL use for Iridium is its inherent corrosion resistance, high melting point, and as an alloy material.  All modern uses focus on that.  Non are mentioned for any other purpose.  With that in mind, all other applications are better served by a different material.

Jewelry too, but yes in modern industry we have a greater access to metals of various properties...

Alloys - We currently do not have a real alloy system.  No bronze is not 1 part copper for each part tin.

Is there a possibility of using more than one bar/wafer of one or both of the metals it is possible to circumvent, also a common alloy o iridium which serves as a great tool in dwarf fortress is 50% iridium and 50% platinum... slightly stronger than optimal carbon steel, but not stronger than all steels... wear resistant etc...

Its brittle. Any edge will not stand repeated combat use.  Then again, obsidian shortswords exist.

Yes obsidian shortswords exist... and both obsidian and and iridium has properties to make up for their brittleness, softness in either of them would have been more of a killing blow...

Will return to fixing stuff this evening...

/Zorbeltuss

[SethCreiyd]

Yes obsidian shortswords exist... and both obsidian and and iridium has properties to make up for their brittleness, softness in either of them would have been more of a killing blow...

I picture something like these for obsidian short swords.

I imagine in real life you could make a nasty "flail" by sticking a handful of iridium inside of a sock.  It's pretty dense, right?

[Zorbeltuss]

Yes obsidian shortswords exist... and both obsidian and and iridium has properties to make up for their brittleness, softness in either of them would have been more of a killing blow...

I picture something like these for obsidian short swords.

I imagine in real life you could make a nasty "flail" by sticking a handful of iridium inside of a sock.  It's pretty dense, right?

Both weapons are nasty... but finding a decent sock for that purpose can be hard... also if you miss you will most probably hit yourself...

Development is going forward, almost all processes are done... I am over 50% done with physical values... there is no syndromes as of yet and everything looks ugly, no thoughts about alloys yet either...
Also if anyone has suggestions for names for the acid that has been used and don't sound either too scientific or too latin I would be very happy to recieve them... (preferably used in history currently as that makes for easier recognition... but as long as the name gives somewhat correct associations shoot)

/Zorbeltuss

[SethCreiyd]

A few off the top...

Historical:  Royal Water, King's Water
Ahistorical:  Withersteel, Essence of Goldrot, Philosopher's Water, Burnwater, Alchemist's Water, Goldbane

[Zorbeltuss]

A few off the top...

Historical:  Royal Water, King's Water
Ahistorical:  Withersteel, Essence of Goldrot, Philosopher's Water, Burnwater, Alchemist's Water, Goldbane

Thanks for the tips..
King's water and Essence of Goldrot sounds best to me... the second one feels more dwarven but the first one is easier to understand... at least to me... hmmm

Other acids without name, sulfuric acid, nitric acid and hydrochloric acid...
/Zorbeltuss

[ein]

Aqua Fortis (Strong Water) is nitric acid.
And keep Aqua Regia.
The alchemical names are cool.

Also, sulfuric acid was called oil of vitriol.

[Zorbeltuss]

Aqua Fortis (Strong Water) is nitric acid.
And keep Aqua Regia.
The alchemical names are cool.

Also, sulfuric acid was called oil of vitriol.

Thats what I use now + muriatic acid which are all alchemical names... now the problem with the alchemical names (except muriatic acid) is that they don't sound at all dwarven... Aqua fortis might be translated to fortified water or something... after a lot of testng I just noted that I can't stand the names while in dwarf fortress, which really hampers my development of this...

/Zorbeltuss

[marcusbjol]

I am not sure iridium is a good metal for DF, just because it took Humans well out of the time period to disover its use.

My only recommendation to this would be to limit the civs able to use it be dwarfs.  If not, it will be tradable via caravans and common goblinite ore.  I have been playing Civ Forge's alchemy beta and I dont bother to dig anymore because of those 2 factors.

[Grimlocke]

I am not sure iridium is a good metal for DF, just because it took Humans well out of the time period to disover its use.

My only recommendation to this would be to limit the civs able to use it be dwarfs.  If not, it will be tradable via caravans and common goblinite ore.  I have been playing Civ Forge's alchemy beta and I dont bother to dig anymore because of those 2 factors.

Could use some advice on how to do this, my latest attempt at it resulted in even kobolds dragging it around.

[marcusbjol]

not a modder, just a player so I dont know.  Mephansteras is the guy to ask, I think there is a DEEP tag that can be added to materials...

Adamanite uses    [DEEP_SPECIAL] to prevent these problems.  Havent messed aroudn with it yet.

[Grimlocke]

Yeah that has some unwanted sideeffects though. And I want just one particular entity to use it, the rest shouldnt be able to.

[marcusbjol]

I think the [DEEP] tag was in .28 and it should be still working now.  I just cant find any info on it.

Oh yeah, Toady will eventually fix alot of the bugs in the combat system, and a big one is exhaustion from swinging the weapon.

IRL a 7lb one handed weapon is on the very heavy side of usable for humans.  Case in point is a baseball bat at 2 lbs and 36 in length (a kilo and a meter).  We dont even attempt to use that one handed (balance is off for combat).  At my prime (10 years ago), I preferred a 4lb sword to use and I could fight hard for about 2 min at a time. 

Yes, one could make a really big/heavy weapon and swing it effectively once in the combat.  If ya hit in that one swing, great (one shots are VERY rare IRL).  If ya didnt, your opponent has plenty of time to kill you while you try to recover.  And swinging such a weapon would distort the bodies movement insuch a way as to telegraph every shot allowing the opponent to PLAN for the incoming swing.  Effective combat weaponry is more than just making a heaver weapon.

Now if we can get to compisite materials for weapons, this might be a different story.  Then this could be used to weight weapons to change balance with out changing size (and iridium tipped sword (top 1/3d of the blade) would be a VERY different weapon from an all steel one of the same volume.  Or electroplating.