Powerful Line of Forbiddance destruction strats?

[CrypticSpren]

I'm currently trying to make a Rithmatics simulator, and have an interesting predicament regarding lines of vigor and lines of forbiddance.

What happens when a line of vigor hits a line of forbiddance with an axis parallel to its own? Does it just repeatedly skip across the line of forbiddance (GIF attached), or does something else happen? It's a weird edge case that won't occur in most Rithmatic duels, but it's something to think about.

Could this potentially be a powerful method of destroying enemy lines of forbiddance? Or would the normally negligible energy loss from bouncing off lines of forbiddance make this not an effective strategy?

[+Invocation]

I kind of picture it like skipping a stone. It'll bounce a little for the first bit, but then peter out into a tiny ineffective squib of chalk before becoming inert.

Of course, I have literally no basis for that, they get compared to light a lot and I don't know how light works, it just seems like fun and makes some vague amount of sense.

Also, are you going to make the Rithmatic simulator downloadable if/when you get to a cool point with it? It'd be fun to mess around in. 

[GoWibble]

This is pertinent:

Quote

KalynaAnne

Lines of Vigor, do they behave like light waves?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

KalynaAnne

So a higher frequency means it’s better at penetrating, lower frequency transfers energy and moves stuff?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Ben McSweeney

Nice, I didn't know that one.

KalynaAnne

So, when they bounce off Lines of Forbiddance, do they follow laws of reflection?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Ben McSweeney

They should always reflect at the same angle.  Think of, like, a pool table.

KalynaAnne

If a Line of Vigor is moving from concrete onto asphalt, is it changing?

Brandon Sanderson

It's going to act like light transferring to a new medium.

KalynaAnne

So it refracts?

Brandon Sanderson

It's going to-- Yeah, it's going to refract.

KalynaAnne

So it changes speed as it moves?

Brandon Sanderson

Yep. So you get a different wavelength, or whatever, once transfers onto a new medium.

Firefight Atlanta signing (Jan. 24, 2015)

 

[CrypticSpren]

To GoWibble:

I don't know any optics so I don't know how light waves would behave... would it be the case that the entire line of vigor actually extends outwards like a single beam? Like the attached picture would be entirely visible in one snapshot in time? If so, I've been going about this entirely wrong . Honestly I might just deviate from canon if that's the case, since I really like the aesthetic of the entire line snaking across the canvas.

If my physics isn't terrible though, I think that energy isn't lost at all on reflection except for the very small amount of momentum that light imparts. And since lines of forbiddance stick in place - that is, they effectively have infinite inertia - there isn't really a way to measure momentum transfer from the line of forbiddance side.

Anyhow, I forgot about bigger wavelengths and more damage with smaller wavelengths against lines of warding. I really should read the KalynaAnne report again. I like that big wavelength lines will have some merit to using, because I don't think they're really that much easier to draw even if the book says that they are.

To Invocation:

I'm not sure how to feel about the skipping pebble, by which I assume you mean a set percent energy decrease every hit. If it's a small-ish number (say, 10%), the line will still be doing significant damage - about half of base power - even after five hits. But if it's a big number (say, 50%), then just a few bounces will lead to massive weakening - Adelle Choi's legendary 3-reflection shot would be doing 1/8 the damage. My gut tells that skipping pebble type energy decay is going to feel the most intuitive, but I somehow can't shake the thought that a linear decay - a set quantity loss every hit - will probably lead to a more balanced game if I ever reach the point where there is a game.

It takes 10 lines of vigor to destroy a line of forbiddance. Landing that many parallel shots is really really hard, and 2x brings that up to 20 lines of vigor. Skipping pebble should work well.

As for an actually cool downloadable - hopefully, but don't hold your breath. I'm very much garbo at coding. And lines of vigor are detected with a janky first estimate based on detecting crests and troughs without a real regression algorithm (though I think I've figured out the math for that when the time comes).

Nevertheless, I hope to be able to post a downloadable file in the Fan Works forum by the end of the month that has just the three "easy" lines (warding, forbiddance, and vigor) to ask for some feedback on the general feel of things. Maybe some fellow Sharders might feel inclined to give me some coding help, though @smartycope 's post and the general inactivity in the Rithmatist thread seem to suggest otherwise. I'm really close to getting the interactions between lines of vigor the other two done; I might even be finished with that tomorrow if I grind hard enough. But I haven't even started on doing anything with bindpoints and line of Forbiddance merging (i.e. marks crosses), which is probably harder. Also, my line of vigor detection formula is kinda crap.

I dream to someday be able to play digital chalk Starcraft with a stylus against my friends, but that's a far way off.

[+Invocation]

25 minutes ago, CrypticSpren said:

I'm very much garbo at coding

Hey! Don't you talk like that about yourself. You think I have a single clue how you did this? It's magic to me. Your coding skills are great!

36 minutes ago, CrypticSpren said:

Maybe some fellow Sharders might feel inclined to give me some coding help, though @smartycope 's post and the general inactivity in the Rithmatist thread seem to suggest otherwise.

Bang your head against the wall for long enough and it will eventually crack. You're further along than the other attempts have gotten, as far as I know, and since Brandon continues to say that The Aztlanian is not abandoned, the Rithmatist portions of the forums will see life again someday. I'd help if I could, but there's a reason I'm no longer a CSE major and that reason is that both programming and math and I do not get along. I might still try, but if I do, I'll probably mess it up horrifically and need to redownload stuff haha.

40 minutes ago, CrypticSpren said:

I dream to someday be able to play digital chalk Starcraft with a stylus against my friends, but that's a far way off.

But with every bit of progress every attempt makes, we're one step closer, and we all appreciate your contributions. And seriously, your thing does look really cool and very well done.

[CrypticSpren]

Thanks for the kind words! I like CS in concept, but I don't have enough practice, hence the attempts at Rithmatic simulator. I am quite happy with what I have right now! It's just taken me an inordinate amount of time (about a month) to get to where I am. I'm definitely not the furthest attempt that's been made: I did see someone with screenshots of their Rithmatics simulator that could support an Eskridge Defense and bind points, but that's died. The BYU version is also good (especially the chalkling system). But I believe that I'll surpass them in time.

And yes, fingers crossed for Aztlanian. I still hold hope for its release after KoW. May Rithmatics rise again on the 17th Shard.

[Quantus]

Just want to jump in and say that this is freaking MAGIC and you are awesome.

 

[CrypticSpren]

Thank you! After all, magic is the goal.

[CrypticSpren]

So, I'm reworking lines of vigor and it seems like I was probably wrong about this post...

The way that I implemented lines of vigor when I made my original post here worked as follows:

OLD VERSION: When a line of vigor impacts a line of forbiddance, a sine wave of equal amplitude with its axis through the point of impact is generated.

That ends up looking like red reflection (in LOV_bad.png). Notice the gap between the axis lines of the shot and reflected lines of vigor. I originally thought this was actually how Lines of Vigor are work: just take a look at how far behind the lines of forbiddance the axis lines intersect in the book illustrations!

However, if Lines of Vigor are supposed to function similar to light waves, this really shouldn't be the case. Just look at the image from the actual physics site image shown.

The way that lines of vigor, shown in LOV_good.png, should actually function is as follows:

NEW VERSION: When a line of vigor impacts a line of forbiddance, a sine wave of equal amplitude with its axis intersecting the original line of vigor's axis along the line of forbiddance hit is generated.

This may not seem like a big deal, but there are some fairly significant consequences of this change.

In most scenarios, the displacement caused by the old version is not all that significant. However, when a line of vigor has a significant enough amplitude and/or is close enough to parallel to a line of forbiddance that it hits, this displacement adds up, creating the skipping effect in the GIF in the original post.

With the new version, parallel shots should instead ricochet back and forth between the same two spots, thus unloading all its energy in the same localized area. Thus, nearly-parallel lines of vigor actually may function as a fun line of forbiddance destruction technique, just not in the way that was originally expected! It probably doesn't have any actual use though, since getting the right angle to land it would be ludicrously difficult in most circumstances, and the size of the line of vigor would have to be massive to hit somewhere in the middle (as opposed to the tip) of a line of forbiddance... 

Also noteworthy, shots close to but not quite parallel and with a large enough amplitude to multi-hit a line of vigor will ricochet back and forth in the same area for a little while before either shooting outwards in roughly the direction it should on a single hit (on an odd number of bounces) or return directly back to the sender along the path it came (on an odd number of hits).

I don't have a good image because desmos is hard, but I kinda did half of one in riccochet.png... Just trust me that the end result will shoot outwards along one of the pale blue lines.

Perhaps most interesting, shots that hook around a line of forbiddance (see hookshot.png) will guaranteed double hit and return to sender on the path it came.

This is actually a pretty interesting result, as it creates a potentially actually viable rithmatic technique. If a rithmatist draws a line of forbiddance to force a line of vigor to be a hookshot, it would send back the line of vigor on a more precise path and not box in the rithmatist as much!

 

Sorry for thread necromancy, but I felt the need to share!