An elementalist who can only control water and absolutely no other element can change the temperature of water so it...

>an elementalist who can only control water and absolutely no other element can change the temperature of water so it becomes ice
>an elementalist who can only control earth and absolutely no other element can change the temperature of earth so it becomes lava
>in both cases, there is clearly an ability to add and remove heat in an element
>but heat itself, or fire, is an element apart from water and earth
>almost all applications of elemental fire control are essentially throwing heated gas around with no combustion required
Wouldn't it make more sense, in a completely new homebrew setting, to classify the ability to create fireballs as a subset of elemental air control?
The most useful part of elemental fire control, creating and destroying heat, is included in the standard abilities of water and earth elementalists anyway.
Do not talk about politics here.
Do not assume I am only referring to the Avatar setting, because I'm not, I'm referring to a fantasy trope in general.
Notice how I did not mention molecules in this post, except just now to clarify that I did not mention them.

It's magic, I ain't gotta explain shit.

Carried from over in? >51345107 I assume.

>

>>but heat itself, or fire, is an element apart from water and earth
Heat is thermal energy, not simply "fire".

If we're discounting current understandings of physics, then it makes perfect sense. In this hypothetical setting, there really ARE just four elements (or maybe five, if you include metal).

Just like there's this pervading Force in this distant other galaxy we've heard a lot about in the past 40 years.

>an elementalist who can only control water and absolutely no other element can change the temperature of water so it becomes ice
>an elementalist who can only control earth and absolutely no other element can change the temperature of earth so it becomes lava

Never seen a game setting where this was allowed desu.

Yes, part of the issue with many settings, or at least the critiques of settings, is that physics works on an entirely different system that doesn't mess 100% with ours, and often times that very much bothers people.
Doesn't hurt that most writers suck at actually expressing that.

Please describe the effect of a D&D 3E Fireball spell as precisely as possible, from an in-setting perspective that doesn't know hit points exist, without mentioning molecules or any modern conception of physics.
The book's description explicitly says the fireball doesn't make a pressure wave or consume oxygen or anything you expect a non-magical fire to do, it just deals damage, and that damage is classified as fire damage, NOT thermal energy damage.
I'd say "fire makes things hot" is true 99% of the time.

In Avatar, at least, turning rock into lava is an extremely specialized skill. And you can turn water into ice or water vapor by changing pressure, not just temperature.

>Once upon a time, in a tavern not far from here, a man in a funny hat made a ball of magic fire and it burned this guy bad! Didn't kill him, but he had to ask the local cleric for healing, which cost him plenty, let me tell you!

>In this hypothetical setting, there really ARE just four elements
You still don't get it.
I change the temperature of water. That's water magic.
I change the temperature of earth. That's earth magic.
I change the temperature of air. That's fire magic??

Temp-ar-tar? What is this word, what does it mean?

(Physics is different here, you can't apply Kelvins to .)

>And from the Mage's hands a ball of flame, much like that in a brazier, leapt forward towards the goblin chief. His underlings clambering overtop of one another failed to escape the flames that washed outwards from their lord and engulfed them, as quickly as the crimson sea had spread it dissipated with little more sound than the crack and snapple of a fire.

You've got to remember the Greeks who came up with the classical system of elements generally thought fire to be it's own tangible material. And while it doesn't make so much sense in hindsight it is still quite fun for fantasy scenarios.

>crack and snapple
heh

typos are fun

How hot something is. In classical greek elements Fire and Air are considered to be the hot elements, while temperature is the sole domain of Fire in Tibetan elementalism.

>classical elements
>Wouldn't it make more sense
No, fucktard, it wouldn't. It's completely arbitrary because we know for a fact that it's wrong no matter what. But let's bite at your shitty bait anyway.

>an elementalist who can only control water and absolutely no other element can change the temperature of water so it becomes ice
>an elementalist who can only control earth and absolutely no other element can change the temperature of earth so it becomes lava
By whose reckoning? Wouldn't it "make more sense" for ice also to require wind, and lava also to require fire? If you parcel out the domain of fire to the other elements, then obviously fire becomes superfluous, but you're still a buttflustered idiot who had to make a new thread because he was triggered by a little harmless Penceposting.

In-universe balancing takes the form of firebenders being able to create fire from nothing. Earthbenders need physical earth, and the ability to pull water from the vapour in the air is a very high-end waterbending ability that is very dependent on the environment.

I use wetstuff magic. I can make wetstuff less hot. I do not know hotstuff magic.
I use hardstuff magic. I can make hardstuff more hot. I do not know hotstuff magic.
I use hotstuff magic. I cannot make hotstuff more wet or less wet or more hard or less hard.
Please stop playing dumb.

heat can be effectively removed from water if you had a microscopic control of it through evaporative cooling and essentially imitating a vacuum

heat can effectively be added to earth through internal friction, theoretically up to melting point.

you're wrong

I wouldn't classify that as playing dumb, but whatever. It's so hard to know if a point is being made, isn't it?

I understand your words with respect to the physics of Earth circa 2017. The point I'm trying to make is that hotstuff isn't the same thing as not-hot wetstuff or hot hardstuff. The rules are different in this theoretical world, which is NOT Earth circa 2017.

Please communicate a bit more clearly, I'm not a huge fan of arguing with obtuse angles on a German tapestry website.

The way I've always seen stuff like this dealt with is by treating areas of overlap as a combination of the involved elements. For instance, lava is the mixture of earth and fire, steam is water and fire, mud or slime is water and earth, etc. I also often see cold as within the domain of air, so stuff like ice could be air and water.

It's probably better to try to address these issues by explaining them in a more robust magical/elemental system than by attempting to reconcile magic with real world physics.

What is this "evaporative cooling" and "internal friction" you speak of? They do not exist in my world.

Then in which case you're dealing with non water and non earth matter.

So yes, arbitrary heating and cooling makes sense.

Then what.
Is the point.
Of calling fire.
A distinct element.

So the setting can have pyromaniacal baddies.

All bending is essentially the samething, the lion turtle said so.

moving rocks, water and creating fire all make air currents, whats the point of air bending being a distinct element

Wasn't turning rock into lava the result of having a fireperson and a rockperson in your immediate ancestry?

Because the Greeks believed it to be a tangible material. And it's fun to play along with that as we follow their model.

Avatar is an interesting mix of great ideas and terrible ideas.

Awful character designs. Fun party dynamics.
Interesting magic system. Retarded magical philosophy.
Cliche story and world. Self-aware humor.
Iroh. Iroh post-Mako.

It's a series that makes me question where did all this shit come from, like there was a good series but someone kept dripping shit into it.

>ITT: Veeky Forums babysits and autist

What's preventing them from using air magic to make a ball of air so hot it emits light, causes injuries identical to fire, and ignites flammable materials on its own, besides "muh Greeks"?

Come to think of it, a magic system where you have to specialize in properties of matter such as hotness, hardness, heavyness, etc., rather than a type of matter, is starting to sound interesting to me.

>Wouldn't it make more sense, in a completely new homebrew setting, to classify the ability to create fireballs as a subset of elemental air control?
It wouldn't make any more or less sense than any other setting's rules (so long as they are internally consistent within the setting itself).

We know that there are universal fundamental rules and properties and states of matter and energy--but in such a different setting and worldview that's not usually the case. The elements are themselves fundamental forces, with esoteric or even arbitrary properties, rather than being a product of fundamental.

TL;DR: What and said.

Hypothetically but it isn't confirmed in as many words, at least as far as I'm aware. At one point Toph mentions that it's a very rare ability, and implies that it's rarer than metalbending, but as far as I know that's all that's said.

I like the idea that only people with earth/fire nation blood simultaneously can lavabend, though, it'd explain why Bolin could do it.

Heated Gas =/= Fire
Heat can make a gas ignite, releasing pure energy, fire.
Fire magic is the control of free energy, and in most settings its easiest to just burn air because its everywhere.

So you'll shut the fuck up.

I completely agree with this as a problem... my current game has 5 chosen people- Air, Water, Fire, Earth, and "aether" (Magic). Magic guy has no clue what the fuck to do with his element and can mostly just lock down spellcasters (which is admittedly useful) but whenever any of us mess with the 'aether' of our elements he's like...isn't aether my thing? And I can freeze shit with water but I was thinking the fire chick could use her ability to reduce temperatures as well maybe? Nope, she can exclusively raise temperatures. I get like a bonus dominion over cold, I guess. Lucky me.

Did the thread last week ever figure out what the best system for a game in the Avatar universe would be?

Then they're doing a rotten job of it, as you can see.

I like how exalted throws lightning and cold into air

>I change the temperature of water. That's water magic.
>I change the temperature of earth. That's earth magic.
>I change the temperature of air. That's fire magic??

No, you don't get it. A decent water mage can make ice and steam. A specialized earth bender can make lava. ANY pyromancer can do all of those things and more.

Fire, due to being energy gives you the most versatility.

Also lightning

Crack n snapple, breakfast of champions!

>awful character designs
>literally the entire Fire Nation for starters

Fight me.

I don't think you actually understand what fire is.

Shit, that belief persisted well into the 18th century.

People kept looking for caloric and shit, assuming it to be a fluid that acted like the Higgs Boson of temperature.

More to the point, the classical elements were NOT just materials you see and shit: They were assumed to be the absolute pure essence of all other materials, the building blocks of everything else. OF COURSE tepid water had some fire in it: That's why it's warmer than cold water!

Your understanding of magic as being "Controlling a single element" is flawed. No philosophers of the time would have believed such a thing was possible with raw materials, unless you had some freakishly powerful shit around.

you can change the state of something without changing its temperature, waterbenders don't necessarily have to heat up or cool down water to change its state

So you're just complaining that (more or less) classical elements don't make sense from a current-day point of view?

>OF COURSE tepid water had some fire in it: That's why it's warmer than cold water!
Then how can a water mage, who only controls water and not fire at all, make water colder?

>Do not talk about politics here.
>Do not assume I am only referring to the Avatar setting, because I'm not, I'm referring to a fantasy trope in general.
>Notice how I did not mention molecules in this post, except just now to clarify that I did not mention them.

????????
This sounds a bit buttblasted for Veeky Forums's usual creativity threads

>deliberately defines an unbalanced system
>why is it so unfair guys?

If you have a particular we can debate it. Fuck off with this bs.

Pretty sure he's talking specifically about Avatar (though I haven't heard about the "Earthbenders making lava" thing)

Metal falls under earth, Toph earthbends metal and goes on to found a school based around teaching people how to do that.

You had a completely shittily thought out premise, and surprise surprise you had a problem with it. It looks like an asian system so take cues from one of those. Metal/void/lightning are all workable. Or maybe just throw in some shit that isn't classical elements, like divination or force.

She actually bends the impurities within the metal. Purified metals can not be manipulated with earthbending.

> the Earthbenders making lava thing
It comes up in the Korra stuff, which does a great job of bastardising so many of the ideas that governed the original TLA series.

You sure that isn't just earthbenders dipping into fire? I'm not too familiar with the series but I thought having more than one element was a thing, just that the avatar only could master all four.

There are two known characters in the series that can do it, one is known to have an earthbender father and firebender mother, the other has unknown lineage. The thing is neither of them appear to be double dipping, they can't do any actual firebending, they can just manipulate rock in (and into) its molten form, it's just a highly specialised form of earthbending. I think, but can't confirm, that it's been canonically stated that people other than the Avatar can only ever truly learn one element, though it's possible to adopt philosophies from other bending cultures to use your own element in a different way, such as Iroh redirecting lightning using water tribe philosophy.

>Korra is the first who handled Lava as earth
Not really.
>bastardising so many of the ideas that governed the original TLA series
Cry some more bitch.
It's not like TLA pulled its own new bending shit out of their asses.

I'm not going to deny that I'm salty about the direction that LoK took, I'm just going to point out that I said that lavabending comes up first in the Korra series, not that Korra the character was the first to do it.

I only recently got around to seasons 3+ or LoK, this salt is still relatively fresh to me. The biggest issue is that LoK seems to be universally praised but subjectively so much worse than the original series.

Yes, I am aware that it is a children's show,

A fire mage can put heat into or pull it out of just about anything. However, fire doesn't normally exist inside stone or water so you can't do a flashy combustion reaction. On the flip side, you can't really control a substance with fire element.

What exactly are your gripes with it?

Huh. Might be a case of *reaching" one element from another. Or whatever. Is the fire element actually limited enough there to earn OPs asspain?

Nice quads, man.

Oh wow, that's a new mistake for me.

*" indeed.

>fire doesn't normally exist inside stone or water
>OF COURSE tepid water had some fire in it

It's just like Lightning being Firebending inspired by Waterbending, Bolin having both blood, being raised by a mixed family and being a mix of earth and fire personnality wise probably help him but he's not some kind of partial doublebender.

Energybending comes from nowhere and is used as Deus Ex Machina but it makes sense even if it's deeply western as a concept. (Basically Aether)

Purified metals cannot be manipulated with earthbending because they are too much refined, but they are still not a new element

>Energybending comes from nowhere and is used as Deus Ex Machina but it makes sense even if it's deeply western as a concept. (Basically Aether)
We also had Bloodbending, sunbending, metalbending, mindbending and mudbending.
Why are people triggered by lava bending?

I think my biggest issue can be summed up by a Tenzin quote from the last episode, I'm paraphrasing, but the gist is, "You've accomplished more in three years than most avatars achieve in a lifetime". The pacing is terrible, the characters lack any kind of depth, things that were considered techniques only masters could pull off ~50 years ago are suddenly used by every common joe, it just felt more style over substance, and fell flat for me because of it.

Like I've mentioned above, it's possibly a lineage thing, possibly just an innate thing only a select few can do. Also mentioned above is the fact that fire in the Avatar universe is the only element that can be created from nothing (though apparently it's difficult to create in colder temperatures), which in itself is an advantage. I'm no physicist, and won't pretend to be, but fire is less 'heat' and more 'pure energy' in the Avatar setting, hence advanced firebenders being able to create lightning.

Honestly I'm more triggered by how common metalbending is than the fact that lavabending exists.

op, think of it like this. temperature increases when particles are excited, as in molecules moving faster. a water bender can excite or calm down water molecules to change its state, same with earth and air. fire, however, has the ability to incite chemical reactions between various molecules to release high amounts of energy, in the form of heat, light, and in some cases, electricity. they act as catalysts, or reactors that generate energy, instead of being able to manipulate specific molecules.

that being said, it is all based on a very archaic and non-scientific model, so, maybe don't worry about it as much.

That depends on where magic comes from. HOW is he controlling the water? If you don't have a mechanism for it, it's quite literally magic, and nobody has to explain shit.

Assuming there are mages for the four classical elements, and they can do all the shit you've mentioned, I think the obvious conclusion is that they're WRONG about the philosophical underpinnings of their art. The water mages control water because water control is what they study in mage school. They can't also learn to control earth, because the earth mages (like all mages) are an insular group who don't want to share their ancient secrets with slimy water mages. And the water mages don't really believe the earth mages know what they're doing. The elemental schools teach contradictory things, and once you have attained the level of deep spiritual understanding of water required for any of the fancier magic, it's very difficult to move on to other fields that blatantly violate the fundamental assumptions of your own.

Ultimately, the four (or five) elemental schools are just different approaches to common mastery over matter. The apparent effects are different because the practitioners have different mindsets, and believe different things to be possible. A magician can master more than one element, but it takes exceptional intelligence and drive, much like mastering more than one field of real-world science. And most available teachers have superstitions about interdisciplinary magic.

So, plasmabending?

More or less, yeah.

>Why are people triggered by lava bending?
Mostly because they don't know how it works. See, what your doing is grinding rocks together until the friction creates enough heat to liquify them.

As I understand it, it's more an obscure technique rather than a talent.
.
...Actually, now that I think of it bending could be a wide range of abilities with a set of common talents. For example, lava benders and metal benders are actually two seperate things but they can both bend earth.

> As I understand it, [metalbending] is more an obscure technique rather than a talent

If that were the case, it wouldn't explain why Bolin was never able to do it, even after being instructed by one of the Bei Fongs, considered the masters of metalbending.

> ...Actually, now that I think of it bending could be a wide range of abilities with a set of common talents. For example, lava benders and metal benders are actually two seperate things but they can both bend earth.

I like this train of thought, it'd help to explain where combustion benders come from.

Airbending can't heat up air, or at least I can't remember an example of an Airbender doing so. So if you really want to keep with the "take heat or give heat", then Airbenders are the takers of heat, Firebenders add heat.

Maybe each school think it's element is above the three others or even their souce ? greek philosophical schools style ?

>Mostly because they don't know how it works. See, what your doing is grinding rocks together until the friction creates enough heat to liquify them.
Compared to lightning that you just shoot out of your finger instead of manipulating clouds?

Lavabending does actually appear in Avatar; Roku bends it back into a volcano, and I believe we also see a brief scene of a fire nation Avatar making a volcano erupt. LoK is, however, the first use of lavabending by a non-Avatar.

Didn't Sozin bend lava alongside Roku?

Partially a technique, partially a matter of perception and mindset, it seems. Same thing with lightning (incidentally also never stated to be a masters-only thing, but appears to have been a secret of the Fire Lord's family).
Bolin simply might not have the personality or worldview to make metalbending work. Both him and chill-enemy-guy can lavabend, though, and they exhibit similarities in personality as well. Maybe there's some other aspect of talent for it in there, maybe there's some genetic factor to it, but I think a large part of it is just that he's a kind of person who can bend lava but not metal.

Fire is a chemical reaction where matter reacts with oxygen, releasing energy in the process, creating heat, light and some sound as well.
So someone who can control fire should thus be able to control oxidization of materials.
Being able to make something catch fire or in case of some metals, make them rust.

Lightning makes sense if firebending is more energy bending.

>Didn't Sozin bend lava alongside Roku?
He pulled heat out of lava but didn't move the lava it'self.

That explains it, I've yet to watch any of Korra.

Remember, metalbending is pretty much solely done by Republic City police earthbenders because Toph was originally the first chief of police for the city and taught her technique to them. It makes vertical movement a hell of a lot easier since air benders were practically nonexistent at the time.

Toph has maintained all along that anyone (who is an earthbender) can learn it, too.

Lightning bending is a very difficult technique that requires and incredible degree of inner calm to pull off-- Ozai and Azula pull it off by having the unnatural calm of sociopaths, while Iroh has worked a long time to master his inner demons.

The fifth element is __BOO!__

What if instead of Fire, Earth, Water and Air majicks we had Strong, Weak, Magnetic, Gravity, Charge and Strangeness majicks

...

Yes, exactly. The whole "academic feud about whose theory of magic is correct" thing isn't anything new, but I like it.

Bonus points for making the various arcane theories compatible with the modern atomic model of matter. The most learned among earth elementalists know that everything is ultimately composed of the same type of stuff, tiny specks of primal matter clumped together in different configurations. Air elementalists know that these supposed "earth particles", if they exist, are so tiny and far apart that all reality is really composed of empty space. Fire elementalists know all there is to know about thermal energy. Maybe even the matter-energy equivalency, though any ability to actually use that would be OP as fuck.
I guess the water guys can take a more abstract route, focusing flows or something. Any flux of matter or energy can basically be likened to a river, right?

It requires inner calm, but I don't think it's to such an extreme degree. Zuko couldn't do it, but that really doesn't really say anything about the lower bound on how calm you have to be.
It's also clear since the first show that you don't have to maintain that state to be able to keep doing it, as Azula does it with ease while mentally and emotionally falling apart.

>strong elementalist
>at-will nuclear explosions

>gravitation elementalist
>levitate mountains

>electromagnetic elementalist
>near-complete control over matter

>weak elementalist
>something something beta decay

I'm not sure if this system is entirely balanced.

Look, if your character pick Weak majicks over Strong majicks he deserves to get the shit jobs like looking after internet nerds.

Each element is an aspect of a shattered Godhead, and is defined by how "solid" it is.

>Light (Strongest when "pure")
>Fire
>Air/Wind
>Balance/Neutrality (The theoretical strongest one however hasn't been empirically proven to exist. Is theorized to be the original form of the godhead.)
>Water/Ice
>Earth/Stone
>Dark (In this case "dark" akin to a black hole- grows more powerful as it pulls stuff in)

And somewhat outside the circle
>Lightning, is an element however scholars argue about where it goes on the table
>Void, the flip side to Neutrality. Tied for being the potential most powerful, however is still only a theory as people who look too much into it have a habit of going mad and/or comatose. Is used by eldritch abominations

That sounds way too scientific for a fantasy setting. I would prefer to keep magic rooted in pre-nuclear understanding of physics.

How about a magic system where you have to specialize in properties of matter such as hotness, hardness, heavyness, etc., rather than a type of matter?

>he hasn't based his 'zards of discworld
Clearly the best way of doing it is to have the older wizards use the elements of Earth, Fire, Water and Air, and the younger Wizards use

A Fire/heat manipulator would have control over the temperature in everyone else's element too.

Fireballs are just their most accessible combat use.

They can make lava, but not control it, they can make ice, but not control it. Try to block them with ice, no more ice.

No, you can't apply Kelvins to it.
Because they use the Antuon scale. Named after glass-smith Antuon who found that when a partiular alchemical solution is poured into a thin glass pipette which is then sealed at both ends, it'll raise and lower gradually with the changing heat of the day. He called these things a Day-heat Ruler.
One Antuon is a brisk night, requiring two pleated quilts for comfort.
At the other end of the scale is forty seven Antuons and three of seven seeds.
This is the heat of a plate of metal that is painful to the touch but will not cause permenent injury or scars.
Antuon felt that having the scale run any higher or lower would encourage willful and inappropriate behaviour that may result in injury or possibly death as owners of Day-heat Rulers wished to see if it would measure such bohemian ranges.

However, if Kelvin has ideas of his own towards the nature of measuring the length of heat, Antuon would be more then happy to discuss it with him.
Antuon can be found in his glass-smithy morn till tea most days.

This is go-to tempreture scale in DnD