Nanomachines, son

how do you stop an organism entirely composed of nanomachines that can shapeshift into various things, like hands turning into guns, but not grenades.
the organism can take the shape of a human being or something of the same size on average.

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youtu.be/n82pfo-LzXY
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chlorine_trifluoride
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EMP

Take the magnetron out of a commercial microwave, put it in a metal tube as a waveguide, and plug it into a car battery in your backpack.

Light those microscopic motherfuckers up.

Discover its killcode.

If the creator has no killcode, show him that still means nothing and hack it.
EMP can be resisted. But hacking will always be an option, no matter how many defenses the controller/machines have.

In addition to EMP, something that can disrupt the communication between the individual nanites.

Traditional anti nano weapons are EMP, microwave/maser weapons, Heat in large amounts, Cryo in large amounts, other nanomachines ect.
Depending on tech level of the nanomachines something simple as have a huge fan blow the nano dust away might work, or if its more grey goo scooping up the whole area and moving it to a containment/disposal area.
Super high tier nanomachines might as well be magic

take it to temperature extremes.
Extreme cold ala terminator 2 liquid nitrogen could concievably work since it will make any moving components more brittle, and circuits will develop stress fractures.

Extreme Heat cause duh

This of course does nothing against any dm fiat/ muh plot

A flamethrower

>t. pic related

...

I would also suggest a big electromagnet, in case said nanomachine does try to escape. It is then much more easier to deal with.

Yes.

This may or may not be true about my characters in sci-fi.

Heat. Nanites are basically just technological bacteria, and while they'd be more durable would be susceptible to the same things. You can burn them out.

I see that you all had the same ideas as me, a part from the MASER weapon. You see, I Will be the DM of that thing and I wanted to find a way to create challenges for it, without being too obvious about it, so EMP would be used just by few people that Know the guy. So I was just thinking about extreme fire/ice at first(because the setting also have Magic in it) and hacking attempts. If somebody else has some other ideas that would be as subtle I would like to hear it. (I also thought about acid and make it "drown" under lots of water.

This. If fire doesn't work make it hotter. There are few things in this world that can't be solved with liberal application of fire.

Fire, extreme cold, electrocution, ionising radiation, a computer virus, more nanomachines or detergent*, of course.

* Surfactants tend to gum up their little nanohands.

Appropriately designed chemicals that can bind to the nanomachines and either alter their structure or break them apart would be highly effective.

True nanoscale machines are really fancy molecules.

Find a way to suspend the nanobots in air or void, Via magic or magnets

I would do what proposed,i.e. i would poison them.

Explain

Think about why you shouldn't put metal in a microwave. Now apply that thought to that user's post.

Well, you can't shoot it in the head, but anything that affects the component nanobots will affect a structure composed of them. Heat, cold, surfactants, acid, current etc. I don't really know how you'd attacking one with an EMP device or a HERF weapon, though. IIRC, there are really two classes of EMP weapons: the non-nuclear kind, which achieve tight coupling with a target using a specific waveform, and the nuclear kind, which I think has a magnitude large enough to incapacitate electronic devices without the need for any particularly tight coupling. So we really want to know what nanobots use for antennas, and frankly I have no clue nanobot-sized antennas work. You might also be able to jam the nanobots so that they can't communicate positional information very well, leading them to generate malformed, nonfunctional structures.

Personally, I'd go with heat. Diamonds oxidize. Proteins lose their tertiary structures. You probably have a flamethrower on hand already and it's not a unitasker. Nice and straightforward.

Shit,i forgot the best option,Heat,EMP,mechanical shock,ionizing radiation and neutrons in a single package.
youtu.be/n82pfo-LzXY

You don't need to be too fancy about it—ozone or peroxide would work fine. This isn't like a drug, where you want some kind of very high specificity; this is a case where you can get away with using harsher chemistry.

Nanomachines are individually much too small to interact with microwaves though unless there is a molecular resonance or the like. And it cannot be assumed the macroscopic form they assemble into will be electrically conductive, metals are unlikely to be the basis of a nanomachine.

Why has nobody thought of asking it politely to stop? It might be friendly. L̢̎ͬͯ͛̃̚e̸͒ͦ̔ͨ̋ͫṭ͕͎͇̱̻ͭ̾̿͊ͨͅ'͝s̵͕͔͇͓̩ͫͬ̄ ̜̻̯ͯ̽͒ͫ̇ͭ̚ț͕͌ͨ̑̀a̝̫͈̘͓l̟͕̥̠̝̱̥͝k̺̜̰̞̳̝̟̏̍ ̸͎͇̉̓̓̃t͙͇̋͛͝ȯ̲͈̤͇ͣ̅̕ ̆̍̀i͚̗͙̹̻̗ͣͬ͜t̳̗͓ͮ͆͌̍̆̓,̓͗̉̐̑ ͖̇́͋̓̋o̕h̸̪̻̪̹̥̭̝ͩͧ͌̈ͦͩ ̮̰̺͎̩̹g̷o̮̯̘̝̹̮̝̎͡d̖̭̣͍ ̲̺̯̐̇͗̕m̨̞͕̝̝̗̼͇ͪ̀̓̄̽͊̋ỹ̬̝̰̎ͅ ̫͕̻̲ḩ̥̳̝́̐̎a̫̜̟̽͗ͯ̐ͦ͝n̡̬̬͔̹͚͗̐d͉̮s͕͛͡,͊ͯ ̷̣͕̖͙̗̠͚̏̃̇ͣ̑ͯ͐ŵ̟̬͎̝̿̉ͤ̋̑͡h͚̜͔̍͝a͙̱̟̖͟t̗̦͕̮̻͈̾̀̐'͎̰̞̈́̌͐ͤ͑s̥̪͕͎̮̪ͅ ̥̗̤̩̫̩̙̇ï̶̻̬͍̮̮̙̬̀ͬ̐̂t̷̖̪̪̪̺̮ͭ͌ ̡͇̯͇͖͗̔̏́̒d̡̳̰ͪ́̆̓o͍̭̓͐ͨ̎͛͡i̪̝̗̠͎̘͈ͮͣ

This is true. But I am trying not to prejudge what the nanomachines are actually like - it is not inconceivable they could have something akin to a viral envelope to protect the functional structure.

Amen Brother

They're eating her, and then they're going to eat me! Oh my goooooooooooooooooooodd!

If you're just looking for challenges for this thing to overcome while being used as a PC, physical damage would probably work at least a little.

If this thing saw an attack coming it could potentially shift some of it's nanobots to stop the thing without being damaged, but otherwise something like a bullet or sword would probably damage at least a few nanobots along the way. Same with explosives.

It would be very slow going, though, unless you had a ton of dudes all unloading into this thing.

Come to think of it, how well does this thing tolerate parts of it being removed? If you cut off one of its arms, would it be able to just reabsorb the nanobots through it's foot? What if the arm fell off a cliff?

If a chunk of it gets separated like that, and the rest gets destroyed, will it be able to reform from that chunk? What if the rest of it isn't destroyed, will there be 2 of it?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chlorine_trifluoride

rip the microscopic bastards apart at the chemical level. borg your way around basic chemistry motherfuckers.

microwave radiation works on polar molecules, they are way smaller than any nanomachine so size is not a factor in any way shape or form. it also has dick all to do with electrical conductivity. the waves impart molecular vibration in polar molecules by causing their poles to flip back and forth with the waves magnetic field. this movement generates heat via friction and imparts it to surrounding molecules by conduction. if any part of these micromachines contains polar molecules they Will interact with microwave radiation. they will build up heat and likely a charge due to friction creating a static charge. even if they are non-conductive, which is highly unlikely, heat will still build in the individual units. a DIY microwave gun may not be enough juice to fuck up a swarm but a large enough emiter could be a sound weapon. your statement is just ignorant of the physics involved.

Logic Bomb.

>an organism
>entirely composed of nanomachines
pick one

PC in OP obviously stole his AC from an SCE

Glue. They can't reconfigure if they're all stuck together.

A big magnet

This.

Melt them

Nuke it from orbit, it's the only way to be sure

That will depend on the setting, its cliches and internal technobabble. Nanotech with quantum impellers, von neumann capabilities, virus mimetics, nanite spores or working as memeplex vectors are quite deadly and difficult to conpletely eradicate. But if your rogue nanoswarm considers "guns" effective, it isn't anywhere near that level of advancement.

Realistically, nanomachines are sensitive to heat, because their tiny size prevents that they store or radiate it well. If they group together to do so, it ain't a nanomachine anymore, likely removing whatever advantage it had by being so.

So just kill it with fire.

Fire. All that delicate nanomachinery is almost certainly going to be fucked up by high temperatures. Lots of fiddly little arrangements of molecules to be kicked into more stable states or ruined by chemical reactions.

I-Isn't that sort of what we are?

Dance off

Well, we're specifically nanomachinery based on organic chemistry in an aqueous solution, which fictional nanomachines usually aren't (generally they go more for the Drexler-style teensy-tiny-gears-and-rods mechanosynthesis idea, although that looks a lot less plausible these days), and our individual cells aren't independently motile.

Depending on the exact nature of the nanomachines, you may be able to hack them.