Thoughts about "Iron Rot"

[kazimmoinuddin]

How exactly do they get metal for their needs? Trees I can understand can be harvested even if the process is risky, but how can they ever mine in safety. The surface is mist covered and dangerous, so how would they find new mines to suit their needs. Can mines be run for centuries without playing out.

[Sully]

How exactly do they get metal for their needs? Trees I can understand can be harvested even if the process is risky, but how can they ever mine in safety. The surface is mist covered and dangerous, so how would they find new mines to suit their needs. Can mines be run for centuries without playing out.

Depends on how much energy you have and what you're mining(you can use explosives to get at ore, but not a good idea with coal, for instance. )  But sure, a large bit of ore could handle mining for centuries.

[kazimmoinuddin]

Do we know how many spires these mines are said to be supplying, I can under stand limited mining being acceptable for a few, but for larger numbers a powerful monopoly would be formed.

[KevinSig]

How exactly do they get metal for their needs? Trees I can understand can be harvested even if the process is risky, but how can they ever mine in safety. The surface is mist covered and dangerous, so how would they find new mines to suit their needs. Can mines be run for centuries without playing out.

I think that's answered in Grimm's discussion of what to do with the crew of the Auroran vessel.  I forget what they were called (base of the Spire?), but Grimm strongly advocated that the crew not be sent to what I assumed were the mines.  I might be wrong on my assumption, but it at least seemed likely from my reading.

[Quantus]

I think that's answered in Grimm's discussion of what to do with the crew of the Auroran vessel.  I forget what they were called (base of the Spire?), but Grimm strongly advocated that the crew not be sent to what I assumed were the mines.  I might be wrong on my assumption, but it at least seemed likely from my reading.

That was my thought at well. He said they'd be "set to work at the base of the spire" which I took to mean a forced labor detail that does all the various things they cannot do/get from the spire, ie resource gathering like wood and ore.  Food plants are grown hydroponically, but wood trees at least are surface-grown

[kazimmoinuddin]

I doubt they mine near or underneath a spire, they can't risk messing with the foundations. And further away from the spire the more dangerous it is to min it.

[Quantus]

I doubt they mine near or underneath a spire, they can't risk messing with the foundations. And further away from the spire the more dangerous it is to min it.

Certainly possible, though between the mythic strength of Spirestone and the exhaustively planned self-supporting habitat, I think it's possible that they accounted for mining operations in their design.  I mean, the spires are squat structures, for all their size, so it would take a significant loss of foundation to bring it down.  And that would be with normal/natural materials, with spirestone it's easily possible that the spire could theoretically support itself from it's edges or by engineered support columns/smaller regions designated off-limits for mining. 

[knnn]

Actually, now that I think of it, I wonder if spires are perfectly flat.  Or rather, they cannot be perfectly flat, but is the incline noticeable?

[Quantus]

Actually, now that I think of it, I wonder if spires are perfectly flat.  Or rather, they cannot be perfectly flat, but is the incline noticeable?

What do you mean?  A slope to the sides? or a sloped roof?

[Sully]

What do you mean?  A slope to the sides? or a sloped roof?

It's not going to have a perfectly flat floor.

[Quantus]

It's not going to have a perfectly flat floor.

Oh, ok.   Umm, why not?

[knnn]

Because nothing is perfectly flat even in our world -- there's always a small incline.  It might not be detectable without instruments, but it will be there.  Consider also that even if the original builders settled the spires perfectly upright, building tend to sinks and the earth moves.  Unless there's some self-correcting mechanism, there's no way it would remain perfectly level.

Note also that all building tend to sway (in wind, minor earthquakes, etc.).   Yes, spirestone is incredibly strong and a spire is relatively short and squat, but it's physically impossible for anything to be 100% rigid.  It doesn't matter how tough it was built, something 2 miles high is going to be moving, possibly vibrating back and forth as the waves move up and down the spire.

[Brightbane]

Because nothing is perfectly flat even in our world -- there's always a small incline.  It might not be detectable without instruments, but it will be there.  Consider also that even if the original builders settled the spires perfectly upright, building tend to sinks and the earth moves.  Unless there's some self-correcting mechanism, there's no way it would remain perfectly level.

Note also that all building tend to sway (in wind, minor earthquakes, etc.).   Yes, spirestone is incredibly strong and a spire is relatively short and squat, but it's physically impossible for anything to be 100% rigid.  It doesn't matter how tough it was built, something 2 miles high is going to be moving, possibly vibrating back and forth as the waves move up and down the spire.

It's also physically impossible for wooden ships to float through the air due to the powers of magic crystals, but I don't see you complaining about that....

[kazimmoinuddin]

Could it be possible the spires absorbs the kinetic energy from vibration and use it to power some of its features?

[knnn]

It's also physically impossible for wooden ships to float through the air due to the powers of magic crystals, but I don't see you complaining about that....

I don't think I consider it a complaint as much as an observation, esp. since I don't believe this is contradicted by anything in the text. 

As to your point, sure, Jim can invent any magic/physics rules he wants, but the general way these things go is that you introduce very few changes to the universe and then assume everything else is consistent.  So yes, magic crystals, but gravity still works, electricity needs to be conducted, material still have finite tensile strength and the Right Hand Rule is in effect until we see explicitly otherwise.

To put it another way, there is a range of fantasy type works ranging from the very "soft" fantasy of Harry Potter where one doesn't look to carefully at inconsistencies to the "hard" ones of Alera and (as far as we have seen) The Cinder Spires where except for a few stated rule changes, everything can be derived logically.   Infinitely hard spirestone would simply be adding yet another technical complication that at the moment seems unwarranted.  That's not to say that a future revelation that spirestone is actually a sort of magical forcecfield that doesn't bend couldn't be in the works, just that it doesn't seems necessary.