Selected Publications

Opinions, Comments, and Correspondences

• Skeptical Magus. Re: Two Years On, The Isle of Popkin Remains the Geographical Center of Noctilucine Research. Proceedings of the Trinational Society of Magi. (4763).

 

  To My Most Esteemed Fellow Magi. In their recent report on the proceedings of the Second Annual Symposium on Astromantic Investigations of the Noctilucine Solar and Associated Phenomena, Magisters Furby and Stunchplort marveled at the myriad ways in which the Isle of Popkin has remained absolutely crucial to studies of the so-called “Noctilucine solar” discovered thereupon. Indeed, given the reported difficulties in replicating the tithonographic apparati described in (Dawnbringer, 4761) using non-Popkinian volcanic substrate materials, the well-documented suitability of the Isle to observations of extraplanetary regions of the Prime Material as well as the four Planes Elemental, and the putative word of this Noctilucine solar itself, one might be induced credulously to exclaim — as Mgs. Furby and Stunchplort did exclaim — that “All Roads Lead to Popkin!” To which sentiment I must inject the query: “If all roads lead to Popkin, who crossed the roads first? The chicken or the egg?” I jest, of course, but to put my question with less jocularity, can a reasoning mind safely assume that Mg. Dawnbringer discovered these phenomena from the Isle of Popkin because the Isle of Popkin is somehow a geographical nexus for all these phenomena? Or, perhaps, might it not be the case that causality runs in another direction — could it be that Popkin remains so important to these studies because the phenomena being studied were “discovered” by an astromancer on that Isle? While I would not for a moment wish to impugn the competence or the integrity of Magister Dawnbringer or her institution, neither do I countenance the flagrant disembowelment of the ideals of scientific rigor by uncritical, guileless amplification of press releases. Your most humble colleague, friends, I remain, Skeptical Magus.

       

Astrometaphysics Research

(Astrometaphysics is the study of how magic and extraplanar influences interact with the natural rules that govern the workings of the Prime Material Plane on scales larger than a single world. Not to be confused with Astral Metaphysics, which is the study of how the Astral Plane works.) A lot of the earliest work in this field grew out of attempts to experimentally determine the spatial limits of spells (i.e., their ranges). Mages started realizing that certain spells and magical effects seemed to have no upper range limit, or at least one larger than the entire world, so they started testing how far things could be pushed. Some spells like Teleport have “soft” limits imposed by the risk of deadly mishaps as distance increases. Some, like Scrying, are limited by the need to have seen a location before to scry upon it.    

• Chungus Spondlespork. “Skimming”, Being a Proposed Method of Superluminal Cisplanar Translocation to Novel Destinations By Alternation of Pulsed Advanced Telescrying with Guided Teleportation. Metaphysical Review Letters 2. (4681).
• Ephraim Mountaintop and Dartagnan Summersbelly. An Advanced Astromantic Telescrying Technique Dramatically Increases Effective Spell Range Using Collimated Coherent Arcane Emissions. Annual Meeting of the Pan-Elvish Numinological Institute of Sciences. (4325).
• S Brejkfasaat, D Wilddown, and O Dawnbringer. Use of Coherent Negative Energy Improves Advanced Telescrying Precision Allowing Enhanced Tithonographic Communications. Astromancy Methods. (4762).

   


Arcanometry and Applied Divinoscopy Research

(These are pretty broadly defined fields of study, but in general they involve the use of various “Detect ___” type spells to determine the physical, chemical, and magical compositions and structures of things at varying scales.)

• There are a few old textbooks covering the historical attempts to map the relationship between the Material world and the other physical planes using ethereal seismography — measuring the time it takes signals sent through the Border Ethereal to “bounce back” from other planes, and how they are changed upon return.
• The oldest book, from nearly 2000 years ago, has a bookmark at a section discussing how “the pointe of clofest convergens to alle the Playnes Elemential appears as fome heretofore undifcovered locus ‘pon the Uncharted antipodean oceanes.”