Ephemera Book

I have seen... so much. I have... experienced... annihilation and deconstruction and reconstruction. I have seen the atoms of the world screaming as they were inverted and subverted and demoted to energy. I have seen I have seen I have sget stick bugged lmao

Modified Slates

I've designed a couple types of slate to be used in spell circles. While they don't provide any groundbreaking new functionality, they can be nice to have.

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Rooted Slate

Works just like a normal slate, but is capable of sending the media wave into the block it is placed on.

Crafted with a normal slate and a stonecutter.

Looks just like a normal slate, but can't direct a media wave at all. Cannot be written to.

A list of all the patterns I've discovered, as well as what they do.

Iota Hashing

I've discovered a curious pattern which scrambles an iota into an unreadable mess. However, unlike Garbage iotas, this mess still contains data, and running the same iota through the pattern will always produce the same mess (known as a hash). While it is not possible to recover an iota from a hash, it can be quite useful for comparisons in situations where I cannot save the unaltered iota.

Hashing Purification (any → hash)

Accepts any iota, and converts it into its hashed form.

Misc. Ephemera Patterns

I've found a couple patterns designed to interact with item frames. Nothing fancy, but they're nice utility for things like controlling my spell circles.

Additionally, it seems Sorter's Purification works on them just fine, so my attempts to find a dedicated frame-item pattern were pointless.

Decorator's Prfn. (item frame → number)

Accepts an item frame entity, and returns its rotation, from 0 to 7.

Decorator's Gambit (item frame, number →)

Accepts an item frame entity and an integer from 0 to 7, and sets its rotation to the number. Costs a negligible amount of media.

Scout's Exaltation ([type], vec, vec → entity | NULL)

As Scout's Distillation, but also accepts a list of entity type iotas. Any entity whose type is not present in the list will be ignored. Costs an amount of media slightly less negligible than that of the aforementioned pattern.

Entropy Reflection II (→ num)

Returns a random number between 0 and 1, with a gaussian distribution.

Status Iotas

These patterns work with a type of iota that represents lingering effects on a creature, which can allow me to asses the state of a creature more thoroughly than with only Nurse's Purification.
While my research suggests that status iotas representing instantaneous effects are possible, they would be very difficult to obtain, and I cannot think of any use case for them at the moment.

Apothecary's Prfn. (entity → [status])

Accepts a living entity, and returns a list of status iotas representing all effects on the target.

Apothecary's Prfn. II (status → num)

Accepts a status effect type, and returns a number based on whether the effect is likely to be helpful, harmful, or neutral to a creature.

Pharmacist's Dstln. (entity, status → num)

Accepts an entity and a status effect type, and returns the effect on the target's duration in seconds.

Pharmacist's Distillation II (entity, status → num)

Accepts an entity and a status effect type, and returns the effect on the target's potency.

Entity Distillation: Status (status, vector → entity | NULL)

Accepts a status effect type and a vector, and returns an entity at that position which has that effect.

Zone Exltn.: Status (status, vec, num → [entity])

Accepts a status effect type, a vector, and a number (n), and returns a list of entities within radius n of the vector which have that effect.

Zone Exltn.: Not-Status (status, vec, num → [entity])

Accepts a status effect type, a vector, and a number (n), and returns a list of entities within radius n of the vector which do not have that effect.

Ablation Purification (entity → num)

Accepts a living entity, and returns how much damage it can Absorb before its health is affected.

Cleanse Status (entity, status →)

Accepts an entity and a status effect type, and removes that status effect from the entity. Cost is based on the effect's innate harmfulness, its potency, and its remaining duration.

Costs more if attempting to remove a positive effect from an entity other than myself.

All of the patterns which deal with a specific status effect on an entity have the side effect that if the entity does not currently have the specified effect, the pattern will fail and inflict nausea upon me.

Patterns and actions that perform a magical effect on the world.

Externalize Pigment

Externalize Pigment (Vector, itemtype →)

Accepts a vector and an itemtype representing a pigment. Costs a negligible amount of media if targeting my own block, or 1 Amethyst Dust if not.

Sets the colors of the conjured block corresponding to the vector to the colorset represented by the passed pigment, or mine if passed a NULL iota.

Not guaranteed to work with unconventional forms of conjured matter.

Feels strangely celebratory, as if something similar was once used in grand festivals where teams would splatter their colors all over their opponents' territory in a bid for ideological dominance.

Messaging

Postman's Gambit (Player, any →)

Accepts a player and any iota less than 256 characters long, and shows that iota to them as if they had cast Reveal, also telling them who sent the message. Cost is inversely proportional to the length of time since they were last targeted by this spell.

Postage Purification (Player → num)

Accepts a player and returns how much amethyst dust it would cost to send them a message via Postman's Gambit, between 1/10 of a dust and 10 dust.

Postman's Gambit II

Resets the cost of sending me a message via Postman's Gambit back to 1/10 of a dust. Costs 1/10 of a dust.

Particle Burst

Particle Burst (vec, vec, num, num →)

Accepts two vectors and two numbers, and uses them to define a burst of particles. Costs a negligible amount of media.

The first vector determines the burst's origin position, and the second vector determines its direction and speed. The first number determines the scale of random numbers added to each position component, and the second does the same for the direction vector.

Mod author's note for Forge users: This spell does not work on Forge. I do not know why. I've set the cost on Forge to zero so at least it won't waste media. Sorry.

I'll try to get it working eventually.

Link Amenities

I've devised a suite of patterns (plus a couple of blocks) to make links a bit more useful for things other than data transmission and media sharing.

Note that the patterns which fetch information about the network make no promises regarding whether returned linkables are within ambit.

Network Dstln. (linkable, num → [linkable])

Scans the link network connected to the input linkable up to a recursion depth equal to the input number (max 32), and returns a list of all connected linkables. Costs a negligible amount of media.

Network Gateway (entity, linkable, vec →)

Accepts an entity to teleport, a linkable to use for access to its network, and a destination. If the entity is within 8 blocks of the linkable, and there is a network node within 4 blocks of the destination, the entity will be teleported. Cost varies based on what entity is teleported.

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Network Gateway Probe

Outputs a brief redstone signal when an adjacent relay is used as the output for a casting of Network Gateway.

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Network Routing Index

When rclicked with a focus in the main hand, attempts to store its iota in the block. When the focus is in the offhand, writes the stored iota to the focus.

Routing Dstln. (linkable, iota → vec)

Accepts a linkable to use for network access, and any iota. If a relay connected to the network has an adjacent Network Routing Index with the same iota, returns that relay's position. Costs half an amethyst dust.

The spells catalogued here are purported to be of legendary difficulty and power. They seem to have been recorded only sparsely (for good reason, the texts claim). It's probably just the hogwash of extinct traditionalists, though-- a pattern's a pattern. What could possibly go wrong?

Induce Mending

Induce Mending (entity →)

Accepts a raw media item on the ground, and attempts to use it to repair a tool in my other hand.

Generally only works on items enchanted with Mending, which are already damaged. Restores twenty points of damage for each amethyst dust's worth of media.

Menderbug's Rfln. (→ num)

Returns how many times the item in my other hand can be used without breaking, durability-manipulating effects notwithstanding.

Menderbug's Rfln. II (→ num)

As previous, targeting the item in the hand I'm casting this with. Most useful with delayed casts of one form or another.

Instant Aegis

I've discovered a rather interesting spell, capable of producing a defensive media barrier that can match and even exceed the protective abilities of many kinds of conventional armor. It can even apply a wide array of persistent effects to the wearer, allowing for incredible versatility.

Instant Aegis (entity, num, num, status, num →)

Accepts a player to grant the armor to, the durability of the armor, the protection value of the armor (max 10), a status effect to apply, and that effect's level. The latter two can be replaced with any non-status iota to ignore them.

Of course, this barrier is by no means indestructible, and its durability decays steadily in addition to any damage it takes from hits. The base rate of this decay can be described as one "point" per second, plus additional points equal to the squared strength of any effect imbued into it. Additionally, it will disappear instantly if removed from the wearer, so there is no way to repair it, short of recasting the spell to overwrite its current state.

The media cost for this spell is a bit complicated: A base of one amethyst dust per 60 durability, multiplied by the armor's protection value raised to the power of 1.5, times the level+1 of any status effect. Thus, producing no-status strength 10 armor with one minute's worth of durability costs ~31.5 dust. Adding Regeneration 2 increases that media cost to ~94.5 dust, and causes it to only last 36 seconds.

This explanation assumes I am wearing no other armor, in practice the cost can be reduced to as little as 25% of that formula's output if all but one of my armor slots is already occupied by more conventional armor.

Invisibility

Hidden Sun's Zenith (entity, num →)

Functions just like the normal Zeniths, applying Invisibility. Costs one amethyst dust per three seconds.

This is the online version of the Ephemera documentation.

The Great Work

Modified Slates

Rooted Slate

Inert Slate

Patterns

Iota Hashing

Hashing Purification (any → hash)

Misc. Ephemera Patterns

Decorator's Prfn. (item frame → number)

Decorator's Gambit (item frame, number →)

Scout's Exaltation ([type], vec, vec → entity | NULL)

Entropy Reflection II (→ num)

Status Iotas

Apothecary's Prfn. (entity → [status])

Apothecary's Prfn. II (status → num)

Pharmacist's Dstln. (entity, status → num)

Pharmacist's Distillation II (entity, status → num)

Entity Distillation: Status (status, vector → entity | NULL)

Zone Exltn.: Status (status, vec, num → [entity])

Zone Exltn.: Not-Status (status, vec, num → [entity])

Ablation Purification (entity → num)

Cleanse Status (entity, status →)

Spells

Externalize Pigment

Externalize Pigment (Vector, itemtype →)

Messaging

Postman's Gambit (Player, any →)

Postage Purification (Player → num)

Postman's Gambit II

Particle Burst

Particle Burst (vec, vec, num, num →)

Link Amenities

Network Dstln. (linkable, num → [linkable])

Network Gateway (entity, linkable, vec →)

Network Gateway Probe

Network Routing Index

Routing Dstln. (linkable, iota → vec)

Great Spells

Induce Mending

Induce Mending (entity →)

Menderbug's Rfln. (→ num)

Menderbug's Rfln. II (→ num)

Instant Aegis

Instant Aegis (entity, num, num, status, num →)

Invisibility

Hidden Sun's Zenith (entity, num →)