I worked for TSAB as a consultant for about six months. There is a lot that I can't put in print at this time, as there are people down the Well that I care about. There are a few things that I can say that are currently public knowledge, that I learned about Handwavium.
The first thing I learned was that if you have some Handwavium you can make more, you just have to feed it and give it time to grow. This is not as easy as it sounds, Handwavium is a finicky eater. What it will eat, and what it likes to eat are often two different things, and these things are different for every Fen that uses the stuff.
For me, it will eat unflavored gellatine, sugar, and water, and it will double it's working volume every couple of days. If I add a flavoring it will double every day. I have found that I can get Handwavium to double it's working volume in 16 hours if I use lime flavoring, and add Sillica and assorted metal oxides. If I use alcohol in the place of water the amount of time doubles, except if I use a good Whiskey or Vodka. It also seems to like detergents, lubricants, and adhesives.
If you have one state of Handwavium you can convert it to another. You can go from a solid to near water like liquid and any consistancy in between. Again how you do this will vary from person to person.
The Second thing I learned was that if you left it completely alone Handwavium will go into a Dormant mode. To do this you have to keep it out of the light, and keep people away from it (a minimum of twenty meters distance). To reactivate it you have to feed it again.
When applying the stuff we learned a couple of more things.
Handwavium feeds on Ideas. You can not just spray the stuff on to a random object and walk away. You need a sentient mind nearby for it to do what it does, specificly said mind needs to have an clear intent when you begin the application. A focussed attention is important as well.
However even with a clear intent and a sharply focussed attention Handwavium will generate random side affects.
Handwavium needs something to work with, you can't just pour the stuff into a bowl and think at it. ... Well, you can, but you'll just end up with an improved bowl. In fact the more details in the starting model before application the better. As an example, we had a rather intelligent teenage girl that made a computer by using a collated stack of printouts of printed circuit illustrations that she had proffessionally hardbound in the size of a Colledge Electronics Engineering text book. As a controll we applied Handwavium to an unmodified blank book and all we got was a "Word Processor" that would convert even the worst hand writing into readable block print.
Handwavium seems to go out of it's way to preserve life. While it will not directly replace missing pieces of a body, it will modiffy and preserve living pieces so that they can retain function. It will even modiffy and enhance Artificial replacements to be as fully functional as, or better than the origional part. You can us it to graft on and grow living tissues form another source. You can even use it "graft on" electronic devices to biological ones.
When mixing Handwavium and life forms you do need to use extreme care, as unintended side effects will occur. One of our Bio-researchers accidently merged herself with a white lab-mouse on a genetic level. She calls this process Biomodification.
This of course makes it exceedingly difficult to use Handwavium to directly build intenally lethal, ranged weapons. While you can apply it to an already existing weapon the best it will do is reduce the need of maintenace for said weapon, at worst it can render an existing weapon in-opperable. It will even render most explosives inert.
This does not mean that you can't build a weapon out of handwaved parts. Enhanced mellee weapons, stunners, paralyzers, and inhibitors of temporary nature are relatively easy, as they do not do direct damage to a person. Strangely enough if your design is weird or rediculouse enough, your weapon might work any ways.
It should be noted that Handwavium will enhance tools, Hammers will hit harder, sharp edges will be even sharper and so on. As an example, I have what used to be butane soldering torch that now produces a flame that varies in power from "Toast a Marshmallow" to "Burn a Hole Through Six Inches of Steel Plate", but even then it wont burn living flesh. (It will burn off clothing, and gloves, but not the flesh and bones beneath.)
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My Employment with TSAB officially ended when we called a convention on the east coast to cover an exchange of Notes and Ideas. After what happened, it is often reffered to as "That Con".
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The first thing I learned was that if you have some Handwavium you can make more, you just have to feed it and give it time to grow. This is not as easy as it sounds, Handwavium is a finicky eater. What it will eat, and what it likes to eat are often two different things, and these things are different for every Fen that uses the stuff.
For me, it will eat unflavored gellatine, sugar, and water, and it will double it's working volume every couple of days. If I add a flavoring it will double every day. I have found that I can get Handwavium to double it's working volume in 16 hours if I use lime flavoring, and add Sillica and assorted metal oxides. If I use alcohol in the place of water the amount of time doubles, except if I use a good Whiskey or Vodka. It also seems to like detergents, lubricants, and adhesives.
If you have one state of Handwavium you can convert it to another. You can go from a solid to near water like liquid and any consistancy in between. Again how you do this will vary from person to person.
The Second thing I learned was that if you left it completely alone Handwavium will go into a Dormant mode. To do this you have to keep it out of the light, and keep people away from it (a minimum of twenty meters distance). To reactivate it you have to feed it again.
When applying the stuff we learned a couple of more things.
Handwavium feeds on Ideas. You can not just spray the stuff on to a random object and walk away. You need a sentient mind nearby for it to do what it does, specificly said mind needs to have an clear intent when you begin the application. A focussed attention is important as well.
However even with a clear intent and a sharply focussed attention Handwavium will generate random side affects.
Handwavium needs something to work with, you can't just pour the stuff into a bowl and think at it. ... Well, you can, but you'll just end up with an improved bowl. In fact the more details in the starting model before application the better. As an example, we had a rather intelligent teenage girl that made a computer by using a collated stack of printouts of printed circuit illustrations that she had proffessionally hardbound in the size of a Colledge Electronics Engineering text book. As a controll we applied Handwavium to an unmodified blank book and all we got was a "Word Processor" that would convert even the worst hand writing into readable block print.
Handwavium seems to go out of it's way to preserve life. While it will not directly replace missing pieces of a body, it will modiffy and preserve living pieces so that they can retain function. It will even modiffy and enhance Artificial replacements to be as fully functional as, or better than the origional part. You can us it to graft on and grow living tissues form another source. You can even use it "graft on" electronic devices to biological ones.
When mixing Handwavium and life forms you do need to use extreme care, as unintended side effects will occur. One of our Bio-researchers accidently merged herself with a white lab-mouse on a genetic level. She calls this process Biomodification.
This of course makes it exceedingly difficult to use Handwavium to directly build intenally lethal, ranged weapons. While you can apply it to an already existing weapon the best it will do is reduce the need of maintenace for said weapon, at worst it can render an existing weapon in-opperable. It will even render most explosives inert.
This does not mean that you can't build a weapon out of handwaved parts. Enhanced mellee weapons, stunners, paralyzers, and inhibitors of temporary nature are relatively easy, as they do not do direct damage to a person. Strangely enough if your design is weird or rediculouse enough, your weapon might work any ways.
It should be noted that Handwavium will enhance tools, Hammers will hit harder, sharp edges will be even sharper and so on. As an example, I have what used to be butane soldering torch that now produces a flame that varies in power from "Toast a Marshmallow" to "Burn a Hole Through Six Inches of Steel Plate", but even then it wont burn living flesh. (It will burn off clothing, and gloves, but not the flesh and bones beneath.)
--
My Employment with TSAB officially ended when we called a convention on the east coast to cover an exchange of Notes and Ideas. After what happened, it is often reffered to as "That Con".
--