Werewolves and silver bullets vs overwhelming force(and lack of science with RPGs)

[Elheru Aran]

On the topic of the One Ring, which has been done to death:

1. Yes, it's a problem of heat, partly.

There's a pile of quotes about the ring being destroyed by heat. I can trot them out later today if people really want. Everyone in the Council of Elrond talks about it as if it's a matter of heat, and even raise the topic of going to Valinor and getting Aulë to use his forge to melt it, which is again, discussed as a problem of getting a hot enough heat...

Er... when? All I can find is that they talk about sending it to Valinor where Sauron can't get at it, which isn't the same thing.

There is so much extra material that Tolkien wrote around his legendarium that it's almost certainly in one of those. I certainly haven't read all of it. Possibly it's from one of his early drafts of LOTR.

[NecronLord]

Checking my sources, the thing about the Ring being cold when pulled out of the fire, is not the whole story. Isildur's writing that Gandalf found explains:
Council of Elrond, FotR p 358.

"It was hot when I first took it, hot as a glede [a hot coal], and my hand was scorched, so that I doubt if ever again I shall be free of the pain of it. Yet even as I write it is cooled, and it seemeth to shrink, though it loseth neither its beauty nor its shape. Already the writing upon it, which at first was as clear as red flame, fadeth and is now only barely to be read. It is fashioned in an elven-script of Eregion, for they have no letters in Mordor for such subtle work; but the language is unknown to me. I deem it to be a tongue of the Black Land, since it is foul and uncouth. What evil it saith I do not know; but I trace here a copy of it, lest it fade beyond recall. The Ring misseth, maybe, the heat of Sauron’s hand, which was black and yet burned like fire, and so Gil-galad was destroyed; and maybe were the gold made hot again, the writing would be refreshed. But for my part I will risk no hurt to this thing: of all the works of Sauron the only fair. It is precious to me, though I buy it with great pain."

Sauron's hand was hot enough to burn an (elven) man to death, and we know that at least in Myth, Gil-Galad fought with a lance a silver shield, though one imagines he might have set Gil-Galad's gambeson on fire or some such. It may well be far hotter than Frodo's fire. Or it could just be different because Sauron was magic and the fire was not, but there's no evidence to presume that.

When they take it from the fire on p109 'The Shadow of the Past' Gandalf says:

‘Your small fire, of course, would not melt even ordinary gold. This Ring has already passed through it unscathed, and even unheated. But there is no smith’s forge in this Shire that could change it at all. Not even the anvils and furnaces of the Dwarves could do that. It has been said that dragon-fire could melt and consume the Rings of Power, but there is not now any dragon left on earth in which the old fire is hot enough; nor was there ever any dragon, not even Ancalagon the Black, who could have harmed the One Ring, the Ruling Ring, for that was made by Sauron himself.

‘There is only one way: to find the Cracks of Doom in the depths of Orodruin, the Fire-mountain, and cast the Ring in there, if you really wish to destroy it, to put it beyond the grasp of the Enemy for ever.’

But certainly the heat of Sauron heated it in turn, and it wounded Isildur.

With respect to the Aulë remark, in p 376 of the Council of Elrond, we also have this:

‘But Gandalf has revealed to us that we cannot destroy it by any craft that we here possess,’ said Elrond. ‘And they who dwell beyond the Sea would not receive it: for good or ill it belongs to Middle-earth; it is for us who still dwell here to deal with it.’

I have always taken this as an indicator that although the Valar (or merely the Ainur of Valinor, maybe even Noldorin jewelsmiths who have been reincarnated there; Celebrimbor perhaps) have such craft, they will not take the Ring. I must concede though that this is my memory playing tricks and he doesn't say that in the text, nor in anywhere I can find in Unfinished Tales, HoME Return of the Shadow, or the Letters, so I may well be imagining that bit.


On the matter of the willpower to destroy the ring, it is mentioned that it would be possible, in despair, for someone to jump into the fire with it, but not willingly cast it aside.

I really do think it's primarily an issue of heat, though, never once does it say 'even a hotter fire, or another volcano, could not do the job.'

[NecronLord]

Oh, and the matter of Sauron being able to only withdraw his power willingly from the ring by complete repentance turns out to be my extrapolation from HoME X Morgoth's Ring p. 391 where the process of the Ring's creation is likened to Melkor's dispersing his will through the entire matter of the world; once sent out for the goal of domination that power cannot be recovered, I believe the possibility of Sauron doing this is discussed explicitly somewhere but I can't source it; I'd have to look through about ten more books to wholly rule it out. Certainly it is likely he could withdraw his essence from the ring via repentance if Melkor could withdraw his essence from the whole matter of the world, the balrogs orcs and dragons by the same.

[NecronLord]

Going back to the well for more.

They also didn't seem to like Randal Munroe's (of XKCD) suggestion from the one time he played D&D. When given a magically enchanted axe, that for him weighed ten pounds and for anyone else weighed a thousand pounds, his immediate solution was to exploit this fact. He wanted to find out if there was a waterwheel in the town. He wanted strap the axe to the waterwheel with him on one side and someone else on the second side. They would then have each person touch the axe as it came around, it would thus accelerate at each turn in a matter not unlike an electric motor. Once it was at its highest speed, they would remove the axle and have the water wheel go careening off at maximum speed towards the enemy.

This wouldn't work anyways, for beyond the reasons expressed earlier, because what the fuck kind of water-wheel axle can endure a tonne weight spinning on it at many RPM? Recipe for being smacked in the face with an axe.

More generally, why is it that so many pen and paper RPGs are set in fantasy settings? I believe it is actually the numerical majority. Is it just a consequence of the fact that D&D was the first? Virtually none are set in realisitc settings. Though most generic systems(especially GURPS) work just as easily at modelling reality, which is likely why no system is designed for it.

Most of the ones I own are set in science Fantasy ones. The only FATE game I own is one called Mindjammer, Transhuman Science-Fiction Roleplaying Game, which is vaguely Culture-esque. Down to playing sentient ships and so on. But what measure of realism do you want?

[Adam Reynolds]

With respect to the FATE RPG, it's systemless, and certainly the Fate SRD outright references among the settings it's suitable for "That animated TV show about mystical knights and their army of clones righting wrongs across the galaxy?" so I don't think it's unsuitable for non-fantasy settings, or at least, settings that aren't trad. fantasy.

That is indeed true, I have even used it for fairly realistic modern day settings. The beauty of Fate as a system is that the mechanics are truly unitless and thus can be easily applied to anything, whether it be boardroom negotiations or a lightsaber duel. Someone I saw recently made a comment about using the system to play a scenario about designing a computer in the 1980s and the corporate battles that ensued around it.

My point was more about the general lack of systems or sourcebooks that have any real focus on modern times for any system. The only ones I really know of are for GURPS and those are by their name generic enough to apply equally to Tom Clancy(not that he is entirely realistic either, his problems were usually in his naive view of geopolitics) or Underworld(with rules for exotic ammunition, including silver bullets)

To answer your other post that mentions it, I also rather like Mindjammer as well. Though I haven't really played anything with it.


On the issue of the One Ring vs willpower, could this be altered if the ring were not handled directly? Closeness is a serious part of the problem, is it not? Say using a robot to pick it up and incinerating both within a prepared thermite oven, with snipers(to insure distance and prevent them from being affected by the power of the ring) positioned to shoot anyone who approaches said robot. Or using a drone to drop it in Mount Doom and thus use the literal air gap to prevent anyone from being corrupted?

Though I suppose you could also argue that elements of Middle Earth make things like drones problematic to operate.

This wouldn't work anyways, for beyond the reasons expressed earlier, because what the fuck kind of water-wheel axle can endure a tonne weight spinning on it at many RPM? Recipe for being smacked in the face with an axe.

The axe would also hit the ground on the first rotation. I just liked the idea in general as a means of applying the consequences of the magic in a way not intended. Though, like the gatling gun versus a silver bullet, there are reasonable reasons for it not to work. In that case, as mentioned, there is the fundamental problem of practicality and that silver bullets are simply easier to use.

[Adam Reynolds]

Again, I disagree. I would argue that maturity is in play, because people who are fully mature tend to be better at considering alternative points of view. In this case that's critical, because in the context of a fictional setting, the laws of nature are different enough to constitute "an alternative point of view."

That depends on whether or not you assume the laws of physics are truly universal. If they indeed are, it is quite reasonable to assume that there are simply new things that fit into the gaps rather than something that gets rid of them completely and replaces it with something almost exactly the same. It's not as if anyone in Middle Earth would suddenly begin falling up and completely ignore gravity.

A person who does not understand this, who rejects the notion, and who demands that the customs of his tribe be treated as laws of nature, will consistently miss and misunderstand what is going on in the story.

I understand the concept of SOD, but that doesn't mean that we must throw out the laws of physics. How else can we possibly analyze the setting with any sort of objectively?

Some other technological means might do the job- but it may simply not be a matter of transferring heat into the object.

That could indeed be true, but that doesn't mean that a properly designed piece of technology, using a full understanding of the laws of physics as the exist on Middle Earth, can't defeat it.

Because while a magical object presumably obeys laws, it may not obey laws that allow you to 'solve' the problem it presents with an object that obeys a different set of laws.

For example: Chess is a game. It obeys laws. A cannon is a machine. It obeys laws. This does not mean you can neutralize the effects of the cannon by making the correct chess moves- or that you can win a chess game by firing a cannon at it.

In and of itself, the mere fact that a magical object obeys some recognizable laws does not mean those laws are the ones you would expect to be in place.

You would certainly end a chess game by firing a cannon at it. But more generally, it should be possible to use the physics of the setting in evolutionary ways to develop things like technology.

Well, yes- but the technology in question may well involve a requirement like "have the right being doing it" or "do it in the right place." Because that may well be part of the laws.

Who says such a thing could not be hacked in some fashion? Like the idea that Thor's Hammer is simply a biometric system of a sort, as mentioned by Tony Stark.

[NecronLord]

I'm not going to dignify the robot idea with a response as any response would by its nature, not be evidence-based, as there is no evidence of robots in Middle Earth nor does Tolkien ever discuss the maximum range of the One Ring in any sense that would be unambigious here.

What I will say is that if you have sniper rifles and robots, you do not need to destroy the One Ring. Overwhelming force very definately works on Sauron, and killing Sauron and throwing the One Ring into the sea is preferable in many contexts to destroying the Ring. A chief example of overwhelming force defeating Sauron with the Ring is when he surrendered to Ar-Pharazôn the Golden, king of Numenor, the other example is of course, when Elendil, Gil-Galad and Isildur killed Sauron. It's only primarily important to destroy the Ring in the Third Age context because they no longer have the means to kill Sauron with it.

[madd0ct0r]

if yo threw the ring into the sea it would appear in the belly of a fish hauled in by a fisherman with a boss who takes it before it is taken by their cruel lord und so weiter.

[NecronLord]

That is indeed discussed in the Council of Elrond.

Good thing this plan calls for killing Sauron, which makes the ring go quiescent for centuries, which is how it sat at the bottom of the Anduin for the best part of a thousand years after it dropped off Isildur's finger until Smaegol and Daegol found it. So, for the next thousand years it'll be harmless.

And if a modern state can deal with Sauron, any future worth having will have no problem with it.

[LadyTevar]

That is indeed discussed in the Council of Elrond.

Good thing this plan calls for killing Sauron, which makes the ring go quiescent for centuries, which is how it sat at the bottom of the Anduin for the best part of a thousand years after it dropped off Isildur's finger until Smaegol and Daegol found it. So, for the next thousand years it'll be harmless.

And if a modern state can deal with Sauron, any future worth having will have no problem with it.

I will point out that Numenor was a "Modern State"... in fact the biggest, most advanced nation at the time. Sauron dealt with them very simply. He Surrendered.
And then he became their buddy.
And then, when he was the Power Behind the Throne, he caused the whole damn island to sink.

Look at the US, Germany, and other "Modern Nations", and tell me that Sauron couldn't pull this trick off again.

[NecronLord]

Sure, he's cunning.

Even in the questionably-canon 'ships cleave through ice' interpretation Numenor wasn't a modern state, the King of Numenor had the absolute power to have the great tokens of the state (the tree Nimloth the Fair) destroyed and people murdered at whim, and the Kings Men had been a growing menace for centuries. The President of the United States doesn't currently have that ability, nor is there such a ready-made band of thugs to be taken over.

He also did not cause the island to sink, except tangentially, that was Illúvatar at the request of Manwë. And to get to that point Sauron was able to exploit the envy of the Valar/Eldar that had been entrenched for centuries since the days of Ar-Adûnakhôr.

Of course, this assumes they let him actually... live. When Elendil/Isildur killed him, he... umm. Died.

Nothing beyond Ar-Pharazôn's ego really stopped him executing Sauron then and there.

Even Morgoth was dealt with by physically executing him. p. 403 HoME X "Morgoth's Ring" has this of the War of Wrath:

Morgoth was thus actually made captive in physical form, and in that form taken as a mere criminal to Aman and delivered to Námo Mandos as judge - and executioner. He was judged, and eventually taken out of the Blessed Realm and executed; that is killed like one of the incarnates. [...] When his body was destroyed he was weak and utterly 'houseless' and for that time at a loss and 'unachored' as it were. We read that he was then thrust out into the Void. That should mean that he was put outside Time and Space, outside Eä altogether; but if tht were so this would imply a direct intervention of Eru (with or without supplication of the Valar). It may however refer inaccurately to the extrusion or flight of his spirit from Arda.

Italics Tolkien's.

Physical death is immensely problematic for the Ainur, even Morgoth. Missile to the face is the answer.

[Simon_Jester]

The point is that Sauron turned out to be so good at manipulation that he could arrange disaster and destruction to befall his 'friends.' The exact mechanism of this disaster would probably depend heavily on what means his friends had available. The Numenoreans had an absolute monarchy and were vulnerable to being destroyed by the wrath of the One. A modern state instead has a horde of competing politicians eager for any advantage over their rivals, and arsenals of nuclear weapons. I doubt it would be that much harder to trick the latter state into destroying itself than the former.

Of course, Sauron can still be physically defeated in war and destroyed by force of arms. Otherwise a medieval army (even a noble and powerful one) would not have been able to do it. But it is definitely not a simple thing, and the threat Sauron poses even when not actively attacking you should not be discounted.

Sauron's hand was hot enough to burn an (elven) man to death, and we know that at least in Myth, Gil-Galad fought with a lance a silver shield, though one imagines he might have set Gil-Galad's gambeson on fire or some such. It may well be far hotter than Frodo's fire. Or it could just be different because Sauron was magic and the fire was not, but there's no evidence to presume that.

When they take it from the fire on p109 'The Shadow of the Past' Gandalf says:

‘Your small fire, of course, would not melt even ordinary gold. This Ring has already passed through it unscathed, and even unheated. But there is no smith’s forge in this Shire that could change it at all. Not even the anvils and furnaces of the Dwarves could do that. It has been said that dragon-fire could melt and consume the Rings of Power, but there is not now any dragon left on earth in which the old fire is hot enough; nor was there ever any dragon, not even Ancalagon the Black, who could have harmed the One Ring, the Ruling Ring, for that was made by Sauron himself.

‘There is only one way: to find the Cracks of Doom in the depths of Orodruin, the Fire-mountain, and cast the Ring in there, if you really wish to destroy it, to put it beyond the grasp of the Enemy for ever.’

But certainly the heat of Sauron heated it in turn, and it wounded Isildur.

Thing is, a thing that is made out of normal matter which obeys the normal laws of thermodynamics, while it might pass unscathed through a fire, would not be unheated. While it may be that dropping the Ring into a hotter fire would cause it to change temperature perceptibly... this would not change the results of the 'experiment' in Bilbo's fireplace.

And note that there is no talk of finding another source of lava to melt the Ring, even one incredibly remote, though almost any volcano would be far safer as a place to do this than the one in the very heart of Sauron's domain. And Gandalf explicitly claims that no dragon, despite the heat of their breath being legendary (and supernatural) would have been able to harm the Ring, even though their breath did claim some of the lesser Rings.

With respect to the Aulë remark, in p 376 of the Council of Elrond, we also have this:

‘But Gandalf has revealed to us that we cannot destroy it by any craft that we here possess,’ said Elrond. ‘And they who dwell beyond the Sea would not receive it: for good or ill it belongs to Middle-earth; it is for us who still dwell here to deal with it.’

I have always taken this as an indicator that although the Valar (or merely the Ainur of Valinor, maybe even Noldorin jewelsmiths who have been reincarnated there; Celebrimbor perhaps) have such craft, they will not take the Ring. I must concede though that this is my memory playing tricks and he doesn't say that in the text, nor in anywhere I can find in Unfinished Tales, HoME Return of the Shadow, or the Letters, so I may well be imagining that bit.

Well, all it says is that they will not receive the Ring. And this is discussed in terms of keeping the Ring out of Sauron's grasp (with alternative strategies being, say, to give the Ring to Bombadil who can resist its corruption, or to throw it into the sea). So the text does not juxtapose the idea of sending the Ring to Valinor alongside the idea of destroying the Ring, but rather with securing it.

No doubt the Valar could unmake the Ring, of course- but they are themselves supernatural creatures of a higher order than Sauron.

I really do think it's primarily an issue of heat, though, never once does it say 'even a hotter fire, or another volcano, could not do the job.'

And yet no one even suggests any alternative means of destroying it.

No, instead, the only thing they even try is to take the Ring to Orodruin, in the heart of Sauron's territory, where the Ring-bearer is surrounded by the Enemy's strength. And where the slightest mistake could see Frodo captured and the Ring lost forever.

Middle-Earth is, canonically, in some sense the prehistoric Earth- there is no reason to assume Mount Doom is the only volcano in the world. Yet a council of beings with vast experience and knowledge, who have traveled widely throughout large parts of the world, cannot think of a single other volcano that could possibly be used as Mount Doom could be used. Nor do they even propose or consider somehow building an ultra-hot source of artificial heat, although granted they might well lack the knowledge to do so even if they wanted to.

To me, this suggests that while the lava of the Cracks of Doom is very hot, that's not the whole story. There must be something else special about it, because in and of itself there is no reason to assume it is uniquely hot. Not so hot that no other lava in the world, and no dragonfire, and no forge that has ever existed including outright magical forges, could match it. Not so hot that it isn't even worth trying to find another source of heat to match it, when the alternative is to send the Ring right into the heart of its master's territory.

On the issue of the One Ring vs willpower, could this be altered if the ring were not handled directly? Closeness is a serious part of the problem, is it not? Say using a robot to pick it up and incinerating both within a prepared thermite oven, with snipers(to insure distance and prevent them from being affected by the power of the ring) positioned to shoot anyone who approaches said robot. Or using a drone to drop it in Mount Doom and thus use the literal air gap to prevent anyone from being corrupted?

At some point, someone would still have to 'pull the trigger-' to willfully take a deliberate action to destroy the Ring. Since the Ring is a sentient artifact, it is entirely possible that pulling the trigger from a distance would run into the same problem. It never comes up in the series, though, so I can't say this is 'mandated' by the evidence.

Again, I disagree. I would argue that maturity is in play, because people who are fully mature tend to be better at considering alternative points of view. In this case that's critical, because in the context of a fictional setting, the laws of nature are different enough to constitute "an alternative point of view."

That depends on whether or not you assume the laws of physics are truly universal. If they indeed are, it is quite reasonable to assume that there are simply new things that fit into the gaps rather than something that gets rid of them completely and replaces it with something almost exactly the same. It's not as if anyone in Middle Earth would suddenly begin falling up and completely ignore gravity.

The problem is, you have to pay attention to what the "gaps" are when thinking about what a supernatural object can or cannot do.

For instance, the Ring shows literally no tendency to ignore or defy gravity- it obeys that law. But it displays, in direct experimental testing, a feature breaks the basic rules of thermodynamics, by staying out of thermal equilibrium with its surroundings despite being (apparently) an inert, passive physical object. It does not obey that law.

So the question is then, what is the 'gap' that allows the Ring to behave in this way? And the answer cannot be "wow, the Ring is made of a metal with an incredibly high melting point." We have metals with incredibly high melting points, that no force available to a medieval blacksmith could melt... but if you stick a chunk of them in a fire and leave it there, it will still get hot enough to hurt your hand.

The answer has to be qualitatively different in some way, and this is why I say that heat does not affect the One Ring the way we would expect it to. And why very high temperature that is not accompanied with the sort of supernatural power which is effective in Middle-Earth might not do the job.

A person who does not understand this, who rejects the notion, and who demands that the customs of his tribe be treated as laws of nature, will consistently miss and misunderstand what is going on in the story.

I understand the concept of SOD, but that doesn't mean that we must throw out the laws of physics. How else can we possibly analyze the setting with any sort of objectively?

The point is that objectivity requires freedom from prejudice. And one of our prejudices is assuming the rules will be the same even when there is evidence to the contrary. So evidence to the contrary must be examined properly and taken into account. Ignoring such evidence, and arbitrarily deciding that one's own intuitive expectations will turn out to be correct anyway, is as dishonest and inappropriate as trying to use Newtonian mechanics to describe nuclear physics.

Some other technological means might do the job- but it may simply not be a matter of transferring heat into the object.

That could indeed be true, but that doesn't mean that a properly designed piece of technology, using a full understanding of the laws of physics as the exist on Middle Earth, can't defeat it.

Yes- but the only beings of Middle-Earth who fully understand its laws are themselves supernatural creatures. To know everything they know, and do all that they can do, it is likely that you would have to become as they are. Which means starting from a position of enlightenment and semi-divine status.

Because while a magical object presumably obeys laws, it may not obey laws that allow you to 'solve' the problem it presents with an object that obeys a different set of laws.

For example: Chess is a game. It obeys laws. A cannon is a machine. It obeys laws. This does not mean you can neutralize the effects of the cannon by making the correct chess moves- or that you can win a chess game by firing a cannon at it.

In and of itself, the mere fact that a magical object obeys some recognizable laws does not mean those laws are the ones you would expect to be in place.

You would certainly end a chess game by firing a cannon at it. But more generally, it should be possible to use the physics of the setting in evolutionary ways to develop things like technology.

I didn't say you couldn't end the game. I said you couldn't win it. Tipping the board and spilling the pieces on the floor isn't a win condition either.

Because ignoring the rules of the game is not the same as winning the game.

Well, yes- but the technology in question may well involve a requirement like "have the right being doing it" or "do it in the right place." Because that may well be part of the laws.

Who says such a thing could not be hacked in some fashion? Like the idea that Thor's Hammer is simply a biometric system of a sort, as mentioned by Tony Stark.

Except that Thor is in a much better position to understand his own hammer than Stark is. There is no reason to assume that a biometric system capable of stopping every other human or Asgardian that tries to lift it would somehow be 'hacked' (or experience a glitch) when Steve Rogers touches it.

Moreover, even if a magical 'technology' does permit some form of hacking, it is very likely that this will require the same kinds of tools and techniques used to create the security in the first place. A computer network cannot be hacked without another computer network- you cannot read an encrypted file without using a computer, even if you already know the encryption key. A physical lock cannot be picked without physical tools capable of moving its internal parts. A legal restriction cannot be circumvented, except by whatever other means are specified in the legal code. Every kind of system that blocks or prohibits an action, can only truly be overcome by another action within a similar system.

Sometimes you can bypass a system by brute force- but this rarely has the same desired result as overcoming the limitation directly. Picking a lock doesn't have the same consequences as blowing it up. Smashing the computer that's locking you out of a file doesn't let you read the file.

[NecronLord]

The point is that Sauron turned out to be so good at manipulation that he could arrange disaster and destruction to befall his 'friends.' The exact mechanism of this disaster would probably depend heavily on what means his friends had available. The Numenoreans had an absolute monarchy and were vulnerable to being destroyed by the wrath of the One. A modern state instead has a horde of competing politicians eager for any advantage over their rivals, and arsenals of nuclear weapons. I doubt it would be that much harder to trick the latter state into destroying itself than the former.

Of course, Sauron can still be physically defeated in war and destroyed by force of arms. Otherwise a medieval army (even a noble and powerful one) would not have been able to do it. But it is definitely not a simple thing, and the threat Sauron poses even when not actively attacking you should not be discounted.

If allowed free reign as a noble hostage, yes.

He doesn't have mind-hacking superpowers. He has to physically torture Gollum, and Finrod Felagund's men, and in the latter case they didn't even crack.

He has no ability to stop soldiers shooting him; he didn't do that to Finrod's men, he didn't make Celebrimbor's elves throw down their arms. Nothing stops them just filling him full of lead.

Even Morgoth doesn't just bewitch Finrod the moment he shows up.

[SpottedKitty]

The point is that Sauron turned out to be so good at manipulation that he could arrange disaster and destruction to befall his 'friends.'

Isn't there a mention in Akallabeth that Sauron wasn't expecting such total destruction, and the actual flood and Downfall took him by surprise? Perhaps he was only expecting the King and his fleet to be destroyed for breaking the Ban.

While it may be that dropping the Ring into a hotter fire would cause it to change temperature perceptibly... this would not change the results of the 'experiment' in Bilbo's fireplace.

Something I just realised — notice, in that quote, Gandalf says "the old fire". I'd say this means something magical specific to dragons and others of Morgoth's creatures, and separate from normal rub-two-sticks-together fire.

[NecronLord]

I'd say this means something magical specific to dragons and others of Morgoth's creatures, and separate from normal rub-two-sticks-together fire.

That is of course essentially subjective interpretation; it's my opinion that the text smithcraft greater than Sauron's own (Including greater heat, such as sophisticated tools that we have, remember, in Tolkien's context 'magic' is a term he avoids scrupulously and always describes in scientific terms) would be able to do the deed, but that no mortal would be able to carry through with the act. I believe I have textual support equivalent to any other position for that. I am aware of no textual support for the idea that the ring could endure infinite trans-volcanic heat and for that reason I consider the ability to produce trans-volcanic heat via thermite etc to be quite satisfying a need for 'greater smithcraft.'


For bonus points, how do people know there's another volcano on Arda? It started out as a flat world with a dome of heaven and was restructured into a sphere by Illúvatar after the Downfall. It doesn't necessarily have plate tectonics. There are no other volcanos on the map.

In any case:

Otherwise a medieval army (even a noble and powerful one) would not have been able to do it. But it is definitely not a simple thing, and the threat Sauron poses even when not actively attacking you should not be discounted.

Given that we know Sauron will be killed if the ring is destroyed, and Adam is talking about ways to destroy the ring, he's presumably talking about a context where our sniper-training, robot-using modern state has resolved to kill Sauron already. Saying that Sauron is politically excellent and extremely subtle (and he is) is well and good, but he's not so good that he can stop people who have amazing weapons that can fly a thousand miles from killing him by words alone if they're resolved to do it.

Sauron infiltrating a modern state, either as a prisoner or by other means, is another question entirely from the topic at hand. Which is that the need to destroy the Ruling Ring can be obviated by simply killing Sauron, a feat accomplishable by a pre-medieval army (Isildur talks in ways like an Anglo Saxon ("wereguild"), and his tactics (emphasis on shield walls) are explicitly Anglo-Saxon, not high middle ages) albeit one with some magic tools of its own.

For infiltrating a modern state, at least in his pre-Downfall days of being able to look human, he would obviously have few problems. Even things like being able to use birds and beasts as spies is pretty amazingly useful within that context; but when that state is committed to applying its military resources to making an end of him? Less so.

[Zeropoint]

Your reading of the text seems to be incorrect--Gandalf's statement about dragon fire seems to indicate that for the One Ring, mere heat is not enough. For the other, lesser rings of power, yes, it would have been, and there's a good chance that thermite would have destroyed them (but even then, it's not clear that dragon fire could destroy them through merely mundane heat. There could easily be a supernatural component to dragon fire).

Also, you seem to be ignoring the textual evidence of the One Ring not getting hot in Bilbo's fire. It seems that non-magical heat sources can't even transfer heat to the Ring. I'd expect that after using thermite on the Ring, the inscription would be glowing brightly, but it wouldn't even be warm.

[NecronLord]

Sigh.

Let's look at those quotes again:

‘Your small fire, of course, would not melt even ordinary gold. This Ring has already passed through it unscathed, and even unheated. But there is no smith’s forge in this Shire that could change it at all.

By extension, other forges in the Shire could heat it, or he would mention say 'no smith's forge in the Shire could heat it at all. Clearly it is capable of absorbing the heat from small fires, not large ones.

So no, I feel I have dealt with the 'issue' of it not becoming hot in a fire, because Gandalf specifically says this is because it is a puny fire. Nothing limitless about that. To extrapolate an immunity to all fire from that is a no-limits fallacy of the worst kind.

Not even the anvils and furnaces of the Dwarves could do that. It has been said that dragon-fire could melt and consume the Rings of Power, but there is not now any dragon left on earth in which the old fire is hot enough; nor was there ever any dragon, not even Ancalagon the Black, who could have harmed the One Ring, the Ruling Ring, for that was made by Sauron himself.

Could melt, is hot enough. Celebrimbor's rings could be destroyed by some but not all dragons, and the dragons who could overwhelm Celebrimbor's rings were able to do so because they produced the hottest flame. It is quite clear he is talking about heat here. If he was talking about special dragon-magic, he would say 'special dragon magic' or something to that effect. He doesn't, he says hot enough

19 out of 20 Great Rings can be destroyed by turning up the heat. Even Ancalagon couldn't do the One Ring because it was made by Sauron. Now you provide a an explicit quote saying that this is because a magic flame is needed (bear in mind that Tolkien's characters deny that 'magic' exists, so I wish you luck there) because, again, 19 out of 20 Great Rings can be destroyed by turning up the heat.

Most Rings of Power can be destroyed by increasing the heat, but because of who made the Ruling Ring, no dragon could have harmed the One. Why not? The same reason as living dragons could not destroy Celebrimbor's rings, one would assume; insufficient heat. Because increasing the heat works on other Rings.

Celebrimbor's rings have their limits, which can be exceeded. Where does Tolkien say that the ring wouldn't melt in something hotter than Mount Doom? He outright says that the others can be destroyed by something 'hot enough.'

[NecronLord]

Addendum WRT the fire incident:

It is quite cool,' said Gandalf. 'Take it!' Frodo received it on his shrinking palm: it seemed to have become thicker and heavier than ever.

The ring may not have been physically altered by the fire, or it might have become heavier for some reason. Frodo certainly feels that it is heavier afterward. That could be subjective.

[Simon_Jester]

The point is that Sauron turned out to be so good at manipulation that he could arrange disaster and destruction to befall his 'friends.'

Isn't there a mention in Akallabeth that Sauron wasn't expecting such total destruction, and the actual flood and Downfall took him by surprise? Perhaps he was only expecting the King and his fleet to be destroyed for breaking the Ban.

Very possible- but nonetheless, Sauron was able to persuade the Numenoreans to do a thing they were forbidden to do, in the face of a vastly superior supernatural power, that would bring about disaster for them. Even if he didn't expect the disaster to be as bad as it was, he still expected something.

NecronLord's point is well taken, though- that you have to be daft enough to listen to Sauron for an extended time in order for this to happen.

While it may be that dropping the Ring into a hotter fire would cause it to change temperature perceptibly... this would not change the results of the 'experiment' in Bilbo's fireplace.

Something I just realised — notice, in that quote, Gandalf says "the old fire". I'd say this means something magical specific to dragons and others of Morgoth's creatures, and separate from normal rub-two-sticks-together fire.

That's what I'm thinking too.

I'd say this means something magical specific to dragons and others of Morgoth's creatures, and separate from normal rub-two-sticks-together fire.

That is of course essentially subjective interpretation; it's my opinion that the text smithcraft greater than Sauron's own (Including greater heat, such as sophisticated tools that we have, remember, in Tolkien's context 'magic' is a term he avoids scrupulously and always describes in scientific terms) would be able to do the deed, but that no mortal would be able to carry through with the act. I believe I have textual support equivalent to any other position for that. I am aware of no textual support for the idea that the ring could endure infinite trans-volcanic heat and for that reason I consider the ability to produce trans-volcanic heat via thermite etc to be quite satisfying a need for 'greater smithcraft.'

That raises a tricky question in the context of Middle-Earth: is great 'craft' purely a matter of knowing things about the physical world, or does it inherently involve magic? All the great craftsbeings of Middle-Earth are in some sense magicians, but you have a point that this doesn't mean only magicians can be such craftsbeings.

For bonus points, how do people know there's another volcano on Arda? It started out as a flat world with a dome of heaven and was restructured into a sphere by Illúvatar after the Downfall. It doesn't necessarily have plate tectonics. There are no other volcanos on the map.

The problem here is that the sphere it is restructured into is supposed to have been capable of evolving into our world through unspecified means and events.

There aren't a lot of volcanoes in Europe either (Middle-Earth being implied to be ur-Europe)... but that doesn't mean there are none, or that others cannot be found anywhere in the world.

It's possible there are literally no other volcanoes and it's pointless to even try to build a forge capable of reaching the temperatures of lava... but this is making a rather bulky assumption in its own right.

Otherwise a medieval army (even a noble and powerful one) would not have been able to do it. But it is definitely not a simple thing, and the threat Sauron poses even when not actively attacking you should not be discounted.

Given that we know Sauron will be killed if the ring is destroyed, and Adam is talking about ways to destroy the ring, he's presumably talking about a context where our sniper-training, robot-using modern state has resolved to kill Sauron already. Saying that Sauron is politically excellent and extremely subtle (and he is) is well and good, but he's not so good that he can stop people who have amazing weapons that can fly a thousand miles from killing him by words alone if they're resolved to do it.

This is true.

[NecronLord]

I have unfortunately lost a post regarding the details of this. But I'll make my reply a little less rambling this time to simplify; Gandalf says 'hot enough' in describing the destruction of dwarven rings. Celebrimbor's rings were immensely resilient, requiring dragon fire (and in some versions of the Fall of Gondolin, Morgoth's dragons are used to melt a navigable pass into the mountains) to destroy them. Sauron's work is more durable than Celebrimbor's, but that doesn't mean it has no limits at all.

One could argue that the dragons are magical, but why does Gandalf not say 'magical enough' instead of 'hot enough?'

Now Mount Doom is almost certainly not an ordinary volcano, this is true (incidentally another Middle Earth volcano is presumably the 'Firey Chasm' that Maedhros cast himself into, unless that is Mt. Doom) and not least I always took the phrasing when the Phial of Galadriel was extinguished as suggestive that there was more going on than was shown.

At first he could see nothing. In his great need he drew out once more the phial of Galadriel, but it was pale and cold in his trembling hand and threw no light into that stifling dark. He was come to the heart of the realm of Sauron and the forges of his ancient might, greatest in Middle-earth; all other powers were here subdued. Fearfully he took a few uncertain steps in the dark, and then all at once there came a flash of red that leaped upward, and smote the high black roof. Then Sam saw that he was in a long cave or tunnel that bored into the Mountain's smoking cone. But only a short way ahead its floor and the walls on either side were cloven by a great fissure, out of which the red glare came, now leaping up, now dying down into darkness; and all the while far below there was a rumour and a trouble as of great engines throbbing and labouring.

That may be poetic of course, or it may be literally describing some machinery.

As for magic in middle earth, it is a complex topic best discussed elsewhere. I'm content to say that Celebrimbor's rings can be overwhelmed by something 'hot enough' and simply state that nowhere does it say 'no heat possible would destroy the Ring' in explicit terms; the other rings are not no-limits creations, the heat required to destroy them is simply lower. That is my reading, and I consider it entirely consistent, and that any no-limits argument with respect to the one is essentially fallacious.

Our topic is 'overwhelming force' and as Tolkien described four of the twenty Great Rings having been destroyed in exactly that manner, and that the other Great Rings did not need to be carted back to the halls of the Jewel Smiths to be destroyed, it is only reasonable to conclude that sufficient force could be used to destroy the One.

Whether that force needs to be magical or not is in a way, not even that important; the Sammath Naur is simply the greatest forge and the only one capable of doing the deed, if Aulë or Arien were to have a crack at the One Ring, I imagine they'd be able to do it by again, applying overwhelming 'magical' force.

[Me2005]

‘Your small fire, of course, would not melt even ordinary gold. This Ring has already passed through it unscathed, and even unheated.

Thing is, a thing that is made out of normal matter which obeys the normal laws of thermodynamics, while it might pass unscathed through a fire, would not be unheated. While it may be that dropping the Ring into a hotter fire would cause it to change temperature perceptibly... this would not change the results of the 'experiment' in Bilbo's fireplace.

Isn't it possible that the ring simply wasn't in the fire long enough to become hot? I stick a fire poker in a fire and quickly pull it out, it won't be hot. We'd use sticks around a campfire and they don't burn even in the hottest portions of the fire because of this quickness. I can briefly put my hand in a 400* oven without damage. It could be that this ring, were it ordinary gold, would have been at least warm after however long Gandalf had it in the fire; but as it isn't ordinary gold and is more dense/heat reflective/whatever, it's still cool.

And note that there is no talk of finding another source of lava to melt the Ring, even one incredibly remote, though almost any volcano would be far safer as a place to do this than the one in the very heart of Sauron's domain.

I think it's reasonable to assume from this that there either isn't another close active volcano or that no one present is aware of one. Traveling as far as they did to do the deed (googling for answers, sounds like +/- 1,000 miles), I'd be unsure of where to go for an active volcano; and I live in the shadows of Mt. Rainer and Mt. St. Helens. And in a time like theirs, traveling at all is dangerous - shoot, many of the things that try to kill them on the journey aren't related to Mordor at all. If they have to go double the distance, it probably isn't worthwhile vs. going into their enemy's turf.

[NecronLord]

And a large band of the south and east is tributary to Mordor anyway.

[bilateralrope]

Isn't it possible that the ring simply wasn't in the fire long enough to become hot? I stick a fire poker in a fire and quickly pull it out, it won't be hot. We'd use sticks around a campfire and they don't burn even in the hottest portions of the fire because of this quickness. I can briefly put my hand in a 400* oven without damage.

Or maybe the ring cools to ambient temperature really quickly.

[Cykeisme]

The ring doesn't necessarily have to defy thermodynamics, if the only suggestion of this is "still being cool to the touch" after being in a simple open wood fire.
It could simply have a very high specific heat content (probably also latent heat of fusion), which would both explain the fireplace scene and also why many heat sources were deemed inadequate to attain destruction.

So perhaps a temperature exceeding its melting point would have to be sustained for a duration that was well beyond their primitive Dark Ages technological level's ability to produce.

[Captain Seafort]

Now Mount Doom is almost certainly not an ordinary volcano, this is true (incidentally another Middle Earth volcano is presumably the 'Firey Chasm' that Maedhros cast himself into, unless that is Mt. Doom) and not least I always took the phrasing when the Phial of Galadriel was extinguished as suggestive that there was more going on than was shown.

It seems likely that Maedhros' chasm and Mt Doom are indeed one and the same. It would easily explain both the magical power of the place, and Sauron setting up shop in Mordor in the first place if there's a Silmaril down there somewhere.