The gadgeteering rookie - how to write

[Ornea]

I have my job theads ongoing and though Ornea here is mainly a metalsmith I'll also try to add some gadgeteering if I can. As she's now at zero points in gadgeteering I need to find out how to start somewhere, somehow. She has her employer NPC to teach her, but I'm not sure how it would need to be written in practice.

Posting an excerpt of my current text (the red italics below) from job thread 1 this winter to check if this piece of thinking would be seen as gadgeteering, or if only practical building of "devices" counts. If it's the latter I would be really grateful for ideas about what would be seens as adequate items for an absolute beginner in "medieval" gadgeteering. And would it be enough to try but fail, or must the "devices" work?

After the fifteenth copy had turned out to be really good it was time to think of an additional part to make the simple mechanism on the drawing work. She felt a bit lost. It seemed likely that this missing part would be a cog too, she thought. Edward had been terribly pleased with this tricky “figure it out” kind of task he had given her. “Invent something!” had been his answer to her questions. “Invention is the core of gadgeteering! It’s often pretty much the same thing. Think, and see if you can solve this!”

She thought of a cog that might work together with the others. She thought of how the cogs would move together, and came up with an idea about how the missing part would need to look. Was this gadgeteering? She supposed so as Edward had said so. Then she and started to draw. This meant she put away the template and the parchment she had used for copying and put a new fresh parchment on the workbench. Once again she took the quill and dipped it in ink.

...

[Sayana]

I haven't roleplayed with gadgeteering myself, however there are lots of different concepts/actions that gadgeteering might cover.

There's the creative process. This would involve thinking in new ways to combine elements together. You might also draw from nature or other mechanisms to see if you could incorporate them into the design you are trying to come up with.

There might be some drawing (like you included). Drawing (or other methods) can convert abstract ideas into something you can communicate, share, or understand better.

There is actually building the gadget.

And there's also putting it all together, tinkering with it, etc.

You might even include experimentation with gadgets as part of gadgeteering. Like if have a pulley system, you might note that even though it's twice as easy to lift the object in question, it takes twice as much rope to pull.


These aren't necessarily concrete ideas/evidence of gadgeteering, but they might be helpful to think about. Also, consider checking out the mathematics article and the physics outline (that Zhol is doing an article on). Those might help give you an idea of what level of technology Mizahar has.

[Ornea]

Thanks Savana

Hmmm...it seems like Ornea's progress in gadgeteering will be a slow thing. I'll give it a try anyway. Once in a while.