54 KiB
[D][BST] You have 2 days to prepare to transport to a land of swords and magic. How do you proceed?
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Author: u/nicholaslaux *
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URL: https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/3a66h4/dbst_you_have_2_days_to_prepare_to_transport_to_a/
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Score: 38
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Created: 2015-06-17T15:19:16
Post:
It is Friday morning, 7am, and as you're doing whatever you would be (or waking up if you'd normally be asleep), and you suddenly have an awareness than in 48 hours you will travel to a portal located at [set of coordinates located less than 20 minutes away from your home]. Everything located within the portal will be transported along with you.
If you are in any way prevented from entering the portal Sunday morning (such as by getting arrested or otherwise restrained), you will immediately die.
How do you proceed?
Comments:
u/eaglejarl [+17] (an hour later)
Hm. Things I'd want to bring:
- Antibiotics and other medical supplies.
- Spices and chocolate. They have the best potential for high-value / low mass/volume that I can come up with quickly and have easy access to.
- Industrial gems (the ones that are cheap as dirt but look the same). My second shot at good trade goods.
- Books. Lots of books. Science, technology, medicine, warfare. Printouts of various Wikipedia articles would work, but I'd also want specific technical manuals.
- Weapons. It's nearly impossible to buy high-quality functional edged weapons in the modern era, but we make really good knives, so that would be a place to start -- I suppose a lamb splitter is approximately a short sword. These are mostly for bribes, sale, and arming my companions once I find some.
- Camping gear, including fire starters and massive numbers of lighters.
- Clothes of various weights -- I have no idea what the weather over there looks like.
- Waterproof containers for everything, especially the books.
Guns would be nice, but I don't know where I could acquire them quickly.
I would also leave notices for family and friends with as much info as I had and any final goodbye messages.
Finally, one of the first things I would do is post a message on /r/rational saying "hey, if you were going to be pulled through a portal to fantasyland in 48 hours, what would you do? Oh and, yeah, this is totally hypothetical, honest!"
EDIT: Things I forgot to list
A wheelbarrow for carrying stuff. A shovel so that I can bury what I don't bring along. Paper and pencils/pens so that I can make a map of where I buried it.
u/Calsem [+4] (an hour later)
You'd have to be careful with the gems; the jewelers might discover that they aren't natural. It might be better to bring some gem unknown to medieval times but cheap to us, if there are any.
u/eaglejarl [+7] (an hour later)
True. Pearls seem like a good candidate; I'm finding prices online of a couple bucks for 80. If you could get overnight delivery that could work well.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+5] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (an hour later)
Industrial gems aren't "fake".
u/Calsem [+1] (an hour later)
fake as in not natural, sorry.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+5] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (an hour later)
Unnatural gems might be more valuable. :)
u/None [+9] (5 hours later)
They are magical in fact, got them from a fairy
u/ancientcampus [+1] juggling kittens (5 days later)
It's possible that cubic zirconium would be more magically conductive due to its lack of blemishes.
u/Jiro_T [+2] (4 hours later)
I doubt that medieval jewelers could figure out that artificial rubies or sapphires are artificial. There seems to be a cheap and an expensive method of making them; reports vary on how much of a difference this actually makes.
u/masterax2000 [+1] Chaos Legion (a day later)
How will you keep the chocolate from going rancid or melting?
u/Empiricist_or_not [+3] Aspiring polite Hegemonizing swarm (2 days later)
Um chocolate pretty much doesn't spoil. . . I remember reading about it being a potential food wrapper for long term space missions because of this.
http://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/7333/why-doesnt-chocolate-go-bad
u/eaglejarl [+2] (2 days later)
I won't be able to keep it indefinitely, but if it's packed carefully -- wrapped in cloth and then ziplocked, maybe -- it will last for a while. I'll just have to trade it in that time period. For that matter, even bloomed chocolate is likely to be valuable in a sword-and-spell world.
u/None [+14] (44 minutes later)
sounds like a plot armor situation. think id take like a house cat and a bowl of ice cream and bank on protagonist luck to carry me through
u/mcherm [+5] (5 hours later)
That would work anywhere EXCEPT in /r/rational. (At least the sidebar says it won't work here. Plot armor is still a pretty difficult thing to banish.)
u/nicholaslaux [+0] (7 hours later)
It doesn't work in this situation. If the characters can't survive more than a day, then they should have prepared better.
u/None [+3] (7 hours later)
sorry but if you want me to come up with an interesting answer i need more than 'land of swords and magic'
otherwise all the answers will be the same, tradeable goods, antibiotics and maybe a cross or two
u/alexanderwales [+27] Time flies like an arrow (34 minutes later)
As an obligatory plug, this week's Weekly Challenge is "Portal Fantasy" so if you have a great story in mind, you can post it there. The thread will go up in ~7 hours from the time of this post. (Edit: This thread, right here!)
I go grab my Kindle, plug it in, and start charging it. I go grab my hand-cranked USB charger from the basement, which gets added to my luggage. I start wiping the Kindle of all unimportant material, and begin loading it down with information, with a focus on technical manuals. I grab a bunch of books on medicine, mathematics, and physics from the 1800s (which will hopefully be less complicated than modern stuff, and won't contain irrelevant information). I go to the store and spend a few hundred dollars from my emergency fund on backups; extra devices, extra cords, extra storage space. I take my laptop too, though battery life is going to be much more of a problem.
I grab copies of survival books from the bookstore. I already have "How to Survive in the Woods", but I want to grab some of those big, glossy identification guides. In case I'm stuck in the woods, they might save my life. In case I can easily find a city, I can hopefully sell them.
I go talk to my father-in-law, who collects guns. If I told him the truth, he probably wouldn't believe me (and I probably would have some trouble believing me either, which is part of why I'm minimizing risks in case this is a delusion). Instead, I tell him that I've been looking for a gun and some ammo. I believe in my state (and the next state over) this is the faster route to gun ownership. Ideally, I'm able to acquire a handgun and ammo for myself, and a turn-of-the-century rifle that smiths and craftsmen will hopefully be able to emulate. I also grab a few of my father-in-law's books on the history of firearms and their construction, of which there are many.
I send out a message on Facebook asking if anyone wants to go on a trip with me. Ideally, some of my friends who play D&D and have an interest in the pseudo-period. Depending on time constraints and how good I am at selling the scenario, I borrow some edged weapons from a friend of mine who does fencing instruction, and a bow and arrows from a friend who does archery.
I say goodbye to my wife, and tell her that I hope to be home before the baby is born. I also say that there's a good chance that I'm just crazy, in which case I will be home in about an hour.
u/nicholaslaux [+6] (55 minutes later)
I'm mildly confused - you're inviting friends to travel with you, but not your wife? And would she not insist on going with you, if she knew there was a chance of you not returning?
u/alexanderwales [+26] Time flies like an arrow (an hour later)
I'm only going because I have to. If I didn't think it would literally kill me, I'd stay the heck away from the portal (or just tell my friends about it and let them go if they want to). My wife is on too many medications to last long in a non-modern world, and the odds of dying in childbirth are too great, to say nothing of the infant mortality rates. I hope that she would agree with this assessment, but if we disagreed I would just leave her behind and hope that with time, she would forgive me.
My friends (or at least, the likely candidates) don't have attachments that would prevent them from leaving, or could bring their attachments with them.
u/Inked_Cellist [+23] (4 hours later)
:(
u/alexanderwales [+21] Time flies like an arrow (4 hours later)
Okay, but you agree that given the scenario as presented, there's no way that you can come with, right? I would do my best to get back to you as quickly as possible, even if it meant having to start a one-man industrial revolution.
u/Inked_Cellist [+13] (5 hours later)
I guess...
u/Iconochasm [+3] (6 hours later)
Ever read The Dragon and the George series? Modern couple gets 'ported into fantasy medieval England. Refusing to have kids for fear of the risk of her dying in childbirth is a theme in the later books.
u/nicholaslaux [+1] (an hour later)
Understandable.
u/None [+1] (6 hours later)
A land of swords and magic, mate.
I think "Lay on Hands" does wonders for even congenital conditions, and it's hard to die of childbirth when you can pay a cleric for a Revive.
u/alexanderwales [+10] Time flies like an arrow (6 hours later)
Yeah, but in the worst case I get a place like Westeros, where the height of medical knowledge comes from the maesters, who aren't much better than barbers. Hope for the best, plan for the worst.
u/Calsem [+8] (46 minutes later)
Some great ideas, I just see one problem: It's a foreign world, so your identification guides could be mistaken at best and totally wrong at worst. For example, a safe looking mushroom here might be deadly over there
u/FaceDeer [+7] (6 hours later)
That's presumably why he's bringing friends along.
u/Transfuturist [+15] Carthago delenda est. (7 hours later)
To test for poison?
Oh wait, Muggle bones are just as good for sharpening as Hufflepuffs.
u/None [+1] (21 hours later)
The correct way for testing if something is poisonous is to eat a very small amount of it. If this small amount is debilitating (it generally doesn't kill you), you want someone around to take care of you and protect you.
u/Transfuturist [+0] Carthago delenda est. (a day later)
Actually, the first step is to chew a bit and let it rest in your mouth.
u/GeneralSCPatton [+2] (3 days later)
Before that, you should merely touch it with your tongue. And before that you should only rub it into your skin.
u/Transfuturist [+0] Carthago delenda est. (3 days later)
Well, before that you should look at it and see if it infects you with a mind-virus.
:P
u/r314t [+3] (5 hours later)
bunch of books on medicine, mathematics, and physics from the 1800s
The problem with this is much of what we thought about medicine prior to (very) roughly 100 years ago was flat out wrong and even harmful. You're better off getting a modern layperson's medical guide (wilderness medical guide or something) plus some medical texts for when you have more time to learn the details.
u/alexanderwales [+4] Time flies like an arrow (5 hours later)
I'd grab a bunch of stuff from all over the place. The big problem that I foresee with more modern medical texts is that they would tell me to use tools and equipment that I don't have and can't make, or suggest courses of action that aren't available to me given how limited my resources are going to be and how far I am from modern civilization. 19th century might be too far back, but I need some criteria that can give me the best books for my situation.
u/Calsem [+11] (18 minutes later)
A compilation of people's ideas:
preparation
- Learn basic phrases in ancient languages. Highly unlikely that the world will have any of the same languages, but might as well try.
- Learn basic survival skills
- Create posts in numerous forums asking what I should do (wait... is OP doing this? :P )
- Ask friends and family for supplies (but misleading them on what it will be used for)
- Set alarms so you wake up on time
- Leave behind a video of the portal
Supplies:
- off-road motorbike (assuming portal is large enough)
- Solar-powered recharger & hand-cranked recharger
- Camera
- Survival Gear
- Food
- sleeping bag
- knife
- medicine
- Matches
- cold and hot weather clothes
- a inflatable boat, in case portal lands you out somewhere in the ocean (and for rivers)
- Taser, guns, sword
- tablet with copy of Wikipedia, and some physical books as backup.
- Trade goods:
- Spices, chocolate, pearls, gems
- Items that might be magical or work against magical creatures:
- Garlic
- good-luck charms
- rare crystals
What to do once there
- Try to find civilization (follow a stream)
- Practice meditation & concentration exercises (in case magic is based on willpower)
- Once in a city, use your knowledge of modern science, rationality, and technology to your advantage. This could be done either by gaining the support of nobility or by using your trade goods to start a company.
Credit to:
/u/alexanderwales, /u/agentstonecutter, /u/HereticalRants, /u/eaglejarl, /u/mcandre
u/nicholaslaux [+3] (32 minutes later)
For the taser, do you actually know a source where you could acquire one within 48 hours? I was initially looking, and finding a source that sells them seemed a bit hard without the internet, given that overnight shipping is likely to be difficult for some more obscure items.
u/Calsem [+2] (39 minutes later)
I presume I could buy one at the local guns shop. If not, I could order one online and hope it arrives in time (1-2 day shipping)
http://www.rakuten.com/prod/taser-m26c-w-laser-trgt-4-cartridges/234728934.html
u/ArgentStonecutter [+1] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (an hour later)
Yeh, I wouldn't bother with the taser.
Oh, something else I just thought of. Bat detector.
u/nicholaslaux [+1] (an hour later)
I was unaware that a bat detector was a thing before just now.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+3] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (an hour later)
Just in case elves or leprechauns have really high pitched voices.
u/Calsem [+1] (an hour later)
It could be hard to get a gun in time and a taser provides a non-lethal solution. That being said, if you have a gun a taser is definitely optional
u/ArgentStonecutter [+1] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (an hour later)
I'm in Texas. A gun is definitely easier to get hold of. :)
u/None [+5] (3 hours later)
My spouse's copy of Pojar. Sword and wand fantasy lands are mostly New Zealand or British Columbia; 50/50 chance that Pojar will tell me what I can eat.
Antibiotics, definitely. The local pathogens will be entirely unlike anything I've experienced, but on the plus side they won't have developed any antibiotic resistances, so I can just bring a few dozen rounds of penicillin and be good. Unless it's radically different, in which case penicillin won't likely have much effect.
The tools I need to rough it for a couple weeks. (Trekking poles, backpack, sleeping bag, iodine tablets, camp stove, MREs, spare hiking shoes.) Nobody said I was going to land in the middle of a city, and even if I did, I'd need to get money and get a place to stay. It might take a few days, especially with the potential language barrier (assuming that's not magicked away).
High-density trade goods. Spices and dyes are a possibility, but most likely people won't trade for an entirely unknown good. Chemistry is probably universal, so I could bring gold and gemstones. (How quickly can I get a large order from Alternatives Lapidary? Interesting cuts of cheap lab-grown gems means a greater profit margin.) As an obvious foreigner, I expect usurious offers, but it's better than nothing.
An inconspicuous locking case for my high-density trade goods. My plan is to find a place to hide this, then grab a small subset to sell at any given time.
Four spare sets of glasses. I'm nearly blind without them.
A mechanical watch. A sextant, and a guide on how to navigate with it. A compass, just in case this planet has a magnetic field. That should help me navigate, or at least not go in circles.
I might be able to purchase a firearm in my area without much delay. If I can, I'll get a 9mm and either a Mosin Nagant carbine or a .30-06 with a fair stack of ammunition for each. Maybe a couple thousand rounds. Failing that, a bow and a pistol crossbow. Knives and poison to apply to them -- if I'm attacked, I want to survive, and killing my attackers before they can kill me is an effective way of doing that.
A knife sharpener. Two, actually: one for the poisoned knives and one for my utility knife. (I don't go anywhere without my utility knife.)
It would be tough to get them in time, but ideally a set of llamas as pack animals. At least one cart, but I'm not depending on landing by a road. Food for llamas, though they're going to forage for the most part. Equipment to care for llamas. They don't have quite the carrying capacity of a donkey or a horse, but they forage better, and once I settle down, I have wool and milk, which I wouldn't with donkeys. Plus I hear they tend to be a bit stubborn if you try overloading them -- clear communication of bad conditions is good.
If I can't get llamas, then an ATV with a hitch, a trailer, and gasoline. I'll probably only get 15mpg, but that'll get me a couple hundred miles within the first day, which might mean sleeping in a bed on night 1 rather than a week of roughing it.
My cryonics medical necklace. I might be heavily deluded about this whole affair. It's not worth the risk of going without it.
u/KZLightning [+4] (13 minutes later)
What do you know about the destination? (Swords and magic is pretty vague. Do you mean a high-magic setting, low magic, utility magic or not, medieval, faux medieval, etc?) Do you know how large the portal is, or what kind of limits you have on what you can bring?
u/nicholaslaux [+1] (19 minutes later)
Before being transported, you know nothing more about the destination. If you search on Google maps, the coordinates appear to match an abandoned warehouse complex. For more details about the portal, you would likely need to physically travel to the site to see if there's anything obvious there.
The only limitation on what you can bring is that it needs to fit into the portal, and you need to actually be able to acquire it.
u/eaglejarl [+2] (an hour later)
How big is the portal?
u/nicholaslaux [+1] (an hour later)
You travel to the site, and find an old warehouse, with an unlocked roll up for large enough for a semi to drive through. Inside, you see four pillars in the corner of the room, forming a roughly 40' square, and the entire center of the room it's inscribed with strange markings that give you a mild headache if you look at them for too long.
You see no other indication of other human presence in the location, and it is far enough from residential areas that you don't think anyone would notice your presence there.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+1] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (an hour later)
40' square? I was thinking I'd have to carry everything by hand through a doorway. If I can drive I rent something offroadable and load it up.
u/nicholaslaux [+1] (an hour later)
You do expect to be able to drive through the portal. It's small by warehouse standards, but larger than a normal house garage.
u/Calsem [+2] (an hour later)
In that case I'd bring an off-road motorbike, which could save me a large amount of time journeying through the wilderness.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+2] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (an hour later)
Point. Motorbike sounds more practical than a 4x4... if you know how to ride one.
u/Calsem [+1] (an hour later)
Doesn't even matter if I didn't know how to ride one, I would just learn in the process of riding it. It's so useful that there's no excuse not to bring it. It could quite literally be the difference between life and death, as I doubt any of us have good survival skills, especially in a unknown magical world.
u/_stoodfarback [+3] (8 hours later)
A note on motorcycles/dirtbikes: There are some tricky things involved in riding a motorcycle safely. I wouldn't recommend "learn[ing] in the process of riding it". A few examples off the top of my head:
- Turning is mostly leaning, as opposed to turning the handlebars. In fact, past a certain speed, turning the handlebars left will cause the bike to turn very sharply right.
- How you move your weight around makes a huge difference in low-speed maneuvers.
- Almost all bikes have a manual transmission, which is getting to be a pretty rare skill in the states. Clutch? What's a clutch?
- Importance of safety gear.
So, if you don't know how to ride a motorcycle, I think your chances of survival actually go down if you bring one, since injury would be catastrophic, especially right when you get there.
u/Calsem [+1] (11 hours later)
good point, but if the nearest town turns out to be 150 miles away, having a bike would be a lifesaver. Walking all that way would be incredibly slow with carrying the supplies and going through uncharted territory. If I ran out of food, I would have to learn how to hunt and forage my own food, which would slow my progress to a crawl.
Good point, and thanks for the tips. However, I wouldn't buy a bike without first learning a bit about it. Also, i'm not going riding right away - there will be a learning period in which I will be going very slow (and even going very slow would be fast compared to walking).
u/ancientcampus [+1] juggling kittens (5 days later)
I mean, I know how to ride a motorcycle, but I've never used a dirtbike, so I would still be more comfortable taking a 4x4 offroad. Despite the multitude of injuries those cause. Make sure to bring a helmet.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+1] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (an hour later)
Point. 4x4 and a motorbike. It's not like I need to cover more than the deposit.
u/FaceDeer [+2] (7 hours later)
Just rent it. If it turns out that this was all a hallucination you're not out a whole lot.
Bring a good mountain bike, too. Gasoline could be hard to come by or it could be one of those worlds where advanced technology just doesn't work for some reason. And a really good bike lock for it.
u/FaceDeer [+2] (6 hours later)
With a portal that size I'm going to rent a couple of U-Hauls and bring everything. All my electronics, all my books, all my camping gear, I'll clean out my crawl space. Who knows, maybe old Christmas tree ornaments will be useful as trade goods, or will retain some kind of magical signature from my home universe, or whatever. It turns out that time is short and space is cheap so throw it all in and sort it out later.
I'll rent a bunch of stuff I don't have immediately handy. A generator, an ATV, etc. I'll be somewhat limited by what's available here in the city - I don't expect to be able to find industrial gems in the timespan available, for example. Better trade goods to find on short notice include pallets of fine cloth or a thousand digital watches or such.
And finally, I'll rent a Bobcat excavator. I'm bringing way too much stuff to handle it all right away, especially without knowing what the other universe is really like. So as soon as I'm through to the other side I'm going to bury the U-Hauls before going off to scout and find out what I'll actually need from them.
u/nicholaslaux [+2] (7 hours later)
That's roughly the same approach that some of my characters took. They've spent upwards of $15,000 at REI alone (primarily due to grouping up rather than travelling solo)
u/nerdguy1138 [+1] GNU Terry Pratchett (13 hours later)
I'm confused. You wrote a book? I've looked through your posts and I don't see anything?
u/nicholaslaux [+2] (19 hours later)
I haven't, but I'm potentially writing up a short story based on this scenario, which I've got personal notes regarding, including so far a full shopping list for each character, including timelines.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+7] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (33 minutes later)
A couple of decades worth of my meds. If I can't get those, it probably doesn't matter what else I take.
Physical paper books, maybe 11th edition of the Encyclopedia Britannica if the portal would fit it, as many "how things work" and survivalist medicine and similar volumes as I can fit in the space. And, yeh, some solar powered chargers for my personal electronics but I wouldn't spend a lot of money on them. They won't last more than a few years, books are a different matter.
Food. At least a couple weeks worth.
Trade goods. Gold, silver, maybe jewels if I can afford some.
A couple of firearms and a bunch of ammo. Plus a katana and a shortsword and machete that I already have.
My collection of meteorites and australites, a bunch of other interesting minerals, on the odd chance they're magically effective.
Edit: the portal seems to be pretty big, so I rent something offroadable and a standalone gas generator and buy a bunch of gas and load everything I own that can fit.
Edit: and a bat detector that does heterodyne and frequency shifting. This one by choice.
u/alexanderwales [+5] Time flies like an arrow (39 minutes later)
A couple of decades worth of my meds. If I can't get those, it probably doesn't matter what else I take.
This is why one of my first priorities in a zombie apocalypse scenario is to break into a pharmacy. Of course, medications eventually decay over time, so even then it's sort of chancy.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+1] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (59 minutes later)
If I actually need more than that, that means they've got some pretty serious medical magic so it's probably not an issue.
u/Calsem [+1] (an hour later)
Although electronics wouldn't last too long, if you had scribes writing down the information on them 24/7 you could get a lot more knowledge than with the amount of books you could carry.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+2] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (an hour later)
That's why I'm still taking my personal electronics. I just can't count on that.
u/alexanderwales [+1] Time flies like an arrow (2 hours later)
That series is so great, though the rerelease which smushes it back into three books is my preferred method of reading it. The next one (Dark State) is coming out soon.
u/FaceDeer [+2] (6 hours later)
The "magic" wildcard could come into play here. Cast mending on a broken laptop, good as new again.
I wonder if mending can fix software problems...?
u/nicholaslaux [+1] (12 hours later)
I've not decided if that spell even exists in my world, but my current assumption is that if it does, it can only repair damages, rather than reassemble fallen apart pieces, so while mending would be able to repair the glass in some broken glasses, if the earpiece snapped off and the tiny screw fell out, mending would unsnap the side, but not rescrew the tiny piece and thus you'd still end up with broken/disassembled glasses.
(As to what makes things broken vs disassembled, it likely has to do with either perception or some sort of chemical bonds. Hopefully it doesn't come up, lol)
u/FaceDeer [+1] (6 hours later)
The "magic" part of the destination world might work out okay for you with regards to the medication. Certainly take as much as you can, just in case, but once you're over there start looking into how healing spells work and whether they can fix whatever it is that ails you. This sort of thing varies widely, of course, but many fantasy settings have top-tier healing magic that's better than anything modern medicine has managed.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+1] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (6 hours later)
And others have willowbark and willpower.
u/FaceDeer [+1] (7 hours later)
Yeah, that's why you should take what meds you can to hedge your bets. Just saying that if your supply runs short it might not be a guaranteed end. Even when planning "rationally" one must sometimes end up taking a gamble.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+1] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (7 hours later)
Like I said, without magic I won't need more than about 20 years anyway.
u/Gurkenglas [+3] (3 hours later)
reads the other comments
I go to the coordinates. If I find the headachy pillars, I call up the Randi million dollar foundation thing, send them a few thousand bucks so they take me seriously (travel costs etc.) and get them here ASAP. With any luck, within 12 hours I have the media, the government and the world's eye on site and its brains thinking on how to address the issue.
Y'all are doing it way too Gryffindor.
u/Calsem [+1] (7 hours later)
To be fair, the pillars weren't mentioned in the original post.
u/codahighland [+1] (12 hours later)
Problem is, at that point you're pushing up against the deadline wherein you drop dead.
u/historymaking101 [+3] (8 hours later)
I grab my girlfriend and maybe some friends. On 48 hours notice I can probably arrange any of that and paying for flights and promising a buttload of my savings to negate them losing their jobs if I'm wrong is probably fine. (So long as I'm sure that I'm right, which isn't entirely certain.)
I'm grabbing a solar charger guaranteed good for a few years and my kindle, loaded with thousands of books on every topic I might need. Also that hand-crank charger, and a movement powered watch. I'm bringing hard copies of any book I want to be able to read/ that I might need when something inevitably happens to the kindle or power supply. I bring food, because who knows what I might need. Either I'll have a gun legally or I'll get a friend who owns several to come along.
I'm buying out large chunks of REI, the grocery store, and places for other supplies and emptying those gas-stationthings of ice. I'm renting a lare truck or several to get these on location. I know how to ride, and I'm not horrible with a saber, so I'll pick up at least one horse and a sword, It's possible that I'll just rent some time on the horses from a stable if I'm low on cash. I know they have insurance, and one of the stables is looking to downsize anyways, I'll pick those horses.
I've got an acquaintance who used to be a professional blacksmith. He's a bit of a handful, but I'll probably bring him and all of his forge supplies. I may or may not be out of money by now, but as my best friends are along for the ride, they sure as shit aren't. We'll bring at least one sailboat as both my best friend, and my HS best friend, who will probably come, are accomplished sailors. With some overlap, the party will include: an economics graduate with a specialty in industrial organization and development, a geological exploitation economist, several computer programmers in case magic turns out to be a Rick Cook type of thing, Several sailors, a blacksmith, A guy with grad degrees in sociology and math, a medieval combat and weapons specialist, a military history buff who knows his Japanese weaponry, a food prep specialist most of the way through a zoology degree, the former commander of a military academy, an electrical engineer, and a civil engineer. Those are within 7 people for those who want to keep count. Core party. I will also be bringing my gf and few jack-of all trades types, plus a close friend or two with no relevant specialties we will just want to keep around. All of our spare,currency, stocks and credit will be converted to gold.
My gf has a psychology and art background which might come useful. she should also bring some of her friends as my core 7 are all male, and only a few of the jack of all trades types are women. Call the party size about 30 as we can add a few current or former IDF members to that list and it seems stupid not to.
I can shoot a bow, ride a horse, and use a sword. My Isreali relatives are all MDs, and former IDF as that shit is mandatory service. We are bringing lots of medical supplies including any likely prescription meds, courtesy of the Israeli doctors. The blacksmith loves to get super drunk and is huge. We've got a bi eagle scout who is multi-lingual (if that matters), engineers, etc. Anything the world wants to throw at us we can handle, at least with some cross training of knowledge unless it involves magic. We can cross-train for anything necessary. Only the Israeli doctors are in their 30s, the rest span from 19-29. Might make a decent fantasy novel.
EDIT: It was pretty close anyways, but edits are successive ninjas after realizing that this was in r/rational. EDIT: Definitely a bunch of horses in case the trucks don't work, probably some wagons. if the portal isn't big enough, then supplies to build a few wagons. Edit:might as well swap cars with my sister, trading my 2011 for her 2007 4WD SUV.
u/nicholaslaux [+1] (10 hours later)
Given the size of your party, I assume you can send someone to the portal site. They find a 40' x 40' empty warehouse as described elsewhere in the thread. Given the amount of stuff you have, I imagine that spsce is likely to be your largest limiting factor.
u/historymaking101 [+1] (a day later)
Yup, But I think I can squeeze everyone and everything in there, at least for a 5 min period if I have to knock a wall down and apply some heavy duty netting. Also is the portal open for an instant, or 5 min or so? I don't have that info and it's easy in 5 min.
Edit: we can cut down on the clothing if we really need to. I want large amounts of food just in case we're someplace rural and far from anyone in winter.
u/nerdguy1138 [+1] GNU Terry Pratchett (13 hours later)
what's REI? that phrase has popped up several times here.
u/eaglejarl [+1] (16 hours later)
It's a camping / sporting goods chain store.
u/nicholaslaux [+1] (19 hours later)
See here: http://www.rei.com/
u/dalr3th1n [+4] (3 hours later)
Magic is merely real? Bored now, gonna study zebras for two days.
u/HereticalRants [+2] (43 minutes later)
First, I set multiple alarms for 4:00, 5:30, and 5:40 on that day (setting my deadline to be at the portal at 6:00), though I'll probably be jittery enough that just the 4:00 one will suffice. Knowing me, I won't be able to get any sleep Saturday night, even though it isn't very good to be tired when going into unfamiliar territory.
Then I find out whether I'm allowed to camp at the site of the portal. If so, then I do that. If not, then I don't want to risk the police evicting me from the area.
Without knowing anything more about the land I'll be transported to, I don't know what I need to take with me, so I'll default to taking everything that I'd take on a backpacking trip (perhaps a bit heavier than usual on the medical supplies), plus books and guns. Books are good because they are a cheap way of carrying a lot of intellectual value that may or may not already exist on the other side, but with a diverse selection of books I'm more likely to have something that'll be of value on the other side than if I were to take any other good. The guns are to protect my interest in that value, though they may be useless on the other side, so I also take a number of blades. I'm probably less than useless in a blade fight and I don't have time for medieval military training, so I'm banking more on the guns. I don't have the resources to take any useful set of any more advanced technology (except in book form), and I don't want to risk stealing anything, so I'm limited to what my meagre savings can buy in a small town.
I can't bring any sort of ebook reader since 2 days isn't enough time for someone in my position to obtain a sufficient portable power supply for such a thing and time I'd spend setting it up is time wasted that I could have spent on gathering hard copy books.
It doesn't matter that I can't obtain gold or silver since it is unlikely that a particular arbitrary metal is of any value on the other side.
u/Calsem [+1] (52 minutes later)
Why not buy a hand-cranked charger from a store for the ebook reader? You should have enough time for that.
u/HereticalRants [+1] (59 minutes later)
No availability.
I can't justify devoting anything more than a tiny portion of my time to trying to find such a thing (or parts for such a thing) since such a complex system as a text-computer is sure to be extremely failure-prone in an unknown environment.
On the plus side, I'm more likely to be able to camp out by the portal (and thus less likely to miss it) than someone who lives in a city.
u/Calsem [+2] (an hour later)
If you get a good waterproof case for your tablet it should be fine. The amount of information you can store on a tablet far outweighs any negatives.
u/mrmonkeybat [+1] (9 hours later)
Things like hand cranked or solar powered chargers are not things that are available in any shop, probably have to mail order them 2 days is not enough time for a mail order.
u/nicholaslaux [+1] (an hour later)
You travel to the site, and find an old warehouse, with an unlocked roll up for large enough for a semi to drive through. Inside, you see four pillars in the corner of the room, forming a roughly 40' square, and the entire center of the room it's inscribed with strange markings that give you a mild headache if you look at them for too long.
You see no other indication of other human presence in the location, and it is far enough removed from residential areas that you do not expect that anyone would notice if you simply set up camp in the parking lot outside the building.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+2] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (an hour later)
Hm. Something occurred to me. Do I get any impression that it's just me that's gonna die, or everyone? That changes the parameters.
u/nicholaslaux [+1] (an hour later)
Just you, unless you find anyone else who seems to be under the same compulsions. It's not a looming extinction level event, if that was your concern.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+2] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (an hour later)
I'm always worried about looming extinction events in these circumstances. :)
u/dalr3th1n [+1] (3 hours later)
Good point. If it's just me, I do all this prep stuff, set alarms, and get there 2 hours early.
If it's all humanity, I buy some chains, lock myself in the portal right now, and don't move.
u/ArgentStonecutter [+1] Emergency Mustelid Hologram (3 hours later)
If it's all humanity, I figure out how many other people I can convince to be inside the portal at t0.
The weird inscriptions that give you a headache would be a good convincer.
u/KZLightning [+1] (an hour later)
The portal seems to exist already. I would check it out ahead of time to find proof of its existence and knowledge about what is on the other side. All that is required is that I actually cross the portal in time. If the portal does not already exist, then I will have obtained information on area around it - including whether or not it can store my supplies.
u/nicholaslaux [+1] (an hour later)
You travel to the site, and find an old warehouse, with an unlocked roll up for large enough for a semi to drive through. Inside, you see four pillars in the corner of the room, forming a roughly 40' square, and the entire center of the room it's inscribed with strange markings that give you a mild headache if you look at them for too long.
You see no other indication of other human presence in the location, and it is far enough removed from residential areas that you do not expect that anyone would notice if you simply set up camp in the parking lot outside the building.
u/KZLightning [+2] (an hour later)
In that case, I would definitely have my "weird intuitions" verified. Symbols do not cause headaches normally, and I do a lot of reading. The most important things to get are basic survival supplies and reading materials. I would immediately check the internet for information on such supplies. (See other comments for the type of materials.) I would want everything to be either immediate use materials that I can carry or long term materials that I can store on the other side. The reading materials should be on some small electronic device that can be recharged through solar power or manpower. I would suggest a more rugged version of the device if possible and two recharge methods. The information itself is more valuable than anything else. To survival supplies, I will add that a large knife, a proper backpack (for survival) and basic food supplies would all be important.
The thing that would strike my interest immediately is the pillars. Perhaps they cause headaches, but I would want a record of all of the strange markings on all of the pillars. In a world with magic I would definitely pursue the magic. (Plus, I like mysteries. No, the headache would not stop me from investigating.) I would probably record the pillars through a video camera or mobile device.
The problem with this scenario is that I am not anywhere close to being fit. I find physical exercise to be boring for the most part. So I doubt that hunting for food would be easy. I would intend to find civilization immediately so that I could survive on the food I already have.
I would leave behind a record of my intuitions, a copy of the video record of the pillars and a note about what I did and why. This would be left behind with a friend of mine. At the scene of the portal, I would leave behind a video of the portal itself (if possible, the friend would tape it for me).
u/HereticalRants [+1] (a day later)
I find physical exercise to be boring for the most part.
My advice to you is to not do boring things for exercise, then. Take up a sport, or climbing, or martial arts, or freestyle unicycling, or whatever strikes your fancy.
Running on a treadmill is boring, whereas running in the woods is not, at least for me.
Finding some sort of exercise that you're actually motivated to do is rational.
u/None [+1] (4 hours later)
- Next-day ship a hard drive with Archive.org, Wikipedia + assorted survival guides + solar-powered laptop.
- Pack layers of clothes in preparation for cold and warm weather.
- Canteen, knife, flint.
- Bring friends!
u/mrmonkeybat [+1] (9 hours later)
I would place posts on variouse internet message boards advertising for traveling companions to a magical fantasy world. I suspect all my family and friends are too sane to come with me. Exackly what kind of magic is in this world
Guns are hard to obtain where I live but I should be able to get a crossbow. I will spend my savings on new camping gear. Go to a martial arts shop see what kind of swords are available if I can only find wall hanger crud without resorting to mail order I guess a machete will have to do. If the camping gear shops have a crank or solar powered charger for kindles that will be useful if not I will have to restrict myself to a few books of the survival kind. Although I know enough about early medieval, industrial, and electrical technology that I should be fairly OK on those things without reference material.
Spend the rest of my savings on preserved camping food. Allot of people have suggested antibiotics but those are only available with a prescription.
u/AluminiumSandworm [+1] (15 hours later)
Something I've not seen anyone post is a strudy pair of hiking boots. Modern shoes are one of the things people missed most in the iron age man experiment. They're just so much better than anything available during premodern times, and you use them every day. Might want to bring more than one pair.
u/Nepene [+1] (17 hours later)
I grab my prepared prepper backpack which has antibiotics, a nexus loaded with useful things, a solar powered charger for said nexus, a few flash drives for extra memory, water purification pills, an axe, a torch, batteries, water bags, my water filter, cutlery and such, my food, my stove, clothing, sleeping blanket, sleeping stuff, my fire starters, my tools, my medical stuff, antibiotics, surgical masks and gloves. I'd remove the emergency money and map and such and the hand cranked radio, keep my binoculars, sewing kit, rope, duct tape, condoms, sun glasses, bags. I can't remember what else I stuck in there.
I live near a flood zone, I don't want to be screwed if the area floods.
I'm surprised I'm the only person who mentioned condoms. All you other rational dudes have a pretty high chance of catching magical siren HIV. Plus if the land of swords and magic is corruption of champions land you're really screwed.
After that I beg/ steal a few guns from my military friends. A grenade launcher would be nice for dragons and such. Maybe some of them can come along too, I know a few of them aren't that happy with life.
I strap on my fencing gear. It's knife resistant so it should give me some limited protection against murderous people with swords.
I use my savings to buy silk, spices, salt,
http://www.historyworld.net/wrldhis/PlainTextHistories.asp?historyid=330
Some of these popular trade goods.
I'll use my free time to try and make some ricin, maybe a few other poisons. It's colorless, odourless, and easy to make with common natural ingredients. If orcs attack me maybe I can poison their water supply. Maybe I could make some nicotine poison or potato poison as well. Might be able to make some cyanide, though that's a bit trickier.
See if I can get some heroin and other drugs from certain other friends. I don't use it myself, but, fantasy world, needs must.
Not sure I can think of an easy way to acquire biological warfare weapons, definitely can't get tactical nukes sadly. If genocide turns out to be necessary it might be tricky.
Edit. The seeds I have in my backpack are pretty old. I might buy some new ones. The shovel seems fine.
u/westward101 [+1] (2 days later)
How can I know what I am experiencing is true? I have an awareness. That awareness is reinforced by accurate depictions of reality (warehouse with unusual totems). Pretty sketchy. I'd probably check in with a psychiatrist. Write about the experience in my blog. Call up a videographer friend and livestream me hanging out at the warehouse, outside the portal, with a goat staked in the middle of it for laughs.
If I was somehow sufficiently convinced (the "awareness" became a compulsion or was otherwise inarguable) then I'd move on.
What can I expect? "Swords and magic" That's not very helpful. Since this is such a bizarre situation, it's likely I'm in a simulation and of all the possible "swords and magic" universe, it seems a good bet to go with the "Camelot" version. The weather will be similar to England. There will be trees and rolling hills. Gold will be valuable. Horses will be in use. There's likely a feudal system of government. Maybe magical creatures. Etc. I will acknowledge "swords and magic" could be a tropical island or ancient China or even something far far different, but just keep that in the back of my mind since I just don't know. Will there be planetary systems as we know it? How does magic work? Will it interfere with modern electronics? Will there be clear good and evil like there often is in my literary tradition? Questions to think about, but not a lot of time.
What are my goals? Short term: Survive long enough to not have my immediate survival a concern. Weapons, food, medicine. Medium-term: Establish a community to ensure my medium-term survival. Weapon generation, Construction, sustainable food. Long-term: Influence society to increase the chances of my long-term survival and the reduce the pain and suffering in my community and in society. Knowledge in the civil, agricultural, and governmental spheres.
Each of those will require different supplies. Ideally I could convince a dozen Navy SEALS with advanced civil engineering and agricultural degrees to come along. I don't have those resources though.
I don't know anyone who I could sufficiently convince that I'm telling the truth in order to be comfortable with "informed consent" so I'm assuming I'm going alone.
The major limiting factor here is time. There's a lot of stuff I'd want that I don't know how to get my hands on in 48 hours.
What could I get in 2 days that will be helpful in those three areas that I could afford?
Short-term (first 6 -12 months): Surviving.
Survival gear: Camping stuff, headlamps, tent, etc.
Weapons: 2 shotguns, 2 long guns, 3 pistols. All the same modern models if possible. 5,000 rounds of ammunition each. Night vision goggles.
Comms: Walkie talkies with rechargeable batteries, solar / hand chargers. A dozen Casio watches. A few battery powered drones, go pro cameras (for recon).
Medicine: Antibiotics. Painkillers (ibuprophen, aspirin, acetimiophen). Anti-biotic ointment. Petroleum jelly. Bandages, athletic tape, bandaids. Cannabis. Heroin. gallons of iodine. Pregnancy tests. 20 toothbrushes, dental floss.
Food: 6 months worth of food for 4. A few thousand mulitvitamins. A hundred gallons of olive oil. Flour, beans, etc. A hundred pounds of ground coffee. 10 gallons of Jim Beam. A keg of IPA (don't forget the tap!).
Medium-term (1-5 years): Building a community.
Weapons: I might be able to scrounge up a couple muzzle loaders and/or flintlocks with a goal towards reverse-engineering them. Recipes for black powder and guncotton. Instructions for making bullets and making bullet-making machines. Hundreds of steel knives, K-bar, chef's knives, etc.
Food: Hit the nursery. Buy them out of vegetable and flower seeds. Fruit tree saplings, cuttings from berry bushes and citrus. Spools of barbed wire. Chicken fence. A few dozen animals (breed stock of pigs, chickens, goats, sheep, etc).
Tools: A dozen chainsaws, parts. 55 gallon drum of gasoline. Flint and steel. Hand wound chronometers. Dental tools. A hundred pairs of reading glasses. A dozen pairs of Vibram soles.
Trade goods: 2 pounds of gold coins. 20 pounds of silver. 100 pounds copper wire.
Misc: 20 baseball mitts. 144 balls. 10 bats. Play on! Phonograph. A hundred rock albums. Kindle with a ton of books.
Long-term: 5+ years. Influencing society.
General: Foot-powered sewing machines.
Food: Books on modern agriculture. Grain seeds (wheat, oats, rye).
u/ancientcampus [+1] juggling kittens (5 days later)
Acquire several books on memory techniques. In case magic requires large amounts of memorization. Ditto for meditation, concentration, and the ambiguous-yet-ubiquitous "willpower".
Google "what to do when time traveling to the past" and save several different guides. Ryan North has a good cheat sheet. In fact, dedicate 1-2 hours of contacting Ryan North personally and geeking out with him. Even if he doesn't believe me, he may tolerate me. Best trick: lick a cow's udder to inoculate yourself with cowpox, and thus acquire some cross-immunity to smallpox.
Bonus answer: make a printout of the complete Evil Overlord List. Sell it to the highest bidder.
u/Kynake [+0] (2 days later)
I'm not sure about what i'd do exactly, but the absolute first thing would be to post about this "hypothetical" situation in r/rational and then read the comments while i prepare for the trip in whatever way i can think about, then do the things that i didn't think about that were suggested in the post.
u/ancientcampus [+2] juggling kittens (6 days later)
You have 60 hours.
Your solution must at least allow Kynake to evade being naked, lost in a fantasy realm without plot armor, holding only his smartphone, facing 36 wild animals and the newly resurrected Big Bad.