<div class="floatright">(https://i.pinimg.com/564x/19/59/d5/1959d5a89df588d70e329492b8e6ff84.jpg)</div><strong>Location:</strong>Introduction to Arcane Theory<br/><strong>Tagging:</strong>Students<br/><br/>Professor Merryweather smiled at Kylie's question.  "This is where things often get a little complicated and requires a more lateral way of thinking than what the textbooks can provide.  When we cast spells, we do so with a particular will and intent: invisibility, in this instance.  There are many ways to achieve a particular effect.  The textbook states to use a shed skin of a chameleon, but that's not true invisibility, simply the changing of one's skin to replicate the wall next to which they stand.  Perfectly transparent glass -<em>don't</em>crunch it up before adding it to the potion or you risk digesting small pieces - can achieve a better effect,  Sound and scent likewise should be taken into account, but the more reagents one adds and the more complex the spell, the greater the risk of unintended side effects.  Those who seek to experiment are best off creating one potion with three effects rather than individually creating three potions that each have one effect, due to issues with individual potion potencies."<br/><br/>Looking to Kylie, she added, "That said, using magic to avoid detection has a particular issue: those who are sensitive to magic will pick up individuals like a beacon.  It can be far more jarring to have one sense tell you of a presence when it's missing from another.  A werewolf who sees five people and smells four is bound to focus on the enigma far more than the rest.  As with many such issues, whether one attempts to use the matter on Normies or Outsiders compounds the problem, and specifics on the Outsiders need to be taken into account."  A warning, not necessarily a how-to guide.<br/><br/>After a bit of consideration, she added, "With alchemy as well, an issue can be activation and deactivation.  A potion activates upon ingestion and lasts until excreted, and one may not want to be invisible that long.  When such precision is required, artifice can be better, such as an article of jewelry or clothing.  With invisibility and the Norse runes, you want to use Dagaz.  It doesn't have the full range of options of potions, and those aware of the supernatural in various ways might train themselves to see past it, but it works well if you're making something more for an unknown eventuality."<br/><br/>"Unless you can program in the variables at the moment of casting," said the technoshaman with a point of pride.<br/><br/>Professor Merryweather smiled to cede the point.  "But that's well beyond the scope of this particular course."  She glanced around the room.  "Further questions?"