Item seed: Draconic Lightning Pistolet.

Draconic Lightning Pistolet – Google Docs

Draconic Lightning Pistolet

The Draconic Lightning Pistolet looks like what a wizard would come up with if she had seen a working raygun in operation; which is fair, because that’s largely what happened.  The wizard was one Damoiselle Yvette Marie Silverlight (Lady-Protector of Windhills), and the raygun was the property of a rather dashing stranger, strong of jaw and moral purpose, that showed up to help the forces of Good during one rather complicated weekend.  Two days of desperate heroics later, the hero was gone, back to his stars — and Damoiselle Silverlight had a notebook full of interesting sketches and working theories.

The Pistolet is not exactly a laser; Silverlight had been told that the raygun ‘tamed the lightning,’ so naturally she went with a spell that could take lightning and project it in a straight beam to the target.  The ‘Draconic’ part references the cast-off dragon’s scales used to line the ‘barrel’ (and the actual spell architecture needed to properly manipulate the scales). And ‘pistolet?’ Well, at first the item looked quite a bit like a whistle, so the name sort of stuck.

In terms of mechanics, the Pistolet hits about twice as hard as a crossbow and can throw a lightning bolt about half a mile, with no need to calculate for windage or arc of fire. However, it only has six shots, and can only be recharged with a natural lightning strike.  Even a magically generated storm won’t properly recharge the Pistolet.  Fortunately for Damoiselle Silverlight, Windhills has reliable lightning storms on a regular basis, which makes it easier for her to keep the item charged up.

Honestly, the Draconic Lightning Pistolet is itself a bit of a toy; indeed, Silverlight largely enchanted it for the entertainment value. The Pistolet works perfectly well, but it’s easier to cast regular fireballs — or lightning bolts, come to think of it.  However: researching how to make the item work has led the Daimoiselle to also really look at lightning, as in what lightning actually is.  Her one conversation with the aforementioned dashing starman on the subject drove home the thought that you could manipulate lightning — or ‘electricity,’ to use the starman’s term — without the use of magic.  That sounded intriguing, so she’s been fiddling around with the stuff, over the last few years.

And this electricity is fascinating.  There seems to be all sorts of things that one could do with it, if one just knew how. Damoiselle Yvette Marie Silverlight (Lady-Protector of Windhills) aspires to know how.