Nathan Xavier
January 01, 2021 7:45 PM
Beginners: Defensive Plants and Projectile Weapons by Nathan Xavier
Nathan stood just inside the door to Greenhouse One as the students began to arrive, returning the marked exams they had taken at the end of fall term. Each exam was accompanied by a greeting and personalized remark on the student's progress, ranging from "Excellent work," to "As a reminder, I offer office hours all day on Wednesdays." Most of Wednesday, of course, was spent grading papers and supervising Zeus and Dora digging holes since the students generally had other class obligations for most of it, but he tried to make himself especially available between classes, over lunch, and after classes ended. He was also willing to write excuse notes to other teachers if someone was really struggling and needed some one-on-one instruction and the other professor approved the absence ahead of time, though that didn't come up very often.Now in early January, the warmth of the greenhouse was a welcome relief to the cold outside, and robes could be worn comfortably without risking heat stroke. Winter was one of his favorite seasons for that reason, given that he consistently spent a good portion of his day inside greenhouses all year round. It was infinitely more pleasant in here now than it had been in early September or would be in late May and early June.
Once all of the students had arrived and taken seats along the long work tables set up down the middle of the greenhouse, he spoke to them more generally, "Welcome back to Herbology. I hope you all had a good break and are ready to start learning about magical plants with defense mechanisms. As this is a beginner class, we're not going to look at anything truly dangerous yet, so be aware that this is the mild end of the spectrum. Plants in the magical world can get quite terrifying, and just because they are - usually - rooted to the ground and - generally - unable to move under their own volition, does not mean they are harmless. We're going to look at two herbological cousins today called the Spiky Bush and the Spiky Prickly Plant, which have very similar features."
He pointed his wand one of two bushes he had sitting at one end of the greenhouse, far enough away from where the students were sitting that they were not at risk, and cast a spell to flash light on it so they knew which one he was talking about. "That one is the Spiky Bush. As you can see, it is a bush that has large spikes growing out of it. If something gets too close, or it otherwise senses harm, it will shoot those spikes out around it. It can only shoot them about two feet out, so you're all safe where you are at. They are generally considered a nuisance plant - not unlike wild muggle pricker bushes and they grow like weeds - so most people don't want to care for these guys but take them out. The safest way to do that is stand well back and light them on fire. The incendio charm works very well on these bushes. They will shoot off their spikes when they catch on fire, so do remember to stand far enough back that they can't reach you."
"Next, I'll ask you to turn your attention to the next bush over," he invited, and cast his light charm again on the other plant to draw attention to that one. "This is called a Spiky Prickly Plant." He made a slight expression of distaste for the informal name given to the bush in question. "As you can see, this one has quite large yellow thorns growing on it. There are two variants of these plants that often grown together in the wild, but its the ones with yellow thorns you need to be most careful of. These are the ones that can also shoot their thorns out at nearby people. If they have brown thorns, those are just normal thorns that can't become projectile weapons. The Spiky Prickly Plant also happens to be fire resistant, so they best way to get rid of these bushes is to just cast a severing charm on the stems to cut them down."
"Neither plant features in any common potions, though a small handful of very specialized brews may make use of the yellow thorns or the Spike Bush's spikes, but neither ingredient is one you will ever find in your potions kits as there just isn't much use for them, and when they are used, they are most effective if collected fresh."
"Now, for the practical part of the lesson, I'd like the first years on this side of the greenhouse, and second years on that side. First years, you will be setting fire to the Spiky Bush." The fire starting charm was a little easier to master than the severing one. Professor Wright had also said he'd covered the Incendio charm already this year, but not the severing one yet, though the second years would have seen it at the end of last year. "Second years, you'll be cutting down the Spiky Prickly Plants. Not everyone needs to cast a charm, so if you don't feel comfortable casting in front of your peers, that is fine. Quite frankly, I don't have enough bushes for everyone to have a turn anyway."
"Please stand here where I have marked a line on the floor a safe distance away but where you should be able to both sets of bushes. You will take turns." He did not envy Grayson for needing to oversee a class where children who were just learning to control a wand were shooting fire around, and he did not want to have to explain to Selina that he had accidentally let his first years burn down his greenhouse, so they were going to do this one at a time. "Please observe how the bushes react to the threat, and how effective the charm is at eliminating the bush. Feel free to take notes on your observations or discuss what you see with your classmates. Now, line up and can I have a first year volunteer to cast the first fire starting charm?"
OOC: You can post about casting the appropriate spell, or talking about the plants with your neighbors. You are welcome to god-mod Nathan requesting volunteers or asking you to cast the spell on the other plant to demonstrate its effectiveness there or summoning a fresh bush from the back of the greenhouse. The information about these bushes is pretty sparse, so don't feel bad about making things up, so long as you don't completely contradict something another post has already established.
Nathan won't let anything get too out of hand, so if there is a potentially dangerous situation, tag me before it gets too bad.
Reference for this comes from this page about the Spiky Prickly Plant and this page about the Spiky Bush.
Subthreads: Fire? by Billy Cobb with Oz Spellman
Blending in by Stanley O'Malley with Ian Malone
What is he doing? [Wally] by Valentine Duell with Wally O'Malley
I don't like the sound of this by Jasper Brockert
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Nathan Xavier
Beginners: Defensive Plants and Projectile Weapons
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Billy Cobb
January 01, 2021 8:34 PM
Fire? by Billy Cobb
Billy liked Herbology a lot better than most of the other classes. It felt more like something he'd do back home. It was like learning to avoid poison ivy or which mushrooms were okay to eat. Those were good things to know and very practical. Sure, learning to make fire in Charms class was good, just like learning how to fight monsters. How to turn one useless thing into another useless thing didn't seem great so far... but if it became turning useless things into useful things, that would be better. The thing those classes had against them, was that the was all inside. This was was outside.. well, almost. These greenhouses were a strange mixture of inside and outside. He'd wondered about all the magic that was used to make them work. Ma would love to have a house for her garden that was always summer inside.He wasn't really much for note taking, but he did scribble some notes as the Professor talked and tried to draw each of the plants. He was not a great artist. However he did perk up more when the professor mentioned they'd be using that fire making spell to burn down these plants. He also make sure to note down that the other one didn't care if it was set on fire. Maybe it had learned from the other plant. Then the professor asked for him to come up and give it a try. Well, he'd asked for a first year, and he was going to try this before his roommates got a chance. This would be fun!
Taking the position indicated he looked at the plant in front of him. Other than those spiky bits, it look like an ordinary plant. He debated stepping closer to see how exactly it threw the spikes, but remembered the Professor say they would do that once it was on fire. Great. He looked over his shoulder at the first-year behind him, "Ready to take notes?" he asked, "Imma gunna make some fire." He grinned and turned back to the plant and tried to remember everything he could about the fire charm. Then he flicked his wand, "Incendio!" The fire erupted from the end of his wand, and nearly made it to the plant. It must have sensed the heat or motion or something because spiky bits shot all over the place and landed short of him, just as his fire had done to it. He gave it an unhappy look. "Dangnabit," he said as he turned back to the person behind him, "Alright, you give it a shot."
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Billy Cobb
Fire?
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Oz Spellman
January 02, 2021 8:42 PM
WOO! by Oz Spellman
Oz took his test back, hurriedly folding it and shoving it in his bag out of sight as soon as he got to his desk. He hoped no one had overheard Professor Xavier's remark as he handed it back.Good work.
If they had, they would assume he was talking to someone else, right? Or that he was just being nice because that was kind of his jam? Oz hoped so. He wasn't sure whether he was imagining it or whether there really had been a note of surprise in Professor Xavier's voice. His test was a lot better than most of the homework he had turned in. He knew that. And his chest tightened a little at the thought of being asked to explain. But tests were easy. You took them in class time, and everyone had to be quiet and work by themselves, with the teacher watching. He put his test score out of his mind, deciding there was no point worrying unless someone brought it up, and tried to pay attention to class.
His mouth dropped open as Professor Xavier explained two plants which honestly sounded straight up like something from a video game. Oz liked video games (he had spectated a lot of them at the arcade) but he had never exactly dreamed of meeting things from them in real life. There was a reason you took a shutgun or a karate to kick to most things you encountered in those worlds. They were bad. 'This thing shoots spikes at you' was however quickly followed up with 'you shoot fire in return' which had him firmly back on board - a fact underlined by the fact he had whooped at the mention of fire.
He scrambled forward eagerly when Professor Xavier asked for volunteers, though funnily enough he wasn’t the only one who was keen to get going, and Billy got there before him. He let out a ‘whoa!’ when the plant totally did the thing that Professor Xavier had said it would do. He was already jumping forward with a ‘my turn, my turn!’ when Billy handed over.
“Incendio!” he cast. The swing lost a little precision in his excitement, but one thing Oz was good at was simultaneously feeling a rush of adrenaline and co-ordinating his movements. It was like when it was your turn to bat in baseball - you were stoked, and hyped, but your body still focussed because it knew this was your shot. He was not quite as well practised with his wand as he was with his baseball bat, but some of the skill in aiming was transferable, and one of the areas he’d found he excelled at was getting his spells to go where he wanted, even if he didn’t always get them to do what he wanted. This time he got both, because after all, who wouldn’t study the heck out of fire spells? It was a little weak as a jet, he could produce more fire power when he concentrated, and it wasn’t right on the heart of the bush, but it touched it! There was a distinct smell of singed plant, and another shower of spikes.
“YEAH!” he grinned, “Ten points to me!” Ten was a nice round number. Probably in a game you’d only get five for hitting the edge or something but five sounded cruddy. Ten was awesome. Whoever hit it in the centre could get twenty.
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Oz Spellman
WOO!
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Billy Cobb
January 04, 2021 6:42 PM
Nice! by Billy Cobb
Billy stuck around to see how Oz's attempt at burning the bush went. He wound up cheering right along with his roommate as the flames singed the plant's leaves. He may also have taken an unnecessary, involuntary step back as the plant exploded once more with thorns. Then he gave Oz a most likely, all to familiar inquiring look. "We're allowed to give ourselves points?" Well, shucks, if he'd known that Pecari would probably be doing a whole heck of a lot better. It must of been in one of them books he hadn't gotten around to reading yet. "Now I really gotta try better when I get another turn."He cast his eyes about the green house for other possible targets he could practice on until he got back to the front of the line again. "How do the points work out? You get ten for hittin' the thing? Do you see anything we could practice on while we wait fer our turns again?" There were plenty of plants around, but he was pretty sure Professor Xavier wouldn't take to kindly to them burning down all his greenery. If only.... Then his face lit up and he snapped his fingers, "I got it!" Billy turned to Oz with a grin, "The professor said that other plant the second years is working with is fireproof, right? So, if'n we can find another one of them settin' about here, we could practice on that without worryin' about burning anything down!" It was a fantastic idea, "Do ya see any more of them?"
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Billy Cobb
Nice!
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