D&D 5E How to pronounce Artificer

[jasper]

Every D&D video I hear pronounces this word wrong. I'm sure of it.

(I'm really asking about where you place the stress, not whether your "ti" is a tih or a tuh.)

It does not matter. As long as the gamers at the table know what you talking about. Now pronounce "PECAN"

 

[CleverNickName]

Magic doesn't exist by definition.

That's really all I was trying to say.

As for magic being real until proven otherwise, I'm reminded of a meme I saw recently:

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I get what you're saying, but that's the origin story of the scientific method--develop a theory, test it, repeat the test--not the origin of modern chemistry. Even pre-Renaissance alchemists didn't think what they were doing was "magical," they thought it was purely physical. (The church disagreed, and well...let's just say that they owned most of the printing presses.)

The field of thermodynamics was one of the rare sciences that "flipped the script," where experimentation actually drove the theory. It's a pretty cool bit of history...or at least I think it's cool. And now that I think about it, those inventors tinkering around in their workshops are probably closer to the D&D idea of "artificer" than pre-Renaissance alchemists were. So maybe I should have just said "inventor" instead of "alchemist."

The origin and history of most alchemical traditions, as well. The father of modern optics was an alchemist. Modern distillation was invented by alchemists, as were tools like the retort and alembic and crucible. Modern toxicology was invented by the famous alchemist Paracelsus. These were all invented via the scientific process.

The idea that alchemy and science are separate things is just a modern bias, not reality.

 

[teitan]

And pronouncing it to rhyme with officer is perfectly reasonable. It is not, however, correct.

There is no central authority that dictates how certain combinations of letters are pronounced (unlike French for example), and the same combination of letters can be pronounced in different ways. Take the homograph "bow" for example. Take a bow for tying a bow onto the bow of the ship. Sometimes spelling has little relation to pronunciation. How do you say Worcester source? Alnwick Castle?

The pronunciation of English words is established by common usage, not spelling, so a word that is not in common usage has no correct pronunciation.

In this case there IS. It's Latin and comes from French. Etymologically.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

In this case there IS. It's Latin and comes from French. Etymologically.

So what? English is not pronounced based on etymology, it's pronounced based on usage.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

That's really all I was trying to say.

As for magic being real until proven otherwise, I'm reminded of a meme I saw recently:

View attachment 152873

The thing is, it's true. It's bad science to say UFOs are not alien spaceships, because there is no evidence that they are not. It's unlikely, but that's not the same as fact. Showing that one UFO was a weather balloon does not prove all UFOs are weather balloons.

 

[CleverNickName]

The thing is, it's true. It's bad science to say UFOs are not alien spaceships, because there is no evidence that they are not. It's unlikely, but that's not the same as fact. Showing that one UFO was a weather balloon does not prove all UFOs are weather balloons.

It's also bad science to suggest that UFOs might be alien spaceships, because no evidence of any alien spaceship has ever been documented. Alien spacecraft aren't just unlikely, they are completely unprecedented. Occam's Razor and all that.

(See also: ghosts, angels, mothman, etc.)

 

[teitan]

So what? English is not pronounced based on etymology, it's pronounced based on usage.

No, dialect is not based on etymology. You have a common core and then variation is approached based on cultural nuance and variation. English does have rules for pronunciation, you learned them in school and those rules are often derived from the root language, not from usage. Usage is dialect.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

It's also bad science to suggest that UFOs might be alien spaceships, because no evidence of any alien spaceship has ever been documented. Alien spacecraft aren't just unlikely, they are completely unprecedented. Occam's Razor and all that.

(See also: ghosts, angels, mothman, etc.)

No evidence of anything is documented until it is documented.

If scientists dismissed ideas that are without without precedent there would never be any paradigm shifts and we would still be living in a stone age. Occam's Razor is a tool for ranking competing theories in order of probability, but Sherlock's Razor also applies: "Once you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth".

Alien spaceships are highly improbable due to the vast distances involved, but they are not impossible. An interstellar craft could be constructed by humans using current technology, the human lifespan is the only currently insurmountable obstacle preventing them making the journey. And aliens, by definition, are not human.

 

[Charlaquin]

It's pronounced like gif.

ʒaɪf