What is the range of Sting's Orc-radar?

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[MrMerildoll]

"Yes I know it's super niche and nerdy even for me but bear with me"
Oh I'm all here for it buddy

[elijahbrown]

Literal definition of "in deep geek"

[alejandromolina]

4:56 ...sang, of course...
That made me laugh out loud.

[andrewpaschke]

One interesting fact is that after Thorin’s death in the hobbit, they laid Orcrist on his tomb to give the dwarves warning about impending orc attacks. This definitely implies at least that Orcrist had an orc radar range of several miles and was more effective than existing lookout positions that would no doubt have been able to see farther than that.

[rashkavar]

It is worth noting that Bilbo's assessment that dim light means "not very near, but not far enough" could just be that he saw Glamdring glowing brightly before, and is thus concluding that a dim glow says they're in the area, but not in the room with him. It's not an unreasonable assumption to make.

[sewnmind]

I think Bilbo meant that Sting was glowing at all meant the goblins were to close for his liking.

[ianhruday]

There's a small complication here. The sword probably glows brighter the more Orcs there are as well, so it's going to be a function of distance and number.

Incidentally, my friend played an Orc in a D&D campaign who found a sword that glowed when it works were nearby. He picked it up and used it as his main weapon, and he named it "The Sword that Never Stops Glowing." It did radiant damage.

[MeepChangeling]

On your first point, I think it's far more in character for Bilbo to not know that a dimer glow means there are Goblins "Close but not too close" but rather he's being whisful. He's saying "There are goblins nearby, and I wish there were not."

[ZOB]

In The Hobbit, it says that The Lonely Mountain couldn’t be taken by surprise because Orcrist glowed whenever enemies approached. Surely the distance from Thorin’s tomb to outside of the lonely mountain is longer than a mile, but as mentioned, Glamdring (and by extension Orcrist) seem to be more sensitive than Sting.

[andreas_rr]

I would say there are 2 more things to consider:
1) How many orcs: i could imagine, the swords might pick up a whole group from a mile away, while a single orc might only be noticed from a few hundred meters away.
2) What about obstacles: whatever it is that the blade reacts to, may it be an aura of orcish malice or anything, chances are, it would be dimmer if there are either obstacles in the way. So, it could be that it shines dimly with orcs a mile away when in open ground at amon hen, but in Bilbo's case in Moria it might be much less distance for the same brightness, similar to 1).

If we try to take a scientific look at the topic, no matter what we compare it to - gravity, electromagnetic/acoustic waves, thermodynamics, hydrodynamics and so on, it would make sense that the propagation is dependant on how many/strong sources there are, and how the path looks like (dampening, reflections, etc.). There are so many factors that would make it physically immersive - and yes, i know, that would me more of an hard magic system, but it wouldnt surprise it if Tolkien would have liked to take inspiration in nature for questions like these.

What we can definitely say though, is, no matter how effective the swords are, the range/intensity should be chosen reasonably by the craftsmen for the purpose. I would neither want a sword glowing like the sun when orcs are even 10km away, nor would i want one glowing dimly with orcs closer than a hundred meters. I think, if it detects a single orc from 500m, a smaller group from a mile away and a large army from 2-5km away, that would sound just about right to be as practical as it can get. This way, it would start glowing when you should be wary of the situation, and will glow stronger, the larger the danger becomes

[antoniotruong]

Image having to be so precise in your world building that when a bunch of nerds looking into the range of a glowing sword is undebatable.

[danioshea]

This week's title made me laugh out loud, but when we got to the D&D MAP I grinned like a fool. Nice work.

[Levacque]

3:48 oh wow, that's a cool depiction of Moria. I love the way they showed the passages rooting into the lodes.

[KingHeggunte]

Just as I’ve always surmised. Upon seeing the title I thought “hold on, didn’t Aragorn and Frodo use Sting to get an approximate distance once? And Aragorn should know pretty well how to read one of those blades”.

And as a side note, I always thought that the intensity of Sting when Sam had it was that’s because it’s how the *Orc* perceived it (similar to how the light from the phial burned Shelob’s eyes), in addition to the visual possibly being influenced by his holding the One Ring, similar to how the Orcs thought he was a huge and powerful warrior when they first saw him.

[SamuelFeet-tqjb]

Things I didn't know I needed to know.

[melkhiordarkfell]

My personal headcanon was that Idril commissioned Sting for the then 7 year old Earendil, as the kings grandson his sword would have been made in the kings smithy. Probably was never delivered since her tunnel wasn't fully finished when the attack came and was still in the tower of the king, so if Glamdring was found with Sting in the troll cave, it was likely that they where picked up together.

[Hlaford]

It may be worth mentioning that - as the author of the video said himself - orcs were blinded by this light. I believe that the main function of this light was not to warn the user of the presence of orcs but to blind those orcs when in battle. It just started shining earlier, so you could use it as a "radar", but it was a secondary function. Primarily, it was a weapon.

[billberndtson]

Today, both you and GirlNext Gondor are covering LotR topics I've never heard anyone cover before. 😃 It's nice - I'm always happy to hear the eagles debate or about Galadriel's gifts but these are refreshing in thier novelty.

[michaelf]

Now this is truly in deep geek in the literal sense!

[SpiritLife]

Robert, this is possibly your best video, or at least your most nerdy which is basically synonymous with "best." The level of detail and respect for source material is exemplary of your channel and of the very best content on the platform!