I have another highly pedantic technical note. I don’t know whether you dive or not (I suspect not), but I do. I’m enjoying your stories. It’s just that when there’s no reason to deviate from fact, I prefer to stick to facts on the basis that the best fiction is that which contains the most truth.

If there is pure oxygen in their tanks (which you’ve indicated several times), they have a depth limitation of 2 atmospheres before that oxygen becomes dangerously toxic. On this planet, that would be a depth of 10 m.

Other notes: “plunge into the sea” seems overly dramatic and I would suggest simply “dive” (and you could remove the word ‘divers’ from that sentence, since ‘dive’ implies ‘divers’). P3S3 (paragraph 3, sentence 3) is a fragment which can be fixed by removing ‘and’.

Comments are always welcome! They offer me new things to acknowledge and consider!

First off, no, not a diver :). I recall reading there is a 100 foot limit to deep diving (more if specially trained?!) and that oxygen toxicity was a big issue with the old rebreathers and why the aqualung was invented.

I edited the first part of this tale due to your comments (and added appropriate tags). I made it so that the tanks aren’t pure oxygen. There’s an “air elemental” aspect to the open-circuit setup supported by a “sylph” in the tank.

I totally agree that real world facts can make the best fiction. But…

I do find that reading factual fiction about topics I’m unfamiliar with is akin to reading fantasy at times. The facts don’t offer me any additional benefits as a reader. The important thing is that the writer not leave the reader lost in the actual tale. This becomes my primary concern—fantasy or fact.

Hope that makes sense for why I feel more comfortable turning to fantastic elements instead though :).

Rebreathers have the benefit of being silent which SCUBA is definitely not. There always has to be some other gas in addition to oxygen for dives below 33’ in order to prevent death. In air, it’s nitrogen of course, but nitrogen has nasty effects too so deeper dives yet use helium instead of nitrogen.

As regards the facts within fiction, I suppose I’m your polar opposite. I often find the facts more interesting than the fiction (historical fiction, certainly) since the facts tend to give you a flavour of what it was like to live in the described circumstances. I more often than not use fiction as a launching point for reading non-fiction.

That 100’ is a standard that the certifying agencies came up with, partly to encourage the new diver to gain some experience at shallower depths before tackling greater depths, and partly so they can add an extra course and make a bit more money.

Technical note: I wouldn’t care to be a sylph in your world. There has to be at least as much pressure in the air tank as in the water surrounding the diver and typically there’s much more. Pressures at the start of a dive are typically around 3000 psi or the pressure that one would find at about 6700’ of water. Most people end a dive with around 500 psi, or about 1100’ of water.

I suspect I’m turning into your worst nightmare. Let me know if I should stop.

Nightmare?!? HELL NO! This info is AWESOME! No amount of research I do (and time spent) can be as efficient as hearing it from someone with first hand knowledge!

Seriously, your comments are greatly appreciated :). Even if I don’t take the super factual approach, your details help me understand better ways to treat the fantasy elements.

For me, understanding the real world reasons allow me to contemplate the function of the fantasy elements (like the sylph elemental in the tank).

The next installment will focus on me TRYING to provide the “fantasy logic” to the equipment based on your comments haha.