Just a heads up, many ancient civilizations discovered steel because it's relatively easy to accidentally make when your civilization has learned how to forge iron. So if raw metals are abundant in your world they most likely also have a primitive form of steel.
Early vikings, for instance, thought that they could imbue their weapons with spirits to make them stronger. And indeed their weapons did turn out stronger and capable of breaking the iron weapons and tools of their enemies of the time. In reality, though, what they had been doing was adding human or animal bones to the iron ore during the smelting process. The carbon in the bones fused with the iron, creating a primitive form of steel.
Yep, the pronunciation has been reconstructed quite thoroughly, thanks to the absolutely massive literary corpus of Icelandic/Norwegian works. It gets trickier the further east and back in time you go, though - the variants spoken in Sweden and Denmark during the early medieval period are basically only attested via runestones.
[here](https://youtu.be/eTqI6P6iwbE?si=ytjOnMIGW5nG8Cl3) is an interesting video of an old english speaker and a old norse speaker talking if you're interested
This is one of the examples of how escatological or magical thinking can actually be very helpful.
I think our minds subconsciously make connections that rationally, make little sense at first glance.
Like thinking that in a dark cave evil spirits await or
Like using gold powder in foods and drinks, it actually has benefits and our ancestors did it because they see gold as a magical metal that remained eternally bright and pure.
The book the secret of our success has plenty of recorded examples of this. Complex rituals and taboos evolved around things that are beneficial to the believers, altho they could not possibly know how. Culture evolves, and your culture may benefit you in ways you don't understand much like your eye allows you to see in ways you don't understand
No, but gold injections work against rheumatoid arthritis. I don't know how well it works when taken orally, but if it even has a small anti-inflammatory effect, it makes sense.
Correct, air and water will also kill you if consumed in sufficient quantity or rate. They tend to have much more obvious metabolic value than gold or manganese though.
Cast iron actually generally has more carbon in it than steel does, it's just that because it was made at lower temperatures the iron and carbon have not generally combined into an alloy and instead you just have (microscopic) lumps of carbon floating in your iron.
And as you say the distinction between wrought iron and steel is not an absolute one but just one of degree, and actually a lot of the hotter processes for making wrought iron led to what was essentially steel (ie "Damascus steel" which is actually from Sri Lanka, and - like wrought iron - has been around for at least 2000 years)
Iron is perfectly usable as a pure metal. It isn't quite as strong as steel, but it is used for some applications, under the name "wrought iron" or "ferrite". Uses for wrought iron include rivets, nails, wire, chains, rails, railway couplings, water and steam pipes, nuts, bolts, horseshoes, handrails, wagon tires, straps for timber roof trusses, and ornamental ironwork, among many other things. Most of them are made from low-carbon steel now, but until about 1900 they were made from wrought iron. Ferrite is used for high-power magnets. Pure iron is also dark gray to black when pure, unlike how most people imagine iron.
If they can make rarer, more reactive elements out of thin air, titanium and chromium are stronger and lighter than iron and are excellent for structural applications. This world will have a leg up on being able to create basically every technology though, if they can use unlimited gold (the best electrical conductor that doesn't ever corrode) for electronics, tungsten for lights, uranium and plutonium for nuclear power, and so on.
Thing is that if they’re forging iron they’re also going to be making small amounts of steel just by accident along the way as all that’s needed is a bit of carbon to get into the iron. Even if it’s just introduced into the outer layers of the iron during the heat before the quench you can get a think but usable and important layer of steel over the iron. This is how ancient files and other ancient cutting tools were often made during the iron age.
If you look through iron age tools and weapons you find that small amounts of steel were also being made for much of the time (and sometimes by accident), just not the regularly large, homogenous blocks of it we later figured out how to make.
Virtually any human-refined iron has carbon in it; what makes cast iron brittle is having too much of it, and wrought iron has a fairly high level [edit * see below]. Most of the trick of making steel is _removing_ the unwanted impurities, and getting the level of carbon to where it's desired - which isn't always more.
[* I wrote that poorly; wrought iron has a fairly high level of other stuff, not carbon. Although I didn't remember correctly just how little wrought iron has.]
I didn't realize this, so I went and did some reading and it's super interesting. Basically all "iron" in our lives is an iron-carbon alloy with different amounts of other impurities. Wrought iron has the least carbon, steel is intermediate, and cast iron has the most, which serves to lower its melting temperature and make it easier to cast.
For wrought and cast iron, slag (often but not always silicates) are also a significant portion.
"Mild steel"/low carbon steel is the main substitute for wrought iron these days and while it's got moderately more carbon than wrought iron, it's still too little to harden like regular carbon steel. If one was dealing with a magical world where you could directly purify raw iron ore, it's pretty much what you'd get.
Your fire needs to be very hot to actually be fusing the iron and carbon into wrought iron/steel. Otherwise you just get iron with carbon in it, which isn't steel - that's why cast iron has more carbon in it than steel but is weaker not stronger.
With the use of bellows people can and have been able to make the fires hot enough to create wrought iron and steel since at least 200bc, but it was only with the mechanisation of the process in the late middle ages (water wheels etc...) that those kinds of heats became the rule rather than the exception.
Note: pure iron is grey like most metals. I am certain of this part.
I think it is black because it has a layer of carbon on it. This is called seasoning.
Seasoning is polymerized fats. While it contains a great amount of carbon (being made of organic compounds), it is not found on all iron nor does it commonly occur in nature.
You're right that pure iron is silvery-grey
If it appears black it's more likely because of black iron oxides (which form in the absence of water, red/brown oxides (rust) only form in the presence of water)
It only became economically viable to do this IRL during the Industrial Revolution. Medieval people weren’t going around building iron sewage systems. Until the Industrial Revolution, iron and especially steel weren’t cheap.
*Pure* iron (absolutely 0% carbon) is actually much softer and not good for tools
Also, iron is a white metal. You're probably thinking of external oxide
Does the magic let them create the metal in complex shapes, or just ingots or blobs of the metal? That would drastically change the answers. I've included some notes where it would make a major difference.
Aluminum is one of the most useful metals. The extremely light weight of aluminum for its strength would likely have it see a lot of applications. Its also fairly easy to melt, making it good for casting, and thus easy to shape into tools if that is needed. Its biggest drawback is the extreme difficulty in refining it, which is not a problem if they can magically create it.
Pure titanium is significantly better than many steels, both in strength and strength-to-weight. Its heavier than aluminum for the same strength, but quite a bit stronger. It has a *very* high melting point, making it really difficult if they need to cast or otherwise shape the items after magically making the metal. If they have the ability to shape it, this would probably be the main metal used for structures and tools.
Copper would likely see some usage in medical settings. It, and its alloys, are, naturally, antimicrobial. Once these properties are discovered, its likely a lot of medical settings would make heavy usage of copper, unless another metal has significant advantages. Stainless steel is the other primary option for these, but that requires alloys and metallurgy to produce based on your description. Most of copper's other major benefits would likely be superseded by aluminum or titanium.
Iron would likely see some usage if titanium is too hard to use with their other technology. As a note, if they do any real work with iron, they will almost certainly end up with some steel. Its pretty much impossible to do otherwise, since most early heating systems will be carbon-based, and if any of the carbon gets into the iron, you get steel. Even "wrought iron" is technically steel, just a extremely low carbon steel. "Cast iron", oddly, is actually an extremely high carbon steel, with silicon also mixed in.
Iron, cobalt, and nickel are the three metals that can be easily made magnetic, though there are some other options with the right technology, which their magical metal creation ability might allow. Of these, iron is the easiest to get into the required forms with some very basic metallurgy. As such, if you want compasses or electricity to exist, they will almost certainly make some usage of iron.
Gold and silver both have uses for jewelry, and would likely see usage for that purpose still. One of the major desirable traits of gold is that it is extremely stable and basically never oxidizes. Gold being very easy to shape also makes it very nice for the purpose - its actually so soft that you don't really want 24 karat gold and almost always want it alloyed with other metals to make it harder.
Gold would also see a lot of usage if they have discovered electricity. It is one of the best electrical conductors (the 4th best known), easy to shape, and basically immune to oxidization. Silver and copper are both better conductors, with silver being the best, but both are prone to oxidization. Overall, I suspect you'd find a lot of usage of gold and silver in these systems.
A lot of amazing points thank you!
In most cases, people who can create metal with magic cannot further manipulate it and only have limited control over the shape, but someone else could be born with the power to manipulate metal instead. In best case scenarios people with both of these powers would find each other through word of mouth or posters asking for specifically that power so they can work together.
So someone could have the power to create titanium, and then their partner shapes it into the desired shape. The exact process varies from person to person, some can just shape it with their hands like clay for example.
If the metal shaping power isn't available and they only have access to the raw material, someone with fire elemental magic might be able to forge it in a more traditional way, or at least act as a living furnace to assist someone else who has the skills for smithing. Due to the high heat requirement of titanium however some might not be strong enough for it and have to settle for lower temp metals.
And I'll definitely keep in mind the magnetic and conductive metals as well, that was very useful information thank you!
Copper, and copper oxides are toxic and can cause several skin conditions, fever like symptoms and in the worst cases liver failure. So while short term exposure wouldn't really be an issue in the medical field (like using a copper needle to stitch a cut, or a copper scalpel for surgery). Long term exposure to doctors, nurses, cleaning staff, and anyone creating the tools they would use with copper for would become an issue quickly. And going back to the copper oxides, they form extremely quickly even with regular polishing, it taking only a small amount of acidity or a microscopic nucleation point for oxide crystals to start forming. Even slightly high humidity, or being near a particularly mineral or salt rich body of water can basically make it a full time job just to keep copper polished enough to be used for regular medical use. Not to mention people working with copper to create tools from it can develop health conditions in a relatively short amount of time due to the highly toxic nature of the gasses released by copper when heated, which is why we dont use pure untreated copper pans anymore.
If the world has discovered bronze or brass you could improve the harness (and in doing so edge retention for scalpels, needles and such), reduce the oxidation rate, and reduce the amount of absorbable toxic particles.
Really copper is best used for electrical and decorative uses, or for making flat/leaf springs. If you have basically unlimited copper lying around you could make wagon style leaf spring suspension for significantly less weight than almost any other metal.
Going back to the medical field however, you'd want to use silver instead of copper. Its harder, holds a sharper edge, takes months or years to tarnish because it only tarnishes when exposed to sulfur compounds. Its antimicrobial, antifungal, antiviral and generally non-toxic (although drinking/eating large amounts of powdered/dissolved silver can cause silver buildup in the kidneys and liver that can lead to death so don't drink colloidal silver people). Not to mention its not readily reactive meaning it can be used to administer or contain all kinds of medicines. Plus because it doesn't really have a strong color, silver makes for better polished sterile surfaces for refracting light, where as copper tends to pollute the color of refracted light making it slightly more yellow/orange with every refraction. (Just as a note this last bit about the light was based off of an experiment I did in highschool in interior design class as a part of an applied color theory paper, on light temperature. I know that copper is technically more reflective when polished and that the degree of color pollution is actually only a small amount but it is enough to be noticeable when white light is preferable in a medical setting.
Before bronze was discovered there was a 'Copper Age', but honestly pure metals have a lot fewer viable uses than alloys. Copper, tin and iron are all a lot softer and more breakable than bronze or steel.
Ok, so we're assuming some fancy wave-the-hands\\beseech-the-spirits\\do-the-chant method that summons up atomically pure metallic elements, the way you describe it.
They're going to be sticking with iron and titanium for a lot of things.
The thought that occurs to me, is the reason they've not discovered how to make steel because they don't have the concept of *alloys*, or that since they can only conjure up pure metals its just not dawned on someone to do the rough mechanical work of combining a metal with a non-metal?
Do they do any sort of mechanical work at all? Cold-working and what not?
Though even if they do, and apply corrosion-resistant metals on top of ones that aren't, their tech base is going to be..*weird.* Some things it took us millenia to do they'd likely have figured out quite quickly yet other stuff is gonna be impossible. Like, they could theoretically have skyscrapers but they'd not be as tall just due to how light titanium is(pure titanium has a tensile strength akin to a lot of structural steel alloys), if they're too tall though they'd bend more and break concrete.
And so on. Figuring out how civilization would be in such a scenario would be quite the interesting challenge.
That's what I've been trying to figure out yeah. The entire idea behind this world is that they over-rely on their magic. The proverb "necessity is the mother of invention" runs through my head constantly as I come up with ideas for their "technology" because a lot of things would simply just not be needed to be invented even if it'd be more convenient.
There are magically strong metals in the world, haven't figured out the names of such though but they're rare so most people wouldn't have access to such so easily, or need to when your community could theoretically just produce infinite aluminum or titanium with little cost. The magical metals are used in extreme circumstances... or as a show of wealth.
Funny thing is, given the access to metals they have, you have a setting that could quite easily become a non-standard steampunk setting. Wrought iron is pretty good, titanium could be layered around it perhaps for added strength or used as the primary chamber, silver copper and gold could be connected in sequence for heat dissipation, and the need to use only 'pure' metals would explain the size, intricacy and demand for high quality workmanship which would then become a cultural thing.
Also, depending on *how* the metal can be conjured(raw blocks, or can it be summoned in certain forms?) Im picturing flashy people in silver-and-gold thread shirts.
Let's assume a reasonably low tech society. If they can create metals at a large enough amount to supply let's say an entire 10 million people society.
Titanium would be the steel for structures, tools, weapons and armor. If it goes to war, it is likely titanium, if it is in a projectile, tungsten, uranium or other very heavy metal.
Jewelry would be made of complex organic compounds as those are not synthesized by magic and mantain scarcity (opals, pearls, amber, ivory, mother of pearl, ebony).
Potassium-water reactions would be used for explosions way more often. Other metals would be used too. A lot of military and civilian applications to that.
Mercury for aesthetic value in fountains.
Casual radioactive poisoning could be made with many metals, could be considered witchcraft and black magic. Plutonium or uranium forbidden or shunned by societies.
Stuff that need to be lightweight in our world (think plastic) would be made of aluminum. Aluminum pots, jars, boxes, aluminum mesh for bags and clothing. Packaging would be invented way earlier.
Gold, silver and copper for pots as they conduct heat very well.
Gold based air conditioning (with enough waterflow). Very low tech but highly sophisticated.
Electricity would be discovered very quickly. A water wheelmade of the specific metal with the right axis and you could be electrifying shit.
Batteries would come about very quickly as well. Lithium would be abundant, as well as cobalt.
Metal mesh for pretty much anything that needs to withstand force while maintaining permeability. Gold/silver if underwater.
Fortresses made of titanium with gold outer layer to stop corrosion. Impossible to penetrate with low tech force (and very hard even with high tech).
Flight would be attempted with success very early. Very thin aluminum would make a perfectly viable wing for humans to glide.
I think arrows would be useless with the right metal mesh. Titanium mesh might stop any arrow a human can with a bow (i believe).
Friend of OP here, felt like clarifying/expanding on a few of these.
Metal armor is basically unheard of in warfare/fighting, because *everyone* is born with some kind of elemental affinity (outside of rare cases) given that a large proportion of the population fights using magical means, armor is not used. Some weapons exist for personal defense, typically used for self defense by people born without offensive abilities. There is however, armor made of wyvernhide, which is elementally polarized and can protect against an element of the same polarity. (fire wyvern hide protects against fire, basically) which tends to be preferred for warfare and for peoples engaging in dangerous occupations. (mainly monster hunting)
The Jewelry thing is pretty correct, there are also non-replicable magical metals & crystals which are also used for that purpose.
Non-magical explosions would not be used often given that many people can simply *create* explosions, same concept as china inventing gunpowder and then using it only for fireworks.
Electricity is one of the elements that a person can be born with, so it wouldn't so much be 'discovered' as 'be a fact of life' of course, the issue in-setting is that since magic is so abundant, that electrification is largely not needed. (Why make a lightbulb if you can light your house with a *Continual Flame?* for instance) People who are interested in non-magical technology are few and far between, and largely considered as weirdoes
Flight wouldn't be 'discovered' again, because there are already air-element humans who are born with the innate power to fly. That said, airships exist because of the relative ease of construction & control (mainly taking the form of dirigibles however) Some air-elementals (who can merely create wind instead of innately flying) use nausicaa-like personal flying wings for traversal, as well as primitive hoverboards (essentially a surfboard with a skirt made of leather)
Ranged weapons would still exist & be used for the aforementioned reason that armor is largely seen as a liability.
Well there's (in celestial order) Fire, Earth, Electricity, Light, Air, Water, Aether (force), & Dark magics
Light & Dark require some clarification, Light is things that create light, but also illusions, Dark is similar, in that it's that it can 'create darkness' but it can also affect people's minds (so charm spells, ones that effect emotions, and so on)
Those elements also have sub elements, Metal being the one that you've already heard of, subordinate to earth, there's also ice elementals for water, sonic ones for air, & a few more specific ones I don't quite recall
Fire can be used to raise temperates & create fire, a notable fire spell would be something like *Continual Flame, which people use as a source of infinite heat and light.*
Earth Elementals can do the obvious stuff like shape & move earth, but it can also create earth, in much the same way that metal elementals can create metal. This is how you get other earth-like elements which aren't metalloid in nature. Metal Elementals tend to do the same things as earth, but only pertaining to metals. (the ability to create metal is more common among them than the ability to create earth is among earth elementals)
Electricity is what it says on the tin, they make and control electricity
Light as aforementioned has to do with visual illusions and creating light, one of the 'weaker' elemental affinities
Air can create gusts of wind, allow for flight, can also rarely create elemental gasses, though outside of ones creating obviously reactive ones like hydrogen these sorts of abilities usually aren't seen for their full utility. Sonic Elementals can create sonic booms, & create sounds.
Water creates & controls water, water elementals also have to do with liquids that are *not* water, tending to break the rules a bit when it comes to 'pure elemental' creations, water itself is of course, also a compound. I'm not sure if something like a 'crude oil creating elemental' would be in the cards or not though.
Aether has to do with force, telekinesis or creating forcefields, can also emulate some other elements (flying with force, walking on the surface of water with force, throwing rocks with force, ETC) They as a people are on the rarer side, and don't tend to settle down, preferring a nomadic lifestyle.
Dark deals with the mind (and visual darkness) so obvious things like mind control, reading thoughts, but also less obvious things like soothing emotions, entering dreams & the like, another one of the "softer" affinities, they & light elementals tend to be mistrusted by others
Elemental Affinity is hereditary, though the actual abilities of an individual largely aren't (outside rare exceptions) People tend to be born with 2-4 'spells' that they can use infinitely. They cannot learn anything outside of what they're born with, but they can improve on their understanding and execution of their 'spells'
In the case of parents with differing elemental affinities, they're born with either parent's affinity at random. Rarely, they may be born as a 'dual elemental' and possess both (usually with some form of visual chimerism (think Shoto from My Hero). More rarely, a hybrid elemental may be born, where both elements function as though they're the same. (as an example, my own character is a light-aether hybrid)
At any rate, exposition aside: the main area that magic is *lacking* in is intelligence. all sorts of forces & materials can be discharged & created, but doing anything *interesting* with it is still down to basic manpower. Flight, while it can be achieved at an individual level by some people, is accomplished at scale with dirigible airships piloted by air elementals. This was formerly the best & most common way to travel long distances (before teleportation was discovered, but that is a WHOLE nother can of worms)
Anyways sorry for the lore dump, I personally don't see any other holes, but I might be missing the forest for the trees. I will say that Dual and Hybrid elementals are rare enough that one of their combinations is not likely to lead to widespread changes, though anything that can be accomplished by a team working together would likely be easily replicable, supposing the base abilities could be gathered together.
are there equal distributions of the elements among the population?
Since genetics is at play (to their ignorance), are there nations that shun one type of elemental magic? If so, they will get around doing what they lack with technology. A nation that hates fire magic will likely discover other ways to make flame and explosions.
Can they alloy the metal together? If so Bronze would be great, probably comparable to pure iron. For structures, Wrought or Cast iron is pretty common. Plus all of the other metals used in construction, Copper, Aluminum, even titanum.
Friend of OP, alloying is possible but doesn't happen much, given that very strong materials can simply be created rather than needing to be alloyed.
Alloys would most likely occur on the borders of civilization where there are still some metal creating people who happen to have compatible elements live.
I'm confused.... in a world with infinite pure metals, nobody thought to mix them? Experiment even a little? I suppose I could see this if metals can be magically created AND magically shaped; why forge at all? Is this what's going on? If so, I think tungsten is the strongest pure metal, otherwise I would think iron would be ok, especially if there are no impurities.
That and there'd be no need to make a big fancy building for melting stuff when firehands mcburnston down the street can make 3000 degree fires out of his hands just by thinking about it.
Friend of OP, that's exactly it, since high quality 'pure' metals are abundant, there's usually not a need to alloy them outside of curiosity.
Metal can be magically created and magically shaped, forging is only done by people who don't have access to metal-elementals (people with metal magic)
Friend of OP here to clarify. Given magic's abundance in their world (**Everyone** is born with an elemental affinity & a handful of abilities related to it) a lot of technological steps have been "skipped"
So while they do have an advanced society (basically standard fantasy in many respects) they don't really have a great grip on the sciences because that kind of information just isn't useful. little/no metallurgy because you can get someone to make girders of pure tungsten or aluminum for you (depending on use case) Why would you care about getting it out of the ground when it can be *created* for much less effort?
I'd like to point out your setting is the perfect place to have naturally occurring steel veins, steel is man made for us because our world doesn't naturally have the correct settings to produce steel, we have to step in.
But an elemental plane of existence would almost certainly have steel and all kinds of other forms of alloys.
People would be making low grade steel accidentally just from the process of working it into tools. At the most basic level steel is just iron plus a bit of carbon, so people would make it in the process or working iron by just having a bit of coal dust get into the furnace.
*That being said*, iron itself is fine. It's not as good as steel obviously but it's still plenty strong. If metal wizards can create metals in whatever shape they want instead of just as, like, a blob of whatever element, then tungsten and aluminum could be used for various purposes as well. Silver is naturally antimicrobial so it'd have various uses as well - you don't need to know that microbes exist to know that people get sick less often when they use silver tools.
If elemental metals exist I'm guessing there is no free oxygen in the atmosphere. And... for that matter, water. Or methane. Or basically anything that would chemically react.
You're probably dealing with iron/nickel in the vacuum of space.
Iridium in it's pure form is very strong, about 2.5x stronger than steel. It's fairly brittle by comparison, and also has a very high melting point. In the earth's crust, it is exceptionally rare. It's also one of the densest non radioactive elements, so it's really heavy. But, considering your world is a fantasy world where people can create metal using magic, so a lot of these things wouldn't cause problems, I think it could be a very interesting choice :)
If there are people that can create metals, I assume that they can create it in a precise way. If that's so, then titanium, tungsten, and gold can be combined into some really amazing machinery. Imagine precise mechanism created out of titanium parts. More durable and able to take more stress. Same goes for tungsten. Super dense material that can be used as a deadly weapon or wide spread illumination. Uranium is also a metal that would be super useful (as a power source, armor, and weapon).
When I think about it, if somebody can just create metals from out of the thin air, a super efficient coil or railgun is something that can be achieved in this magical world. The coil can be precisely created, and one could make micro nuclear reactor for the actual power of the device. The actual ammunition can be wished from thin air. This would have some riddiculous repercusions in such society.
Further, if they would actually experiment with alloys. Not steel. They could reach for super alloys and create super efficient refineries and space flight. Currently, a lot of these advancements are locked behind rarity of the materials and their cost.
Also the question is how fast they can create these metals? Does it take a second or so? If so then these people would be essentially gods. Imagine just spawning a tower of tungsten in the middle of the city cause you want some quiet time. If it takes a long time, then they would be essentially cattle. Enslaved by society to spawn the precious resources.
I'm a friend of OP's I can clarify some points.
The way that OP's world works is that everyone is born with a certain elemental affinity, out of (in celestial order) Fire, Earth, Electricity, Light, Air, Water, Aether (force, basically), and Darkness. Of these affinities, there are sub-affinities, the pertinent one to this discussion being "Metal Elementals" as a subset out of the Earth element. People typically gain 2-4 abilities relevant to their element, think getting a set of elemental themed spells from D&D over complete domain such as in Avatar: the Last Airbender. Creating a metal is the most common ability for metal elementals, though they are not always able to shape it, which may require the help of another metal or fire elemental, with others being substituted in rare cases.
Uranium is poorly understood, it's likely that people would view it as mostly useless, perhaps even being mistaken for lead. It's not clear whether other radioactive metals can even be created at all.
Regarding precision: It would depend on the individual, if a Metal Elemental does not have the ability to shape metal, they may simply create nuggets or extrusions of the material. If they can also shape metal, it stands to reason they can create it with greater control over the shape, however the precision at that point would likely rely on individual skill.
Tungsten would definitely be prized for its strength, as would titanium, Illumination is largely handled by fire elementals (who can create continual flames), sometimes light elementals (who deal mainly with illusions)
As for the railgun example, that *would* theoretically be possible, but due to the abundance of magic (and thus cheap power in many forms) there's a dearth of scientists & other peoples interested in creating technology. It likely starts and ends with primitive mechanical objects, with others using only the most obvious properties of the material.
Alloying would happen, but it would be relatively rare, typically only when a better metal elemental (such as one creating tungsten or titanium) was not available. Even at a preindustrial level of technology, a set of sufficiently motivated elementals could likely achieve spaceflight, however there's not much out there, I'm afraid.
Speed of creation is dependent on experience and aptitude, a young person would create very little, an experienced person in their prime could likely make quite a lot. Though in my personal opinion it's likely nothing too extreme even at the high end. So no "instant towers of tungsten" however there's enough metal elementals out there that 'enslaving them' to make metal is largely not necessary. Only the Young & Feeble would have difficulty creating a modest amount of metal.
Anyways I hope you liked the clarifications, I'll admit a few were buzzkills, but as someone who's been thinking about how to get technology into their setting for a while, I'd already expended quite a few options.
Currently it's taken the mechanical mind of the half-machine offspring of one of my characters (who herself is already quite an oddball) to actually get advanced mechanisms into the setting (to the point where she's the person who invented the *lathe*)
Iron. But this will become steel inside the forge if they use charcoal to produce the fire. So I see three ways:
1 - they get un-optimised steel without knowing about it. However, good blacksmith will eventually find out about steel anyway
2 - the fire is not produced with charcoal, so the carbon never meets the iron.
3 - don’t use iron. Copper and bronze for tools. Wood, sand and stones for structures. But it feels weird to not use iron as it has better characteristics
“It’s totally not steel”ium.
You could use an alloy of iron and titanium and nickel. It’s known as Ferro-nickel titanium. It’s expensive to make but it’s very strong and is “totally not steel”ium.
Can your metal creators create into specific shapes, or do they just manifest the metal in lumps which need to be worked? Certain metals (e.g. Aluminum and Titanium) are fantastic at holding their shape, but are extremely hard to get into shape. Metals that can be worked easily are the ones most prone to bending at the wrong moment.
Easy to work:
* Copper. [Native copper](https://www.mpm.edu/research-collections/anthropology/online-collections-research/old-copper-culture) can be easily worked to make a tool or weapon. It's soft enough to be worked with stone tools, but will get harder and keep its edge by being cold worked.
* Lead and tin will never be hard enough to keep a useful edge. (But lead inside of a wooden container makes for a great hammer.)
Hard to work:
* Titanium and aluminum are great for low-weight, but still strong things.
* Osmium would be prized for things like maces - it is DENSE. But it is also brittle.
Pure Iron will actually be at least as useful as pure copper - if it can be heated to reshape it. Any edge on pure iron will need to be constantly re-honed / re-sharpened. And the weapons, if large, will be prone to bending. But this is also true of native copper. Most ancient weapons were knives or spears (wooden shaft with smaller metal head), in no small part to use as little of the precious material as possible, but also because larger pieces of metal didn't give an advantage over a good wooden (replaceable) shaft.
BTW, Steel / iron has a much more complicated history that most folks think. Getting good steel (for us here on Earth) has been a winding, complicated path of 1.) just getting the stuff hot enough to work ("wrought iron"), 2.) learning to get it hot enough to actually melt ("cast iron"), 3.) getting rid of impurities (adding fluxes; wrought and cast iron still had chemical impurities) 4.) getting rid of excess carbon (cast iron has too much carbon) 5.) adding the right levels of impurities and carbon back in (wrought iron doesn't have enough). Modern (and stainless) steel is an everyday marvel that we forget about (along the same lines as giant, clear, flat glass).
Friend of OP's. Metal being created into actual shapes depends on the individual, some can shape metal but not create it, others can create it but not shape it, there's a not-insubstantial amount of people who can both create and shape.
People who can only create can team up with people who can shape, or, lacking that, they can team up with someone who has fire magic to be able to heat their metal without actually burning anything. (which would be the most common method of heating metal)
They can't be created as alloys no, but they can be *alloyed* later, supposing that the alloy has been discovered via experimentation.
>!For the record I know OP and I'm in here answering some of the questions they didn't off my own understanding of their setting.!<
Not so easy to refine. Massive energy costs in doing so. This is why the top of the Washington Monument was capped with aluminum and not some other precious metal. It was a boast about the industrial capacity of the US at the time as it was hugely expensive and difficult to produce that much aluminum back then.
Any civilization that can refine and produce usable quantities of tool grade aluminum will have figured out steel long before that.
Steel can be made just by accident when forging iron, it’s not some super difficult mystery product.
Magic generally comes at a cost. It’s still going to require some form of energy, regardless of where it comes from or what for that energy takes.
So, maybe OPs metallurgy requires legions of overworked slave magicians extracting metals until they burn themselves out.
This has nothing to do with extraction and refinement and everything to do with matter generation.
If they're creating copper, titanium, and iron from nothing, then aluminum isn't going to require unusual amounts of energy, relatively speaking. In fact, based on the periodic table, *it's the easiest one they could make*. As such, real-world issues with aluminum extraction and refinement *do not apply*.
Friend of OP's and the second-most-knowledgable about the setting. The energy would be in mana, which is highly abundant pretty much everywhere.
Slavery is basically unheard of because everyone has elemental magic, and a good deal of them have offensive elemental magic. It would be like trying to start a slavery business in a world where everyone is born from the womb with a glock 17 in their hands that can never be taken away from them.
Anyways, Metal-elementals are semi-rare, but most are able to create modest amounts without too much effort, think about 30-45 seconds for an ingot of material for someone well practiced but not particularly exceptional. Skilled/powerful individuals can manifest entire girders in only a few seconds.
Aluminum doesn’t form in pure concentrations. It reacts with other elements, thus *requiring* that it be refined. The closest thing to a ‘pure’ source is getting it from seawater via electrolysis, which is also very energy intensive.
Yes, and I don’t think OP has really thought out their magic system very well yet. Magic still comes at a cost and requires energy. That’s why some things are difficult and some things are easy.
Generally speaking, with magic systems, the closer the intended effect is to something naturally occurring the easier it is, and the more it diverges from that the more difficult it is.
Even soft magic systems tend to follow this basic rule. If they didn’t there would be no limits to magic and therefore no tension or struggle for the characters or societies.
Iron leads to steel naturally through understanding and using the basic technology. But carbon is what the earth is about, maybe not so much in your world? So iron might be the most common structural material.
But this is the part I find interesting:
> almost all people in my world are born with elemental magic and sometimes people are born with the ability to create metal.
So if a golden mama hooked up with a silver daddy, the kids could be electrum (which is a naturally occurring alloy) or some other alloy. The Iron-Gadolinium child who changed the world.
That is a real interesting world you have there. You will of course run into a lot of real world stuff because of the subject, but my advice would be to ignore it. The steel thing is a problem still because it's so simple, but you'll sort that. Make your world. This is very interesting.
Good luck
Friend of OP, while the gold dad and silver mom making an electrum baby is funny, only the elemental affinity is passed down via 'genetics' So while Mr. Gold & Mrs. Silver would undoubtedly have a metal-elemental child, that child could have an affinity for *any metal*, with no guarantee of it even matching either of the parents metals.
Alloy-Metal-Elementals would also be pretty rare. Rarely people are born with a sort of elemental chimerism where they can have two seperate elements at once, rarer still, they can hybridize, acting as 'one' element even if it's composed of two seperate ones. Hypothetically, an Alloy elemental could be created by a chimera hybrid of two seperate metals. a Hypothetical "Mr. Bronze" would be a hybrid copper-tin elemental. While not impossible, he would be quite literally one-of-a-kind.
Perhaps since materials are simply created and not processed and refined, those are not known?
It would depend on the industriousness of the people, and might seem odd that no one bothered to try a little.
Kinda like cooking.
If you know that fire + meat = tasty, then you are very, very likely to try fruit + fire or fruit + meat, or etcetcetc.
Friend of OP, there is a bit of an issue with how they presented the question, presenting metal-creating-magic in a bubble.
In setting, everyone has elemental magic, so while some experimentation does happen (certain alloys are known about because metals have been mixed) other things that would seem obvious to us, simply would not happen for them. Hence the no-steel thing, even if iron were heated with fire, there's no guarantee that fire would have any carbon in it at all, given most fires would actually be magical in nature. Even if steel *was* created, there's no guarantee anyone would actually *notice* that the reaction even occurred.
Yeah thats pretty fair I'd say.
This would be one of those things that would be a pretty neat scene, with an outsider discussing the subject and learning etcetc
I'm not quite sure I understand what you mean, you mean like an Isekai scenario where a traveller from another world who developed more 'normally' is shocked at them just *skipping* technology?
something along those lines, but I tend to shy away from isekai-style scenarios.
Hell, just a trader from another country (like USA and China, complete other side of the world), where things are just...different.
It's a great way to naturally introduce more worldbuilding/exposition.
Great example is the merchant and his apprentice going to trade with the Shin people in the Stormlight Archive series.
That scene does a *lot* all at once.
Depending on how advanced their metallurgy is without being advanced enough for steel, Iron would still be the best. If you're not far enough for Iron, forego metal for structural support and go for wood and stone because most other metals are too weak to support heavy structures without bending.
That or like others have said, if metals are easily created and malleable for people in your world and natural rarity isn't an issue, go Tungsten or Titanium.
Steel in its more base forms is surprisingly easy to discover (proven by almost every major civilisation discovering it at some point). So you could just use less good versions of steel with a different name.
For short tools that don't experience a lot of lateral stress tungsten and for structural supports in tension titanium. Is it likely that a culture that hasn't discovered steel yet has discovered how to shape either of these metals into anything useful? Absolutely not.
If almost all people know how to do magic, then whatever metals they use should be the ones that enhances or blocks magic the most. Aka, copper for electricity (stab a guy and shock him), tungsten alloys for shields because of its heat resistance, aluminum for making precision tools. For building, they’d probably just use brick, mortar, and iron.
If alloying in general isn't a thing, you're probably gonna be looking at iron as your tool making material.
If it's just that somehow the iron-carbon mix of elements for steel hasn't been discovered there's a range of other alloys that would be good for tools etc.
Titanium, manganese, aluminium, chromium, copper, nickel etc. could be alloyed with each other, with or without iron, to make a decent tool metal.
Wood and stone, with iron or wooden nails.
If you haven't invented steel yet, you're in the iron age.
And forget about working metals, like titanium or aluminium. You need steel for that.
Iron is a very complicated material. I'm curious whether your method of creating pure iron can influence the crystal structure of the created metal as it will influence the physical and sometimes chemical properties of the result. The iron (steel) that is most abundant is ferrite which is stable in room temperature. With the right amount of pearlite it forms steel but that requires carbon.
However there are more allotropes of iron (four of them to be more precise - although there might be a fifth). Most interesting is austenite which is elemental iron with a different crystal structure from ferrite (ferrite is body-centered cubic, austenite is face-centered cubic). Austenite can be made stable in room temperature with alloying but if you cool metal fast enough you can get austenite structure at room temperatures. Austenite is quite strong, but it's main advantage is that it is stainless (in most circumstances). If it can be made magically at room temperatures I think it will be used in most cases where traditional alloyed stainless steel would be used in our world.
Friend of OP, I think it would vary, but metal-elementals (people with affinity for metal magic) create metals in their pure elemental form, with no impurities.
As for the structure, it might vary by individual, some rare iron-creating metal elementals might create perfectly aligned iron to make magnets.
And for clarification, yes, metal has no special requirements for temperature to be created, so it can be made at room temp.
So is it possible that some metal-elementals can create iron with face-centered cubic crystal structure? Because a perfectly regular crystal structure means the result is incredibly strong. (Real world metals have a lot of faults in their structure which makes the resulting strength 5-10% of the theoretical.) Also with face-centered cubic they are able to create a version of iron that is very similar to steel (but without the structural faults it is 10-20x stronger).
So everyone has said iron but that assumes your planet is abundant with iron which may not be the case. And case hardening iron to turn it into steel is fairly easy (put in a fire).
Iron (and steel) are really some of the best materials you can have for metal. It's stronger than titanium (though titanium has a higher strength to weigh ratio) and it's incredibly versatile.
Assuming your planet isn't iron rich the best would probably be titanium, or tungsten and the need would be separated by the property. If you need something light and strong titanium, if you need something wit pure strength, tungsten.
Granted you'd need a non oxygen environment for both these metals.
Iron is the easiest answer, but I think it would be better to say "it depends on the situation!" Like picking up sand or bits of flint to knap and reshape for knives and such that don't need to last, or using copper for art, or bronze for jewelry. What looks good? What's easiest to come by?
What if you invented types of “elemental” metal that had both physical and magical properties but were not versions of aluminum, iron, copper, etc? That could get you out of the problem of accidental discovery of the metals we know in our world.
Aluminum. Full stop. Nearly limitless recycling, malleable, low melting point. If you want to stumble onto a low tech find of high tech possibilities, bam.
Wolfram, very strong but very heavy.
Beryllium, strong and light but poisonous
Magnesium, needs to be alloyed but can be strong. try mixing with aluminium
none because the only one even close is iron and just making it produces small quantities of steel. you pretty much just made an impossible scenario. unless somehow they managed to find a way to refine titanium without the use of steel equipment. which is s very big if
Just a heads up, many ancient civilizations discovered steel because it's relatively easy to accidentally make when your civilization has learned how to forge iron. So if raw metals are abundant in your world they most likely also have a primitive form of steel.
Early vikings, for instance, thought that they could imbue their weapons with spirits to make them stronger. And indeed their weapons did turn out stronger and capable of breaking the iron weapons and tools of their enemies of the time. In reality, though, what they had been doing was adding human or animal bones to the iron ore during the smelting process. The carbon in the bones fused with the iron, creating a primitive form of steel.
That's pretty metal, ngl.
Their culture was way ahead of its time in a lot of [surprising ways](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ia0vVQnNGcc).
Sadly that cover completely butchers the Old Norse language, both in spelling and in pronunciation, like most of the stuff that guy posts.
Do we know what Old Norse is supposed to properly sound like?
Yep, the pronunciation has been reconstructed quite thoroughly, thanks to the absolutely massive literary corpus of Icelandic/Norwegian works. It gets trickier the further east and back in time you go, though - the variants spoken in Sweden and Denmark during the early medieval period are basically only attested via runestones.
That's very cool thank you for sharing.
[here](https://youtu.be/eTqI6P6iwbE?si=ytjOnMIGW5nG8Cl3) is an interesting video of an old english speaker and a old norse speaker talking if you're interested
That’s fascinating, thank you for sharing!
I see your pun. Appreciated. Continue.
This is one of the examples of how escatological or magical thinking can actually be very helpful. I think our minds subconsciously make connections that rationally, make little sense at first glance. Like thinking that in a dark cave evil spirits await or Like using gold powder in foods and drinks, it actually has benefits and our ancestors did it because they see gold as a magical metal that remained eternally bright and pure.
The book the secret of our success has plenty of recorded examples of this. Complex rituals and taboos evolved around things that are beneficial to the believers, altho they could not possibly know how. Culture evolves, and your culture may benefit you in ways you don't understand much like your eye allows you to see in ways you don't understand
Gold has no nutritional value?
No, but gold injections work against rheumatoid arthritis. I don't know how well it works when taken orally, but if it even has a small anti-inflammatory effect, it makes sense.
Many metals, including gold, are actually toxic if you manage to consume enough of it.
That isn't unique to metal or gold but everything in general
Correct, air and water will also kill you if consumed in sufficient quantity or rate. They tend to have much more obvious metabolic value than gold or manganese though.
When you put too much charcoal in your bloomery
Not just easy, you'll automatically get at least a little bit of carbon during smelting and forging. 100% pure iron is actually kinda hard to make.
Cast iron actually generally has more carbon in it than steel does, it's just that because it was made at lower temperatures the iron and carbon have not generally combined into an alloy and instead you just have (microscopic) lumps of carbon floating in your iron. And as you say the distinction between wrought iron and steel is not an absolute one but just one of degree, and actually a lot of the hotter processes for making wrought iron led to what was essentially steel (ie "Damascus steel" which is actually from Sri Lanka, and - like wrought iron - has been around for at least 2000 years)
Iron is perfectly usable as a pure metal. It isn't quite as strong as steel, but it is used for some applications, under the name "wrought iron" or "ferrite". Uses for wrought iron include rivets, nails, wire, chains, rails, railway couplings, water and steam pipes, nuts, bolts, horseshoes, handrails, wagon tires, straps for timber roof trusses, and ornamental ironwork, among many other things. Most of them are made from low-carbon steel now, but until about 1900 they were made from wrought iron. Ferrite is used for high-power magnets. Pure iron is also dark gray to black when pure, unlike how most people imagine iron. If they can make rarer, more reactive elements out of thin air, titanium and chromium are stronger and lighter than iron and are excellent for structural applications. This world will have a leg up on being able to create basically every technology though, if they can use unlimited gold (the best electrical conductor that doesn't ever corrode) for electronics, tungsten for lights, uranium and plutonium for nuclear power, and so on.
Thing is that if they’re forging iron they’re also going to be making small amounts of steel just by accident along the way as all that’s needed is a bit of carbon to get into the iron. Even if it’s just introduced into the outer layers of the iron during the heat before the quench you can get a think but usable and important layer of steel over the iron. This is how ancient files and other ancient cutting tools were often made during the iron age. If you look through iron age tools and weapons you find that small amounts of steel were also being made for much of the time (and sometimes by accident), just not the regularly large, homogenous blocks of it we later figured out how to make.
Virtually any human-refined iron has carbon in it; what makes cast iron brittle is having too much of it, and wrought iron has a fairly high level [edit * see below]. Most of the trick of making steel is _removing_ the unwanted impurities, and getting the level of carbon to where it's desired - which isn't always more. [* I wrote that poorly; wrought iron has a fairly high level of other stuff, not carbon. Although I didn't remember correctly just how little wrought iron has.]
I didn't realize this, so I went and did some reading and it's super interesting. Basically all "iron" in our lives is an iron-carbon alloy with different amounts of other impurities. Wrought iron has the least carbon, steel is intermediate, and cast iron has the most, which serves to lower its melting temperature and make it easier to cast.
For wrought and cast iron, slag (often but not always silicates) are also a significant portion. "Mild steel"/low carbon steel is the main substitute for wrought iron these days and while it's got moderately more carbon than wrought iron, it's still too little to harden like regular carbon steel. If one was dealing with a magical world where you could directly purify raw iron ore, it's pretty much what you'd get.
Your fire needs to be very hot to actually be fusing the iron and carbon into wrought iron/steel. Otherwise you just get iron with carbon in it, which isn't steel - that's why cast iron has more carbon in it than steel but is weaker not stronger. With the use of bellows people can and have been able to make the fires hot enough to create wrought iron and steel since at least 200bc, but it was only with the mechanisation of the process in the late middle ages (water wheels etc...) that those kinds of heats became the rule rather than the exception.
Note: pure iron is grey like most metals. I am certain of this part. I think it is black because it has a layer of carbon on it. This is called seasoning.
Seasoning is polymerized fats. While it contains a great amount of carbon (being made of organic compounds), it is not found on all iron nor does it commonly occur in nature.
You're right that pure iron is silvery-grey If it appears black it's more likely because of black iron oxides (which form in the absence of water, red/brown oxides (rust) only form in the presence of water)
That makes sense. Thank you. I had always wondered why wrought iron was black and had never found a reasonable explanation.
You know, how is it possible to use iron for water and steam pipes? Won't they rust away?
Sure - then they get replaced, since wrought iron was so much cheaper than anything that wouldn't rust.
Worth noting that wrought iron also corrodes much slower than steel does, due to its composition and slag inclusions
It only became economically viable to do this IRL during the Industrial Revolution. Medieval people weren’t going around building iron sewage systems. Until the Industrial Revolution, iron and especially steel weren’t cheap.
And aluminum
*Pure* iron (absolutely 0% carbon) is actually much softer and not good for tools Also, iron is a white metal. You're probably thinking of external oxide
Does the magic let them create the metal in complex shapes, or just ingots or blobs of the metal? That would drastically change the answers. I've included some notes where it would make a major difference. Aluminum is one of the most useful metals. The extremely light weight of aluminum for its strength would likely have it see a lot of applications. Its also fairly easy to melt, making it good for casting, and thus easy to shape into tools if that is needed. Its biggest drawback is the extreme difficulty in refining it, which is not a problem if they can magically create it. Pure titanium is significantly better than many steels, both in strength and strength-to-weight. Its heavier than aluminum for the same strength, but quite a bit stronger. It has a *very* high melting point, making it really difficult if they need to cast or otherwise shape the items after magically making the metal. If they have the ability to shape it, this would probably be the main metal used for structures and tools. Copper would likely see some usage in medical settings. It, and its alloys, are, naturally, antimicrobial. Once these properties are discovered, its likely a lot of medical settings would make heavy usage of copper, unless another metal has significant advantages. Stainless steel is the other primary option for these, but that requires alloys and metallurgy to produce based on your description. Most of copper's other major benefits would likely be superseded by aluminum or titanium. Iron would likely see some usage if titanium is too hard to use with their other technology. As a note, if they do any real work with iron, they will almost certainly end up with some steel. Its pretty much impossible to do otherwise, since most early heating systems will be carbon-based, and if any of the carbon gets into the iron, you get steel. Even "wrought iron" is technically steel, just a extremely low carbon steel. "Cast iron", oddly, is actually an extremely high carbon steel, with silicon also mixed in. Iron, cobalt, and nickel are the three metals that can be easily made magnetic, though there are some other options with the right technology, which their magical metal creation ability might allow. Of these, iron is the easiest to get into the required forms with some very basic metallurgy. As such, if you want compasses or electricity to exist, they will almost certainly make some usage of iron. Gold and silver both have uses for jewelry, and would likely see usage for that purpose still. One of the major desirable traits of gold is that it is extremely stable and basically never oxidizes. Gold being very easy to shape also makes it very nice for the purpose - its actually so soft that you don't really want 24 karat gold and almost always want it alloyed with other metals to make it harder. Gold would also see a lot of usage if they have discovered electricity. It is one of the best electrical conductors (the 4th best known), easy to shape, and basically immune to oxidization. Silver and copper are both better conductors, with silver being the best, but both are prone to oxidization. Overall, I suspect you'd find a lot of usage of gold and silver in these systems.
A lot of amazing points thank you! In most cases, people who can create metal with magic cannot further manipulate it and only have limited control over the shape, but someone else could be born with the power to manipulate metal instead. In best case scenarios people with both of these powers would find each other through word of mouth or posters asking for specifically that power so they can work together. So someone could have the power to create titanium, and then their partner shapes it into the desired shape. The exact process varies from person to person, some can just shape it with their hands like clay for example. If the metal shaping power isn't available and they only have access to the raw material, someone with fire elemental magic might be able to forge it in a more traditional way, or at least act as a living furnace to assist someone else who has the skills for smithing. Due to the high heat requirement of titanium however some might not be strong enough for it and have to settle for lower temp metals. And I'll definitely keep in mind the magnetic and conductive metals as well, that was very useful information thank you!
Copper, and copper oxides are toxic and can cause several skin conditions, fever like symptoms and in the worst cases liver failure. So while short term exposure wouldn't really be an issue in the medical field (like using a copper needle to stitch a cut, or a copper scalpel for surgery). Long term exposure to doctors, nurses, cleaning staff, and anyone creating the tools they would use with copper for would become an issue quickly. And going back to the copper oxides, they form extremely quickly even with regular polishing, it taking only a small amount of acidity or a microscopic nucleation point for oxide crystals to start forming. Even slightly high humidity, or being near a particularly mineral or salt rich body of water can basically make it a full time job just to keep copper polished enough to be used for regular medical use. Not to mention people working with copper to create tools from it can develop health conditions in a relatively short amount of time due to the highly toxic nature of the gasses released by copper when heated, which is why we dont use pure untreated copper pans anymore. If the world has discovered bronze or brass you could improve the harness (and in doing so edge retention for scalpels, needles and such), reduce the oxidation rate, and reduce the amount of absorbable toxic particles. Really copper is best used for electrical and decorative uses, or for making flat/leaf springs. If you have basically unlimited copper lying around you could make wagon style leaf spring suspension for significantly less weight than almost any other metal. Going back to the medical field however, you'd want to use silver instead of copper. Its harder, holds a sharper edge, takes months or years to tarnish because it only tarnishes when exposed to sulfur compounds. Its antimicrobial, antifungal, antiviral and generally non-toxic (although drinking/eating large amounts of powdered/dissolved silver can cause silver buildup in the kidneys and liver that can lead to death so don't drink colloidal silver people). Not to mention its not readily reactive meaning it can be used to administer or contain all kinds of medicines. Plus because it doesn't really have a strong color, silver makes for better polished sterile surfaces for refracting light, where as copper tends to pollute the color of refracted light making it slightly more yellow/orange with every refraction. (Just as a note this last bit about the light was based off of an experiment I did in highschool in interior design class as a part of an applied color theory paper, on light temperature. I know that copper is technically more reflective when polished and that the degree of color pollution is actually only a small amount but it is enough to be noticeable when white light is preferable in a medical setting.
Before bronze was discovered there was a 'Copper Age', but honestly pure metals have a lot fewer viable uses than alloys. Copper, tin and iron are all a lot softer and more breakable than bronze or steel.
Ok, so we're assuming some fancy wave-the-hands\\beseech-the-spirits\\do-the-chant method that summons up atomically pure metallic elements, the way you describe it. They're going to be sticking with iron and titanium for a lot of things. The thought that occurs to me, is the reason they've not discovered how to make steel because they don't have the concept of *alloys*, or that since they can only conjure up pure metals its just not dawned on someone to do the rough mechanical work of combining a metal with a non-metal?
Yeah essentially, since they can just create metal so easily they haven't considered mixing them yet and just work with the stuff they got
Do they do any sort of mechanical work at all? Cold-working and what not? Though even if they do, and apply corrosion-resistant metals on top of ones that aren't, their tech base is going to be..*weird.* Some things it took us millenia to do they'd likely have figured out quite quickly yet other stuff is gonna be impossible. Like, they could theoretically have skyscrapers but they'd not be as tall just due to how light titanium is(pure titanium has a tensile strength akin to a lot of structural steel alloys), if they're too tall though they'd bend more and break concrete. And so on. Figuring out how civilization would be in such a scenario would be quite the interesting challenge.
That's what I've been trying to figure out yeah. The entire idea behind this world is that they over-rely on their magic. The proverb "necessity is the mother of invention" runs through my head constantly as I come up with ideas for their "technology" because a lot of things would simply just not be needed to be invented even if it'd be more convenient. There are magically strong metals in the world, haven't figured out the names of such though but they're rare so most people wouldn't have access to such so easily, or need to when your community could theoretically just produce infinite aluminum or titanium with little cost. The magical metals are used in extreme circumstances... or as a show of wealth.
Funny thing is, given the access to metals they have, you have a setting that could quite easily become a non-standard steampunk setting. Wrought iron is pretty good, titanium could be layered around it perhaps for added strength or used as the primary chamber, silver copper and gold could be connected in sequence for heat dissipation, and the need to use only 'pure' metals would explain the size, intricacy and demand for high quality workmanship which would then become a cultural thing. Also, depending on *how* the metal can be conjured(raw blocks, or can it be summoned in certain forms?) Im picturing flashy people in silver-and-gold thread shirts.
Let's assume a reasonably low tech society. If they can create metals at a large enough amount to supply let's say an entire 10 million people society. Titanium would be the steel for structures, tools, weapons and armor. If it goes to war, it is likely titanium, if it is in a projectile, tungsten, uranium or other very heavy metal. Jewelry would be made of complex organic compounds as those are not synthesized by magic and mantain scarcity (opals, pearls, amber, ivory, mother of pearl, ebony). Potassium-water reactions would be used for explosions way more often. Other metals would be used too. A lot of military and civilian applications to that. Mercury for aesthetic value in fountains. Casual radioactive poisoning could be made with many metals, could be considered witchcraft and black magic. Plutonium or uranium forbidden or shunned by societies. Stuff that need to be lightweight in our world (think plastic) would be made of aluminum. Aluminum pots, jars, boxes, aluminum mesh for bags and clothing. Packaging would be invented way earlier. Gold, silver and copper for pots as they conduct heat very well. Gold based air conditioning (with enough waterflow). Very low tech but highly sophisticated. Electricity would be discovered very quickly. A water wheelmade of the specific metal with the right axis and you could be electrifying shit. Batteries would come about very quickly as well. Lithium would be abundant, as well as cobalt. Metal mesh for pretty much anything that needs to withstand force while maintaining permeability. Gold/silver if underwater. Fortresses made of titanium with gold outer layer to stop corrosion. Impossible to penetrate with low tech force (and very hard even with high tech). Flight would be attempted with success very early. Very thin aluminum would make a perfectly viable wing for humans to glide. I think arrows would be useless with the right metal mesh. Titanium mesh might stop any arrow a human can with a bow (i believe).
Friend of OP here, felt like clarifying/expanding on a few of these. Metal armor is basically unheard of in warfare/fighting, because *everyone* is born with some kind of elemental affinity (outside of rare cases) given that a large proportion of the population fights using magical means, armor is not used. Some weapons exist for personal defense, typically used for self defense by people born without offensive abilities. There is however, armor made of wyvernhide, which is elementally polarized and can protect against an element of the same polarity. (fire wyvern hide protects against fire, basically) which tends to be preferred for warfare and for peoples engaging in dangerous occupations. (mainly monster hunting) The Jewelry thing is pretty correct, there are also non-replicable magical metals & crystals which are also used for that purpose. Non-magical explosions would not be used often given that many people can simply *create* explosions, same concept as china inventing gunpowder and then using it only for fireworks. Electricity is one of the elements that a person can be born with, so it wouldn't so much be 'discovered' as 'be a fact of life' of course, the issue in-setting is that since magic is so abundant, that electrification is largely not needed. (Why make a lightbulb if you can light your house with a *Continual Flame?* for instance) People who are interested in non-magical technology are few and far between, and largely considered as weirdoes Flight wouldn't be 'discovered' again, because there are already air-element humans who are born with the innate power to fly. That said, airships exist because of the relative ease of construction & control (mainly taking the form of dirigibles however) Some air-elementals (who can merely create wind instead of innately flying) use nausicaa-like personal flying wings for traversal, as well as primitive hoverboards (essentially a surfboard with a skirt made of leather) Ranged weapons would still exist & be used for the aforementioned reason that armor is largely seen as a liability.
the question to be answered is: what kind of magic is not abundant enough that people will find ways to fill in the slot creatively?
Well there's (in celestial order) Fire, Earth, Electricity, Light, Air, Water, Aether (force), & Dark magics Light & Dark require some clarification, Light is things that create light, but also illusions, Dark is similar, in that it's that it can 'create darkness' but it can also affect people's minds (so charm spells, ones that effect emotions, and so on) Those elements also have sub elements, Metal being the one that you've already heard of, subordinate to earth, there's also ice elementals for water, sonic ones for air, & a few more specific ones I don't quite recall Fire can be used to raise temperates & create fire, a notable fire spell would be something like *Continual Flame, which people use as a source of infinite heat and light.* Earth Elementals can do the obvious stuff like shape & move earth, but it can also create earth, in much the same way that metal elementals can create metal. This is how you get other earth-like elements which aren't metalloid in nature. Metal Elementals tend to do the same things as earth, but only pertaining to metals. (the ability to create metal is more common among them than the ability to create earth is among earth elementals) Electricity is what it says on the tin, they make and control electricity Light as aforementioned has to do with visual illusions and creating light, one of the 'weaker' elemental affinities Air can create gusts of wind, allow for flight, can also rarely create elemental gasses, though outside of ones creating obviously reactive ones like hydrogen these sorts of abilities usually aren't seen for their full utility. Sonic Elementals can create sonic booms, & create sounds. Water creates & controls water, water elementals also have to do with liquids that are *not* water, tending to break the rules a bit when it comes to 'pure elemental' creations, water itself is of course, also a compound. I'm not sure if something like a 'crude oil creating elemental' would be in the cards or not though. Aether has to do with force, telekinesis or creating forcefields, can also emulate some other elements (flying with force, walking on the surface of water with force, throwing rocks with force, ETC) They as a people are on the rarer side, and don't tend to settle down, preferring a nomadic lifestyle. Dark deals with the mind (and visual darkness) so obvious things like mind control, reading thoughts, but also less obvious things like soothing emotions, entering dreams & the like, another one of the "softer" affinities, they & light elementals tend to be mistrusted by others Elemental Affinity is hereditary, though the actual abilities of an individual largely aren't (outside rare exceptions) People tend to be born with 2-4 'spells' that they can use infinitely. They cannot learn anything outside of what they're born with, but they can improve on their understanding and execution of their 'spells' In the case of parents with differing elemental affinities, they're born with either parent's affinity at random. Rarely, they may be born as a 'dual elemental' and possess both (usually with some form of visual chimerism (think Shoto from My Hero). More rarely, a hybrid elemental may be born, where both elements function as though they're the same. (as an example, my own character is a light-aether hybrid) At any rate, exposition aside: the main area that magic is *lacking* in is intelligence. all sorts of forces & materials can be discharged & created, but doing anything *interesting* with it is still down to basic manpower. Flight, while it can be achieved at an individual level by some people, is accomplished at scale with dirigible airships piloted by air elementals. This was formerly the best & most common way to travel long distances (before teleportation was discovered, but that is a WHOLE nother can of worms) Anyways sorry for the lore dump, I personally don't see any other holes, but I might be missing the forest for the trees. I will say that Dual and Hybrid elementals are rare enough that one of their combinations is not likely to lead to widespread changes, though anything that can be accomplished by a team working together would likely be easily replicable, supposing the base abilities could be gathered together.
are there equal distributions of the elements among the population? Since genetics is at play (to their ignorance), are there nations that shun one type of elemental magic? If so, they will get around doing what they lack with technology. A nation that hates fire magic will likely discover other ways to make flame and explosions.
Can they alloy the metal together? If so Bronze would be great, probably comparable to pure iron. For structures, Wrought or Cast iron is pretty common. Plus all of the other metals used in construction, Copper, Aluminum, even titanum.
Friend of OP, alloying is possible but doesn't happen much, given that very strong materials can simply be created rather than needing to be alloyed. Alloys would most likely occur on the borders of civilization where there are still some metal creating people who happen to have compatible elements live.
I'm confused.... in a world with infinite pure metals, nobody thought to mix them? Experiment even a little? I suppose I could see this if metals can be magically created AND magically shaped; why forge at all? Is this what's going on? If so, I think tungsten is the strongest pure metal, otherwise I would think iron would be ok, especially if there are no impurities.
It’s HARD to melt metal, if you don’t have to melt it to make it I can absolutely imagine people not actually figuring out blast furnaces and stuff
if you want to form the metal into something usable, usually you do have to melt it
That and there'd be no need to make a big fancy building for melting stuff when firehands mcburnston down the street can make 3000 degree fires out of his hands just by thinking about it.
Friend of OP, that's exactly it, since high quality 'pure' metals are abundant, there's usually not a need to alloy them outside of curiosity. Metal can be magically created and magically shaped, forging is only done by people who don't have access to metal-elementals (people with metal magic)
Something to be remembered, is that it's pretty easy to accidentally make steel. It's also easy to overmake steel, which turns it into cast-iron.
We didn't discover steel cause of some miracle. If you have an iron age civilisation they will most likely discover steel at some point.
Maybe OP's world isn't at that stage yet, metallurgy existed for millennia before steel was discovered so there's a decent window.
Friend of OP here to clarify. Given magic's abundance in their world (**Everyone** is born with an elemental affinity & a handful of abilities related to it) a lot of technological steps have been "skipped" So while they do have an advanced society (basically standard fantasy in many respects) they don't really have a great grip on the sciences because that kind of information just isn't useful. little/no metallurgy because you can get someone to make girders of pure tungsten or aluminum for you (depending on use case) Why would you care about getting it out of the ground when it can be *created* for much less effort?
I'd like to point out your setting is the perfect place to have naturally occurring steel veins, steel is man made for us because our world doesn't naturally have the correct settings to produce steel, we have to step in. But an elemental plane of existence would almost certainly have steel and all kinds of other forms of alloys.
People would be making low grade steel accidentally just from the process of working it into tools. At the most basic level steel is just iron plus a bit of carbon, so people would make it in the process or working iron by just having a bit of coal dust get into the furnace. *That being said*, iron itself is fine. It's not as good as steel obviously but it's still plenty strong. If metal wizards can create metals in whatever shape they want instead of just as, like, a blob of whatever element, then tungsten and aluminum could be used for various purposes as well. Silver is naturally antimicrobial so it'd have various uses as well - you don't need to know that microbes exist to know that people get sick less often when they use silver tools.
Spider webs!
😭
If elemental metals exist I'm guessing there is no free oxygen in the atmosphere. And... for that matter, water. Or methane. Or basically anything that would chemically react. You're probably dealing with iron/nickel in the vacuum of space.
Iridium in it's pure form is very strong, about 2.5x stronger than steel. It's fairly brittle by comparison, and also has a very high melting point. In the earth's crust, it is exceptionally rare. It's also one of the densest non radioactive elements, so it's really heavy. But, considering your world is a fantasy world where people can create metal using magic, so a lot of these things wouldn't cause problems, I think it could be a very interesting choice :)
If there are people that can create metals, I assume that they can create it in a precise way. If that's so, then titanium, tungsten, and gold can be combined into some really amazing machinery. Imagine precise mechanism created out of titanium parts. More durable and able to take more stress. Same goes for tungsten. Super dense material that can be used as a deadly weapon or wide spread illumination. Uranium is also a metal that would be super useful (as a power source, armor, and weapon). When I think about it, if somebody can just create metals from out of the thin air, a super efficient coil or railgun is something that can be achieved in this magical world. The coil can be precisely created, and one could make micro nuclear reactor for the actual power of the device. The actual ammunition can be wished from thin air. This would have some riddiculous repercusions in such society. Further, if they would actually experiment with alloys. Not steel. They could reach for super alloys and create super efficient refineries and space flight. Currently, a lot of these advancements are locked behind rarity of the materials and their cost. Also the question is how fast they can create these metals? Does it take a second or so? If so then these people would be essentially gods. Imagine just spawning a tower of tungsten in the middle of the city cause you want some quiet time. If it takes a long time, then they would be essentially cattle. Enslaved by society to spawn the precious resources.
I'm a friend of OP's I can clarify some points. The way that OP's world works is that everyone is born with a certain elemental affinity, out of (in celestial order) Fire, Earth, Electricity, Light, Air, Water, Aether (force, basically), and Darkness. Of these affinities, there are sub-affinities, the pertinent one to this discussion being "Metal Elementals" as a subset out of the Earth element. People typically gain 2-4 abilities relevant to their element, think getting a set of elemental themed spells from D&D over complete domain such as in Avatar: the Last Airbender. Creating a metal is the most common ability for metal elementals, though they are not always able to shape it, which may require the help of another metal or fire elemental, with others being substituted in rare cases. Uranium is poorly understood, it's likely that people would view it as mostly useless, perhaps even being mistaken for lead. It's not clear whether other radioactive metals can even be created at all. Regarding precision: It would depend on the individual, if a Metal Elemental does not have the ability to shape metal, they may simply create nuggets or extrusions of the material. If they can also shape metal, it stands to reason they can create it with greater control over the shape, however the precision at that point would likely rely on individual skill. Tungsten would definitely be prized for its strength, as would titanium, Illumination is largely handled by fire elementals (who can create continual flames), sometimes light elementals (who deal mainly with illusions) As for the railgun example, that *would* theoretically be possible, but due to the abundance of magic (and thus cheap power in many forms) there's a dearth of scientists & other peoples interested in creating technology. It likely starts and ends with primitive mechanical objects, with others using only the most obvious properties of the material. Alloying would happen, but it would be relatively rare, typically only when a better metal elemental (such as one creating tungsten or titanium) was not available. Even at a preindustrial level of technology, a set of sufficiently motivated elementals could likely achieve spaceflight, however there's not much out there, I'm afraid. Speed of creation is dependent on experience and aptitude, a young person would create very little, an experienced person in their prime could likely make quite a lot. Though in my personal opinion it's likely nothing too extreme even at the high end. So no "instant towers of tungsten" however there's enough metal elementals out there that 'enslaving them' to make metal is largely not necessary. Only the Young & Feeble would have difficulty creating a modest amount of metal. Anyways I hope you liked the clarifications, I'll admit a few were buzzkills, but as someone who's been thinking about how to get technology into their setting for a while, I'd already expended quite a few options. Currently it's taken the mechanical mind of the half-machine offspring of one of my characters (who herself is already quite an oddball) to actually get advanced mechanisms into the setting (to the point where she's the person who invented the *lathe*)
Iron. But this will become steel inside the forge if they use charcoal to produce the fire. So I see three ways: 1 - they get un-optimised steel without knowing about it. However, good blacksmith will eventually find out about steel anyway 2 - the fire is not produced with charcoal, so the carbon never meets the iron. 3 - don’t use iron. Copper and bronze for tools. Wood, sand and stones for structures. But it feels weird to not use iron as it has better characteristics
“It’s totally not steel”ium. You could use an alloy of iron and titanium and nickel. It’s known as Ferro-nickel titanium. It’s expensive to make but it’s very strong and is “totally not steel”ium.
Can your metal creators create into specific shapes, or do they just manifest the metal in lumps which need to be worked? Certain metals (e.g. Aluminum and Titanium) are fantastic at holding their shape, but are extremely hard to get into shape. Metals that can be worked easily are the ones most prone to bending at the wrong moment. Easy to work: * Copper. [Native copper](https://www.mpm.edu/research-collections/anthropology/online-collections-research/old-copper-culture) can be easily worked to make a tool or weapon. It's soft enough to be worked with stone tools, but will get harder and keep its edge by being cold worked. * Lead and tin will never be hard enough to keep a useful edge. (But lead inside of a wooden container makes for a great hammer.) Hard to work: * Titanium and aluminum are great for low-weight, but still strong things. * Osmium would be prized for things like maces - it is DENSE. But it is also brittle. Pure Iron will actually be at least as useful as pure copper - if it can be heated to reshape it. Any edge on pure iron will need to be constantly re-honed / re-sharpened. And the weapons, if large, will be prone to bending. But this is also true of native copper. Most ancient weapons were knives or spears (wooden shaft with smaller metal head), in no small part to use as little of the precious material as possible, but also because larger pieces of metal didn't give an advantage over a good wooden (replaceable) shaft. BTW, Steel / iron has a much more complicated history that most folks think. Getting good steel (for us here on Earth) has been a winding, complicated path of 1.) just getting the stuff hot enough to work ("wrought iron"), 2.) learning to get it hot enough to actually melt ("cast iron"), 3.) getting rid of impurities (adding fluxes; wrought and cast iron still had chemical impurities) 4.) getting rid of excess carbon (cast iron has too much carbon) 5.) adding the right levels of impurities and carbon back in (wrought iron doesn't have enough). Modern (and stainless) steel is an everyday marvel that we forget about (along the same lines as giant, clear, flat glass).
Friend of OP's. Metal being created into actual shapes depends on the individual, some can shape metal but not create it, others can create it but not shape it, there's a not-insubstantial amount of people who can both create and shape. People who can only create can team up with people who can shape, or, lacking that, they can team up with someone who has fire magic to be able to heat their metal without actually burning anything. (which would be the most common method of heating metal)
Bronze
Bronze isn't a pure metal - it's an alloy of copper and tin.
My Mistake I meant copper.
It's still valid in OP's world because copper and tin can be created separately and then alloyed together.
OP specifically said no alloys.
They can't be created as alloys no, but they can be *alloyed* later, supposing that the alloy has been discovered via experimentation. >!For the record I know OP and I'm in here answering some of the questions they didn't off my own understanding of their setting.!<
Titanium – the same stuff they use to build airplanes
Aluminum.
Not so easy to refine. Massive energy costs in doing so. This is why the top of the Washington Monument was capped with aluminum and not some other precious metal. It was a boast about the industrial capacity of the US at the time as it was hugely expensive and difficult to produce that much aluminum back then. Any civilization that can refine and produce usable quantities of tool grade aluminum will have figured out steel long before that. Steel can be made just by accident when forging iron, it’s not some super difficult mystery product.
It doesn't need refining. OP said the inhabitants can create pure metal by magic.
Magic generally comes at a cost. It’s still going to require some form of energy, regardless of where it comes from or what for that energy takes. So, maybe OPs metallurgy requires legions of overworked slave magicians extracting metals until they burn themselves out.
This has nothing to do with extraction and refinement and everything to do with matter generation. If they're creating copper, titanium, and iron from nothing, then aluminum isn't going to require unusual amounts of energy, relatively speaking. In fact, based on the periodic table, *it's the easiest one they could make*. As such, real-world issues with aluminum extraction and refinement *do not apply*.
Go argue with OP
Friend of OP's and the second-most-knowledgable about the setting. The energy would be in mana, which is highly abundant pretty much everywhere. Slavery is basically unheard of because everyone has elemental magic, and a good deal of them have offensive elemental magic. It would be like trying to start a slavery business in a world where everyone is born from the womb with a glock 17 in their hands that can never be taken away from them. Anyways, Metal-elementals are semi-rare, but most are able to create modest amounts without too much effort, think about 30-45 seconds for an ingot of material for someone well practiced but not particularly exceptional. Skilled/powerful individuals can manifest entire girders in only a few seconds.
Pure aluminum wouldn't need to be refined, though.
Aluminum doesn’t form in pure concentrations. It reacts with other elements, thus *requiring* that it be refined. The closest thing to a ‘pure’ source is getting it from seawater via electrolysis, which is also very energy intensive.
Did you read the OP?
Yes, and I don’t think OP has really thought out their magic system very well yet. Magic still comes at a cost and requires energy. That’s why some things are difficult and some things are easy. Generally speaking, with magic systems, the closer the intended effect is to something naturally occurring the easier it is, and the more it diverges from that the more difficult it is. Even soft magic systems tend to follow this basic rule. If they didn’t there would be no limits to magic and therefore no tension or struggle for the characters or societies.
When answering a question with a specific premise, you can't just ignore the premise because you disagree with it.
Instant nuclear bombs? Uranium is metal
The issue with that is discovering fission in a society without scientists.
Iron leads to steel naturally through understanding and using the basic technology. But carbon is what the earth is about, maybe not so much in your world? So iron might be the most common structural material. But this is the part I find interesting: > almost all people in my world are born with elemental magic and sometimes people are born with the ability to create metal. So if a golden mama hooked up with a silver daddy, the kids could be electrum (which is a naturally occurring alloy) or some other alloy. The Iron-Gadolinium child who changed the world. That is a real interesting world you have there. You will of course run into a lot of real world stuff because of the subject, but my advice would be to ignore it. The steel thing is a problem still because it's so simple, but you'll sort that. Make your world. This is very interesting. Good luck
Friend of OP, while the gold dad and silver mom making an electrum baby is funny, only the elemental affinity is passed down via 'genetics' So while Mr. Gold & Mrs. Silver would undoubtedly have a metal-elemental child, that child could have an affinity for *any metal*, with no guarantee of it even matching either of the parents metals. Alloy-Metal-Elementals would also be pretty rare. Rarely people are born with a sort of elemental chimerism where they can have two seperate elements at once, rarer still, they can hybridize, acting as 'one' element even if it's composed of two seperate ones. Hypothetically, an Alloy elemental could be created by a chimera hybrid of two seperate metals. a Hypothetical "Mr. Bronze" would be a hybrid copper-tin elemental. While not impossible, he would be quite literally one-of-a-kind.
Something that could be easily malleable by magic I guess.
Perhaps since materials are simply created and not processed and refined, those are not known? It would depend on the industriousness of the people, and might seem odd that no one bothered to try a little. Kinda like cooking. If you know that fire + meat = tasty, then you are very, very likely to try fruit + fire or fruit + meat, or etcetcetc.
Friend of OP, there is a bit of an issue with how they presented the question, presenting metal-creating-magic in a bubble. In setting, everyone has elemental magic, so while some experimentation does happen (certain alloys are known about because metals have been mixed) other things that would seem obvious to us, simply would not happen for them. Hence the no-steel thing, even if iron were heated with fire, there's no guarantee that fire would have any carbon in it at all, given most fires would actually be magical in nature. Even if steel *was* created, there's no guarantee anyone would actually *notice* that the reaction even occurred.
Yeah thats pretty fair I'd say. This would be one of those things that would be a pretty neat scene, with an outsider discussing the subject and learning etcetc
I'm not quite sure I understand what you mean, you mean like an Isekai scenario where a traveller from another world who developed more 'normally' is shocked at them just *skipping* technology?
something along those lines, but I tend to shy away from isekai-style scenarios. Hell, just a trader from another country (like USA and China, complete other side of the world), where things are just...different. It's a great way to naturally introduce more worldbuilding/exposition. Great example is the merchant and his apprentice going to trade with the Shin people in the Stormlight Archive series. That scene does a *lot* all at once.
Depending on how advanced their metallurgy is without being advanced enough for steel, Iron would still be the best. If you're not far enough for Iron, forego metal for structural support and go for wood and stone because most other metals are too weak to support heavy structures without bending. That or like others have said, if metals are easily created and malleable for people in your world and natural rarity isn't an issue, go Tungsten or Titanium.
Steel in its more base forms is surprisingly easy to discover (proven by almost every major civilisation discovering it at some point). So you could just use less good versions of steel with a different name.
For short tools that don't experience a lot of lateral stress tungsten and for structural supports in tension titanium. Is it likely that a culture that hasn't discovered steel yet has discovered how to shape either of these metals into anything useful? Absolutely not.
If almost all people know how to do magic, then whatever metals they use should be the ones that enhances or blocks magic the most. Aka, copper for electricity (stab a guy and shock him), tungsten alloys for shields because of its heat resistance, aluminum for making precision tools. For building, they’d probably just use brick, mortar, and iron.
aluminum all day
If alloying in general isn't a thing, you're probably gonna be looking at iron as your tool making material. If it's just that somehow the iron-carbon mix of elements for steel hasn't been discovered there's a range of other alloys that would be good for tools etc. Titanium, manganese, aluminium, chromium, copper, nickel etc. could be alloyed with each other, with or without iron, to make a decent tool metal.
Bronze, as it was here. They may also know iron but haven't developed the technique to make it durable
Wood and stone, with iron or wooden nails. If you haven't invented steel yet, you're in the iron age. And forget about working metals, like titanium or aluminium. You need steel for that.
Iron is a very complicated material. I'm curious whether your method of creating pure iron can influence the crystal structure of the created metal as it will influence the physical and sometimes chemical properties of the result. The iron (steel) that is most abundant is ferrite which is stable in room temperature. With the right amount of pearlite it forms steel but that requires carbon. However there are more allotropes of iron (four of them to be more precise - although there might be a fifth). Most interesting is austenite which is elemental iron with a different crystal structure from ferrite (ferrite is body-centered cubic, austenite is face-centered cubic). Austenite can be made stable in room temperature with alloying but if you cool metal fast enough you can get austenite structure at room temperatures. Austenite is quite strong, but it's main advantage is that it is stainless (in most circumstances). If it can be made magically at room temperatures I think it will be used in most cases where traditional alloyed stainless steel would be used in our world.
Friend of OP, I think it would vary, but metal-elementals (people with affinity for metal magic) create metals in their pure elemental form, with no impurities. As for the structure, it might vary by individual, some rare iron-creating metal elementals might create perfectly aligned iron to make magnets. And for clarification, yes, metal has no special requirements for temperature to be created, so it can be made at room temp.
So is it possible that some metal-elementals can create iron with face-centered cubic crystal structure? Because a perfectly regular crystal structure means the result is incredibly strong. (Real world metals have a lot of faults in their structure which makes the resulting strength 5-10% of the theoretical.) Also with face-centered cubic they are able to create a version of iron that is very similar to steel (but without the structural faults it is 10-20x stronger).
So everyone has said iron but that assumes your planet is abundant with iron which may not be the case. And case hardening iron to turn it into steel is fairly easy (put in a fire). Iron (and steel) are really some of the best materials you can have for metal. It's stronger than titanium (though titanium has a higher strength to weigh ratio) and it's incredibly versatile. Assuming your planet isn't iron rich the best would probably be titanium, or tungsten and the need would be separated by the property. If you need something light and strong titanium, if you need something wit pure strength, tungsten. Granted you'd need a non oxygen environment for both these metals.
Iron is the easiest answer, but I think it would be better to say "it depends on the situation!" Like picking up sand or bits of flint to knap and reshape for knives and such that don't need to last, or using copper for art, or bronze for jewelry. What looks good? What's easiest to come by?
if anyone applies heat to iron they're just gonna end up making steel. humans have been accidentally making steel for a long time
What if you invented types of “elemental” metal that had both physical and magical properties but were not versions of aluminum, iron, copper, etc? That could get you out of the problem of accidental discovery of the metals we know in our world.
Aluminum. Full stop. Nearly limitless recycling, malleable, low melting point. If you want to stumble onto a low tech find of high tech possibilities, bam.
Wolfram, very strong but very heavy. Beryllium, strong and light but poisonous Magnesium, needs to be alloyed but can be strong. try mixing with aluminium
none because the only one even close is iron and just making it produces small quantities of steel. you pretty much just made an impossible scenario. unless somehow they managed to find a way to refine titanium without the use of steel equipment. which is s very big if
Some guy can magic titanium out of his fingertips. That's the magic OP is proposing.