Poll: Which THREE of the following potions would you choose?

This should be fun.



No shenanigans, don't try to skirt the rules or find "loopholes"!


Vote and discuss!

 

Most interesting... let's analyse each one in turn:

• Pink: While the surface benefits look good, I do wonder if there are still benefits of sleep beyond simply feeling 'rested' that you'd be missing out on while benefitting from this potion. I'm sceptical about this one.
• Orange: While it'd mean I'd no longer need my Duolingo course I've been working on to learn Welsh, and would be able to recover and expand upon my French and Spanish language knowledge from GCSE, there would be loads of languages I really wouldn't have any interest in speaking. Can be useful, but on a lower tier for me.
• Dark Green: I can see how this one could go awry pretty quickly... very soon you'd have an army of cats trying to get into your house and smell it out. And not just your ordinary tabby variety either... any lion or tiger you meet at the zoo would try and break out of their enclosure to follow you home!
• Blue: I'd like to think I have a pretty good memory, but this would be an ample boost to cover all the iffy areas in my mind. Plus, I can record memories at will, so can ignore any bad memories and preserve the good. I like this one.
• Purple: I couldn't give a toss about the modern world outside the UK, especially as you can see all the bits in any way worth seeing on TV, so this one's a pass for me personally. Now if it allowed me to travel back in time and see the Ancient World, with so many much more interesting peoples and cultures, it'd be worth trying... but there were no airports anywhere until the 1910s/1920s, so the potential for time travel and exploring history is very limited.
• Grey: I'm a discerning eater that only eats that which tastes pleasurable anyway, so this potion is of limited use. However it would mean I could eat more healthy vegetables without having to experience the vile 'green' taste that many of them have. A possibility.
• Red: While this may be of certain help against some diseases, it wouldn't stop all their symptoms, and I can't see why else you'd want your body temperature to not change. An oddity that won't be among my selections.
• Brown: Having a general phobia of wasps and other flying insects that bite or sting, I'd take this one in a heartbeat, especially as most harmless insects still fly away from you anyway because they're not keen on contact with such a giant, dangerous creature as a human.
• White: While I like cheese, I'm not prone to kicking things. And I wouldn't eat cheese that had been in contact with any ground outside, especially if it had just been kicked by my shoed foot. Just why?
• Yellow: While I do all I can to help my parents with chores when I'm not working, this would give us all a break and would mean I can spend more time hobbying and fulfilling my life's missions. Yes please.
• Light Green: I'd have thought emotions are pretty easy to identify on the surface, and I'd like to think I'm emotionally intelligent, but this potion would certainly still be a help in my continuing mission to master the art of social fluency and maximise my attractiveness to a potential mate. And it'd give me a helping hand in truly understanding whether a girl is interested in me to boot...
• Black: Finally, something to help me grow my Celtic Warrior moustache! But in all seriousness, this one's purely something to improve your looks by a certain extent and nothing more. One I might take for a laugh or if the other choices were all complete rubbish, but I think I've already found my three now.

With that, I'd choose the brown, yellow and light green potions, please.

 

Ability to speak every language: hell yes. I always hated that my attempts to learn another language faltered and died. I don't have the head for learning languages. I speak two languages: English, and BAD English.

As a bonus, I see the word "every" and that just ups the desire even more. The ability to speak dead languages? Cripes, yes please. Unfortunately the word "Speak" means that hieroglyphics and sign language are out of my grasp, but considering I have every spoken language that has ever existed? That's a small downside compared to the massive upside.

Record things perfectly in my memory: I can't fail to emphasise how much I would love to never forget a detail or thought I'd had. And if I can tell myself what not to remember? I've had moments that I'd like to forget, so that is al big win for me. I can focus my mind less on objective details and more on the imaginative pursuits without feeling like I have to delete trivia to make space in my brain.

Fairies do my chores: I hate doing chores. They take away precious time from pursuits that I want to be doing. So, if every night I get some fairies cleaning my home, cleaning the dishes and sorting all those tedious and boring chores?

It's a pure convenience choice, but is one I'll take in a heartbeat.

 

Gods, I didn't think of this application of the orange potion... I could instantly speak Brythonic, and Old English...

That makes said potion a whole lot more appealing.

But I've cast my votes already, and I'm still happy with the three potions I've chosen.

 

Great lists everyone! As I guessed, there are lots of interesting variations in the votes and good rationales behind them

No monkey paw nonsense. The potions are fair and as described, no trickery to worry about!

 

My list:

My three choices

• Never need sleep and always feel rested - straight up increases my (conscious) lifespan by 1/3. Not only that, never feeling tired would be an improvement on your normal waking hours too. So you have more waking hours and better waking hours! Also, it makes trips/travel a lot more affordable, as you don't need a hotel, which works doubly well because of my next power...
• Ability to teleport to any airport any time you wish - this one is awesome! Travel is now almost free and I don't have to endure the plane ride. The world is your playground. It can also get you out of tricky situations, as assuming you are alone at the time, you can just teleport out of any danger or difficult situation. Its one limiting factor is that it is only teleportation for one (unless of course @Mrs. NIGHTBRINGER also gets to choose three potions, in which case she is very likely to select it!).
• Things taste (to you) like whatever you want them to - this choice makes life sweeter (literally in my case as I have a sweet tooth). It's a pure enjoyment upgrade in your life. I'd eat nothing but the healthiest foods and they would all taste like my favourite foods! Every meal would taste exactly what I'm in the mood for. The health benefits would be obvious. All that water I'm drinking tastes like soda pop and ice tea. A very easy selection, removing all those hard-to-resist temptations for life!

Runner-ups

• Fairies finish your chores - a huge convenience factor, saving some time (but I've already got my no sleep potion time save and the chores won't tire me out). It is very tempting, but ultimately, its still something I can do myself, unlike my three top choices.
• Your body temperature never changes - this is probably my 4th place choice, just shy of my top 3. I hate the cold and I live in Canada... so there is that. Now those winters would feel like perfect weather. Snow and ice that doesn't make you feel cold would be really fun. I could go ice skating outside in shorts and a tank top and never be cold! I could go swimming in ice cold water, beach day in January. The only reason why I didn't choose this one is that I can always opt to teleport to a tropical destination and that change of scenery would be more fun. Still, an argument can be made for swapping this out for the airport teleport ability. Also, don't forget, this power would prevent you from getting burned too. Plus it would grant some sporting advantages and never sweating means you would be less stinky.
• You can record things perfectly in your memory, at will - a very useful ability, just not as game changing as my other selections.

Good choices

• Ability to identify the emotions of anyone you talk with - nice advantage when playing poker . In truth, it would provide you with a substantial advantage in most social situations. You could be a better spouse, friend, worker, etc. On the downside, it is a bit intrusive and could get tiring (and while you can use it at will, it would be tempting to always do so).
• All insects avoid you - I don't like insects. I especially don't like spiders. They all stay away from me... that is a win. In reality though, it simply removes an inconvenience, so its not as impactful as the other potions.

Okay choice

• Ability to speak every language - it's convenient, but I just don't see it radically altering my life. I can speak two languages, but in truth, English alone already gets you very far in the world. Also, this ability continues to diminish in value as real-time translation technology continually improves. The tech solution isn't a perfect substitute, but still an ever-increasingly good one.

Little or no use

• All felines like you, upon meeting you - I'm not a huge cat person so this power is of pretty limited use.
  
• Things you kick 3 times turn into cheese - I don't even like cheese. I guess I could kick things and sell the cheese, but that's about it.
  
• Grow your ideal beard - my ideal beard is no beard, and aside from the nuisance of having to shave, that's pretty achievable without having to waste one of my potion selections

 

It's not a bad ability, but so far I've gotten along just fine on my travels with English alone. The tourist industry is heavily tailored to catering to the English speaking traveler. Also, while not as good as being able to speak the language, adequate tech solutions are becoming increasingly sophisticated. Additionally, comes down to the type of traveler a person is, the things you want to do and experience; some activities are much less language orientated.

 

Hmm... I guess Pink, Orange, Yellow. Maybe Orange, Blue, Yellow? If I was single, then maybe Pink, Orange, Purple?

 

Technically though spiders are arachnids, so the potion wouldn't work on them

 

Fair enough. My bias against all manner of creepy crawlies showed through, improperly lumping them all in together. You're right though, the potion only states it works on insects, so spiders would be unaffected.

Makes the potion less valuable, but it still stays in its current tier.

 

We agree on 2 out of the 3 potions. That's pretty rare for you and I.

 

That's funny, because our head-to-head debate record would indicate otherwise. To your credit though, you usually recognize when you've been outmaneuvered (without admitting it) and go radio silent rather than suffer the indignity of the killing blow.

 

...the killing blow.