Timewaster's Guide Archive

I think that hemalurgic spikes can only take the power if the person dies.  Otherwise, it would not be the power of Ruin.  The hemalurgic spike steals the life out the person as they die, and stores it in the spike.  Or at least that's how I think of it.

I love Pat Rothfuss' book titles.  Both 'The Name of The Wind" and "The Wise Man's Fear" are exeptionally good, as far as titles go.

Speaking of which, do we know the title for the third book yet?

Here's my question. How would Ruin "get" the atium and what exactly would he do with it?  what did he have to do once he "got" it to gain its power?

Ruin would influence people into taking the atium; and once it is in the hands of people, the nature of atium is such that it causes conflict, for a few reasons:

1. It is very valuable AND useful, and there is not enough to go around (mostly because the Mistborn and Seers use it all up).  So if someone else has it, you want it, whether that's because you want to burn it or because you want to sell it.  Either way, in many cases, this leads to violence and destruction.

2. Atium as a feruchemical bracelet (an Atiummind) stores age, and generally the people who would use it for this purpose are the type of people who would tend to cause violence.

3. In an allomantic battle, atium makes it much more likely for one person to beat the other (rather that it ending in someone running away).  Whoever has less atium dies, basically.

Hope that helped.

I recently finished Warbreaker, and I thought it was awesome!  The only problem I saw was that God King does seem a little too similar to Lord Ruler.  God=Lord, King=Ruler.  But other than that, the magic system was ingenious (as always) and the plot was amazing.

We don't know if the religion's interpretation of the Returned is correct.  By making them rulers, they can influence things, though.  The Returned may be imprisoned, but I must admit that it is a very nice imprisonment with a decent amount of power.  Note, however, that their quest may not necessarily be to heal somebody.  That may just be an act of mercy they perform after finishing the quest.  So asking if Denth and Vasher have to heal somebody is not as relevant ask asking what they were supposed to do.  And for Vasher, I think the term Warbreaker may be sufficient.  I dunno about the others, though.  They seem to have failed...

I got the impression at the end of the book when Lightsong healed the God King that he sort of knew it was time to do what he had come to do.  My theory about the Returned is that they are very much like awakened sentinent objects (like Nightblood): they are given one command and that command sort of defines them.  In the case of Nightblood, the command is "destroy evil" and it was given to him by Vasher and Shashara.  In the case of the Returned, I think that the person gives himself a command, causing his body to be awakened as an entity.  So the 'quests' of the gods/returned are actually just a command they gave themselves.  I agree that it definitely doesn't have to be healing someone.
In the case of Denth and some others, it would be possible according to my theory to have an evil quest, if the person gave themselves an evil command.  However, since Denth used to be good, I think this is unlikely.  Instead, I suggest he has an obscure command, like Nightblood's "destroy evil".  Certainly Vasher could be considered 'evil' in Denth's mind.

On the subject of Vasher's and Denth's abilities to do things that most Returned can't, I would point out that they have been living for a far longer amount of time than the others.  Also, the priests do hold quite a bit of information back from the gods living in Hallandren.

I totally agree that Clod is Arsteel.

Now, I would like to propose that there are actually 8 BioChromatic entities: four spontaneous, and four non-spontaneous - spontaneous meaning awakened and commanded by oneself and non-spontaneous meaning awakened and commanded by others.  So the 4 non-spontaneous would be Nightblood-type things, awakened objects, lifeless, and a sort of sentinent creature created from a dead human body the same way Nightblood was created (this last one would be very dangerous - imagine Nightblood as a person).  The four spontaneous entities would be Returned, returned lifeless, returned objects, and returned sentinent objects (if Nightblood was destroyed, he could choose to return as the last of the four).  A returned lifeless or returned object seems improbable, since they would have to be awakened by themselves, but if you commanded an object or lifeless specifically to return if it was killed, maybe that would work.

One question: why didn't Vasher just use his own army to destroy the Lifeless army?  He could have stopped them on his own, without the God King's help.

For me, Vin and Elend's deaths seemed unnecessary at first as well.  Kelsier's death was also depressing at first.  But Kelsier's death had time to sink in, and by the end, it seemed completely necessary and normal.  Just like when someone dies in real life; you get used to it after a while, and even though you still may be sad about it, life goes on and you go on with it.  The problem I think many people had with Vin and Elend is that the book ended right after they died, so they were still attached to the characters.  Life didn't go on, it stopped right in that tragic moment.  I think that reading the next series (once it comes out) should give the deaths time to sink in, and eventually Vin and Elend will be just like Kelsier.

Where to start...

Vin and Elend's deaths were inevitable.  I can't really imagine a world in which Vin and Elend are living as king and queen.  They're just not the type to live in a peaceful world.  Also, I'd like to point out that all the good books I've ever read almost always kill a character who you don't want to die.  It's basically essential to put some tragedy in it; otherwise it seems like defeating the dark lord was simple and easy.  A book needs to surprise you to the extent that you're never quite sure what's going to happen.  Without that, there is no suspense and the reader is never afraid of something bad happening.
The third book ended on a happy note, and that is good.  I, personally, don't really enjoy a series that ENDS on a tragic note.  It needs tragedy, but doesn't need to leave you with it.
Kelsier's death in the first was very tragic.  I'll admit I was a little mad when it first happened, but the series gave it time to sink in and at the end it seemed necessary.  The reflections on his last words helped with that especially (I am hope).  I really like how he's looked at like a hero through the rest of the books, in memory.  And besides, as I think Brandon Sanderson said Kell just needed to die because if he didn't, he'd always be in control of everything.  He didn't allow the other characters to develop.
I loved the series as a whole, especially its system of magic.  There are only two things I didn't like:
1) I was a little dissappointed in how Rashek turned out to be good.  I realize Ruin was strongly influencing him, but I still think it kind of ruins the horrifying way the first book portrays the Final Empire.  Mistborn set it up as a horrible, cruel world (I know there's a better adjective I'm looking for here, but I can't think of it) and that was the main reason why Kell's death was so meaningful.  By making the Lord Ruler a good person the book kind of ruined Kell's whole purpose.
2) The ending of HoA seemed a little rushed and/or cut short.  I think there should have been a little more epilogue material.
OK, that was a little harsh.  The series, all in all, was amazing.  I'm looking forward to Brandon's future work.

Wasing the thought of the being of Spook, but deciding of the not.  Wasing probably who I am the most of being like, but I am the liking of the Marsh more.  If wasing there being another Feruchemist who notting of the personality of Sazed or Tindwyl, I wasing the would of choosing them.

If any person fluent in Eastern street slang were to read the above, they would probably be laughing.  Not like I know anyone fluent in Eatern street slang.

Here are some questions.  I don't think any have been answered, but I'm not entirely sure so just tell me if they have.  I realize I'm getting really technical, but my mind likes to have scientific explanations for everything.

1. The metals Cadmium, NotCerrobend, and Copper all work with a 'bubble' or 'cloud', and Iron, Steel, Zinc, and Brass also work that way in the sense that you can only affect things at a certain range.  Does the cloud have a specific size? Does it get bigger if you flare or use duralumin with the metal?  Or does the cloud have no distinct ending, but just gets less and less powerful the further away you go from the source?
2. What happens if you burn Zinc and Riot happiness and sadness at the same time?
3. What happens if you flare or use duralumin with Gold or Electrum? Does it make the shadows clearer, or does it make you see further into the past or future? Does it do anything at all?  Does it perhaps tell you something else about the shadows, like how likely they are to happen or to have happened?
4. With Duralumin, can you enhance Nicrosil, and vice versa? If so, you could get a chain of people (either Mistborn or Nicrobursts), standing in a line, and then have each one burn Nicrosil while touching the person in front of them. The person in the front would then have EXTREMELY amplified powers to the next metal he/she burned. (The front person would be Mistborn).
5. Since a Mistborn burning Lerasium will enhance his powers, what would happen if a Mistborn or Duralumin Gnat burned duralumin with Lerasium?
6. If Lerasium in alloy creates Mistings, couldn't you get a double-misting by giving someone two different alloys of Lerasium?  Or would the second alloy 'cancel out' the first?
7. Can you alloy Lerasium with Atium?  What would happen?
8. Concerning the two types of mist: Does burning Tin make the Ruin mits more clear, just like it makes the normal ones translucent?  Does using Hemalurgy attract the Ruin mists? Can a person using Hemalurgicly-stolen Tin powers still penetrate the mists?
9. If the Lord Ruler was controlled by Ruin through the Atium Bracers on his arms (which stored age), shouldn't that have shown what Atium's Hemalurgic Power is?
10. How does the Steel Inquisitors' Eyesight work?  Is it just the Allomatic properties of Iron and Steel (the blue lines) or is it a different power granted by Ruin?  It doesn't seem to work in exactly the same way that Ironpulling and Steelpushing lines work.