Timewaster's Guide Archive

I can't believe I missed this topic. I'm not doing well enough at my forum stalking, apparently.

Virtually all of these questions have highly likely answers, except for #7. Also, I will go out a limb on #1, because that question hasn't been directly asked. But, here are my answers for you:

1. No. Metals are the focus for Preservation's power. All burning a metal does is unlock Preservation's power, and thus it grants the particular Allomantic ability corresponding to the metal. Burning should not be taken literally. There are other focuses in the Cosmere, and I asked Brandon once. The Commands in Warbreaker for Awakening, the Aons in Elantris... All of these are immensely magical in nature. I do not believe that "burning" metals would actually produce heat. Remember, these terms are in-world. The first Allomancers probably created the term, and its rather catchy, so it must have stuck, regardless of it being factually accurate.

That is what I assumed, but I do seem to remember one of the characters mentioning how the familiar warmth sprang up in their stomach, or something to that effect. That could just be my mind adding things in after hearing it called burning and flaring all trilogy long, but if they felt the warmth, it might be possible that a physical side effect of Allomancy is heat. Just like Endowment drains color and drawing the Aons produces Light. The Light is obviously not the main focus (unless it's Aon Ashe ), but it is there.

But I wouldn't be surprised if it is a purely symbolical term. The metals disappear, and you can use them at different speeds. For a medieval society, almost the only vocabulary word that would fit would be 'burn'.

2. Absolutely. Atium has its Feruchemical power of youth, so Lerasium must have such an ability as well.

No, you misunderstood me. I'm not asking if Lerasuim has Feruchemical powers, all Allomantic metals have functions in Feruchemy and Hemalurgy. I'm asking if a Lerasium-mind is an everything-mind, and a Feruchemist could store heat, wakefulness, speed, weight, everything in a Lerasium-mind. Maybe not all at the same time, meaning they have to tap and drain all the heat out before they start storing speed, but then again, maybe all at the same time.

It's not very awesome of a power, but it would make sense. Hasn't it been confirmed that a Lerasium Hemalurgy spike steals all powers from the victim? I know it's been theorized.

3. We do not know that Lerasium-Steel creates a Coinshot for certain. For all we know, creation of Mistings is just another "side effect". I would imagine that whatever Lerasium-Steel does, it will not store precisely the same Feruchemical ability. However, I do not know. There's no basis for that theory, as we do not know Feruchemical powers of any God metal alloy.

I thought side-effect was the wrong phrase, and that a Mistborn burning Lerasium gained 1 Original Mistborn Strength™  in addition to what they originally had. But good point. We don't know enough Feruchemy to really make good theories.

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4) If someone is Hemalurgically imbued with a Feruchemist's power, could they tap that Feruchemist's metalminds? For instance, Feruchemist A spends his whole life storing senses in Tin, and then is captured by Inquisitors, who use a Tin spike to steal his Feruchemy powers and add them to Inquisitor A. Could Inquisitor A then tap Feruchemist A's tinminds? After hearing Hemalurgy described as "stapling a part of someone else's soul to your own", it sounds like it could be possible. (After glancing through the Mistborn wiki on Wikia, it looks like it would have to be a Brass spike that is used)

4. First of all, thank you referring to Hemalurgy as being "imbued". I need to start a petition for Brandon to use that term permanently. In the MB annotations, Brandon calls such metals "Hemalurgically charged", which I think is confusing it with Feruchemy.

The simple answer to this question is no.

Now, I know this for certain. I had a fellow TWGer ask Brandon at a signing. Basically, just like an Allomancer can't burn another person's Feruchemically charged metals, a Hemalurgist cannot either. In order for that to happen, the spike would actually need to be imbued from yourself, which is more than slightly ridiculous.

Dang. It makes so much sense. Just to be clear, I know a Hemalurgist can't burn just anyone's Feruchemically charged metals, but not even the person that was used to grant them Feruchemical powers? It's the same person's ability tapping the metalminds, it's just been transferred to someone else.

5. Others have answered this one really well, but to expound a bit: Inquisitor powers also depended on what skaa Mistings they could find at the time of their creation. That's a major hindrance there.

Not to get sidetracked, but if they really couldn't find any skaa mistings to use, couldn't they re-use spikes? There would be more power-loss but it's better than nothing.

In terms of Inquisitors "doubling up", does Hemalurgy work like that? If someone takes three Pewter spikes instead of one, does that make them automatically three times stronger than a one-spike Inquistor? Or possibly stronger by a factor of 3 rather than a multiple?

My answer to that would be it depends on the genetic strength of the Allomancers you are spiking. Obviously, spiking someone like one of the Original Allomancers will increase the recipient's abilities much more than a skaa Misting who has noble blood three generations removed.

Yes, I agree. And obviously it's not 3 times stronger, but more like something like 2.7, because you have to figure power-loss in.

I also believe that Allomantic strength is a major factor in piercing copperclouds at all. If you were a weak Smoker, such copperclouds would be easier to break. You don't necessarily need to double up on your Bronze if you already have sufficient Allomantic strength (like the Lord Ruler). I think you just need to break a threshold on Allomantic strength relative to coppercloud you are attempting to pierce.

I agree here too. Original Strength Smokers' Copperclouds were probably unpiercable, even for Original Strength Seekers/Mistborn

6. Good question! The way I understand it is that those genetic (and spiritual) codes are tiny fragments of Preservation itself. I would guess that there no good way to predict what Misting you will get (or if you will get an Allomancer at all. Tevidian had strong genetics, but I don't think he was an Allomancer). Certainly in noble houses like Venture, there was a lot of diversity in their small amount of Mistings. If Misting abilities were directly hereditary, Straff (Tineye) would have made Zane a Tineye as well, which is not what we see happening.

Yes, but is it more likely for a Misting to have a same-power-Misting child? So they have a 30% chance to have a Allomancer child, and of that 30%, a 20% chance to have a Mistborn, a 30% chance to have a random Misting, and a 50% chance to have a same-power-Misting? (Or to get real complicated, a 20%-Mistborn, a 30%-other Misting, a 30%-same Misting, and a 20%-other Paired Misting, (Meaning a Lurcher instead of a Coinshot, a Rioter instead of a Soother, etc)

It should be obvious, but those numbers are all made up. Just trying to provide an example. There'd be some pretty crazy Punnett Squarage involved.

7. It's very difficult to say. I can't even make a convincing argument there So, instead, I shall say what my Table of Allomantic Metals says (I knew there was a reason for mounting it above my computer: quick reference!): "In alloy form, it produces various expanded mental and temporal effects." I wonder what that would mean if you alloyed it with a Physical metal... Now that'd be an interesting question for Brandon.

Perhaps it shows only what metals are going to be Allomantically Pushed/Pulled. Or how strongly a Thug or Tineye is going to flare and use their metals. A very specific and weaker form of Atium, like a Lerasium Alloy is a specific and weaker form of Lerasium.

And one more question, that my brother asked me the other day:

8 ) Could a Soother take down the Hulk? He could just keep Soothing the anger away, but could he do it fast enough?

Alright, so I got thinking the other day about some various Allomancy and Feruchemy scenarios, and I have some questions. If anyone here can answer them, that'd be great, if not I'll save some of them for the next signing I go to.

1) Does an Allomancer's body temperature rise when burning metals?

2) Can a Feruchemist store anything and everything in a Lerasium metalmind?

3) If a Lerasium-Steel alloy will turn a normal person into a steel-misting (Coinshot), can a normal person store physical speed in a Lerasium-Steel metalmind feruchemically?

4) If someone is Hemalurgically imbued with a Feruchemist's power, could they tap that Feruchemist's metalminds? For instance, Feruchemist A spends his whole life storing senses in Tin, and then is captured by Inquisitors, who use a Tin spike to steal his Feruchemy powers and add them to Inquisitor A. Could Inquisitor A then tap Feruchemist A's tinminds? After hearing Hemalurgy described as "stapling a part of someone else's soul to your own", it sounds like it could be possible. (After glancing through the Mistborn wiki on Wikia, it looks like it would have to be a Brass spike that is used)

5)Were Inquisitors gifted with all Mistborn powers? For instance, could regular Inquisitors burn Copper, or Aluminum?

6) If two Coinshots were to get married, are their offspring more likely to be Coinshots, or just more likely to be Mistings? Do genetics code for specific Mistings, or just Allomancy in general?

7) What would an Atium-alloy do? We've seen Atium-Gold in the Eleventh Metal, or Malatium, but what about Atium-Bronze, or Atium-Iron?

A lot of you have probably seen this, but for everyone else, the Way of Kings Cover Art has been posted.

The Tor.com post about it: http://www.tor.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=blog&id=58815




Pretty good. I was kind of disappointed when I first saw the cover, but the final picture in the article (the full print) is awesome, and the cover is growing on me.

Quote from: Gher on February 14, 2010, 07:14:46 PM

RJ said that the opening gateway would push the cuendillar out of the way. What could be interesting is if they made a cuendillar doorframe, and inserted it in a gateway and then let the gateway try to close around it.

Wouldn't it just get pushed out?

Well, if you positioned it right, and possibly had a groove running around the outside of the cuendillar frame, that the gateway could get caught in, then you could have a gateway that never closes. Similar to tying a weave off, but with the added safety of not worrying about brushing the edges of the gateway.

It's kind of funny, this exact thing was discussed very recently at www.readandfindout.com (which I'll shamelessly plug for any WoT fans here.)

Problem Solved.

Quote from: Gher on January 22, 2010, 06:03:21 PM

But do we know of any Lerasium mines? Is it possible the people living elsewhere in Scadriel have lerasium mines?

RAFO.

Excellent. 

Are there any stockpiles of Larasium (or is it Lerasium?) laying around somewhere? Or any place where it can be found "naturally" like the Pits of Hathsin? Or is Preservation's "body" tied up in Humans and the mists more than a specific metal? And if Preservation was needed to create Humans, how do Humans exist on other Shardworlds?


Gah, this was only supposed to be about larasium stockpiles, but my train of thought got going.

Oh, and do we know (or have theories about) what Atium alloys do? Besides Malatium (atium-gold) of course.