Author Topic: ***SPOILERS Official Hero of Ages Spoilers Thread. Includes Q&A w/Brandon****  (Read 335701 times)

jjb

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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.


People already use atium, so if the whole point is to cause conflict then Ruin can already do that. Atium is Ruin's body, so I think once Ruin found the stockpile he would have his body back and be able to influence the world in more direct and less subtle ways.

ursidae

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People already use atium, so if the whole point is to cause conflict then Ruin can already do that. Atium is Ruin's body, so I think once Ruin found the stockpile he would have his body back and be able to influence the world in more direct and less subtle ways.
That was the way I understood it too.

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1. TLR stock-piled the atium to keep it away from Ruin. If he just let it grow in the Hathsin Pits, than Ruin would've known right where to find it, and he would've been much harder to defeat.

2. The atium slowly does dribble back to the Pits, but it takes about a hundred years.

3. Yes it is limited, because Ruin's influence is limited. TLR wants there to be a small amount of atium. He keeps a little bit in the market to keep his power, but the rest goes to the Trustwarren to keep out of the hands of Ruin.

Yeah, I forgot that the Trustwarren was covered in metal (meaning that Ruin couldn't detect it).

I still think it would have been smarter to consume the atium as soon as possible. If it takes a couple of hundred years to dribble back to the pits, Ruin can't access most of it anyway. Of course, that does not prevent some noble to stockpile it which may be the reason he did it (although it would be hard for the nobles to stockpile any significant amount as long as TLR control the Pits).

Patriotic Kaz

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i believe the process would be sped up by said consumption... it i a natural power that must re assert itself
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Shard

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I was under the impression that Ruin needed a major power boost and the Atium would do just that since it was his body. I think he needed that boost so he could finish destroying the world.
We need the metaphor of Magic and Monsters to understand the Human condition ~Stephan Donaldson.

happyman

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I think this question has to do with the Balance between Ruin and Preservation.  Even dead, Preservation still opposed Ruin and kept his destruction from happening in a single blink of power.  Ruin needed his body to tip the power to the point where he could easily overwhelm Preservation, who was weak from giving his soul to mankind.

From Ruin's behavior, I think we can say that a directly controlled minion could give Ruin access to his body, but that he would need to absorb most of it in order to actually get the power he was seeking.  (This last bit is needed to explain why Marsh' small piece of Atium wasn't enough to satisfy Ruin.)
Nature hates being reified.

Eri

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Great series!
And great suprises, the less suprising twists too.

The ending is as it should be, even a bit too picturesque-happy-ending like for me (I mean their bodies on the flowerfield, Saze mentioning talking with them in the afterlife... twice... a bit too much.). I'm absolutely OK with Vin and Elend dead and really happy that others survived.
But Sazed was my favorite character, so I may be biased.

Kandra are cool, I want more of TenSoon and MeLaan in the sequel (hope they are still immortal?). They will make a cute couple.
Marsh - I also want him in the sequel. Especially because of his numerous misfortunes in Mistborn (his brother got the girl, she died for him, he fulfilled her dream, Marsh became a mind-controlled monster and couldn't help it, got kicked by Vin, kicked by Elend, spared by Elend... and left like that. Sucks to be him.). And because of his cool Hemalurgic powers, too. :D

One of my big theories: contrary to what Sazed said, I still think that Feruchemy is of Preservation, and Allomancy of both. Why?

First - Preservation is not creation. It's keeping things as they are. That is why he needed to cooperate with Ruin to create. So Allomancy (positive balance) is of creation, therefore of both powers. Of Preservation is Feruchemy, which does exactly that - keeps things. Doesn't increase power, doesn't decrease power... just keeps things as they are.

Second, psychological, argument. The kandra claim to be of Preservation. The (modern) Terrismen, with similar attitude (very Conservative and lawful) are, in my opinion, also connected with Preservation. Both ancient and modern Terrisians are Feruchemists. Well, not all of them, but it's their national Metallic Art.
Allomancers tend to be much more dynamic and brutal, partially because their powers are more combat-oriented.

Allomancy is bestowed by larasium, true (however, there have been some Mistings before Ascension, not necessary because their great-...-great grandpas had used larasium). But it's mostly used to kill things, so it kind of balances itself.

Another reason - Snapping. If Allomancy was of Preservation, why would it need an extreme pain to awake? I don't know how Feruchemy first manifests, but from no mention of it in the books I guess it's rather peaceful.
OK - Preservation did Snap people (he was mad, however) so he may not be as nice as the name suggests.

However - the mist "liking" Allomancy and (probably) not reacting to Feruchemy is hard to explain with this hypothesis.  And probably somewhere on the forum it is officially said that Saze was right...

douglas

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Sazed isn't guessing when he says that.  It's from one of the chapter blurbs which were all written by Sazed after his ascension to godhood.  He had definitive knowledge of the subject granted directly by possession of the full power of both Ruin and Preservation.

Eri

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Yes. And still there are things he does not know. And with Allomancy - Preservation he sounds a bit like guessing, not knowing. I'm not sure if Metallic Arts were created by P&R or did they just emerge somehow. And if the latter option is true, it is possible that Saze does not know everything about them.

Of course, you are probably right. I'm just hypothesising.

Matty

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Yes. And still there are things he does not know. And with Allomancy - Preservation he sounds a bit like guessing, not knowing. I'm not sure if Metallic Arts were created by P&R or did they just emerge somehow. And if the latter option is true, it is possible that Saze does not know everything about them.

Of course, you are probably right. I'm just hypothesising.
I would assume that allomantic powers are just kinda like... building blocks of the universe. They're innate laws, like gravity and the conservation of energy.

Sheaman3773

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I'll go ahead and leave out the obligatory "Sanderson is great" comments, since they are pretty ubiquitous, and I'll jump straight to the questions (despite no responses here for quite a while :( [and yes, I understand that he's juggling a lot. I"m just pointing out it's been a few months since a post from him on this thread :-\]). I had a lot of questions, but I've forgotten most of them after working through all of these pages >.< so I'll just post the ones I do remember and come back to add more if they come back to me:

1) It was stated in FE that if a nobleman slept with a skaa woman, she had to be killed before she came to term. However, what happened with the reverse? What if a noblewoman took a skaa man to her bed? One could assume that such events wouldn't happen, but white women slept with black slaves during our own unfortunate period in history when the US had them, despite the illegality (and often lynching of both involved parties), though it is common knowledge that male slave owners slept with their female slaves much more. So, logically, it must have happened at least once in a thousand years. What then? Was the noblewoman killed, just as the skaa woman would be? I would think yes, but hey, it's worth an ask.

2) I was also mildly curious as to what the respective reproductivity of the nobles vs the skaa. It was mentioned that skaa had lots and lots of children, and that nobles were (rumored, at least) to have trouble having children. I was curious whether the change was in the males, the females, or both? Would a nobleman/skaa woman coupling be more productive than noblewoman/skaa man pair, or vice versa? Or would they be equal? Just a minor thought.

3) If Ruin could not even see metal, or what was written on it, how was he able to alter what was stored within metal Feruchemically? (This was already asked, but I felt it worth another mention  :))

The others will be added as/if I remember them :)

Eri

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1) My guesses:
- it didn't happen (or it was rare and such women were killed for perversion or something), or
- the baby was killed (before or after birth)

3) Maybe he perceived it somehow? Not the metal, but the feruchemical charge.

ursidae

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1) I think it probably did happen numerous times during the Final Empire era, but in most cases probably the noblewomen "got away with it", i.e. the husband was not aware of it and the child was raised as a nobleman's son. Granted, if the noblewoman often slept with skaa men (or one man in particular) it would probably create rumours, possibly causing ministry (or husbandry) action.

I don't remember whether the books mentioned any instance of this happening, I have a vague feeling that this may be the case.

pirsquared

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Re: ***SPOILERS Official Hero of Ages Spoilers Thread. Includes Q&A w/Brandon*
« Reply #867 on: August 09, 2009, 02:45:16 AM »
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First - Preservation is not creation. It's keeping things as they are. That is why he needed to cooperate with Ruin to create. So Allomancy (positive balance) is of creation, therefore of both powers. Of Preservation is Feruchemy, which does exactly that - keeps things. Doesn't increase power, doesn't decrease power... just keeps things as they are.

Second, psychological, argument. The kandra claim to be of Preservation. The (modern) Terrismen, with similar attitude (very Conservative and lawful) are, in my opinion, also connected with Preservation. Both ancient and modern Terrisians are Feruchemists. Well, not all of them, but it's their national Metallic Art.
Allomancers tend to be much more dynamic and brutal, partially because their powers are more combat-oriented.

Allomancy is bestowed by larasium, true (however, there have been some Mistings before Ascension, not necessary because their great-...-great grandpas had used larasium). But it's mostly used to kill things, so it kind of balances itself.

Another reason - Snapping. If Allomancy was of Preservation, why would it need an extreme pain to awake? I don't know how Feruchemy first manifests, but from no mention of it in the books I guess it's rather peaceful.
OK - Preservation did Snap people (he was mad, however) so he may not be as nice as the name suggests.

I would say that Preservation doesn't just 'preserve'; while he doesn't create, he DOES change things in order to max out their capabilities.  This is how Allomancy is - metals are 'burned' and changed into certain abilities.  No creation - just transformation.

Also, I don't see how Ruin and Preservation could work together to create.  Neither one knows how to create - even together it would not be possible.
« Last Edit: August 13, 2009, 05:41:38 AM by pirsquared »

Patriotic Kaz

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Allomancy is not creation and only someone who is ignorant of the definition would say it was (if you feel that those words were harsh don't there is no crime in ignorance unless it's willfull) you could apply both definition 1 and 4 to so here they are 1. the act of producing or causing to exist 4. the original bringing into existence of the universe by God. meaning to create it must be from nothing...on scardiel metal is power and the three metallic arts are merely the utilization of the power already in the metals
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"Chaos, go to your room!" - Momma Kaz

Batchman

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I have read the third book now (I think in mentioned it in another topic, but commenting on my thoughts obviously better fits here.)

I realize I have no proof of this, but I figured out a few of the plot twists the very first time they were hinted at in this book, and one of them, perhaps, in the last book.

I think it was during the last book that I started thinking that Vin's extra abilities (pierce copper clouds, for example) came from her earring, and this book only made it more plain. But I did not comprehend the exact reason for it until the book explained it. (The third magic system, which I would ruin the spelling of, so I will only refer to it as the third system.)

On the other hand, there were bits that I missed. Despite realizing that Zane was being spoken to and affected by Ruin (though not by name at the time) in the second book, and seeing the same thing happen to Spook in the third book, I did not catch on to Vin's brother's voice being the same thing, until it was specifically spelled out. I just plain did not make the connection.

I enjoyed the book quite a bit. I accepted the sacrifices at the end of it, though it would have been nice if Vin and Elend could have had more time together. It worked well enough that it didn't upset me, like it did some.

On the other hand, I did not find it to be as incredible as people seemed to think I would. To me, it did not transcend any of the other things Brandon has written, or elevate this above all his other works. It was a good conclusion, and a good story, and another in the line of books that convince me that I want to read everything Brandon writes unless and until he starts disappointing me.

It was a very enjoyable story among all of his other very enjoyable stories.

But now I will be looking forward to Way of Kings.