Leaderboard

I'm afraid that I'm going to have to pull out of this game. I've greatly enjoyed catching up, and analysing the game, but doing so took me more than 40 hours last week, and has meant that I averaged less than three hours sleep a night. This would have been fine, but I collapsed after lunch yesterday, and had to be taken to hospital by paramedics. There appears to be something going on with my heart, and it's either caused or exacerbated by stress and lack of sleep. As such, ceasing playing seems to be a sensible, albeit sad, decision to make. Thank you all for providing such entertainment, and particularly Meta for running the game.

I think it depends on the type of fairies, and how they are used? I'm not really a fan of the sugar plum dumpling type of fairies, for instance; you know, those warm and cheerful and friends to the boys and girls. I do t see any kind of interesting hook with them. But, their existence does make the fey a lot more interesting. I'm thinking mostly of Pratchet -read Lords and Ladies, it's amazing- but also, I think... Celtic mythology has a lot of characters and gods and goddesses who would feed into that fey angle. I think the thing that's interesting about them is that tint of darkness, that alien wildness to them. It's compelling, almost intoxicating. The fey -and fairies, obviously- I think are maybe interesting because they are more liminal that straight up gods abd goddesses? They are just human enough that we can understand them, just alien enough that we can't. They have their own worlds - Tir Na Nog - but unlike, say, Olympus, it's a place mortals can go to...but unlike Valhalla, going there carries a price (ie: the stories about people crossing over and coming back after a few days to find centuries have passed). I don't know. It's an interesting question, and these are off the cuff rambles. Sorry.

The Inquisitato

Well, I officially started my business today. Avalon Woodcraft, LLC- specializing in custom cabinets and fine woodworking. Bought myself a CNC router and everything. Just thought I'd share. And now I'm going to bed. I'm beat.

We were all thinking it anyway

In the last couple of weeks I managed to regularly find some time to work on a secret project that I hope will be reveal to the Shard community before the release of Oathbringer

You know how at award shows reporters ask all the celebrities "who are you wearing?", meaning "who designed your clothes?" So a lot of celebrities have begun to voice their annoyance and disdain for the term. I just want one celebrity to have the guts to answer "who are you wearing?" with something along the lines of "Oh, her name was Cheryl. She was a sweet girl, but she knew too much."

Hiya! I'm Marva and I'm loving reading all the Cosmere books. I have a blog that I started over on tumblr which is always fun. I'm interested in getting to know everyone around here in the fandom. I'm currently in the middle of Words of Radiance (WHICH IS AMAZING) and I think it's my favorite of them so far. I've also read the first Mistborn, Warbreaker, and Elantris. Anywho! That's me!

"Wasing the being of voting. Ising the being of defending of not." Sart had mostly based his analysis on voting patterns. He had seen Herwynbe's vote on Rae as a tacit defense of Nyal. He understood that analyzing posts were important, but he had been more concerned with getting his analysis out on time. If that lead to misconceptions, then he supposed he was sorry for them.

Day 12: Perchance to Dream Jack was having a horrible dream- if you could call it a dream. It seemed a bit too vivid for that. It felt more like it was a recollection from another time, where events similar to those taking place in Tyrian Falls… had happened? Were going to happen? In the end, it didn’t matter. They were similar enough in structure that he saw how it would all play out. He saw how the paranoia and the fear slowly sank their teeth into the villagers. He saw how it turn friend against friend and elevated petty differences into justifications for death. He saw as supplies were destroyed and reserves ruined, which made the villagers all the more frantic and fanatic in their search to purge the evil out from amongst them. If it wasn’t so horrifying, he could almost respect the way these forces of destruction systematically encouraged the people to do their work for them. And in his sleeping state, the recent events in Tyrian Falls mixed with those recollections and he dreamt about the gruesome deaths that had just recently happened in new and mortifying ways. Jack tossed and turned throughout the night. He wanted to wake up; to let this nightmare end. But he was not immune to the effects of what was happening in Tyrian Falls and his body was just too exhausted. Then he dreamt of a figure creeping into his room, cloaked in darkness and comfortable in the shadows. The figure stealthily made their way across the room; avoiding any of the squeaking boards that could have given them away. When they reached his bed, they pulled out a wicked looking dagger. When they raised it above their head, it glinted in the moonlight and it looked stained with the blood of those it had already killed. Now this dream felt incredibly weird to Jack. This didn’t feel like a recreation from an earlier time and it seemed embedded in his current reality. Some part of Jack’s instincts kicked in and he snapped awake. He awoke to the exact same scene he had just been dreaming about! And the dagger was already plunging towards his chest. Suddenly, before he could do so much as breath in to scream, he was yanked to the right with such force that he felt as if he had been slammed into by a Koloss’s fist. The dagger stabbed down and sank almost to the hilt into the bed where Jack had laid just a second before. The force was so strong, it carried him across the room and crashing out through the window; glass ripping at him as he barrelled through. Finally, he rolled to a stop in one of the huge piles of ash that hadn’t been cleaned up in the town recently. As Jack lay there, panting and trying to calm down, he could only think of one thought: Thank the gods I got a room on the first floor! Night 12 has ended and Day 12 begins! You have 48 hours. A Joe in the Bush was attacked, but they survived! Good luck! Player List

A very obscure 17th Shard / Edgedancer in-meme. Props if you get this one. Also the above meme is ironic because Anakin failed right after saying that.

You'll get the hang of it. I know for a fact how annoying it is to have everyone drop WoB you never heard of on you, when you are new, but eventually, you'll catch up. I doubt all Windrunners were hateful people: it seems a rather restrictive criteria to use to chose future knights. I would point out right here Brandon did say that while the essence of the oaths were the same for all knights of a same order, the wording and the circumstances would differ on an individual basis. What does Kaladin's third oath teaches us? Upon first glance, it seems as if it wants Windrunner to try at protecting all people, even those he hates, but if we dig further, I think we can draw the conclusion the oath isn't about hate, but about rational thinking versus emotional one. In other words, a Windrunner has to offer protection to those who needs it independently of how he personally feels towards those persons. In Kaladin's case, it was hate, but it could also be the complete opposite: love. I will protect those who need it the most not just those I love the most. Or more broadly: I will not let my feelings decide whom I should protect. These are two examples which, I believe, embody the essence of the third oath with a complete different wording and a completely different character progression. Hence, I think we cannot base ourselves merely on feelings existing within characters to determine if one is suited for one given order or another. We should also be careful in tying too closely individuals within the same order: not all Windrunners will be almost identical clones of Kaladin, not all Edgedancers will be street orphans with a bad mouth, not all Elsecaller will be scholars, etc. Hate I believe is irrelevant when it comes to finding out the next Windrunner. The question we should ask ourselves if whom seek to protect when put to the trial? Whom is ready to give up chances of advancement, of escape, of fulfilling a dream in order to be better placed to protect others? Is it Moash? I think, based on the character we have read so far, it is practically impossible to guess. I would say no, but we do not know how the guy will progress for now on. Other thoughts for Moash would be Dustbringer as we still need one.

During the end of WoR, a medical professional in Dalinar's army inspects Dalinar's newest shoulder wound. The doctor is horrified to see that the skin is mostly scar. Dalinar seems to have suffered an incongruently large number of wounds to his shoulder (and likely other body parts). The doctor says that Dalinar shouldn't be able to fight at all considering the previous trauma that the shoulder has suffered. Danilar should never have recovered full from his previous wounds. Dalinar jokes off the remark, but the doctor insists that the human body can't function normally after receiving wounds like his.... “Storms” the surgeon said, “Highprince, you’re all scars under here. How many time have you been wounded in the shoulder” “Can’t Remember” “How can you still use your arm?” “Training and practice” “that’s not how it works…” she whispered eyes wider “I mean… Storms…” --- Do we think Dalinar has previously drawn in stormlight? Has he been a base-level Radiant for a lot longer than we thought? Dalinar took multiple arrows to the shoulder in his newly released flashback chapters. It seems as if Dalinar never stopped being the Blackthorn due to injury, though? The Blackthorn doesn't sound like a great candidate for a Nahel-bond so it doesn't make a lot of sense to say he was healing with Stormlight? Perhaps Shardeplate has regenerative qualities? Perhaps the gems can slowly leach into the body? Shardplate is so rare that perhaps medics haven't had the opportunity to study its effects on healing. Another option is that The Thrill might grant impressive regenerative properties (we know that it can energize and invigorate), but you'd think the medic would be aware of such a phenomena associated with The Thrill. Perhaps Daninar's Thrill was something so beastly that he was able to tap into Odium's investiture? My other thought is that perhaps his body was healed by The Nightwatcher. This seems unlikely since Dalinar has sustained multiple wounds to his body over the course of decades. It seems unlikely that Dalinar visited the Nightwatcher so early in his life (though we can't be sure just yet). What do you guys think? How has Dalinar managed to heal from the wounds he sustained in his youth?

Hithon's stormlight had run out. He had been careful. Had tried to use it in only controlled bursts. But getting thrown bodily from the back of an enraged chasmfiend proved to be the final straw. When the other Initiates had managed to get the fiend to smash into something, the fiend had lurched forward alarmingly, and Hithon had been jerked off from his position. He had tried his best to twist himself into a landing position, but it had all happened too fast. He smashed into the ground, having taken an unprepared fall from the height of Urithiru's third storey. it had hurt. But he did not have the luxury of unconsciousness. The spheres he had been carrying had contained enough Stormlight to patch up his broken bones and injuries. He had forced himself to his feet, even as the last of the light washed over his body. The first tired step forward, the light finally winked out, leaving him empty. And even though the light must have healed his major injuries, he still felt every single cut and bruise and ache screaming in his body. It hurt. But he had gritted his teeth and forced himself to walk towards the thundering roars. He knew, at least, that their efforts had not been in vain. The roars sounded noticeably more anguished and weaker than enraged now. It was failing. As he picked his way painfully through the fallen rocks, his foot came across a body, who groaned at the kick. Hithon frowned, kneeling. Quickly, he placed a hand on the person's chest, feeling a strong heartbeat. Efficiently, he searched the person, coming across a bow clutched in a death-grip in the man's hand. Shinon. The man groaned again - he seemed to be half conscious. Hithon groaned. Must he? He knelt, hooking his elbows under the man's armpits. This maneuver was difficult, and much easier when he had his eyes. Nevertheless, he was familiar enough with the movements that it wasn't too awkward. After maneuvering Shinon into a position where he was draped over his shoulders, he began to painfully walk forward towards the noises. Towards the other Initiates, hopefully. Towards help. Oh, it was painful. But he had lived a life used to pain. After a time of walking, footsteps came running up. Hands lifted Shinon from his shoulder, and a comforting, soothing voice was speaking to him, thanking him, telling him that he had done enough. The stranger. Kintas. He couldn't hear what the man was saying. Something was pushed into his hands. A pouch, filled with round spheres. Hithon gasped. Then suddenly, Light. Strength. Relief. All the bruises that he had been carrying seemed to melt away, all the pain - gone. Relief. He could stand straighter, he no longer had to gasp for every breath. Light. "Thank you..." He gasped. Above them, the chasmfiend screamed. Hithon jerked his head up, although he couldn't have hoped to see what had caused it. The fiend wasn't dead yet. And he knew - he himself was living proof that a creature wounded and frightened would strike back twice as hard if not quickly subdued. He still wondered why he had charged out with Teresh earlier. But it didn't matter, for now. He had started out to do one job. And it was time to finish it. Hithon drew two more poisoned daggers with wicked blades, turned calmly towards the source of the roars, and started running. Time to end this. Don't worry @TheMightyLopen, Hithon's got your back @Jondesu, you got two new patients.

I just joined a few minutes ago, and I wanted to stop and say Hello. I'm rather new to all things Cosmere, but I'm sure I'll soon catch up. I've read Elantris, Mistborn: The Final Empire, and I'm currently reading Well of Ascension. I'm trying to pace myself, and I'll probably start Stormlight when a firm release date for Oathbringer is announced. If I'm lucky, I may even get to read The Winds of Winter this year, as well.

"Get up. You are needed." Sareth looked around the darkness. It was a room, completely black, with visible dimensions and invisible everything. And in the center of it was an orb of light. "Get up, Sareth. I won't let you die yet." Sareth struggled to his feet, or at least what he thought were his feet. Did he have feet? He couldn't see them. He squinted at the orb. "Wha- who are you?" He asked. The orb seemed to wink at him. "I am Immera. Now let's get you back alive..." the voice faded away as the light from the orb intensified and engulfed the room, getting brighter and brighter, threatening to burn Sareth away... ... Daylight. And stormlight. Sareth hastily sucked in the stormlight in front of his face, feeling the power course through his body, fixing him where broken and strengthening him where not. He looked up at Kintas, who looked down at him with relief. "Oh, thank the Almighty you are alright. You wouldn't breathe the stormlight, and I was getting worried. Oh, and I found this nearby," he handed something to Sareth. It was his staff, a little beaten, but still whole. Sareth pulled it to his chest. He smiled and nodded to Kintas. "Thank you so much for this. I will find someway to repay you," he said. Kintas looked up, something catching his eye. Sareth followed his gaze. It was the Fifth Nameless, as the others had become to call him, standing on the back of the chasmfiend. He extended his arm to Sareth, the other grasping a quarterstaff. "Let's finish this," he said, with a determination in his voice that didn't take no for an answer. Sareth got to his feet, leaning on his staff, and smiled. "Yes, let this be finished." Then he ran and leaped, thrusting himself into the air and landing on one of the beast's legs. Then he swiftly climbed onto the back, feeling alive and full of energy. He turned to the Fifth, staff gripped firmly. "Let's do this."

I see your Inquisitato and raise you Potatodin!

It's kind of a common thing for me to accidentally hit the downvote button instead of the upvote button. I'm on a small touchscreen most of the time, so that's probably the cause. My question: if I downvote a post, and then quickly change and upvote it, does the person get a notification?

As Uther breathed easier beside him, recovering, Kintas searched the chasm around him with his eyes, looking for other opportunities to help. The beast itself was down, pinned and while not helpless, less of an immediate threat than it had been, and there was rubble strewn about from its struggles. Peeking out from around the edge of one particularly jagged boulder, Kintas spotted part of a cloak and then an arm laying on the ground, hopefully still attached to someone behind it. Sprinting out again, he quickly made his way to the tangle of rocks and vines that lay over Sareth, the Shin man who had blinded the chasmfiend, at least partially. Kintas had seen that he was still atop the beast when the outcropping fell onto it, but hadn't been able to work out until now where he'd ended up. Sareth was unconscious, but Kintas was quickly able to ascertain that he was still breathing, and while he had some unhealed wounds, indicating he had run out of Stormlight, nothing looked too serious. Before Kintas could grab a pouch of his own spheres, he spotted a bag of them on Sareth's belt, still infused and glowing. He held those up closer to the man's face and hoped he could Breath in the Stormlight unconsciously, but nothing happened at first. Taking his waterskin from his side, Kintas splashed some on the man's bald head and face, shocking him back into semi-consciousness. "Take to wake up, Sareth. You've done your part, let's clear the way for others to finish the beast off." @Hemalurgic_Headshot, hope that's satisfactory!

Orlock, I hope you get better Those small little slips are the things we really need to look out for, so, I propose that we should feast on lynch Magestar! "Hey, look blood!" someone says. Everyone stops for a moment then starts chasing after the person that accidently cut himself. "I guess even the regular people are working for Ruin," Mr. Hoid said.

On the other hand, some people can use that to stealthily downvote some old posts of people they don't like.

They are, generally, personifications of forces and events we do not/did not understand. They are best used as plot devices because while they can generally resolve a lot of problems, their fey nature makes them unpredictable. That leads to some interesting humor or suspense.

Have you guys seen this? Season 7, with William Shatner!

Hey everyone, I'm really sorry that I haven't been on and posting, but from now on, I am going to at least try and post twice to three times a day. So, I see that any other spiked have been killed, do we have any ideas for spiked yet? Mr. Hoid wakes up from his really long nap and said, "Wow, that was a . . . really long sleep, can anyone even sleep that long?"

I have downvoted your post, un-downvoted it, upvoted it, un-upvoted it, and then upvoted it again and left it there. What did you see?

Believe me. I've got bigger plans than another greatshell for Chapter Four...

Guess who just passed the 20,000 word mark?

One of my friends said this

As someone with 7 siblings, the concept be being an only child sounds strange

Just use hemalurgy to steal that attribute from platypus and implant it into a windwhisperer ferring.

Buying a new Sanderson book like:

Nice work.

I read a sample chapter of a book once and was going to buy and can't remember the name. The general idea was about a leader (wizard) who was traveling around the land in a moving fortress.... Does this sound familiar at all? I know its a long shot. Thanks.

Well, it's well and truly long past time we closed this game up. Congratulations to the Traitors. A well fought victory. This game just goes to show that you don't need roles to have a fun and enjoyable game as well as demonstrating the value of good discussion. A lesson for all of us. Many thanks and upvotes to Hael for running the game. If anyone would like to try their hand at running a game, please get a hold of Gamma, Wilson, Metacognition or myself. Not only will we get you added to the list, but we'd also be more than willing to help out in any way we can. You can also ask questions and get some hints and feedback from everyone over here in our Art of Game Creation thread as well. With all the games that we've run so far, we have plenty of experienced GMs that can help you refine any game you're thinking about! For those wanting to play, MR20: With Ruin Beside Us is open for sign ups but will be starting soon so feel free to join in the fun. Thanks again to everyone that played and we look forward to killing seeing you in future games!

We still get to kill each other right? Also, since we're talking about rights, don't Elims have a right to die just as much as the rest of us as well? Equal treatment and all...

Indeed. You have opened my eyes. I know it's going to take time but hopefully one day you can forgive me for how I used to think of Elims.

My first time reading a Brandon Sanderson book was the Way of Kings about one year ago. I was always a huge fantasy/sci-fi book reader. It started with the Harry Potter series which I've read at least 7 times growing up. I've read the Eragon series (Book 4 was the biggest blue balls ever), Rangers Apprentice, Asoiaf, the two King Killer books, LoTR etc. I've enjoyed all of those series in one way or another besides the 4th Eragon book... When I started WoK, I expected a generic fantasy story because I've never read a Sanderson book in my life. None of those other series (ASOIAF was close) gave me the "high" that I felt reading WoK, WoR, and Era 1 of Mistborn. Ive lost count of the amount of times I've said "alright that's enough reading for today" and continued reading. What I would give to read the Tower, the Arena duel, Kaladin's 3rd oath moment completely fresh. Those moments were some of my favorite throughout any books that I've ever read.

Just a notification for an upvote. Well, thank you, I guess that answers it!

One of my friends posted this little art game on Facebook, and I'm having waaaay too much fun with it: Here's what I've made so far: I'm thinking we might have a lot of fun 'shopping the potato to look like Sanderson characters... Who's game?

Well, casting came in. While I think I had a good audition, I was placed in the ensemble. Which isn't bad! It's just a little bit frustrating because it seems the person who got the role I was trying for only got it because they are a senior and it's their last performance. Oh well, it'll be a fun musical and maybe I'll get a better role next year!

So far, Kaladin's oaths have been about disconnecting his actions from his feelings: he has to do what is right because it is right, not because his feelings dictate him to do so. It thus makes no sense to me his next oath would be about him "Protecting others to the cost of his life" as his oaths aren't about making a final stand, it is about doing the right thing as best of his abilities. He would fulfill nothing by dying and it would make his previous stance rather... pointless.

We know a rough timeline of some events. He went after Ambition first, but couldn't find (him?) He then took out Devotion and Dominion on Sel (they were the first, so this is the best point to try mapping out timelines) After D&D, he took out Ambition at some unspecified time. Odium visits Roshar, gets trapped there for a long while and does Desolations Around 2 Millennia(by my best estimates) pass, and Honor is killed around the same time as the Recreance occurs. Remaining 2200-2500 years to the present date in Stormlight Archives. The problem with reverse engineering it is that we only have a statement by Brandon that is subject to change about how long ago the Shattering was. 6,000 years before Prelude in Stormlight. [2] Debate about how long the Desolations took ensues... I'm siding with the "there were only 9 Desolations" camp and using the Heraldic Epochs for this. Dalinar's vision with Midnight Essence gives us a lot of things. Midnight Essence are a sign of an impending Desolation. The date is the Eighth Epoch, 337. -If I combine those 2 things with the assumption that after each Desolation is a new Epoch, I can assume (for theoretical convenience) that each Epoch lasted around 350 years. -350 years x 9 Desolations (so that Aharietiam was #10 for you Vorin people) is 3,150 years, give or take a few decades. -This would give Odium about 2,800 years for Ambition and D&D Mistborn Era 1 takes place around 300 years before Stormlight(because Alloy happens around that time) Elantris takes place "far earlier. It's quite... It's not thousands" compared to Hero of Ages. I'll use 1,400 years because it'll be convenient in a minute. That puts Elantris a few centuries before Rashek's Ascension. The physical city of Elantris was built "hundreds of years if not over a thousand years" before the book takes place. If we put that at another 1,400 year gap, that puts the total time-gap at 3,100 years before Stormlight Archive. (Around the same time Odium got trapped, see? Convenient) Only Elantrians can draw Aons, and since the city is built as an Aon, the first Elantrians predate it. This is important, because we are assuming that the Aons being based on the land happened after D&D got splintered and shoved into the cognitive (where location and space matter) The early Elantrians learned the language by trial and error, which should preclude the possibility of divine shardic assistance. We have a 2,800 year timeframe left. Subtract from this however long of a time you think it would take for the early Elantrians to map out the Aons and build the city of Elantris. Take away an additional span of time after D&D were splintered for Elantrians to start appearing (maybe 200-300 years?) Note: I cannot find anything regarding timelines and the death of Ambition, so there is still room for doubt depending on if Ambition died before or after the events of Elantris. Edit: Yata's right. Ambition had to die before the events of Elantris(Book) so their death is irrelevant to the question

I once asked about the wording in this line, and here is the answer I got from Peter: The answer is almost one year old, and I hope it still works...

The Principle of Intent You are going to love this theory. I guarantee it. I was reading Andrew's article the other day, and that got me thinking about what makes magic work on a fundamental level in the cosmere. This will be somewhat of a rebuttal to you, Andrew, because this direction is far more fruitful. But it's much more than a rebuttal. In my opinion, this is quite a paradigm shift. In any given Shardworld, magic is directly tied to a Shard. Everyone has pieces of Shards inside them. In Mistborn, everyone has fragments of Ruin and Preservation inside them. In Warbreaker, everyone has Breath. It's not unimaginable to think that this generalizes for any Shardworld, so I'm going to assume that always holds. In order to use Allomancy, you need to have "enough" Preservation in you. There's other stuff you need, too, like Snapping, but we'll discuss that later; it's not important anyways. The only real requirement for Allomancy is that you have enough Preservation. The rest is just book-keeping. And likewise, for Awakening, you need Breath, a fragment of Endowment. So here's a question: why is Awakening different from Allomancy? Before you go saying this is a totally obvious question, let me remind you that there are distinct differences between Awakening and Allomancy. Awakeners never need to Snap, though Allomancers do (and the Shaod is sort of similar to Snapping, too, in a way). We want to discover the fundamental rules of how magic operates, right? So the question about the difference between Awakening and Allomancy isn't so dumb. Now that I've made the question sound important, let me completely trivialize it with the easy answer: they are different because the Shards are different. Duh. That's fairly obvious. But in fact, this is precisely the key to understanding all magic. My principle is simple: To interact with the spiritual power of the Shard inside you, it must be in accordance with the Shard's intent. (That is, the name of the Shard. Ruin. Preservation. Endowment. It is what the Shard wants to do. Look at the bottom here for that reference.) I'm going to call it the Principle of Intent, simply because that makes it sound important. Now I simply have to show you how important this principle is. Let's say that Breath is the Nalthis equivalent of those fragments of Ruin and Preservation on Scadrial. These latent powers of a Shard can be accessed and manipulated. With Preservation's magic, I can do lots of cool things, but one thing I can't do is move that fragment of the soul around. But, I could do such a thing if I was using the right magic system. On Nalthis, Endowment endows. It makes perfect sense that Awakening can move pieces of souls around, because that's Endowment's intent. Indeed, I can do similar things with Hemalurgy, because it is inherently destructive. Ruin ruins. Endowment endows. Preservation preserves. "But wait, why does Allomancy cause such rapid changes if it's from Preservation? That seems antithetical to Preservation's intent." There was a thread about this on Adonalsium.net, actually, and I couldn't come up with a proper explanation. Now I can. Watch closely, because this is fancy footwork. Think, for a moment, less about the external effects of Allomancy. Brandon's said that powers don't need to have rational explanations, just that they are bound by rules. Is there any particular reason why iron does the Physical Internal power rather than pewter? No, and that's okay. Instead, let's consider what happens to that piece of Preservation inside you when you utilize Allomancy. Awakening moves spiritual energy, or endows it to something else. This doesn't happen with Preservation. There ought to be some reason why Preservation provides a net gain of energy with Allomancy instead of Awakening's system, and there indeed is. Preservation does preserve, it just preserves the piece of Preservation inside you (and for that matter, every aspect of your body. There is no direct physical cost to Allomancy in the act of burning metals). When you think about it from a Shard level, each Shard has a focus. Ruin and Preservation share a focus in metal. This metal activates some spiritual action, I'd imagine. Lock and key. The metal is the key to all the Metallic Arts. The metal must do something with respect to Preservation, and what's it going to do? With the Principle of Intent, that fragment of Preservation inside you wants to preserve itself, its spiritual energy. It also wants to preserve yourself. So, the only place it receive energy from is some external source, in order to preserve your own energy. Slight side note: Another issue with Allomancy and its net gain is the idea that if Preservation "designed" Allomancy--though that term is a bit misleading, as I suspect no Shard explicitly could design something like that--he's losing energy. That's not true. The Well of Ascension refills every thousand years (technically, 1024 years). Utilizing it doesn't make it go away. Burning atium also regenerates eventually in the Pits of Hathsin. Likewise, there's no reason why this Allomantic energy actually goes away. It regenerates, too. Wait a minute. I just got the most brilliant idea ever as I wrote that. Brandon said that Preservation or Ruin could, in principle, fuel any of the Metallic Arts, but he said that it expends power in ways gods are hesitant to do (I can't find the citation right now, but I think it's in the Hero of Ages spoiler thread). Why would it expend energy? Doesn't it all regenerate? No, I think not. Not exclusively. What if a Shard's power only regenerates when the Shard is doing something according to the Shard's intent? Atium is of Ruin, and so using that energy with respect to Ruining something will make it regenerate. The Well put Rashek into severe Preservation mode, making him extremely reactionary. So in a roundabout way, that again is Preservation. That kind of explains why dispersing the power broke Ruin's prison--it was an act not of Preservation, so the power wasn't conserved. Also, if this was true, it makes a heck of a lot more sense why Endowment Returns people, and why he isn't dead from doing so. The power all comes back eventually. Ahem, that got off track. I'll build that theory in more detail, with better citations, later. Back to the Principle of Intent, with respect to the other Metallic Arts. It's been noted in the annotations that Ruin is selfish. So, fragments of its power wouldn't want to destroy itself, but it is perfectly okay with destroying other things. Hence Hemalurgy doesn't do much to yourself, and instead destroys other things. To use the analogy with Preservation, Preservation preserves spiritual energy, while Ruin destroys spiritual energy. I suspect that the greater amount of Ruin inside you, the more likely to perform Hemalurgy, however. So why does Feruchemy work? Well, it's perfect balance. I can't utilize the power of either Ruin or Preservation here. They are balanced. I can't use either power up now. Were I to use or "access" the Shard's powers, they'd cancel each other out, so to speak. Nothing happens on the spiritual side of things (Okay, that's probably not true. It's just no spiritual energy is changed. I'm sure on some Realmatic level, both Ruin and Preservation act equally) So what happens if not doing something with spiritual energy? I draw from myself. This fits the Principle of Intent just fine. You may be wondering why there'd be such a principle at all. Sazed could do all sorts of things when he held both powers. The difference here is that the body acts as a conduit--and not a very good one--for the power. Only once Vin's body vanished did the power become more expansive. I suspect this effect is due to the Physical, Cognitive, and Spiritual Realms. When a Shard's power is in a physical form, it does one specific thing (lerasium, atium). The Physical Realm seems to have a restricting effect. Thus, for humans, they access the power in their Shards in a more restrictive manner simply by being human. That's why the Principle of Intent appears to hold. Of course, even as a full Shardholder, the same principle applies eventually. The Shardholder's mind would be shaped to the Shard's intent over the centuries. Furthermore, Brandon said that Preservation or Ruin could, in principle fuel any of Metallic Arts, but he said that that expends power in ways gods are hesitant to do. Presumably, this is because while a Shard is a part of the power of creation and can do lots of amazing things, the Shard can more easily do things in line with its intent. Or, if I was right about the conservation thing, it's that a Shard knows the power will come back eventually. A Shardholder's consciousness apparently "feeds" off the spiritual power of the Shard, so if that power is all gone, that person dies. Maybe you're not buying my principle. Don't believe me? Well, no theory is good unless it has some predictive power, so let's do some theorizing on other magics. I'd like to work with Elantris, but I don't know either Aona or Skai's Shard name, so it's going to be challenging to know just what they do. But Stormlight Archive is the perfect testing ground for a theory. We know all the Rosharian Shard's names, and there's a bunch of magic systems that don't exactly make sense. I began pondering what exactly would Honor--the Almighty's Shard--do. Knowing the answer to this would give an intuitive understanding to the mechanism of his magic. But Honor is hard to pin down. Ruin ruins... Honor honors stuff. That's, uh, super helpful. But you know what's really honorable? Oaths. Promises. Bonds. Oathpact. Surgebinder. Peter said on TWG that a Surge is what people on Roshar call a force (I'd assume things like gravity). Surge, plus a bond with a spren? Surgebinders. Congratulations, you are now a magic user. Honor's power comes from oaths and bonds. Perhaps it creates a spiritual bond of sorts. That's what Honor does. There was also the question of what happened to Kaladin at the end of Way of Kings. He spoke the Second Ideal of the Knights Radiant, then he burst with power. Seems to me that this near unequivocal evidence that Honor uses these oaths in a specifc, magical way. Then there's good old Szeth. How is he a Surgebinder if he doesn't have a spren? I'm not totally sure, but perhaps his strong oaths as a Truthless provides the sufficient bond for Honor's magic to work. Maybe there does exist a spren. Either way, those oaths are intricately tied with Szeth's Radiant powers. So, I'm calling it right now: if Szeth breaks his oaths, he will lose his powers. I read a little bit of Way of Kings today, and I had forgotten that Jasnah said that two orders of the Knights Radiant have natural Soulcasting abilities. Now, recall that in the 17th Shard interview with Brandon, he said that there are ten powers (it seems to be ten Surges is the technical term), and you make an order of the Knights Radiant by picking from two of those Surges. I never realized before, but that must mean Soulcasting is a type of Surgebinding. That's kind of a scary implication. We've seen, what, Windrunners and Soulcasters, and there are ten more powers? Plenty more magic systems to go around, clearly. But a more detailed analysis of Stormlight Archive magics is for another day, I think. Other theories for other days.

I was never sure how Dreamworks would adapt it, anyways, but it would've been spectacular for Alcatraz to get more public awareness, at the very least.