"Upending an Entire Mercantile Ecosystem"

[Obnoxiousspren]

So in Secret History Hoid tells Kelsier that by destroying the Pits of Hathsin he "Upended an entire mercantile ecosystem..." We also get this from a WOB:

QUESTION

In Secret History, Hoid says something to Kelsier about him destroying the Pits and destroying an entire mercantile system. Is he talking about literal inter-Realmic trade?

BRANDON SANDERSON

Yes. Interplanetary trade, yes.

With all this in mind, what do you guys think Scadrial has that is so valuable to other planets in the Cosmere? Furthermore, what do you think other planets have that is worth trading around? 

One thing that I have considered is that Scardrial would trade with other planets for aluminum. Because it cannot be pushed or pulled it is extremely valuable on Scadrial but maybe not on other planets. Of course, we know aluminum has some funky things that it can do with investiture, so it might be extremely valuable on other planets as well. Anywho, let me know what you guys think this "mercantile ecosystem" might consist of!

[TheBlueShifting]

Well for starters, I'm sure a major export could have been Atium.

 

I mean, the Pits were the place where people would travel on and off world, so smuggling some Atium would probably be easier than most other riches. Plus the fact that it is a God metal would be of interest to many off-worlders, even if they couldn't burn it. Brandon has implied that Atium can do many other things besides what we see it used for in the book. 

 

Other than that, Scadrial would have been a great place to sneak slaves away from. Grab some unfortunate souls lost in the pits and sell them on the Black Market in Silverlight. I hope that's not the case but it sure is a possibility.

 

Aluminum might have been a possibility, however, we know that up to the time of the Shattering of the Pits, Aluminum was extremely rare and mostly unknown as a metal. That would make it hard to mine and ship off planet discreetly. 

[Spoolofwhool]

3 minutes ago, TheBlueShifting said:

Aluminum might have been a possibility, however, we know that up to the time of the Shattering of the Pits, Aluminum was extremely rare and mostly unknown as a metal. That would make it hard to mine and ship off planet discreetly. 

He's probably saying ship aluminum to Scadrial. 
It's a possibility, but aluminum isn't valuable for it's properties in the Final Empire as it isn't really known about. No one seems to know about it allomancy-immune properties at that time.

[Yata]

I always assumed it was:
- Slavery (people with a little but possible chance to Snap into Allomancers)

- Atium, also if I don't see the gaining in doing this as the Atium would be useless for almost every standard uses (remember the Hemalurgy wasn't wide knowed and Atium's Hemalurgy itself was misunderstood)

- Exotic flora/fauna from the Ashen World. maybe there is another planet where that flora/fauna is needed

PS: Allumin is really unlikely as it's more easy to be obtained in other places

Edited May 22, 2017 by Yata

[+Extesian]

I've always thought atium was a decent possibility, with House Venture mining atium and the possibility that someone in House Venture is involved in inter-planetary trade

Quote

QUESTION

In Secret History, Hoid says something to Kelsier about him destroying the Pits and destroying an entire mercantile system. Is he talking about literal inter-Realmic trade?

BRANDON SANDERSON

Yes. Interplanetary trade, yes.

QUESTION

Is House Venture involved?

BRANDON SANDERSON

House Venture is not involved. People in House Venture might be.

My money would be on Felt (Venture spy master) as a confirmed worldhopper.

Quote

QUESTION

So I noticed in MIstborn Era 1, a guard of the Venture house was named Felt. There’s also a character in Words of Radiance, a scout called Felt. Is that the same person?

BRANDON SANDERSON

It is the same person. That’s one of the two things I can remember surprising Peter, when he’s like, “This name is kind of interesting. It’s kind of different. You sure you don’t want to use more of a Vorin name?” I’m like, “Go read back in Mistborn.” He’s like “OH!” [laughter] I’m always happy when I surprise Peter, because the other big one that surprised him was when I put Vasher into Stormlight. He’s like, “Huh...Vasher is in Stormlight?” And I’m like, “Go read Way of Kings Prime.” Which he had read, which is the Way of Kings I had written in 2002, where lo and behold Kaladin’s sword master is Vasher, named Vasher at that point. He hadn’t realized I’d written Warbreaker after as an exploration of this character who’d already been in the Stormlight Archive. Those are the two things I can remember Peter not catching about the Cosmere, he gets most everything.

But my problem with this is, as had been said above, knowledge of atium's true nature was pretty limited. But we are talking about worldhoppers here, if anyone would know atium's nature ie suspect it, even if they weren't allomancers they'd consider it valuable. 

Kandra is the other one that springs to mind specifically. I'm assuming they still kept to the Contract even if sent offworld.

[cometaryorbit]

4 hours ago, Spoolofwhool said:

He's probably saying ship aluminum to Scadrial. 
It's a possibility, but aluminum isn't valuable for it's properties in the Final Empire as it isn't really known about. No one seems to know about it allomancy-immune properties at that time.

Well, the Steel Ministry probably knew (the Inquisitors at least knew its Allomantic property), but yeah, the nobility seem to just value it because it's really rare.

[Jace21]

I'd always thought he was talking more about the logistics of trading rather than any particular product. Afterall countries on earth trade for everything I never felt the product being shipped off world was in any way special.

Since Kelsier had made it impossible to worldhop via the pits then it would have made ANY kind of trade almost impossible, potentially destroying a mercantile system. I doubt your average worldhopping merchant would be willing to pull a Hoid and use the well since ruin was still focussed there at that point.

I guess I need to go back and look for what the actual import/export could be.

Edited May 25, 2017 by Jace21

[Pagerunner]

The full quote, for those interested:

Quote

"Destroying the Pits, O scarred one. That was the only perpendicularity on this planet with any reasonable ease of access. This one is very dangerous, growing more so by the minute, and difficult to find. By doing as you did, you basically ended traffic through Scadrial. Upended an entire mercantile ecosystem, which I'll admit was fun to watch."

"through" is an interesting phrase, almost as if Scadrial was just a pit stop. Overall, I suspect that Scadrial is primarily a consumer of off-world goods, like flowers and such that can't be grown in the Final Empire. There might also be colonies from other worlds (Remember, there is a Kenton St in Luthadel), who would pay for stuff from their homes. When my family was in Mexico, whenever we'd take a trip up to the States, we'd stock up on good American peanut butter.

Or maybe it's more of a straightforward black market, with guns or Breath or something like that. I don't think Scadrial has anything to offer, except for the services of kandra. But since they work for atium because of their secret allegiance, I don't think they'd be interested in going off-world.

[Obnoxiousspren]

6 hours ago, Extesian said:

I've always thought atium was a decent possibility, with House Venture mining atium and the possibility that someone in House Venture is involved in inter-planetary trade

I actually don't see atium as a very likely possibility. For one thing, because it is extremely hard to use, especially if you aren't from Scadrial. Another reason would be that atium is the most valuable commodity in Scadrial so I find it hard to imagine them gaining something in return that they consider worth it. The final reason is just the wording Hoid used. When he talked about disrupting Cosmere trade, he didn't make reference to the destroyed atium, but to the now unavailable shardpool. I feel that if atium was central to the disruption he would have referenced that.

[The One Who Connects]

36 minutes ago, Obnoxiousspren said:

When he talked about disrupting Cosmere trade, he didn't make reference to the destroyed atium, but to the now unavailable shardpool.

   ^- This is why I agree with Jace21's assumption. "Overseas" trade is upended because Kelsier blew up the port/harbor.
As valuable or worthless as they may be, the items that they were trading are irrelevant at that point.

[Green Hoodie Mistborn]

Well, Scadrial is very metal heavy. Seemingly heavier than other planets so that could be a prime export. 

I wonder of that phrasing "through Scadrial" though, that seems odd. Not sure how it would be a pit stop, unless it's a more like old school 18th century and earlier trade than more modern trade. To get the goods that were valuable as an import locally, you'd often have to do a multi-pronged trade sweep/swing. Local export to point A, trade for point A's goods, take them to point B trade for their goods, then back to your home with point B's goods which are what is valuable in your location. 

So Scadrial could have been a prong of a system like that, which would have disrupted the whole thing and ruined some merchants!

Edited May 22, 2017 by Green Hoodie Mistborn

[hoidhunter]

Well...hemalurgic spikes charged with allomantic and feruchemal powers would be worth a pretty penny.   

[The One Who Connects]

19 minutes ago, hoidhunter said:

Well...Hemalurgic spikes charged with Allomantic and Feruchemical powers would be worth a pretty penny.   

The intended user would have to come for the spikes themselves, as Hemalurgic Decay will still apply while in transit in the Cognitive Realm. Not sure how viable that is for an economy since it cuts out the middleman and not everybody can worldhop.

The alternative is that there's a vendor stand out there selling glass jars of blood with a spike in them, which would go swimmingly...

[Oversleep]

The fact that the trade is interplanetary does not necessarily mean the goods are special in any way (discussed atium or Hemalurgic spikes). Perhaps it was simply metal and metal-crafted goods - Scadrial's metallurgy was probably quite good, as they can make alloys of specific percentages. Besides that, Scadrial's rich in metals while for example Roshar relies on Soulcasting it.

On the other hand, Scadrial had food problems. I could see that Nalthian spices or whatever was viable for long transport would reach high prices on Scadrial.

[The One Who Connects]

4 minutes ago, Oversleep said:

On the other hand, Scadrial had food problems.

I remember an old discussion about a possible typo involving stolen Nobleman food having something that is made from fruit(not ketchup, um..) and Scadrial apparently doesn't have fruits. Don't know if Brandon decided it was a typo or not, but this could solve that problem. Either way, I like the idea. We get so caught up on the magical that we forget about the practical.

[Oversleep]

12 minutes ago, The One Who Connects said:

We get so caught up on the magical that we forget about the practical.

This should be the tagline of the 17thShard

BTW, Roshar also has specific spices, maybe they also export them?

Who can be in this interplanetary trade?

Sel: nope, very difficult access except for seasoned worldhoppers like Hoid or Khriss & Nazh.

Roshar: probably.

Nalthis: probably.

Threnody: unstable perpendicularities may be a problem. Could be.

First of the Sun: nope, extremely dangerous perpendicularity.

Taldain: Nope, sealed off by Autonomy.

Now, Scadrial... That one is weird. We know the primary perpendicularity were Pits of Hathsin. But they were kinda full of people searching for atium geodes and then there were guards up there. How did lone worldhoppers get out (except Hoid who can Lightweave) not to mention merchants who would need to carry stuff?

'Turn away! This site is closed and guarded! Who are you and what do you want?'
'I just need to ride in with all my merchandise and carry all of it into the Pits. Don't mind me.'

Now, we know people in House Venture were in on it but it still sounds weird.

Edited May 25, 2017 by Oversleep

[Farnsworth]

2 hours ago, Oversleep said:

Now, Scadrial... That one is weird. We know the primary perpendicularity were Pits of Hathsin. But they were kinda full of people searching for atium geodes and then there were guards up there. How did lone worldhoppers get out (except Hoid who can Lightweave) not to mention merchants who would need to carry stuff?

'Turn away! This site is closed and guarded! Who are you and what do you want?'
'I just need to ride in with all my merchandise and carry all of it into the Pits. Don't mind me.'

Now, we know people in House Venture were in on it but it still sounds weird

It would be strange if it were regular merchandise. However if it was slaves, they could just take prisoners from the pits. If a few prisoners disappeared, they would just assume that they were dead.

[The One Who Connects]

I would consider an alternate cave pathway to the pool itself, but then that shouldn't have been destroyed when Kelsier broke the Pits...

[Calderis]

14 minutes ago, The One Who Connects said:

I would consider an alternate cave pathway to the pool itself, but then that shouldn't have been destroyed when Kelsier broke the Pits...

It wouldn't have been, but I always understood this as the geodes themselves are what provided the perpendicularity as the pool itself was inaccessible. So even if there was an alternative pathway, and it remained intact, it would transition from a path to a portal, to a hole in the ground.

Edit: I mean to say that the geodes provided a sort of bubble of thinning between the realms. So an alternative pathway could lead inside the bubble without actually being accessible from the Pits themselves. 

Edited May 25, 2017 by Calderis

[Yata]

@Calderis I have the strong opposite feel.

The worldhoppers reached the Black Lake itself to worldhop ad they arrived in a Place with a dock-like envirorment.

The geode will not provide enough Investiture to bend the Realms

[Calderis]

16 minutes ago, Yata said:

@Calderis I have the strong opposite feel.

The worldhoppers reached the Black Lake itself to worldhop ad they arrived in a Place with a dock-like envirorment.

The geode will not provide enough Investiture to bend the Realms

I imagined the docks on the Cognitive side, as the Pits would be well within the sea of mists. If the geodes didn't provide the perpendicularity, I don't see how Kelsier's actions could have destroyed them. He didn't destroy the cave structure, as it's still there in Era 2,and if world hoppers could reach the actual lake, there'd have been no interruption in travel. 

[Yata]

The Well didn't react well to Hemalurgy. It's possible the Black Lake didn't react well to a powerful Allomancy.

We saw only the effect on small sacks of Investiture (the Crystals)...but the reaction of the Perpendicularity will be greater and greater.(like the different reaction of the Mists and the Well)

Edited May 25, 2017 by Yata

[Calderis]

16 minutes ago, Yata said:

The Well didn't react well to Hemalurgy. It's possible the Black Lake didn't react well to a powerful Allomancy.

We saw only the effect on small sacks of Investiture (the Crystals)...but the reaction of the Perpendicularity will be greater and greater.(like the different reaction of the Mists and the Well)

I'm sorry, but I can't believe that a fully functional shardpool could be accidentally (or even intentionally) destroyed by a single allomancer. The concentration of investiture in a Shardpool should be able to resist damnation near anything a mortal could throw at it. 

[Yata]

2 hours ago, Calderis said:

I'm sorry, but I can't believe that a fully functional shardpool could be accidentally (or even intentionally) destroyed by a single allomancer. The concentration of investiture in a Shardpool should be able to resist damnation near anything a mortal could throw at it. 

It doesn't need to be destroyed. A simple mini earthquake could physically block the Perpendicularity or the surround

Edited May 25, 2017 by Yata

[Ciridae]

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't there a WoB or something in the annotations that said that the black lake was moved underground, as in covered up, by Rashek or something similar which caused Atium geodes to form in the first place? I agree that that means the geodes themselves form the perpendicularity, it's still a lot of investiture concentrated in a relatively small area. 

About the limited access that traveling merchants would have had to the perpendicularity, the kandra homeland was connected to the Pits if I remember correctly. No way the kandra would entrust Atium to foreign merchants, but I could see them allowing traffic to and from the perpendicularity if it didn't reveal too much sensitive kandra info and they got something out of it. I can't think of anything a kandra might want from a worldhopping merchant other than information. I don't remember seeing anything about kandra being cosmere aware in Era 1 but Rashek was to a certain extent. Maybe there's some connection. 

I don't know, it seems very un-kandra to risk exposure like that for some info that they may or may not care about. But I can't imagine the merchants pulling off getting to and from the perpendicularity without the help of the kandra.

On a side note, how many Atium slaves do you think ended up accidentally worldhopping?  It might not be as easy to do as with an actual shardpool, but I like to imagine some of those poor guys got away.