Bigmikey357

@The Technovore I like the analysis, good job.. A couple comments. 1. Roshar is not seriously planning any invasion in the Cosmere without Radiants. They aren't stupid. Even with Radiancy being a relatively new concept for modern Roshar their scouts would tell then they would be going against a planet of magic users. They ain't going in naked. 2. Stormlight supply is the biggest limiting factor for a Rosharan offensive. I don't see them using gunpowder weaponry like Scadrial's forces, they seem more comfortable with light based weaponry. But to do so they're going to need a breakthrough to keep their forces properly supplied. 3. Of the opposing forces, Roshar benefits much more from a scout force than Scadrial because Scadrial's weapons aren't exactly unique. It's much easier to get a gun than a Shardblade. And if Roshar goes in prepared they have the commanders to best take advantage of the information gained. If they can go in with at least comparable weapons Scadrial is going to have a really tough patch. Still, I agree for the most part with the assessment.

I can't give this enough thumbs up. How do you think it looks if Scadrial had the home field advantage?

So I guess every Scadrian soldier becomes Waxillium Dawnshot if you give him an aluminum pistol and a pass to Roshar. Even an aluminum gnat is metalborn so he is automatically the most deadly gunslinger in the Cosmere. Meanwhile Shardplate is as strong as wet cardboard as long as it gets hit with an aluminum bullet and the literal Surges of Creation are a minor inconvenience to deal with for a Mistborn. No offense but how ridiculous does that sound? Just say you like the Mistborn books over Stormlight. That'd be more honest. As powerful as Wax is the only way he beats Jasnah is with the Bands. I'd give Kaladin about equal odds even if you gave Wax the Bands. The only people from Scadrial's magic system that can stand toe to toe with a full Radiant regardless of order is a Fullborn. Next likely is an R-Inquisitor or a Double Steel or Double Gold twin. Then it's standard Inquisitors, Full Feruchemists and finally Mistborn with Atium. Those are literally it. I don't care what type of Mistings or Ferring you throw at a 4th Ideal Radiant, a candle flame in a hurricane has a better chance. I'd be willing to change my mind if Scadrial had modern weaponry and Roshar had no way to get it. As it stands now there are at most 5 people in the entire Mistborn series that would stand a chance of beating a Radiant. Vin, Marsh, Sazed, TLR and maybe Wax. As far as armies, maybe Scadrial can mount an entire army full of Metallic Arts users. Unlikely but possible. But to rely on the regular soldiers to snap en route or once the fighting starts would be incredibly foolish. How many Mistings are worth anything in direct combat? Steel, Iron, Pewter. Everything else is either useless or strictly support. Meanwhile every Radiant on the field would be a menace, every individual with Plate is a tank, and Surges are just as much a gamechanger as post Civil War guns are.

I thought I saw a conflicting timeliness where the events of Elantris happen a couple thousand years prior to the Final Desolation but I could be mistaken. Even so, if the Iri and the Stormlight bank in Lasting Integrity are anything to go by, they've solved their location based restrictions at least somewhat. Enough to power an invasion of another Cosmere world? Maybe not now but I ain't willing to discount anything until I get Elantris Era 2. I really think we're all going to regret underestimating Nalthis one day. Their Shardic advantage should not be taken lightly. They might get smoked 1 on 1 against any of the other 3 but if everyone there is a magic user they could drown the other powers with sheer numbers.

At the request of @LewsTherinTelescope and because the Roshar v Scadrial debate is getting a bit stale, I wanted to try and etch out what it would look like with more combatants. There are issues with this line of speculation but we could try and power through them anyway. The Big 4 are of course Roshar, Scadrial, Sel and Nalthis. The obvious bottleneck is in information, and that heavily skews thinking. We have 2 Eras of Scadrial's history and 4 epic Doorstoppers of lore from Roshar. Although we've only seen half of each planet we can be relatively confident of their current abilities, likely motivation and future prospects. Based on what we've seen on page it'd be hard not to pick one of those 2 pillars to be the ultimate Victor in any Cosmere-wide conflict. Of the other 2 pillars much less is certain but the clues left in WoB's, breadcrumbs left in our premiere novels and some deep diving of the 3 texts we have at our disposal leave tantalizing possibilities. There is evidence that Sel has already solved some of the issues we know about from their local conditions as well as Roshar's little problem. Elantris predates our current Cosmere timeliness by at least 7000 years and they don't look like a culture prone to stagnation. Nalthis is even more of a mystery as we don't even know what other things we can do with Endowment. But from what we can infer, Nalthis would be the only pillar with a singular purpose since they only have to contend with 1 Shard's will. Add to that, they can bring to bear more magic users than the other 3 combined and can imbue weapons of power and you may have a thorny problem ruffling Edgli's feathers. So who wins and why?

It's not that new Vessels get a power boost upon obtaining a Shard, it’s that they are able to act outside the Intent of the Shard with a great degree of freedom, a freedom that decreases the longer the Vessel holds the Shard. Vessels who have held their power for a number of years can really only act in ways that are in line with the power, or at least cannot act outside the parameters set by the power without either a good deal of pain or an opening in their soul vulnerable to attack by another Shard.

I think the Scadrian specific Godmetals can be pushed and pulled allomantically because they are a part of the magic system, in a way they built the magic system and so could not be exempted from it as other Godmetals are. That's my headcannon until Brandon comes up with something better.

@The Technovore There is no doubt that Stonesinew is or should be at the top of everyone's list. That being said, our respective lists don't vary much. I tend to think Feruchemist is a better opponent for a Radiant than a Mistborn, but a Mistborn could beat a Feruchemist. It's almost rock paper scissors for me. I didn't want to add guns because then you gotta add Fabrials and Soulcasters in particular are some broken objects. Then again to each their own. Last, the list is just in general. The power list is quite a bit more complicated when we start contemplating specifics within powersets. It's why I put Unchained Bondsmith and Fullborn at the top, one has every power, the other can snatch every power.

A Gold misting is really just a regular dude so of course Shardbearer gonna smash. Even the random dude with a Shardblade is going to mow down a lot of Mistings. I was mostly thinking of the more martial users of Allomancy, the Atium misting, the coinshot and lurcher, the Thug, maybe a Tineye with a Sniper rifle. Mostly my list is about innate ability, not tools. Guns even the playing field somewhat, as do certain Fabrials including medallions. But once a tool is introduced both sides can use them to a greater or lesser degree. That's the entire purpose of tools after all.

Honestly field effects as a side effect of extreme Feruchemy usage seems right to me. It would explain the limited strength increase Wax experiences when tapping Iron too, though I'm at a loss even attempting to explain it mathematically. My issue is that most of the extreme applications aren't going to be much useful in a fight. Maybe a Feruchemist could actually move at Mach speeds but that's overkill for something that burns through their reserves like napalm on kindling and hurts them in ways only F-Gold can combat. Maybe F-Iron can store enough weight to unbalance the planet or make a black hole but who exactly would the guy be fighting to make that necessary? All the Metallic Arts applications (save Maybe Hemalurgy) are better used for space age types of uses. Store F-Iron to assist in escape velocity. Tap F-Steel for speedier interplanetary travel. Bendalloy and Cadmium bubbles for Aburrcurie Drive mechanics and Supraluminul travel. Why even fight one on one when you have that type of tech. That isn't to say that a Feruchemy user as a whole would not be a dangerous opponent for anyone. Sazed holding a city gate against a rampaging army mostly by himself would put paid to that notion. In fact I believe that a war band Feruchemist is even more dangerous to a Radiant of any level than a Mistborn would be. So after RoW here's my new Heirarchy of Power between Scadrial and Roshar: Fullborn Unchained Bondsmith Full Radiant/Ruin Modified Inquisitors Full Feruchemist (w/Armor)/4 Ideal Radiant/ Regular Inquisitors/Fused 3 Ideal Radiant/Mistborn/ Regal Battle applicable Twinborn Regular Singers/Shardbearers 2 Ideal Radiant/ Koloss 1 Ideal Radiant/ Mistings Random dude with a dead Shardblade.

Kaladin and Syl were exploring different applications of shape-shifting. Remember she was exploring surgical tools and how she might possibly become something like a scalpel for Kal. They may be something akin to Green Lantern rings but you have to get the spren to understand what you are trying to accomplish, thus making an extra step. Living Blades are underutilized I agree, but that's because they are perfectly suited for the warfare practices on current day Roshar. Nobody has needed them to do more or thought about ways to make what is essentially a God weapon be anything more. But I suspect that interaction with the greater Cosmere will change things significantly. Just wait until s Radiant has to combat someone with guns...

Minor quibble. I'll withdraw my statement until I can further review. You may very well be correct in this.

Era 2.

Rules changed since Harmony took over.

@Publius No textual evidence, just psychology and supposition. Miles Hundredlives is a bit of a special case as he's been double Gold his entire life and was a Gold savant. He no longer even felt pain he was using Gold so much, it would have been damn difficult to budge his identity in any way. But these new double Gold constructs presumably won't have that type of resilience. This would not be a painless process and I can imagine that if I were the one being constantly spiked I ain't trying to go through that process ad infinum. Plus we know from TLR that the Spiritweb is always recording. For example it always knew his real age and it was becoming harder and harder for him to effectively hold back that age magically. So my thoughts are that even if the hole is patched perfectly the web will still remember that it was wounded. But this discussion really makes me wonder how encisors work. @VeryNiceName I think it was only 2 spikes. It could have been 3. But IIRC he only wore one at a time because 2 or more would have opened him up to Harmony and his control.