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Let's say an Allomancer were to go to Nalthis and buy him or herself a healthy number of Bio-Chromatic Breaths, then get attacked by someone trying to Hemalurgically spike them. The Allomancer/Awakener Awakens their cloak to try and protect themselves, but their attacker manages to spike them and give themselves the Allomancer's power. The Hemalurgist then retrieves the Breaths from the Cloak because they have enough of the Allomancer's Identity to grab the Breaths. If the Hemalurgist were to lose their spike, would the Breaths taken from the Allomancer/Awakener stay but be un-commandable, dissipate, or remain pretty much the same as if they had gotten them through normal means?

Been meaning to ask this to Brandon directly, but then I realized I could probably just post it here and get some great feedback! Does the process of Returning affect the subject's Identity (in the realmatic/investiture sense)? If, hypothetically, a feruchemist were to store something in a metalmind, then died and Returned, would they be still be able to tap that same metalmind? Or would their Identity have changed, making them essentially "unkeyed" from it? Similarly, if a Returned became a feruchemist and stored something, would that metalmind be inherently unkeyed?

If a young child were to regularly tap an Unsealed Identitymind, would it leave a lasting effect on their physical and cognitive aspects? Could a society that wanted to cultivate a certain mindset use this method to artificially change their people to better fit their standards? If a Returned were to store their Identity in and Unsealed Aluminum/Goldmind, could someone who tapped both the Identity and health inside change their physique to better match that Returned?

So we know that all the scadrians are born with a connection to preservation and ruin (Harmony now), with metal born having a stronger connection. So what would happen if 2 metal born went to Nalthis and have a child, would that child still have that connection to Harmony? Could they be metal born? Would they be born with a breath because of where they are born or would no connection be formed with endowment? Would a child of two people from Nalthis born off world be born without breath? What about someone born in space, would they be born with no connection at all? This follows up to the next question of whether the nightwatcher didn't come to worldhoppers because they lack a connection to cultivation?

In the Cosmere, Identity is a unique attribute held by an entity that separates it’s investiture from another entity’s investiture, such as with a Feruchemist’s Metalminds. However, I believe that Identity has more meaning than simply keying your investiture to you. I think that it acts as a natural separation form other spiritwebs, a natural defense from other’s control over you. We’ve seen multiple beings in the Cosmere that don’t have an Identity, and both of them can be controlled pretty easily by external influence; the Slaveform Singers and the Lifeless. Lifeless probably also have something else going on that makes them able to be controlled by others (their Awakened Commands), but here is a WoB that says if a Lifeless were to tap certain Metalminds, they may not stay a Lifeless. . . With the Slaveform Singers, they just do what anyone says without resisting. I believe the reason for this is that the natural Connection that is possessed by their human slavers can “dominate” them without much resistance. It would be a similar situation to a Connector Ferring dominating a Hemalurgic construct with an enhanced version of their natural attribute of Connection, only instead of having holes left in the soul by Hemalurgic spikes, it’s that the Singers don’t have any separating attribute in the first place. Having a higher intelligence and strength of will would likely allow them to resist control, but in many cases of mind control it seems like the targets are of only simple intelligence, which makes controlling them easy. It seems as though your Identity also has an influence on your state of mind, as we can see with Listeners and Singers who take different forms, so blanking your Identity may leave you feeling with significantly reduced motivation or emotion in general. It may be possible to Feruchemically enhance your own Identity and make yourself less susceptible to outside influence, or you may be able to more easily manipulate someone actively storing it. This theory may have some holes in it, but this is how I understand it now. Thanks for reading

I found these quotes in the Arcanum. So it sounds that by changing your Identity you can make "minor" alterations to your physical form, and it will also make some alterations to your mental faculties, though your memories and your core personality will remain intact. This won't let you grow extra limbs, switch biological sex (probably; I'm not totally sure on that one), or change species, but I can still see uses for it's manipulation. Perhaps you could, therefore, get a Singer to fill their Identity into an Unsealed Metalmind while wearing a specific form, which would allow a human to tap it and gain access to that form. Or perhaps Scadrial and other worlds could use this method for cosmetic purposes; hire attractive and healthy individuals to store their Identity, then use compounding to mass produce Unsealed Identity Minds for those who can afford it.

So, this is the first time I've actually asked a question here since signing up, so if I accidentally break some kind of rule, please let me know. Hemalurgy seems to always warp the recipient of an invested spike, particularly with stolen human attributes. Since Identity is something that can be stolen via hemalurgy, I was just wondering if you were granted someone else's Identity, would your physical body change to appear more like them?

When someone stores there Identity while filling another metalmind, that other metalmind becomes "unkeyed", allowing anyone with the relevant ability to tap it and use it as fuel for their ability. But what about the Identity itself? Can someone even tap an Identity mind, since it itself seems to be Identity keyed to someone else? Or does the investiture not count as having an Identity itself, only temporarily granting Identity to someone who taps it?

This is something I just thought of while finishing RoW. Typically a Darkeye can become a Lighteye when they bond a Shardblade or become a Knight Radiant. Yet somehow we have had natural born Lighteyes that has continued for just a bit under 4000 years, most likely since the Recreance. We also know that Deadeyes only started appearing since the Recreance. The link between both "races" would seem to be that the eyes were affected since this happened. We are aware that the sealing of BAM had wide reaching affects on Roshar. A similar example we observe is how the Parshendi were affected by the sealing of BAM, specifically in my opinion is that their Identity was taken away from them. Deadeyes also seem to be in a "Identity"-less state like the Parshmen are. So it feels like something was ripped from the Spiritweb of the spren and imprinted on the humans at the time of unbonding. This then became a hereditary trait on the few people who unbonded their spren/took the dropped shards and continued to pass it onto their descendant's spirtiwebs. TBH I think this might have been very obvious for some people but this just hit me like the stormwall haha.

There is philosophical dilema, paradox from the field of metaphysics of identity, Is called "Ship of Theseus" paradox. So, there is Ship of Theseus. It stays in harbour of Athens. In time, rotet and decayed planks of ship are replaced with new ones, to the point the whole Ship is fully replaced. Still has the same owner, or his offspring. Is this ship still the same ship? And later, someone rebuilds ship from the old planks. Is puttung together piece by piece, untill has the whole ship made from original planks. So is this original ship? Has all original parts. But not have original history. Witch one is original Ship? And, more important for us, how would look like the spren of Ship? And witch one would be Original? And how they would look like compare to each other? would they be twin-spren? Would they have the same memories of Theseus's Jurney? Witch one would be consider as Original Spren?

Ah, it's been a while since I've posted a topic. Hope you all didn't miss me. So, we know that Kandra spikes are unique to them and that they can't accept another Kandra's spikes. This is probably because of Identity, similar to how metalminds only work with their user. However, we see Bleeder use two new spikes that were not her original, made out of trellium, a god metal. So how is she able to do this, despite the problem with identity? I have two theories. 1. Trellium is an alloy of a Shard's god metal and whatever Paalms original spike was. This would explain why Paalm has two that she uses despite having access to more (Which she uses to create chimeras), and why they are still useable for her. (The metal most likely being copper, as Paalm was third generation, and from Tensoon, it appears the third generation was created with blessings of presence, which needed copper spikes (This is also based on my assumption that generations were made with one type of spike.)) OR 2. Trellium's special ability has to do with identity, allowing bleeder to use it despite not being keyed to her identity, like that of an unkeyed metalmind. Seeing as every godmetal seems to have one unique capability (lerasium creates mistborn, atium is the best metal for hemalurgy, acting as a wild card, tavatsium is incredibly hard and can cut your soul, etc.) this would not be hard to believe, and would also fit in with all the identity and connection shenanigans going on in Mistborn Era 2 magic system.

I am pretty sure that I saw someone else say something about this, but for the life of me I can’t find the post. It is an interesting theory so I want to hear ideas. When BAM was imprisoned, it affected the entire land and created slave form among the singers. It created a new state of being for them. What if it also affected the spren of the Knights Radiant?. What if before the imprisonment of BAM, the bond could be broken without killing the spren, only some pain on their part. BAM getting imprisoned changed the land and the Knights didn’t know anything had changed. They had the plan to end their oaths but they didn’t realize it would kill the spren.

Ok so after reading chapter 2 and 3. I would say shallan is doing very well. Unlike most ppl I don't find it strange for one person to have three ppl within them but it does being some questions to mind. One, how does it affect thier spiritweb ? Like are they sharing one too much like how they share shallans body or is it like her spiderweb has expanded to thrive the size. Two , what would happen if odium were to use a duralumin spike on her ??? Would radiant and Veil seperate from and manifest discreetly in other bodies in whom the spikes are placed ? Three, how autonomous are they ? Now veil for example liked kal a lot. I imagine she can't be too happy with adolin of she truly is completely independent and equal of shallan. So would it be lead like an arrangement where 5 days shallan gets to be with adolin , the 5 days she gets to date kal or someone else ??? That would be amazing but I'm guessing that ain't happening. Four , is Shallan foreshadowing for Autonomy ? And We know bavadin has a similar but far more intense cognitive divergence thingy going on. I think we will learn a lot about Autonomy with how shallan deals with VnR . And total aluminium foil but could this foreshadowing itself foreshadow autonomy or one of her avatars meddling in Roshar , probably in the Stormlight era 2 ???

So when I first read Elantris, I thought it was kind of odd that Adien's autism was just healed when Raoden heals Elantris. Since autism is connected to increased memorization and perception, as displayed in Adien's knowledge of distances, I wasn't sure how that would transfer after the healing. Now that I know more about the Cosmere and how healing works to form one's ideal self, I believe it's more likely that whatever made him unable to communicate was healed, rather than the entirety of his autism. "I...I feel like my entire life has been a dream, Raoden. I remember everything that happened. But I couldn't interact - I couldn't say anything. That's changed now, but one thing remains the same. My mind ... I've always been able to figure numbers..." Going off of this quote after he healed, it seems like his ideal self would be able to interact with others, but he would also retain his mind as it was. I thought it would be neat if in the next book, he's written as a high-functioning autistic rather than a regular Elantrian that is good with numbers. I'm curious as to what others think about this, let me know!

I am going to start this topic with the most auspicious declaration of: Oh my god! Oh my god! Oh my god! This is my FAVOURITE Cosmere work! *clears throat* now on with the actual topic. Wan ShaiLu, the Forger is arrested while attempting to steal a painting in the capital of the Rose Empire, where Hoid, disguised as the Fool, ensures her capture (while stealing the Moon Sceptre himself) so as to force her to fulfill the task that would be thrust upon her as a condition for her release. Which raises the question of why Hoid would consider this important enough to require his attention? Would a change of Emperors be so great a political upheaval? But much more interestingly, when Shai does successfully Forge a new soul for the Emperor, what exactly does the Emperor become? Does Ashravan qualify as a Cognitive Shadow? Or is the new Ashravan truly a new Ashravan? (which is kind of terrifying) When the injury rendered Ashravan in a vegetative state, was it more akin to gluing something broken back up together or perhaps more like patchwork stitching? ~Mistborn spoilers~ That is, was Ashravan still alive in a way in the Cognitive? Was his Identity damaged in some way? Did Shai just resurrect him? ~Warbreaker spoilers~ Did she just create a new Spiritweb or repair the original? Had the original Ashravan passed into the Beyond at this point? This WoB indicates that death in the Cosmere is a rather complicated affair: ~Mistborn & Warbreaker spoilers~ Brandon has made comparisons between these three situations before: What exactly is Ashravan now?

It's probably really obvious and I just dont know where to look but I was thinking, would aluminium and duralumin ferrings be easier to soul stamp while storing attributes and harder to stamp while tapping their mettalminds? Do we have any WoBs or something about how identity and connection affect soul stamps?

Selish magic can access at least Fortune, as seen by the Dakhor assassin in Teod. AonDor can do a lot of physical things and also has mental and corporal capabilities. But what about spiritual stuff? Can it tap into Fortune or manipulate Identity? Given that it is built on geographic constraints, Connection seems to be taboo. What do you think?

I was thinking about Kandra in Bands of Mourning and something occurred to me. In Bands of Mourning it talks a lot about Identity, but it's all in reference to Feruchemy and Allomancy. I was wondering if Identity could be important for Kandra. Specifically, I was thinking that it may be part of how they are able to so convincingly take the forms of other people. This eventually lead me to thinking about other shapeshifters as well, but first I'll talk about Kandra. Young Kandra are only able to shapeshift into the form of a person after consuming their body. After a lot of time spent taking on various forms they're eventually able to take liberties, mixing and matching, adding, subtracting, adapting, etc. But at first they're only able to consume a body and then turn into a copy of that body. Once they're in a form they have a hard time not acting like the person that form belongs to (like when MeLaan takes on the form of the Governor Innate at the end of Shadows of Self, she knows she's supposed to be placating the crowd, but that's not what Innate would have done. This could be from training and practice, but I think that would only take you so far. Particularly when she didn't actually know much about Innate.). Anyway, so I'm proposing that when a Kandra consumes a body they are able to consume a portion of the person's Identity. This helps them to not only copy the person's physical appearance, but their mannerisms, their speech patterns, etc. It wouldn't give them the person's memories, but they would instinctively be able to tap into the way that person would do things. This is similar to when Shai is testing pieces of the pattern for Ashravan's essence mark on Gaotona. This effectively gave Gaotona a copy of a small portion of Ashravan's identity. Sometimes Shai would incorporate actual memories into the stamps as well, but like with the part about how his favorite color was green. I feel like that had more to do with Identity than memories. For a Kandra I feel like they would get more of the person's Identity than Gaotona was getting, though not the whole thing. For a Mistwraith I bet they get the bits of Identity as well, but without sapience it doesn't do them any good. So that brings me to other kinds of shapeshifting in the Cosmere. Here's a list of all the kinds of shapeshifting I can think of: Kandra/Mistwraith, Aimian, Dician Aimian, Forgery (minimal, but it does still happen), and Returned/Royal Locks. Aimians and Dician Aimians we don't see enough for me to judge how much has to do with Identity, but I suspect that it does play a part. Forgery you're only changing to different versions of yourself, but I still think that your identity is changing. Returned we don't see too much of it, but the parts we do see seem to me like it's totally about Identity, and the Royal Locks we already know work the same way, just on a smaller scale. Illusions aren't actually shapeshifting, but I think Identity frequently plays a part in them as well. Anyway, I thought this was interesting. Thoughts?

Identity that is stored in an aluminummind is either always keyed, or always unkeyed, and I can't decide which it is. My thinking is as follows. When you store Identity, you don't have Identity, but you did have Identity when you started storing it. It's one of those "which came first" paradoxes. Help me.

So if you were a super evil guy that just did evil things as a pass time and you wanted to be able to wield Nightblood, assuming you had enough investure to sustain it, could you store Identity and hold Nightblood without fear of him eating you? I know it has alot to do with how Nightblood perceives the world, but what do you think?

Hello Shard! It's by far time I've been on the shard without creating a proper theory! This ones been brewing in my head for a while and its time I share it with the world, and besides, the Elantris forum looks a little empty... So my proposed theory is that the magic system of AonDor is separate from Identity and Connection unlike any other Cosmere magic system we've seen. We know that the Dor, or the Investiture of Devotion and Dominion, exists inside the Cognitive Realm. We also know that Connection and Identity plays a big part in what makes the Spiritual Realm, where most Investiture is stored. Aons have a wide range of powers and this could be due to the lack of set rules put in place by the Shards of Adolusium, they also can effect practically anyone! I believe that these factors leads to Identity having less of an impact on Sel's magic systems. Of course, Identity and Connection still effect the magic, otherwise anyone could draw Aons, Elantrian or not! To prove this theory more information could be used, either we all wait for the sequel to Elantris or we ask Brandon some questions, hopefully not being RAFO'd! This is my first theory and I would like to know what you think. Questions For Brandon! Could an Elantrian make a stamp with an Aon on it then use it instead of drawing their Aons? Could Multiple Elantrians work together on drawing one massive Aon, would this have any effects on the magic? @Ladrian

(spoliers for BoM) Recently, I looked over the Feruchemical powers again and recalled the scene in BoM where the group finds the Nicrosil and Gold bracelet (I think) stored with an immense amount of Health that anyone could use because of the Investiture in the Nicrosil. It happens again in the epilogue with the coin and memory of Kelsier in the Final Empire. Now, after seeing Aluminum's Feruchemical power was Identity, I'm curious as to how it works. Do we know anything? My guess is that it may be a sort of protection against brainwashing, or in combination with Nicrosil, could literally make someone drawing both Investiture and Identity act like the Identity donor. What do you all think? Or what do we actually know?

Aight so essentially I’m wondering if you could influence Fortune with the metallic arts based on a couple WOBs I’ve found (please keep in mind this is my first foray into the Arcanum) Questioner[PENDING REVIEW] In terms of discussing Identity, I know that in Emperor's Soul,they talk about Identity, and the Parshendi talk about losing their identity, and then I was just rereading Bands of Mourning, and one of the kandra talks about how the spikes are their Identity. Are all of those things connected somehow or are they different forms of Identity? Brandon Sanderson[PENDING REVIEW] They are connected, although the Parshendi losing their identity is a little more metaphorical. But yeah, the idea of these things is Identity is an innate attribute in the cosmere that is related to your soul, your spirit, and it is one of the things that Hemalurgy can fiddle with and Feruchemy can fiddle with. It's kind of important to how the Metallurgic Arts play out, but it's important to all the magics. Identity is involved in why you can't use another person's metalminds, right, that kind of thing. And those are all related. The Parshendi is more metaphorical. So here I noticed how Sanderson talked about Identity as an “innate attribute” and how it could be influenced using hemalurgy or Feruchemy, and it somewhat reminded me of how he spoke of Fortune in the following WOB, how he talks about it as a “property” Chaos[PENDING REVIEW] Odium said to Taravangian, "You did this without access to Fortune or the Spiritual Realm?" How does one access Fortune without the Spiritual Realm or Feruchemical chromium, as almost all future sight tends to utilize the Spiritual Realm in some way? Brandon Sanderson[PENDING REVIEW] So, that line is mostly just me saying... [long pause] I think you're picking apart those things too much. Chaos[PENDING REVIEW] Right, that makes sense. Hey, Odium said it, so I didn't know... Gotta take that seriously, so. Brandon Sanderson[PENDING REVIEW] So, yeah, don't read too much into picking apart those two things. You can read it as... Honestly, that is me making sure I am being clear in the text. Chaos[PENDING REVIEW] That there are those are two different things. Brandon Sanderson[PENDING REVIEW] Yeah those are two different things, but they are just interrelated. Fortune is a property, and the Spiritual Realm is a place, but not a place. Do you know what I mean? To use Fortune, you're always involving the Spiritual Realm, but in the Spiritual Realm, you're not always involving Fortune. so would it be possible to spike yourself foresight, or store it somehow in a metalmind? Would love to know if I’m entirely off-base here. source source

This contains spoilers for Bands of Mourning.

Simple enough. Do we know if you can spike the part of you that defines your birthplace? If yes, could you get a few of those and gain Selish magic?