The Most Powerful Metallic Art

[Straff Venture]

Okay, in the scenario there are no 'lord ruler twinborns' or other amalgamations of the metallic arts, as this will just confuse the end result (though its probably wise for me to acknowledge hemalurgy naturally going with one of the other two for maximum power).

Which is the most powerful of the metallic arts? Each has its advantages and disadvantages so in aid of an organised thread opening, I will talk about each art separately. This thread is basically seeing what each of the arts could do at its limit.

Feruchemy

Advantages - Its excellent ability to delay the release of an attribute and release it all in a chosen amplification makes feruchemy one of the most rawly powerful of Sanderson's magic systems at any one point. Say if a feruchemist was to literally spend the first forty years of their life intensively storing attributes in their metalminds and were then sent into battle, they could literally do anything, and for quite a long time too. The variety of these powers would mean they were almost invincible in every way.

Disadvantages - It is VERY costly to the person in question. For feruchemy to be as ridiculously powerful as said, the feruchemist would have to spend a large portion of their life in a physically and mentally disabled state. I doubt many people would be willing to devote their life to this, and anyone who argues because they can store age and therefore live forever is wrong, because they could only live double their normal life expectancy (live as an old man for their whole life and then spend another lifetime like that, but that would be a pretty miserable life anyway. Only compounders are immortal).

Hemalurgy

Advantages - While Marsh was already an incredibly powerful inquisitor (with only twenty spikes and only being a bronze allomancer before his transformation), in a chapter in HoA, Marsh states that there are hundreds of different points on the body where hemalurgic spikes can be placed for effect. This could create a hemalurgic super soldier (credit to someone else on this forum for that term, sorry I can't remember where I saw it) with allomantic and feruchemic powers, capable of surpassing even the feruchemical superpowers previously mentioned.

Disadvantages - The sheer cost of all the power needed for this kind of super soldier is staggering. To have hundreds of allomancers and feruchemists killed for the powers of one person would likely be out of the question in a real-story situation. Also, though I'm not completely sure about this, if inquisitors were the easiest to influence by rioting and soothing with their large amount of spikes, an inquisitor with hundreds of spikes could be taken in by the lightest of touches.

Allomancy

Advantages - It is certainly the cheapest of the powers mentioned, needing only flakes of metal instead of a life devoted. To take into 'overdrive mode' like I have done with the other powers simply requires the consumption of duraluminum. So basically if an allomancer has a large supply of duraluminum and the other they can become seriously powerful. Over time, allomancy is much more cost effective.

Disadvantages - It is quite obviously the weakest of the three in raw power. Unlike the other two, it is trapped in a finite amount of power that can be released at any one point. This means it would have no chance against either of the other two in battle, hemalurgy even having the same powers as allomancy just at a much higher level.

So what do you think, judging these different factors? I personally think feruchemy is the best, as it has the ability to become virtually invincible without having to turn into a glorified metal hedgehog who could be taken in an instant by any soother.

I don't expect many people to read it all, but I hope you enjoy

[Vortaan]

Hemalurgy can create compounders. If you only kill one coinshot and one steelrunner, you have unlimited speed matched to the ability to use any piece of metal as a bullet. So... yeah, Hemalurgy for the win.

[name_here]

I'd always go for Allomancy. Partially, while Feruchemy has many things going for it, none of them are flying. At least not in any quick or controllable manner. Also, without Compouding, storing up enough steel, gold, and pewter to match a Thug for a sustained duration takes an incredibly long time.

Also, Allomantic Atium. I can see the future. Your superpowers are invalid.

Edited September 7, 2012 by name_here

[Arcanist Lupus]

Between Feruchemy and Allomancy, the answer is obvious. Power = Energy/Time. In Allomancy the amount of energy you can access in 1 second is limited. In Feruchemy you can access arbitrarily large amounts of energy in a second. Therefore Feruchemy is more powerful.

(Yes, yes, I know there are other definitions of power. Let me have my fun, okay?)

[Cracknut]

Hemalurgy > Feruchemy > Allomancy

Allomancers can fly and thats fun but give Feruchemist years of stored attributes and he'll eat Allomancers alive. Even endless Atium won't help them. Though on more balanced situations original Mistborn would be stronger...

[Observer]

In a short 1v1, Feruchemist beats Allomancer easily. In an exteded fight however, or against multiple opponents, Feruchemy begins to suffer. It's good for quick, focused bursts.

In a longer, more extended battle, Allomancy wins, as it has no real limitations to how long it keeps going. Add pewter to the mix, and I find that allomancers are built to fight for very long stretches of time.

Unfortunately for us all, Hemalurgy is both abilities, and more. If, for any reason, you figured out where to stick the spikes, and then managed to kill even one person, you would gain the powers of a ferring or misting. Using those powers, you could kill another person, therefore doubling your power. If you played it safe, you could become rediculously powerful. Supposedly mental fortitude makes you insane, but in the event that you found a way to beat it, it could be used to counter bodily take-over if you had enough of it.

All in all, I think Hemalurgy is the superior art if you're clever with it. Neglecting that, in short fights, Feruchemy wins. In long fights, Allomancy takes the cake (Provided GLaDOS isn't nearby).

[Riddlesinthedark]

In a short 1v1, Feruchemist beats Allomancer easily. In an exteded fight however, or against multiple opponents, Feruchemy begins to suffer. It's good for quick, focused bursts.

In a longer, more extended battle, Allomancy wins, as it has no real limitations to how long it keeps going. Add pewter to the mix, and I find that allomancers are built to fight for very long stretches of time.

Unfortunately for us all, Hemalurgy is both abilities, and more. If, for any reason, you figured out where to stick the spikes, and then managed to kill even one person, you would gain the powers of a ferring or misting. Using those powers, you could kill another person, therefore doubling your power. If you played it safe, you could become rediculously powerful. Supposedly mental fortitude makes you insane, but in the event that you found a way to beat it, it could be used to counter bodily take-over if you had enough of it.

All in all, I think Hemalurgy is the superior art if you're clever with it. Neglecting that, in short fights, Feruchemy wins. In long fights, Allomancy takes the cake (Provided GLaDOS isn't nearby).

Its been awhile since I read the WoA or HoA, but in MFE, I swear Marsh mentioning fatigue as being a serious factor for the Inquisitors. Or was that just because he was new?

And are we comparing apples to apples here? I would think, barring Shardic intervention

Marsh-level Hemalurgic Super Soldier>Lerasium Mistborn>Full Feruchemist

Edited September 8, 2012 by Voldy

[Aminar]

Hemalurgy can create compounders. If you only kill one coinshot and one steelrunner, you have unlimited speed matched to the ability to use any piece of metal as a bullet. So... yeah, Hemalurgy for the win.

I seriously doubt this. I really do. Being a compounder should require that the hemalurgic spikes come from the same donor to compound due to the spiritual dna involved.

[Aradel]

I'm advocating Feruchemy. Not only is there no upper limit to how much you can enhance yourself, some of the costs can double as benefits. You can binge-eat whatever you want and slowly store away excess calories, heat or cool yourself as you please, blend in or stand out, stay up for days and beat insomnia at will.

In other words, feruchemy gives more raw power and is useful in more situations than allomancy. Hemalurgy can duplicate feruchemical powers, but not without extra cost. So I think feruchemy is best.

Edited September 8, 2012 by Goradel's Nephew

[Voidus]

I seriously doubt this. I really do. Being a compounder should require that the hemalurgic spikes come from the same donor to compound due to the spiritual dna involved.

Some of the inquisitors found out how to compound, not most of them but a few, and I highly doubt that they managed to find twinborns for their spikes. Given that it may be possible to share spikes by use of completely storing your identity I think that your identity is more important than where the sDNA comes from.

I'm going to have to go with Hemalurgy as well, gives you the ability to compound but additionally it could also be used to give you enhanced base-stats (Strength, etc.) and all you need for those is ordinary humans, you could make yourself a compounding Kandra with Koloss level strength if you had the know how and a simple aluminum cap takes care of the main weakness to emotional allomancy. The main problem with Hemalurgy is that comparatively to the other metallic arts it is hugely difficult to learn, sure you might stab a misting with the right spike but did you place it in the right area? When you place it in yourself did you place it in the right area? How will it alter your body? It's insanely complicated to use so in that regard it is also one of the least useful of the arts.

Basically it depends how much you know about hemalurgy, assuming that you know everything about it Hemalurgy dominates Allomancy and Feruchemy, if not you just accidentally stabbed a Bronze misting in a manner which can only steal Copper and you then gave yourself three arms.

[Vortaan]

I seriously doubt this. I really do. Being a compounder should require that the hemalurgic spikes come from the same donor to compound due to the spiritual dna involved.

Why would it require both? By burning Steel, you release your Feruchemical storage in a large amount. Since you were the one to store it, you should be able to get it back, as long as the speed stored is yours to begin with. I thought Marsh was compounding atium as a way of staying young until AoL times.

[Aminar]

Why would it require both? By burning Steel, you release your Feruchemical storage in a large amount. Since you were the one to store it, you should be able to get it back, as long as the speed stored is yours to begin with. I thought Marsh was compounding atium as a way of staying young until AoL times.

I believe he is, but I don't think he has spikes that allow for it. I think he's been granted the abilities of an Atium Twinborn by Sazed.

I look at it this way.

A spike grants you allomancy at a specific soul frequency and Hemalurgy at another. So if you tried to allomantically burn one of your hemalurgy granted metalminds the allomacy would be burning it on a different frequency much like how an Allomancer gets no benefit from burning a metalmind. In order to have Compounding spikes you'd have to steal both powers from a given compounder. Otherwise why would TLR have given Inquisitors compounding. They still wouldn't be a threat to him and would have been far far more capable. Especially Gold compounding. They wouldn't have needed to stay resting for so long, and could have been almost constantly active. Not to Miles's degree where he's burning gold all the time, but they could be back to full healing storage in a matter of hours or days, not weeks or months.

[Aminar]

Some of the inquisitors found out how to compound, not most of them but a few, and I highly doubt that they managed to find twinborns for their spikes. Given that it may be possible to share spikes by use of completely storing your identity I think that your identity is more important than where the sDNA comes from.

I'm going to have to go with Hemalurgy as well, gives you the ability to compound but additionally it could also be used to give you enhanced base-stats (Strength, etc.) and all you need for those is ordinary humans, you could make yourself a compounding Kandra with Koloss level strength if you had the know how and a simple aluminum cap takes care of the main weakness to emotional allomancy. The main problem with Hemalurgy is that comparatively to the other metallic arts it is hugely difficult to learn, sure you might stab a misting with the right spike but did you place it in the right area? When you place it in yourself did you place it in the right area? How will it alter your body? It's insanely complicated to use so in that regard it is also one of the least useful of the arts.

Basically it depends how much you know about hemalurgy, assuming that you know everything about it Hemalurgy dominates Allomancy and Feruchemy, if not you just accidentally stabbed a Bronze misting in a manner which can only steal Copper and you then gave yourself three arms.

Where does it say that? Vin could have never dealt with a compounding Inquisitor. None of them showed any signs of compounding at all.

[Voidus]

Where does it say that? Vin could have never dealt with a compounding Inquisitor. None of them showed any signs of compounding at all.

It's word of Brandon, I'll see if I can find the quote.

EDIT: Also just remembered Marsh can obviously compound Atium.

EDIT: I just realised that someone already brought that up.

as for

I believe he is, but I don't think he has spikes that allow for it. I think he's been granted the abilities of an Atium Twinborn by Sazed.

We do have confirmation that he found a spike for it, I believe he got it off of one of the inquisitors Vin killed, I'll have a look for that quote too.

Found the second quote

ZAS678 (REDDIT.COM)

Why on earth does Marsh have a Feruchemical Atium Spike? You've said that Ironeyes is in fact Marsh. Did Ruin spike someone for him? Or did Sazed grant him the power?

BRANDON SANDERSON (REDDIT.COM)

Dead inquisitors Vin killed. Some were granted the spike for reasons I haven't spoken of yet.

I still can't find the other one and I'm beginning to think I may have imagined it

Edited September 8, 2012 by Voidus

[Eric]

Yeah, given enough victims, Hemalurgy grants every power of both Feruchemy and Allomancy. Since that's by definition an amalgamation of the Metallic Arts, I have to say that despite it being against the OP's intent, it wins by being the exception to the rules laid out.

@Aminar: Think of this: you only need the sDNA of the Feruchemist to use *his* metalminds, not create more of your own. You have that ability from the spike. Burning a metalmind you can tap grants you the compounded storage as the Allomantic effect. Thus, Hemalurgy opens up compounding.

[Riddlesinthedark]

Yeah, given enough victims, Hemalurgy grants every power of both Feruchemy and Allomancy. Since that's by definition an amalgamation of the Metallic Arts, I have to say that despite it being against the OP's intent, it wins by being the exception to the rules laid out.

@Aminar: Think of this: you only need the sDNA of the Feruchemist to use *his* metalminds, not create more of your own. You have that ability from the spike. Burning a metalmind you can tap grants you the compounded storage as the Allomantic effect. Thus, Hemalurgy opens up compounding.

Thus why we should compare apples to apples...

Aka, Marsh vs Elend vs pre-Harmony-Sazed.

(High level Hemalurgist; Original Mistborn; Full, experienced Feruchemist, with abilities stored)

[Straff Venture]

Thus why we should compare apples to apples...

Aka, Marsh vs Elend vs pre-Harmony-Sazed.

(High level Hemalurgist; Original Mistborn; Full, experienced Feruchemist, with abilities stored)

In the introduction to this thread I was also seeing what each of the arts could do at their absolute limits, no matter the cost:

(Duraluminum savant, feruchemical lifestorer and hemalurgic hedgehog)

[Eric]

@Voldy - We need a time period for Marsh. Alloy of Law era Marsh is over 300 years old, considerably more practiced than either pH Sazed or Elend ever were. I'd say that's about the pinnacle of Hemalurgy that we've seen: low finesse, insane power, and presence out the wazoo.

Both Elend and Marsh have excellent odds against Sazed, depending on terrain. Sazed will be using up his weight quickly trying to avoid even simple pushes and pulls. If Elend has an anchor, a Duralumin Steelpush could end Sazed's life just from the sudden force. Marsh has defeated Sazed, albeit while Sazed was nearly tapped out and Marsh very young and not in fully control of himself.

Elend versus Marsh happened. Atium was involved, but Marsh's abilities were winning the day until Vin started fueling Elend's Allomancy and he used Duralumin with Atium to see that giving up was the best option anyway. And again, this was a much younger Marsh.

So, in canon, our prime Hemalurgist was more than the match of an original Mistborn and an experienced Feruchemist. Still handing it to Hemalurgy.

@Straff - The Hedgehog can be both a Duralumin Savant and a Lifestorer. Gods help us when we find out what compounding does when you burn Duralumin at the same time.

Edited September 8, 2012 by Eric

[Straff Venture]

@Straff - The Hedgehog can be both a Duralumin Savant and a Lifestorer. Gods help us when we find out what compounding does when you burn Duralumin at the same time.

I think a battle as titanic as this one would be an incredible read, but the hemalurgist's sheer ability to just destroy any opposition with impunity would be seriously overpowered and wouldn't work with any plot. As Sanderson's second law states, limitations>powers for any successful story

[Vortaan]

I believe he is, but I don't think he has spikes that allow for it. I think he's been granted the abilities of an Atium Twinborn by Sazed.

I look at it this way.

A spike grants you allomancy at a specific soul frequency and Hemalurgy at another. So if you tried to allomantically burn one of your hemalurgy granted metalminds the allomacy would be burning it on a different frequency much like how an Allomancer gets no benefit from burning a metalmind. In order to have Compounding spikes you'd have to steal both powers from a given compounder. Otherwise why would TLR have given Inquisitors compounding. They still wouldn't be a threat to him and would have been far far more capable. Especially Gold compounding. They wouldn't have needed to stay resting for so long, and could have been almost constantly active. Not to Miles's degree where he's burning gold all the time, but they could be back to full healing storage in a matter of hours or days, not weeks or months.

Couple of things here.

1) Allomancy doesn't have a frequency in order to be able to sense a Feruchemical reserve. Vin can sense the one Sazed gives her, she just can't access it because it isn't hers. I imagine that if you stored the reserve, you'd be able to access it, no matter if the Allomancy came from the person whom you got the Feruchemy from or not.

2) TLR would likely not have given Inquisitors gold-Allomancy spikes. It doesn't do your fanatical priesthood of uber death and limited humanity good to look back on the people they were before they had eight people shoved into them. Again, it's a built in weakness so that the Inquisitors would be easier to control. That said I wouldn't be suprised if Ruin found a few Augurs and supplemented a few Inquisitors with gold to allow for compounding. The way Vin killed off most of the Inquisitors wouldn't allow for healing to save them

[Aminar]

There's more than just gold to worry about. A steel And zinc compounding Inquisitor could have wiped the floor with anything. And we know some of the inquisitors would have had at least steel compounding but we never see the Flash in Spiked Mangod form. All you would really need was a few of those spikes to make a warrior no Mistborn could hope to handle. And Augering is so horribly useless why would TLR care? He can still easily control the inquisitors. I maintain that if spikes allowed for compounding vin would never have been able to deal with Ruin.

Think of it this way. If I use a spike to take a Feruchemists copper I can in fact use their memories. Therefor when I store that Feruchemy I'm storing it in their encoding. I still shouldn't be able to compound with it.

[Vortaan]

There's more than just gold to worry about. A steel And zinc compounding Inquisitor could have wiped the floor with anything. And we know some of the inquisitors would have had at least steel compounding but we never see the Flash in Spiked Mangod form. All you would really need was a few of those spikes to make a warrior no Mistborn could hope to handle. And Augering is so horribly useless why would TLR care? He can still easily control the inquisitors. I maintain that if spikes allowed for compounding vin would never have been able to deal with Ruin.

Think of it this way. If I use a spike to take a Feruchemists copper I can in fact use their memories. Therefor when I store that Feruchemy I'm storing it in their encoding. I still shouldn't be able to compound with it.

The only time Ruin is actually trying to kill Vin, she's drawing directly on the power of Preservation. I don't think it would matter at that point how powerful an Inquisitor was, he or she would still not be able to mimic the raw power of Preservation. As I said before, a lot of how Vin killed Inquisitors was completely crushing heads, removing spikes, or dropping giant spires atop of them, something I don't think even Miles could have survived.

[ReaderAt2046]

Elend versus Marsh happened. Atium was involved, but Marsh's abilities were winning the day until Vin started fueling Elend's Allomancy and he used Duralumin with Atium to see that giving up was the best option anyway. And again, this was a much younger Marsh.

So, in canon, our prime Hemalurgist was more than the match of an original Mistborn and an experienced Feruchemist. Still handing it to Hemalurgy.

Remember, Elend had been fighting koloss for hours and was almost out of the basic metals. That may have had something to do with it.

As for which art is the most powerful, I think it depends on the context. For example, Feruchemy can deleiver the most raw energy per unit time, but it has very limited power reserves. Allomancy, on the other hand, has virtually unlimited duration but there's a cap on how much raw power you can use at any given second. So Feruchemy would be better at tasks that demand a lot of power really fast, but Allomancy would be better at tasks that demand long stretches of effort.

[Aminar]

The only time Ruin is actually trying to kill Vin, she's drawing directly on the power of Preservation. I don't think it would matter at that point how powerful an Inquisitor was, he or she would still not be able to mimic the raw power of Preservation. As I said before, a lot of how Vin killed Inquisitors was completely crushing heads, removing spikes, or dropping giant spires atop of them, something I don't think even Miles could have survived.

Still none of the descriptions match what a compounder would be doing. No constant blurs of speed running up buildings faster than gravity could catch them. No hulking titans of feruchemical pewter. Just regular old mistborn fighting. If the inquisitors had worked out compounding- if they could have- Vin couldn't have won- even just looking at the affects of compounded steel with pewter and Atium boosted reflexes which they would have had. Compounding is a spectacular looking thing for most of the physical metals. But none of that was shown. It all suggests that hemalurgists cannot compound via hemalurgy as it is normally acquired. Now Sazed seems to have granted Marsh the ability to compound Atium somehow but there are half a dozen ways he could have done that. He could have just granted Atium twinborness. He could have aligned the spiritual DNA in Marshs spikes so they match up. But until we see otherwise it is safest to assume spikes don't allow for compounding. The narrative just doesn't support it.

[Observer]

You forget that the inquisitors aren't storing in metalminds, they'r eusing their spikes to hold a charge. They can't very well eat their spikes now can they?

In the Mistborn world, Hemalurgy wins.

In the real world, I think Feruchemy hold far more uses than either of them.

I think I should make a list of useful IRL metals...

Pewter: Useful. Pewter drag is great for school, work, anything. Yay.

Tin: Only semi-useful. I can't find too many wonderful uses for it.

Bronze: Truely useless if you're the only allomancer.

Copper: See above

Zinc: Great for getting that promotion or that girl. Go zinc!

Brass: See above

Iron: Not all that wonderful, though I suppose it's great for a security guard

Steel: Not sure how many times flying is useful IRL. See above.

Gold: IDK.

Atium: Unless you brawl a lot, useless.

Nicrosil: Worthless so long as bronze is

Chromium: See above

Alumin-No.

Duralumin: Only a little useful

Cadium: I can't see many situations where this is useful.

Bendalloy: By far one of the most useful metals for IRL use.

Pewter: Not too useful unless you're killing somebody

Tin: Food critic powers! Oh..ya....besides that not wonderful

Bronze: Only really useful for cramming a test or keeping awake while that one guy lectures

Copper: Perfect. IRL, memory = success. You'd be an instant winner.

Zinc: Speed of thought is never a bad thing. Spend a day as a vegetable and come back as a Genius.

Brass: If I remembered what this did I'd post.

Iron: Unless you want to pretend you weigh 100 pounds, not much use here.

Steel: Great for races I suppose. Or getting the paper finishe din 10 seconds.

Gold: Feign sickness perfectly. Never worry about plane crashes aagin. Yay.

Atium: Live twice as long. Not too bad, but not wonderful either.

Nicrosil: We don't know anything about this yet

Chromium: Fortune used right is instant win. Gogo!

Alumi-Still no.

Duralumin: Be ignored or adored at will? Count me in.

Cadium: Good for swimming, but little else.

Bendalloy: Who doesn't love binge-eating?

Edited September 8, 2012 by Observer