[Bands Spoilers] On the Lord Ruler's Allomantic Strength

[Necarion]

I don't know if it's obvious (though someone probably figure it out before me), but I think I finally figured out how TLR was such an unbelievably powerful allomancer during the Final Empire. In some of his interviews, Brandon made it clear that there's a compounding trick to getting supercharged allomancy, and the assumptions I saw seemed to think that to become a Super Soother, one would burn Brass and then store that allomancy in a nicrosil mind, and then burn that to compound, ad infinitum. Except that this particular explanation isn't very elegant and requires a BUNCH of nicrosil minds.

 

I think what actually happens is that TLR stores his Mistborn-ness in a nicrosil mind, and then burns it, getting the compounding effect, storing the excess back into the nicrosil mind. Then when he taps his stored "Full Mistborn Strength" N time, he becomes an (N+1)-strength mistborn, meaning that all the allomantic powers are now boosted by a factor of (N+1).  I get the impression that the metals themselves burn at a relatively constant rate (e.g., pewter on max flare runs out at the same speed, regardless of who's using it) but more powerful allomancers get more juice out of the same mass of metal.

 

Any Full Twinborn (Fullborn?) can probably do that with Feruchemy too, but it's not at all clear what the benefits of more Strength in Feruchemy does for you. Allows you to stuff more investiture into a metal mind? Reduces the amount of investiture you loose when you tap at greater than 1x?

 

The Bands of Mourning and all Derived (and Lesser) Bands (Bands of Mild Sadness?) are going to have a finite Misting/Mistborn capacity that needs to be recharged. If one wanted to break the Bands of Mourning so they would never be used again, you'd basically have to draw out all the ability to use Feruchemy and Allomancy, and then you'd never be able to do the compounding trick to restore them. On the flip side, you can give people Starter-Bands which just have a core of Full Twinborn in a nicrosil mind, and let people build up their own compounded stores.  No way this can possibly go wrong, right guys?

 

Related, but which Knight Radiant character would benefit the most from Full Twinborn powers? Windrunning is in some ways too similar to Mistborning, and Lightweaving is maybe too Orthogonal.

Edited January 29, 2016 by Necarion

[Voidus]

I'm still of the opinion that Vin and co. would have noticed if TLR had any metalminds of an unknown metal.

[Ari]

Depends how Nicrosilminds work. If they're like tinminds (I think tinminds are senses? I lose track of the metals for the more obscure feruchemical powers) then you need one Nicrosilmind for each type of Investiture you can store. In the absense of evidence that seems like a more likely explanation.

[Irkutsk]

Depends how Nicrosilminds work. If they're like tinminds (I think tinminds are senses? I lose track of the metals for the more obscure feruchemical powers) then you need one Nicrosilmind for each type of Investiture you can store. In the absense of evidence that seems like a more likely explanation.

From what we've seen though, Allomantic and feruchemical abilities either come as a single power, or a full Feruchemist or Mistborn. You can be a twinborn, but there is no way to naturally have more than one allomantic or feruchemical ability, unless you have all of them. Which seems to show that the genetic traits and sDNA for "one allomantic power" and "Mistborn" are separate. So, I think that TLR would be able to store "Mistbornness" in a Nicrosilmind, without storing all 16 powers in separate metalminds.

[fyodor]

Depends how Nicrosilminds work. If they're like tinminds (I think tinminds are senses? I lose track of the metals for the more obscure feruchemical powers) then you need one Nicrosilmind for each type of Investiture you can store. In the absense of evidence that seems like a more likely explanation.

 

Right, just like you need separate Hemalurgic spikes for each power. I agree that this seems like a sensible way for TLR to enhance his power, but it seems like Vin and co. would have noticed Nicrosil bracers if he wore them. 

[fyodor]

Actually, the more I think about it, I think that the actual Bands were probably created by the Sovereign, who I assume is Kelsier, rather than TLR. He was described as having all of the powers. 

[The Rooster]

He was a super powerful Allomancer because he got Allmoancy from Lerasium. 

[The Invested Beard]

He was a super powerful Allomancer because he got Allmoancy from Lerasium. 

 

This. It's pretty widely believed that the original mistborn who ate the beads of Lerasium were much more powerful as evidenced by Elend's ridiculously OP allomancy.

[fyodor]

WOB is that TLR did not use one of the beads, but used his temporary preservation powers to make himself stronger . Also he could compound his allomancy to make himself stronger. I assume that, in light of what we learned, this involved storing investiture.

http://www.theoryland.com/intvsresults.php?kwt=%27lord%20ruler%27

[natc]

Besides, Elend doesn't seem even remotely strong enough to push metal in people's stomachs like TLR. TLR even made shattered glass vibrate, I think?

[Oathbringer]

The Lord Ruler could have near limitless strength with his compounding. Besides that, he had access to a quantity of lerasium. If one bead makes you a full, strong mistborn then what if he kept several to himself? Would his power increase exponentially?

[Stoic0209]

Hmm... I thought TLR gave the other beads to certain nobles that were loyal to him? What if it's a combination of things (i.e., nicrosil compounding AND the lerasium/godlike abilities he inherited from the well)?

[WayneSpren]

Besides, Elend doesn't seem even remotely strong enough to push metal in people's stomachs like TLR. TLR even made shattered glass vibrate, I think?

 

The Lord Ruler could have near limitless strength with his compounding. Besides that, he had access to a quantity of lerasium. If one bead makes you a full, strong mistborn then what if he kept several to himself? Would his power increase exponentially?

I was under the impression that increasing your weight with an Ironmind made it easier to push on metalminds and other Investiture'd objects. So could Wax push on metals inside people if he increased his weight by a thousand or something?

[Ari]

I was under the impression that increasing your weight with an Ironmind made it easier to push on metalminds and other Investiture'd objects. So could Wax push on metals inside people if he increased his weight by a thousand or something?

 

It makes it easier to push on objects more forcefully because you're harder to move, being heavier. I don't see how it would make it easier to push on Invested objects, however.

 

 

Hmm... I thought TLR gave the other beads to certain nobles that were loyal to him? What if it's a combination of things (i.e., nicrosil compounding AND the lerasium/godlike abilities he inherited from the well)?

 

It is definitely a combination of being a Lerasium Mistborn, (whether he actually swallowed Lerasium is irrelevant- he attuned himself to Allomancy just as strongly) and Nicrosil compounding. (For the ridiculous Soothing he used, it would make no difference how Nicrosilminds work. He can't have used Duralumin though, as he didn't swallow any metals between waves) Elend never did the ridiculously powerful emotional Allomancy the Lord Ruler used, which would have been very useful in controlling the Koloss without using Duralumin.

 

Right, just like you need separate Hemalurgic spikes for each power. I agree that this seems like a sensible way for TLR to enhance his power, but it seems like Vin and co. would have noticed Nicrosil bracers if he wore them. 

 

How? It basically looks like steel. It would have been just another metalmind. Besides, if he's compounding Nicrosil, they wouldn't have been bracers. Most likely earrings or rings that would be easy to swallow. And he doesn't have to wear them around. He can store Investiture when he's safely in Kredik Shaw, and if he anticipates needing strong magic, swallow a metalmind to burn when he want a burst of extra power.

[king of nowhere]

Any Full Twinborn (Fullborn?) can probably do that with Feruchemy too, but it's not at all clear what the benefits of more Strength in Feruchemy does for you. Allows you to stuff more investiture into a metal mind? Reduces the amount of investiture you loose when you tap at greater than 1x?

 

I definitely think it means you can store more in the same metalmind. Wax did not recognize the spear as a metalmind because it was so heavily invested; he can feel other people's metalminds. why would normal people need more expansive metalminds when they could store so much in so little space? well, the easiest answer is that they cannot actually store so much in so little space. And that's why kelsier (I'm assuming obvious he's the one-eyed-spiked sovereign, but apparently some people are arguing over it) was able to fit so much power into a piece of metal easily held in one hand.

[Ari]

Stronger Feruchemists can weaken themselves further than usual when storing, building up their stores faster. IIRC, the amount of capacity a metalmind has for feruchemical charge is just about its size, isn't it?

[Voidus]

Stronger Feruchemists can weaken themselves further than usual when storing, building up their stores faster. IIRC, the amount of capacity a metalmind has for feruchemical charge is just about its size, isn't it?

That is suggested in book but if true it's pretty redundant, there are very few metals that can actually be stored as strong as you'd like anyway, most would kill you if you approached that limit.

[Ari]

That is suggested in book but if true it's pretty redundant, there are very few metals that can actually be stored as strong as you'd like anyway, most would kill you if you approached that limit.

 

It could be quite relevant to things like using Aluminium to unlock metalminds, storing senses, or other qualities that can be safely stored completely, or that are actually desirable to store. (eg. using an Ironmind to become fully weightless)

[natc]

Being fully weightless isn't as awesome as it sounds. Your ironminds still weigh you down after all.

[Ari]

Being fully weightless isn't as awesome as it sounds. Your ironminds still weigh you down after all.

 

It would allow for some pretty awesome jumps, slowed only by air resistance.

[Orsium]

<p>Going back to TLR being stronger than normal, he DID hold Preservations power.  And a full Feruchemist.  So I'm of the mind that his temporary god-hood has something to do with why he is stronger than even Elend was with Lerasium, separate from the whole compounding aspect.  The compounding was just icing on the cake.</p>

<p> </p>

<p>EDIT: I forgot that he never actually used Lerasium, he made himself one with Preservations power.</p>

Edited February 4, 2016 by Orsium

[Copperkeep]

The thing is, I feel like we've been given more than one explanation for TLR's power that would be entirely plausible all by itself, but which for some reason I still don't feel completely satisfied by. He's a sliver, and he remade his body and soul into an enormously powerful allomancer using the full force of Preservation's power, and that probably is enough to explain him being many times more powerful than even a Lerasium Mistborn. (We know he didn't actually take one of the beads himself, at least not for allomancy.) And then there's the weirdly still unanswered question of what he was gaining from hemalurgy. But now we have nicrosil, which seems an even more solid answer, assuming he actually used it.

So can any Nicrosil ferring Twinborn store and tap their allomancy to become a Lord Ruler level Misting in moments of dire need? I feel like the MAG is going to have a hell of a time figuring out what "tapping large quantities" of allomantically strength does for each metal. What does super-boosted Allomantic nicrosil do?

....Oh. Actually, that's pretty scary. And now I really want to play a Nicrosil Compounder using our newly understood function of Nicrosil. Utterly insane ramifications. And maybe you could even store some of the nicrosil to control the collateral damage when using it offensively. It would be like using a nicroburst on The Lord Ruler. (Well, actually, it would be like getting a Nicroburst from The Lord Ruler, which would probably amount to something similar.) (Okay, but how about compounded Allomantic chromium?)

When you store allomancy, do you store "time as an allomancer"? Because that feels pretty cheap phrased that way- you can just be storing any time you're not actively using your allomancy. Of course, that's a concern for the MAG- the game needs some measure of balance, in theory, but the novels have no obligation to arbitrary balancing rules so long as its own internally consistent rules make sense. It doesn't seem to make much sense to me that you'd store allomancy while burning metals to get the effect, since what would be the equivalent for feruchemy?

Heavily invested metal is harder for an allomancer to push on, and makes thinner lines, as if it's a weaker anchor. You can overcome that by tapping weight, but I'm guessing if it's so invested (or so thoroughly blocked by blood) that you can't see it with ironsights at all, increasing weight doesn't help you. Increasing your weight gives you more physical force to exert with steel and iron, but actually doing things like seeing trace metals, seeing metal and souls as glowing investiture and such is definitely a factor of increasing your allomantic strength, not just your mechanical force.

I've always felt like the idea that feruchemists are limited by their "power" as to how much they can store and tap was just an arbitrary restriction imposed by the MAG for game balance. Now I'm wondering if the need for large bracers as a practical rather than personal consideration is as well. But there needs to be *something* separating a strong feruchemist from a hemalurgic feruchemist with weakened power, doesn't there? It definitely struck me that all the Lord Ruler's power could be held in a little spearhead, when normal ferring said are seen wearing bracers.