Wasteful creation of Inquisitors

[Ciridae]

So when making new Inquisitors Seeker mistings, like Marsh, were preferred by the Steel Ministry as they can pierce copperclouds after gaining additional spikes to find skaa mistings. Most Inquisitors are also able to burn Atium, meaning that a full Mistborn was killed for that single spike. I've always felt that this was extremely wasteful. In the days of the Lord Ruler it made a certain amount of sense. He would have only wanted truly dedicated people to become Inquisitors and probably didn't want to pick Mistborn of uncertain loyalty and religious conviction out of the nobility. He still would have had to find and kill the Mistborn for each of the Atium spikes though. 

But as soon as Ruin is free, we see that Marsh and the other Inquisitors are buffed up with more spikes, some with Feruchemichal abilities after attacking the Terris villages. But as soon as you have more than four spikes Ruin has a pretty strong grip of you, so why didn't he just take preexisting Mistborn and full Feruchemists and buff those up? The argument that hemalurgy is supposed to be ruinous and by using more spikes, ruin killed more people, doesn't hold up. An army of near Fullborn fully under Ruin's control would have been just about unstoppable. We know that Ruin can build things up if it means that he can destroy twice as much in the long run. 

So why didn't he use the Feruchemists and Mistborn instead?  Was it just that he felt it didn't matter and the world was going to end soon anyway?

[Calderis]

I suggest you read the annotations on Brandon's website. There's a ton of extra little information on the world building. 

They obviously preferred to use Mistborn because then everything is a boost. 

Seekers were preferred when they couldn't find enough Mistborn. 

Yomen was not the only Atium misting. It was known of and tested for in the steel Ministry, so not all inquisitors that would have Atium came from Mistborn, and not all inquisitors had atium. 

Feruchemists... Due to the secretive nature of the Synod and TLR policies towards the Terris, I'm guessing that these were both hard to find, the main portion inquisitor spikes, and ridiculously wasteful, as every feruchemist was a full feruchemist from whom only one power could be taken. 

Edited July 19, 2017 by Calderis

[+hwiles]

TLR didn't want to use feruchemists for his inquisitors because they would've been far too powerful.  He let the inquisitors recruit their own new members, meaning Ruin got to influence the decision, and Ruin wanted people who were susceptible to his manipulations; he didn't care about their power since, for the first 1024 years of his plans, even a bad inquisitor was needlessly powerful.  During the last year of his plan, Ruin seems to have just not cared about the waste.  From the second he got free, right up until the very last second before he died, it was absolutely clear to him that he was going to win by overwhelming force.

Even Vin's ascension didn't put much of a damper on his plans.  Alongside Ruin's work on the volcanoes, his crumby and wasteful inquisitors were sufficient to nearly extinct all mistborn, mistings, feruchemists, and indeed, humanity at large in just a few months...Making the inquisitors stronger probably wouldn't have improved his ability to fulfill or accelerate his plans in any meaningful way.  Sure, he may have found the atium quicker, but once he destroyed the planet, sifting through the ashes to find the atium probably would've been relatively simple, even if it took a while.

It's like why, if two countries go to war and one side gains a clear advantage, they don't immediately deploy all of their remaining forces or start arming their women and children and rushing the battlefield.  They already know they're going to win, going through unnecessary trouble to further overwhelm their opponent is pointless.

[Ciridae]

7 hours ago, Calderis said:

I suggest you read the annotations on Brandon's website. There's a ton of extra little information on the world building. 

That might be a good idea, I've only read the Warbreaker annotations so far.

3 hours ago, hwiles said:

TLR didn't want to use feruchemists for his inquisitors because they would've been far too powerful.

I didn't mean TLR would, maybe that was poor phrasing on my part, sorry. Just wondering about why Ruin didn't.

3 hours ago, hwiles said:

They already know they're going to win, going through unnecessary trouble to further overwhelm their opponent is pointless.

The thing is, he did go through the trouble of finding all the Feruchemists and buffing the already powerful Inquisitors. But I guess you're right and it doesn't really matter in the end.

[cometaryorbit]

On 7/19/2017 at 3:54 PM, Ciridae said:

I didn't mean TLR would, maybe that was poor phrasing on my part, sorry. Just wondering about why Ruin didn't.

By the time Ruin was directing things, I'm not sure there were any Feruchemists left (except Sazed). The Terris refugees talk about Inquisitors attacking the Synod late in Well of Ascension, before Ruin is released. Ruin was able to mess with Marsh and Zane while imprisoned, but I don't know that he was really controlling the Inquisitors as a whole yet.

[cometaryorbit]

On 7/19/2017 at 8:10 AM, Calderis said:

Yomen was not the only Atium misting. It was known of and tested for in the steel Ministry, so not all inquisitors that would have Atium came from Mistborn, and not all inquisitors had atium.

I always wondered about that last bit. Wasn't that a major risk to take in terms of preserving their mystique/image of invulnerability, given that they might end up fighting a Mistborn with Atium?

But then TLR did a bunch of stupid things, probably because he was at least half crazy most of the time. (spoiler for length)

Spoiler

Like letting the nobility have aluminum. It would be pretty easy for a noble Coinshot/Lurcher to find out that it's Allomantically inert... given the 'Feruchemical gold doesn't heal with aluminum in the wound' thing, aluminum weapons become Inquisitor killers, and conceivably could kill TLR himself -- that would require a ton of luck, but if you plan to live forever even small risks add up...)

Like keeping his atiumminds on the outside of his body, where someone could figure out what they were. Sure, he couldn't expect anyone to have Vin's Shard-boosted Allomantic strength to Pull them away from him - but someone could cut off his arms. With Feruchemical electrum to keep from fainting and Feruchemical gold to avoid bleeding to death, he could just do surgery on himself and hide the atiumminds.

I never understood why he bothered to create Hemalurgic creatures at all (Ruin messing with him, I guess, but he designed them at the Well... had Ruin already gotten to him?) Sure, there was the whole kandra double agents thing, but that was a plan to resolve a problem that wouldn't have existed if there were no Hemalurgic creatures for Ruin to use in the first place. He didn't need koloss to conquer the world, really.

 

[+hwiles]

6 hours ago, cometaryorbit said:

I always wondered about that last bit. Wasn't that a major risk to take in terms of preserving their mystique/image of invulnerability, given that they might end up fighting a Mistborn with Atium?

But then TLR did a bunch of stupid things, probably because he was at least half crazy most of the time. (spoiler for length)

  Reveal hidden contents

Like letting the nobility have aluminum. It would be pretty easy for a noble Coinshot/Lurcher to find out that it's Allomantically inert... given the 'Feruchemical gold doesn't heal with aluminum in the wound' thing, aluminum weapons become Inquisitor killers, and conceivably could kill TLR himself -- that would require a ton of luck, but if you plan to live forever even small risks add up...)

Like keeping his atiumminds on the outside of his body, where someone could figure out what they were. Sure, he couldn't expect anyone to have Vin's Shard-boosted Allomantic strength to Pull them away from him - but someone could cut off his arms. With Feruchemical electrum to keep from fainting and Feruchemical gold to avoid bleeding to death, he could just do surgery on himself and hide the atiumminds.

I never understood why he bothered to create Hemalurgic creatures at all (Ruin messing with him, I guess, but he designed them at the Well... had Ruin already gotten to him?) Sure, there was the whole kandra double agents thing, but that was a plan to resolve a problem that wouldn't have existed if there were no Hemalurgic creatures for Ruin to use in the first place. He didn't need koloss to conquer the world, really.

 

He needed the Koloss to maintain hold of his empire. He wasn't a competent and benevolent enough ruler to maintain peace and security through loyalty and a perception of shared goals, and he didn't want to spend all of his time traveling the continent and killing rebel armies by himself. He couldn't rely soley on human armies, because they could turn on him and would require insane amounts of upkeep. So he made an army of monsters that could digest dirt and rocks...

[Nathrangking]

In terms of numbers it simply was more practical to add little bits to your army over trying to find new ones to use. Remember he could not create new mistborn or mistings as a result he had to work with what he had.

[Daydam]

On 21/07/2017 at 6:34 AM, cometaryorbit said:

By the time Ruin was directing things, I'm not sure there were any Feruchemists left (except Sazed). The Terris refugees talk about Inquisitors attacking the Synod late in Well of Ascension, before Ruin is released. Ruin was able to mess with Marsh and Zane while imprisoned, but I don't know that he was really controlling the Inquisitors as a whole yet.

Actually, I'm pretty sure that the attack was directed by Ruin. Marsh attacked Sazed under his influence before Vin released him, and the other Inquisitors wouldn't be much harder to control. True, Ruin had a better grip on them after being released, but he could have easily controlled them to go attack the Terris and harvest their powers. The main piece of evidence of Ruin's slightly less powerful control of the Inquisitors is the fact that Marsh stopped Sazed and attacked him, but he still apologized and, unlike in HoA, he wasn't enjoying his own actions.

[Daydam]

On 21/07/2017 at 6:44 AM, cometaryorbit said:

I always wondered about that last bit. Wasn't that a major risk to take in terms of preserving their mystique/image of invulnerability, given that they might end up fighting a Mistborn with Atium?

But then TLR did a bunch of stupid things, probably because he was at least half crazy most of the time. (spoiler for length)

  Hide contents

Like letting the nobility have aluminum. It would be pretty easy for a noble Coinshot/Lurcher to find out that it's Allomantically inert... given the 'Feruchemical gold doesn't heal with aluminum in the wound' thing, aluminum weapons become Inquisitor killers, and conceivably could kill TLR himself -- that would require a ton of luck, but if you plan to live forever even small risks add up...)

Like keeping his atiumminds on the outside of his body, where someone could figure out what they were. Sure, he couldn't expect anyone to have Vin's Shard-boosted Allomantic strength to Pull them away from him - but someone could cut off his arms. With Feruchemical electrum to keep from fainting and Feruchemical gold to avoid bleeding to death, he could just do surgery on himself and hide the atiumminds.

I never understood why he bothered to create Hemalurgic creatures at all (Ruin messing with him, I guess, but he designed them at the Well... had Ruin already gotten to him?) Sure, there was the whole kandra double agents thing, but that was a plan to resolve a problem that wouldn't have existed if there were no Hemalurgic creatures for Ruin to use in the first place. He didn't need koloss to conquer the world, really.

 

I think TLR kept his bracers visible as a way of telling others "I have the power, and I have the riches you seek". After all, who would dare to attack him? He was seen as a god, and every single person who tried to oppose him was executed. His power was far beyond anyone else's.

Spoiler ahead:

  Hide contents

Besides, little is known about Feruchemy in the Final Empire. I don't think even Sazed knew of atium's feruchemical properties. So, the only real reason to steal TLR's atiumminds would be simply to get the atium, and it would be an enormous and stupid risk. Stealing from one of the Houses would've been much easier and safer. Even Vin, having realised who TLR really was and how he got his powers, didn't exactly know what the atiumminds did to him. She just saw them piercing his skin and realised how important they were to him.

Edited July 29, 2017 by Daydam

[The One Who Connects]

On 7/21/2017 at 4:44 AM, cometaryorbit said:

I always wondered about that last bit. Wasn't that a major risk to take in terms of preserving their mystique/image of invulnerability, given that they might end up fighting a Mistborn with Atium?

But then TLR did a bunch of stupid things, probably because he was at least half crazy most of the time. (spoiler for length)

  Hide contents

Like letting the nobility have aluminum. It would be pretty easy for a noble Coinshot/Lurcher to find out that it's Allomantically inert... given the 'Feruchemical gold doesn't heal with aluminum in the wound' thing, aluminum weapons become Inquisitor killers, and conceivably could kill TLR himself -- that would require a ton of luck, but if you plan to live forever even small risks add up...)

Like keeping his atiumminds on the outside of his body, where someone could figure out what they were. Sure, he couldn't expect anyone to have Vin's Shard-boosted Allomantic strength to Pull them away from him - but someone could cut off his arms. With Feruchemical electrum to keep from fainting and Feruchemical gold to avoid bleeding to death, he could just do surgery on himself and hide the atiumminds.

I never understood why he bothered to create Hemalurgic creatures at all (Ruin messing with him, I guess, but he designed them at the Well... had Ruin already gotten to him?) Sure, there was the whole kandra double agents thing, but that was a plan to resolve a problem that wouldn't have existed if there were no Hemalurgic creatures for Ruin to use in the first place. He didn't need koloss to conquer the world, really.

The Nobility didn't have Aluminum. From the Annotations:

Quote

Allomantic Secrets

Some people have asked me why the Lord Ruler was so careful to keep secrets about Allomancy. What would it have mattered if he let out that there were atium Mistings?

Some of the secrets offered a sizable tactical advantage. Keeping back duralumin and aluminum gave him and his Inquisitors (the only ones told about those metals, other than a few select obligators) tools that nobody knew about.

As for killing TLR with Aluminum weapons.. not really. He walked up to Kelsier with two spears impaled into his chest. The wound didn't heal around them, and it wouldn't really heal any differently than it would if they were aluminum. It healed up to the spears, but they were still there, blocking the wound from fully healing. Besides, the man has been beheaded before and lived. I see no reason why he couldn't just remove the offending limb that has aluminum soaking up his healing and move on. If it's in his chest, he can use F-Steel and A/F-Pewter to rectify the situation pretty quickly.

Daydam also makes a good point about Feruchemy being more obscure, so the "in the wound doesn't heal" logic isn't known. That said, they would still use them for their lack of push/pull, but when he can push you away via the metal in your blood, nobody can really hold him down. Heck, unless you catch him outside, he could tap F-Iron for weight, and steelpush you into a wall(shatter bones on the impact like Vin did, maybe even kill you if you get slammed hard enough into stone pillars). Your weapons might be push-proof, but you aren't when dealing with TLR. And that's something that nobody could learn without going against him to test it.

Regarding where he hid his Atiumminds, Daydam is right. It's a display of power, like his plethora of rings and bracelets. Yet another thing exemplifying his utter lack of fear in the face of potential dangers. @Daydam Sazed does know what F-Atium does. He mentions it to Vin at some point in TFE(something about not too useful beyond disguising your age here and there).

Getting back on topic, TLR had a Bracer on each arm, so unless they cut both of them off at once, he'd be fine. Ok, maybe not fine, but he'd live, and F-Gold with F-Steel rectifies the lack of an arm right quick. Regarding your surgery idea, I don't think it'd work. He'd have to not heal in order to have an open area to put the bracers in, because F-Gold would prevent him from opening his skin long enough before it closed itself. Which makes we wonder, if he saw them coming, would preemptively tapping F-Gold prevent the limb from actually being severed to begin with? Miles doesn't end up in scattered pieces when holding exploding dynamite after all..

Ruin whispered to TLR about Kandra, Koloss, and Inquisitors while TLR was using the Well. It's one of the reasons why TLR had made no further progress with Hemalurgy in the following millennium: Ruin wasn't being helpful anymore.

• Kandra were the double-agent plan, so that's their validation.
• As for Koloss, you are right that TLR could conquer the planet by himself, but that'd take far, far longer than the Koloss method, not to mention Koloss keep the people in line while he conquers some other kingdom. Like the Lerasium beads, the Koloss hordes could have been a "gift" to the kings that supported him, to supplement their forces in controlling captured territory. And to destroy said kings if they betrayed him, but that's basic insurance.
• Inquisitors were his Mistborn equivalent, ones that he could ensure the loyalty of through spike control somehow(which is what prevented Ruin from directly controlling them for all those years too, TLR kept them on too tight a leash for Ruin to get to them). A crack team of supernatural bodyguards and enforcers goes a long way towards enhancing divine reputation, political control, and much more.

While they may seem like stupid decisions, many of his actions are practical and understandable when you think about them.

[Daydam]

4 minutes ago, The One Who Connects said:

@Daydam Sazed does know what F-Atium does. He mentions it to Vin at some point in TFE(something about not too useful beyond disguising your age here and there).

I had completely forgotten about that.

5 minutes ago, The One Who Connects said:

Which makes we wonder, if he saw them coming, would preemptively tapping F-Gold prevent the limb from actually being severed to begin with?

I think you're right. Not only Miles didn't get scattered all over the place when he held the dynamite, but earlier in the book (when Push and Pull are introduced) he jumps down and breaks his legs, but they heal so fast it seems like he didn't even get hurt. I think it would be the same for TLR.

[Nathrangking]

These decisions were also a bit about pride I think. TLR was ...

Spoiler

quite proud as was shown in TFE and SH. All of that power would have gotten to him immediately despite the danger of Ruin he probably thought that he would always best ruin and as such doing these things would not only display his power, but would arrogantly spit in ruin's face as if to say that " I'm superior to you a god".

 

[Kingsdaughter613]

The arm bracers couldn't be visible - they had to be against his skin and he wore a coat. 

[cometaryorbit]

On 7/31/2017 at 3:38 PM, The One Who Connects said:

The Nobility didn't have Aluminum

Yes they did - Vin's metallurgist in WOA gets the aluminum to make duralumin (and the other alloys they experiment with) from noble silverware. What TLR/the Ministry kept secret was the knowledge that it was an Allomantic metal.

 

 

On 7/31/2017 at 3:38 PM, The One Who Connects said:

 Besides, the man has been beheaded before and lived. I see no reason why he couldn't just remove the offending limb that has aluminum soaking up his healing and move on. If it's in his chest, he can use F-Steel and A/F-Pewter to rectify the situation pretty quickly.

Was TLR actually completely beheaded (as opposed to having most of his neck cut through, but not completely separated from the body)? I'd think that would separate his brain from his goldminds, so he wouldn't be able to heal... or would the soul stay with the body, so he'd grow a new head? That would only work if he was already tapping or Compounding-burning gold at the time, though.

Either way, though, an aluminum weapon could kill him by damaging his brain sufficiently that he couldn't heal - even an already-operating gold healing couldn't fix it as long as the weapon stayed there. It would be really tricky to arrange without guns, though, since aluminum isn't hard enough to make arrowheads that could pierce a skull -- the best bet would probably be something like a warhammer with a spike/military pick.

 

On 7/31/2017 at 3:38 PM, The One Who Connects said:

but when he can push you away via the metal in your blood, nobody can really hold him down.

A minor point, but I think he pushes on the metals in Vin's stomach, not the iron in her blood - I doubt even TLR could manage that, especially as iron in blood etc. aren't actually in metallic form, and you can't Push on rocks - limestone is calcium carbonate etc.

 

Quote

Getting back on topic, TLR had a Bracer on each arm, so unless they cut both of them off at once, he'd be fine

Well, sure, but cutting off two arms at once isn't inconceivable with a large blade and pewter-boosted strength - Vin cut Straff in two, which is probably a lot harder than cutting just the arms.

All these things are pretty low-probability, but if you expect to live forever you have to watch out for the low-probability things too.

 

Quote

Regarding your surgery idea, I don't think it'd work. He'd have to not heal in order to have an open area to put the bracers in, because F-Gold would prevent him from opening his skin long enough before it closed itself.

Yeah, that's why I included the F-Electrum to not faint. He'd cut himself open without tapping Gold (but while tapping massive Electrum), stick the atiummind into his body cavity, then tap massive Gold to heal the wound.

Quote

Which makes we wonder, if he saw them coming, would preemptively tapping F-Gold prevent the limb from actually being severed to begin with?

 

I think yes, if the healing rate was sufficient to keep up with the cutting rate.
 

Quote

 

As for Koloss, you are right that TLR could conquer the planet by himself, but that'd take far, far longer than the Koloss method,

 

Not if he did it intelligently - all TLR has to do is demonstrate his power to the existing leaders and once they're convinced that they personally won't survive unless they do what TLR wants, he can leave the existing infrastructure in place (and if any don't fall in line, he kills them and tries again with their successor). No need to actually fight armies.

I don't think creating vast armies of beings easily controlled by Ruin was a good tradeoff for being able to take direct control immediately (especially since - being immortal - he could slowly change those existing systems over centuries, probably without people even realizing what was happening). He was just impatient.

Quote

Inquisitors were his Mistborn equivalent, ones that he could ensure the loyalty of through spike control somehow(which is what prevented Ruin from directly controlling them for all those years too, TLR kept them on too tight a leash for Ruin to get to them). A crack team of supernatural bodyguards and enforcers goes a long way towards enhancing divine reputation, political control, and much more.

While that's all true, it still seems like a poor tradeoff to me - TLR considered the possibility that he would die (as shown by those plates in the storage caverns), at which point the Inquisitors become extremely powerful agents for Ruin.

I think TLR really didn't know what he was doing, though. When he took power, he was young, driven by anger, and with absolutely no experience in governing anything; and I think Ruin's influence kept him from learning as much from experience as he could/should have.

But IMO he was a fairly mean person even without Ruin's influence; he can't have been that touched by Ruin right at the beginning (the HOA epigraphs even say that his actions holding the power show Preservation's influence), and a decent person wouldn't have turned most of the world's Feruchemists into mindless blobs to avoid something that might be a threat to him centuries down the line.

Edited August 2, 2017 by cometaryorbit
posted too early; replied to the rest

[Calderis]

7 minutes ago, cometaryorbit said:

Was TLR actually completely beheaded (as opposed to having most of his neck cut through, but not completely separated from the body)? I'd think that would separate his brain from his goldminds, so he wouldn't be able to heal... or would the soul stay with the body, so he'd grow a new head? That would only work if he was already tapping or Compounding-burning gold at the time, though.

He would grow a new head. 

Spoilered for length. 

Spoiler

http://www.theoryland.com/intvmain.php?i=944#6

SORONIR (FEBRUARY 2013)

I love how many authors we get on this subreddit, it's amazing. Not sure if you meant this forum or not but it's still cool. I hope I see Brandon Sanderson one of these days, I have a stupid question for him.

BRANDON SANDERSON

Shoot.

I've been terrible about my reddit pms lately. Better to ask here.

SORONIR

About Miles from Alloy of Law and his regenerative powers. If he was bisected down the middle and the halves were separated immediately before the healing process could begin, would the two halves each regrow into a whole Miles?

BRANDON SANDERSON

Good question. In all of the Cosmere's Shard-based magics, the greater portion of a bisected body regrows the lesser portion. If it were done EXACTLY halfway, the soul wold jump to one or the other randomly and that would regrow.

Amusingly, this first came up in 1999, six years before I got published. (I see someone else already mentioned the situation where I had to consider it.)

HALO6819

As little add—on Sanderson has stated that at its core, Shard-based healing is about restoring the person back to themselves. So someone who wears glasses and gets shot and healed, will still need glasses as that is how they (or their soul) sees themself. I assume this would happen in more extreme cases too, some one who had a limb amputated at birth gets healed at another time, the limb will not be restored because they see themself as an amputee, even if it is within the magic's ability to restore limbs to some one who recently lost one.

PHANTINE

So... wait a sec, the Lord Ruler got decapitated at one point...

What did he do with the severed head? Mount it on the wall?

BRANDON SANDERSON

PHANTINE

He mounted it SIDEWAYS?

PHANTINE

Actually, this is kind of a sillier followup to a silly question, but could you use Forgery to say 'actually, this half had 51% instead of 49%' and temporarily clone Miles?

BRANDON SANDERSON

Boy. That's a can of worms, right there...

Quote

A minor point, but I think he pushes on the metals in Vin's stomach, not the iron in her blood - I doubt even TLR could manage that, especially as iron in blood etc. aren't actually in metallic form, and you can't Push on rocks - limestone is calcium carbonate etc.

Wax using the bands counters this. He was able to push on the trace metals in the ground that he normally couldn't detect. The body should be no different. 

Edited August 2, 2017 by Calderis

[cometaryorbit]

15 minutes ago, Calderis said:

He would grow a new head.

 

Probably... I remembered the 'half Miles' WOB, but thought it might be a slightly different situation since each half would have half his brain, while in a decapitation, the larger portion would have zero brain. And Brandon didn't directly reply to the TLR part.

Quote

Wax using the bands counters this. He was able to push on the trace metals in the ground that he normally couldn't detect. The body should be no different. 

Well, TLR did specifically push on the metals in Vin's stomach (it describes "It felt like a Steelpush, slamming against the metals inside her stomach" and "the metals in her stomach threatening to rip free from her body"). Maybe he could push on the metals inside somebody's blood, but I kind of doubt it -- the Bands at full "draw" are probably more powerful than even TLR was (he wasn't emitting mist) and trace metals in the ground might be traces of actual metal while the iron in blood is part of a protein, therefore non-metallic. I don't think the metal that is part of the chemical formula of the stone could be described as "trace" - it's a significant portion of the total mass.

[18th Shard]

I think TLR if he was actually trying is as powerful as the bands - you have to remember, when he's fighting Vin, he's really not trying. otherwise, boosted steel and compounded iron and he could rip her to shreds without moving a muscle.

[Calderis]

1 hour ago, 18th Shard said:

I think TLR if he was actually trying is as powerful as the bands - you have to remember, when he's fighting Vin, he's really not trying. otherwise, boosted steel and compounded iron and he could rip her to shreds without moving a muscle.

He wouldn't have even had to bother with that. Compounded steel speed and he could have casually killed her before she knew he'd moved. He was overconfident, and he was right to be. If Vin hadn't been able to draw on the mists in that moment he'd have lived. 

@cometaryorbit not sure why I didn't see your response here until now, but yeah, I think your right that Wax with the bands was even stronger than TLR. I shouldn't have tried to make that connection. 

 

[The One Who Connects]

Of all things to pull me back on here... And of course it's a think-piece too. Anyway, enjoy.

On 8/2/2017 at 0:15 AM, cometaryorbit said:

A minor point, but I think he pushes on the metals in Vin's stomach, not the iron in her blood - I doubt even TLR could manage that, especially as iron in blood etc. aren't actually in metallic form, and you can't Push on rocks - limestone is calcium carbonate etc.

On 8/2/2017 at 0:46 AM, cometaryorbit said:

TLR did specifically push on the metals in Vin's stomach

You appear to be technically incorrect. Here's Dyring correcting me on the subject:

On 3/7/2017 at 1:10 PM, The One Who Connects said:

On 3/7/2017 at 1:05 PM, dyring said:

He pretty much does it to Vin in the end of Final empire, to a lesser degree. Probably just regular push there thou.

"pushing the metals in her stomach and in her body, threatening to crush her back against the pillar"

But its really unimportant. The speed is the killer, he never bothered to use that much, to much Ennui I guess.

guess I remembered the wrong line. Figured the "in her body" that she used at a later point was referring to the metals in her stomach.
Actually, given that he had enough strength to push Vin, rattle the doorframe, and push pieces of his stained glass window.. It's the glass that makes me think he might know he can do that, since he can assume metal door hinges and Vin's metal reserves, but no such shortcut for the glass.

---

On 8/2/2017 at 0:15 AM, cometaryorbit said:

Was TLR actually completely beheaded (as opposed to having most of his neck cut through, but not completely separated from the body)? I'd think that would separate his brain from his goldminds, so he wouldn't be able to heal... or would the soul stay with the body, so he'd grow a new head? That would only work if he was already tapping or Compounding-burning gold at the time, though.

Spoilers for Liar of Partinel(I believe, this is operating from memory of someone else's post centuries ago)

Spoiler

Hoid apparently got beheaded at one point. Body grew a new head, much to his surprise. He thought it'd be "head regrowing body" since, you know.. brain and all.

Actually, you can ignore the LoP spoiler, I have a WoB on surviving decapitation. Here

Quote

[–]Logic_Nuke 6 points 1 year ago 

I heard you were still answering questions, so:

1. Could decapitation kill a Gold Compounder? With a guillotine, for example?

[–]mistborn[S] 10 points 1 year ago 

1. Most forms of extreme cosmere healing don't care much what is done to the physical body, as the person's spiritual template is in power at the time.

On a semantics level, the man with the godly reputation admitted to having been beheaded, burned and even flayed by mere mortals. I don't think he's lying about it, and I don't think an head chop counts as "beheading" if a head doesn't roll.

On 8/2/2017 at 0:15 AM, cometaryorbit said:

Either way, though, an aluminum weapon could kill him by damaging his brain sufficiently that he couldn't heal - even an already-operating gold healing couldn't fix it as long as the weapon stayed there.

As previously stated, he can remove the offending limb(in this case, head) that is soaking up his healing via impaled aluminum. However, you make me wonder... You stated that "it might be a slightly different situation since each half would have half his brain." If Miles could heal even with a bisected brain, would having a spear impaled through it be that different? Yes it's aluminum, but it's something to think about.

On 8/2/2017 at 0:15 AM, cometaryorbit said:

Not if he did it intelligently - all TLR has to do is demonstrate his power to the existing leaders and once they're convinced that they personally won't survive unless they do what TLR wants, he can leave the existing infrastructure in place (and if any don't fall in line, he kills them and tries again with their successor). No need to actually fight armies.

I don't think creating vast armies of beings easily controlled by Ruin was a good tradeoff for being able to take direct control immediately (especially since - being immortal - he could slowly change those existing systems over centuries, probably without people even realizing what was happening). He was just impatient.

While true, it depends on when TLR started the Final Empire Project. If that plan was conceived while he was still at the Well, then leaving the existing infrastructure was never an option in his mind. I'll give you the impatient line, given his aggressive timetable when it came to world domination. However, there's still some things to argue.

If they don't fall in line, TLR is gonna be fighting armies. Consider: He just waltzes into your throne room and threatens your life and liberty, insulting/humiliating your kingly reputation, even making demands about how things are gonna be run in the future of your kingdom. He has no powerbase for you to topple beneath him, no people to threaten/enslave, no holdings to seize. Not to mention that he's imbued with the power of the gods. I can't imagine them sending anything less than an army to kill him off, especially if he does something... dramatic to prove his godly stature and powers.

Sending an army against someone like that is not overkill, it's justifiable fear. The shattered remnants of that army either comes back as TLR's pawns, or they come back in a bag. With Koloss, it's yet another layer of fear to prevent insurrection, an army that he and only he(for a while) can control, and an occupying force that has guaranteed loyalties. Sure, the tattered remains of the army used against him probably follow out of fear, but fear breeds resent and rebellion. I see it as a good trade-off compared to going it alone and "trusting" foreign kings that he threatened to their face. Wounded pride turns even the greatest of leaders into mere children who don't think. Granted, we know that TLR kept Inquisitors on too tight of a leash(somehow) for Ruin to actually take control of them, so he may have thought he could do this with Koloss as well, making it 4-1 in favor of Koloss in his mind.

On 8/2/2017 at 0:15 AM, cometaryorbit said:

While that's all true, it still seems like a poor tradeoff to me - TLR considered the possibility that he would die (as shown by those plates in the storage caverns), at which point the Inquisitors become extremely powerful agents for Ruin.

You are right, but you also have to consider that TLR eventually reached a point where he started to believe in his own immortality. Blind faith to the point of stupidity, so he isn't without fault here either, but we don't know if he started making inquisitors right at the beginning do we? (Genuinely curious about this one) He could have started/expanded the Inquisitorius much later on, after he stopped believing he could actually die. At that point, the threat is considerably lessened in his mind, even if it isn't actually any safer.

There is also the mystical control he had over them, preventing Ruin from taking over. I wouldn't put it past him to think he could physically control them like Kandra/Koloss and have them remove their own linchpin spikes. A TLR level Soothing Savant with Duralumin is a scary prospect, and I genuinely think he could do it. It's more foolish blind faith, but when you're powerful enough to prevent a god(a weakened one, granted) from possessing people, I think a little overconfidence is warranted. It's not smart, but I can't blame him for it.

On 8/2/2017 at 0:15 AM, cometaryorbit said:

I think TLR really didn't know what he was doing, though. When he took power, he was young, driven by anger, and with absolutely no experience in governing anything; and I think Ruin's influence kept him from learning as much from experience as he could/should have.

Ruin definitely stunted some aspects of his learning, but the best teacher is experience, and Ruin can't prevent that. Not to mention that he likely gained all manner of knowledge when his mind was expanded by the power of the Well. He understood the usefulness of having allies, hence gifting the Lerasium beads to the kings that supported him.

The Koloss(and possibly Inquisitors) come in handy when it was time to make those 'allies' bend the knee so he can be Lord Ruler rather than Coalition Leader. I admit he could've avoided needing the Koloss if he won over his allies armies, but by that point, he had already made the Koloss so the point is moot.

Edited August 28, 2017 by The One Who Connects