Problems with Nicrosil

[trav]

1 hour ago, Dunkum said:

three: Aluminum, Nicrosil, and whatever you want to grant.  they need aluminum to drop identity, Nicrosil to be able to store an ability in the first place, and the ability in question in order to be able to store it - though techinically the third could be allomancy instead of ferruchemy.

I am unsure if the one that fills the unkeyed metalmind has to be the same person that also unseals it. the nicrosil mind and then other mind can come from 2 differnt persons imo.

making a unkeyed metalmind requires 1 spike (or a full feruchemist). what the nicrosil mind requires to unseal it, we don't yet know.

but since you would require the ability to tap the respective unkeyed mind you are most likely right.

 

the actual conundrum remains.

how would anyone without nicrosil feruchemy be able to tap the powers from the nicrosil mind to gain access to the other metalmind?

 

EDIT: should probably have said "at least 1 spike". twinborn exist so 1 can be enough.

Edited August 27, 2020 by trav

[Dunkum]

21 minutes ago, trav said:

I am unsure if the one that fills the unkeyed metalmind has to be the same person that also unseals it. the nicrosil mind and then other mind can come from 2 differnt persons imo.

making a unkeyed metalmind requires 1 spike (or a full feruchemist). what the nicrosil mind requires to unseal it, we don't yet know.

but since you would require the ability to tap the respective unkeyed mind you are most likely right.

 

the actual conundrum remains.

how would anyone without nicrosil feruchemy be able to tap the powers from the nicrosil mind to gain access to the other metalmind?

 

EDIT: should probably have said "at least 1 spike". twinborn exist so 1 can be enough.

good point, you might be right on that.  ostensibly they could be tapping an unsealed nicrosilmind to get the nicrosil ferruchemy needed to store the other attribute.

[Halyo_Alex]

9 hours ago, Dunkum said:

good point, you might be right on that.  ostensibly they could be tapping an unsealed nicrosilmind to get the nicrosil ferruchemy needed to store the other attribute.

How would you tap unsealed nicrosil to get nicrosil feruchemy if you don't have nicrosil feruchemy?

That's why I think the Nicrosil in a Medallion contains an unkeyed, Hemalurgic charge of the ability.

[Dunkum]

2 hours ago, Halyo_Alex said:

How would you tap unsealed nicrosil to get nicrosil feruchemy if you don't have nicrosil feruchemy?

That's why I think the Nicrosil in a Medallion contains an unkeyed, Hemalurgic charge of the ability.

thats what an unsealed metlamind is - one that doesn't require you to already have that ability in order to use it.

[Halyo_Alex]

1 hour ago, Dunkum said:

thats what an unsealed metlamind is - one that doesn't require you to already have that ability in order to use it.

And you're agreeing that, therefore, the Nicrosil metal part of a Medallion is filled with an  Unkeyed Hemalurgic Charge of the Feruchemical power of the other metals in the Medallion?

[StanLemon]

4 hours ago, Halyo_Alex said:

How would you tap unsealed nicrosil to get nicrosil feruchemy if you don't have nicrosil feruchemy?

Potentially the Nicrosilmind if unkeyed can be tapped by anyone. Which frankly makes sense otherwise a Nicrosil Ferring would never be able to regain their Stored ability

4 hours ago, Halyo_Alex said:

That's why I think the Nicrosil in a Medallion contains an unkeyed, Hemalurgic charge of the ability.

The biggest issue I see with this is that by everything we know about Hemalurgy, the Spike would have to be placed into a bind point to work. Even a Kandra Blessing which is about the closest thing to what you propose still needs to be inside the body to work.

[Dunkum]

1 hour ago, Halyo_Alex said:

And you're agreeing that, therefore, the Nicrosil metal part of a Medallion is filled with an  Unkeyed Hemalurgic Charge of the Feruchemical power of the other metals in the Medallion?

no.  I don't think that's how that works, though I have trouble trying to put words to why.  my post was in response to your first question, about how you can tap the metalmind without having nicrosil ferruchemy - that's what an unsealed metalmind is, by definition.  the how is much harder to come by, though im hoping we get more info on it in the next mistborn book.

[Light In the Darkness]

Quote

Questioner

Does creating unsealed metalmind involve Feruchemical duralumin?

Brandon Sanderson

(hesitating)...Yes. I will write it all out for you eventually. I want to get at least one more book done, then you find out exactly why and how.

Questioner

Because I was pretty confused about the Investiture and Spiritweb...

Brandon Sanderson

Here is the reason I'm kind of hesitant of this, [why not you just RAFO this one right now], but it is not a RAFO, because it is like it's a secret. I want to write it out exactly how it happens, because I have it in my notes in bullet points and it's complicated, right? Cause I want some of the things in the magic system as be as complicated as for instance explaining how a computer works right now. You can do it, but you know...I want the magic to start getting that technical if that makes sense. When you say "involve", right, that's a big word. Why just don't you let me, after lost metal...if I haven't released it, you have permission to come to me and say: "Brandon, you said you would release this, you haven't yet [...]" and I will give to you the bullet point flowchart of how you build the unkeyed metalminds.

Leipzig Book Fair (March 24, 2017)

We definitely will eventually get how to make an unsealed metalmind. Now I know I called this thread "Problems with Nicrosil" but I would also love to talk about some possibilities, since we've beaten the problems we started with to death. Per the above WoB, we know we will get that answer eventually, and per another WoB:

Quote

Pagerunner

When you tap the nicrosil portion of a medallion, will it run out over time? Or is it like a coppermind, where something discrete is taken, used, and returned?

Brandon Sanderson

Good question! Like a coppermind.

General Signed Books 2018 (Oct. 15, 2018)

We know that the variable storing is different from what I proposed; the only remaining mystery is how a soulbearer would get their power back after storing it, if F-Nicrosil was their only power. Compounding was suggested, but I think the mechanism is probably something else, and a bit more complex, because else no one would no that non-twinborn ferrings with F-nicrosil existed; they would accidentally store once, maybe, and then they would never use any feruchemy again and likely go undetected. So, since we have all been able to get those out of our system more or less, what are the possibilities and implications here? I believe I read a WoB that said that the investitures could be converted through nicrosil, like stormlight to breath or other forms of investiture. That sounds pretty dangerous to me; think of a Nicrosil compounder, who then converts it all to stormlight and uses it to surgebind; the devastation they could wreak would literally be infinite if they had enough Nicrosil. What other applications could you guys see?

[Raphaborn]

5 hours ago, Light In the Darkness said:

We definitely will eventually get how to make an unsealed metalmind. Now I know I called this thread "Problems with Nicrosil" but I would also love to talk about some possibilities, since we've beaten the problems we started with to death. Per the above WoB, we know we will get that answer eventually, and per another WoB:

We know that the variable storing is different from what I proposed; the only remaining mystery is how a soulbearer would get their power back after storing it, if F-Nicrosil was their only power. Compounding was suggested, but I think the mechanism is probably something else, and a bit more complex, because else no one would no that non-twinborn ferrings with F-nicrosil existed; they would accidentally store once, maybe, and then they would never use any feruchemy again and likely go undetected. So, since we have all been able to get those out of our system more or less, what are the possibilities and implications here? I believe I read a WoB that said that the investitures could be converted through nicrosil, like stormlight to breath or other forms of investiture. That sounds pretty dangerous to me; think of a Nicrosil compounder, who then converts it all to stormlight and uses it to surgebind; the devastation they could wreak would literally be infinite if they had enough Nicrosil. What other applications could you guys see?

One possibility I would like to see would be a sealed but unkeyed nicrosilmind. In that case he could grant powers to only other Soulbearers. It looks a little cheaper, and would guarantee a type of Ferring the ability to be a wildcard.

In addition, I am always curious about what Nicrosil will do at Compouding. Since you burn for Compouding a metalmind with its own Identity, or without an Identity (presumably), a Nicroburst could buy an unkeyed nicrosilmind and use Compouding in it.

[Halyo_Alex]

5 hours ago, Light In the Darkness said:

That sounds pretty dangerous to me; think of a Nicrosil compounder, who then converts it all to stormlight and uses it to surgebind; the devastation they could wreak would literally be infinite if they had enough Nicrosil. What other applications could you guys see?

Coughs in soulcasting

Yyyyeah. If you can Soulcast more Nicrosil than it consumes in this process, you literally have unlimited power. As a Lightweaver, you would be able to make a sound so loud that it shatters the entire planet apart (or at least obliterates anything on the surface)... Or just hyper-intense gamma rays to give everything instant cancer

[Halyo_Alex]

2 hours ago, Njvodin said:

I feel like there's some misunderstandings in this forum, but i may be wrong. Storing something DOESN'T permanently get rid of your ability to store that thing. Think of how Sazed was storing his sight, and used glasses temporarily. After he was done storing, he ditched the glasses. His sight went back to normal. If you store your ability to store, then it only temporarily removes it. Once you stop storing, it comes back. 
Your ability to store is integrated into your Spiritweb, and you can't just tear off parts of your SW with Feruchemy. That's why Hemalurgy is "monstrous" (plus killing people, but sacrifices are necessary). If you store Nicrosil at 50%, then it takes 50% of your ability to store, and then it gives diminishing returns, so it would take quite a while to be able to store a large amount. 50% turns into 25%, turns into 12.5%, so on and so forth.

If you store 100%, then for that split second, it takes your entire ability and shoves it into the metalmind. Then, once it's over, you can keep storing at 100% for small amounts of time. That's the fastest way I can think of, just small bursts.

But anyway, storing your ability to store doesn't get rid of it forever. It doesn't tear off chunks of your SW. That would destroy you, making F-Nicrosil literally useless. And, as we see, it's really useful so yeah that's my take on F-Nicrosil

Except we have WoB that F Nicrosil stores "Like a coppermind", which means it DOES take something and permanently remove it from you, like how copper removes a memory from you.

[Dunkum]

4 hours ago, Halyo_Alex said:

Except we have WoB that F Nicrosil stores "Like a coppermind", which means it DOES take something and permanently remove it from you, like how copper removes a memory from you.

I'd bet that is because of poor question phrasing though.  like a coppermind could mean a variety of different things, and it is possible that Brandon interpreted it differently from that question than you are doing now,  It isin't like he volunteered that apropos of nothing; there may be better comparisons (tinminds possibly) that weren't mentioned by the questioner so weren't part of the answer.

[Halyo_Alex]

10 hours ago, Dunkum said:

I'd bet that is because of poor question phrasing though.  like a coppermind could mean a variety of different things, and it is possible that Brandon interpreted it differently from that question than you are doing now,  It isin't like he volunteered that apropos of nothing; there may be better comparisons (tinminds possibly) that weren't mentioned by the questioner so weren't part of the answer.

Alright, let me grab the actual WoB so you can decide what he meant on your own.

Quote

Pagerunner

When you tap the nicrosil portion of a medallion, will it run out over time? Or is it like a coppermind, where something discrete is taken, used, and returned?

Brandon Sanderson

Good question! Like a coppermind.

General Signed Books 2018 (Oct. 15, 2018)

 

[Dunkum]

3 hours ago, Halyo_Alex said:

Alright, let me grab the actual WoB so you can decide what he meant on your own.

 

I know, I saw it upthread.  Maybe it means what you think, but mentioning copperminds in the question itself is leading.  It is just as possible that asking the question in a more open manner, without making explicit mention of copperminds, would have produced a different example with different implications.  without further clarification beyond "like a coppermind" i'm not inclined to believe that it removes anythign permanently.

[Koloss17]

13 hours ago, Njvodin said:

Think about it logically though, if you store your ability to store, then you're screwed. you can't do anything. there's no point in that, and i don't think Brandon intended it to be that way

Well, ya see, that’s where the whole identity key comes into play! You can tap from things that have your identity stored in them. That is how unsealed metalminds work-or at least part of it.

[Aspiring Writer]

13 hours ago, Njvodin said:

Think about it logically though, if you store your ability to store, then you're screwed. you can't do anything. there's no point in that, and i don't think Brandon intended it to be that way

Not precisely. You act like your ability to store is 1 and you have to put 1 in metal mind to make it work, but none of the traits are like that (Except Atium which breaks lots of rules) Basically, storing is a trait and your putting a little bit in it so you can fill up the mind, like how all feruchemy traits work. 

[Aspiring Writer]

29 minutes ago, Njvodin said:

but if you store something such as sight, that trait goes away for that little while. If you store your ability to hear, then your hearing would be dulled. that, i imagine, would hold true for your ability to store, as with pretty much everything.

Your point being?

[Guest Somebody from Scadrial]

34 minutes ago, Aspiring Writer said:

Your point being?

That you would constantly regain your ability to store as you lose the ability to store so you still can store

[Aspiring Writer]

6 minutes ago, Somebody from Sel said:

That you would constantly regain your ability to store as you lose the ability to store so you still can store

You store half of your ability, you can still store, just less so, so you can fill up the metalmind

[Guest Somebody from Scadrial]

4 minutes ago, Aspiring Writer said:

You store half of your ability, you can still store, just less so, so you can fill up the metalmind

Then you would be storing half your ability to store half your ability to store half your ability to store half your ability so on so forth

[Aspiring Writer]

15 minutes ago, Somebody from Sel said:

Then you would be storing half your ability to store half your ability to store half your ability to store half your ability so on so forth

... I think that rabbit hole just snapped my brain in half.

[Guest Somebody from Scadrial]

4 minutes ago, Aspiring Writer said:

... I think that rabbit hole just snapped my brain in half.

Which made your ability to make your brain snap in half snap your ability to make your brain snap in half snap your ability to make your brain snap in half so on so forth

[Aspiring Writer]

2 minutes ago, Somebody from Sel said:

Which made your ability to make your brain snap in half snap your ability to make your brain snap in half snap your ability to make your brain snap in half so on so forth

Quite, funny. I'll rep you, but I'm out right now. Now, if you excuse me, I am going to reread the coppermind on this a few hundred times.

Edited November 3, 2020 by Aspiring Writer

[Guest Somebody from Scadrial]

Just now, Aspiring Writer said:

Quite, funny. I'll rep you, but I'm out right now. Now, if you excuse me, I am going to reread the coppermind on this a few hundred times.

I'm considering doing it again but I won't

[Dunkum]

7 hours ago, Somebody from Sel said:

Then you would be storing half your ability to store half your ability to store half your ability to store half your ability so on so forth

Scadrian version of Zeno's paradox right here.