Atium Shardblade???

[Bigmikey357 Full Shardbearer]

I was just checking in on the forever thread and saw something that intrigued me, mainly the thought of an Atium Shardblade.  

We all know by now that Atium is a Godmetal, super useful to all the Metallic Arts and hideously expensive because of its rarity.  But let's say someone were to get enough Atium to forge a Sword.  What would its properties be?  And would those properties outweigh the benefits of just burning it?

Here's my thoughts.  If you used it as a Sword only I think it'd be terrible.  I get the impression that it's a soft metal so it's likely to fail against simple steel. It would more than likely stop the soul cut of a Tanavastium style Shardblade and might even be able to take a couple hacks from Nightblood but it would not stop their momentum. That sword breaks in the face of any type of force used against it. Also that Sword, being a part of the Metallic Arts,  can also be effected by the Metallic Arts unless you do the Nightblood thing and carry it in an aluminum sheath. Pull it out against a Mistborn at your peril.

However I don't think it'd be useless altogether if fashioned correctly.  Say instead of a Sword, make it a dagger with said aluminum sheath. I believe that if the user can swing the thing with Intent it has the potential to be a hell of a hazekiller weapon.  If you can bury that pigsticker anywhere into a magic user you snatch all their power in one go, permanently. Even if you cannot take the power for yourself,  simply depriving it from a magical opponent makes them normal. For most magic users, thats synonymous to useless or just plain dead. Then discharge what the knife snatched into whomever you choose later. It would have to be a punch dagger, slashing attacks would not do the trick  IMO. 

I think the perfect use for such a weapon is in the hands of a trained Magic User as a weapon of last resort.  A mistborn has a better use for the metal but a Radiant or Awakener can't burn the stuff anyway.  And you can create a magical ally with it, a controllable one. Cause that ally knows that they only have power as long as you wish it. Pull the dagger,  lose the power and the guy probably dies from the wound to boot.  Anyone else got some opinions of applications of such a weapon? 

[Aspiring Writer Twinborn]

37 minutes ago, Bigmikey357 said:

I get the impression that it's a soft metal so it's likely to fail against simple steel.

What gives you this impression?

 

38 minutes ago, Bigmikey357 said:

Also that Sword, being a part of the Metallic Arts,  can also be effected by the Metallic Arts unless you do the Nightblood thing and carry it in an aluminum sheath. Pull it out against a Mistborn at your peril.

Yeah, Atium can be pushed or pulled because of a mistake BS did. Not sure how it would work with other types of investiture because of this. Someone should ask BS.

[Parzival Pahn Kahl]

I had a theory that to make a more accurate shardblade using the nightblood method, that is awakening a sword using 1000 breaths, you could make the sword out of a godmetal, so it is already special, and then awaken it, and it would essentially be just like radiant shardblades, highly invested swords made of a godmetal.

[CephandriusTW Pahn Kahl]

52 minutes ago, Parzival said:

I had a theory that to make a more accurate shardblade using the nightblood method, that is awakening a sword using 1000 breaths, you could make the sword out of a godmetal, so it is already special, and then awaken it, and it would essentially be just like radiant shardblades, highly invested swords made of a godmetal.

I don't think that would work. God metals are invested so it would be way more difficult to awaken a God Metal Sword than awakening a normal sword.

[Parzival Pahn Kahl]

On 3/29/2021 at 10:31 AM, CephandriusTW said:

I don't think that would work. God metals are invested so it would be way more difficult to awaken a God Metal Sword than awakening a normal sword.

It would be harder, but the investiture in the god metal isn't actively fighting agianst the awakening so I still think it would be possible, tho it may take an awakener of the same level as the God King to accomplish it

[Thaidakar the Ghostblood Voidbringer]

On 3/29/2021 at 9:38 AM, Parzival said:

I had a theory that to make a more accurate shardblade using the nightblood method, that is awakening a sword using 1000 breaths, you could make the sword out of a godmetal, so it is already special, and then awaken it, and it would essentially be just like radiant shardblades, highly invested swords made of a godmetal.

well since Shardblades, are god metals this theory is good. also what if Nightblood is made of Endowment's god metal.

[Aspiring Writer Twinborn]

11 minutes ago, Thaidakar the Ghostblood said:

well since Shardblades, are god metals this theory is good. also what if Nightblood is made of Endowment's god metal.

I don't think Sharahara would have been able to awaken it then, cuz awakening a godmetal would be like infusing it

[Thaidakar the Ghostblood Voidbringer]

Just now, Aspiring Writer said:

I don't think Sharahara would have been able to awaken it then, cuz awakening a godmetal would be like infusing it

true

[Frustration Herald]

17 minutes ago, Thaidakar the Ghostblood said:

well since Shardblades, are god metals this theory is good. also what if Nightblood is made of Endowment's god metal.

Nightblood is steel

[Thaidakar the Ghostblood Voidbringer]

oh  then I guess my theory is void then

[ScadrianTank Bloodsealer]

Atium swords would not automatically be Shardblades in that they would be Invested but wouldn't have any special soul-cutting properties. Otherwise, the Fused would have pulled their Raysium together and made a few Shards for themselves.

Figuring out how to stuff a regular object with Investiture so densely that you get something similar to Nightblood with any magic system other than Awakening seems impossible, at least for the moment. Maybe also AonDor, not sure about it, though. 

The way I think about it may be inherently flawed, so correct me if I'm wrong.

1. Godmetals are the most Invested naturally occurring material in the cosmere, at least so far as we know.
2. Brandon said that Nightblood is the single most Invested object in the cosmere.
3. That means that Nightblood is more Invested than Honorblades, swords made entirely out of crystalized Investiture.

Yes, we know that Nightblood consumes Investiture, and it wasn't as Invested when it was created as it is now. 

[mathiau Twinborn]

5 hours ago, ScadrianTank said:

Atium swords would not automatically be Shardblades in that they would be Invested but wouldn't have any special soul-cutting properties. Otherwise, the Fused would have pulled their Raysium together and made a few Shards for themselves.

On the other hand you could summon a Seon as an Aonium Shardblade so if you found a Spren of Ruin you could probably make an Atium Shardblade

Quote

Figuring out how to stuff a regular object with Investiture so densely that you get something similar to Nightblood with any magic system other than Awakening seems impossible, at least for the moment. Maybe also AonDor, not sure about it, though. 
 

I think we have WoBs that AonDor Shardblades exists

Quote

The way I think about it may be inherently flawed, so correct me if I'm wrong.

1. Godmetals are the most Invested naturally occurring material in the cosmere, at least so far as we know.
2. Brandon said that Nightblood is the single most Invested object in the cosmere.
3. That means that Nightblood is more Invested than Honorblades, swords made entirely out of crystalized Investiture.

Yes, we know that Nightblood consumes Investiture, and it wasn't as Invested when it was created as it is now. 

When Nightblood was created he was less invested than a Returned (1000 breath versus 2000)

[ScadrianTank Bloodsealer]

1 hour ago, mathiau said:

On the other hand you could summon a Seon as an Aonium Shardblade so if you found a Spren of Ruin you could probably make an Atium Shardblade

There probably is a way to do that without a Spren of any kind. Honorblades are not sentient, and they work just fine. From the Hemalurgic table and information on old fabrials from RoW, we can suppose that Godmetals can be used to all kinds of things, even imitate effects traditionally associated with a specific Shard. And if any Sharblade would be dangerous, it would be one made with Ruin's power.  But because Intent matters, Scadrians would have to find some way to imprint this command to destroy on a blade, and that isn't something their magics can do. Because of this, I find Atium lightsaber-type of weapon somewhat easier to imagine. South Scadrians already have a way to extract power from Godmetal, so similarly burning Atium to enhance a regular blade or create an energy blade seems easier, in a way.

[LewsTherinTelescope Radiant Squire]

16 hours ago, ScadrianTank said:

Atium swords would not automatically be Shardblades in that they would be Invested but wouldn't have any special soul-cutting properties. Otherwise, the Fused would have pulled their Raysium together and made a few Shards for themselves.

How would they have known?

[mathiau Twinborn]

Just now, LewsTherinTelescope said:

How would they have known?

Or even got enough Raysium to make a blade.

That being said we have WoBs that pushing on a Shardblade would be nearly impossible while pushing on a Godmetal is easy so it would probably not make a Shardblade

[LewsTherinTelescope Radiant Squire]

17 minutes ago, mathiau said:

That being said we have WoBs that pushing on a Shardblade would be nearly impossible while pushing on a Godmetal is easy so it would probably not make a Shardblade

That seems more like atium specifically being really weird (mainly due to it predating Brandon making the rule on Pushing Invested things) than godmetals as a whole, since the specific reason given for Shardblades being hard to Push is that it's super Invested. (Confusing side note that may or may not be related, but atium "must be refined" to be used as a Hemalurgic spike in the manner indicated on the Hemalurgic table, so atium might just be sort of weird in its current form.)

[mathiau Twinborn]

4 minutes ago, LewsTherinTelescope said:

That seems more like atium specifically being really weird (mainly due to it predating Brandon making the rule on Pushing Invested things) than godmetals as a whole, since the specific reason given for Shardblades being hard to Push is that it's super Invested. (Confusing side note that may or may not be related, but atium "must be refined" to be used as a Hemalurgic spike in the manner indicated on the Hemalurgic table, so atium might just be sort of weird in its current form.)

But wouldn't it be more hard-magic like to have atium's weirdness be caused in universe by it being a Godmetal and therefore shared with the other ones?

[LewsTherinTelescope Radiant Squire]

4 minutes ago, mathiau said:

But wouldn't it be more hard-magic like to have atium's weirdness be caused in universe by it being a Godmetal and therefore shared with the other ones?

No, because that breaks the big rule of Investiture interfering with other Investiture. Imo it makes more sense if there's something odd in that specific case, whether it's atium ordinarily being way less Investiture-dense than other godmetals due to something Pres did when making the Pits, or if it's that something with Ruin and Scadrial means Ruin's Investiture doesn't directly interfere with Scadrian magics the same way, etc, rather than such a broad and seemingly arbitrary exception to such a fundamental rule.

Edited April 15, 2021 by LewsTherinTelescope

[ScadrianTank Bloodsealer]

5 hours ago, LewsTherinTelescope said:

How would they have known?

Surely Odium mentioned to some of his Fused scholars that Spren manifest as Godmetals in a Shardblade form. 

[Bigmikey357 Full Shardbearer]

I think the Scadrian specific Godmetals can be pushed and pulled allomantically because they are a part of the magic system,  in a way they built the magic system and so could not be exempted from it as other Godmetals are. That's my headcannon until Brandon comes up with something better. 

[LewsTherinTelescope Radiant Squire]

45 minutes ago, ScadrianTank said:

Surely Odium mentioned to some of his Fused scholars that Spren manifest as Godmetals in a Shardblade form. 

You'd think so, but he also didn't even bother to tell them that spren were able to be trapped in gems like any other Investiture (the Fused didn't learn of this until BAM's capture, but the gemstone archive specifically mentions preexisting knowledge of spren being captured, and the only breakthrough mentioned is that Unmade specifically can be caught, so it was definitely a known thing at some point that he never bothered to alert the Fused to), nor did they even use raysium at all until the latter end of the Desolations, from the sound of it. Even now, it's super duper rare. So it seems like his help is selective, lol. And ultimately it's better used to let a lot of Fused drain Radiants of Light than make one or two Shardblades for every hundred Fused anyway.

Edited April 16, 2021 by LewsTherinTelescope

[ScadrianTank Bloodsealer]

2 hours ago, LewsTherinTelescope said:

You'd think so, but he also didn't even bother to tell them that spren were able to be trapped in gems like any other Investiture (the Fused didn't learn of this until BAM's capture, but the gemstone archive specifically mentions preexisting knowledge of spren being captured, and the only breakthrough mentioned is that Unmade specifically can be caught, so it was definitely a known thing at some point that he never bothered to alert the Fused to), nor did they even use raysium at all until the latter end of the Desolations, from the sound of it. Even now, it's super duper rare. So it seems like his help is selective, lol. And ultimately it's better used to let a lot of Fused drain Radiants of Light than make one or two Shardblades for every hundred Fused anyway.

I agree that draining light is more useful as a mass-produced weapon for the Fused, but I still think that if making Shards was as easy a forging a pile of Godmetal, they would have tried it. Odium being selective about what he tells his forces is very likely true, but it's hard to believe that after so many returns of fighting Radiants, the Fused wouldn't have figured out how the weapons of their enemies work. 

[Bejarden Lord Prelan]

Also they know that Radients have spren. They also know that Spren can manifest as different things.

It seems hard they woudnt put 2and2 together 

[LewsTherinTelescope Radiant Squire]

11 hours ago, ScadrianTank said:

I agree that draining light is more useful as a mass-produced weapon for the Fused, but I still think that if making Shards was as easy a forging a pile of Godmetal, they would have tried it. Odium being selective about what he tells his forces is very likely true, but it's hard to believe that after so many returns of fighting Radiants, the Fused wouldn't have figured out how the weapons of their enemies work. 

It's not too surprising to me. It's not like they have enough raysium to mess around with, even if someone came up with the idea, you'd be limited to a very expensive small pointy stick to test it out. Much better to not waste it.

[cometaryorbit Radiant Squire]

I'm actually not 100% sure that godmetals are necessarily automatically super-Invested. Unless I misunderstand, all of Scadrial was created from Investiture by Ati/Ruin and Leras/Preservation.

In the HOA Epigraphs, Sazed/Harmony says "Atium, then, was an object that was one-sided". I think that could imply that it's simply "100% Ruin" matter, whereas normal Scadrian matter is "50% Ruin/50% Preservation".

In the Cosmere, Investiture is convertible into matter and energy, like matter and energy in RL. But the quantity of Investiture represented by 1 gram of atium might not be any greater than the quantity of Investiture represented by 1 gram of water.

Atium being Pushable might be an early quirk, but that's not necessarily incompatible with it fitting into the later system, IMO.