Did both Harmony and Kelsier....

[Isilel]

...want Marsh to be weak? Each for his own reasons - Kel because Marsh sometimes works for Harmony perhaps, while the latter maybe because of something that he sees in the future? Because that's the only way that I can explain Marsh being almost at the death's door due to lack of atium in TLM. Kelsier works with people who were born 1-2 millenia previously and while some of their longevity is likely time-dilation, they also must have ways to significantly slow aging.

Harmony could have prolongued Marsh's life - there is a WoB that TLR could have made himself immortal via Connection manipulation, if he had thought to figure out how to do it while he held the power of the Well. Surely Sazed knows how. I equally don't believe for a second that he didn't know how to produce some atium, either natively or by splitting his metal. I'd also point out that kandra stole both atium and lerasium from Wax's lab on Harmony's instructions and could have taken atium to Marsh, which would have allowed him to participate in the action. Harmony clearly could locate him at any time, as the interlude with the police demonstrated. But he basically made Marsh sit out a close brush with the alleged end of their world, by witholding atium until the dust settled. And it isn't like Harmony wants Marsh gone, seeing how he occasionally invests him with Shardic power to give the last walk to the souls of the dead, and how he established a cover for continued atium supply for him vis-a-vis Kelsier.

I have previously mentioned in one of the book reaction threads that Marsh being conveniently incapacitated during TLM felt far too contrived to me. Now, if Harmony arranged it that way for reasons it is slightly better, but then I'd like an explanation for what these reasons were at some point. I also don't entirely understand why Marsh is still around, if he isn't allowed to act, lest he upstages the new protagonists. Won't the problem  persist into Era 3? Is it just because he is the closest thing to a sliver of Ruin that they have, while Kel is a sliver of Preservation and Sazed is both?

[Frustration he/him]

Marsh wasn't out of Atiim, he was just getting close. Inquisitors by their natures have to rest for long periods of time, and the amount of time increases as they age.

Edited November 21, 2022 by Frustration

[SteelBagel]

16 hours ago, Frustration said:

Marsh wasn't out of Atiim, he was just getting close. Inquisitors by their natures have to rest for long periods of time, and the amount of time increases as they age.

Still doesn't explain why Sazed couldn't just give him some more, or power his de-aging directly, or tell him how to make it, and had to wait for wax to make it.

Edited November 21, 2022 by SteelBagel

[Frustration he/him]

17 minutes ago, SteelBagel said:

Still doesn't explain why Sazed couldn't just give him some more, or power his de-aging directly, or tell him how to make it, and had to wait for wax to make it.

Harmony didn't know how to make it until Wax did.

[SteelBagel]

Just now, Frustration said:

Harmony didn't know how to make it until Wax did.

It's literally made of harmony, how would he not not know how to make it? even if he doesn't know the process with Trellium, couldn't he just coalesce some ruin investiture into solid form? hell, why even bother? why not just directly de-age marsh? It's the powers of ruin and preservation that are used to do this, and he has both, couldn't he just directly produce the effects of allomancy and feruchemy without ever having any metals to use as a focus?

[Frustration he/him]

4 minutes ago, SteelBagel said:

It's literally made of harmony, how would he not not know how to make it? even if he doesn't know the process with Trellium, couldn't he just coalesce some ruin investiture into solid form? hell, why even bother? why not just directly de-age marsh? It's the powers of ruin and preservation that are used to do this, and he has both, couldn't he just directly produce the effects of allomancy and feruchemy without ever having any metals to use as a focus?

Because all action is basically impossible for him at this point. And He's said in the text he had no idea how to split harmonium until Wax did it, despethe fact that the Set has been doing it for years.

[Leuthie]

7 hours ago, SteelBagel said:

It's literally made of harmony, how would he not not know how to make it? even if he doesn't know the process with Trellium, couldn't he just coalesce some ruin investiture into solid form? hell, why even bother? why not just directly de-age marsh? It's the powers of ruin and preservation that are used to do this, and he has both, couldn't he just directly produce the effects of allomancy and feruchemy without ever having any metals to use as a focus?

This should teach you a bit about what Shardholders can and can't do with Shards, not make you upset that it didn't meet your previous expectations.

[SteelBagel]

16 hours ago, Leuthie said:

This should teach you a bit about what Shardholders can and can't do with Shards, not make you upset that it didn't meet your previous expectations.

It just doesn't seem consistent to me. If the mists and the dor can power allomancy because they're made of investiture, the shouldn't something else made of that same investiture (a shard) could do the same thing? The metal just provides access to that investiture, whether that be directly or by working as keys. We see proof of this when Vin fuels elend in HoA. She probably coudn't fuel feruchemy or Atium allomancy, because she didn't control Ruin at that time, but this is not a restriction that applies to Harmony. I don't see why he couldn't fuel the appropriate abilities to de age marsh, or even just physically modify his body to be that of his younger self. He definitely knows how, shards seem have to have a flawless  memory, and TLR manipulated all of humanity and some plants, animals, and microbes on a genetic level in a short amount of time. So Sazed could probably just swap out his body to it's younger version, while keeping his cognitive and spiritual aspects.

[Frustration he/him]

19 minutes ago, SteelBagel said:

It just doesn't seem consistent to me. If the mists and the dor can power allomancy because they're made of investiture, the shouldn't something else made of that same investiture (a shard) could do the same thing? The metal just provides access to that investiture, whether that be directly or by working as keys. We see proof of this when Vin fuels elend in HoA. She probably coudn't fuel feruchemy or Atium allomancy, because she didn't control Ruin at that time, but this is not a restriction that applies to Harmony. I don't see why he couldn't fuel the appropriate abilities to de age marsh, or even just physically modify his body to be that of his younger self. He definitely knows how, shards seem have to have a flawless  memory, and TLR manipulated all of humanity and some plants, animals, and microbes on a genetic level in a short amount of time. So Sazed could probably just swap out his body to it's younger version, while keeping his cognitive and spiritual aspects.

Sazed cannot take direct action, his opposing interests make it almost impossible. And even if he did, taking action like that is much easier for newer vessels, and can leave him open to attacks from opposing shards.

[SteelBagel]

5 minutes ago, Frustration said:

Sazed cannot take direct action, his opposing interests make it almost impossible. And even if he did, taking action like that is much easier for newer vessels, and can leave him open to attacks from opposing shards.

I guess. It still seems weird to me that he can make Atium via telling the kandra to make bombs in order to de-age marsh, but not just de age marsh directly. sazed's (not harmony, but sazed) intent (to de-age marsh) is the same either way. He intends to do the same thing, one path is just more roundabout. Why is ordering someone else to do it different from doing it yourself, for the Shard's Intent?

[Isilel]

19 minutes ago, Frustration said:

Sazed cannot take direct action, his opposing interests make it almost impossible. And even if he did, taking action like that is much easier for newer vessels, and can leave him open to attacks from opposing shards.

That's the rub, isn't it - why _didn't_ Sazed modify Marsh when he was still new and could have easily done so?  Why keep poor Marsh as a hemalurgic construct dependent on atium for his longevity, instead of either turning him back into a human or, if Sazed foresaw the need to keep him around for a long stretch in this state, why not give him longevity via Connection shenanigans, which per WoB TLR could have done while he held the power of the Well, if it had occurred to him?

Kelsier, of course isn't under any strictures at at all and is surrounded by people who surely use Connection and other methods  to extend their lives, yet he left his brother out to dry too.

[Frustration he/him]

1 hour ago, SteelBagel said:

I guess. It still seems weird to me that he can make Atium via telling the kandra to make bombs in order to de-age marsh, but not just de age marsh directly. sazed's (not harmony, but sazed) intent (to de-age marsh) is the same either way. He intends to do the same thing, one path is just more roundabout. Why is ordering someone else to do it different from doing it yourself, for the Shard's Intent?

A lot of things. The vessel can have their own thoughts and desires.  However the Shard's intent must be satisfied in order for them to use their power.

1 hour ago, Isilel said:

That's the rub, isn't it - why _didn't_ Sazed modify Marsh when he was still new and could have easily done so?  Why keep poor Marsh as a hemalurgic construct dependent on atium for his longevity, instead of either turning him back into a human or, if Sazed foresaw the need to keep him around for a long stretch in this state, why not give him longevity via Connection shenanigans, which per WoB TLR could have done while he held the power of the Well, if it had occurred to him?

Kelsier, of course isn't under any strictures at at all and is surrounded by people who surely use Connection and other methods  to extend their lives, yet he left his brother out to dry too.

New Sazed was kind of busy fixing the planet, and Marsh wanted to die once his Atium ran out.

[agrabes]

33 minutes ago, Frustration said:

A lot of things. The vessel can have their own thoughts and desires.  However the Shard's intent must be satisfied in order for them to use their power.

New Sazed was kind of busy fixing the planet, and Marsh wanted to die once his Atium ran out.

I would also argue that not only was Sazed busy, we shouldn't assume he had perfect knowledge or understanding of how to use his powers especially at first.  I think the WoB about how TLR could have made himself immortal if he'd thought to do it applies to Sazed equally.  We shouldn't assume that even the Shard Vessels have perfect knowledge, at least at first.  But I think even with time, we shouldn't assume they know everything about everything.

[kenod]

20 hours ago, Isilel said:

That's the rub, isn't it - why _didn't_ Sazed modify Marsh when he was still new and could have easily done so?  Why keep poor Marsh as a hemalurgic construct dependent on atium for his longevity, instead of either turning him back into a human or, if Sazed foresaw the need to keep him around for a long stretch in this state, why not give him longevity via Connection shenanigans, which per WoB TLR could have done while he held the power of the Well, if it had occurred to him?

Kelsier, of course isn't under any strictures at at all and is surrounded by people who surely use Connection and other methods  to extend their lives, yet he left his brother out to dry too.

Keep in mind that, based on what we've seen of people who just received shardic powers, they often don't fully know how to use their powers. They seem to be able to modify the physical realm to a fair degree instinctively, but they don't fully know how everything fits together. TLR could easily do big scale things, but lack of understanding meant he kept messing up his changes. Vin didn't instinctively understand why the ash clouds were there, and exposed the planet the the heat of the sun.

Add to that that making someone immortal through connection is likely a non-trivial thing, and not something likely covered in Sazed's copperminds, and Sazed very likely didn't have the understanding to do something like that yet, and trying it could have very likely messed up Marsh even worse.

It's also important to note that Sazed still doesn't appear to fully understand the full nature of his powers, given how other shards (Autonomy) have been able to outwit him or work around him, despite him having more power available.

[BinarySecond]

The power to act and knowledge to act on a particular thing seem to have an inverse relationship.

At the time you can enact the greatest change you desire you haven't fully taken in the shard so don't get access to the knowledge you would need.

 

Catch-22 of holding a Shard.

[ScadrianTank he/him]

On 21/11/2022 at 7:06 PM, SteelBagel said:

why not just directly de-age marsh?

Solving people's problems directly is a subpar outcome to making them figure things out on their own. Harmony or Sazed's approach since Ascension seems to be pushing people into developing solutions. After stumping the North's tech growth by solving people's problems for them, it makes sense to me that he'd lead his people to a way to have atium again and explore it in more depth instead of directly solving Marsh's aging. I'd even say that this action actually give a little credence to Saze claiming that "he had it in hand".

On 20/11/2022 at 8:26 PM, Isilel said:

Kelsier works with people who were born 1-2 millenia previously and while some of their longevity is likely time-dilation, they also must have ways to significantly slow aging.

This one interests me the most, though a simple answer would be that Marsh just refused, for whatever reason. I don't see any scenario where Kel would deliberatly refuse to help his brother attain longevity.

[alder24]

As I understand it, there is no Ruin or Preservations any more, only Harmony. Those Shards no longer exist in pure form, they're part of Harmony but Harmony is somewhat different from any of them alone. So there cannot be any Atium nor Lerasium made as there are no Shards connected to that metals. That's why splitting Harmonium required so much imput and getting both Atium and Lerasium was a big deal as it was unexpected.

But why would Marsh wanted to be involved in any of this? Last time he was, he was a puppet of pure destruction, he killed countless of innocent people, tortured and spiked dozens of Allomancers and Feruchemist, almost killed Vin, nearly was killed, killed Elend, almost lead to destruction of the whole world, and was spiked more than 20 times, feeling constant pain, that maybe he still feels. Moreover his feruchemic powers are weaker than normal feruchemist have, forcing him to spend more time on filling up metalminds than doing something. He might still be geting tired very quickly. Why on rust would he ever want to be seriously involved in anything considering all of that? Did he not deserved to just chill out? And to add more, he has more than 20 spikes, making him easily controllable not only for Shards.

[Leuthie]

On 11/24/2022 at 3:13 AM, ScadrianTank said:

Solving people's problems directly is a subpar outcome to making them figure things out on their own. Harmony or Sazed's approach since Ascension seems to be pushing people into developing solutions.

This is the best answer. After finish Lost Metal, I'm convinced that Sazed CAN act but chooses not to. He is forming a world and society that must last and meet coming challenges. He can't do this by simply bestowing powers and fixing issues using his Shard.

Harmony is a difficult Shard to use due to the competing Intents, but Intents aren't hard limits on action. Sazed wants to limit the Ruin side of his Intent so he, as a vessel, isn't shaped to be a tool of Destruction. He also needs to limit his Preservation side so he isn't shaped to be a tool of Stasis. So he self limits his actions to control how the Shard shapes him. But this isn't the main reason for his inaction.

He needs his world to be able to shape itself without his constant intervention. Challenges from outside provide opportunities for growth. By acting directly, Sazed would be taking those opportunities away from his people.

How does this apply to Marsh? Marsh wants to die. Marsh deserves to move on to the next stage. Sazed knows this and is allowing Marsh to make his own way and helping where he can without direct action. Kelsier doesn't want to die/move on, so he actively seeks his own solutions. Sazed likes this, as well, as it provides Sazed with weapons that he doesn't have to directly manage; he can manage them through his old friend.

Autonomy blinding Sazed was particularly an issue because it limited his ability to monitor all of his tools and step in at the last minute to help should it be needed. Sazed could have stepped in and fixed everyone's issues at any time. He feared doing so more than he feared that Autonomy would win.

At least, that's how I see it all.

Edited December 1, 2022 by Leuthie