Mistborn, Feruchemist, Awakener, Surgebinder or Elantrian?

[Ati16 he/him]

Which would you like to be more, a Mistborn, Feruchemist, Awakener, Surgebinder or Elantrian? I personally like Feruchemy more, but I wanted to see what others thought.

Edit: I decided to add a few more magic systems, because I saw that someone had already done this.

Edited December 21, 2022 by Ati16

[Quantus he/him]

I think I'd go with the 5th Heightening, though Feruchemy is a strong 2nd.  But the 5th is the most low-key (and mostly permanent) immortality around, and the sensory upgrades have always fascinated me.  

[JustQuestin2004 he/him]

I'd pick Elantrian if it means I get sent to Elantris.

The not only am I immortal, but I also have access to one of if not the most versatile Magic System in the Cosmere.

Sure it'll take time to master it, but I'd have all the time in the world thanks to being immortal. 

If not and I just get the powers where I am right now then I'd go with the Fifth Heightening for the Agelessness.

Space Age here I come!

[alder24]

Awakener! I don't care that his weaker in power than Mistborn or Surgebinder. He can do so many cool things and only imagination is stopping him. It's the most versatile system on par with Elantrians. 

[Green Hoodie Mistborn he/him]

If the choice was only Mistborn or Feruchemist, I'd have gone with Feruchemist, because it would jive with my avid indoorsman lifestyle...

... but you also offered me 5th heightening Awakener giving me all the coolness of Heightenings 1-4 + Immortality without having to have an Atium cache for compounding or being bound to a specific planet or something

I can't remember if Elantrians are natively immortal, but I seem to remember them dying or being spoken of passing away in the novel itself by Galladon, so yeah. 5th Heightening Awakener for me please

[StormingTexan he/him]

Man this is a really tough choice because I want to say 5th heightening Awakener but I am going to have to go with Feruchemist just because possessing peoples breaths seems creepy to me. 

[Letryx13]

Elantrians seem like they use the most versatile of the Cosmere's magic systems. The only drawback is that you need to learn the Aons to make it work, so I'd go with that.  Radiants (of the 5th ideal) seem like the most powerful magic users because they get armor, weapons, and powers.  MistBorn and Feruchemists seem like a balance, having multiple strong abilities, but not endless different tricks. Awakening and breaths always seems like the weakest of the magic systems, at least in my opinion.

[NameIess]

Definitely fifth heightening Awakener. Immortality is awesome. The other abilities would be cool, but I'd probably get myself killed using them (with the exception of an Elantrian), and I could still die of cancer or other illnesses no matter what I picked.

[Werewolff Studios he/him]

This is rather tricky, but I'd have to go Elantrian I think, so long as I could use it wherever I am. One of the most versatile magic systems and I think there'd be ways to jerry-rig a lot of similar cosmere powers.

If I didn't have access to knowledge of the Aons or it was restrained by connection, I'd probably go with Mistborn. 

[StanLemon]

Elantrian. They have enhanced mental faculties, immortality, perfect health, hard to kill, and the most versatile magic system known in the Cosmere. Just have to worry about major natural disasters that alter landscapes. Though probably could find a way around that.

[Tamriel Wolfsbaine]

5th heightening all the way.  

Biggest benefit is that it seems to pause aging so you should be able to awaken temporarily losing that heightening so long as you haven't remained under that heightening for a lifespan.  

Lifesense would be the bees knees. 

I love the idea of a cloak that watches my back and leg wraps to absorb the shock of falls... seriously I would be jumping off buildings for the fun of it so fast.  Arm wraps that extend as far out as they have fabric to grapple people for me.   

Honestly, the scenes in my mind of awakeners fighting are so much more cinematic than other systems... Vasher vs the thugs where he awakens the dead guys clothing to make a meat shield... the wrist wraps crushing and throwing people like ragdolls...

At least in my mind, those are the coolest scenes in all of the cosmere.  Atium would be fun to watch on the screen and Szeth vs Kaladin would be fun to watch as well but we have already seen flying immortals bash eachother around a thousand times. 

Whispering commands and watching the world come to life around your characters... masterpiece.  Cloaks choking and pulling their owners in different directions deflecting blows and causing mass chaos.  

 

Yeah awakening is my #1 hands down. 

Metal eating would be next.  

 

[Tglassy]

It's a tie between Mistborn and Feruchemist, though prolly Feruchemist.  Technicallly, it's cheaper, lol.

But yeah, with all 16 metals?  I can eat as much as I want and just store the excess calories in Bendalloy.  Never worry about getting fat again.  

Keep yourself constantly at 3/4 strength and weight, so you can have the perfect beach bod whenever you need to. 

I sit and watch tv all the time, so just store mental speed and physical speed while I'm vegging on the couch.  Do all the senses, too.  Don't need em while vegging.  

There are plenty of times through the day when you can just store stuff.  It isn't as good as compounding, but it's still great. 

The main reason MIstborn really draws me is Pewter.  Being able to just burn pewter and be stronger, faster, and more graceful is almost too good to pass up.  

[Sky Breaker]

Elantrian because I have always wanted to learn programming and this would light a fire under me 

Edited March 4, 2023 by Sky Breaker

[cometaryorbit]

Elantrian might be the most powerful (if you can get around the region limitation) but I don't like the idea that a random earthquake could turn me into a zombie. And that region limitation is harsh.

5th Heightening Awakener is tricky, because if you don't get the Breath back every time you lose the immortality. But apparently even much smaller amounts of Breath extend life: a mere 50 (1st Heightening) adds a decade to life expectancy, and Vivenna with - what, 800 maybe? Definitely over 600 but not 4th Heightening yet - is I think said to be almost immune to aging and disease. And Breath can be given to others, and a very long extra-healthy life shared with my family is probably preferable to immortality alone. So that option seems very attractive... OTOH, if people figured out what it was they might kidnap me and try to force me to give up the Breath. I don't know how obvious a BioChroma aura would be for non-Nalthians without Breath of their own, but at 5th it's likely pretty distinct. (Hoid doesn't show one, but he might only be 2nd and might also know a trick to suppress the aura?)

Feruchemist is also tempting, because it has so many everyday-life benefits.

Surgebinder... also tricky. Since the poll says third ideal, presumably that's Radiant, and I don't want to risk killing a spren. (If I could be an Honorblade Surgebinder, though, the Edgedancer or Truthwatcher one - for the ability to heal people - would be super tempting. Progression Growth might also have environmental uses, like regrowing a forest really fast.)

I think my choice would have to come down to how obvious the aura would be. If I could get around that, Awakener,  if not, Feruchemist.

Edited March 5, 2023 by cometaryorbit

[IlstrawberrySeed]

Elantrian or Awakener. They have the easiest to make magitech, and if I share my breath, I might get children with breath, acculating more for my descendants to play around with.

[One who Breaths and Reads she/her]

I'd go with Feruchemy, because not only is it one of the most versatile and useful abilities, but unlike the others you cannot gain the ability unless you are born with the ability, meaning if you were in the Cosmere that you would be able to at least be able to find other ways and such to acquire the effect without Hemalurgy. As well as its the most Cosmere wide hepful when it comes to things such as things such as storing all sorts of effects such as Connection or Investure. The mechanics overall are more useful as well as accessable if you wish to make use of it when it comes to things such as acquiring the correct metals. Although the time storing it can be annoying, you can always figure out how to acquire Lerasium or go to Nalthis for breaths. Heck on Roshar, Surgebinding is one of the few magics that doesn't require you to be born on the planet to gain the benefits without any extra efforts. Such as Breaths and Awakening with Nalthis. Personally I would want to be born on Nalthis born with Full feruchemy

[SodiumIsSalty he/him]

 

Spoiler

Elantrians are probably the right choice from a pure versatility standpoint but, they just feel pretentious to me and I kinda hate that.

[Trusk'our he/him]

On 3/9/2023 at 0:22 AM, SodiumIsSalty said:

 

  Hide contents

Elantrians are probably the right choice from a pure versatility standpoint but, they just feel pretentious to me and I kinda hate that.

Spoiler

How so? If you mean the Ire, then I suppose that makes sense, but Raoden and the other Elantrians seemed pretty nice.

 

Edited March 18, 2023 by Trusk'our

[Duxredux he/him]

I'm a bit iffy on Elantrian. Aons are abstract enough that I would have a lot of trouble drawing them - particularly the curve on the base Aon. It would be cool but... I screw up enough when doing normal computer programming when I accidentally capitalize something I shouldn't  have, forget to close a parentheses. that I shouldn't have or omit a semicolon. (Edit: see?? case in point.) Having to redo the entire program if I sneeze halfway through and twitch my hand would be incredibly abnoxious. Also, I can't just run my program in development, it will turn that rock into a potato, if I'm lucky and didn't screw something up. I can curse someone I meant to heal if I forget a line? Yeah... no. I'm not confident that I won't ever accidentally nuke something.

I'm torn between Feruchemist and Awakener. As an Awakener, my piano and vocal skills would improve dramatically, I wouldn't ever get sick, and I could give half of my Breaths to my wife which would put us both at 4th Heightening. Perfect Lifesense to always know where the toddler is... furthermore, if we ever decide we've had it good and are ready to move on, we have an inheritance to give to our children and/or grandchildren. Awakening is the most easily giftable of the abilities, and so the most sharable. If I'm the only Invested being on the planet, that's kind of lonely.

Feruchemist because there are totally days when I wish I could just sleep on command, have augmented focus etc.. I wear glasses and I already have found many times when being able to choose to effectively go blind can be really nice. Being able to dampen hearing, or smell as well wouldn't be bad either. See, for many of the attributes I would use it for the storage process just as much as I would to be able to tap the metal. For obvious reasons, gold would be the most obnoxious to store, but... I'm not that wealthy. I'm unlikely to have that much gold in my life to store more than a ring or two. Copper isn't as useful as it was in Sazed's time, since we have pictures, videos, and the internet, but being able to selectively forget things could be really tempting for the wrong reasons.

Also, Sazed was a genius, because even if I had a textbook I could pull out, I don't think I would be able to pull off viable mechanical engineering techniques just from ancient theory created by a forgotten religion. As we have learned from the internet, access to knowledge doesn't necessarily equate to mastery of technique.

Edited May 13, 2023 by Duxredux
ironic spelling and grammar errors

[Spearguy]

Awakening is probably the second most versatile of the options here I feel, the ability to bring any object to life is amazing just on its on, and that's without going into some of the other things we've seen from awakening, such as the way that breaths can interact with memories, or awakening circuits. The basic benefits from  the heightenings alone make it very tempting

[Treamayne]

On 12/21/2022 at 11:27 AM, Green Hoodie Mistborn said:

I can't remember if Elantrians are natively immortal, but I seem to remember them dying or being spoken of passing away in the novel itself by Galladon, so yeah. 5th Heightening Awakener for me please

WoB:

Spoiler

 

Quote

 

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Elantrians have no physical limitations on their lifespan. The power will sustain them, but it's emotionally and mentally exhausting to be an Elantrian, so as far as immortality goes it's actually harder to be an Elantrian than other forms of immortality that exist in the cosmere.

 

 

 

[Walter The Moral]

This depends on one thing, where do I get the power? Am I in the Cosmere, or am I on Earth.

On Earth is easy. Feruchemy. It's the most useful day to day power, since you can store and tap a buch of inconveniences. You need to remember your shopping list, put it in a Coppermind. It's too hot outside, put it in a Brass mind. You have free time with nothing to do, store some sleep. Something smells bad, store your sense of smell in a Tin mind. You're relaxing on a couch, store strength, speed, mental quickness, weight. And then, when you need you can stay up for days and not be tired, you can be as strong as you need to be, you can withstand cold weather, you can become quick and smart. Feruchemy is just the most useful in everyday life.

If I was in the Cosmere, I'd probably be an Elantrian for all the variations. I love learning languages, so learning the Aons would be fun. It's just the most versatile, plus you're immortal (but can be killed with enough work) which isn't too shabby.