why worldhoppers don't become more involved?

[king of nowhere]

All the worldhoppers we see have uberpowerful combinations of magic powers that dwarfs any main character, and they clearly have goals and want the world to develop in specific ways; yet they never unnleash their mighty potential, preferring to give slight (and possibly ineffective) nudges here and there.

 

I'm thinking mostly of a minor words of radiance character (which I try not to hint who he is cause of spoiler policies) of whom we are told he is from nalthis and can use stormlight as breaths. it's like having unlimited amount of breaths. he could easily make an army to make the kalad's phantoms look like a pushover. just take all the bodies that the plateau battles leave  behind, soulcast them to stone, and awaken them (or viceversa). the only problem would be that stormlight would leak over time, but embedding gems into the lifeless would give them an autonomy of at least a few days. that character could easily take down the whole listener army by himself, yet he prefers to give a few  hints to the other main characters.

 

Not to mention hoid. he could have easily killed the lord ruler, convinced vin to free ruin, take preservation and make the heroic sacrifice to destroy ruin, and got someone fit to take the shards as he didn't want them himself. he could have solved the plot in 20 pages. Instead, he posed as a beggar informant and many many things almost went wrong.

 

We don''t know enough about other worldhoppers, but most of them are guaranteed to be very powerful and more knowleadgeable in realmatics than any native.

 

I know the reason they remain in the background is "because otherwise the stories would be really boring", but I was wondering about the in-world answers.

 

[Observer]

These world bear the touch and design of Adonalsium. Each worldhopper has their goals, and despite the good helping a whole planet might cause, their goals tend to supercede the needs of a world, especially when shards are involved. Imagine trying to mess with things on Scadrial. Harmony would probably have every reason to crush you flat for upsetting the balance, and your efforts would cause no good. Whatever Hoid wants with Roshar, he clearly thinks it's worth more than the planet's lives, which I find telling. It's kind of late on my end, so sorry if this post makes no sense, but it seems to me that they have more important things to be doing with their time and with the attention they gather, and helping people is only a short-term thing in the Cosmere.

Edited July 14, 2014 by Observer

[Bow Tie Bandit he/him]

 

 

but it seems to me that they have more important things to be doing with their time and with the attention they gather, and helping people is only a short-term thing in the Cosmere.  

 

I have to agree!  It would be like micromanaging.  If they spent too much time trying to fix everyone's problems they would not get anything they needed done.

 

I think they need to be more free to keep jumping between world and pushing things ever so slightly in their favor. 

 

Also we have to remember that if they do too much that they may create too much attention.  Hoid had people after him in WoR and even though we know that he is powerful we don't know how powerful they are.  If he makes too many waves he might end up in a showdown with some real bad mamerjamers.  

 

 

 

I'm thinking mostly of a minor words of radiance character (which I try not to hint who he is cause of spoiler policies) of whom we are told he is from nalthis and can use stormlight as breaths. it's like having unlimited amount of breaths. he could easily make an army to make the kalad's phantoms look like a pushover. just take all the bodies that the plateau battles leave  behind, soulcast them to stone, and awaken them (or viceversa).  

 

I understand the theory but I am not sure that he can awaken other things on Roshar.  He can rig the stormlight to feed him breath but I do not believe that he can then use it as breath to awaken.  (Disclaimer:  I have only read WoR once so maybe I missed him doing this already in all of the awesomeness that the book is)  

[Swimmingly he/him]

It's also possible that the events of novels tend to be the delicate culminations of Shardic plans, created meticulously. Interfering could screw things up royally. In addition, if Hoid went around saving the world for everyone, then you wouldn't have a few protagonists backed by allies inheriting control, you'd have a bunch of opportunistic power grabs by people powerful under the previous system - look at the fracture of the Final Empire.

[Edgedancer he/him]

As for mister Naltis. Not only do we not know how awakening works with Stormlight but the last time he did something similar it did not end well for him. He still feels guilty. Plus, he is on a vacation.

With Hoid, we don´t really know enough to make anything more than guesses.

[Darkarma he/him]

Mainly I think because these worldhoppers have bigger fish to fry  and can't risk their own lives of things that Fortune has put into place to take care of. Let a world solve the problems it can handle. World Hoppers take on things it can't or doesn't have anyone to spare for. Example, Hoid helping the Terris people while Vin and Company go remaking the world.

 

Sure it seems Worldhoppers are trying to do some good but if these people are to survive shardic influence then they need to rely on their own backbone and set up their own standard operating procedure. Just look at Hoid in WoR and his attempts to tell a story to Kaladin,  "A Chick and a Bunny are hopping through a field..." "Wait what? A Chick as in a Chicken?" These worldhoppers don't know the planet they are on as intimately as someone born there. Culture clash between them and the (semi-)natives is bound to happen and complicate things.

 

Zahel:

As for using stormlight as breath I think the consensus is that he can awaken but like stormlight the effects would be temporary as it bleeds off unlike breath.

Edited July 15, 2014 by Darkarma

[happyman he/him]

I would say that the most important thing we don't know is what limitations the respective world-hoppers have and what their goals are.  Without those bits of info, everything else is speculation.

 

For instance, we've had pretty strong hints that Hoid can't kill anybody directly.  That's a strong limitation.  Combine this with the fact that we don't know how other powerful forces in the universe (Shards, 17th Shard, etc) feel about his actions and it should be clear that we just don't know enough.

 

The same goes for Vasher or other world-hoppers.  We just don't know enough.

[king of nowhere]

I don't buy the argument that they have bigger things to be involved in; if that was the case, they would spend their times doing those things, and not subtly influencing events around. hoid spent much time acting as a beggar, after all.

 

I also don't think the "they fear a power vacuum" argument is solid; hoid is willing to let roshar burn, by his own admission. if he wanted the lord ruler to die, odium to be freed and then reunited with preservation, he would not have cared about the state of anarchy that would have left behind.

 

the argument that they are afraid to interfere with some shardic plan is more sound, but double-edged: yes, the shards have precognition and can make long-term plans that humans cannot, and interfering, even with the best intentions, risk making things worse. But, aren't hoid and the others interfering already? they are still pushing events to their goals, and are just as likely to disrupt a plan as they would be if they acted with their full power.

 

the arguments that they need to keep a low profile because there are other worldhoppers that disagree with them is a good one and a satisfying answer. that would mean that worldhoppers politics are even more complicated than we assume.

[Darkarma he/him]

Also the bigger fish to fry is probably Hoid itself. Seems like all of the 17th shard is out for him since all the books where we have non-ftl worldhoppers have been books that also included Hoid.

[Moogle]

At the time of TLR, Hoid was not an Allomancer+Feruchemist (that came at the end of Well of Ascension), so I doubt he could have killed TLR. TLR remade himself to be stronger than even lerasium Mistborn as well, so I doubt Hoid would have had an easy time with him. This is ignoring the fact that Hoid is apparently literally incapable of harming people, too.

 

As to Vasher, there's no signs he can actually use Stormlight to Awaken. We know it's possible in theory, but Stormlight runs out, unlike Breath, so it's quite likely he couldn't in fact make an army. I don't think your gem idea would work to power the Lifeless. Warbreaker showed that Vasher was incapable of killing an army by himself with Nightblood, so I'm not entirely sure your criticism is on point with him. Vasher is probably one of the weaker worldhoppers we've seen.

 

Overall, I'm not quite sure what worldhoppers could do. Feruchemist worldhoppers could assassinate tyrants, I suppose, but I'm having a hard time thinking of who they could kill. If they tried to kill Taravangian as things are, they doom the world.

 

I also wouldn't count the worldhoppers out just yet. Mraize is a worldhopper and seems to be involved in some serious manipulation of Roshar. It'll be interesting learning what the Ghostbloods are all about.

[WeiryWriter he/him]

At the time of TLR, Hoid was not an Allomancer+Feruchemist (that came at the end of Well of Ascension), so I doubt he could have killed TLR. TLR remade himself to be stronger than even lerasium Mistborn as well, so I doubt Hoid would have had an easy time with him. This is ignoring the fact that Hoid is apparently literally incapable of harming people, too.

 

We don't actually know *when* Hoid became a Feruchemist, and since it is related to his ability to be in "the right place at the right time" it would seem that he's had it for quite a while.

[Moogle]

We don't actually know *when* Hoid became a Feruchemist, and since it is related to his ability to be in "the right place at the right time" it would seem that he's had it for quite a while.

 

I was referring more to his status as Allomancer. We know he originally was looking for the bead in order to become one. Without being an Allomancer, I think TLR would have been more than a match for Hoid.

[Swimmingly he/him]

Unless Hoid felt the need to call in a favour on Roshar and borrow a Shardblade. Or find a big electromagnet - assuming that Innate Investiture doesn't affect purely physical phenomena. Hell, just go to Sel, where the tech level must have progressed to useful levels at this point, and have an aluminum gun forged.

[Moogle]

Unless Hoid felt the need to call in a favour on Roshar and borrow a Shardblade. Or find a big electromagnet - assuming that Innate Investiture doesn't affect purely physical phenomena. Hell, just go to Sel, where the tech level must have progressed to useful levels at this point, and have an aluminum gun forged.

 

Shardblade: TLR would have just tapped speed and killed Hoid before he could swing it. Also, Feruchemical gold heals Shardblade wounds (unless it hits the spine?). Or just burn atium.

Electromagnet: TLR would have just tapped strength and weight and not cared, then tapped speed and crushed Hoid.

Aluminum Bullet: TLR would have just tapped healing and not cared, then tapped speed and crushed Hoid. Or just tapped speed and then never got hit by the bullet anyways. (I'm aware there's WoBs on aluminum being hard to heal with Feruchemical gold, but I was lead to believe that the wound could be healed and the bullet would just be left inside TLR. I'll look up more on this. Edit: Nope, getting hit by aluminum sucks for Feruchemical gold. Okay, Feruchemical gold won't work with this one, he'll just have to be so fast that bullets can't touch him!) Also, he might have known about using brass and just tapped heat and vaporized the aluminum before it even touched him.

 

Compounding means that TLR's reserves are way, way larger than non-Allomancer-Hoid's and he can refresh them in an instant.

 

This is fun, though. How would you kill TLR? Nuke him from orbit? Apply enough heat to melt his metalminds? There's probably a way.

Edited July 15, 2014 by Moogle

[Swimmingly he/him]

A legion of suicidal Cadmium-burners, a few Hemalurgically boosted copperclouds, and a small group of Bendallomancers with aluminum-spitting machine guns. The cadmium bubbles would create an overlapping zone of slowed time, while the Bendallomancers would move through, taking turns making the bubble, and plugging tLR with aluminum. Not counting decreasing returns, he would burn through his steel at a 10x rate just to stay at the same speed as his attackers. I would then have a group of snipers go for aluminum headshots, and give the cadmium-burners wide-bore aluminim shotguns with aluminum shot to keep a constant pressure of cumulative, unhealable wounds. With enough fresh bodies coming in, we would get him eventually.

[Edgedancer he/him]

Do we by now have confirmation that Hoid used the Lerasium to gain allomancy? Last time I checked that was only a gues and not a fact.

For killing the LT there are 3 options:
1) Removing the right Metalminds.

2) Insta kill wound. (Shardblade should do the trick, if the right place is hit.)

3) A LOT of small wounds to depleate his metalminds, this would take an obscene amount of time, so we can disregard this.

As for Hoid killing tLR, we don´t really know everything he is capable of. He might be able to completly mask every aspect of his presence, walk over to tLR and pull out the spikes.

[king of nowhere]

 

This is fun, though. How would you kill TLR? Nuke him from orbit? Apply enough heat to melt his metalminds? There's probably a way.

 

I think it's relatively easy for hoid, since we can assume hoid has all the knowledge we do and a lot more on how investiture works.

 

HE just need to surprise tlr, but i doubt it's that difficult: i don't think he can burn atium all the time in his own palace. and hoid can easily disguise himself as a servant with lightweaving and tap luck at the right moments.

 

Then, shot tlr in the heart with an atium bullet (i think? maybe some other metal is actually needed). the bullet would act as an hemalurgic spike, removing tlr fatium and condemning him to die of old age, suddenly incapable of drawing from his own metalminds. easy. and remember, hoid can tap luck to make the perfect shot.

 

Another option is to awaken tlr bed sheets to rremove his atium bracers while he's sleeping (with compounding he don't need to sleep, but i figure he'd stil want to take a nap every once in a while for the pleasure of it)

 

Also a shardblade through the brain should kill him before he can regenerate. hoid would have to disguise as a servant, then summon the blade to be exactly inside tlr brain. that would probably be riskier.

 

Or, if hoid for some reason could not use any of those plans, he could have just sent a note to kelsier like

 

the lord ruler is both a mistborn and a feruchemist, [follow explanation on compounding], so you can't defeat him. but remove the atium bracers from his arms, and he'll die of old age in minutes. vin can do it, she need to tap the mist, but in order to do that she need to remove her eraring, which is secretly an hemalurgic spike (which by the way is also the reason she's  so good with bronze).

a friend.

 P.S. [follow eplanation on ruin, preservation, the welll of ascension, and what they need to do to fix the world]

Actually, I would give some money just to see how kell would have reacted upon receiving such a letter.

 

As for killing tlr with modern means, a well-aimed explosive round from a cannon would tear him into a puddle of goo, i doubt he could regenerate from that. even a minigun would probably be enough. if not, you have to use something bigger, like a high-explosive air-dropped bomb. I'm pretty sure there's no regeneration that helps against one ton of explosive.

And if he can avoid it with atium and superspeed, as a last resort you can launch a nuke to his location. seeing the nuke hitting a few seconds before may give him a few hundred meters to duraluminium/steelpush away, but it will matter little against a nuke with the power of making a fireball with one kilometer of radius and knocking down concrete buildings twenty kilometers away.

Edited July 15, 2014 by king of nowhere

[Dellexe he/him]

 

As for killing tlr with modern means, a well-aimed explosive round from a cannon would tear him into a puddle of goo, i doubt he could regenerate from that.

 

Well, there's one instance where he's apparently burned to almost nothing but bones and still regenerates. As long as he's even slightly cognitively aware and has a gold metalmind attached to him he can regenerate from just about anything through massive compounding. As long as his metalminds aren't removed and he isn't instantly killed he's still going to keep bouncing back from any wound.

[Edgedancer he/him]

Modern high grade explosives would most likely destroy his metalminds or at the very least ad some impurities throught melting, making it impossible for tlr to tap, even if his healing would be fast enough.

[king of nowhere]

Well, there's one instance where he's apparently burned to almost nothing but bones and still regenerates. As long as he's even slightly cognitively aware and has a gold metalmind attached to him he can regenerate from just about anything through massive compounding. As long as his metalminds aren't removed and he isn't instantly killed he's still going to keep bouncing back from any wound.

no, there is not. there are legends saying that, but they are exaggerations. I'm pretty sure (no idea where to find the quotes) that brandon said that being burned to the bones, or being decapitated, would kill him. even in case it won't, a regular cannon round has enough explosive potential to tear a man in pieces collectable with a tea spooon. even if one of those pieces remained in contact with a piece of a metalmind (which also would be disintegrated), i'm pretty sure the amount of healing needed to regenerate a full body from a little finger would be more than what that amount of gold can contain. and without a stomach he cannot make more charge.

 

anyway,using a bullet as an hemalurgic spike is by far the most elegant method.

[Dellexe he/him]

Actually, you don't need to have metal in your stomach to use it Allomantically, it just needs to be within your body. I can't remember where I saw that WoB, but it exists somewhere.

If it completely obliterated him to bite sized pieces then it would have instantly killed him. If there was enough left to allow him to start healing and he had a metalmind, he could come back from it.

[soulcastJam he/him]

I imagine that tin would allow seeing through illusions.

[Observer]

If it isn't broken, don't fix it. If you want TLR dead, just Duralumin-yank off the metalminds, or use Nicrobursts and Iron/Steel mistings if you don't have access to Mistborn. Problem here being that Hoid had no real reason to mess with the Final Empire. It was holding two shards down where they couldn't hurt anything, and at the time had very little cosmere-wide significance. Why would a worldhopper mess with that?

[king of nowhere]

If it isn't broken, don't fix it. If you want TLR dead, just Duralumin-yank off the metalminds, or use Nicrobursts and Iron/Steel mistings if you don't have access to Mistborn. Problem here being that Hoid had no real reason to mess with the Final Empire. It was holding two shards down where they couldn't hurt anything, and at the time had very little cosmere-wide significance. Why would a worldhopper mess with that?

I don't know, but he was giving advice to kelsier. If he was fine with the final empire, why would he help kelsier overthrow it? unless he was trying to mislead him, in which case tipping the steel inquisition would have been more effective. Probably his goal was gaining access to the well of ascension, and overthrowing the lord ruler was part of it; but that bring us back to the fact that he could have helped much more. If, instead, he wanted to gain access to the well without overthrowing the lor  ruler, giving advice to kelsier is definitely not the way to go at it.