Testing Metallic Arts' Investiture

[Trusk'our]

Measuring the Investiture and efficiency of that Investiture in practice is something that would be really, really good to know. Once we get to that point we'll start actually getting Invested units and whatnot, which is something I've been really looking forward to. But how to do it (in world, that is)? Well, here's a few Ideas of mine (please feel free to pitch in and come up with more ways to measure the Investiture as well).

1. Using a spectroscope to determine Investiture amount; a spectroscope was used in TLM by Wax to determine whether Trellium was a Godmetal, and it seemed that the Set used a similar device to determine the amount of Investiture inside of a Hemalurgic spike. This device could be used to determine the baseline of Investiture for Hemalurgic spikes and Metalminds.

This would also be useful to tell what the size categories are for Metalminds and Hemalurgic spikes when it comes to storing Investiture in ideal vessels (WoB).

2. Feruchemical practice; with this method you just hire a Feruchemist to store attributes of certain types for certain periods of time at certain percentages. Then you use the aforementioned spectroscope to tell how much Investiture is inside. This will tell the level of Investiture that each attribute actually equals- different Allomantic powers equal different levels of Investiture, so Feruchemical ones likely follow suit.

 Then have the Feruchemist tap those attributes at fixed rates so that the level of attribute loss due to compression can be determined- then we'd finally know just how long one must store to get a set amount of time at X amount of tapping.

3. Hemalurgy and decay; this one is pretty simple. Just take a spikes with a set amount of Investiture (determined by a spectroscope) and let it sit and decay naturally, testing it on occasion to tell how the rate of Investiture loss. Different amounts of starting Investiture, varying sizes of spikes, and periodically stopping decay and resuming it could determine how much those factors impact the rate of decay.

4. Hemalurgy and practice; you could use Hemalurgic spikes that have a determined amount of power inside them to tell how much of an effect they give the wielder. For example, you give a Hemalurgic spike to the test subject (in an easily removable way, such as an earring) that grants Allomantic pewter. The subject would have had their natural strength determined beforehand. They burn pewter under the effects of spike and you use the new amount of weight they can lift to tell how much actual strength the spike gives. Repeat the process with more spikes of various levels of Investiture to determine the rate of efficiency you get with more and more Investiture being squeezed into a small space (i.e., I don't think that 200% of the Investiture of the spike would yield 200% the muscle strength- we see that Feruchemy doesn't work that way, so Allomancy and other Investitures are likely similar).

You could use a similar process with Hemallurgically granted Feruchemy to determine the efficiency of storing or tapping attributes at higher or lower levels of Investiture.

Edited September 22, 2023 by Trusk'our
Learned what a spectroscope is.

[Quantus]

Spoilers for Hoid (with a side of White Sand, Warbreaker, and Stormlight 5 sample chapters), but:

Spoiler

it seems like he uses a combination of White sand and Perfect Color Recognition to measure investiture in some sort of quantitative way.  To most people it would appear like White Sand blinks from Black to White in a binary state, but it appears like he can get more scale information out of the Sand, and I believe his Heightenings are doing it.  

However that may only be effective with Kinetic Investiture.  For Investiture that is statically stored in a Physical Object, I think you'd need a repeatable/mechanical Push rig, something that emits a very static/repeatable Push something upward, and measures the Resistance To Investiture By Investiture as evident by distance it moves (and/or the gravity equilibrium point).  But that would be limited to metal object, and really just to spikes and metalminds.  You could probably do the same thing with a (Stormlight spoiler)

Spoiler

Gravitation Surge Fabrial, since it wouldnt care whether it was metal or organic or whatever, unlike any Metallic Arts or Breath solution.

 

[Walter The Moral]

1 hour ago, Quantus said:

Spoilers for Hoid (with a side of White Sand, Warbreaker, and Stormlight 5 sample chapters), but:

  Hide contents

it seems like he uses a combination of White sand and Perfect Color Recognition to measure investiture in some sort of quantitative way.  To most people it would appear like White Sand blinks from Black to White in a binary state, but it appears like he can get more scale information out of the Sand, and I believe his Heightenings are doing it.  

Spoiler

At the end of RoW, Hoid has his Breaths stolen by Odium, which caused him to lose his Perfect Pitch. I would think that if he doesn't have Perfect Pitch, he wouldn't have Perfect Colour Recognition, unless he took some Breaths out of Awakened Objects.