Waging war on the rest of the Cosmere 101

[Xiahida]

We all know that war will come to the Cosmere eventually... So let's strategize! I made a post about Hemalurgically controlling Chasmfiends for war, and in that post someone said something about Lifeless Whitespines. My vision is thousands of Chasmfiends charging enemy lines with a dozen Lifeless Whitespines on each, and a Radiant with Plate and Blade at the head. The Chasmfiend has aluminum wrapped around its legs, and plates of steel for Coinshots to launch themselves off their mount. A Rioter or Soother stays on it to maneuver the mount and send out the Lifeless.

Any new takes on this idea?

[Njvodin]

If war comes, I feel like Scadrial and Roshar are definitely NOT gonna be on the same side, but that Chasmfiend panzer idea is pretty cool

[JustQuestin2004]

The main question is going to depend on whether there are spaceships or not.

If there are then you'd have an immense advantage of anyone who doesn't. Then you just have to advance their weaponry and destroy anyone else who also possesses space ships.

If there are no spaceships, then you are almost completely out of luck due to needing to use Shadesmar to Worldhop, with Perpendicularities being the ultimate chokepoints. An army of Chasmfiends ain't gonna fit all at once, even at all maybe depending on the size.

You'd need to find another way to transition between Realms, either by following Autonomy's idea and just make your own secret Perpendicularity on the planet you want to invade, or try to find Invested Arts that enable autonomous Realmatic Transition like the Surge of Transportation or AonDor.

My idea would be going to Roshar, try to find a Willshaper or Elsecaller, spike them and their Spren for Transportation, you can bring a Spike off planet unlike a Spren, try to find a way to compound the Surge with F-Nicrosil and spread it among the army along with either A-Duralumin or A-Nicrosil to enable a Supercharged Elscalling to instantly teleport many people across Realms. That takes care of the travelling problem at least. Depending on how F-Nicrosil works. 

[Dracoe]

There is a note in one of the Mistborn Era 2 books, I believe Lost Metal, where Harmony mentions that Scadrial is the most technologically advanced of all the cosmere worlds and will reach stuff like interstellar travel first, which is why Autonomy wants to destroy Scadrial. So spaceships will certainly be involved.

Hear me out, spike the Fused. Then you have deathless, stormlight powered war machines... who can then ride the spiked Chasmfiend panzers into battle.

[Lord Spirit]

A couple of quick points

Scadrial essentially has nuclear weapons as of TLM. There would be very few, if any places that could survive that, except maybe Elantris or Urithiru.

Radiants are stuck on Roshar, and Elantrians can't do much away from Elantris. Allomancy, Feruchemy and Sand Mastery don't have any such limitations, but are weaker than the prior. 

@Frustration has created a lot stuff ranking how powerful different planets are types of investiture are, so you could check that out.

[alder24]

5 hours ago, JustQuestin2004 said:

If there are then you'd have an immense advantage of anyone who doesn't. Then you just have to advance their weaponry and destroy anyone else who also possesses space ships.

We know there are spaceships so that settles any future conflict - orbital bombardment. Chasmfiend army is useless when rods from god are falling at you at Mach-10 or more. Or simply deorbit small asteroids with the Surge of Gravitation to make them strike any place on an enemy planet. No need for any fancy weapon, just plain old rocks falling from the sky.

26 minutes ago, Dracoe said:

There is a note in one of the Mistborn Era 2 books, I believe Lost Metal, where Harmony mentions that Scadrial is the most technologically advanced of all the cosmere worlds and will reach stuff like interstellar travel first, which is why Autonomy wants to destroy Scadrial. So spaceships will certainly be involved.

Taldain is still the most advanced planet in Cosmere, but Scadrial is closing in, that's why Autonomy wanted to subjugate or destroy it. We know from SotD and Tress that spaceships are present in the space era of Cosmere.

[Xiahida]

7 hours ago, alder24 said:

We know there are spaceships so that settles any future conflict - orbital bombardment. Chasmfiend army is useless when rods from god are falling at you at Mach-10 or more. Or simply deorbit small asteroids with the Surge of Gravitation to make them strike any place on an enemy planet. No need for any fancy weapon, just plain old rocks falling from the sky.

Rods from god aren't accuret, at least in our world and the number of satelites you need for there to be enough to kill thousands of Chasmfiends is almost impossible in my opinion

[alder24]

2 minutes ago, Xiahida said:

Rods from god aren't accuret, at least in our world and the number of satelites you need for there to be enough to kill thousands of Chasmfiends is almost impossible in my opinion

I'm talking about the future of Cosmere, Era 4 - they have spaceships with FTL, they don't need satellites for that. I'm not talking about literal rods from god, but orbital bombardment in general. Precision won't be a problem, yield as well as you can adjust the size of projectile based on your needs. If they can make FTL, they can easily make precise kinetic orbital projectiles and you have all different invested arts to help you with that.

Your Chasmfiends army is vaporized in an instant. A classical, medieval form of waging wars is obsolete when we're talking about modern, combined arms warfare, not to mention the future one. Chasmfiends are just huge, walking targets for artillery or air force to practice on - and artillery is already on Scadrial in Era 2.

[Lord Spirit]

We have also seen some awakened technology in the secret projects, so Nalthis also has gotten pretty advanced, not to mention that their shard is (as far as we know) alive and in control. 

[CR0N0S.LXIII]

On 11/1/2023 at 1:39 PM, Lord Spirit said:

A couple of quick points

Scadrial essentially has nuclear weapons as of TLM. There would be very few, if any places that could survive that, except maybe Elantris or Urithiru.

Radiants are stuck on Roshar, and Elantrians can't do much away from Elantris. Allomancy, Feruchemy and Sand Mastery don't have any such limitations, but are weaker than the prior. 

@Frustration has created a lot stuff ranking how powerful different planets are types of investiture are, so you could check that out.

SPOILERS FOR TRESS OF THE EMERALD SEA:

Spoiler

We see both Riina and Hoid use AonDor in Lumar. Elantrians don't seem to have any limitations on his powers outside of Sel.

 

[alder24]

8 minutes ago, CR0N0S.LXIII said:

SPOILERS FOR TRESS OF THE EMERALD SEA:

  Hide contents

We see both Riina and Hoid use AonDor in Lumar. Elantrians don't seem to have any limitations on his powers outside of Sel.

 

Tress spoilers:

Spoiler

That's not true, at least partially. Tress is taking place far in the future of Cosmere, we don't know how Riina and Hoid were able to use AonDor so far away from Elantris, they shouldn't be able to.

One explanation is that Riina used something like what Shay in TLM drew when she was transformed into Elantrian - some kind of Aonic map of the local land, which hacked the system allowing her to use Aons on Scadrial. After all, there was a map of Lumar in Riina's tower (but it didn't glow like Shay' map). Another explanation is that there is a possibility that Dor was fixed, someone Ascend to Devotion and Dominion putting all of Dor back into the Spiritual Realm. Or maybe there is something entirely else going on with it. We don't really know what's going on there.

No matter what happens in the future, right now it's very, very hard to use AonDors away from Elantris, and that includes other planets. This is because the investiture which Elantrians used is in the Cognitive Realm not Spiritual, which creates this location dependency. There are some ways to hack the system, like what Shay did in TLM, but generally this is hard to overcome.

Spoiler

Questioner

[Can’t hear the actual question]

Brandon Sanderson

Elantris’s magic is location based because the primary source of the magic is located in the Cognitive Realm. Most of the worlds, the primary source of the magic is the Spiritual Realm, where all places are one. So for instance, Mistborn, you can go anywhere in the Cosmere and use the magic. Elantris, you can’t, because Devotion and Dominion were killed and their bodies were stuffed into the Cognitive Realm and the magic is being powered that way.

Boskone 54 (Feb. 18, 2017)

 

Spoiler

Questioner

So we know that you can't just have someone-- If someone were to do something similar to Hoid, he can't just pop and go "Oh look, I can now do Allomancy or I can now do Surgebinding". What about Breath? If someone could somebody get Breath-- Maybe not *audio obscured* Could they still get the benefits of--

Brandon Sanderson

Oh, good question... Yes you can, actually. Breath is-- Once it is given to you, it is being keyed to you. Your Identity. So that transfer makes it yours to use however you want.

Questioner

So you could Awaken?

Brandon Sanderson

You could Awaken. If you-- If you were to somehow make it there, you would be able to Awaken. It's the easiest of magic systems to get the magic from, and then to manipulate. Because it has keyed into it Identity.

Questioner

*audio obscured*

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, you can take Breath onto another world. In fact, you've seen characters do this.

Questioner

*audio obscured*

Brandon Sanderson

It would work, yes.

Questioner

*audio obscured*

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, it would work the same way.

The only magic that is location-dependent--  The ones who aren't interested in this, just hum to yourself, okay? *laughter* You don't need to know any of this stuff to enjoy the books, okay? I write them so that you could just-- each series can be read independently, and enjoyed. There is behind the scenes stuff, and if you want to dig, it goes pretty deep.

So on Sel, we have AonDor. AonDor is based on the fact that the Dor, which is an amalgamation of Dominion and Devotion, has been pressed together and stuffed into the Cognitive Realm by Odium who didn't want it to gain sentience, as Investiture will do if it is left alone. It will either seek someone to be its Vessel or it will gain sentience. He pressed it in there; he pressed it together, which creates the violent reaction, because those two intents are opposed. And that is the foundation of the magic. Because it's stuck in the Cognitive Realm rather than the Spiritual Realm (the Spiritual Realm is location-independent; Cognitive Realm is location-dependent), it makes the magic on Sel only work in close proximity to what is keyed through there to the location they're keyed to. This has to do with Identity and Connection. Mostly Connection. So that means you can't do AonDor on another planet, but you can do other magics works anywhere, because they're drawing the magics specifically through either the place, or they're end-neutral, like Breath is, and you don't need any extra power.

Arcanum Unbounded Chicago signing (Dec. 6, 2016)

 

Spoiler

Jofwu

Why did Shay-I have to draw a map of the Elendel basin, if the jar of Dor was her source of Investiture? Did the map connect her to another source of Investiture?

Brandon Sanderson

No, the map didn't, but her magic is still wonky. Selish magic has some wonkiness to it and it needs to be tricked.

YouTube Spoiler Stream 5 (Dec. 2, 2022)

 

Spoiler

DoritoJH

So, AonDor is super versatile and powerful.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, but region-locked!

DoritoJH

Yes, it is region locked, exactly. If a full Feruchemist using nicrosil were to create an unlocked medallion that allowed an Elantrian to store Connection to Elantris' location, would it let them use AonDor at full power as long as they were tapping that Connection?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. That should work just fine.

...

Just understand that the medallion's going to have to be usable by everyone in order to work. You're going to have to jump through some hoops, but I think what you want there would work. And for those of you listening, that would be the harder way to unlock AonDor. There are easier methods.

DragonCon 2019 (Aug. 31, 2019)

 

 

[CR0N0S.LXIII]

1 hour ago, alder24 said:

Tress spoilers:

  Hide contents

That's not true, at least partially. Tress is taking place far in the future of Cosmere, we don't know how Riina and Hoid were able to use AonDor so far away from Elantris, they shouldn't be able to.

One explanation is that Riina used something like what Shay in TLM drew when she was transformed into Elantrian - some kind of Aonic map of the local land, which hacked the system allowing her to use Aons on Scadrial. After all, there was a map of Lumar in Riina's tower (but it didn't glow like Shay' map). Another explanation is that there is a possibility that Dor was fixed, someone Ascend to Devotion and Dominion putting all of Dor back into the Spiritual Realm. Or maybe there is something entirely else going on with it. We don't really know what's going on there.

No matter what happens in the future, right now it's very, very hard to use AonDors away from Elantris, and that includes other planets. This is because the investiture which Elantrians used is in the Cognitive Realm not Spiritual, which creates this location dependency. There are some ways to hack the system, like what Shay did in TLM, but generally this is hard to overcome.

  Hide contents

Questioner

[Can’t hear the actual question]

Brandon Sanderson

Elantris’s magic is location based because the primary source of the magic is located in the Cognitive Realm. Most of the worlds, the primary source of the magic is the Spiritual Realm, where all places are one. So for instance, Mistborn, you can go anywhere in the Cosmere and use the magic. Elantris, you can’t, because Devotion and Dominion were killed and their bodies were stuffed into the Cognitive Realm and the magic is being powered that way.

Boskone 54 (Feb. 18, 2017)

 

  Reveal hidden contents

Questioner

So we know that you can't just have someone-- If someone were to do something similar to Hoid, he can't just pop and go "Oh look, I can now do Allomancy or I can now do Surgebinding". What about Breath? If someone could somebody get Breath-- Maybe not *audio obscured* Could they still get the benefits of--

Brandon Sanderson

Oh, good question... Yes you can, actually. Breath is-- Once it is given to you, it is being keyed to you. Your Identity. So that transfer makes it yours to use however you want.

Questioner

So you could Awaken?

Brandon Sanderson

You could Awaken. If you-- If you were to somehow make it there, you would be able to Awaken. It's the easiest of magic systems to get the magic from, and then to manipulate. Because it has keyed into it Identity.

Questioner

*audio obscured*

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, you can take Breath onto another world. In fact, you've seen characters do this.

Questioner

*audio obscured*

Brandon Sanderson

It would work, yes.

Questioner

*audio obscured*

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, it would work the same way.

The only magic that is location-dependent--  The ones who aren't interested in this, just hum to yourself, okay? *laughter* You don't need to know any of this stuff to enjoy the books, okay? I write them so that you could just-- each series can be read independently, and enjoyed. There is behind the scenes stuff, and if you want to dig, it goes pretty deep.

So on Sel, we have AonDor. AonDor is based on the fact that the Dor, which is an amalgamation of Dominion and Devotion, has been pressed together and stuffed into the Cognitive Realm by Odium who didn't want it to gain sentience, as Investiture will do if it is left alone. It will either seek someone to be its Vessel or it will gain sentience. He pressed it in there; he pressed it together, which creates the violent reaction, because those two intents are opposed. And that is the foundation of the magic. Because it's stuck in the Cognitive Realm rather than the Spiritual Realm (the Spiritual Realm is location-independent; Cognitive Realm is location-dependent), it makes the magic on Sel only work in close proximity to what is keyed through there to the location they're keyed to. This has to do with Identity and Connection. Mostly Connection. So that means you can't do AonDor on another planet, but you can do other magics works anywhere, because they're drawing the magics specifically through either the place, or they're end-neutral, like Breath is, and you don't need any extra power.

Arcanum Unbounded Chicago signing (Dec. 6, 2016)

 

  Reveal hidden contents

Jofwu

Why did Shay-I have to draw a map of the Elendel basin, if the jar of Dor was her source of Investiture? Did the map connect her to another source of Investiture?

Brandon Sanderson

No, the map didn't, but her magic is still wonky. Selish magic has some wonkiness to it and it needs to be tricked.

YouTube Spoiler Stream 5 (Dec. 2, 2022)

 

  Reveal hidden contents

DoritoJH

So, AonDor is super versatile and powerful.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, but region-locked!

DoritoJH

Yes, it is region locked, exactly. If a full Feruchemist using nicrosil were to create an unlocked medallion that allowed an Elantrian to store Connection to Elantris' location, would it let them use AonDor at full power as long as they were tapping that Connection?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. That should work just fine.

...

Just understand that the medallion's going to have to be usable by everyone in order to work. You're going to have to jump through some hoops, but I think what you want there would work. And for those of you listening, that would be the harder way to unlock AonDor. There are easier methods.

DragonCon 2019 (Aug. 31, 2019)

 

 

Oh I see. I didn't remember that Investiture in Sel was trapped in Shadesmar after the splittering of Devotion and Dominion.