Hemalurgy and Animals

[Brik_head]

In mistborn book three, hero of ages, it is discovered that without hemalurgic spikes the kandra become mist wraiths. My main question is, what if you used spikes on a horse? would that horse gain sentience? 

Secondary question could you use an iron spike (steals strength) to gain the strength of a lion or other animal? 

Third and finally. Can you turn a cat into a coin shot?

[alder24]

Hey, welcome to the forum!  If you're interested here are some tips about tools available to you on the forum:

Spoiler

• At the bottom left of a post you will see a "+" icon, a "Quote" link.
• At the bottom right you will see an heart icon (and possibly different reactions in the future).
• At the top right you will see a hamburger menu (three dots) which shows: Report, Share, and (your posts only) Edit and Hide tools.

Likes/Reactions:

  Hide contents

• The Heart Icon (Like) is how you thank people or "like" a post
  • Likes, Mentions and Quotes should all send an alert to the appropriate person - even when added to an old post through the Edit feature.

Report Tool:

  Hide contents

• Use  the Report tool to report any post (your own or others) to a forum Mod
  • Use this if you do accidentally double-post (sometimes it's the browser or a slow link that causes a double post) - just leave a message that it was an accidental double post and the Mods can fix it. If it was the first post of a new thread that doubled, they usually can merge the threads if they both have answers, so all of the content is retained.
  • For reporting Spam, only report a single post by the user to let the Mods and Admins know - they get messages for each "report" so reporting each Spam post is annoying and unnecessary. If all posts by a "new user" (bot) are all spam - then all of those posts will be deleted when that account is deleted.

Hide Tool:

  Hide contents

• Use the Hide tool to hide your post if you want to remove it after posting (useful for accidental double-posts)
  • Hiding the first post in a Thread will hide the threan as long as ther have been no replies (Needs Testing)

Mentions:

  Hide contents

• You can "Mention" a person by typing "@" and slowly typing their user name (spelling matters). As you spell their name, the interface will show a pop-up with matches - when you match appears, click it to add the Mention
  • Likes, Mentions and Quotes should all send an alert to the appropriate person - even when added to an old post through the Edit feature.

Quote Methods:

  Hide contents

• The "Quote" link is exactly that, when you click it the quote will be added to the reply at the bottom of the thread wherever the cursor is (adding a carraige return if necessary)
  • So, if you have already started to reply before you decide to quote you can then add the quote before or after your text depending on the cursor location when you click "Quote"
• The + icon is multi-quote. As you read a thread, if you want to quote multiple items you can click that for each post you want to quote
  • As you click +, you should see a toaster pop-up on the bottom right of the browser window showing how many quotes you will have
  • They are added in the order you click the + icon, not in the original post order, so you can set the order of quotes for your reply
  • When you are ready to reply, click on the toaster pop-up and it will take you directly to the reply section and add the quotes automatically with one blank line between each for you to add your comment(s)
• Finally, you can also highlight a small section of a post and, when hovering over the highlit portion, click the "Quote Selection" button that pops up.
  • This will also be added to the cursor location, rather than the bottom of the reply.
• Also note that you can move quotes after they have been added to your reply.
  • For example, you add a quote and realize there are no empty lines below it for you to type - so you can hit "enter" before the quote to make an empty line then when you hover over a quote you will see a 4-way arrow at the top-left that you can use to drag the quote up (or down)  and move the quote to before the empty line. . .
  • This is also how you can add quotes to an Edit of your own post. You quote using any of the methods above and the quote will go to the reply section. You then hover over the four-way arrow and use CTRL+C to cut the quote, which you can then paste into your edit window.
• Likes, Mentions and Quotes should all send an alert to the appropriate person - even when added to an old post through the Edit feature.

Editing posts:

  Hide contents

• Use the Edit link to make changes to a completed post or add information to your post if it is the most recent (to avoid double posting)
  • Quote buttons will still send a quote to "Reply" if you have a post open for edit, but it is easy to cut/paste the quote to the Edit box
  • Editing the first post in a thread allows the thread-creator to edit the thread title (important for changing accidental spoilers)
  • Editing allows you to add a reason for the edit (Spelling and grammar (SPAG), formatting, clarification, new information, etc.), but it is not required.
• Likes, Mentions and Quotes should all send an alert to the appropriate person - even when added to an old post through the Edit feature.

Other:

  Hide contents

• Quotes and Spoilers are very similar, but here are the differences:
  • Spoiler tags are default "closed" and are not attributed - they may be opened by clicking the spoiler box title
  • Quotes are default "open" (but may be closed by clicking the Quote Title and are denoted by the basic arrow icon on the left side of the quote title), If the quote was added with one of the methods explained below, it will be attributed - if it was added with the quote icon in the Reply/Edit tools, it will not be attributed.
  • Attributed Quotes will have a curved arrow icon on the rigth side of the quote title to jump directly to the post from which the quote was taken.

Hope that helps.

 

10 hours ago, Brik_head said:

In mistborn book three, hero of ages, it is discovered that without hemalurgic spikes the kandra become mist wraiths. My main question is, what if you used spikes on a horse? would that horse gain sentience? 

No, at least not if you do it like with Kandra. The reason why it works with Mistwraiths is because they used to be people, they are part human with cognitive blockade, and Blessings allows them to push through that blockade and regain sentience. Just giving spikes to horses won't make them sentient.

Spoiler

Brandon Sanderson

Chapter Eighty - Part Two

Sazed Sees Mistwraiths

I worry that I didn't get to show mistwraiths very much in this book. It's not that big of an issue—they're only a minor world feature, and are only tangentially important. Still, they're a part of the kandra past and culture, and I want readers to understand what they are and what they have to do with the kandra life cycle.

Remember, all of the kandra save for the First Generation were born first as mistwraiths. That race of creatures breeds true, and has only a fifty-year lifespan. They die off, but birth new members. Taking one of those new members and adding spikes to them, however, awakens them and brings them sentience. They're part human, just like the koloss who remember having once been human.

The Hero of Ages Annotations (May 27, 2010)

 

Spoiler

NinjaMeTimbers

How intelligent is a mistwraith? Could you raise and train mistwraiths like dogs or horses, controlling what forms they take by the bones you give them? Would you be able to train yourself a horsewraith steed by giving it only the bones of a horse?

Brandon Sanderson

This is feasible. One thing to keep in mind is that mistwraiths are people who have a blockage between the Physical and the Cognitive Realm, messing with their ability to think. Think of them as mentally-stunted people. There's enough there to train, but then you have to dig into the ethics of it...

17th Shard Forum Q&A (Sept. 27, 2012)

However, Stormlight spoilers:

Spoiler

Ryshadium are a type of horse that is almost sentient, because they are more invested than normal horses, they have a spren bond which invests them. 

Spoiler

Questioner

What effects does a spren bond have on a Ryshadium? Sapience, or more?

Brandon Sanderson

It increases their intelligence a great deal and gives them a little extra hardiness to survive in Roshar. And in exchange, the spren gets pulled into the Physical Realm, which they really like.

Tor Instagram Livestream (Nov. 25, 2020)

 

This means that investing animals in a specific way (like maybe with raw investiture in a nicrosil spike, or a copper spike giving them intelligence) might make them sufficiently intelligent to make them truly sentient. Theoretically you can make animals sentient, but that requires a different approach from those we currently know of.

11 hours ago, Brik_head said:

Secondary question could you use an iron spike (steals strength) to gain the strength of a lion or other animal? 

Yes, you can. However there are consequences of doing that - physical deformations. Stealing strength from humans deforms the body of the recipient, turning them into a Koloss. Chimeras, which we saw in Era 2, are most likely the effect of deformations given by an attribute stolen from an animal (probably a dog) and given to a human. Stealing physical attributes from any source probably always causes physical deformation in a recipient.

Spoiler

Vegasdev

Would Hemalurgy work on animals?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, it would. 

Hero of Ages Q&A - Time Waster's Guide (Oct. 15, 2008)

 

11 hours ago, Brik_head said:

Third and finally. Can you turn a cat into a coin shot?

Yes and no. You can give them powers, but they won't be able to use them because they are lacking intelligence for that. First you need to make them really intelligent, beyond any animal, if you want them to use those powers.

Spoiler

Questioner

Is a chull able to receive some form of Investiture? ...I'm thinking of Scadrial... Would it have the presence of mind to be able to use the abilities?

Brandon Sanderson

Not as it is right now. But you can see in the way that Ryshadium are working that we have animals that are reaching beyond-animal intelligence. Aviar are the same way. And it is possible to assume that you could get to the point where you could use such powers. But none of them are there yet. But the Aviar kind of use their powers, so I guess some of them are. So, yes, I will say that's possible.

Skyward Seattle signing (Nov. 10, 2018)

But I admit, a Coinshot cat sounds so cool and terrifying at the same time - the mess it can make in your home...