Giant Carved Forgery?

[Trusk'our]

It's been a while since I've made a good post about Forgery, but I've finally come up with another idea.

AonDor can potentially have its power amplified by having larger Aons being drawn;

Spoiler

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/171/#e8187

Snipexe

Does the size-- Let's say you have a really big Aon, and you had it pretty far away from Elantris, does the size of the Aon allow it to be more powerful?

Brandon Sanderson

To an extent, yes.

In fact, I think this is a big part of why Elantris is able to increase the Elantrians' power so much; it's so big that it can do that.

So what if you carved your Stamp into a massive stone pillar (or multiple pillars. Boom, Sel's Stonehenge is born) and Connected it to the Linchpin stamp actually used to stamp someone? Could you amplify the power you could draw from the Dor to make more unlikely things be possible via Forgery?

It still has a pretty big limitation as you'd need to stay close to the stone(s) to maintain the Forgery, but there could potentially be some circumstances where it would be useful.

[Njvodin]

We still don't really know how Soulstamps are made, but this could be a huge clue as to how they function! Great thinking

[Trusk'our]

7 hours ago, Njvodin said:

We still don't really know how Soulstamps are made, but this could be a huge clue as to how they function! Great thinking

We don't? Shi simply carved one with knowledge and Intent as a person born in MaiPon.

Also, thanks for the support! I appreciate it 

[alder24]

18 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

It's been a while since I've made a good post about Forgery, but I've finally come up with another idea.

AonDor can potentially have its power amplified by having larger Aons being drawn;

  Reveal hidden contents

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/171/#e8187

Snipexe

Does the size-- Let's say you have a really big Aon, and you had it pretty far away from Elantris, does the size of the Aon allow it to be more powerful?

Brandon Sanderson

To an extent, yes.

In fact, I think this is a big part of why Elantris is able to increase the Elantrians' power so much; it's so big that it can do that.

So what if you carved your Stamp into a massive stone pillar (or multiple pillars. Boom, Sel's Stonehenge is born) and Connected it to the Linchpin stamp actually used to stamp someone? Could you amplify the power you could draw from the Dor to make more unlikely things be possible via Forgery?

It still has a pretty big limitation as you'd need to stay close to the stone(s) to maintain the Forgery, but there could potentially be some circumstances where it would be useful.

Huh. That makes sense. Brandon said all Selish magics can be called as the one system, so while not every one of them can be as versatile or do the same things as AonDor, the basic mechanics should be more or less the same across every system. Thus if you can amplify the strength of Aons in AonDor, I see no reason why you can't make the same with Forgery or even Dakhor. What would it take to do the same with Dakhor? A giant twisted T-Rex's skeleton? Or a whale's one? That would be fun. 

Spoiler

Crspu

Is there going to be a magic system for every Shard? 

Brandon Sanderson

Uh, yes, whether there'll be books? We get into a problem here... is... what is a magic system, right? 

[spoilers cut out]

So the answer is yes and no, in that every one of the Shards will inspire really interesting magic systems. But is there a one to one? What do you call a magic system? And beyond that, will I have time to write books about all of these, I don't know. You could even look at Sel. Sel has how many magic systems, is it one? Is it lots? Is Forging a different magic system from AonDor, or is it two aspects of the same magic system and so... It's tricky. 

YouTube Spoiler Stream 2 (June 3, 2021)

 

Spoiler

Questioner

The Emperor's Soul was intentionally on Sel or was it just picked up as...

Brandon Sanderson

No, it was intentional, because the magic system... the way I build the magic systems in the Cosmere is very deliberate and certain planets have certain themes for their magic. And Sel's magic systems are all basically computer programming languages and when I was designing that magic system, it had to be on Sel, it couldn't work on any of the other planets for various reason.

Questioner

And another question, is the Shaod random or is there a purpose beyond it?

Brandon Sanderson

It is not completely random. *laughter from audience*

ICon 2019 (Oct. 15, 2019)

 

[Trusk'our]

1 hour ago, alder24 said:

Huh. That makes sense. Brandon said all Selish magics can be called as the one system, so while not every one of them can be as versatile or do the same things as AonDor, the basic mechanics should be more or less the same across every system. Thus if you can amplify the strength of Aons in AonDor, I see no reason why you can't make the same with Forgery or even Dakhor. 

I agree; Selish magics are all cousins, so finding a particular hack with one system likely means you can use similar methods to hack other Selish systems.

1 hour ago, alder24 said:

What would it take to do the same with Dakhor? A giant twisted T-Rex's skeleton? Or a whale's one? That would be fun. 

Dakhor in particular would be difficult to work with, as it requires a physical change to the body to function and size is an important factor. With only so much bone you can fit in the body there is going to be an upper limit with this system as it is currently used to how powerful you can make someone.

Perhaps if the Dakhor managed to make multiple monks share Investiture via Connection they could bolster the power of an individual in close range, or if they used a sacrificial ritual like the ones they use to teleport they could temporarily boost a monk's power.

But a T-rex Dakhor does sound pretty fun 

[Longshot97]

On 11/17/2023 at 3:56 PM, Trusk'our said:

So what if you carved your Stamp into a massive stone pillar (or multiple pillars. Boom, Sel's Stonehenge is born) and Connected it to the Linchpin stamp actually used to stamp someone? Could you amplify the power you could draw from the Dor to make more unlikely things be possible via Forgery?

 

It's a very good thing linchpin stamps exist, otherwise the only way to utilize these power boosts would be to somehow levitate a giant stone pillar into stamping motion, which I don't think anyone wants to deal with. 

I do question what extra power would offer in Forgery. Then again [Spoilers for Mistborn]

Spoiler

Moonlight's Universal Stamps lasted longer thanks to an infusion of unkeyed Dor. So we do have precedent for less likely transformations "sticking" longer with extra Investiture.

Could unlikely transformations become permanent with more power? I feel like that sort of defeats the spirit of Forgery, but who knows.

On 11/18/2023 at 10:24 AM, alder24 said:

Moonlight's Universal Stamps lasted longer thanks to an infusion of unkeyed Dor. So we do have precedent for less likely transformations "sticking" longer with extra Investiture.

I'll take it one step further. What about ChayShan? Could a larger person channel more Dor as they engage with the forms? Either naturally larger people, or someone like a [Spoilers for Cosmere].

Spoiler

koloss-blooded Scadrian, or any Rosharan (particularly Alethi or Horneaters)

Or maybe entire groups of JinDo can collectively perform a very complex form, and channel the Dor as a group? I wonder if ChayShan is purely a combative art, or if physical movements translate to other uses of Investiture.

[Trusk'our]

7 minutes ago, Longshot97 said:

I'll take it one step further. What about ChayShan? Could a larger person channel more Dor as they engage with the forms? Either naturally larger people, or someone like a [Spoilers for Cosmere].

  Hide contents

koloss-blooded Scadrian, or any Rosharan (particularly Alethi or Horneaters)

Technically, I'd say yes, though you may need to have a significant difference in size to make such a thing make a noticeable difference in the level of Investiture drawn from the Dor. ChayShan would have the same limitations as that of Dakhor, where the body of the practitioner is a big limitation, limiting the scale you can increase that particular magic system to.

10 minutes ago, Longshot97 said:

Or maybe entire groups of JinDo can collectively perform a very complex form, and channel the Dor as a group?

Possibly. Dakhor can do something similar after all, even though their Investiture is primarily focused on using the body as a focus in a somewhat similar fashion to ChayShan.

13 minutes ago, Longshot97 said:

I wonder if ChayShan is purely a combative art, or if physical movements translate to other uses of Investiture.

It likely has more uses outside of battle, but we don't have enough information on it yet to know what they may be.

13 minutes ago, Longshot97 said:

I do question what extra power would offer in Forgery. Then again [Spoilers for Mistborn]

  Hide contents

Moonlight's Universal Stamps lasted longer thanks to an infusion of unkeyed Dor. So we do have precedent for less likely transformations "sticking" longer with extra Investiture.

Could unlikely transformations become permanent with more power? I feel like that sort of defeats the spirit of Forgery, but who knows.

Well, TLM spoilers;

Spoiler

There's a WoB stating that Shai's Elantrian Soulstamp may be permanent though some method.

Quote

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/509/#e16022

Love-that-dog

Why won't Moonlight's stamp wear off by itself?

Brandon Sanderson

This is an excellent question. The answer is—it might someday. But the other question is—it's been a spell. Depending on where I time these things, it's either been hundreds of years or decades since... Moonlight has had a lot of time to practice with powers and investigate what's possible in the Cosmere with magic and talk to some of the smartest people in the Cosmere about how it works. You should draw from the way the soulstamps work, the more mundane ones, that Shai has made a ton of progress in pushing forward the art of Forgery.

I suspect this may be accomplished by the Forgery drawing Investiture from the Dor via the SR somehow to continuously maintain it, mostly likely due to the fact that Shai is stamped into an Elantrian which gives her access to the Investiture necessary to maintain the Forgery and something the Elantrians may have done to make accessing the Dor available via the SR.

Tress spoilers:

Spoiler

This accessing the Dor via the SR could be how the Sorceress is still able to remain highly Invested (with metallic glowing skin) and is able to use AonDor.

 

25 minutes ago, Longshot97 said:

It's a very good thing linchpin stamps exist, otherwise the only way to utilize these power boosts would be to somehow levitate a giant stone pillar into stamping motion, which I don't think anyone wants to deal with. 

Well, that would be an interesting challenge involving a lot of ropes, pulleys, and a whole lot of ink 

Actually, that gives me another idea. . .