Strategies for Feruchemists

[Trusk'our he/him]

I haven't been too active on the Shard for a bit (needed a break), but I've got some more ideas to post!

I was thinking on what kinds of tactics a Feruchemst could realistically use to get as much attributes stored as possible with as little drawbacks (with no hacks involved), and I came up with a few general options.

1. Sick Day: this tactic is the one Wayne typically uses; you store lots of a particular attribute all at once in order to get a sizable amount. This is very debilitating however and will often prevent you from functioning well. In many cases, you'd actually need to take a sick day in order do this, as it could prove too disruptive to let you be very productive in work, school, or other activities.

2. Bit by Bit: this tactic revolves around always storing but at a much, much slower rate. Storing about 5% of an attribute is not going to significantly impede your ability to function, and if you store for 16 hours a day, you'd get about 48 minutes of doubling your attribute (16 hours x 60 for minutes /20 for 100% Tapping = 48). Per day (not accounting for compression loss).

3. Bedtime: this tactic hinges on the fact that the average person takes between 10 to 20 minutes to fall asleep each night (link, link#2, link#3). You aren't doing anything during that time (at least not if you actually want to fall asleep), so that makes it prime time to store attributes for later. Even if the time itself is short, you can afford to store at a much higher rate depending on the attribute (physical and mental speed maybe even 80-90%).

4. Flicker: this tactic requires the most skill and attention, and the actual opportunities you'd have to use it would vary greatly depending on the metal. Basically, if you find yourself performing a task that doesn't need much of a particular attribute, you can use that time to siphon some off into a Metalmind for when you do need it (i.e., strength isn't needed for reading a book or listening to a phone call).

Those are the basic tactics I could think of for Feruchemy, though each metal has its own quirks for storing.

Iron: we get a pretty good example of how storing would look for this metal from Wax. He stores about 1/3 or 33.3% of his weight all the time, as its actually rather beneficial in most cases. Iron definitely follows the Bit by Bit tactic, though you can and should store more than the amount the method is normally devised for.

Steel: this attribute is probably one of the most powerful, but storing would be a real pain. . . except that there actually should be plenty of opportunities to store without too much hassle for its worth.

5% of one's speed via the Bit by Bit tactic is probably not insurmountable to overcome with some practice (most people don't walk or interact with objects as fast as they could. I know I don't, though it probably would be more beneficial if I did), and though doing it at first would be annoying, I think you could get used to it.

Plus, storing 90% of your speed over the course of 10 minutes or so when you are falling asleep could be quite useful for later if you need a quick burst. The slowing of your need and ability to breath might even make it easier to fall asleep once you get acquainted with it.

Finally, the Flicker tactic could be used in many cases, as Sazed in WoA (chapter 50) shows us that storing physical speed doesn't slow down one's recognition of the surrounding environment, just the speed at which you can interact with it. Basically, any mental task or sensory task (reading, listening, or mentally calculating) isn't going be negatively affected by storing physical speed.

Tin: similar to steel, I think that there are plenty of opportunities you could find where storing would be very easy to do, and some of which might even be directly beneficial.

You could store smell, taste, and some touch most of the time, as those senses aren't' used by humans all that much but Tapping them in large amounts later would make them useful.

Storing hearing and sight would prove more difficult, but glasses can help mitigate the loss of vision and hearing aids can help a temporary loss of hearing. Additionally, you could focus on a visual project while storing hearing in order to focus better (keeping noisy people around you from irritating and distracting you while you do your math or work) and you don't need good vision to listen to a podcast or audiobook.

Pewter: this metal has some of the most variability when it comes to storing I believe.

If you were to use the Bit by Bit method, you may be able to increase your natural muscle building by allowing it to work harder in normal everyday tasks. According to Healthline, a study by PubMed Central says you can expect to get more rapid muscle gains at first, but only slow gains after your body begins to adapt. As such, reducing your strength a little should make it easier for your body to build up more and more natural strength, which can then be siphoned off into a Metalmind until needed.

A Brute devoted to using their power would not only have a temporary edge in regard to strength, but an edge in building natural muscle (which also gives more of an edge to their temporary strength enhancement).

Zinc: It would probably prove harder to store this particular metal, as it would reduce the speed and ease at which your mind processes information.

Sazed's storing of mental speed in WoA (chapter 50) shows us that while there is no delay in which you see the world, understanding the meaning would be slower and more difficult. That does mean you might be able to understand things you know well with less difficulty, but figuring out new things and general adaptability would be harder.

So, a Bit by Bit tactic might work, though you'd have to be careful not to use it when dealing with tasks that require any measure of quick thinking (such as driving or operating heavy equipment). You might be able to get away dealing with tasks you have down to a tee as you don't require much forethought to accomplish them, meaning any sort of repetitive labor or job you've done hundreds of times before isn't going to be seriously impaired by storing mental speed (I wonder if it would feel soothing even, when doing a boring job).

I suppose listening to music wouldn't require speed of thought, so if you like to do that to wind down that might be a prime time to store with zinc.

You could almost certainly store mental speed when falling asleep, as you need to spend that time slowing down your thought process anyway (might even be useful to fall asleep).

Brass: storing heat is probably one of the easiest attributes to gets lots of very quickly. Simply go to an area that is very, very hot and store the excess heat, such as a hot tub or going for a jog outside on a hot day in winter gear.

You could also use the Bit by Bit method by wearing heavier clothing, and wouldn't ever need to worry about getting too hot. The same would apply for exercising, and as a bonus would make it easier to keep exercising without overheating.

Copper: this metal is different from the others, as you cannot just store percentages, you must store specific, individual pieces of information in the Coppermind.

Sazed and the other Keepers would train themselves to have better memories, allowing them to better hold the information they Tapped so that it could be returned to their Copperminds after use.

Additionally, they would form catalogs in their Copperminds to sort through their contents more easily.

Bronze: this metal is also different from the norm, as it is the only attribute you can store while sleeping.

I think that the best strategy would be to etch out an extra 30 to 60 minutes a day to sleep while storing wakefulness in a Bronzemind.

Actually, you could probably go to sleep immediately instead of needing to wait the 10 to 20 minutes, since F-bronze can allow you to sleep on demand (WoB), so you could use that time to save up for later. With that in mind, only needing between 10 to 50 minutes on top of your normal schedule wouldn't be too bad if you set things up right (I suppose it depends on how busy your schedule normally is and when you choose to go to bed).

Cadmium: needing to constantly hyperventilate to get enough oxygen would get annoying, but if you use the Bit by Bit tactic it probably wouldn't be too bad with some experience.

Bendalloy: this one would actually be nice for many of my fellow Americans; just eat an extra helping of food and drink and extra couple glasses of water at mealtime without gaining weight.

Gold: this is a tough one, as storing for a prolonged period of time will weaken your immune system to the point that pathogens with make you sick, and any allergies you may have will act up.

Wayne's tactic for shoring up an emergency reserve of health is to spend a week or two in bed saving up health in large amounts getting absolutely black out drunk so that he doesn't have to suffer so much from the illness storing health brings.

I wonder if you could also stagger storing to help prevent infections from occuring. Basically, if you followed the Bit by Bit tactic but made sure to store for a little while, then gave stopped to let your body catch up with fighting pathogens, then continued storing again. 

Electrum: storing the ability to have the willpower/emotional energy to do something. Sounds like it would be difficult by its very nature, but I suppose you could mitigate this to some degree by using the Bit by Bit and Bedtime tactics.

Chromium: we don't know too much about Fortune at this point, but it seems that, in essence, it allows one to know things they wouldn't otherwise know and can lead to circumstances that seem to be coincidental by accessing the SR (i.e., Hoid knowing where he needs to go).

I believe that a Spinner Ferring would probably be less aware or have lessened instincts when storing, which would be similar to zinc in its ability to directly affect you decision making ability. As I understand it right now, there realistically is no time that Tapping some Fortune wouldn't be useful, so the best course of action for storing would be to deliberately choose times where the probability to make poor decisions or be harmed through misfortune would be lessened (reading a book, lying in bed, or any other passive action).

In any case, a Spinner would almost certainly find the best time to store Fortune when falling asleep, as there generally aren't any major decisions made during this time. 

Nicrosil: we know very little about this metal as well, and on its own it wouldn't be very useful.

But, if you can store it at a certain rate to later Tap and increase the strength of your other powers, then a Twinborn (or possibly Hemalurgist) would find the Flicker method to be quite useful; as long as they aren't actively using their Allomancy, they can store it as fast as possible to get the maximum effect. If this is true, storing Nicrosil would be pretty easy in most cases.

Aluminum: we also don't know too much about this metal (we don't even know that you can keep a Feruchemical charge in it, perhaps you can only Blank your Identity).

I'm not even going to bother dealing with this one, as we just don't know enough to hypothesize effectively and a lot of the evidence we do have is Cosmere relevant.

Duralumin: another one we know little about, but we do know that a Connector Ferring can increase the speed at which they form friendships with others by Tapping the right kind of Connection and they can fly under the radar of others by storing their Connection to them.

This one is going to be more circumstance relevant I believe, but the Flicker method might prove most useful, as you can either choose to fly under others' notice or to make fast friends with others.

[+Lewis Nethur He/Him]

First, awesome post. Your observations on Pewter alone are maddening and system-breaking and I can't see any holes in them; 100% agree that a brute with ambitions on being a professional body-builder could store muscle mass and strength continously, persistently work out while weakened to achieve consistent accelerated gains, then tap their mind on demand to become an 800lb gorilla and that's horrifying...

I would take Wayne's sick-day strategy claims with a grain of salt though...he's a good man deep (DEEP) down, but he lies a lot. I just have trouble believing that one can meaningfully store health while severely drunk; I don't doubt that he binge drinks and screws off for weeks on end, I just don't believe that's actually how he gets his charge and suspect he must be using the bit-by-bit method constantly in order to keep up with how often he gets shot, stabbed, or broken. Storing health while drunk just sounds like a super bad idea that shouldn't work.

Zinc, I think, would actually be one of the easiest metals to store and build up. Admittedly, if one stored 20% of mental speed constantly, people they interact with regularly would probably develop a perception that they were slow in the head, which isn't ideal. That said, tapping 500% for 5 minutes in anyone's presence would likely be enough to permanently convince them that you're a genius, angel, or some kind of God.

Electrum. I would actually think that determination could be stored best using your flicker method. I'm pretty sure I could store at 90% during most of my daily meetings and no one would notice as long as I stopped when asked to speak.

Chromium. 100% agree that storing Fortune should not be conducted using the bit-by-bit method; that sounds like a recipe for ruining one's life. Storing while specifically engaging with controlled, safe, low-variance activities should be basically negligible though, and tapping while engaging with random, high-risk, and high-variation activities (like gambling) would be awesome.

Steel. Sick day method 100% here. Getting drunk for a whole day and watching TV requires nearly zero physical movement and would net one approximately 16 hours at 2x speed later and that's freaking insanely broken. I would only move at 0 or 1000% as a steel ferring.

[Trusk'our he/him]

46 minutes ago, hwiles said:

First, awesome post.

Thanks so much!  That means a lot to me.

48 minutes ago, hwiles said:

I would take Wayne's sick-day strategy claims with a grain of salt though...he's a good man deep (DEEP) down, but he lies a lot. I just have trouble believing that one can meaningfully store health while severely drunk; I don't doubt that he binge drinks and screws off for weeks on end, I just don't believe that's actually how he gets his charge and suspect he must be using the bit-by-bit method constantly in order to keep up with how often he gets shot, stabbed, or broken. Storing health while drunk just sounds like a super bad idea that shouldn't work.

Eh, he's not 100% trustworthy, but if I recall it was Wax who mentioned in AoL that Wayne liked to use that strategy, and Wax has known Wayne pretty well for a while.

But yeah, storing lots of health while having a 72% alcohol to blood ratio is going to wreak havoc on your liver. . . and brain. . . huh, maybe that's part of why Wayne is so, well, Wayne 

53 minutes ago, hwiles said:

Zinc, I think, would actually be one of the easiest metals to store and build up. Admittedly, if one stored 20% of mental speed constantly, people they interact with regularly would probably develop a perception that they were slow in the head, which isn't ideal. That said, tapping 500% for 5 minutes in anyone's presence would likely be enough to permanently convince them that you're a genius, angel, or some kind of God.

Personally, I think it might be even harder than steel, at least for someone like me who likes to daydream about random Cosmere stuff more than they run around.

But now that you mention it, perhaps reducing your mental speed to help fool others into underestimating you, and you can later Tap mental speed to get even more advantage.

56 minutes ago, hwiles said:

Electrum. I would actually think that determination could be stored best using your flicker method. I'm pretty sure I could store at 90% during most of my daily meetings and no one would notice as long as I stopped when asked to speak.

Lol, so true 

[alder24]

4 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

2. Bit by Bit: this tactic revolves around always storing but at a much, much slower rate. Storing about 5% of an attribute is not going to significantly impede your ability to function, and if you store for 16 hours a day, you'd get about 48 minutes of doubling your attribute (16 hours x 60 for minutes /20 for 100% Tapping = 48). Per day (not accounting for compression loss).

Considering that there are ~20 compressions, your tapping time will be shortened to a minute or two if you account for the loss. That's not very useful. This strategy simply doesn't work if you need to tap with diminishing returns. It works only if you need to for example increase your strength only by 10%, unless you're not using your attributes often, like Wax and weight. For every metal that you're using often it just won't work with that amount of loss. 

4 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

3. Bedtime: this tactic hinges on the fact that the average person takes between 10 to 20 minutes to fall asleep each night (link, link#2, link#3). You aren't doing anything during that time (at least not if you actually want to fall asleep), so that makes it prime time to store attributes for later. Even if the time itself is short, you can afford to store at a much higher rate depending on the attribute (physical and mental speed maybe even 80-90%).

Not viable for F-bronze, but also for some other attributes. I think it would be a distracting mental exercise on its own, forcing yourself to store attributes when you want to fall asleep. Additionally, storing some attributes might be simply too irritating - like heat. But if the mental focus required to actively store attributes isn't that great, or if you personally can ignore that when trying to sleep (I can't), it is a handy way of storing.

5 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

Zinc: It would probably prove harder to store this particular metal, as it would reduce the speed and ease at which your mind processes information.

I think the Flicker tactic would be handy for every task you engage your "muscle memory." Something very repetitive that you've done hundreds of times before and you don't really think about what you're doing when you're performing this task. It can rage from taking a shower, brushing your teeth, cleaning or even some repetitive hard work. You might be able to just shut down your brain and allow your "muscle memory" to do that instinctively for you. 

5 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

Electrum: storing the ability to have the willpower/emotional energy to do something. Sounds like it would be difficult by its very nature, but I suppose you could mitigate this to some degree by using the Bit by Bit and Bedtime tactics.

Yeah, the last thing you need before sleep is getting severely depressed. 

 

Overall I agree. That was fun to read.

 

4 hours ago, hwiles said:

I would take Wayne's sick-day strategy claims with a grain of salt though...he's a good man deep (DEEP) down, but he lies a lot. I just have trouble believing that one can meaningfully store health while severely drunk; I don't doubt that he binge drinks and screws off for weeks on end, I just don't believe that's actually how he gets his charge and suspect he must be using the bit-by-bit method constantly in order to keep up with how often he gets shot, stabbed, or broken. Storing health while drunk just sounds like a super bad idea that shouldn't work.

It just means you won't get sober. For Wayne that's a positive. 

He was doing sick weeks, it was said many times that Wayne was spending weeks in bed to store up his goldminds and when they got empty, he was storing on pages as much as he could. He didn't lie about serious stuff like that. Before the AoL ballroom shootout he spent two weeks in bed and that was only enough for healing 3 or 4 gunshot wounds. Wayne needed a lot of health, which he could get only by storing as much as possible. AoL ch 6:

Quote

That was the second bullet wound of the night,” Wayne said. “I can maybe heal one more.” Wayne stood as Waxillium pulled him to his feet. “Took me a good two weeks in bed to store up that much. Hope that girl of yours is worth it.”

[AdonalsiumIsMyDad]

Amazing post! I kept looking for something to add but honestly I’m just so impressed with how you implemented each strategy. Great job

[Trusk'our he/him]

57 minutes ago, AdonalsiumIsMyDad said:

Amazing post! I kept looking for something to add but honestly I’m just so impressed with how you implemented each strategy. Great job

Thank you! I don't think I've ever made a post with this much appreciation before 

[IcedOutPenguin He/Him]

with a twin-borns, sometimes their ferucemy is super useful and sometimes its not, I mean, some twin-borns have got to be jealous of people who can compound their ferucemical type, healing is all well and good but, I mean getting super speed or being able to think super fast could get you out of almost anything. 

[Trusk'our he/him]

12 hours ago, laserz667 said:

with a twin-borns, sometimes their ferucemy is super useful and sometimes its not, I mean, some twin-borns have got to be jealous of people who can compound their ferucemical type, healing is all well and good but, I mean getting super speed or being able to think super fast could get you out of almost anything. 

True. Compounds are on a whole new level, as unlike other Feruchemists they don't have to worry about scrounging for attribute stores.

17 hours ago, alder24 said:

Considering that there are ~20 compressions, your tapping time will be shortened to a minute or two if you account for the loss. That's not very useful. This strategy simply doesn't work if you need to tap with diminishing returns. It works only if you need to for example increase your strength only by 10%, unless you're not using your attributes often, like Wax and weight. For every metal that you're using often it just won't work with that amount of loss. 

Well, by the end you're only Tapping it at 100% in the calculation (you could Tap higher, I was just making a point on what you could realistically get out of it), but at that rate your body isn't siphoning off a ton of extra Investiture in order to alter your spiritual aspect to protect against the dangers of the power. Basically, my train of thought currently is that storing is mostly going to be at the same efficiency as you're not accounting for that lost Investiture, but when Tapping larger amounts it gets less and less efficient due to that necessary loss.

So, perhaps it would be more like 45-46 minutes instead of 48, but I don't think the loss would be that significant when only doubling your attribute.

17 hours ago, alder24 said:

Not viable for F-bronze, but also for some other attributes. I think it would be a distracting mental exercise on its own, forcing yourself to store attributes when you want to fall asleep. Additionally, storing some attributes might be simply too irritating - like heat. But if the mental focus required to actively store attributes isn't that great, or if you personally can ignore that when trying to sleep (I can't), it is a handy way of storing.

It probably depends mostly on what you're used to, but if you're new to the tactic it could prove frustrating to your sleeping patterns. I also find it worth mentioning that Allomancers don't typically have an issue with maintainint their burning while performing other activities, so perhaps Tapping with Feruchemy is similar in nature.

17 hours ago, alder24 said:

I think the Flicker tactic would be handy for every task you engage your "muscle memory." Something very repetitive that you've done hundreds of times before and you don't really think about what you're doing when you're performing this task. It can rage from taking a shower, brushing your teeth, cleaning or even some repetitive hard work. You might be able to just shut down your brain and allow your "muscle memory" to do that instinctively for you. 

Exactly; if it's something you don't need to consciously think about, you can probably afford to store with F-zinc while performing that task.

17 hours ago, alder24 said:

Overall I agree. That was fun to read.

Thank you. I appreciate it friend 

[alder24]

28 minutes ago, Trusk'our said:

Well, by the end you're only Tapping it at 100% in the calculation (you could Tap higher, I was just making a point on what you could realistically get out of it), but at that rate your body isn't siphoning off a ton of extra Investiture in order to alter your spiritual aspect to protect against the dangers of the power. Basically, my train of thought currently is that storing is mostly going to be at the same efficiency as you're not accounting for that lost Investiture, but when Tapping larger amounts it gets less and less efficient due to that necessary loss.

So, perhaps it would be more like 45-46 minutes instead of 48, but I don't think the loss would be that significant when only doubling your attribute.

The loss of investiture in diminishing returns is due to compression of attributes. You need to compress this 5% to 10% and that takes investiture. If you have 20 compressions just to get 100% you're gonna lose a lot of investiture and that's why you get only a minute from all of this. It's not about "protection about the dangers of the power" - this was never said to be a contributing factor to the loss and it's likely miniscule. 

Coppermind:

Quote

if the Feruchemist taps at a greater rate, then some of the attribute is lost, to facilitate the compression of the Investiture.

 

Spoiler

Sporkify

This is more towards the whole physics stuff, but is Feruchemy really balanced? If it gives diminishing returns, wouldn't this end up as a net loss of power?

Brandon Sanderson

It doesn't diminish. Or, well, it does—but only if you compound it. You get 1 for 1 back, but compounding the power requires an expenditure of the power itself. For instance, if you are weak for one hour, you can gain the lost strength for one hour. But that's not really that much strength. After all, you probably weren't as weak as zero people during that time. So if you want to be as strong as two men, you couldn't do it for a full hour. You'd have to spend some energy to compound, then spend the compounded energy itself.

In more mathematical terms, let's say you spend one hour at 50% strength. You could then spend one hour at 150% strength, or perhaps 25 min at 200% strength, or maybe 10min at 250% strength. Each increment is harder, and therefore 'strains' you more and burns your energy more quickly. And since most Feruchemists don't store at 50% strength, but instead at something like 80% strength (it feels like much more when they do it, but you can't really push the body to that much forced weakness without risking death) you can burn through a few day's strength in a very short time if you aren't careful.

Footnote: This question was asked when fueling Feruchemy with Allomancy had only been seen in Rashek. As such, the term compounding is used purely to reference tapping at a higher rate than can be stored.
Hero of Ages Q&A - Time Waster's Guide (Oct. 15, 2008)

Edited January 11, 2024 by alder24

[IcedOutPenguin He/Him]

Is it possible to become a ferucemy savvant?

[KelsierFortnite he/him]

On 1/10/2024 at 12:17 PM, Trusk'our said:

 

So, a Bit by Bit tactic might work, though you'd have to be careful not to use it when dealing with tasks that require any measure of quick thinking (such as driving or operating heavy equipment).

 

Are you sure that's a good idea? 

[alder24]

49 minutes ago, laserz667 said:

Is it possible to become a ferucemy savvant?

Not without an external source of investiture like compounding or unkeyed metalminds.

Spoiler

Questioner

There are Allomantic savants, are there Feruchemical savants?

Brandon Sanderson

Much harder to do. My feeling on Feruchemical savants was because it was your own power in the first place, you can't steep in it so much in the way. But, if you can get someone else's power or if you are fueling your Feruchemy another way, you would become one. So, the Lord Ruler is a good example.

Questioner

Was Miles a...

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah. Miles would be the same sort of thing.

Questioner

Is that why he didn't die as quickly in the execution?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

So yeah. Normally no but if you can Compound you become... basically that is how I am explaining part of the Compounding abilities. 

Starsight Release Party (Nov. 26, 2019)

 

[IcedOutPenguin He/Him]

8 minutes ago, alder24 said:

Not without an external source of investiture like compounding or unkeyed metalminds.

 

Thank you

[Trusk'our he/him]

On 1/11/2024 at 11:31 AM, alder24 said:

The loss of investiture in diminishing returns is due to compression of attributes. You need to compress this 5% to 10% and that takes investiture. If you have 20 compressions just to get 100% you're gonna lose a lot of investiture and that's why you get only a minute from all of this. It's not about "protection about the dangers of the power" - this was never said to be a contributing factor to the loss and it's likely miniscule. 

Coppermind:

  Reveal hidden contents

Sporkify

This is more towards the whole physics stuff, but is Feruchemy really balanced? If it gives diminishing returns, wouldn't this end up as a net loss of power?

Brandon Sanderson

It doesn't diminish. Or, well, it does—but only if you compound it. You get 1 for 1 back, but compounding the power requires an expenditure of the power itself. For instance, if you are weak for one hour, you can gain the lost strength for one hour. But that's not really that much strength. After all, you probably weren't as weak as zero people during that time. So if you want to be as strong as two men, you couldn't do it for a full hour. You'd have to spend some energy to compound, then spend the compounded energy itself.

In more mathematical terms, let's say you spend one hour at 50% strength. You could then spend one hour at 150% strength, or perhaps 25 min at 200% strength, or maybe 10min at 250% strength. Each increment is harder, and therefore 'strains' you more and burns your energy more quickly. And since most Feruchemists don't store at 50% strength, but instead at something like 80% strength (it feels like much more when they do it, but you can't really push the body to that much forced weakness without risking death) you can burn through a few day's strength in a very short time if you aren't careful.

Footnote: This question was asked when fueling Feruchemy with Allomancy had only been seen in Rashek. As such, the term compounding is used purely to reference tapping at a higher rate than can be stored.
Hero of Ages Q&A - Time Waster's Guide (Oct. 15, 2008)

I respectfully wish to disagree; I believe Brandon is speaking about Tapping more in general, not necessarily about the actual rate at which the attribute was originally Stored. Essentially, my current belief is that since Storing doesn't take into account the necessity of adapting your Spiritweb to use the power, storing at 5% for 20 minutes equals the same amount of stored attribute as Storing at 20% for 5 minutes.

Spoiler

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/361/#e11520

Calderis

I recently got the opportunity to ask you a question about Feruchemical steel and if it was a temporal effect and you told me to define that better. When tapping steel, the mind of the Feruchemist is sped up and physics affects their actions normally. When storing, their mind is not slowed and the effect seems tortuously difficult to amass. Storing generally seems to be the more dangerous/difficult option in Feruchemy, so does [Feruchemical steel] alter a person's personal relationship to the flow of time, with the disconnect between the Physical and Cognitive as a drawback of storing?

Brandon Sanderson

I see what you're asking. The mind-altering effects of [Feruchemical steel] are similar to the slight strength you gain from [Feruchemical iron]--it is your Spiritual nature adapting to the new influx of an attribute that it's not really expecting, and siphoning some of that investiture to make you capable of actually using it. So there is a slight temporal effect here, but nothing as big as I think you're looking for.

However, this is not confirmed at this point, so it could be as you say.

On 1/11/2024 at 12:23 PM, KelsierFortnite said:

Are you sure that's a good idea? 

Depends on the circumstance; if you know that you don't need a ton of extra brain power for a task you've done hundreds of times before or is just mind-numbingly simple, I could see it be very wise, as it gives you "free" mental speed to use later when you really need it.

But, yeah, there would always be some risk something hazardous coming up while reducing your brainpower, so it's more about the risk versus reward of the situation and trying to get the most efficiency possible (though training yourself to automatically stop Storing when such occurrences happen could potentially be achievable, further mitigating this issue).

[Jobobminer]

Because fortune is limited pre-cognition, fortune is useful in deciding how you use fortune.

A specific way to store Fortune most effectively:

1 - Store up a small but meaningful amount during low-risk events where you aren't making decisions. There's still the risk that losing your natural level of fortune during this time causes problems but that's just the price you pay for fortune.

2 - Tap that fortune and use your insights/instinct to choose a better time to store up more fortune in the future.

3 - Use your even bigger stockpile of fortune all up at once to create a fortune-building/spending schedule.

Make a habit of intentionally using a good chunk of your fortune to decide when you store fortune and you should be able to choose times when it isn't too critical and you aren't going to get shot or something.

Bonus: if you can get mental speed you can use your fortune better and physical speed would probably help with writing it all down.

[alder24]

6 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

I respectfully wish to disagree; I believe Brandon is speaking about Tapping more in general, not necessarily about the actual rate at which the attribute was originally Stored. Essentially, my current belief is that since Storing doesn't take into account the necessity of adapting your Spiritweb to use the power, storing at 5% for 20 minutes equals the same amount of stored attribute as Storing at 20% for 5 minutes.

If you take two cups of water, both 1 L each, each of them have 5% of salt diffused in them, and then you mixed them together, will you get a solution with 10% salt in it? No, you get a 2 L solution with 5% salt. You need to first do the work, use some energy to get this 10% solution you want - like by heating up and vaporizing some water, so the remaining salt will be more concentrated in the solution. 

The water is the time for how long you stored, the salt is the percentage of attributes stored during that time. You want to have a higher percentage, you have to use some time to compress the attribute. Sure, it’s not a perfect analogy but it’s something. You have to use investiture to compress your attribute and because Feruchemy is end-neutral - nothing comes from the outside sources - you have to use what you stored in your metalminds. Your own attribute has to be used to compress it to higher percentages. That’s why you get less and less of it with each iteration of compression. That's why 5% for 20 min doesn't equal 20% in 5 min.

Sure, some of your attribute is siphoned for your spirit web to adapt, that’s also a contributing factor for your loss of the attribute, but it’s one of two factors. And because you get only some minor effects from this siphoning, the vastly more influential factor is the loss due to compression.

[Trusk'our he/him]

7 hours ago, Jobobminer said:

Make a habit of intentionally using a good chunk of your fortune to decide when you store fortune and you should be able to choose times when it isn't too critical and you aren't going to get shot or something.

I like it! That feels like a very clever use of the power, especially if you can use it to more safely get access to more Fortune at a later date.

[Voidlit Man he/him]

On 1/10/2024 at 11:25 AM, hwiles said:

Electrum. I would actually think that determination could be stored best using your flicker method. I'm pretty sure I could store at 90% during most of my daily meetings and no one would notice as long as I stopped when asked to speak.

I would be worried that while storing Electrum, if someone asks you to speak in a meeting or something, you'd have no motivation to stop storing. Sort of an "eh, what's the point" kind of deal, where you don't care about your job. Of course, that depends on how Electrum storing actually works, but I think there is a real danger in just not caring about anything at any time. This one seems like it would really suck to store.

[Trusk'our he/him]

7 hours ago, Voidlit Man said:

I would be worried that while storing Electrum, if someone asks you to speak in a meeting or something, you'd have no motivation to stop storing. Sort of an "eh, what's the point" kind of deal, where you don't care about your job. Of course, that depends on how Electrum storing actually works, but I think there is a real danger in just not caring about anything at any time. This one seems like it would really suck to store.

True, that could be a possibility. 

I suppose you might just have to learn to function despite the loss of determination, which could be useful (though difficult) in its own right.

[Treamayne]

7 hours ago, Voidlit Man said:

I would be worried that while storing Electrum, if someone asks you to speak in a meeting or something, you'd have no motivation to stop storing. Sort of an "eh, what's the point" kind of deal, where you don't care about your job. Of course, that depends on how Electrum storing actually works, but I think there is a real danger in just not caring about anything at any time. This one seems like it would really suck to store.

21 minutes ago, Trusk'our said:

True, that could be a possibility. 

I suppose you might just have to learn to function despite the loss of determination, which could be useful (though difficult) in its own right.

Just go to Boot Camp. . . 

The military are experts in "You don't have to like it, you don't have to want it; you just have to do it anyway"

 

[LightRinger he/him]

On 1/10/2024 at 8:17 AM, Trusk'our said:

Bendalloy: this one would actually be nice for many of my fellow Americans; just eat an extra helping of food and drink and extra couple glasses of water at mealtime without gaining weight.

Even more powerfully, it can be used to lose weight and burn calories at a drastic speed, and you don't need to store unless you want to, because it's one of the few you can make up for at a later time. Maybe Brass, or Bronze?

[Colors]

This is great @Trusk'our. A lot of insightful thoughts here. 

I have always questioned the seeming limitation on storing while sleeping.

Spoiler

I know that Sazed has explicitly stated he cannot store anything but wakefulness while sleeping, but Sazed was a fallible character with limited knowledge and experience at that point in the story, we cannot take his words as absolute, just what one person with that ability understands to be the case. Especially since characters in the Cosmere have made comments before that weren't necessarily true and only reflected their understanding at the time. 

It's pretty clear to me that at least when using Medallions, users can store and tap while sleeping. Malwish Airship crews would need to be able to do these things presumably, and we know in BoM that several of the characters who are wearing medallions and storing weight sleep while riding the airship. 

I suspect it may be one of those things that could have to do with intent and perception, with the correct intent and perception allowing one to store while sleeping. Another possibility is it may only apply in cases where there is an emergent imminent need, such as the ability to tap or store other attributes unconsciously at times. For example, if you're trying to sleep in an ice cave your body may be capable of tapping heat while you are sleeping or unconscious, or in this case if you're in the sky and the only thing keeping you there is being very light you are able to store weight. I think this could tie into the perception/intent aspect too and the necessity creates a subconscious intent for you. The only other option I can think of is that the Medallions are just special for some reason we don't know yet and it is only possible with a Medallion, but not for a natural ferring.

I can understand why it might not be a common ability, because that could make feruchemy OP, but I think if it was a very difficult skill that only the best feruchemists could accomplish (in non-emergency situations) it wouldn't skew things too crazily. 

Personally, I'd love to be a Bendalloy Feruchemist. Might be a small thing, but eating as much as you want without putting on weight would be great. Can you imagine how awesome this would be to someone with Lift's unique abilities?

[Trusk'our he/him]

1 hour ago, Colors said:

This is great @Trusk'our. A lot of insightful thoughts here. 

 

Thank you! I appreciate it 

[Returned he/him]

I think that you could use modern technology to get a boost out of a couple of traits. Cadmium could be offset somewhat by being in a hyper-oxygenated environment, and gold by being in a sterile cleanroom. People with certain autoimmune disorders might even benefit from storing health all the time, depending on how exactly that works, especially if they could do it in an unsealed metalmind which they could then sell.

I like the approaches you've outlined, but I think that the biggest variable is really how often you want to tap the attributes. Using them to any practical effect seems like you'll just burn through attributes so much more quickly than you could ever store them, especially if you use one of the lower-impact methods to store.

With that in mind, how and when do you think it would be most efficient/effective to tap the attributes? I imagine there is a lot of scope for tapping just a bit at key times, like Ham burning just a bit of pewter here and there where it counts the most (like just for a moment to recover balance).

My top pick would be to tap a generous amount of zinc to come up with approaches for that. But otherwise my mind always slides over to dramatic superhero-esque feats, which is kind of the opposite of tapping just a bit when you can leverage it the best.

[Colors]

2 minutes ago, Returned said:

I think that you could use modern technology to get a boost out of a couple of traits. Cadmium could be offset somewhat by being in a hyper-oxygenated environment, and gold by being in a sterile cleanroom. People with certain autoimmune disorders might even benefit from storing health all the time, depending on how exactly that works, especially if they could do it in an unsealed metalmind which they could then sell.

I like the approaches you've outlined, but I think that the biggest variable is really how often you want to tap the attributes. Using them to any practical effect seems like you'll just burn through attributes so much more quickly than you could ever store them, especially if you use one of the lower-impact methods to store.

With that in mind, how and when do you think it would be most efficient/effective to tap the attributes? I imagine there is a lot of scope for tapping just a bit at key times, like Ham burning just a bit of pewter here and there where it counts the most (like just for a moment to recover balance).

My top pick would be to tap a generous amount of zinc to come up with approaches for that. But otherwise my mind always slides over to dramatic superhero-esque feats, which is kind of the opposite of tapping just a bit when you can leverage it the best.

I assume being in a sterile environment would help, but there are certainly other aspects of health unrelated to infectious diseases that could also be an issue, though they haven't specifically been shown on page.