Hemalurgic effect of Bavadium

[Dofurion]

It's just a simple thought to see what they think. Could the haemalurgical effect of Bavadium be "stealing invested connections"?
That would imply that in this case he could steal the 16 Allomantic powers with a single nail (As long as the "donor" is a Mistborn), but that he could not steal a Breath or Feruchemimic abilities

[Trusk'our he/him]

21 minutes ago, Dofurion said:

It's just a simple thought to see what they think. Could the haemalurgical effect of Bavadium be "stealing invested connections"?
That would imply that in this case he could steal the 16 Allomantic powers with a single nail (As long as the "donor" is a Mistborn), but that he could not steal a Breath or Feruchemimic abilities

Possibly, but I think it being more of a wild card like Atium is more likely. Metallic Art powers are more like a Connection plus Investiture, so just stealing Connection alone wouldn't work to take them, or else duralumin spikes could take any power.

[Dofurion]

14 minutes ago, Trusk'our said:

Possibly, but I think it being more of a wild card like Atium is more likely. Metallic Art powers are more like a Connection plus Investiture, so just stealing Connection alone wouldn't work to take them, or else duralumin spikes could take any power.

That's why I nuance with "invested connections" the idea is that it takes the connection of the Allomancer with Preservation (in this case Harmony). And in general cut the connection of users of invested arts that require connecting directly to a Shard.

Edited March 16, 2024 by Dofurion

[Koloss17 She/They]

1 hour ago, Dofurion said:

It's just a simple thought to see what they think. Could the haemalurgical effect of Bavadium be "stealing invested connections"?
That would imply that in this case he could steal the 16 Allomantic powers with a single nail (As long as the "donor" is a Mistborn), but that he could not steal a Breath or Feruchemimic abilities

Well, we know that technically, lerasium steals ALL abilities of the target, so technically there’s that. However, I think lerasium is supposed to be special in that regard (and is admittedly a bit useless now)

[Dofurion]

After a while I found a way to revisit this topic from another perspective, the hypothesis is the following:

All divine metals can store multiple attributes (In an amount less than or equal to 8).

I've been looking into this and there's a pattern:

1. Atium can steal any power. This implies several things, first that it only steals powers (it can't steal strength for example) and beyond the fact that in theory it can store the 32 powers of the metal arts, it can only replace 8 of the 16 allomantically viable metals.
2. Lerasium steals all abilities. This hypothetically implies that the metal seeks to preserve all non-supernatural attributes (strength, intelligence, etc.) at the same time. So in theory it can replace 8 of the allomantically viable metals (7 if we remove Aluminum).

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Curious note: This also implies that 'Kandra blessings' cannot be created with Atium.

So, following this pattern, we can speculate that Bavadium could also replace approximately 8 metals from the table.
The question here is which 8 and how that fits with the 2 haemalurgical properties that we know of this metal.

• Given the abilities that Paalm displays, Bavadium can replace Steel and Pewter, two metals from the Physical quadrant.
• Furthermore, given the characteristics of the Chimeras, could it also be physical properties that it steals? By replacing Iron and Tin.

It would already be replacing 4 of the 16 metals, all from the Physical quadrant.

Since divine metals act in a certain way in accordance with the intent of their associated Shard, could Bavadium seek to acquire physical/corporal properties? It makes sense given Patji's idiosyncrasies. In which case it could hemalurgically replace Gold as well [Hybrid Feruchemical Powers].

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Note: I am using the symbol for the number 256 since we do not have a proper symbol for Trellium Bavadium.

If we relax the description a bit, we could include the section on mental powers: Brass, Bronze.
In this case, it would be the same amount as those replaced by Lerasium.

Fun fact: Lerasium is still able to store 8 attributes even if we leave out Aluminum.

1. Strength [Iron]
2. Senses [Tin]
3. Emotional Strength [Zinc]
4. Intelligence [Copper]
5. Fate [Chrome]
6. Investiture [Nicrosil]
7. Connection [Duralumin]
8. Identity [Duralumin]

Fun fact 2: The minimum optimal for creating a Steel Inquisitor is 8 Atium spikes and a Steel spike (like Linchpin).

[Trusk'our he/him]

55 minutes ago, Dofurion said:

Curious note: This also implies that 'Kandra blessings' cannot be created with Atium.

I mean, ReLuur's Blessing is made of pewter, which steals physical Feruchemical powers. Plus, Paalm was able to create functional Trellium spikes for herself that could keep her sapient (though not fully sane) while simultaneously granting powers.

As such, I think that Atium could be used as a Blessing. Though, using Ruin's pure essence as a Blessing might Connect the Kandra to that Shard more, potentially making them more vulnerable to its control or influence (unless Preservation's severing of Connection prevents that, seeing as Ruin can't even track it in Era 1).

1 hour ago, Dofurion said:

Atium can steal any power. This implies several things, first that it only steals powers (it can't steal strength for example) and beyond the fact that in theory it can store the 32 powers of the metal arts, it can only replace 8 of the 16 allomantically viable metals.

I'm not so sure about this. Atium is a wildcard, being able to steal any power with the right Intent and placement. 

Spoiler

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/202-barnes-and-noble-book-club-qa/#e5971

Chaos2651

Hemalurgically, atium steals Allomantic Temporal Powers. But, that seems unlikely, since atium is a god metal. It wouldn't fit in with the rest of the magic system. Did Preservation, in addition to switching cadmium and bendalloy for atium and malatium, also switch atium's Feruchemical and Hemalurgic powers with cadmium? Because it seems to me there's not a lot of atium Marsh can use to live for hundreds of years into the next Mistborn trilogy.

Brandon Sanderson

Preservation wanted atium and malatium to be of use to the people, as he recognized that it would be a very powerful tool—and that using it up could help defeat Ruin. But he also recognized that sixteen was a mythological important number, and felt it would make the best sign for his followers. So he took out the most unlikely (difficult to make and use) metals for his sign to his followers. But that doesn't have much to do with Hemalurgy's use here.

Remember that the tables—and the ars Arcanum—are 'in world' creations. (Or, at least, in-universe.) The knowledge represented in them is as people understand it, and can always have flaws. That was the case with having atium on the table in the first place, and that was the case with people (specifically the Inquisitors) trying to figure out what atium did Hemalurgically.

Their experiments (very expensive ones) are what determined that atium (which they thought was just one of the sixteen metals) granted the Allomantic Temporal powers. What they didn't realize is that atium (used correctly) could steal ANY of the powers. Think of it as a wild card. With the right knowledge, you could use it to mimic any other spike. It works far better than other spikes as well.

As for Marsh, he's got a whole bag of atium (taken off of the Kandra who was going to try to sell it.) So he's all right for quite a while. A small bead used right can reverse age someone back to their childhood.

But this was a little beyond their magical understanding at the time.

I think that Trellium is similar in its abilities- it's been seen granting powers to Set members, though like with pewter being usable as a Blessing, it's been used to twist people into Chimera as well.

[+Lewis Nethur He/Him]

I would totally not expect foreign godmetals to serve in Hemalurgy as wildcards exactly like atium; the metaphysics would just be too wonky...Ruin wanted to ruin things, so his metal steals anything (but only any ONE thing.) Preservation wished to preserve all, in stasis if necessary, and his metal rips out as much of a soul as it can grab onto and just...holds on to it...

So I would think that Autonomy's metal would steal and grant that which maximizes individual degrees of personal freedom. This probably has a LOT of overlap with atium for most 17th sharder's purposes, but it should not be singular and universal like Ati's metal is.

What could this mean?

Well...it's possible that trellium only steals some metals from some of the normally organized metal quadrant, and steals only some other nonmagical characteristics while being inert against others. If it functioned as a full wild-card like atium, then that would essentially mean that Autonomy's metal is better at ruining things than Ruin's personal metal in his own personal insane asylum of a system since it also grants inherent cloaking from shardic attention. That just...wouldn't really make sense. It should do something similar to Atium, but specifically possess at least some of the limits and shortcomings that atium just straight up ignores. For example, I could see trellium simply being incapable of stealing spiritual allomancy and Feruchemy, or having other gaping holes in its ability to steal that simply never came up during Bleeder's very limited demonstrations.

It occurs to me that trellium might simply steal the portion of a spiritweb that is most important to or valued by its victim. This would allow it to function as a full-blown wildcard, but in an uncontrolled (autonomous?) Way. For example, if you harvest a random tin-ferring with trellium through the heart, you would probably end up with a mangled piece of soul with tin-feruchemy coded into it; buuuuuuut...you might just get a mangled piece of soul coded with some random guy's love for his family if their Feruchemy was wildly unimportant to them. Now that...that would be like Autonomy; allowing victims to essentially choose what they surrender and putting the full onus on harvesters to truly case out and profile their prospective hunts...

[Dofurion]

2 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

I mean, ReLuur's Blessing is made of pewter,

I just checked it out and while Coppermind claims this, the WoB it's based on doesn't make it clear.

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Zas678

About Bands of Mourning... Marasi finds ReLuur's missing spike, and she describes it as pewter... Which is not one of the four metals conventionally used in kandra blessings...

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Zas678

...and is used to steal Feruchemical abilities. Was Marasi just mistaken, or is something going on there.

Brandon Sanderson

That you will eventually find out.

Calamity release party (Feb. 16, 2016)

I don't think it's that simple since Sanderson said RAFO, I think it's probably one of the spiritual quadrant metals.

 

Regarding the subject of Atium and Lerasium and their functioning in Hemalurgy, the question lies in the definitions.

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Pagerunner

The Hemalurgy table, you wrote down "atium steals any power, lerasium is all abilities, nicrosil is Investiture"; what's the difference between those three?

Hemalurgic atium, lerasium, and nicrosil. What's powers, abilities, and Investiture?

Brandon Sanderson

People are Invested in ways that do not give them active powers. So for instance, everyone on Nalthis is Invested. Everyone in the cosmere is, really. You want to steal their Investiture, but they don't have a power. You're still ripping off a piece of their soul. So there is a distinction between the actual Investiture that's in a human being and a specific power that they have.

So that distinction is pretty easy. You can also, with Hemalurgy, steal specific things. You can steal just general Investiture. You can steal, if you want--this is where the kandra Blessings come from. You can instead steal specific things that are not like stealing Allomancy. Stealing, for instance, someone's mental acuity.

Pagerunner

So abilities is like the half that's all the strength, speed, all that kind of stuff? Those are abilities, versus the Metallic Arts are all powers?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Pagerunner

Then Investiture, is that offworld magics?

Brandon Sanderson

No, no, it's the raw power.

Pagerunner

Nicrosil is their soul?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. A piece of their soul, essentially.

Pagerunner

So how would you go about stealing an offworld power?

Brandon Sanderson

It's going to depend. A Breath, you would steal with nicrosil. It's general Investiture, is what you would probably going call that. You could forcibly remove someone's Breath from them. The ability to be a Sand Master you would steal with the power ability.

JordanCon 2021 (July 16, 2021)

In this same WoB, the distinction is made between the three use cases:
Lerasium: Abilities( Strength, Intelligence, etc.)
Atium: Powers (Allomantic, Feruchemical, Sand Mastery)

While the descriptions on the tables are in-world, if Atium could steal everything its description would most likely say "Can steal any attribute" instead of Power.

What I do have to modify is the ability of Lerasium to replace Nicrosil.

1 hour ago, hwiles said:

It occurs to me that trellium might simply steal the portion of a spiritweb that is most important to or valued by its victim. This would allow it to function as a full-blown wildcard, but in an uncontrolled

It's a very interesting idea and I like it. But the problem with it is that in that case the Chimeras would not be so similar to each other, they would be more of an amalgam than canids... that is the other option, if it turns out to be as you suggest, it is most likely that the Set was taking the haemalurgic attributes from dogs or similar animals.

[+Lewis Nethur He/Him]

3 minutes ago, Dofurion said:

...

It's a very interesting idea and I like it. But the problem with it is that in that case the Chimeras would not be so similar to each other, they would be more of an amalgam than canids... that is the other option, if it turns out to be as you suggest, it is most likely that the Set was taking the haemalurgic attributes from dogs or similar animals.

Not so! The chimera spike farming would just function more like a dog breeding farm than a manufacturing floor in the sense that, while yes, there would be way more variability and uncertainty, you still get to choose which monstrosities you ship out the back door and which you send somewhere else. Please for the love of god do not test it, but i'd bet a year's pay that at least 8/10 golden retrieves would produce a loyalty spike if harvested.  that's more than enough for limited production of high fidelity, high quality, high uniformity Chimeras.

[Trusk'our he/him]

5 minutes ago, Dofurion said:

Regarding the subject of Atium and Lerasium and their functioning in Hemalurgy, the question lies in the definitions.

In this same WoB, the distinction is made between the three use cases:
Lerasium: Abilities( Strength, Intelligence, etc.)
Atium: Powers (Allomantic, Feruchemical, Sand Mastery)

While the descriptions on the tables are in-world, if Atium could steal everything its description would most likely say "Can steal any attribute" instead of Power.

Agreed: Atium steals any power, not any attribute. I believe Brandon in the WoB I provided meant to say that Atium can copy any Inquisitor spike, anything that takes a power.

Though I do maintain my stance on Hemalurgy's flexibility, so I think it's probably possible with the right expertise to fill a spike with something it may not be originally intended to hold.

10 minutes ago, Dofurion said:

I just checked it out and while Coppermind claims this, the WoB it's based on doesn't make it clear.

I don't think it's that simple since Sanderson said RAFO, I think it's probably one of the spiritual quadrant metals.

I suppose that's possible. Marasi is an in-world information source, and those can be wrong. 

And Brandon is being a bit dodgy in the WoB too, so I wouldn't discount ReLuur's Blessing being of a different metal, but personally I still err on the side of pewter being what it is made of- it just feels too direct based on how it's presented in the book, and straying from that feels less like a clever twist that Brandon is known to pull and more deliberately frustrating.