Question and Answer

[tbone5711 he/him]

Well, I wasn't sure where to put this so this thread seems as good as any.  There are two quotes, one from Galladon in Elantris, and one from Szeth in WoK.  Szeth makes this comment:
 
     Dangerous thoughts. His way of life was all that remained to him. If he questioned Stone Shamanism, would he then question his nature as Truthless? Dangerous, dangerous. Though his murders and sins would damnation him, at least his   soul  would be given to the stones upon his death. He would continue to exist. Punished, in agony, but not exiled to    nothingness. Better to exist in agony than to vanish entirely.
 
In Elantris, Galladon makes this comment:
 

    They didn't burn the boy. Not only did they lack the proper implements to make fire, but Galladon forbade it. "We can't make a decision like that. What if he reaIly has no soul? What if he stopped existing when we burned his body? To
    many, an existence of agony is better than no existence at all."

 

I know this could just be a random coincidence, but seeing as how Galladon is a confirmed worldhopper, Is it possible that Galladon has already worldhopped prior to Elantris and this quote is a reference to Szeth?  Or am I just reading too much into it?

Edited April 5, 2013 by tbone5711

[Tarontos he/him]

I know this could just be a random coincidence, but seeing as how Galladon is a confirmed worldhopper, Is it possible that Galladon has already worldhopped prior to Elantris and this quote is a reference to Szeth?  Or am I just reading too much into it?

The events of Elantris are far prior to the events of the StormLight Archive. Probably close to a millennium of difference. So it is unlikely that this is a reference to Szeth.

[Nepene he/him]

Yeah. Transcribed or spoken by Windrunner and others, we recently had an interview confirmation of the timelines.

 

www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/3189-brandon-signing

 

No, like for instance, Way of Kings and Alloy of Law are pretty close to one another but Elantris is fairly far before them. So far I’ve written them chronologically basically, except I’ve skipped certain stories, like there’s a series called White Sand which is in the middle there somewhere which will actually be a jump back in time when I end up doing it and some things like that. And Dragonsteel is like way at the beginning which I’ll eventually do but I’ve done them chronologically so far.

[Pechvarry]

Is there confirmation anywhere saying allomantic duralumin only affects your other allomancy abilities?  Or is it possible it would affect other stuff (feruchemy would be the obvious alternative, but any form of investiture).

Edited April 26, 2013 by Pechvarry

[Phantom Monstrosity]

Is there confirmation anywhere saying allomantic duralumin only affects your other allomancy abilities?  Or is it possible it would affect other stuff (feruchemy would be the obvious alternative, but any form of investiture).

From Vin and the inquisitors, we know aluminum doesn't do anything to hemalurgic spikes, and duralumnium doesn't seem to either. Edited April 26, 2013 by Phantom Monstrosity

[Pechvarry]

From Vin and the inquisitors, we know aluminum doesn't do anything to hemalurgic spikes, and duralumnium doesn't seem to either.

 

An interesting point.  Hemalurgic spikes don't "exhaust" though, so there's nothing for aluminum to set to 0 or for duralumin to burn the entirety of.  Self counterpoint: they do decay when out of the body, so it would be interesting if duralumin made spikes in you inert (which would be lethal rather frequently).  I know, this doesn't happen, or else the entirety of books 2 and 3 would not make sense.  

 

But I'm still not convinced they couldn't be made to affect other sources of investiture within you.

[skaa he/him]

From Vin and the inquisitors, we know aluminum doesn't do anything to hemalurgic spikes, and duralumnium doesn't seem to either.

Interesting! Do we know for sure if Vin was wearing her earring when she was forced to burn Aluminum? She wasn't always wearing it, right?

Edited May 20, 2013 by skaa

[Phantom Monstrosity]

Interesting! Do we know for sure if Vin was wearing her earring when she was forced to burn Aluminum? She wasn't always wearing it, right?

She was definitely wearing it then.

[skaa he/him]

She was definitely wearing it then.

 

Okay, so I got off my lazy chull and decided to check the book. Vin couldn't have been wearing the earring, because shortly after her escape, she got it out of her trousers.

 

So, Pechvarry, that means we don't really know yet if aluminum affects Hemalurgical spikes. Too bad it'd be quite difficult to force an Inquisitor to burn one.

[Phantom Monstrosity]

Ah, my mistake.

[kroen]

If during the time of the Final Empire a Feruchemist and an Allomancer got together, was there a chance for a Full Feruchemist which is also a Mistborn to naturally be born?

Edited May 21, 2013 by kroen

[Youngy he/him]

If during the time of the Final Empire a Feruchemist and an Allomancer got together, was there a chance for a Full Feruchemist which is also a Mistborn to naturally be born?

If both could exist within the same being's sDNA, I would assume so, seems it would be just combinations of sDNA from both of the parents.

 

[Kurkistan he/him]

Brandon has said in the past that Ferrings arose as a result of Allomantic genes messing with Feruchemical genes. I think he's stepped back from that since (though I can't find a source at the moment); to simply say it's a result of "thinning" bloodlines rather than "corrupted" ones. The chance remains that his original statement still holds and thus that no natural Twinawesome could be born, though.

Edited May 22, 2013 by Kurkistan

[Phantom Monstrosity]

Brandon has said in the past that Ferrings arose as a result of Allomantic genes messing with Feruchemical genes. I think he's stepped back from that since (though I can't find a source at the moment); to simply say it's a result of "thinning" bloodlines rather than "corrupted" ones. The chance remains that his original statement still holds and thus that no natural Twinawesome could be born, though.

Technically, it could be whatever genes cause mistings to exist instead of mistborn...

 

I mean, it seems more likely that mistborns are lacking some limiter than having fifteen extra genes.

[Kurkistan he/him]

My understanding is that there is no qualitative difference between a misting and a mistborn, just quantitative. A mistborn's power is exactly like a misting's, then, only more so. The fact that getting over a certain "threshold" of Preservation's power is enough to jump you from 1 to 16 powers is simply the way that it works: You can make car with a jet engine and wings, but it's only ever going to be able to drive on the ground until you hit a certain speed. Okay, maybe that's not the best analogy, but you get the idea.

This is illustrated by how mistings can produce mistborn children, and how the weakening of Allomantic lines of descent is shown by decreasing proportions of mistborn to mistings. It's all fundamentally the same power going up and down in the background.

Edited May 22, 2013 by Kurkistan

[Phantom Monstrosity]

My understanding is that there is no qualitative difference between a misting and a mistborn, just quantitative. A mistborn's power is exactly like a misting's, then, only more so. The fact that getting over a certain "threshold" of Preservation's power is enough to jump you from 1 to 16 powers is simply the way that it works: You can make car with a jet engine and wings, but it's only ever going to be able to drive on the ground until you hit a certain speed. Okay, maybe that's not the best analogy, but you get the idea.

This is illustrated by how mistings can produce mistborn children, and how the weakening of Allomantic lines of descent is shown by decreasing proportions of mistborn to mistings. It's all fundamentally the same power going up and down in the background.

 

I think having a lot of power is a requirement to be a mistborn, but not necessarily sufficient.  After all, if it were just a matter of the bloodline thinning, you wouldn't get any mistborn descended from mistings and skaa crossings at all - the children would always have less allomantic power than the parents.

 

Also that would result in weirdness with hemalurgy, but hemalurgy is already weird so who knows.

Edited May 22, 2013 by Phantom Monstrosity

[Kurkistan he/him]

I've always seen it as similar to how height is passed down, genetically (by my unscientific and potentially inaccurate understanding).

 

Parents contribute a random number of "tall genes" based on their own genetics, describing something of a normal distribution around 1/2 of the number they actually have (what with haploid cells and all). So, in the average case, a set of 5' and a 6' parents' children would be 5'6". Weird variants can occur, though, such that two short parents can produce a tall child, or the inverse. It all depends on the "tallness" of the genes that each parent contributed and some statistics.

 

With magic (yes, the topic of this essay on what I can recall of the biology of reproduction), and more specifically sDNA, I imagine it follows a very similar course. So an unlucky mistborn can produce misting children, or even muggles, depending on how the cards fall. IIRC, the first few generations of Allomancers were all mistborn because their Allomantic potential was just so insanely high: If you put together an 8' giant and anyone else, the result is always going to be able to dunk.

 

While a skaa might have a base Allomantic potential of 2 out of 10 (to pick a number out of a hat), with 5 (same hat) as the minimum threshold for a misting, copulation with a 6 misting could bump their child above the line, and at the very least will give it a higher base level for subsequent generations to work off of.

 

EDIT: So if you take  2 and a 6, they should even out to 4. But they might get a 2 or an 8.

Edited May 22, 2013 by Kurkistan

[Phantom Monstrosity]

I've always seen it as similar to how height is passed down, genetically (by my unscientific and potentially inaccurate understanding).

 

Parents contribute a random number of "tall genes" based on their own genetics, describing something of a normal distribution around 1/2 of the number they actually have (what with haploid cells and all). So, in the average case, a set of 5' and a 6' parents' children would be 5'6". Weird variants can occur, though, such that two short parents can produce a tall child, or the inverse. It all depends on the "tallness" of the genes that each parent contributed and some statistics.

 

With magic (yes, the topic of this essay on what I can recall of the biology of reproduction), and more specifically sDNA, I imagine it follows a very similar course. So an unlucky mistborn can produce misting children, or even muggles, depending on how the cards fall. IIRC, the first few generations of Allomancers were all mistborn because their Allomantic potential was just so insanely high: If you put together an 8' giant and anyone else, the result is always going to be able to dunk.

 

While a skaa might have a base Allomantic potential of 2 out of 10 (to pick a number out of a hat), with 5 (same hat) as the minimum threshold for a misting, copulation with a 6 misting could bump their child above the line, and at the very least will give it a higher base level for subsequent generations to work off of.

 

EDIT: So if you take  2 and a 6, they should even out to 4. But they might get a 2 or an 8.

 

Yeah, but every skaa allomancer has noble blood within 5 generations back.  Worst case that's what, 1/32th? (sidenote mister Sanderson: I am disappointed that it wasn't 1/16th)  Even if you've got a full 100% power mistborn as the noble... that's not a lot of magical inheritence remaining. 

 

 

That said, it could just be that having even a tiny extra dollap of preservation disturbs the even balance of powers needed to develop feruchemy. 

 

I figure though, if the Lord Ruler was worried about getting someone who could challenge his power, it's probably possible.  He's got magical intuition into this sort of stuff.

[Senor Feesh]

Ok, please let me know if I'm being crazy, but I thought I read somewhere that Rashek, when he held the power of the Well, was unable to use the power to destroy (something, I forget what) because the power was of preservation. This actually informed my (now debunked) Shardic Lens theory. However, if I DIDN'T imagine this quote, it seems to contradict the info which I linked over there - specifically, that any Shard can be used to power any magic system, but that the Shards themselves are limited in HOW they grant the power.

 

As such, Rashek should have been able to destroy whilst holding Preservation's power. So does this quote exist, or am I crazy? I would actually prefer the second option, because it preserves (heh) consistency in the quoted material.

[Kurkistan he/him]

I do not recall such a quote, and it runs contrary to even what we saw in the books. Rashek toasted the world and then proceeded to "fix it" in the most damaging way possible, while Vin also did a fair job of burning everything, as well as causing a few tsunami's for good measure.

Edited May 26, 2013 by Kurkistan

[Isomere]

Here is the quote, it says Rashek tried to destroy Kwaan and was unable to. My interpretation is that someone using the Well of Ascension is more affected by the Intent of the Shard than someone using Allomancy. Brandon has said that Rashek effectively became a co-shardholder with Leras for a while there, until the power in the Well was used up. 

 

Kwaan was the only one who turned down this offer, calling it a betrayal of who they were as a people. Rashek could have just made him one anyway, but in a moment of anger, he tried to destroy Kwaan—which he couldn't do, not with Preservation's power. As the other Feruchemists changed, Kwaan remained the same. Rashek eventually hunted him down and killed him.  Source

Edited May 26, 2013 by Isomere

[Kurkistan he/him]

Ah, thank you Isomere.

 

I suppose you have to "cheat" a bit to destroy stuff when holding Preservation. Setting up others to act (Leras), technically benign actions with negative side-effects (Vin, Rashek), etc.

Edited May 26, 2013 by Kurkistan

[Windrunner he/him]

I think it all has to do with your intentions. Rashek moved the world and created the ashmounts with the intention of saving the world. Vin caused tsunamis and killed millions in her attempt to save the world. It reminds me of this quote:

Shards affect you over time, but your mind will not leave a permanent effect on the Shard. A holder's personality, however, does get to filter the Shard's intent, so to speak. However, if that holder no longer held that Shard, the Shard will not continue to be filtered by that person.

Rashek and Vin believed what they were doing to be "Preserving" so the intent didn't matter.

(Also, this "show new post" feature is amazing!)

[Isomere]

Here is the other quote about Rashek becoming the shard for a short time. 

 

If you hold all the power that makes you a Shard, but the Lord Ruler held a little bit of it and then let it go. From then on they referred to that change in him—the residue, what was left—as a Sliver. When he held it he became the Shard for a short time, and Vin was a Shard for a short time. After Vin gave up the power, what Kelsier is at the end of the trilogy—that's a Sliver of Adonalsium.  Source

[Kurkistan he/him]

I'm not quite so sure about a simple "intent to Preserve" being enough. Leras couldn't "kill to protect" because he was too corrupted by Preservation's Intent, while Vin could. I guess it's a bit of a scale: a fresh Shardholder could probably justify Preservation-intended destruction, while Leras couldn't.