Feruchemical awakeness

[DarkClaw 82]

Forgive me if this has been discussed already. But I’m back on Scadrial (Band of Mourning Audiobook) and a thought semi-randomly hit me. So, if a person stays up for several days in a row, it can alter the brain chemistry and have adverse affects on their personality. If a Ferring stored up awakeness (or whatever its referred to as) and they tap it for several days at a time, does it have the same effect on them, or does it the stored up ability have secondary benefits that counteract this? I assume it does, but I could see this as a limitation that could intrigue Sanderson enough to have in place. 

[Steel Speedster ♂]

Tapping wakefulness gives all the benefits of actual sleep. I'm pretty sure there was a WoB about it, but I can't find it right now.

[Treamayne]

12 minutes ago, DarkClaw 82 said:

Forgive me if this has been discussed already. But I’m back on Scadrial (Band of Mourning Audiobook) and a thought semi-randomly hit me. So, if a person stays up for several days in a row, it can alter the brain chemistry and have adverse affects on their personality. If a Ferring stored up awakeness (or whatever its referred to as) and they tap it for several days at a time, does it have the same effect on them, or does it the stored up ability have secondary benefits that counteract this? I assume it does, but I could see this as a limitation that could intrigue Sanderson enough to have in place. 

Tapping a Bronzemind is like sleeping. WoA:

Spoiler

Ch 37:

Quote

Sazed glanced at the window shutters, noting the hesitant beams of light that were beginning to shine through the cracks. Morning already? he thought. We studied all night? It hardly seemed possible. He had tapped no wakefulness, yet he felt more alert—more alive—than he had in days.

Tindwyl sat in the chair beside him. Sazed’s desk was filled with loose papers, two sets of ink and pen waiting to be used. There were no books; Keepers had no need of such.

“Ah!” Tindwyl said, grabbing a pen and beginning to write. She didn’t look tired either, but she had likely dipped into her bronzemind, tapping the wakefulness stored within.

Ch 45:

Quote

Stay alert! he told himself. There isn’t much time left. Not much at all….

Tindwyl was doing a little better than he, but her wakefulness was obviously beginning to run out, for she was starting to droop. He’d taken a quick nap during the night, rolled up on her floor, but she had carried on. As far as he could tell, she’d been awake for over a week straight.

Ch 50:

Quote

He should probably be lying down—but if he did that, he was liable to sleep. And, while sleeping, he couldn’t fill metalminds—or, at least, he could fill only one. A bronzemind, the metal that stored wakefulness, would force him to sleep longer in exchange for letting him go longer without sleep on another occasion.

Ch 57:

Quote

Sazed’s mind, however, turned to Vin. He’d understated her malady, and he was beginning to worry. A pewter drag drained the body, and he suspected that she’d been forcing herself to stay awake with the metal for months now.

When a Keeper stored up wakefulness, he slept as if in a coma for a time. He could only hope that the effects of such a terrible pewter drag were the same, for Vin hadn’t awoken a single time since her return a week before. Perhaps she’d awake soon, like a Keeper who came out of sleep.

 

 

WoB:

Spoiler

mikkomikk

It just stores wakefulness right? I don't think it gives you the actual benefits of a good night's sleep. So after an extended period of bronze Compounding, your body will start deteriorating and eventually die.

Brandon Sanderson

Bronze Compounding will indeed let you never have to sleep. /u/mikkomikk as a good theory, as I haven't really talked about this, and that might be the way to theorize without more info--but it was designed to let people go without sleep, and does give benefits of a good night's sleep.

ElTigreChang1

Alternatively, could you compound copper for a supernatural sleeping aid? or would that just lead to accidentally sleeping for 16 hours

Brandon Sanderson

Copper? I don't see that working, I'm afraid. Did you mean bronze?

You could fill bronze to sleep. (This is actually the very first power for Mistborn I imagined, back in highschool. Wishing, as an insomniac, I could sleep when I wanted to and be rested when I wanted to.)

General Reddit 2019 (June 14, 2019)

Hope that helps

[Quantus he/him]

It's also worth mentioning that you can Store the sort of False-wakefulness you get from chemical stimulants like Caffeine, but Tapping it will feel different in the same ways that it's not real sleep.  So you get out what you put in, in terms of wakefulness and mental state.  Im curious if that'll get adapted into anything more nuanced as a form of non-chemical mental health care (the way I assume Electrum will).  

Edit: I should highlight that this WOB says explicitly "That's my answer right now, but that's one pretty mutable, as we go forward." so it's very much subject to change once we actually get back to Scadrial.

 

Quote

 

Vodid

If you have caffeine, can you store that as wakefulness in a bronzemind?

Brandon Sanderson

I think that you can, but I think when you tap it out, you will have kind of the same effects, right. Like, you will feel like you are not quite as awake. Like that feeling you get, I think you guys know what I'm talking about. I think that you can, I think that you can hack the system with some things like that. That's my guess... That's my answer right now, but that's one pretty mutable, as we go forward.

Adam Horne

I'd be curious to see what you could do with that in Era 3, because pharmaceuticals will exist.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes well, you're already getting into the fact that you could replicate a lot of things, with... once they figure how to change types of Investiture and whatnot, then suddenly you've got some wacky things going on. Which is why a Mistborn cyberpunk would be so much fun, because metallurgic wetware would be fun. But no promises on that—I already have too many things to write. It's just that if I do write it, and I make it a trilogy, then we have sixteen books in the Mistborn series.

YouTube Spoiler Stream 2 (June 3, 2021)

 

 

Edited February 14, 2025 by Quantus