Incremental Investment

[Trusk'our he/him]

Radiants are able to grow in power as they swear oaths, becoming more in line with their Shards' Intent and gathering more Investiture. Similary, Sand Masters can grow in power through Overmastery.

I wonder though, are these growths of Investiture relegated only to certain MoI, or do others do this too?

We now have two examples of very, very old Cognitive Shadows growing in power over time. The Yoki-Hijo, over nearly two millenia, were able to grow significantly in Investiture.

Over the millenia the Heralds were able to eventually "draw on the powers of Roshar" completely separate from Tanavast's meddling. 

I believe that these growths of Investiture in both groups are due to them having tremendous experience welding the power, honing skill and being shaped by its Intent, which naturally increases Connection to and saturation by that very power as a side effect. 

Spoiler

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/518-shardcast-interview/#e16173

Argent

If we are looking at very highly Invested beings, we have Yumi, and we are told that she is more Invested than Elantrians, more Invested than Returned. Let's compare Yumi, Elantrians, and Heralds. Who is most Invested, who is least Invested?

Brandon Sanderson

Of those, probably Heralds... The thing is, the Heralds varied. How in tune and aligned they are with their oaths, their promise... It wasn't Oaths, but they did promise certain things when they became Heralds. It was pre Knights Radiants, it's not as formalized as Oaths. How in line with the power of Honor, how in line with the kind of natural Investiture of Roshar--which is separate from Honor, Cultivation and Odium--are they, how can they draw upon that. I will call them the least of the three though.

Argent

So Heralds on the bottom, and Yumi on top, and Elantrians in the middle?

Brandon Sanderson

Yumi on top, but Yumi's very close to an Elantrian. They're within the same conversation. And most of the yoki-hijo were traditionally in the past less, they've gained Investiture over time.

So, does this hint that all Investiture uses may develop more over time?

Allomantic Savantism may allow for small increases in total Investiture- not much for a standard human lifetime, but some Scadrians aren't limited by this.

Perhaps TLR, over a thousand years of near constant use of Allomancy, grew in Allomantic power until he was in the state we see in TFE. 

Could Marsh be adding to his spikes' Investiture over three and a half centuries? 

What about Vasher? Awakening doesn't draw from an external pool like the others, so I'm not sure how it would interact, but maybe his Innate Investiture could expand over the centuries as he consumes Breath and Light? (I'm far less confident about the last one, especially since he should be easily aware of this growth and its implications and hasn't mentioned it).

Edited March 13, 2025 by Trusk'our

[JustQuestin2004 he/him]

2 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

Allomantic Savantism may allow for small increases in total Investiture- not much for a standard human lifetime, but some Scadrians aren't limited by this.

Savantism has a cap for how much power you can get from it.

2 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

Perhaps TLR, over a thousand years of near constant use of Allomancy, grew in Allomantic power until he was in the state we see in TFE. 

That's one part to it, but mostly it was because he used the power of the Well to turn himself into a ridiculously powerful Mistborn, more powerful then even those who consumed Lerasium beads. Plus some unknown way of Reverse Compounding (Using Feruchemy to amplify Allomancy).

Spoiler

Chaos (paraphrased)

I continued to ask about the Lord Ruler and his Allomantic strength.

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

There's an upper bound to the amount of power you can get from being a savant. Brandon said that, obviously, the Lord Ruler wasn't using duralumin and Elend could only get that powerful in Soothing using duralumin. He implied that there was a way to Compound to enhance Allomancy.

2 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

Could Marsh be adding to his spikes' Investiture over three and a half centuries? 

There's been implications that he's gotten new spikes.

Spoiler

Questioner

Did Harmony give Ironeyes full Mistborn powers, or anything other than what he has with his spikes...

Brandon Sanderson

Just what he has with the spikes, I believe. No-- okay let's say this: Harmony did not do anything... That doesn't mean that Marsh hasn't done things himself.

2 hours ago, Trusk'our said:

What about Vasher? Awakening doesn't draw from an external pool like the others, so I'm not sure how it would interact, but maybe his Innate Investiture could expand over the centuries as he consumes Breath and Light? (I'm far less confident about the last one, especially since he should be easily aware of this growth and its implications and hasn't mentioned it).

For Awakening you just need to gather more and more Breath, endlessly. With the only limitation being how many Nalthians you can convince to give you their Breath.

[Ashbringer he/him]

The yoki-hijo probably were growing in power because they'd been alive (well, alive-ish-Shadows) for so long. It's hard to tell if they're usually immortal or not, as Yumi doesn't do anything to indicate it - or rather, Yumi is immortal and innately has more than enough Investiture to be immortal, but the plot of Yumi of the simulated old-Komashi doesn't seem to imply that yoki-hijo have abnormally long lifespans the same way Elantrians/Returned obviously do.

 

39 minutes ago, JustQuestin2004 said:

That's one part to it, but mostly it was because he used the power of the Well to turn himself into a ridiculously powerful Mistborn, more powerful then even those who consumed Lerasium beads. Plus some unknown way of Reverse Compounding (Using Feruchemy to amplify Allomancy).

There's also the note that whatever Rashek had, he wasn't innately Invested enough without his metalminds to be immortal. If he was, through some trick with tapped nicrosil or the Well, he wouldn't have died from losing his armbands.

Which in retrospect is interesting, since he seems powerful enough that it would be fairly simple to do so. Could be he didn't know how to use nicrosil properly / would rather be dependent on atium than outside Investiture, or he was waiting for the Well to refill, or could be that (through Ruin's influence or his own decisions) he didn't want to be actually fully unaging.

 

I'm also a little skeptical that the Heralds are actually less invested than an Elantrian, since Honor calls out that they have too much of his power... but Elantrians and the yoki-hijo are gaining Investiture from Splintered Shards, which likely gives them extra allowance. But WoBs have been misleading before (ie the ones about Honor also being Splintered, when he seemingly wasn't).

[therunner he/him]

15 hours ago, Ashbringer said:

Which in retrospect is interesting, since he seems powerful enough that it would be fairly simple to do so. Could be he didn't know how to use nicrosil properly / would rather be dependent on atium than outside Investiture, or he was waiting for the Well to refill, or could be that (through Ruin's influence or his own decisions) he didn't want to be actually fully unaging.

How would he use Nicrosil to invest himself permanently? Nicrosil is still Feruchemy, he would have to be tapping + Compound, it would likely be far less efficient than what he is doing with Atium.

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I'm also a little skeptical that the Heralds are actually less invested than an Elantrian, since Honor calls out that they have too much of his power...

The WoBs is that Heralds varied, so it could be that Heralds between Aharietam and Night of Sorrows were less Invested then Elantrians..most of the time (Ishar with power from the Well of Control was likely far more Invested)

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Argent

If we are looking at very highly Invested beings, we have Yumi, and we are told that she is more Invested than Elantrians, more Invested than Returned. Let's compare Yumi, Elantrians, and Heralds. Who is most Invested, who is least Invested?

Brandon Sanderson

Of those, probably Heralds... The thing is, the Heralds varied. How in tune and aligned they are with their oaths, their promise... It wasn't Oaths, but they did promise certain things when they became Heralds. It was pre Knights Radiants, it's not as formalized as Oaths. How in line with the power of Honor, how in line with the kind of natural Investiture of Roshar--which is separate from Honor, Cultivation and Odium--are they, how can they draw upon that. I will call them the least of the three though.

Argent

So Heralds on the bottom, and Yumi on top, and Elantrians in the middle?

Brandon Sanderson

Yumi on top, but Yumi's very close to an Elantrian. They're within the same conversation. And most of the yoki-hijo were traditionally in the past less, they've gained Investiture over time.

Shardcast Interview (July 30, 2023)

With the Oathpact restored, they likely jumped up on how Invested they are. And Honor talking about them being too Invested is back when Oathpact was still fully in place.

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but Elantrians and the yoki-hijo are gaining Investiture from Splintered Shards, which likely gives them extra allowance.

That too likely plays a role.
Plus Elantrians seem to be acting as living conduits for Dor, constantly channeling to restore their bodies, so basically non-stop drawing in Investiture.

[Ashbringer he/him]

6 hours ago, therunner said:

How would he use Nicrosil to invest himself permanently? Nicrosil is still Feruchemy, he would have to be tapping + Compound, it would likely be far less efficient than what he is doing with Atium.

We still don’t really know how Nicrosil works, but being able to Compound Nicrosil seems like a way to gather Investiture. Store a bit of innate Investiture, compound it, repeat as necessary… or even if that doesn’t work, Scadrial had some level of trade with Nalthis, all he likely had to do was obtain a Breath and Compound it.

7 hours ago, therunner said:

The WoBs is that Heralds varied, so it could be that Heralds between Aharietam and Night of Sorrows were less Invested then Elantrians..most of the time (Ishar with power from the Well of Control was likely far more Invested)

Fair. I’m also just saying we’ve had WoBs that say “Honor is Splintered” or “Kor is the only Dragon Vessel” or “Sleepless hordelings can only become fist-sized”, where they’re later proved to be very misleading if not just wrong. (Which is fine, things change… but perhaps Honor’s words are a sign of things changing.)