Experimenting with Shardmetals

[Trusk'our he/him]

By era 3 there will be at least three Godmetals available for experimentation, four assuming a pinch of Lerasium is made and Marsh can spare a bit of Atium.

Most are still very, very rare though, so experimentation should be done as efficiently as possible.

First, when making Godmetal alloys, DON'T use them for Allomancy first. All known Metalminds are 100% recyclable, and alloys use the same percentages as Allomantic and Hemalurgic use.

Second, keep at least one super-Seeker on staff to listen to the Pulses emitted when using the metals. Vin was capable of innately understanding Breeze's Allomancy in WoA (chapter 20, I think, though I can't find my copy). Doesn't matter if it's done through a Nicroburst, Hemalurgy, or some form of Harmonium, it's worth Investing in so you can get an even better idea of what the new Investiture is trying to do.

Other suggestions to experiment and discover uses with Godmetals?

[Belandrius Ohhmar He/Him]

so how would this work like do I just say something like:

I Combine Some lerasium and Atium.

or something?

[KaladinsSenseOfHumourSpren He/Him]

I wonder if Discordium has different properties to Harmonium

[BigBadBagsworth He/him/his]

Have a fourtune compounder onsite if possible to say if a big explosion is about to happen and get everybody out. Embed a full unkeyed goldmind into the skin of the person using the metal.

[Duxredux he/him]

Let's see. We're talking about how we've been told in the Ars Arcanum for years that alloys with God Metals are viable and are likely to create effects different from what we've seen?

I asked ChatGPT what standard experiments are run on any newly discovered material or metallic alloy, which I'll link to here. Considering in canon they haven't figured out how to use Harmonium directly for any of the traditional applications of the Metallic Arts, some of the key usages may not be directly related to a person burning or storing in a metal at all. 

Take Trellium's property of moving away from an Allomancer burning metals for example. A locking pin made of such a material could make a genuine "allomancer only" safety like the one used in Vindication, except it works for more than just Lurcher's and Coinshots. Depending on the sensitivity of Trellium, it could be hugely useful for later era security checkpoints. 

Larger Cosmere spoilers on the same vein of material science,

Spoiler

The thermal resistive properties of Shardblades as seen with the shield put over the Beacon ship in TSM, or Zellion flying through the sun in his Plate, if that can be applied elsewhere, that could be a huge factor in space age interplanetary war. Incredibly hardy material, but the shelf life of their portable Investiture requires highly specialized gems. Compare that to Scadrial's solid fuel in Harmonium, and that's nothing to sneeze at. 

Properties of how these metals interact with Investiture is perhaps more Roshar's domain with fabrial tech and the Raysium spears, but it's definitely worth examining.

Back to experimentation parameters. Allomancy and Feruchemy generally affect the user and their environment in the following categories: Physical, Cognitive, and Spiritual, as seen on their respective tables (and yes, temporal is there too but I'm skipping this for a bit). For this, try to have an observer qualified in each category, be it a boosted Seeker, doctor, Inquisitor sight, someone observing from the Cognitive Realm, etc., though obviously the trickiest is the Spiritual Realm (at least so far, maybe one of the new metals will help with that). You'll probably come out behind in the exchange, but getting Hoid to observe and give commentary would probably be useful. Probably. If it's possible to make a Unsealed Coppermind logging the expermint, that could prove invaluable - particularly if the experiment goes awry.

Complicating the matter is that while we know how to make a full Mistborn, we don't yet know how to make a Full Feruchemist, so some of the tests may be handicapped based on available and trusted candidates. Furthermore, we know some applications of Allomancy require a sapient target, sometimes one utilizing Investiture. There may not be a safe way to go about some of the experiments that require human targets other than to go veeeeery slowly and cautiously. Probably need to offer a huge payout in case of fatality to next of kin. Probably have a massive unsealed Goldmind just in case. In other words, doing this ethically is really problematic. 

Of course the cheater answer is to have Scadrial be in a crisis, and have the protagonist experimenter put in a Pathian earring and get Sazed to weigh in on the matter.