Breath strength

[Through The Living Grub He/Him]

The number of Breaths for a Heightening can vary based on the strength of the Breaths. Does the health of the holder affect the amount of investiture? Or something else? Is there an average amount of Invesisture per Breath and the variability is negligible?

[Frustration]

Breath strength variance is largely minimal, though the health of the holder does impact it, but there is a baseline to it.

Spoiler

Emerald101

I was wondering if there is a unit of Investiture, like maybe something Khriss uses.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, but I haven't canonized it yet. Good question. I will eventually canonize it, because I think that people will want it, but I probably won't do so 'til [Mistborn] Era 3, because I want the scientific way of talking about the cosmere to mirror how developed the cultures are, but some of the scholars are beyond where everyone else is. It can be measured. There is a unit.

Emerald101

Like, maybe grams of solid Investiture?

Brandon Sanderson

It will probably be an in-world unit of measurement. Right now, to talk about it online if you want, the unit is probably gonna be based around Breath, because a Breath is a distinct amount. Whereas in most of the settings, there's not a distinct amount. Like, how much Allomancy, things like that. How much can a gem hold. It really depends on how the gem is cut, and how long the gem has been out. So... the Breath is a really easy one, so it's become the unit. But there will probably be a fantasy term for it. I might just call it Breath. That's why I'm not canonized yet. But if you guys wanna talk about it in Breath terms, that's probably the easiest.

Arcanum Unbounded release party (Nov. 22, 2016)

 

[alder24]

10 hours ago, Through The Living Grub said:

The number of Breaths for a Heightening can vary based on the strength of the Breaths. Does the health of the holder affect the amount of investiture? Or something else? Is there an average amount of Invesisture per Breath and the variability is negligible?

Age is the most important factor. Breaths of younger people are stronger and more vibrant than those of adults, old age weakens them even more and Breaths from dying people are the weakest. Still, the difference is pretty small so it's not that big of a deal. 

Spoiler

Brandon Sanderson

Lightsong Feeds on the Child

Why a child? It doesn't much matter, truthfully. An adult, or even someone elderly, could provide a Breath that would keep a god alive.

But the Breaths of those who are aged aren't as vigorous as those of those who are young. If Lightsong were given one of those to feed on, he'd survive for another week—but he wouldn't feel as vibrant or alive as he does after feeding on the child's Breath.

The people of Hallandren are faithful. Even if Lightsong himself doesn't believe, they do, and they want to provide the best for him. Hence they use children. Old enough to know what they are doing, yet young enough to give a powerful, vibrant Breath to their god.

Warbreaker Annotations (Aug. 3, 2010)

 

Spoiler

Questioner

I teach economics at Rutgers and in general I love the books but *inaudible* I like to tease him because he loves them, and say it doesn’t really make sense to have a fixed price for Breaths and it doesn’t make sense that if you give it away when you’re young, and his claim was that somewhere in the book it talks about how the Breath actually gets weaker as you get older.

Brandon Sanderson

So, dying Breaths can be much weaker, but not middle aged ones. So, you have a legitimate thing, my counter to you is, having listened to a ton of Freakonomics, economic people do not do what is logically economic, particularly in a closed system. You might find that Breaths sell for different things, or are treated differently, in other countries.

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Calamity Philadelphia signing (Feb. 20, 2016)