Feruchemy question!

[bronzecompounder he/him]

hi folks! because i am a terrible, terrible fanboy, i've been toying with the idea of buying some metal bracers/cuffs to be my "metalminds". obviously this isn't totally possible in some cases, as the contact with your skin would cause some of the metals to degrade (if they're pure, that is).

my question is this: does feruchemical purity matter as much as allomantic purity? i seem to remember someone (possibly sazed) saying something like "the metal was close enough to feruchemical purity to store a charge" or something to that effect. am i dreaming this, or what?

tl;dr- can i get stainless steel bracers/cuffs and still store speed? (lol) :3

Edited June 23, 2012 by bronzecompounder

[Triasmus]

If Sazed said something like that I believe it would be at the part where

he was breaking out of kandra jail

If you want to try finding that spot for yourself .

Edited June 23, 2012 by Lantern13

[Aeshdan he/him]

hi folks! because i am a terrible, terrible fanboy, i've been toying with the idea of buying some metal bracers/cuffs to be my "metalminds". obviously this isn't totally possible in some cases, as the contact with your skin would cause some of the metals to degrade (if they're pure, that is).

my question is this: does feruchemical purity matter as much as allomantic purity? i seem to remember someone (possibly sazed) saying something like "the metal was close enough to feruchemical purity to store a charge" or something to that effect. am i dreaming this, or what?

tl;dr- can i get stainless steel bracers/cuffs and still store speed? (lol) :3

Probably an impure metalmind can store far less than a pure metalmind of the same size.

[bronzecompounder he/him]

If Sazed said something like that I believe it would be at the part where

he was breaking out of kandra jail

If you want to try finding that spot for yourself .

THAT'S RIGHT! thank you so much. i will go looking

Probably an impure metalmind can store far less than a pure metalmind of the same size.

yeah, this is what i was thinking. :3

but now i'm wondering... what if a feruchemist made a bracer out of a metal alloy of two (or more) feruchemical metals?

HMM..................

[Strawberry Eggs she/her]

If it were an alloy, it would change the metal entirely. It wouldn't make the Feruchemist sick as wrong alloys of metal would do to Allomancers, but it probably wouldn't store anything.

[Triasmus]

What happens when you turn your iron metalmind into steel? I'd assume you'd lose the charge, but do you also lose storing space?

[Aradel he/him]

We know from AoL that feruchemical spikes keep some form of charge after being split and reforged; just vastly reduced.

[Quantum Toast he/him]

We know from AoL that feruchemical spikes keep some form of charge after being split and reforged; just vastly reduced.

That's hemalurgy, but I'd expect that something similar happens to metalminds that get split up.

[Windrunner he/him]

Interview database to the rescue!

MARU NUI

What happens when you break a Hemalurgic spike or metalmind? What happens to that power?

BRANDON SANDERSON

Hemalurgic power can be split among multiple spikes and reforged, but remember that the longer a spike is outside of a person, the more the power is going to decay. Things like splitting it will decay it even further. Metalminds can also be broken and still be accessed.

Source

[Shard of Choice he/him]

I have a question.

What if a Brass/Zinc Twinborn were to store mental speed in some Zinc, then take that Zinc and forge it into Brass and then Burn it? What would happen. Would he get a charge from it? Would the charge dissipate due to the Alloying? Anybody have any ideas?

[bronzecompounder he/him]

I have a question.

What if a Brass/Zinc Twinborn were to store mental speed in some Zinc, then take that Zinc and forge it into Brass and then Burn it? What would happen. Would he get a charge from it? Would the charge dissipate due to the Alloying? Anybody have any ideas?

oh man that is a really good question, 50 points to whatever hogwarts house you're in

well... feruchemy is end-neutral so i can't see the charge just dissipating or being destroyed... so i have to conclude that the charge would remain in the metal.

on top of that, remember how nicrosilminds work? (correct me if i'm wrong!) you can place a store of, say, weight from an ironmind, in it and then take it out again as, say, an equal charge of health and put it into a goldmind. so maybe the mental speed charge in the zincmind that gets alloyed into some brass gets transformed into a charge of warmth?

WOW THIS IS A REALLY INTERESTING IDEA *ROLLS AROUND ON THE FLOOR*

[Vortaan he/him]

It seems likely if you change the alloy of the metalmind, you probably lose access to what's inside the metal. It wouldn't be that the charge is gone, but more like if someone changes their phone number, I guess. The person is still there, but you can't access them because the route you used to do so is no longer good.

[Lanscaper]

I also think that is has to do with if the person is a full Feruchemist, or a Ferring. In my opinion I think that a Ferring would not be able to access the re-forged metalmind, as their spiritweb is not able to cope with the change of medium. But perhaps a full Feruchemist might be able to follow that charge of power despite the different medium.

[Deus Ex Biotica]

I agree that if a normal Ferring were to store a charge in a Metalmind, then alloy it, the charge would be there but unreachable. If a full Ferruchemist did the same, they'd be able to get the charge back out, but it would still be the thing they stored the first time (so, if you store Mental Speed in a Zincmind, then alloy that into the proper mix of brass, you still retrieve Mental Speed, not Warmth).

The question emerges when you have a Twinborn who can Burn an alloy of the metal they Store with, like the Brass/Zinc example mentioned above. After all, if you Burn your own Metalminds, you gain back what you stored in them tenfold. Would the same apply here? Would you gain back the same amount of Mental Speed you stored, and also nine times that much Warmth? It's an interesting question.

Here is my theory: you still get back what you stored, but that's all. Your spiritual DNA has the code to be given extra power when it Burns brass, but the brass in no way interacts with the stored Mental Speed - it just wound up holding it by a fluke. Since it your Ferruchemical storage, you can retrieve it, but not compound it.

However, as much sense as that makes, it seems a little boring. So, here's an alternative which I freely admit I would use in an RPG or the like where this question came up: when burning an alloyed Metalmind, you can "push" the charge further into the metal, thereby gaining back a weakened Compounding effect (maybe two or three times the original charge). However, this makes the Burning resonate poorly with your spiritual DNA, so you get sick, much as if you had burned a bad alloy.

However, even then, I would only allow that when the metals were a linked pair. For example, if you stored Hearing in a Tinmind, then alloyed it into pewter and burned it, this effect might occur. If you instead could Burn bronze, then no pseudo-Compounding could happen - physically, Allomantic Bronze is one-quarter Tin, but spiritually, the two are not connected. You could get your initial storage back, but that's all.

-- Deus Ex Biotica

P.S. Hurm. I wonder what combination I would most like to exploit this way. Pewter/Tin is one I've considered before, and it's worth noting that a Crasher like Wax would be able to multiply Weight if this works - keep an eye out on Shadows of Self to see in Brandon Sanderson weighs in on the debate - but I think the coolest option might well be Zinc/Brass itself. A Soother who can (given time, metalworking facilities, and a bit of sickness) rack up a ton a Mental Speed for rainy days is not to be underestimated as a manipulator.

[Vortaan he/him]

I'd almost say gold/electum would be more dangerous. A Miles that doesn't run out AND can see if you are going to trap him? Not sure how you'd stop that guy.

[Deus Ex Biotica]

Close down his bank account? Needing more gold for a given amount of Compound, and then also needing silver to complete the cycle, is even more restricting than Miles' situation (and he did think to himself about how he's only immortal as long as he can essentially eat gold).

Also, depending on how strictly yo interpret the "Compounding makes you sick, like Burning a bad alloy" idea, they might have periods of vulnerability while they re-filled their Metalminds, like the Lord Ruler.

Bur, yeah, Gold abuse is always impressive.

-- Deus Ex Biotica