Discussion: Allomantic Efficiency

[Moogle]

Technically Sazed never says, "Rashek ate a bead". He just says Rashek was as powerful as the original allomancers. If Rashek simply used the power of the well to make himself one full bead of Lerasium's worth of Mistborn, there's no contradiction in the epigraph.

 

But... why would he make himself only that powerful? WoB is that if Vin ate some lerasium like Elend did, she'd be stronger because it's additive. Clearly it's possible to become more powerful than the nine original lerasium Mistborn. Rashek wasn't the humble type, so I don't know why he'd not bother making himself more powerful. It would also be incredibly incredibly strange if Rashek made himself exactly as powerful as one bead of lerasium would. I'd expect him to be a little bit off. Sazed says that every single one of the first lerasium Mistborn had his strength, though.

 

Does anybody know the relevant portion of the book?

 

I pasted it earlier in the thread. Here it is again:

The beads of metal found at the Well—beads that made men into Mistborn—were the reason why Allomancers used to be more powerful. Those first Mistborn were as Elend Venture became—possessing a primal power, which was then passed down through the lines of the nobility, weakening a bit with each generation. The Lord Ruler was one of these ancient Allomancers, his power pure and unadulterated by time and breeding. That is part of why he was so mighty compared to other Mistborn—though, admittedly, his ability to mix Feruchemy and Allomancy was what produced many of his most spectacular abilities. Still, it is interesting to me that one of his “divine” powers—his essential Allomantic strength—was something every one of the original nine Allomancers possessed.

Edited January 21, 2015 by Moogle

[Oudeis]

Sorry, I didn't post or quote it here because Moogle already had in this Thread.

 

Moogle... first of all, I assume you ask out of further academic interest, since you cannot possibly be contending that the latest WoB is wrong.

 

Second, the short, semi-copout answer. We don't know. There is a ton we don't know about what Rashek did in those few minutes or why he did it. Why did he pick ash, instead of a few other options which might have worked to cool the planet? Why did he turn feruchemists specifically into mistwraiths instead of one of a dozen other ways he could grant his buddies immortality in exchange for their power. Why did he offer immortality instead of some other prize? Maybe one day we'll learn, but maybe we won't.

 

Third, a few thoughts. To begin, Sazed could have been giving a range rather than an exact amount. He was as powerful as the original allomancers. Maybe he was a touch more powerful. Maybe he was third most powerful of them all. The essential point he was trying to make was the difference between Mistborn-of-old and Mistborn-of-today; just as there's a difference between how strong Mistborn are today (Vin was stronger than Kelsier, and so on) there were likely differences between how powerful Mistborn were at the dawn of the Final Empire, but as a whole you can point to an average of the powers of present day and an average of the powers of the past and compare them, and you're not "wrong" just because you don't spend an additional paragraph explaining that your words aren't meant to be taken as an admission that every original Mistborn was at the exact same power level to within an iota.

 

As another point, either the beads were not all the same mass, in which case there was a range of powers, or they were all the exact same mass, in which case I turn the question on it's head. Why would Leras have made all the beads at exactly that level of power? For that matter, why would he make them even all roughly the same mass? Shouldn't there have been big nuggets and small? Yet clearly he did make beads of all roughly the same mass. Why? Perhaps there is a reason and we just don't see it. Maybe a Mistborn much more powerful than that was at dangerous levels of Investiture. Maybe that much power had hazards that aren't apparent to those of us who have never seen someone that much stronger. Maybe Leras simply wanted them capped at a certain amount, and when Rashek (Who, as a Terrisman, worshipped Terr at the time) used the power and felt its history, he decided to obey his God's wishes and keep his powers at not much more than the preset limit. Or maybe not; maybe he did it for one of a dozen other reasons