Power and Range

[Moogle]

Soulcasting

Consider the scene with Jasnah in WoK:

Jasnah turned casually, brushing his shoulder with her fingers as he struggled to his knees. He became crystal, a figure of pure, flawless quartz—his clothing transformed along with him. The diamond in Jasnah’s Soulcaster faded, but there was still plenty of Stormlight left to send rainbow sparkles through the transformed corpse. The other two men fled in opposite directions. Jasnah took a deep breath, closing her eyes, lifting her hand above her head. Shallan held her safehand to her breast, stunned, confused. Terrified. Stormlight shot from Jasnah’s hand like twin bolts of lightning, symmetrical. One struck each of the footpads and they popped, puffing into smoke. Their empty clothing dropped to the ground. With a sharp snap, the smokestone crystal on Jasnah’s Soulcaster cracked, its light vanishing, leaving her with just the diamond and the ruby.

 

Note here:

• When she Soulcasted via touch, Jasnah's gem did not shatter.
• When she Soulcasted via ranged lightning bolt, Jasnah's gem did shatter.

This suggests to me that Soulcasting at range requires more power, as it puts more stress on the gems. (In a similar fashion, Shardplate draws a ton of Stormlight and stresses gems placed in it to the point where they shatter when it is trying to repair itself.)

 

It is possible that the difference is between smoke and quartz, and that smoke requires a ton more Stormlight. It is further possible that this happened because she Soulcasted two people, rather than one. However, for the purposes of this theory I'll be assuming it is mainly range.

 

Where else have we seen an effect like this?

 

Awakening

Awakening has a limitation: you have to touch the thing you're Awakening. However, this limitation is bypassed at the higher Heightenings, where you can Awaken anything within the range of your voice.

 

Again, more power means more range.

 

Where have we not seen an effect like this?

 

Nicrosil and Chromium

In Allomancy, chromium and nicrosil Mistings can wipe or superburn the metals of an Allomancer they touch (effectively doing aluminum/duralumin on others). It requires touch, as per the AA of Alloy:

CHROMIUM: Leecher Mistings who burn chromium while touching another Allomancer will wipe that Allomancer’s metal reserves.

 

Allomancy is, however, comparatively low power (or so I would assume, based on the lack of anything glowing).

 

Speculation on Mechanics

It is not immediately apparent why this should be true. Why should power have much to do with range? I have a few ideas:

 

1. Investiture, when sent at range, dissipates into the atmosphere partially on the way there. Without enough power backing you, it all dissipates before it reaches its target. Doing it via touch allows a much more efficient transfer. (Susebron does not, however, lose any Breaths to my knowledge when doing ranged Awakenings, which strongly suggests this is not a factor for Awakening - it may, however, be involved for Surgebinding. Stormlight is much less 'sticky' than Breath.)

 

2. In order to transfer Investiture from you to your intended target, there needs to be a connection of some sort between you and the target which acts as a pipe. We can theorize that anything you're touching has a much stronger connection to you than something you're not touching. Hemalurgic spikes and the fact that your clothes are considered as part of 'you' as your skin is for the purposes of some powers (like Abrasion?) support this. Holding more Investiture may, in general, increase the strength of your connections.

 

Or, perhaps, it eventually expands your mind to the point where you have a more instinctive grasp of the other Realms and can 'select' a weak connection.

 

Either way, using a weaker connection may require more power. (Feruchemy suggests this. Your gains from tapping your metalminds are not linear, but are instead logarithmic or some other slow-growing function, implying the 'pipes' transferring power are resistant to more flow, and you need to spend that much more power to get the desired rate of power.)

 

(I could use more explanations.)

 

Conclusion

It seems likely to me that any power which requires touch should be capable of being boosted to being able to be used at range with sufficient power. What does this theory predict?

• Ranged Lashings for Kaladin if he ever bothers to experiment (this may require more Ideals before he can handle the Stormlight necessary). I find this prospect exciting.
• Ranged Soulcasting for Shallan (ie. it's not a Travel Surge enhancement Jasnah gets). This theory does not guarantee that it's not a Travel Surge thing, but the fact that Awakening can manage it (not to mention that one system I'm unable to mention) suggests it's a general feature of systems of Investiture.
• Chromium and nicrosil Mistings should be able to use their powers at range when taking in the mists, or perhaps when getting boosted by a Nicrosil Misting.

Thoughts and criticisms welcome. I've actually been sort of assuming this was all-but-confirmed, and I realized I should probably post it and get people to give it a shakedown.

[Edgedancer he/him]

It could be but unless I'm missing something we only have two data points directly relating to this (and whatever this other system is you mention), Awakening, which would fit yout theory but we don't exactly know why it does, and Jashna's ranged Soulcasting, which also has another perfectly valid explanation at our current knowledge.

On the other hand we know that Allomancy can work at range (physical external and emotionally external), yet there's no reason to assume those metals have so much more power than Nicrosil and Chronium would, which tenatively speaks against your theory.

 

Overall it just seems that we lack enough data to say either way.

Edited May 5, 2015 by Edgedancer

[skaa he/him]

A few thoughts:

• I agree that in Cosmere magic systems ranged magic seems to require more power as you say. But then, it would be a bit weird if a ranged effect required the same or less power than an equivalent point-blank effect. Or maybe I'm just thinking that way because I've come to believe that Cosmere magic follows physical laws (as Brandon recently implied in the recent Q&A in Chicago), and the inverse square law applies in a lot of real world physics.
• Another example of ranged magic is AonDor. Unlike Forgers, Elantrians can affect targets that aren't in physical contact with their symbols, though the effect weakens with distance (as expected if Investiture follows something like the inverse square law). Unsurprisingly, the Elantrian manifestation of Selish Investiture appears to use up a lot more power compared to the MaiPon variant; at least that's what it looks like from all the glowing involved in AonDor.
• I wonder what it would take to augment MaiPon Investiture enough to enable ranged Forgery. They'd probably have to create a city-sized Forgery changing the history of MaiPon to somehow give Soulstamps a lot more power than they currently have. Such augmentation might also make targets more amenable to Forgery (i.e. less probability of rejection). Not sure how one would use a stamp for ranged Forgery, though. Stamping the air in front of the target?
• Reverse Lashing consumes very little Stormlight. If more Stormlight is all it takes to use long-range Lashings, then it would be best to experiment on long-ranged Reverse Lashing first to save on Stormlight. Hopefully the resulting "multiplied strain of simultaneous infusion" won't be enough to harm Kaladin's Spiritual aspect (Syl probably won't let that happen).
• Speaking of multiplied strain of simultaneous infusion, it's possible that trying to make some short-ranged abilities long-ranged is just too dangerous for normal humans. They might need to Ascend in order to survive such feats.

Edgedancer, on 05 May 2015 - 8:50 PM, said:

On the other hand we know that Allomancy can work at range (physical external and emotionally external), yet there's no reason to assume those metals have so much more power than Nicrosil and Chronium would, which tenatively speaks against your theory.

I think you misunderstand Moogle's point. I think he's saying that magical power (how much a target is affected by magic) is inversely proportional to range, so if you increase your range you will experience a decrease in magical power unless you compensate somehow (e.g. via a proportional increase in Investiture).

The fact that External Physical and Mental Allomancy are long range only means that their effects aren't as strong as they would be if they were short range given the same level of Investiture. The fact that Enhancement Allomancy is short-range actually helps it because the target is affected directly with minimal power loss.

Edited May 5, 2015 by skaa

[Moogle]

Thanks for your thoughts.

 

@Skaa:
 

In a similar way as you wonder about ranged Forgery, I wonder at the idea of ranged Hemalurgy, and whether or not the idea makes sense. The idea is to attach a bit of sDNA to someone - but this sDNA is part of the spike. It seems like ranged Hemalurgy would require you to fling the sDNA in the spike away from it and directly into them, and so Hemalurgy practicioner may not actually be able to do this sort of thing at range. One might have to define what is meant by 'Hemalurgy' and how it is actually practiced, as in what the mechanics are, such that they could be power boosted.

 

In general, more "Spiritual" things (Forgery, Hemalurgy) seem to be more strict about requiring physical contact. "Cognitive" or "Physical" things seem to have no problems with range - Pushing/Pulling/Soothing/Rioting all affect things at a distance, and don't seem Spiritual in nature.

 

In his recent AMA, Brandon said that location doesn't particularly matter in the Spiritual. (Presumably, this explains why Hoid can use Allomancy off Scadrial - the Investiture comes from the Spiritual.)

 

So I'm left wondering why the Spiritual powers - where you affect something's Spiritweb - should have a range limitation if location doesn't matter in the Spiritual. It seems to me like the reason is that you need to somehow interface with the Spiritual thing, that you send Investiture through the Physical and then it makes its way into the Spiritual via the target's body.

 

However, there's a very binary effect going on. You don't gradually gain the ability to Awaken at distance - there is no inverse square law in the typical sense. It's just something you get at a specific Heightening.

 

I'm left wondering if the touch limitation is actually due to some resistance of the soul of the target. Souls resist Forgery and outside influence. Something about a Hemalurgic spike 'pierces' this barrier and allows an outside influence (Ruin) in. I wonder if Forgery does a similar thing, where the physical act of stamping somehow opens a barrier in the person's soul and allows you to actually put your Investiture in.

 

In this case, the requirement of having a massive amount of Investiture makes more sense - you need a ton before you can outright shatter a body's natural resistance without using physical touch to bypass it, because more Investiture means you can 'push' with more 'force'. This would explain the binariness of Awakening. Perhaps there's an inverse square law as well, but I'm not entirely sure.

[skaa he/him]

However, there's a very binary effect going on. You don't gradually gain the ability to Awaken at distance - there is no inverse square law in the typical sense. It's just something you get at a specific Heightening.

 

Do we have WoB on this? Remember, aside from Susebron (Tenth Heightening), we don't actually see anyone of significant Heightening even attempt to Awaken objects at a distance. For all we know, someone at the Fifth Heightening could Awaken something within a very small distance from him without physical contact, though it might take much more Breath than usual. At any rate, Audible Commands at Ninth Heightening follow the inverse square law by definition since sound follows the inverse square law.

 

The "resistance" theory could work for Forgery and Hemalurgy (and I've in fact discussed Investiture resistance in other threads), but it doesn't explain Awakening, Lashings, External Enhancement Allomancy, and Feruchemy since those work at a mere touch and so don't seem to require any "barrier-piercing".

 

Okay, how about this: Perhaps the secret of Investiture range lies in Identity and Connection. Just as a Surgebinder can easily move Stormlight to any part of his own body, certain forms of Investiture are easy to manipulate within the host Identity and gets really difficult to manipulate outside of the Identity unless some sort of Connection is used. This Connection acts as the path through which Investiture can be directed outside of the host Identity. Without a Connection, the Investiture "particles" move in their own paths, leading to dissipation (which follows the inverse square law).

 

When you're Pulling on a metal, you're using the Ironline between you and the metal as the Connection through which Investiture can be directed. Similarly, Mental Allomancy uses some sort of Mental Connection between the Allomancer and the target. (I guess this theory can be tested by determining the effects of Feruchemical duralumin storage on long-range Emotional Allomancy).

 

On the other hand, in Nicrosil Allomancy (and Feruchemy, Awakening, Lashings, etc.) there is no convenient long range Connection already in place, so the user must form his own Connection. The easiest way is to simply touch the target, instantly creating a Physical Connection. If physical contact is not available, then the only options left are 1) expend some power to create a temporary long-range Connection between yourself and the target (e.g. Jasnah's magic lightning), or 2) gain so much power that the inverse square law is not enough to dissipate the Investiture before it reaches the target (e.g. Audible Command).

 

Obviously, Hemalurgy and Forgery can be described via this Connection model as well. It's just that Hemalurgic or Forged Investiture is naturally repulsed by a targets' Identity for some reason and so requires some sort of "barrier" piercing to create a viable Connection.

 

I wonder if there is such a thing as "positive charge" and "negative charge" in Investiture. That might explain the resistance of some things to some kinds of Investiture.

Edited May 6, 2015 by skaa

[Moogle]

Do we have WoB on this? Remember, aside from Susebron (Tenth Heightening), we don't actually see anyone of significant Heightening even attempt to Awaken objects at a distance. For all we know, someone at the Fifth Heightening could Awaken something within a very small distance from him without physical contact, though it might take much more Breath than usual. At any rate, Audible Commands at Ninth Heightening follow the inverse square law by definition since sound follows the inverse square law.

 

Vasher had a sizeable fraction of the God King's Breaths at one point, and you gain a more instinctive understanding of Awakening the more Breaths you have. I think he'd know. Now, perhaps he never mentioned the fact, but I don't agree on the whole that it's likely to be gradual. There's too many Awakeners, and I'm sure at least one or two have tried to Awaken something a few millimeters from their hand.

 

An inverse square law would suggest that even someone with a mere hundred Breaths should be able to Awaken something very close to them, since Susebron can affect something at a distance of... well, whatever his voice can reach, so let's say 10 meters as an underestimate. Someone with 1/10000 of his Breath would be able to affect something within 1/100th of that - 100 centimeters of range.

 

I agree it's not confirmed, but I do not find it likely that it is gradual.

 

I do not agree that, due to sound, the inverse square law is being followed necessarily. I do not know, but I suspect it might not take more Breaths to Awaken at range. We'll have to get a WoB on that though, because I am not at all certain.

 

Regarding your models of Identity and Connection, I like the train of your thoughts. I do have an issue: why does an Emotional Allomancer not require a connection of the same sort? It seems like they can 'blast' Investiture around them in an area to affect everyone, so perhaps a connection is not needed?

 

As to the Identity repelling thing: I've been a proponent of that idea for quite a while. In particular, (SA3 spoilers)

Jasnah being repulsed when she tried to touch the flame of another living being in Shadesmar was something I found very supportive of the idea.

 

I like the idea of there being positive/negative charge. It would explain Feruchemy nicely. The resistance of a soul to outside Investiture (or the resistance of Breaths not being transferred through touch, if it turns out more Breaths are not required) might even be able to be modeled as the equivalent of an electric potential or a hill (with potential energy + gravity), where when you have enough power you can finally bypass it, and once past the potential you regain the energy you expended passing it, much like you regain your speed when zooming down a hill you spent energy to climb up.

 

[skaa he/him]

I saw the private message you sent, and I am fine with abandoning the inverse square law theory, at least for now, if that will move the discussion forward. The important thing is that there is an inverse proportionality between power and range that you yourself noted in the original post ("Soulcasting at range requires more power", etc.).

Regarding your models of Identity and Connection, I like the train of your thoughts. I do have an issue: why does an Emotional Allomancer not require a connection of the same sort? It seems like they can 'blast' Investiture around them in an area to affect everyone, so perhaps a connection is not needed?

When a Feruchemist stores Connection in a Duraluminmind to decrease his "friendship", does he not store the "friendship" Connections to everyone around him in the area simultaneously, as if in a "blast"? I think a similar thing happens in Emotional Allomancy when it's being "blasted" in an area. The Allomancer uses "emotion" Connections (which may or may not be the same as the "friendship" Connections of Feruchemical duralumin) on a subconscious level, such that even when he thinks he's doing something undirected, Investiture is actually being directed through every "emotion" Connection attached to him.

This is similar to the "bubble" of Steelpushing that Wax does. He sends a Push towards all the Ironlines attached to him (is it still called Ironline if you're using Steel?), giving an appearance of a pseudo-bubble.

In both cases, Connections are still used.

I like the idea of there being positive/negative charge. It would explain Feruchemy nicely. The resistance of a soul to outside Investiture (or the resistance of Breaths not being transferred through touch, if it turns out more Breaths are not required) might even be able to be modeled as the equivalent of an electric potential or a hill (with potential energy + gravity), where when you have enough power you can finally bypass it, and once past the potential you regain the energy you expended passing it, much like you regain your speed when zooming down a hill you spent energy to climb up.

This is pretty cool, Moogle! I've spent the past hour reading up on related topics like the threshold potential and action potentials in living cells, and I think developing your line of thought might lead to some pretty interesting theories. Since you're much more aware of the physics concepts than I am, I think it would be a great idea for you to explore this further. *thumbs up*

Edited May 6, 2015 by skaa

[navybrandt he/him]

To support your theory, power/energy, in general, transfers much better on contact than through space. Basically, conduction is much more efficient than convection or radiation.

Examples:

- An oven cooks food, but if the food were to contact the heating element, it would probably catch on fire.

- I can put my hand near a hot iron and feel the warmth, but if I touch it, it will burn me.

- Electricity travels through a conductor, but if the voltage is high enough, it can travel through air (larger distances = much higher voltage required to cause an arc).

This brings up other interesting possibilities. Just like certain materials conduct heat or energy better than others, perhaps certain materials transfer investiture better than others. Would soulcasting underwater affect how much power is needed? With that in mind, I propose this formula:

I = (p + (d^2)*m)/k

Where

I = total investiture needed to perform the task

p = base power required to perform task (regardless of type of investiture being used)

d = the distance between the person using investiture and the intended target

m = a material multiplier based on the substance's resistance to Investiture

k = a conductivity constant specific to the type of investiture being used (with smaller numbers equating to more investiture being needed)

So, on contact, d=0, and this simplifies to just I = p/k.

Edited May 11, 2015 by navybrandt

[Moogle]

When a Feruchemist stores Connection in a Duraluminmind to decrease his "friendship", does he not store the "friendship" Connections to everyone around him in the area simultaneously, as if in a "blast"? I think a similar thing happens in Emotional Allomancy when it's being "blasted" in an area. The Allomancer uses "emotion" Connections (which may or may not be the same as the "friendship" Connections of Feruchemical duralumin) on a subconscious level, such that even when he thinks he's doing something undirected, Investiture is actually being directed through every "emotion" Connection attached to him.

 

I am very hesitant to agree with your model of Feruchemical duralumin. Off-topic:

Feruchemy is basically entirely internal, the only exception (which we don't even know is an exception) chromium for storing luck. We know that storing/tapping Connection makes it easier to use magics off-world:

Q: I’m not sure if it was duralumin or something but the Feruchemical ability to store connection, is that how Hoid worldhops? It stores Connection to another world?

B: It’s a good question, it doesn’t have anything to do with worldhopping *but* what it does do is once you have worldhopped you can change your Connection to which planet you are on, which helps you with magic systems.

 

I'd rather believe that what you're storing/tapping is some sort of Spiritual weight/charge (call it charisma). Connections form between two entities normally, as they 'attract' each other (I view it sort of as a spring - you both push on the spring to draw yourselves closer, and this spring is the connection). While storing, you simply don't attract these Connections anymore, and so the 'spring' of the connection extends once more and it's like you've never met. While tapping, you pull the spring closer faster.

 

(This idea of there being a spring actually relates very naturally for the tendency of two things of different Identities to push each other way - I see a parallel to fundamental forces of physics, where the protons in an atom want to repel each other, but nuclear forces keep them together.)

 

To relate it to the off-world magic WoB, I imagine you'd naturally form a Connection with something like Arelon (so you'd be eligible for being an Elantrian) on a timespan of decades. If you store up a bunch of Connection, you can speed up this process (because you form the connection to Arelon quicker, and because you're giving up your connection to Scadrial?).

 

In any case, even if I have specifics wrong, I still lean away from your model just because it seems less internal. Your idea seems to propose that he's sort of cannibalizing the connections between him and another person, which seems decidedly external. I could also come to agree with your model if you viewed the 'friendship' you're blasting towards people to be some sort of Spiritual heat radiating from you, and storing/tapping makes you 'hotter' or 'colder', but that still seems to me a variation on my model above.

 

Despite that, I agree with your general point. Wax's Steel"bubble" certainly seems like he's just directing energy through every connection, rather than radiating a field.

 

...

 

This was a very interesting and solid post. Thank you. I like the idea of some materials conducting Investiture better than others. It reminds me of Skaa's(?) theory on the metal in fabrials being used to conduct Investiture. I'm not 100% sold on the equation (too many things are unclear to me on Investiture mechanics), but at least it seems like the right place to start.

[navybrandt he/him]

Well, of course, that formula was based on years of scientific research and not made-up because it kind of looks like other formulas... , so it is absolutely accurate.

[natc]

That's what I always assumed the steel bubble to be; pushing everything at once, rather than an actual field of power. Think the Lord Ruler did something similar once, and in true Lord Ruler fashion even shook the glass windows.

I guess the trick is to learn to actually push everything indiscriminately without having to consciously acknowledge the presence of every individual line?

[Shaggai]

I am very hesitant to agree with your model of Feruchemical duralumin. Off-topic:

Feruchemy is basically entirely internal, the only exception (which we don't even know is an exception) chromium for storing luck. We know that storing/tapping Connection makes it easier to use magics off-world:

 

I'd rather believe that what you're storing/tapping is some sort of Spiritual weight/charge (call it charisma). Connections form between two entities normally, as they 'attract' each other (I view it sort of as a spring - you both push on the spring to draw yourselves closer, and this spring is the connection). While storing, you simply don't attract these Connections anymore, and so the 'spring' of the connection extends once more and it's like you've never met. While tapping, you pull the spring closer faster.

 

(This idea of there being a spring actually relates very naturally for the tendency of two things of different Identities to push each other way - I see a parallel to fundamental forces of physics, where the protons in an atom want to repel each other, but nuclear forces keep them together.)

 

To relate it to the off-world magic WoB, I imagine you'd naturally form a Connection with something like Arelon (so you'd be eligible for being an Elantrian) on a timespan of decades. If you store up a bunch of Connection, you can speed up this process (because you form the connection to Arelon quicker, and because you're giving up your connection to Scadrial?).

 

In any case, even if I have specifics wrong, I still lean away from your model just because it seems less internal. Your idea seems to propose that he's sort of cannibalizing the connections between him and another person, which seems decidedly external. I could also come to agree with your model if you viewed the 'friendship' you're blasting towards people to be some sort of Spiritual heat radiating from you, and storing/tapping makes you 'hotter' or 'colder', but that still seems to me a variation on my model above.

 

Despite that, I agree with your general point. Wax's Steel"bubble" certainly seems like he's just directing energy through every connection, rather than radiating a field.

 

 

This was a very interesting and solid post. Thank you. I like the idea of some materials conducting Investiture better than others. It reminds me of Skaa's(?) theory on the metal in fabrials being used to conduct Investiture. I'm not 100% sold on the equation (too many things are unclear to me on Investiture mechanics), but at least it seems like the right place to start.

I think that Connections are defined by both parties. The "string" is attached to both ends. Someone on one end can let go of the string, thereby breaking the Connection. Changing strength is a bit different, but it's an analogy and analogies are never perfect. Maybe it's multiple strings? If so, that would imply that Connection is quantized.

 

To support your theory, power/energy, in general, transfers much better on contact than through space. Basically, conduction is much more efficient than convection or radiation.

Examples:

- An oven cooks food, but if the food were to contact the heating element, it would probably catch on fire.

- I can put my hand near a hot iron and feel the warmth, but if I touch it, it will burn me.

- Electricity travels through a conductor, but if the voltage is high enough, it can travel through air (larger distances = much higher voltage required to cause an arc).

This brings up other interesting possibilities. Just like certain materials conduct heat or energy better than others, perhaps certain materials transfer investiture better than others. Would soulcasting underwater affect how much power is needed? With that in mind, I propose this formula:

I = (p + (d^2)*m)/k

Where

I = total investiture needed to perform the task

p = base power required to perform task (regardless of type of investiture being used)

d = the distance between the person using investiture and the intended target

m = a material multiplier based on the substance's resistance to Investiture

k = a conductivity constant specific to the type of investiture being used (with larger numbers equating to more investiture being needed)

So, on contact, d=0, and this simplifies to just I = p/k.

This is really cool. The formula doesn't seem to act like the behavior of energy, though. I decreases smoothly with distance. The formula looks more like gravity, which doesn't change in strength depending on whether there is contact or not. Perhaps it would work better if we replace d² with C, where C is the strength of Investiture transfer (corresponding potentially to the user's Spiritual connection to the target), and say that C = 1 on contact (because resistance to Investiture doesn't just go away upon contact) and d² + s outside of contact (s > 1, s is a constant depending on the type of Investiture and how good it is at radiating).

 

Furthermore, getting rid of d² removes the need to separate m and p, and I'm not entirely sure why k is in the denominator (surely "larger numbers mean more Investiture required" would describe a variable in the numerator?) which means that potentially a better equation would be 

 

I_T = pmCk, which means that I_T = pmk upon contact and I = pm(d² + s) at a distance. Also, T = I₀/pmCk  where T is the amount of change that the Investiture can cause and I₀ is the amount of Investiture provided.

[navybrandt he/him]

Yeah, my bad, I was tired. I'm an engineer too and made such a gross error. I do think your formula works better too, so let's go with that one.