Stormlight usage formula

[Alfa he/him]

Start of the discussion: here

 

I wrote there some basic formula on how fast a radiant loses inhaled stormlight, and Oudeis pointed out, that it has its flaws. The idea of this topic is to find the most accurate formula on the loss of Stormlight.

 

Let us begin with definition:
 

Stormlight. I will use the letter S for the Stormlight a radiant has inside of him/her. I will use the letter L for "captured" stormlight hold by gemstones. I will use the letter L' for "free" stormlight in a highstorm, but this case is special.

Gain: A radiant gains S by inhaling L. I will use the letter G for the term discribing this process. 

Inefficiency: Every radiant is an imperfect Vessel for stormlight and it bursts out of him (and so are gemstones). I will use the letter I for the term that describes the inefficiency of the radiant. The inefficiency is based on how much S a radiant holds.
Healing: Stormlight heals. H is the letter to sum up this term.

Enhancing: Stormlight enhances the abilities of the radiant. I will use the letter N for this process.

Surgebinding: Stormlight is also used on different kings of surgebinding. U will describe this process.

E is the error in my equation (In the ultimate end, E shall be zero).
t is time, as usual.

 

So far we have this equation:
S(t+1)=S(t) + G(t) - I(t) - H(t) - N(t) - U(t) + E(t)

 

On I(t): I have two different assumptions.

One is, that a radiant loses a constant amount of stormlight in a given time period. In this case I(t) = i, and "i" is the amount of S lost (for example a chipful of S in 1 minute).

The other, more difficult equation will be I(S(t)) = S(t)*a and "a" is the percentage of stormlight lost in a given time period. Note, that "I" is dependant from S(t)

Further, I(t) is affected by the effect of the knight radiant exhaling, but I will neglect this effect for first.

Szeth tells us somewhere, that Voidbringers lose no stormlight, so I(t)_voidbringer = 0  (assumed)

 

On H(t): We know, that a person using a honorblade does not heal itself as fast as a KR, so I assume, that it uses more stormlight on it. This shall somehow affect H.

 

More thoughts: Somehow the amount of Ideals spoken by the radiant affects his or her powers. Probably this is somehow like the total factor productivity in economic equations (TFP), but now i have no clue, how to use it. For future discussion i will reserve the letter Z for it.

 

So far on this. Opinions, constructive criticism and ideas are welcome.

 

EDIT: Spelling. I am not a native english speaker.

Edited August 11, 2015 by Alfa

[Oudeis he/him]

I'm real sorry, I didn't mean to imply your formula had flaws. It was an excellent formula. I simply wanted to make sure everyone understood, as I'm sure you did, that seemingly-simple things like your value of "a" were more likely themselves derived from another formula. And, regrettably, noting that there are many, many values and expressions we can barely even guess at. Your initial work was and continues to be amazing and I don't wish to detract from that.

 

Also, one other thing to throw out. As has been pointed out before, this whole thing is difficult even to begin until we learn what a unit of "Stormlight" even is, and how much of it fits into a chip, mark, and broam. It's like trying to come up with formulae to compare distances when we don't know what a meter is and our only source is someone telling a story where the concept of length is obliquely referenced.

[Grey Knight]

MATH!!

[Alfa he/him]

I didn't meant the word "flaw" as "wrogness" but more as "incompletness" and did not want to say that you accused me on using wrong terms. This was constructive criticism from your side. As I said, English is not my native language, so forgive me for misunderstandable word usage.

And on the value of stormlight: we have no Idea of amounts, but we can think about its behaviour. It is more or less like we know that three meters are more than two, even if we have no Idea how much a meter is.
On stormlight amounts in money: we can assume that they are equivalent of the exchange rate of broams, marks and chips. To-read (or RAFO) for us: does an emerald chip have the same amount of stormlight as a diamond chip?

EDIT: FInished my somehow unfinished text.

EDIT 2: Won't be here in the next days, so please surprise me with a bunch of new ideas when i come back.

Edited August 11, 2015 by Alfa

[Ookla the Absent]

S(t+1)=S(t) + G(t) - I(t) - H(t) - N(t) - U(t) + E(t)

It's interesting that your responding variable (result, in this case S[t+1]) has the [t+1]. I think I get what you're getting at, but the mathematician in me has to point out that the responding variable should be S(t), or amount of stormlight you have rather than S(t+1) or the amount you will have in one unit of time. As I am interpreting your equation, I see the formula as

S(t)=S(t-1) + G(t) - I(t) - H(t) - N(t) - U(t) + E(t)

The significant change is that I assumed that you have stormlight equal to what you had before minus what you are using now rather than stormlight later being now minus now... hard to explain in english, but basically my formula has immediate effects, and has a properly formatted responding variable, as far as my understanding of math goes. I am not a math major.

[ParadoxicalZen he/him]

A few questions worth asking: Is the amount of stormlight a proto-radiant/Radiant can hold the same for each individual Radiant? Does it change as a Radiant might age ie Lift is younger than Kaladin/Shallan/Jasnah/Renarin so perhaps she might not be able to inhale as much? Does a Radiant's usage/capacity to inhale increase as they speak the Oaths, or does it become more efficient to use the Surges? Does each Surge use the same amount of stormlight across the Orders and does it change for each level reached?

[Seloun]

It seems completely impossible to do any reasonable quantitative analysis of Stormlight usage given the data we have available.

 

That said, here's my initial cut at some values.

 

1) The distance to the permanent bridge from the bottom of the chasm at the 'shallow' bridge is 40 feet:

 

 

“Syl, lead us to the short chasm.” They’d spent some time investigating, finding the best place to launch arrows into the bottom of permanent bridges. One bridge in particular was close to Sadeas’s warcamp—so they often traversed it on the way out on a bridge run—and spanned a particularly shallow chasm. Only about forty feet deep, rather than the usual hundred or more.

Sanderson, Brandon (2010-08-31). The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive) (p. 839). Macmillan. Kindle Edition.

 

2) Kaladin has a 'small fortune' of spheres when he attempts to carry the armor out of the canyon:

 

 

Teft grimaced behind his short, greying beard, but offered no further objection. Kaladin continued to follow Syl. In his pouch, he carried the rest of the spheres they’d discovered on bodies while scavenging. They made a habit of keeping some of each discovery and sticking them to bridges, and with Syl helping at scavenging, they now found more than they used to. He had a small fortune in his pouch. That Stormlight—he hoped— would serve him well today.

Sanderson, Brandon (2010-08-31). The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive) (pp. 835-836). Macmillan. Kindle Edition.

 

3) All of the spheres in the bag appear to be 'fully charged':

 

 

She snorted, zipping into the air, becoming a ribbon again. “Come on, hurry up.” She shot off down the chasm. Kaladin collected the dun sphere, then dug into the pouch for another one to provide light. Had he drained them all? No. The others still glowed strongly. He selected a ruby mark, then hurried after Syl.

Sanderson, Brandon (2010-08-31). The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive) (p. 838). Macmillan. Kindle Edition.

 

4) Assumption: each sphere of a given size (chip, mark, broam) contains roughly the same amount of Stormlight. Therefore we don't necessarily have to estimate the value of the 'fortune', but its composition (number of spheres and the type of spheres). Unfortunately I don't think we have a good way to estimate either; I would suggest that the number of spheres are (in order of magnitude) somewhere between 10 and 100.

 

Kaladin uses a sapphire mark first, then selects a ruby mark. This may suggest 'average' denomination is a mark, so I'll estimate that Kaladin has 50 mark's worth of Stormlight on him (in theory he spends the sapphire, but this is well within the uncertainty anyway).

 

He infuses rocks to climb up to the bridge. I'll estimate that each rock is spaced roughly a foot apart (if anyone can provide a better argument, go for it); he does not climb the entire way and he can skip the first couple of feet, so I'll estimate that he infused 35 stones.

 

It takes him roughly 15 minutes to make the climb:

 

 

Kaladin relaxed. He was still steaming light, and—save for the call to Lopen—he’d been holding his breath for a good quarter hour. That could be handy, he thought, though his lungs were starting to burn, so he started to breathe normally.

Sanderson, Brandon (2010-08-31). The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive) (p. 842). Macmillan. Kindle Edition.

 

Kaladin then has a short conversation with Syl before jumping down, which expends all of the remaining Stormlight:

 

 

He came to a crouch, resting one hand on the stone, a jolt of coldness shooting through him. His remaining Stormlight came out in a single burst, flung from his body in a luminescent smoke ring that crashed against the ground before spreading out, vanishing.

Sanderson, Brandon (2010-08-31). The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive) (p. 843). Macmillan. Kindle Edition.

 

So roughly, 50 Stormlight marks = 35 infused stones + loss over 15 minutes + buffering for 40 feet fall + loss from speaking to Syl (~5 minutes of talking).

 

Earlier, Kaladin uses 5 spheres (again assume marks) to tussle a bit with Teft and to stick a 'medical supply pack' to a barrel:

 

 

“Gancho,” Lopen said, walking up, carrying the medical supply pack over his shoulder. “Here you go.”

...

 

Stormlight. Kaladin hastily released Teft, fishing at the pouch of spheres in his pocket. He yanked it free and pulled it open. It was dark inside. All five gemstones had been drained. The white light streaming from Kaladin’s skin faintly illuminated the inside of the bag.

Sanderson, Brandon (2010-08-31). The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive) (p. 795). Macmillan. Kindle Edition.

 

However, he still has Stormlight remaining after this:

 

 

Syl alighted in the air before him, hands behind her back, looking closely at him. “You’re glowing.”

...

 

Kaladin reached down, picking a stone up off the ground. It was as big as his palm, weathered smooth by highstorm winds and rain. He pressed it against the wall of the barrack and willed his Light into the stone.
 

...

 

“This…thing,” Kaladin said, gesturing toward the stone. “It isn’t natural. The Radiants betrayed mankind. Their powers left them, and they were cursed. Everyone knows the legends.” He looked down at his hands, still glowing, though more faintly than before.

Sanderson, Brandon (2010-08-31). The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive) (p. 797). Macmillan. Kindle Edition.

 

He runs out shortly after, however:

 

 

By the time night drew close, the light had long since stopped streaming from Kaladin’s body. It had faded like a fire going out, and had only taken a few minutes to vanish.

Sanderson, Brandon (2010-08-31). The Way of Kings (The Stormlight Archive) (p. 798). Macmillan. Kindle Edition.

 

So, estimated, 5 marks = 1 infused stone + 1 infused pack + ~5 minutes of talking. It's unclear if the pack takes more Stormlight than the stone (it's almost certainly larger); based on the way Kaladin describes 'spreading' stormlight in WoR, it sounds more like a surface area thing than a volume thing. Still, the pack is probably more than the stone. As a wild guesstimate, let's assume the pack took about 3 times the Stormlight of the stone. We still don't have a good way to compare the infusion spending versus the loss spending, but just to make things even let's take the 5 minutes to talking to be worth 1 mark, and 1 infused stone to be 1 mark.

 

This would combine with the first estimate to give us

 

14 marks = 15 minutes of no breathing + 40 feet drop

 

Since no breathing is definitely less than the talking, the 15 minutes of no breathing should be less than 3 marks worth (this is assuming the 5 minutes is an accuracte estimate for the speaking portion, though). I'll postulate that it's more like 1 mark (2 mark for the period seems high, as it would imply talking loses less than double not-talking). This gives us

 

13 marks = 40 feet drop

 

which actually sounds kind of expensive. Have to try an analyze the cost of the gravitational lashings, but my gut feeling is that Kaladin could have gotten down much more cheaply by using gravitational lashings carefully.

[Herdazian he/him]

And we also don't know whether rate of loss of stormlight is same or if it is more like diffusion and gets slower the less stormlight there is

[Oudeis he/him]

@Paradox: Excellent questions. I'm sorry I have no answers.
 
@ Herdazian: You mean in people, or in spheres? We do know that the rate changes in people; Kaladin mentions it when he's getting his tattoo. When he's filled with Stormlight, it pours out of him. When there's just a touch in his body, it barely trickles out.
 
As for gems, I don't know, and I've often wondered. We know that gems dim as time goes by. Keep in mind, Stormlight isn't like water. You can look at a glass pitcher and if you see a lot of water in it, there's a lot of water in it. If you see very little water in it, there's very little water in it.
 
However, the Stormlight you're seeing isn't the Stormlight in the gem, it's the Stormlight that's escaping. So if you see a dull sphere, we assume that means the sphere itself is weak, but all it really means is that only a very little Stormlight is pouring out. In theory, a very large Gemheart somehow made in such a way to retain Stormlight better would look very, very dull, but could very well have much more Stormlight that one glowing brightly. Szeth says the Voidbringers can hold Stormlight perfectly; therefore, in contrast to the Radiants, they shouldn't glow at all. No loss, no inefficiency, no glowing mist pouring from your skin.
 
Though this does make you question how light interacts with Stormlight. When Kal gazes deeply into a gem and sees the light roil, is he seeing Stormlight itself? Or is light passing through the gem, hitting the trapped quantity of Stormlight, bouncing off and hitting his eyes? Basically, does Stormlight reflect visible light?
 
In conclusion, since we know a gem near the end of its glow will glow more dimly, it's reasonable to assume that the rate is non-constant, though this technically remains speculation since the phenomenon is poorly understood.
 
 

S(t+1)=S(t) + G(t) - I(t) - H(t) - N(t) - U(t) + E(t)
 
...
 
S(t)=S(t-1) + G(t) - I(t) - H(t) - N(t) - U(t) + E(t)

 
Hrm... yet you keep all the subsequent expressions in the second formula as (t)? Not as (t-1)? Aren't they being affected by the moment in the past, not the moment in the present? Kaladin doesn't gain Stormlight because he's about to inhale it, he gains Stormlight because he inhaled it a moment ago.
 

2) Kaladin has a 'small fortune' of spheres when he attempts to carry the armor out of the canyon:

You sort of address this as you go on, but I just want to point out that "small fortune" is an incredibly subjective term. Are we hearing it now from Kaladin, the boy who grew up middle-class(well, ish) with a huge store of diamond marks in the next room? Or the slave who gets paid each week enough to buy twenty-five loaves of bread?
 
 

3) All of the spheres in the bag appear to be 'fully charged':

Just gonna mention here that "fully charged" is, obviously, a function of how long it's been since the last Highstorm. I don't think we know, in either of your examples, how long it's been. Simple hours could be enough to change the amount of Stormlight in a single sphere by significant amounts.
 

Kaladin uses a sapphire mark first, then selects a ruby mark. This may suggest 'average' denomination is a mark.

Gonna disagree here. I think we can get much, much more accurate with a different estimation. First, Kaladin wasn't fishing for a random sphere, he would have preferentially selected a larger one to get more Stormlight. So a mark is more like an upper bound than an average. Also, consider actual change in real life. I happen to collect change I get and almost never spend it, for reasons. I have one jar of mixed silver, and one just with my pennies. By volume, there are nearly twice as many pennies as the rest of the coins combined. I hasten to suggest that chips will prove to be far, far more common to be found than marks. Also consider distribution of polestone types. A single emerald mark would be half a year's salary for Kaladin. I don't think that would be considered a 'small' fortune. In short, I suggest we assume the 50 spheres are two parts chips and one part marks, so let's say 17 marks and 34 chips.
 

It takes him roughly 15 minutes to make the climb:

Prolly not relevant since all of your terms are within the same frame of reference... is an hour on Roshar the same as an hour on Earth?
 
 

loss from speaking to Syl (~5 minutes of talking).
 
Earlier, Kaladin uses 5 spheres (again assume marks) to tussle a bit with Teft and to stick a 'medical supply pack' to a barrel:

 

You're comparing two five-minute talking losses as equal when we know they are not. The first time, it was not the last of his Stormlight, and so would have been streaming at a much faster rate. The very final trickle would have been as slow as the leak will ever get. The difference could easily be in orders of magnitude.

 

And I'm going to suggest again a distribution of sphere sizes. How about three chips, two marks?

 

Man. There are a few hundred thousand questions we'd need to ask and measurements we'd need to take before we can start to get the very first idea of how much Stormlight it takes to do something.

[Blaze1616 he/him]

All right, it's been a full year since I've performed rigorous math of any kind, so bear with me if I make any statements that seem obviously wrong.

 

The inner engineer/mathematician in me wants to agree with Gargoyle here, in that you're equation should be trying to identify S(t) and not S(t+1). Stormlight transfers seems to be near instant, and so the loss/gain would affect the current instance of time, not the next instance. We would need to know the mechanics of loss of stormlight though. Is it rendered unusable the moment it passes through the membrane that is the skin, or is it unusable at some other point in time? This seems like something that would be up for debate, and I'm not sure I have the correct mental image of the mechanism as we know it currently.

 

Not that this would have any real effect on your equation due to each of the terms being added/subtracted, but I have a feeling N(t)=0. From my readings of the novels, I've understood the enhancements, as you've named them, are a passive effect of holding stormlight, and not a function that consumes the resource.

 

As far as efficiency of use, I think your I(t) term would cover both the differences between oath levels, as well as using an Honorblade versus being a Radiant. A (relatively) simple coefficient would likely explain such differences in comparison to the base case of being a full Radiant. I say relatively simple, but the coefficient could be an equation of some kind. Of course, perhaps you are right an instead this coefficient must be applied to multiple terms, and as such can be factored out to form this Z or Z(t) you mention.

[Oudeis he/him]

1. How quick need something be to be "near instant"? Are we talking relatavistic speeds? We know that if a sphere is on a table, and Shallan Invests from it, the Stormlight starts in the sphere. Then it spends some time in the air between them. Then it's in her. Is that really fast enough to be near-instant? I honestly do not know.

 

2. I believe differently than you about N, but I don't think either of us are convincing the other any time soon. That I know of, absolutely nothing in the books does much to suggest one way or the other, apart from the fact that when you're absolutely bursting with Stormlight you feel compelled to physical activity, moreso than when you've got just a bit of it.

 

Shardplate, without Stormlight, grants no strength. Does it actually use Stormlight to grant strength, or is that just a function of Stormlight existing?

 

Mistborn, Warbreaker

On Scadrial, the ways to enhance your strength come at a cost, regardless of end-neutrality. Allomancy burns pewter and is powered directly by Preservation. Feruchemy can only use the finite quantity of strength already stored. Hemalurgy requires the loss of a life and most of a spiritweb and grants less than the sum-total strength lost.

 

In Warbreaker, we have slightly less clear and more roundabout way to do it. You can enhance a pair of pants to give you more strength. Mr. Sanderson has said this is an end-neutral process, which I believe since he's the author but do not understand; you are getting strength, yet apart from some hue which seems not equal you lose nothing. If it's not being externally powered by Endowment's energy the way Allomancy is by Preservation, how is it end-neutral? Regardless, a rope has the power to lift and chuck boulders without using up the Breath inside, it seems.

 

Mistborn being the significantly more clear-cut and direct analogy, I'm inclined to believe that there is a cost for enhanced attributes, but this is simply a gut feeling on my part. We obviously have precedent for either option being the case.

[ccstat he/him]

I'm not going to chime in on the math part today, but I do want to contend one point.

However, the Stormlight you're seeing isn't the Stormlight in the gem, it's the Stormlight that's escaping. So if you see a dull sphere, we assume that means the sphere itself is weak, but all it really means is that only a very little Stormlight is pouring out.

I used to agree with this, but I no longer think it is the case. In my opinion, Stormlight is analogous to the mists in Mistborn: a gaseous form of investiture. On Roshar this gas glows, but the act of glowing doesn't cost much energy and doesn't substantially reduce the amount of Stormlight in a gem or person. Wisps of gas do escape from imperfect containers, and this happens more quickly (and therefore visibly) from proto-Radiants and those with Honorblades, but the glow is more an indication that loss is occurring.

Since I assume the amount of light given off per unit of Stormlight is constant, the brightness of a gem is directly indicative of the power it contains, and if a gem were a perfect vessel for Stormlight I believe it would continue to glow indefinitely.

Edited August 12, 2015 by ccstat

[Blaze1616 he/him]

...

1) About a year and a half ago (so take this as you will), I took a course called Transport Phenomena (Yay Chemical Engineering!), in which we rigorously examined the micro transfer of mass, energy, and momentum (whereas a macro examination is essentially the Thermodynamics and Mass & Energy Balance courses). If I am recalling correctly, and I can look into this if we'd like to discuss further, the equations treated the transfer through a membrane as instant. If a unit of mass passes through a wall at time t=1, the system which it left is one unit of mass less at that time t=1, and not t=2. Again, if I am recalling correctly, the same was true for energy, though if it were different we'd need to define stormlight, and probably investiture in general. Let me know if we'd like to continue this discussion, and I'll crack open the text book and possibly my notes too.

 

2) As you've noted, there is precedent for both possibilities, and as such I see a discussion of the topic to be fruitless at this point in time. It is interesting that it's not more clear cut. Vin describes holding the mists near identically to how Szeth describes holding stormlight. Do her abilities get enhanced without her fueling Pewter powers with it? I don't recall such a description, but that is likely the easiest way to tell, whether Vin comments on it, since Allomancy already provides a means of enhancing oneself.

Edited August 12, 2015 by Blaze1616

[Emerald101 he/him]

I seem to remember a WoB that said Voidbringers don't hold stormlight perfectly, just really well, but I can't find it.

 

 

Also, though I'm not sure how this affects the formula, but gem cut and clarity have more to do with how long it holds stormlight than gem size.

 

Source

 

 

CHRIS KING (MIYABI)

Two more questions here: Do bigger gems store more stormlight for longer than smaller gems? So a broam would hold it for twenty hours where a chip might hold it for six hours or something.

BRANDON SANDERSON

The cut of the gem and how flawless the gem is has more to do with how long the stormlight stays than size.

[Oudeis he/him]

I'm not going to chime in on the math part today, but I do want to contend one point.

I used to agree with this, but I no longer think it is the case. In my opinion, Stormlight is analogous to the mists in Mistborn: a gaseous form of investiture. On Roshar this gas glows, but the act of glowing doesn't cost much energy and doesn't substantially reduce the amount of Stormlight in a gem or person. Wisps of gas do escape from imperfect containers, and this happens more quickly (and therefore visibly) from proto-Radiants and those with Honorblades, but the glow is more an indication that loss is occurring.

Since I assume the amount of light given off per unit of Stormlight is constant, the brightness of a gem is directly indicative of the power it contains, and if a gem were a perfect vessel for Stormlight I believe it would continue to glow indefinitely.

 

I disagree. In Words of Radiance (Chapter 22), a large ruby fabrial is noted to glow less brightly than it should. The energy, the stormlight inside, is going into heating the room, rather than glowing. If the sheer amount of stormlight inside passively generated light (and also, how could it possibly generate actual light without using up fuel?) then the fact that the stormlight is being used to heat the room shouldn't change how brightly it glows, but it does.

[ccstat he/him]

how could it possibly generate actual light without using up fuel?

The amount of power involved in generating light varies dramatically with how you do it. An LED takes about 6W to make the same amount of light as a 60W incandescent bulb, and the heating elements in a toaster oven take about a 1000W and generate substantially less light than that. (Incidentally, a burning candle--the point of comparison for brightness in-world--is ~100x less efficient than an incandescent bulb). While "indefinitely" was hyperbole, I believe that the glow of stormlight is closer to an LED's efficiency, and the light generation is a minimal cost on its power.

I disagree. In Words of Radiance (Chapter 22), a large ruby fabrial is noted to glow less brightly than it should. The energy, the stormlight inside, is going into heating the room, rather than glowing. If the sheer amount of stormlight inside passively generated light ... then the fact that the stormlight is being used to heat the room shouldn't change how brightly it glows, but it does.

This is an important point, and I don't have a good answer. Shallan makes a similar observation about Pattern when she is practicing her lightweaving, so it seems to be a general feature that latent stormlight glows more than "in-use" stormlight. It just seems to me that the energy it takes to make a sphere glow like a candle for two weeks (their apparent limit given the Weeping, if we assume the glowing is what uses up the energy) must be far less than the amount to make a giant stone fall the wrong way, stick a Herdazian to a wall, transmute a human into crystal, or heal someone who fell off a cliff.

To be honest, it is the healing that gives me the most trouble. I could buy the idea that surges are really just making changes on the spiritual realm, for example convincing an object that gravity is pointing the other direction. In that model the stormlight doesn't have to accelerate the object at all, instead letting "gravity" do the real energetic work. But instant healing when you get stabbed in the heart, or regrowing body parts, seems to be a direct effect of the stormlight itself.

Edited August 12, 2015 by ccstat

[Patrick Star]

Stormlight is a light emitting gaseous substance.

 

Inefficiency should be called "Diffusion" in order to reflect this.  It's how much stormlight moves from the gem/surgebinder (or still gem, if surgebinders have gemhearts) into the atmosphere.

[Seloun]

 

Gonna disagree here. I think we can get much, much more accurate with a different estimation. First, Kaladin wasn't fishing for a random sphere, he would have preferentially selected a larger one to get more Stormlight. So a mark is more like an upper bound than an average. Also, consider actual change in real life. I happen to collect change I get and almost never spend it, for reasons. I have one jar of mixed silver, and one just with my pennies. By volume, there are nearly twice as many pennies as the rest of the coins combined. I hasten to suggest that chips will prove to be far, far more common to be found than marks. Also consider distribution of polestone types. A single emerald mark would be half a year's salary for Kaladin. I don't think that would be considered a 'small' fortune. In short, I suggest we assume the 50 spheres are two parts chips and one part marks, so let's say 17 marks and 34 chips.

 

 

 

You're comparing two five-minute talking losses as equal when we know they are not. The first time, it was not the last of his Stormlight, and so would have been streaming at a much faster rate. The very final trickle would have been as slow as the leak will ever get. The difference could easily be in orders of magnitude.

 

And I'm going to suggest again a distribution of sphere sizes. How about three chips, two marks?

 

Man. There are a few hundred thousand questions we'd need to ask and measurements we'd need to take before we can start to get the very first idea of how much Stormlight it takes to do something.

 

Regarding the pouch composition: I agree that the distribution is likely preferentially weighted towards chips (probably Zipfian; I would argue for something like 9-3-1 if this was critical) but given the amount of uncertainty we're already dealing with (what is the relative content of each type of sphere? how charged are they really? what is the variation between spheres? how many spheres are there in a pouch? does the gem type matter?) the specific distribution of the sphere types is probably not terribly important. The main significant assumption is that the distribution in the pouch is probably 'similar' (for some value of similar) to the 5 sphere pouch. Essentially I'm not saying they're mostly marks so much as that there's some idealized 'average' sphere when it comes to stormlight capacity.

 

'Small fortune' is certainly not much to go on; mainly it sets a likely lower bound on the number of spheres. We do know the spheres in the pouch are almost certainly of relatively lower denomination, since the most expensive spheres are likely turned in (to hide keeping the other spheres, as Kaladin suggests) and because the moderately expensive spheres are probably the ones smuggled out via the arrow pouch (since they are limited in the number of spheres they can smuggle out). So a 'small fortune' of spheres is probably significantly bigger than 10, which is why I provided a order-of-magnitude guess at about 50.

 

The conversations are in fact quite different, and the loss is likely affected by the factors you mentioned (and others besides). Again, the exact value is not really the point (since it's quite impossible to generate in any case); instead we should look for things that are roughly similar so we can try to analyze the differences. In particular, there's probably an order of magnitude of difference in stormlight between the chasm scene and the 5 sphere scene; by looking at the main differences in activity (more sticking, and the big fall) and praying to the Central Limit Theorem, we can come to a rough analysis of the relative stormlight costs between sticking things and falling (which is where I left it). There are a few more scenes we might be able to do similar analysis with:

 

- Szeth's interludes in TWoK (though it's hard to compare Szeth to Kaladin since we're told they spend at different rates)

- Kaladin's solo chasm training scene in WoR appears too fuzzy to do much with

- Maybe Kaladin's training with Rock and the rest

 

However, Kaladin's usage is likely more efficient in WoR than TWoK; this would be another factor that would have to be accounted for.

[Oudeis he/him]

This is an important point, and I don't have a good answer. Shallan makes a similar observation about Pattern when she is practicing her lightweaving, so it seems to be a general feature that latent stormlight glows more than "in-use" stormlight.

 

First, upvote for being willing and able to say, "Good point, not sure" without taking it as an attack. We need more like you on this forum.

 

Second, I had always thought of those as two different phenomena, but you might have a point. Regardless, I still believe both circumstances point to the conclusion that Stormlight doesn't passively generate normal light, that the light we see is Stormlight escaping the container. I admit all evidence at this point is circumspect, either way.

 

since the most expensive spheres are likely turned in (to hide keeping the other spheres, as Kaladin suggests

Interesting... Had not thought about this. This all comes down to what people believe, not what is actually true. They do want to keep and use the spheres for monetary reasons, but they also want them for Stormlight. If the bridgemen believe that a clearmark and a skymark hold the same amount of Stormlight, they would almost certainly turn in the sphere with greater monetary value and keep the ones that will help them just as much with Surgebinding.