Awakened Hemalurgy

[Araris Valerian]

So I was thinking about how hemalurgic spikes worked, and came up with this theory: if a hemalurgic spike was Awakened then it would be able to use the powers it had stolen. For example, since hemalurgy can steal from any magic system then you could spike a soul caster, embed a gemstone in the spike to hold stormlight, and have some sort of auto-soulcasting system that could trigger on contact. Since spikes don't have to maintain their original shape, you could make a floor plate that soulcasts anything that steps on it into smoke. Of course, I don't know if you can Awaken an already invested object, but this could have some interesting uses. Any thoughts?

[WeiryWriter]

Of course, I don't know if you can Awaken an already invested object, but this could have some interesting uses. Any thoughts?

 

I highly doubt it, it is really hard to invest something that has already been invested.

[Argent]

It breaks my mind to think about this...

[Araris Valerian]

Hemalurgic spikes do show that they lose investiture over time. This loss could potentially be replaced with breath. I mostly think that it would be cool to have non-living objects capable of wielding cosmere magic. Also this could work the other way around. An already awakened object could be used as a spike. While this doesn't change the amount of investiture, from this perspective it seems more reasonable since we haven't learned of any limits on invested objects being used as spikes.

Edited November 1, 2013 by Araris Valerian

[name_here]

No one has successfully Awakened an already Awakened object unless you count fixing up completely totalled Lifeless, and I think that Lifeless need to be reawakened after the original Awakening has completely failed; if the Awakening is still functional then the Lifeless just needs to be patched up.

 

That is absolutely not to say it is impossible; there are many things that Awakening can theoretically do which very few people know how to do, a number of things lots of people know which the Five Scholars are confirmed to have discovered how to do, and likely many more things no one knows about yet. I have absolutely no idea what the effects would be.

[bartbug]

Wait, hold on a sec.

Do you think that the mechanical metallic arts used on southern scadrial could have anything to do with this? Viewing it from this viewpoint is the most plausible explanation I've heard yet.

[Kadrok]

Wait, hold on a sec.

Do you think that the mechanical metallic arts used on southern scadrial could have anything to do with this? Viewing it from this viewpoint is the most plausible explanation I've heard yet.

The South would need to gain not only breath, but the ability to awaken things... while it does make sense, I'd be very surprised if breath was how it worked. I mean, if getting enough breath to run your Hemalurgy machines was that easy, I imagine the Lord Ruler would have gathered enough to get to the Fifth Heightening, rather than fiddle about with Atium.

[Vortaan]

Hrm. I would think this would end badly, since a spike would need to burn itself Allomantically and probably wouldn't have any room to store a Feruchemical charge. I also doubt it could store any Stormlight.

[Oudeis]

It's also prohibitively difficult to Awaken metal of any kind in the first place.

[Araris Valerian]

While the spike itself could not store stormlight, it could absorb some from a gemstone that it was touching. Also, a feruchemical spike could (theoretically) store charges in metals it was touching. Due to the spike not having an identity, this potentially could create an infinite supply of certain types of feruchemy. Although, such a spike probably could not store an attribute such as age or health that it didn't possess in the first place. Now that I think of it, an awakened stormlight spike would basically be an automated fabrial that was not tied to a specific shape. Anyways, I would love to hear what BS has to say about this.

[Oudeis]

Since spiking a feruchemist lets you use metalminds that person stored in, then presumably a feruchemical spike would, in fact, have the "Identity" of the feruchemist it killed.

[Satsuoni]

So I was thinking about how hemalurgic spikes worked, and came up with this theory: if a hemalurgic spike was Awakened then it would be able to use the powers it had stolen. For example, since hemalurgy can steal from any magic system then you could spike a soul caster, embed a gemstone in the spike to hold stormlight, and have some sort of auto-soulcasting system that could trigger on contact. Since spikes don't have to maintain their original shape, you could make a floor plate that soulcasts anything that steps on it into smoke. Of course, I don't know if you can Awaken an already invested object, but this could have some interesting uses. Any thoughts?

Well... You would probably need to spike a spren to begin with, not Soulcaster. Then you would need to Awaken the thing - theoretically possible, but quite hard (hema charge isn't that much Investiture), and that might mess the charge... Then forge the spike, reducing its power... attach gemstone... To get something that bleeds black smoke, is possibly sentient, and probably insane. OR you could just make a common fabrial that does the very same thing (if you manage to capture,say, cryptic) which, to me, seems easier.

[Vortaan]

While the spike itself could not store stormlight, it could absorb some from a gemstone that it was touching. Also, a feruchemical spike could (theoretically) store charges in metals it was touching. Due to the spike not having an identity, this potentially could create an infinite supply of certain types of feruchemy. Although, such a spike probably could not store an attribute such as age or health that it didn't possess in the first place. Now that I think of it, an awakened stormlight spike would basically be an automated fabrial that was not tied to a specific shape. Anyways, I would love to hear what BS has to say about this.

 

Personally I kind of doubt this. How is a metal spike going to store strength? Or health? If it does, how would a human being tap it, since what constitutes strength for a spike is going to be fundamentally different than what a human counts as strength? 

 

As for drawing in Stormlight, you're talking about spiking a Surgebinder, correct? Look at the descriptions of Kaladin and Szeth using their abilities again. How is the spike going to breath the Stormlight in? I think this method would differ from making a fabrial, since spren's ties to Stormlight are more natural.

[Araris Valerian]

I would like to point out that hemalurgic spikes are indeed separate from the people that they end up in. Vin lost her earring on several occasions and with it her ability to sense ruin. I don't think that it is too much of a stretch to assume that through awakening a spike could take control of its own powers.

[Oudeis]

I would like to point out that hemalurgic spikes are indeed separate from the people that they end up in. Vin lost her earring on several occasions and with it her ability to sense ruin. I don't think that it is too much of a stretch to assume that through awakening a spike could take control of its own powers.

 

Sure, but how would Vin's earring ingest bronze in order to sense bronzepulses? Do you suspect it would then be able to communicate what it knows?

[Araris Valerian]

I suspect that several powers would be of limited use. That is why I used surgebinding as an example. However, the most practical use for this with the magic systems that we have seen so far is feruchemy. A spike could store warmth and be used as a refrigerator, or store weight and be used as a part of an elevator. The metal of the spike simply would need to be welded into another correctly alloyed metal that would serve as a metalmind.