theory One Spike (at a time)

[natc]

If you want to be philosophical about it, feruchemical atium basically manipulates at what stage your body has decayed towards. It might not really ruin anything, but it's still sort of in theme, I guess.

Allomantic atium also basically makes you an unstoppable killing machine, but that's more in practice than in functionality, so that's kinda pushing it.

Hemalurgic atium is apparently so good at ripping souls to shreds that it can steal anything. I suppose that's ruinous enough . . .

[Tarion]

I'd be careful with the lerasium thing - the WoBs on those are unclear. For example, there's this WoB:

I wouldn't state so firmly that it's a side-effect, despite the WoB mentioning it.

A Shard's Intent has little to nothing to do with what effect it has in magic systems. Ruin was bad at seeing the future, and atium lets you see you the future. Nothing about Steelpushing is "of" Preservation. In Hemalurgy, atium results in less Hemalurgic decay, also counter to its Intent.

What I'm trying to say here is that it seems a Shard's Investiture within its own system has very broad effects. Nothing about what I'm saying has anything to do with Intent.

What odds would you lay on harmonium creating a metalmind that can store anything? I'd put them pretty high, for all that we don't know enough about the god metals. (We do know via the Chicago signing that such a metalmind does exist. I'm waiting for a transcription, or else I'd link it.)

I agree we can't say anything with confidence, but it seems very very wrong for our newest god metal to be so universal. I would be deeply appreciative of a WoB on it - I want the tour to be over, so Peter can confirm/deny it!

I'm going to disagree that a Shard's intent doesn't influence it's metal in magic. 

 

It's in the annotation to HoA (I believe) where it's mentioned that it's not a coincidence that Atium turns you into a killing machine.  It's a reflection of Ruin's Intent.  Similarly, the fact that it's just so efficient in Hemalurgy could be seen to encourage more Hemalurgy, which contributes to Ruin.  As natc says, even the Feruchemy is manipulating your relationship with Ruin.  It's only the Compounding that's just outright weird.  

 

Although I would agree that Harmony's metal (Sazedium, surely) would most likely function as a metalmind that anyone could access and store anything in.   

 

As for why this metal has such seemingly broad effects, I think that co-opting the effects that are already there seems like a fairly fitting effect for a Shard intruding on another world.  It's already using the local magic systems on the bigger scale, so maybe it's doing it on a smaller scale too.

 

Also, going to go out of my way to stake out a theory now - The Shard at play is a reformed Dominion (Which ties nicely into the 10th Anniversary for Elantris).  Dominion fits with Miles' statements in AoL and Paalm's methods seem pretty damnation close to those undertaken in Elantris.  'Stealing' the magic systems already in play would fit with Dominion, as would stealing power directly.  In fact, I'll try to write up a separate post about this later.  

[Moogle]

It's in the annotation to HoA (I believe) where it's mentioned that it's not a coincidence that Atium turns you into a killing machine.  It's a reflection of Ruin's Intent.  Similarly, the fact that it's just so efficient in Hemalurgy could be seen to encourage more Hemalurgy, which contributes to Ruin.  As natc says, even the Feruchemy is manipulating your relationship with Ruin.  It's only the Compounding that's just outright weird.

 

Sazed's just speculating when he says that:

When people burned atium, then, they were drawing upon the power of Ruin—which is, perhaps, why atium turned people into such efficient killing machines.

 

WoB is pretty direct on the matter that none of the powers are of the Shards:

Andrew the Great (19 October 2008)

Why can Vin fuel Elend's atium-burning, even though Atium is Ruin's Body and Vin is using Preservation? Or did I misread that and he was just burning atium and had run out of everything else?

Brandon Sanderson (20 October 2008)

Yes, as has been pointed out:

A powerful peace swelled in Elend. His Allomancy flared bright, though he knew the metals inside of him should have burned away. Only atium remained, and the strange power did not—could not—give him this metal. But it didn’t matter. For a moment, he was embraced by something greater. He looked up, toward the sun.

 

As a note here, the powers granted by all of the metals—even the two divine ones—are not themselves of either Shard. They are simply tools.  And so, it's possible that one COULD have found a way to reproduce an ability like atium's while using Preservation's power, but it wouldn't be as natural or as easy as using Preservation to fuel Allomancy.

The means of getting powers—Ruin stealing, Preservation gifting—are related to the Shards, but not the powers themselves.

(source)

[Oudeis he/him]

Nothing about Steelpushing is "of" Preservation

 

If anything, I always saw it as of Endowment.

 

"Here, have this coin... REALLY FAST!"

"AAAAAH! Thanks!"

[Elbereth she/her]

Still, if trellium steals Allomantic/Feruchemical powers, it would have the same power as atium, which is a little boring. And Brandon, as we know, is never boring.

[Argent he/him]

Yeah, that's my problem with it. All we know is that Bleeder had a trellium spike with Allomantic steel charge. Here are some variables that can skew our assumptions:

• Maybe trellium doesn't steal an ability, maybe it generates it
• We've only seen Bleeder use steel, so maybe...
  • ... trellium can store multiple Hemalurgic charges in a single spike, keeping them - dare I say it?! - autonomous of each other, but only allowing one to be active. There could be a limitation that it can only store multiple charges of the same metal
  • ... the spike we get from Bleeder is not trellium, but an alloy of trellium and steel, which allows the spike to steal either Allomantic or Feruchemical steel

I personally am rooting for trellium being able to hold multiple charges.

[jturner]

Two points derived from Hoid's notes at the end.

 

First, twinborns don't have just two powers, or in the way of kings double surges; they have two powers and an effect. I think this explains Wax's extra endurance while in the mists; it may also explain Paalms limited ability to speak through the spikes if she is using two types of investitture (trell(and whatever shard he is)/ruin?)

 

The other thing; it says god metals aren't readily available, but not NOT available. It also says that there are 32 alloys we don't know about (God Metal alloys). Perhaps atium is one of the elements of the spike? Since we don't know these alloys, they  may easily explain a lot of what Paalm can do but isn't supposed to be able to. 

Trell/Ruin alloy spike?

Edited October 14, 2015 by jturner

[Elbereth she/her]

First of all, we have no idea who writes the Ars Arcanum. My intincts say it's not Hoid, actually, because Hoid's Ars Arcanum would be a lot funnier and more snarky.

Next. I interpreted Wax's extra strength in the mists from Harmony giving him a boost, like Vin did with Elend.

The 32 alloys we don't know about are only atium and lerasium alloys, not trellium. I don't think the author of the Ars Arcanum knows about trellium. Storms, even Harmony doesn't know about trellium.

EDIT: That said, a trellium/atium alloy is still possible. It's unlikely to me because 1) I feel like Harmony might have found her, even with the trellium, if she also had a part of Ruin's body within her, and 2) because atium hasn't been rediscovered yet, so another Shard might have been able to find some, but it's still unlikely. I suppose Paalm might have had some too.

Edited October 15, 2015 by Limelleth

[natc]

We do have a relatively good guess for the author of the AA though, I believe. And it isn't Hoid.

General assumption is apparently that Khriss does all the writing, and occasionally sends Nazh off on bogus errands so that he can come back with a decent map of the place or illustrations of something. Whether it's actually Khriss or not, I think it's confirmed that the author is Nazh's boss.