Nicrosil Feruchemy and "Bottoming out" an attribute

[Irkutsk]

After a very brief search I didn't see anything closely related to this theory, so forgive me if I'm beating a dead horse here.

Ahem. So I was looking at Nicrosil and it's ability to store "the ability to use a power." For example, in Bands of Mourning we see it used with the Medallions to grant various feruchemical powers to those who don't normally have them. What interests me however, is the effect storing and tapping your abilities has on a regular soulbearer.

It seems that storing and tapping allomantic power changes the strength of burn possible for the user. So an A!steel/ F!Nicrosil twinborn who is tapping their own steel allomancy can get more power out of their steel, letting them push harder and flare higher. This makes sense, tapping your abilities makes you more effective with them. But I was wondering how that works when storing or tapping feruchemical abilities? It's hard to imagine being "better" at storing or tapping strength or weight. 

Therefore I propose that Nicrosil Feruchemy is what allows a feruchemist to "bottom out," or store away all of an attribute at once. By tapping their own other powers, a feruchemist can store or tap more of an attribute at once. By tapping enough power, they can then reach a point where it is possible to store away all of an attribute. 

We know that storing the entirety of a power is possible, because it is a required part of medallion creation- one must store all of their identity before storing another power, so that the medallion will be unkeyed and useable by anyone. 

Storing Identity is only one use though. Assuming I'm correct, tapping F!Iron from a a Nicrosilmind would let you store away more weight at a time, making you buoyant in air and literally able to fly. Storing all weight through mechanical Feruchemy could also come into play in the fourth trilogy where a massless ship would be able to go light speed. Storing all your health, strength, nutrition or breath would probably kill you, but tapping more of those at once could be useful, especially if you have very large stores. (Tapping beyond the normal max would probably drain your stores incredibly fast, assuming there even is a normal max) 

So, do you agree with me? Feel free to shoot holes in this if it doesn't stand up to scrutiny. I won't feel bad. On the flipside, if this is a widely accepted belief that I was somehow not aware of, I apologize. 

[Landis963]

The inability to bottom out is a safety feature designed such that a feruchemist or ferring doesn't store all their health, sustenance, breath, etc. Into a metalmind, causing death by illness or starvation or suffocation or what have you.  I suspect that using nicrominds to bypass this safety feature is not going to be a thing that happens, if only because it would be the most stupid death ever. 

Edited July 12, 2016 by Landis963
Better cause of death for overstoring health.

[Yata]

Actually a Ferring may always stores all his Attribute... He simply knows how much store without die.

We saw for example Feruchemist who stored a "not vital attribute" without problems... For example both Wax and Sazed stored all their weight in the books.

Edited July 12, 2016 by Yata

[Oversleep]

Both effects which you proposed are already features of Feruchemy.

Any attribute can be stored 100%. The thing is, practical limit on some of them is lower; for example storing too much strenght would make your heart too weak to pump blood and your ribcage muscles too weak to breathe.
We have evidence of people storing 100%, for example iron.

One of defining traits of Feruchemy is its lack of upper limit of tapping - you can tap as much as you want as fast as you want.

My personal theory is that strenghtening Feruchemy (be it by multiple spikes or tapping nicrosil) lets you overtap much more efficiently (overtapping is when you tap at the level above the Standard Tapping Rate - when you lose power due to compression).

[Stormgate]

One can, actually, be better at tapping and storing attributes. Either it works so you have more precision (storing health in your healthy arm and tapping it in your broken one, making your one hand really strong while your legs are too weak to stand, etc.) or you can store more of an attribute at a time, and tap more of the attribute without it being wasted. (Picture someone as a bucket. They have a certain amount of water in the bucket. They can not only pour more of that water into another container, but when it's poured back, more can go in at once without splashing or going over the edge of the bucket. The better the Ferring, the bigger and more waterproof the bucket is.) Or, they get better precision and greater maximum and minimum limits on traits.

[Irkutsk]

6 hours ago, Yata said:

Actually a Ferring may always stores all his Attribute... He simply knows how much store without die.

We saw for example Feruchemist who stored a "not vital attribute" without problems... For example both Wax and Sazed stored all their weight in the books.

Not true, if they stored all their weight they would become massless and a tap would send them off at light speed. Heck, if they even got lighter than air they would float like a balloon, which I'm sure has been tried. 

Anyway, to the rest of you, I was under the impression that the people of era 2 Scadrial were not generally aware that identity could be bottomed out. I know there are some attributes that would kill you to bottom out, like strength and health, but I am pretty sure the limit existed on all attributes regardless of which ones are dangerous. 

[Oversleep]

1 hour ago, Irkutsk said:

Not true

 

[CaptainRyan]

10 hours ago, Irkutsk said:

[snip]

We know that storing the entirety of a power is possible, because it is a required part of medallion creation- one must store all of their identity before storing another power, so that the medallion will be unkeyed and useable by anyone. 

[snip]

Just a quick question: Are we sure medallion creation requires 100% drop in Identity or does it only require a large enough drop so that the metalmind is keyed to "human" as opposed to "specific human"?

[Yata]

8 hours ago, Irkutsk said:

Not true, if they stored all their weight they would become massless and a tap would send them off at light speed. Heck, if they even got lighter than air they would float like a balloon, which I'm sure has been tried. 

Anyway, to the rest of you, I was under the impression that the people of era 2 Scadrial were not generally aware that identity could be bottomed out. I know there are some attributes that would kill you to bottom out, like strength and health, but I am pretty sure the limit existed on all attributes regardless of which ones are dangerous. 

Like @Oversleep kindly showed. A feruchemist has not a upper or lover bound to his Store-Tap Ability. Of course I talk about the power itself, his body may be damaged or killed by a dumb use of the Feruchemy.

[Irkutsk]

Well all right, it looks like I've been thouroughly disproven. Thank you all.