Shardigrade Posted November 7, 2017 Posted November 7, 2017 Hello sharders! I've had an account for a bit now, and have been a lurker for years, but finally decided to chime in and ask a question I've been thinking about. How fast could a mistborn (or someone hemalurgically altered to do so) switch between pushing and pulling on an object? As in, could a practiced allomancer theoretically work a set of speakers by pushing and pulling on the metal plate extremely quickly at the correct frequencies? Or, could someone push and pull on a piece of metal so quickly that friction causes it to melt? Not sure if this has any practical uses, although theoretically one could manipulate the vibrations of say a streetlamp to project words or sound out in public settings. Imagine the Lord Ruler walking down the street and making his voice literally emanate through the window frames of every building in the area! This also makes me wonder about how pushing and pulling liquid metal works. Is it possible? Could Wax carry around a crucible full of a molten metal and shoot lasers of fire and death? XD sounds strange but I can't see why that couldn't happen. Anyway, thanks for listening to my ramblings! 2
Walin he/him Posted November 7, 2017 Posted November 7, 2017 I don’t know; we’ve probably never gotten a WOB on this. I’m guessing not, since thought processes happen pretty slowly in the terms of vibrations. You could probably push/pull from inside a bendalloy bubble. My primary evidence for the slow Allomantic switching ability is this: How fast can you shake your hand? Maybe multiply that by ten because of the required neuron length between the hand and the brain, but even then you’ll never get the super high frequencies you need for sound. But as a Mistborn, you could totally do it from a bendalloy bubble (seeing as Brandon wrote in-bubble time as being incredibly fast), and maybe the Lord Ruler could use Steel Feruchemy to speed up just himself to do that.
King Cole he/him Posted November 7, 2017 Posted November 7, 2017 (edited) How quickly can you think about switching pushing and pulling? Thats how fast you could do it, I don't know about vibrating things, but carrying around a bunch of molten metal would be super dangerous and impractical. Edited November 7, 2017 by King Cole
Shardigrade Posted November 7, 2017 Author Posted November 7, 2017 What if you tapped mental speed from a zinc metalmind? I'd think that would work too
Kingsdaughter613 she/her Posted November 7, 2017 Posted November 7, 2017 Kell pushes and pulls on the same piece of metal at once during the TFE.
Carbonationspren he/him Posted November 7, 2017 Posted November 7, 2017 1 hour ago, Shardigrade said: This also makes me wonder about how pushing and pulling liquid metal works. Is it possible? Could Wax carry around a crucible full of a molten metal and shoot lasers of fire and death? XD sounds strange but I can't see why that couldn't happen. This reminds me of Calamity (Reckoners 3). It sounds a lot like (minor spoiler) Spoiler the R'tich, which allows people to manipulate liquid mercury in the air, creating things like shields and steps. If steelpushing and ironpulling worked on mercury, that could potentially be very useful.
amflare Posted November 7, 2017 Posted November 7, 2017 I mean, you can push and pull on the same piece of metal at the same time. I suppose if you only pushed then switched to only pulling, it would be as fast as your normal reaction. Punch your fist out and pull it back. That's how fast.
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