[OB] If Shallan Burned Gold

[Lord Mistborn Bondbreaker he/him]

If Shallan was an augur and burned Gold, would she see possible pasts for herself, Radiant, and Veil?

Edited December 27, 2017 by Herald Of Justice

[digitalbusker he/him]

Shallan's occasional Lightweavings of a mostly catatonic version of herself remind me of the vision Vin has when she burns gold.

So probably one of those, maybe with a Veil and/or Radiant thrown in for good measure.

There's clearly some similar Realmatic underpinnings to Augur visions, self-applied Lightweaving, and soul Forging. All draw on your own history but add a "what if" twist.

[StrikerEZ he/him]

That's actually a pretty interesting question. It's interesting to note that Brandon has said that there's a little bit of Soulcasting going on when Shallan changes between her personalities. I think she'd have to be one of her other personalities before she could see Augur-visions of them. 

[SpeakoftheDeval]

Wait, I haven't read mistborn in a while, remind me again how exactly gold works? The coppermind says that you see a possible past self, so for example if I burned gold what, would I see a child version of me who likes sport instead of books (the horror)?

But I feel like this wouldn't work because of the temporal aspect of it- soulcasting (which is apparently happening with Shallans personas) convinces an object to become something else as opposed to forgery which convinces an object that it was always something else- thus in soul casting the object would still have its original form in its spiritweb as it's past version. Therefore Veils past is simply Shallans.

I think it's also important to note that shallans personas aren't really a what if type of thing, because she could imitate literally anything with no limits on plausibility because it's a direct manual change, as opposed to Forgeries, which must be close to what actually happened to stick, which I assume is the same mechanic gold used.

[StrikerEZ he/him]

2 hours ago, MadhavDeval said:

Wait, I haven't read mistborn in a while, remind me again how exactly gold works? The coppermind says that you see a possible past self, so for example if I burned gold what, would I see a child version of me who likes sport instead of books (the horror)?

But I feel like this wouldn't work because of the temporal aspect of it- soulcasting (which is apparently happening with Shallans personas) convinces an object to become something else as opposed to forgery which convinces an object that it was always something else- thus in soul casting the object would still have its original form in its spiritweb as it's past version. Therefore Veils past is simply Shallans.

I think it's also important to note that shallans personas aren't really a what if type of thing, because she could imitate literally anything with no limits on plausibility because it's a direct manual change, as opposed to Forgeries, which must be close to what actually happened to stick, which I assume is the same mechanic gold used.

Eh, the Coppermind isn't exactly right then. Augurs see a version of themselves if they had taken a different path or if different events had happened. 

[digitalbusker he/him]

So far we've only seen two Augur visions in the active PoV. In both cases the character saw a version of themselves as they would have been if they hadn't made a particular choice.

[Calderis he/him]

Yeah, I think if Shallan were to burn gold she'd see herself either as a non-radiant while still had mental health problems, or whole. 

Edited December 28, 2017 by Calderis

[digitalbusker he/him]

"Whole" doesn't really seem plausible. I don't think Gold can show you a version of yourself that depends on other people making different choices.

[Calderis he/him]

4 minutes ago, digitalbusker said:

"Whole" doesn't really seem plausible. I don't think Gold can show you a version of yourself that depends on other people making different choices.

It shows an alternative version if the past had happened differently. A turning  point in someone's life is a turning point regardless of who made the decision. 

[digitalbusker he/him]

8 minutes ago, Calderis said:

It shows an alternative version if the past had happened differently. A turning  point in someone's life is a turning point regardless of who made the decision. 

It sounds like you and I have different understandings of what Allomantic Gold does. And since I don't think there's enough canon information to prove either of us right, we may just have to live with that.