Metalmind size and storage capacity

[Gasper he/him]

Does the size of a metalmind matter when storing an attribute? Would a small gold stud hold less health than a large gold bracer? Would a pewter necklace hold more than a pewter ring? 

[Weltall]

2 hours ago, Loialty loailty loailty said:

However, when Wayne gets that bracelet it did seem that he was surprised about the amount of health that was stored inside of it so this may not be the case by the second era. 

It wasn't the amount stored per volume of gold that surprised him, just how much health there was. Bloodmakers have it very rough because you have to spend a lot of time feeling awful and you can burn through stored health extremely quickly. After his big expenditure of health about halfway through Alloy of Law, Wayne mentions that he's storing as much health as he can while still being able to move around and by the end of the day he'll have enough to maybe heal a scratch. He normally needs to spend weeks in bed to store enough health for useful healing in an emergency. So what that bracelet represented to him was more stored health than he'd ever had access to, free for the taking.

Oh, and we have this WoB about metalminds that's relevant to discussiing Era 2.

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kanuut

Why don't feruchemists wear small metalminds like rings, toe-rings, earrings (Lot of rings it seems), as backups.

Brandon Sanderson

Most Feruchemists do just what you say. Look at the Lord Ruler and Sazed. Both have tons.

In the new era books, you have two Feruchemstis where it doesn't make sense. Wayne's healing stores are very difficult to build, and take a lot of time. He generally burns through them quickly, though sometimes mentions he's got a little stored away. Being Wayne, though, he tends to use these up and push himself right to the edge of running out.

Wax is somewhat similar. He can use iron, a very common metal, to store and make a metalmind. He's generally storing weight everywhere he goes, a little, as the books point out. He's got many metalminds, but he's not as possessive of them, as filling his metalmind is as much of a power as tapping it.

So...I'm not sure what gave you the impression that they don't have lots of metalminds. Also, keep in mind that in your example of someone getting knocked out, they're going to get searched well enough to find a toe ring. Generally, as Wayne has pointed out in the books, sticking a coin or something in your mouth is the preferred way to hide something.

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And more generally, this one that talks about how volume of metal relates to how much of a charge it can store

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Questioner

I was wondering if the size of a piece of metal determines the amount of Feruchemical charge that can be stored in it.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Questioner

So how does that scale, like, in terms of the volume or mass of the metal or...

Brandon Sanderson

It-- So I've talked about this before, I'm trying to remember exactly what I've told people-- It does not scale as logically as you think it does. How about that? It's more like certain thresholds. You can have a-- You can store a Hemalurgic or Feruchemical charge even in very small pieces of metal, but larger pieces of metal will let you get more.

Questioner

So it's kind of like there are different classes of sizes?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, kind of like that.

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[Loialty loailty loailty he/him]

I believe when sazed is using his metals he explicitly states that his smaller rings hold significantly less than the bracers he wears on his arms. I could be remembering wrong but I'm pretty amount of metal mattered when sazed was human. However, when Wayne gets that bracelet it did seem that he was surprised about the amount of health that was stored inside of it so this may not be the case by the second era. 

[Wandering Investor]

Sazed specifically states that his copperminds had to be large to store all the memories. And I believe there is a moment when he states he can only store up so much with metal rings. But the specifics are never made clear, and it seems to have little/no impact on the story other than in those instances. Wax for instance is stated to be continuously storing weight and has amassed a huge amount, but little details are provided on his metal minds. He's never noted for having to swap metal minds out after they get full, or if they even get full. 

After for changing in the second era, that's possible. There was some debate at one point about whether Harmony altered Furechemy (I thought yes but most thought no) in terms of one power vs full powerset. Maybe he did alter the amount that can be stored. Or it just shifted narratively since there were not defined boundaries.