Awakening Metal

[Gasper he/him]

Would awakening Iron taken from blood be easier than metal that has not been apart of someone? Example: A supercharged Mistborn pulls the iron from the blood of a random person, would an Awakener be able to awaken the iron pulled from the blood easier than iron that had never been apart of a living object?

[The One Who Connects he/him]

10 minutes ago, Gasper said:

Would awakening Iron taken from blood be easier than metal that has not been apart of someone? Example: A supercharged Mistborn pulls the iron from the blood of a random person, would an Awakener be able to awaken the iron pulled from the blood easier than iron that had never been apart of a living object?

By virtue of being from something living, it'd be easier. How easier is up for discussion, but you're still gonna have a heck of a time awakening metal.

[whattheHoid she/her]

I haven't gotten around to Mistborn era 2 quite yet, so maybe some rules changed, but I thought you couldn't pull internal metals? Like you couldn't pull an Inquisitors' spike by pulling on it with iron because it's inside them? Also if you could do that and have an Awakener awaken the metal, it would be very laborious to say the least. I think the question would be what would be the advantage of doing something so labor intensive? Would it give an you an extra edge? Interesting questions.

[The One Who Connects he/him]

5 hours ago, whattheHoid said:

but I thought you couldn't pull internal metals? Like you couldn't pull an Inquisitors' spike by pulling on it with iron because it's inside them?

The biggest theme of the Metallic Arts is that if it gets called a "rule," odds are it can be broken by adding more power. We don't even make it to the end of Final Empire before that revelation is thrust upon us, as the Lord Ruler so handily demonstrates:

Quote

"Marsh!" she cried, jumping and Pushing herself toward him. However, as she flew, the Lord raised his hand absently. Vin felt a powerful . . . something crash into her. It felt like a Steelpush, slamming against the metals inside her stomach, [..] Discarded coins shot away from the Lord Ruler, streaking across the floor. The doors wrenched free from their mountings, shattering and breaking away from the room. Incredibly, even bits of colored glass quivered and slid away from the dais. And Vin was tossed to the side, the metal in her stomach threatening to rip free from her body.

[..half page..]

He flung her like a doll, tossing her towards one of the room's massive support pillars. Vin quested desperately for an anchor, but he had blown all of the metal out of the room. Except . . .
She pulled on one of the Lord Ruler's own bracelets. He immediately whipped his arm upwards, throwing off her Pull, making her spin maladroitly in the air. He slammed her with another of his powerful Pushes, blasting her backwards. Metal in her stomach wrenched, glass quivered, and her mother's earring ripped free of her ear.

[..two pages..]

The Lord Ruler lifted a hand, and Vin suddenly felt an impossible weight press against her. Allomancy, Pushing the metals in her stomach and in her body, threatening to crush her back against the pillar.

Multiple mentions of "and in her body" show pushing on the trace metals within one's body is possible, and her earring is little different from an Inquisitor spike.

[whattheHoid she/her]

@The One Who Connects Ok so if you are a powerful enough Allomancer or whatnot and could pull the metals from your blood what would be the advantage of such  a skill besides the obvious- you can kill or immobilize your opponent very quickly- could you recycle the metal pulled? How much metal would even come out of the blood of a full grown adult? We have about 1.5 gallons of blood on an Earthling, but that may not be the amount of blood a Scadrian would have for example. Maybe you could "coinshot" the metals in the blood? Projectiles?

[Slimy_Slider]

In terms of advantages, it's pretty much just a guaranteed way to push/pull someone Allomantically, although it would be weaker than a normal push or pull. Doesn't matter if they wear/hold no metal if you can push them around by their own blood. Also keep in mind that, TLR was abnormally powerful, so it is unlikely that that ability would be available at an effectively useable level to anyone, particularly in Era 2 and beyond.

[Weltall]

13 hours ago, whattheHoid said:

Ok so if you are a powerful enough Allomancer or whatnot and could pull the metals from your blood what would be the advantage of such  a skill besides the obvious- you can kill or immobilize your opponent very quickly- could you recycle the metal pulled? How much metal would even come out of the blood of a full grown adult? We have about 1.5 gallons of blood on an Earthling, but that may not be the amount of blood a Scadrian would have for example. Maybe you could "coinshot" the metals in the blood? Projectiles?

I'm imagining that one scene in one of the X-Men films where a guard gets injected with extra iron that Magento then weaponizes... Anyhow, yes, if you can successfully use A-Steel/Iron to rip trace metals from someone's body (and bear in mind, you have to be very powerful to do this, even Rashek didn't go that far when attacking Vin) then you could theoretically take that same metal and burn it. Mind you, you'll be looking at all non-allomantically-inert metals which doesn't factor in metal type or purity so you wouldn't want to do this without sifting that metal first for the ones you can actually burn safely.

I'm sure someone here could give you a fair guess at how much metal could be found in the average body that's allomantically viable. We do know that Scadrial is the Earth-analogue of the Cosmere so what applies for a real-world human would apply there too.

[RShara she/her]

There's maybe 5 grams worth of iron in a human body, more or less.

[Apollyon he/him]

There are 4 grams of iron in a full grown adult male’s blood. That might seem enough to Pull/Push, but consider the fact that a coin(a Standard US Quarter) is 28 grams, 7 times the amount in a human body. That seems a rather small amount of metal to use allomancy on considering that your taking an entire 150 lbs. with it. I don’t think it’s plausible.

[whattheHoid she/her]

Ok that's really not a lot of metal in one's blood. So I guess besides killing someone, I couldn't see the point besides making you look powerful and a baddy. @Weltall I was also imagining an X-Men scene! It looked pretty sweet in my head! Sidenote, thinking about pulling metal from blood,  the Mistborn series era 1 or 2 could make an awesome open world type video game! The Investitures on this planet would look amazing played out on screen!

[Wandering Investor]

Once you've pulled metal out of a person, which you'd have to be compounding to do in the first place, I don't think it would count as organic matter anymore, so awakening it would probably still be difficult. That's an interesting question, because it raises the question of what is considered alive in the cosmere. Connection might allow the iron to be considered alive for awhile.

Even if you did pull the iron out, which I imagine would cause at least some damage to the host, it would just be iron dust. Wielding it as a weapon after that might be a tad bit difficult. But if you're compounding, anythings possible. Dust fired at super speeds might still be able to do some damage.

[Apollyon he/him]

Correction, compounding doesn’t increase Allomantic power. Compounding only fuels a Feruchemical metalmind. It doesn’t even produce an Allomantic effect. 

Ex. A Steel/Steel compounder has a steel metalmind with a small Feruchemical store inside. They swallow the mind and burn it. Instead of tapping the metalmind to gain speed, burning it produces the speed. No steel-lines come out of the Allomancer’s body. They cannot push on metals. They are, essentially, burning the steel to gain Physical speed.

On a side note, the iron in one’s self is not alive. I would think that to have it be considered alive, it would have to be at least a cell at smallest. Iron particles are not alive.

[The One Who Connects he/him]

2 minutes ago, Apollyon said:

On a side note, the iron in one’s self is not alive. I would think that to have it be considered alive, it would have to be at least a cell at smallest. Iron particles are not alive.

In the modern era, this would absolutely be true, but in the olden days, only knowing that the iron came from the blood of a person could very well be enough to count as "from something alive" thanks to the perception aspect of the Cosmere.

This is probably one of the better contention points to ask Brandon about so we can learn just how far perception can go while overriding the facts.

[Apollyon he/him]

@The One Who Connects, you’re saying that in that era, being cognitively alive(viewed as living by other things and itself) would be more important than being physically alive? I’ll take that.

Edit: Accidentally mentioned Gancho Libre in the first draft. Your profile pictures are so similar!

Edited May 29, 2018 by Apollyon

[Wandering Investor]

3 hours ago, Apollyon said:

Correction, compounding doesn’t increase Allomantic power. Compounding only fuels a Feruchemical metalmind. It doesn’t even produce an Allomantic effect. 

Ex. A Steel/Steel compounder has a steel metalmind with a small Feruchemical store inside. They swallow the mind and burn it. Instead of tapping the metalmind to gain speed, burning it produces the speed. No steel-lines come out of the Allomancer’s body. They cannot push on metals. They are, essentially, burning the steel to gain Physical speed.

On a side note, the iron in one’s self is not alive. I would think that to have it be considered alive, it would have to be at least a cell at smallest. Iron particles are not alive.

Nicrosil can be used to store investiture, including the different allomantic powers. You can then compound that for extreme levels of allomancy. That's why when Wax taps the Bands of Mourning, he gains all of the powers, allomancy and feruchemy. He at least uses ironpulling in that scene, on a massive airship.