Soulcaster Shapeshifting

[Awaken Returner she/her]

High-level Soulcasting seems to involve at least one of three things.

First, the ability to at all influence a change in an object's essence especially when the targeted result is conceptually 'far' from the spren's current state.

Spoiler

Jasnah's ability to quickly create a stone staircase from air vs. Shallan's attempt to burn a stick.

Even if a stick should more readily transform to fire than air would to stone, as wood is conceptually thought of as being 'something which can burn' and the concepts of air and stone, 'freedom and rigidity', are very much unalike, as Jasnah is far more skilled in Soulcasting than Shallan, she can influence a drastic change in an object while her apprentice cannot influence a stick to burn.

Identity also seems important here. If I'm not mistaken Soulcasting is supposed to be harder to cast on targets with 'more' identity like people than otherwise.

Second, the ability to perform precise Soulcastings.

Spoiler

Jasnah burning letters directly into paper and Soulcasting Shallan's blood during Way of Kings.

I imagine this has something to do with conceptually separating parts of an object like what Wax does with a bullet in the opening of the Bands of Mourning.

Essentially, precision here denotes the capacity to designate which parts specifically of a given whole are to be Soulcast.

Third, the ability to 'accurately' Soulcast something. The better you are at Soulcasting, the less general your changes are. In this case we'd compare generic  Soulcast grain and meat against proper Strawberry Jam or chicken-flavoured meat.

Aside from blood purification, however, most of what we've seen of Soulcasting's greatest feats involve changing a targeted object's essence into another rather than changing a target into an object within its own essence.

Further, we've really only read about one highly proficient Soulcaster, Jasnah, whose specialties don't lie in the Soulcasting of the blood essence, the essence most likely closest related to life. While transforming armies into fire or creating metal barriers from thin air is impressive, I think a very significant part of Soulcasting's potential lies beyond Jasnah's proficiencies.

What if we had a character whose Soulcasting abilities rivaled Jasnah's but whose specialties lay in the blood essence?

Can you Soulcast a person physically without killing them? If so...

Could a Soulcaster precisely pinpoint precise parts of their body, their bones and skin for example to make them harder and more durable? Could you Soulcast your body features to disguise yourself?

What about Soulcasting your sensory organs to make the them more effective tools (bat's sense of hearing, cat's eyesight, etc.) Could you Soulcast your internal organ structures such that it could and houses a gemheart?

Could you Soulcast air and mend it to your body as workable wings? (Basically fooling your body that you've always had the wings and attaching them to your nervous system, among others, to make them usable)

Could you change your species with Soulcasting? Maybe you could turn yourself into a Mistwraith or transform a Kandra into a human. (The Nightwatcher can apparently do this so I'm wondering if Cultivation's Investiture could allow a Soulcaster to do this as well)

Most importantly, could you Soulcast the surrounding air and ground into you as to add to your overall mass and change your body structure such that you become a dragon?

Assuming you could trick your body into accepting the changes brought by Soulcasting, maybe Lightweaving would help, and the changes you've made to your body are plausible and workable (circulatory, nervous, skeletal, etc. systems are all properly accounted for) it should be possible right?

---

Stone skin or bones would probably be impractical I guess. As for more organic methods, you'd have to change a lot more about someone's body structure to account for denser bones and tougher flesh.

Edited April 29, 2019 by Awaken Returner

[Karger he/him]

Um yes? I must point out that soulcasting someones bones to something like stone would likely be bad for them and I doubt that any individual has the proficiency to safely soulcast anyone else in major ways like you suggest but in theory their is no reason why it is not possible. 

[RShara she/her]

An extremely skilled Soulcaster could probably do some of the things you describe, but honestly, most of those wouldn't be healthy for the individual in question. I mean, look at all the problems that come from an organ transplant. That's basically what you're proposing here. Without insane knowledge about how living things work, and that specific person in particular, you're likely to cause agonizing pain, and eventual death or at least major health issues.

[Turin Turambar]

OK, now we wait for the Dragon of Roshar who was really in idiot elsecaller who thought it was a good idea.

[Awaken Returner she/her]

A fun idea at the very least...probably. The overwhelming pain thing was a really good point, I doubt Stormlight could ease much of that even if the transformation was performed by a particularly well-read and studied student of human and animal anatomy. The Dragon of Roshar has a pretty good ring to it, especially with that Elsecaller character. I can just imagine his / her plan to become a dragon. For science!

Edited April 29, 2019 by Awaken Returner

[Bookish Ocelot she/her]

 

So I found this WoB. Shapeshifting is cosmetic surgery on a really large scale. 

 

 

 

Quote

Shallan's Ward [PENDING REVIEW]

Could Soulcasting be used for cosmetic surgery?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

Yes...*sigh* Boy. *Hesitantly* Yes, but give it a very shaky yes. Indicate that Brandon is wincing a little bit about that one.

Hoiditthroughthegrapevine [PENDING REVIEW]

Could you give a brass nose like Tycho Brahe?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

That, definitely, you could do.

Skyward Seattle signing (Nov. 10, 2018)

And this one. So it is possible to soulcast the body, but it'd be very difficult. 

Quote

Sparkle Hearts [PENDING REVIEW]

Can you Soulcast hair?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

Yes, if you can cut it with a Shardb...You can Soulcast even the body. Hair is much easier. While it's attached, it's going to be harder. Easier than Soulcasting a body, if you have the skill to just soulcast the hair.

While it's attached, treat it more like a body than you would not a body, but easier than a body.

Legion Release Party (Sept. 19, 2018)

There's another WoB stating that soulcast blood has DNA and can be used for blood transfusions without adverse effects. 

In theory, you could soulcast more skin/muscle/whatever containing DNA and attach it to yourself. You could probably? make yourself into a dragon, but it'd be painful. I feel like enhancing bones/eyesight/muscle tone etc or adding claws/wings would be more practical than shapeshifting your entire body.

Can somebody ask Brandon this? 

[Pathfinder]

11 hours ago, Awaken Returner said:

High-level Soulcasting seems to involve at least one of three things.

First, the ability to at all influence a change in an object's essence especially when the targeted result is conceptually 'far' from the spren's current state.

  Reveal hidden contents

Jasnah's ability to quickly create a stone staircase from air vs. Shallan's attempt to burn a stick.

Even if a stick should more readily transform to fire than air would to stone, as wood is conceptually thought of as being 'something which can burn' and the concepts of air and stone, 'freedom and rigidity', are very much unalike, as Jasnah is far more skilled in Soulcasting than Shallan, she can influence a drastic change in an object while her apprentice cannot influence a stick to burn.

Identity also seems important here. If I'm not mistaken Soulcasting is supposed to be harder to cast on targets with 'more' identity like people than otherwise.

Second, the ability to perform precise Soulcastings.

  Reveal hidden contents

Jasnah burning letters directly into paper and Soulcasting Shallan's blood during Way of Kings.

I imagine this has something to do with conceptually separating parts of an object like what Wax does with a bullet in the opening of the Bands of Mourning.

Essentially, precision here denotes the capacity to designate which parts specifically of a given whole are to be Soulcast.

Third, the ability to 'accurately' Soulcast something. The better you are at Soulcasting, the less general your changes are. In this case we'd compare generic  Soulcast grain and meat against proper Strawberry Jam or chicken-flavoured meat.

Aside from blood purification, however, most of what we've seen of Soulcasting's greatest feats involve changing a targeted object's essence into another rather than changing a target into an object within its own essence.

Further, we've really only read about one highly proficient Soulcaster, Jasnah, whose specialties don't lie in the Soulcasting of the blood essence, the essence most likely closest related to life. While transforming armies into fire or creating metal barriers from thin air is impressive, I think a very significant part of Soulcasting's potential lies beyond Jasnah's proficiencies.

What if we had a character whose Soulcasting abilities rivaled Jasnah's but whose specialties lay in the blood essence?

Can you Soulcast a person physically without killing them? If so...

Could a Soulcaster precisely pinpoint precise parts of their body, their bones and skin for example to make them harder and more durable? Could you Soulcast your body features to disguise yourself?

What about Soulcasting your sensory organs to make the them more effective tools (bat's sense of hearing, cat's eyesight, etc.) Could you Soulcast your internal organ structures such that it could and houses a gemheart?

Could you Soulcast air and mend it to your body as workable wings? (Basically fooling your body that you've always had the wings and attaching them to your nervous system, among others, to make them usable)

Could you change your species with Soulcasting? Maybe you could turn yourself into a Mistwraith or transform a Kandra into a human. (The Nightwatcher can apparently do this so I'm wondering if Cultivation's Investiture could allow a Soulcaster to do this as well)

Most importantly, could you Soulcast the surrounding air and ground into you as to add to your overall mass and change your body structure such that you become a dragon?

Assuming you could trick your body into accepting the changes brought by Soulcasting, maybe Lightweaving would help, and the changes you've made to your body are plausible and workable (circulatory, nervous, skeletal, etc. systems are all properly accounted for) it should be possible right?

---

Stone skin or bones would probably be impractical I guess. As for more organic methods, you'd have to change a lot more about someone's body structure to account for denser bones and tougher flesh.

I think a big problem you would run into is kind of the frankenstein issue. Just because you sewed something on, doesn't mean it is going to work the way you want it to. For instance I believe either you or someone else in this thread mentioned soulcasting wings. Theoretically I think this is possible. Soulcasting flesh, bone, and sinew I think would be all within the soulcasters preview.  Soulcasting a circulatory system as well as a nervous system through the wings so they can live with blood flow and be used I think gets more difficult but is potentially possible? But here is where we get to the issues. You now put huge bat wings on a person. In order for that person to fly with them, the wings would have to be far larger than the person to be able to provide the necessary lift. The musculature required to pump the wings also would be incredibly impractical for the size. Finally all the bones of the person would have to be made lighter, and hollow to even get the person off the ground at all. All of this (if you are lucky) would potentially lead to a person who could possibly glide when jumping off a cliff or other high place, but very doubtful will they ever fly. These issues could be applied to any other ideas. Could it maybe possibly be accomplished? Sure. Could maybe possibly some how get the body to accept the change and not reject it outright? Maybe. Account for all the other millions of little changes that would have to be done to the body in order to sustain such a change, or even get the desired result to work at all? That I think is going to be the main prevention of this idea getting off the ground. 

[Awaken Returner she/her]

Yeah, you'd probably not be able to use attached wings to fly, feathered or otherwise, without another magic system allowing for it to do so. The human body isn't really that aerodynamic. You could ask a Windrunner friend to lash you but then you would be better off simply using the lashing to fly in the first place. You might need to change your whole body structure completely to account for workable wings - transforming into a large bird maybe.

Though, as has been noted, species change might be too difficult for even a skilled Soulcaster to manage without seriously hurting themselves even through Stormlight healing. I think the main strength here would still be the potential to Soulcast yourself bodies with inherent magical properties like Mistwraiths (so you could spike yourself); otherwise you could possibly induce or cure Savantism, grant yourself Larkin-like abilities somehow, or give yourself a workable gemheart (specie changing into a half or full parshendi?) to make use of the different forms.

As for other opportunities with this kind of Soulcasting though, I think there's some interesting interactions it could have with Awakening. Soulcasting a corpse into a dragon-like creature and then turning it into a lifeless might be feasible.

---

Now that I think of it, Iron Metalminds might help you fly with Soulcast wings. The act of filling a Metalmind doesn't really require much effort on the part of the Ferring or Medallion holder, and once you've Soulcast wings, you should be able to sustain on-demand personal flight without need for additional investiture. I'd get it for something like angelic wings if nothing else.

Edited April 30, 2019 by Awaken Returner

[Toaster Retribution he/him]

It would take insane skills. Hoid with a thousand years of practice and modern day tech might be able to do it. But I doubt its something that will come into play in the current books.

Edited April 29, 2019 by Toaster Retribution