Snapping in alloy of law

[High prince of geeks he/him]

It occurred to me that with a more "modern" society , were beating children would hopefully be seen as barbaric, that finding out you were a misting would be much harder. If you lived in the roughs you'd have plenty of opportunities to snap, but in elendel would you just walk around not knowing if your were or not. And then that implies a dangerous rise in self inflicted harm (Like in wor where people would drop boulders on themselves thinking it would cause them to realize that they where a knights radiant). Plus another general question about snapping, most allomantic mettles are slightly poisonous, after going through a traumatic event are you supposed to subject yourself to poisonous testing to find out what kind of misting you are? Please answer

[lyht]

I believe snapping is now easier. I will have to go looking for it, but I think there is a WoB that Harmony smoothed that out a bit. But I don't know if it is ever described how people find out now.

[Swimmingly he/him]

I'd guess that the rather intense trauma of birth is enough to trigger it now.

[Tempus]

Harmony has made Snapping easier post first trilogy, so no more beatings. As for heavy metal poisoning, Iron, Steel, Tin, Pewter, Zinc, Brass, Aluminium, Duralumin, Gold, and Electrum are all reasonably safe. Allomantic metal quantities are quite small, and only a tiny amount is necessary to make a reservoir. Assuming an allomantic dose of 10g, those would all be perfectly safe. Most of those metals have safe intakes above what you would feel comfortable eating at any one time (1kg+). Copper, and Bronze are a bit stickier, according to my research, you shouldn't take more than 62.5g at a time without risking being ill. A little lower from Bronze. Not too bad still. 

 

Nicrosil is mostly nickel and chromium. The limit is about the same for both elements, so it would be about 9g maximum single dose to avoid illness. Cadmium is the worst, at 2.25g maximum single intake, and Bendalloy (being mostly Bismuth) would be not much of a problem, at about 140g max.

[PorridgeBrick he/him]

To avoid metal poisoning, have a Chromium savant on hand. Even if it isn't a metal they can burn, it's still an impurity, and since Aluminum savants can remove any of those from themselves, the same should work for Chromium on others.

[WeiryWriter he/him]

As people said Sazed lowered the threshold necessary to Snap, but he couldn't get rid of it completely:
 

Kchan

How does Snapping work after Sazed changed it? If you don't want to reveal it all right now, are there any hints you can give us?

Brandon Sanderson

He couldn't get rid of this entirely. I don't want to spoil things, but Snapping was built into Allomancy primarily because of larger-scale magical issues. This is getting deep into the issue, but it has to do with a person's spiritual makeup and a 'wounded' spirit being easier to fill with something else, kind of like a cut would let something into the bloodstream. Sazed made this threshold on Scadrial much easier to obtain.

(source)

[SmurfAquamarineBodies he/him]

Going from his analogy, which knowing Mr Sanderson, is used deliberately, it could be assumed that where a Snap in the Spiritweb was needed before, now only a cut is necessary.

[Chaos he/him]

As people said Sazed lowered the threshold necessary to Snap, but he couldn't get rid of it completely:

 

(source)

Interesting how this is indeed exactly how Brandon stated Surgebinding works, on the back of Words of Radiance. So this is definitely a general property.

I wonder why Feruchemy does not have an equivalent, though. Perhaps just because Feruchemy draws its power from yourself, rather than Allomancy and Surgebinding, which draw from something else, and require that "wounded" spirit.

[Moogle]

Interesting how this is indeed exactly how Brandon stated Surgebinding works, on the back of Words of Radiance. So this is definitely a general property.

I wonder why Feruchemy does not have an equivalent, though. Perhaps just because Feruchemy draws its power from yourself, rather than Allomancy and Surgebinding, which draw from something else, and require that "wounded" spirit.

 

The annotations talk about this a little bit:

 

My idea on this is that Allomantic potential is a little like a supersaturated solution. You can suspend a great deal of something like sugar in a liquid when it is hot, then cool it down and the sugar remains suspended. Drop one bit of sugar in there as a catalyst, however, and the rest will fall out as a precipitate.

Allomancy is the same. It’s in there, but it takes a reaction—in this case, physical anguish—to trigger it and bring it out. That’s because the Allomantic power comes from the extra bit of Preservation inside of humans, that same extra bit that gives us free will. This bit is trapped between the opposing forces of Preservation and Ruin, and to come out and allow it the power to access metals and draw forth energy, it needs to fight its way through the piece of Ruin that is also there inside.

As has been established, Ruin’s control over creatures—and, indeed, an Allomancer’s control over them—grows weaker when that creature is going through some extreme emotions. (Like the koloss blood frenzy.) This has to do with the relationship between the Cognitive Realm, the Physical Realm, and the Spiritual Realm—of which I don’t have time to speak right now.

Suffice it to say that there are people who have Snapped because of intense joy or other emotions. It just doesn’t happen as frequently and is more difficult to control.

(source)

 

Allomancy is imbalanced because it requires more Preservation than Ruin. You need to Snap to let your extra-Preservationy Allomancy bit free from between Ruin and Preservation. Feruchemy, which is a balanced art, should not require it.

 

This implies that Surgebinding requires Snapping because humans are Invested by both Honor and Odium. I should probably go make a thread on this.

[Chaos he/him]

Or Honor and Cultivation at least. I doubt Odium would have invested himself in humanity. He came later, after all.

It still does seem like a Realmatic principle that we haven't quite stated properly yet. Brandon avoids talking about Realmatics there, so there's clearly some deep principle here.

[Moogle]

Or Honor and Cultivation at least. I doubt Odium would have invested himself in humanity. He came later, after all.

It still does seem like a Realmatic principle that we haven't quite stated properly yet. Brandon avoids talking about Realmatics there, so there's clearly some deep principle here.

 

I'd guess that Odium did invest himself in humanity. We've got a couple of suggestive WoBs:

Shadowsaber223 ()

If Odium were lured to Scadrial, would his physical body turn into a burnable metal? If so, could Harmony create an Odium-metal legion of Mistings to consume and burn it? Would that weaken him sufficiently enough to be killed or destroyed?

 

Brandon Sanderson

The difficulty here is, again, one of Identity. People born on Scadrial have an Identity tied to it and its magic. Odium would have to do certain things to make them able to use a magic he fuels. He has done these things on Roshar, so it's not impossible for him to manage it on Scadrial.

(source)

 

Q:  Was Shallan's father influenced at all by Odium?

B.  Yes.

(source)

 

To use a Shard's magic system, most of the time you need to have a bit of their Investiture in you. You can't be an Allomancer without having the genetics for it (or cheating via lerasium to get the required genetics), you can't use the AonDor if you're not of the right lineage/born in the area, that sort of thing.

 

Also, a lot of humanity really does seem quite hateful on Roshar. Investiture has effects on your personality.

Edited June 12, 2014 by Moogle

[Chaos he/him]

That's a good point. I hadn't thought of that. Maybe Odium Invested himself in humanity later, in an effort to make humanity destroy itself.

[Cstryon he/him]

Speaking of snapping... I took an iron supplement, and then stubbed my toe. Next thing I know I accidently pulled myself into the fridge.

[Curiosity he/him]

Snapping, I believe, is a necessary component of any magic system that directly channels raw Investiture. In Allomancy, it is taken directly from Preservation. In Surgebinding, it is Stormlight, which appears to be the raw Spiritual power of Honor, Cultivation, or a combination of both. 

 

Feruchemy doesn't involve raw Investiture, so no Snapping is required. 

 

I'd guess that Odium did invest himself in humanity. We've got a couple of suggestive WoBs:

 

 

To use a Shard's magic system, most of the time you need to have a bit of their Investiture in you. You can't be an Allomancer without having the genetics for it (or cheating via lerasium to get the required genetics), you can't use the AonDor if you're not of the right lineage/born in the area, that sort of thing.

 

This raises interesting questions about whether koloss (AoL era) could practice Allomancy without Hemalurgy. Do they have enough Preservation in them for that to happen? Do they have enough Ruin that Hemalurgy could be easier for them? 

[David Coppercloud]

Wouldn't the modern age be aware of the connection between mist sickness and snapping. Instead of beatings they could just camp out in the mists and see if anything happened.

On the topic of mist sickness, with the case being more severe for a more powerful mistling,  were those who died of it in the first trilogy potentially full mistborn? 

[Swimmingly he/him]

I'm pretty sure they described the deaths as symptomatic and targeting specifically the sick, young, and old that were infected.

[Shadeshadow227]

To avoid metal poisoning, have a Chromium savant on hand. Even if it isn't a metal they can burn, it's still an impurity, and since Aluminum savants can remove any of those from themselves, the same should work for Chromium on others.

 

THAT...is a good idea.

[Shadeshadow227]

Snapping, I believe, is a necessary component of any magic system that directly channels raw Investiture. In Allomancy, it is taken directly from Preservation. In Surgebinding, it is Stormlight, which appears to be the raw Spiritual power of Honor, Cultivation, or a combination of both. 

 

Feruchemy doesn't involve raw Investiture, so no Snapping is required. 

 

 

This raises interesting questions about whether koloss (AoL era) could practice Allomancy without Hemalurgy. Do they have enough Preservation in them for that to happen? Do they have enough Ruin that Hemalurgy could be easier for them? 

 

Koloss, or Koloss-blooded people? Because Tarson's a Thug, and he's a Koloss-blood.

[Your3rdShadow he/him]

Koloss according to MAG lose whatever Allomancy or Feurchemy they had upon making the transformation, or at the very least, they can't access it anymore. So I would think that the alteration of the Koloss process overwrites the spirit web too much for the magics to flow naturally. As for the Koloss-blooded, as pointed out, they can still use the two magic systems, as such, I believe that justifies the perspective that their merely slightly altered humans, better physically in every way, but still pretty much normal.

[DeadFencer]

My theory is that the threshold was lowered, and the mists snap people. If the threshold is lower, the mists don't need to cause as much trauma to snap people.