Good evening!

[ProgrammerA10]

Hello! I am ProgrammerA10. Hopefully you haven't seen me on the Discord server, but if you have had that misfortune, then you probably know that I enjoy the Cosmere and have absolutely no opinions or theories worth listening to, but you're going to hear them anyway. The best character is Lightsong, Wax and Steris have the best romance, Wayne is overrated (only a little overrated, but still), Steel-Steel is the best Twinborn combination, and Scadrial is the best planet, followed closely by Threnody. 

Despite any rumors you may have heard, my attempts to read the future of the Cosmere via atium savantism are not the only reason that atium is the lost metal. The similarly-purposed experiments with trained monkeys, typewriters, and Fortune Compounding were not as unethical as you have been led to believe, nor were they successful. I have seen Hoid in concert three times, and am currently in possession of the Vax novel, the only success of the aforementioned monkey business. I have not read it, primarily because it has Mistborn 12 spoilers. My most closely held belief is that good evening is the best way to greet someone, regardless of time of day.

My current all-consuming quest is discovering the secrets of speed bubble cooldown times, especially as they relate to full Mistborn, figuring out what the hinted way to boost Allomancy via Feruchemy is, learning what the difference between F-Zinc mental-speed and F-Steel mental-speed-to-match-your-physical-speed is, and finding out what the heck is going on with Pinnacle Ferrings.

[Honorless he/him]

Welcome to the Shard, @ProgrammerA10! *winces* Arguing Feruchemy is a lost cause, trust me

[Karger he/him]

1 hour ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

figuring out what the hinted way to boost Allomancy via Feruchemy is,

Nicrosil compounding?

1 hour ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

Pinnacle Ferrings

They store determination.

1 hour ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

F-Zinc mental-speed and F-Steel mental-speed-to-match-your-physical-speed is

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Shadows of Self Chicago signing (Oct. 12, 2015)
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Alteroden

With [Feruchemical] zinc, you get mental speed. How is that any different from [Feruchemical] steel, except without [physical] speed?

Brandon Sanderson

I think of the mental speed actually turning you into... Let's say you sped up your body, and you wanted to figure out some really complex equations.

Alteroden

So it lets you have intuitive leaps.

Brandon Sanderson

Right. It basically turns you into Ken Jennings. That's how I imagine it.

Kurkistan

So it's not like bullet time?

Brandon Sanderson

No... It'll bullet time a little bit, it certainly will, because you're thinking faster than everyone else, but it has applications beyond bullet timing. Bullet time is really--

Kurkistan

That’s steel’s thing?

Brandon Sanderson

That’s kind of steel's thing. They kind of overlap on that one, because the steel thing... But yeah. It's more like "I think fast, but my reaction speed is not sped up".

 

[ProgrammerA10]

Thank you, @Honorless! Lost causes have never daunted me before, no matter how much experience I have gained telling me that they should!

56 minutes ago, Karger said:

2 hours ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

figuring out what the hinted way to boost Allomancy via Feruchemy is,

Nicrosil compounding?

Perhaps, but it's been hinted (can't find the WoBs right now, but they're out there) that there's some sort of inverse-Compounding. It's never sounded like that would be Nicrosil, (given how reticent Brandon has been) but I could be wrong.

56 minutes ago, Karger said:

2 hours ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

Pinnacle Ferrings

They store determination.

Yeah, but have you ever thought about how weird that is? On the Feruchemical table, Electrum is a "hybrid" metal, and the other three in that category are Gold, Cadmium, and Bendalloy, which store health, breath, and nutrition/calories respectively, none of which are anything like determination, and in fact are very physical. In the Cognitive section of the table, we find Copper, which, storing memories, rather nebulous things, is probably the most comparable to Electrum, but it's still wildly different. Copper stores definite memories, and memories have, at least in the sense of, well, sense itself, a coherent identity, they're a thing that exists. (Copper is really weird as a Feruchemical metal as well, seeing as how it stores actual pseudo-objects rather than qualities, but that's a different story) Determination, though? Is it an emotion? A neurochemical hormone? What, exactly does it mean to be less determined? The Arcanum descriptions make it sound a tiny bit like being controllably bipolar, but that isn't really what "determination" means. It's not a Spiritual attribute, which are the second most comparable, but everything we've heard makes F-Electrum sound a lot like the Feruchemy for dealing with Spiritual attributes. The non-Spiritual metals are rather definitive. Store wakefulness and you go to sleep. Store health and you get sick. Store breath and you start hyperventilating, etc. The Spiritual metals? Store Connection and you get... less... Connected. Your friends don't like you as much or something? Huh? (Is this why Jak is always so... mildly callous towards Handerwym? The "I am proud to count a savage as my friend" incident, was Handerwym storing then? Hmmmm...) Store Identity and you're... what? Who knows? Not you, because there isn't a you, kind of! Not really! Someone help! Store Fortune and you're... unlucky? How does that work? If you lie in bed and do nothing that could involve the vagaries of chance, but start storing as much Fortune as you can, are you going to have an aneurysm? Store Investiture, and you're... less invested. What the heck does that mean for a Nicrosil Ferring? Shouldn't storing Nicrosil Investiture make one less able to do that storing in the first place? The pattern continues with determination. When you store in an electrummind (okay, that word should never be used again), you're... less... determined. Is that just motivation? Do you not feel like doing things as much? How much can you store? Is it purely a mental thing, would the maximum storage be suicidal tendencies or something? Or is it something deeper? Could you store enough determination to make your subconscious just give up and stop running basic body functions? That'd be a bit dangerous. What if you were already storing just a little too much determination, became suicidal, and then just stored all the rest? That'd be a neat party trick. (Is this why we haven't seen any Pinnacles yet?) The same with tapping determination. You become.. MORE determined! Huzzah! You're... what? How does this work? Do you become motivated enough to do everything you think of doing? This sounds like it could be a bad thing. It also sounds like getting drunk. Is it really a lowering of inhibitions? Or are you just more motivated to get things done? Is it a good thing or a bad thing to tap determination?

TL;DR? I think determination is either really really weird or a Spiritual attribute. Leaning towards the former, but that doesn't help much. I really hope we see a Pinnacle as a main character in some books soon.

 

56 minutes ago, Karger said:

2 hours ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

F-Zinc mental-speed and F-Steel mental-speed-to-match-your-physical-speed is

Quote

Shadows of Self Chicago signing (Oct. 12, 2015)
#2 Share Copy

 

Play/Pause

 

Alteroden

With [Feruchemical] zinc, you get mental speed. How is that any different from [Feruchemical] steel, except without [physical] speed?

Brandon Sanderson

I think of the mental speed actually turning you into... Let's say you sped up your body, and you wanted to figure out some really complex equations.

Alteroden

So it lets you have intuitive leaps.

Brandon Sanderson

Right. It basically turns you into Ken Jennings. That's how I imagine it.

Kurkistan

So it's not like bullet time?

Brandon Sanderson

No... It'll bullet time a little bit, it certainly will, because you're thinking faster than everyone else, but it has applications beyond bullet timing. Bullet time is really--

Kurkistan

That’s steel’s thing?

Brandon Sanderson

That’s kind of steel's thing. They kind of overlap on that one, because the steel thing... But yeah. It's more like "I think fast, but my reaction speed is not sped up".

Ah, I hadn't seen that WoB. Everything I had seen seemed to specify that Zinc was only mental speed, but I guess I was wrong. On that note, can Zinc Compounders create the Diagram? Without becoming psychopaths?

Edited November 17, 2019 by ProgrammerA10

[Karger he/him]

3 hours ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

Yeah, but have you ever thought about how weird that is? On the Feruchemical table, Electrum is a "hybrid" metal, and the other three in that category are Gold, Cadmium, and Bendalloy, which store health, breath, and nutrition/calories respectively, none of which are anything like determination, and in fact are very physical

The table is an in universe construction.  The fact that Scadrails have a silly classification system does not really mean much in my book.

3 hours ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

Store Identity and you're... what? Who knows

Less able to express yourself.  Tapping identity may cure or at least alleviate some of the symptoms of depression.

3 hours ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

Connection and you get... less... Connected. Your friends don't like you as much or something? Huh

You have trouble communicating and your bonds to things like family and nation become less emotionally charged is how I read this.

3 hours ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

Store Fortune and you're... unlucky

Less effected by serendipity.  You don't have that pull that makes you feel "this person could be the one."

3 hours ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

ou lie in bed and do nothing that could involve the vagaries of chance, but start storing as much Fortune as you can, are you going to have an aneurysm?

Fortune is not luck.  I think of it more as a gravitational tide.  It pulls some things together and others apart.

3 hours ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

Shouldn't storing Nicrosil Investiture make one less able to do that storing in the first place

It is also likely not 100% efficient.  You can't(as far as we know) store 100% of any attribute.

3 hours ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

you're... less... determined. Is that just motivation? Do you not feel like doing things as much? How much can you store

Maybe you just give up on things really easily.

3 hours ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

you store enough determination to make your subconscious just give up and stop running basic body functions

I seriously doubt it.  You might give yourself a mental health problem though.

3 hours ago, ProgrammerA10 said:

Ah, I hadn't seen that WoB. Everything I had seen seemed to specify that Zinc was only mental speed, but I guess I was wrong. On that note, can Zinc Compounders create the Diagram? Without becoming psychopaths?

I think it just turns you into Sherlock Homes.  You notice everything remember everything and get really good at predicting certain things and deductive reasoning.

[WalshLover he/him]

Welcome to the Shard, ProgrammerA10! Glad to have you with us.