Advanced Allomantic Electrum

[Halyo_Alex he/him]

Been thinking about my favorite allomantic metal again...

Started wondering if a skilled/near savant Oracle could start to trim down the number of future selves they see, down to like a top 5 or 3 or something of likeliest futures. That starts to get pretty close to Atium (without the mental boost), though, so i dunno.

Also, a skilled Oracle could probably come up with some sort of subtle hand gesture that their past(but actually present) self could see, and use that to instantly be like "ah that's the best timeline of the bunch, let's follow that shadow's path" or "oh jeez that one didn't end well let's avoid that".

Also of course the best feruchemy to pair with Electrum would be Zinc to replicate the other half of Atium.

[theTruthshaper]

The main problem I see with this is that electrum only offers a few seconds foresight. Also, I am unsure of how electrum works. If you resolve to walk in a striaght line and then burn electrum will you only see one shadow? What if you have lots of F-zinc stored and you resolve to follow none of the shadows you see?

[Halyo_Alex he/him]

3 minutes ago, The_Truthwatcher said:

The main problem I see with this is that electrum only offers a few seconds foresight. Also, I am unsure of how electrum works. If you resolve to walk in a striaght line and then burn electrum will you only see one shadow? What if you have lots of F-zinc stored and you resolve to follow none of the shadows you see?

I think it has something to do with quantum decoherence. It shows you other possible futures based on probability, so if there's a 0% chance that you, for example, spontaneously explode, then you won't see that happen.

...Which means if you DO see it that should be cause for concern.

[theTruthshaper]

3 minutes ago, Halyo_Alex said:

I think it has something to do with quantum decoherence. It shows you other possible futures based on probability, so if there's a 0% chance that you, for example, spontaneously explode, then you won't see that happen.

...Which means if you DO see it that should be cause for concern.

I doubt that this is what electrum shows. Quantum decoherence is a very small scale phenomenon, at the level of humans reality is basically deterministic.

[Halyo_Alex he/him]

Just now, The_Truthwatcher said:

I doubt that this is what electrum shows. Quantum decoherence is a very small scale phenomenon, at the level of humans reality is basically deterministic.

Ok the real answer is Fortune, which is basically the same thing as "quantum" as an explanation for "weird inexplicable science stuff".

[theTruthshaper]

15 minutes ago, Halyo_Alex said:

Ok the real answer is Fortune, which is basically the same thing as "quantum" as an explanation for "weird inexplicable science stuff".

But we do not know any thing about Fortune, while we do have some knowledge about Quantum Mechanics. Also, the two expplanation have entirely different predictions, as Fortune is related to Cognitive and thus is unlikely to show somebody exploding.

But what do you predict Electrum would show in the above two cases?

[Halyo_Alex he/him]

Just now, The_Truthwatcher said:

But we do not know any thing about Fortune, while we do have some knowledge about Quantum Mechanics. Also, the two expplanation have entirely different predictions, as Fortune is related to Cognitive and thus is unlikely to show somebody exploding.

But what do you predict Electrum would show in the above two cases?

We do know SOME stuff about Fortune. Not all of it is from Mistborn, sure, but it's still there...

 

Well, based on my understanding of Electrum, normally it shows you a set of possible future outcomes, based on what is likely to happen next. Under specific circumstances you might be able to constrain the possible futures enough to compact the electrum shadows down to only a select few. If there are unlikely but still possible futures, they might show up if the likely futures are similar enough that there's only one electrum shadow for them (i.e. walking down a path and looking left vs right but all else is the exact same).

[GoWibble he/him]

Second voice here, 

Electrum is described as sort of working like Sak from Sixth of the Dusk

Quote

Questioner

Sak, Dusk's non-native Aviar. That ability is very, very similar to Allomantic electrum.

Brandon Sanderson

It is!

Questioner

And his other Aviar is very, very similar to Allomantic copper.

Brandon Sanderson

It is.

Questioner

Is there a connection between those two, deeper? Or is it--

Brandon Sanderson

will RAFO that. Let's just say it is an intentional reference, but I'm not going to say whether it's a direct connection to Scadrial magic systems or more that fundamental rules of magics can reproduce one another. We have seen multiple instances of Lightweaving, so-- It's one of those two... That at least narrows it down for you.

Arcanum Unbounded Chicago signing (Dec. 6, 2016)

Quote

Sam Hock

Is there a connection between Sak's talent and Allomantic electrum? If so, what is it?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. Reading a person's spiritual connections and possibilities. Similar powers, as is atium.

General Twitter 2015 (April 17, 2015)

So you could try and use it like that if you know what you are doing

[Halyo_Alex he/him]

7 hours ago, GoWibble said:

Second voice here, 

Electrum is described as sort of working like Sak from Sixth of the Dusk

So you could try and use it like that if you know what you are doing

Awesome. Thanks for the WoBs.

Makes me wonder if there's a potentially complex Cognitive component to Electrum Allomancy, and nobody has figured it out yet.

[GoWibble he/him]

16 minutes ago, Halyo_Alex said:

Makes me wonder if there's a potentially complex Cognitive component to Electrum Allomancy, and nobody has figured it out yet.

Yeah. It would be interesting for someone to ask Brandon if Sixth burning electrum would have the same effect as Sak's power