Lightning

Okay, so I'm not convinced that Trell is Autonomy. My theory is that Trell is Rust, a being who was created by Ruin (hence the common phrase "Rust and Ruin"). Here are some ideas to back this up: Trell has great knowledge and skill with hemalurgy. The Trellic spikes seem to be "rusted". Brandon said that the new shardic influence is well-known. That makes sense if the influence is from Ruin! Thoughts? Up-votes? Spiked cookies?

I like the pill idea. Taking that further, it may be possible that there are some substances you could coat your cadmium in which would make it just pass through your digestive track without interfering with its allomantic burning ability. That said, mixing metals with other substances usually seems to ruin their allomantic ability.

Good catch about inadvertently burning gold! Upvote from me.

For those of us here in Utah, who also like Magic, I plan on bringing 3 commander decks so we can play just inside the Wilk before they open the doors. If you are interested, just meet at one of the tables (near the foodcourt). (We did something similar for the last release, where I discussed my theory that burning allomantic gold with duralumin would make your personality flip. There were lots of other awesome theories that went around.) If Brandon gets done signing the books early, and has nothing better to do (yeah right!) he is also welcome to join us!

My (completely unjustified theory) is that Trell is Rust, a "subshard" of Ruin. In the original religion of Trell, his counterpart was supposed to be the sun (hence a bigger, brighter more powerful counterpart), just like Ruin is the more powerful than Rust.

Rogue Saint, I read about the first 7 chapters of the Worm web serial. I couldn't take it any more after that. Perhaps you can convince me to continue. My reasons for stopping are in the spoiler below.

No, sixth-generation doorman probably just means that people in the man's family had been doormen for 6 generations. I took "metalborn" to simply mean that a kandra's mind is created from the spikes-- so they need metal to be born. *shrug*

You need to read the sequels to Ender's Game.

Voidus, it appears you may have misunderstand my theory. My theory is that NASA performed experiments which allowed access to other "dimensions" where the physics are different. It is quite conceivable that in another dimension minds do control matter (or at least certain types). It is also possible that in one of the dimensions it is quite easy to access other dimensions (which would explain Megan's power).

I just do not see the Lord Ruler, who worked extremely hard to prevent anyone from becoming a full mistborn and feruchemist, making it an easy matter for people in the south to do so. One of the southerners would have used that power to become an immortal (like the Lord Ruler) and possibly try to take over.

I wonder if Brandon isn't really being coy when he says things like "the person who calls himself Taln". Perhaps Brandon is actually giving us some real information that can also be found in the books. Remember that Hoid talked about a person being taken apart and then put back together, and suggested such a person is not the same. They become jumbled. Perhaps this is what happened to Taln. He is sort of the same person, but also not...

So I'm getting excited for Calamity, and thought I'd share my thoughts about a theory I have. I think that Calamity was an employee of NASA, and they were doing some reality warping experiments. (We know that there are alternate universes because a certain epic has powers related to this fact.) The reason the epic powers break the laws of physics is because the physics come from alternate dimensions. The astronaut involved in these initial experiments became Calamity. It might be the person who beat Prof in the contest... Thoughts?

I think I might deserve an upvote or two for coming up with the "discord" theory over a year before Brandon's recent quote. See: http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/7245-sazeds-future/?hl=%2Bdiscord+%2Blightning#entry121385

I want to know:

I tend to think not, because Elend was burning a whole stomach-full of the stuff and was not consumed with bloodlust. But of course, Elend was a pretty special guy.

My mind was just blown. If you can store your mass (i.e. your interaction with other things through gravity), then couldn't you also store your electromagnetic interactions? That would mean you could start walking through walls. (It would also mean you would fall through the floor into the earth...)

I like this theory!

Just to clear something up: I recently asked Brandon about why the Lord Ruler would spike himself with hemalurgy. Brandon then said he thought that the bracers were not hemalurgic, asked Peter about it, and Peter concurred with Brandon they were not hemalurgic. So we have some conflicting statements on the topic.

Alternatively, if you already have feruchemy, maybe you can feruchemically store that ability in lerasium. (Would you then be able to get it back out, since you would have lost feruchemy?!)

Balance restored!

I agree with this completely. A lot of it was as you describe. (I even admitted as much in my post.) But not all of it. (See the second spoiler for instance. My paranoia is not completely unmerited.) I think there is a valid reason I wanted to catch the tip-off, and it actually doesn't have to do with sharder syndrome, per se. It has more to do with putting myself in the main character's shoes. If I was in Wax's shoes I really would be looking around every corner for the kandra. But ESPECIALLY if I started hearing her voice in my head in response to things I said out loud. I really wouldn't trust anyone around me if I couldn't do what Vin did (which was slightly push on their emotions to see what happened). It was important to catch this kandra because she is a murderer and very dangerous. In Vin's case, it wasn't as important, nor was the kandra such a huge threat, so it was less important to be suspicious of everyone.

My feelings after reading the book were quite mixed. Let's start with the positive. Wayne: I really liked about everything done with Wayne. It was fun, playful, and just awesome. I didn't understand why he had to visit the daughter of the man he murdered (that was a huge plot hole at least one other has mentioned), but I actually enjoyed the scene itself. Steris: I just really liked her as a character in both books, perhaps because she is authentic. I agree with another poster who earlier pointed out that people don't really treat her very kindly, in their choice of words. The bullet reveal: I absolutely agree with others that Brandon hid it quite well. I thought the bullet might do something else, like have some of the serum in it that temporarily paralyzes kandrakind. Now come the things that actually bothered me a bit. The Lessie reveal: I figured it out at least a good 20-30 pages before it happened. It was just a bit too obvious. Sazed blatantly tells Wax that women can be villains; and in essence I could see Brandon trying to say "You silly readers, you can't see it either." Except I did see it, and it somewhat ruined the ending for me. It just seemed too cliche. Also incredibly sad. My theory here is that: It was also obvious that the villain had some connection to Wax, and besides those characters we already knew about, Lessie was the only one left. Also there was an obvious connection to bloody Tan. So, just a bit too obvious here. The kandra plotline: The idea of a kandra impersonating a friend in the Well of Ascension worked because of four reasons. (1) There were a TON of characters that we knew intimately. (2) We trusted in Vin's abilities to see discrepancies. (3) The kandra needed to be someone important. (4) The kandra were (apparently) weak (unable to do allomancy), so we could ignore them as a threat (when we really shouldn't have!). In Shadows, there are only really three characters that we know really well (Wax, Wayne, and Marasi). That meant that I was constantly looking at every other character wondering if that was the kandra. It got really annoying, because it meant I couldn't just enjoy the story without thinking I might miss the tip-off that that person was the kandra. Second, Wax's plan to have secret pass-phrases was stupid since he knew that the kandra could hear him when he was speaking in a bare whisper-- so I had no reason to believe he would be like Vin and be able to spot the kandra. Third, that left the only important person who could be the kandra to be the governor himself. Now, for a theory that I highly advise people to NOT read, since the thought also somewhat ruined things for me. Sazed's impotence: Seriously, Sazed can't you look through Wax's (or MeLaan's) eyes at the party, and notice that you cannot sense the governor with your other senses? I just do not buy the idea that Sazed had no way to track down Paalm. I'm okay with the spike being hidden from Sazed, and even people with spikes being hidden from his view-- but shouldn't he be able to use his agents (like Ruin did) to just look around and see what he cannot? Or become a mist spirit and start pulling on people's emotions? etc... etc... Sazed's duplicity: He plays God while not really believing he is God (because he isn't). Not a good place to be. How religion is dealt with: I was surprised at how lightly Sazed, MeLaan, and essentially all other characters treated religion. Yes, Sazed is not God--but doesn't he believe that God did give him those powers, to help people? For some reason, the way Sazed and others talked translated (in my mind) into a high level of irreverence for the truly sacred. The cameos/this isn't a sequel to Alloy of Law: This one isn't all Brandon's fault. It is all on me. I just really wanted another western because Alloy of Law worked so well! This wasn't a sequel (for reasons already written earlier in the thread). The pacing was way too quick. I wanted more character development of the characters from Alloy that we had grown to appreciate. I did not connect to MeLaan or even TenSoon in this story, nor really to Sazed. Part of me felt like they were included only for the "cameo" aspect, even though that wasn't true.

Kurkistan, Exactly! I was aware of those quotes, which is why I asked Brandon the question I did. And to clarify, when I said "he" I meant Brandon, the author. In other words, Brandon thought the atium bracers were only metalminds not hemalurgic spikes, and when Brandon asked Peter for confirmation on that, Peter confirmed it.

I wish I could get 10 rep, just by posting two names! My question to Brandon was why the Lord Ruler spiked himself. I didn't clarify initially that I meant with hemalurgic spikes. Once I did, Brandon said he thought they were not hemalurgic but only metalminds, and Peter backed him up on that.