Titan Arum

It appears there may be some credence to my Blue Line Theory (or BLT, as I've fondly begun to consider it), given this new WoB from the never-ending AMA on reddit: https://www.reddit.c...5?context=10000 He concedes that mass is a factor, but to what end? He didn't really answer my question which was an indirect way to get to blue-line thickness, but it does leave room for thickness to vary by mass instead of just by size. Now if he'd only answer the actual question I asked!

Yep, that's what I was implying with my sunglasses smiley guy, which was supposed to be a b]. Paying such a large group of thieves must be difficult, so let them keep the spoils of the heist while the Set gets what it wants with the kidnappings.

The robbery is a good cover for the Set's true motives: the kidnapping. Up until this heist, all of the robberies were on the train tracks. I imagine, given how they robbed the trains, having a very large crew is critical. At this point, they had a few people on their list they wanted to kidnap and robbing the wedding was a way to a)] cover their actions and b] pay the very large crew who got to keep the spoils of the heist (assuming, you know, Wax doesn't kill them all), if I recall correctly. [Edit: turning by b smiley into an actual b]

You didn't miss anything. It's awkward for everyone at all times. All of middle school is awkward for everyone at all times.

Twi! That seems like cheating! By your own admission you're only touching your tongue to the wall! The dictionary defines a lick as "passing your tongue over something". Thus touching is clearly not a lick! Also...you're 5 second approach to the chasm wall reminds me of the first 6.5 minutes of the middle school game 7 Minutes in Heaven where you're in there with your friend you have a crush on but never admitted it to...you stare at each other awkwardly until you have to kiss at the last second! And to answer the new question: definitely traverse a Pantheon island at night. Since you haven't said which island, as long as it's not Patji, I'm sure I can survive. A nose bleed in the Forest of Hell? Not sure if I could survive that. Would you rather hold an unsheathed Nightblood for five seconds or be on a small shattered plain plateau without a bridge or Shards with a full grown Chasmfiend for one minute.

No need to wait for Warbreaker. Download a copy from Brandon's website and upload it to an e-Reader or print it!

Hemalurgic spikes...because I think they're going to ultimately have more Cosmere-wide implications than the surges will. And then the Denizens of the Dark Alley would need to find new things to research! Would you rather eat chull dung stew or lick a chasm wall for 15 seconds?

Welcome, welcome! I love the Princess Mononoke image you're using for your profile picture. That was the first anime I ever saw...geeze, something like 15 years ago. The beginning of a great journey! Have you read the any of the other Cosmere books/novellas/short stories as well? I find Warbreaker doesn't get enough love!

If the Set is looking to kidnap women of the correct allomantic line to possibly breed a Mistborn, why were they not trying to kidnap men as well? I find it hard to believe that allomancy is primarily maternal, unless the sDNA of allomancy is stored in the spiritual equivalent of mitochondria. Unless...they already have men with strong allomantic lineage who are members of the Set. We all know Mr. Suit's lineage, but is that enough or are there other members who know that they are direct descendants of the Lord Mistborn?

Vincent van Gogh's version of a typical gargoyle. Well executed. If you squint really close to the building on the left hand side of Starry Night Over they Rhone, one can see where your gargoyle comes from. 9.5/10

While The Letter is in fact a key primary document providing insight on who Odium is and was, we need to be careful when considering its implications. A letter like this is inherently biased towards the writers viewpoints, and whomever the writer is obviously has a negative view towards Rayse in the first place. This original dislike could easily carry over towards Odium today and show him in an even worse light relative to others' viewpoints. There could easily be other entities in the Cosmere who do not agree with the writer's pre-shattering assessment of Rayse and who Rayse is as Odium. If I were a historian like Jasnah, I would want other sources before jumping to any conclusions. Granted, with the WoB Weiry posts, we know that hatred is clearly involved...but it says nothing about Rayse. Just Odium.

Welp, why not, right? This be me two months ago after a 5 am hot air balloon ride in Turkey. I was dead tired, but had the time of my life.

Hey there Pauly! You may want to consider changing your username to something not related to your personal email account Also, is your boss on the 17th also? I'm currently trying to get one of my colleagues and my mother to join.

My favorite part about you linking to that: Quiver was the last person to post in that thread.

If Inquisitors truly see trace metals in everything, wouldn't they just be blinded by blue lines? I'd imagine all of the lines appearing to merge together due to the insane amount of trace metals in the environment. Then again...maybe that's how they actually see? If they can determine the mass of the metal and use Ranette's trick of identifying what type of metal it is, then maybe they could see through all of the noise and identify each individual line, which helps them determine what they're looking at by the shape of the object projecting lines of constant and fixed widths.

The only edit I'd make to your interpretation of my model: their illumination RATIO will be equal. Not the absolute value of the illumination, because the gold line will be longer and thicker. Also, this ratio will vary by the individual looking at the same piece of metal as another because each individual's own ratio is determined by their overall allomantic strength. I'm also glad there was confirmation of the mass idea in AoL. I didn't have that book readily available for searching quotes like I have for the ebook version of Mistborn.

I agree, Oudeis, that mass can have an impact on distance...but it's still fixed with regards to the thickness of the blue line. In the example of the iron roof, I'd imagine that the roof has so much mass that the blue line would be rather thick. There probably is a direct positive correlation to distance then, and this still fits within the framework of my theory because the more mass the metal object has, the more power a coinshot or mistborn can use to push on the object. It's not necessarily more illumination, it's that the blue line will just be visible for longer. Think of it with the gold coin and iron coin example. If the iron coin allows Vin to push herself up 40 feet before the blue lines fade to almost nothingness and thus limiting her height, then the gold coin could potentially allow her to push herself up to 70 feet because it has more mass (and thus gives her more power) because the blue line is just longer in length...not necessarily more illuminated. The length of the blue line will have the same ratio of brightness as you move along the blue line; you just get each amount of brightness for longer because the blue line itself is longer.

From the Ars Arcanum: The blue lines of iron-sight and steel-sight seem to hold a lot of information. For example, Oudeis provided evidence before that Ranette's use of iron may have given her the ability to identify other metals, simply using her ironsight. Maybe this is because she's an iron savant? With this in mind, what if there is more information to be gleaned about metals and their relationship to iron and steel sight? The Ars Arcanum quote above leads me to believe that the size of the blue line is directly correlated to the "size" of the metal source and that the brightness of the line depends on the "proximity" of the metal source. A lot of quotes from the original Mistborn trilogy seem to back this up. However...I've found inconsistencies in the quotes from the original trilogy AND I want to propose that the word "size" is incorrect. I'd argue that "mass" makes more sense instead and would fit better with Ranette's metal identification skills. This quote shows that proximity does in fact have an effect on the brightness/illumination of the blue lines. It reminds me of the Doppler Effect. As you move away from the metal sources the color dims like the sound of the waning Doppler Effect. We also have a mention of width, but nothing to the effect of size or mass. The next quote helps us here better. Here we see that the size of the metal dictates the thickness of lines. Seems pretty straightforward, and confirms the Ars Arcanum, right? The bold sentence (emphasis mine) contradicts the Ars Arcanum. The word "faint" should be replaced with "thin", because a size, small, is referenced afterwards. Here Kelsier is confusing the correlation of the illumination of the blue lines with what should instead be a description of the blue lines thickness. Either Kelsier is misinformed or Brandon made a mistake here. Whichever it is, this led me to think more about what the full description of the blue lines really means. There is plenty of evidence (which I won't quote here) throughout the books that shows that the illumination of the blue lines is indeed correlated with proximity. I have no problem with this observation by the author of the Ars Arcanum or the other characters in the book. However, I believe that interpreting thickness as "size" is incorrect. All the evidence in the book shows that proximity and illumination vary while the thickness of the blue lines never varies when an person is burning iron or steel and looking at their blue lines. At least, there is never a description of the thickness changing. This, to me, is because the mass of an object is fixed. Yes, size matters too, but it's more than that. It's quite common for size to be misinterpreted when commonly talking about mass. Here's how Wikipedia defines mass with regards to physics: Does this sound familiar? I think so. It sounds a lot like how the iron and steelsight actually works. When Vin is first testing out her steel push with Kelsier on the top of the Luthadel wall, she notices that there is a limit to how how high she can push. Her steel-line fades in color, but she never comments upon the thickness. This is because the mass of the coin doesn't change. It's fixed because of the metal the coin is made out of. But what would happen if she uses a coin with a higher mass? The "size" is the same, but the mass increases...would the thickness of the steel-line increase and thus allow Vin to push herself even higher? I'd argue yes. Let's think about this slightly differently. As we move down the periodic table of elements, each element has a higher atomic mass. Thus, the same number of atoms for gold, for example, will have a higher mass than the same number of atoms for iron. Now let's compare the same size unit for these metals: a cubic foot of iron weights 491 pounds while a cubic foot of gold weighs 1206 pounds. All because the mass of the atoms of the two elements is different. Would we really expect equal steel push strength on both of this slabs of metal? I'd argue no, because I think steel pushing specifically relates to the mass of the object you're pushing against. Thus size is irrelevant. But mass is important. Let's pretend Vin uses a gold coin instead of an iron coin to push herself. I'd argue that since the mass is different but the size is the same, she'd observe a thicker blue line AND be able to push her self higher. What implications does this have on the whole for Scadrial? Well, a weaker coinshot could artificially inflate their powers by using coins with a higher mass relative to a stronger coinshot using simple iron coins. Thus they'd appear to be stronger than they actually are, because everyone thinks steel pushing is all about size of the metal source instead of mass. This reminds me of arbitrage in finance. If someone were to discover this, they could take advantage of this information. Which brings us back to Oudeis' insight on Ranette's ability to determine which metals are what simply by using her ironsight. Is she identifying metals because of each metals unique mass as seen through the blue lines of her ironsight? Yes, if you ask me.

300 years is actually the perfect amount of time for the atium geodes to grow back, according to Kelsier. Here's a WoB where someone asks about atium and the AoL era books:

Welcome Seize! I'm sure you'll enjoy our little world here on the 17th Shard. Out of curiosity, what do you know about the Cosmere in general? Do you know why we're the 17th Shard? A lot of people find there way here because of Hoid... Technically, according to WoB, the names in Mistborn are supposed to be French sounding. For example, Kelsier in-world is pronounced "Kell-see-ay". However, Brandon himself says he pronounces them with an American accent.

A few points to make: crem is probably nutrient rich because it is probably derived from small rocks or sand or some other geological formation breaking down to very small particulate sizes due to all of the friction (and other forces that may be involved) when these geological items slam into each other when they are airborne or when they are pushed across the ground during a high storm or even when water slams into them over time from tidal forces. This is the basic tenants of erosion, and sand is created from all types of erosion. Rocks and minerals are inherently nutrient rich, so when they break down enough and the dust becomes airborne, you have the requisite nutrients in the air to make crem. The next ingredient for crem is most likely water. When highstorms, with their strong winds, come across the ocean from the Origin, they'll pick up moisture (by evaporating surface water, due to the high speeds of the wind) and thus they generate rain. When the rain falls through very, very fine layers of particulate matter, you'll get crem, which is equivalent to raining mud. In fact, this phenomenon exists on Earth. A year or two ago I was in Jordan during a dust storm when a rain storm slammed in from another direction. The result was mud falling from the sky because the water droplets picked up the fine dust as they fell. I'd never seen anything like this before. I have a feeling this real world phenomenon was what inspired Brandon's crem. Second, according to fluid dynamics (and yes, air is a fluid...fluids do not need to be liquid), you can determine the largest size a piece of particulate matter can be to remain airborne. The technical threshold derived for this is called the Reynold's Number. Without knowing the specifics of the physics involved with highstorms, if they are strong enough to pick up boulders and make them airborne temporarily, then the Reynold's number is surely high enough to keep sand and dust airborne for long periods of time. I would argue that it would even be possible to keep the same particle airborne for multiple trips around the planet. Now, it's highly unlikely though that the winds of a highstorm are strong enough that airborne boulders stay constantly airborne. My guess is they become airborne after being pushed off surfaces...kind of like what a ramp would be. Of course, gravity would be the more dominant force and that is why they eventually slam back to the ground. As a reference on our Earth, particulate matter from China (i.e. pollutants) blow all the way across the Pacific Ocean to America. Additionally, winds can be strong enough on earth for sand to become airborne as well: here is a picture of sand blowing off the coast of Africa heading towards the Canary islands, which is 60 miles away from the African coast: [Edit for grammar]

Hahaha. This is great. My Polish boss asked me recently to, as a joke, put a post-it note on my Polish office-mate's computer that read "dupa". Kupa and dupa are closely related. Is it just a coincidence that they rhyme? (I assume they rhyme.)

Kobold, have you ever played a Final Fantasy game, kupo? Moogles are these cute little characters that, if I recall correctly, first appeared in FFII, kupo. They've probably been in every game since, kupo. They are one of the best things about the series, kupo, if you ask me.

When you have the following SMS conversation with your mother who just finished Words of Radiance for the first time: Major WoR spoilers...

In addition to Shadows of Self, then shortly after followed up with purchases of Bands of Mourning and Calamity, right? I too will need this game! I can't wait to see what sort of Kickstarter exclusives are included when we can finally back this project! Maybe something along the lines of a collector's edition?