Dunkum

depends a lot on the kind of work, I suppose. for example, it is hard to imagine any allomantic power being particularly useful in say computer programming, but ferruchemical zinc could be, so perhaps the best for that would be zinc compounding. likewise if you are a professional gambler, the ability to compound luck would likely be more useful than anything else. in fact, i suspect that for a lot of jobs, being able to compound the most useful attribute for that work would probably be the most useful.

i'll echo the others that we don't have a definitive answer either way. I will note that I tend to agree with your interpretation until I learn otherwise. i've pretty much always assumed the forgettign was the boon

don't know if anyone saw this yet, but apparently Berlanti is looking at doing a Black Lightning show in addition to all the rest: http://www.avclub.com/article/greg-berlanti-making-another-dc-comics-superhero-s-242038

I dont have time to research it right now, but if memory serves, the point could just be orthogonal to the body right? not just up but down too, which would look like a downburst, I think. but most importantly, I think that for just a section of atmosphere where the highstorm is located, the theorem would not apply (pretty sure a vector field over a plane doesn't need the 0 point, and that a sufficiently small segment of a sphere is close enough to a plane for it to work there too)

I'll put this in a spoiler for good measure:

I'm not entirely certain that theorem applies here, since a highstorm does not cover the entire face of the planet. based on the descriptions in the book, the highstorm might be closer to a derecho than a hurricane, a massive straight line storm with little to no rotation. I suspect that normally something like that couldn't sustain itself crossing an entire continent (though the one that hit my area moved from ohio across the mountains and into the DC region, if memory serves, so maybe) but the highstorms a loaded with stormlight and so probably aren't exactly natural. alternatively: the stormwall is often described as the most damaging part, and the stormwall, for all intents and purposes, is always moving in one direction, so maybe there is rotation, but once the wall is passed, the rotating winds just aren't as damaging. who knows, I am not a meteorologist.

that was sort of the feeling I was getting, and while I do think it may be a more accurate portrayal of life and so forth, from the perspective of the reader (well, this reader anyway), it just isn't very satisfying. I still enjoyed the series overall, but I think this is a much bigger flaw (maybe not the right word...downside, lets say) than whatever people are talking about when they recommend that newcomers read gardens of the moon 2nd or 3rd.

I liked Malazan when I read it, it is definitely kind of dark, but I was OK with that. the one thing that bothered me about it was that I'm not sure how well it cohered into a single story. basically I felt that there were a bunch of character threads that kind of just dropped or were only barely addressed by the end of the series.

hmm, could have to do with the sources for the powers. ferruchemy is at least partially sourced in Ruin's power, and allomancy is purely preservation. whereas surgebinding is a mix of honor and cultivation (or potentially is, I am not sure we know this for certain). that still would mean that a full ferruchemist should exhibit something, though

i'll second that. also my favorite parts ended up being the weirder questions he included but did not even attempt to answer

related: we know from WOB that a bronze savant could theoretically detect other types of investiture use, but would that include a ferruchemist actively storing to a metalmind (or an awakener actively awakening an object) since it involves a net decrease in the person's investiture?

i don't think there was any specific mention of it, but I believe that Shadesmar as a concept is a bit more widely known (though I'd have trouble sorting through 2000 pages of SA books to find the quotes that lead me to think that), so it may be that others do see it. or it may be that they know of it for unrelated reasons.

my understanding is that he intends/intended to write a seventh book (makes sense really) called something like "Master Alvin" (a continuation of the apprentice and journeyman titles from earlier), but to the best of my knowledge he hasn't written it yet, and I have no idea how far along he might be.

ahh, yes, that is basically what I am going for.

well, that isn't quite true. Kelsier and vin discuss how the metals burn some in the original mistborn books. for example, we know that atium burns faster than other metals (though I didn't include it in my example because as a god metal it is playing by different rules), and that tin is one of the slowest burning metals and pewter burns pretty quickly, if pressed, I could go find quotes for those. but what we don't know is why, necessarily. is it because tin pulls in more investiture, or because pewter's effects require more investiture to work so the same amount last less time. that is definitely what I was going for. it doesn't seem like a particularly likely situation, but I was imagining something like a mistborn who has had a lot of other mistborn family members on their father's side of the family, say, and a bunch of pewterarms on the mother's side, and who ends up then being stronger with pewter (due to natural strength, not hemalurgy or anything else) than with any other metal.

a couple mistborn related questions: 1. is it possible for a mistborn to naturally be inherently stronger with one metal vs all the others, that is actually allomantically stronger, not just more skilled, and not because they are a savant with one metal? example: in mistborn, we know Vin was stronger with bronze than her other metals due to hemalurgy, but is it possible for someone to be born that way (or be that way as soon as they snap) without involving hemalurgy or any other such thing. 1a. related: if a misting were to burn a bead of lerasium, would they end up stronger in their original metal than all the others? ex if they started with allomantic strength x with their one metal, and 0 for all others, then burned lerasium so that they were at strength 1 for all the other metals, would they be at 1+x (give or take) with their initial metal? 2. does the same amount of different metals produce the same amount of investiture when burned? example: we know pewter burns pretty fast, and tin burns pretty slow, bit if a mistborn who is equally strong in both were to burn 1 gram each of tin and pewter, would they each produce the same amount of investiture?

in the original mistborn trilogy, they note that for allomantic purposes, the various alloys need to be pretty close to exact percentages of their component metals, so steel that is too much iron and not enough carbon would not be as good as whatever the right mix is (and it could even be harmful to burn it). I'd guess that atium alloys work along similar principles

yea, I mentioned him in my original comment. by other surgebinders, I mean more like Shallan or Lift

that was the main event I was thinking of when I said it, but I was looking for a more general way to phrase it that included the other times it happens too. Despite having just finished a reread a couple weeks ago, I don't remember if we ever see this effect with any of the other surgebinders (I think we do, but I'm not 100% sure)

I never understood the complaints against crossroads when path of daggers is right there. It is not a coincidence that my 3 least favorite books in the series happen to be the 3 where we don't get Mat's POV. but yes, things definitely pick back up with knife of dreams

Well one of the side effects of the surges that Szeth and Kaladin were using did involve frost forming. As far as I am aware it is unclear why that was happening, but if it is related to one of the windrunning surges, then they might be able to do it at will if they tried. I also wouldn't bet against some form of fabrial nor would I bet against an Aon, but I don't know that we have specifically seen either one having that effect.

there was also some kind of ban on the Justice League and Justice League Unlimited shows from using most of the characters associated with Batman. If memory serves, you get Bats himself, and the Joker shows up a couple times, but that is about it. really they should have just let the tv universe keep using the characters. deadshot was a pretty consistently good recurring character in Arrow, and while I didn't really like their Waller, the rest of task force x was generally pretty fun. though I think they are realizing their mistake here, since apparently superman is supposed to be showing up on supergirl next season (not sure that is necessarily a good thing, but it shows they might be rethinking that ban at least)

I don't really see that as ruining him, honestly. its actually more interesting that way, I think, since he does resist it in the end

maybe Awakening is a bit more end-positive than we've been lead to believe? it kind of holds for other awakened objects too, actually, if you think about it.

heh, that is how the back half of the Malazan series went for me. more because I was burnt out on reading by that point, but still