Deus Ex Biotica

I the same thing as happens when any other fast-moving object passes into the bubble: it enters the frame of reference of those inside. It cannot move fast (the train parts around it hold it in place), and it's not sheared in half (not any more than Wax and Marasi are when they pass through), but you could open windows one by one, or write elaborate graffiti, or what have you. -- Deus Ex Biotica P.S. Personally, I wonder why bullets get deflected going out, but not coming in.

Hey, Aiken, did you know that the weakness is due to Ruin, not the Lord Ruler? Deep stuff, man.

Hey, lots of math got done without a symbol for zero. It happens.

Actually, the Skaa were quite willing to run back to the nobility when things got bad and confusing back in the Mistborn trilogy, too, but they were raised under that system. By this point, that is no longer true. To be fair, Western Expansion allowed for the rise of the robber baron, with train moguls, mining companies, and, of course, John D. Rockefeller getting on top of developing markets and exploiting them. It might stretch credibility a little to assume that in Alloy of Law, these entrepreneurs are invariably in the nobility (the opposite happened in America), but then, maybe that's not true - Steris mentions that her family is filthy rich but not respected by the nobility, and her father has much rougher manners than most nobles, so they seem like the Noveau Riche to me. As for expansion outside the Basin, as I mentioned above, are there any natural resources out there? At all? It's not clear. In any event, I am not trying to critique the worldbuilding of the Alloy Of Law, just to understand what has been built. -- Deus Ex Biotica

Maybe, but he had access to a ton of it, if he wanted to. He might have smuggled quite a few beads to himself, even if most of them never left the pits.

Side note: in previous posts, I have assumed tyhat Copperclouds could block Hemalurgy, but I have increasingly realized that this makes little sense. The Lord Ruler, and then Ruin, kept control of the Inquisitors quite absolutely. As such, the back door seems to be something which transcends even Allomancy - I wonder if AonDor would also be able to exploit it.

The Alloy Of Law is unique among Sanderson books I have read so far, in that it at no point involves a massive social upheaval (though Miles, at least, wants one). As such, we know less about the society it takes place in than his other works. The purpose of this Thread is to guess everything we can about the world in which Alloy Of Law is set. Here is what I have speculated thus far: * Other than the mysterious "sea people" and Terris, all of known humanity seems to be roughly one nation. I suppose they were together for 1,000 years, but on the other hand, that was 340+ years ago. One assumes that the "Faceless Immortals" have been manipulating society to avoid war, but even so, this is impressive. * As such, the name of the country is never mentioned. * The government appears to be some sort of democracy, but there are still noble Houses, and those Houses are allowed to maintain standing armies, and sometimes have "skirmishes" with one another. * Those Houses are, in fact, so isolated from the general public that Allomancy is still notably more common among them. * House names include: Ladrian, Cett, Yomen, Tekiel. * The Roughs are nominally under the authority of the central government, but a band of Koloss can destroy entire towns without reprisal. One wonders why people even go out there - it sounds like bad farmland, nobody talks about any valuable mines beyond the mountains which ring the Elendel Basin, and there is no indication of cattle trains or other major sources of revenue being brought into the Basin from the Roughs. As far as I can tell, they don't run train tracks or canals there, either. * There are labor unions, and the Houses clash with them. * There are at least four major religions: Sliverism, Survivorism, Trellism, and The Path. Wax's descriptions of The Path imply that rather fewer than all 300 of Sazed's religions are practiced on a large scale, though a few others might be. * Despite the Basin being some 350 miles across, with something like 40 notable cities, everyone calls Elendel "The City," and it seems to be the center of commerce and social interaction - Wax and Marasi might just be prejudiced, but Ranette doing the same seems telling. * Terris seems to be isolationist, still experts in Feruchemy, and still training elite personal servants (since Tillaume is described as being trained in the Terris style). We do not hear about any particular stigma against Terrismen, or Koloss-blooded for that matter, but since they are the only ethnic groups we know, I have been assuming there is some among those less enlightened than Wax. * Electricity is new, steam power is somewhat accepted. The canals are still used extensively. * Gold and Aluminum are among the most valuable metals. I did not find a reference to what the coinage is called (presumably, not "Boxings," but I may have missed something. Please, contribute anything I missed, and your own speculation! -- Deus Ex Biotica

I wondered about the idea of a minor house having a pair of Mistborn at once - couldn't they just announce they'd had one, and try to marry into a Great House since their Allomancy genes are clearly superb? On the other hand, I really have no idea how many Mistborn there were during The Final Empire. Assuming that punk Vin took out before fighting Shan Elariel really was a Mistborn (and not just a Coinshot wearing a Mistcloak as a decoy), at least one House had two of them in the city, and was willing to commit both at once. Since most of the Mistborn die offscreen in the house wars between books one and two, it is really hard to judge, and I can understand an RPG rounding up. -- Deus Ex Biotica

I missed that - thanks!

Also, I think all the reindeer need Bronzeminds, to avoid combusting when the speedbubbles drop. This isn't an issue for Wayne, but he's not going nearly as fast as they are.

The Pewter/Gold combo has come up several times, though I just started wondering what it would mean for Savants yesterday night. Personally, I don't think it would stop you from becoming one - whatever it does to keep your body whole when you're tapping, it does just as much to make you get messed up faster when you're filling (and does physical health even relate to Savant-ness? If it did, would Pewter Savants ever exist?), but I do think that, by tapping your Goldmind, you could spend some time without the pain of being a Tin savant or the numbness of being a Pewter one, asyour body briefly returns to normal functioning. Working on NPCs for an Alloy of Law-era setting last night, I thought of a really neat pairing for a shotgun messenger: Allomantic Tin, Feruchemical Steel. So, he'd spend most of his day in the seat of a wagon, barely moving (and filling his Steelminds), but burning Tin so that he'd know well in advance if there was trouble. Then, whenever he did have to act quickly, he'd immediately begin tapping Speed to deal with quickly and efficiently. -- Deus Ex Biotica

The weakness against emotional Allomancy is inherent in Hemalurgy - Sazed confirms as much in one of the Hero Of Ages epigraphs.

As far as we know, Atium can steal any one power (Q&A sessions), the twelve pieces of Lerasium were too valuable to waste (Sazed), and the bracers were, indeed Hemalurgic spikes (Brandonthology). Of those, Sazed's notes are the only uncertain source. That said, if he really wanted a lot of Hemalurgic power, each bracer could have been made of several smaller spikes - if they spent very little time outside the bodies of their victims, it could have still worked.

This. The Investure theory is cool and makes some sense, but I really wish people would stop treating it as canon. And, personally, I do not believe that the Lord Ruler even knew about Chromim and Nicrosil, otherwise they would have been in his supply caverns as the ultimate anti-Inquisitor weapon.

Was he? Alendi was a Misting (a Seeker), but I never had reason to assume that Rashek was anything more than a Feruchemist. He might be stronger than usual since he touched Preservation directly at one point, and certain is because of his long practice, and access to otherwise-unknown metals.

Mistborn Annotations, Chapter 36, Part III: "I figured it would make sense that the Lord Ruler would be so old, so experienced, and so powerful that he wouldn't be able to be lied to. He's been around people for centuries and centuries. It's very hard to fool him."

Sure, go ahead and ruin my disturbing Christmas imagery with your logic. You get to murder almost 100 people to make your Reindeer, but I can't even have a few sentient Feruchemical heads dropping down chimneys. I see how it is. And, yeah, I considered that he could store Strength to get thinner (why does Strength alter musclemass, but Weight does not affect density?), but there's a hard limit on how much you can shrink (your skeleton), and almost none for how much you can dismember. I also have a theory for how he gets in if there's no chimney at all, which could also explain how he gets into other houses. He throws up a speed bubble (probably augmented by the nearest couple of Reindeer), taps his Copperminds for perfect knowledge of architecture and engineering, burns pewter, and then quickly dismantles a section of roof, builds a chimney of the proper size out of a supply of stone kept on the sleight for this purpose (he likes chimneys, alright?), and then goes down and does his work. -- Deus Ex Biotica

But how was Ruin wheedling at Rashek, if Rashek had not been spiked in the first place?

Lerasium is "a metal that anyone can burn." Apparently it has a function other than giving people Allomancy (or increasing the Allomancy of those who already have it), but we do not know what this is. Atium being usable in Preservation's arts raises some interesting questions. I think it is because, ultimately, both come from Andalsium. In any event, it implies that Lerasium could be used to make spikes. What these spikes would steal is unknown, though stealing the other person's connection to Preservation as a whole (and, thus, all the powers of a Mistborn at once) seems like a solid bet to me. -- Deus Ex Biotica

The annotations mention that he's a smart Tineye who's 1,000 years old, and it making perfect sense to Brandon Sanderson that someone like this is impossible to fool. That said, he knew of the existence of Aluminum and Duralumin (and Electrum), so it is quite likely that he tried using them as Metalminds. -- Deus Ex Biotica

And remember, this is Marsh. A man so socially awkward, he made Vin look talkative when he trained her, and so set in his ways, he hasn't learned subtlety with emotional Allomancy after 300 years. When he has a secret meeting to swap info with a stranger, he goes out of his way to mention, as a side note, that he doesn't really agree with God. He is not well-suited to bringing calm and reassurance. Honestly, I'm not certain he would have spoken with Spook even once before sauntering off to lurk at the edges of society, playing Hemalurgic Batman. -- Deus Ex Biotica P.S. Yes, Marsh is one of my favorite Mistborn characters.

Simplicity itself: he puts on earrings made of Gold, Aluminum, Steel, Cadmium, and Bendalloy (all filled with heavily Compounded amounts of their respective properties. Then, tapping all of those except Gold and Aluminum, he quickly dismembers himself, making sure all the pieces fall down the chimney. His head falls last, still alive due to the oxygen and nourishment he is drawing from the Cadmium and Bendalloy Metalminds. Once his body is all in a pile in your fireplace, he taps the Goldmind to heal back into a working body (his bright red outfit will hide the bloodstains on him), and he can burn Bendalloy to create a speedbubble and clean up the mess in the fireplace*. After that, he eats and milk and/or cookies available (good children make Bendalloy cookies for The Lord Santa), and sets out the presents for the good girls and boys. People tend to not notice him even if they are watching, since he fills his Aluminummind at 100% during all of this, but if the do notice, he immediately taps it fully, soon giving them to know that they've nothing to dread. Finally he goes back into the fireplace and, laying a finger aside of his nose, throws up a new speedbubble, dismembers himself again (this time, he Steelpushes the pieces up using various bits of his jewelry wrapped around them, and then Lurches his head up at the end), re-assembles on the rooftop, and goes to the next house. Merry Christmas to all! -- Deus Ex Biotica * Did your parents ever tell you to stop looking through the ashes in the chimney for Santa's footprints? It was because one of them had found there as a child, and was trying to spare you the trauma.

Very interesting, and somewhat plausible. I shall need a little longer to muse on this before a list of reasons why I agree/disagree, but I really like the concept.

Miles' inner monologue does, indeed, note that old age is the form of death his power cannot prevent (though, personally, I suspect that decapitation and the like might work, too). This is one of the reasons I presumed that Gold Compounding does not grant immortality, and tried to explain this fact with conjecture.

It seems to me that, for the purposes of Mistborn, "age" must be an actual, measurable factor distinct from years lived or lifestyle choices. Why? Because Ferruchemists store Age. In theory, if age worked like it does in our world, then they could begin in a safe, indoor environment with adequate food, and doing solid but low-impact exercise, store 20 years, and still be in a good position to continue working out this way, because they have been staying in shape the whole time they aged. Ha! But it doesn't seem to work like that. Blame Ruin's touch on humanity if you must, but age has a strictly quantifiable cost to Ferruchemists storing it, and (we may assume) everyone else as well. As such, a Gold Compounder might bypass the need to eat, sleep, or breathe (Take that, Bronze, Cadmium, and Bendalloy Ferrings!), but it cannot bypass the body's aging - this is something which transcends health, and enters into the nature of humanity itself. Otherwise, the Lord Ruler died because he just randomly decided to regulate his age in an infinitely more difficult and less effective manner, for 1000 years. -- Deus Ex Biotica