Landis963

Well, they will be fighting off the Set and their creepy, immortal masters. That's the sort of thing that becomes legend really really quickly, if it turns out to be flashy enough. The problem is that they don't have a lot of current fame to serve as a foundation for these legends. (Wayne, as mentioned, will fade into the background, Wax is known as a walking Roughian adventure story protagonist, Steris will undoubtedly be relegated to either "Girl Friday" or "Damsel in Distress" and never the twain shall meet, and Marasi has no such fame)

Perhaps, but recall the example of Calmseer. She Returned because she saw that her family would one day be threatened by the disease that killed her. That's as personal a motivation as one can get without dipping into greed. (Now if Endowment knew that one of Calmseer's descendants would be important somehow, and wanted to protect that line before illness snuffed it out, then the two agendas would coincide, would they not?)

With a bit of thought, one could probably point at a host of characters, in various and sundry works, that "could" be Hoid. The problem comes in when one needs to narrow the field. (At which point things like "It doesn't take place on Earth" become very important)

Something I saw on the Cosmere Q&A sparked this idea. The general process of Returning works thusly: A person dies, their soul is shown a picture of some bad future (or at least some facet of it that they care about), and then the soul is given the choice of whether or not to Return. If they accept, they gain a Divine Breath and Return as a 5th-Heightening amnesiac that needs an additional Breath each week. However, there's something odd going on. Why do the memories not return when the person does? If it were the actual soul (or rather, the Cognitive and Spiritual aspects of that person) returning, the memories they had would come with them (as part of the Cognitive aspect of that soul). This is very much not the case (as it would severely simplify and obviate the major mystery of Lightsong's character, among others), but what is interesting is that muscle memory is maintained (juggling vs. pottery, for example), attitudes are maintained (Lightsong instinctually rebelling against the gods' lifestyle, instinctually calling Llarimar "Scoot"), but not memory. My conclusion is that the Returned is not the original soul but is instead a Divine Breath in the shape of the original soul. The spiritual Connections remain in place, and the Physical body of course has not moved during the process of Returning, but the Cognitive is absent entirely. The process of Returning, therefore, is a "half as long, twice as bright" version of making a Lifeless, that only Endowment can do because She can see into all 3 realms. What happens to the soul? I suspect that this shaping forges a Connection between the soul and the body, and therefore the soul sticks around as a Cognitive Shadow, watching their body work toward the goal set by Endowment's Awakening. (Maybe that's why the Returned needs so much Breath - it's all going to sustain the original soul in the Cognitive Realm)

Also relevant: First of the Sun (Setting of Sixth of the Dusk) has no Shard, but it does have a perpendicularity. (Patji's Eye, where all minds are absent and the Aviar worms gain talents to bestow upon hosts)

I still think all the conclusions we came to are valid (minus of course the ones involving the movies, which are set on Earth, etc. etc.). Of course, this is coming from a relative MLP layman with passable google-fu and access to TV tropes, but still.

They seem to be the best exemplars of the powers in question, yes.

The Threads have most of it, but here's the Cliffsnotes version: F-Steel, in addition to granting physical superspeed, also grants enhanced reaction time. I believe there is also some physics cheating that happens so that, say, friction doesn't burn you, your shoes, the floor, etc. F-Zinc, speeds your mental thought processes but only your mental thought processes; can't get twitch timing from F-Zinc, but can analyze every possible outcome of, say, a chess scenario in an instant. Also aids in making mental leaps ("Turns you into Ken Jennings" I believe is the WoB). If they were onscreen, it would be a similar bullet-time effect, but F-Steel would be the character moving at normal speed during the effect, and F-Zinc would be the character inner-monologuing at normal speed during the effect.

@FeatherWriter, what is the next read going to be?

Hurt Surgebinding Heal Rithmatics 7. Surgebinding -4 15. Rithmatics, 81

Wasn't Szeth also confirmed as a recipient of the visions? Or is that just speculation?

Animation rotoscoped over clips from the movie version of TFE, I'd say. (Because I have a lot of trouble thinking of a situation where SH is adapted before TFE is) Helping sell the fact that Kelsier isn't a full-fledged human anymore.

Usually (unless the author's making some kind of point about conservative hypocrisy, or doesn't want to ascribe that kind of morality to their magic) Dark type magics are geared toward hurting oneself and others, while light type magics are geared toward helping oneself and others. This is a huge generalization, but that's how it usually goes in high fantasy works that are looking to cut a few corners in their worldbuilding (say, to make good gameplay and come in on schedule and under budget - looking at you, Warcraft).

I was actually wondering something about that system: How should the powers be selected? There are two ways I can go: I can have the color of the glass choose the power (which indirectly makes the dust system much more difficult to whip into line with the scientific method, among other complaints) or I can have the shape of the molecule make the power (which makes the dust easier, but makes the beads much more difficult to use: Say, a bead of Antimony glass produces a fog bank, and a bead of Tin glass encases an AoE in solid air, but since both produce white-colored glass, they are very difficult to distinguish at a glance) Other noteworthy pros/cons: The latter means I need to come up with 15 distinct powers for these beads to use (one of which I know is teleportation), the former means I need to choose whether or not variations on color (say, cobalt blue vs. copper blue) alter the power somehow, and if so, what rules do they follow? EDIT: Careful consideration leads me to the conclusion that it's easier for me to remember if there's a scale of focus, and the darker the color the more focused the effect. Which means those teleport beads need to be created at a very specific level of opacity to work on a sapient being.

Heal Rithmatics, Hurt Feruchemy. 2. Feruchemy- 25 7. Surgebinding- 31 15. Rithmatics- 29 Edit: I'm just sad I didn't get here in time to say that "Oculator Stuff" is Silimatic Technology.

Unfortunately, we won't know for certain until Dragonsteel is concluded. But if this gets proven in the 10+ years necessary for that to happen, ha, I win, and you heard it here first.

Because Stormlight is Investiture, and Investiture can act like matter in some ways and act like magic in others. In this case, something about the cut of the gem allows it to absorb Stormlight.

Not necessarily. The Connection has to come from somewhere, and if Rayse allowed his hatred for Adonalsium to define him, then that would be all the connection he'd need to strip "Hatred" away from the rest of God's corpse. The second letter only states that Adonalsium had hatred in addition to "the virtues that gave it context." (Please correct if the quote isn't exact)

Oh. I was wondering why his hairstyle looked so similar to the title character's. Anyway, now the system has ballooned a bit, and gained a precursor in a magic system regarding ground crystals that would be blown at an enemy to produce effects (the beads would be a concentrated and standardized, for lack of a better term, version of this system).

I'm detecting a disconnect between what I think my magic system does, and what my description says my magic system does. First off, this particular application (even if it does sound like a story-worthy power) would not work as intended, I don't think. You would only be able to do this once for each object (as the crystal used to power the teleportation moves to the object's previous location) and would need to travel to the previous location physically in order to retrieve the bead, or would need another person on the other end to activate the spell to return the object to its previous place of rest, and there might be some glitches with the object's center of gravity moving to where the crystal was. You would be tightly gripping the sword by the blade when it arrived (ouch), and you could only transport one coin or bill with the beads. In addition, I don't plan on adding any sort of quantum-entanglement to the magic (although it's good to consider). The boulder-drop trick is actually possible, under the current paradigm. However, it would be much less practical than you suggest, as it involves 1) throwing the bead with pinpoint accuracy such that the boulder actually lands on the target (I picture the jump such that any forces on a bead (gravity, momentum, etc.) are transferred to the target (unchanged by conservation of momentum ) after a jump), and 2) getting an ally to send the bead back once the boulder has come to a stop (or worse, having to traipse back home to teleport the boulder back and then traipse back to the scene of the crime in order to retrieve the bead) Back to details about the magic: I'm currently thinking that the beads and the powders have the same powerset, only concentrated and more predictable (ETA: and a bit more specialized as well, now I think on it). Which then leads me to the realization that the sand version of the teleport power was not "teleportation" to its users (which would cast by blowing a cloud of it at a target), but would probably function more like "banishing" or Harry Potter's Evanesco. The teleporting ne'er do well could in fact be a new development in the study of this magic (which still needs a name, because names are the bane of my existence when writing). In addition, the "powders" (which would be added to the glassblowing process to color the beads, which in turn would define what the bead in question can do) are metal oxides, which means the dust-blowing mages must be from an area with plentiful metal resources. Note that the color of the bead, and not the metal structure, dictates the power, admittedly taking another cue from the Polestones (a Uranium Oxide green, for instance, would differ in effect from a Copper oxide green, and both would be different from Uranium oxide yellow).

I assure you, the concept was developed before my connecting it to Szeth, and I just used that as an easy way to describe it. I still think the coolest hook would be showing the magic from the outside first, though (so, unlike Szeth, heh). Maybe the POV of a police squad of some sort, tracking a cat burglar who uses the beads as a getaway? Requires further thought. A bit of consideration has led me to the idea that the beads are a special kind of silicate glass, which have the peculiar property that when forged, their insides stay liquid (if highly viscous) until annealed by magic (yes, this is a nod to the old saw about glass being a highly viscous liquid, why do you ask?). "Attuning" a bead is therefore a matter of telling it what you want it to do, and it will do that when you activate it. Crafters can tell what kind of sand to use by the fact that it glows when exposed to moonlight. In another part of the world, they might have another magic system where powders of different varieties might produce different effects when blown. Putting the two together (and I'm not sure what the glowy sand would do on its own) would give you the teleport beads and their ilk. Which means I have at least two commodities to base an economy around.

I just did, and wow, I see what you mean. I looked him up, and started watching his fights for examples of how the demonstrator would act in a scene. Luckily, I hit on Minato's fight scene vs. the Raikage, which happens to include him throwing a whole mess of kunai to use as teleportation targets, just like my system was designed. However, some minor differences: When the assassin teleports to one of his knives, the knife is teleported to his former location, so he can't immediately use it for assault purposes. Also, Minato frequently teleports to some place in the vicinity of his knives (or rather the TP spell bound to them), which does not work if the crystals are being swapped for the characters' center of gravity. Last, (and this last really makes him OP) he can place a teleport spell on anything with long enough contact, meaning that given a long enough engagement the enemy is a valid target for teleportation. And given that the "engagements" in question (vs. Raikage, and the flashback one vs. Kakashi) were, at best, a few seconds long, I can see why he is so widely feared.

Assuming, of course, that Autonomy survives the events of the White Sand trilogy (because it is, I believe, set to be a trilogy).

"Devil Went Down to Georgia," eat your heart out. Especially if you make the magic good in a solo context, in addition to orchestral. Anyway, I was recently struck by inspiration for a magic system, but it suffers from being the barest sketch of concept. The basis is that there is a special kind of crystal bead that can be attuned to a person. Something about the crystals determines what sort of magic it can produce. My original thought is that one of the powers on offer is a sort of teleportation: A charged bead can exchange places with its attuned user (For simplicity's sake, I'm assuming that the bead in question marks where the incoming user's center of gravity will be after the jump, and the user's center of gravity pre-jump is where the crystal moves to). This would be demonstrated in a Szethian scene where an assassin or fighter has a whole bunch of throwing knifes, with these stones in them somehow, and uses the jumps (note to self: get a better name for the teleport) to gain height/speed/distance on his pursuers.

I've just thought of a magic system, wherein a specific type of crystal can be attuned to a person such that with the right activator, they can teleport to the exact position of the bead, with the bead itself teleporting to where the caster used to be. This would be demonstrated (to begin with) in a Szeth-ian assassination attempt of some bigwig or other, with the assassin in question having a bunch of small throwing daggers that he would jump to in order to gain distance/height/speed on his enemies. Which raises the question: Should there be other powers, and how do I distance these crystalline beads from the polestones?