KidWayne

My bane was the last third of Calculus 2 where you had to do series. I just didn't see the patterns the way some others seemed to have the ability to see. I maintain that the capability to express patterns as equations requires a level of abstract thought that should be regarded as a talent; I'm honestly not sure if mastery of that skill can be taught. I mean sure, if you made me do hours of these kinds of problems for several weeks, I could probably develop a basic competency; however, like musical talent, I don't think practice session grinding will ever produce a more-than-mediocre equation writer or musician. Also arcs drove me nuts. I could NOT grasp (still can't really) how an arc can be the same length as a line connecting two points. I remember getting so stuck on this that couldn't pay attention past that point to hear the rest of the lecture. It just contradicted the maxim of "the shortest distance between two points is a straight line." Any of you math geniuses able to offer a better explanation (of how an arc connecting two points can be the same length as a straight line connecting those same points) than, "Well, arcs can be the same length. That's just the way it is."?

Yeah, it's an option, but we would still need permission. For the same reason that you can't just go out and sell mickey mouse dolls you made in your garage (without being sued by Disney), you can't make merchandise without the intellectual property owner's consent. If December rolls around and I haven't heard anything, I'll try to touch base with Team Sanderson some other way.

Voidus is the "first lurker of the Dark Alley" he has a link in his signature that points to the post that coined the Dark Alley stuff. The link is under the spoiler tag below.

This is adapted from another post, but I feel like it's applicable. It's not a perfect example, but the metal in Allomancy is close to the way we think of gasoline in a car. The gas doesn't make the car go by itself. Instead, it releases the power of combustion when it comes into contact with fire (i.e. the spark from a spark plug). That combustion (i.e. small explosion contained within your engine cylinder) pushes the piston head down which turns a rod (crank shaft), which turns the differential gears in your transmission, which turns your car's axles, which turns the wheels. So, metal unlocks the power of Preservation in the same way that gas unlocks the power that drives your car. The metal is like the gas, an allomancer is like the engine, and the allomantic magic is like the machine that is attached to the engine (in this case that would be everything in the car except the engine). The way that both allomancy and combustion engines express their power can vary. I'm going to assume we all know about Allomancy's 16+ expressions of power. You could say that allomancers channel Preservation's power to ... and proceed to list each of the 16 allomantic metals and what allomancers can do with them. You can do something similar with internal combustion engines ("ICEs"). For instance, combustion engines can spin things attached to a rod which can power a machine that is able to... ◘ cut things ◘ turn wheels, screws, and blades ◘ push things by combining gears with wheels or screws ◘ pump fluids ◘ fly ◘ clean ◘ transport people and other physical goods ◘ construct a building ◘ create electricity by spinning a magnet, and ... ◘ power anything that runs on electricity Basically, ICEs can be used replicate or approximate all of the physical allomantic powers (tin is hard, but we can make electric powered machines that enhance most senses and electricity can be created with an ICE). The mental metals are a little iffy. ICEs provide physical power; however, electricity - derived from chemical sources - is what powers our brains. Since we haven't figured out how to consistently manipulate the brains of others by electrically stimulating their brains, I guess I can't make the argument that we can approximate Zinc & Brass. Also, Copper & Bronze are a little meta in the sense that they hide and detect allomancy. I'm not sure whether or not we have tech that hides or detects an object's use of electricity, unless you consider a voltmeter to be an electricity detector and insulation to be "tech" that hides electricity. I've made an attempt to illustrate my 'Allomancy Engine' below. I even included a shutter valve to allow for the various ways allomancy usually consumes metal (regular, flare, and duralumin). Also, there's this WoB: "One thing I did get a question on today, ... is understanding the tie between Aondor [the magic system from Elantris] and allomancy [Mistborn’s magic system]. People ask about getting the power from metals and things, but that’s not actually how it works. The power’s not coming from metal. I talked a little about this before, but you are drawing power from some source, and the metal is actually just a gateway. It’s actually the molecular structure of the metal… what’s going on there, the pattern, the resonance of that metal works in the same way as an Aon does in Elantris. It filters the power. So it is just a sign of 'this is what power this energy is going to be shaped into and give you.'"

Yeah, I think that a lot of new rules that come out later in a series like, "coating a hemalurgic spike in blood prevents hemalurgic decay..." are literary devices used by authors as a means of expediency more than they are intended to be consistent with the way the magic system worked when the author originally conceived it. Wheel of Time spoiler: In this case, Brandon can make up a new rule like this and explain it away as, "Well, Bleeder's coat-the-spike-in-blood trick did preserve a great deal of the hemalurgic charge, but it was less effective than the Steel Ministry's method of driving the spike through the victim and into the recipient directly." Less effective is still pretty good in this case. Not that I'm saying either Robert Jordan or Brandon Sanderson are bad authors or that their work is tainted by poor planning. Sometimes story tellers have to tweak and bend their own rules in order to accommodate the really good ideas that come to them as the story progresses or to make the story less predictable. This tends to happen more often with stand-alone stories that leave the door open for sequels. The author feels the need to end the story in book one, but wants to leave door cracked. That is certainly what happened with Mistborn.

I think this has some merit, but I would amend your metaphorical example a bit. Imagine a PVC pipe, capped on both ends, in a vacuum. The pipe is filled by metals, since metal unlocks preservation's power and is consumed in the process. Both ends of the pipe are usually closed; however, when either side is opened, the metaphorical vacuum sucks out the metal/power. You seem to say that the "push" side is the normative exit point; however, when aluminum is used, the "pull" side is opened instead causing the metal/power to burn away uselessly. I've tried to illustrate this below. I even included a shutter valve to allow for the various ways allomancy usually consumes metal (regular, flare, and duralumin). This helps accommodate what you call stretching the tube. It's not a perfect example, but it's close to the way we think of gasoline in a car. The gas doesn't make the car go by itself. Instead, it releases the power of combustion when it comes into contact with fire (i.e. the spark from a spark plug). That combustion (i.e. small explosion contained within your engine cylinder) pushes the piston head down which turns a rod (cam shaft), which turns the differential gears in your transmission, which turns your car's axles, which turns the wheels. So, an allomancer is like the car and the metal is like the gas. It seems to me that aluminum simply renders all the other metals inert. That makes more sense to me than having aluminum burn the metal in a way that pulls the the power away so that provides no benefit to the allomancer. To go back to the car example, it makes more sense for the aluminum to render the other metals inert (like putting Bromotrifluoromethane/Halon in your gas tank which would not allow the gasoline to ignite) and then it releases all the now useless metal stores in the same way that duralumin does (i.e. very quickly). Aluminum would better be explained by a comparison to a wet blanket thrown over a pile of dry wood. It makes the most sense for a Leecher/Chromium user to impose an extinguishing force/agent on another allomancer instead of actually burning the other allomancer's metals. That's just my opinion though. This is a good theory. It got me thinking about how this could work. Although, a cynical part of me thinks that all of this works in whatever way Brandon needs it to work in order to fit the story he's trying to tell. Somehow I doubt there is a unfied theory of alomancy that will make this all work in a way that follows consistent principals.

Doesn't the "though broth are we, their meat is men" line from one of their songs kind of debunk this? Also, they call themselves Listeners, not singers. I take that to mean that "good" spren will not bond with Parshendi when humans are available. So, to make this theory work... maybe at one time in the distant past you had Parshendi bonding power-giving spren. However, now that humans are available, the spren spurned the Parshendi. So, now a bitter and betrayed people turns to a new god (Odium) or gods (the Unmade) who is/are willing to restore the glory and power of the Parshendi with hate-spren.

@ natc The short and simple "crazy" theories are my favorite. I love this idea. Nightblood would be a perfect fit for a "Justice" shard if one exists. Maybe a reforged Devotion if it doesn't; the thing is nothing if not devoted to "destroying evil."

I'm going to give Peter a little while to respond. I don't want to be pushy, I just want to do as much as I can to make this happen without being annoying to anyone.

I really like this idea. I thought about the surges in the middle too. It's actually something that has been bothering me since I first took a good look at the surge chart (not because there weren't 16, but because the two in the middle just seemed out of place).Stormlight Archive spoilers:

@ Unite Them You shouldn't have taken that cookie, dude. Finish Mistborn, then come back and do a forum search for "the Dark Alley." After that, you'll better understand Kipper's maniacal laughter. I don't know whether to praise or scold Kipper for picking on the new guy like that. It was impressively underhanded; I mean the new guy was all, "Thanks for the cookie, mate! Have a beer." That's cold-blooded, Kipper. WARNING for Unite Them: Be sure to finish all three Mistborn books before looking up the dark alley, you'll spoil some pretty major plot details if you check it out before you finish the books.

Well, I sent a PM to Mr. Alstrom on 11/03/2015 with a sincere business proposal. I laid out potential manufacturers, break-even points, as well as potential costs & profits. More to the point, I offered to lend Team Sanderson as much of my personal labor and professional expertise (as an accountant and business consultant) as they are willing to accept for free***. *** Just in case someone important reads this post, I am going to qualify the "for free" part a little. I can offer my expertise and a good chunk of time for free, but my wife would kill me if I made an ongoing/long-term offer of free labor. So I'm offering to help get this off the ground for free, but I would ask for modest compensation if I were asked to personally run the entire supply chain from manufacture to distribution (which is a service I am confident that I would be able to provide; I just assumed that Brandon already had some kind of distribution system in place since he runs the store on his website).

Thanks Kipper! That was my problem, I couldn't figure out how to go about finding games to sign up for.

So, I've noticed several members have RPG game results in their signatures. Some of them sound pretty fun. I checked out the Forums → Community → Role-Playing boards, but it was not at all clear how someone would go about finding a game to join that wasn't already in progress. Anyone have any tips for how to get started? Thanks!

@ Cadmium Uh... Both? OK, you caught me. I meant immortal, but my ego insists that I point out both words kind of work in this case.

I really enjoyed the maths I took in my undergrad attempt at an aerospace engineering major (really, I did). It was the calculus-based physics that got me in my Dynamics class. I did college in the mid 2000's and they were just starting to allow the internet to affect the format of some classes. My Dynamics class was one of those, you had to watch the lectures online, take a quiz based on the lecture, and then do 3+ hours of homework (I'm pretty sure it was a Monday, Wednesday, Friday class). Anyway, I did college 7 hours away from my parents house, so I had to work to pay rent. Let's just say that when you have to work a job for 25 - 30 hours a week, take a full course load of other engineering classes, and deal with a weed-out course that is assigning a minimum of 12 hours of work each week (outside of class), something is going to go wrong. Try it, and you too can turn in a 4 question final emblazoned with the statement, "I give up. See you this summer." Oh and you might also end up majoring in accounting when you realize that you were terrible at force equations that you have to turn around and integrate. It was usually a pretty good indication that I was on the wrong track of a 'conservation of angular momentum' problem when the integral of my force equation required abstract algebra to solve.

August 3rd is "Civic Holiday" in Canada!

Stuff like that is why some kind person made this: https://www.donotcall.gov If you're feeling litigious...

I liked the premise of the show, but found each of the points you bring up annoying as well. The part that kept getting on my nerves was how people were dying left and right, but none of the main characters ever seemed to die despite falling missiles, getting sucked into the vacuum of space, or being shot by poison-tipped arrows. That is to say, all of the teenagers manage to stay alive, despite being subject to mortal wounds and/or impossible-to-survive situations. Spoilers for season 1 of The 100:

Well, there's a saying that goes something like, "The Lord giveth the and the Lord taketh away." The "Lord giveth" part sounds like endowment/blessing. My best guess for the "taketh away" part would be: • forfeiture • punishment / wrath (would go well with Odium, but I'm pretty sure Devotion is his intended opposite) • seizure (not the medical kind) • surrender • submission • confiscation • withdrawal • destitution / poverty • antagonistization • theft • the opposite of "He who adds" EDIT: Here's one more I thought of while pondering the opposite of love/devotion: Jealousy/Envy Some of these obviously don't work very well as attributes of a capital "G" God (e.g. theft, antagonistization, & poverty), but jealousy is an attribute that the "Old Testament" of the Bible frequently uses to describe God.

Snickerdoodles?

From another post that I probably should have posted here: I just finished watching season 2 of The 100 on Netflix last night. So, when I read Kythis's comment that begins with, "Speaking of Hemalurgy, with its ability to steal other powers..." I had a mini-PTSD flashback. Seriously, harvesting stuff from humans is just plain evil. Dalinar needs to export his philosophy on avoiding evil/dishonorable means to accomplish goals for the greater good to Scadrial before things get messy. To all you "Dark Alley" folks, go watch The 100. Season 2 is basically all about what happens when someone turns the lights on in the dark alley, and it ain't pretty. At least The 100 takes the moral ambiguity away from the ultimate goal (all of the major players are just trying to figure out a way to survive). I'm starting to wonder how Sazed will be able to allow hemalurgy - a power under his control - to be used to slaughter so many innocents and/or good guys without turning into a bad guy himself.

This is off topic (sorry), but I just finished watching season 2 of The 100 on Netflix last night. So, when I read Kythis's comment that begins with, "Speaking of Hemalurgy, with its ability to steal other powers..." I had a mini-PTSD flashback. Seriously, harvesting stuff from humans is just plain evil. Dalinar needs to export his philosophy on avoiding evil/dishonorable means to accomplish goals for the greater good to Scadrial before things get messy. To all you "Dark Alley" folks, go watch The 100. Season 2 is basically all about what happens when someone turns the lights on in the dark alley, and it ain't pretty. At least The 100 takes the moral ambiguity away from the ultimate goal (all of the major players are just trying to figure out a way to survive). I'm starting to wonder how Sazed will be able to allow hemalurgy - a power under his control - to be used to slaughter so many innocents and/or good guys without turning into a bad guy himself.

I have a wild theory that Wax's grandma is a silent partner in the Set. I propose that she is the one responsible for breeding feruchemists and then turning them over to the Set's hemalurgical butchers. The Set's goal is ostensibly to recreate a hemalurgical Lord Ruler (i.e. a full mistborn and a full feruchemist). I also noted that SoS setup the idea that kandra can use the metallic arts through hemalurgy. So, if you have a kandra who is also a full allomancer & full feruchemist, you have an immoral being of immense power without the need for atium to achieve immortality. The catch here is that such a creature would obviously be susceptible to Harmony's control.