Lewis Nethur

@gbazz4 your proposal of 10 bondsmiths is seditious and must be stomped out before its seeds can bear fruit.

The significance of 16 is universal and pervasive in strange ways across the Cosmere and is not attributable to any one Shard. It's probably not a coincidence that Adonalsium was shattered into 16 pieces, as that would be straining credulity. It may have just been because of the Vessels' superstition however, so it's pretty early to speculate. The number 16 appears to have a "natural" significance IRL as well, which is probably what inspired Sanderson to use it. Google "hexadecimal," if you're curious.

Sounds legit. I think you're supposed to post the quote in the typos thread (It's at the top of the mistborn forum). You should probably give the chapter/section and page number and the exact words in a quote bubble there. Pretty sure Peter, or someone from Sandersons team, goes through those threads every once in a while and decides whether or not each proposal should be corrected in future editions. If you submit enough edits that get accepted they may even offer a personal Thank-You. Note: I've never experienced this and can't make promises on their behalf, this is purely speculative.

Agreed. They aren't flinging spells or chanting aryas, they're utilizing a natural function of their physiology. Sometimes it's a conscious effort, like when someone takes a big breath before diving under water, other times it's reflexive, like when someone jumps back when startled.

We don't know really. Preservatiom may have given up a lump sum of Investiture upfront to support an arbitrarily large number of scadrians, or he might've parceled Investiture out to each newborn scadrian. It's sort of a moot point. The Investiture that is "lost" to hemalurgic decay returns to the spiritual realm in some form. It's like what happens to atium when it's burned; the Investiture isn't lost, it goes...somewhere...through...some kind of cycle...and eventually manifests again in someway. Free Investiture might return to the planet, a nearby shard, or redistribute itself in any number of ways. The reason the specific mechanics of this operation don't matter enough to generally come into play is: Shards and planets have so much more Investiture than people, that a meaningful comparison can't usually be made. Preservation and Ruin made Scadrial from the void. Matter is made of Investiture. Scadrial contains roughly 25ish orders of magnitude more matter than the combined mass of every scadrian. Harmony bats Scadrial across the solar system like a baseball. Ergo, Harmony is so unbelievably more powerful than an individual scadrian, that any loss of Investiture he might suffer from newborn Scadrians ought to be virtually undetectable at least until Scadrians start colonizing other planets. Even then, off the top of my head, I'm thinking they'd need to overpopulate hundreds of worlds to weaken Harmony detectably. To be fair, that's not canon, it's just my interpretation.

I enjoyed SoS. And I thought it transitioned really well into BoM. But...Virtually every character, except maybe Wayne, felt to me like they were almost completely rewritten after AoL. There are very good reasons for this; AoL was orginally planned as a stand alone one-off novel. It was only given sequels because it received such an overwhelmingly positive response that not expanding it would've been perceived as irresponsible. Marasi, Steris, and Wax undergo extreme off-screen changes after AoL and, in my opinion, it made the first half of SoS cumbersome and awkward to read while re-learning the characters. No, I don't really think there's a good way this could've been avoided. My way of resolving this awkwardness on my Mistborn reread was to adjust my reading order to: AoL, the original trilogy, then SoS and BoM. I enjoyed SoS so much more for not having just finished AoL that I probably finished it in half the time. I weep for people with eidetic memories who can't utilize this memory-relaxation technique...

So...When Jasnah soulcasts people...she's destroying their souls...? That hardly seems fair. I feel like the mechanics of hemalurgy imply that the Cognitive aspect isn't the main component of the soul in the Cosmere as well, but I'm having trouble articulating why. I'll chime back in if something coherent comes to mind...

I assumed that she was talking about the naturally occurring spren-bonds of Roshar's native inhabitants (greatshells, skyeels, parshendi, ect.) that are used to access the surges. I suspect that no one on Roshar, except maybe the parshendi who would be unlikely to be forthcoming with Khriss, understands how the bonds between things like skyeelss/greatshells and spren works, or even understands completely that they exist in the first place. Khriss, as a scientist, understands that greatshells are too big to sustain life, so she correctly believes there's a magic system keeping them alive, but she doesn't understand it, and neither does anyone else, hence: esoteric magic system. Her words seem to imply that this magic system ought to be utilized in as yet unrealized ways by the non-native inhabitants of Roshar to achieve access to Investiture. Indeed, she appears to be correct, as evidenced by the Ryshadium. The rules and nature of this system, and whether it is one system or many, appear to be a mystery to everyone on Roshar, which is why she had very little to say about it.

Fair enough, also, is that a True Blood reference, or just a coincidence? The last point I'll argue is that, while the cognitive aspect might be what most people in real-life would think of as the "soul," according to realmatic theory, it is much less significant. The spiritual aspect would probably be a better contender for the status of "soul," but even that is somewhat unclear. As long as a Cognitive Shadow's spiritual aspect isn't destroyed, their soul should still make it to the beyond. Even if their spiritual aspect was destroyed, which I'm not sure actually makes sense, they still might have a soul independent of their manifestation in each of the 3 realms. Since we're never going to get an answer about what exactly The Beyond is, we'll probably never get clear answers to these points, so I suppose it's all rather moot...

Shades can be killed and Leras was killed; Cognitive Shadows aren't immortal. They appear to be immune to aging, but sufficient force can still rip them apart. After Ruin nearly beats Kelsier to death, Kelsier again begins to feel the pull of The Beyond; his expanded soul (and status as a Cognitive Shadow) allows him to resist the pull once again, but only because Ruin had, by that time, lost interest and stopped pummeling him. Once his existence was once again primarily in the Physical Realm, he should once again have become subject to the laws of that realm, which are loosely based on real-world physics and sciences. IE: no walking through walls anymore, no using willpower to resist sleep endlessly, requiring food to supply energy, and no resisting death through simple willpower. My interpretation is that if Kelsier dies again in the Physical Realm (or in any realm actually), he ought to transition between the realms, gradually losing his Connection to each one, and like before, be confronted with a steadily growing pull from The Beyond that he should eventually be unable to resist. This could theoretically be stopped again by a Shard, and, theoretically, he ought to be able to repeat whatever trick he pulled last time to revive himself. As a sliver, he might be able to remain in the Cognitive Realm indefinitely if he suffered another death in the Physical Realm, but, separated from his physical body (which is technically made of Investiture like all matter), he would be greatly weakened. At that point, I believe he would need to literally build or steal a new body for himself in order to return to the Physical Realm (in addition to, once again, reestablishing his Connection). So I guess I agree with your Option 1, with the additional caveat that he might not be pulled into the beyond after death, but he also still wouldn't be able to just use a perpendicularity or simple Connection manipulation to return to the PR; the process of returning would be much more complicated if he died again, requiring intervention by a Shard, or possibly stealing/building himself a whole new body. Option 2 sounds like it would have some silly implications, so I think we can toss that one out. Does that sound slightly more reasonable?

He probably wouldn't be able to manifest a physical body in the Physical Realm even if he was able to transition back after death; at least, under normal circumstances. However, Kelsier's circumstances are not normal. He was touched and preserved by the power of Preservation, thereby solidifying him in the Cognitive Realm. He was imbued with Investiture from a source external to himself to, as Preservation put it, "expand his soul," to allow him to resist the pull of The Beyond. In the Cosmere, matter, energy, and Investiture are all technically the same thing, just in different forms, therefore, I posit that the Investiture Preservation conferred onto Kelsier to allow him to manifest solidly in the Cognitive Realm was molded by Kelsier's soul into a new body and would therefore allow him to manifest physically in the Physical Realm. Kelsier's problem is that the Connection between his soul and the Physical Realm was completely severed before Preservation preserved him. This prevented him from using the well of ascension to return to the Physical Realm, and also made it difficult for him to affect things in the PR after he took up the power of Preservation. He lacked a "body" in the sense that his "body" didn't exist in, or have any ties to, the PR. TLDR; Preservation gave Kelsier a body; it's what allowed him to resist the pull of The Beyond. What he didn't do was repair Kelsier's severed Connection to the Physical Realm, and therein lies Kelsier's real problem.

Relevant paraphrased WoB: This was in 2009 though, so it may no longer be intended to be explored in the main stories anymore, but I believe that this, and several statements like it, are where people derive the idea that lerasium (and also atium) are going to make a comeback. Seems likely to me that it could come up for exploration in the planned SH-2 or (in the very distant future) SH-3.

TLR didn't want to use feruchemists for his inquisitors because they would've been far too powerful. He let the inquisitors recruit their own new members, meaning Ruin got to influence the decision, and Ruin wanted people who were susceptible to his manipulations; he didn't care about their power since, for the first 1024 years of his plans, even a bad inquisitor was needlessly powerful. During the last year of his plan, Ruin seems to have just not cared about the waste. From the second he got free, right up until the very last second before he died, it was absolutely clear to him that he was going to win by overwhelming force. Even Vin's ascension didn't put much of a damper on his plans. Alongside Ruin's work on the volcanoes, his crumby and wasteful inquisitors were sufficient to nearly extinct all mistborn, mistings, feruchemists, and indeed, humanity at large in just a few months...Making the inquisitors stronger probably wouldn't have improved his ability to fulfill or accelerate his plans in any meaningful way. Sure, he may have found the atium quicker, but once he destroyed the planet, sifting through the ashes to find the atium probably would've been relatively simple, even if it took a while. It's like why, if two countries go to war and one side gains a clear advantage, they don't immediately deploy all of their remaining forces or start arming their women and children and rushing the battlefield. They already know they're going to win, going through unnecessary trouble to further overwhelm their opponent is pointless.

Honestly, I feel like simplicity is sort of the way to go with shardweapons. They're essentially indestructible under most circumstances, and any solid hit is going to cause catastrophic damage. The shardblade is a decent default form, but something with a little more reach would be better for slaughtering infantry. Assuming that spren-blades can't just be arbitrarily long and thin, it seems reasonable to assume that you could still achieve a longer reach by making the handle longer and the blade shorter and thinner. Something like a fauchard or war-scythe could conceivably double a Radiant's reach (and therefore, their killing power). Against an opponent in shardplate, the length of the blade on a shardblade is actually a determent in terms of its destructive potential, as it spreads out the force of the impact too much. Szeth uses stabbing motions to great effect to quickly break through individual sections of plate (IIRC, he even one-shots an opponent's helmet in Kharbranth at some point), whereas duelists like Adolin tend to generally rely on a more conservative (defensive) style of fighting where they attempt to slash the same sections repeatedly. Combining these two tactics ought to be extremely effective, IE: a shard-pickaxe (or morningstar), combining the more conservative and defensible slashing motion of a shardblade, with the increased pressure and destructive potential of landing the concentrated hit of a stabbing motion. With very little change to his style, Adolin (if he had a living-sprenblade) could go from slowly cracking his opponent's plate, to cleaving through entire pieces with each hit, all without exposing himself to any additional danger.

But in that case, the best way to not worship him would be to defy him, and call it Sazedium just to stick it to him...

So I've seen people argue that Kelsier could have a bunch of spikes hidden on his body before, but recall: Harmony doesn't let people spike themselves that much. Suit limited himself to 3 spikes because, above that, Harmony's influence over members of the Set became intrusively great, and it's implied that he used that influence directly; otherwise suit probably would've made himself a fullborn. I've always taken this to mean that Harmony possesses people after they insert 4 spikes because he so strongly disagrees with using hemalurgy. Marsh got grandfathered in but I think Harmony would have a serious problem with Kelsier spiking himself too much, especially since it would mean he had to hunt and kill ferrings of metals that weren't known about during the FE...

Ah yes, you said that before and I simply forgot; if they ever join the shard, be sure to pass them an upvote on my behalf. You may keep the one I gave you as recognition of a good-deed.

No yeah, I can totally see it now: FE = V for Vendetta + Oceans 11. I sort of doubt the similarities are intentional (but it's been a long time since I read the annotations so maybe?) but I also wouldn't say they're a mistake. Probably more like subconscious inspiration combined with similarities arising from using the same type of proven/widely-known templates/techniques for developing interesting characters, meets honest coincidence. Your analysis is certainly worth an upvote though!

Yeah, but that guy who did the gateway nonsense was a character Sanderson made and introduced totally independent of Jordan's notes and outlines IIRC. That's why he was so pivotal in wrapping up so many diverse loose ends, he was Sanderson's personal response to needing to conclude a bunch of arcs that had been inadvertently assigned to channelers who, in previous books, received very little screen time, and not wanting to give 10 different Ashaman their own pov chapters; so he just made a new one that better fit his normal character template: interesting non-standard strength + legitimate weakness that has to be faced and dealt with. Upvote for going out of your way to make WoT analogies!

Wait wait wait wait wait. Isn't it confirmed that Harmony is the only shard Invested in Scadrial as of SoS? Does this...Does this mean that Trellium almost has to be derived, at least tangentially, from Harmony? What we know about Trellium: It's from a Shard we know, in order for it to be usable in the metallic arts the Shard it came from "probably" has to be Connected in some way to the metallic arts (I assume the only way to do this is to Invest in Scadrial?), and Harmony is the only Shard on Scadrial...Is Harmony just having some kind of mental breakdown, self-shattering, or internal struggle...? Dear lord...Have an upvote for blowing my mind.

@The One Who Connects I don't think McSweeney's placement of the spikes is technically canonized. I believe that years back someone walked it by Sanderson and got some kind of tentative approval, but to the best of my knowledge Sanderson has not officially endorsed it. I think the placement of the spike in the bellybutton was explained as an aesthetic choice by the artist actually. That whole part of my argument is something of a sidebar, I was about to delete it but I felt too invested from having already written it out... Hopefully it doesn't undermine the rest of the post too badly...

Zane mentions that his mind gets fuzzy and distracted when he thinks about his spike and he doesn't like wearing cloaks because of how they rub against his spike, presumably because of the additional weight of the fabric compared to a normal shirt, as shirts don't bother him. I think it's fair to speculate that the pain from a single spike would be much less than that from 11 spikes. I propose that Ruin could Ruin someone's mind (see what I did there? ) by slowly making them ignore the spike and everything about it entirely. The entry wound from when the spike is first installed hurting isn't going to confuse anyone. I'd speculate though that, over time, Vin and Zane gradually forgot about and learned to ignore the pain completely due to Ruin inserting thoughts and feelings into their minds. It doesn't violate Ruin's intent to brainwash someone into not noticing that their spike hurts, his Intent isn't to cause pain, it's to embody the spirit of entropy and change. His eroding a person's ability to feel something is perfectly inline with his Intent. His ability to make them forget about the spike is limited though. Inquisitors were either just too damaged to keep out of agony, or he didn't care to, and Zane's spike was uncomfortable enough for him to notice when anything brushed against it (like any wound).

To be fair, (SA spoilers): I think the kandra/mistwraith hijacking ideas could work, but they seem overly complicated to me. Kelsier doesn't necessarily need to create a whole new body and install his mind/Investiture into it. He already has a body in the Cognitive Realm; he thinks, he feels, he can get beaten up by Hoid, ect. If he can reestablish his Connection to the Physical Realm, he should be able to just walk through a perpendicularity and take his current body with him. I'll preface this by saying it's my own speculation, and it's not ironclad. I recognize and respect that there is legitimate room for argument and skepticism, but hear me out: The fact that Kelsier could be punched in the face implies to me that he could be stabbed. The fact that he can be stabbed implies to me that, on some level, hemalurgy can work on him if a spike is brought to the Cognitive Realm. Kelsier explains that he can't write with his hair or blood to keep notes while imprisoned in the Well of Ascension because they don't exist in a permanent sense once he removes them, IE: once removed from his body, they gradually fade away like when he tries pulling threads off his shirt, but they do exist in a permanent sense while inside of him. Cognitive Realm Kelsier having blood and being able to be physically interacted with makes me think he can be spiked. He has a soul, blood, and, thanks to Preservation's intervention, a permanent unaging body. But his Connection to the Physical Realm was severed on death (his Connection to the Cognitive Realm would've been severed too if Preservation hadn't helped him). This is why he can't use a perpendicularity, he can't leverage himself across the threshold without a line of Connection to the Realm attached to his soul. He's like a man trying to lift himself up by pulling on his own feet; what he needs is a rope anchored to the other side of the gap, and the matter of transitioning becomes trivially easy. A pet theory of mine I've been working on is that Marsh may have given Kelsier one of his own eye spikes (then replaced it with one from a dead inquisitor later). The linchpin spike in Marsh's spine establishes the Connection between his other spikes that keeps his spiritweb from unraveling due to the strain imposed by hemalurgy; if Marsh went to the Cognitive Realm, ripped out one of his eye spikes, then stabbed Kelsier in the eye with it, the Connection between the linchpin spike and the eye spike may remain active, especially if Marsh had used it as a metalmind (thereby storing some of his own Investiture in it and keying it to his Identity, thus make a permanent Connection). This would allow Kelsier to piggyback off of Marsh's Connection to the Physical Realm and ride a perpendicularity back home because the exchange would have resulted in Kelsier's spiritweb being stapled with an active Connection to the Physical Realm. It's a hack you see; the spike only gives Kelsier Connection to the Physical Realm because Marsh is Connected to the Physical Realm, Marsh's soul is Connected to the soul-fragment contained in Kelsier's spike via feruchemical storage and probably his linchpin spike, and the soul-fragment in Kelsier's spike is firmly stapled to Kelsier's soul. The only real problem I see with this explanation still is that my understanding of Realmatics implies that Kelsier would die if Marsh died unless he found a new source of Connection. However, this could be circumvented through compounding Connection. The only thing I absolutely cannot reconcile is how Kelsier has access to all of the feruchemic metals when it seems like 1) he probably has less than 4 spikes because Harmony doesn't let people have more than that, and more conclusively, 2) he doesn't appear to have any arm spikes: Argument for why Kelsier shouldn't be able to have received 16 feruchemic powers through hemalurgy without visible spikes in his arms, which the flashbacks seem to indicate that he doesn't have, spoilered for length and because it's sort of a sidebar: It seems to me that his feruchemy is most likely coming from a source other than hemalurgy, so there's almost certainly some stuff going on that we simply can't account for with current information. However, I feel like even with our current understanding, we can explain how he was able to return to the Physical Realm. Thoughts?

My current understanding of the "can't/can bond honorblades" issue is: Anyone can "bond" an honorblade, probably through a process similar to bonding a shardblade, and acquire the ability to summon/dismiss it. The blade can't "belong" to anyone other than the Herald it was made for. The Herald each honorblade was made for originally received some kind of additional power over what we've seen Szeth do with an honorblade that may or may not still be available to them. This may have simply been the ability to be fueled by the Shard Honor directly, or it may include the ability to summon their blade away from someone else who has picked up/bonded it, we just don't know. My take on the controversy is that the confusion was originally introduced because Sanderson was trying to indicate to fans that honorblades are distinct in their operation and the powers they confer from shardblades, but he wasn't ready to reveal some of the information we've received since. IE: he wanted to clarify that there were powers that Szeth couldn't draw from his honorblade, but he didn't want to reveal why. Just my take on the issue; I'm not aware of any actual functional changes or rewrites on the topic.

That seems unlikely; Kelsier appears to be a fullborn these days; at least, he was able to make the Bands of Mourning, so if he isn't technically a fullborn, he may as well be. Vin was really only able to kill TLR because he was extremely overconfident, somewhat unhinged, she was being fueled by Preservation's power to supercharge her allomancy, she was a mistborn, and his atiumminds weren't firmly attached to him. Another fullborn bad guy might just be too much for Scadrians to deal with...They'd probably just have to let him win and do what he said or face destruction...