cometaryorbit

Nalthis' Royal Locks are a precedent for Investiture affecting hair color... what's happening on Roshar is much lower key and not obviously magical, but...

Yeah. Fused "cannot share their dwelling" but that is specifically a Fused thing that wouldn't apply to other kinds of control or influence, through Voidspren or Unmade etc. Who knows how a human-Fused-equivalent would work? Though I would kind of expect Gavilar to become an "Odium-Herald" rather than possess anyone.

This issue is weird, and it goes deeper than that. I can see cartilage true bodies not being a thing, since I don't think there is any land animal with that kind of skeleton and especially not a large biped like a human (not sure cartilage could support that kind of motion by itself)... but hair and bone are created by living cells. If kandra can manipulate their cells and biochemistry precisely enough to make tissue transplants that avoid rejection issues, why can't they make osteoblasts etc. or hair-producing cells? Sure, it would take a long time* but it ought to be possible. *Or would it? TenSoon eats a horse and incorporates its mass in like an hour? a couple hours? in HoA. That kind of metabolic speed is pretty insane. I get that these sorts of limitations need to be there to keep kandra from turning into super biological nanotech factories, but I am not sure where the lines exactly are once you start thinking at the cell level, which Era 2 kandra are. (The issues didn't really come up in Era 1 - everything they did there could be explained by manipulating whole tissues, without cellular-level or biochemical changes, as long as kandra blood was the same color as human.)

Kelsier was "very close to death" during his stay in the Pits. I agree it was a specific moment, but I'd think it's at least as likely to be when he was about to give up and die (Kelsier refers to it in his thoughts when visiting the caverns where the rebel army is hidden & the entrance reminds him of the Pits). That experience seems to me the more appropriate time for the "SURVIVE" intent to be what helped him. When he actually Snapped, it was more "Get revenge". Kelsier describes it as being Mare's death itself that Snapped him. I don't think the "bursting out of his hut" quote necessarily implies something different - he could have gone back to plan his attack/escape, or maybe it took him a little while to realize he had Snapped.

I believe the Returned can leave because of the Intent of Endowment - Nalthian Investiture is 'given without strings attached', so doesn't form a Connection - or at least as much of a Connection - to the planet as elsewhere in the Cosmere. Shades are weird in general. If we knew what makes them (near-)mindless, we might know why.

Investiture-interference resistance might well make the Fused immune. Or it might kill the singer body, but the Fused Cognitive Shadow would go on to be reborn as normal (IMO the likeliest result... the Fused is already a Shadow). I kind of doubt shades are strong enough to overcome/transform the Fused Shadow (Zahel/Vasher considers them very strong Cognitive Shadows), but if so .. it might depend on why shades are mindless. If they are just pulled into the Physical Realm "wrong" like Syl before she established a full bond with Kaladin (my guess), then the Fused might be restored as soon as it found a new singer body (if it retained enough mind to try). If the Cognitive Aspect itself is actually damaged, though, it would presumably remain mindless.

I think spren know less about the Physical world than humans, so I don't think they'll help in terms of science/mundane tech (Syl talks about natural laws not really being a thing, so if anything, too much interaction with spren could actually stifle the development of physical science. Worldhoppers, yeah, in the long term... otoh its not just knowledge, it's infrastructure, and Roshar's weird geology (lack of some natural resources) + ability to "cheat" with Soulcasting removing motivation to build some of those early but necessary steps... eh, I don't think Roshar is a good prospect for conventional tech.

Hmm, see, I read that differently. I thought the idea was that that voice kept him going when he was actually working in the Pits, before he Snapped... keeping him from giving up & dying. Once Mare died he was motivated by revenge. His intent at that point was less "Survive" and more "kill all the soldiers and nobles" (IIRC he killed all the guards and all nobles within ten miles). Hmm, I thought he literally Snapped watching Mare die. Knowing immediately didn't seem that surprising to me since we are told that that part of the Central Dominance has lots of metal in the ground (which helped hide the kandra Trust of atium from Ruin) so he probably would have felt trace metal reserves (like Vin did before she knew she was an Allomancer... but Kelsier knew enough about Allomancy, from Mare and Marsh, that he would have immediately realized what was happening).

Yeah, IIRC allomantic bronze would be storable, so probably. Though apparently technically Inquisitor-level steelsight is learnable by anyone with allomantic iron or steel (from the HoA annotations).

Kelsier says he Snapped watching Mare be killed (he mentions it a couple of times in book 1, once when he explains to Vin what Snapping is, and then later on when he thinks about the Pits more). This seems like regular Snapping due to trauma, to me.

I took the implication of Dawnshard (the novella) to be that a Dawnshard lets you use whatever Invested Art you have access to at enormously increased (world-threatening) levels of power - but it doesn't give you obvious overt powers by itself (though there are Heightening type effects). Thus why Rysn is now not supposed to bond a spren - she's not that dangerous with just the Dawnshard, but the Dawnshard plus (KR-style) Surgebinding would give her world-threatening powers. So I think what destroyed Ashyn was (Ashynite) Surgebinding "supercharged" through one or more Dawnshards. (If it was a war, presumably at least two, but I am not sure we know that it was -- could have been more like a magical version of an industrial accident.) I just meant that there's probably not "unkeyed" Investiture just 'sitting out there' on planets like First of the Sun, Threnody, etc. - it probably only exists where actively made by someone. I mostly agree, but some Shards might have more than one equally "natural" interpretation.

Yeah, there's a ton of this stuff in history of science/technology. Mendel's experiments on genetics could have been done as early as selective breeding of plants started, thousands of years ago -- why did that have to wait until the 19th century? And even after they were done, they were forgotten for several decades until rediscovered independently... A simple form of steam engine was built in the first century AD (it's described in a book by Heron of Alexandria), but it was never developed into anything beyond a curiosity. Gunpowder was discovered by accident, 700+ years before chemistry had the ability to figure out explosives systematically. If not for that "out of order" discovery, history would be completely and utterly different (imagine if guns weren't invented until the late 18th century - when the first non-gunpowder explosive was discovered). The problem the Rosharans will have is lack of theoretical basis. They can use magic to bypass the lack of tech (e.g. Soulcasting metals hard to make by conventional means) but there are a lot of things that they won't even think of trying, since they don't have the base knowledge to suggest that they are possible.

So maybe "Excisors" are hemalurgic spikes granting f-Nicrosil and a-Nicrosil?

If Whimsy is a "Change" Shard, not a mental / thinking one, it might be something like this... Change (Cause change in the world, positively or negatively) / [Temporal Quadrant?] Cultivation Ruin Whimsy Endowment Be (Cause things to exist, remain, and be separate from other things) / [Physical Quadrant?] Preservation Autonomy Mercy Ambition Enact or Bind (Cause your decisions to become effective and binding, imposing your will or virtues on the world) / [Spiritual Quadrant?] Honor Odium Devotion Dominion Envision (Understand the world, and envision what could be, or should be) / [Mental Quadrant?] Valor Invention Prudence (Unknown Shard, possibly something like Secrets?) I don't really like Valor under Envision, though Courage is a mental thing...

I think that is true when tapping/Compounding at halfway sane rates, but Marasi was really tapping crazy amounts of speed - if she tapped equal amounts of healing, the damage might literally heal faster than the nerves could react.

I personally doubt the parallel with the Allomantic table is as close as one-to-one Shard-to-metal correspondences. It might be as loose a parallel as "sixteen grouped into four quadrants of four", or perhaps a bit closer - the four Dawnshards might correlate vaguely to Physical/Mental/Temporal/Spiritual ("Change" Dawnshard = Temporal? Dawnshard of binding = Spiritual? Maybe something like Think/Know/Imagine/Envision for Mental and something like Be/Exist for Physical)?

I think Love-in-the-broader-sense-of-caring (as opposed to specifically romantic love) is what Devotion is. It's probably the closest thing to a direct opposite to Odium. (Though I really don't think Shards are generally paired as direct opposites.) I think Odium is probably a bit broader than just hate, from Dalinar's experience of perceiving Odium, but I think it's limited to "aggressive" emotions. Odium is described with burning imagery repeatedly. It's inflaming emotions, conflict-type ones, self vs others. There's a comment in ROW that the power wants conflict and opposition even when Rayse doesn't. I'd say it incudes fear and rage, but not courage (Valor); lust, but not love (Devotion). EDIT: However, I do think it's not a safe assumption that Adonalsium was a Christian-style omnibenevolent omnipotent omniscient deity, given that it was Shattered violently by others, which implies a limited being. It might be something more like the Gnostic concept of the demiurge (creator of the known universe but not the ultimate source of everything, either intentionally malevolent or introducing flaws into the universe by its ignorance depending on the version).

She tapped "everything". F-gold at these ridiculous levels of power is basically total invulnerability (barring investiture leeching, anti-investiture, etc.) It does describe what sounds like a sonic boom, but supersonic speeds aren't enough to cause any visible fire or anything. She wasn't moving at orbital-reentry speeds, granted. I think at this ridiculous level of tapping F-gold, she wouldn't feel any pain because the healing would happen so fast there would be no time to perceive the damage. Except that Mistborn/Lurchers/Coinshots can react to coin attacks, and a coin would have to be moving at really high speeds to be a reliably effective weapon. (We don't see sonic booms mentioned, so probably subsonic, but it can't be that much less). I am going to have to look for references to this in Era 2, I kind of thought there were mentions going both ways on this. Even if they can't, that would put the limit they can react to as faster than coins but less than 1910-era firearms... probably somewhere around the speed of sound. Really ridiculous speed like what Marasi used with the Bands can do it, but think these arguments overstate the advantage of more sane levels of super-speed vs. a Mistborn, Radiant, etc. (Vin travels at twice the speed of a horse her first time trying long distance Allomantic travel. I don't know Roshar's air pressure, but a double Lashing - about 1.4 Earth gravities - would probably have terminal velocity well over 100mph.) I do think Fullborn are definitely stronger overall than Radiants, except maybe a 'Bondsmith unchained'. I just think that F-steel super-speed by itself is overrated, and Roshar has a few specific tricks that would be hard for Scadrian magic to counter. That assumes that there will be a Scadrial vs. Roshar conflict in space age cosmere, but also, right now Scadrial has a huge tech advantage. Era 2 Scadrial is not too far off time-wise from Stormlight first arc, and Scadrial is ~1910 while Roshar seems basically High Middle Ages tech wise* - though they use magic to get around some of those limitations (spanreed communications, Soulcasters for logistics). If Roshar follows their current path, their "tech" will be way more magic dependent, and so Scadrial might counter the magic advantage with vastly better mundane tech. *The best mundane armor, from Dalinar's flashbacks, is "plate and mail" - they don't seem to have the metallurgy to make full articulated plate armor, even though they have an example of what it would look like from Shardplate.

I think Ashyn people did Surgebind (though admittedly it might be a loose use of the word like calling the Fused spren). I figured that was a full Shardworld magic system (Cultivation) - just one where the Shard later left. It can be unkeyed 'artificially', yes, but I don't think unkeyed Investiture naturally exists. I think that would be influenced by the Vessel's interpretation of what Preservation means. Vin would probably keep the current rate of increase IMO; Leras as we see him in Secret History would probably keep the same speed. (Originally he probably did see the need for growth, however.)

A-steel and F-gold for combat A-pewter would also be a good choice, but requires getting up close; in Era 2 with guns, A-steel's probably better. For practical use in my actual life, probably A-tin/F-zinc. F-zinc is the obvious Feruchemy choice (store during boring things so they seem to go faster, tap for apparent super-intelligence). No Allomantic power fits really well: zinc or brass would be the most useful, but I find them ethically iffy. A-pewter is another option, more for the grace/agility and health than raw strength. What I'd actually want is A-gold/F-zinc... I'd really like to explore A-gold's alternate selves/timelines ...but can't justify that as "practical use".

Hmm. Quite possibly. So does someone permanently lose power for every medallion made? Or is Nicrosil Compounding involved?

I think he was likely an Atium Compounding Savant (or equivalent of savantism) and suffered some kind of shock or spiritweb damage or whatever when he lost his atiumminds. Combined with the probably extremely painful effects of super-accelerated aging, he probably wasn't in any state to do much of anything useful. Miles in AoL says he doesn't feel pain anymore. If he got that way from Compounding Gold within a normal human lifetime, TLR probably didn't feel pain either... so he might have been in pain for the first time in 900+ years.

I am not sure Ashyn is really the same thing - that (from the few hints we have) seems to be a magic system actively used by humans. I don't think there is any such thing as unaligned Investiture (except maybe during the transition from one type to another eg what Raboniel and Navani are doing when converting Lights in RoW). All Investiture was "assigned" to one of the Shards at the Shattering - though the Shard/Vessel as a person may not be aware of the Investiture on a planet they aren't resident on. The trapper culture could totally be Autonomy influenced. I'm not really convinced Shards are actually infinite in the mathematical sense, rather than simply absurdly incredibly highly Invested - Preservation putting Investiture into humans weakened it vs. Ruin, and Preservation stealing some of Ruin's Investiture to make atium weakened Ruin. Subtracting a finite quantity from infinity shouldn't make a difference. What I was getting at is that Allomancy draws power from Preservation, not from the user - Preservation is "giving of itself" to Preserve the user's strength. Whereas Feruchemy draws power from the user. So Feruchemy is end-neutral, which kind of seems more Preservation-y, but I think it's critical that Preservation's Intent doesn't require it to Preserve itself. (Just as Leras/Preservation could sacrifice his mind to trap Ruin, though his Intent prevented him from trying to kill Ati/Ruin.) Re: Allomancy being of Preservation, the "survival" aspect of Snapping may also be relevant. Feruchemy doesn't seem to have an initiation mechanism.

I do think a Fullborn is more powerful than nearly any below-Shard-level being in the Cosmere, but I don't think Feruchemical Steel speed is necessarily as much of an auto-win as generally assumed. Lurchers/Coinshots/Mistborn can react to very fast-moving objects, so I think that Investiture-power-use reaction times can be much faster than physical ones. Scadrian magic tends to be relatively low-investiture compared to Rosharan, so Investiture resisting other Investiture may not be all that much help here. Jasnah might actually have a chance vs. the Lord Ruler (I am not sure f-Gold would protect you from turning to fire, and would atium shadows show anything useful there)? The Lord Ruler probably didn't have Bendalloy, Chromium, or Nicrosil. He was also dependent on his metalminds to survive; I don't know if Soulcasting them would be easier or harder than Soulcasting him directly. Depending on how Division works, maybe it could destroy them? Similarly for an artificial Fullborn or near-Fullborn like Marsh or (possibly) Era 2 Kelsier. A hypothetical non-Hemalurgic Era 2 Fullborn, with all metals and no "remove/destroy the spike/metalmind to instantly kill" weakness, would be even scarier. It's specifically said that Marasi "tapped everything". Massive levels of F-gold healing would hold her body together without needing A-pewter toughness. I don't think normal steel speed, without other powers, is as extreme as usually stated on here. Even Paalm, being a kandra, was presumably tougher than a pure Steel Twinborn would be.

Oh I think there's thought put into it, it's just that the Derethi faith is more of Dominion so they are going to "put down"/devalue Devotion. 'Of course we're better at uniting'. I don't think it's anymore fundamentally true than the Fused's "Adhesion isn't a real Surge" sour grapes. Invention is presumably about inventing new things. I guess "Create" could be considered distinct from "Change" (of basically existing things) but I don't think there are four Creation Shards. Also, the term "power of creation" for Investiture/Adonalsium in general, and the way Ruin and Preservation can create together but not individually, also kind of biases me against a 'Create' Dawnshard. So it would probably need to be Change. If Honor is about bonds, not just honor in the usual sense, then all the emotion/act of will Shards probably have a broader meaning than the obvious. Odium is consistently described in terms of 'burning', so I think Odium has an aspect of "inflaming" things, heightening them in a destructive or oppositional way, turning them against one another (the grain of truth behind his claim to be Passion - and while it's not true, I don't think it's 100% a lie either, as Dalinar feels rage and desire coming from Odium as well as hate). That would make him a Change shard.