robardin

Well if it IS storing someone's Identity for laterz, there can be little question as to whose Identity it would be, eh?

So what you're saying is he only checked if they were another set of BoM type device (which would have a nicrosilmind band or ring somewhere with it) by picking it up and thinking "Go Go Sovereign Bands Power!" to no effect, and since it wasn't, concluded it was just plain aluminum. I agree that that is very likely what he did, but to my mind, the specific additional phrase "no kind of charge" suggests he is assuming it is nothing more than what it appears to be, an aluminum belt, without thinking how odd it is to decorate a statue with an aluminum belt, when aluminum is still a rare metal on Scadrial. I'm not saying Wax has ruled out it being an aluminummind. I'm saying Wax has not yet really thought about the possibility of it being an aluminummind. Because what would that mean, anyway, if aluminum stores Identity? It was described by VenDell as a kind of runoff mechanism to drain Identity while filling another metalmind, to create an unkeyed metalmind. Does that imply that one could never create an unkeyed aluminummind, since apparently, Identity is exactly what is causing the keying of metalminds in the first place? Wouldn't it be interesting if, by their very nature, all aluminumminds are "unkeyed" in that any Trueself Ferring could tap any aluminummind, and swap or overlay Identity with another Trueself Ferring? Think about it: Sazed and other Full Feruchemist Keepers of Era 1 didn't have aluminum handy to use as metalminds. Other than hints dropped via the Word of Harmony, all the understanding of feruchemical use of it for Identity comes from research based on Ferrings in the Terris community of Era 2, where the Ars Arcanum gives the name of "Trueself Ferring" for this power, and states that "this ability is not fully understood, and is rarely discussed outside of Terris communities". If the only use of an aluminummind by a Trueself Ferring was to store their own Identity into it and get it back again, how would that illuminate anything about "the spiritual sense of Identity" for Era 2 Terris researchers? Yes, I agree, but the text only says that "he'd checked the belt" (past tense) while the Malwish ship was preparing to leave the temple site, which doesn't specify that he did so while holding the Bands. In fact, I think the entire time he held the Bands is accounted for in the narrative: he got it handed to him by Marasi, using its goldmind and F-gold power to heal himself, then rampaged around, then tossed it out the window to confront his uncle. At some point after landing on the ground on top of his uncle and decking him across the face, Wax retrieves the Bands from the snow and uses its Super-Lurching (and some of its stored feruchemical Super-Weight, since he'd emptied his own ironmind in one massive tap to break through the floor in his duel with his uncle) to keep the airship the Set are on from escaping. After he sets the airship down and the Set crew come out in surrender comes the scene where he argues with Captain Jordis about access to the Bands, where Steris brokers the mutual acceptance of MeLaan the kandra acting as a neutral (and divine) party as its custodian. So I think his "checking the belt" happened after MeLaan took the Bands, while the Malwish reasserted control over their airship, and before it was ready for takeoff to Elendel.

The Bands must operate based on F-nicrosil; F-aluminum stores Identity. If the aluminum belt were a pure feruchemical store of Identity, keyed or otherwise, Wax couldn't know that without accessing the ability to tap it. In other words, I would consider Wax's assessment of them as "just aluminum" based on his normal inspection for Investiture based on Steelsight to be invalid, and he may not have realized this. He'd have to use the Bands to gain F-aluminum to check for it being an aluminummind (and only if it were unkeyed would he be able to tap it).

Hmm How can he tell they have no charge (of Investiture)? He tests objects for being metalminds with Steelsight, but he can't Push on even ordinary aluminum. Of course he's also new to the idea of aluminumminds in the first place...

I felt awful for Elhokar when Moash killed him about halfway through Oathbringer, which says something about Sanderson's writing, because I rather despised him nearly all the way through Words of Radiance. I always remember the transformation as beginning with his conversation with Kaladin when he pleads for him to "teach him" how to be a hero and a leader. And his resolve to figure it out even after realizing that it wasn't a skill he could be instructed in, but had to grow into: "I will be a king to be remembered." Then, when he saw Shallan's drawing of him. Beaten, on his knees, but defiant, resolute, and determined. This is what he could be. The special mixture of Transformation and Illumination that is the Lightweaver's forte, that could turn a callous slaver's henchman like Bluth into a selfless hero, even give Gaz back a measure of self-respect... And then, think about this: had he become Radiant, without Moash killing him, he would have been a Lightweaver himself.

(Secret History spoilers to follow, but that's following suit with the OP itself, so no boxing.) What Kelsier meets in the Cognitive Realm after death is a fraction of Preservation that is missing enough of the full Shard as to be considered a Cognitive Shadow of the Shard. And - this is key - it's missing enough of the Shardic power in a way that cannot be reacquired or merged back by Leras. But, it's enough (I'm guessing a little more than half) that it also identifies as "Preservation" and not something like on Roshar, where the Stormfather identifies as "the remnants of Honor" (though in that case, the Stormfather existed before the splintering of Honor, so maybe not quite the same parallel). The way I understand it, Leras basically Splintered himself to create Ruin's prison, which involved mini-Splintering some of Ruin's power away as atium, and then giving a large portion of his power not sentience but its own Intent (to hold back Ruin), in a way that also required a renewal of that Intent by a proxy Vessel at the Well of Ascension every 1,024 years. In which act the Splinter would somehow leverage the full power of Preservation, to re-create the prison, then re-Splinter off. When Vin "released the power", the prison was not renewed and Ruin was set free, but the splintered power of Preservation didn't go back to Leras and make him whole again, either. It went to mist, I guess? The point is that Leras doesn't get it back, because it was his own Intent that created the splinter in the first place. No backsies, even if the purpose for that splintering is now moot. Which meant that the freed Ruin, minus the atium, was slightly greater in power than Preservation minus the released power of the prison, and minus the extra amount he put into Scadrian humans... Who then set about destroying Preservation, aiming to Splinter it, but it took some time to get there, enough time for Kelsier to do his thing with the Connection Bomb to take the entirety of Preservation (minus the humanity-plus part) as a new Vessel. What's confusing is that we don't see the physical body of Leras, the Vessel of Preservation, drop into the Physical Realm until that is essentially complete, and the Cognitive Shadow of Preservation retains the personality, memories, and countenance of Leras, even as it is self-aware enough to know that it isn't the Full Monty. Put another way: when Preservation says to Kelsier that he's "already dead", that's not Leras the Vessel speaking, who doesn't actually die, leaving behind Physical remains and passing into the Beyond, until he's fully separated from the Shard (after giving Elend one last spark of hope). That's the Shard of Preservation speaking, whereby "missing so much of myself that I'm not really a Shard any more, but a giant Splinter" is equivalent to "dead".

Hmm, isn't there a "broadsheet" column in Alloy of Law about "Ironeyes sightings on the rise"? It'd be even funnier if that wasn't just ad copy hyperbole, and Marsh has made a list of 16 things he'll play along with and pretend he's repelled by. "Noooo! You have 16 marewill flowers circling the crown of a black Derby hat! How did you KNOWWWWW?"

I guess hemalurgy can be stacked as well, then? We have seen hemalurgy used to stack a stolen Allomantic ability on top of what a person's already got, like Vin's and Marsh's bronze, but I don't think we've seen anybody getting the same power multiple times via hemalurgy alone (i.e., Suit theoretically using his two spikes to double up on A-steel to out-Steelpush Wax). It seems plausible, but I could also see a reason for it being mechanically impossible as well.

I literally shouted out loud, "Hey! That's NIGHTBLOOD!" Which got me some strange looks on the NYC subway I was riding at the time.

I haven't even gone there, really. But I figured I'd post that and see who would out themselves as "hey I wasn't the only one!"

Interesting point about Inquisitors living longer than normal lives, he may or may not have been doing the Rashek Maneuver for as long as I'd thought. But he's definitely doing it by Wax/Wayne's time:

One word: Shallagaz.

Well what he "actually said" appears to be in the WoB quote: you could find a way [to separate harmonium into atium and lerasium], but you're not going to get it through normal, mechanical means. I agree with you that that does not equal "While difficult, it is possible to split harmonium through distillation to get lerasium and atium", at least not without the caveat that the "distillation" in question would not be what we consider distillation, which is a mechanical process. It would involve magic. Whatever the Cosmere equivalent of "Rand cleansing saidin" in the Wheel of Time would be.

He might be eating off-screen... And as far as what Ruin fed them... There were a lot of dead people and koloss... Besides, how many feruchemical spikes could he have? Ruin harvested all the Keepers he could catch, which appears to be the entire population of living feruchemists on Scadrial not named Sazed or Tyndwyl, to steal one (1) feruchemical power from each. That's what you call a limited resource. And most Inquisitors of the Lord Ruler's making would not have had many, or even any, of them. Per the Coppermind's count, he had a total of 16 Inquisitors at his command, and we saw non-Marsh Inquisitors exhibiting F-steel and F-pewter - though oddly, they don't appear to have discovered or used Compounding, or the Inquisitor that Vin and Elend face together at the beginning of Hero of Ages that tried to spike Elend by moving in a burst of speed too quickly for him to follow would have been able to sustain it indefinitely (and totally destroyed, or spiked, both of them). Anyway, eschewing more Marsh Inventory Analysis, he certainly knows about compounding from Sazed's exposition in the Lord Ruler's throne room, and has used atium compounding to live 300 years... Which means not only is he compounding atium, he's compounding bronze to stay awake to tap that atiummind on a 24/7 basis, just like Rashek. So not only has he had 300 years to do stuff, about 200 of those 300 years are days without any downtime. And there are no more to come. And he's extremely visibly identifiable, so he can't just hang out in an Era 2 theater or cafe. To me, that's definitely got Long, Dark, Tea-Time of the Soul potential. If he's spiked for F-zinc, he might even fill zincminds to slow his mind down as the closest thing he can get to sleep these days. Though per a WoB, Era 2 Marsh is "Marsh's version of happy". He's not miserable. So whatever he's found to occupy his indefinite and sleepless prolonging, it's low key, and he's enjoying that. (That WoB even gives some flavor: "There's a part of Marsh that really likes skulking around and being an incarnation of Death in peoples' minds... There's a part of him, the part that's related to his brother, that really digs that, even if he would never admit it")

You mean he's NOT?

Oathbringer loss of memory; O agony, claiming pain! memory of loss.

"The glorification of him being Mr. Right in every way?" That is a straw chull, my friend. As are a number of the distortions I bolded above. I hardly think any character is "Mr. Perfect" (that would be somewhat poor characterization on Sanderson's part), even Kaladin Stormblessed definitely has character flaws and regrettable decisions. But I also think you're going out of your way to paint Adolin in a poor light in the above descriptions. In my reckoning, Adolin was simply training Shallan the same way he was trained. When you are playing the role of a master instructing a junior (especially a novice), it is traditional even in our world to require formal terms of respect even if you are otherwise friends in a less formal context. I believe Adolin said as much from the get-go, that their relationship had to be in a different "mode" while training. The very fact that he was willing to train Shallan, a woman, in Shardblade forms, was a huge break from Vorin tradition, and is an obvious counter to anybody saying Adolin only views Shallan as "a silly girl who draws". Quite the opposite, he has enormous respect (and even envy) for her abilities and inner strength. I view Shallan's creation of "Radiant" as a persona to reflect her desire to measure up to the very serious requirements that come with being looked up to as a Shardblade-wielding KR not just by Adolin, but by everyone; where Shallan would get distracted by lovey-dovey thoughts of Adolin being so physically close, Radiant can focus on the business at hand. His "stepping back" to "let" her be with Kaladin (or, as he erred in phrasing it, "to let him have [her]") was painful to him, he did it out of a sincere desire for her to be happy. However you interpret his frequent and brief courtships of women in the warcamps, or his killing of Sadeas (which act should have repercussions in Book 4 now that the truth is out there), I think as written, it's clear that Adolin (a) genuinely loves Shallan, (b) is concerned about her "multiple personalities", which he didn't know about for a while, (c) is helping Shallan to view her "original" self, the one he first met, as the real Shallan. If you as a reader disagree that her "original" self (as she presented herself when first arriving to the Shattered Plains in Words of Radiance) is in fact her "real" self, even after all the first person POVs from her perspective as well as what Adolin himself sees, that's your right. But I think that would be a case of reading beyond what's there. As for "Shallan doesn't need a man to be whole" - it depends what you mean by "whole". Shallan grew up very sheltered, and is clearly is the romantic sort, possibly from forming her ideas of social interaction primarily from reading a lot of books (and guess what women's fiction is full of, even on Roshar, as Palona's reading attests to). She fell for Kabsal rather quickly, was madly attracted to Adolin at first sight, got googly-eyed over Kaladin... She doesn't "need a man" to function, but it's clearly in her personality to want to be with a man. Frankly I'm more worried about Adolin's future emotional well-being than Shallan's.

I think this is a very good observation. That said, I think Adolin's acceptance of her is important for her mental health, not because Adolin sees her only as "the silly girl who draws", but because Adolin sees her fundamentally as a single person. The scene where she flashes between Veil, Radiant, and "herself" (Shallan), and Adolin grips her hand tighter when "Shallan" peeks through, more reflects him recognizing a certain fullness or stability that Shallan has when being "herself". He even says as much when Shallan blithely speaks of marrying her being a kind of 3-for-1 deal that some men would be eager to have. He doesn't want "just Shallan" meaning "just the part of Shallan that's left after you filtered out the rough and tough bits into Veil and Radiant". He wants a Shallan like she becomes (or is trying to become) at the end of OB, one who uses roleplaying as Veil or Radiant to perform in a role or persona, but knows when the roleplaying is done. "She was occasionally them. But they were not her." She created those personas to be able to do things she had to do (to spy, to fight, etc.) that were expected of her from others (Ghostbloods and Dalinar and co., respectively) while suppressing aspects of her nature that would get in the way (Vorin lighteyed female protocol, or her softer, more emotional side). She was roleplaying so much in OB that her "alternate selves" were getting equal billing instead of being as-needed. She seems to have that conquered now, but we'll see how it continues. It could even be approaching a kind of Fourth Ideal level of Truth for Lightweavers. "Whatever else I appear to be, I am still me", or something like that.

By the time of Hero of Ages, it seems like Marsh had become Ruin's primary pawn, which would be one reason for Ruin to invest in Marsh having as many useful powers as possible. The additional spikes serving to make him that much more subject to Ruin's domination was more of a side effect. Why did he settle on Marsh as his primary pawn, and not another Inquisitor (maybe one that had been made from a Mistborn, who would be more powerful)? My guess is that Marsh had killed most, perhaps all of such Inquisitors, who might well have been kept close to TLR in Luthadel, all of who Marsh treacherously killed by removing their linchpin spikes while they were in their resting phase (and unsuspecting of a fellow Inquisitor). At the end of the first book, Marsh is the only Inquisitor left in the capital; the Inquisitors we see Vin and Elend dealing with in Hero of Ages were the ones outside Luthadel, or made by Ruin after he escaped. And Ruin had already developed an affinity for using Marsh in Well of Ascension, playing on the surviving crewmembers' trust of him. As for what his "upwards of twenty" spikes consist of: The Coppermind entry for a Steel Inquisitor states that "The Lord Ruler's steel Inquisitors have eleven spikes in all--two through the eye sockets, one in the middle of the spine on the back, and eight--one for each known Allomantic power--in the torso". But I'd argue that the standard Inquisitor probably got a spike for A-atium rather than A-gold. We certainly see multiple Inquisitors, not just Marsh, burning atium, so they were either Seers or Mistborn from the get-go, or were given it via a spike like Marsh was. This would be a critical power to give an Inquisitor expected to have to deal with Allomancers, possibly including rogue Mistborn like Kelsier (even without being skaa). On the other hand, there seems to absolutely no reason for TLR or Ruin to want to specifically create a gold-burning Inquisitor who could sit there and reflect on what Might Have Been. (Though finding "Seer" Mistings to create spikes from must have been difficult, maybe they would reuse spikes from previous Inquisitors?) And why would Ruin be interested in finding a Misting to give Marsh a spike for A-aluminum, or A-gold except to enable compounded health, which he didn't exhibit? So I'd enumerate Marsh's spikes as: 11 spikes as Final Empire OEM: 2 eye spikes, the linchpin spike, 7 non-gold base metals, plus A-atium 6 more as known or plausibly suspected Ruin add-ons: 2 for allomancy: duralumin and electrum (not seen, but plausible, to serve as a "poor man's atium" defense without needing to use atium) 4 for feruchemy: pewter, gold, steel, atium (all documented in story, or by WOB) That only adds up to 17, tops. He has at least 4 more spikes to have "upwards of twenty" when facing Elend outside the kandra Homeland. Hmm. The Final Empire had no knowledge of or physical availability for chromium, nicrosil, cadmium, or bendalloy. Even if Ruin knew of the potential for such metals, there would be no way to identify Mistings to harvest for the ability for spikes. Similarly for aluminum, while it was a metal known to them (even if very rare), discovering an aluminum gnat to use to make the spike would have been nigh impossible... So even if you counted Marsh as having a spike for A-gold - maybe Ruin did it to enable him for gold Compounding, or maybe it really was part of the OEM Inquisitor set - that would still only add up to 18, leaving 3-4 spikes of unknown utility to account for, that would be attainable at the end of Era 1. Unless a Mistborn were used (wasted) for its creation. That seems to be the only logical conclusion: to make any more allomantic spikes beyond the "basic" set of 17 or so for Marsh, Ruin would have to have done so by spiking a Mistborn for it, specifically planning for a post-Scadrial run. And if the plans involved the feruchemical use of the metal, Ruin would also have needed to steal that metal's power from a Keeper. So, assuming the number is 5 to come to 22 spikes for Marsh, and that one of them is indeed for A-gold... What are the other four likely to be, that were so important to Ruin's long-term plans that he harvested full Mistborn and Feruchemists for one ability each? A-nicrosil, F-nicrosil, F-duralumin, and F-aluminum? This is on top of a WoB stating that Marsh was spiked for A-duralumin by means of a Mistborn. Man, a lot of extremely rare resources sure went into the making of Marsh. (Weren't Keepers even more rare than Mistborn at the end of TFE?) EDIT: In another thread, I realized that for Marsh to live into Era 2 and beyond via the same trick as The Lord Ruler (compounding atium), he must also be compounding bronze to stay awake to do so, just like TLR did. So he's got a spike for F-bronze in his count, too.

Indeed, when I read that scene in OB, I was like,

That would be interesting. Don't get me wrong, I really love the OP's proposal as to the form of the Fourth Ideal of the Elsecallers, especially as it pertains to Jasnah. But immediately upon reading that passage early in Oathbringer, I totally expected Shallan to say something snarky about Radiant Shardplate, and Jasnah cooly flashing it in a quick private demonstration to shut her up. Was even a little disappointed when it didn't happen.

Jasnah may have already sworn her Fourth Ideal (for Shardplate) prior to Thaylen Fields. Earlier, in Urithiru, when she catches Shallan sketching instead of taking notes during one of Dalinar's meetings planning how to talk to the other world leaders about the Everstorm (and sketching Kaladin, no less), she rejects Shallan's suggestion that her wardship be considered over because she's a "full Radiant" now: "Radiant, yes. Full? Where's your armor?" I thought the obvious comeback would be, "Well, where's your armor then, if you're playing Senior Radiant?" but Shallan merely acts confused. Jasnah then goes on to make a list of the ways that Shallan has proven herself either immature or unreliable, and concludes by saying that in any case, Shallan's wardship as a scholar is separate from her path as a Radiant, where they're in different Orders anyway and that Jasnah probably isn't suited to be her mentor in that regard in any case. But it seems to me that someone like Jasnah would not drop that kind of line - "Where's your armor, then, Miss Full Radiant?" - without being prepared for the obvious "same to you" comeback. And "I never said I was one, either" seems like a lame comeback.

That was definitely one of the classic Brandon Blew Me Away moments for me. "You were my brother. ... I knew that if a man like you were chosen to Return - a man who had died to save another - then the Iridescent Tones were real. You gave me back my faith, Stennimar. You are a god. To me, at least. It has to do with who you are and what you mean." That, just minutes after Llarimar exploded at the god he served, shouting "what is wrong with you?!" and ranting about how once again, he was getting into trouble for something stupid that Lightsong/Stennimar had done and dragged him into.

Ehh, I don't see TLR letting his Personal Kandra actually get sent to the Pits of Hathsin for a few months, even if she'd posed in the role of Mare to go after Luthadel's most wanted skaa thief. What would be the point? Just have her die immediately at the Pits and come back to her next assignment, she's not going to learn anything at the Pits. And there'd be even less reason for a kandra Mare to sacrifice herself (even in a fake beating) to extend the life of Kelsier with the gift of an atium geode. Plus, Mare had associated not just with Kelsier but also Marsh, Sazed the super-sought-after-by-the-Ministry Keeper, and presumably other skaa Mistings of their mutual acquiantance (including the Smoker they'd brought with them to Kredik Shaw who was killed off straightaway by the Inquisitors). Since we know Bleeder remained loyal to TLR to his end, it seems unlikely that such information acquired in the guise of Mare would have gone unforwarded and unused by the Steel Ministry. That's on top of Kelsier recalling in Secret History how Mare had wanted Kelsier to give up the dangerous life of a Luthadel thief, and retire on their savings to the far West where skaa could have a quiet and better life. Sure, you could say that a skilled kandra could be applying reverse psychology, but added to the other bits, I don't think it's plausible. If you're supposing that Mare-as-Bleeder did all that because she'd "fallen for" Kelsier the way she'd later do with Wax, I think that's too much of a repeat (so her falling for Wax wasn't a completely unexpected development for her and even Harmony, but something she'd actually had a history of?)

Yeah, re-reading Warbreaker after reading Words of Radiance and Oathbringer has some nice payoffs like that. There's also the touch about how Vasher ties a rope around his waist in a specific way, wrapped around him several times, to form his "characteristic belt", before beginning his sword dueling with Denth. When Kaladin first meets him as Zahel, he's dressed in brown ardent's robes but with a non-ardent-regulation full head of hair, and a rope tied around him several times... I also wondered if there was link with with Dalinar's story to Kadash in Oathbringer about his sword master teaching him to wrap a belt around himself multiple times, which he had learned from imitating his master, and it turns out that was because his master's master had been so short that the typical Alethi belt was too long for him. I know that can't also be Vasher, but since we know that Vasher and others of the Five Scholars had come to Roshar early on (before the Manywar), where they learned about Shardblades, and that Denth and Arsteel were master duelists surpassing him in ability. It stands to reason that they learned and applied Rosharan dueling forms, and maybe also a a particular multiple-pass form of rope-belt-tying.