alder24

Yeah, Shards would be unaffected by such things (they are mostly in SR, not PR). Planets can be actively protected by Shards if a GRB or a shockwave was incoming. Rashek was able to move the entire planet several times, shift the crust and Scadrian magnetic field; Shards can do much more and fully protect their planet from supernova destruction (which btw could damage entire Cosmere, so nobody - except Ruin - would want a star in Cosmere to go supernova).

F-zinc doesn't increase your physical speed. It allows you to think faster - that's it. A-electrum allows you to see a few seconds into the future. It wouldn't really be a reaction, rather you would simply move out of the way before a bullet is fired.

I've respond to this already earlier: It is complicated, Avatar is a part of Autonomy - only a semi-autonomous part: In the end if that's not enough to convince you, we won't convince each other. It's better to agree to disagree than repeating the same thing over again.

Is it weird? It's no different than Ati channeling Ruin into entropy and natural decay. Bavadin is channeling Autonomy into making people independent of others' influence (and proving they deserve that), but that others simply doesn't include Autonomy. They have to be independent in her way. Avatars allow her to expand her reach beyond Taldain with ease, Avatars aren't fully autonomous, they are only semi-autonomous.

Exactly, Mists were already preoccupied in Snapping people, so if Preservation and Ruin were to clash directly (like when Vin did that) they would not be contributing to the power of Preservation in that clash. That's what I'm talking about. A long term plan is different but dumping a significant portion of your "usable" power into a sun would just make you weaker if you were to clash with other Shard. Ok, I've finally got you. Then it's still no. Preservation isn't about Preserving itself, Ruin isn't about destroying itself, Odium isn't about hating itself - Autonomy isn't about being Autonomous form itself. The intent of a Shard is expressed externally, not internally.

The only thing we know, the only thing that matters is that T'Telir requires at least 25 births every week to sustain the Court of Gods demand for fresh, child's Breaths. That's at least 300 Breaths per year. Using the data from the city of Warsaw (Poland), which in 2015 had nearly 20,000 births per 1.744 million inhabitants, you would need a city of ~26,100 people to sustain the Court of God with the same birth rate. But the Court has room for twice as many Returned, so the city would have to be at least 52,000. That's really, really small. T'Telir seems to be much bigger, they have much greater births per year. It doesn't really matter how many adults sell their Breaths because we know nothing about this. They don't count in this statistic because they aren't babies, they can give up their Breath whenever they want - not when they are young. We don't know how many Breaths are held by the upper class or priests, how many Breaths are sold or anything. We can't speculate because that's just wild guessing at this point. We can only look at how big the city needs to be to provide Returned with fresh, young Breaths every week. We can't include the amount of Breaths sold by adults because we know nothing. Another way to look at this is that Hallandren has 40,000 Lifeless. Those will eventually break down after a couple of years and they would need a replacement. If we assume an average "life" expectancy of around 10 years for Lifeless, they would need on average 4,000 bodies per year to replenish losses. In 2015 in Warsaw nearly 19,000 people died. That means that T'Telir needs to have a population of at least 367,000 people to sustain such an army. That's more like what I've imagined. That's comparable to the population of the largest cities in Europe in 1600. The population would have to be even larger because many of those bodies would not be adequate for Lifeless soldiers - like too weak, too much rotten, lacking limbs, etc. But then the entire country would contribute to the replenishment of the Lifeless army, people from outside of the T'Telir could be making Lifeless and selling them to the Court of Gods. But let's assume for the sake of simplicity that it's cheaper to make them from bodies found in the city, thus they prioritize mainly those.

But that power is not usable at all, it's invested in something, it's being used, it's not ready for a Shard to attack another Shard. It would be treated more like Atium was to Ruin when attacked. It's like with Shard's powering Allomancy directly (like Vin and Ati did at the end of HoA) - it's an expenditure of power that weakens them. Well, the quote even ended with "In truth, it would be a combination of a Vessel’s craftiness and the power’s Intent that we should fear most." It said that it's difficult to separate the power (Shard) from the Vessel because the Vessel is the Shard now, they power makes him up. They are intertwined. The first part is very important. The last part said that the Vessel acts after a long time because of the power - the Vessel's mind was overwhelmed by the power's will after that long. This means that the way Bavadin acts is the way Autonomy acts, and because Bavadin and Autonomy are difficult to separate, they act as one, they are one. The Shard can't act on its own, the Vessel controls the Shard. Autonomy can't act on its own, against Vessel's will, but because now the Vessel's will is overwhelmed by the Shard's will, Bavadin's will is Autonomy's will. A Shard CAN'T act on its own, it needs a mind to control its power. The power has no mind on its own. Again, the Shard and the Vessel are ONE. Bavadin is the Shard of Autonomy. It's like saying "it's not heliovox's action, it's your brain." A Shard CAN'T act without the mind - a Vessel is the mind of a Shard, a Vessel CONTROLS the power. Bavadin is not a mask, it's the Shard.

It depends. You mean acting as hurting? A Splinter can have its intent different from the Shard's intent they came from. If a person, a human, was using investiture of Odium, it wouldn't change the way they act, it wouldn’t change their mind. A Fused would still behave like a Fused do, even with a Dawnshard. If a Vessel of a Shard had a Dawnshard, they would be bound by the Shard first and foremost. It really depends on the circumstances. Would they be unable to cause harm with Hoid's Dawnshard? Well, perception matters a bit. Some might find a way, a Shard would definitely be able to find a way to do something that would mess things up. For all we know, Dawnshard doesn't affect the personality of its holder (unlike Shards). Dawnshards (people holding a Dawnshard are called a Dawnshard - Rysn is a Dawnshard now) are capable of acting on their own, free will. As we know right now only Hoid's Dawnshard prevents from causing harm, we don't know if others do that as well, or something different - we know Hoid's Dawnshard is probably the different one. Hoid would be unable to hurt a LIVING person in the Cognitive Realm as well. Have you read Mistborn Secret History? The place where they are hurting others doesn't matter, it matters if they are alive or dead and if Hoid is just beating the Cognitive manifestation of a dead person, which should not feel any pain, because it doesn't have a body anymore. WoB:

OR the time dilation effects are far lower than you think, fitting within 1.2 g experienced on Sel. Some things in CR are influenced by perception, others probably not - there likely are some fundamental laws governing the way CR works, and that can't be changed. No matter the amount used for it, once you start to directly attack other Shards, you better be strong enough to repel their counterattacks. Autonomy dumping investiture on that scale doesn't make sense considering her aggressive actions. Harmony doesn't say Bavadin, he says Autonomy. This could just be a conflation, because that happens a lot, but, for instance, though the long WoB says that Patji is not a shard.... Patji sure did respond to Hoid on Autonomy's behalf. That's normal. That's how Brandon talks about Shards. That's how people in Cosmere talk about them. They are not people anymore, they are Shards. Only Hoid and people who knew Vessels before Ascension address them with their names. The way Autonomy acts is how Bavadin wants it to act, Avatars are semi-autonomous, they are not fully independent, they have their own personality but it's still the Shard. Sure, Telsin is independent from Bavadin, but when Bavadin didn't like the way Telsin acted, the power was withdrawn from her. It’s the Bavadin who decides (or rather allows an Avatar to act freely), Bavadin is always aware. An Avatar is a part of Autonomy, Patji is a part of Autonomy. SA 6th Letter: Autonomy is all over the place, she doesn't focus their power everywhere, they are mostly using the power already present in the system - all under Bavadin command as she is the Vessel, she is the mind controlling the power. The power can't act without the mind. So I disagree with you here, I disagree with the way you treat the power separate from the Vessel. The power has no mind of its own, it can't decide to act. The mind, the Vessel does that. Bavadin is making Avatars all over the place and allows them to command some of the power available in their system on their own, probably so she can focus on more power elsewhere. But he can take that power away from them, as evident from Telsin's example. It was Bavadin that blinded Harmony, because Telsin was not Trell yet. Telsin was on her way to become Trell. The investiture used to blind Harmony came from outside of the Scadrian system because it invested in the world - it wasn’t already invested in it. That was Bavadin.

No. The spikes are Hemalurgically charged thus affecting the soul, but the metalmind-spikes do not. They don't influence the soul, they don't pierce it, they don't invest the soul, they wouldn't affect the cracks in the spirit web. The metal is more invested, but his soul isn't. However if Marsh were to tap lots of investiture, thus the investiture is flowing through his spirit web, he would become more resilient to emotional Allomancy, for the same reason Rashek is. However the amount of investiture available in Feruchemy is low compared to other worlds, Marsh would need to tap really a ton of investiture. I believe that would only widen the crack. The bigger the charge of Hemalurgic spike, the more "space" it needs to fit in the soul, the bigger the crack, the bigger the flaw.

I see no indications of Lirin being a Dawnshard. Being a Dawnshard is visible - you have an aura of enhanced colors around you, something that isn't there with Lirin. Lirin is capable of harm, can be hurt, has eyesight problems (he's wearing glasses) which would be healed if he was a Dawnshard and is affected by alcohol, which he shouldn't be if he was a Dawnshard - he would be too invested. Lirin is just an empathetic doctor with strong morals. It prevents causing harm to the soul and the body. If you punch someone who's dead in his Cognitive form in the Cognitive Realm, then you're not harming them, because it's their mind that imagines pain which shouldn't be there because they are dead. Dawnshard can have malicious intentions, they seem to not change the minds of their holder.

Not much if we're talking about regular Breaths. Depending on the number Vasher has, Dalinar would just get a few more decades of life (the 1st Heightening extends your life by a decade iirc), but it won't make him any younger or stronger. If Vasher were to give his Divine Breath, then it depends on Vasher's intent - it can do something more than healing. No, a younger Dalinar with Stormlight would be stronger and faster than the current Dalinar with Stormlight. Stormlight generally enhances the body, but the effects of age are still there, less visible but there. Breaths don't do that. Holding Breaths doesn't make you stronger, faster or better physically in any way. The most they do is enhance your immune system and make you immune to illnesses or poisons, but they don't make you stronger. Vasher and Deth are stronger and faster because of their nature of Returned (Cognitive Shadows) and their Divine Breaths, but Divine Breaths can't be given, they can only be used to do something - like heal. He's the most experienced, fearsome and skilled fighter Roshar has to offer. And consider if the new Odium wants the Contest to take place at all, maybe he wants Dalinar to break the terms before the fight to get free?

No, only Bronzeminds can be filled while sleeping.

Some have already done that in the past. You can learn it, to the same extent as inquisitor's Steelsight. The most complicated thing about it would be knowing it's even possible. The Bands made you see like that because you could push on every line. The Bands are just that strong.

It's about both. A Vessel at this point is just investiture merged with infinity. I don't think that it is reasonably possible to produce the effects you want. A Vessel might just heal themselves with the infinite power they are holding.

Yes, yes and yes, that's all already happening even in our Solar system. Nothing new, but simply on a lesser scale. But the differences between time dilation in a valley and on a mountain would probably be quite small. What is a few kilometers more when you are already considering a distance of nearly 10k km? There would be also different time dilation depending on the latitude you're on, but again, that's not a big factor, we can ignore that. It really depends on how CR interacts with PR and the spacetime in PR. If it doesn't affect PR spacetime, then we can ignore all of that. If it does, then we can't and Selish would be crushed by the forces acting on them. You will get use to it I'm also slow with long responses. I meant the attack that blinded Harmony's vision that happened before TLM, not whatever Trell or Set were doing. That was Autonomy directly. She invested the planet and Harmony directly, or set up her trap. Either way that Was Autonomy, that was Bavadin. TLM ch 19: Distributed is the wrong word, rather expanded and explored her understanding - her mind - but there is still a limit on that, like said in the previous WoB, Vessel's mind isn't infinite. Long WoB about this, bolded important parts:

Then you don't need any spike in your eye, just in your chest giving you A-steel/iron - a Misting can learn how to view the world like an Inquisitor or Kelsier. The spike is concealed and you have all benefits of steelsight.

That's what I also count on. I'm surprised that Awakeners doesn't breed some spiders and scorpions to use them as Lifeless when going on a mission, that would be extremely effective. Panic is a factor. That was under a control environment, not when you're panicking because bugs are eating your face when you're fighting an Awakener. Even if you manage to remain "calm," thick plated fingers could be unable to pick up small bugs on your face. Even if they would, that would take a lot of time, bugs would try to avoid you, get into your nose, mouth and eyes, it would be more and more painful and terrifying - all of that distracting you when an Awakener would simply kill you with other means. Edit: Yes, it's better to agree to disagree than to keep arguing with unnecessary heat, especially if there might be a misunderstanding. I respect you a lot, I really enjoy your point of view on this forum, but I also enjoy engaging in a bit of competitive debates too, so I quickly responded in that way here too. My point was to just show that Awakened insects can be a nasty weapon in the Awakener's arsenal, they can pose a significant threat while being hard to detect and at the very minimum provide a distraction for Awakener's opponent and open them to Awakener for a killing blow. Truthfully, this topic isn't a typical "versus thread," it's about exchanging ideas. I definitely became too defensive about this particular idea, for which I apologize. I'm also probably a bit biased against insects because they are the most terrifying creatures on this planet, spiders especially. With a syringe This idea is terrifying for me in general, that's why I've missed this. It was fine as long as spiders weren't mentioned but now... Thanks for the nightmare fuel Eyes are probably the worst of them, because you see with them, you see those bugs eating you, while you can't see your opponent. Insects crawling into your throat is the second worst because it can cause suffocation.

That would mean that Autonomy would constantly be weakening herself the more investiture she dumps into the Sun. Why would she do that if she aggressively attacked Harmony? A Shard holds practically infinite investiture, but the Vessel's mind is finite, they can't use all of that, they can only reach a limited amount of investiture. A physical form of investiture would count as "being in use by the mind" - just like Atium was separated from Ruin yet still weakening him. I don't think Bavadin would do something like that, it would weaken her too much.

Technically you can spike a Vessel/Shard, but that's practically worthless. You won't really achieve what you want. A Vessel is the mind of a Shard, they are one, they are investiture.

The prey is defined by an Awakener - I said it very clearly. Insects naturally hunt and eat their prey, an Awakener defines what a prey is for Lifeless insects. Sure, naturally insects don't try to kill large mammals but some sure won't back down from attacking when needed - all kinds of spiders, or scorpions, ants, wasps, hornets will do that and mosquitoes even hunt mammals directly. Not to mention how many bugs there are that eat corpses. Use those who are naturally hunters, or have strong defensive mechanisms. They won't produce it but you can either replace it with some other venom, or preserve the one they were using naturally. It will work. Ok, tell me what will you do when insects are on your face? Take off your helmet? You're dead, the Awakener will use it to just kill you with ropes or other Awakened objects. Use your massive gloves to pick up insects individually from your face? Too big hands, you're more likely to hurt yourself with this additional strength while you're panicking. Taking off your gloves takes even more time and exposes you even more. Use your Shardblade? Yeah, no. You can't stop them once they are inside your helmet without exposing yourself to the Awakener, and they are just waiting for you to do that. All you can do is feel them eating you alive, biting your eyes, crawling into your nose and mouth, biting your neck etc. How comfortable can you be when dozens of insects are crawling all over your skin, biting, chewing and trying to get into your eyes? What subordinates?? In the middle of the fight with an Awakener? Why do you say they have subordinates? Maybe an entire army as well to back them? It's a hypothetical scenario, a Shardbearer has his shards only and is fighting others ("What characters in the Cosmere can beat a full shardbearer with dead plate and dead blade without plate or blade?"). If a Shardbearer takes off their helmet and distract themselves with insects, the Awakener will kill them, the Awakener is just waiting for that opportunity. I fully agree. They just need to send a couple of Larking Hordlings to suck off Stormlight from the plate. Please, I think there is too much misunderstanding between us. Please look carefully at the specific quote I was responding to - this was not about your later incendiary attacks ideas, but ONLY to the idea of using warmth to kill insects, like how bees are killing wasps. That would not work. And yes, I clearly stated that I agree burning them will work, but a Shardbearer has no flamethrower. Because Lifeless are dead? Cells are already dead? They don't function anymore as they were when alive? No breathing, no heartbeat, No metabolism, no life. The effects of high or low temperatures would be greatly reduced on Lifeless.

If you're interested, there is a whole topic dedicated to discussing the 5th Ideal of Windrunners: Personally I think they are already willing to sacrifice their lives for others - just look at Kaladin or Teft. They don't struggle with that. I think it's more likely that their last Ideal will be about realizing that they shouldn't sacrifice their lives rather than what you are proposing. However, there are just too many good options (as discussed in the topic linked above) so I am more open-minded, I like many of those ideas.

There is a whole topic dedicated just for that. Feel free to respond and expand with your ideas: True. However the problem with A-electrum is that you see so many shadows around you that it's hard for you to actually process them all. It doesn't work like A-Atium, which also enhances your mental capabilities to process those shadows. In that case it's a great idea to pair A-electrum with F-zinc, because you will finally be able to use 100% of information provided to you by those shadows and use it like A-Atium. A-electrum alone is really hard to master. Even if you pair it with F-steel you would still have a hard time using electrum shadows. Why F-electrum? For determination? Personally I don't like F-electrum that much - you get either manic episodes or severe depression, both are rather inconvenient. F-bronze for wakefulness would be better. But yes, potentially.

I think of this in this way - it's a computer, a computer doesn't think, it sends electrical signals through wires. That's something a physical speed can increase, making it process data faster. Zinc increases how your brain works, a computer has no brain, it's made out of logic gates. It's because of the nature of Endowment and Nalthian Awakening. Breaths are about GIVING not taking. There are simply things that you can't do to yourself with Breaths, like healing. But healing is not because of how invested Nomad was, it was only because of his nature as a former Dawnshard holder. He can use any investiture to heal, manipulate Connection (which allows him to speak languages) and stuff like that. Normally just being invested doesn't heal you, this is an active ability which you have to have in your Spirit Web. Breaths don't give you that ability. However a Divine Breath does increase speed, reflexes and strength - but that's connected to their nature of Returned and a Cognitive Shadow. It's also possible to do more than just heal with a Divine Breath. It may be possible for a Returned to grant some temporary physical enhancements instead of healing.

Maybe, there were many situations like this in both Era 1 and 2 where they saw a line behind their back moving. You might be able to even judge the size of the object moving - the bigger it is, the thicker the line. Well, Kelsier is doing fine somehow. There are no stories of people seeing Kelsier and truthfully in this case it would be ignored as fanatic, religious followers wanting to appear more important rather than something real. If you really want to be unnoticed, give yourself F-duralumin with Hemalurgy, then nobody would see you and your giant spike in your head - I'm surprised that you, a hemalurgic enthusiast, didn't immediately think of this solution