Inquisitor #5

My immediate thought is "What possible reason could she have for wanting that?!"

Thank you, I seemed to remember there being a Veden civil war but I wasn't sure. Interesting.

Yes, in theory. But that would depend on both the Shard and the Vessel. What other Shards would a, be willing to work together, b, be as scary/as credible a threat as Odium, c, actually do something like that? Odium is contained and most Shards seem to not want to interfere. And if Odium were defeated by an outside force in, say, book eight then it'd (possibly) boil down to remnants of Odium's forces vs Roshar's humanity vs wildcard. I expect Odium to be the big bad throughout, as someone else noted, he's taken most of the continent already and he's not even fully committed at the moment.

While that is true, Odium is a Shard, what would be the man behind the man (as it were) to him? It would also be incredibly anticlimactic if he were properly defeated before the end, what with his buildup and how he's described.

I will accept that there are people I cannot protect or I will let those who can protect themselves, maybe?

The Singers plus subverted human forces seem to have been the intended army. That didn't exactly work out but... Now there's a traitor in our heroes' midst, quite a few Singers may still be whipped into soldiers and the humans are fairly scattered. Alethkar, the warrior nation, is occupied, their armies diminished, their leaders not always seeing eye-to-eye. Also they are a nation in exile at the moment which may negatively impact their morale, along with the infighting between various armies. One of their armies also betrayed them (yes, we know they were supernaturally influenced, but can that be verified by the characters?) probably not helping them look trustworthy in the eyes of their allies. Oh, and their leader is a heretic when several of the nations are nominally Vorin. Jah Keved has gone through a chaotic period of important people dying left and right, destabilising the government, at least until Taravangian came into the picture. Azir seems mostly fine, but the supposed ruler's authority doesn't really extend to all the people they nominally rule. Thaylenah was hit hard by the Everstorm, was the site of the first real battle of this Desolation and had their fleet stolen... and the fleet was their thing. Shinovar seems to be staying out of the entire mess and is where the Everstorm hits hardest. To close out on the nations (yes I know there are more, but I don't have a lot to say about them) all the nations that made use of parshmen had parts of their workforces lost to them, even if the Singers didn't cause any wanton destruction. All their economies would be negatively impacted (in wartime) and we already see people upset at doing work that's "beneath" them. In addition, basically the entire order of Skybreakers went over to Odium/the Singers, along with their Herald, denying mankind their power and support while granting the same to their enemy, along with a Herald's power and experience. It's implied that all the Fused are not awake yet, the greatest of their number taking longer it seems. And while the Fused might not be enough to call an army, they are ancient and experienced, not to mention functionally immortal as long as they have a Singer to possess. Odium has fighting resources other than armies as well, like whatever the inky creature in Dalinar's vision is and thunderclasts, which are basically living siege engines that aren't vulnerable to enemy fire as they advance (seeing as the spren can sneak close and then the "creature" can rip itself from the ground) and that are powerful enough to take down a Herald, as noted in the very first chapter of WoK. There are eight Unmade still out there, even if one seems to want to switch sides. And related to that, one of them corrupted one of the Oathgates, one of humanity's greatest resources. The Heralds have all gone various brands of insane and are not very helpful to humanity at the moment, unlike the previous Desolations. The Everstorm exists (in at least two variations) which it hasn't before and it's of Odium. And destructive... The Fused have swept in and taken over in Shadesmar, both watching the Horneater perpendicularity and keeping watch over the big Spren city and possibly more. I suppose the concise answer is that Odium is not there in full force yet and had hoped for/counted on an early decisive victory. Odium is bound by oaths, once he accepted combat by champion he had to abide by it. He was planning on subverting the man who thought himself the human champion to be his own champion instead. He entered into the agreement of trial by combat convinced that Dalinar would fall to him and conquer Roshar as his champion. Dalinar was endowed with the capacity to make this deal with Odium and if he fell under Odium's influence either the Rosharan champion would be defeated by default, freeing Odium from the Oathpact or he'd presumably be empowered by Odium to defeat whatever champion came forward, freeing Odium from the Oathpact, at which point the conquest of Roshar would presumably be a formality.

Sympathetic to his goals, disagree on his methods, dislike his aligning with Odium.

http://www.theoryland.com/intvmain.php?i=727#23 ¤_¤

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Ah, yes. But it still stands that Investiture stored is one specific thing and not "generic Investiture." And at the current time, for all intents and purposes "stores the capability to use Investiture" is correct, no? And that's really interesting, hadn't thought of it before. Might be possible with a bit of Spiritual gymnastics. ¤_¤

Oh, I definitely agree. It's incredibly impractical, if technically doable. It's like a volatile substance that can be stored safely. Just because it's possible doesn't mean you'd want a jar of it at home. ¤_¤

OK, I'm not talking about using it as a spike, only as an Allomantic metal or metalmind. And I think that was a ball of lead coated with Atium... I'll get back on that once I've checked the book. The Well of Ascension, p. 592, TOR paperback. ¤_¤

I'm pretty sure a completely sealed capsule would preclude burning the metal. But we do know that metal only has to be within the body to be burned so I'd think my original idea works, i.e. making an earring out of it and putting it in an already made hole, one that's healed enough that there's no bleeding anymore. Would work either as an Allomantic power source or a metalmind. ¤_¤

Well, Hemalurgy still allows comboing powers. I'd say Marsh is pretty overpowered in present day Scadrial. Then again, I would think that... Possible: yes, I suppose. Probable: no. ¤_¤

That or simple paranoid superstition. ¤_¤

@Faceless Mist-Wraith, that's how I read the implication there, yes. Mind you, I could be utterly wrong on that. ¤_¤

Well, it seems the rules have changed slightly since the Sazed's ascension: http://www.theoryland.com/intvmain.php?i=1109#22 And with the WOB Spool quoted up there I'd think we've got a pretty strong case for "no, you can't achieve it naturally." ¤_¤

Great work tacking the WOB down, Spool! I couldn't find it myself. And I think you're approaching this from the wrong direction, @Jedal. The point isn't the "size" of your soul as much as what it contains, I think. ¤_¤

I'm saying maybe, also, interesting idea. Well, "natural" Investiture on Scadrial is tied to your sDNA and is something you're born with. ¤_¤

Yeah, I was thinking of a similar analogy there, if we think of Allomancy and Feruchemy as both being expressions of a recessive gene, well, if we get one of each they're co-dominant, no? So you can get a bit of both but not either fully (without... enhancing... of course.) And I know my genetics analogy isn't perfect, it can't account for mistings/ferrings... ¤_¤

I think the intent here was the stealing of the entire Mistborn package in one go. Well, don't we think alike. You're not a Shard, are you? *points to username* ¤_¤

Seems about right, my boxings are on Atium, personally. Atium being (pretty much) mythological at this point and known of by people in general. So if someone, say, went on an expedition for "The Lost Metal" they'd probably be going for Atium. And WOB is that the God-metals could be distilled from the mists, IIRC. So, last for now. That's really interesting, who knows what Atium Hemalurgy could accomplish with a bit of tweaking... hmm... And I'd not even considered Hoid having a medallion for it before. NICE! I suppose there's no reason it couldn't happen if you used a workaround (Hemalurgy, TLR's self-empowering at the Well, etc.) but I'm fairly confident that it couldn't happen naturally, i.e. that you're born with both. ¤_¤

Earrings are piercings, and people don't bleed from the holes made for those once they've healed. ETA: Though sweat would still be a (potential) problem. ¤_¤

Yeesh... ¤_¤

We still don't know what burning that would do. And seeing how volatile the stuff is... ¤_¤