Inquisitor #5

@Frustration, darn yooooou! ¤_¤

If it's untappable, functionally yes, actually no. I also haven't followed the theorising that led to that conclusion, and I'm not sure why it'd be interactable one way but not the other, might boil down to the nitty gritty of how feruchemy functions. ¤_¤

But, judging from Venli's example, not the ability to use Stormlight. Before the tower is restored the only people who can use Stormlight are people with the Windrunner powerset, one way or another, so Rlain's vision, in that moment, can not have been powered by Stormlight, at least from my understanding. Yeah, we only know that a mistborn serial killer is planned to appear, and it might well be everyone's favourite stab-happy ghost. I can still see why you'd want to avoid re-stating hours of arguments here. Heh, my recent post history will show that this is 100% not true for me as well. Yeah, I mostly wanted to make the point that atium is not guaranteed to actually be central to the plot of Lost Metal and that we can't conclude that atium and lerasium will be seen again in a significant way just because of the title of an upcoming book. ¤_¤

I find myself echoing LewsTherinTelescope here, the power of the Surgebinding isn't the question, the closeness/Connection to Honor is, and I'd argue that there are few things closer to Honor than an Honorblade granting Honor's Truest Surge. Moash also keeps Surgebinding when the tower comes alight, even though his Connection to Odium is diminished, as he can feel things at that time. Fair, neither do I, though its relative relevance might be diminished. Oh, I definitely think that the title is about atium, especially when there's the empty display case with a plaque that says "Atium, the Lost Metal" on it in one of the books. I just don't think that atium has to be very relevant going forward. I wonder why they didn't want the 1000+ page book to be called the Book of Endless Pages. I do see where you're coming from and I was a little hesitant to include Warbreaker on the list. I'd personally say that my interpretation is that these titles were never really plot relevant, Warbreaker being a cute nod to how this is Vasher's backstory, Shadows of Self being quite vague and Alloy of Law, while being namedropped at one point, isn't actually a thing, really. Contrasting titles like Well of Ascension (major plot point), Way of Kings (large part of motivation of a major character), Rhythm of War (product of main plot) or Bands of Mourning (main plot device), I find them lacking. This may be partly me being on the spectrum shining through, as that might make me more inclined to take what is written at face value and lead to me missing some subtler things, I hadn't considered Alloy of Law as thematic representation of Right vs Lawful, for instance. (Ah, the eternal bane of Lawful Good.) And yet era 2 doesn't have them. I fully expect mistborn to almost entirely be a thing of the past going forward, unless someone works out how to distill lerasium from the mists. Ah, I misunderstood. I think that might be a quirk of the Vessel, not the Shard and I'm pretty sure secretspren are of Odium. I could see Taravangian (or his possible successor) trying for a more middle ground approach, in fact, it might not require any intervention from him at all, Odium is now part of Roshar, the third Pure Tone, presumably the admixture of Investitures will arise organically from there. Partly utter, blatant favouritism on my part, I'm really intrigued by what Yelig-nar + Bondsmith would do, I like the idea of possibly being able to work as mass empowerment, granting temporary Surgebinding to people through Connection shenanigans and Yelig-nar granting access to all the Surges and I'd simply want to see what interesting interaction we'd get between Bondsmith powers and all the Surges. I'm also a big fan of Sja-anat and have been hoping for her to enter a bond since Oathbringer and she's actually been working, if not with, then at least along the Radiants. Partly it's who I think would fit, the mindless Unmade are out, as while I thinl they can be bonded, I don't find it realistic, especially as they presumably lack the capacity to judge oaths. This leaves Mishram, who's an obvious pick for the Voidlight Bondsmith, Yelig-nar, Sja-anat, Dai-Gonarthis, Re-Shephir and Chemoarish. Of these Dai-Gonarthis and Chemoarish are practical unknowns, so I can't make informed guesses about them. Mishram I consider spoken for. This then leaves Yelig-nar, Sja-anat and Re-Shephir. Sja-anat's transformative nature, to me, puts her more in line with Cultivation, so makes sense for taking the role as middle ground between Odium and Cultivation, possibly being modified in the process to fit her new role. Yelig-nar I originally mostly thought about due to his being known as Blightwind, wind being associated to Honor, though he also is supposed to grant Adhesion, Honor's Truest Surge as well as the Surge of binding (I personally believe it can be used to manipulate the other nine in some way), possibly even granting Adhesion primarily, as a way to manipulate the other nine. In either case, this places him closer to Honor. Re-Shephir... I honestly didn't consider, though I don't find her to be a great fit for either, based on what we've seen. At best she's a malicious Nightwatcher, both seeking to understand humanity, but very differently. I suppose this comes down to if we consider Renarin a Truthwatcher or not. Is a Truthwatcher someone with access to manifestations of Progression and Illumination? Someone bonded to a mistspren? Someone who has the Surgebinding powers of Progession and Illumination? Is someone with the Truthwatcher Honorblade a Truthwatcher? If Renarin is a Truthwatcher then is someone who has the equivalent manifestations of the Surges of Tension and Adhesion not a Bondsmith? Renarin's powers still manifest within the context of the Radiant bond, he takes in Stormlight to fuel his abilities (though I'm sure he can take Voidlight as well), he can manifest his spren as a Blade and he presumably still swears oaths. Though I will admit that this could definitely go either way. Yeah, this is probably gonna be one of those points we won't agree on before we get a canonical answer. I still find it being a resonance as the simpler explanation, it might even solve the "always on" issue, but I see where you're coming from. And there's the crux of this entire thing, eh? No explicit confirmation either way. Yeah, that's really, really odd when you lay it out like that. I'd say Brandon's phrasing is possible to explain as being about the broad strokes, these are general functions of Fortune, rather than being meant as "it works specifically as the atium/atium interaction" but even then the specifics of how the effects line up (or don't) in the text are strange. Yeah, I can see why you'd not go in deep again. Sheesh. Though I'm not sure I have room to talk after typing up this. ¤_¤

Yes, this is indesputable. Why? It's suppression of Honor's Light. I'll grant that this should be true for the suppressor under normal circumstances, when suppressing Voidlight and when it is used with Odiums Truest Whatever. But I don't think any Connection to Odium would let you bypass the suppression of Honor's power, any more than a strong Connection to Honor would let you use Voidlight under the suppressor working normally. Yeah, that's fair. I could see it going either way, really. I mean era 2 =/= era 4 and we have no idea if Harmony is making more of it. And I mean, Shadows of Self, Alloy of Law, Warbreaker and Words of Radiance are all titles with very little relevance to what happens in them, so I don't think that's super solid. Also, in era 4 there should be barely any use for atium, barring hemalurgy. It's honestly odd that just having it won't protect you, though I know that to be the case. Or it's odd that Renarin is protected all the time, as he's presumably not surrounded by halucinations of stained glass 24/7 (or 20/5 as the case may be.) Didn't say they did. I meant it as each of them could potentially make a Bondsmith if bonded. Let me pull up my new favourite WoB: Bolding mine. I've believed for a long time that (generally) if it goes in a fabrial it goes in a gemheart it goes in a bond, with certain spren obviously being too large to go in most gemhearts. My belief is that as long as it has a valid output in one of these systems, it has a theoretical valid output in all of them, Radiant bond, fabrial, singer form. Though good luck swearing anything to the charge in a spike. If this is true, and I have very little reason to doubt it, I don't find the idea of the Unmade, either in part or in whole, being valid Bondsmith spren, or at least as valid as Renarin being a Truthwatcher. Mishram? I believe that the ancient Radiants made a bit of a deal of how she was supplying Voidlight. It would also irk me something fierce if there aren't eventually spren for each Light, personally guessing Mishram for Void, Sja-anat for "Thorn," maybe Yelig-nar for War, don't know for the tripartite Light, possibly a spren that doesn't yet exist. Because his seizures didn't make spheres go dun before? ¤_¤

Well, the standard Bondsmith spren don't give up their ties to the parent Shard(s) when bonding a Bondsmith. I also think that Mishram might have wanted a Bondsmith as a release valve of sorts, as it's possible that she wasn't able to fully control her use of Connection, which I'd say tracks with it not being a known ability of hers, per the gem archive. This might have led to her getting in too deep, connecting too strongly. In any case I can definitely see having a Bondsmith being a step towards strengthening a claim to legitimacy. ¤_¤

Venli could use her Surgebinding with Voidlight but not Stormlight, and I'd hazard that the same would have been true for Renarin powering his abilities, had he been at the tower. Stormlight, barring exceptional cases, doesn't work. And I don't see the point in mentioning that the powers of the Fused work, when they run on (unsuppressed) Voidlight. That doesn't mean he didn't notice though? Ah, right. But, that's not what I said? In the bit you quoted right after that I said that I don't think it counters atium. I'm also not sure that atium is going to have much, if any, presence in Era 4. Yes, it makes your future unpredictable, you're a domino that can fall in any direction. And we don't know how atium interferes with Shardic future sight, so we can't compare them there. Or eight, Honorblade, Stormlight, Lifelight, Towerlight, Voidlight, Warlight, "Thornlight" (Odium-Cultivation) and "Military Sciencelight" (all three) or thirteen, Honorblade, Stormfather, Nightwatcher, Sibling and the Unmade. And this implies that he doesn't know this uses Light how? Huh, I'd forgotten that, neat. I do wonder if that would actually be more noticable in direct sunlight? ¤_¤

OK, it makes sense, I really don't like it. Why is it something outside the context of regular allomancy? Is Adhesion also outside the standard Surges? Are the Shards just inconsistent? ¤_¤

My reading of this is that there's both the Hemalurgic Decay Constant, that is the inevitable loss when outside a body, and some sort of additional loss upon death of/removal from the original recipient, otherwise I don't see why a reused spike would be much less effective. ¤_¤

My only problem with this is that this might count as a creature enough that the spikes would bestow their powers on it, leaving you with much less potent second hand spikes once you want to use them. Like the idea though. ¤_¤

Yes and *cough* every other Windrunner *cough* and even then their healing slowed as the corruption got worse, just look at Kaladin. Kaladin also encountered resistance when using the reverse lashing, and spanreeds stopped working when the suppressor got flipped, over all Stormlight is inhibited. There's also clearly something up with Moash/the Honorblade, as he seems capable of using gravitatioinal lashings under the suppressor and since we don't actually know why, I'd say we can't draw conclusions based on him. So, why would Stormlight function for a non-Windrunner/Bondsmith, non-Honorblade wielder under these circumstances? You know, the circumstances that they are the only known exceptions to. Oh, you're right, I misremembered which markings were which, my bad. And someone already pointed out that Teft noticed. I mean, it shouldn't be that hard to figure out why spheres go dun around you, especially if you have a communicative spren. I'm not sure what you mean when you say that Glys wants him to decide he doesn't want them. Because nothing requires this to be a balanced system. And it fits thematically with the powers, strength of squires makes sense for being the resonance between drawing things together/attracting things and binding things together, you draw them in and stick them to you, in the same way I find the visions to make sense as Progression of Illumination. I also doubt it's more powerful than atium, I don't think it would counter atium for instance, as it doesn't show immediate future, but it'd probably be countered by atium, as that makes the now unpredictable. Atium is also something known to be under your control, unlike the visions. I'd say differently powerful. Also on the note of this not having to be balanced, Bondsmiths are a thing. Teft? How do you know that? Hmm, maybe. It's still odd that he seems trapped in it against his wishes. Yeah, Lightweavers are odd, though I guess it doesn't make sense for mnemonics to be entirely passive. Could make the argument that the ability to take a Memory is the resonance, rather than the taking of the Memory. Haha, excuse my very legitimate, highly official inquisitorial seal. ¤_¤

I think this one has a good chance of working, though it might need to be spiked before it's soulcast. Also, it may not work as being made into a lifeless is about having been alive while the spike wants something that registers as body, which a lump of former meat might not. That really depends on the limits of soulcasting, though I don't think a spike would care if the mateial was alive (sidenote, can rock soulcast into flesh be Awakened?) Also, sphere of meatification, yuck. I don't think this would work at all, ichor-alcohol probably doesn't register as blood realmatically. Sure, it fills a similar function in Lifeless, but I don't think it fills the same functions as blood, like oxygen transfer. It's there to keep the zombie fresh and lifelike, presumably prolonging time between re-infusions of Breath and generally improving the shelf-life, not letting various fun decay processes set in. ¤_¤

I've personally felt that the same statement of requiring a special prison and Melishi, could easily be restated to apply to to the capture of Nergaoul as well, as "It will require a special prison. And Dalinar Kholin." What the prison is is obvious, and Dalinar thinks about it as being the same as capturing an ordinary spren, draw it in with something it knows well. In that case Dalinar (and Melishi) are the bait for an Unmade. From this comes the question, what does Melishi have that Mishram wants? What does Mishram want? Mishram wants to be a god (of some description.) What would legitimise Mishram's divine status? A Bondsmith. All the other divine spren have them. This especially fits if Mishram was indeed the original sprenspren. My personal theory is that Melishi might have offered Mishram a Bondsmith, himself, severing the Sibling's bond and allowing Mishram to take their place, then turning the resultant power back on her, trapping her. This also fits thematically to me, as a Radiant attacking their own spren just clicks with the incredible wrongness of the capture of Mishram, along with definitely betraying unite instead of divide. I also wish to note how the Sibling feels remarkably poorly informed about what exactly transpired for someone who helped Melishi do it, lending credence to the idea that their bond was severed before the capture. I'm also very on board with the idea that Mishram has/had a deep Connection to Roshar, otherwise the backlash wouldn't have been so severe. In fact, she almost has to be the spren of spren, if she can facilitate forms of power. ¤_¤

Hmm, yeah, that's fair. Now I wonder how much control you have over how much Light you take in, like, can you choose to not drain an entire gem of Light in one go? And how much control would Renarin have while panicing over yet another vision? Could he keep himself from drinking the nearest lamp and glowing conspicuously? And if he actively didn't want the visions, which does seem to have been the case, why wouldn't he have taken care to stay away from Stormlight lamps and not carry money unless he had to, if they actually use Light? I suppose it feels more solid to me if the visions aren't something that requires more power than, say, Kaladin's strength of squires, as that doesn't require me to rationalise character decisions that, in this light, are unreasonable. It's also the simpler solution from my point of view. Why doesn't anyone catch Renarin glowing? He doesn't need Light. Why doesn't Renarin try to stay away from Light? It wouldn't make a difference. Why can't he control it? It's a resonance, Kaladin can't control his squireing either. ¤_¤

Right, but even if you can't tap it, the fact that you can store in it is hecka odd, it has a valid use that isn't just an expanded null, both A- and H-aluminium seem to work from the baseline arcane properties of the metal, "do nothing, null" and expand on it, A-aluminium wiping metal reserves and burning away Investiture in your system to some degree, H-aluminium apparently wiping powers. Both those effects make sense for aluminium, being able to store in it doesn't. That's my take anyway. ¤_¤

Uhm, no? That's the point of the suppressor? Also, if Rlain was using Light, of any kind, shouldn't someone have remarked on his tattoo melting off? (Though to be fair, I'm not certain of how exactly the tattoo stayed and was incorporated when he changed to warform, so there may be some weirdness there.) To be fair, that was in direct sunlight. At least for Jezrien's Honorblade, which grants Adhesion, so we don't know if this is Honorblade shenanigans, Adhesion shenanigans, Honorblade with a permadead Herald shenanigans, other shenanigans or a combination of multiple of these. That kinda makes it sound like Renarin is constantly walking around with a slight charge of Stormlight, as the visions strike randomly, it seems. So he'd need to constantly have Light in case one comes over him. ¤_¤

You could argue that some Surges fit multiple Shards, I'd say that Division fits Ruin and Odium both, for instance. Though I don't think that Surges have to map to individual Shards. Assuming Raboniel is at least mostly correct when she explains the Surges to Venli, nine of the Surges are the interplay of Honor and Cultivation (which makes sense, they are interpretations of natural laws, Cultivation and Honor) and one is of Honor alone, this one also being called "Honor's Truest Surge" by the Sibling. This implies to me that a Truest Surge should fall outside the nine "natural" Surges (yes, I'm well aware of the whole thing with Lift, Lifelight and Progression and how it looks a loooot like Kaladin, Stormlight and Adhesion) and as such any Shard could have a theoretical "Truest Surge" that exists outside the power set and context of Surgebinding and the Surges. Of course, Raboniel could also be lying or have been decieved by Odium, allowing us to find two "Truest Surges," Adhesion and Progression, both being of Honor and Cultivation, just on the extreme ends of the Honor-Cultivation spectrum and each capable of shenanigans when paired with the matching Investiture. This last effect is presumably based on the same principle as Ruin and Preservation being differently good at fueling different parts of the Metallic Arts. Power matching the nature of the ability seems to have an advantage (this line of reasoning also opens up questions like "does Vasher need more than a Breath's worth of Stormlight each time?") I still refuse to believe that "Voids" are a thing, but we don't need to repeat that discussion here. Is there also such a thing as Preservation's Truest Metal then? I like this as it makes several things known to be part of the functioning of Urithiru Sibling-adjacent, Transportation for the Oathgates, Transformation in the shield fabrial, Cohesion in the walls/doors. I'm less sure about how/if Division fits in, but since I'm of the oppinion that the Suppressor fabrial messes with Connection, I could see it maybe being Spiritual Division or somesuch. This makes sense, I really don't like it. Same Makes sense, Adhesion being "the Surge of Binding and Oaths." Bondsmiths and Windrunners are closest to Honor, power wise, and presumably pulling Investiture out of the Spiritual is a function of Adhesion, one that Bondsmiths get standard and Windrunners as a level up bonus. ¤_¤

Applied physics, ontomancy Calligraphy, lettromancy, rave lights Bone spurs, osteomancy Applied murder, piercing world championship ¤_¤

Could you remind me of when this happens? It's been a while since I read WoK and WoR. But why would a power manifest as a seizure? I'm much happier with the idea of this being a resonance simply because it seems like an attribute, something that just happens, just like Kaladin's squires. It might also be that Renarin, having grown up with seizures, simply rationalises this as a different kind of seizure, where Rlain might not, not having that same reference frame. I think it makes sense if the original vision is the resonance and the "stored" vision is simply a manifestation of Illumination, showing the same thing, sure, but not being the same thing. And the suppressor is still flipped at this point, meaning that this vision would have to be fueled by Voidlight if that were the case. Yeah, that is an interesting point. You put it better than I would have. ¤_¤

Shouldn't, say, Shallan have remarked on him glowing at the end of WoR though, when he's definitely seeing something? Also, it's been pointed out on Shardcast that we've never seen any other example of someone Surgebinding unwillingly, uncosciously, yes, against their express wishes, no. So it would be odd of this was an actual ability he was using but couldn't control. I don't know, possibly because actively using the ability takes more effort? Possibly because it's not actually a vision, but the recreation of a vision? Oh? -Rhythm of War, chapter 111 He doesn't get a vision? ¤_¤

You might be right. I of course have a bias toward my own interpretation (and for instance for a long time held that what Renarin did couldn't be Voidbinding, as it was too similar to Surgebinding, unlike the metallic arts, which are very dissimilar, imo), but I see where you're coming from, I think. It might simply be that SA has mostly given us similarities thus far, of course. I think we'll have to agree to disagree for now, the Metallic Arts are, from my point of view, too dissimilar to be treated as the same kind of framework as the Surges, as the ways surges manifest seems more consistent than how the nature of the metal influences the magic. Also, aluminium isn't an enigma in feruchemy, it, for some bizzare reason, has a valid interaction with the magic system that isn't just a magnified null. ¤_¤

The visions that come to him unbidden require Light? I know he uses Light when he deliberately "re-plays" one, but nothing of the sort is indicated about when he just sees the stained glass images around him. Also, I believe Rlain gets the same type of vision when he's in no position to have Light. ¤_¤

I, huh, really? I have a hard time accepting that because the Metallic Arts have no visible commonalities, compare S-Illumination and V-Illumination, both have obvious effects related to light/waveforms, thus we'd expect A-steel, F-steel and H-steel to share some commonality, relating either to Pushing, speed or physical allomancy, for most of the metals there doesn't seem to be a common theme, no rhyme nor reason as to why this metal fills this function across magic systems. We can make educated guesses about most of the powers of Voidbinding (Tension, Division ), because we can, based on Renarin, conclude that they will have effects in line with Surgebinding and how it expresses Surges. We wouldn't expect V-Tension to enable Soulcasting, as that is not in line with being an expression of Tension. On the other hand, if you handed someone a feruchemy chart and gave them a thorough explanation of the Metallic Arts, leaving out which metals perform which function in the other two, then asked them to, based on this information, fill in the metals on the other charts, could they reliably conclude which metals actually do what? Seeing as there tends to, aside from tin, be very little relation between what the metals do in each system, I'd hazard a no. Does that make sense? ¤_¤

Ehh, I'm not so sure about this. I have personally theorised that the bond-mate (most likely spren, but presumably any Cognitive entity/sapient bit of Investiture will do) has a lensing effect on the power, a bit like shining light through a coloured or warped lens. So Renarin and Rlain can access Truthwatcher Surges through an Enlightened Mistspren lens, rather than a Mistspren lens, but I don't think this will grant them access to more power, but different power. I will say though, the fact that Enlightening seems to be an imperfect method, as Tumi implies the Rhythm of War to be significant (though this might be philosophical), with the different Investitures apparently not harmonising, I could see the case for them potentially having access to both the regular Surgebinding of their order and the Voidbinding equivalent, though possibly imperfectly, on account of using two "half lenses" instead of one "lens." It will temper Odium in the sense that the Vessel will no longer have a singular overpowering Intent to contend with, it will not just be hatred all the time, though that particular combination isn't one I'd like to see. Other than that I don't think there's a difference in the way the Shards combine if they make Harmony, Discord or even just Inaction or Indecisiveness, just how the mind of the Vessel interprets/rationalises these two Intents simultaneously, but I don't think the actual power of [Ruin+Preservation] is any different no matter the combined Intent. And which one is War? Or is it both? I don't think this is something with a simple answer, though I'm personally inclined to believe that War would be both of them feeding the worst of eachother. Honor as a justification for Odium and as a way of making it "okay," because there are rules in war, the hatred is dressed up in glory and Odium pulling Honor towards martiality. I'd say that the spren with the least influence from Honor is the Nightwatcher, who's wholly of Cultivation, unlike the Cultivationspren, who are an Honor/Cultivation mix, though presumably heavily biased toward Cultivation. Spoilered for length, bolding mine. There's even disagreement among the spren about who's most like Honor and we don't actually know the ratios for any spren, with obvious guesses being Honorspren leaning heavily toward Honor, Cultivationspren leaning heavily toward Cultivation and the Stormfather, Nightwatcher and Sibling presumably being entirely Honor, entirely Cultivation and 50/50, respectively. I really don't like that interpretation, it doesn't sit right with me for a few reasons 1) I don't think that spren have easily isolatable Investiture properties, but are (normally) wholly composed of whatever investiture(s) make them up, ie spren generally consist of a chunk of [Honor and Cultivation], not two chunks of [Honor] and [Cultivation], so claiming that only the Cultivation part was affected sounds to me a lot like just heating up the tin in a bar of bronze. 2) the fact that Tumi put import on the Rhythm of War might also be because it's the first known fusion of Odium and any traditional Tone of Roshar, which is hopeful for Sja-anat's children as it's an affirmation that they do have a place, also: Bolding mine. The Rhythm of War might be significant specifically for being a melding of Honor and Odium, if this is the perspective, again with the added sense of belonging, as above. ¤_¤

Riight, except no-one's making the case that A-steel and F-steel are both expressions of the "force" of steel. I'm inclined to think that all rosharan manifestations of investiture are expressions of the Surges, similar to how all selish manifestations are expressions of the Dor (with the obvious difference of one side being principles and the other power source, but I felt that as an explanation this made sense.) Mind, I don't think we'd disagree if we all said V-Illumination, even if we'd read it differently. ¤_¤