Oudeis

I fully agree with you, this is one model for how it works. However, I don't think it's the only one. Basically, what I'm saying is, how does "Soothing" work? You look at a person, think of an emotion, and concentrate on damping it down in your target. If you do it on a koloss, you have no direct sensory feedback telling you it's not affecting him. Think of Breeze and Sazed. Breeze tried to Soothe Sazed's sorrow early in Hero of Ages, not realizing that Sazed was in the throes of such depression that it wasn't doing very much. So my question... can you uselessly Soothe other things? If I stare at this bottle of soda on my desk, burn brass, and try to reduce it's happiness... am I doing anything? Or not? How is it different from Soothing a koloss, who will be similarly unaffected... until, of course, you get enough power to overcome the Flaw. So basically, this is my question. Do we know that you cannot even focus on a piece of metal with allomantic iron until the blue lines appear? Or is it like Soothing, where the Investiture inside of you can be directed by your will, even against targets which are resisting you, until such time as you overcome the resistance? Thank you, Serendipity. I tend to have disappointing super-powered dreams. They usually operate like games of make-believe, where I don't actually have powers, everyone just "follows the rules" as if I did. Once I had the power to shoot fire from my hands. The bad guys sent swarms of minions running at me down a stairwell. I raised my hands above my head and screamed, "FIRE!" and even though nothing happened, they all politely turned and walked out the door of whatever landing they were on, playing the part of "we're burned to ash now".

I love that the Bridgeman is 4.

Ooo, hadn't thought of that. This might help me phrase the question. "According to the Lord Ruler, multiple Soothers can overcome a koloss's resistance to emotional allomancy and exploit the flaw. Could multiple Lurchers work together to pull on metal piercing a body? Could multiple Seekers work together to pierce a coppercloud?"

Floating something out there, a random thought which occurred to me today. We know that a typical Lurcher is unable to affect metal inside of someone's body. We know that a typical Soother is unable to affect the emotions of a koloss. The Lord Ruler flat-out stated that multiple Soothers could work together to overcome a koloss's resistance to emotional allomancy and activate The Flaw. We know that "cannot affect metal" isn't a binary thing, it's a matter of resistance; this is supported by the fact that with the Mists or duralumin, Vin could Pull on metal inside someone's body, and WoP is the most recent to mention the sliding scale. So. With all this in mind... I don't know how I myself feel about this, but I wonder. Could many Lurchers, working at once, Pull on a piece of metal in someone's body? My initial reaction is to say no. Why? Because there's not even a line traveling to that metal, so how could any number of Lurchers affect it? However, this got me thinking about Soothing a koloss. We know there's no effect from Soothing a koloss normally. You just stare at the koloss burning brass and think really hard. The emotions aren't affected and there's no mental feedback to let you know how you're doing. Yet, many Soothers at once can work together, and eventually penetrate the defenses. This implies that at least one plausible model is: The resistance of an object is lowered for every Misting opposing that specific resistance. If that model is true, a dozen Lurchers could all burn their iron. Even without ironlines, they could all stare at the same earring, focusing their mental energies on it. If this model is correct, the resistance of this metal to allomancy would weaken with each successive Lurcher focusing on it. Eventually, one of them would see an ironline and be able to Pull on it. Just a random brainstorm I had today. It's still fresh in my mind and I don't know how I feel about it, if I think it's a plausible model or not. Perhaps someone will point out to me something super obvious that invalidates the model, or maybe I'll come up with it on my own after considering it for a bit longer, or maybe I'll ask Mr. Sanderson at a signing.

Could it be related to how Breeze recruited an army of dejected skaa?

...except that Szeth has already eliminated every King.

Man I wish I knew that dropped audio at the part about Frost... What is a race? Dragon? Is it something else?

Well... I'm still waiting for you to tell me what exactly you've "observed" that tells you they're different. Cuz I've pointed out already how we're shown in every instance that they're the same. I disagree with you that saying "observed" means something is subjective, rather than objective. Interpreted is subjective, but pure observation is an objective thing. An exothermic reaction can be observed to produce 7 joules of heat. If you "observe" it you're not going to get 15 joules, you're not gonna get 2 joules. Now, you could take the same set of data points I have and come to a different conclusion, and that would be subjective, but by that point we're done observing and we're now interpreting. You and I both "observed" Jasnah turn men into smoke. Your interpretation of that event is that it couldn't possibly be due to Jasnah convincing their cognitive aspects to change. You also interpret that the way we've seen Shallan attempt to Soulcast is the only form of Soulcasting available to her. I'm just saying. You're using inherently objective terminology to express your own speculation as fact. It's becoming more and more prevalent on this forum to do so, and there are a lot of new people trying to figure stuff out. If you say things like, "we've seen that Jasnah and Shallan Soulcast in different ways" people will tend to believe you, and then they'll have false information. Unless, and I'm gonna reiterate this once more, if you can show me what I'm missing, if you can present me with any evidence of their powers operating differently that's strong enough to counter the WoB saying that they work the same, I will concede that you were right, and that you did in fact observe something.

Does anyone who's more recently read the book than I recall what color Vasher's clothes are?

Sorry for the double-post; just wanted to make sure people see this as NEW because if you're going it could be very relevant. Just spoke with the venue, and I have some additional information. They will require that you purchase a book there to attend the event. They have more of his Young Adult stuff, but you can call and order any book still in print, though you will have to purchase it over the phone. If you buy a book but don't show up on the day of the signing, they will have Mr. Sanderson sign it for you and hold it until you can get there. The store itself closes at 6pm. They will open again at 7pm for the signing event. They don't typically do numbers or wristbands. If they expect very large groups, they might give out numbers. The last Sanderson event at this store had about 40 people, which wasn't enough to warrant numbers. I will call again on Monday the 26th. By then, based on how many people call to ask about the event, they will make the decision on whether or not to give out numbers. If they do, you can pick up your number/buy a book from about 5pm to 6pm, before they close prior to the event. If they expect a TON of people, they will leave the store open the extra hour between 6 and 7 to pick up numbers. Also as a general rule, she said, Sanderson fans are courteous and nice, so I for one look forward to living up to her expectations.

That's my point. What I'm trying to figure out is, will she get a vibe from him under any circumstance? Or was there something specific about the other circumstance? If it's just him... is it all Worldhoppers? Is it her enhanced bronzedar detecting his Lightweaving, so it would only be other Worldhoppers when they're Invested? Was it about the situation? Maybe it wasn't an arcane feeling, but a purely mundane one. She spent her formative years around the beggars and lowest class of Scadrial. Maybe Hoid, for all his acting skill, was just barely off enough for her to realize he was a fake. Whereas she's spent time recently with the Terris, but not to the extent that she could see through Hoid's disguise, so maybe she wouldn't have gotten any sort of vibe from the Elder. I fully admit this one question independently will not be the aluminum bullet that provides the answers to all the questions, but it's one more step in the process. It might help us refine further questions, like, was it an arcane or mundane "vibe" she got from him? Would she have gotten it from Vasher? Lightsong? Siri? Renarin? Gaz? Sarene? Ashe? In short, we have one point of data. What I'm "trying to figure out" is to get a second point, and using that information try to figure out the best ways to get more and more data, like Battleship. Except that we're all playing Battleship against someone who has the option to not tell us whether or not we hit a ship of his, making the game significantly harder.

You're speculating about something else, and basing that speculation on this statement, saying that there's "observation that they seem different." Except... there is no observed differences, and they don't seem different. If you want, you can guess that they're different in a way we don't yet have clues about, but if you phrase it like this you'll confuse people into thinking that there's actual evidence of that being true, when in fact we have evidence that they're not different in any significant way.

If Vin had met the "Terris Elder" that Elend ran into at the end of Well of Ascenion on his way back to Luthadel, would she have gotten a weird vibe from him?

...How have I never thought of this before? How did Hoid get by in ash-filled Scadrian air? Did he simply constantly tap health and heal? While infinite gold stores would heal the damage caused by inhaling contaminants your body isn't prepared to handle, would it actually prevent you from hacking and coughing constantly? And he even showed up in especially ashful air. Was he maybe wearing a filtration mask under his Lightweaving? This bothers me even more than how he was able to slip into the Terris and IMMEDIATELY become one of their Elders. Which is sorta out of character for him, really, since he seems to avoid positions of real authority. @Blaze and Pestis: Well, like we've all said, this is now a matter of opinion. You understand the gist of what I'm saying, and our contention seems to come from how likely a Scadrian is to find someone with metallic gold hair undismissably atypical. Since we agree on all salient points, I'm not willing to devote more brainpower to deducing the freak-out threshold of the average Scadrian.

I'll bring my Szeth game figure. If someone else brings their's, we can play! Since we don't know how to play and the stats are perforce exactly the same, it will consist of having our Szeths face each other, each roll a die, and whoever gets the higher number wins. ADVANCED RULES: Best two out of three.

As expected, for the expected reason. You're at the tail-end of the recording? ... So... transcript soon? I WANT W'S-o-B! Crazy fan? What crazy fan? ::goes back to costume-making::

@Argent and Wetlander: You're not really addressing my point. We've never seen a Soulcasting from Jasnah, that I know of, in that she doesn't have a Viewpoint chapter in either Way of Kings or Words of Radiance. Shallan's only ever successfully Soulcast twice, and tried (well, really tried) and failed once. Maybe Jasnah is better at convincing; maybe convincing is one way, but not the only way for either of them. Basically what I'm saying is, if you take one guy who can just barely lash, and falls every time he does it, and has to stop and think about it each time, and can only Lash himself... and compare him to a guy who can Lash multiple times to increase his speed, who can sail the air and own the skies, who can catch a man Lashed by someone else and carefully bring him to the ground... you'd be comparing Kaladin to himself. My point is, a novice might look like they're doing something very, very differently than a master does, even when the master is doing the exact same thing, just better. tl;dr, we don't see Soulcasting from Jasnah's perspective. The mechanical results are exactly the same. Many aspects are all exactly the same. The parts that you're saying are different are just speculation, since it could easily be that they're very similar, and the difference is simply a matter of raw talent and expertise. It's possible they're different, but we don't know and frankly given WoB on shared Surges acting very similar, we have no good reason to speculate that they're going to be any different.

Lin Davar only became a Ghostblood just at the end, didn't he? When he took on Luesh as Steward? Years after his wife stopped being a member of any organization, up to and including "united brotherhood of living people."

How does Transformation work differently for each of them? The way Shallan changed the goblet and the ship seemed pretty similar to how Jasnah changed the wine into crystal, or the paper into fire.

A question for anyone who got one of the Epic cards: Do they have stats on them like the Szeth card does for the game? (I'd be surprised if they did as the stats seem very Realmatic-centric).

Found it! Though in the course of looking for it, on like the first page I found someone else pointed it out before me. I've upvoted him for beating me to the punch, though I think I explain the case in more detail, myself.

It does help that Roshar is freakishly diverse. It's easier to blend in there, like how it'd be easier for aliens to blend in to New York City than Raleigh, North Carolina. There are SO MANY DIFFERENT people on Roshar with such drastic racial identifiers that the little imperfections get glossed over. Isshik (that's the purelake guy's name, yes?) may or may not have met Herdazians, whose fingernails are rocks, or Unkalaki, whose teeth let them eat claws and shells, or an Alethi/Iriali hybrid with particolored hair of black mixed with a metallic golden hue. Given all that, "A makabaki but he's kinda tall" isn't gonna scream ALIEN to him. If an Iriali traveled to Scadrial, however... I mean, people made a big deal about how Allriane was blonde. BLONDE. Someone showing up with actual golden skin would absolutely trigger their "alien-dar". I wrote a story about a Final Empire era Mistborn traveling to Halladren once, and I wrote in how he had to explain why he was freakishly short, and why he had such trouble breathing in their non-ash-filled air, and don't get me started on a fruit-rich diet for a man whose digestive tract has been designed to flourish from vegetables grown in ash. So, partially to answer your question, I invite you to look at the context. Roshar is a place where people who look different can get by. We know little about Worldhoppers visiting other worlds, but I assume they'd use hair-dye, eye drops, make-up, perhaps costumes when they don't simply have magic to illusion them. Otherwise, you're right, they'd look different enough that people would be screaming alien.

Thank you. Something to add... not really to disagree, just one more element to keep in mind. I concur that everyone must do something to impress Endowment, and apparently must in your final moments exemplify something heroic or noble. And I agree that on average this prolly does make you a reasonably nice person. I'm just remembering a LARP I was in once. (Yes I'm admitting that in public). A group of good guys got to the final battle, and were able to put up a massive shield around the central prize to keep all evil out, then tried to do their thing. My group showed up to stop them, and we were told, "You can't be in here, anyone evil can't enter this room." And we told them, "We're not evil, we're good. We just don't agree with how you want to use prize." My point is, just as two rational, reasonable people can look at the same evidence and draw two different conclusions, two different people can both be "heroic" and "endowful" and not necessarily both be good people. For example, Blushweaver apparently died in an extraordinarily "Honest" way. Brutal honesty is seldom nice. As Emily Dickinson said, "As lightning to the children eased with explanation kind, the truth must dazzle gradually, else every man be blind." Children especially are typically introduced to the brutal truths of the world on a gradual basis. A person exemplifying total honesty might find that children are not naturally attracted. Again, not trying to flat-out disagree with your statement. I think you're right, that the vast majority of people who Return, being hand-selected by Endowment specifically to make the world be a better place, are prolly decent blokes to whom children might necessarily flock. I'm just pointing out that outliers prolly do exist; not to say that I think your statement didn't allow for this, I just wanted to express what you had implied. Hrm... I think I'll go start a thread in Warbreaker, unless I find that it already exists. Returned "Destinies". Do they usually work? EDIT: To respond to Skaa... I disagree, only because I think Tien did to Kaladin EXACTLY (not in fundamental principle) what Shallan did to the Deserters. Hrm... huge speculation, but in my personal headcanon I agree with you that what Vasher did was, to an extent, similar to what Lightweavers do. However, it's by such a broad generalization that I think it's exactly like what Breeze does. I think in the specific tease that Mr. Sanderson gave us, he was talking about something more specific. So... I disagree with you, not because I think your answer doesn't fit the situation, just because I think there's another example that fits the situation so much better, it's prolly what Mr. Sanderson was talking about. I'll try to find my link to the thread where I present all my evidence for why Tien is obviously a Lightweaver.

I'm sorry... you're saying that Hoid would never travel to anywhere that wasn't a shardpool? So the Shattered Plains, the Horneater Peaks, the middle-of-nowhere, and Kholinar... are all shardpools, then? Not to mention everywhere he's been seen on the three other known Shardworlds?

Well if it's someone no one would suspect, we can rule out Hoid.