Trusk'our

Ah, that's a good point. I had forgotten she hadn't quite Ascended yet, though she was close. I went diving into some WoBs to refresh my mind on the topic (I probably should've done so before making the original post, but, eh). Avatars are fundamentally considered a part of the Shard still, and unlike Splinters are not fully autonomous. They don't have the same mind, but I think share a strong Connection and Identity with the core of the power. They can form of their own accord and do not require a Vessel's permission (as I suspect happened for both BAM and Ishar). It is also worth noting that the "standard" Avatar is essentially considered a Vessel, but on a much smaller scale with more finite pool of Investiture to access. With these in mind, I think an Avatar is unique from a Spren, Radiant, or other Invested being in that they are considered a part of a Shard in the same way a Vessel is, however that works (I still think Connection is a big part but Identity might be an even larger factor), but are ultimately allowed a smaller reserve of Investiture to access- the Vessel is still head honcho and can wrestle control from a disobedient Avatar if they feel like it. Except, of course, when the Shard itself holds preference for the Avatar. So I guess not just anyone with the knowledge and resources can dip in a Shardpool to become an Avatar, but they could take steps to accomplish it of their own volition, and if they impress the current Vessel or Shard enough they can potentially get away with it.

True. Autonomy was even able to revoke Telsin's power as her Avatar, though only did so once she fell out of favor. I think it's still totally possible to become an Avatar via Shardpool, but probably only if the Shard itself allows it (as Mishram won over Rayse) or if it's set in motion by the Vessel themselves (as with Rashek and Vin). I like to think of the WoA as a quick-burning method of using the Investiture, immediately converting it to a kinetic state that either disperses or is used up quickly, though in a grand display of power. Kind of like Allomancy metabolizing a metal to grant a temporary effect. Conversly, BAM and Ishar's usage was more like absorbing a Bio-Chromatic Breath. They got much less flash than something like Allomancy gets, but it sticks around giving smaller perks until utilized. It's also worth mentioning that the WoA was used to affect Scadrial, which is uniquely linked to the power of Preservation (and Ruin), something that Odium didn't have on Roshar despite being Invested there. No, I did mean that I think someone could absorb a Shardpool to more or less permanently Ascend to become an Avatar. "Ascend" in this case meaning you have a Connection to the relevant Shard that lets you access loads of Investiture on demand and can act on its behalf, at least in some ways, not necessarily that you dissolve into pure Invested and can move planets around and such. Something like Telsin or Ishar, basically. Actually, I wonder if Rashek had been more focused on consolidating power initially upon drawing in the Well (or if had more Cosmere knowledge than a pack man) if he could have overrode the temporary aspect of it. He did make himself into an absurdly powerful Mistborn, which is a permanent Investment, so dedicating enough of the Well to that task might just do the trick. Anyway, thinking on this general topic, I wonder if this is part of where Era 3 is going to go. Sazed favors Preservation too much, causing Ruin to seek an outlet. Kelsier, armed with knowledge of BAM and Ishar's shenanigans tries to exploit this, seeking Harmony's Shardpool to absorb the power and become an Avatar of Ruin/Discord. Given his ties to Ruin, his resources, and Sazed's instability over Ruin, I think he could do it. Plus, knowing him, he'd totally jump at the opportunity.

Based on what we've seen, I think that Shardpool Perpendicularities have a similar Connection to a Shard as an Avatar. BAM and Ishar were both able to absorb a significant portion of Investiture, but for some reason needed Odium's Perpendicularity to do so. It seems they couldn't just absorb Voidlight (or Stormlight, in Ishar's case) over time, but actually needed the WoC itself. Furthermore, the WoA was used as a conduit for Rashek and Vin to temporarily Ascend and essentially become Avatars of Preservation. We see that in TLM that Autonomy has the odd ability to create Perpendicularities wherever she wants, though some special circumstances must be met. She also happens to have the ability to easily Invest new Avatars, even on other worlds, which I think helps point to the two abilities being linked. I think that all of these individuals used more or less the same mechanism- a unique, direct Connection to a Shard that is naturally present in a Shardpool (or, in Telsin's case, probably just handed that Connection by Autonomy. Though, I suppose she could have fought her way to a Pool of Autonomy's, proving herself above other Set members). These Perpendicularities function as a place in the Physical or Cognitive Realms you can "touch" a Shard without actually holding a seed of its Invested Art or being aligned with its Intent. On a parallel note, I think that there are three ways you could absorb a Perpendicularity to become an Avatar of a Shard (not a Splinter. An actual proxy for a Vessel to a limited degree). You could either be in favor of the power, like BAM yoinking it despite Rayse's wishes, you could use Connection tricks, probably as Ishar pulled as a primal Surgebinder (I don't think he had his Blade back then) or maybe a device like the Ire orb, or the power itself can be tweaked by the current Vessel like the WoA. In any case, I think having a pre-established Connection to the power is helpful. Ishar got his original Surgebinding from Odium, BAM was literally made up of Odium's Investiture, Vin was chosen by Preservation and was Mistborn, etc. If you aren't careful though, I think the power could reject you like Preservation nearly rejected Kelsier or Honor rejected Tanavast, because unlike a Hemalurgic spike, Breath, or most MoI it's an actual part of the Shard, not just a part of a world's Invested Art. I'm really happy this mechanism was explored more, as the WoA felt very much like a one time phenomenon to me- cool, but of little continual relevance. Now, however, every Shardpool has tons of latent potential.

Another possibility for a Nalthian system of collecting Breath: what if a culture existed that believed in voting for their god to their position? Everyone gives their Breath to a single person, who is then supposed to use that power to reign over the people as a deity, blessing them in return for the people's devotion- though the type of devotion is something voted on too. Funnily, if everyone giving up their Breath felt entitled to getting attention and help from their created god, the Investiture would pressure the person holding it to actually do that instead of just conveniently using it for themselves. It would probably still be an easy system to abuse, given that all Investiture goes to one person and even with the helpful urging of the people's Breath it would be relatively easy to steal/use only for personal gain, but it would certainly be interesting in that you would have a very, very powerful Awakener to perform government functions. Makes me wonder, what kind mindset would that give people, if you believed you could shape deity itself to your will? It's a foreign thought process to me, as my own beliefs don't align with that, but it would be very interesting to explore in a story, I think.

Nightblood holds some of Ruin's Investiture, most likely due to its Intent altering what it got from Endowment and other sources, I'm thinking. I would be willing to guess that any sufficiently "mangled" Investiture could count as Ruin's though, given it's Intent and the unique ability the Shard might have according to my proposal.

It doesn't seem so, though that would've been cool.

I would venture to guess that the loss of energy is because the metal isn't getting converted into energy, as a Harmonium/Trellium bomb works, I think it's just trading one thing for another. Matter for Investiture, which isn't necessarily one-to-one. Though as @king of nowhere said, both the Investiture and the metal return to Preservation's system eventually. It's weird. Allomancy does rely on a small seed of innate Investiture to function, but also metabolizes a metal to draw more fuel directly from the Shard of Preservation. Feruchemy is the art that really relies purely on your own Innate Investiture, though even it breaks the rules a little bit and draws extra power from the SR to facilitate change in states of matter. There's also just the fact that the term end-positive, end-neutral, and end-negative are all imperfect terms that kind of break down the more you mull it over.

We know that every Shard has unique abilities. Honor can bind even other Shards, Autonomy seems to be capable of booting other Shards off claimed worlds and creating Perpendicularities more easily (probably from making largely autonomous Avatars), etc. I think, perhaps, that Ruin might have the most dangerous potential of any Shard. Not only is it driven to change things, it has an undeniable destructive edge regardless of who holds it. Furthermore, I believe we've seen evidence of Ruin's Intent not just corrupting Investiture, but actually converting it over to itself fully (Hemalurgy granting Connection to Ruin despite stealing fragments of other Investiture and Nightblood bearing Ruinous colored Investiture despite taking from many sources). I think it's just possible that one of Ruin's unique Shardic abilities is to completely destroy and overwrite another Shard's Investiture, which would grant it the potential to be the most dangerous Shard, I'm thinking. There's definitely the question of whether Ruin would be controlled well enough to actually kill another Vessel and devour their Shard, but I think if it did happen the Cosmere might just be doomed as Ruin kept eating up other Shards and growing with each one.

I think that Identity could be considered something of an individualized Rhythm or Tone. I've explored this topic more here if you're interested.

I mean, if you get some purified Dor and a Seer bodyguard it might work. Barring that, an Oracle could simply train to use electrum shadows to convey pertinent information to themselves, perhaps with hand signals. It would be more indirect, but more plausible with limited resources.

You raise a fair point in that we still do not fully understand how Hemalurgy interacts with Spren, nor Gemstones used as an alternative focus. However, we do know that both Ishar and Battar used some version of this Hemalurgy, though for different reasons. I think this at least hints at this being less a result of Bondsmithing, and more a natural interaction with Investiture they can exploit. I'll admit that since we don't yet know the full mechanics of this system that we cannot determine with certainty what is possible, but I suspect that no stolen Spiritweb fragments were involved with the Spren-spiking we've seen. I think, instead, this method simply relies on the same Realmatics that capture Spren in Gemstones to begin with. With the right Intent and the correct focus you bind a Spren to a location or entity, the Gemstone or metal acting only as the medium necessary. Otherwise, I'm not sure Moash's transformation could have happened, as Ruin's ability to facilitate Spiritweb theft seems to be tied to metals alone and Battar probably lacks the necessary Bondsmithing to compensate. Though, she is a primal Surgebinder separately from her Honorblade abilities, and we know from other WoBs that you can spike Investiture off of or into Spren, so this headcannon of mine could just be false. A fair take, and there very well may be more complications than I'm imagining. Could be, if done right. Fiddling with Connection might be enough on its own to gain agelessness. I've actually wondered, could you spike a recently deceased person, reattaching their Spiritweb to their body? Normally, we see that this requires extraordinary amounts of Investiture to make them persist, but I wonder if this is strictly necessary to actually pin a soul to a body, Kelsier style.

I believe originally Brandon had intended for Rashek to use a Lerasium bead to gain Allomancy and then rely on some unknown Feruchemical effect (likely nicrosil Compounding) to boost it. However, later this was retconned into him simply being extraordinarily powerful by virtue of using the WoA to make himself an Allomancer. It was also said that Rashek had spikes at one point, but this seems to also have been changed for some reason, though it could simply have been Brandon forgetting a relatively small detail.

Been a little while since I've done one of these, but WaT has given me a few new ideas and a fresher perspective. We've seen an open example of Hemalurgy on Roshar now, or at least something using the same mechanism of splicing Investiture into a recipient's Spiritweb. And, we've seen that crystal spikes can pin a Spren to a location, which was actually part of the original plan to trap Unmade though it got changed eventually. This, I think, should be possible with metal spikes too, given Kelsier's situation. So, my thinking is, what if you created a Hemalurgically sound bullet, spiked a Spren onto it (a very nasty kind, like an anger or death Spren), then shot an enemy with it? Perhaps this would allow you to hit them with a hostile piece of sentient Investiture, which would continue to attack Invested individuals from the inside. What's more, Navani's experiments with taming lesser Spren might mean you could also train them to do this better, encouraging them to attack and destroy. Or, maybe this would be a viable method for Investing other metal weapons on Roshar. Want a shield to resist Shardblades? Skip the Fabrial and spike some Bindspren for durability. Want a sharper sword? Maybe a cutting Spren exists to be harnessed. Heck, with the right training, metal, and Spren, you might be able to craft a functional suit of Shardplate, all without Surgebinding or Awakening. I suppose a lot of these techniques could be accomplished with gemstone tech, but I feel this might be simpler and easier on a large scale. Or, perhaps it could simply become a Scadrian method of creating Fabrials in the space era.

As @Treamayne has brought up, there is at least one example of a Kandra with four arms. Though we don't see them used I find it hard to imagine the Kandra keeping that form if it were truly unwieldy. I think, then, as long as a true body were sculpted with the correct structure they could coordinate a large number of arms- especially given that their brain mass should be flexible. Larger bodies IRL require more neurons to control (which is why some creatures like whales and elephants have bigger brains than humans despite having less sapience), so a Kandra with added arms should be able to coordinate with a some practice so long as they add some brain lobes along with the extra limbs. This is also supported by Kandra greatly increase their mass without losing coordination, like when TenSoon becomes a bulky horse or even just with Mistwraiths' typical body plan. Added arms would increase total weight, but I doubt it'd be enough to seriously disrupt their total capacity. There's also some issue regarding how the muscles and bones would be placed- I don't think an actual human body plan could do it without serious modification. I think if a Kandra tried to take a human skeleton and plaster on an extra pair of arms they'd have to become pretty grotesque in their upper body to support them, and the rotation of the secondary arms may still be more limited that the original. But, I'm no biologist, so perhaps these worries aren't as founded as I make them out to be. Whatever the case, I'm sure a Kandra could make four arms work with some effort (though any more will probably involve becoming a centipede by necessity).

Metals on Scadrial aren't Invested unless they are Godmetals. They're just used to obtain and/or hold Investiture, depending on the Metallic Art. And, I'm guessing the reason they glow in the CR is because of Scadrial's interaction between Investiture, the SR, and metals. I was under the impression that Metalsight sensed Connections to axi, but we do see in BoM that strong enough Metalsight can allow you to see- and possibly interact with- souls/Investiture, so I think there's merit to your theory. Metalsight might just be a different flavor, perhaps weaker under normal conditions.

An interesting concept. I'm not sure if expanding the power itself is actually what Savantism does. From my understanding, it's more like an overuse of Investiture that ends up widening the cracks made by Allomancy (or, perhaps, Hemalurgy), in the process warping the Spiritweb to accept the constant influx of Investiture. I think this would explain why Spook loses most sensory input when he stops burning tin as a Savant- his Spiritweb has new cracks in it, replacing some of his natural self with the Allomantic Investiture. Though this makes his power much more efficient and tunes him into it far better, he loses a lot of his natural ability. However, given that Investiture can seep into Spiritweb cracks, I find it unlikely that there isn't some way to plaster them closed. I just don't know if Savantism is the best rout to take. Hmm, perhaps. Kandra seem to have spikes that have fully integrated into their Identity, but still suffer from the Flaw. I think it would take a little extra effort, at least in most cases. Hemalurgy causes damage as an inherent mechanism, so you'd have to find a way to more precisely know what to take, I'm thinking. As Spiritweb reading tools advance and as Investiture knowledge expands, I think this will shrink the Flaw's relevance over time.

If Dalinar had not left for the Beyond, yes, he could have been spiked into a body like Kelsier or have simply existed in the Cognitive Realm as long as he'd wanted. But, given his departure, I don't think it will happen.

Rhythms aren't your actual emotions, but but a direct Connection to the SR. Emotional Allomancy is more like a CR wave that laps against your Cognitive Aspect, stirring it to feel a certain way. Weirdly, emotional Allomancy seems to be capable of bonding an Allomancer to Hemalurgically pierced beings, which feels more SR based. I'd guess it's because the CR waves squeeze into the Spiritweb cracks and transition to being a more direct manipulation. Perhaps this is why Kandra, despite having sapience, reportedly do not feel emotional Allomancy without it being strong enough to overtake them (though TenSoon might have just been lying to protect his people's secret). You make good arguments for combat oriented emotional Allomancy. I agree. Also, it would be exceptionally powerful on large squads of troops. Bolster your allies with a controlled Thrill whilst smothering their opponents with waves of fear, mistrust, and depression.

What can I say? I am a Hemalurgy enthusiast, after all. Given the several, relatively easy avenues proposed to blank Identity, I'm not convinced that this will be the only issue. While Snapping doesn't change one's chances of passing down their Allomantic potential, it does allow them to use that power for themselves. I think, then, that if sub-Allomantic powers are stolen from non-Metalborn you might still miss a component to use them. Perhaps Snapping activates the Investiture by bonding Preservation?

Do you mean to ask if you can Allomantically burn a Hemalurgically Invested metal? If so, yes, it's possible, but as you guessed Identity contamination interferes under normal circumstances (but it's been proposed that Steel Inquisitors could, as they can sidestep Identity contamination- though the process would be excruciating). What's more, we don't actually know what exactly it would do beyond that it would somehow splice the Hemalurgic metal's Spiritweb and the Allomancer's Spiritweb in some way. This won't grant access to stolen powers though. You may also, like with Compounding, be able to choose the Allomantic effect of a burned spike over the new effect. If I were to guess what new effect burning a spike would do, I'd guess there would be residual aftershocks of the stolen Spiritweb, like how Koloss-blooded have a small portion of their parents' Iron spike strength. Or, perhaps you can overwrite your physical appearance or something.

We've seen that Anti-Stormlight won't react within a Radiant unless they're currently full of Stormlight. But, we've also seen that there are other ways to directly force Stormlight into someone. Let's say you're a Windrunner or a Skybreaker. You use Gravitation to weigh down your opponent as you stick them with your handy-dandy Raysium knife, which allows a destructive interaction to occur within them. An enemy Radiant would probably be finished off by this. I doubt this would permanently kill a Fused, as corrupted Spren survive the process of burning away their Stormlight-comprised parts (as shown by Mraize's Cryptic). However, it would still be damaging and could temporarily finish them off from the fight. Another possible weapon to a Radiant could be using an Anti-Stormlight polestone as a grenade by breathing Stormlight into it, though I suppose it really depends on the speed of the reaction and the range you can breath it into the Anti-Stormlight polestone. Might require some mechanical tinkering like with Allomantic grenades (which would arguably remove the need for a Radiant at all).

If I recall correctly, Kelsier says in TFE that TLR was reduced to nearly a skeleton by being burned at one point, only to regenerate in an eyeblink. If Rashek had been burned that badly he may not have been able to retain contact with his Metalminds, or there may simply have not been any living tissue remaining to grow back from regardless of his healing factor. However, I think this is story is more than likely untrue, as there are exaggerated stories of assassination attempts on TLR (as hinted by the WoB), and of course Rashek could just heal before the damage got that bad or could simply prevent death via fire by storing heat.

Yes, though I believe they require an additional strong Connection to do much (Ruin gets automatic access because the Spikes themselves Connect to its Intent). Autonomy, for example, was able to hijack Hemalurgy by using her own Godmetal to oust Harmony and establish her own Connection. This allowed her to speak through- and likely control, unless her Intent prevented it- those sufficiently pierced by Hemalurgy and one or more of her own spikes. Still, adding mental resilience, Copperclouds, or aluminum lined helmets/caps to your Hemalurgically enhanced soldiers would be wise, particularly when treading on another Shard's home turf. Alternatively, I suppose Ruin was able to control and hold onto his own constructs to prevent outside influences, so that could also help mitigate external forces (though Vin's Mist-enhanced Soothing to control Marsh shows this tactic isn't infallible).

Sounds like you're in the right place! Welcome to the Shard! If I may ask, which Brandon Sanderson books have you read yet, so that we don't accidentally spoil anything for you?

Actually, do we know they were particularly weak? The amount of Lerasium consumed is directly proportional to the strength of Investiture it, but we don't know the level of Investiture that was actually given to Wax and Wayne by Lerasium (no examples without duralumin or trace metals from what I remember), nor the size of Elend's original Lerasium bead, I believe. I think it's possible it's a Spook situation, where their new level of Allomancy would be comparable to or perhaps slightly stronger than the rest of the population for simplicity's sake. But this is admittedly just conjecture, given my lack of evidence. I think the WoB is primarily trying to point out the need for Snapping rather than how much of a person's power is unlocked when they do Snap. People who have 20-30% can't Snap without external intervention, though even if they do they'll still be weaker than those at 50%, who have enough Investiture to Snap and gain access to their power through standard trauma. People at 100%, I think, are just those who didn't need to Snap later on (Elend automatically bonding Preservation through Lerasium and Vin Snapping at birth). It's weird that Rashek isn't mentioned as being at 100%, but I suspect Brandon either forgot or is specifically talking about viewpoint characters. Interesting. I think that idea has merit, considering that all unSnapped Allomancers have predestined powers.