Trusk'our

True, he hadn't Snapped, which means his Allomantic power must have been lower than a Misting's. However, we know that breeding between Skaa and Noble bloodlines was enough to almost entirely erase other genetic differences (like height and intelligence) over time and that while Allomantic potential does significantly reduce over generations, it will eventually find an equilibrium (I think it might be comparable to how Hemalurgic spikes will lose potency over time, but won't ever fully return to their original level of Investiture). I think we can also reasonably conclude from the Set needing a varying number of victims to Invest non-Metalborn spikes (between 20 and 30) that non-Snapped Scadrians still have notably varying levels of Investiture. With these in mind, I would maintain that Elend would have higher levels of Investiture than pre-Ascension people due to there still being some residual power from his line. Actually, if I recall, Vin's father Tevidain Tekiel was not an Allomancer, but was still a noble. This was enough to give Vin the chance to be Mistborn. I wonder then, even if Elend's personal Allomancy was comparable to the original Mistborn (or as I'm guessing, marginally stronger), would his genetic potential for Allomancy be much stronger due to his innate potential being combined with his Lerasium?

Always nice to have a new 17th Sharder. Welcome! Which of the three Metallic Arts is your favorite and why? What is one part from each that you think would be cool to further explore in the upcoming Ghostbloods trilogy?

Awesome! Kelsier's one of my favorite characters too. Welcome to the Shard! Which of the three Metallic Arts is your favorite and why? What is one thing from each you'd like to see in the Ghostbloods trilogy?

When thinking on Elend's Allomancy, I considered something: is Elend actually a good example of what an original Lerasium-strength Mistborn would be, since he had higher Allomantic potential than people pre-Ascension? He wasn't an actual Allomancer, but he was still a descendant of one of the first Mistborn, which should affect his total level of Investiture. I think this suggests Elend's Allomancy would actually be stronger than the original Mistborn, though perhaps not by a large margin. Enough to point out to Mistborn geeks like myself though

Huh, never caught that. Maybe a Kandra Blessing?

I don't think we really know yet, but does anyone have any guesses as to what Death does with his free time? I know he's "occasionally" Invested by Harmony to guide souls to the Beyond, and I'm sure he's dropped by at least a few Sliverists to guide them and send them on better paths, but. . . what about the rest of his time? Kelsier has a Worldhopping organization that's vowed to protect Scadrial that he runs and Sazed has more than enough to do being God and all, but I don't think I've heard of any plots or groups under Marsh's purview in his three and a half century life after the Catacendre. He didn't join Wax's cause in AoL, SoS, or BoM, so I assume he's usually busy with something important. Any ideas?

Given how certain numbers seem to affect the strength of Honor's Investiture (10 being its own, but both 1 and 16 being good substitutes), could this also affect Scadrial's Investiture? For example, we know if you're born with Allomancy or Feruchemy you either have one power or all sixteen. I wonder, could this be a similar situation to Honor's, where the Investiture seeks specific numbers to fulfill? What about Hemalurgy? If an Inquisitor had sixteen Hemalurgic spikes, would it strengthen their power somehow, maybe reinforce their Spiritweb to the burden placed on it? Or, if sixteen Steel Inquisitors bonded one another with Emotional Allomancy to resist outside influences, would the number affect the strength of the bond like the Heralds?

Yeah, you might have to start involving off world Investitures if you want to generate artificial Breath, as Awakening generally doesn't add extra properties to an item beyond its innate abilities. For Nightblood's creation I'm betting some extra shenanigans had to happen, considering its unique abilities. But regardless, I'm thinking you'd normally have to do more than hold a lot of Breath and give a Command to create an item that converts/generates Breath. I just worry that Endowment wouldn't appreciate that too much. It might go against her perceived Interest, taking instead of giving. Maybe you could get away with it if the process were less direct, like distilling the Tears of Edgli for Edglium perhaps?

I would think that polestone color aligns more with metal type than the specific power it gives, though it acts as a focus for determining what can be held, just as metal type does. Scadrian Hemalurgy we know can refine what is taken within metal groups, as Koloss spikes and iron Kandra Blessings share a metal, but use different parts and different amounts of stolen Spiritweb. I think a comparable method of refinement for Rosharan Hemalurgy could involve spiking or trapping different types of Spren, even if using the same polestone color.

So, the proposition here is that Lerasium Allomancy- specifically the component that transforms you into an Allomancer- could be Feruchemically stored and Compounded into more Allomancy? I guess it really depends on whether this function of Allomancy counts as an actual power or not. I mean, it's been hypothesized that regular nicrosil Compounding basically does this already, just in a temporary way. I would also guess it isn't doable just for balancing issues. But, I also think if someone really knew what they were doing they could replicate Lerasium's abilities such as- Cosmere spoilers: Or, maybe just Feruchemy with a lot of extra steps (using Unsealed Metalminds to change how you view yourself and then "healing" yourself into having powers you never actually had).

Welcome to the Shard! This is an excellent observation. Preservation actually swapped out a difficult to obtain power from Allomancy (like chromium) temporarily in exchange for Atium Mistings, as he wanted a notable sign for his followers, but to still be able to make use of Atium. Hope this answers your question!

I've been thinking that Nalthis will want some kind of way to obtain more Investiture in the future, given their more limited resources, but few options available to their system feel realistic. This one, however, I think could be accomplished with some tinkering. You'd still need to weigh the cost of Awakening it initially over the amount of Breaths you save with it, but it might prove useful. Or, I suppose using them on actual Awakeners to prevent their unexpected (but likely inevitable) deaths from affecting their pool of Breath would be more effective.

Maybe as a Mistborn or Hemalurgist use a Coppercloud and then hit them with Rioted fear/panic for maximum effect?

Sorry, I meant to say it in regard to your immune system being magically bolstered for a time before giving up your Breath, so if young adults all gave up their Breath at the same time you might cripple your primary work force until their immune systems learn to deal with threats without Investiture. Hmm, that sounds like a cool dynamic. You have a class of Awakeners which are expected to use their Investiture to care for those who are recorded giving up their Breath to them and/or their descendants. If it was properly expected by the Drab class, the expectation might transfer along with the Breath, pushing the Awakeners to serve more diligently. Kind of like how Vahr got greater determination to topple the Hallandren government from his fellow rebels' Breath (though that took many hundreds, so it depends on how many they get).

Been thinking on this one lately, but if a society required everyone to give up their Breath at a certain age, which age would be best? Younger Breaths are stronger and more vibrant, but young children have less ability to choose responsibly, leading to more moral complications. Plus, you'd lose most of your life having it around, and your immune system isn't fully developed until your late teens/early adulthood. An elderly person would give weaker Breath, not to mention that their already compromised immune system would mean giving their Breath would probably kill them shortly thereafter. However, they do get to keep their Breath most of their life. Young adulthood seems better, as you're stronger by that time and better able to choose for yourself. You might end up notably weaker for a time, but if society is prepped for people giving Breath at this time it's probably manageable.

Now, technically since Fused are Invested and they'll resist Soothing or Rioting, but let's assuming that the Allomancy is strong enough to power through somewhat. Voidlight amplifies one's emotions much more than normal, so could this be used against them when using Emotional Allomancy? Say you Riot them with anxiety or fear- shouldn't this be further amplified? I suppose their resistance might just get canceled out by this, but it might be an ironc edge to use against them.

I won't completely wave away such a possibility, I just don't imagine it being something he'd want to do. He seems far more focused on making the stories themselves to work on canonizing all Resonances. He might just be too busy with his 7th secret novel, subconsciously writing it up in his brain where even he isn't aware of its existence yet.

It does, yes. However, I'm thinking it's a safe bet he won't go out of his way to tell us 256 different Twinborn Resonances. Most people aren't insane enough to try.

As I've thought on the double nicrosil Twinborn more and more, I get the feeling that they could obtain more raw power than any other non-Shardic Scadrian. Firstly, they can Compound. That alone allows them to use their Allomancy to fill Nicrosilminds for later use, powering up their abilities later, albeit in shorter bursts. However, based on the hypothetical use of F-nicrosil increasing the strength of your Allomancy (or Feruchemy, possibly), I think that they could deliberately not store part of their Compounded Allomancy, which in turn would increase the strength of their Compounding as they Compound, making their overall Investiture output higher. There'd definitely be an upper limit to this based on compression loss, but it would still be another powerful trick. Then, however, there's Savantism. This would further increase the power and efficiency of every step in the process, making them able to draw even more Investiture as they Compound. Then there's the Resonance. I'm not sure how this would truly manifest, but given that there powers are boosting Investiture and strengthening Investiture when Tapping, I think it's as safe a bet to guess it would strengthen their overall Investiture as you can when dealing with Resonances. Plus, you know, you're adding extremely heightened versions of the Investiture plus Savantism to the Resonance, which I suspect would only further its effects. But, this is all just a thought experiment for fun. Take it as you will.

Good points as always. I'd say soft for a Sanderson magic. I do think each Resonance will likely have some kind of hard ability, but actually predicting them will be basically impossible. It isn't inherently bad, as this gives some wiggle room for the Investiture, especially in Mistborn where most abilities are so hardwritten you can accurately plot them in advance. Buuuuut this does mean that if we want to create Twinborn for the upcoming RPG (or just for fun) we can't actually grasp all that they can do. Not canonically, at least, which does bother me somewhat because I'm unusually a stickler for staying true to the source material. It would be nice to get some examples in the RPG, especially since they could give us a way to determine what is viable for being a Resonance purely on its "balance"- how powerful its effects should be and what thematic elements we should pursue when looking at Twinborn or Radiants.

I've kind of been hoping for a while that Sanderson would eventually canonize a hard system for determining how a Resonance would manifest, allowing us to accurately predict all Twinborn (and maybe some extra special artificial Metalblessed) Resonances. Unfortunately, I get the vibe from his most recent WoB on the matter that he views Resonances as being closer to a type of soft magic, where he can do "fun things", but without real predictability. I'm probably taking this too seriously and will still probably try to make Resonance predictions in the future, but I guess I'm just a little tired of waiting for answers on some of these things. Anyone care to throw in a second opinion?

Welcome to the Shard! Of the three Metallic Arts, which is your favorite? If you got to read something new from Scadrial's magic in upcoming books, what would you hope it to be (i.e. a specific kind of Twinborn powerset, a unique way to use a certain power, or a new kind of Hemalurgic construct)?

I'm curious, do you think it's inherently evil, or just that it's evil in the majority of cases due to its set up?

Yes, Singer Forms are essentially a more organic version of Hemalurgy. Agreed. There are WoBs suggesting this should be possible too, though using captured Spren instead of actual Spiritweb fragments I think could yeild similar, if not better results. Or you could steal a Singer's ability to bond a Spren, and gain Forms that way. Maybe even steal multiple Gemhearts, then bond several Spren simultaneously for more exaggerated or hybrid Forms.

Welcome to the Shard! Which of the three Metallic Arts is your favorite? What's one cool thing from each that you'd like to see in Era 3?