Returned

The only counterargument I can think of is that in one of the other era 2 books atium is titled "the lost metal". There are displays of all of the metals used in the Metallic Arts, and one of the display cases is empty and labeled as atium with the "lost metal" description. Atium is also what the Set was initially trying to produce with their harmonium experiments. But I like lerasium as the lost metal more. It's more thematic, it was always more rare, and there was still atium around just about to the end of era 2 (even if Marsh was the only one that knew about it or had any).

No reason to think that he did. As I said above, there may have been some alternative to testing everyone with the hardest-to-get metals. Indeed, if we stick to the premises that those metals are not accessible in the amounts needed to test for those Mistings, but those Mistings were found anyways, then some other method was used. And, of course, we don't even know that that happened. The relevant metals existed in functional quantities in the Bands, which means they came from somewhere. They wouldn't be easier to produce immediately following the Catacendre than later-- Elendel just recently got access to electricity. "Rashek made them exist with divine power" is at least as plausible an explanation as any, as is "Sazed made them exist with divine power". There isn't a reason to think that either definitely did happen, but there is a relative dearth of alternatives It's not circular at all. The Bands exist, therefore they were created via some means that would work to cause them to exist. Prior to Lost Metal we thought we had an idea how they might have been created, based on how we thought the medallions might be made, but Lost Metal suggests that those ideas were almost certainly mistaken. I don't mention Hemalurgy as the method, even as a possibility, (was the comment to that effect intended for me?), nor any method for creating the Bands at all.

I wonder where the line is between a Shard interacting with people and intervening more directly than they're allowed to. Shards aren't supposed to just smite people (Odium couldn't "harm" Wit at the end of Rhythm of War), but a lot of Shards' behavior when they want something to happen is almost ridiculously circuitous. An impossible-to-measure amount of that is probably related to futuresight, but maybe there is something prohibiting a Shard from just magically assembling a bunch of laser guns and fusion reactors on a planet for people to pick up and use. Shards' physical manifestations are in a lot of ways their least meaningful ones for the actions they undertake. Spiritual elements seem mostly covered in the magic systems that result from Shards' Investing in specific places, and don't seem to change much outside of interactions with other Shards' Investments. The cognitive realm is interesting in how it's shaped by mortals and not Shards, and seems to be the realm which the Shards manipulate the least (or at least the least directly). Shards seem to be bound by rules we don't know about according to principles we don't understand, and so much of their actions seem almost metaphorical (or otherwise freighted with complicating implications). I wonder if there are more pressing reasons for Sazed to have held off gifting more technology to Scadrians than just his view of what's the best way for people to develop.

Trustworthy in what sense? Wax was hard-used by Harmony, even though Harmony was working for the best possible outcomes for everybody (as he defined them), including Wax. Just because he doesn't do what one character or another wants doesn't mean that he's betraying anybody. I think he still has the right goals and motivations, and is doing what he can according to those. His becoming indecisive, maybe even impotent, may make it a less advisable idea to rely on him for specific things, but I don't think anyone has much reason to distrust him. I think he's still working for Scadrial and its people as best he can, while also learning that he has to factor the wider Cosmere into those considerations.

I think that it could be an educated guess based on general Cosmere-awareness. If you know the basics of how Shards work with their Vessels and Intents you would be able to extrapolate a lot about a situation like Harmony's possession of two strongly opposed Shards. Harmony himself talks a lot about how his Shards' opposed natures impact his ability to take action, and other observers have noted that the issue seems to have gotten worse over time. Telsin probably doesn't have poorer access to information than anyone on Scadrial, so I think she'd have the generally required knowledge to figure something like this out.

It's not impossible that Rashek would have created a cache of relevant metals, otherwise unavailable, for his own use during his time with Preservation's power at the Well. He may well have used those metals Feruchemically, even if he didn't want to use them for compounding. There isn't any particular reason to think that this is what did happen, but we shouldn't just rule it out. The ultimate cheat is that he could have accessed Fortune during his brief Ascension, causing him to do things with no relevance to him or surrounding events and for no clear or immediate reason. The powers used in making the Bands came from somewhere. While we obviously don't have the details on what happened, questions like "how and why would [x] do [y]" fall into the same category: for some reason we don't know, via some mechanism we don't know about. With what little we thought we know about medallion technology being undone in Lost Metal, I don't think we can brush aside any explanation which is at least technically plausible. We also have to account for our own imperfect knowledge of how the Metallic Arts can be applied. Maybe a clever use of malatium, gold, bronze, or chromium (via Hemalurgic spikes, as necessary) and a well-trained, experienced Metalborn possessing the right knowledge could elide the practical issues we have with finding Mistings and Ferrings who can make use of the rare metals. Sanderson's coyness about medallion-style technology, declining to give us essentially any new information at all, suggests to me that for answering these types of questions we're looking at something fundamental to the magic system ("with the right knowledge, any Allomancer could use their metal to do [x]") rather than some arbitrarily insurmountable hurdle ("nicrosil is virtually impossible to find!"). In the same way that making someone into a Mistborn is only one of, and the most basic of, many possible applications of lerasium.

I'd read that book! @Ati16 gave the right approximate timeline, so it seems unlikely that she would be. Marasi's abilities as a Pulser might give her enough extra time to make that work. But my bet is that she'll be like Spook-- a hugely consequential social and political figure whose influence extends far into the future, but not one whose influential period is shown while it's happening in the books.

I think that she probably will worldhop, though I think it's likely that she'll spend most or all of her time on or near Scadrial. She's pretty committed to her "serving the public" role, so I doubt she'll abandon the people of the Basin (or Scadrial more broadly). But after the events of Lost Metal it's clear that that role requires a higher-level perspective which incorporates the Cosmere. If nothing else she'll end up doing something like heading a division within Scadrial's governments that deals with offworld affairs and monitoring and policing worldhoppers. Her age, plus the timeskip we'll have between Lost Metal and the next book may keep her from being an active field agent during the events of the books, but she can still set up and organize a lot which will be relevant later on. I think that we're past the point of radical transparency. Marasi likes to color inside the lines, but she also has participated in lots of secret operations and dealt with important information which she doesn't distribute to the public directly. I think she'll end up working within a legal structure, like the Elendel constabulary but on a planetary scale, and will end up steeped in secrets (some of which she'll share within that structure, and others of which she'll be compelled to keep quiet).

It seems possible, but at the same time the martial focus of the Radiants (and of the warlike state they left behind in Alethela) seems like a foreign invasion of the type Autonomy prepared for Lost Metal would be a relatively low risk. At least less risky than stealthier approaches, like the one Autonomy seems to have initiated on both Scadrial and Roshar. Heavy Investiture, especially when there are active Shards around, seems to have a lot of consequences and complications. I think that your suggestion has merit and is probably correct, but not necessarily the main reason (or even one of the major) reasons Nale and Ishar were so opposed to Surgebinding coming back. If nothing else, access to the magic seems like it heightens conflict. But focusing on humans alone is a mistake in that regard; it seems to me that the concentration of Investiture among the Listeners who adopted Stormform was a significant factor in making the Everstorm a reality (in addition to the actual, proximate things the Listeners did to call it into being). Invasion from other worlds is one of many issues that concentrating cosmic power can give rise to.

What we know of Fortune is pretty vague, but seems to work like this (pasted from another thread): Cosmere Fortune is about putting you in the right place at the right time for a good result, and you yourself don't necessarily know why you're there or what the good result will be. Like, if you were in a casino, it might draw you to the roulette table when someone is about to win and, in their exuberance, give money to everyone nearby. It wouldn't tell you what the actual result (the number and color) of the roulette spin would be.

All fair. They're just the reasons I think that Sazed is more correct than Kelsier.

Military problems are also economic problems. The ability for Scadrians to defend themselves requires that they be able to actually manufacture weapons (and similar) and have people that can afford the time and focus to learn to use them. Having better technology known to your society doesn't necessarily organize everyone in ways that can produce it at scale and in time or use it in practical ways. One of the issues in Lost Metal is that the Basin can't quickly get onto a war footing despite its wealth-- even if we include Bilming's fleet (so, pretending it wasn't under the control of Autonomy's agents), the North wasn't ready to deal with a military threat from the South. I'm not sure I'd rely on Autonomy choosing to ignore me, at least not as a Shardworld (even a minor one, like in Sixth of Dusk). And all the technology in the world won't save Scadrial from schemes like Telsin was pursuing, which is an option Autonomy would always have (a powerful collaborator). Unless they develop technology that completely blocks Autonomy's influence, even through agents,

Most of the plot of Bands of Mourning was focused around the idea of unsealed, unkeyed metalminds, and most of the Set's acute operations were based around commoditized Metallic Arts. There was a strong element of "everything is going to change" surrounding the introduction of the Southerners, the Bands, and Southern medallion technology. To have those not develop at all across a six-year time skip is odd in that light. I certainly expected Southern medallions to be much more widespread over that time, given their incredible possible applications, or at least a solid explanation of why they aren't; they seem like an incredibly revolutionary technology. What we got on that score was, more or less, "btw, nope". It's a perfectly valid writing choice (whatever the reasons) to not follow up on these things immediately in the next book, but the lack of narrative weight resulting from that choice is the piece that's odd. We'll get all of the answers in time, so I'm not too fussed about it. But when the things that were teased were not delivered it's understandable for some people to feel disoriented.

I think that there are real social and cultural benefits to developing the skills and infrastructure which allow discoveries of new technology which would not be available if the technology were just given to them. I can also imagine weird social and cultural development impacts to living in an environment of endless received technology, though which might actually occur is hard to predict in the general case. It takes a lot, and in very diverse sectors, to maintain higher levels of technology. I also don't think that technology, as a concept, is a great sole organizing principle for a society. The technology the Lord Ruler permitted was under his control and was only sustainable (in the society he constructed and maintained) with mass slavery. Had he allowed automobiles or airplanes too, I don't think that society would have been that much different for anyone in the Final Empire. As an era 2 example, locomotive technology had huge impacts for everyone in the Basin and Roughs but was radically uneven in whom was benefited, and how much. Had Northern Scadrians had airships, nuclear power, smart phones, and laser guns, I don't see how Autonomy's plans would have been any different or the intra-Scadrial conflicts would have been mitigated. The Set would still have jockeyed aggressively for effective control of those, would still have accumulated influence in every government they could reach, the tensions between Elendel and everywhere else wouldn't (necessarily) have been any better, the resources available to one group relative to another would probably not have been less balanced, etc. The problems that exist on Scadrial, and the dangers that its inhabitants face, aren't really technological-- the Northerners (who have the least advanced technology on the planet) nevertheless live in a place of abundant resources. And Scadrial is one of the more technologically advanced of Shardworlds (though "technologically" gets fuzzy with such diverse magic available in different places).

Of course! Clarity is important, especially when we're getting into the most fiddly details of fictional things. The Cosmere terminology is getting more and more unwieldy over time.

*Sigh* An Allomantic-pewter-granting spike is what I was describing, as I'd hoped context would make clear. I will edit my post above to make it completely explicit, though. I don't know if the forums have coalesced on a standard for discussing Hemalurgic spikes, but since some metals can carry one of multiple powers it seems more succinct to describe them by the power they grant, with exceptions for where the spike's material is the topic of interest. The nickname for the misting/ferring attribute is also a good method.

Skill definitely matters, but not so much for the strength of Pushes, which is what natural-Coinshot-plus-Coinshot-spike would influence. But Wax is clearly sort of Mistborn; see the instance in which the out-of-reach metal vial "snaps" into his hand on page 183. It's clearly implied that he Pulled it, and there is nothing suggesting a mundane resolution to that moment. That's also the only reason Harmony would have sent Wax special vials of metals to use-- they have more than just steel in them. Wax can get his own steel with trivial ease. The strongest argument against the Mistborn idea is that Wax isn't described as noticing any other metal reserves in his body, which seems like the kind of thing he would notice and comment on. But even then that only establishes that Wax would have some degree of ability to burn pewter already and doesn't rule out that he might also have taken a spike granting Allomantic pewter later.

That's the same feeling I had reading it. A good book: I thought it had excitement, particularly good character development, and a nice balance of tensions. But a lot of it was dedicated to connecting to other works, not even in crossover magic combinations, and I think that the plot structure suffered a bit for it. Some of that was (for me) the breakneck pacing that has characterized era 2 (the books cover a couple of days each, at most). I couldn't escape the feeling that the main plot (the bomb and impending invasion) were almost afterthoughts. I felt that there wasn't much for me, as a reader and Cosmere fan, to think about on those topics while going through the book. Certainly not compared to the implications raised by things we saw of the worldhoppers, whom I felt took center stage. Some of it felt pretty superficial. I expect we'll see more of TwinSoul (I hope so at least, I liked him!), but we learned very little about him and he didn't have much role to play in TLM. His biggest thing was saving the hostages, which was great and I liked seeing it, but was also an arbitrary problem which was solved as soon as it arose with an arbitrary solution. Similar for Moonlight, though we got to see more about her as a person (and she's likely a certain character we already knew). I think that the most important thing we learned about the Mistborn setting, specifically, from the book is that Sazed is trending towards Discord, but we didn't really get any context or guidance about what that means or why, exactly, it will matter (though obviously it will). The most important things we learned about the Cosmere are some examples of how much can be done with pure Investiture, along with a very rough guideline for how much power a jar of it represents. I really expected, given how much of an issue the medallions and Bands were in Bands of Mourning, that we'd learn more than nothing about them. What we did learn, that Hemalurgic spikes aren't working for compounding, came from the Ars Arcanum! Though I also think that we (I) should give a bit of extra slack to era 2. Since it wasn't originally planned as a set of entries in the Cosmere books it probably was hard to write them with plots that were consequential but didn't upset the already-planned Cosmere events across all series. It's an awkward spot for books to be in. And given my experience with the other era 2 books I suspect I'll like TLM more and more each time I re-read it. But it'll be a while until the next Mistborn book and, at least for me, TLM wasn't really substantial enough to tide me over until then.

Thanks, I've fixed it.

I think that Harmony's dual nature makes it difficult for him, himself, to manifest one "component" godmetal or the other. He can't just incorporate half of his nature (even if he balanced creation of lerasium with equal amounts of atium), and perhaps can't directly cause such a thing to happen by any means while he holds both Shards. I'd wager that, in addition to the appropriate Intent, there also needs to be a sufficient Connection to Harmony and his Preservation side. I'm also intrigued by the use of bavadinium. Is that the only godmetal that will split harmonium into its constituent Preservation/Ruin aspects, given its power's Intent towards autonomy rather than combination? Or would any godmetal be capable of that outcome from division of harmonium? Has Autonomy planted a new seed to cause trouble on Scadrial through introducing ways to split harmonium, not unlike how Trellism was planted and then used?

I'm torn as well. It was an inevitable development, as long as the series remain distinct from one another (which they likely always will), and the inter-series conflict has been building for a long time. So it's nice to see some of those pay off. But the separation of series also seems to be leading to a shift in how plotting and events are handled within a given book. Like, we potentially lose some of the content that relates to a particular book in order to get hooks and teasers for other series, while also getting infodumps shoehorned in about settings and events that are largely unrelated to the current story. There also seems to be some pressure to give the spotlight to cross-series characters, expanding the cast that needs to be dealt with in any given book. I'm excited for the new, larger conflicts between planets and Shards, as those have been implied forever. But I've also found myself enjoying recent Cosmere releases less than some of the previous ones. I enjoyed Lost Metal, but I also felt that most of its content was there to service the Cosmere generally rather than to advance stories in Mistborn proper, especially elements raised in Bands of Mourning. Lots of good character pieces, and an exciting, fast-paced adventure in its own right, but I felt that a lot of what was in it was really just opaque hints about what's happening elsewhere in the Cosmere and some blunt statements about the state of Scadrial, either plainly setting up future things (Discord is approaching) or flatly capping off things set up previously (the Community was a good explanation of events in Alloy of Law, but ended almost as soon as we learned about it).

There is a WoB about using an essence mark to become an Elantrian. Without a lot of Investiture to back it up it will work superficially (you'll look like an Elantrian and have the appropriate mindset and thoughts) but won't grant Elantrian powers. It shouldn't be Shaod-like, as the transformation isn't arrested due to blockage of the Dor, but the fuel for Elantrian magic in all its forms and applications won't be available. I imagine it would be like an Elantrian moving away from Sel entirely, even if they actually were on Sel.

I'd have grouped that under "Kelsier's did make the Bands, but his condition has changed since then", but the distinction might be important since we don't really know anything about the process of making them (or the medallions).

Where does it say that? My reading sessions of the book were pretty quick, so I'm sure I glossed over a lot. I'd thought that Wax took his duralumin spike (only), and then was Mistborn due to the harmonium explosion in his lab, so I wasn't looking for other spikes.

I was a bit annoyed by this, since we'll likely have to wait so long to get more information. Our (assumed) understanding was wrong in any or all of the following ways: Kelsier isn't the Sovereign Kelsier didn't make the Bands Kelsier didn't make the Bands alone Kelsier did make the Bands, but his condition has changed since then The Bands aren't what we thought It seems like the details were put in just to invalidate, or at least sow doubt about, the most popular ideas surrounding the Sovereign and especially Scadrian Metallic Art technology. I was really expecting to get more information about both in this book, but instead we only learned that we've always had less than we thought.