Returned

It's as good a guess as any, but honestly I think this is just a retcon (though still official even so).

Maybe? It's an interesting idea, and the Lord Ruler almost certainly used copperminds. He would have been aware of Ruin's abilities though, and so not relied on them, even if such a trick were effective. But if forced to guess, I would guess no. Ruin's already able to affect people with emotional Allomancy and can implant dialgoue and visions into their minds. Its essence is permeated into everyone and everything on Scadrial. Even if Ruin couldn't see through metal very well it had no problem reaching into a metalmind (metal, so hard for a Shard to see, and also Invested) and reading the contents well enough to make the subtle changes that subverted an entire culture of Feruchemists using copperminds. And while it's not a perfect comparison, when filled with Preservation's essence after drawing in the mists Vin was able to affect metals inside of others' bodies, including metalminds like the Lord Ruler's atium bracelets (or were they bracers? I don't remember... time for a re-read!). If the power of a Shard could do that even to metal inside another's body I'd presume that another Shard could similarly affect metals inside of people's bodies. You have made me wonder, though, how easily and fluidly Ruin might notice a particular metalmind in a Feruchemist's body, to know to rifle through it and make changes. Ruin's capacity for that sort of thing seems large enough that it might not be a major obstacle, but its Vessel was tricked before, so maybe a different plan might involve this maneuver.

Maybe not as much when you've only got a couple of nuggets! Wayne comments on running out a few times in sticky situations. @Trusk'our has it right, Wayne even mentions that most Sliders can't afford enough Bendalloy to become anything close to a savant. Bendalloy is also really dangerous to handle and especially ingest. Not a big deal for someone who is also a Bloodmaker, but another Slider who wants to use a lot of Bendalloy is probably going to have some serious health problems in short order (which are even worse when the effects are sped up relative to the rest of the world, which might be able to treat you). But I think that you're right that, if someone could deal with the scarcity and toxicity, Bendalloy would be a very useful Allomantic metal to be skilled with. I imagine we'll see more of it in later Mistborn books for that reason, though we'll have to wait a bit to find out for sure.

It allows for a perfect record of information which is very compact, discreet, and not subject to being forgotten or misremembered to any degree (Ruin's influence aside, which admittedly ended up being a pretty important exception!). I think that a good example of its usefulness was in the caverns in Hero of Ages when Sazed needed to design a mechanism for controlling the floodgates between the canals and the reservoir. Sazed wasn't an engineer, didn't have much experience (that we know of) with the relevant subjects, and couldn't cart a whole library of books around the Final Empire in case he might find a use for one particular concept. Instead he reviewed his index of information in his copperminds and had all of the information to hand, perfectly reliable, and he simply referenced the applicable bits and made notes to review when he replaced the memories back into the copper. Other applications we've definitely seen might be less impressive than other Feruchemical metals, like the Lord Ruler's perfect memory for faces; Sazeds knowledge of ancient languages (not for spoken fluency, probably, but enough to translate Alendi's logbook); and Sazed's ability to preserve records of past religions despite the dedicated efforts of the Lord Ruler to destroy all such things. It's almost like having the internet, plus the Wayback Machine (or your favorite internet archive), in your pocket or on your wrists. Plus some cool, subterfuge-esque applications like learning information and storing it while eliminating the information from your mind... It's not the most dramatic power, but it has tons of flexibility and potential applications that are very practical.

Meh. It's a concept which can be used well or poorly, and which is the case depends on the writer more than any specific tool. I'll agree that it's a convenient tool for lazy or poor writers to not bother with reasonable plotting but I don't think that Sanderson is such an author. While I do have my concerns about some of the trends in his writing lately, I don't think that we have to worry about inadequate plotting requiring luck/destiny/fortune/whatever being among them. Especially since relying on or fiddling with Fortune has been a serious story element more than once so far. I expect that Fortune will matter quite a bit but will have its huge, story-shaping impacts well before the Cosmere finale sequences.

Can spren be changed without a corresponding change in how they're perceived? They're primarily cognitive aspects given form through Investiture, and much of their nature is defined by how thinking beings think of them. I wonder if something like this is a consequence of what we're seeing with advancements in fabrial technology. Thoughts about fire and heat give rise to what flamsepren are and draw those spren to the things that people associate with those ideas, but artifabrians have figured out ways to work with that relationship in reverse and produce heat from manipulating an instantiation of those ideas. Once spren stop being (essentially) passive offshoots of people's ideas, maybe their natures will become wildly more malleable.

I don't see any reason it couldn't be something like the Infinity Gauntlet from the Avengers movies: a construct designed to channel the incredible power of some components combined with it in ways which could not otherwise be achieved. Such a construct being itself destroyed in the course of using it would fit with the WoB without needing to have the Dawnshards themselves be weakened, or even changed. We know so little about the Dawnshards, their powers, and their implications that nearly anything about them could be true. Especially from our current frames of reference-- we know that Shards have some limits on the amount and scope of their powers when dealing with each other, but to a mortal in most situations they might as well be limitless. Given what has been implied about Shards and their effect on the universe around them I've been thinking that the Shattering involved a change to reality itself, and whatever the weapon was that effected that change it is unsuited to reality as it now exists. That could certainly include a severe reduction in the Dawnshards' power, however defined.

Not if he was trying to avoid giving away something he's reserved for other books. Saying "it did happen" could be a big spoiler which isn't necessary to answer the question of whether or not it could happen. We've gotten some pretty careful language in answers to questions before. My bigger question is: what would the point of a Shardblade on Sel be? Skaze and Seons seem pretty useful as they are, and might be far less so as a physical object. The various magics on Sel seem like they would make a single Shardblade impressive but not much help in any practical way (hence the sword being enshrined rather than in use as a relic?). Might a Skaze-based Shardblade have special properties compared to other blades, like Nightblood's (but probably less dramatic)?

The most popular theory is that the opposed natures of Preservation and Ruin are the cause of Sazed's difficulty acting, and so adding another Shard (any Shard at all) would provide a Shard's worth of power but that would not be opposed by any others Sazed holds. His difficulties are not a question of balancing a few Shards, exactly, but of 100% of the powers he holds being in such strong opposition to each other. They aren't even quite two separate Shards any more, but one super-Shard in him, and we've no reason to think that taking another would not have a similar effect. If he were to take up another Shard, it would certainly have an impact on Sazed's Intent and would almost certainly have impacts on his mind, nature, and behaviors over time. Exactly what those would be isn't clear, even if we pick a specific Shard, since we have so few examples of multi-Shardic interactions like that. I very strongly oppose the suggestion that Harmony is balance and Discord is imbalance. That interpretation doesn't match very well with what we know of Sazed's situation nor the nature of the Shards he holds. We'll learn more, I'm sure, eventually. But I think that another Shard would change Sazed's circumstances drastically and would give him much more scope to act than he has had.

I think that a major part of the issue with Ruin in era 1 is that the Vessel directed the power to work in malicious ways. Now that Sazed is the Vessel that particular danger seems less pressing. If Sazed were to change in some way that would upset this I think that a metal-etched copy of any text would be the least of the issues people would face-- Sazed has the full power of two Shards and is not confined or limmited in the ways that Leras and Ati were. Still seems like a good idea to have a metal copy though, if only for heritage's sake.

There is definitely something going on (I think that much is clear even without the WoBs included above), but I don't think that Sazed intentionally weakening the Metallic Arts is necessary to explain what we've seen. We don't know enough about how Feruchemy works or where it came from/how people came to possess it to draw strong conclusions yet. The dilution to Ferrings in era 2 has driven a sort of parallel to (modern) Allomancy in terms of inheritance but I don't think that that is very sound. Frustration's observation that Feruchemists didn't appear to dilute to Ferrings until era 2 is an important one; Allomancy appears to degrade through inheritance much more quickly than Feruchemy (one thousand years from ten lerasium Mistborn to assorted Mistings being the most common type of Allomancer by far). But Feruchemy bred true for full Feruchemists, even during the Lord Ruler's suppression campaign and breeding program until the Catascendre, after which we see only Ferrings in the course of just 300 years. It's true that Sazed was the last surviving full Feruchemist, which is surely a factor, but the Keepers also made a strong effort to include Tindwyl in the breeding program to propagate Feruchemy. At the time that would have meant the potential for full Feruchemists, not just Ferrings. Terris people reproducing at all must have been a difficult undertaking if all Terris boys were castrated, but full Feruchemy was still a common enough outcome to fully stock the Synod with it. And yet by era 2 Ferrings are as powerful as Feruchemists get, ever, despite a distinct Terris population that has grown fairly large. It's a discontinuity that can't be ignored. As for the dangers of Feruchemists mixing with the broader population, that statement strikes me as too broad to be worth a whole lot. Dangerous for whom, and to what degree, and in what ways? My current best guess is that we're talking about the (still undefined) dangers of compounding, largely based around the fact that Hemalurgy apparently no longer allows for it for unknown reasons. But I've also started to think that limiting the availability of Feruchemical powers also makes it harder to find and practice with the Cosmere-shaking powers (alone and together) we've seen hinted at: manipulating Investiture, Identity, and especially Fortune. Those are powers that can mess with Shardic plans pretty directly, particularly Fortune. And if they're rare, and knowledge of Hemalurgy is getting out, I think that increases the incentive to steal and hoard them. We know that that approach really does fundamentally weaken the powers, no divine intervention required.

I love it! I think that the themes, mood, and tone really shine. We've reached the point where further edits are mostly going to be about your satisfaction with making sure the things you want to express are all there, and land as you want them to. I don't think that there is a need to work in anything more about Megan's concerns about seeing David at Solider Field because I think that those ideas are already clear enough from the text. I don't think there is more tweaking that needs to happen, or portions that require further attention. Changes can always be made, of course, if you aren't satisfied, but I think the piece is in great shape. Nice writing!

Muchas gracias por los correcciones, estos cosas son exactamente los que necesito mejorar. Los artículos son difíciles porque son poquito arbitrario, y simplemente necesita saber las formas en cada caso. Es el tipo de cosa que requiere practica del idioma, y espero que puedo hacerlo aquí. El segundo también es importante (los colocaciones) por razones similares. Hay muchas posibilidades que puedan expresar una idea que son técnicamente correctos (o, probablemente más preciso, no son exactamente incorrecto), pero que no son usados por hispanohablantes verdaderos. Los dos son cosas que son muy difícil a superar solo por estudiar. Obviamente necesito practicar, y tú y @Cellit son muy clementes a ayudarme con esto. Por todos aquí, ¿piensen que será interesante o divertido a traducir frases de libros de Sanderson, y discutir la gramática y elección de palabras por la traducción a español? Pienso que sería útil por el aprendizaje y nos daría algo a discutir en la cadena aquí.

I, personally, would prefer to have read it immediately after Hero of Ages. The "spoilers" people are referring to are indeed better after Bands of Mourning, but I don't think they're that much better that it's worth becoming less familiar with the relevant events from the first three books. Even if you do prefer to wait until after BoM you'll get more out of SH if you re-read the original trilogy immediately before anyways. Cosmere interconnectivity between books being what it is, and the fandom being what it is, there is a real chance that the SH spoiler(s) will be less impactful than they would have been right after SH was published. I wouldn't say that there is a wrong way to read SH though (except maybe before reading era 1, I guess), so I wouldn't worry about it too much no matter what you decide.

Fantastic, it's really come along nicely! When I saw all of the line breaks I was apprehensive, but after reading it I think that that structure really works. It gives me the impression of a staccato, rapid-fire train of thought wrapping around Megan's emotional struggle. It's great! It's nice to have the extra words as breathing room for any more adjustments you'd like to make. But the piece is pretty well streamlined and focused as it is, so I'd be careful about adding much new content that you won't have enough space to flesh out-- diluting focus will tend to make the piece feel more bloated and less impactful. As ever, with each editing pass we get to more nit-picky details which lean more towards style and choice than anything else. So please feel free to ignore my suggestions below if they pull the piece away from what you want it to be. I think that "bloodred" and "crimson" are repetitive here, and slightly at odds with each other. I would keep one or the other. If you really want both, using one of them elsewhere in the piece is probably better than keeping both here or trying to describe the flame with both in the same paragraph. I like the repetition of "miss" in this line, but since Megan's feelings are driven by recalling David (rather than seeing him) a couple of words to that effect might be helpful. Along with something describing that she is involuntarily remembering him or that she expects/worries that the feelings will surge when she sees him again at Soldier Field (or both!). As currently written the line is more suggestive of a problem that occurs for Megan when she's around him, which isn't quite the case here. Since memories and expectations are seated firmly in Megan's mind, rather than an objective circumstance in which she sees David, there is an opportunity here to further underline Megan's internal state. And as that is what really drives the piece (as I read it, at least), I think that it would be a good opportunity to make use of. This sentence is a run on (which is fine for the style and subject), but it's overstuffed. There are enough changes in topic and temporal focus (what David is, what he wants, what he's spent the last ten years doing, what he's going to do now, and why he's going to do it) that it becomes a little bit awkward to follow. I think that you can address this with punctuation (a comma after "for it", maybe), or possibly breaking the sentence up. If you do the latter I'd try to keep the sentences slightly incomplete, like dependent clauses, to keep up the breathless rhythm that the current sentence has. I like this line, but smell doesn't link to blackening very cleanly. Adjusting it to "see it blackening", "practically see it blackening", or something similar might be worthwhile. It's not a big issue either way, even leaving it as it is, just something I noticed as I was reading. I'd put these together on the same line as they are elements of the same thought. Doing so makes the next line, "I don't want it any more", stand out more strongly. This is a great inclusion but won't be clear to someone who hasn't already read Steelheart. At minimum I would change it to something like "Firefight. Me." This feels like a key moment that expresses the tension between Megan and Firefight, the person that loves David and the Epic that can't abide him, and the choice she's making between two mutually exclusive options (as she thinks of them in that moment). I would be careful expanding this section too much more, since it's so expressive and dramatic as a succinct item in the midst of Megan's stream of consciousness.

I'm pretty burned out on Wit, to be honest. It's not that I don't find him interesting, because I do. It's that his character is so integral to the wider Cosmere, and the mysteries of his character and backstory are so woven into the end of the overarching story, that the constant hinting and teasing have become wearying to me. We learn tiny bits, but they're often not all that substantial. He's such a lambent character at this point that I just cannot get very invested in any glimpses we get any more. What's the point when I know that my curiosity isn't going to be satisfied now, or soon? And what's left is a character that mostly delivers exposition. Maybe we'll start to see less of him on screen again, but I feel like we are going to remain on a series of unresolved cliffhangers about him for a long time. I look forward to the payoffs, and I'm positive that I'll enjoy him more on re-reads when the Cosmere stories are complete (or much closer to it), but for now I've just barely started to dread seeing him as a major character in any given chapter or scene. Whenever he breaks out of that I'll be very excited, but in any new book segment I have little expectation that this time is going to be the one. I want to reach the destination very much, but the journey seems less palatable than it used to. I do like hearing from others less jaded about his appearances than I've become-- people that are more excited than I have been tend to notice more exciting details that I've missed, and they are there.

I could've sworn I saw some reference somewhere that said she'd be an Archivist, which seems like it could be pretty cool for a computer programmer/hacker sort of character. Though I don't have the provenance of that, so it might just be another rumor. But I think that there is a strong role for a copper Feruchemist with all of the secrets and powerful knowledge that will be swirling around in era 3. I have no idea what the resonance would be but I'm very intrigued about nicrosil + anything.

I like the new additions! Burnout is always tough, but I'm sure you'll manage. 261 words is still a substantial number, but there is enough on the page now that it might be time for the red editing pen before starting to deplete them. Editing is also usually easier than writing new material, so it might be a good break as well. The piece has a lot more depth now, along with enough information for any reader to be able to appreciate both the broader setting and Megan's immediate struggle. I particularly like the linking of the Reckoner's jackets through mentioning David's and, later, Megan's resistance to her own. The only section that I might adjust on this front is "the powers that turn us all malevolent", which may be a good spot to use some of the extra available words: "turn us all malevolent" could be made a little bit clearer that it's about Epics (though I think the reader will understand anyways), and is also a really good opportunity to express more about Megan's difficulties and mindset. For example, it would be interesting if there were a subtle, though noticeable, change in Megan's thinking as she uses her powers. There are a lot of ways that something like this might be expressed, and this particular one may not suit what you want to show. But my read of the theme is that Megan is pitted against David in every way except for her human emotions. Duty to Steelheart, David's determined opposition to Epics, and Epic powers damaging the less malevolent human bonds like the one Megan has started to develop for David. The overall cadence is good too (that's always one of my personal issues when I'm trying to push through a block to write more), but individual sentences are starting to get overstuffed. Some are definitely defensible even while long (the second-to-last line is an example of this, giving a good stream-of-consciousness vibe while still being easy to follow). But the sentence that starts with "I scoff" is a run-on: it has too many discrete actions with little relation to each other. Some of it can be lifted out into other sentences, allowing tighter focus for each piece and a more fluid combination. It's hard to balance an inner monologue featuring a strong character voice and more focused prose for a reader, but I think that the piece in general would benefit from having some (not all!) of those longer sentences be broken up. As ever, the editing process is about tightening focus, so as you review I think it's a good idea to evaluate how much each line contributes to your aims and how they might better do so. The piece is already strong, so I think you'll have a relatively easy time polishing it up. That will in turn make it easier to find good uses for any remaining words, or make you feel more confident that you don't need them all.

Es muy provechoso, gracias. Uso de la idioma típica es exactamente lo que necesito, y es difícil a buscar las respuestas de preguntas especificas mientras consumir los medios sin un gran cantidad de inmersión. Y ya entonces es difícil a tener confianza que mi impresión de algo es correcto o si es un error que indica que no capto la idioma correctamente.

Tengo una pregunta general sobre el subjuntivo. ¿Es usado mucho en expresión hoy? En inglés técnicamente existe pero se está volviendo obsoleto. Probablemente un estudiante de inglés aprendería los conjugaciones subjuntivos, pero la mayoría de hablantes nativos de inglés no se da cuento si es usado o no. En tu opinión, ¿merece el subjuntivo la atención de nosotros?

As in my post, I'm referring specifically to Dalinar's trying to accommodate Evi's wishes about a massacre and, later, his interaction with the Nightwatcher. He did go in for numbness, too, but these examples are things for which Moash doesn't have any analogues. Moash ditches the guilt and then goes on doing the exact same things that made him feel guilty in the first place, even while retaining the full memories of his actions. Again, Moash's story (narratively so far, I'm not saying the situations are identical) is equivalent to burning Rathalas, always remembering it, and having his guilt removed so that he can keep razing cities full of innocent people to the ground. I'm prepared to believe that Dalinar might have come out a lot more like Moash now without Gavilar, Jasnah, and WoK, plus the Cultivation's intervention, but he did receive those interventions. Moash, on the other hand, got his own intervention from Odium. This seems to me like a sign of difference between the two, not a similarity. I could see an argument that Moash trying to help the abused Singers in Oathbringer is an effort to change and improve, though I don't find it persuasive. If and when we see Moash do anything to try to improve or come to terms with what he's done, then I might see more merit in your argument. But so far the only evidence that he will be redeemed is that you're asserting that he will because someone else was. I think it's unreasonable to conclude that the arcs are the same when Moash's current situation is equally consistent with a totally different outcome. Though by the same token Dalinar's story isn't done either-- if he winds up as Odium's champion he'll probably look a lot more like Moash does now, and I think that there would be a lot of interesting parallels to Moash's story. I'm not trying to argue you out of your view that Moash is on the road to redemption of one sort or another, just that it's not a foregone conclusion and that similar themes might be a contrast rather than a guarantee of identicality.

I don't disagree, but it's hard to say how Hoid's actions fit into his goals when we don't know what the goals are. We also don't really know what's good for the Cosmere, and a lot of things that are presented to us as "good" end up not being so great when we see a fuller picture of events. I don't find the secrecy to be too damning, since one of Hoid's most valuable and practical attributes is the depth and breadth of his knowledge. Plus, once someone else knows one of his secrets he can't expect it to remain a secret; new Vessels seem to learn a lot about what older Vessles knew, and today's Shard ally might be tomorrow's Shard bitter enemy. I definitely agree that there isn't any definitive reason to think that Hoid is a hero of the story, and we've got indications (including the example you gave) that people are generally a little bit too ready to ascribe pure and beneficent motivations to him.

I think that whether or not Moash feels guilt is less important than what he actually does. The contrast to Dalinar is that, for a long time, Dalinar didn't care about the consequences of what he did because he thought that his mode of action was morally correct, or at least acceptable. To his mind there wasn't much to feel guilty about, and when there was he faced up to the consequences of his actions. My key example is sparing the young heir to Rathalas when his moral system, religious beliefs, and orders were to kill him. When the consequences of that decision came around he was 100% prepared to fix it, even as he was willing to try an unconventional (for an Alethi) route to do so. When he speaks to the Nightwatcher he doesn't want numbness, he wants forgiveness, and his treasured memories of the wife he consistently failed were the price rather than the prize. And those doesn't even include his later transition into Radiance. Moash doesn't do that. He's never wrong, in his own mind, he's always righteous, and anything he wants is always acceptable or even the only good decision that could have been made. Who cares if he feels guilty or not when he continues to make the same decisions? Continuing with the comparison to Dalinar, it's as if he chose to keep burning cities just like he did Rathalas. That's the contrast: Dalinar felt guilt and tried to change, while Moash maybe felt guilt (I think he did), but then doubled down. And along the way he also made himself more comfortable in engaging in the same behaviors he has consistently chosen. None of that means there can't be a redemption arc for him, but so far I don't think the "he's exactly like Dalinar" position is a very strong one.

My feeling is that the level of agreement for a Parshendi to be a "volunteer" is lower than the word suggests. For all the talk of Passions and committing to pursuing what you want, the Singers don't seem to have much freedom to choose what they want to do. Most of them probably don't have many substantial interactions with individual Fused either, so I don't know how much an individual Singer really understands about the process. I could imagine it seeming more like the personality changes different forms bring, especially when the host of a given Fused is someone you've never met.

I think similarly to you, OP, but I also think that we have enough Cosmere books yet to be written that Hoid's plans are probably bigger than opposing Odium and his end goal may not be quite what we assume (even though reviving Adonalsium is still my best guess too). With Odium as the main major antagonist in Stormlight so far I think that it's not going to maintain that role through the next 10+ novels that will bring the metastory to its conclusion. It would be a bit counter to Sanderson's style so far to keep the same major villain like that for so long, especially when they're so powerful and also so directly involved in many events on-camera. Although having other Vessels deal with the Shard might be enough to overcome that, so who knows? Gathering powers is intriguing, but also gives Hoid a lot more tools to work with as he goes about doing whatever he does. It could be directly related to his end goal (whatever it is), but it could also just be a means to helping him accomplish his ultimate aims. Whatever it is you want to do, it seems like it could only help to be Mistborn, and be able to Lightweave, be an Elantrian, etc.