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Returned

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  1. Welcome to the Shard, @The_Lopen279! As you may have noticed, forum members go wild for this kind of thing and your question is interesting and very much appreciated as well. I had fun thinking through it, even if I can't match @DrPhysics.
  2. You can be as generous or stingy as you want in assessing the description of most action sequences. I'm no physicist, and probably less skilled in that area than you given that you went to the trouble of diagramming it, so the below are only possibilities and definitely not firm judgements. I'm not suggesting that any of the below are necessarily the case, but if the scenario as described is bothering you maybe some of them can soothe that, at least a bit: I would be shocked if the bead were larger than 0.5 cm, but as I looked for evidence to support my shock I came up with very little so I can't say this confidently; the beads are generally described as tiny, which is obviously imprecise, but I personally wouldn't think of a 1 cm bead that way. If we're trying to enjoy the scene in light of the issues raised in the OP I think it makes sense to err on the side of estimating the bead to be smaller. Also, we don't know much about the density of atium, which is relevant to its dangerous momentum as well as its loss of velocity to air resistance A person's waist isn't the same as their hips (the waist is higher up the body), so the vial is already higher up from what your measurement suggests if the vial is indeed at her waist She could have been crouching (seems very Mistborn-y), or leaning back (she did stumble away from Shan), or moving in some other way, any of which could change the center of mass' angle relative to the metal vial, including at different moments of this (very rapid) sequence of events. If she bobs and weaves a bit then there might be any number of adjustments to the atium bead's vectors The vial will still be in the air while she's doing the pushing and pulling (even if also headed downward). The whole sequence is rapid enough that the vial doesn't need to hit the ground before the bead is ripped out. For that matter, Vin is very practiced at pushing and pulling by this point in the book and so it seems fair to think she's timed and modulated this push and pull to accomplish what she wants (atium in the mouth) When she pulls on the atium bead, the vial will still be moving away from her due to her initial push, so the bead will hit the side of the bottle nearest Vin with the force of her pull as well as the opposite-vector force of the glass moving in the opposite direction (which you may have already factored into your calculation, but if not the velocity of the bead doesn't need to be as high as might otherwise be suggested). If she pushed and pulled with equal strength this would double the impact force and not require the bead to move towards Vin at such a fast speed. This might explain why the pull caused the vial to shatter while the push did not I see little reason to assume they use tempered glass for their metal vials, though of course it's possible. If that's the sticking point, then Occam's Razor strongly suggests that it's not tempered Vin is burning pewter, if I remember correctly, which would give her extra physical resilience against the bead and any glass that came along with it. Even if it hurt her it wouldn't necessarily kill her as described, or even meaningfully injure her. Pewter lets Shan survive being stabbed in the heart and Vin survive being disemboweled by an axe-- it's a hugely important factor The angle of the bead's travel towards Vin is unclear because she is presumably moving (particularly suggested by the description of her "[catching] the bead in her mouth"), so it might not be as fatally directed as you have suggested and probably not directed at her mouth or head at all; the angle should be shallower. Additionally, if she's moved (say, slightly to the side) then more tweaks with iron or steel to get the bead into her mouth could bleed away velocity in the dangerous vectors as the direction of the bead's motion is changed Vin could easily (instinctively or due to her training and practice) have pushed on the bead again when it was near or in her mouth, to mitigate its velocity somewhat, not unlike how she modulates her pushes and pulls to control her descent and objects' angles of motion in other circumstances The bead's shape is irregular, certainly not bullet-like, and it's not rotating like a bullet shot from a rifled barrel, so it will lose velocity more quickly and be more responsive to other deviations in its direction than any modern bullet. I wouldn't expect those to matter over a distance of a few feet, but if we're grasping at straws we might as well grasp at all of them that we can! The bead is almost certainly not moving faster than coins shot by Allomancers burning steel, and while those hurt they don't tear through Mistborn like bullets, so a tiny bead of atium probably wouldn't either
  3. Sorry, I wasn't clear-- I didn't mean it's ethically the same thing, more that it's mechanically very similar. "I didn't understand [X] in this chapter of this book, can someone clear it up for me?" is a question someone might ask here, and get a summarized answer from readers who participate on the forum (including making mistakes!), along with cited excerpts. It doesn't come up (because no one asks, because it doesn't really matter) if those readers borrowed that book from the library or a friend or bought it from a used bookstore or garage sale, or even stole it. LLMs trawling through Coppermind, the Arcanum, the 17th Shard, subreddits, and similar to aggregate all of that second-degree information is an interesting situation, even if the LLM has never consumed any of the books.
  4. Anything that's got an entry in Coppermind or the Arcanum will probably be pretty reliable (up to the most recent training date), though not 100%. That kind of information is unlikely to cause confusion, though I agree with @Treamayne that searching those sources yourself is not a heavy lift (and it will be more reliable). There isn't much question that the LLMs have scraped Coppermind, along with its excellent linking and citations, so that's not surprising. Going beyond something that is plainly written in one of those spots can quickly become problematic, and while that's easy to fall into the types of things @owensbt is describing probably won't dip into that territory. I'm not sure I'd trust it to shield me from spoilers but that's a risk you run no matter what you do. As a side note, many LLMs almost certainly have consumed all of these books (it's been acknowledged by many of the companies that run them that they trained on a huge amount of stolen copyrighted material, including published books). I doubt they'll return much about those books' content, for now, but if they did it wouldn't be that different from dedicated fans collating information on a site like Coppermind.
  5. I can sympathize with the idea but don't recommend it. I have tried using LLMs for some basic Cosmere research: I was trying to find a specific citation to post here, and knew it existed but didn't recall exactly where. I thought it might be faster to use the LLM to find it than to scan through the books manually. The LLM output was well organized, concise, specific, and 100% wrong. I followed up asking it to cite the sources for its wrong information, and it came up empty, confessing that the information provided did not match my question and the constraints I placed on it. I followed up once again, asking for any reference to what I was looking for along with the relevant passage (if possible) and a book and chapter citation so that I could look it up myself. The results were, again, well organized, concise, specific, and 100% wrong. It cited the wrong chapter name (a chapter which doesn't exist in any SA or Cosmere book), the wrong chapter number for the information I wanted, an incorrect description of the information I wanted, and a wrong conclusion about what I was looking for. For reference, I was looking for something objectively answerable and specifically mentioned: the number of casualties during Desolations, and I was trying to find the vision in which Dalinar spoke with Nohadon after winning one because I recalled Nohadon giving a number (he did, plainly stated). It will work, sometimes, but if the issue is that you're not sure you remember all of the relevant details then you won't be able to catch the errors and will get weird, garbled information which is likely to obscure more than it illuminates.
  6. Welcome! I don't think you can force enthusiasm you aren't feeling, and when you have to dedicate a good chunk of time and attention to reading something you're not excited about it's hard to revive or imitate the excitement. My only suggestion on that is to try audiobook versions of books you're less than thrilled about during regularly available stretches of time-- times like cooking meals, commuting, working out, etc. Multi-tasking that way can reduce the amount of effort you have to invest, and as long as the other activity doesn't demand too much of your attention you can still follow the books. The Cosmere narrators are very good, which helps.
  7. As long as it's not immediately fatal I'd think that you could heal it, just like Kaladin healing his arm or Hobber's legs. That might even be what happened with Hobber. Szeth's Blade might have cut him through the legs at any height to paralyze him, but not being able to feel his legs at all could also indicate a cut through his lower spine.
  8. I hadn't thought to compare Xisis to the Lord Ruler, but I think @Nitpicking's comparison is pretty apt. Xisis might be a model of what the Lord Ruler wanted to be but couldn't. He was hampered by his weaknesses of character, flaws in his perception and concepts of power, his unsuited-ness for immortality, his disengagement with the world, and Ruin's constant degradation of his mind and will. I like thinking of them on the same axis.
  9. It would be a big swing to devote one seventh of the book to a PC-PC relationship which might not even potentially fit a lot of groups-- how many even have one Radiant (probably most, lol), one Fused, and a romance between them, and another two players who are open to the story not really including them? I would find it weirder to have that setup than a story that any group could participate in, interest permitting. I have read dozens upon dozens of TTRPG supplements of all types, from mega-campaigns to smaller adventures to one-shot adventures to supplemental lore to prompts that inspire other dimensions for existing games to lists and generators of thematic names/objects/books/organizations to include. I haven't seen everything there could be but I have seen a lot. The book bills this as an adventure for four players, so that's how I'm interpreting it, but with not quite four pages to cover it maybe it's closer to the "here are some prompts on a theme" variety of book. It's not an expensive book, so that would fit. At this point I'm tempted to buy it just to see what it really is, after all this chat around just the (brief, vague) advertising copy!
  10. That's true. I still don't read that as the technicality-in-a-contract sort of element of the plot, more a thing that happened which set the stage for the situation characters encounter when the books start. I can see an argument that what the nine members did in abandoning Taln is that sort of thing, though at least that isn't the resolution of anything. Maybe that's why it doesn't rankle as much as the contest of champions plot line: it sets the stage for events but doesn't guide or end all that many of them. It's a setup and creates opportunities for things to happen independent of it (while influencing those things), while the contest of champions invites characters to constantly think about what is and is not allowed as events follow courses prescribed by those thoughts on a timeline the contract itself imposes towards an end point the contract itself defines. I don't know if @Lord Stormer feels that way about the Oathpact, maybe it's another example of what they talk about in this thread. Towards the end of RoW and throughout WaT, you can't get any outcome outside of what the contract describes, and how you act is heavily circumscribed by that same contract. It feels like a category difference to me rather than a difference of degree, and while I don't love the contract I also don't mind it as much as the OP. But I perceive it as being relatively unique to those books (out of all Cosmere works), and the nature of the conflicts in SA do lean harder on the restrictions that limit Shards, if only because the Shards are more directly active in that series.
  11. That would be unusual for TTRPG supplements I've seen, though I'm only minimally familiar with the Cosmere set of games so maybe they have a different style. Typical TTRPG published supplement scenarios are complete adventures, not just outlines of themes and ideas. So I would expect each of the scenarios in this book to include locations where events take place (including descriptions, notable features, etc.), NPC characters (including backstory, role, and stat blocks where applicable), and a plot (usually broken out into distinct sections for the players to work through), plus plot hooks so that existing player characters might naturally start the adventure even if they're already situated in a different, larger campaign. Though with seven adventures listed and only 27 pages it seems likely that this book really has taken a different approach; not quite four pages per adventure (at most) isn't a lot of room. If it's 3-4 pages of mostly considerations about how such a romance might play out in this setting and with this mix of characters then it could be a really good supplement! I probably wouldn't describe something like that as an adventure for players to experience in the game, and the ad copy does promise seven complete adventures, so it's probably not so narrowly focused as that. For sure game masters often do (and should!) tweak the details of a supplement to work for them and their players, but I would be very annoyed to pay money for a supplement and get something like "what if there were a Fused character, and a Radiant character, and they had a romance that required the Fused to betray Odium?". The OP's description of the Fused in question as a "high ranking" one suggests to me that this is the case here and this character is an NPC (so it's not intended to be a romance between two player characters). Regardless, if the supplement doesn't provide the Fused character for this story then I think that reinforces the randomness of the Fused's identity and nature; whatever else they are, if you want to use the romance story they'll have to be ready to engage in the romance. Though, as above, that doesn't mean that the romance story can't be both good and also appropriate for the Fused thematically and in terms of lore.
  12. I don't hate him as you do, but I do agree that he's a really effective antagonist/villain. I like the appearance of an antagonist who isn't Shard-level powerful, aloof, and mysteriously/arbitrarily restrained. He's a big deal who is a big deal because he's effective at what he does and has been for millennia. His arrogance, while unpleasant, might actually be earned by an honest assessment of his abilities. I especially liked the contrast of his opulent, but human-appreciable, décor and luxury against the alien-ness of his mindset and life (his improvised piano piece was a really nice touch). I hope he doesn't just depart the stories, Amaram-style.
  13. I'd meant along the lines of what I read the intent of the thread to be: major plots which are resolved because of specific technicalities in agreements which are struck between characters, sometimes off-screen. Certainly rules exist in all of the Cosmere books (they're kind of famous for it). Few of them feature binding contracts as the boundaries for how the on-screen conflicts unfold and are settled. I wouldn't say that the plot of Shadows turns on those rules in the same way that WaT turns on the specific wording of the agreement Odium and Dalinar strike. Had Silence's bounties not gone to the forests she wouldn't have had to deal with any of that and the plot would have been the same. She had to follow the rules which govern survival where she happened to be, but there was nothing about those rules that was broadly required to apply to her endeavors. There was no contract nor any spirit of any agreement. As another example, I'll argue that Shadows and Final Empire have similar features in this regard: Vin's victory over the Lord Ruler relies on specific mechanics of Feruchemy. She needs the power of the mists to steelpush on the Lord Ruler's highly-Invested atium rings piercing his skin, and being out of physical contact with those rings prevents him from tapping youth to continue living. Vin understands that situation and leverages that knowledge to win. That's different from "here are a bunch of rules and restrictions that we've all already agreed to, so we will all follow those rules to the conclusion they allow". The OP (to my reading) is describing this, not the situation in the paragraphs above nor any other version of "rules exist in Cosmere settings". My position is that very few of the novels' plots are governed by the forma legalism the OP describes. They suggest Stormlight, where it really matters for RoW and WaT, and a so-called loophole in that contract is one of the key plot elements not just for those books but in resolving the entire first SA arc. They also suggest Mistborn (era 1, presumably), which I'm less convinced about.
  14. Random, certainly not. Cryptic, not by intention (but maybe otherwise unclear). I had thought it was clear enough, or at least not impenetrable, but if someone needs it the Cliff's Notes explanation is more or less: Some scenario had to be written because they were releasing a commercial product, and so a writer reached for a common trope to build the (or a) conflict. If the angle is an enemies-to-lovers one, then it hasn't yet been used much as a major story in the setting. So the sentiment expressed in the OP (this is a sop to some slice of the fandom) may be a significant element of how this story came to be in the product, but may not be strictly about that. "Traditional" romance doesn't need to be the angle on a romance story, and a romance could focus on what a Fused-flavored version of romance might be. That would not only be in-character and lore-appropriate, it could also be interesting to people who find the lore and background of the Fused interesting (whether they are broadly interested in romance stories or not). This one is the most direct response to the OP. Love of any type is a sufficient motivation to drive virtually any story in which a Fused might betray Odium, and romantic love isn't a better or worse approach than any other. SA readers have accepted such non-romantic motivation before, so there's little reason to reject a romantic version as well. Or at least little reason to reject it out of hand. Most writing is mediocre (it's hard to be inspired all the time, and there are other factors which weigh on creating and publishing creative writing, especially in a commercial project). So even if one feels that this is a bad writing project (in concept and/or execution), it's unreasonable to suggest that that is only because it's a romance story-- romance stories can absolutely be done well, and in any number of ways. "We go to print in X weeks and need another story so that we can charge $20 (or whatever)" is a prompt that leads to writing being finished, not necessarily any other standard of "good".
  15. I really like this one! The pose is great and I love the windspren, both how they were drawn and for the motion they imply in the picture.
  16. The trope I was referring two was "any two major characters who have interacted with each other should get together", though your point is still valid. That it isn't necessarily a bad story was explicitly stated in my post, including a portion that you quoted. That most writing is rather cheap and flimsy, regardless of genre, type, or focus was also plainly stated. The reason I described the Fused as a random one is because they almost certainly were created after the plot was arbitrarily conceived, as opposed to an existing character with details that might naturally lead into this (or any) story; their identity and traits as a character are secondary to the role they were created to fill (assuming, of course, that that was the writing process here, which I think likely but do not know). Any character traits will do, as long as they have this particular one. Some of the arguments presented upthread suggest that such behavior seems highly uncharacteristic of any of the Fused, who are distinct from the Singers due to their millennia of permeation in Odium's essence and frequent/constant participation in torture and war. I think of their general mindset (to the extent that ~4,000 individuals will have one mindset) in terms of broadly rejecting rhythms other than Odium's, how they attune Craving rather than Curiosity, and other more dominance-and-aggression sorts of rhythms like Derision, Spite, etc. None of that means that no Fused could ever act differently (and as an example, Leshwi more than suggests that many do, for at least some values of "differently"). My comment was that a romance plot might well fit entirely within what we know of the Fused, especially if the concept of romance takes inflections that we already associate with them. Romance doesn't have to be flowers and chocolate. I never said it was bad, nor that I would not be the target audience for such a story. I am confused as to why you assume so. The section the above quote responds to was meant to address comments that Leshwi and Kaladin's or Navani and Raboniel's relationships were clearly romantic. Relationships can be and generally are much richer than "romantic or totally non-romantic", something which factors into many romance stories as well. I'm not entirely sure why you have so thoroughly quoted my post in disagreement, as it does not seem that we disagree. Maybe I (also? uniquely?) am misunderstanding. If you're looking to quarrel with people who think this plot is bad and/or inappropriate you'll have to look to someone else.
  17. It's a trope, which makes it easily understandable and accessible for writing which was likely done because something needed to be written (to sell), rather than out of inspiration or a meaningful extension of the themes, lore, and details of a setting. That it may not be conceived or written particularly well is common to most writing (for evidence, refer to any of my posts here). I don't think it's necessarily bad (I haven't read it, so it could be done well even if it's an awkward prompt). It's not hard to imagine a Fused betraying Odium, or at least grasping for their own advantages or preferences. I wouldn't expect a random Fused's concept or expression of love to be something we would describe as romantic. Instead I would think it more likely to be possessive, dominating, and cruel (an angle I've used for romantic relationships in my own tabletop games for similarly aligned characters)-- but still an expression of feelings (Passions, perhaps?) for another person. Passion as a motivator seems on-theme for a Fused even if a romance doesn't. Love strong enough to cause such a betrayal doesn't need to be romantic, though apparently that's the angle this story took. Some people read romance into absolutely everything involving any two characters and refuse to even imagine they could be mistaken. I do not perceive that there is anything romantic between Leshwi and Kaladin, nor between Navani and Raboniel. Both relationships feature emotional connections which could potentially dovetail into something more romantic, and there are traits between them that might resonate. But I don't think that anything along the lines of a romance was actually written into their stories thus far.
  18. I do recommend Edgedancer first, as it is sequentially the right order and will help flesh out a bit of Oathbringer. I don't think it's necessary though, and probably won't alter your experience a lot either way. I read Oathbringer first and didn't feel that I was missing anything, and re-reading it after reading Edgedancer didn't reveal or highlight much for me (though that's obviously not the same as reading Edgedancer first). I think you'll have a good and very similar experience no matter what, so don't stress about it.
  19. Thanks! I could swear I have the prose version stored somewhere, but I doubt I'll be able to find it. These links are really helpful!
  20. I always thought about it as being a channeling of Cultivation's power, granted to the Nightwatcher by Cultivation (whom Cultivation allows to hold court in her stead). That conduit to a living Shard is why boons are possible for the Nightwatcher, while we never see the Stormfather nor Sibling do anything similar. The boon Dalinar asks is beyond the Nightwatcher but I interpreted that as being beyond her ability to understand more than her ability to grant. The material goods I assumed were things the Nightwatcher/Cultivation obtained in more conventional ways-- she offered Nightblood only because she happened to have it (or had the ability to get it) at the time. Supernatural abilities seem accessible via enough Investiture, not unlike how Harmony just made Spook Mistborn. I like the Connection angle, especially since Connection does increasingly seem to be one of the most fundamental and consequential elements of the Cosmere. But the boon/curse setup is, I think, not unique to a Bondsmith spren so much as it is unique to a Shard/Splinter duo in close proximity and general agreement with one another.
  21. My interpretation was always that Szeth's coming was a major move by someone relevant enough in the Cosmere (whether Odium, Taravangian, Szeth, or even possibly the Honorblade) around enough other relevant people (Dalinar, Kaladin, Syl) that it had spiritual reverberations. The Syl also is aware of Szeth's impending arrival, if imprecisely, so it's not just Pattern and therefore probably not related to the double bond nor Heraldic parentage. The Stormfather knows and specifically tells Kaladin about it, though we know he can perceive via the Highstorms and so he has a clearer explanation. In my mind I connected it with foreboding sense that preceded the coming of the Everstorm, but in light of this question I'm not sure they're so directly comparable. I think we could probably rig together an explanation that is lore-friendly enough to be acceptable, but if I had to wager on it I would place my bet on it being a narrative decision to increase tension (as you suggest).
  22. I've yet to read White Sand (in any form), so I'll take your word for it and stand corrected on that. The OP describes books' plots which are dominated by inviolable agreements and resolved by the mechanics of those agreements, constraining all possible actions and only escapable with technicalities (or "loopholes"), which is what I was referring to in my post. I might be forgetting something about Shades, but which stories' plots turn on the technicalities of the rules Shades follow in the same sense that WaT turns on the promises made between Honor and Odium and, later, by the contract Dalinar struck with Odium?
  23. Um, almost none? Buying a pound each of steel, iron, pewter, tin, zinc, cadmium, chromium, and brass, all used in flakes, is not an intense activity nor very expensive (setting dependent). Exotic or trademarked metals are definitely going to be harder. Duralumin, zinc, brass, cadmium, (some) chromium, and pewter are around $1-5 per pound when I checked, which isn't exactly breaking the bank. Bendalloy is ~$20-70 per pound. Iron and steel are far less. Tin, interestingly, is much more expensive than all of those save maybe Bendalloy. One pound of each can last an allomancer a very long time, depending on how much you want to burn (I realize that's a big asterisk). Allomancy could easily pay for itself in a variety of ways, and pocket cash is enough to get started. A few clicks or a phone call to a metal supplier are all it would take. Enough for what? It's always a key question, and will vary a ton from person to person. For some it will be very little, but then they're also not getting much out of their Feruchemy. For others it will be a lot, and storing it will be a major issue. Some attributes fit this better than others, too. It's hard to predict how much extra health you might need, for example. But it's true that you don't necessarily need much storage to make good use of the attributes. In the books we tend to see a lot of storage consumed very quickly, but for great feats and people who are in constant, mortal danger. We don't see a whole lot of casual, day-to-day Feruchemy, so maybe the storage/consumption ratio for that is a lot more favorable than my intuition suggests. Yes, this is exactly my point as well. I can part with $50 for months' worth of metals far more easily than I can sacrifice several weeks to abject misery, uselessness, and/or vulnerability for the really dramatic Feruchemy applications. I can spend an hour getting the money for lots of Allomancy, but you can't spend an hour to get more of a trait than you store. True. While a lot of the Feruchemical storage schemes I've heard also seem to carry some similar risks to them they are risks of a different type and seem far less likely to be addictive. I, personally, am not at all concerned about becoming addicted to tin or pewter, nor about overuse of pewter. Industrial metallurgists produce metals with the exact mixtures that are requested, all day, every day. It wouldn't take a lot of experimentation, already knowing what metals you can use, to get to the right mixtures. A few serious migraines aren't going to be fun, but it's a bearable cost (and not too dissimilar from the cost of storing health!). I disagree with your assessment of the usefulness of the metals for Allomancy. Iron and steel have tons of useful applications beyond the publicly, overtly magical, and "overtly magical" is not unique to Allomancy. Tin and pewter addiction is something that could happen but there's no reason to assume that it will. That people keep returning to brass and zinc as being nothing but ethically problematic is disturbing to me-- reaching such a conclusion strikes me as being really focused on some (obviously) bad things and little to no imagination outside of those things. Some people would be monsters, but some people would only use Feruchemy to commit crimes; it's not an indictment of the magic itself any more than using Feruchemical Connection only to con people means F-Duralumin is inherently problematic. And none of these metals are so expensive as to be out of reach for a typical person (in the U.S., at least, certainly there will be a wide variety), especially since Allomancy offers opportunities to earn money. Toxicity is irrelevant when you can control how much metal you ingest and then burn it off at will with aluminum (also very cheap and widely available). A lot of the feruchemical applications you suggest are obviously magical (or potentially so, such as suddenly Hulking out with pewter) or are pretty minor conveniences (I want more out of my magic than to not need to take a drink while working out). Again, all cool and appealing applications but not a slam dunk in Feruchemy's favor for me, personally. It's not wrong to prefer Feruchemy, for these or any other reasons.
  24. I think they cover the Allomantic metal piece well enough. Allomancers do run out in tight situations, which is bad, but they can also just buy more to prepare. If you have something to do tonight or tomorrow or next week, go to the store or get your file out. The time it takes to get ready is the time it takes to do a shopping trip, at least for less exotic metals. Allomantic amounts are measured in flakes and beads, so you don't need very much unless you're going to be doing something big like a pewter drag. You don't need Allomancy all the time any more than you do Feruchemy. Feruchemists don't have such an option, though they still need to procure the metals (and a lot more of them than an Allomancer needs), especially if you're storing traits to ditch (like pain). Wax, Wayne, and Sazed routinely use in short bursts attributes that they spent weeks if not months storing up. And they have to spend a lot of time doing the storing, often debilitated, which gets a paragraph or two of coverage at most (and usually less). Sometimes that doesn't matter (you can watch TV for a long time while storing physical speed, you can store weight pretty constantly without much downside, or store other attributes in short bursts when convenient). Sometimes the storage can be good, as you point out, but not necessarily for drawing on that attribute later. It takes a large amount of real time and consequences to store enough of an attribute to use for very much, and that time cannot be skipped over. Feruchemy is still cool and amazing but the tradeoffs it requires can be difficult, and if you don't make them you don't get the benefits. Your average attribute with Feruchemy is always the same while Allomancy increases your average. An all-nighter with bronze requires another eight hours' worth of wakefulness be converted to sleep-- you don't get an "extra" night because you have to trade a different, equivalent amount of wakefulness away to get it. You can cut the intensity of storage to mitigate that, but then it can take a long time to store that whole night's wakefulness. With pewter you actually can get the "extra" night, to some degree. I'm not saying Feruchemy is bad, and trading one hour of being awake per day gets you almost a whole all-nighter each week, which is cool. The tradeoffs can get less clear and less comfortable or convenient with some other traits, which is less appealing to me but still cool and can be very workable. But you still have to sacrifice proportionally because your average [whatever] is always 1, while Allomancy gives direct benefits on-demand that make your average greater than 1. That's why I would prefer it to Feruchemy, but I wouldn't say no to Feruchemy nor do I discount Feruchemy's unique potential.
  25. I would probably choose Allomancy. Feruchemy is amazing and cool, but I think that the books gloss over how much time and capacity has to be spent to get enough of an attribute stored to do the really dramatic or useful stuff. It's still hard to turn down, even so.
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