Mistchemist16

Theoretically speaking, it is possible to bonds 2 radiant spren and even to belong to 2 different orders.

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Questioner

Is there a limit to how many Shardblades you can have? Be bonded to?

Brandon Sanderson

Theoretically, not really. There are some things that could bound that. I can imagine people having a lot. In the original draft of The Way of Kings (2002) Amaram had two. And so, it's definitely possible to have multiples, and I had not thought of someone trying to bond every Shardblade. 

Questioner

So that means you can be bonded to more than one spren.

Brandon Sanderson

Well, those Shardblades... Can you be bonded to more than one spren? That question's answer is also yes. Potentially. But there is a much harder limit on that.

Words of Radiance Chicago signing (March 22, 2014)

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tganchero (paraphrased)

Is it true that humans can bond to multiple spren?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

They can theoretically bond to multiple spren.

Words of Radiance Lexington signing (March 18, 2014)

As long as you could find spren who were cool with it and could maintain oaths on both sides, it’d be possible. Alternatively, you could probably be a squire to another order, even as a full Radiaint. At the most extreme point, you could theoretically bond every order, though it’d be practically impossible to keep your oaths at that point. Nevertheless, I thought I’d ask to see how far you guys would go 

For the purposes of this exercise, let’s handwave away any mechanical difficulties of forging more than  bonds and imagine they can be established just as if they were seperate. Would you be willing to bond multiple spren? Or be a knight of one to more order and a squire in others? Which orders would those be? Keep in mind that you may not be able to be a squire for Edgedancers, Elsecallers, or Truthwatchers.
 

https://www.brandonsanderson.com/the-ten-orders-of-knights-radiant/

 Got 81% Truthwatcher as first place. Second and third were Edgedancer and Windrunner. So a lot of different Surge options there, though I had a feeling Truthwatcher would fit best even before the quiz. Such is the way of the nerd. Also, being a Windrunner seems like it could be scary at times and not just by learning to fly. I could see plenty worrying about either getting themselves killed by biting off more than they could chew or about getting their honorspren killed by not protecting enough.

The common concensous of the amount of Mistings for every Mistborn is 1 to 18 in Era 1, based on WoA stating Straff had 18 misting children out of an unknown number. However, that is not completely accurate. A more accurate description would be 1 Mistborn to every 18 mistings of the known types. Since Straff’s bastards were kept secret, I find it extremely unlikely any of them would’ve been tested for metals known only to the Steel Ministry. Given that there are 8 possible Mistings that couldn’t be easily tested for, it’s reasonable to assume that at least one of Straff’s kids was a stealth Misting. In fact, Elend himself could’ve been a Misting of almost any unknown metal . The only ones that would be potentially noticeable are gold, electrum and Atium, as those metals could probably breach the Spiritual Realm if Elend had lerasium and a natural ability. 
 

Given these facts, we can still assume 1:18 is an accurate minimum ratio, but the real number is probably higher. Of course, the 1:18 ratio is more useful for estimating how many active Mistings there were in Era 1  (though not all, as some Ministry members used hidden metals). But even that number doesn’t represent every potential Misting at the time, especially since some stealth Mistings could find jobs with the Ministry, as Yomen did. Regardless, if anyone has estimates about how many hidden Mistings were in the Ministry or who existed all together, I’d certainly be interested in hearing them 

In Era 1, the Mists were coded by Preservation to avoid Ruin. Hence, why Hemalurgy repels the Mists and why a certain earring became so useful. But there’s also another way to use Ruin’s power that made me think: Era 1 Atium.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t believe we’ve ever seen what the Mists actually do when a non spiked Allomancer burns Atium. Maybe there’s a mention in scenes with Kelsier or Shan, but I can’t remember any off the top of my head. That suggests Atium might also repel the Mists. It is powered by Ruin, just as with Hemalurgy

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When people burned atium, then, they were drawing upon the power of Ruin—which is, perhaps, why atium turned people into such efficient killing machines. They didn't use up this power, however, but simply made use of it. Once a nugget of atium was expended, the power would return to the Pits and begin to coalesce again—just as the power at the Well of Ascension would return there again after it had been used.

HoA Chapter 78

But the ramifications that I’m most interested in are what happens if you burn Atium while actively drawing on the Mists. My best example for this thought experiment is Vin at the end of HoA, when she starts drawing in the Mists but before she fully Ascends. What would happen if she tried to burn Atium at this point? I see a few possibilites

1. Burning Atium would act like a spike, immediately dispelling the Mists as a sort of safety measure

2. The Atium is treated like any other metal and simply gives Vin a view of the Spiritual Realm, as if she was doing the Duralumin combo

3. The power of the Mists rejects the Atium and causes feedback, like when Vin tried to use the Well with a spike. It’s unclear exactly how harmful this would be, but probably can’t cause any more injuries than a spike attempt would.
 

4. Similar to option 3, except the Mists override Ruin’s power and perhaps hijacks it, adding it to Preservation

5. The hack provides some sort of gateway for Ruin’s influence, just like spikes do. That would be horrifically bad. However, I don’t think this one is super likely. If Ruin could do that, I imagine he would’ve plotted for Vin to have Atium as she Ascended (unless Atium also blocks the Mists). Plus, Ruin can’t directly interface with Atium. He needs to burn it before it belongs to him again

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Chaos (paraphrased)

What would have happened if Ruin did get the atium? Yeah, the world is destroyed, but how does Ruin "absorb" the atium so he can utilize the power?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

He would metabolize it, just like the normal people have to do. However, if he did get it he would then be able to destroy the world.

Ancient 17S Q&A (May 1, 2010)

Assuming that Vin could ascend with an Atium reserve, it also makes me wonder if she could keep it once she fully Ascended. Even then, it probably doesn’t have enough meaning since it’s so small. But it’d also be really cool if it were possible to somehow hijack Preservation’s Intent by burning Atium. Something like that could even be part of why Preservation blocked spiked people from getting the Mists, though the bigger issue is preventing a pawn of Ruin from acting on his behalf

I don’t know exactly. I just think it’s an interesting possibility since Atium provides more potential to “disrupt” the Mists while they act. Let me know what you guys think.

Seeing these discussions about random twin orbs, I had an idea of one Twinborn concept that seemed like a good fit for Era 3. We haven’t seen really any of the Spiritual Feruchemy in action or a proper usage of A-Elecrtum. So a combo that could be neat is A-Electrum and F-Chromium. The former gives you short range but probably more precise future sight, while the latter does more long term prediction. I also think they’d probably have interesting synergy, kinda like how Wax can manipulate his Steelpushes with weight shifting. I imagine that this Twinborn could probably direct their shadows far better than any other Oracle.  Maybe tapping Fortune makes the electrum shadows less chaotic. You might even be able to guide electrum shadows without recalling thinking about it, which would achieve an Atium like effect for yourself. As for Resonance, my favorite idea is “detaching” an electrum shadow and having one travel around doing stuff, guided by Fortune. I’d call this Twinborn a Diviner. But I’m also curious about what else it could do. Based on what we know of Electrum and Fortune, does this combo seem like it would work well? What sort of ways could you use its future sight? 

2 hours ago, alder24 said:

There for sure were electrum Mistings there, but keep in mind, electrum was very rare at this point, almost unknown, so Elend would have only a few flasks worth of electrum just for himself, no more. They had chemists/metallurgists that made them electrum. And there was a cut in chapter as soon as Elend found out that mistfallen were Mistings now. I think it was even mentioned by Elend and Yomen that they have only base 8 metals in storage, no fancy metals. But Brandon's words support that all of them were Mistings of one of 16 metals, including Atium and Malatium. There were Malatium Mistings too, as Malatium and Atium were swapped in base metals for cadmium and bendally.

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little wilson (paraphrased)

I saw Brandon at a book signing back in mid-December, and I asked him about the 16 percent deal. He said that Preservation replaced the real External Temporal Metals with Atium and Malatium (at least I'm assuming Malatium, but he didn't mention that specifically. He only said Atium). So not-Cerrobend and Cadmium weren't counted in the 16%. Nicrosil and Chromium, on the other hand, were. So there are Chromium and Nicrosil mistings running around, not knowing that they're mistings.

TWG Posts (Jan. 20, 2009)

 

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Kirrin

Also, you should tell us what the last two metals are.

Brandon Sanderson

The last two metals are chromium and nicrosil. We'll reveal what they do on the Allomancy poster. Suffice it to say that in the next trilogy, the main protagonist would be a nicrosil Misting. And, to make a Robert Jordan-type comment, what those two metals do should become obvious to the serious student of Allomancy... (It has to do with the nature of the metal groupings.)

Happy Man

If I read the poster correctly, and have the correlations down, these metals are the external enhancement metals.

The simplest idea is that they do to another person what aluminum and duralumin do to the Allomancer burning them. If this is true, then chromium would destroy another Allomancer's metals (useful skill, that, especially in a group of Mistings fighting a Mistborn) while nicrosil would cause the target's metals that are currently burning to be burned in a brief, intense flash. This could be used either to enhance a group of Mistings or to seriously mess up an enemy Allomancer.

Peter Ahlstrom

The other metals do not have exact one-to-one power correlations like that, so it seems more likely to me that they would work differently. It could be like an area effect weakening or enhancing spell. You would want an enhancer in your party, and you wouldn't want to go up against a weakener.

Nicrosil is a rather more complicated alloy than the others. It's an interesting one to pick, rather than something simpler like nichrome (though I guess that's actually a brand name).

Brandon Sanderson

Nicely done.

Ookla is right, the others don't have 1/1 correlations. But I liked this concept far too much not to use it.

In a future book series, Mistborn will also have become things of legend. The bloodlines will have become diluted to the point that there are no Mistborn, only Mistings—however, the latter are far more common. In this environment, a nicrosil Misting could be invaluable both as an enhancer to your own team or a weapon to use against unsuspecting other Mistings.

Douglas

I take it either Spook did not have children or Sazed made him a reduced-strength Mistborn rather than giving him the full potency of the 9 originals and Elend?

Brandon Sanderson

Spook is a reduced power Mistborn.

Chaos

Very interesting about the nicrosil.

So, if there is no more atium, then that would mean in any future trilogy, there would only be 14 metals, right? Somehow, that doesn't seem right, but maybe that is because it irks me that one quartet to be left incomplete with the absence of atium.

Would it be possible for Sazed to create a replacement metal, by chance, or will the temporal quartet remain inherently empty? It doesn't seem like it's too far of a stretch for Sazed to make more metals: after all, the metal Elend ate was a fragment of Preservation, and now Sazed holds Preservation.

Brandon Sanderson

That's a RAFO, I'm afraid. Suffice it to say that what the characters think they understand about the metals, they don't QUITE get right. If you study the interaction between the temporal metals, you might notice an inconsistency in the way they work...

Peter Ahlstrom

Uh-huh. That was already noticed by theorizers in the forums here. Gold works like malatium and electrum works like atium. Yet they're on opposite corners of the metal square.

Brandon Sanderson

Ah. I wondered if that had been noticed.

Hero of Ages Q&A - Time Waster's Guide (Oct. 15, 2008)

 

Are we sure that Atium and Malatium were swapped for cadmium and bendalloy? There is a more recent 2016 WoB that initially said chromium was subbed out, but then claimed Atium instead. Not sure what the caveat is. If malatium is still there, that suggests Duralumin Mistings were also bumped. Maybe because they could t use a power even if they did get that rare metal. Or to stop Ruin from sneaking more Duralumin by tracking Preservation’s forced Snapping.

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wicktacular

At the end of the first Mistborn trilogy it's really significant that 1/16th of the soldiers who got really sick are now atium Mistings.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

wicktacular

So were there-- were 1/16th of the rest of them just *inaudible* just not significant?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. Sixteen that he-- when Preservation set that all up. He, number one, was not all there. But he was trying to create sixteen as a symbol to say, "Hey, catch this. I've given you a clue-- uh-- help." And so it was devised specifically for that. "*inaudible* Something's going on here."

wicktacular

But we know that there's more than sixteen metals. Wh--

Brandon Sanderson

No, no, they would have been Mistings of other types as well.

wicktacular

Did he bump one of the other types then to make it sixteen?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah.

Brandon Sanderson

Chromium.

wicktacular

Okay. Do you have in your head *inaudible*?

wicktacular

Chromium?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, that's right. It would probably have been one of the metals that was difficult to get at that level of technology. It would have been chromium - chromium would be hard gather at that time. Actually, no, it would have been aluminum. *about a minute later, while signing someone else's book* Hold on, there's a caveat to that last answer. Let me finish signing this and expand on that. *pause* So, it would still have been aluminum, but not for the reason your thinking. It would have been aluminum, but there's an asterisk next to that answer.

wicktacular

Okay. Interesting.

Brandon Sanderson

Hard to get chromium.

wicktacular

I've been thinking about--

Brandon Sanderson

Oh no! He bumped aluminum. Yeah, he bumped aluminum. Sorry I had to-- I changed my mind.

wicktacular

Oh!

Brandon Sanderson

*a moment later*

Okay, Chad? I have a <qualification> for you. I'll do this and then we'll...

*a moment later*

So...

wicktacular

On the sixteen or the *inaudible*...

Brandon Sanderson

The sixteen. So the answer is "yes," but it's not something-- it's not what you're thinking it is. 

wicktacular

Okay.

Brandon Sanderson

Alright, there's an asterisk on it, okay? There's an asterisk on it, it's not what you're thinking. Uh, you're making-- you're making assumptions. 

Arcanum Unbounded Hoboken signing (Dec. 3, 2016)

2 hours ago, alder24 said:

No, because precisely 1/16th of all mistfallen were Atium Mistings.

Let me make sure I’m on the same page with you for a moment. I’m suggesting that Preservation knew he wanted mechanical electrum for the Atium mistings. but had just enough future sight to know he couldn’t just have them be sick for the same amount of time as everyone else. So he faked it. He made two 1/16 groups of Electrum Mistings, but made 1 Group extra sick so that Elend would assume they were for Atium. That accounts for how exactly 1/16 of mistfallen became super sick. They didn’t necessarily have to be, but Preservation knew he needed Elend to draw the proper conclusion about them. The other Electrum Mistings just got sick for a few days because that was the minimum for Snapping to work.

Now, meta wise, I don’t see this as highly plausible. If I stepped in Brandon’s shoes, I imagine they were truly God Metal Mistings, even with the retcon (though a hack that would never exist naturally). But I also don’t think we know very little about what happened to the Snapped with unknown or Era 2 metals. So I’m just trying to see if it is impossible for the “Atium Mistings are tricked Electrum Mistings” logic to work

43 minutes ago, Stormlightsong said:

When someone uses gold, they do not see a shadow. They see another version of themself if something had gone differently. Both Electrum and Atium make what is described as a “shadow” because of its dark blurry appearance, and the fact that it follows around the person it is showing the future of. I have seen some people say that Electrum should have been an alloy of Atium because of how similar they are.

The term shadow is still used for gold. It is “gold shadow”. Check the Alloy of Law Ars Arcanum entry for gold. I imagine it’s more a matter of detail that distinguishes gold and electrum. That both have the same “base” shadow, but gold fills it in with more past details. I accept that the metals have very different functions, but the principles are the same.
 

Also, I do like the idea that Era 1 Atium can be used as either electrum or a lesser refined atium. However, the really annoying part is Preservation’s 16 scheme. 1/16th of the Mistings got super sick and became Atium Mistings. There should’ve also been 1/16 Electrum Mistings.
 

But that being said, I don’t believe we excplictly see electrum mistings get found in HoA. So it is technically possible that Preservation did double up and made one group of electrum Mistings extra sick to make them seem like “Atium Mistings”. He does have future sight, so maybe he could still translate that. But I don’t know if there’s more concrete proof for either side of that argument.

5 minutes ago, Stormlightsong said:

But you don’t get shadows with gold it’s specifically an electrum and Atium thing

Gold still works by showing you shadow versions of the thing beyond time. I’m not saying gold functions exactly the same as electrum. I’m saying that gold, electrum, Atium, and malatium all use shadows as a medium. Gold and malatium give you more information from that past version plus a few other things. Electrum and Atium are the ones that’s see the future and share their own common traits (splitting into tons of shadows against another person seeing the future). 
 

I just don’t see the point you’re exactly trying to make by saying Era 1 Atium provides electrum shadows. It just provides shadows of the future. It’s possible that electrum does help shape the more limited Atium, but that doesn’t soildly confirm Era 1 Atium is comparable to electrum. 

5 minutes ago, Stormlightsong said:

Then, why is it that you get electrum shadows allomantic atium.

You get future shadows because that’s how Metallic Arts future sight works. You see shadows. It happens with gold too. There’s no real justification to say that the Atium shadows must be the same as electrum

2 hours ago, alder24 said:

You can't really spike a Shard, there is just too much investiture in a Shard, incomparable to a single spike.

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Blightsong

Is it theoretically possible to Hemalurgically spike a Shard into someone else, and if so, what would be the outcome?

Brandon Sanderson

A full shard? Hemalurgy could not hold that much of an Invested charge... not... yeah, like a hemallurgic spike really couldn't hold that much. Not without something really weird happening, so.

OdysseyCon 2016 (April 8, 2016)

 

Yeah. The only things we’ve seen that can meaningfully interact with a Shard’s full power are other Shards. You might be able to do stuff to the Vessel if they manifest, kinda like… (ROW)

That being said, you might be able to spike a full power Shard if another Shard were helping you out. Part of me suspects that all Shards have a power similar to Soulcasting, just by having so much Investuture and influence in the Cognitive Realm. So maybe they could  turn most of their being into a massive spike and use it in the PR or CR, especially if it included Ruin. That would take a large bite out of the targeted Shard, and perhaps overwhelm it if the Hemalurgy Shard is stronger. But I doubt that mortal Hemalurgy can do anything meaningful to a Shard: only an exposed Vessel.

21 minutes ago, Trusk'our said:

That certainly could be the case, but based on the nicrosil being like a Coppermind quote, it's possible that it was referring specifically to the Malwish medallions, which have also been stated to be more limited in some ways than straight up nicrosil Feruchemy (part of the greater restriction on the medallions being that you can't choose to tap them at an accelerated rate).

I may just be reading into that too much, however.

I hope that the coppermind trait is unique to medallions. If not, that makes the idea of F-nicrosil really annoying. The whole point of Feruchemy is that you’re supposed to get more of an attribute by forgoing it in the moment. Copper is an exception because we can intuitively understand why it would make sense to store memories as they are. F-Nicrosil doesn’t have that. It’s not even like aluminum either, because aluminum makes sense as an Allomantic pairing to duralumin and it doesn’t break the normal rules of Allomancy either. 
 

24 minutes ago, Trusk'our said:

I wonder if, since Spiritwebs are mostly made up of Connection (acting as the "structure" of the Spiritweb, while Identity defines its borders, and Investiture is the substance it's built of), if perhaps a rudimentary Spiritweb is crafted for each medallion via the Excisors. After all, they do have more of a "life force" and individual Identity than other Metalminds.

 

You could probably do some things like that and I’m sure artificial souls will come up again at some point. However, I don’t get the impression that it’s what the F-duralumin does. Look at the word choice of that WoB again

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Raddatatta

In Era 1, Sazed says the only thing you can Feruchemically store while sleeping is wakefulness, but in Era 2 they have the sky ships that require everyone to be storing weight to fly and they don't land while people sleep. Was Sazed just wrong, or is that a difference between normal Feruchemy and using the unsealed metalminds?

Brandon Sanderson

Unsealed metalminds, I am moving toward complete—you probably already guessed this—mechanical uses of Investiture, and this indeed is a step toward that. And so we are stepping toward having a little machine that gives you powers. That's what the world wants to try to find. And this is—this being mechanical—we'll just say that the medallions and the things that they're building have more of a life-force, more of an Identity of their own than a traditional metalmind does, even though they're unkeyed and all of this stuff.

YouTube Spoiler Stream 5 (Dec. 2, 2022)

The tone sounds like Brandon trying to justify a story decision that doesn’t fit perfectly. Especially when he says “we’ll just say”. That sounds like a sort of handwave to me.

To clarify, I’m not saying this as an insult. Brandon is an amazing author and I find Mistborn to be especially addictive. But at the end of the day, authors do have to make choices. I don’t think this is a major breach of Cosmere rules and it allows massive storytelling potential in return. I could see Brandon making that trade.

However, I could also be reading this wrong. If I am, then my best guess is that the mechanics are complicated in a way Brandon doesn’t want to explain. Or he’s leaving us with a more vague explanation to be expanded upon. But I really think this is a mostly meta decision.

On an unrelated note, I have a question. If excisors are spikes, how would you guess F-Duralumin fits in? Do you just have to use the Duralumin Ferring to store in the medallion? Do medallions have Duralumin alongside Duralumin? I do want to know what general ideas you have in mind for the medallions.

1 hour ago, Koloss17 said:

Yeah, I keep forgetting this WoB exists. Well, F-Duralumin involves connection. Honestly? I got no clue. I’m certain there’s been older posts about where it factors in.

I did actually have my own theory about the Duralumin connection (pun intended). In my theory, it’s possible for a Duralumin Feruchemist to tap Connection directly from a God Metal, even though it’s not a metalmind. Mostly because the God Metal is still very Invested and Connected to a Shard. So an Excisor is harmonium hacked to act as pure Investuture, allowing free usage of stored powers similar to lerasium. 

Here’s the full theory

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Brandon Sanderson

So one of the things people have been asking about a lot the nature of Identity and its uses for accessing other people's metalminds, and things like this right. And I hedged a little bit when somebody asked me... *inaudible*...send people into spirals of confusion, so I'm gonna clarify it for now. So, someone comes in and says, we need a blank metalmind, anybody can use that. I'm like, yes but, the reason that it's a hedge is that you need to actually be a feruchemist to access it, right, you can't just hold the blank metalmind not being a feruchemist, even though it's somebody else's investiture that's been blanked, right. So people keep kind of missing this thing. I'm hedging in the sort of, you don't quite have it, I've kind of dodged it, but I worry that it's just going to be confusing.

So the issue is, you need two things from one of these. You need something that makes you a feruchemist, and then you need a metalmind that somebody else has filled with blank investiture, ok. Now if you can get pure investiture, that can be used by anybody, regardless, ok, you need it in pure form though. But, so there are some other tricks with this as well that don't make it...so anyway, you've got a couple of things that can go on. So you've got a blank metalmind, right, with nothing. You need either investiture, to be able...like you need to be the right type. There are ways to access that if you are completely blank also, if you were a blank slate, but that is still...kind of hard. It's even harder if you are blank, and the metalmind is not blank, but that's not what they're doing in Mistborn right now. You are tapping investiture, gaining the ability of feruchemy and then you are drawing out a blank metalmind, ok. That's the one you need to be...and everything else I'm hedging on intentionally, and I'm worried I hedged in a way that made it sound confusing, ok. So you know now what they're doing. You know that there are other things possible. But I don't want you to think that you have the explanations for how all those things happen, ok.

Arcanum Unbounded Seattle signing (Dec. 1, 2016)

36 minutes ago, Koloss17 said:

Honestly, this is how I think unsealed metalminds work. You rig a device that spikes someone with F-aluminum, both A and F-Nicrosil, and a metalborn ability of choice. You black identity, compound nicrosil, getting two or three people’s worth of metal, and then donating that to a metalmind.

Decent theory. However, I do have one other question about it. Per WoB, creating unsealed metalminds involves F-Duralumin. It was hesitant, but Brandon did say yes and clarified he had the steps listed out. So my question is, where does F-Duralumin fit into your theory? How would it help make an unsealed metalmind?

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Questioner

Does creating unsealed metalmind involve Feruchemical duralumin?

Brandon Sanderson

(hesitating)...Yes. I will write it all out for you eventually. I want to get at least one more book done, then you find out exactly why and how.

Questioner

Because I was pretty confused about the Investiture and Spiritweb...

Brandon Sanderson

Here is the reason I'm kind of hesitant of this, [why not you just RAFO this one right now], but it is not a RAFO, because it is like it's a secret. I want to write it out exactly how it happens, because I have it in my notes in bullet points and it's complicated, right? Cause I want some of the things in the magic system as be as complicated as for instance explaining how a computer works right now. You can do it, but you know...I want the magic to start getting that technical if that makes sense. When you say "involve", right, that's a big word. Why just don't you let me, after lost metal...if I haven't released it, you have permission to come to me and say: "Brandon, you said you would release this, you haven't yet [...]" and I will give to you the bullet point flowchart of how you build the unkeyed metalminds.

Leipzig Book Fair (March 24, 2017)

12 hours ago, Treamayne said:

Note: I'm fairly certain you only get one Gold Shadow (at least at normal burn - we saw flared Malatium show something else so Flared or Duralumin Gold may do the same).

I think thats a very real possibility. It depends on how you interpret the differences between gold and malatium. Atium’s effect. Refined Atium grants a more expansive view of the future than it would otherwise. That expansive could mean a burst of extra power more in line with Duralumin. However, it could also simply mean that you can see another target (more expansive, beyond yourself)

Given that malatium at a regular burn seems to work almost exactly the same as A-gold, I’d say the probability is high that flaring effectively does the same thing. So it would let you see a historical event, but for an alternate self. Duralumin might let you see the Spiritual Realm but only based on those alternate selves, in the same manner as Elend. Alternatively, duralumin may create visions like… (SA)

However, we don’t know exactly what effect Atium has on seeing through time beyond targeting other people. WoB did say replicating the Atium-Duralumin combo would be harder for electrum because there would be “more interference to fight through”. But I don’t know if that means you couldn’t see the Spiritual Realm altogether or if you would only get more limited/contradictory info (seeing multiple possibilites at once)

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Wigginns

What would a Hemalurgic spike granting atium do for an Allomancer already able to burn atium? Does it function similarly to bronze, granting enhanced atium-ing? Along this line of thought, would enhancing electrum burning via spike be of any advantage?

Brandon Sanderson

A spike of something you have would enhance your ability, giving your more strength. With atium, more strength makes for a minimal edge--the length you can push out the atium shadows. However, there's a certain breaking point where you kind of crack the whole system, peer straight into the [Spiritual Realm], and kind of have a "It's full of stars" moment.

Electrum could reach this same moment, potentially, though there's more interference to fight through. Extra strength in electrum isn't going to be terribly useful up to that point.

Alsadius

Is that what happened when atium was burned with duralumin?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

Footnote: In his original response Brandon mistakenly said burning atium and duralumin would cause the Allomancer to peer into the Cognitive Realm, rather than Spiritual Realm. He has since confirmed that this was a mistake.
/r/books AMA 2015 (Aug. 1, 2015)

12 hours ago, Treamayne said:

I don't know if you could exercise a skill or task (especially combat) while actively burning Gold since, unlike Atium Shadows, they don't seem to be semi-transparent and there is at least some interference with your normal senses while "experiencing" the Gold Shadow.

Good point. That sensory distortion is brutal and probably not solvable with just A-Gold. But maybe you could make fabrials to help filter out useless info. There are so many cool ways to do A-Gold fabrials! Which would also be fitting for my Everything, Everywhere, All at Once references.

1 hour ago, Koloss17 said:

Now actually, economists/geologists correct me if I’m wrong, gold is really expensive due to the fake worth we give it as currency. In Scadrial, I don’t think there’s that type of association, so while it might be expensive from people not needing it, it wouldn’t cost a fortune.

I did do some basic Googling. It seems like gold has a few specific things going for it. It’s easily recognizable for currency, generally looks good, ages well, and is just rare enough to be used but in demand. Most of these things are still true in Scadrial and gold is referenced as valuable to some extent. In AoL, Miles specifically needs a wealthy patron for more gold (though he does use a lot) and boxings were made of gold (Vin got her first taste of gold Allomancy using one). I’m also pretty sure that one AoL chapter states that using aluminum was like having gold plated guns or bullets, though that could be for our benefit as much as an actual in universe perspective

However, there is a big difference in how gold is perceived. In Era 1, gold was seems as a “high metal”, so it probably got a value boost from that. Of course, it would still be vastly overshadowed by atium, but gold was seen as special

Era 2 is really what would make gold drop. At that point, people would learn gold is useless for metallic arts, once Allomancy is effectively public knowledge. There may be some Allomantic metals that are more valuable. Aluminum would be before electrolysis and Wayne notes that bendalloy is hard to get. So maybe those metals would be more expensive, but gold still has most of the things we Earthlings could plausibly value. Not to mention a world that finds choice metals to be far more meaningful than we do.

https://www.investopedia.com/articles/investing/071114/why-gold-has-always-had-value.asp

I think the highest potential of gold would be something like the movie Everything, Everywhere, All at Once. In that movie, one can use technology to find alternate  realities and borrow the skills of those selves, fighting or otherwise. I imagine that August with proper Intent and practice could do that. But just as in the movie, you’d have a harder time finding selves unlike you and may even have mental side effects, given what happens when you touch a gold shadow. But I don’t think you can travel to another timeline beyond that.

We also don’t know what happens if you flare or Duralumin gold. Malatium lets you see the Spiritual Realm when you flare it, as shown in Secret History. Empowering gold would probably do something similar but focused on either your life or an alternate self. However, flaring probably wouldn’t be enough for gold. You’d need Duralumin or Hemalurgy. Wonder what would happen if you spike doubled A-Gold (probably seeing the Soiritual Realm). F-copper would also be interesting for an August Twinborn.

Fortune would probably help with gold. by making you more aware if the Spiritual Realm and functioning as an alternative to Duralumin (imagine a Twinborn with A- Gold + F-Chromium). I think storing Identity would be of only limited use, since you’re mostly using the Spiritual Realm. I think it’s more likely the shadows would become blurry or nonexistent than of new people. You’d want more Spiritual presence, not less. But I could be wrong. I just think Intent or Firtune are more useful. But tapping Identity may work for boosting Spiritual presence

Ultimately, I think there is a fair bit of potential for gold because everyone thinks it’s useless and it’s really expensive to experiment on. I don’t even think most Twinborn would crack it, especially with a decent Feruchemical power. But I’d also like to think some Gold Misting would eventually figure it out, just because there is nothing else to distract them.

4 hours ago, alder24 said:

Keep in mind after the first century there would be around 4000 Allomancers (with nobles at 10%, from which 210 were Mistborn) alone, all of them would be children, grandchildren and great grandchildren of the very first Lerasium Mistborns. That's a looooot. They were for sure busy at night.

I was referring that despite Vin asking Kel "what would happen if they met another Mistborn at night", they never encounter any Mistborn or Misting in the whole first book. Yes, there were far fewer Allomancers at that time, but there still should have been around 10-30 Mistborn in the whole Empire before the House War began. Luthadel was huge, yes, but Mistborn can quickly jump across the whole city in a few minutes. Therefore I think in the early years, in a smaller city, with almost 10x the amount of Mistborn present, such encounters would have happened more frequently (I'm not saying they would fight, just that they would awkwardly meet each other on some roof - <insert spiderman pointing at spiderman meme>).

What exactly would these Mistborn be doing at night? In most cases, Mistborn would be sent at night to do jobs. If not assignations, then something else big like stealing Atium, as Kelsier did. Jobs like that would have to be on minor houses if they didn’t want to start a house war. Some  Mistborn could be training, but that would probably be a relatively short time. I guess others could go jumping for fun, which would be the best reason for crowded roofs, so to speak.

But my point is that Mistborn do operate under MAD to some extent. When they are allowed to do jobs, it’s either against lesser houses that don’t have the resources to fight back or it would quickly spark a house war. Even if this arrangement wasn’t known during the first war or two, that would be more reason for nobles attacked by Mistborn to respond in kind. In other words, not realizing MAD is in effect would start the house war immediately. It may also be part of why Mistborn began hiding their powers. If one was seen and known to be part of a family, then that house knows they’ll be getting a nighttime visit and no one wants to risk that. Better to make it a bit harder for houses that get attacked.

9 hours ago, cometaryorbit said:

(Still doesn't explain how Preservation gave Feruchemy to the Terris in the first place, but...)

There would’ve been others who took the Well of Ascension before Rashek. Maybe one of them used Shard knowledge and lerasium experiments to grant Feruchemy (likely with Atium) . This would also explain why it’s only the Terris who have it. 

32 minutes ago, alder24 said:

Proportion of Mistborn to Misting was probably lower than 1:19, because I can't imagine 200 Mistborn (out of total 264) jumping around Luthadel at night - quite crowded roofs  

Rooftop mist parties every night! 

But to be fair, Mistborn would only really be jumping around on missions. Brandon has described conflicts with Mistborn as similar to mutually assured destruction. No house leader wants to bring them out because they and their loved ones are next on the chopping block. So the only time the roofs would be crowded would be in a major house war and the amount of those can be counted on your fingers. Though it does make you wonder what the house war would be like in year 200 or 400, when everyone has Mistborn. As well as how many times Mistborn were used during the Fibal Empire (since MAD is in effect)

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Secondly, there is the feel in this world about using Mistborn–it’s a little like the modern idea of Mutual Assured Destruction. If both parties have Mistborn, and one attacks, there will be retribution. People tend to hold their Mistborn back, using them only in emergencies, lest they unleash something dangerous in return.

No matter how many Mistborn there are, the vast majority of them are probably pretending to be Mistings of one type or another. Few would flaunt their true power and even fewer would pretend to have no powers (might as well take the excuse to openly use one). 
 

Wonder which Mistings they chose. Bet Coinshot, Tineye, and Thug were the most common. Some social ones like Shan could pick Rioter or Soother (though they wouldn’t outright claim to be one). A few odd ones might bluff Lurcher or Seeker. No one would ever choose Smoker though. Probably makes them pretty trustworthy friends (wouldn’t want to accidently be dealing with a secret Mistborn)

2 hours ago, cometaryorbit said:

I also don't think FE demographics are Medieval Europe like. There's a lot of major differences:

- TLR's meddling with fertility

 

I don’t know if this affects your calculations at all, but I also found this WoB about the fertility. It seems to suggest a lot of adjustments came from regular urbanization and propaganda, with little relevance from magic fertility changes. Make of it what you will

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<snip>

Phantine

>While he couldn't change genetics, his work here did make people start to look at things like class and clothing more than accents or racial identifiers.

How did the 'skaa/noble' class genetic tinkering work out, anyway? Did the leadership of every nation just wake up the next morning and find themselves taller, more intelligent, and less fertile?

Brandon Sanderson

Most genetic differences between skaa and noble were exaggerated, even fabricated, by noble culture as justification for their perceived superiority. Height differences due to nutrition, 'intelligence' due to education and societal expectations, fertility due to common factors in urbanization. The LR did try some minor tinkering, to be played out over time through genetics, but in the end these changes weren't very successful.

 

8 minutes ago, alder24 said:

If it's 10%, then the number of Allomancers is either lower (less than 0.1% which I assumed) or there is a lot of Mistings (3x my number, ~4500) but the percentage of Mistborn is lower instead (less than 1:19 which I assumed).

One other thing to consider. Most Mistborn would probably lie and claim to be a Misting of their favorite metal. That would make them fit in better with the nobility while also hiding their true abilites. So theoretically, people may have believed there were more Mistings than there really were, no matter what. But I doubt that factors in since we are taking about overall population

16 minutes ago, alder24 said:

But then is the 10% mentioned by Brandon the number of all nobility + obligators? Obligators were only from noble houses, and I was counting without them. If yes, many of those mistings would be Obligators, and we know they were used. Depending on the nobility and the Ministry, you might get something closer to 5% nobles + 5% obligators, which is not unreasonable to assume that many nobles would join religious organization, like what was happening in Europe.

The Steel Minsitry adds a bit of an interesting angle. On the one hand, it can very much prove the power of its god. On the other, the role of obligators is different from our priests. Obligators also served bureaucratic roles and were meant to emphasize loyalty. I don’t actually know if that would be a turn off or not. But it may be worth keeping track of the differences, just in case. 

7 hours ago, alder24 said:

Not to mention intent. For them to use the power of an earring they would have to know what power there is, and because there are around 30 possibilities, people would not be able to figure out which power they have. The chances for a Misting/Ferring getting a spike with corresponding power, which would allow him compounding, is very low and not possible at all if Kandra alone were distributing inquisitor spikes because they would ensure nobody would be able to compound.

Just want to clarify something. You dont necessarily have to know which power a spike provides, just that it has one. Think back to Spook getting his pewter. Ruin only said that the vials weren’t tin. Spook only realizes that it’s pewter after he burns the metal. But he can still find the reserve just by having reason to look for one.That being said, the rest is valid. Given the rarity of Metalborn and the kandra monoplizing spikes, it’s unlikely anyone would crack Compounding.

40 minutes ago, cometaryorbit said:

I agree with the general concept that Inquisitors need Atium (IIRC we know that not all Inquisitors had atium spikes, but that could be because the natural Mistborn Inqusitors - or Inquisitors made from Atium Mistings, which the Ministry did have - didn't need them) but not the conclusion. There's two ways a Misting Inquisitor could still have 9 spikes and have atium:

1) Not all Inquistors had f-Gold, so 8 basic metal + Atium

2) if that Inquisitor was an Atium Misting first, they could have 9 spikes including f-Gold.

Doubling atium isn't worth it, so I don't think any Inqusitor made from a Mistborn or Atium Misting would have an A-Atium spike.

1). You misunderstand my count. Inquistors have spikes for the 8 basic metals + a linchpin spike. The fifth steel spike that the Vetitan Inquistor had was most likely the linchpin spike, which certainly can’t provide Atium. I guess you could argue that other Inquistors had Atium linchpin spikes, but I doubt it. Remeber, killing one requires specifically targeting a linchpin spike. If it were Atium, someone would’ve noticed that.

2) Inquistors were generally made from Seekers or Mistborn, so they could have enhanced bronze. If a Seer were to become an Inquistor, they would either need a fifth bronze spike or go without it. Not impossible, since the epigraphs state that Seekers were the preferred candidates, as opposed to the only ones. Plus, spiking a Seer with extra bronze may work better, since you don’t need to spend Atium making an A-Atium spike. But it does appear most Inquistors had enhanced bronze.
 

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In most cases, however, Inquisitors were created from Mistings. It appears that Seekers, like Marsh, were the favored recruits. For, when a Mistborn wasn't available, an Inquisitor with enhanced bronze abilities was a powerful tool for searching out skaa Mistings.

5 hours ago, alder24 said:

This is an option, but I wouldn't call it reverse compounding. 

Out of curiosity, do you have another name for it? I ask because the term reverse Compounding generally has been used for this method on other threads.

Whether normal Compounding is required depends on how medallion tech differs from nicrosil Feruchemy. If the latter does function like most attributes, instead of as a coppermind, you could compress that power without ever compounding. Hence the comparison to A-Duralumin

5 hours ago, alder24 said:

This very likely can be related to reverse compounding, but likely normal compounding would be required first. The WoB you quoted is about nicrosil in medallions but we know from Wax that nicrosil in the Bands is running out of attribute, and compounding was required to fill it up again. That's how normal Feruchemical nicrosil might work. And storing Allomantic attributes in nicrosilmind, and compounding it might make it stronger for certain period of time.

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Calderis

Does the nicrosil portion of the medallions function identitically to how a Soulbearer Ferring would use Nicrosil? 

Brandon Sanderson

Not exactly. The medallion is a little more restrictive, for one thing.

Skyward Pre-Release AMA (Oct. 31, 2018)

 

I highly doubt you could just wish for the attribute in metalmind to become something else. There are too many restrictions in Feruchemy, and every attribute in metalmind has its own tone, changing it just like that is not possible. SA spoilers

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You would need to do something like Navani did in RoW, blank the tone of investiture and reprogram it to another

If you manage to change it, you would end up with investiture that normally should be in nicrosilmind, but is in steelmind instead. I don't think you need to change the investiture in metalmind. Maybe with proper intent you can overwrite normal compounding and use investiture in metalminds as a different type of filter, that's strengthen your Allomancy instead. I do think that this option might be close to the truth, you need to somehow use investiture in metalmind to provide more Allomantic power, but how, that’s too hard to tell.

I agree with you to an extent. I don’t believe it’s feasible to just change the filter of a Feruchemical attribute. It’s why I find theory #3 far less appealing than #4. I guess you could change it similar to how Ruin changes copperminds, while the Investiture is kinetic. But at that point, you’re being horrifically inefficient anyway

5 hours ago, alder24 said:

That's expand option 3, which does seem to make some sense. However, like in option 3, you now have an attribute in a zincmind that should be stored in nicrosilmind. But what you propose is kinetic Allomantic investiture being stored, not innate (part of your soul that provides you Allomantic ability). This might be the way around it that would make it work. 

I do believe that storing this kinetic Investuture is greatly different from nicrosilminds,as you said. But keep in mind, this is a hack. It’s not impossible to trick these magic systems in a way. Compounding already shows elements of it by burning a metal yet getting Feruchemy. This is a more advanced technique, but on similar principles.

Fittingly for reverse Compounding, method #4 uses the filter in reverse. The molecular structure of normal metal is itself a kind of filter. Compounding is using Allomancy to burn metal with a Feruchemy filter. Method #4 is using Feruchemy to tap from metal with an Allomantic filter. The unaltered metal/metal reserve is the filter for which power you get, but your method means you can store and tap. 
 

5 hours ago, alder24 said:

Normal nicrosil compounding can explain how Rashek's Allomancy was so strong, as well as the Bands, 

Yes and no. Mechanically, both should work and it’s certainly justified for the Bands. But I don’t believe it explains Rashek. It is technically possible that Rashek created nicrosil using the Well or made every dose himself. But remember, it would also mean he had no nicrosilminds on him at the end of TFE. If he did, then the crew would’ve found an unknown metal on his body. It’s not impossible, but it is tricky to justify.

5 hours ago, alder24 said:

However I worry that this might not work at all. If there is a different type of investiture in a metalmind, then it might be fully inaccessible to you, and burning it would not give you any power, per these WoBs

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Questioner

So, about Feruchemy. If someone takes, for example, a copper metalmind, fills it with memories, and then a tin metalmind, fills it with senses, then melts them together into a bronze metalmind, would you be able to tap anything from it, and what?

Brandon Sanderson

If you made an alloy of them, you would not get anything out of them. You would know there's Investiture in there, but you wouldn't be able to pull it out. 

Questioner

Even if it's your own?

Brandon Sanderson

Even if it's your own, yup. They would interfere with each other to the point that you wouldn't be able to get anything out. Sorry.

Tel Aviv Signing (Oct. 18, 2019)

 

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Rogaen

What would happen if a Feruchemist fills, for example, a tin metalmind then mixes it to make a pewter metalmind? Does the stored attribute change? Is the Investiture gone when you melt the metal? What if he just makes it into a tin metalmind again?

Brandon Sanderson

If you make it impure, you'll keep the investiture, but won't be able to get it out. If you make it back into the same thing, you'll be fine, and can access it normally. If you try to fill it, after changing the composition to make another viable metal, it will act a little like a computer hard drive with corrupted sectors. Some of it will work for the new investiture, but you won't be able to fill it nearly as full. (Depending on how full it was before you melted down.)

This holds for basic uses of the metallurgic arts. Once you start playing with some of the more advanced parts of the magic, you can achieve different results, which are currently RAFO.

eSPiaLx

Similarly, if you were to soulcast a metal would it have similar effects of corrupting the investiture and making it inaccessible? Like if you turned a steel metalmind into pewter.

Brandon Sanderson

I've stayed away from soulcasting and forging in these types of discussions, as I feel my answers will dig too deeply and prompt more questions that, eventually, will lead to lots of RAFO type questions. I don't really want to go there--but I will say this. Changing invested objects with other magics is hard, and often requires such a force of investiture yourself, that it becomes very power-inefficient. Just like we can technically turn lead into gold right now--by spending way more money than the gold is worth.

BipedSnowman

So you could, for example, use electrolysis to dissolve a metalmind in water, then reverse the reaction later to get the investiture?

OR, better question, if you store investiture in one allotrope of iron, can your retrieve it off you change to a different allotrope?

Brandon Sanderson

I see no reason why these wouldn't work.

dce42

So would forging with the blood of a radiant(kaladin, dalinar,etc) work on a shard blade from a fallen radiant to say change who they had bonded, or how the bond was broken (to say death instead of giving up on the oath)?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO.

General Reddit 2016 (Nov. 11, 2016)

 

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Questioner (paraphrased)

What would happen if Allomancer was also an Awakener and Awakened metal he'd burn?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

If he did that, he’d get Allomantic power and also get back the Breaths used in Awakening the metal.

Footnote: Supposedly it was around half an hour into the signing line; has not been found on the record although we may have started it after it was asked already; follow-up to this
Warsaw signing (March 18, 2017)

This WoB might suggest that even if investiture in a metalminds was inaccessible by tapping, because it isn't right type of investiture, when being burnt, you would get that investiture back (investiture won't get lost), and if that's Allomantic kinetic investiture (like steel push in a steelmind) your own steel push would get stronger than normally, by the amount of kinetic investiture released during burning that metalmind.

If you’ve hacked the system so the kinetic Investiture in Allomancy can be store, it should also be something you can tap. In those WoBs, you are talking about changing a metalmind after you’ve already stored in it. But in method #4, the power itself hasn’t changed. It’s just been wrong from the start because you hacked it. If it can do one part of Feruchemy (storing), it can do the other (tapping).

5 hours ago, alder24 said:

Don't focus too much on Marsh. In most cases he was the closest Ruin had, like the closest to Fadrex, to Goradel etc, that's why Ruin used him. Marsh, like other Inquisitors, was simply doing many other duties during the whole HoA, he wasn't that important, he was just a tool that was the closest for Ruin to use. Yes, Marsh got the most spikes of all Inquisitors, but that doesn't really mean that he was the main Inquisitor, maybe that's because Ruin saw in his future vision that Marsh will be important in defeating Vin and Elend, and that's why he gave them so many spikes? Or maybe Marsh was the first one to get all those spikes and rest were soon to follow him as well, but they couldn't simply find enough Mistborn/Feruchemist?

Interesting. I remeber other threads have suggested that Ruin was trying to be extra cruel to the crew, but now I’m thinking that’s improbable. He didn’t really care about them except as pawns. And the only times Marsh enounters them is when he’s already nearby (Fardrex, the village) or needs to fulfill some other objective (getting Atium in the Battle of Hathsin).

I do think the second option is less likely. Ruin would probably know how many Mistborn there were. He didnt known which people were Duralumin gnats because they didn’t know. But most Mistborn would know and probably be using their powers regularly. Your first explanation seems to be the best one.

It does also make me wonder what build Ruin’s Inquistors had. The most important ones would probably have A-Duralumin, F-Pewter, F-Steel, and perhaps one of the mental metals if we assume the brass spike in the prologue wasn’t for Marsh. Slapped on a Misting with Marsh’s old build, that’d be 15 spikes. But Ruin may have also given more out. I’m just assuming that the rare ones who got A-Duralumin also had the most spikes in common with Marsh.

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Of course, this did give us a slight advantage, at the end. Ruin had a lot of trouble giving duralumin to his Inquisitors, since they'd need an Allomancer who could burn it to kill before they could use it. And, since none of the duralumin Mistings in the world knew about their power, they didn't burn it and reveal themselves to Ruin. That left most Inquisitors without the power of duralumin, save in a few important cases—such as Marsh—where they got it from a Mistborn. This was usually considered a waste, for if one killed a Mistborn with Hemalurgy, one could draw out only one of their sixteen powers and lost the rest. Ruin considered it much better to try to subvert them and gain access to all of their power.

8 hours ago, therunner said:

I don't think that would be the case.
Ars Arcanum talks about Ruin pushing more on fabric of fabrial, and pushing souls beyond what they could handle.

So I see it that Hemalurgic constructs and people spiked prior to Catecedre would retain the 'empowered' version of Hemalurgy, but anyone spiked after, even with old spike, would not get those benefits since Ruin is no longer present to push on their soul.

Interesting. It’s not impossible, but we do need to account for when Marsh actually got the spike in that case. If the empowered Hemalurgy was actively done by Ruin, then it should’ve ended the moment Vin collided with him. That suggests Marsh got the F-Atium spike after fighting her but before he confronted Elend. Most of Ruin’s Inquistors were right there for the looting and Ruin himself would’ve been focused on Vin.
 

If Era 2 Hemalurgy was instead a gradual process caused by Harmony, Marsh would’ve had plenty of time. Also, Spook shouldn’t been doing Hemalurgy immediately after the Ascension. Thus, this interpretation makes it more feasible for Spook to have Atium Compounding. If the first one is true, his longevity was probably cadmium based (barring worldhopper intervention).

Or it’s just that any spike made in Era 1 functions normally, as I said. I don’t believe we can dismiss any of the three theories out of hand, but I’d be happy to hear further arguments

1 hour ago, Trusk'our said:

I think that this is an interesting idea. We know that it is possible to store Bronzesense inside a Tinmind, so it's likely that you could store excess healing and possibly strength from pewter (though it may just make it easier to store at a higher percentage than normal).

It would be really cool to see if you could store A-pewter's muscle enhancement without F-pewter's bulk, but we'd need to see this in books or get a good WoB for me to put my money on it.

I do actually have a WoB that I neglected to post the first time. I’ve edited the OG post but I’ll put it here too

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Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Allomantic pewter strength can be stored in a metalmind, but it's probably easier to just Compound.

Alloy of Law 17th Shard Q&A (Nov. 5, 2011)

1 hour ago, Trusk'our said:

The quote was talking specifically about the Malwish Medallion tech, so it's possible that it is different than a normal Nicrosilmind. If a normal Nicrosilmind still acts "like a Coppermind" however, I would venture to say that Compounding would only copy the power, not increase the power you get from it (and tapping it faster wouldn't help either).

Good point. I do actually have my own seperate line of theories about the medallions, but I don’t think they contradict the idea that nicrosilminds are like most metalminds (not distinct).

1 hour ago, Trusk'our said:

Ah, so basically, you fill a Metalmind normally, but you convince the Investiture inside to act as it's Allomantic counterpart when tapped? I think that would be really neat, but you may require more than Intent, since when you store the metal it's Keyed to a specific use; you wouldn't be able to Feruchemicaly store in pewter and get Allomantic pewter than you could store strength and get health from it even if you had the proper Intent. More action would be required to reprogram it, though it might be possible with some work.

I wonder if you were to Blank your Identity whilst storing you could leave the stored Investiture susceptible to manipulation. Then, you use a special method discovered in RoW...

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Use Navani's method of changing an Investiture's Tone. Use Allomantic bronze and possibly Feruchemical duralumin (Connection) to learn the Rhythm of the Allomantic power you want the Metalmind to take after. Then, convince the Investiture inside the Metalmind to change to that Rhythm. Perhaps then you could tap the new Investiture and convince it to act as it's Allomantic counterpart and possibly even Compound it.

It's an educated guess, but I think that it may be possible to pull off.

Yeah. This is the method I feel like you’d need Spiritual Realm hacking. The impression I get is that a normal metal’s molecular structure aligns with its Cognitive and Spiritual aspects. If all three work together, you get Allomancy. Making it into a metalmind alters all but the physical, so you’d have a really hard time convincing it. Especially since you’d have to alter not just the Cognitive Realm, but the Spiritual.

1 hour ago, Trusk'our said:

Interesting. So, if I have what you're saying correct, you mean to say that with the proper Intent you could burn a metal Allomantically and then store its Investiture Feruchemically? It's an interesting idea, but it may be a bit of a stretch; I think that more than Intent would be required to make such a power work, though using the method of tweaking I came up with in #3, maybe?

Yep. It’s basically a hybrid hack of burning and tapping. When you first activate the reserve, it functions like Allomantic burning. For example, zinc would give you Rioting. But once the power enters your body, your Intent makes it behave like Feruchemy. It still has the Allomantic effect, just like a metalmind using for Compounding burns while providing Feruchemy. But since your hacked power thinks it’s Feruchemy, it can be stored. It’s also something that I don’t think needs Spiritual hacking. It’s a trick no one would ever think to try without inherent Shardic knowledge. Which makes sense, since our two main suspects for this use are Rashek and Kelsier, both of whom qualify from their time with Preservation.

I also imagine that if you activate the reserve with this Intent, the metal will still be under the limits of normal flaring, but everything provided while it burns functions with Feruchemical properties. So you can leave hacked bronze burning and store at any time in a bronzemind: immediate transfer isn’t required.

But most interesting of all, it makes Compounders even more crazy. Their Allomancy gains most of the benefits of Feruchemy, bypassing all known power limits and maybe even becoming undetectable to bronze. Their Feruchemy is fueled at no cost by regular Compounding, as we’ve already seen. It’s the perfect marriage of both systems and combines their best qualities

1 hour ago, Trusk'our said:

I agree completely on the loyalty part; I don't think that Ruin would have wanted to bother keeping around Marsh longer than necessary since he resisted so much. Too much hassel. I think that the Inquisitors who had F-Atium spikes likely had them either because they were experimenting between the death of Rashek and the release of Ruin on Keeper powers (Rashek likely didn't want them to have too much Feruchemy for fear of them learning to Compound, so likely didn't tell them all of the Feruchemical powers), or than Ruin wanted a few of his more loyal Inquisitors to survive long enough to continue acting as his agents in the Cosmere after the fall of Scadrial.

Could be that Ruin wanted them to be able to Reverse Compound Atium, but if #4 is true wouldn't they still use Atium up in the process?

Overall, good post @Mistchemist16, nice work, nice discussion 

Thank you for the compliment!

I do think loyalty is the only reason to explain the F-Atium puzzle. Ruin clearly spent lots of effort making Marsh into a perfect battle pawn. He gave Marsh Duralumin fresh from a Mistborn, even though it was a waste. So if Ruin did value F-Atium in any way, then logically Marsh should’ve received it too. Unless Ruin wanted to save those powers for pawns who wouldn’t struggle. And any plausible use of F-Atium would be in the long term, when Marsh’s struggles would become a greater liability.

Given what we know about F-Atium, we have to assume Ruin still intended to use Inquistors after destroying Scadrial. Either immortality or reverse Compounding are great reasons to get F-Atium. For approach #4, the main benefit of reverse Compounding is seeing the Spiritual Realm, though longer future sight doesn’t hurt either. Approach #3 could do the same but also be better or worse at it, depending on how efficient the conversion is. But if anything, I do think atium’s ability to see the Spiritual Realm would be far more valuable than the combat power. After all, any Atium spent reverse Compounding could just be burned for its regular effect, instead of being compressed to achieve the same goal.