Ari

Yeah, unless your preferred Trell candidate is neither Odium or Autonomy, I would suggest Hoid would be uninvolved with Paalm. And there's some circumstantial evidence in favour of both Odium and Autonomy, so I think you'd also need to make an argument for your preferred Trell candidate first.

Good point. It's possible she had a single "trellium" spike that stole allomancy. It's possible she had a regular allomantically charged spike and a "trellium" spike, which together somehow allow her to gain allomantic abilities, while also gaining other abilities "Trell" Invested into his or her spike. I'm not ruling out either at this stage, although I would agree it could be a simpler explanation if Trell simply made some direct observations into Wax's mind, and that Paalm was using single, allomantically-charged or feruchemically-charged Trellium spikes the whole time, and Wax was wrong when he observes that she could have been using two spikes. edit: In some ways, a single Trellium spike would make a lot of sense in terms of how Paalm acted, especially if Autonomy is Trell.

I agree with you that all that's guaranteed is that Paalm was using at least one spike. It is possible that she had a second spike, if it was made of the alien God Metal, especially as one specific candidate for "Trell" could well shield her from Harmony's influence that way. I'm not ruling out that she had only a single spike, but I think some of the abilities she displayed could be much more readily explained if she was in fact using the alien God Metal spike herself.

Nope, spike-having inquisitors can tap metalminds because they have a relevant spike to make them non-muggles, (and more specifically, to make them spiritually close-enough-to-the-same-person to access the metalminds) thus they can make their own stores to compound if they have the necessary spikes for both feruchemical and allomantic powers. The only thing backing up the idea that allomancers don't require the ability to tap feruchemical metalminds in order to compound them is that Word of Brandon. It's also possible that Feruchemical Aluminium allows for identity erasure, isn't it? What you don't know is what type of tricks they need to do in order to make that metalmind accessible to the hypothetical Augur- it could well be that metalminds are accessible to ferrings and feruchemists when they're blank-identity, but need to be specific to the Augur in order to be compounded. (In which case, a Trueself Augur could store his Identity in an aluminiummind, and a full feruchemist could store her own Identity, tap the Trueself Augur's identity, and then possibly store in a goldmind, assuming the process doesn't make her into a trueself Augur) It would definitely be interesting to know, but remember, your WoB is specific and the answer is short and vague. Don't read too many additional specifics into it.

I think it could definitely go either way, but his initial motivations are clearly related to that earlier character beat he had with a young woman whose father he had killed, and he saw this as his chance to actually make a difference for someone similar who had also been wronged. We'll see in Bands!

Indeed I am, and I know that's not for certain. However, some of the things she did being called impossible in-world suggests that using a god metal spike charged a specific way could help, for instance, a Kandra gain Allomantic and Feruchemical powers. Any explanation has to balance its assumptions with its explanatory power in terms of Occam's razor. I think assuming Bavadin's involvement and that Paalm was using his spike the whole time explains things very neatly, (as there's a couple things she seemed to do that staying spiked with the God Metal spike might make easier) but I am definitely open to equally- or more elegant theories. It is also entirely possible that the alien God Metal spike is just what Paalm used to make her super-zombies. (In which case, it would require Bavadin's active interference to make them, and it would arguably make him a much worse candidate for Trell, as that might violate his Intent) Or she could keep the spikes in some sort of container embedded in her flesh. (Didn't Vin have Tensoon carry allomantic vials at one point? I know for sure she had him carry an Atium bead) No chance of spiking accidentally, but she'd have to open the container and swap ones whenever changing spikes. If Paalm is changing spikes on the run, she has to have some way to carry them, and I'd imagine a Kandra would carry secret magical weapons inside their flesh if possible.

The Ars Arcanum does explicitly contradict this, and say that it's not completely about the interaction of the two abilities, not that those Ars Arcanums aren't incomplete information or anything. ...and man I got confused there, thought I had accidentally ended up on the mistborn board so I spoiler tagged the post, then saw I wasn't so had to change it back... ><

If Harmony hasn't been dramatically changed from Sazed, I definitely trust him at this point. He was one of the most caring characters in the Era 1 stories, and I can't see him using Wax like this unless his available actions were drastically curtailed by his conflicting Intents. That said, that doesn't necessarily mean that Harmony noticed everything he should and might not have missed another way out of "Trell's" trap. But Sazed wouldn't manipulate someone like he seems to have manipulated Wax if he had a better choice. His methods were distasteful, but in extreme situations sometimes it's a choice of the least bad option, and Sazed doesn't seem to have violated any of his principles. In fact, I take issue with the people who say that Harmony witholding information is in conflict with his desire to see Scadrial become more self-sufficient. In fact, if you were a God or other very powerful being interacting with people with a much more limited perception, giving them all relevant information whenever you talk to them would quickly make them less and less self-sufficient. Learning how to gather your own information and come to your own conclusions is an important part of "growing up", which might be a bit of a dreadful analogy in this case but it is the most ready one. If Sazed doesn't let people use their own initiative and senses to find out some things, then he might as well just be issuing commands to them and moving them around like puppets, exactly like Paalm accuses him of doing. That said, was it a bad move not to tell Wax who Paalm was? At least to some degree, yes, of course. It's especially terrible if he actually did intend Paalm and Wax to form a relationship when he assigned Paalm to guard him, as was alleged in the book, or if he took any action to stop Wax from finding out, that's also incredibly bad form. But if he didn't intend the two to form a relationship in the first place, and decided Paalm should be the one to tell Wax who she was, and it coming from him would just hurt Wax even more, I can accept that as the least bad option in this situation. But we really don't know enough about what was going on for Harmony in this situation to really judge very well the ethics of it, and I expect we may not ever find out, either. Harmony has the luxury of acting on much more perfect information than we do, and given how kind his personality was in previous novels, I'm inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt for now. If a lot more things like this continually happen... well, then I'd be very worried about what's happened to Sazed.

I think you'd need a hybrid power to express such complex concepts and communicate signifiers through emotions, but that doesn't mean it wasn't building on emotional allomancy in doing so, so that's definitely an alternative. The fact, however, that Wax found it practically indistinguishable from Harmony talking to him says to me that some sort of Shardic involvement is the most direct explanation, as we'd have to go inventing a new magical effect to explain it otherwise. That said, DSC has a perfectly acceptable point that it could be direct communication from whoever Trell is, possibly relayed somehow through Bleeder, or possibly just with enough background information about Paalm to know the right things to say. I'd say that explanation is probably even simpler than my initial one and ought to be the favoured theory for the moment.

The Ars Arcanum refers to inbreeding between Terris people and Allomancers, rather than interbreeding, which is mildly amusing edit: this is specifically the metallic arts section relating to Twinborns.

Also, can a duralumin Compounder swallow their burnmind and normal duralumin at the same time and get allomantic duralumin with feruchemical duralumin for a super-flare of connection? Because jeez.

I felt like Wayne and MeLaan were just good friends. If Wayne is going anywhere with anyone, it's the inventor's daughter who he's going to bankroll IMO. I actually hope Marasi doesn't get paired off due to completionism. She strikes me as having a particular type and I don't know if a random worldhopper would fit it. And yeah, until we found out who Paalm was, I was actually on team Steris/Wax. I don't know how they'll do with Wax's fresh emotional wounds, but I like Steris a whole lot more after the middle of the book, and I hope they can work it out. I'm pretty sure that if Ranette were on the bisexuality spectrum Brandon wouldn't have labelled her as gay. I got the distinct impression that Ranette was aware of Wayne's delusions about her and found trying to dispel them pointless or impractical.

I'm very much in favour of this option. It's entirely possible that Trell, whoever Trell is, has the same ability to communicate with people who have spiritual holes that Ruin did, and that part of what the trellium spike does when Paalm uses it is bestow that ability. (Which Trell could have Invested directly into the spike similar to how you can steal anything you like with Atium) And while Harmony can't manipulate Paalm through one hemalurgic spike, it's possible that Trell can manipulate her through the trellium spike and a normal spike? Although that would be problematic for one of the Trell candidates. In which case we have no idea what would happen if someone burned Trell's element. It's possible that like Lerasium it would spiritually attune you to be able to use their planet's investiture? The reason we don't get that side-effect for Atium is that anyone can use Hemalurgy. It would probably also make you act somewhat more in accordance with the Shard's intent, the way Atium makes you more violent. If Trell is who we expect they are, then I guess it would free you from other Shardic influences and compel you to liberate others?

I've just finished the book and somewhat undecided on why I feel Paalm was crazy. I kinda want to say Harmony pushed her too far at the moment, and that the combination of the influence of the unknown shard and her emotional instability led her to go waaaay to far. Part of that is due to the fact that if the spike is from who I think it's from, it would seem to me to be against his Intent to give her anything that would drive her insane, but he thought he could use her to destabilise Elendel into a revolt against Harmony despite the fact that she was already in a pretty unstable place, and it would be perfectly fine for him to free an insane or unstable person from Harmony's control.

Autonomy would absolutely interfere with a Shard it felt was taking free will away from the people it presides over. Freedom to enslave other people is no freedom at all. Now, while Paalm's desire to be free and free others could be a purely coincidental thing resulting in an unwanted push from Harmony, it could also be something Bavadin took deliberate advantage of to build on. I'm pretty convinced the alien spike is made of "bavadinium", or whatever the appropriate name is, due to its ability to allow Paalm to retain control while double-spiked, and due to how much she talks about her desire to free people whenever she talks with Wax about her plans. What we seem to be missing here is, sure, Wax thinks that the ability to talk into someone's mind is specifically from Ruin, but we know that various shards share abilities- some can see into the future, some can read minds, some can change words, etc... it's entirely possible that whichever shard the alien spike is from granted that ability to Paalm as part of the spike. So I think you could get a double-whammy question on confirming who the alien spike came from by simply asking whether Odium and Autonomy have the ability to talk into people's minds when they're spiked. I would bet that the answer is that Autonomy is capable of it.

Did it drive her crazy though? Or was she already crazy, and it just removed Harmony's stabilising influence from her?

My take on it was that their goals aren't actively opposing each other yet so they're sticking to their own spaces and doing their own thing, and we haven't seen any evidence to the contrary, so it seems perfectly reasonable to assume Hoid is going it alone, like he always has in the past.

There's bits in the text about how TLR would have to spend increasing amounts of time filling burnminds for himself as he grew older and eventually he would reach the limits of age compounding as he would no longer be able to fill metalminds fast enough to burn them. Now, that could be referring to filling them even a little, but it seems like that would make it very hard to hit such a limit, as you'd more practically be limited by the amount of Atium you could source.

That was exactly what I was thinking. Well, that and he is the Survivor on Scadrial. Kelsier is probably a Godspren in his own right, if that's the correct classification for the Stormfather.

The intents apply to the shards at least a little- see Odium wanting to be hated, for instance. Ruin was an Avatar of Ruin- and probably wanted people to see him that way, which is as far as his intent applying to him went. Likewise, Autonomy would want to be seen to be ending paternalism, interference, slavery, and unjust rule over others. (He is probably okay with power structures that are sufficiently opt-in, as that would be an autonomous choice. But things like kingdoms would not sit well with his Intent) That could very easily bring him into conflict with any Shard who is guiding their world a little too actively, not just Dominion.

It would certainly seem so. On Roshar you need an Honourblade, Radiant sDNA, or to become a Radiant Squire in order to breathe in Stormlight. We do have WoB that Breaths are different in this regard, most likely due to the nature of Endowment's powers. Most likely he has a gem awakened with a command like "Be as my breath and gather Stormlight."

Voidus, we actually understand all that already. The feruchemical charge is multiplied by Preservation's power, but there's no violation of magical thermodynamics. And we have a rather good idea of how it works- the feruchemical charge overrides the usual focus of the allomantic metal to hack preservation's power into a feruchemical effect. We don't know exactly how much power is returned, but we do know it's more than enough to fill the same type of metalmind all over again with at least as much effect left over, so we do know it's at least multiplicative compared to tapping the power, if not exponential. I do wonder if the amount stored in the metalmind has any effect- TLR seemed to want his atiumminds full before burning them, and you would think he would have had time to experiment with compounding. It could well be that the strength of the compounding is based on how much you've stored in the burned metalmind, so that would mean that if your metal is at all valuable, it would be best to completely full your burnminds before using them.

I had honestly forgotten he did that. It's certainly a leap forward from any other advantage you might have. As for gravitation- basically it can help him by moving people's blows out of the way if he uses it subconsciously.

Brandon mentioned that the Dustbringers and Willshapers would approve of what he had done. So if Adolin is to become a Radiant, he'd likely fit into one of those two orders, as it seems like murder is something very few of the orders would be forgiving about, and that would block him from attracting the necessary Spren. I could go either way on radiant!Adolin. I think it's not necessary to the plot or to him as a character right now, and that it might be more interesting for him to have to deal with practically his entire family, including his fiancee, being Radiants, while all he gets are dead shards. But I also like seeing more radiants, and it's certainly not off the cards for him yet. So *shrug*.

I'm not actually arguing that Kaladin's edge is exactly the same thing as being very talented, I am arguing that in terms of developing his skill, it functions in a similar way. Probably a better analogy is someone with three arms playing the piano- they could do things that would be impossible for your typical piano player because they simply couldn't hit three keys so far apart so quickly, which would make things easier for them before they have fully learned how to move their arms and developed the necessary muscle memory needed to play piano at a master level, and that advantage might lead to them becoming a master if they were the only three-armed piano player around, because nobody else would find it quite so easy to hit multiple keys. Once they progressed to being as skilled as masters with two arms, they could then play pieces that were flat-out impossible for other people. It might be that if this person lived in a world full of other three-armed people, they would never dedicate the practice to playing the piano. But in our world where they are an anomaly with an "impossible" advantage, they might end up a master. Likewise, Kaladin trained in an environment where he was likely the only Surgebinder. His ability to use Gravitation as action-at-a-distance likely kept him alive during phases of his training or during battlefield situations that would have killed people who weren't proto-radiants. He may have inhaled small amounts of Stormlight in dire situations and ended up with an edge, and his near-misses in those situations might have allowed him to learn crucial combat lessons that would normally have killed people with his level of skill. This would be similar in effect for his training, although not in method, to someone with a ridiculous talent for fighting that had not yet trained. Does that make more sense? I don't disagree with you that Kaladin does magical and ridiculous things, and that some of those things wouldn't be conceivable to a skilled or talented fighter that didn't have access to magic.