Why the God King doesn't get invited to Rosharan parties

[Duxredux he/him]

The God King walks into a Rosharan bar...

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Shadow Guardian

If an Awakener were to go to Roshar and were to bleed the color from a gem would that gem still be able to store Stormlight?

Brandon Sanderson

Bleed the color from a gem… Um ye-ye-ye-yeah. This would interfere with its function on Roshar. It would probably still be able to hold Stormlight…

Shadow Guardian

Might not be able to be used for Soulcasting?

Brandon Sanderson

Yea-- It's going to… You know what no it would just change it. It would just bleed the color from it and turn it into a dusty quartz or something like that. That's probably what it would end up with, a dusty quartz. Because the molecular structure doesn't matter as much as the color for Roshar. So yeah you would probably still be able to hold Stormlight because a diamond can but I don't know, quartz might cut it. You'd probably end up with something that's not going to work so well.

Questioner 2

What about a fabrial that needs a specific--

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah a specific-- A ruby wouldn't work any more, and it would let go whatever is captured inside.

Bands of Mourning release party (Jan. 25, 2016)

...and every fabrial in the building breaks? Polestones are what largely define what kind of fabrial can be made to the extent that inspecting a polestone and the metals used in a fabrial allows an artifabrian to reverse engineer a fabrial. Awakening and draining color from a gemstone apparently works, so what happens if those colors are merely distorted? It doesn't have to be a permanent change, just enough for the spren to be released. Even if it doesn't, if it simply disrupts the fabrials that could still be pretty useful.

The core question: Are spren held by the hue, value, or intensity of the color of the light, and which of these scales are altered by Biochromatic Auras? Do BioChromatic auras alter color enough to break Rosharan fabrials, particularly in the case of the 10th Heightening or Nightblood?

Thoughts? Applications? Unusual rock/paper/scissor element here?

Edited December 14, 2023 by Duxredux

[Treamayne]

14 minutes ago, Duxredux said:

The core question: Are spren held by the hue, value, or intensity of the color of the light, and which of these scales are altered by Biochromatic Auras? Do BioChromatic auras alter color enough to break Rosharan fabrials, particularly in the case of the 10th Heightening or Nightblood?

Draining an object of color is a change to the object to fuel the art. Changing a color with Biochromatic Aura is changing the perception of the color, not the object. Until we have evidence or WoBs, my Headcanon is that the auras (brighten and deeepen) "add" <something> to the light reflected from the object before that light is viewed by others.

Which, of course, begs the question of how a strong enough Biochromatic Aura might effect Shardic Light. . .

Edited December 14, 2023 by Treamayne
SPAG/Clarity

[Tamriel Wolfsbaine]

I won't say it would ruin any light itself... But the way Susebrons fight scene looked at the end spells spooky for gems and places with many gems. 

If he showed up to The Tower and started draining everything to white would all of the radiants still be able to function as normal there?  

Edited December 14, 2023 by Tamriel Wolfsbaine

[alder24]

3 hours ago, Duxredux said:

The God King walks into a Rosharan bar...

...and every fabrial in the building breaks? Polestones are what largely define what kind of fabrial can be made to the extent that inspecting a polestone and the metals used in a fabrial allows an artifabrian to reverse engineer a fabrial. Awakening and draining color from a gemstone apparently works, so what happens if those colors are merely distorted? It doesn't have to be a permanent change, just enough for the spren to be released. Even if it doesn't, if it simply disrupts the fabrials that could still be pretty useful.

The core question: Are spren held by the hue, value, or intensity of the color of the light, and which of these scales are altered by Biochromatic Auras? Do BioChromatic auras alter color enough to break Rosharan fabrials, particularly in the case of the 10th Heightening or Nightblood?

Thoughts? Applications? Unusual rock/paper/scissor element here?

As long as he doesn't Awaken and drain color from gemstones, splitting the light refracting or generating from them won't change their molecular structure, thus he won't break, or disrupt every fabrial. Draining color to Awaken changes something in the spirit web of an object. Biochromatic Aura doesn't do that, it just changes the light around. 

Spoiler

tallakahath

So, on Nalthis, in the Warbreaker universe, when the color's pulled out of something, is that a physical or chemical change or is that a perceptual change?

Brandon Sanderson

It is actually a physical change, but the spirit of the thing is changing, and it's filtering through to the Physical Realm.

tallakahath

So, if I do that on a carrot, I can break beta carotin? If I do that on a piece of metal, I can reduce it and charge my battery that way?

Brandon Sanderson

Potentially, yeah! Yeah, that would work, you're changing it's Spiritual nature.

DragonCon 2019 (Aug. 29, 2019)

It would look beautiful tho. The light leaking from Stormlight infused gemstones would be split into a rainbow with a wide blue band, like what Navani did, RoW ch 65:

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Excited, she performed an old experiment from her books: splitting apart light into a rainbow of colors. All you had to do was put a candle in a box, use a hole to focus the light, then direct it through a prism. Then, curious, she extrapolated and—after several attempts—was able to use another prism to recombine the component colors into a beam of pure white light.
Next, she used a diamond infused with Stormlight instead of a candle. It worked the same, splitting into components of light, but with a larger band of blue. Voidlight did the same, though the band of violet was enormous, and the other colors mere blips. That was strange, as her research indicated different colors of light should only make bands brighter or weaker, not increase their size.
The most interesting result happened when she tried the experiment on the Towerlight Raboniel had collected. It wasn’t Stormlight or Lifelight, but a combination of the two. When she tried the prism experiment with this light, two separate rainbows of colors—distinct from one another—split out of the prism.

 

3 hours ago, Treamayne said:

Which, of course, begs the question of how a strong enough Biochromatic Aura might effect Shardic Light. . .

What do you mean by Shardic light? Stormlight? 

 

21 minutes ago, Tamriel Wolfsbaine said:

If he showed up to The Tower and started draining everything to white would all of the radiants still be able to function as normal there?  

The Tower is the physical body of the Sibling, it's heavily invested and it might resist changes. But it's still possible that he would break fabrials in the tower by draining color from them, most would probably stop functioning, others would leak lots of light.

Edited December 14, 2023 by alder24

[Treamayne]

4 minutes ago, alder24 said:

What do you mean by Shardic light? Stormlight?

Yes-ish. I originally typed Stormlight, but changed it because that is Honor's Light - but we also have (at least) Lifelight, Voidlight, Warlight, Towerlight, and (unnamed) Life+Void Light. I was trying to encompass them all. There is probably no effect; but it would be interesting if Light that passes through a strong Biochromatic Aura while being breathed-in is somehow "enhanced" for the shift in its "brightness." 

Wonder if that has something to do with how Vasher converts light for consumption to fuel his Divine Breath?

[alder24]

9 minutes ago, Treamayne said:

Yes-ish. I originally typed Stormlight, but changed it because that is Honor's Light - but we also have (at least) Lifelight, Voidlight, Warlight, Towerlight, and (unnamed) Life+Void Light. I was trying to encompass them all. There is probably no effect; but it would be interesting if Light that passes through a strong Biochromatic Aura while being breathed-in is somehow "enhanced" for the shift in its "brightness." 

No, I think Susebron would just act like a walking prism, and split all those lights into their individual rainbows. The Stormlight wouldn't be affected, but the light (electromagnetic radiation) it generates would be. Illumination gemstones created aren't Stormlight itself, it's just light. Stormlight is gaseous investiture that just generates light.

Spoiler

Alteroden

With Stormlight, the better the gem is cut, the less Stormlight it leaks, and the longer it holds its charge. If a gem was perfectly cut, on a molecular scale, would it leak Stormlight at all?

Brandon Sanderson

In a theoretical flawless gem, then no it would not.

Alteroden

Would it actually give off light?

Brandon Sanderson

[...] Theoretically no it would not, but it's not what you're thinking...

Alteroden

No no no, that’s not what I’m thinking, I figured that’s something totally different.

Brandon Sanderson

Well, actually, it probably would still give off light, because it's drawing out of the Spiritual Realm. So I’d say it still lights, but it doesn't leak. The leaking is not where the illumination is coming from. The illumination is coming from a direct... It's basically a light bulb screwed into the Spiritual Realm.

Shadows of Self Chicago signing (Oct. 12, 2015)

 

[Duxredux he/him]

1 hour ago, alder24 said:

No, I think Susebron would just act like a walking prism, and split all those lights into their individual rainbows. The Stormlight wouldn't be affected, but the light (electromagnetic radiation) it generates would be. Illumination gemstones created aren't Stormlight itself, it's just light. Stormlight is gaseous investiture that just generates light.

  Hide contents

Alteroden

With Stormlight, the better the gem is cut, the less Stormlight it leaks, and the longer it holds its charge. If a gem was perfectly cut, on a molecular scale, would it leak Stormlight at all?

Brandon Sanderson

In a theoretical flawless gem, then no it would not.

Alteroden

Would it actually give off light?

Brandon Sanderson

[...] Theoretically no it would not, but it's not what you're thinking...

Alteroden

No no no, that’s not what I’m thinking, I figured that’s something totally different.

Brandon Sanderson

Well, actually, it probably would still give off light, because it's drawing out of the Spiritual Realm. So I’d say it still lights, but it doesn't leak. The leaking is not where the illumination is coming from. The illumination is coming from a direct... It's basically a light bulb screwed into the Spiritual Realm.

Shadows of Self Chicago signing (Oct. 12, 2015)

 

It's inconclusive to ask this, but there is the question of if the spren are attracted to the color or to the Spiritual property of the colored Stormlight... and if changing the color through an aura phase shift alters that light's Spiritual properties or not, albeit temporarily.

The difference between Susebron walking by and simply placing a prism next to a sphere is that the prism splits the light outside the sphere. From the perspective of a spren inside the sphere, there would be no difference, it probably couldn't see the change. Similarly you wouldn't have to worry about red shift or blue shift for a moving gem because it is stationary relative to the spren contained within. I also wouldn't expect applying a colored film to a gemstone to affect the spren at all. In contrast, I'm guessing that Susebron's color distortion isn't limited to the surface of the sphere but permeates through the entire sphere. The chemical composition of the gemstone is far less important than the hue of the Light. Again a question of where the color component really matters and if a BioChromatic aura can alter even the color of Stormlight or not for the purposes of spren taste.

 

Really though, the part that surprises me is that changing the color of a gemstone releases the spren. That's... interesting and unintuitive as dun spheres don't eject spren otherwise every fabrial on Roshar would require require extensive maintenance every Weeping. Absence of Stormlight won't release a spren, but a mismatch of color will. Why? Makes me wonder if this was a verbal misstep on Brandon's part. It does lean towards requiring the Spiritual nature of the gem to change to break the fabrial though.

Edited December 14, 2023 by Duxredux

[alder24]

5 minutes ago, Duxredux said:

It's inconclusive to ask this, but there is the question of if the spren are attracted to the color or to the Spiritual property of the colored Stormlight... and if changing the color through an aura phase shift alters that light's Spiritual properties or not, albeit temporarily.

The difference between Susebron walking by and simply placing a prism next to a sphere is that the prism splits the light outside the sphere. From the perspective of a spren inside the sphere, there would be no difference, it probably couldn't see the change. Similarly you wouldn't have to worry about red shift or blue shift for a moving gem because it is stationary relative to the spren contained within. I also wouldn't expect applying a colored film to a gemstone to affect the spren at all. In contrast, I'm guessing that Susebron's color distortion isn't limited to the surface of the sphere but permeates through the entire sphere. The chemical composition of the gemstone is far less important than the hue of the Light. Again a question of where the color component really matters and if a BioChromatic aura can alter even the color of Stormlight or not for the purposes of spren taste.

I say this again, in my opinion the aura would not affect the investiture - Stormlight itself - it would affect only illumination it gives off, which isn't investiture. The spren would not be affected because Stormlight was not affected. Stormlight Tone wouldn't be changed - the Tone matters, not the color, Honor's Tone determinantes in what color Stormlight glows. It wouldn't matter for spren that they now live in a rainbow gemstone, because the Tone of Stormlight is still the same. 

16 minutes ago, Duxredux said:

Really though, the part that surprises me is that changing the color of a gemstone releases the spren. That's... interesting and unintuitive as dun spheres don't eject spren otherwise every fabrial on Roshar would require require extensive maintenance every Weeping. Absence of Stormlight won't release a spren, but a mismatch of color will. Why? Makes me wonder if this was a verbal misstep on Brandon's part. It does lean towards requiring the Spiritual nature of the gem to change to break the fabrial though.

Probably because a certain spren has to be caught by certain gems - a Flamespren has to be caught by a ruby only (is this confirmed?)- if you drain the color of the ruby, it changes its chemical composition and stops being a ruby.