Feruchemical Duralumin: what can it do?

[Trusk'our he/him]

I've been browsing the Arcanum and I've stumbled upon something that piqued my curiosity regarding Connection manipulation and magic usage:

Spoiler

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/508-dragonsteel-2022/#e15860

Questioner

Could you use AonDor to manipulate Connection? If so, would a real AonDor smarty be able to do something similar to a Bondsmith?

Brandon Sanderson

The short answer to your question is: yes. Let me give some explanation.

Even when you are seeings some things happening in Elantris itself, you are seeing them manipulate Connection. It is mostly reinforcing Connection, but it is, in a way, manipulation. Rewriting Connection, rewriting Identity are both things that they can do. So with enough power, with enough smartiness, what a Bondsmith can do can be done.

In fact, we have seen short-range Elsecalling done by… Obviously Elsecalling’s not Bondsmithing, but you know that a Bondsmith powered a big Elsecalling [to migrate from Ashyn], one of the big things you’ve seen a Bondsmith do is get people between planets. And you have seen people use AonDor to Elsecall. You’ve seen them Lightweave, you’ve seen them do a lot of these things. They also could do some of this same stuff.

Basically, rule of thumb is: almost anything in the cosmere that is possible can be replicated with AonDor with the right program. But you may need an injection of Investiture in certain ways.

This feels pretty big to me.

Does this mean that Connection is the lowest "program" for Investiture then?

For example, if you were to look at and measure the power of an Allomancer or Feruchemist, would you mostly see Connections existing as the language used to tell the Investiture what to do?

But diving into the main idea for this topic, how far can you take F-duralumin then?

We know that you can at least store/tap things like Connection to people, places, and times, but full transformations of self through this method are not achievable for some reason (I'm still curious as to why this is though; if Connections are essentially the Spiritweb's way of recording what's happened to an individual and changing Connection to a land can trick your soul into believing its grown up in a place so you can effectively learn a new language, why not be able to change more?)

Spoiler

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/50-calamity-denver-signing/#e645

Dirigible

Can you store any sort of Temporal Connection?

Brandon Sanderson

Um, most.

Spoiler

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/113-utah-humanities-book-festival/#e2621

dougpgc (paraphrased)

I asked him if a feruchemist were to visit Earth and tap Duralumin, could they do something as involved as talk local sports with someone?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

No -- when you trick your spirit into thinking it's from where you're currently tapping, it's not a full transformation, like Sel-ish magic making a copy.. It doesn't just fill your head with things from the place you're visiting.

Despite these limitations, it's making me wonder of advanced Feruchemical Connection could be used to be nearly useful as Forgery (actually, could that be some of the reason you can't get a full transformation? Maybe like Forgery it has to be a plausible change? Or, maybe it changes the base of the Spiritweb, but doesn't have the energy to translate to the Cognitive or Physical Realms, limiting its capacity?)

I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts on this. 

[Quantus he/him]

8 minutes ago, Trusk'our said:

I've been browsing the Arcanum and I've stumbled upon something that piqued my curiosity regarding Connection manipulation and magic usage:

  Hide contents

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/508-dragonsteel-2022/#e15860

Questioner

Could you use AonDor to manipulate Connection? If so, would a real AonDor smarty be able to do something similar to a Bondsmith?

Brandon Sanderson

The short answer to your question is: yes. Let me give some explanation.

Even when you are seeings some things happening in Elantris itself, you are seeing them manipulate Connection. It is mostly reinforcing Connection, but it is, in a way, manipulation. Rewriting Connection, rewriting Identity are both things that they can do. So with enough power, with enough smartiness, what a Bondsmith can do can be done.

In fact, we have seen short-range Elsecalling done by… Obviously Elsecalling’s not Bondsmithing, but you know that a Bondsmith powered a big Elsecalling [to migrate from Ashyn], one of the big things you’ve seen a Bondsmith do is get people between planets. And you have seen people use AonDor to Elsecall. You’ve seen them Lightweave, you’ve seen them do a lot of these things. They also could do some of this same stuff.

Basically, rule of thumb is: almost anything in the cosmere that is possible can be replicated with AonDor with the right program. But you may need an injection of Investiture in certain ways.

This feels pretty big to me.

Does this mean that Connection is the lowest "program" for Investiture then?

For example, if you were to look at and measure the power of an Allomancer or Feruchemist, would you mostly see Connections existing as the language used to tell the Investiture what to do?

But diving into the main idea for this topic, how far can you take F-duralumin then?

We know that you can at least store/tap things like Connection to people, places, and times, but full transformations of self through this method are not achievable for some reason (I'm still curious as to why this is though; if Connections are essentially the Spiritweb's way of recording what's happened to an individual and changing Connection to a land can trick your soul into believing its grown up in a place so you can effectively learn a new language, why not be able to change more?)

  Hide contents

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/50-calamity-denver-signing/#e645

Dirigible

Can you store any sort of Temporal Connection?

Brandon Sanderson

Um, most.

  Hide contents

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/113-utah-humanities-book-festival/#e2621

dougpgc (paraphrased)

I asked him if a feruchemist were to visit Earth and tap Duralumin, could they do something as involved as talk local sports with someone?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

No -- when you trick your spirit into thinking it's from where you're currently tapping, it's not a full transformation, like Sel-ish magic making a copy.. It doesn't just fill your head with things from the place you're visiting.

Despite these limitations, it's making me wonder of advanced Feruchemical Connection could be used to be nearly useful as Forgery (actually, could that be some of the reason you can't get a full transformation? Maybe like Forgery it has to be a plausible change? Or, maybe it changes the base of the Spiritweb, but doesn't have the energy to translate to the Cognitive or Physical Realms, limiting its capacity?)

I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts on this. 

Connections in feruchemy are the bits that tie your Spiritweb to outside things, but it's fundamentally External (per the grid and all), whereas Forgery (and the more powerful Lerasium) can directly rewrite the Spiritweb itself which is much harder and rarer.  Manipulating Connections is so common across the magic systems that it's just called "Connection Tricks" in TLM.  I suspect fiddling with actual Spiritwebs is harder for the same reasons it's harder to affect metals Inside a person.

[Returned]

I'm not sure I'm sold on Connection as the lowest-level piece of Investiture, but it does seem more foundational than other aspects. Like, being an Allomancer is about your Connection to Preservation, right? Burning Lerasium greatly increases that Connection, but the power you gain by doing so is still filtered through Allomancy and so you can only get the effects Allomancy offers in the way that it offers them (burning specific metals to produce specific effects).

But if you could, generically, Connect to other Shards you should be able to access their powers as well. If you could manipulate Connections between other people and/or places you could probably do things that otherwise seem impossible now. I'm thinking of Surgebinders being unable to leave Roshar being related to Connection to that planet in some way, and the migration from Ashyn as an example of "cheating" that limitation by changing the population's connection from the former to the latter.

We have a fair number of examples, especially in WoBs, that suggest that a lot can be done with Cosmere magic that depends on the amount of power you can draw, with enough power compensating for less-than-ideal mechanisms for doing things. If F-duralumin could be used to increase Connection to a Shard, maybe more stuff becomes possible. I'd bet that current knowledge of F-duralumin limits what can be done, but that clever applications, coupled with more raw Investiture, will show it to be nearly as powerful and versatile as we imagine F-nicrosil to be. The Feruchemist just has to be sufficiently knowledgable and precise, and I'd imagine there are a lot of connections that would need to be finessed to get a useful, dramatic result.

[Quantus he/him]

24 minutes ago, Returned said:

I'm not sure I'm sold on Connection as the lowest-level piece of Investiture, but it does seem more foundational than other aspects. Like, being an Allomancer is about your Connection to Preservation, right? Burning Lerasium greatly increases that Connection, but the power you gain by doing so is still filtered through Allomancy and so you can only get the effects Allomancy offers in the way that it offers them (burning specific metals to produce specific effects).

But if you could, generically, Connect to other Shards you should be able to access their powers as well. If you could manipulate Connections between other people and/or places you could probably do things that otherwise seem impossible now. I'm thinking of Surgebinders being unable to leave Roshar being related to Connection to that planet in some way, and the migration from Ashyn as an example of "cheating" that limitation by changing the population's connection from the former to the latter.

We have a fair number of examples, especially in WoBs, that suggest that a lot can be done with Cosmere magic that depends on the amount of power you can draw, with enough power compensating for less-than-ideal mechanisms for doing things. If F-duralumin could be used to increase Connection to a Shard, maybe more stuff becomes possible. I'd bet that current knowledge of F-duralumin limits what can be done, but that clever applications, coupled with more raw Investiture, will show it to be nearly as powerful and versatile as we imagine F-nicrosil to be. The Feruchemist just has to be sufficiently knowledgable and precise, and I'd imagine there are a lot of connections that would need to be finessed to get a useful, dramatic result.

Burning Lerasium straight up rewrites your Spiritweb per WOB, it's not necessarily about strengthening Allomancy. But yes, WOB does say if you alloyed Lerasium with another Shard's godmetal it could potentially grant you access to their Magic system (the example was Sand mastery from a hypothetical Bavadinium).  

As far as specifically Feruchemical Connection goes, the only actual example we have is the Medallions that granted language and those where storing "Blanked Connection" that connects to whatever is local....which is a whole other mystery, and I think we need to understand that basic mechanism before we can speculate too far on what advanced uses it might be capable of. 

Side Note:  Im fully convinced that Allomancy is by definition just a Luhel Bond, which being a more specific Connection just like the Nahel Bond it might have more specific characteristics compared to the more generic Connections that grant Language etc.    

[CtrlAltDepressed]

1 hour ago, Quantus said:

As far as specifically Feruchemical Connection goes, the only actual example we have is the Medallions that granted language and those where storing "Blanked Connection" that connects to whatever is local....which is a whole other mystery, and I think we need to understand that basic mechanism before we can speculate too far on what advanced uses it might be capable of. 

I imagine this was what the device Kelsier stole from the Ire was doing. It was pure blanked Connection that when accessed Connects you to whatever is local - in Kelsier's case Preservation - allowing him to briefly Ascend. 

[Quantus he/him]

16 minutes ago, CtrlAltDepressed said:

I imagine this was what the device Kelsier stole from the Ire was doing. It was pure blanked Connection that when accessed Connects you to whatever is local - in Kelsier's case Preservation - allowing him to briefly Ascend. 

That would make sense.  What I cant figure out is how it would be made Feruchemically, where you can either Blank an Attribute by Storing it all or Tap it, but doing both shouldn't work by our normal Understanding.    

[CtrlAltDepressed]

23 minutes ago, Quantus said:

What I cant figure out is how it would be made Feruchemically, where you can either Blank an Attribute by Storing it all or Tap it, but doing both shouldn't work by our normal Understanding.   

I think you would only need to blank your Identity by filling an aluminum mind fully. Then, any Connection you store should be blank, as there is no Identity attached to it. Though there are probably other hacks you'd have to do. 

[Quantus he/him]

51 minutes ago, CtrlAltDepressed said:

I think you would only need to blank your Identity by filling an aluminum mind fully. Then, any Connection you store should be blank, as there is no Identity attached to it. Though there are probably other hacks you'd have to do. 

Blanking your Identity should have no impact on you Connections, as I understand it.

[Atlas333]

On 7/26/2024 at 12:36 PM, Quantus said:

As far as specifically Feruchemical Connection goes, the only actual example we have is the Medallions that granted language and those where storing "Blanked Connection" that connects to whatever is local....which is a whole other mystery, and I think we need to understand that basic mechanism before we can speculate too far on what advanced uses it might be capable of. 

That's the only confirmed feruchemical connection use but I'm fairly certain whatever Wax's grandmother was doing in the Village was a manipulation of connection in Shadows of Self. 

Some book quotes 

Quote

"Sitting in this hut ... the scent of Grandmother’s tea ... Memories grabbed Wax by his collar and shoved him face-first up against his past." (p 86)

"Wax took a deep breath. A mixture of scents lingered in the air. From the
tea? Scents like that of freshly cut grass. His father’s estates, sitting on the lawn,
listening to his father and grandmother argue." (p 87)

"Wax stood up, grabbing his hat, mistcoat rustling. He almost wanted to
believe that the scents to the room, the memories, were his grandmother’s doing.
Who knew what she put into that tea?" (p 88)

While it's never directly stated the vividness of these memories seems to be supernatural (as evident in Wax's suspicion of the tea) and connection would be a decent explanation. However, it's unclear what exactly is happening here, mechanically speaking. It seems Wax's connection to the village or his past is being strengthened. But I don't think that's likely as he isn't the one tapping connection. Instead, I think Wax's grandmother is probably tapping connection to the village and to Wax at the same time and acting as a medium between the two. 

 

There's also whatever Iron Eyes was doing at the end of The Lost Metal but I don't have the book on hand to pull quotes (but the coppermind does list this as one of his abilities https://coppermind.net/wiki/Marsh). Essentially, Iron Eyes passes by people unnoticed and claims that it's possible because of emotional allomancy which Wax doesn't believe. This points to it being some other power, potentially storing connection to prevent people from forming connections with him. This use of f duralumin is much more speculative.

 

To me, this is what "basic" feruchemy connection looks like. When tapping it can grant vivid memories (at least in one instance) and storing allows you to blend in better. I don't think the full-on transformations being proposed here are impossible but they would likely require a few other feruchemical powers to achieve (like being able to store identity).

Edited July 29 by Atlas333
added coppermind link

[MindMeltingMistwraith he/him]

My understanding of F-Duralumin is as follows.

Storing Connection would affect how memorable you are to others (as alluded to by Marsh as Atlas333 mentioned), and may have the same effect on you, because Connection is a two-way thing.

Tapping Connection does something similar to what Dalinar does when he Connects to people to understand their language. If I remember correctly (and it's been a while since my last read-through of era 2, so correct me if I'm wrong), there are medallions that allow for translation via Connection.

In my head, (no WoBs that I know of) a Surgebinder could Store their Connection to their spren, resulting in less efficient Stormlight usage, and Tap that Connection to get the opposite effect. This could potentially do the same for an allomancer by strengthening/weakening their Connection to Preservation.

My biggest question: can you isolate your individual Connections, or do you store your ability to Connect as a whole? If it's the first (similar to tin), my theories above work. If it's the second, they don't.

Edited August 26 by MindMeltingMistwraith
Fixed typo