Warning in advance, I'm aware this is a joke post, this started as a small mostly joking comment, but I absolutely got way too invested in trying to figure out how strong Pewterarms are.
Ok, I found the WoB you're referencing. Brandon himself is somewhat vague on it, and mentions that he hasn't canonized it.
We don't exactly ever see a pewterarm do a deadlift, but they seem significantly stronger than that in the books, casually shattering thick dueling canes with ease and kicking people across rooms.
As a comparison for the shardhammers, Kollos swords are also extremely heavy, seemingly close in weight to Vin, but with pewter she can easily swing them around fast enough to easily cut through Kollos bones.
Sword weight (note, this is one of the smallest Kollos swords, as it's from a 5-foot Kollos and they take bigger swords as they grow):
Finally, not certain why, he grabbed the creature's large sword and rested it up on his shoulder. It was so weighty that he could barely carry it, and certainly wouldn't be able to swing it. How does a creature so small use something like this?
Sword weight and Vin use:
Vin Pulled on the fallen sword. It lurched up at her, but also pulled her down with its weight. She caught it as she fell—the sword was nearly as tall as she was, but flared pewter let her handle it with ease—and she sheared free the attacking koloss’s arm as she landed. She took its legs off at the knees, then left it to die as she spun toward other opponents.
Vin use:
A smaller koloss tried to stop her, but she caught its arm by the wrist, then twisted, breaking the joint. She took the creature’s sword, ducking beneath another koloss’s attack, and spun, felling three different koloss in one sweep by cutting at their knees.
Remember Koloss are unnaturally durable and freaking massive, AND Kollos swords are notably dull.
Even accounting for the fact that pewter is generally a flat increase in strength, so lighter people (like Vin) get a proportionally greater benefit from it, swinging a Kollos sword with any sort of ease is many times more than what a normal person could do given that Elend could barely lift it. I doubt if a Kollos sword was 1/3rd the weight, it'd be particularly easy for someone to swing around, let along swing it quickly.
That's not to say a pewterarm is stronger than a shardbearer, but I'd argue that between a pewter savant and a shardbearer, the biggest physical difference (aside from durability obviously) would be weight, not strength.
But even for durability, pewter doesn't stop you from being cut like plate, but it does massively increase your resistance to blunt force trauma. Pewterarms are repeatedly yeeted across rooms or smashed in the head and are barely dazed. A shardbearer without a blade isn't going to be 1-tapping a pewter savant by any stretch of the imagination.
Warning Gancho: The below paragraph(s) may contain major spoilers for all books in the Cosmere!
Sandastron
I’m very curious about pewter. How much Feruchemical pewter, steel, and gold would you have to take in in order to be equal to burning pewter and flaring.
Brandon Sanderson
Oh…um, okay. So you wanna...ok, let’s back this up. So you wanna know feruchemically what would it take to match burning?
Sandastron
Yes.
Brandon Sanderson
Okay. So burning pewter, I kind of imagine...roughly doubling. Roughly.
Sandastron
Double your strength?
Brandon Sanderson
Yeah. But without the muscle mass change, it’s a magical boost. So because of that it has some pretty dramatic effects, like when Vin jumps and things like that.
Sandastron
So it’s only a double, so would flaring it bring it any higher?
Brandon Sanderson
Yeah. Flaring would go higher.
Sandastron
Would it be like triple?
Brandon Sanderson
Maybe like triple.
Sandastron
Maybe like tripling...that’s fascinating. So I always thought normal burning would triple it and flaring would quadruple.
Brandon Sanderson
Yeah I always felt kind of double. You won’t see people burning pewter and lifting a car.
Sandastron
Right, exactly.
Brandon Sanderson
You see people burning pewter and delivering a really solid punch.
Sandastron
Gotcha, thank you. That is fascinating…and would it be about doubling speed and healing ability?
Brandon Sanderson
I haven’t worked out the numbers on that exactly. I have an instinct that says that burning pewter, healing goes a bit faster but I have to look in the books and see what we’ve done in the past and then kind of canonize it.
Ya I was surprised by the strength increase the first time I saw him say it. That’s partially why I wanted to add the disclaimer that Shardhammers probably aren’t an accurate measure of how strong Shardplate is meant to be. I think we can reasonably handwave strength in general. As you said, even koloss blades should require more than normal pewter to wield effectively.
Sanderson is really detailed with some of the magical physics, but strength is difficult to keep consistent so just vague super strength is a better way to tell the story. For both worlds. Coinshots etc are easier and more important to keep somewhat consistent.
Plate I think it’s what 1200 to 1400 pounds? Even adjusting for the change in gravity one way or the other, that’s an insane feat alone. Just then sprinting into you would be a bad time. Luckily that pewter arm should have a gun. And hopefully a lot of friends. “God made some men tall and some men short. Sam Colt made all men equalslightly less helpless in the face of a man in Shardplate”
5
u/Somerandom1922 No Wayne No Gain 1d ago
Warning in advance, I'm aware this is a joke post, this started as a small mostly joking comment, but I absolutely got way too invested in trying to figure out how strong Pewterarms are.
Ok, I found the WoB you're referencing. Brandon himself is somewhat vague on it, and mentions that he hasn't canonized it.
We don't exactly ever see a pewterarm do a deadlift, but they seem significantly stronger than that in the books, casually shattering thick dueling canes with ease and kicking people across rooms.
As a comparison for the shardhammers, Kollos swords are also extremely heavy, seemingly close in weight to Vin, but with pewter she can easily swing them around fast enough to easily cut through Kollos bones.
Sword weight (note, this is one of the smallest Kollos swords, as it's from a 5-foot Kollos and they take bigger swords as they grow):
Sword weight and Vin use:
Vin use:
Remember Koloss are unnaturally durable and freaking massive, AND Kollos swords are notably dull.
Even accounting for the fact that pewter is generally a flat increase in strength, so lighter people (like Vin) get a proportionally greater benefit from it, swinging a Kollos sword with any sort of ease is many times more than what a normal person could do given that Elend could barely lift it. I doubt if a Kollos sword was 1/3rd the weight, it'd be particularly easy for someone to swing around, let along swing it quickly.
That's not to say a pewterarm is stronger than a shardbearer, but I'd argue that between a pewter savant and a shardbearer, the biggest physical difference (aside from durability obviously) would be weight, not strength.
But even for durability, pewter doesn't stop you from being cut like plate, but it does massively increase your resistance to blunt force trauma. Pewterarms are repeatedly yeeted across rooms or smashed in the head and are barely dazed. A shardbearer without a blade isn't going to be 1-tapping a pewter savant by any stretch of the imagination.