Yeash

Very well could have been, I read through that thread once before I registered. Couldn't remember if it had been discussed there or not.

I think that the letter in tWoK was written by Hoid and directed to Sazed. Since Hoid seems to have an unhealthy obsession with the Shards, it seems likely that he would have sought out Sazed after he took up the powers of Preservation and Ruin. Based on what's in the letter, Hoid may have taken it upon himself to run a little 'Shardbearer' orientation to give Sazed some history on the powers. This would explain the tenses used in the Chapter 18 epigraph: knowing how Ati turned out vs how he was before taking the power of Ruin. Sazed was always one to not be a leader and not direct anything, but to be a scholar who stayed on the sidelines. During the Mistborn era, Sazed was very reluctant to enter into any conflict. Hence the reason that Hoid is trying to convince Sazed to take action against Odium. Hoid refers to an element that Sazed would be familiar with. This could be a reference the leftover Atium that Marsh had at the end of WoA. Seeing has how Atium is the power of Ruin in super concentrated form, it seems like this is something Hoid would want to keep out the hands of Odium. As for the references to the 17th Shard, Brandon has stated in various forums (anyone want to help out with a reference?) that Sazed has the capability to travel between the various planets. Its entirely likely that Sazed may have visited Sel in an academic pursuit of religion around the solar system. Being there, he probably would have tried to interact with the locals to find out more about their religions. In doing so, he would have met the Elantrians and may have shared some of the "Shardbearer" primer info. Hence the reason the 17th Shard came into existence is trying to hunt down Hoid. Anyway, that was long and rambling, hopefully some of my points might actually make sense. Let the refutation/support begin!

So yeah, hi. Or as my 21 month old daughter says: HEWWO! I'm a Brandon Sanderson fan and long time lurker... well as long as you could have lurked here. I'll apologize in advance for any crazy theories of mine that don't make sense; I'm an engineer and presentation of anything to a non-engineer is a serious downfall of mine. For the same reason you'll mostly likely be able to find an abundance of made up words from me. Like automagically.