Spectre

I agree. And that's sort of my theory--the 17th Shard is after him because they want him to take up the shards and become their God in full. He, however, has other plans. I'm not fully certain what those are, of course. Venturing a guess, I would say that he's setting dominoes carefully in place to knock over when the time is right... Maybe after the various shardworlds develop FTL travel and start converging on each other?

Yeah... We definitely don't have enough information there for a solid "This is what it means!" kind of theory. Still, it's compelling. I'd love to see the original WoB on it if anyone has a link.

I hadn't read anything about this. That's pretty awesome. Take my up vote, good sir, and thanks for the tinfoily support. =D

Hello, all. So, I'm new to posting here, but I've read just about EVERYTHING I can get my hands on about realmatic theory, WoB, the Cosmere, etc. As I was going through some things on Hoid recently, something hit me: Why is the Seventeenth Shard after him, really? I mean, it's apparent that they don't like/agree with him on the way he does things, but why is a group of our heroes (assuming Vao is as heroic as both Demoux and Galladon) chasing this man? He doesn't seem evil. He certainly has an agenda, sure, but he's not a bad guy, I think. (He's going to have his own series, for pete's sake.) Here's what I think: the answer to our question is in the two epigraph letters from TWoK and WoR and in the name of the organization chasing him--the Seventeenth Shard. We all know that he witnessed the shattering of Adonalsium. The recipient of the first letter makes it sound like Hoid's presence at the shattering of Adonalsium wasn't just as a bystander--he had a hand in it. In fact, in the second letter we read: "Is not the destruction we have wrought enough? The worlds you now tread bear the touch and design of Adonalsium. Our interference so far has brought nothing but pain." and (speaking of Rayse), "He bears the weight of God’s own divine hatred, separated from the virtues that gave it context. He is what we made him to be, old friend." Hoid, then, is likely to have caused the shattering of Adonalsium alongside--perhaps--the recipient of the first letter. But that alone is not why they are seeking him, I think. The answer, as I said, lies in their name. In causing the shattering, I think Hoid became the only vessel capable of containing all the shards' power again--in effect, he is the seventeenth shard. They need him. And that's why they're after him. He's their liege and their plans require him. Hoid, however, has his own plans and finds them to be useless or, at the very least, unhelpful. Another theory would be that Hoid was originally a piece of Adonalsium himself and now is the only remaining physical aspect of the god left. This one feels unlikely due to what we know of his likely past. I think we have a few evidences of this all being feasible: 1. Hoid is Spiritually Blind. In the shattering, he could have lost this ability. All of the shards are filled to the brim with investiture (which we know comes from this realm). It could have something to do with it. 2. Hoid is unable to kill (or unwilling to). Maybe during the shattering when he became the vessel for deity (or became... infected with deity) he became unable to destroy Adonalsium's greatest creation: mankind. 3. According to WoB, Hoid is really, really, really hard to kill. I think this would account for that. There are likely others. I think its a sound theory. But... I want to hear what you guys think. Be brutal. I'd like to see what the consensus on this would be. Let me summarize in closing: Hoid is not a shardholder, but the required vessel for recreating Adonalsium in all of its/his glory because he caused/took part in the shattering or because he was originally a part of the divine. The Seventeenth Shard (group) has so named themselves because they seek him (Hoid) in order to rebuild their sundered God. Edited for clarity.