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First off, I realise that there is an existing Hemalurgy thread in the Mistborn section, but I wanted to discuss certain topics without needing to worry about spoilers. Additionally, I wanted the discussion to have a more theoretical direction, rather than a philosophical one. I have a few topics to cover, so they'll be broken up into different sections. ETHICS Hemalurgy is often considered an "evil" magic, and not without reason. So far, we have seen it as a very destructive force that not only kills innocents, but damages their very soul. However, we have had many interesting revelations since the original trilogy both in the books and through WoB. Many of these revelations paint a more... palatable picture of Hemalurgy. First and foremost, we have confirmation that Hemalurgy does not have to kill the person donating a spike. Relevant WoB: The reasons vary between WoB, but the meaning is clear: one does not have to die from getting spiked. It would still rip out a piece of your soul and change you as a person, but you do not have to die. Okay, so you don't have to die, but you're still losing a piece of your soul. That sounds like a big deal, right? Well, maybe not: So in the Before-Afterlife it certainly matters, but in the After-Afterlife? Not so much. That's a good thing, but it ultimately doesn't matter, because we have even better news! Soul wounds can be healed from: So not only is it confirmed you can heal back your soul, essentially creating a new patch of soul out of Investiture, it would also give you back the power you just had spiked away. Theoretically, you could be spiked multiple times for the same power. There's some implications that you wouldn't want to do this repeatedly, but the possibility is there. Alright, that's all well and good, but that only helps people who can heal back from a spiking. So that only means... everyone on Scadrial now. Those fancy medllions that the southerners have kindly introduced mean that everyone can heal back from being spiked by tapping an unkeyed goldmind. What's important to take away from this is that Hemalurgy may not be nearly as bad as we have been lead to believe. You don't have to die, you don't have to lose your power, you don't have to permanently damage your soul and it won't have scary, unknown implications for the After-Afterlife. I have no doubt that certain portions of society would be against it regardless of the science, but that doesn't mean that it wouldn't be used. MECHANICS In this section, I'm not going to be covering the topics of bind points or the uses of different metals as there's just not much to go on. Ultimately, I don't think the exact details are what's truly interesting about Hemalurgy anyway, but rather the interactions it has with the other magics on Scadrial. So, what do we know about Hemalurgy from the books? Well, you stab spikes into people and it gives them powers. So far as we know, each spike only steals one thing at a time, spiking an ability you already have makes you stronger and you can't have more than three spikes without opening yourself up to the influence of others: That's some pretty harsh restrictions. Suit appears to have his spikes piercing his heart, or at the very least they pierce his chest, and it was assumed that removing them would kill him. Pretty dangerous weakness to have these days, what with Coinshots and getting access to Duralumin medallions, or whatever other power boosting effects that may let people rip your spikes out. There's one person we know of who did fantastic things with Hemalurgy though, and seemed to have none of the associated weakness: the Lord Ruler. He was an impossibly powerful Mistborn, able to push on the metals inside Vin's stomach while she was burning them. Even Elend, with all his Lerasium granted strength, did not perform feats anywhere close to this. So, how did the Lord Ruler achieve this? The obvious answer is that he also ate Lerasium. WoB says that's not the case though: So how did the Lord Ruler become so powerful? According to WoB, it was Hemalurgy: So the Lord Ruler needed all three systems, but Hemalurgy was the most dramatic. Other than his incredible Allomatic strength, I cannot think of anything else he did that was not explained by compounding or God metals. There's a problem with this, though. So far as we know, the Lord Ruler only had two Hemalurgical spikes located in his upper arms, which doubled as his Atium Metlaminds. Even if these had granted Allomancy, they could not explain the entirety of his awesome power: The fact that he had no other spikes was actually a plot point. Remember that Marsh also thought that the Lord Ruler had been spiked like an Inquisitor, and his plan to kill him was based around this: So how can someone use all three systems of magic to benefit from Hemalurgy but not be full of spikes? Well, I think I have the answer, theorized from a few WoB and based around burning spikes with Allomancy: So we have some discrepancies between these WoB. In one, it says you would splice the sDNA together. In another, it says it won't graft the stolen soul on, but it would have some interesting effects. Finally, in one it says it won't have any effect when you burn it unless it also came from you. I believe these seemingly contradicting elements can finally be reconciled after learning about Identity in BoM, while also explaining why the Lord Ruler was so powerful. If you've read some of my other posts, you can probably already see where this is going. My proposition is simple: similar to Identity and Metalminds, the results of burning a Hemalurgical spike are dependent on whether or not you have Identity access to it. If you share an Identity with the Investiture in the spike, or possibly if the spike was donated from an individual who had no Identity at the time, then a process similar to compounding occurs. As the Investiture is drawn from Preservation and filtered through the metal, the Hemalurgical Investiture alters the shape that the magic takes, thereby spicing the sDNA in the spike and the sDNA of the Allomancer together. For a full explanation on my theory for the mechanics of Allomancy and compounding, see my huge ranty post. So, what effect would this have? Well, I believe we saw the results of this in the Lord Ruler. In the case of spikes which grant Metalborn abilities, splicing the sDNA results in granting, or increasing, the abilities of a Metalborn. It does not "graft" or "tack on" a piece of sDNA as has been described of spikes, but rather a full merger or "splicing" between the sDNA, impossible to separate afterwards. If this were the case, it would explain how the Lord Ruler managed to achieve his "dramatic effects" with basically no spikes, and would indeed require all three systems of metal magic. He needed an understanding of Hemalurgy to spike his own powers out (probably controlled a Kandra or Inquisitor for this), Feruchemy to survive said spiking and heal back his ability, and Allomancy to burn the spike and add it back onto his sDNA, thereby increasing his Allomatic strength without being a "common Inquisitor" with "endowed fabrications." He could then repeat this process until he reached some unknown theoretical limit. Keep in mind, the Lord Ruler was the most knowledgeable user of the metalic arts to have ever existed (so far), so if anyone could figure this out, it would be him. Okay, so maybe this is possible and he figured it out. Why did he use spikes for his Inquisitors then? Control, obviously. He brutally controlled the use and knowledge of Feruchemy just to prevent compounding, and this is easily more powerful. He designed all of his Hemalurgical constructs with both clear weaknesses and methods of control, and anyone granted power through this method would have neither. This is the extent of my evidence on the subject, so it is by no means proven, but I think there's a possibility for it to be true. I didn't find anything directly contradicting it, but Brandon has been getting pretty tight lipped about this sort of thing as time goes on. If you have anything on the subject, I'd be interested in seeing it. HEMALURGY USE GOING FORWARD Theoretically, this could be absurdly powerful going forward. If all that is required is an unkeyed spike, rather than a spike you share an Identity with, then you could potentially turn anyone into a Mistborn via the use of medallions. Give a Metalborn a Feruchemical Gold/ Feruchemical Aluminum medallion, dump their Identity while you spike out their power and have them heal it back with the goldmind. Give the recipient an Allomancy medallion corresponding with the metal of the spike, have them burn the spike and then boom, you've got a brand new Metalborn. Rinse and repeat. As I mentioned before, there's anecdotes that you may not want to do this repeatedly, as Soul injuries apparently scar even when healed and who knows what that does, but the ability is strong enough even without spiking people multiple times. That being said, I don't think Hemalurgy would gain wide spread use even if this were possible, simply because it's too damnation powerful. Imagine a world of Lord Rulers. Wax gave up the Bands of Mourning because the power was too great for mortals, and this is potentially even more powerful than that. I can easily see governments suppressing and regulating the use of Hemalurgy for the same reason they regulate guns. Or, perhaps more appropriately, for the same reasons as nukes. Still, the potential is there for this to be even more disruptive than medallions. FINAL THOUGHTS I consider this to be very theoretical and am by no means claiming to be convinced of its veracity. I'd love to hear what others have to say on the subject, and what they think of my interpretation.

I seek nothing if not approval of my fellow Sharders! Day 3:

Wow, exercise really does make a lot of difference

Hello, this is my first theory, so try not to tear it apart too fast . I've looked around and am fairly certain there's not a topic on this, although if there is, kindly point me to it. I do not have a ton of evidence for it, but essentially, I believe that the Evil from Threnody is really just fainlife and I'll explain why. (By the way, there are a few AU spoilers ahead, specifically for the Threnody essay, so beware) I first made the connection when I noticed they were both described as creeping. From LoP: And from the Threnodite System essay in AU: The descriptions here are pretty similar in both wording and feel. They are both portrayed as catastrophic, death-bringing forces laying waste to entire continets. For those who haven't read the Liar of Partinel, as far as I understand, fainlife came as a result of the death of Yolen's gods. It says that the fainlife came from the gods' corpse, implying that it came directly from them, and not that the gods were simply holding it back and when they died, it was left to ravage the land. We know Ambition, a shard, which can be considered a god, died in the Threnodite system. So, assuming LoP is mostly still canon, I think that the Evil is fainlife born from the death of Ambition. Now I know Ambition didn't actually die in the Threnodite System, but was only mortally wounded. However, Khriss says that So it seems fair to say at least a part of Ambition died there and that it definitely had some harmful consequences for Threnody. I know thats not a perfect argument, but it makes sense to me that fainlife could be something that causes the inhabitants of the Fallen World to flee. The fainlife we see in LoP drove the people to the brink of extinction. It pushed mankind into very small pockets of civilization where space was extremely limited and growing food was difficult. And I mean, consuming continents, feasting on the souls of men, that seems pretty reminiscent of fain. I can see how the destructive power of fainlife could cause a contintent wide evacuation in Threnody considering what we've seen of it in LoP. It just seems to fit. There are also a couple holes I'd like to address. First of all the biggest issue I see is of the timing of it. The battle between Ambition and Odium occurred relatively soon after the Shattering, however the arrival of The Evil appears to be much more recent, like within a 100 years of Shadows for Silence, which occurs later in the sequence of cosmere books. The only explanation I can think of is that the effect on Threnody of the battle was somehow delayed. Maybe it took time for the pieces of Ambition to reach the planet, or they somehow lay dormant for a long time, I don't know, I'm just speculating on this part. If anyone does know anything about that, please share. The second thing is why Nazh, being from Threnody, did not explain the Evil to Khriss. The most likely explanation is that Nazh was born long before the Evil started wrecking havoc on the Fallen World. This seems to make sense due to his worldhopping history. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Shadows for Silence takes place after Era 1 of Mistborn. And since we see him in SH, its likely he was around before the events of SfS and the Evil. He also talks about the rituals of becoming a shade, which do not line up at all with what we see of shades in SfS. They seem much more dangerous than the way he describes them, suggesting he comes from a different time period when the shades were not quite so evil. Khriss says he could only talk about the Evil vaguely, and I think thats because he didn't actually know what it was since he was not on Threnody at the time. Anyway, there's my theory, I hoped you liked it. Remember, all of this could be completely invalid if in the canon, fainlife is not the same. Feel free to share your thoughts, comments, ideas, criticisms, and any relevant WoBs. Have fun speculating!

Apology up front, but I've spent too long without venting a set of questions on here, so there are quite a few this time around. AonDor Questions: Does drawing an Aon larger make the effect larger and/or more powerful? Are any currently known Aons an exception to this? Can Aon effects be stacked? ie: would overlaying 4x Aon Ashe mean 4x brightness? Do the modifier lines have to be drawn on the same scale as the base Aon? Clarification: Draw a 1ft by 1ft Aon Daa with modifiers, if I make the base Aon 2ft by 2ft, do I also have to double the size of the modifiers? If so, what effect would keeping them the same size have on the Aon when I use it? Can you build an On/Off switch into the modifiers of an Aon? ex: A flashlight using Aon Ashe for light Ancient Elantrians used Aon Ehe to make lanterns that never went out. Given how newly drawn Aons are weaker away from Elantris, would these lanterns(that are already activated) start to dim as they got further from the city of Elantris? If not a RAFO, would this hold true for all Aons that are already activated? Does Aon Aha ["Breath, Air" per Ars Arcanum] produce air in AonDor? I got an Elantrian Scuba Diver image in my head this one time... If so, could it be used to have a never emptying oxygen tank or would it continue filling/raising pressure to the point that the tank bursts? If he somehow doesn't RAFO this, can you prevent pressure bursting with the right modifiers? Allomancy Questions: The point where someone has enough power that they start leaking mist has been given the fan-name of "Mistpoint." Do you have an actual term for this or can we use this term as actual Canon? We've speculated that Mistpoint marks the strongest point that an Allomancer can be(barring Ascension). Are we correct in this assumption? Would Mist-fueled entities [ie: Elend and Marsh during the final battle] be considered as at Mistpoint? How close would the Lord Ruler get to Mistpoint by Duralumin burning his Allomantic Metals? You've said that Elend could only match TLR soothing by using Duralumin. For reference, was the Lord Ruler only burning or was he flaring brass during his intense soothing scenes? Suppose you could reliably steal 80% Allomantic Strength with a Spike. That 80% would differ slightly from person to person correct? Pretty sure we know this already, but just in case. In another WoB, you have said that burning Pewter gives 2x strength and flaring gives 3x. Mathematically, that means flaring gives you double what burning gives. Does this hold true for all metals? Clarification: In essence, Burn = Strength+1, Flare = Strength+2. Thus Flare is 2x the effect of Burn. If no, which metals does this math work with? / Which metals does this math not work with? Gen. Purpose Roshar Questions: Is Thaylenah a mercantile culture? Captain Tozbek runs a shipping business, Rysn and Vstim trade all over Roshar, Tvlakv is a slave trader, Barmest sells books in Kharbranth, Vstim is legally Rysn's father until he considers her ready to be a merchant on her own, several people of several cultures speak Thaylen well, etc.. Rysn and Vstim traded in both Shinovar and the Reshi Isles. Thaylen, Reshi, Aimian and Shin are all in different language families, yet Axies the Collector(Aimian) spoke Thaylen well, the Shin they traded with(Thresh) and the Purelaker guide(Gu) spoke it very well, and the Reshi trader(Talik) spoke Thaylen well enough for Rysn to question his country of origin. Taravangian knows a Shin proverb in its native tongue. Is the language barrier thinner than we would expect it to be? Can you compare the level of difference between some languages with an Earth equivalent? ie: Going from Alethi to Horneater is like English to Russian, or something like that to give us a idea of how different these languages really are Does Azir have a standing army, and would their "by the book"/paperwork oriented lifestyle translate into a well regimented force and chain-of-command? (assuming they filled out the necessary forms to go to war) When Iri and Rira split, was it a peaceful split or was there a civil war of sorts? Additionally, how long ago did this split happen? What do the Reshi actually do to interpret the Tai-Na on whether they should go to war with a nearby island? Cosmere Questions: Would a Shardblade kill the limb of a Kandra, or do they have some form of resistance/immunity to this? If they have a resistance, why/how does it resist a Shardblade cut? Would a Shardblade physically cut the "bones" of a Kandra with a true body made of stone/metal or would the limb still have to be killed first? We seem to be fixated with FTL and space travel, but are there any worlds that would be more interested in exploring the deep seas of their world? If so, have we seen this world? and/or Do we know enough about the culture/magic system to figure out how they would explore the deep seas?

I grilled burgers, porksteaks & sausage and an now fixing to go enjoy my labor.

LG31: Day 1 - Dancing Mist Our tale begins. The mist has set in and a solemn figure strolls through the dancing mist. Shoulders hunched, she makes her way to an imposing building, almost obscured by the veil. The Canton of Finance, the bank of the Final Empire. The mist’s fingers caress her body, swirling around her, almost...comforting. But no amount of comfort will help her, for she is to con an obligator. At the foot of the building, at the bottom of the stairs, she gives a deep breath and shudders. First step. Second step. She makes her way up through the dancing mist. A door, an imposing door, an imposing steel door stands in her way. A shiver, and a push. She’s inside. Men look up as she enters, an assortment of nobles and obligators. One raises an eyebrow, staring at her suspiciously. She smiles faintly at him and makes her way through the lobby, a spacious room with benches and tables along the side. She struts through the middle, hoping she looked confident until she comes to a large table at the end. The obligator at the table looks up and asks in a husky voice, “Appointment?” She nods and replies, “Fadrex city, I came to request an investment for a shipment to Fadrex City”. The man nods and looks down at his ledger. “Name?” “Ariel Gadth, related to the Hastings,” came the reply. “Everything seems to be in order, please make your way to the office at the end of the next hallway, ignore the bloodstains if you will”. Bloodstains? She wonders, “My thanks”. She pushes through to the next hallway, speed-walking to the office now. She enters the room without knocking, with a flourish of her hair. “I believe I am expected?” she announces arrogantly. The obligator in the room smiles, “Indeed…”. He studies her carefully and nods to the table next to him. “You will find all you need there, allow me to finish off this paperwork.” Two agonising minutes, and yes! She is homefree! She nods curtly at the obligator, snatches up the bundle and promptly leaves. She exits the establishment, wary of eyes watching her. The mists are there to greet her and she breathes a sigh of relief. The mist didn’t seem as animate as before… something was off. A slight rustle to her left. She turns, another to her right. She quickens her pace, eyes darting. Shadows in the sides of her vision, a glint of metal here, a shine there. Heart beating, hands sweating. She breaks into a frantic run….and runs into a body with a dull thump, she falls back onto the gravel, dropping everything. “You didn’t think we would be this easy to fool did you?” A scream. And the mists keep dancing. LG31 has begun! You have 48 hours to choose someone to lynch. Rules Clarifications: PMs are not open! Only Kandra may make PMs, and only two per cycle. Allomantic Tin only finds out the action, not the person targeted as well. Ties will result in a coin flip.

There have been some good responses on Reddit recently, especially as part of the AMA and Oathbringer updates. I don't have time to compile those yet (and some have already been posted here) but one on a separate thread about character deaths jumped out at me. Here is the whole quote, with the important piece in bold. Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/Stormlight_Archive/comments/5yejj3/comment/derrlv5 I'm pretty sure this is the first official pronoun for Adonalsium besides "it." I take this as unintentional confirmation that Adonalsium was a being/Vessel and (probably) male, something Brandon has been quite evasive about.

Language! I believe that's what they call Hoid because he keeps traveling everywhere

In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. And then the murders began.

The bloodsealer was actually drawn by a Sharder, @Botanica. Her other TeS artwork is here: She also has some other cool artwork in the gallery on other subjects.

I dreamed that Portugal had a child dictator sometime in the recent past. This kid demanded that no one give him an answer other than "yes," made a movie about himself, and installed glass doors and walls in every government building. For some reason, those doors were still there when I visited with some class or other. I was not the only one who kept running into them.

Yeah, I'm active, no need to hit me with the contribution crusade. I don't have any suspicions yet (I mean, we haven't been plating for half a day, anyone who claims to have suspicions now is probably an elim). I do have some general thoughts and opinions on what might be a smart thing to do. First of all, I recommend that Kandra try and make sure they use their two PM's each cycle. PM's are wonderful things that allow you to gain more info, and talk over ideas without immediately having to throw them into the thread for all to see. Kandra are also going to be useful for getting new metal vials where they'll do the most good, but remember that confirmed Kandra is not confirmed Noble. Second, the metalurgists. There are unfortunately no metals that have only utility for the village. That having been said, I'd still attempt to get the most out of the role, if not from the start, then at least once you've found someone you're pretty sure is village who can act as stockpile ( @Elbereth, @Darkness Ascendant, @Conquestor, I assume you can't give metal vials to yourself as a metalurgist?). The reason for this is that it's going to be important for the village misting to remain stocked with metals at all times, as you'll never know when a game-winning vote comes down to whether someone still has some brass, zinc or copper left. Before the last part, I'd quickly like to give the Arinian Disclaimer: "I am not certain about any of the numbers to follow. If it seems like I'm stating something as fact, it is merely because I forgot a 'maybe' or a 'probably'." So, the number of elims. If the 20% convention is used, there's 3, or maybe 4 elims. However, since they've got a faction conversion ability, I suspect there are going to be less of them to start with. There will almost certainly not be 4 of them (unless there's a massive amount of pewter among the village), and I suspect there are only going to be 2 of them. This does depend on the number of half-skaa around. So, those are my thoughts on the rules and what might be a smart thing to do. If you see something idiotic that I've missed, or a fatal elim-exploitable flaw, don't hesitate to point that out and throw a lynch vote on me(and for that matter, remember that my name is 'Jondesu' for purposes of lynching).

Search your feelings, you know it to be true.

I guess you could say they 'Raysed' a murderer. ... Snark is the only thing I have to contribute to this conversation, carry on.

Sadeas is still alive.

Chapter Nine is now over, and with it the game. Due to me attempting to write an especially epic conclusion to Part One of The Most Important Words (the saga of Roshar games I will be running) - as well as a conflict in my work schedule - it will take longer than usual for me to post the next Chapter. I'm not sure how big the delay will be exactly, but I hope I'll need no longer than an extra day to take care of what's left. Thanks for playing, everyone. I look forward to seeing the survivors return in Part Two, along with a new, equally wonderful batch of characters.

Disclaimer: this is not intended to be sacrilegious (I'm a Christian myself). "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. And then the murders began." Not too far off from the original story anyway.

Full disclosure: I am still reading Way of Kings. This meme does not reflect any upcoming twists that may make me reconsider the opinion expressed therein. Also, it probably makes me a terrible person for thinking of it.

I'm looking for an audio book for a long trip, so I did a search on books for Sanderson fans. Every list puts Name of the Wind as its number one suggestion, but I listened to it and Wise Man's Fear on previous trips and I wasn't impressed. This makes me wonder, am I in a small minority. The book is well written and I don't have a problem with Rothfuss' writing style. I just don't find Kvoth to be a very likable character. The whole series seems to just be him bragging about how awesome he was at everything while his life was so tough and unfair and then him describing stalking a girl who wasn't interested in him. There is some interesting potential in the hints Rothfuss has given that Kvoth is lying about his past, but I feel like the 80+ hour investment, so far, is too much for the payout of a reveal. This story disappoints me if I'm supposed to relate the the character as portrayed and it frustrates me if I'm supposed to put up with the false character until the real Kvoth is revealed.

I just received quite a good question from my good friend who does not have a Shard account. He asked, "What the heck does copper compounding do to the memories?" I thought it was a great question, so I'm posting it here.

On my reread of Secret History I noticed something - when Nazh gives Kelsier his knife, he says that "Ire were doing this much longer than us". Us meaning him and Khriss. While we don't know when Khriss started her cosmere scholar career, it was definitely after White Sand. We know White Sand is before Elantris and we know Elantris is less than two thousand years before Mistborn First Era. Well, now we don't know how long is "much longer" or when Khriss started doing her thing. We don't know how long before Elantris is White Sand. We know that Ire are really, really, really, really, really old. But all in all together I think we can safely assume Ire (as a group) were doing their thing long before Reod occured.

As I understand the spirit web, it is like spiritual circuitry, powers and other aspects get coded into the "circuitry". When you use Hemalurgy, you rip out the chunk of someone's spirit web the controls the attribute you are stealing and then you staple it into the recipient's spirit web. When the "circuit" is spiked into the appropriate place for that aspect, the "wiring" works as intended and the power is transferred. When it is put somewhere else it makes weird connections and does weird thing. i.e. Koloss don't just have the strength of 5 men, they have blue skin that doesn't grow despite the fact their body never stops. Spook's book also said that you can make just about anything by changing the spirit. Now Shardblades cut the spirit. While Hemalurgy works additively to change the spirit, I wonder if one could use a Shardblade to make modifications of a subtractive nature in more complicated ways than just paralysis. Something like cut away at the shoulder(Hemalurgic bond point for pewter Allomancy) of a natural Thug and destroy the part of their spirit that lets them burn pewter. Or forcibly break someone's bond to a Shardblade while leaving them alive. It may even be possible to create Hemalurgy style monsters like Bleeder's creepy things by cutting away bits of the spirit.

I'm late to this party, but I'm with 8bit here. I would like to add one WoB I obtained a few weeks ago, though it is lateish and I'm feeling ill, so I'll just summarize rather than dig it up. Me: Could you withdraw Breaths from an awakened object if the person who Awakened it had a blank Identity at the time he Awakened the thing. Brandon: (hems and haws) Me: What about both of them being blank? Brandon: (still pretty reluctant about answering something about Identity in an open Q&A) Yeah, that should work. (goes into a fairly long discussion that boils down to many powers would be accessible if one party is Identity blanked, and almost all can be used if both parties are blank. I assume that the exception would be Surgebinding because of bonds making things difficult) I think of Identity as a literal key. If power matches your Identity, it goes through the locks on your soul and the power reaches you. If the power is keyed to someone else, the power just runs up against a different lock and can't enter you, but you can still feel the power pushing up against you, like Vin does when she burns the metalmind. If you have no Identity on the power, it is like the power is a key with no teeth, a bare tiny cylinder of metal that will slot into most any lock. If you have no Identity, it is like your lock is just a massive circle, able to accept almost any shape with room to spare. There would only be a few keys or locks that would require both cases to be true, but they are possible. Also, sometimes spren just block the key anyway. So for this specific example, when you burn the unkeyed metalmind, you get a flow of power (that is compounded because the Allomancy is powering it, rather than just returning 1:1). This flow of power can enter you since the power has had the teeth of its key stripped off. I'm not 100% sure how to reconcile getting normal allomantic power from burning a metalmind that is keyed to someone else, but I would just guess that the power wants to enter you properly, so it bucks off the feruchemical filtering and gives you allomantic power. That is definitely something I would like to clarify with Brandon, since it looks like that part of the relevant WoB may have just been something added to an afterthought that isn't actually accurate. He has certainly misspoken in the past.

I know right! Firefight is totally just a gold Allomancer... Bringing up shadows of alternate selves. As for the invis illusion, I have seen this in other books, and it is always a nice touch. In one, a super speedster ran faster than light and everything went black, which, while cool, isn't what would happen, but it first introduced the idea to me. If you just moved faster than light, you would see something really distorted as your eyes move and mop up swathes of light, which would look really weird. Regardless, we are totally on the same page with this.

Neat theory, I like it! @strumienpola Liar hasn't been abandoned per se, Brandon's still planning on writing it. It's just that we can't rely on the sample chapters available to us because he's stated he wasn't happy with the original effort (including some characters specifically but he won't say who) and he's especially called out his inclusion of Aethers as something that's probably not going to make the final cut, now that he's planning on rewriting the book they originally appeared in as well. That said, we know fainlife is still going to be part of Yolen's backstory because the AU essay on Scadrial talks about how that planet was made in Yolen's image and the flora and fauna found on the former resemble that of the latter 'aside from the fain parts'. Which doesn't prevent some variation on that theme from being the source of the Evil, especially as Threnody is a minor shardworld and unlikely to get the kind of deep development as the major worlds, so a bit of conceptual recycling is probably okay. @The One Who Connects I don't remember that WoB but assuming it's the case for purposes of argument, if you want to get really picky about it since Odium was the one to wound Ambition, we could call him the 'cause' of the Evil as much as Ambition and we knew about Odium before Shadows came out.

Interesting. I had not considered this interpretation. I worked under the assumption that he simply made himself an Allomancer and then built off of that, but it is possible that he just made himself super strong from the get go. Similarly, I am aware of that compounding the effects of Allomancy is possible, and it could be that he simply knew this trick and that's the reason. This begs the question though, if he's using one of these to boost his Allomancy, what is he using Hemalurgy for that could be considered "the most dramatic"? We know he was using it in a big way for something that we saw. If there had never been anything said on the subject of burning spikes, then I too would have assumed it to be something else, but we know that burning a spike has some sort of effect. I'd argue that "hacks" or "tricks" like compounding are actually really simple, comparatively. Spiking someone requires you to know exactly where to place it and is likely even more complicated to make constructs, whereas this just requires you to try burning a spike sometime and messing with Identity. Realmatics is said to be central to the old Terris religion, so it's possible that Rashek actually knew something about Identity to begin with and the knowledge was surpressed afterwards. Naturally occurring Aluminum is rare, but not unheard of, after all. This is indeed something that bothers me. What was he spiking himself with? Why did he want to? It could be that he just wanted even more insurance that his Atium Metalminds couldn't be Pushed or Pulled, seeing as he almost instantly died of old age after losing them and that's kind of a big deal, but who knows. I mean, this is the Lord Ruler we're talking about. Even if he used a puppeted construct to do this, he definitely killed them afterwards just to be sure. Probably doesn't really matter what he used in the end. On whether or not it's still Hemalurgy, I think it is. I can pull off "dramatic effect" on my car by boosting it with Nitro (shoo, car enthusiasts, you don't need to bother telling me this is wrong lol) and just because the effect is just going really fast and it still runs on gasoline doesn't mean that it wasn't pulled off with Nitro. This is the worst metaphor I have ever told and this is what I get for responding in a car. I'm heading off to a family dinner now, so I probably won't be able to respond for the rest of the night. Glad to see the responses so far.

Well, I don't think I actually made a point about it not being likely to happen on D1, but I'm glad you admit some amount of fault in the initial logic. That being said, the inherent problem with bandwagons is players not thinking for themselves, in my opinion, not a stall in discussion. Besides, I'd rather see a bandwagon than a bunch of poke votes and no votes any day, as bandwagons have a lot more potential to reveal useful information. Additionally, I'd argue that the problem you're addressing isn't the bandwagons, but the fact players would rather wait around for information than actively pursue it. It really isn't too different than a game of follow the cop if we all just wait around for answers, except it's even more likely the elims will be able to take advantage of our silence if there's no genuine reason for it, therefore I think that's the issue worth addressing. I'm also glad you responded as fast as you did (I'm assuming it's because of the mention, though I will record it here and now that between the time I posted and the time Phatt did, I only saw one player, Straw, viewing the thread. Thus if phatt turns out an eliminator, it might be possible Straw saw the vote and gave his teammate a heads up). Regardless, I am going to keep my vote on you, mostly because that's the second time you've advocated more discussion without making a significant effort to help perpetuate it.

I'm here (kind of). I'm actually feeling under the weather (not from drinking this time, I promise), so my head's not in the right place right now to make progress on the LG30 finale in a way I think it deserves. While lying in bed hating life, I've also been binge reading Worm, because like an analogy I made on the discord channel we have for Worm readers, the story is a lot like a bag of potato chips in that it's very easy to tell yourself "just one more chip" (chapter) and next thing you know you're halfway through the bag (book) and you've no longer the self-control to stop. That said, I'm not sure how much analysis I can contribute right now, let alone if it would even be helpful. I will say that right now, on the first day, the Contribution Crusade isn't worth being implemented yet. I don't feel up to thoroughly explaining my perspective on it, but I will say that I feel we need more evidence of inactivity than a lack of posting in 24 hours to make any accurate judgments on a player's involvement in the game, and whether or not they should be removed solely for that reason. If someone's gone for several turns, sure, but I believe we all deserve a little slack. As for the rest that's been discussed... poke votes. I don't like them, mostly because of their inefficiency. I don't believe they accomplish much, as voting is most useful when it applies genuine pressure on the target, or when it forces bystanders to advocate or oppose the death of the target. Even a player deciding to remain neutral or not comment on it at all can be telling. So, in the spirit of that... Pauses to quickly look over the previous votes... Elenion voted for both SB and phatt for CC reasons, so nothing particular to read from that until we know his alignment. If he's a villager, than he'd just be genuinely poke voting. If he's an eliminator, then, well, there could be a lot of motives, but honestly if he died today, there'd be not enough interactions between him and other players to analyze what his intent was, exactly. So not very useful in the long run. I haven't yet read his role advice so I can't say for sure if there's some underlying intent there. I'll probably attempt that later, when my head is in a better place. Regardless, as much as I agree with Orlok's arguments regarding the Contribution Crusade, I don't feel like voting for Len is worth it. For now my gut is saying he's village, anyway, not that gut isn't infallible, or that I've really thought too hard on this. SB's vote on Magestar is a pure poke vote. Same conclusion as with Len's. Unlike Len, though, I would vote for him because he hasn't done much else to participate since, if anything at all (off the top of my head). Already said my piece on Orlok's vote, really. I see why he voted for Len and I can agree with it. Need some sparks to ignite a fire. But while my gut is also telling me Orlok is a villager, it doesn't mean I feel the need to follow his lead. Magestar. Hm. His participation in the discussion gives me good vibes, too. So at the very least, I will cross him off my list of people to suspect. For now. I'm glad that Ecth pointed out the fallacy in one of phatt's statements, though I don't think he made as big deal out of it as it deserves. So I'll go ahead and quote the exact post now, and accompany it with a vote of my own. Phattemer. Can you explain to me exactly how waiting to vote = encouraging discussion? It's not like voting on someone causes other players not to respond, and it also doesn't help discussion if that sentence is all you say before you disappear. Your actions don't match your implied desires, and that confuses me. @phattemer Vote Tally (0) Silverblade5: Elenion, (1) Magestar: Silverblade5, (2) phattemer: Elenion, Ecthelion III, Amanuensis, (1) Elenion: OrlokTsubodai, It should also be noted that Jondesu retracted a vote for Drought, though he never put Drought's name in red, only '@mentioned' him with a "I'll poke vote you in the name of the Contribution Crusade." Which reminds me. Not going to talk as much about this as I should, but given that most games, the players who would bring up this sort of thing are dead by the time it's relevant, please make sure you constantly check back through old turns every time new information is revealed. I've seen games recently where villagers could discover the identities of the eliminators fairly easily if they just revisited old discussions (and even just tallies) with the knowledge of a player's alignment. I'm not saying any of these votes are particularly important, but there's always a potential there is. I will try to RP at some point in this game, as I have a few ideas regarding Neer, but I won't make any promises I can't keep. At least until I finish the LG30 finale. EDIT: Leave it to me to write a post this long when I started it off trying to be terse >>

@Figberts Patience, Grasshopper. Your latest meme post hasn't even been up for a full day, and each person can only upvote it once. I, for one, enjoyed them all immensely! That hawk in the first one looks like the bird version of Clarity Clarence. XD And where in Calamity did you find that epicly creepy fanart of the Bloodsealer??

That's fine, so long as Lyla is okay with a lot of "You want what? Uh-huh, and you mind telling me why?" from Autumn.

Now we're only missing two players probably a record I'll get a post down once I analyze better. Also, to quote Phatt, " I'm going to wait to vote to encourage more discussion. " Actually, wait. That logic sounds a bit dubious, don't you think, Phattemer? I'm going to vote on you, hopefully this doesn't discourage discussion by me voting.

Maybe. It is the Holy Land after all. Strangers things have happened. Theres also Jon Snow White and this woman who was on leave from army service, taking not-a-damsel-in-distress to new levels.

I don't know whether it is allowed to be discussed, but I do see people mention it in its current state as non-canon. Meaning that it might not be as useful of a discussion piece for future revelations. If we are allowed to discuss it, I'd label it with Liar of Partinel Spoilers, and probably a "may not be canon" disclaimer like some MAG discussions had. If we are not allowed to speak of it, I'm sure someone who knows more will tell you.

But these are similes... Well... Carry on!

You go in the corner and think about what you have done! On topic, I like it. I don't think this explanation is inevitable as you suggest it might be - Rayse could've gone after Aona and Skai because he was afraid they might form an alliance against him (because of pre-Shattering friendship, or because of compatibility of mandates, or something else entirely), or because of another personal grudge. As to why he didn't just Splinter them like he did Ambition and Honor after them, I actually think I recall a WoB about how he didn't yet know how to Splinter properly. Rayse always knew he didn't want to just kill the other Vessels because that left the Shard available for pickup. But I don't think he knew how to Splitner their minds this early in his "career", so he did the next best thing - he made them extremely dangerous to even approach, let alone separate. By the time he got to Ambition, he must've figured it out. But I like the idea. Very nicely thematic.

First instalment of The Emperor's Meme! Day three coming soon!

Lift will figure out a way to access all the Surges, making her Roshar's first ever Awesomeborn!

Yalb will ride a greatshell into battle against the Voidbringers. Kaladin will Lash a chasmfiend into the sky.

Dalinar is actually an extremely skilled Dysian Aimian. The real one died long ago.

At the end of Oathbringer a new red star shows up. They decide to call it Calamity.

Well, there will be a direct sequel to this game. I figured Uther would participate in that

LOL my favorite topic. I'm in the camp that thinks that all sixteen Shards are divine attributes but do not directly fall into pairs....nor do I think that groupings are necessarily the best way to describe it either, because its rare that a personality (which is kinda what we're describing here, Adonalsium's divine personality shattered into sixteen specific attributes) can be cleanly sorted into groups. Instead I picture the Shards as being on a spectrum, that encompasses all three Realms. Much like most things in the cosmere touch or span all three Realms in one way or another, I think all sixteen Intents have some Spiritual, Cognitive and Physical aspects to each of them....but that each Intent is described better by one of the three than the other two. For instance, on one far end of the spectrum would be the more Physical Shards, like Preservation and Ruin. Both these Shards have cognitive and spiritual aspects to their Intent as well, but they're more strongly of the Physical than either of the other two Realms. Consider the Intent of Preservation.....its best defined or expressed through actions, through physicality. You can be spiritually devoted to the essence of what preservation means, being a person devoted to preserving life, society, any of that. You can be cognitively focused on the intellectual essence of what preservation means, whether saving one person is more important than letting one person die to save multiple people. But at the end of the day, the Intent of Preservation is most clearly expressed through action....the intent to preserve something means nothing without the actual action, your reasons for preserving something or why you choose to preserve one thing over another doesn't alter the actual end result of the actions you took. I believe this also plays into why some Shards and their magic systems seem more rooted in the Physical Realm than others. You initially access allomancy by physically acting to preserve. The focus, the fuel, pretty much all the fundamentals of the metallic arts are rooted in the Physical Realm. Now look at the other end of the spectrum, Shards that are more of the Spiritual than the others, even though they, like Preservation, do still touch on all three Realms and have aspects pertaining to each. Honor and Odium....both divine attributes like Preservation, but their essence is more of the spirit than of specific actions or physicality. With Honor's magic system, a person's spirit matters more than just their actions. Without special 'hacks' like wielding an Honorblade, you can't become a Surgebinder just by going through the motions.....performing specific actions doesn't cut it, its not just about the end result, its about the WHY of your actions. You only attract an honorspren by being honorable. Kaladin's reasons for doing certain things, the SPIRIT of how he wields his shardblade has an actual impact on Syl, their bond, and his ability to use magic that is of Honor - all in a way that just fundamentally isn't true of Preservation and how allomancy works and its relationship with mistings and mistborn. And then in the middle of the spectrum, you have Shards that are primarily Cognitive, they're the in between Intents, just as the Cognitive is kind of the 'middle' Realm in between the Physical and the Spiritual. Primarily cognitive Shards have aspects to them that are strongly of the Spiritual and the Physical Realms, but their Intents are most strongly defined and expressed via how the mind interprets the juxtaposition of spiritual essence and physical action - primarily cognitive Intents are ones where why you perform specific actions sometimes matters more, but sometimes the reverse is true. Its the eye of the beholder, or more accurately, the thought process of the Vessel or the magic user, that matters most. I'd say that the Cognitive Shards are like the 'gray area' Shards, like Devotion. With a Spiritual Shard like Honor or Odium....there is no real way to act against the SPIRIT of Honor or Odium. Your access to their magic system is contingent on being true to the essence of what is 'true Honor', something immutable, the personal views and belief system of the Surgebinder can only stray away from this to a minimal extent. I don't think you can really use Odium's Investiture for something good, because Odium is pure spiritual hate, there's not a whole lot of leeway for his Intent to be interpreted in a non-destructive fashion. But by contrast, I'd call Devotion and Dominion more strongly Cognitive Shards. We tend to view Aona and Devotion as a benevolent Shard, but Devotion is named what she is for a reason I think. While there are synonymous interpretations of devotion and love, the Intent of Devotion is not innately the same thing as the Intent of Love, which I'd call a Spiritual Intent. Devotion though, is more ideological. More intellectual. You can be devoted to negative pursuits just as easily as you can be devoted to positive ones. Unlike the spirit of divine hatred, which doesn't leave a lot of wiggle room to use that power for good (to be clear, I think there are plenty of ways to use say, anger for good or put that to productive use, but hate, not so much) - with devotion, the focus of your devotion matters as much as anything else. A person who is devoted to their country above all else is as much in tune with the Intent of Devotion as a person who is devoted to life in general....but the diehard patriot devoted to their country is going to be willing to kill or destroy in the name of their country without acting against Devotion's Intent, no matter that this puts them completely at odds with the person who is fiercely devoted to making sure all life is preserved regardless of nationality. And like with Preservation and Allomancy, I think Devotion and Dominion being Cognitive Shards has a lot to do with the nature of Sel's magic systems....and might well have to do with Odium being able to bottle their Investiture up in the Cognitive Realm after shattering them....something that perhaps was only possible because they were already more strongly concentrated in the Cognitive Realms than the other two Realms. So again, I don't think splitting the Shards into four groups of four or something similar is the way to go. I think mapping them as a spectrum might glean more insight. You have the Shards that are more strongly of Spirit at one end like Honor and Odium. Shards more strongly of Physical at the far end, like Ruin and Preservation. And I think most of the other Shards fall somewhere in between.....some in the middle, strongly of Cognitive more than anything else, but others that are a blend of Spirit and Cognitive and others that are on the further end of the Cognitive, mixing with the Physical. Personally, I'd look at the Spectrum of Intents (the ones we have so far) as looking like the following: ODIUM -- HONOR -- ENDOWMENT -- DEVOTION -- DOMINION -- AMBITION -- AUTONOMY -- CULTIVATION -- RUIN -- PRESERVATION At the farthest Spiritual end of the Spectrum, you have God's Divine Hatred, Odium, an almost purely Spiritual Intent that can easily applied to the cognitive or the physical, but can not truly be altered by either of those things. No matter what mental gymnastics you perform, no matter what actions you take with Odium's Investiture, Hatred is still Hatred. A little to the right of Odium is Honor because it also is a predominantly spiritual intent, there does seem to be True Honor, the distilled essence of what Honor actually is, and this seems to be a barometer that spren like Syl use in determining who appeals to them most, when it comes to forming bonds. However, I put Honor a little more towards the cognitive than Odium, because Honor is more easily diluted than Hatred is, the Cognitive and the personal views and ideologies of a magic user, an individual's view of what constitutes being honorable does have some sway. A little further towards Cognitive is Endowment, another Spiritual Intent because the primary focus of it is the essence of bestowing, of endowing. On the surface this sounds more like a Physical thing, a specific action, but I'd argue this isn't so, because of how Shai describes the spiritual essence of things in TES. If you look at how the magic works in Warbreaker, Endowment seems to be an immutable Intent, at least so far as Awakening goes. It doesn't matter what the individual's view of endowment or gift-giving is, it doesn't matter why they give up their Breath, if they're being coerced or tortured or something. All that matters is that they endow their Breath, that they give it away 'willingly' - even if external factors are being applied to force the person to give up their Breath. This implies to me that the Intent of Endowment is one of the most spiritually pure, in the sense that there's not a lot of room to deviate from its essence. HOWEVER, Endowment has a second part to its Intent....an endowment is meant to be used, by its very nature. Its giving something with the intent or aim of that gift being used to help the recipient of the gift. And this is why I put this Intent a little more towards the Cognitive, because how the gift of Breath is used resides more in the Cognitive realm (hence the Spiritual fuel of Awakening, but the Cognitive focus of commands). Devotion I've already described above...it has a stronger spiritual aspect than it does physical, but its largely dictated by the cognitive, what a person is devoted to, how they apply that devotion. But access to Devotion's Investiture seems to be a combination of the spiritual and the cognitive....all Elantrians are devoted to a specific thing or person or ideology, and then of course Elantrian magic is largely Cognitive in its mechanics. Dominion is a little further to the right, because its like Devotion in a lot of ways, but a little bit more towards the Physical act of exerting dominion. Devotion is a bit more spiritual, a bit more cognitive, a bit more focused on the ephemeral or the abstract.....Dominion is still very much a Cognitive ideology, but requires a bit more Physical action than Devotion, IMO. They're close though (part of this idea of the spectrum is that while not all Shards are paired, the ones that are will be found next to each other on the spectrum....the further away two Intents get on the spectrum, the less they have in common and thus the less accurately they can be argued to reflect each other). Next I would put Ambition. We don't know much about Ambition, next to nothing, actually....but Ambition to me strikes me as another gray area shard, an Intent that is very much influenced by the personal views or goals of the Vessel or anyone using Ambition's Investiture. It's a bit more Physical than Devotion or Dominion, because Ambition by its very nature demands action. If someone just sits around all day, it doesn't really matter how big they dream, they're not usually going to be regarded as very ambitious, because they're not DOING anything to make those dreams happen. We also know that while Ambition was actually shattered somewhere outside of Threnody's system, the weirdness around Threnody and Cognitive Shadows and Shadesmar there has to do with Odium wounding Ambition while in that system....and much like what happened on Sel, Ambition having a largely Cognitive nature could be tied to the fallout of its wounding having largely Cognitive effects on its surroundings. I would also suggest that if my theory on a spectrum of Intents and Ambition's place on it holds true, then if Ambition did at any point have its own magic system, it was probably Cognitive fueled and focused, like the magic on Sel. Next we have Autonomy, a little more towards the Physical. I think Autonomy is another primarily Cognitive Shard because there doesn't seem to be a distilled essence of what it means to be Autonomous in the cosmere....all Bavadin's actions (and Trell's, if related to Bavadin either as a pseudonym or a proxy of hers) seem to suggest entirely different approaches to gaining or maintaining autonomy. Sealing Taldain off from the rest of the cosmere to maintain its autonomy makes sense for that Intent....but meddling in the shaping of other cultures as Bavadin is said to do is not as in keeping with that Intent UNLESS that Intent has a lot of Cognitive leeway to make all kinds of different arguments for what it means to be autonomous and how to go about achieving it. So far, Bavadin and Autonomy seem to embody the argument of 'do the ends justify the means'....if total autonomy is only the END goal, then there's plenty of room in the meanwhile to interfere and meddle in pursuit of that end goal. In a lot of ways, the Intent of Autonomy is like the divine focus on free will....and as such, it makes sense that the Intent most like 'Free Will' would be extremely cognitive, given that the very nature of free will has spawned countless intellectual arguments throughout human history. I actually think that if my spectrum theory pans out, once all sixteen Shards are mapped out on it, we'd find Autonomy right smack in the center of it, maybe just leaning SLIGHTLY more to the Physical than the Spiritual given the seeming physical focus and nature of magic on Taldain thus far, and the fact that like action is required to preserve something in according to Preservation's Intent, action is required to act to free oneself from outside influences to act according to Autonomy's Intent. (But since external factors shackling one's autonomy are rarely as cut and dried as the physical threat one needs to act to to preserve something, there's a lot more Cognitive involved in an individual determining what is oppressing them and what they need to be free of). Next I would put Cultivation, who despite having a close relationship with Honor and Honor's magic system, is a very Physical oriented Intent and magic. Cultivation is the physical act of building upon things, developing them further. It still has a strong Cognitive element because there's no singular action taken to cultivate things or systems or ideas. If you look at Surgebinding as a combination of Honor and Cultivation, as we know it to be, then Honor's part of it is a distilled spiritual truth at the heart of the magic that causes different spren to seek out bonds with people who act with 'true' Honor and in pursuit of 'true Justice'. Honor is the basis of the oaths the Knights Radiant take to fully cement their magic. However, Cultivation's part of Surgebinding is the physical and cognitive act of growing those bonds, deepening them, learning new oaths, taking where the magic user started and adding more magic as that magic user works to become more in tune with Honor, to grow his or her personal service to the ideals of the Knights Radiant and Honor. It fits that Cultivation and Ruin would be next to each other on the spectrum, because Brandon said once that they would complement each other well, if Ruin weren't already paired opposite Preservation, which of course is on the other side of Ruin on the spectrum. And of course on the far Physical side of the spectrum thus are Ruin and Preservation...Preservation being the furthest right because it as an Intent is almost wholly of action free of Cognitive ideology or Spiritual purity. The act is all that matters with Preservation....action also largely defines Ruin, as he's at times been described as mindless destruction, but I put him ever so slightly more towards the Cognitive than Preservation because most of what we've seen of Ruin and his Investiture in the cosmere is conscious will shaping the entropy it causes or embodies. Allomancy, you act in self-preservation, you Snap. You drink a vial of metal flakes, you're fueled to use Allomancy. Ruin's magic requires a little more conscious intent in what you're stealing via hemalurgy, where you apply spikes, etc, and so while Ruin and Preservation are a true pairing of Intents and thus right next to each other on the spectrum, I weigh Ruin as being incrementally more of the Cognitive than Preservation is. Now all of this is pure theory at this point, but I do think if it pans out, a number of things about the cosmere would fall into place, and it would glean a little insight into the six remaining Shards. For instance....I don't think we'll find out six of the remaining Shards are more 'purely Spiritual' than say, Odium, or more Physical than Preservation....I think they anchor the spectrum pretty well and any remaining Intents are going to fall somewhere in between, even if there's another Spiritual Shard that's right next to Odium thanks to having a pure essence of what its Intent means. We know that the Shard that just wants to survive has an Intent that's only tangentially related to its desire to stay out of things happening elsewhere in the cosmere....that to me suggests that this is a Cognitive Shard somewhere in the middle of the spectrum, one whose Intent gives it a lot more flexibility and leeway in interpreting it than Odium or Ruin have, as an example. I think the cluster of four Shards or so in the very center of the Spectrum are going to end up being Shards whose Vessels are unaltered by their Intent far more than many others....because their Intent is so Cognitive based that their personal perception of what it means matters a lot more than with most Shards. This certainly seems to be true of Bavadin thus far, from everything Brandon's said about her. So, the Shard that just wants to survive seems to motivated more by personal choice or agenda than Intent just by Brandon's choice or wording (ie Brandon specifying that first, one Shard just wants to hide and survive but second, that this want is not specifically in service to their Intent)....it having more freedom to act based on personal wants suggests to me that it is has a great deal of leeway in how its Intent is interpreted....which again, suggests that its very near to Autonomy on the spectrum. That's why personally, I think that it has a possibility of pairing with Ambition, also close to that center of the spectrum, and that's why I think this Shard is Caution. If Ambition is the divine urge to act, then Caution is the divine urge to wait and let things develop, divine patience if you will. I do think we'll see at least one or two more Shards that fall strongly in the Cognitive/Physical area than anything we have so far. Something that I'd place more towards the Physical than Autonomy, but not as far as Cultivation. Like for instance, Invention or Inspiration. Cognitive inspired, but requiring Physical creation. I also think we'll see another Shard or two that's somewhere around Endowment, maybe between it and Devotion. A mostly Spiritual Shard but with a stronger Cognitive influence than Endowment has....Judgment, the Intent of Divine Condemnation perhaps. I do think there's a strong possibility for another pure Spiritual essence Shard, something like Enlightenment or Mercy, that relies on the idea of a 'true' essence of being merciful. I also like the possibility of another strongly physical shard, such as Revolution, the Intent of change through action. Caution, Invention, Revolution, Judgment, Enlightenment, Mercy - those are my favorite six picks for the last remaining Shards.

In recent interrogations interviews Brandon's official word on the matter is "He took a bead of lerasium, he's used allomancy, you figure it out." I take this to mean that 2+2 does in fact equal 4, no more no less. Coupling that with snarky remarks Hoid himself has made on the matter (e.g. "I protect [the element] like I protect my own skin") and it should be very clear-cut and obvious. But then again, this fandom wouldn't be the same if we didn't muddy up even the clearest of Cosmere issues.

That's an awfully defeatist way of looking at things. You're also not the only person dealing with a high death rate. Here's some interesting statistics: the sum of all the characters/avatars who have been in every game played in SE is 1653. The death count is 1102, or 66.7%. This means that the average survival rate is 33.3%. Individuals with a lower survival rate than that die more frequently than the average SE player. Here are the survival rates of a selection of players with lower survival rates than the average: A couple things I'd like to comment on this. Everyone, minus Ecth, that is higher than Seonid has played more than 20 games. Seonid, Hael, and Kas are all at 17-18 games. The rest, including Ecth, are between 10 and 15. There are some really low survival rates there. Mage is less than 10%. He's only survived one game, out of 15. That's kind of insane. Hael died the first 12 games he played. However, if we count just from the time people stopped making a hobby of Hael Hunting, his rate is 60%. 3 out of 5. Not too bad. And I imagine, it'll hold to about that. If he were to continue playing rather than going on a hiatus, I imagine his death rate would balance out at about 30%. Once you hit about 25 games, the survival rate you have is probably going to stay about the same, unless you make a concerted effort to change it, and even then, it's questionable. Death is just something that happens. It usually balances out the more you play. The average survival rate for those with 20 games or more is about 30%. So less than the average SE player, but not by much. Certainly better than 20-25%. But that's because you've played more games and people have a better placement of you in terms of kill-necessity, and you've gotten better at being less suspicious-looking, no matter your alignment, so you'll probably by lynched less as well. Especially early on. For example: You've been lynched 7 times in your 12 games. 2 of those lynches were when you were village (so you accrued suspicion and couldn't deflect it....or your brother arranged your lynch because he was evil ), and 3 were when you were evil. You've been lynched every time you're evil. But I'll bet you've learned something every time you've been evil as well. You're probably learning how to avoid suspicion. That's what happens when you're evil. You learn. You get better. Eventually, you'll make it through a game without getting lynched as an eliminator. You might get vig-killed, but hey: at least it wasn't a lynch. And you'll improve from that. You've been killed by the eliminators once, and that was in MR18, towards the later part of that game. You've been attacked by the eliminators a couple of times early on as well, but you didn't die to them. And yes, attack cycle is rather different than death cycle. The first block of information is the cycle you take your first hit. The second block of information is what cycle you die. You've been attacked 4 times in the first 2 cycles, but you've only been killed 3 times in that same chunk of time. You tend to be attacked first between cycle 3 and 4, but you don't tend to die until cycles 5 or 6. That's...not bad. Sure, your death rate in the first two cycle is on the high side, but there are others with a high number of deaths in those same cycles. Orlok has been killed 7 times in the first two cycles. He can definitely relate, because he was really upset about it after the 4th or 5th time it happened. Really, it's just about playing more. Those early deaths will average out. Your survival rate will rise. You've only played 12 games, which I get that that sounds like a lot, but comparatively, it's fairly low. There have been players who played 10+ games before they finally became an eliminator for the first time. Like I already said, Hael died the first 12 games he played. 12 games isn't enough to get into the true direction your stats are headed. That takes around 25 games. And I can practically guarantee you that your stats won't look like this 13 games from now.

Alright, first part of Memebreaker. Here it is:

I'll add it to the Sandmastery entry. So it would be Sandmastery, Feruchemical bendalloy, Feruchemical iron. I like the bird + electrum one. I wish we knew more about Truthwatchers to know how atium drualuminium atium burn would work for them.

Let's make this an even playing field: the armies of Roshar and the armies of Scadrial are somehow fighting over a third world (so no highstorms, and no ash or mists). TLR sends his full armies with a few inquisitors and Mistborn. Lots of allomancers join the fray for money and power (but no Feruchemists, as they are hiding). TLR is OP, and getting lazy in his old age, so he stays home to ensure the stability of his empire and to watch the Well of Ascension. The peoples of Roshar, seeing a chance at mutual advantage, put together a vast coalition expeditionary force under Alethi leadership. However, there are no radiants yet - just proto-radiants. All the shardbearers of Roshar go. The Heralds are in hiding, and choose to remain so. No Chasmfiends, whitespines or other terrifying creatures are tamed and sent to battle. NUMBERS: Scadrial: There are around 300k Koloss during HOA, so we'll assume that that's how many they have here. There are roughly 20 inquisitors. We'll assume that they send 15, as that seems reasonable (the other 5 would be back home doing their duties) Cett and Yomen between them raised some 100,000 in one dominance. Let's assume TLR can do the same in every dominance, and so he sends 500k footsoldiers. We don't know how many Allomancers there were in TFE era. However, I'd estimate that, assuming TLR advertises an opportunity for wealth and advancement, there will be a sizeable component of Mistings, and maybe 5-15 mistborn? Total: 500k Skaa soldiers, 300k Koloss, 15 Inquistors, 10 Mistborn, and an uncertain number of Noble mistings. Roshar: We know that the Alethi had an army of 100k deployed at all times on the shattered plains. Seeing how much fighting was going on at home, how they're surrounded by hostile kingdoms, we can assume the Alethi would be able to muster at least 50k more troops for an expedition. We can assume from in text references that Jah Keved has a similar force, so another 150k. Jah Keved and Alethkar make up around a third of Roshar, but they are also the most militaristic nations by far. Thus 300k between them, and another 400k from the rest of Roshar seems reasonable. There are around 100 shardbearers on Roshar at this time as well. MILITARY INFRASTRUCTURE AND TECHNOLOGY: Scadrial: TLR can get skaa to do whatever he wants in terms of raw labour. The final empire has canning, extremely useful for establishing a supply line. Scadrian military technology, however, is purposefully suppressed and simplified. The Scadrians are not militaristic, nor military innovators. This is due to the intentional pacifying influence of TLR. Scadrial has a decent number of horses. Ranged: Scadrial has simple bows, and that's about it. Possible they have composite bows, but seems unlikely. Why would they? Yomen has some trebuchets, so siege weapons are known. Longbows, crossbows, and etc all seem to have been suppressed. Melee: Basics. Spears, swords, hand axes. War staffs? Scadrial just doesn't seem to like weapons. You don't hear of any pikes, halberds, longswords, maces, anything. Shields don't appear to be widely deployed (only Hazekillers and a couple of soldiers in HOA are mentioned as having them. Medical technology: Not terrible, but not great either. Sazed has historical knowledge of medicine, and likely there's some basic field surgery, but no mention is made of antiseptics, antibiotics or proper sterilization. Roshar: Soulcasters. Soulcasters. Soul flipping casters. I'm a history geek, particularly a history of war geek, and frankly, SOULCASTERS. Those things are so insanely useful it's not even funny. Roshar can fight wars almost without a supply line at all, with no risk of running out of ANYTHING. They have as much food, water, metal, leather, EVERYTHING as they need. THIS IS HUGE. HUGE. If you're not a war geek, you have no idea how much of an advantage this is. The only supply line Roshar needs is a line supplying them with fresh gemstones/stormlight. This is a far simpler supply line then anything in history ever. Running gemstones with stormlight to the front is so much easier than running a complete military train it's mind-boggling. Horses, however, are rare on Roshar, and expensive. Ranged: While the Alethi aren't huge lovers of bows, they still have lots of seemingly excellent archers (especially that one highprince...). The Parshendi have composite bows, and the Alethi appear to have good bows of some different kinds. In Dalinars flashback that Brandon posted, there's an archer using what appears to be a heavy longbow. Some Rosharan cultures have a good mix of ranged weapons. Crossbows, however, do not seem to be used at all, AFAIK. Siege weapons are likely well known, but I can't remember them being explicitly mentioned. Melee: The Rosharans LOVE melee weapons and equipment. And they're good at it. They have everything, pikes, long spears, shortspears, halberds, short swords, long swords, maces, battleaxes. You name it, they got it. Furthermore, they also have good access to armour and shields: Alethi spearmen appear to be trained to fight in a manner similar to Grecian Hoplites, as well as later era Macedonian hoplite/pike mixed formations. Medical Technology: Wisdom of the Heralds indeed! Roshar has military medical surgery that's as good as what we had in WWII, if not better. Excellent antiseptics and a good understanding of infection and prevention of infection (if not the causes of infection), excellent sterilization practices. A large number of well trained and equipped field surgeons. MILITARY THEORY, TRAINING, EXPERIENCE AND LEADERSHIP: Scadrial: Not much, frankly. Scadrial has many things, but military experience, theory, and leadership on Scadrial SUCKS. Scadrial hasn't had a proper war in a millenium, and it shows. Military leadership is ineffectual at best. Military theory even worse. The Lord Ruler has done an excellent job of preventing real warfare, and real war experience, to affect his people. The most his armies do is crush the occasional rebellion, and that's usually done by letting the Koloss rampage. Well of Ascension really shows the absolute dearth of military leadership both on the platoon level, the battalion level, and the division level. The leaders and soldiers are completely unprepared for real war. With a core of troops from the old empire, and 'experienced' officers, the defenders of Luthadel are laughably undertrained after over a full year. The best armies of the Lord Ruler simply let the Koloss do 75% of the fighting. They never had to face a superior foe, or even an evenly matched fight. Likely they'd never been in a position where it seemed likely that they'd lose. The troops, even veterans like Clubs, haven't experienced real war. Roshar: Odium reigns. Which has had an interesting side-effect, Roshar is at war with itself ALL THE TIME. Large scale, small scale, everywhere in between scale. Roshar is filled with generals, captains, squadleaders. Thousands upon thousands of experienced Officers and NCO's, hardened veterans with battle training and excellent military theory. Roshar's armies are filled to the brim with highly trained, well prepared and well led veterans. At least half, if not more of their forces are disciplined troops who can follow orders, hold their ground, and have faced terrifying odds before. People who aren't at their first rodeo. With hardened, brilliant generals like Dalinar and Gavilar, the Rosharans know how to run a real campaign. MAGIC: Scadrial: Tons of it. Scadrial would have thousands of mistings for sure. Pewterarms who can lead a charge, Coinshots and lurchers who can protect formations against arrows and set enemies off balance, rioters and soothers who can maintain the composure of their forces while weakening their enemies resolve, Tineyes who can scout and spy extremely well, and most crucially the Inquisitors/Mistborn; fighters who can dominate small battlefields on their own, especially when they have Atium (Atium would have to be used sparingly though - likely saved for when fighting Shardbearers. In an extended conflict, even the full cache, in the unlikely case TLR let it be tapped, would run out quickly; there's not a lot of Atium and it burns fast). Duralumin would be useful, but AFAIK, TLR had concealed it at this point. Kandra provide a huge advantage in information warfare: TLR would certainly infiltrate Roshars ranks. Poisoning food/water supplies wouldn't be terribly effective (because of Soulcasters), and it's unlikely that they'd be able to effectively counteract soulcasters/fabrials (they might be able to steal a few, but once they started to steal them, security would tighten up significantly). But the Rosharans would have no secrets, and could be effectively screwed with at a few key points in combat. Roshar: Shardbearers. These guys are tanks, and their invested equipment is almost certainly immune to steelpushes and ironpulls. I'm not kidding when I call them Tanks: the tactics and opportunities they allow for are very much likely armoured warfare in WWI/WWII. They can pierce through enemy lines almost unmolested, shatter a hole allowing for the regulars to exploit the breach, hold a weakened position all on their own. Their uses in combat are manifold. Fabrials: instantaneous communication across the whole campaign is a fantastic advantage: again, something that wouldn't be seen on Earth until the first and second world wars. Navani's plethora of cool tools would be very helpful, but likely not game changing. Soulcasters are just, wow. Such useful, so soulcast, much supply line, very wow. CONCLUSIONS: Roshar has an incredibly advantage in military theory, experience and infrastructure. They're tactics, strategy, everything. Infinitely superior to Scadrials, due to their overwhelming weight of experience. Their battlefield leadership, and hardened soldiers, would make them far more efficient, flexible and effective a fighting force. Their military training, formations and equipment are all far superior to those we see on Scadrial. Scadrials magic advantage is huge. Mistborn and Inquisitors can both turn the tide of a smaller conflict, and are much more useful and flexible than a shardbearer. However, this is a conflict on a truly immense scale. Absolutely immense - 25 people can only do so much before succumbing to exhaustion (a great example of the best large scale use of allomancy in combat is Elend in HOA - he could only do so much, and that was with a constant supply of Atium!). By the same token, there aren't enough Shardbearers to be everywhere. Enough to be useful, but not enough to change the course of the battle. There are, however, lots of mistings. Rioters and soothers would likely make up for a good chunk of Scadrials morale disadvantage (inexperienced soldiers, especially before modern training, are FAR less more likely to break and run than veteran soldiers. Even with veterans, most battles ended in a rout, not a slaughter. Inexperienced forces tended to get routed AND slaughtered). Coinshots and lurchers are helpful, but actually not that useful in a full-scale battle. Their offensive use of coins aren't really better than arrows or crossbow bolts. They'd certainly make a difference (especially in stopping arrows), but not that much of one. Thugs are super handy, and would definitely help shore up weak points. Koloss are interesting. They're big, no problems with infrastructure, hard to kill, and impossible to rout. They will make a significant difference. Roshar however has proper equipment, formations, tactics and leadership. Koloss function a bit like a mixture between heavy infantry and heavy cavalry - but they completely lack armour. What's the best way to stop a charge of heavy cavalry, OR of lightly armoured heavy infantry? A spearwall, or a pike wall. Roshar has both in spades: Spears and pikes would be extremely effective against Koloss, especially backed by archers who can shoot over their allies heads (as the most dangerous Koloss are tall!). Roshar's advantage in experience, training, equipment and infrastructure is HUGE. Absolutely huge. Those are the things that win real wars. However, Scadrial has a simply incredible advantage when it comes to magic (and Koloss!). What would likely happen? It would be a very, very even match. If the Scadrians were able to force major field conflicts early on, they'd likely win. A well-led rush of Koloss against troops who hadn't seen them before, backed by rioters, soothers and inquisitors, would have a good chance of breaking the Rosharan army right away. However, if Roshar was able to weather the initial conflicts against Koloss, they would likely win. Battles are won by experience, training and discipline (usually), and wars are won by infrastructure, medicine and food. Roshar has a huge advantage in those key fields. But Scadrial has Koloss. And Koloss don't follow normal rules. In the end, it would be very, very interesting. And make a ridiculously fun video game if done in the Total War series style: I can see it now! Total War: Cosmere. EDIT: Uhhh... Wow. I tend to geek out about these things. That's a long post. I'd be sorry, but it's just too interesting a topic for me! Cosmere AND military history? How can I resist! TL;DR - Roshar has a huge advantage in military training and experience. Scadrial has a huge advantage in magic. It would be a very even fight.

good job. upvote. here's a long one... A Tineye and his father are looking for a bar to drink in for the night. The father goes to walk into the first bar that they come to but his son stops him saying, "With my enhanced senses...I can tell that this place is dirty and cheap, despite the dim lights. We should go somewhere else." And off they go. His father goes to walk into the 2nd bar they come to, but his son stops him saying, "With my enhanced senses, I can tell from this far away that this place smells terrible. We should go somewhere else." Dad is a little irritated...but off they go. The father goes to walk into the 3rd bar that they come to, but his son stops him saying, "With my enhanced senses, I'm not going to be able to stand this place. It's obnoxiously noisy." The father says, "Fine! But you should be happy that I'm not a Tineye!" The son says, "Why?" Dad replies, "Because if I was as picky as you...I would have never knocked up your mother!"

Previously, in ​Way of Kings….. First off, this actually happened to me this morning. Kaladin sees someone unexpected in the sky. Teft makes a strange and disconcerting discovery. Jasnah gives Shallan a philosophy lesson. Brother Kabsal reveals his sense of humor. Bridge Four is under new management.