Leaderboard

There seems to be a worrying online trend of presuming bad intentions and bad personality traits whenever somebody makes even a small mistake in expressing their thoughts about these things, or simply doesn't have enough experience to fully understand things - or even just bc of small disagreements. It doesn't help anyone, it only pushes people further apart. Personally, until Brandon confirmed that Renarin is autistic, I was convinced he simply had social anxiety. His communication seemed totally fine when he was with his family and presumably more relaxed. In fact, I have mild social anxiety as an adult, not enough to prevent me from functioning relatively normally , but as a kid and a teenager I was maybe even more shy than Renarin. But when I expressed something similar on another forum I was attacked left and right and made look like a villain just because I don't understand all the intricacies of autism So once again, guys: what The Disporportionate is saying is not that they have a problem with multiple "queer" traits in a single character, but that Brandon, in his writing about them, might forget to focus on the more individual parts of their personalities, especially considering how little screen time they get. It is certainly in the interest of any minority to be presented as complex personalities rather than only based on their "queer" traits, no?

Guess what!

Izzy-daughter-Ammi needed a breath of fresh air. The building that housed their group and the precious Honorblades, while majestic, had a trapping feeling. Maybe it was all the dark corridors that people invariably got stabbed in. The combination of wooden structures and no Stormlight lamps meant nights were dark. On some days, it felt better that way. Izzy could look outside and see the sky scattered with stars. This wasn't really one of those days. She wasn't supposed to go outside, especially at night like this. Not with what she carried. Which is why she was on the rooftop instead of in But... watching the grass, bending yet resolute... was rather soothing. She listened for a gust of wind to make the grass blow. Instead Izzy heard the sounds of footsteps behind her. She stretched out her hand, but it was too late - the knife flashed, and the Honorblade she'd been about to summon clattered to the rooftop. Her dying eyes saw a single blade quiver in the field below. A blade quivered below. One quivered by her side. One quivered in her heart. It was almost poetry. The ominous kind. * * * Alvron has been killed! They were a member of the Shin High Council and the Bearer of Shalash's Honorblade! Shalash's Honorblade is available to be claimed by Alvron's killer! If it remains unclaimed, it will be redistributed at the end of the turn. * * * PMS ARE NOW CLOSED, and will remain closed until they are reopened. Please stop PMing or creating new PMs. (When PMs open again you can resume your old PMs, you don't have to start new ones. In fact, please don't do that... The Day Turn will end at 5:00 PM PST on December 21st, in about 48 hours. Get your actions in! Other Note: Ookla Season ends... today? tomorrow? So if you change your name back, please make a post in-thread saying so. It helps with @ functions and writing names and things. Honorblade List: Player List:

*leans over table* so I'm playing Pokemon, right, starting a new game in Alola, and on a whim I decide to play as a boy because why not. I'm only like halfway through the game and the 'he's and 'young man/boy's are annoying the heck out of me, like no, I'm a she, thanks, and sometimes I'm just straight-up surprised that I'm a guy in the game because I've just been imposing my own thoughts onto this kid. I imagine this happening for my entire life. Be nice to trans people and use the pronouns they hecking ask you to. Thanks for coming to my TED talk

I felt a treatise instantly jump to mind, but it's one of those ones where the thousand-word pictures are there and in line, but the actual words to describe it all are difficult to find.I'm gonna chalk it up to "I'm tired" but here's my attempt. I find it's rare to have a character like this in fantasy; where an intelligent, powerful woman isn't punished by the story for being competent. Jasnah feels amazing as a female reader, where I don't have to worry Brandon is going to decide she needs to be brought "low" for no reason, just because she "deserves" it or whatever. She is an extremely guarded person, because she is surrounded at all times by people who think she should be brought low - because she's a woman, an atheist, whatever - and she is constantly putting on her strongest face, because to let everyone know she's touchable is an opening to destroy her. A lot of people want to destroy her. She's seen as cold, and that's an effect of her persona, she doesn't emote or present her emotions - but she does have them. There is a disconnect between what she feels and what other people see in her that is so frustrating, when you're in her shoes. Better to let people think you're an emotionless witch, it serves her appearance of strength, and in the meantime she... quietly wonders whether she's making a mistake. But she lets her walls down occasionally - with Shallan on the boat in WoR, with Renarin at the end of OB... She's always planning, conniving, scheming - and while a lot of the people around her think she's invincible because of her skill in this, the reader knows she's afraid she's just barely ahead of the curve. This is textual, in fact, in the beginning of WoR, when she lets down her walls with Shallan. We know for a fact Jasnah is treading water, discovering secrets almost too late to be of real use - coming back to Urithiru when all of her expertise is no longer needed, the Heralds' open return making her years of hard work basically irrelevant. Jasnah is a woman desperate to use her abilities in a way that matters, and she's barely breaking even. All of her intelligence and ability honed to an edge, and she still doesn't get to swoop in and save the day deus ex machina style like she would be able to in another, weaker story. If you don't like Jasnah, you don't like Jasnah. On principle, I hate the term "Mary Sue" and I think it's illegitimate, but this thread isn't really the place. She's competent, but competence in a female character is not enough to make her a cardboard cut-out. Part of her character is based on the fact that she's very secondary, even tertiary, right now - she just isn't going to get the role where we experience her pathos with her until later. In the meantime, what Jasnah really is a woman who intentionally obscures who she really is in public and sometimes even with her family. She requires a second look to see beyond the persona.

WoK:

A lot of those tend to be super boring and characterless. And even crazy hacks tend to include at least token non-straight white male characters for diversity points/to gotcha critics these days. Freaking Tom Kratman had a female Latino protagonist in a book he wrote about Evil Lesbian Hillary Clinton being evil, and Tom Kratman thinks that the SS were good guys and the Jews are just sore losers (no, I'm not kidding, that's actually a plot point in a book that he wrote about the SS being heroes who bravely save the world from alien invasion, and yes, somehow that racist moron still gets published). It'd be nice if people would be a little less harsh towards genuine attempts to give healthy and supportive representation for marginalized groups in fiction, though. Even BS's weakest books in this regard (looking at Elantris with all of two female characters who actually matter and a very obviously 2000s approach to women's liberation that's about on the same level as the anvils Tamora Pierce was dropping in the '80s, before she wrote Protector of the Small and created the best female protagonist of any book I've ever read in Kel) at least have interesting, competent, well-written female protagonists (I still like to imagine that the lady who ran the gang in Elantris to protect the Hoed kids getting to be a Cognitive Shadow and being able to watch over her kid from the Cognitive Realm, I really liked her and wish she hadn't died). And considering we're talking about an author who grew up in the 1980s and 1990s in a conservative Plains state, I'm not surprised at all that it took him a while to feel comfortable writing LGBT characters in a respectful manner. And besides, isn't the whole point of the Stormlight Archive that you don't have to be perfect, you just have to genuinely try your best and get better bit by bit as you go?

According to what we know of Nightblood, when it kills Fused, they are completely gone. No Returns. Nothing left over. Nightblood killed the thunderclast Bob in the last book. People in Braize should be wondering "where the hell is our monster-mate Bob?". We can presume everybody, including Raboniel, should be hearing about this too. After all, a missing Fused is kind of a big deal for a bunch of immortals. Shouldn't Raboniel be hunting down Nightblood to help free her daughter? And since it kills Fused, it is logical it will also kill Radiant spren. Another of Raboniel's end goals. Maybe she wanted to get into Urithiru not because of Sibling, but because of Nightblood?

Notes for Books: D1: D1 first reads: Mild village: Matrim, Quinn Very mild village: Illwei, stink Very mild elim: Connie D1 Second Reads: Gears: Leaning Village SfS: Leaning Elim Araris: No solid read Lotus: Slight Elim Alvron: No read given Connie: No read given Notes: Gives reads on players (See above) Votes for Connie. Wants everyone to either vote or give reason for not voting. Later retraces vote. Reiterates request for everyone to vote so elims can’t control lynch. Plenty of discussion about Shaman and rules. Knows the rules quite well. Disagrees with Fura about Shaman recalling Blades and giving them to ‘trusted’ villagers as they believe the elims would target trusted players. Overall, some good villager advice. Votes for Illwei claiming that the interaction between Connie and Illwei doesn’t seem v/v so one is likely elim. (Illwei later turned up village) Removes vote from Illwei. Doesn’t see Connie as elim anymore but will likely vote for either Connie or Illwei before end of cycle. Gives second reads on players (See above) Removes vote from Lotus and votes for Danex. Feels Danex has better chance of being lynched and wants vote to matter. Books doesn’t post again after Voting chaos starts. D2: Expresses suspicion of Matrim Votes for Experience Tags everyone who hasn’t voted and asks for their reads. (At this stage Ventyl and Araris had two votes and Experience has 3. Seems disappointed day ends in a tied lynch again and says vote manipulation will likely be involved. N2: Doesn’t like ties. Clear sign of evilness! Votes against the vote against ties and wants a tie in this for the irony. Maybe not such a bad guy after all. Several rule talks posts. D3: Unsure between Connie and Fura lynch. Trusts Mat so won’t vote Connie but doesn’t get either village or elim read on Fura. Might be willing to join in Ventyl lynch due to vote manipulations last round.. Doesn’t vote at this stage. Votes on Lotus though notes it likely won’t make a difference D4: Votes for SfS. Wonders how they knew Matrim reads were at least a third wrong. Removes vote shortly after once SfS explains their reasoning/joke. Doesn’t vote/post again. D5: Confused about Fura’s post. Busy with essay. (Hope it went well.) Overall: Imo, Books played a very solid elim game. Didn’t really defend anyone except Ventyl and even then was light defense. Gave good solid advice and rules interpretations/corrections. Tries to keep everyone voting and with good reasons. If Ventyl wasn’t dead, would very likely still be alive and considered village. A very good player. Keep an eye on Books in future games.

I love OSP. I think something she doesn't get into much though is the fan reactions. Identifying the impact of the "baseline" character traits in aggregate on characterization is a good exercise, but it's definitely true that characters that do not fit all the 'default' boxes because they are female, gay, neuro-atypical, etc. are more likely to be criticized for being 'flat' or 'defined by their attributes' then characters who are defined by accepted 'default' attributes. I like what she says about 'default' attributes being somewhat invisible, and so maybe that's where it comes from. The more I think about this, the more I get turned around by the idea that some characteristics are seen as adding to a character or developing them, making them more three dimensional (quirks, talents, unique ways of thinking) whereas others are seen as making characters more one dimensional. I definitely see this where a person has one defining character trait (gay, female) and no other distinctive traits, but I think aversion to these one note attempts at representation might make us over-zealous at times at policing representation in fiction. The gay character is not one note because they are gay - they are one note because they are ONLY gay. The absence of defining character traits is difficult to look for (its easier to spot the presence of something than its absence) - so maybe our brains tend to scrutinize non-hegemonic character traits more closely as a short hand. Past experience tells us authors are more likely to cut corners with secondary minority representation characters, so we scrutinize those characters more heavily for complex characterization than we do for straight white cis neurotypical male characters, because we expect those 'default' main characters to be more fleshed out (even if they often really aren't). This is meant to argue anything - just musing on different reactions. Anyways, applying this to Rlain and Renarin - I think we've already seen a lot of both of them. We know Renarin puts family first to a fault, is clever and observant, prefers to let other take the lead but gets frustrated not being listened to, and deals with a lot of fear and anxiety at times. He is hard working and willing to try things he is not good at. We also know his is autistic, and now that he has an attraction to another male character. We know Rlain is willing to give people the benefit of the doubt, but still stands up for himself. We know he is very open to meeting new people and learning about people who are different from him. We know he is compassionate and brave. He is principled and dislikes deceit and liars, but can be pragmatic and shows willingness to work with people he doesn't like for the greater good. He is also a Listener who had a bad experience with mateform and may reciprocate Renarin's feelings. Basically, I guess my point is, whether or not these characteristics are revealed through a narrative dominated by a particular theme (such as being an outcast), they are still multiple dimensions of these characters. Adding a new axis on which to examine the character, like a romantic one, should be an opportunity to examine the different facets in a new light and expose new ones. Issues with exploring different characteristics can exist independently of a character's identity intersections, and no matter how many match the 'default' baseline. [Sidebar] Lastly (sorry for the essay - I just find this stuff really interesting), I think the earlier comment about people assuming the worst when people make certain statements can apply multiple ways. Yes - its easy to get emotional and assume the worst in someone when your reading of their statement upsets you. I think its also easy to mistake an emotional response from someone who cares a lot about an issue, or for who the matter being discussed hits very close to home, and assume it is a personal attack when it isn't. As I wrote in our guide to contentious topics, I think, aside from some extreme exceptions, it's generally best to assume the best of people on all sides. When I read something as problematic or offensive, I like to assume the person didn't intend it that way and offer polite correction. When something feels like a personal attack, I like to take a moment to examine my defensiveness, and see if it's actually less about what the person who is disagreeing with me is saying, and more about my own insecurity or discomfort knowing that I might not have worded my point as intended, or made a comment unsupported by my education or experience. [/End Sidebar] Obviously I find this all very interesting, particularly because of its application to Rlain and Renarin, who I absolutely adore. Sorry if this is too off topic haha.

One ting to add here that I didn't see mentioned: When Raboniel and Navani discuss how they people of Urithiru have been using Stormlight to make the crops grow, Raboniel mentions that Lifelight actually works better. it seems reasonable then that lifelight would probably be a better fuel for progression as well, so that might be part of what allows Lift to push past the supression, in addition to some or all of the other things mentioned.

You are completely correct that if he took the fight seriously he could have ended Vin instantly. But he didn't take the fight seriously. He was so confident in his abilities and immortality that he didn't see a reason to really fight. Basically, imagine there's an ant walking across your floor and you try to crush it. You're not going to fight an ant like you fight a person, where you have to keep up your guard and anticipate what they're going to do and figure out the best way to strike back. Now imagine that ant in less than a second grew to human size and punched you in the stomach. You probably wouldn't be in a circumstance to anticipate and guard against that, even if you probably could have had you been expecting it. That's what happened with the Lord Ruler. A little nothing that was no threat to him became actually capable of hurting him for a brief moment while he was unprepared, and in the end only that moment mattered. The fact that if he had been prepared, and say been tapping speed, is ultimately pointless because he saw no need to do that just to deal with a simple mistborn.

And that's a wrap on Ookla season 2020!

As far as Lirin goes, thank everything holy for Hessina. Maybe it should have been obvious but if it wasn't for her I probably never would have realized that Lirin has the exact same hangup regarding Tien that Kaladin has. He blames himself for his son's death. He even has more justification for it than Kaladin. He could have caved on the spheres. He could have moved away. He could have let the knife slip on that operating table. Note that I do not blame him for any of these decisions. In many ways Kaladin would not have become the guy we all love had his father wavered in his moral character when things got tough. But I can understand that he feels that he failed his family, that he failed his then-youngest son. Therefore the actions he takes after Tien's death, the stances he adopts, are totally reactionary to past trauma. It makes him a dark mirror to Kaladin in some respects. That being said, I can admit Lirin is well written. I'm aware that Brandon pulled all the heartstrings, that I'm supposed to hate him in this book. I can even see the realism, for we often hurt those closest to us, if for no other reason than we know where the the armor is thinnest. And I can appreciate that with an assist from Hessina he was able to give his kid a break and eventuallycome tosome common ground. I can know all of these things, understand all these things, yet still want to punch Lirin repeatedly in the face until my hand bleeds. And part of that is reflexively trying to defend Kaladin. I can acknowledge that. But there's things you just don't say to someone with PTSD. There's things that you just don't say to heroes. And really Lirin, read the flipping room for crying out loud. You're determined to be the only human on Roshar that isn't proud of Kaladin or respects his accomplishments. Hell, Moash is probably the worst person ever. Even he loves Kaladin, albeit in a stupidly twisted way. Do better Lirin, BE better. I actually used to like you.

Renarin and Rlain was one of the things I was most excited about after finishing RoW, so I am vibrating over the news. I have to say, it feels very validating for subtext to be acknowledged as intentional and legitimate. Often I find writers will include queer subtext without meaning to, or the worse ones include it just to string queer fans along with no intention of giving a pay off in the end - so it's just super exciting to know Brandon is foreshadowing this intentionally. For me the argument of a character being crammed full of two many 'isms' doesn't really carry much water (I didn't love Brandon's use of it in his annotation about Jasnah either). Everyone is crammed full of isms. Even the stereotypical "straight white cisgender male" is full of isms, they just happen to be ones that are associated with the hegemonic norms. Identities are intersectional, so I have no issue with Brandon exploring intersectional identities in his books. I think representation-wise this only becomes an issue if there is only ONE minority character meant to represent as many minority groups as possible. Here we have lots of characters with diverse race, gender, and sexuality identities, so I don't see intersectionality used in this way to be an issue. EDIT: It's interesting that the reverse argument never comes up - you never see characters with multiple hegemonic norms brought up as lacking individual character. I've never seen anyone say there's no room in Kelsier or Elend for individual characterization because of their straight white cisgender neurotypical male-ness, so I'm confused why it would be an issue for queer characters. Now I'm just excited for Renarin telling Adolin about his crush, because that's going to be just the most wholesome thing ever. I don't think it'll earn screen time, but I'm also head canoning brunch between Renarin and Rlain and Drehy and Dru because imagining them taking some time to fondly kvetch about the heterosexual nonsense of the rest of Bridge Four would just be super fun and relateable.

Points to consider: He's noted to have an obsession with escaping and disappearing, in line with the Willshaper emphasis on freedom and independence. He leads a resistance group against an oppressive and invading government, again in line with Willshaper principles. We several times see him vanish or appear without any sign of him actually arriving/departing, almost as though he's teleporting somehow. While the majority of the Reachers are obviously choosing to back the listeners this time around, we've seen that spren aren't monolithic, so the idea of a rogue Reacher deciding to bond a human is not improbable.

Adhesion is "the truest surge of Honor". Progression seems to be the equivalent for Cultivation, judging from Lift's experience. Is there a surge that is particularly close to Odium and why is it Division? *side-eyes the Skybreakers and Dustbringers* *side-eyes the name "Division* *side-eyes the most likely candidate for the Surge of Honey I Blew Up The Planet* Yeah, it's Division, isn't it?

First time posting here. Hi, everyone. So I just happened to randomly notice today ...in the Gathas, there are seven Amesha Spenta, that is "emanations" of the creator, Ahura Mazda. Two of them are Vairya and Armaiti--that is, Devotion and Dominion. That same article on Zoroastrianism also mentioned that theYasna is a ceremony to strengthen Creation against the forces working to destroy it. Coincidence? Well, maybe. I thought it was interesting, though.

Hello 17thShard! What is your Intent? I'm Osvibu, chiming in from Spain so excuse my english Reading has always been a passion for me, specially Sci-Fi (Asimov, Anderson, Adams...) and Fantasy (Tolkien, Pulman, Tad Williams...). I'm also into videogames (Nintendo, Total War and Single Player) and Film and TV. I guess this is a common build During these past 18 months I have read most of Brandon's books (The Rithmatist is angrily looking at me from my shelf) and he has become my favourite author. No question at all. I'm in love with the concept of the Cosmere and find its "reality system" fascinating. As well, I am really interested in how Brandon is using this world to present and put in dialoge diferent morality and belief systems. On top of that, and I wasn't expecting it, but I have become a fan of Brandon himself. I just admire the way that he seems to have a plan and the way he deeply cares and respects his fandom. I have yet to hear him say or read something about him that makes me think less of him. All in all, that's me... Listening to the recent Shardcasts made me join so I am looking forward to be part of the community. PS: Here is my Snadershelf though ROW and WOT couldn't fit the photo. Best!

Questioner How would a mistwraith bond with a spren? Would he use a gemheart, oaths, or songs like the listeners? Brandon Sanderson *Brandon motions for Joel to hold up the RAFO sign*

Yep, one of the most exciting things about this is the high probability of Rlain being a key character in the back 5. I also wonder whether he has the same combination of powers as Renarin - or if he has Illumination and another power instead of Progression, so the other way around.

At the risk of missing something here's my comment without reading everything. Outcasts band together. RenarinXRlain has to be the ship that makes the most sense. Also I bet the both get a ton more characterization in the back half where Renarin will be a much bigger deal.

"The time of the Ookla is over — my people are leaving these shores. Who will you look to when we've gone? The roleplayers? They hide in their mountains seeking riches — they care nothing for the troubles of others."

I know there is no logical way for it to work, but I want fifth ideal to grant a Ryshadium somehow.

Ookla Season #1: Success!

I gotcha covered, fam

Veil is not gone, Veil is integrated. Which means she is more a part of real Shallan now than she was before. I'm curious what happens next ...

I think Lirin is a great character. I don’t know how Brandon manages to write the Father-Son relationship so well. The man’s a genius. Anyway, I think Lirin is a good person in-world as well. He’s written in an antagonistic way, but that doesn’t make him a bad person. If we saw the entirety of Stormlight through Lirin’s eyes, and then saw Kaladin for the first time in the same way, a lot of us would probably hate Kal. I saw a lot of people are surprised at Hesina too, because she wouldn’t stand up for Kal. I think she knows Lirin a lot better than any of us do, and she knew that he wouldn’t actually turn his own son in to the Fused. Also, I’m reading the thread more thoroughly, and I think it’s funny how you can kinda infer what people’s relationships with their own fathers are via their opinion of Lirin. Very interesting.

So, lots of people have pointed out that gay autistic people do actually exist (some of us are even trans on top of all of that. I can confirm I am incredibly boring I have no personality I am simply here for the woke points) I just have two questions for you. First: We see that Kaladin has depression and has since he was a young boy, He's also got PTSD that obviously developed later in his life. Is there room for his "actually personality?" Even if it is a facet of his PTSD was there room for Teft to have a personality between his PTSD and addiction? What about when Renarin was Autistic and also had epilepsy did he have an "actual personality" then? Second: Sanderson said he already has laid the groundwork for this relationship, that he wants it to be obvious to us now that Renarin has a crush on Rlain. This means that Renarin is already queer, it's not "coming later" he already has the crush. So, when did he lose his personality? if you are so sure that a character can not be both autistic and queer with out loseing room for their actual personalities when did Renarin lose his? He's been Autistic and Queer for the last two books, at what point did those things become so cumbersome that there was no room left for him to have an "Actual personlity?" Being autistic is part of who Renarin is, that IS part of his personality. Being shy, not being able to say the right thing, being interested in "feminine" things, those are all part of his personality, AND they are part of his autism. Similarly Rlain's personality is dependent on the things that make him an "outcast" if he were not a listener he would not be who he is. That's the whole point, who you are and how society sees you shapes your personality, it shapes who you are. Renarin isn't just gonna stop being Renarin and start, idk, dressing in drag or whatever gay men on Roshar do. Why? Because that's not who he is, that's not part of his personality. At any rate I'm incredibly excited, my poor friends, most of whom have never read these books, have had to deal with me talking about this all day because I didn't think I was going to ever see an autistic queer man in something that wasn't YA. I really did not think I would get to see an autistic queer man in an adult fantasy series. But here we are. Depressed, hetero, AND has PTSD, there's just too much going on in his character there's no room for him to have a personality now :((((

I've always considered our favorite Herdazian General to be a budding Dustbringer instead. He almost supernaturally slips out of cuffs, rooms, ect. His personality, forever poking at Dalinar, laughing at chaos, and having moments that show his gooey sentimental center look like both Malata and the Dustbringer entries in the Gem Archive by turns. Lastly he takes responsibility for his country even though it's occupied, and the Dustbringer oaths are themed towards responsibility. I will say however that Willshaper seems just as valid considering the arguments brought up by OP. All we know now is he doesn't have a spren yet.

Last status update for a while, I swear on my books and the many characters who are all very dear to me who reside within their pages. I'm leaving tomorrow to go on a short trip. I'll try to check in in the morning, but that might not happen. But I'll be back on Tuesday evening, Wednesday at the latest. Good thing I already finished my secret santa thing. I probably wouldn't have time if I had put it off... Happy holidays!

I didn't want to put this in the art gallery since its spoilery, but here ya go

I completely agree. My worry is that Rlain’s ‘outcast theme’ is going to end up being his one and only theme. That isn’t the main critique really, it isn’t the the ‘focusing on being an outcast’ that concerns me, it’s the ‘only focusing on being an outcast’. I’d have the exact same opinion about Rlain if, instead of focusing on his ‘outcastness’ Brandon was focusing on how much Rlain loves to paint. It isn’t the specific thing that is being focused on that I’m worried about, it’s the fact that it seems like that is the only thing that’s being focused on. Which makes me really confused as to how so many people so drastically misunderstood me. This is how the thread has gone from my POV: Me: I’m worried Brandon might be starting to focus too much on this one aspect of this one character. Everyone Else: So you’re a bigot then. This is a good point, hopefully this will be the case.

I'm here for that, too! Or Adolin decides that he's going to pay for the best restaurant available during the apocalypse, and he will personally monitor the service to make sure it's the best (because Adolin Kholin's brother deserves the absolute very best, storm it), and Renarin and Rlain spend the whole time politely ignoring the incredibly obvious dork making sure that literally everything is absolutely perfect from the next room. Or Shallan distracts Adolin with a fake mission with her and Kaladin, but one of the bad guys kidnaps them or something so they end up having a dramatic adventure and sleeping in a cave together and they stumble back through the Oathgate the next morning battered and bruised with Adolin wearing a rust-eating grin and Kaladin refusing to speak of what happened and Dalinar and Navani are like "WTF were the kids doing?" and Dalinar is like "well at least Renarin can do this courting thing right, now to be Very Tolerant of his extremely unusual choice of date" and Navani is like "you do that, Dalinar, I need to talk to your other kid" and Shallan makes Adolin stay tight-lipped for Kaladin's sake. Or Bridge 4 decide to do the cooking and so Numuhukuakiaki'aialunamor gives them something specifically designed and served so that they have to share it in a super romantic way and Sigzil takes notes on Alethi and listener courting traditions from an unobtrusive spot in the corner and Kaladin comes looking for his men and ends up apologizing for interrupting the date but Renarin says that honestly it's not that big a deal and really, Highmarshal, you should try dating yourself, it's good to have somebody in addition to a spren to share your troubles with, and Syl materializes to agree emphatically and Kaladin flushes red as a beet. Or...look, I'm here for literally any lightly comedic soft gay softness. It's been a storming terrible couple of years and I just want these poor screwed-up characters to be happy.

What about "Adolin gives Renarin dating advice and then Shallan points put Adolin doesn't have a great track record, and then Pattern says something hilarious" - honestly there's so much great potential.

Arguing that Rlain being gay would make him more of an outcast is kind of weird since homosexuality isn't even marginalized within Alethi society. I really don't think that argument stands up within the context of the story, lmao... you can argue readers would treat him as more of an outcast, I guess, but that's not something that the characters would do.

Finally completed this novel. I have got to say that if this novel was only of 500 pages it might have been enjoyable. All the talks of cosmere science in Navani's POV could have been reduced by a great length. Stress on Kaladin's mental state was repetitive.

I got a question answered! And it wasn't a RAFO! YES!!! I had to use my mom's phone (and Youtube account) so the name attached isn't mine. I'll post it here once it goes through Arcanum.

Here are some reasons why Jasnah is awesome: Jasnah "Abraham Lincoln" Kholin. More political stuff: Kaladin doesn't get along with her. And yet... Jasnah is awesome because her morality is a rational, reasoned one. She's the quintessential philosopher-king. She's what Taravangian wants to be: relentless, almost ruthless pragmatism nevertheless tempered with altruistic motivations. By defying the prediction, Jasnah probably saved Roshar if not the Cosmere here. The fact that she was in position to make such a decision is also a testament to the methodical scholarship to recognize that there was something dangerous about Renarin; the decision she makes is what makes her a better Taravangian. Despite her awesomeness, I would argue against the claim of her sue-ness. First, Jasnah has relatively small direct impact on the plot given her ability: she's missing for essentially all of WoR and a significant chunk of Oathbringer. This puts her somewhat behind despite her massive initial lead, something she acknowledges in Oathbringer: Second, not everyone likes Jasnah. As noted above, Kaladin doesn't get along with her very well. Shallan forces herself onto Elhokar's mission team to get away from her. Her highprinces certainly have issues with her policies. Navani is pretty ambivalent considering she's Jasnah's own mother. Dalinar does get along very well with her, but this was noted as far back as TWoK; it's not a sudden development: It may feel like everyone has a high opinion of Jasnah in RoW, but this is mainly because she's interacting primarily with Dalinar and Wit, and to a lesser degree the other monarchs. Finally, Jasnah's not immune to making mistakes, and there's plenty of things that she's not necessarily an expert in; the most immediately applicable is that she's not particularly good in personal combat. Her surgebinding makes her incredibly lethal, but she's not able to automatically become proficient in battle in general: Fundamentally, though, Jasnah is awesome because she's the best person to be leading your country.

A hallway of corpses strewn out behind her, Trace kept walking. The house was on fire now; pity, it would probably help hide the evidence. Before pushing through what looked like the door to the master bedroom, Trace fingered her dagger. She had no idea what lay inside. She tried waiting for her power to build, but that proved to be annoying. Trace flipped over her dagger, took a breath, then stabbed it into her arm. She screamed in pain, but it seemed to do the trick. It took even more willpower just to pull it out, though; blood, pent up behind the knife blade, spilled out onto the floor. After that, it streamed down steadily, leaving her arm red. Power stored, Trace was ready to go. She pushed open the door. Two guards were the only defenses. They were dead in seconds; one by her dagger, the other by a burst of power to the chest. So she didn’t need to do all that preparation. She healed herself by blowing the wall clean off, letting in a crisp breeze that contrasted the fire building up throughout the house. A terrified-looking man clutched a sword, shivering a nightgown and shaking uncontrollably. “You did this?” He demanded. “You’re just a child!” Trace retrieved her dagger, walking forwards calmly. “The body I’m in is, sure. I’m closer to a thousand years old.” The man was quiet for a moment, then said, “you’re here for me?” “Yep. Any last words?” He yelled what sounded like a battle cry, running at Trace. He swung his sword awkwardly; an attack easily dodged. It still grazed her arm, though, leaving a thin line of blood imperceivable against the red already there. He stumbled forwards, and Trace held out her dagger for him to fall into. He gasped, clutching his chest and coughing up blood. The nobleman didn’t scream; it seemed that he wasn’t capable of doing so. He just fell over, coughing a few more times before going quiet. With the house burning behind her, Trace hopped out the hole in the wall. She might’ve dislocated her ankle by the fall, but she healed herself of any wounds she might’ve received by releasing another burst of power behind her, shattering a modest portion of the house. The small cut the nobleman had given her was still there, however; curious. Trace walked over to where Cruz had been standing, looking around to try and spot him. While she waited, she grabbed a mostly unburnt curtain from the house, using it to soak up the blood covering her arms. “Cruz?” She asked. “Assassin guy?”

Comments. (page 1) - First line is rather passive. Is W opening the door? Suggest you make them active in this. Also, does the handle squeak, or make some noise? Or, show W being competent and smearing some grease on it in case it makes a noise, or some sap from a nearby tree. Super competent, and more interesting/active. - "perfectly puffed pillows" - alteration throw-down; three to beat. - "stuck their tongue out" - Huh? Why? Also, this second paragraph is a bit jumbly, doesn't flow well, IMO. - "Holding an illusion for the environment around them, and a concealing glamour around their body" - What is the illusion doing? Confused. Why is it needed if their appearance is glamoured? - "would have garnered suspicious...?" - missing word - "Life was so much simpler when they could use glamours or illusions to boost their disguise, instead of leaning on their magic to provide it" - Confused again. So, are glamours and illusions not magic? And is their disguise physical/real then, since it requires boosting? I'm not following all the different things going on here. It's too complicated, IMO. - "There were many columns in the mansion’s master bedroom, holding up the arched ceiling" - Architecture problem: an arch is a structural element that, by definition, has no internal supports. Kind of the point of ceilings is to avoid having posts and columns, and most rooms will not be big enough to need internal support, especially not a bedroom, which is unlikely to be a big enough span that normal floor joists / beams would not be able to span without support. (different-types-of-ceilings) - "found the one that with an almost invisible crack" - typo. - "sticking their stiletto under a small gap where the cauking was missing" - (1) into a small gap, I'd say. How do you put something under a gap?; (2) 'caulking' - sp.; (3) caulking is a waterproof sealant, but this is not a bathroom. Grout would be the usual substance used to fill the gaps between floor tiles, in my experience of re-grouting both our kitchen and bath floors. (page 2) - "leveraging the heavy tile upwards" - levering. As a verb, leveraging is something you do in business, using borrowed capital to make another investment in the expectation that the returns will be greater than the interest you have to pay on the original loan, leaving you with a profit. IMO, this is the only meaning of leverage as a verb. - "Each One lock pick was enough to earn W the death penalty if caught" - "resources the BK had spent to find the location of locate the crystal" - Simple is best, usually. (page 3) - "gone out, and nearly gotten himself assassinated..." - Ahhhh. This is a satisfying callback to you-know-when. - "tisking silently" - I usually see it as 'tsk' and therefore 'tsking'. Also, I'm not sure it's 'tsking' if it's silent, since the word is onomatopoeia that comes form the sound itself. Taking away the sound and how can the word still apply? - "glamours and illusions" - Why both? I don't understand. - "to reset the chest and tile" - There was no mention of a chest, W took the crystal from the hidden compartment. Oh, is that the lock they were picking? Better mention the chest, or removing the chest and mention a locked door. - "There wasn’t time to reset the chest and tile, not if they were going to be able to slip the rubbings into the right vase as backup in case they were caught" - A smidge overwritten, IMO. - "Leaves us all the time in the world" - Awkward using two phrases that centre around the word time, one after another. - "stirred into motion" - But lame. I want more drama, more agitation: uproar, stramash, frenzy, outrage! - "had excussed himself" - typo. (page 4) - "Ir paused to ask a servant for directions" - Once you establish we're in Ir's POV, you don't need to use her name again, unless another character comes into it, and then to reassert her POV. I think it's a lot more immersive if you just use the female pronouns. I think it makes the POV feel close, or maybe rather makes the reader feel close to Ir, that the don't need to be reminded of her name. They are not going to forget that. - "Silently cursing the idiocy of the rich" - Cheap shot. The (so-called) rich are not any more idiotic than 'non-rich' people. 'Non-rich' people might (and I'm pretty sure do) have just as many dumb ideas, but perhaps don't have the funds to implement them. In this case, a struggling cooper might attempt to supplement his/her income by producing huge uncomfortable seats from old barrels. The particular bad idea does not rely on being rich to implement it. Lowest common denominator philosophy is not, I think, a good way to convince an editor that an author has interesting things to say about life, and the human condition. - "Her back gave a satisfying pop" - Yaaaargh, <cringe>. - "How much room did one family need?" - How big is the family? How large is the extended family? How often do they entertain? Do they run retreats, host wine holidays, multiple day tasting tours? Maybe the put up the harvesting crews. I'm sure they do. Not in the main house, of course. - "now covered in ants" - lovely detail. (page 5) - "If they was discovered" - grammar typo. - "the BK would be caught as well. His entire entourage could be in trouble" - No, I don't buy this. Okay, the BK will be caught, and would be embarrassed, but he's the king, he can do what he likes. No one is going to impeach him (for example ). Imagine the FSB (Russian domestic security service, their FBI essentially) getting caught bugging some Russian business man? Boo-hoo. Would Vlad Putin be embarrassed? I suspect not. Incident brushed under the carpet, move on. - "What would happen in B if the R got wind..." - Yes, okay, but BK has put down one attempt revolt already. I don't think he really faces any real threat from the rebels. - "Heart hammering, she starred at W" - Typo: 'stared'. - "whatever disguise was hidden under the bush" - Okay, I get that using glamour and/or illusions is taxing, and a physical disguise will be required sometimes just because of the logistic and cost of magic use, BUT, was it not mentioned when they broke in that W was wearing a disguise under the glamour+illusion? Doesn't that imply they changed from one physical servant disguise into a different physical servant disguise in order to break in? Yes, yes! Because they were thinking that it would look 'odd' if a servant was spotted on the roof. So, why have they gone to the trouble of changing from one servant disguise into a different one? This seems bizarrely overcomplicated, OR, I'm misinterpreting something. - "“What can I do?”" - I do like her proactivity, and I believe that she would do this, always ready to help anyone in need if she can. - "Too soon, the entire place would be being searched for whatever valuable" - Awkward > 'be being'. 'Any moment, Gre would start turning the place upside down searching for...' (for example). (page 6) - "clambered over the ugly barrel bench and onto the roof. ” " - Stray inverted commas at the end here. - "who W most certainly stole from" - confusing: Gre or the wife? And how does Ir know this 'most certainly'? (page 7) - "Guests were milling about, watching the drama Gr’s wife was causing with venomous eagerness. The rumor mill was already turning. She mimicked the servants and waiters, trying to look like she too wanted to avoid confrontation." - Okay, I feel I've been commenting a lot on this recently, and so I using this as a more general example, if you don't mind, @Snakenaps. I think that when one uses a name, or demarcates a clear individual (Gr's wife), the next pronoun needs to reflect that. So, in this case, I think 'She' sounds as if it refers to Gr's wife. In this case, I would replace 'She' with Ir. However, if there is no other character being referred to, or even no other female character in the scene, it's only necessary to refer to Ir maybe once per page, and use general female pronouns almost exclusively. I think that makes the narrative more personal, puts the reader as close as possible to Ir's thoughts, because, clearly Ir will not think of herself by her name, but rather in terms of general pronouns (she, my, etc.). - "griffin guard came down the line" - Who does the guard work for? - "neatly folded in her waistband. she wiped her clammy hands" - typo: missing capital. - "No one knew what had been taken" - Someone must know if they're searching for paper tucked in a waistband. (page 8) - "I just got to make sure that none of them are secretly spies from another winery" - (a) 'I've just got to make sure'; (b) I think secret goes without saying. Wouldn't be a very good spy if they were in public. - "His eyes passed over Ir without a second glance, just like they had done to everyone else. W had told the BK she had the scroll, right? Or did he not know?" - I think these lines are contradictory. First sentence, fine, no issue; (a) this wording I struggle to associate with the movement of eyes: it's the word 'they', I think, which sounds like the gender neutral pronoun in this case. If it was me, I'd word it as 'the same as everyone else', I think, removing the pronoun; (b) These two questions are misleading, or maybe rather dense. The BK would be insane to give an sign of recognition to Ir in this situation. She cannot draw conclusions to either of those questions, because the BK's reaction to her would be the same whether either answer was yes or no. - "She sincerely doubted they were simply charms to improve wine, but the Black King wouldn’t be interested in something like that" - This second thought follows directly from the first one, it is not contrary to it. - "Had they taken the trip just for this information?" - Now this is a smart thought. I'm not sure it has the impact is deserves, because of the wording. Just to play around with it, for suggesting purposes, 'Had the whole trip been for just this one piece of information?' - Here are three words that all stress the premise of the question, building it up so that it sounds more like a key discovering on Ir's part. (page 9) - "These thoughts tumbled over and over her mind" - I didn't get the sense of this thought on the first read through. - "It’s ridiculous what the rich will get their tails in a knot over." - Consider it another way. Gr's whole business is dependent on his commercial secrets. Imagine if someone broke into the Coke laboratory and stole the formula? You'd expect them to react in order to protect their business. It's certainly not a disproportionate reaction, IMO. - "as she missed the well-loved topic" - I don't understand the meaning here. - "She hoped J thought that most of her worries were over her family, and not about something else" - Why 'most of'? Doesn't add anything, IMO. (page 10) - There are a few contradictory statements on this page: (1) - "It was pitch black outside, except for the occasional lantern" - Hmph, I mean not really pitch black then. (2) - "could see an equine form lit by one" - I feel it was pitch black, she would not be able to see anything. Pitch black, for me, is being in a cellar with no light. (3) - "Except for his silhouette, the BK melted into the night" - But being silhouetted is the exact opposite of melting into the night, it's being illuminated for all to see. - "a touch of curiosity, of excitement" - I feel this is a nicely timed reveal, after her acting to aid W instinctively. It's a good place for such a realisation, here at the end of the chapter. (page 11) (4) - "The sounds of a sleeping city echoed around them" - If the city's sleeping, what sounds can she hear? - "getting any answers for a project" - I'd say 'answers about a project' - "this entire trip had been orchestrated for that tiny scroll of charms" - She's asked herself this exact question before, so this repetition doesn't sound right. I think she needs to 'reconsider' this point, acknowledging in the phrasing that she has asked herself before, probably only an hour ago (or two?). It's as simple as 'So, had the entire trip been orchestrated...etc.' - Oh, it's the last line of the chapter. That really doesn't work for me when asked herself this question before. Been if she hadn't, it still doesn't work as the last line of the chapter, IMO. Overall I really do like this chapter. Honestly, I can't tell a great difference from when I read it before, but that's neither here nor there, I think. I recognise that Ir has more agency, and I do like her taking the initiative, then recognising afterwards that she's less scared of the BK, acknowledging her curiosity. Good stuff. It really does open up a door for Ir's progress as a character. There would be no harm in her forming a fascination with the work that W does. That really would propel her forward, but either way, I'm happy with this.

Here's the inscription Brandon left for me in my copy of Rhythm of War... "Adonalsium was not mad at the Shattering - more sad...'

I know, Dalinar-Adolin-Renarin-Jasnah-Navani are some of my favorite Kholins as main characters, but for me it's always Evi who'll triumph over them as 'in the' family. She's the purest character I've ever read and her sheer strength has been undermined throughout whole book. She travelled to another end of world, married to a warlord who thirsted for battle more than love and then did whatever she could to blend into Alethi culture even though she was always strown as an object of mockery by Vorin women (looking at you Navani and Ialai). Evi was left-handed but she freaking changed it along with her accent! She raised Adolin and Renarin in absence of Dalinar, and now you wonder why both of these boys also have a gentle heart and do not relish like their father used to. No matter whatever came forth, she always loved her husband and family fiercely. And it was because of Evi's distant echoing strength, Dalinar was able to speak his third Ideal and push back against Odium. I know the Kholins are our favorite but we should never forget this women whose direct and indirect presence pull strings of this story together for this family.

It's been a while since I've been theorizing! It's time to change that. This treatise--and it is a treatise; it is way too long--has a long history in my mind, and now it is finally time for me to actually put it down in writing. (The graph also took forever to figure out how to do, but I finally got it to work. Yes, there's a graph in this theory.) Introduction There is a wide variance in magic in the cosmere, but it has never been clear why some magics might be more related to one than another. Considering Words of Radiance, we know that Stormlight and Breath are similar in many ways. In this exhaustive classification scheme, we will rigorously describe how cosmere magics differ, using Realmatic reasoning, and also provide a high level view on how these magics came into being, and why they act as they do. (Look, I know I should be calling them Investitures or manifestations of Investiture, but I'm going to go with magic systems for now because it is just less clunky than "manifestations of Investiture," okay?) These ideas began, as many things with me do, with a conversation with Windrunner. When we read Words of Radiance, we had many thoughts, and we started comparing magic systems. What makes one stronger than another? The Spiritual fuel is important, but what of spren? In this scheme, I said that Allomancy and Surgebinding was probably the most "powerful" of the magics, but for different reasons. Allomancy was very restrictive, but because it was so restrictive, its effects could be much more impressive. AonDor was also very powerful in its own way, but while flexible, it required a great deal of preparation. So I supposed that maybe there's a "Power" axis and a "Preparation" axis. BioChroma would be of more middling power, but require less preparation. This seemed like a sensible way of organizing the magics together from a high level. But, I had never been satisfied with these terms, as they had no relation with any other cosmere terms. And more importantly, something seemed… missing, somehow. It turned out there were more precise axes to use: Realmatics. We throw terms around like Physical, Cognitive, and Spiritual, but we don't know what they mean as much. But with Emperor's Soul, we know more, and now I'm going to relate these in classifying cosmere magics. Two axes seemed too few, so let's go with three, the typical Physical, Cognitive, and Spiritual. In fact, there are good reasons to use these as attributes. In Words of Radiance, the writer of the Ars Arcanum uses it to describe Lightweaving: Of course, this by itself, is not a new idea. A long-espoused idea is that All Magics have Three Parts. But that theory didn't go far enough. Why? Magics are not equally rooted all three Realms. Time for a short digression on my philosophy on magic: every magic is essentially a Realmatic exchange. Power--Investiture--is moved or transformed from one Realm, say the Spiritual, to a different Realm, like the Physical. Not all magics have the same Realmatic exchange between Realms, but there's always some sort of interaction between all three Realms. For this to happen, a magic system has to be partially embedded in each Realm. Think of it like a chemical reaction: you have three different pots and with the right conditions, you cause a reaction between these three pots, causing various effects. This is not entirely relevant to this theory, but to me it seems to be an interesting way of thinking about magic. It's more fundamental, and to me explains the reasoning why magics need to have roots in all three Realms. It seems obvious that magics will be rooted in each Realm differently. Awakening has a strong Cognitive component that Allomancy does not. Surgebinding requires a Spiritual connection, and is totally different from Awakening and Allomancy. Three different magics, three different distributions in which Realms the magics are rooted. I think the idea of a "focus" can also be fit into this classification scheme. Originally, without Roshar, the focus of a magic system seemed pretty self-evident: Aons/symbols, metals, Commands--with Commands being the least immediately obvious, but in retrospect, Commands do all the "action" of this Realmatic interaction, if you think about it. But Surgebinding just doesn't have an obvious equivalent, and that's totally okay. Brandon has more recently said that the idea of a focus is something that peoples came up with to describe magic, which implies to me that the notion of a focus is not a core, fundamental attribute to cosmere magics. But again, let's not get ahead of ourselves. Let's classify magics. The Model You guys know I have a math degree, right? (Now a Master's degree in fact.) So, this part may be slightly… unnecessarily numerical. Don't worry about it; you can skip the numbers. Mathematical models, at their simplest, start with a few core principles and then use that to construct equations or numbers which hopefully illuminate things. We obviously have little to no true numerical information, so I'll be doing some estimations. But first, let's make our assumptions very clear before insanity begins. 1. Every magic is rooted in each of the three Realms (pretty widely accepted) 2. Depending on magic system, this distribution is not equal. So let's get onto classifying just how much each magic system is rooted in each Realm. It seems sensible that perhaps we rate magics on a scale of 100 points, and we'll have three values, for Physical, Cognitive, and Spiritual. These values need to sum up to 100, so you could say these are the rough estimates for how much a magic is rooted in each Realm. (If you've had probability, you can just scale these to be from 0 to 1 rather than 0 to 100, but big numbers seemed nicer for this). So we might say a magic is 50 in Physical, 30 Cognitive, and 20 Spiritual, for an example. Now, that might seem like a pretty safe assumption, but what I'm effectively doing is saying that I'm normalizing every magic to have the same power level. There's 100 "power" to distribute between Realms. That's a pretty big assumption! We will see minor Shardworlds where Splinters power magics rather than Shards, and those magics will definitely not be as powerful as the Shardic magics. So, our final assumption: 3. Generally all Shardic magics have the same amount of pure "strength"; it is just distributed differently (this may be totally false, but right now we don't have tools to properly measure if one magic is purely stronger than another). With our assumptions in hand, we can begin thinking about magics. But maybe I ought to say what I mean by Physical, Cognitive, and Spiritual. Physical: How much a magic is aligned with things in the Physical Realm. The Physical generally results in more restrictive abilities. Cognitive: How much a magic is aligned with Cognitive things, such as thought, preparation required in manifesting magic Spiritual: How much a magic is aligned to ideals, Identity, and other Spiritual traits. Depending on which Realmatic attribute is dominant will determine how a magic's focus is. Physical magics require a very rigid focus. Cognitive magics have more fluid foci. Spiritual magics may purely not require a focus because of a person's direct connection. We'll talk a lot more about this in a bit. Finally, let's get to business. Scadrian magics are interesting in that they are specially hardwired into a person's Spiritweb (and Hemalurgy revolves on rewiring these, essentially). It's the only cosmere magic like this, with very rigid abilities encoded into you. Many other magics can be accessed more easily, but not the Metallic Arts. You either have it or you don't, or you're a horrible person and like spiking people. I would thus classify all Scadrian magics as Physical. Whereas other magics require significant work to get going, like AonDor, Forgery, or Awakening, all the "work" of the Realmatic interaction is contained in the correct metal. Nothing else is required. Allomancy - Heavily Physical, minor Spiritual (due to its connection with Preservation), very little Cognitive Feruchemy - Physical, about equal Cognitive and Spiritual Hemalurgy - Physical, Spiritual, and Cognitive, but there's more Cognitive to Hemalurgy (since it heavily depends on knowledge of where to put the spikes), and it steals a lot of Spiritual attributes, hence its Spiritual designation. One could argue, perhaps, it is more Cognitive than Spiritual. Nalthian magics are most obviously embedded in the three Realms: color, Commands, and Breath are its Physical, Cognitive, and Spiritual components, respectively. But where does the work lie? It's primarily Cognitive. The visualization and the Command is the most key element to the magic, Awakening - Cognitive, Spiritual, then Physical Selish magics are also highly Cognitive. It requires a lot of work to create just the right Aon or soulstamp. AonDor - Cognitive, Spiritual, very little Physical Forgery - Cognitive, Spiritual, more Physical I'm not including the ChayShan or Dakhor, as we know so little about them, but if we had more data I'm sure we could fit them into this scheme. At the moment, ChayShan seems more Physical, and Dakhor has a more strong Physical component too. AonDor really has the least Physical of all the Selish magics, yet a very strong Spiritual component. Finally, Roshar. This is a Spiritual magic if I've ever seen one. It requires a deep bond with your spren to make the magic work. If you don't have that bond, you need an Honorblade, which I would call a "focus" in this case. It grants that ability for you, giving you that connection to Honor necessary to suck in Stormlight. But in most usual Surgebinding, its dominant attribute--the reason for the power--is your Spiritual Identity. Who you truly are. Surgebinding - Spiritual, Physical, Cognitive (the last two depending on Surge) Of course, in this, I'm generalizing all magics under one umbrella. Certain Feruchemical abilities are in one Realm entirely, and while Windrunning doesn't involve much Cognitive, Lightweaving does. So take these as rough averages at best. Putting it all together: Allomancy - Heavily Physical, minor Spiritual,very little Cognitive Feruchemy - Physical, about equal Cognitive and Spiritual Hemalurgy - Physical, Spiritual, and Cognitive Awakening - Cognitive, Spiritual, then Physical AonDor - Cognitive, Spiritual, very little Physical Forgery - Cognitive, Spiritual, more Physical Surgebinding - Spiritual, Physical, Cognitive And heck, let's put some numbers to it, because I feel that will show a magic's attribute and its distribution more effectively than me blathering: Allomancy: 60 Physical, 30 Spiritual, 10 Cognitive Feruchemy: 50 Physical, 25 Cognitive, 25 Spiritual Hemalurgy: 50 Physical, 30 Spiritual, 20 Cognitive Awakening: 60 Cognitive, 30 Spiritual, 10 Physical AonDor: 50 Cognitive, 45 Spiritual, 5 Physical Forgery: 50 Cognitive, 40 Spiritual, 10 Physical Surgebinding: 60 Spiritual, 20 Physical, 20 Cognitive That seems to sum things up pretty nicely. The only one I'm not really sold on is Forgery, since it throws around much less power than AonDor, but yet still deals with Identity (a very Spiritual attribute) heavily. Perhaps if we consider that AonDor only seems so powerful with the help of Elantris, this power disparity doesn't seem nearly as extreme. So of course, here's a pretty graph displaying this info: Each color corresponds to a particular world: Red - Scadrian Purple - Nalthian Blue - Selish Green - Rosharan But what is a 3D graph from just one angle? That's why I made a fully interactive version for your viewing pleasure! Now that I think is pretty slick. Power levels and Cognitive Intermediaries And with that model in place, we can get back to the discussion Windy and I originally had, about relative powers of a magic. Tied up in this question also will be spren and foci. Remember, in my conception of magic, manifestations of Investiture occur because Investiture is being shifted between the Realms. This effects don't happen in a vacuum; they require a user, and almost always, they require activation of some sorts, a will for magic to occur (the only time it doesn't is when Allomancers unconsciously burn metals). But more importantly, there needs to be a catalyst for this Realmatic interaction to occur. If we think about Surgebinding and Shallan Soulcasting, Pattern acts as her intermediary in Shadesmar. Given Syl talks about magic being an "agreement with friends," it seems reasonable to say that your spren is the thing that, in the Cognitive Realm, makes this interaction work. It all comes back to the Cognitive Realm, really, because Shadesmar connects the Physical and Spiritual. It's where change happens. (Is it any wonder that Shadesmar is predominantly water? Liquids are a transitionary state of matter between solids and gases) I'll call spren a Cognitive Intermediary, or an Intermediary more simply. These are the catalysts that make magic all work. So, that immediately asks the question, do other magics have a similar Intermediary? Of course! They are focuses. I originally defined a focus as something that shapes power into a specific effect. Realmatically, that focus facilitates the Realmatic interaction. This explains why AonDor is incredibly unforgiving. Without a sentient Cognitive Intermediary acting on your behalf, you have to do all the action yourself, and persuading the "spren" of other things to do what you wish is… well, as we know from Shallan, it is nontrivial. Aons allow Investiture to be shaped very specifically, but you have to get it precise, or else the whole thing is for nothing. Awakening's Commands are also that Intermediary, and similarly, you have to be pretty darn specific in your Command (and your Cognitive visualization, which is really what you want; the words just help to visualize the Command). You are willing that Breath to take this very specific shape and form, for the "spren" of the object to do as you wish. You have to be a pretty persuasive. What of the Metallic Arts? In the case of Allomancy, the consuming of the metal unlocks the Investiture directly from Preservation. I interpret this as, the powers are very specifically ingrained into you, and when the metal--the Intermediary--is used, Investiture is forced down the very specific paths that are ingrained into you. It's like a very narrow conduit that suddenly opens with the metal present. Other magics that aren't as firm in abilities either need a very precise Cognitive focus to shape the power how you want it, or it requires a deep Spiritual connection, with something doing the action for you. Those are the three ways you get magic. And of course, the way the Investiture is accessed also needs to be in line with the Shard's intent, but this goes a step further in identifying what components a magic will require need, Realmatically. (Tangent: Nightblood is a spren, really. He's his own Cognitive Intermediary in Shadesmar, like a spren. I imagine in Shadesmar, he's violently using the power of his Breath and the Breaths he consumes to actively fulfill his specific intent. Other spren get vaguer intents and have a bit more freedom in what they do.) So Allomancy is hardwired in, and it is powerful primarily because its power is very focused in specific ways. In AonDor and Awakening, you construct your Cognitive Intermediary yourself. Differences between these two magics come from the way you get the magic in the first place (differences in Shard intent), but also, AonDor has a lot more Spiritual power to throw around. Awakening is interesting in that it is the only magic (well, other than Hemalurgy) where Innate Investiture--Breath in this case--is the fuel, and in the scale of Shards, Innate Investiture is really small. Powerful magics require a connection with something more Spiritual. In Allomancy and Feruchemy, the encoding grants that connection to the Shards, and your Identity and who you are is what triggers the Shaod, allowing a direct connection with the Dor. Thus, AonDor has a lot more to work with. So power, ultimately, is vested in the Spiritual. The stronger a magic's spiritual aspect, the more power it gets to throw around. As such, Elantrians, Knights Radiant, and Allomancers have a great deal of pure "strength". However, Elantrians and Radiants are more closely related in this spiritual way. Radiants and Allomancers are more related in ease of use, because things are less Cognitive, but that comes with limitations: the magics that are fast to use are limited and not flexible. The more a magic is Cognitive, though, the more flexibility it has. Awakening and AonDor have almost innumerable abilities. Practically unlimited! Physicality means that things are the least flexible. But rigidness means you get dramatic effect at minimal costs. I predict that there will be very few Physical magics in the cosmere, as building a physical magic with these specific Spiritweb encodings seems like a very deliberate act on a Shard's part, and I'm not sure a Shard would make such an intense effort. Which brings us up to a more mythological analysis on maybe, just maybe, why these magics are vested in each Realm the way they are. A historical perspective (Source, and emphasis is mine, of course) This is an incredibly important quote. Focuses are not a function of the Shards themselves, but also the Shardworld. This could be taken to mean many things about a Shardworld, but what if this means foci occur because Shards and the actual events that happen on that planet? So let's take a historical look at magics. Allomancy, Feruchemy, and Hemalurgy have much more active Shardic connections, and their Spiritweb encodings represent a specific design. It's as if the magics were created with that purpose (If you buy that the Metallic Arts are designed, this can explain how Harmony can alter the way Snapping works and Preservation could switch out metals--the magic itself is Physical. Constructed. Designed.) That does make sense given Scadrial's origin. Things on this planet were born of an agreement between two Shards. They had to carefully craft what they built. Preservation let people access his power more, forging Allomancy in the process. The metal, being an artifact of agreement, became its focus. Ruin countered Preservation by using the metals for his purpose instead. He of course wouldn't let people access his own power. Their agreement was hardly a pleasant one. They were enemies and every action they did had to subtly give them an advantage over the other. As such they could have agreed upon a focus which let them be very careful in how their Investitures were used; hence the reason abilities are so rigid here. (Another tangent: It is important to note that they did not Invest the metal on Scadrial. Rather, they made a more interesting construct: Investing people in very particular, specific ways, and allowing the metal to be the key to unlocking the Investiture. So a Scadrian could burn Rosharan tin and find it chemically identical, unlocking the power exactly the same as elsewhere.) That was how Scadrial's conflict manifested in its magic. On Roshar, things emerged quite a bit differently. Honor and Cultivation, romantically involved, went to the Rosharan system. It is possible they Invested some of their power onto Ashyn or Braize--we don't know yet. But either way, Honor and Cultivation made it to Roshar first. Then Odium came and caused some issues. (Understatement of the millennium) Odium would not have agreed, as Ruin did, to an easy accord. Odium didn't even want to construct--he wanted to eliminate his opponents. Honor and Cultivation disagreed rather strenuously. Honor, at the very least (it is not clear how Cultivation fits in), began opposing Odium with everything he has. Honor threw around a ton of his power in opposing him--perhaps creating the storms in what seemed at the time to be an effort to blow Odium's forces off the whole planet. Odium threw a lot of his power around too. As such, Rosharan magics have a high ceiling of power because the Shards there threw a lot around. Conflict is Roshar. Or, rather, "Man's life on Roshar is conflict," says The Arguments (Way of Kings, Chapter 24). Spren, appearing through… well, the origin of spren is not clear, but possibly Honor and Cultivation wanted them prior to Odium's arrival. Either way, spren began imitating the Heralds' abilities and granting them to humans. The Heralds bound these Surgebinders to them, and perhaps due to the Heralds' connection to the Almighty, Honor Invested his power into these Surgebinders, so if they followed Ideals, they would become ludicrously strong. They became the Knights Radiant. There's another mystery with Roshar; why did Hoid say that its Shards are very strict? Well, in this epic conflict, Honor and Odium were battling with powers that were hard to comprehend for us. But Shards have limitations. Whether there were efficiency restrictions in this battle (Honor would not have wanted to use his power in such a way to be much weaker than Odium), Honor made it so you got two Surges, not all ten, for whatever reason. This is still a bit mysterious to me why this would be, but the strictness of the Shards came from high level restrictions and rules to how this war happened, maybe through the Oathpact. On Nalthis, Endowment Invested people and began Returning. Magic arose naturally (though I'm sure we could debate this a long time). Endowment allowed humans to do with the power what they will, not restricting the power. They could do basically anything with the power, if they knew the right Commands. Is it any surprise that the Scholars discovered essentially how to make a Shardblade (which Nightblood essentially is)? BioChroma is incredibly versatile. On Sel, the current day magics are really different manifestations of the same magic (this was proposed in Kerry's Selish theory, and I am absolutely certain Brandon said that's essentially what's happening, but I can't remember where that confirmation was posted. If someone finds it, I'll update this) It seems entirely rational that prior to Devotion and Dominion's Splintering, there was in fact a single magic system on Sel. Devotion and Dominion worked together, I think. Complementary. But whatever magic looked like on Sel, the Splintering created this unformed mass of power that couldn't be released effectively. The Dor formed. And because the Selish magic wasn't as restrictive, when the Shards were Splintered, The question you might ask is, why would Selish magics break whereas Honor's did not? Two reasons: first, Honor's Splintering power had places and people to Invest in, so his power didn't cause this cataclysmic Dor. Second, Honor was probably much more precise in how people could access his power than Devotion and Dominion. If you agree with how I've sorted magic systems as above, it seems as though Devotion and Dominion took a more hands off approach to how their magic initially was. There's not evidence of grand conflict between the two initially, so that could make sense. When Devotion and Dominion Splintered, that lack of "definition" meant that the method that mortals usually accessed the power also was disrupted, and so you needed a different sort of connection (and Identity) to the power to use magic. Comparing magics and replicating effects Let's talk about Nightblood more. Come on, you know you want to. It seems intuitive that Stormlight and Breath are similar. Both are gaseous metaphors. You Invest the two similarly. However, Breath is of life. It is the Innate Investiture on that world. Stormlight is not the power of life: it is directly the power of chaos, of the storm raging inside you. That is similar across all Radiant orders. This is to say, I'm suggesting that Spiritual power actually sees itself differently, depending on how the Shard's power was distributed (and the Shard itself, surely). Endowment made Breath Innate. Breath was of life. When you have more Breath, your life sense is increased, and at the fifth heightening, you're immune to disease and are freaking immortal. (Makes sense that you could use Breath to influence the mind--it is a Cognitive magic, and it is affecting life, right in line with Breath.) Then there are other abilities granted with that much Spiritual power, too, and other abilities related to tones and color (other Nalthian attributes). It perfects, as Spiritual power does. Stormlight is the power of storms and chaos. It perfects, but does so entirely differently. And actually, Stormlight is probably a much more potent source of energy than Breath. Breath being Innate means it is a weaker investiture than these gigantic storms and the power they radiate. Also, it seems as though Stormlight is more Physical than Breath is. Stormlight Invested things glow; Breath does not. But you can hold a lot more Breath than Stormlight at a time. Breath also requires color to move (an extra physical impetus for that spiritual transfer to a new physical host), whereas Stormlight requires a Spiritual link to Honor to move it in the first place. The idea that Stormlight is more Physical than Breath may explain why Stormlight dissipates while Breath does not. It's more Physical, so that power diffuses into the Physical Realm, while Breath is located more elsewhere. This idea--that these fuels are subtly different in intent--could mean a lot to Vasher and Nightblood. Shardblades are ludicrously destructive, and cause spiritual damage.(cite) Nightblood is, in many ways, a Shardblade. Would not the type of fuel matter for Nightblood? As I said, Breath is the power of life, and that's very different from what Nightblood's intent is. Stormlight though. That seems like the perfect fuel. Chaos. Destruction. So when it comes to some magics, if you want to get the most bang for your buck, you want the right Spiritual fuel for the job. I'm not sure if this makes Nightblood more or less destructive. Maybe he wouldn't be so vicious at consuming Stormlight as he was with Breath because the storms are a better fuel for him. Stormlight might make Vasher quite a bit different. Remember, any Investiture, no matter how small, will change you over time(cite), and Vasher has lived a long time. Make no mistake, Vasher is there because he can live off Stormlight(cite) easier than acquiring a new Breath frequently… but I'm thinking that because he's consuming the power of storms and chaos, he would be quite a bit different. It seems to me that if you wanted the right magic for a given task, you would want to consider the effect you want to have, and pick the Investiture colored by a Shard's intent that would be most in line with what you wanted to accomplish. Then, depending on what Investiture you selected, you'd have to work to shape the power in exactly the form you wanted. Illusion magics are replicated frequently. Yolen has it. Sel has it with AonDor, but that variant is different as there's no Spiritual requirement; it is all Cognitive. It is possible that Yolish magic has a key Spiritual component, if Lightweaving is similar. If Preservation and Ruin actually altered themselves to allow metal to be the key to their power, as I suggest, it makes sense that iron and steel influence metals. That might actually be the hardest basic Allomantic effect to replicate on another world because of those Shards relationship with metal. The other effects of Allomancy could definitely be replicated, especially the mental metals. Conclusion (the tl;dr version) The Realmatic description of magics help define magic systems much more precisely. How much a magic is rooted in each Realm determines a number of effects of a given magic. It can determine how you access it, and what sort of "focus" it requires. Physical magics cost the least to do, Cognitive magics are the most flexible, and Spiritual magics throw the most "power" or Investiture around. I realize this was far too long, but I hope I minimized the amount of crazy in the theory and made it as elegant to describe as possible. The numbers weren't important (since they are just guesses), really, but the moment I realized there were three axes, I had to show an awesome graph. At the very least, I hope I gave you a new way of thinking about cosmere magics, with the Realmatic interactions, Cognitive Intermediaries, and the nuts and bolts of how these Realmatic interactions happen.