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MR52: Guard Duty Getting guard duty on the upper levels of Uritheru is probably about the most boring post you could have. But, at least today you’ve got a deck of cards to play with. How will you play? What cards will you gain? Do you even know what the rules are? Or what the name of the game is? How much will you bet, how much will you loose? We'll find out.... Welcome to MR52: Guard Duty! I’m very excited to be your GM for this game, but it is my first time so bear with me as I figure things out! (I am looking for a co-gm, pm me if interested) GM: @lotus Co-gm: @Illwei IM: TBD Signups will end Sunday, August 1st at 9:00 am PST and the game will begin shortly after that. Rules: (Link to rules dock HERE) Player list: Spectators: Quick links: Questions? Just tag me! Please let me know if I forgot anything in this post!

Yeah, I would never have gotten it

If I had to choose one of these options, I'd say it was more the former. But I don't think I would describe it as an either/or. I think it can be both. There were ongoing and growing fears that spiked at a certain point (the imprisonment of BAM I think), prompting a "decision in the heat of the moment by the spren and their knights" as Brandon said in the recent WoB. Let's just set the scene. The False Desolation is ongoing and the KR are fighting singers with forms of power and Voidlight provided by BAM. The Heralds are MIA. We know that the generation of Radiants that committed the Recreance learned the truth about humankind's origins. They learned that humans had originally come from Ashyn but had destroyed Ashyn through Surgebinding. They learned that humans were the invaders in the war with the singers over Roshar. Honor was going mad and/or dying. And so, rather than reassuring them that their cause was righteous as he had with previous generations, Honor raved and told them they would destroy Roshar just as they had Ashyn. There's also friction between the Radiants and the rest of the world, and in-fighting between the orders. Oh, and the Sibling has lost trust in humans and is expelling them from Urithiru. So imagine all of that going on and then the imprisonment of Ba-Ado-Mishram happens. This tears out the the Connection and Identity of an entire species, leaving them shells of beings. We're also told in RoW that the imprisonment wounded Roshar itself and "touched the souls of all who belong to Roshar. Spren too." So this would have included all of the Radiant spren, who are bound to the spirit web of Roshar. (in RoW 75, Vaiu tells Adolin that "Deadeyes cannot think, but they are still spren - bound to the spiritweb of Roshar herself.") And because the Nahel bond involves linking the spirits of spren and human, one imagines that the Knights might have felt something too. So imagine, already burdened with worries about the dangers of the Nahel bond and the Surgebinding it allows, the KR and their spren witness/feel the extent of the damage that can be done with powerful Surgebinding. So now you've got a concrete example of harm to go with the existing fears. I can buy that that freaked them out enough that they acted rashly, thinking they needed to make sure they put a stop to Radiant Surgebinding right away. As a postscript on BAM's imprisonment and its relation to deadeyes, I'll note that I think BAM Connected to all of the singers by Connecting to some portion/aspect of Roshar itself. And as I noted above, spren are connected to the spirit web of Roshar. So when BAM was imprisoned, I think some crucial Spiritual aspect of Roshar (maybe something to do with how Honor's Investing in Roshar created sapient spren?) was also sealed away and therefore torn away from the spren. This made the Radiant sprens' spiritual Connections to their Knights all the more crucial, and when the Knights foresook their oaths, that left the Radiant sprens' minds untethered, causing the deadeye phenomenon. Ooohh, running with this idea that BAM's imprisonment messed with whatever Honor did to create sapient spren, what if before the imprisonment, spren were able to come to the Physical Realm without giving up their minds? Do we know whether that's always been the case? Might explain a bit of what happened with Adolin and Maya - maybe it was him forging a Connection with her and then sharing his mind with her while in the the Cognitive Realm that allowed her to regain some level of sapience.

THE JACK OF SWORDS "How would you like to die?" Karnan paused. It was not a question he was used to being asked. He fanned the cards out and shrugged. The other man placed a hand on the first card, and Karnan eyed him warily. Archer, not much of a swordsman. You could see that from his shoulders, the way he moved. You could train a man to know the sword, but you couldn't always make it sing in his grasp. "Well?" "How would you like to die?" Brightlord Terneas had asked, and then, Karnan had laughed and said, "In your service, Brightlord." A different life, then. He'd thought himself one of the Sons of Honor, working for the return of the Heralds. But Terneas had lied to him, had used him, had used his blade ruthlessly, and now... He glanced at the man across the table. Heron, he'd called himself. Knife man, maybe. Many archers were. Figured if it came down to it, he'd flip the table, and then buy himself seconds to draw. Of course, it all went to Braize if Heron was a Shardbearer. Somehow, Karnan didn't think so. Life was like that: you worked with what was in your hand. You had to know when to hold your cards, and when to fold them, and to always, always play them close to hand. "Old," Karnan said, casually. The other man's smile didn't reach his eyes. "Friend, you're in the wrong profession." He flipped over the card, and of course it was the Tower, struck by lightning, those plummeting from it. Fallen from grace. Karnan supposed it could be worse. He flipped over the next card, and then it was worse: the King of Scythes, grinning from the painted face of the card. "All men die," Karnan said, quietly. "Retirement suits you," Heron said. "Best stick with it, yeah?" Karnan gestured expansively. "It's a quiet guardpost, in Urithiru of all places. I'd imagine the worst I'd have to fear are ulcers from all that sitting on my arse and losing all my spheres at cards. "Don't say it." "What's the worst that could happen?" [OOC: Been a bad series of work weeks, I need something fun, this looks like it. Shuffling out of retirement for this one. Going to try to stick entirely to RP for this one. Cheers ]

I knew you would get it! Well done!

Sixth of the Dusk. Mmm, Vathi fits better. Nevermind, forgot the bonds. Sixth it is.

On what are you basing "dead Blades aren't supposed to work"? Why assume Testament is "dead"? None of the characters understand everything about how Nahel bonds work, and they often "know" things that are wrong, so we as readers also can't yet know what is and is not possible. Many manifestations of Invested magic are limited by the Intent, Identity, or misconceptions of the user; the only reason they can't do something is because they "know" they can't do it. "Ten heartbeats" comes to mind. I strongly encourage you to read the terrifically well-researched discussion of these questions which starts here:

Yeah, I had a similar thought pretty early on in the book, and as it went on it became way more clear how much Lifeforce didn't follow the established rule. But at the same time, his power is really weird. I kept waiting for an explanation of the ravens getting regular injections of other people's blood in order to have lives they could send their injuries to, but they never seemed to need that, instead, he seemed to be able to act as a relay for them. This makes me wonder if he's maybe a different kind of gifter than the others. In many ways Prof and Conflux seem more like batteries, giving away the "energy" of their powers which others could then use for a while. My main reason for this analogy is that David makes comments in Firefight about needing to "recharge" his gifted shield power by having Prof give it to him again, whereas if he just got a weaker ability to create force fields then he should be able to regenerate his own as long as he had the power. The fact that Lifeforce didn't give a number of extra lives, but rather the ability to draw on his own supply, suggests that rather than acting like a power supply that could give others some charge he instead was able to create a connection to them that they could draw on for a constant supply of power. For this reason alone, we might be able to conclude that there are different kinds of gifters, and thus they might not all share the same limits. But as I said, Lifeforce's powers are weird. Deathrise only complicates the matter, as its unclear how much of Lifeforce's powers were his own abilities, and how much was from Deathrise. Part of this mystery is the events around Lifeforce's first attempted suicide after being rejected by Lovestruck. When we first heard the story, I was wondering who was around to touch him and activate his power, since at that point he didn't have the strategy of injecting blood into himself. I have to wonder if Deathrise possessed him then, and somehow provided a burst of healing, saving him from the suicide, like how Page was saved from her raven wounds. But as I said, I'm not sure if the injury transfer was Lifeforce's own power, or if he was never an epic at all, and it was always Deathrise inside of him providing the power. One thing that will help make this clear is whether or not Page manifests the injury transfering, or if she develops her own abilities. The only reason I hold back from thinking that Lifeforce might have not been an epic at all is that he had an epic weakness. Otherwise I'd wonder if he was something different that came about through Deathrise. But that might be a discussion for another thread. My point just being here that Lifeforce was very much not a normal epic, and his ability to gift his powers to other epics is only one piece of that.

I just wanted to make this because there doesn’t seem to be enough defending elysium content in here, an I think it gives cool insights on the main series. when I read it, I thought it was really cool. It was a lot like era 2 mistborn, in a way. I also liked the whole mindblade things. I can’t wait for spensa to use it (if she is able to)! I also pieced together that the darkness was just the nowhere but without the eyes because the delvers weren’t there yet. There’s also an interesting evolution in cytonics from defending elysium to skyward.

"Wine before bread. Stroganoff before wheat germ. Journey before gustation. These are the Oral Words and I invite you to say them with me each week, here on Nohadon's Kitchen." Nohadon's Kitchen is made possible by donations from the Alethala Tourism Council, the Thalath Merchant Guild, and viewers like you.

...I like this a lot a lot. Can we get Nohadon's cookbook? Please? We're getting picture books, I think we deserve this cookbook. It could even be formatted like a stereotypical recipe blog with a chunk of text from the Way of Kings (in-universe version) that vaguely relates to the recipe below!

Here's my opinion: Every human is about to have the absolute worst ten days of their lives. So far the war has just been a series of mostly normal battles, albeit with the introduction of Surgebinders and thunderclast. We haven't seen the Midnight Mother since OB, and as far as we know she can create endless armies of eldritch abominations. Kaladin, one of the strongest fighters in the entire coalition, struggled to beat a Yelignar-powered Amaram with almost no knowledge of the surges and about 5 minutes of practice controlling his powers, while he was still going through the transformation. The Windrunners are heavily outnumbered, Jah Keved has just turned to the enemy, the KR have no real way to use Anti-light without Raysium, and one of the leaders among their Radiants just started a war with one of the most powerful secret society in the entire Cosmere. of the two Bondsmiths, one barely gained her powers, and the other is going to be preoccupied with the contest of champions. Kaladin and Szeth, the two best fighters of the Knights, have been deployed on a mission to a place about as far away from the battlefield as possible, on a mission to help an insane herald with the power to destroy planets, who may or may not be not just insane but also evil. TLDR, I'm expecting a lot of Bridge four and KR interludes that include a lot of dying, and Kaladin's PTSD clinic is going to be very, very busy.

Well first off any Shard can give access to any magic system, so you are right on that point. However Voidbinding and Surgebinding are not the same thing anymore than Feruchemy and allomancy are. Cultivation has a magic system independent of Surgebinding There are only ten surges and only the Rosharan ones would have a distinction. Welcome to the Shard

I wouldn’t be so sure that that was shardplate. And Radiant is less about bypassing a truth as she is about not having to deal with the way people treat her, as a radiant.

Surely you mean that cheeky jokester, Tonk Fah.

Time's up! It was: [RoW] The turn is up for grabs.

Acts in the service of. Serves under. This character and a PoV character are on opposing sides. The PoV character hopes this character will succeed. However, neither know each other. Nope. Wrong clause.

"Oh hush, you're making us look approachable."

The one she uses on the Oathgate was Pattern though, as dead Blades aren't supposed to work? The Truth came later. I would have to get my poor old copy of WoR to confirm but I also think she changed the Blade's size in the chasms, while cutting out the shelter. I got a new idea about that end-of-RoW Truth, not sure if it's been brought up or maybe obvious to some, but could that Truth have been to Testament, not Pattern? It was mentioned Testament looked better afterwards, but at the time I wasn't sure why. I certainly agree about drawing conclusions about Lightweavers from Shallan, not only is she unreliable but there's also the double bond situation now messing up things.

I think we can safely assume she reached at least 3 Truths with Testament, given that she used Testament as a Blade to do The Deed. Yes, that Bond was damaged, but not "broken"; I, and many others, think it likely that the Blade she summons during WoR is in fact Testament. Later, with Pattern, more Truths were spoken. It's especially challenging to draw general conclusions about Radiants from Shallan, as she's such an unreliable narrator.

https://www.17thshard.com/news/shardcast/shardcast-shallans-past-r737/ 1.1 Steps Forward 1Step Back After the Shallan's Past Shardcast I've been thinking about Brandon's comment regarding how Shallan is progressing and the things she's able to do before she should be able to in WoK and WoR (Soulcasting, and seemingly summoning Pattern in the Chasm). https://wob.coppermind.net/events/452/#e14526 The only thing that makes sense to me is if she progressed to at least the third level as a child, broke her oaths, but Testament is still around and connected to her a bit which allows Shallan to temporarily get back to those same levels to do things she used to. To put it another way her bond is spiking back up to where it used to be but only briefly, it's doing this: Because she broke her Oaths she went back to near zero for a long time, but she's progressing again and once in a while her Bond will spike up to where it used to be and she can say summon what seems to be Pattern in the chasm before she's said enough Truths on the page unless we really contort to find Truths. She already reached those levels, her spiritweb was altered, Testament still exists and is bonded to her in some way, the bond is more deflated than broken. Think of how Dalinar sees the Oathpact as 9 thin golden lines and one robust line for Taln who did not break his Oath. Or think of it as a "groove" that a Cryptics investiture can still fill. I think both Testament and Pattern are filling up that deflated original bond / "groove" that makes it easier for her to spike back, I think Pattern is mostly filling it now, but Testament is also filling it a bit. I don't have much to go on beyond my gut, but to me it is the simplest answer that fits with what we've seen.

I think an interesting way that Brandon could obliquely address the weirdness here is if we see a bonded spren get permakilled by the anti light knives, and the bonded radiant bonds another spren. Is their spirit web already changed so their new bond is at the same level as the old one, or do they progress very quickly back to that point? Are their new oaths different than their original oaths?

Since Shallan is bounded to two different Sprens so I'm not surprised she has to say more truths than normal

Having not anticipated him to actually believe her, despite not lacing her bluff with anything but the truth, Aderet hesitates just a moment to consider before responding, keeping their gazes locked all the while. “That.” She gestures to the object. The device appears to her as being in possession of violent capabilities, judging by the way the glow had built and then subsided, and having it out of his hands could only be for the better. “As well as an assurance that you won’t later come after me.” Her eyes briefly slide towards the far end of the tablecloth, as though the corpse may somehow be seen through the translucent fabric, then back to him. ”And an explanation of what wrong that...that man did to you to deserve that." The last part slips out almost unintentionally. The sounds of footsteps seem to be nearing, though she knows that still comes with no guarantee of rescue. She adjusts her grip on the vial. And waits.

I think there is one truth that Shallan spoke as a child that she has repeated to Testament as an adult: "I am terrified". Shallan repeating this restored the connection to Testament in a way that was stronger than before, thereby allowing her to Soulcast in that instant.

Well well well! I finally decide to make an account to post a theory, and there's already a forum thread discussing the same kind of ideas My categorization includes both internal/external and push/pull relationships; not sure if that makes it more valid or less valid. Mind, all the dawnshard names are applied and come up with after grouping by internal/external push/pull. I'm not very confident on which shard would be push and which shard would be pull; I do have them sorted in a way that makes sense to me here, but they could fairly easily be swapped. Also - I retroactively realized that internal/external are much more like abstract and concrete - the shards I categorized as internal represent an abstract idea, and the shards that I have as external represent some concretion of that idea. Without further ado, here they are (abstract on top, pull on the left): Odium <-> Wisdom Ambition <-> Invention Dawnshard: "Experience"? "Understand"? Mercy? <-> Honor Unknown <-> Valor Dawnshard: "Moralize"? Similar to "Virtue" as above Autonomy <-> Cultivation Whimsy? <-> Endowment Dawnshard: Change Preservation <-> Ruin Devotion <-> Dominion Dawnshard: "Control"? Things I really like there: Odium <-> Wisdom mirrors Taravangian Cultivation/Endowment being abstraction/concretion or internal/external Honor/Valor in the same relationship More generally, the Intent of all shards that are in abstract-concrete happens to really line up well - if you wanted to hold two shards without changing your Intent too much, those vertical connections are pretty good bets. Also, while the four dawnshards I propose aren't integral to the cosmere like Survive and Unify, they are reasonable commands for existence and deity that creates life - I especially like "Experience/Understand", because it reminds me of the One. Things I dislike: Ruin and Dominion don't line up Intent-wise despite their relationship on the chart Whimsy and Mercy's placements are weird, there might be some swapping worth doing with those, autonomy, and the unknown shard Whimsy doesn't fit Change that much (although I think Autonomy does, as it essentially means allowing things to change on their own) Thoughts on this?

Ohhh, let me come in to stir the pot. I don't believe that there can be such a thing as Lives/Lifes and probably not Voids. My personal interpretation (which I find also makes things very simple) is that Surgebinding, Voidbinding, Khriss' theorised "Thirdbinding," Fabrials, the Forms of Power/Regals and the general fauna with a bit of magic are all expressions of the ten forces that rosharans label Surges. Now, before anyone pounces on me, wielding Renarin like a club, I'm not contending that there's nothing different between Renarin's Illumination and, say, Shallan's Illumination, I just believe that they are both expressions of the Surge of Illumination. I'm personally in the camp of "Renarin's powers sure seem to express in a Spiritual direction," as there's no reason to mention the Even More Perfect Adolin(TM) unless this is somehow relevant and, well, you've seen what his Illumination does. I also think that this can be seen by implication on the so-called Voidbinding chart, the basic design is obviously borrowed from the Surgebinding/Radiant chart, including the basic design of the Surge glyphs, but they are rotated weirdly, almost like they represent a "twisted" version of something familiar, from the in-world artist's point of view. And that is my entry into the "is the chart itself just art or is the border just art" falling square into camp border is art. Now, an answer to the initial premise of the thread, I'd say that there's an argument to be made for Adhesion being Odium's truest Surge. It is after all the Surge of Pressure and Vacuum. What is a vacuum? An emptiness, a nothing, a Void you might say. Do I personally believe this? No. But the argument can nontheless be made. Um, source? Spiritual Adhesion? 1. This could be a reference to the ashynite refugees using some poetic language. 2. I fail to see how setting yourself on fire is a beneficial power to have. By that same token Kaladin hearing Dalinar for his Fourth is unreliable from his point of view, people hearing voices accept their oaths is an established thing, why doubt it now? Seeing as they all fall under the category of "creature bonding spren," wholeheartedly agree. ¤_¤

everyone knows that the aluminum medal is the best on the same topic (kinda) when you use aluminum dice in dnd to make sure that coinshots and lurchers don't affect your rolls

to clarify: only nalthians are born with Breaths, however anyone can receive breath. if you have a breath (either natural born or received), you can use it for awakening and/or give it away. there is no location restriction on this, so you don't need to be on nalthis to do any of it.

I feel like I didn't phrase it right in my initial thing, so that's my bad. I'm picturing anti-Connection as blank Connection, not so much a Connection-annihilator. Just something that mixes with existing Connection and waters it down until it's neutral again and ready to be shaped into Connecting to specific things. And that's somethin already established in the cosmere: Scadrian language medallions.

Leechers would have trouble destroying Shardblades and they would die before they could do anything to Nightblood (as they/it is much more invested than even Shardblades). Generally the speed at which leecher leeches is dependent on burn rate, and they are simply much slower at this than Nightblood. Also chromium burns relatively fast On the nicrosil, that is a good question. I think Nicroburst would not really do anything to Nightblood, as Nicroburst affect only kinetic investiture, whereas Nightblood's effect seems to be inherent to it, i.e. it is a passive one.

Brandon's said no to that before, multiple times: Brandon's also confirmed Hoid is not in Sixth of the Dusk either. If he was, that would've been impressive, perhaps he could've hidden in the background, wearing camo and going completely unnoticed... This needs to get memed, asap. Back to Threnody, People did wonder if Daggon was Hoid. But he turned out to be Felt. I'm kidding, we don't have any WoBs on Daggon. Maybe Brandon wanted Daggon to be a Hoid cameo but changed his mind, and now changed his mind right back. Given Daggon's perceptiveness & him being a storyteller, he's the character most likely to be Hoid, if Hoid does appear in the story.

Hey, I’m both! Kinda... I’m working on the therapist bit. Kell’s last words to Vin were also pretty harsh, if we’re being fair. And I do think some of what she said came from knowing that he wasn’t going to follow her Beyond. But I think she told him what she did because she KNEW it was the last thing she would say to him. And she remembered the effect Kelsier’s last words had on her. And she wanted him to remember them whenever he remembered her. Because Kelsier’s story has a long way to go. And there’s something in his future. Something I think Leras saw when he Preserved Kelsier and again as he died and Kell Ascended. Something Sazed saw when he refused to resurrect Kelsier because “Sazed believes in Kelsier more than Kelsier does.” Something Vin saw when she was Preservation. Her words were harsh, yes. But as Kelsier continues to survive, continues to plot and manipulate, continues to scheme and contrive, it’s something he needs to remember. Something he needs to hear from one of the few people he can’t ignore and won’t forget. Something he needs to keep in mind as he moves through the centuries; something to keep him on the right side of the line; something to push him toward becoming a better man. And Vin was never going to get another chance, nor a better one, to tell him. I don’t know if that helps, but that’s how I see it. She told him what he needed to hear, not necessarily what she wanted to say. And that’s love too.

I really want the Chana theory to be true because that makes Shallan’s inability to admit the truth so much more plausible and relatable (at least to my own psychology) Sure, someone might repress killing both of their parents in self defence. I get that. But I also get knowing deep down that what you did was the right thing. Shallan knows what she did with her parents was the right thing. It doesn’t seem that killing her parents is as truly awful as killing Testament. And even then, did Shallan even know she was killing Testament and just not being friends anymore? Maybe depending on what Testament told Shallan. But even then, it sort of makes sense with what a kid might need to do in that situation (especially if it is "just a spren" that is "immortal"). I am not convinced Shallan really knew what she had done until she learned what Deadeyes are and how they are made. But killing a herald and ending the world? And knowing your mother/herald was 100% for sure being mercilessly tortured by voidbringers? Because of you? That's concrete. That is something a kid understands. That’s something that would leave a person “unable to laugh”. Who wouldn’t be insensate at that? Imagine being told over and over by relations that your mother was in a better place now, but you KNEW that wasn’t the case. And not only that, but you aren't even being punished. Your father is taking the blame for what you did, and you can see how much everyone you love despises him for it, and they dont even know the extent of the atrocity! And then realizing your mother was a god and realizing a god HATED you and tried to kill you for the good of the world. Each time someone praises the heralds, Shallan has to repress the knowledge that a herald despised Shallan and wanted her dead for being “one of them”. How do you deal with that? Devote yourself more to the church? Does that ever go well for “abominations?” Can she take comfort in her father? Her father is devolving into an evil man, and that evil man loves ONLY her. He is driven to such rage - to such horrors - to protect her. Her? She is vile and one of the most evil people in the world. Her father's psychotic devotion is just further proof of how wretched she is. Growing up any moment of joy would be ruined by a rogue thought of her mother being scalded, skewered, or worse. Any comfort at “a better place” would be a punch to the gut. How could you ever truly enjoy your life when you knew your life had cost the world, a god, and your mother so much? This is why Shallan says over and over that she does not deserve joy or happiness. She’s evil. She was told so by a herald and by her mother, and because of Shallan each day her mother is burned alive. One day her mother will break, and the world will end, and everyone will know it was Shallan’s fault How could she not repress that? I would. I get that lie and likely would support repressing it myself.

After 4,500 years, I think he is so far gone he can't break, like litterally couldn't do it. He's completly unresponsive to any stimuli, I don't think he's capable of breaking his word at this point

*Audible Gasp* I added this to the main post and credited you! This is said right before "Red carpet turned white". Amazing!

She still seemingly had functional Lightweaving, so clearly it's more complicated than that exactly, and he may have been able to tell that somehow.

It fits with the Pattern (hehe) of ShallanReveals too. Reveal 1: ‘omg I killed my dad’ Reveal 2: ‘omg I killed my mom’ Reveal 3: ‘omg I killed my spren’ Reveal 4: ‘omg I killed my planet (indirectly by causing the cycle of desolations to resume by sending my herald mom back to Braize)’

This is hard. I second the suggestions: 'Keeper of Words' or 'Keeper of Winds' I cannot think of a single decent 'k' world that hasn't been suggested. Lots of variants on 'kin' if Brandon adds a sexy vampire invasion subplot. 'Over' is another preposition. Also 'off', 'out', 'onto', 'outside'. More suggestions: Keeper of Wills [for Ba-Ado-Mishram / Melishi / Recreanace] Kingdom of Walls Knights of the Writ Knitter of Wrongs Key of Worlds Shinovar xenophobia suggestions: (Kindly) Keep Outside Walls Kick out these Worldhoppers Titles for Nohadon's bestselling cookbook: Kneader of Wheat Ketchup on Wings

I'm comparing starshight with warbreaker. in warbreaker, brandon tried hard to represent everyone's viewpoint about the conflict. he had jewels give a irade about the hallandren religion because someone had to defend it. he said in the annotation that he considers important to give space to all opinions in his books, even if they are fictional opinions on fictional topics. then we have starshight, where absolutely nobody defends the supremacy. which - minus the random executions of dissidents - is probably worth defending more than most people realize. having recently read the old man war saga from john scalzi, it influenced how i perceive a galactic community. in that saga, every race is enemy with everyone else. the humans have contacted 600 other races, and for 550 of those the policy is "fire on sight". the other races are no better. so I'm thinking, what if breeding people to be excessively mild and polite - quaranteening everyone else - is actually the only way to avoid that scenario? what if the supremacy is the only thing standing between a peaceful universe and total war? I didn't expect the point to be explored, but I would expect that someone would at least raise it.

Great theory. The pattern of destruction on the Shattered Plains will probably be revisited and somehow tie into all of this. Maybe there is more to Stormseat than we know.

go easy on me it's my first cosmeme/crempost

I have a joke about the 4th ideal of the Windrunners but I'm not ready to say the words.

I just finished re-reading - here's a couple more "why's" from me: Wayne's apparatus to imitate "Old Ironeyes" & how that scene played out Ranette's spheres & the creative ways Wax used them Melaan with her broken-up skeleton still standing tall at the end to accept the Bands on behalf of the kandra Choc! (I wonder if Brandon's kids love hot cocoa & that was the inspiration - ?) But best of all was (Wax's thoughts) "Those arms Those arms!!" At that point on my first read-thru, it was all I could do to not throw the book up in the air & scream "Survivor of Hathsin! Survivor of Hathsin!" Happily, I resisted the urge to destroy a lovely hardback book, but - - - wow!

I get that! I get that reference!

*Riiiiiiiide intooooooooooo the danger zone*

Ugh this is a question I've wrestled with ever since I read Skyward...in the US military, you don't get to choose your callsign, your squad chooses it for you, so I was surprised that they chose their own in Skyward. I'm from Tennessee and still live here, so maybe something southern related... Callsign Whiskey? Redneck? Or as my loving wife tells me, "you were so skinny, you looked like a Somalian pirate back in high school" (this was 12 years ago, mind you, way before we ever met). So maybe Callsign: Pirate? I do like to lovingly bend and maneuver around rules I don't like, which is very piratey. Or, based on my username, just call me Toilet

[bands of Mourning and Secret History Update: Appended to the end of this post. I have not edited the original text of the post, so no one can infer anything about SH based on what I cut, add, or change.] I just finished re-reading the Mistborn trilogy (got the hardcovers for Christmas), and it really jumped out at me on this read-through just how good Vin is at everything. If it had been my first time through the series, it probably would have bothered me how quickly she picks up Allomancy and other tricks. (I read it several years ago, and I don’t recall it sticking out to me, then.) As she’s learning Allomancy, all the Crew members comment on how naturally it comes to her – Marsh, especially, thinks she has already been practicing. Even mundane things, like how influential she is on Camon’s crew or how quickly she adapts to the nobility, stuck out. However, having read (and re-read) everything in the Cosmere, it seemed more like a clue. Mentions of how Vin was a quick learner or trusted her instincts were slipped in about as often as mentions of her earring, Reen’s voice, or how Sazed wore his copperminds on his arms. It made me wonder… what was the secret behind how quickly Vin learned? In the last epigraph of Book 3, Sazed speculates on Vin: Sazed speculates was special because she was chosen by Preservation as a child and possibly drew in some mists. But he doesn’t stop there; he says that there is something else special about Vin, something he doesn’t understand. So, what could it be? Can we figure it out? I kept this thought in mind during my reread, and some thoughts began to coalesce. The crystallizing point for this theory came to me after Kelsier’s death in Book 1, when Vin went back to Kredik Shaw and fought two Inquisitors. She prepared two tricks: arrowheads with rings on them (basically, the same thing Ranette would invent as anti-Coinshot bullets), and pewter dust to blind the inquisitors. It’s one thing if Vin has an affinity to learning how to use Allomancy because she was chosen to take Preservation or because she drew in some mists as a child; but I didn’t see how that would give her these kind of tactics. So, it occurred to me that maybe Vin had these experiences from a previous life. I know reincarnation isn’t a common thing in the Cosmere, but there have been instances of the dead not staying dead (in Warbreaker, obviously, and Kelsier hangs around even if he doesn’t take on a new body). What if an experienced Allomancer who died during the Final Empire hung around like Kelsier did, but instead of sticking around and meddling, she (assuming it’s a lady Allomancer, as I will go into more detail below) bestowed her experiences upon Vin? Before I dive in to the specifics, I’ll include a brief Table of Contents of the theory. Vin’s Unearned Experience: the instances of Vin’s surprising aptitude Vin vs Valette: Vin views herself as a combination of two or more people Déjà vu: the pieces required for a reincarnation are already present in the series Guess Who?: speculation as to Vin’s previous identity Hoid: maybe this explains what warned her away from him Kelsier: the ramifications on the future of the series Part 1: Vin’s Unearned Experience So, Vin obviously picks up Allomancy very quickly in TFE. Not only does she burn pewter and zinc on instinct, but she learns all of the metals extremely quickly. Other areas of her training, like acting like a noble or even her time on Camon’s crew, come to her naturally, and her instincts guide her. Instincts became the keyword that I looked for; anywhere Vin trusted her instincts (or, even better, her instincts told her something, an active-voice sentence with “instincts” as the subject). I also looked for instances where the word “instincts” wasn’t expressly name-dropped, but people remarked how Vin learned very quickly. (Or I thought she learned too quickly.) Basically, any place that her past life could be manifesting. See the full list below. It’s roughly chronological order, not by importance. I’ve italicized the points that are more circumstantial; the good examples are all un-italicized. On the first mission Vin went on with Camon’s crew, this quote jumped out at me when Vin first became suspicious: Ooh, an internal voice. We haven’t seen those before. Later on, she thinks something along the same lines: Two active voice verbs, where Vin is the object, not the subject. As if something else is acting upon her. Is this Ruin’s influence? I don’t think so. Her earring isn’t in at this point in the novel; she starts wearing it after they get back to the lair, and she prepares to sneak out. These “instincts” can’t be Ruin’s influence. So, to summarize, Vin’s instincts tipped her off to the Ministry’s tactics, even when Camon, an experienced crewleader, was falling for the trap. Experience beyond her station. She responds surprisingly well to Kelsier using zinc on her when he first meets her. “Somehow” is a squirrely Sanderson word for when there’s something behind the scenes. (Okay, not every time, but it’s still a red flag.) Vin could have recognized this from her previous life experiences. When it’s just just her and Kell and Dox, she also resists his Soothing: After resisting his soothing, we see another interesting sentence: There’s that dang “instinct-as-a-subject” construction again. Pushing her to stick with Kelsier and learn Allomancy. That last point aside, the main takeaway from this point is that Vin has experience in recognizing and resisting emotional Allomancy. Vin picks up being a Noblewoman very quickly. She sums up her experience during the first planning meeting with the crew: However, when rubber meets the road, she knocks it out of the park. A sampling of praise: And she keeps getting better. According to Sazed, in Chapter 24 of TFE: Maybe because she’s a reincarnated noble? Vin acknowledges in Hero of Ages how she took to the nobility naturally, because it was a part of her. I won’t quote that in-depth at this point in the theory; see Section 2 for a more in-depth analysis of what this means for her character. Just a quote of interest from when Vin trains in steelpushing. Circumstantial evidence; doesn’t support reincarnation, but takes on new meaning. The coin pouch trick is more substantial. Vin teaches Kelsier a new trick after only a few months of training, the first (of many) times she displays her Allomatic tactical ability. In fact, in Kell’s words: “Fantastic progress”… maybe because she’s remembering skills she had in her past life. The push-match also struck me as uncharacteristic of Vin. She had always avoided direct confrontation, but here, she throws her weight directly at Kelsier, getting in a Push-match. Maybe that’s an instinct from her past life, where she may have been larger and it was an effective tactic. Again, not supporting evidence, but something that takes on new meaning. The evidence from this passage is how Vin learns super-fast. As she thinks to herself: Kelsier is speaking with Sazed later. That last line is Sazed. Sound familiar? (It’s because he calls her special in the HoA epilogue epigraph.) So, yes, her instincts (*cough* past life experience *cough*) make her special. When Sazed is quizzing her as she gets her hair cut, he says: Add another tally mark to the “Vin, you’re so good at everything” comments. Remember when Kelsier said Vin only was good at the physical metals? Soon after that, she sits in on one Breeze session where she realizes how to Soothe subtly. She follows Kell as he goes to find Camon, and sooths him. He catches on, but only barely. His thoughts: I know how! It’s her past life experience coming through! Learning the spikeway quickly was another example of her Allomantic tactics. I won’t do the full quote, but the narration does say “She got the hang of it quickly.” When Sazed rescues her from the Inquisitors, he gives her some of Ham’s pewter to heal. He says: Vin was unconsciously burning pewter when she was on Camon’s crew – she recognizes it when Kelsier gives it to her for the first time. Her body has been familiar with Allomancy for a long time. As Marsh says later: Again, we learn that… Vin is special. “Instincts” pops up again, but in an interesting context, after Vin has gone to a number of balls. An interesting take on her part, since it doesn’t seem she’s losing instincts, but gaining new ones. Also, “Valette” is natural because her previous life experience was a noblewoman. (See the next major section.) Training with Marsh. A huge clue. Marsh gives the spiel, gets her burning bronze, and asks her what she feels: What takes practice comes naturally to Vin… it’s been the story of her life as she learns Allomancy. Again, I suggest that this is because she actually does have prior experience. This doesn’t really have anything to do with anything, but I suspect Vin unconsciously burns gold in Chapter 24. She just came from a ball, where I suspect they had gold-plated utensils (I looked over the chapter, and I didn’t see any mention of anything), and she’s sitting with the crew, having a good time. She imagines she sees herself out in the shadows, as she was before she met the crew. Sounds a lot like the gold shadow she sees of herself later. Anyways, it’s of no substance to this theory, except maybe showing she can unconsciously burn more obscure metals. Allomantic tactics. When fighting Shan, she extinguishes her atium a few seconds early, tricking Shan into thinking that she had run out. When she turns it back on, she confuses Shan, and Vin kills her. A nice bit of trickery for someone who has thus far only burnt Atium against other Atium-burning Inquisitors (and she got subsequently steamrolled by them). Again, unearned experience; tactics she may have learned in her previous life. Kelsier notices how good she is: He goes on to tell her that directly: Allomancy is nothing but tricks, and Vin comes up with new tricks time and time again, things that Kelsier and even the Inquisitors (coming up in another bullet point) don’t have figured out. Ah, the Inquisitor fight in TFE Chapter 36. The place where this theory came together for me. I won’t quote the passage directly, but Vin uses rings on arrowheads to launch un-Steel-able projectiles to shred one Inquisitor, then uses a cloud of pewter dust to blind another. These don’t come from being strong in Allomancy; these are tactics, tricks. Vin comes up with these all the time. Why did she think of these when others didn’t? She even thinks that she wasn’t sure how their eyes worked, but she knew a perfect way to block out their senses. How did she know? Here, more than anywhere else, when her soul is damaged by Kelsier’s loss, her past life begins to creep in the cracks, giving her the training and experiences of her past life to help her with her battles. Oh my, I’ve got this many examples, and I’m only starting WoA. Hoo boy. Anyways, we start off with some more talk about Vin being “special,” this time from Elend as she spars with Ham. She winds up beating Ham, a good thug. Vin is a quick learner when it comes to fighting, too, not just when it comes to Allomancy. He also remarks on her strength in Allomancy; she might have her Allomatic strength determined by her previous life’s strength, during a time when Mistborn were more powerful (not as powerful as Elend, though). She gives OreSeur dog bones. That’s another new tactic – no kandra had used animal bones before, as we find out in Book 3. Vin really does come up with these all the time. I wonder how she does it… She instantly picks up Duralumin-Steelpushing herself. She first uses it to go rescue Breeze, and she lands at just the right spot. A brand new skill, and she does it perfectly the first time. I think she might have past-life experience with duralumin. She wasn’t the only one to discover it; the Lord Ruler mentioned it in one of the storage caverns. There’s another very powerful clue for me when Vin was researching the Deepness. She starts the chapter being barely trained in writing: A very clear picture: Vin has little experience writing, and is not good at it. But, apparently, she can write very well anyways. Vin, of course, brushes it off and starts talking about the Straff’s army. But it seems a little heavy-handed to me. Perfect penmanship? What an odd thing to mention. The only thing more Mary Sue-ish would be… …oh, no, she’s also the most graceful person in a dress. When Tindwyl takes her and Allrianne shopping: *gag* I certainly hope this is indicating she spent a long (previous) life as a Mistborn noblewoman. Because otherwise, this is getting out-of-hand with how good Vin is at everything. And then, we have The Big One. Taking down Zane. Beating someone burning atium without your own atium. And what word shows up in the narrative? Instinct: that word keeps popping up. She let her body do what it wanted to. This is a crazy technique, and, again, it’s one she does perfectly without practice. It reminds me of the way she resisted Kelsier’s Soothing when she first met him. She has experience resisting Allomancy; mental metals, and now atium. Techniques I think she learned in her past life. Vin doesn’t think she’s the first to figure it out: If it was a technique she had done in a prior life… then, yes, Vin, you were the first to think of it. And the second to think of it, as well. Maybe someone else can take bronze… (that’s a reference to Olympic metals, not Allomantic metals.) Oh, and don’t forget the flying horseshoes trick. The annotations say that she is the first one to pick up that particular trick. So, that’s not one tactic that’s definitely not from a previous life. Oh, good, things are going a lot quicker through the rest of the trilogy. I’m on to Hero of Ages, now, and I’m 30 chapters in before Vin does something surprisingly well. It’s when they crash Yomen’s party. She dives in from a position of power, something she had never had in her previous ball interactions, and she instantly takes to it. Elend notices: So, there are three main categories where these examples fall in to: Learning Allomancy quickly, learning Tactics and Fighting quickly, and learning Nobility quickly. If it were just Allomancy, I could believe it was enhanced intuition provided by Preservation. Even the anti-atium and anti-Inquisitor tactics, on a good day. But all three categories? It seems too much of a stretch that being chosen as Preservation’s hero would give her penmanship and the mindset of a noble. So, I think these experiences come from a past life as a noble. Part 2: Vin vs Valette One major theme of Vin’s character arc is reconciling her two different personas. She wonders, is she Vin the street urchin? Or is she Valette the noblewoman? Eventually, she determines that her true self is a combination of the two. She needs to incorporate both the experience gained on the street with the noblewoman who goes to balls. This conflict is presented from the beginning, from Kelsier’s first training session with her: When she was thinking of how “Lord Renoux” adopted his persona: She begins to realize that she isn’t actually either of them, but something else entirely. From WoA, Chapter 35: She tries to push the “Valette” persona off as an act, but her conversation with Tindwyl when they were dress-shopping begins to change that. Vin says she sees a problem with wearing dresses because it wasn’t really her; Tindwyl asks, “And these can’t dresses be part of who you really are?” More pointedly: This conflict continues, somewhat, into HoA, Chapter 27: She eventually realizes in Chapter 32 that being a noble is an essential part of her: Since I was thinking about the context of reincarnation, this took on a different meaning to me entirely. Vin isn’t just a combination of her two sets of experiences… what if she is a combination of two different people? Vin the street urchin represents her current life experiences. Valette the noblewoman (and Allomatic experience) comes from a previous life. As she struggles with these two halves of herself, she’s actually trying to merge her current and previous identities, to create who she truly is. Oddly enough, combining multiple people into one is a concept that is presented elsewhere in the Mistborn trilogy. Koloss and Steel Inquisitors are both described as being multiple people combined into one. Steel inquisitors first, by Noorden, the friendly obligator. Immediately afterwards, Elend realized how koloss were created: I thought it was an odd way of characterizing the change; Hemalurgy has been presented more as stealing someone else’s attributes, not combining multiple people. But it gave me some insight into how Vin could be the combination of two people. Marsh was still Marsh, even though he had other people “combined” into him. Same with Human the koloss; the annotations give his backstory, so he is a real person. The reincarnation isn’t a Wheel of Time kind of reincarnation (like the Heroes of the Horn being spun out into new identities), but someone who has already died giving up her experience to Vin. I don’t think I’m saying Vin is a Hemalurgic creation; the experiences of a past life spiked onto an orphan girl. But I think it’s a similar concept, not necessarily carried out using that magic system. Part 3: Déjà vu So, conceptually, it’s a bit of a stretch to say Vin’s experiences belonged to a dead person. I get that – there isn’t a single hint of this kind of previous lives in the trilogy (or even in Alloy or SoS). But I think all the pieces are there in the trilogy itself. Dead individuals stick around. Kelsier sticks around. Vin’s previous incarnation could have stuck around in a similar fashion. Combining multiple people into one. I discussed this in Part 2, so I won’t go into detail here. The gods made Vin special. According to Sazed, Preservation chose Vin after she was born, because she snapped so early. Ruin also made his mark on her when she was young, spiking her with her sister’s Bronze ability. A third individual, “meddling” like Kelsier, could have also imparted past life experiences onto her. Souls can return to bodies. Sazed says that he didn’t figure it out in time to resurrect Vin and Elend, but WoB says it’s possible. http://theoryland.com/intvmain.php?i=727 Minds can be used to power magic. I’m not sure my Realmatics are quite right, but we saw Preservation turn his mind (soul?) into Investiture to imprison Ruin. It wasn’t his body, his Shard’s power; it was just his mind. The mind of Vin’s past life could be the power behind this reincarnation of its experiences. So, while the way I’ve assembled them may be novel, I think that it is a natural progression of what is presented in the novels. Part 4: Guess Who? I strained my eyes looking through the pages, trying to figure out who could have been Vin’s previous life. This person had to be dead before Vin was born (duh), and they had had to be born after Allomancy was discovered (because Vin knew tricks against both Steel Inquisitors and atium burners). And, lastly, this person had to be a Mistborn (since Vin had good instincts in all metals). I also think that her previous incarnation needed to be a noblewoman, because of how her internal conflict played out between orphan and noblewoman. I guess it could have been a nobleman, but Vin always sounds secure in her femininity. She’s a combination of Noble and Urchin, not a combination of Man and Woman. Now, gender and status aren’t deal-breakers; if I could find a character who met the previous three conditions who was a non-noble or a man, I would consider them a strong candidate. So, boil this all down, compare it to characters from the books… and I’ve got nothing. Gemmel is the only Mistborn who’s dead before the series begins, but he was still alive after Vin was born. (Also, not a girl.) Alendi crossed my mind, but he was only a Seeker, and he never fought Atium burners. Other than that, we don’t know much about the history of the world. So, I can’t point to an individual who I think was Vin’s previous life. But I can describe what I think she was like: a noblewoman Mistborn. Part 5: Hoid Now, the part where this really got fun was when Vin decided to avoid Hoid (hmm, that might be the Cosmere name for Tag. Avoid Hoid. It’s got a nice ring to it.) Uhh… let’s try this again. When Vin decided to avoid Hoid (stay on target), she trusted her instincts. Remember, Instincts = Past Life in this theory. So, something about her past life told her to stay away from Hoid. But what could it be? All Vin heard was humming. She didn’t even see Hoid. Just heard him. What was he humming, anyways? I wonder if Vin recognized it. Could it have been a song she knew in her past life. Has Hoid visited Scadrial before? Did he work with Vin’s past life, someone who knew that song? That’s a very Hoid thing to do; hum a song from a bygone era that no one living knows (except Vin has a vague memory of it because of her past life). And, hey, let’s go down the rabbit hole. Hoid was looking for the Well of Ascension to get a Lerasium bead. Vin’s previous life might have thought she was the Hero of Ages as well, looking for the Well of Ascension, even though the thousand years hadn’t passed. After she died, she stuck around, and saw who Preservation chose to take her power and use the Well of Ascension. And she (old Vin) decided to grant her experience and skill to the new Vin. Mad speculation, of course. We know precious little about what Hoid has been up to. I have no idea what Vin’s previous life was all about. So, please disregard the previous paragraph. (I’ll stand by the rest of this section, though.) Part 6: Kelsier So, this is a fairly complex undercurrent for Vin’s character. If Brandon was writing something like this into her arc, how is he going to get it across to the readers, now that the trilogy has been concluded? What are the ramifications on the future of the series? He doesn’t have plans for flashback books, so how would we ever learn about Vin’s past life? I’ve compared Vin’s previous life to Kelsier a number of times throughout the theory. That’s where I think it becomes relevant: not in learning about Vin, but as a key trait of a character in a future trilogy who Kelsier reincarnates into. He would grant his experiences, his motivations, to a new character, to aid them in… well, whatever a future Mistborn trilogies would be about. That way, we can learn about the circumstances of reincarnation, without going back to Vin. We learn it all through new eyes, and then someone like Harmony says, “I’ve seen this before. Although we didn’t realize it at the time, the Ascendant Warrior had the experiences of another to aid her. What you have is what remains of Kelsier, the Survivor. You can trust it.” Except, probably in much more epic language. That also would let us see some of that hinted-at Hoid/Kelsier animosity! Vin was known as the Heir to the Survivor. I don’t think she inherited anything from him, though; I think she was the Heir to someone else’s experiences. This hypothetical future incarnation of Kelsier, however… he would be the true Heir to the Survivor. Another mythical Hero who we thought was Vin this whole time, only to have the rug pulled out from under us. Again. Summary Okay, here’s the gist: Vin is so good at what she does because a dead person has passed along her experiences and skills. That is why Vin learn so quick and come up with her tricks, and it also contributes to her “identity crisis” between skaa and noblewoman. This might become relevant in the future if Kelsier reincarnates himself in the same fashion. Also, sorry for direct-quoting 30% of the text of the Mistborn trilogy throughout this post. Bands of Mourning/Secret History Update: