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So, I got to thinking, because I had a crap time trying to sleep and that’s all I could do: Why can’t we see our piece of creativity the same way others see them? Well, first of all: We’ve seen that certain thing so much that we got desensitized to the idea and what we did with it. The idea is old to us, but it’s completely new to others and it fills them with excitement, much as it may have done when we first came up with the idea. Second: It may have to do with us putting a little piece of ourselves into that piece of creativity; that’s how I see creativity. For me, especially when it comes to writing a new character, that little piece of me is being shown through different ways. That piece of me can be hurt or praised, depending on how the audience reacts to it. And third: It may just have to do with some sort of anxiety we face. I feel like any person that is creative in any sort of way deals with a form of anxiety, that being different from anybody else’s (e.g., my anxiety shows through fast-paced thoughts, almost hyperventilating, but it may be different for Connie). Anyways, that anxiety can hold us back to becoming who we want to be or what we want our pieces of creativity to be. In conclusion: I need sleep and to stop thinking about these things late at night/early in the morning.

hey guys check out this cool hat i found

Sebariel.

I'm not going to get any further on 15 and 16 - Helmet and Compass respectively - so here they are. Helmet featuring the metally shielded Granite and Compass featuring Caden's emotional rock, his sister Acalia. I'll post these again if I end up inking them

We used to be pretty lax about necroposting for the reasons you stated, and I like to still think we are much laxer than many other forums. (Remember, Reddit automatically archives things after six months!) We absolutely realize that many topics can have a very long shelf-life. Before our rules revamp last year, we explicitly said that many times posting in old topics can be relevant! Our current rules say: But let me go into a bit more detail here. Closing older topics is actually a newer thing for 17S! I don't think we did it at all prior to 2020. However, there were many times in the past few years where a newer member presumably gets to a topic via Google or something, and one of a few things can happen. They can respond to a very old topic, and these sorts of things can happen: Responding with a generic comment that doesn't really add to the discussion. (Like "I agree!" or things like that.) Responding with a WoB or book content that is much more recent than the original topic. Now, that could be good or bad, but if a topic is from 2016, pre-Oathbringer and the entire premise of the conversation was on Words of Radiance knowledge... like lets say it was a 2016 topic speculating on the Unmade. It's kind of pointless for a member to be, "Well actually, the Unmade are these!" several years later. Yes, everyone in the original discussion would agree, but it's not really helpful. (That's not to say that new stuff couldn't add to discussions, but sometimes discussions have run out their course.) This did happen more and more frequently as time progressed. There is a small subset of users who got extremely irritated with new members for doing this, even though staff didn't really make a big deal of it. (We did discourage those long-time members from making comments to the new members who made a necropost like these.) So while we definitely realize that theory topics and others can have a really long lifetime, maybe having every topic from the forum's inception in 2010 open for anyone to respond to is not necessarily optimal either. There is something to be said to not having topics open for too long, which I have grown to appreciate in Reddit over the years. Having the same active/popular topics at the top of a forum for months and months isn't necessarily great, as smaller topics can get lost in the midst of it. Invision Power Suite, our software, doesn't have an automatic way to lock old topics, so I began doing this manually. I think this is most important to close older Stormlight topics more frequently. So right now, topics are open from about March 2020 and on in Stormlight. On other forums, especially like Elantris and Warbreaker, it's definitely trickier to decide when topics should be closed, but also, if a topic hasn't had responses in multiple years, I don't think it's a huge loss to close it. I have given generally more time to noncosmere, since there is much less discussion on those things. So where is the line? It's kind of hard to say. I'm happy to discuss it! Also, as the rules state, we are perfectly happy reopening certain topics if needed!

"Okay, then." EmLee took a deep breath. "EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" EmLee regained her breath. "Was that good enough for you?"

Well, it seems like most of you are finally starting to take this seriously. Unfortunately, that means the Sacrifice has a much harder job. So, adieu, Drought. It was a valiant effort. And adieu to Danex, your replacement. However, someone's clearly been skirting the boundary lines. Ash, you had every opportunity to avoid this. It's your own fault, you know? Vote Count: Danex : 5 votes Droughtbringer : 4 votes Lahilt: 1 vote The Unknown Order: 1 vote Ashbringer: 1 vote The Unknown Order was the Keymaster. Araris Valerian was the Sage. Droughtbringer was the Sacrifice. Droughtbringer did not complete their objective. They have been executed. By majority vote, Danex has been chosen for execution. Ashbringer has not voted twice in a row. They have been killed for their inactivity. Player List: This Phase will end in 24 hours, on October 21st at 8 PM CST. Good luck.

Yes! Your turn again!

Yup! You go!

Absolutely! Great round! Nazh?

Diversion:

Okay so I posted a theory about Odium’s champion in the ROW lore/magic thread and I feel like nobody saw it or maybe just thought it was too unlikely or insane or something... BUT I was just rereading the ROW prologue and gosh I’m so damn convinced that Odium’s champion is going to be Gavilar!! This is what he says to Navani in the prologue: This is freaking me out. Like at first I was just trying to think through all the possible candidates for Odium’s champion and people like Szeth just seemed a bit too obvious to me, so I thought who would be the most surprising AND crippling to Dalinar? And who better than Gavilar himself, the one he looked up to and failed. Now I do actually think this could be possible! And maybe even likely from these words that Gavilar says. And since we know that the next prologue is going to be from Gavilar’s perspective, what if we get to the part where he’s killed and he appears in the cognitive realm and finds a way to stick around? He was slightly invested like Eshonai was. And the more info we get about him (RoW prologue and Venli flashbacks), the more we learn how much crazy cosmere stuff Gavilar was in on. His relationship to the heralds, and to Axindweth who seems to clearly be a worldhopper of who knows what allegiance - he even seems to know of Kelsier/Thaidakar. So what if he figured out a way to stick around and his motives are not what we think. His whole stint with the Sons of Honour seem to have been a cover for other intentions, since he already knew the heralds were around? It just seems crazy to me how much Gavilar was in on - like where did he get those void light and, especially, the anti-voidlight spheres?! So many questions. Can we get all the answers to them in one prologue? Or will we get those answers from Gavilar as an actual character in the next book!! He is so obsessed with being extraordinary, with unending existence, so what if he finds the opportunity for this by joining Odium’s forces? I at least think it’s possible that we will find out in the prologue that Gavilar has stuck around, and if he does I think he would be an excellent and surprising candidate for Odium’s champion. Also one death rattle I remembered could perhaps support this theory... Interested to read thoughts!

YKYASFW you and your two sanderfan friends spend all the time not spent discussing Sanderson trying to convince the fourth guy sitting behind you to read Sanderson.

YKYASFW you are disappointed to change seats in school before you realize that you are now sitting by two people who are also both sanderfans. Cue the incessant talking and getting absolutely no work done. Also when you meet someone who is also a sanderfan and instantly start trying to impress them with your knowledge of modern relative theory and cosmere theology. Also when someone asks what your favorite religion is and your mind immediately goes to either Vorinism or Survivorism

I most certainly am not Hoid...

Yes I do, and I’m honestly really surprised there’s somone who knows about conlangs on here! (Other than Esperanto, that is) TPBM likes waffles, French toast, and/or pancakes

"Superstitions" is a rather strong word when we know (via the text and WoB) that people of Nalthis do give up something significant when they give away their breath. The magic system may help some people, but it makes life measurably worse in many small ways for those who choose to give (or sell) their breath. Allowing the sale of breath is like legalizing the sale of kidneys in the real world -- it won't kill the donor, but it does make life more difficult for them (in both the short and the long term) and it incentivizes those who are willing to take advantage of the poor and desperate. Applying religious pressure to sell your kidney to the theocracy in order to keep religious figures alive would be considered a particularly abhorrent practice in our world. You can argue that banning breath transfer (and thus condemning all returned to their second death) is equally abhorrent, but we're definitely in a moral grey zone when comparing the practices of the two nations. I'll also say that given the current real world parallels between China (Hallendren) & Taiwan (Idris), where the larger, more powerful nation is poised to destroy and/or absorb the smaller one due to the smaller one posing an inherent challenge to the current regime's claim to authority -- I'm more willing to side with the underdog.

The Lopen.

It doesnt, it just makes you struggle more while you are doing those things, so you jog and heal slower and with more difficulty. Feruchemy is naturally limited by how much you can store at any given time, and how detrimental that is. In most cases you would have to store up for a very long time (suffering the whole time) to get the dramatic bursts of power. There are a few exceptions that can be more easily stored like Rest (which is the only one you can store while asleep). Weight is easy to store (beneficial even) but typically not as useful as it is for Wax because it doesnt make you all that more durable and you need a way to exert the force (like steelpushing). Most of the others would suck to store fully (storing Gold fully could literally kill you in time) so you would only be able to pull off the big trick Once before you needed weeks of recovery time. Compounding, on the other hand, can get pretty ridiculous, especially with an actual Fullborn. Thank gods they are normally impossible.

The closest we have is Brandon saying if Kelsier joined the Ghostbloods he would be running them within a year. Whether he really meant that Kelsier joined them or he was just joking is not really known. We do have WoB that the Roshar faction has gotten a little bit away from him. I don't think that this means they are disloyal, just that their methods and outlook might not line up with Kelsier's

Long story short: Remodeling the house and the Wifi decided to take a very long vacation‚ so here we are. I’m tired as heck. Day 19: Loop

mi wile e sina kama sona toki pona (I want you to learn toki pona, literally "me want you arrive knowledge tokipona")

Well PERFECT TIMING BECAUSE I HAVE ONE WHOLE CHAPTER WRITTEN.

I love it, just wanted to say

As per this post, the Final Empire is about the size of Europe Its alloys can make people into mistings, and alloying it with other God Metals can give people access to other magic systems. Becoming a Lerasium savant would make someone ascend to Preservation. I think it just strengthens someone's Connection to a Shard's Investiture.

I might just be strange, or it might be that I'm from Texas and haven't been back home in over ten years, but every time I start to reread Misborn, I can't wait to get to Alloy of Law. I just...I love it. All of Era 2 is my favorite of the cosmere books. And I love Stormlight and Elantris and even Warbreaker. But I love Era 2 Mistborn. I love the characters. I love the interactions, the mystery, the "rise of technology combined with magic" and how that's affecting the growth of civilization. I love love love the Easter eggs, the misconceptions people have about the heroes of the past. One of my favorite tidbits is how "Eastern Street Slang" became "High Imperial", and is used in all official documents. Because OF COURSE Spook would do that. I just love all of it. Wax is my favorite protagonist, Wayne is my favorite side character, and by the end of Bands of Mourning, I even grow to appreciate and, dare I say it, like Steris. It's great, and is what makes me excited for future Mistborn books. I love the new interplay of Twinborn as being the new "Mistborn". I love the concept of Ferrings alongside Mistings. I just love all of it. It was a fantastic direction to take, and I love the execution. But I prefer my stories to be about the characters, not about the explosions. Yeah, I went to see the new James Bond, and yeah, there was something nice about going to see a movie that was mostly about what's going to be blown up, but that's still cheap thrills. I prefer to have my characters have some depth to them. But that's just me.

Gotta go Rust and Ruin. it's just so useful, rolls right off the tongue.

I have a friend who constantly likes to flex his relation to BS, so I'ma spread that flex cuz why not. My friend lives very close in proximity to Sanderson and recently met him in the gym (Yes, Sanderson goes to the gym. Yes, I was surprised when I heard it, too. Yes, it looks strange and surreal.) The image below is proof of this. (No, Sanderson does not know, as far as my friend knows, that he took this picture. He took it before speaking with him. Considering he is fairly famous, I'm sure he's used to it. Also, me and my friend live in different places, so no requests please.) Furthermore, and this is wholesome, he was able to get BS to say/record happy birthday to a friend (This friend is not me.) This friend's birthday isn't till Feb, and he is considering giving it to her during Christmas cuz he's impatient. Either way, her reaction will be in the future, and I'll be sure to get that reaction on recording and send it on here. That is going to be a fun day.

I don’t have to have read Stormlight, but I know that fire is better!

I agree with Tani. FIRE SHALL CONSUME THE WORLD!!!!!

Cosmere Conversations is pretty good, they go in depth on a lot of stuff, and most of the latest episodes have been about RoW stuff, eg RoW worldhoppers, the RoW epilogue, etc. I recommend it, though Shardcast is still my favorite.

A few points against this. None of the other characters, Herald, Ghostblood, spren or Unmade notice this She didn't feel Jezrien's death.

I thought you guys might want to see the final versions of the posters I made to take to the airport when our missionary comes home next week! Thanks for all your help!

We've seen that the Ideals are shaped by the individual Windrunner's hang-ups. I wonder what Teft's or Lopen's might have been or will be in terms of "accepting limits" on their desire to protect for their Fourth... ...But in terms of the Final Ideal of the Windrunners, we can safely say that Kaladin's Final Ideal has to be even harder for him to reach than it was for him to "learn to deal with failures in protecting". So what could that be? Kaladin's barrier to the Fourth Ideal was so strong that it nearly led him to suicide or to falling to Odium to escape the pain of it - which was key to Odium's ploy to gain Kaladin as his Champion in lieu of Dalinar via Moash. And plot-wise, it feels like Kaladin reaching the Fifth Ideal (or dying trying) will be a big component of the climax of SA5. So from a writerly perspective, I suspect Kaladin's Final Ideal will tie in to the climactic ending to the Contest of Champions, whether or not Kaladin is that Champion. We've wondered who Odium's Champion will be: Taravangian is a much more wily Vessel than Rayse, and thinks he sees a way to "win either way". It won't be simply be "the best fighter I can send in", but someone with a built-in advantage. Put that way, it won't be someone he believes Honor's Champion might find impossible to kill (e.g., Gavinor), because that's not "winning either way". It would be someone who, if killed by Honor's Champion, only furthers his goals as well. Dalinar is planning to be his own Champion, but hey, there are still ten days for him to change his mind, so perhaps it will be Kaladin in the end after all. What if the Fifth Ideal is about dealing with the idea of killing someone he's previously sworn to protect (Odium's Champion), in the name of the greater good? I mean the Final Ideal CAN'T actually be that (given how Kaladin reached the Third Ideal), but it could be that Odium will try to make it seem like that's the only two choices on the table. So that if Kaladin does kill his Champion, it would represent Kaladin breaking his oaths and then falling to him, to then become his chief agent in the Cosmere as he'd wanted after Dalinar escaped that fate in Oathbringer. Or else, he gets Dalinar after all. Win/win. In that case, I would guess the "someone Kaladin had sworn to protect" is Moash. Kaladin still thought of him that way even after he killed two innocent villagers and Roshone in Hearthstone, that what Moash had become was something he could/should have prevented - but would any part of him still feel that way after HE'D. KILLED. TEFT? What if he were dealing with a blinded Moash, anguished after Odium abruptly withdraws his emotional void, begging his only and truest friend for forgiveness or release of death for all he's done while admitting he doesn't deserve it? But, Dalinar wouldn't have this kind of hang-up with Moash. For this to work, "Todium" would have to be separately machinating to get Dalinar to send Kaladin to the Contest of Champions. And while I feel like it'd be far too easy an out, depending on how it is written, perhaps Kaladin then finds a version of the Fifth Ideal that enables him to "save" Moash but to "kill" Vyre to fulfill the conditions of the Contest. (Why else go to the specific detail of saying that Moash was "reborn to Odium with a new name" in Oathbringer?)

The only problem that Kaladin has left that requires an ideal is not protecting himself; he's doing that already. It's not accepting that there are people who can protect themselves, that was part of his 4th oath. It's not about letting other people protect him; he has no problem with that in Oathbringer, and he's never really had a problem with it. The reason Kaladin has been so self-destructive with his behavior is because he feared failing to protect people. He's let go of that guilt now, so he won't have problem anymore. Kaladin's only remaining issue that needs to be addressed by an ideal is how to protect. in tWoK, Kaladin's father insisted that you cannot kill to protect. Kaladin killed parshendi to save Dalinar, and realized that he didn't know if killing parshendi was the right thing to do. In WoR, Kaladin realized that killing Elhokar was the wrong way to protect. In OB, Kaladin was finally forced to face his greatest problem: how is it right to kill people if they don't deserve to die. He sees the parshmen that he protected and can't kill them. in RoW, Kaladin tries to find a different way to protect. He becomes a surgeon, and tries to protect without killing. But he can't. Urithiru is invaded, and he has to fight to protect it. I don't think that it's a coincidence that Kaladin is going to Shinovar, the one place in all of Roshar that looks on killing as wrong, no matter what the circumstances are.

Those are the terms. Doesn’t specifically mention a fight I suppose…but it’d be quite the triathlon if they had to participate until the death lol

Ah, but nobody has established what the contest of champions is going to be. Maybe it's a triathlon.

It took some convincing, but I am now 100% on Team “Gavilar is definitely coming back”. I’m not going so far as to predict he will be Odium’s Champion, (although I think it’s quite likely)... but I will be SHOCKED if Gavilar does not make some kind of present-day (non-flashback) appearance in the next SA novel. Consider the overwhelming preponderance of groundwork that has been laid: We see the day of his assassination in the prologue of every single novel. We’ve had POV accounts from Szeth, Jasnah, Eshonai, Navani, and also, in a RoW flashback chapter, Venli. We’re obviously supposed to infer that this event – and thus Gavilar himself – is very important. I fully expect that the prologue of Book 5 will be Gavilar’s own POV of that day, setting the stage for us to see how exactly he avoided permadeath, and his return to a physical body. He’s a huge part of Dalinar’s flashback arc. I don’t think it’s a stretch to say Gavilar is the single most important reason Dalinar is the man he is today. A confrontation with his brother is the obvious pinnacle of Dalinar's journey. Gavilar has also had direct and important influences on Navani, Jasnah, Elhokar, Venli, and other critical viewpoint characters. We know that he was trading information and making deals with Heralds; that he was involved with the Sons of Honor, whose goal was presumably the return of the Desolations – which we still don’t fully understand; that he knew about Thaidakar and the Ghostbloods, another hot topic we have MUCH to learn about; that he had access to both Voidlight AND Antivoidlight years before anyone else knew about them. Finally, we know that he was Cosmere-aware, likely importing items and/or Investiture from offworld, and learning about the Cognitive Realm and Realmatic Theory. Mraize claims, in talking to Shallan, that Gavilar travelled to Braize himself and brought back Voidlight, and that he was "testing the movement of Light between worlds". He obviously knew Thaidakar wants this knowledge. What other reason would he have to assume it was Thaidakar who had him killed? There are multiple reasons to think he was Invested when his body was killed, and we all KNOW what THAT means. He is literally THE CENTRAL FIGURE of just about every mystery in this entire 5-book series, despite never (yet) having a single POV chapter. I don’t see how anyone can even doubt that he’ll turn up somehow.

It occurred to me some time ago that Awakening is the only magic system in the cosmere where piloting a giant mech is logical. Allow me to explain: Beeath works best when you put it in something human shaped. We have seen that cloth can be greatly strengthened. Stone and steel are very hard to Awaken but straw and other plant based materials are easy. Therefore if I wanted to create a tank powered by Breath I would make a human shaped object out of cloth, wood or other easily awakened materials, this would then be garishly painted to aid the Awakening process. Now I take the above concept and bring it into the future and imaging how a Nalthian spaceship would appear or function. Giant robots In Space. I actually had a less ridiculous thought about awakened ships that I was going to post but this was too much fun.

When you do this in Alethi

Oh my gosh... I just realized... Leky Stick. Stick. Sarene was a stick. This makes me unreasonably happy.

"There are no ideals past the first," the Cryptic whispered. "Now, you must speak truths." Mistrunner took a deep breath. "You want a truth?" she said. "I have no social life." "Ah... a powerful truth indeed." Speak again the hallowed oaths: Books before friends. 17th Shard before the real world. Release dates before birthdays. The Knights Awkward must stand again.

Next they'll have a picture of Shallan painting left-handed or Adolin reading. I AM OFFEND!!! VERY OFFEND!!!!!

I know! It's an Accelerated Reader summary. You have to read the first chapter, and you know he uses a spear. Literally the first chapter. I checked. More proof that AR is dumb. That and the fact that they gave WoK a 5.2 reading level.

When you read something like this and have to correct it... Spear. He's darkeyes, which means spear, not sword. Where was this travesty of a summary? While I suppose the rest of it is technically true, I do wish that people writing these things would actually read the books first. Same with cover artists.

When this summary of Way of Kings makes you want to demand boots: "Kaladin, having traded his medical apprenticeship for a sword to protect his brother, finds himself in military servitude in the wars that plague the world of Roshar." Do I even need to start?

Only two tabs? Ha! I have eight. When you're seriously offended at how little a friend who has been reading Sanderson novels knows about Kaladin's personality.

You know you're a fan when you and your friends get lost and everyone wants to kill you after a few hours because you just keep repeating "journey before destination" over and over again.

I speak fluent Aleithi, Aonic, Sanderson profanity, and sarcasm. Oh, and the occasional bit of English.