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  1. The other day, one of my best friends asked for one pretty sentence relating to snow, because she wanted to write lyrics for a song or something. I ended up writing this short thing. As you can see.. a little more than one sentence.
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  2. I'm drinking Bubble Tea again! I think I found the first one so sweet because it was some weird wildberry variation (it tasted a bit like fruit juice with tapioca pearls). Now I tried the "original" one (a.k.a the one made with actual black tea) and its so much better! I love it, I love bubble tea! And frankly, I was sort of encouraged by you all to try it as you said it was good, so thank you!
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  3. I DID IT. I READ 50 BOOKS IN A YEAR. AND I FINISHED A DAY EARLY. *continues reading*
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  4. One of my favorite poems, done with the ink I got for Christmas. Yes, it's a bit late, but the light was never right. (Never mind that I'm using a lamp...) Also, there's two pics of this one, because guess what this ink sparkles! Oooh! can you tell where the ink started flowing better
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  5. Thank you so much for that! Your kind words mean a lot. What you said about lockdown, I do hope it's true. But there is a big chance of it happening. Still, thank you for everything you said and for calling me strong . I realised that asking for help is a good things and that's why I went to my counselor. That decision was partly becuase of the Shard due to when I posted in this thread in July and recieved so much of support from you and the other Sharders. So thank you for that too I do hope things get better in Germany, and I hope everything is in peace one day for everybody.
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  6. Don't worry about sounding selfish, you don't! Furthermore, you should at least hear that asking for help is a smart thing. Always! Even when it makes you feel insignificant or even stupid for not figuring things out for yourself, it is a smart thing to recognize when you need help. And you already said enough about your situation at home to really justify that. Most times here, you seem just like any other happy poster here, no one would guess the situation you're in. Carrying on like that only shows that you are a very strong person. Still, feel hugged right now. Concerning Lockdowns... I really do not know how the country you live in deals with the pandamic. Mine (Germany) does very poorly. Even though the number of infected persons is skyrocketing, it is all but certain that there won't be another lockdown. The reasons for that are purely political and not at all connected to the overworked healtycare system. A few month ago we had elections and no one dared to do anything out of the fear of losing voters. The new government is completely overwhelmed with all the problems that have to be fixed and so far nothing happens. I'm sorry, I drifted off. My point was that there are some very stupid reasons to delay things like lockdowns and more often than not, politics stand in the way of otherwise good measures to fight the pandemic. At least in Germany. So perhaps a lockdown in your town/country is less likely than it seems. As always, keep your head up! *hug*
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  7. My home situation is getting worse and worse. When schools reopened, I went to talk to my counselor, but now its Christmas vacation, and every day is a struggle. Also there's a chance on a lockdown once again happening in my city (hence, schools closed) and I am pretty scared of that. I am hoping for online exams, but school was my only solace and I don't want that taken away. My counselor was the only one I could confide in. How do I cope with it all? And I can tell you one thing to describe what is happening at my home, is that the situation is pretty much like Shallan's was in the fact that I am not hit, but I watch my little brother get hit almost constantly. Plus, I am not allowed to go anywhere without my mother tracking my every movement. And she constantly puts me down. She wont ever accept my views and if I say something she disagrees with, she'll shout about how what I am saying is wrong, and I how am very close minded. If I stay in my bedroom, and I am not studying, she'll tell me to keep the door open and that there is no reason for me to close it. She makes everything about her. I told her that I had nearly read 50 books this year (something I was very excited about) and she said that 50 books was not a lot and when she was younger than me she must have 50 books in two months. She tells me constantly how weird I am and how physically weak I am, and puts me down like that. If I read, she tells me to use my time in things that matter. Please help me, please give me some consolation. I hope I don't sound selfish right now.
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  8. Hey, y'all. I actually posted something in my blog. I also stole the 1000th topic for the Creator's Corner. Those two things are definitely not related, by the way.
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  9. So this is Brandon Sanderson's fansite. Talk to most young authors nowadays: chances are they're a hard worldbuilder. They can throw together the foundations for a decent universe on the fly without a pen or pencil in just a few minutes. Chances are also likely that they read Brandon Sanderson--let's face it, who doesn't? Is there a correlation here? ... Yes. Yes, there is. The answer is yes. Which is fine. Hard Worldbuiding is great; I would know. I'm a hard worldbuilder too. Heck, I'm right here at the Sandersite. But I don't need to write a blog post defending Hard Worldbuilding. Now, most people aren't jerks (there's gonna be a blog post about that soon-ish too, actually). However, I've still met the odd folk infected with Worldbuilder's disease who knows absolutely nothing about Soft Worldbuilding (imma called it "Softy" from here on out) and are kinda mean to people who do it. This problem stems from misunderstanding (obviously): essentially, people will assume that Softies exist as just a weaker version of Hardies, which of course would be bad. Basically, what this means is that soft worldbuilders would simply be lazier than hard worldbuilders, and should be treated like such. Which is wrong. That's not what Softies are. It is not a form of Hard Worldbuilding with fewer details and weaker connections; it's a form of worldbuilding with a focus on a different aspect of the story. Generally speaking, Hardies are very plot-centric. Take Mistborn, the Final Empire, for example; I mean, both the magic and the world are both there in the name! The plot is all about the nobles versus the skaa, and the exclusionary metal magic and creepy eye spike dudes. Why do you think they're called the Stormlight Archives; it's all about the Stormlight! Hardies are a planner's playground. Sofites, on the other hand, cover a completely different side of the story: the tone. Show of hands: how many of you read Mistborn and have tried to write a dark fantasy, nitty-gritty slog story? Based on what I've seen from the Shard, a lot of you have. Some are better than others (I'm thinking of Syn's Mystic-verse in particular), but it's easy enough to say that a lot of you have a half-murderhobo protagonist who gets down and dirty with some sort of oppressive force, using their magic to slaughter the evil and bring about justice in their own twisted way. In the case that you rasied your hand, then clearly you liked the tone of Mistborn enough to try and replicate it. There's no problem with that; I loved Mistborn as much as the next guy. Its tone is so perfectly dark and gritty. The point I'm tryna get across here is that tone is crucial for a story--but it's often difficult to get across correctly. A Softy story is almost always entirely tone-centric. They're meant to evoke more otherworldly feelings and internal connections rather than drive a hard plot along with logic and reason. If any of you have seen Studio Ghibli, try to imagine the strange wistfulness that every (good) movie always evokes: Spirited Away, Castle in the Sky, Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, Howl's Moving Castle, Kiki's Delivery Service, uhh... Ponyo (what was that movie? I love it to death but it was so weird). PRINCESS MONONOKE (I just watched that last night so I'm still kinda in the vibe). These movies never really expound on the details because that wouldn't help--heck, it'd even detract from--the immersion. Lemme whip out an example that people have actually seen, though, so I can go into more detail: Spiderverse. To start, imma just say that this movie is the best frikin cinematic masterpiece of a singular film ever created (it's tied with Castle in the Sky, by the way, for first place in my grand tier list of movies. Endgame would be higher, but it's too perfect and also not much of a standalone, so I keep it away). Now, to start, this is a comic book movie: it's not exactly designed for cold hard reason. However, a lot of Marvel films are very hard worldbuildy anyways (Iron Man and Captain America, for example, are farther on the harder spectrum than, say, Shang-Chi and Doctor Strange), so I honestly couldn't care less. Anyways, Spiderverse leaves that amazing, wistful gut feeling in you like nothing else; every time it gets to the final scenes and everything awesome has already happened I'm always just aching for more. But that's not created by the hard physics of multiversal travel and Spiderman powers: it's created by Miles Morales' and all the other Spidey's arcs. Tone is captured by the atmosphere of the setting as well as the characters and their emotions. It's almost as all-encompassing as a theme, and manages to capture your world not in a fancy picture frame but through a different lens. Every story needs it; but Softies are almost always 100% focused on it. When I first started writing, I never really focused much on the Tone. Iconar Collective was just a boogaloo of hard magic and worlds. I never focused on trying to set a vibe to the whole thing; I was too bent on showing off this epic world that I had created. But, of course, dropping exposition left and right isn't writing: hence why the first act is so goshdarn terrible. It's easy to learn and memorize facts: how to properly plot and pace a world, how to give a character an arc, how to develop of a solid world. It's less easy to learn the writing itself: theme, tone, voice, and all that. And it wasn't until I started trying out Softies that I really got a hang of decent prose. Before I wrote Wishing Away and a myraid of other little storyettes, I'd never focused how to write a decent setting or strike a certain mood. I'd go completely minimalistic for how everything and everyone looked, leaving the reader with a blank image of pretty much nothing in their head. All they got was magic and facts. But now I go into paragraphs upon paragraphs of detail explaining just one or two things so it's very clear just how this particular place is supposed to look and feel. Currently I'm working on another Hard Worldbuilding project (the itch came back to me), but all my dabblings in the Softy realm have given me more experience in theme, tone, and even just prose itself than jotting down details in a notebook ever would. So if you take anything away from this at all, then just give a Softy a try. Crack open a google doc and try to hit the tone instead of the details of the world; flesh out as little as you can, and just focus on your character. If you can figure it out, it'll give you the most experience a piece of writing ever could. * * * * * * Thanks for reading! This might've made absolutely no sense because I'm terrible at explaining things, but if you've gotten this far, then good for you! I'm going to create a thread in Creator's Corner dedicated to developing Softies so people can ask questions that I'll hopefully answer in time. I've been meaning to make one for awhile, actually. And no, I'm not only making it now so I can have the 1000th topic in the subforum. I'll edit in the link as soon as it's made. Don't die! ~ Fadran
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  10. Firstly, *Hugs.*. Now that that that is out of the way. I cannot even begin to imagine what it's like going through what you are going through. That being said I think that you truly are strong as others have said!! You seek light in darkness and don't succumb to it. Yours is a strength that is to be admired. You certainly are not selfish for using the shard to vent. Lord knows in my years here I have vented so much that sometimes I'm surprised that the shard has not collectively told me to shove it. We are here for each other now and until the internet runs cold. There will be warmth again. Things will get better. If you ever need to vent or talk my DM's are open! Fields of gold glistening in splendid light. A throne rises up and blesses both earth and sky. They sing in unison an endless song that bears power for all time. In the heights sun and moon gaze in envy at power they may never hold. While below warmth does descend as a cloak ready for the ruler who would sit upon the serenaded chair.
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  11. *hugs* You are definitely, absolutely valid and not selfish to be feeling these things. I hope things get better for your and your brother soon.
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  12. I'm so sorry you're having a bad time, Elf. *many, many hugs* Keep hanging on and remember that things will get better (I know it sounds cliched, but my own home life is seven kinds of stormed up right now, and that's what I keep telling myself.) And you are not being selfish in any way. From what you said, you are definitely in a stressful situation, and it's completely okay and normal to feel sad, angry, or depressed. Remember that I'm always there if you want to talk. *more hugs*
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  13. On my last re-read of WoK I noticed that the Alethi war codes that Dalinar adheres to are very Windrunner-like, and it turns out that they date back to the time of the Radiants. We know that Windrunners were most often from Alethkar, so it makes sense that their war codes were culturally influenced by the Windrunner ideals. But then I got thinking, what if the codes themselves were actually authored by a Windrunner? And if so, what if that was in fact their 5th ideal? I think this would make sense for the progression of the ideals, as we've seen through Kaladin's struggle with the idea that he cannot protect everyone. If he can't protect everyone, but the Windrunners are focused on protecting and leading, then perhaps the final progression of this would be to leave behind some kind of work that could have a greater impact, to lead by example and empower others to protect! If this were the case, it would make a lot of sense why very few Radiants reach this 5th ideal, as it is something that can only be done after much experience and growth through the other ideals. I think it makes sense for Kaladin's arc too. So far his protection has been focussed quite narrowly - protecting Tien, protecting his squad, bridge four, etc. He has sworn to protect those who cannot protect themselves, even those he hates so long as it is right, and that there are those he cannot protect. To be able to carry out these oaths to the greatest effect, he really needs to empower others to uphold these same ideals - not to put all of the responsibility on himself. Not only this, but his arc shows that Windrunners don't necessarily have to remain in combat forever; that he can protect in other ways too (e.g. his support work with people suffering from mental illness in RoW). So I can imagine Kaladin's 5th ideal being to write a book or start some kind of clinic focussed on mental health and reforming the current treatment of those suffering from mental illnesses. In this way, he is protecting people on such a bigger scale than he ever could fighting alone, empowering others to learn and develop whole new understandings and treatments regarding mental health that would continue to protect people well into the future. I could imagine something similar being the case for the other Knights Radiant orders too. For Lightweavers, perhaps their 5th ideal being some kind of art piece that captures something important about the self to preserve that knowledge for future generations - be it a painting, a play, song, poem, etc. I think we currently only know the 5th ideal for the Skybreakers - they "become the law" - which fits with this broader idea as I suppose this could involve actually writing their own legal code to inspire legal reform and advocate justice on a wider scale. Perhaps the in-world Way of Kings is an example of this too, potentially being Nohadon's fifth Bondsmith ideal as it inspires unity across societies and class, and is a legacy of honor to be drawn upon by future generations? Personally, I feel that the 5th ideal really has to be about having a greater impact/leaving a legacy in the realm of what the Radiant's previous oaths are themed towards - be it protection, freedom, truth, justice, responsibility, unity, etc. Anyway, these are my rambling thoughts. Thank you for reading and do let me know what you think
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  14. When shards like Odium visit mortals, they seem to need a certain strength of Connection to do so, as we see with Dalinar, Moash, and Taravangian in RoW. But could the reverse be done? Could a mortal who had the ability to manipulate Connection be able to visit a shard in their own realm by manipulating Connection? If a Feruchemist could store the Connection associated with Odium, while hiding themselves from Odium’s future sight via chromium, could they visit Odium and attack him with Nightblood, killing him? This seems like the kind of scheme a certain Scadrian would plan
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  15. THANK YOU! I love your poems Your poetry always makes me feel very calm and happy And thank you for everything you said and the offer of venting in your DMs. You have no idea how much your words mean to me. And if you ever need to vent then my DMs are open too. All the replies here are strengthening my resolve. I really thank the Shard for being what it is.
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  16. Thank you so much for that. Your support means a lot to me. . And things will get better. I will do anything it takes to have the kind of life I've always desired. Soon my days will be filled with travelling, books, and tea, and I won't have to worry about anything.
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  17. Of course, but the "soul" of the Ideal remains the same. For each Radiant the wording is different, unique in their way but the meaning behind it stays true to the way you showed it.
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  18. Exactly, ive been trying to reconcile Windrunners Leadership trait with their oaths for years now, and I admit that the 4th ideal threw me off a bit, but En-priestess point about the Alethi warcodes being related to Windrunner just made it all klick. I’m not thrilled with the actual wording though, need a bit of work.
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  19. Thank you. I just edited my post to have more detail cause I was being kinda vague. But thanks so much for your reply. And you deserve hugs too. *Lots of Hugs*
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  20. My bad there, but now I see your point, which makes a great deal of sense. This might actually be it. I forgot that the Windrunners also represent Leadership. My proposal of Ideal might even be a little selfish, considering that each Radiant's journey is one of improvement and self care, but this one is really possible and makes a whole lot of sense, specially if you part from the 4th Ideal, acceptance that you cannot protect everyone, so how do you improve upon it? What is the next step? What better way to show leadership and improvement than showing others to protect themselves.
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  21. I think you might be misunderstanding me a bit. I don't think that the Alethi war codes are the 5th Windrunner ideal. I think they could have been one Windrunner's 5th ideal in the past. Their personal legacy to inspire protection and leadership in society since they have sworn to protect, yet also understood that they personally cannot protect everyone. This would be a way to continue to protect, yet also empower others to be part of that protecting and not forcing all of the responsibility on oneself. In that way, the fifth ideal would be a Radiant's personal embodiment of the ideals in some form that could be used by society more broadly and have the greatest impact. I completely agree that the ideals are unique to each individual, as we have seen in the books many times now, so my idea was that Kaladin's 5th ideal would also be something of a legacy for protection in the vein of his own personal struggle - something like a book or clinic that aims to improve support for people experiencing mental illness like he was starting to do in RoW.
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  22. Exactly - it would be well beyond the scope of a "Young Adult" novel (and thus out of line with the first two books) I think Evershore had the biggest jaw-drop moment for me in the entire series. Sure, in true Sanderson style, there WERE hints and foundational groundwork descriptions about Detritus: its relatively small size, its lack of surface water, and the "platforms" surrounding it (the entire planet) that indicated the ancient human creators had imbued it with a LOT of protections and offensive firepower, including linking up to form a shield between them... And when it was revealed how taynixes powered the really OP stuff, and hey, the planet "just happens" to have internal caverns full of them and their food sources, and then they found they could teleport the platforms with the taynix to BAM come to help in the defense of another planet... And is also the source of the DDF's graviton "GravCaps" flying tech... Maybe it SHOULD have crossed my mind about, well, maybe the ENTIRE PLANET is a flying fortress - a Life Star, if you will, as opposed to a Death Star, or at least a fortified ark. But it didn't.
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  23. Alright, I might say something here that might be pretty polarizing, but I feel if all of these novellas were somehow mixed in with Cytonic that the book would have been much better for it. I enjoyed Cytonic for what it was. However, if we had the high stakes of each of these novellas intermixed with the deeper dive into the Nowhere, I think it would have been a better read. Evershore was fantastic, and it was truly hard for me to put down.
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  24. This is not entirely explained, I think intentionally ... the possibility of re-uniting Honor may be part of the Stormlight Archive plot, or if not, I think it's at least a plausible red herring - Odium's "WE KILLED YOU" may imply that Dalinar is on the path to reunite Honor. (I personally lean in the 'red herring' direction). But we do know that Investiture can't really be created or destroyed (though it can be converted to other forms) - it seems that what is really happening is that when the Shard is Splintered, its identity (Identity?) is changed so it no longer exists as one thing that can be held by an individual, but instead as many separate entities. Honor's Investiture is in Stormlight in the highstorm and in spren; a Physical Realm person can bond a spren, but the spren remains a separate identity, and you surely can't bond all the spren containing Honor's Investiture at once. A Shard can have Splinters without being Splintered as such - Divine Breath are Splinters of Endowment, and honorspren existed before Honor was killed - so reuniting Honor wouldn't necessarily involve killing all the honorspren and other spren with parts of Honor's Investiture, but it would probably involve some kind of crazy Connection/Identity/etc work plus inhaling a highstorm or most of the Stormlight in the world or something ... maybe? but that would seem parallel to [MIstborn: Hero of Ages/Secret History spoilers]
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  25. Or when you finish an entire trilogy the day after Christmas because you didn't have time to read on Christmas day. (no this totally didn't happen to me and no my arms are not cramping from holding books for hours)
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  26. I seem to be fading. Although this is nothing new, it is nonetheless disheartening. *birds sing* *crickets chirp* *grass grows* *paint dries* It is against my nature to die. The sneaky shadow follows always, hidden while you face the light. Ready to consume you if you ever look back... And it fades to black.
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  27. I just reread the beginning of Sunreach and came upon this quote: ”This was Jorgen. He probably did think being cytonic should have come with a manual.” After Evershore, I think we can all agree that boy can do miracles with a manual.;)
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  28. Cause of Dominion and Devotion splintering confirmed.
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  29. Hi there! This was inspired by Jello Apocalypse's movie review series. It's basically what it says on the tin - I'll be reviewing each of the cosmere novels, but I'll restrain myself to a limit of ten words. Then, I'll say more about my three favorites and three least favorites. Please read the below first. In addition to a ten-or-less word review, I will also be graciously providing you with a rating on a scale from one to ten. These ratings won't be from "Harmony-awful" to "Pretty good," like most things you see rated on a scale like this. Since I didn't dislike any books in the cosmere, I decided it would be more interesting to have 1 represent "pretty good," and 10 represent "the best book I've ever read." Remember that I enjoyed reading all of these books. This will be very controversial. All of the ratings I'm presenting here are subjective - meaning what I liked or didn't like, not what's objectively good or bad. Feel free to reply to my post and disagree (or agree! ) with me, just don't get too heated about it . Also, spoilers for the ENTIRE COSMERE. Don't read any of this, even reviews for books you've already read, if you haven't already read everything. Okay. Let's get started. ~~~~~ The Final Empire: A hero who's the villain of another story. 9/10 Rhythm of War: The story where he's the villain. 8/10 The Well of Ascension: Nothing really happens until the end. 3/10 The Hero of Ages: The classic girl vs. God story. 6/10 The Alloy of Law: Try this one weird trick and become a Coinshot today!!!!!!!! 5/10 Shadows of Self: *puts on Steris fan club t-shirt* 5/10 Bands of Mourning: OMG KELSIER!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 8/10 Elantris: Politics and Zombies. 9/10 Warbreaker: Politics and Zombies 2: electric boogaloo. 7/10 The Way of Kings: A masterpiece of worldbuilding and character development. (Not plot, though.) 10/10 Words of Radiance: "I am a stick." Nothing else in this book matters. 6/10 Oathbringer: A slow burn, for people who like slow burns. 5/10 White Sand: Unremarkable. 1/10 ~~~~~ Okie dokie. Now, let's take a look at the top and bottom three (in true JelloApocalypse fashion!) Third Best - Elantris Elantris is the most under-rated of Brandon's books. While everyone was blathering on and on about Mistborn and the Stormlight Archive, I finished this book in one afternoon (while I was supposed to be doing homework). Sure, Brandon's writing has improved since he wrote it, and the characters could use some work. But the setting and the plot are just so compelling that I couldn't help but be dragged in. When people say this in book reviews, I often roll my eyes, but with Elantris, I really couldn't turn the pages fast enough. Third Worst - Oathbringer Ok, ok. Hear me out here. Oathbringer is a good book, objectively. But subjectively, it just wasn't my thing. The worldbuilding, which was why I'd loved tWoK, had been put on the back burner, and there really wasn't anything else that could fill that void. Maybe if it was faster-paced, it would've been better, but it wasn't - it moved at the same slow-burn type pace that tWoK and WoR had. Only this time, there wasn't any worldbuilding to fill in the gaps. The plot id did have was good, which kept it from being moved further down the list. Second Best - The Final Empire This one's a more conventional opinion. The Final Empire was my first Sanderson book, and it feels like it perfectly exemplifies who he is as an author. There's political intrigue, philosophical discussions, a gripping plot, and amazing characters. Kelsier really feels like one of those protagonists that's only the protagonist because there's a bunch of even worse people around. It feels like if he was in another story, he'd be the villain... oh, wait Second Worst - The Well of Ascension This book is just... slow. Nothing much really happens until the end. I still enjoyed reading it, but it's turned two of my friends off Mistborn, and I really wish that didn't happen. Most of the Final Empire is a heist novel, in essence. It drops that pretense about three-quarters of the way through the book, but that's just in time for the first pebbles of the Sanderlanche to start coming down on our heads. However, this becomes a bit of a problem in Well of Ascension. I signed up for a heist and political intrigue, and I got bland romantic tension, and a slow-going siege that just feels like it takes forever to resolve. Best - The Way of Kings The Way of Kings isn't too heavy on the plot. But it did everything else so well, I hardly noticed. It plunges you straight into this strange and wonderful world that's filled to the brim with secrets to unravel, the characters are three-dimensional and lifelike, and what little plot it does have is masterfully worked. This is one of those books that makes me wish I could just tuck all of my memories of it away in a coppermind and experience it for the first time again. Worst - White Sand I enjoyed reading White Sand. I don't really have a problem with the story or the characters. But that's honestly all it has going for it. It's just... unremarkable. I don't really know what else to say. ~~~~~ Sooooo, that's it! Let me know if you want one of these for non-cosmere novels or novellas or something else. I certainly had a fun time making it. byeeeee
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  30. Over the course of obtaining my undergraduate degree in electrical engineering, I came to really enjoy some of the higher level mathematics that describes what this post is about, but I'll spare you most of that with some handwaving, and maybe a few links for those interested in digging deeper. For now please forgive me while I indulge in showing off a selfie of our department's club shirt that's about as math geeky as you can get. This is actually the fundamental equation behind this post. Ok, that out of the way, Rhythm of War has a great deal of stuff in it that danced around real world stuff I learned mostly from a class called "Sound Engineering" that I found really exciting and wanted to post about. Hopefully I can do a good job of communicating this that doesn't hand wave away too much of the underlying principles, while also not getting dragged down into boring details or assuming too much prior knowledge for most people that might also find this interesting. I'm building this from a post I made here. The post will be mostly about the RL principles. I'll reserve a first reply where I might post speculation on how it might influence where the story is going. Sounds, particularly constant sounds like a note from an instrument can be analyzed according to their frequency content. (That's what the equation in the image does) A "pure tone" will have only one frequency associated with it that is a perfect "sine wave" however, in real life, things generally aren't "pure" and actually, less "pure" tones are usually more desirable. Here's a picture of a sin wave pulled off the internet. Because of the nature of how a bow draws across a violin string (or a plate as in the scenes in The Stormlight Archives) the wave generated from them is more like a "saw tooth wave" like this: Now what really matters, is that mathematically it has been shown that for non "pure" repeating waveforms like the saw tooth above, there are multiple contributing frequencies that add up to make them, and the primary one or "fundamental frequency" is the pure tone with the same frequency as the repeating waveform. The next important characteristic is that all other frequency "components" are multiples of the "fundamental frequency." So the note A at the middle of the piano has a fundamental frequency of 440Hz, and that note is also comprised of other frequency content at frequencies of n*440Hz. That is, 440 (1x440), 880 (2x440), 1320 (3x440), 1760 (4x440), etc. This higher frequency content in a note is sometimes called the "harmonic frequencies" and whether two notes harmonize is dependent on if this higher harmonic content meshes together mathematically, or it can be dissonant and the higher harmonics can "beat" against each other (more on that beat later). What makes an "octave" an "octave" is that it is the next note up or down on the scale that matches this pattern, so the "A" one octave up on the piano has the fundamental frequency of 880Hz, and all it's other harmonics are the same higher frequency harmonics as the note that corresponds to 440Hz. This is the underlying principle for why properly tuned octaves are in perfect harmony with each other. The notes on a scale are placed such that choosing ones that harmonize will have other parts of their higher frequency content mesh up perfectly with each other. (Edit: This is a gross simplification. After reading my post for context, @Zincmind's post below has much more on how notes on a scale are placed where they are mathematically) Back to Beats The concept of "beats" relies on constructive and destructive interference. Here's a 12 minute youtube video you can skip or watch for more on what that means, but here's the hand wavy version in a few sentences. When two pure tones are almost but not quite exactly the same frequency, adding them together will have moments when they cancel out and become silent and alternating moments when they add together and become twice as loud in a rhythmic interval like a "beat." How fast they beat depends on how close together the two frequencies are, with closer making for slower beats, and the beat speeds up as the frequencies get farther apart. This 1.5 minute video, you shouldn't skip, because it demonstrates the phenomenon audibly, while displaying a representation of the waveform, and the experience really makes the concept click. Dissonance At higher frequencies, beating tones can be harsh and annoying, a property sometimes used by some alarms to really get your attention. This is also the principle that underpins why dissonant notes are dissonant. So when you play two dissonant notes on a piano, on a superficial level, you just hear the two fundamental frequencies with no louder and softer pulses, but beneath that the higher frequency harmonics of the notes are of frequencies that are slightly off from one another and they "beat" against each other. You can't necessarily hear this on a conscious level, but on a subconscious level you do, and it generates tension on this subconscious level. This is why "chopsticks" is grating on your ears, and it is also abused in horror movies to generate tension with the music alone.
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  31. We know from RoW that in order to 'reverse the polarity' of Investiture and turn it into anti-Investiture, at least in the case of Lights, you need to separate it from its normal tone and then make the next thing it 'hears' that same tone with different intent. Now, Navani accomplished this isolation using vacuum tubes. However, I think that with access to allomancy, there's an easier way. So we know that, besides muffling allomantic pulses, coppercoulds interfere with Rhythms. Therefore, I think that if you put a Light inside a coppercloud* and then exposed it to its proper anti-tone while it was still in there, you'd get anti-Investiture. *It's possible you'd need a copper savant or multiple overlapping clouds or something to fully block out the tone, since we know that with enough juice a coppercloud can be pierced, but maybe not. I want to say just taking scale into account that Shards' pure tones would be pretty good at piercing copperclouds, but looking back it feels like the tones are actually pretty difficult to hear outside certain special conditions.
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  33. We don’t talk about Bruno, no… bUT WE SHALL SING ABOUT HIM FOR ALMOST FOUR MINUTES.
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  34. Bruno is the best, for some reason he reminds me of Hoid...
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  35. Nah, I received via PM and sent via PM.
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  36. I believe balefire does not actually permanently destroy the soul, it just keeps the Dark One from transferring Forsaken souls since it kills them "back in time" so by the time the Dark One knows to look, the soul has already passed on. So if Moridin balefired himself he'd still reincarnate, I think.
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  37. That is possible, though why they would be afraid would remain unansewred and as all magic in the cosmere can be worked together I don't see why it would have that limitation. I don't think so, even seeing connections was something that wasn't possible until the recreance. Just some thoughts on specific interactions, Basic lashings can be preformed to specific directions, but with Bondsmiths, it's possible that they could be connected to specific objects, or even people. Progression could become a form of time dialation, like the space between spaces the Stormfather can create. Cohesion could make objects soft for specific people, making doors only a few can enter, and so forth.
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  38. While that does seem vaguely possible, we do know that Bondsmiths do not exist in the Odium Brands. Only nine are known, and Brandon confirmed Bondsmiths do not exist in them. Somebody else could find the WoB for me, as I am bad at looking for specific WoBs.
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  40. hey awake people go watch this SPAAAAAAACE (yes I woke up at 4 am for this)
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  41. There are multiple threads, so you are not alone. I disagree with you, but everyone is entitled to their opinion, and maybe seeing the numerous other threads in the same vein will help. Some threads involve other topics, but some individuals state their distaste of her. (threads listed below, spoilered for length and organization) threads that have a problem with Jasnah threads that look at her capabilities threads that look at her beliefs I don't think you are missing something, she just doesn't work for you, which is ok. I have noticed an unfortunate trend that since her scenes are so rare, people tend to remember those scenes in an altered and extreme light. Which is why awhile back I wrote a thread to see things from Jasnah's perspective, and included full quotes from the book for reference. If you are so inclined, please check it out, but if not to each their own. As to her having an "un-radiant moral code", we have multiple WoB stating multiple orders would be completely fine with Jasnah, not only elsecallers. Further Jasnah is a confirmed Radiant of the 4th oath, so her code must be analogous with the order she is a part of otherwise she would be unable to progress.
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  42. I mean technically she did have a character arc where she failed: getting proof on the Voidbringers to help combat the coming True Desolation. When she was finally able to come back from Shadesmar, the world had moved past the use of all that she had devoted her research to. And I rather liked the way her "perfection" is used in RoW, both within the narrative and in a meta sense. Navani, Shallan, Adolin all comment on how Jasnah could've gotten it done. Dalinar and Renarin seem to have a more complete? relationship with her. People build her up both in the story and out of it, and the way she herself deals with her reputation was really quite interesting and iirc I commented on it a bit in the Rhythm of War reaction threads. And self-improvement is also the central theme of the Elsecallers, so I'd say that fits as well. But yeah, shoving dealing with Darkeyes... slavery / indentured labour / forced labour on her instead of Kaladin was not a great look. Nor was that meme-worthy stick figure of the patriarchy. Instead of actually dealing with those themes, and her character is actually well-set to deal with the latter, so idk why that scene even existed, hilarious sure but pretty meh. Really, I don't know what to tell you. Right now, Jasnah is representing a lot of things to a lot of people, but she's not a well-developed character as of yet, we haven't really explored her. She is the atheist and the woman in the patriarchal society and the utilitarian, and those are the things that people are enjoying and talking about, the things she represents.
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  43. And Flamespren, forms that aren't of Odium, Lift, the Old Magic Are they Voidbinding too?
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  44. TL;DR: Pretty sure that "Physical Adhesion" is just an extremely limited form of Spiritual Adhesion, as opposed to a separate manifestation of the concept. (This theory's a lot less complex than many of my others, so it's gonna be way shorter and less formatted.) Rereading the Ars Arcanum, a couple things stood out to me about Adhesion: If it's just a Physical binding, it's odd it's so completely unbreakable, and "binding objects together as if they were one" certainly doesn't sound very Physical when put next to the other powers of Adhesion. In fact, it sounds somewhat similar to what Ishar did: Now, obviously the effects are not exactly the same—the Pursuer doesn't get all his Voidlight drained out, and neither does Lopen. But it might be a version of the same thing with a weaker Connection, or perhaps making them "as one" in a different way than directly making the surface part of the target's body. But yeah, after what we saw with Ishar and the emphasis in RoW of Adhesion as a much more spiritual force ("Honor’s Truest Surge, the Surge of Binding and Oaths"), I think that "Physical Adhesion" isn't a separate manifestation of the Surge from "Spiritual Adhesion" at all, it's just that Windrunners don't have enough raw power to manipulate the Connection in more complex or deeper ways than a quick "you, you're that now". Perhaps it's similar to how normally Allomancers can only Push and Pull on metal, but if you chuck enough Investiture into the spiritweb via something like the Bands of Mourning, you reach the point you can see and nearly interact with the souls of objects and people, like Marasi and Wax mention? A Bondsmith spren probably has enough Investiture that when it starts to enter your spiritweb, it pushes the limits of what's possible pretty far compared to a normal sapient spren. (None of this is particularly groundbreaking as a concept, but "Spiritual Adhesion" and "Physical Adhesion" are still distinctions I've seen thrown around and even used myself until very recently, so I think it's still worth a discussion even if it's probably happened before.)
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  45. The Nightwatcher: Hey Odium! I'm thinking of making the Valley into an automated system so I have some more me time. Odium: Tell me more. N: Well, I’ll put two pieces of Investiture out in the Valley for people to take. One is for a boon, the other for a bane. I'll put a sign out telling people to take one of each. O: Interesting. But how will you know people won't just take a boon? N: Oh, it's honor system. O: ._.
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  46. Mistborn all (also Avengers Endgame and Event Horizon) Oathbringer Warbreaker General
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  47. End of Words of Radiance
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