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Important note: This list would be far less complete if not for the efforts of everyone who helped me compile it. Specifically thankyou to: Awesomeness Summoned, Delightful, Argent, PorridgeBrick, Kurkistan, Quiver, Green Hoodie Mistborn, Senor Feesh, Observer, ccstat, Swimmingly, Alvron, Metacognition, The Only Joe, GreyPilgrim, Aether, jasonpenguin, Mailliw73, Moodle, Tempus, Baine, Kobold King, LeftInch, Sir Jerric, Tensoon, Ashiok, Theorymaker, Seonid, Shaggai, TheYoungBard, Curiosity, Snoopy, Voidus, Frosted Flakes, Kasimir, Shallan. (Let me know if I missed you.) Hokay, for those who want to know the ranks, I looked through everyone who had at least 10 posts. Here are my findings. 10000+ God Beyond 9000 9999 Adonalsium 8500 8999 Hero of Ages 8192 8499 The Broken One 7800 8191 Shard 7500 7799 Splintered Shard 7200 7499 Splinter 6800 7199 Dragon 6400 6799 Stormfather 6000 6399 Herald 5700 5999 Sliver 5350 5699 Nightwatcher 5000 5349 Worldhopper 4750 4999 God of Color 4500 4749 Lord Ruler 4250 4499 Unmade 4096 4249 Dawnshard 3761 4095 Prime 3500 3760 Lerasium Mistborn 3250 3499 Bondsmith 3000 3249 Voidbringer 2750 2999 Knight Radiant 2500 2749 Most Ancient 2250 2499 Steel Inquisitor 2048 2249 Mistborn 1900 2047 Tarachin Superstar 1800 1899 Dawnsinger 1700 1799 Rambleman 1600 1699 Savant 1550 1599 Gerontarch 1500 1549 Midnight Essence 1450 1499 Listener 1400 1449 Enefel 1370 1399 Kalad's Phantom 1338 1369 Compounder 1337 So l337 Hoid Can't Compete 1300 1336 Surgebinder 1260 1299 Radiant Squire 1220 1259 Kandra 1180 1219 Twinborn 1145 1179 Returned 1111 1144 Scadrian Waffle Cook 1080 1110 Stone Shaman 1050 1079 Cryptic 1024 1049 Honorspren 1000 1023 Sentient Awakened Object 980 999 Truthless 950 979 Highprince 920 949 Worldbringer 890 919 Full Feruchemist 860 889 Full Shardbearer 830 859 Shardbearer 800 829 Seer 777 799 Spinner 760 776 Wyrn the King 730 759 Elantrian 700 729 Originator 667 699 Svrakiss 666 Torturer of Heralds 650 665 Shade 625 649 Soulcaster 600 624 Forger 575 599 Dakhor Monk 550 574 Lord Prelan 512 549 King's Wit 496 511 Son of Honor 475 495 Vanisher 450 474 King's Tester 425 449 Ghostblood 400 424 Envisager 375 399 Artifabrian 350 374 Ferring 325 349 Stormwarden 300 324 Bloodsealer 278 299 Silent Gatherer 256 277 Misting 225 255 Arbiter 200 224 Gyorn 180 199 High Prelan 160 179 Oldblood 145 159 Cobalt Guard 128 144 Hazekiller 110 127 Forescout 100 109 Houselord 90 99 Babsk 80 89 Prelan 75 79 Arteth 70 74 Idrian Monk 64 69 Obligator 56 63 Lighteyes 50 55 Grand 45 49 Noble 40 44 Crew Leader 32 39 Ardent 25 31 Pahn Kahl 20 24 Awakened Object 16 19 Noble-Blooded 10 15 Bridgeman 7 9 Spearman 5 6 Darkeyes 2 4 Skaa 0 1 Spren --- -1 -2 Negaspren -3 -5 Lifeless -6 -10 Hoed -15 -19 ? Beheaded Inquisitor -20 -24 ? Rotting Chull Carcass -24 -25 Lamespren -26 -100 Zucchini -101 and below Chasmfiend Corpse Note: negative reputation titles are no longer obtainable due to downvotes having been removed. I'll update this as we learn more We now know them all! I like the new levels. Good work Chaos Please don't ask me how long that took. Current lowest Unknown rep: nonexistent. We're so close to getting them all =D Edit: Wooohooo first popular post Later edit: For the record, at the time I added that comment 10 rep was a little more exciting Another edit: The lower rep ranks have changed at some point, I don't know where all of the new boundaries are yet.

I am pleased to announce that there's an entirely new set of reputation titles. Check out under your name to the left of your post and see what title you are--I imagine it will be very different. Why did the ranks get altered? Well, I hadn't ever really expected people to rise through the ranks so fast. Obviously this site isn't going anywhere, and five years down the line, it wouldn't make sense for all of us to be Adonalsium, now would it? So this new scheme was designed to be much more sustainable for years to come. It's also designed to have a ton more progression than the old system. In the old scheme, you became Shard at 128, and then new ranks appeared at 256, 512, and 1024. Not so much progression. Considering how many people are in the 1-500 range, there needed to be a lot more ranks. And boy, there are a lot of new ranks. In the old scheme we had less than 20 ranks total. In this new system, there are 102 positive reputation levels. There's also no exponential growth on new ranks--it's much more linear, with the differences between levels gradually increasing. I hope you find the new system fun! There are a lot of very powerful and cool titles now, but there are also delightfully obscure cosmere titles, and some that are just plain silly. Hehehe. And of course, now with a properly large list of ranks, it's time to complain about their ridiculousness. Some of the promotions are... interesting, to say the least. Discuss yours in the These Stupid Ranks topic.

Meanwhile in the Soviet Cosmere...

Feels like we haven't had one of these posts in some time, doesn't it? In reality it's only been ~3 weeks but it feels nice to get back to something resembling a normal schedule. Nothing lasts, unfortunately, as we have something like 8 commissions in the works right now (many of which are simple, but still), but that's a problem for future mysterious-author-of-these-posts, not present mysterious-author-of-these-posts (this sentence makes a lot more sense on Patreon, where you can't check who is writing the posts, just go with it here). That should be enough padding, let's look at some art! For the month of May our patrons wanted to see the Lightwoven story of The Girl Who Looked Up, but as it is told to us in the Oathbringer chapter 82: The Girl Who Stood Up - when Hoid finds Shallan hiding in a Kholinar house, and helps her finish the story beyond the earlier version we got, the one where the moral is that the wall was there to keep the girl's people in. In the Hoid-assisted version, the girl ventures out, steals some of God's Light, and brings it back to her people so they don't have to live in darkness... and in the process brings the storms as well. For this piece we decided to work with barlydoodles on Tumblr. They have some truly excellent (fan)art, including this silly comic about Shallan wanting to do a Bridge Four sexy calendar and Kaladin absolutely perishing. You can see the exquisite work yourselves, but what is not immediately obvious is that they threw in the additional, standalone portrait of the girl for free, and without being asked to do - just for fun! Barly (?) was great to work with, and you should expect more from them in the future when we land on the right prompt.

Waxillium is not throwing away his shot.

OB: No spoilers really, but it's Stormlight: RoW:

Hi Sharders! There are a couple of ongoing discussions that the staff have been having, and we want to fill you in on some of what we've been working on. In particular, we want to say we realize that we are a predominantly white moderation team, and that our relative lack of racial diversity may make the Shard a less welcoming place for some folks. We've heard calls for more diversity on our team, especially on Shardcast panels. We hear that concern loud and clear and are taking it seriously. It is important to all of us that the Shard is a welcoming place for people of all backgrounds and cultures to form community—both among general members and among our moderation team. We all agree diverse perspectives are incredibly valuable on a leadership team, and that a lack of particular points of view can lead to serious oversights. While we've made some great strides in recent years in terms of increasing representation in some areas (like gender and sexuality), there are other areas where we still have lots of room to grow. As a result, we've been discussing our recruitment practices. Currently, we tend to observe the membership and take note of people who exhibit qualities like thoughtfulness, patience, or skill at conflict resolution, and then keep them in mind when we feel we need to break out the spikes and expand our numbers. Sometimes we have specific asks—like web design, coding expertise, or content creation—and look at our active membership to determine whether there's anyone with the desired skill-set who we think would be a good fit. We also value different backgrounds (including race, nationality, age, gender, sexuality, occupation, socio-economic status, disabilities, etc.) as an asset in making moderation decisions and producing content. Our current recruitment method relies on people being active and self-descriptive on Discord and the forums. Otherwise, we have no way of knowing what great candidates they may be, or what perspectives they might be able to add to our team. We are hoping to open up our pool of candidates, acknowledging that some people who love Brandon's books and would be great contributors to our moderation and content-creation team might not feel comfortable being super loud about their background or skills online. While we will continue to shoulder tap people we think would be a good fit, we also don't want to miss out on people who have valuable skills and insights to contribute. We generally try to consider staff balance, and certain points may become more or less important at different times. In the interest of transparency, here are some examples of what we generally look for when recruiting new staff: Strong communication skills Conflict resolution skills or experience Previous contributions to the community (art, writing, Arcanum, Coppermind, etc.) Diverse backgrounds and perspectives (gender identity, race, nationality, sexual orientation, age, people with disabilities, occupation, socio-economic status, etc.), especially if it is in an area where the current staff is lacking Technical skills (coding, video editing, graphic design, etc.) Ability to work as a team Familiarity with the Brandon Sanderson works and fandom communities (both on the Shard and elsewhere) Timezone coverage How fabulous you look with spikes for eyes Going forward, we want to continue to learn and adjust our recruitment practices so they acknowledge the diversity of this community. Having access to different perspectives and insights from people of different backgrounds will enhance our moderation team and creative projects, and it's something we are hoping to continue improving on. If you don't feel represented by the current staff, or have skills you think would be a valuable asset that aren't listed above, feel free to let us know what you think is missing, and what you feel you could contribute. The questionnaire attached with the post is a new tool we are trying out. If it works, we might keep using it; if not we might try something different. We will not review responses regularly, and may only review periodically when we are looking to make recruitment decisions. The purpose of the questionnaire is just to give us more information to work with than what would normally be available crawling the forums and Discord. We also wanted to give people the opportunity to either put themselves forward or to nominate another person (please ask consent before nominating anyone!). So if you're interested in being staff, even if you don't feel qualified to do so or aren't sure exactly what you may bring to the team, please feel free to fill out the form. Lastly, if you have any ideas or recommendations on how we could improve, we'd love to hear them. Please feel free to post them in the comments of this news article or the #17s channel on our Discord, put them in the questionnaire, or message a staff member of your choice; we love suggestions! Questionnaire

We now have 14 shards. Grouping them in fours should now be possible. Here are my groupings, subgroupings and why. I though subgroupings would be useful. I have them as positive or negative based on how I think a shard operates. Note that Negative does not mean evil/dangerous. Instead that axis refers to weather I think a shard is working too something or primarily against something. I am also adding internal or external based on if I think the shard's power starts from within or without IE Cultivation pushes things to grow against their environment but Ruin breaks from the outside. Members of the same group and subgroup are opposites as in allomancy. THIS IS STILL A WORK IN PROGRESS. I would like additional opinions whenever possible. Change/Probability/Temporal Shards. Ruin: Rather obvious but nonetheless clearly belongs here. Ruin is the shard of entropy. Its power wants to increase the randomness of the universe avoiding order. I am going to add the subgroups Negative External. Preservation: Similarly wants the opposite. Preservation is the shard of stasis. It wants to make things happen in more static and orderly ways avoiding chaos. I am going to add the subgroups Negative Internal. Cultivation: A shard of development according to natural rules. Think evolution, learning, and growth. Organisms who learn to take advantage of their surroundings based on predictable results. I am going to add the subgroups Positive Internal. Wimsey: This one might be a bit controversial but I personally see Wimsey as this temporal rather then emotional shard. It also functions a lot as an anti Cultivation which is somewhat rational. Wimsey is random but random in such a way that coincidences seem targeted. You flip a coin 100 times and never get tails. You bet your house on this new inexplicable fact of nature and get heads. I am going to add the subgroups Positive External. Connection/Relation Shards Autonomy: A shard of independence and mastery. Wants things less connected and for existing connections to weaken. I am going to add the subgroups Negative Internal. Honor: A shard of connection and promises. Wants things to get steadily more connected and for those connections to get stronger. I am going to add the subgroups Positive Internal. Dominion: A shard of ownership. Wants for things to fall under an authority. I am going to add the subgroups Negative External. Devotion: A shard of caring. Wants to give authority to another. I am going to add the subgroup Positives External. Desire/Emotion Shards Valor: A shard of courage and acting against interest Works to eliminate dangers and follow through on difficult missions. I am going to add the subgroups Positive Internal. Mercy: A shard of defense and reaction. Works to eliminate cruelty or death. I am going to add the subgroups Negative Internal. Ambition: A shard of wants or desires. Works to grab, take, or master. I am going to add the subgroups Positive External. Odium: A shard of hatred and emotion. Works to topple all wrong or punish those who abuse what they have. I am going to add the subgroups Negative External. Interpretation/Creation Shards. Invention: A shard of advantages and planing. Wants to create things of interest or use. I am going to add the subgroups Positive External. Endowment: A shard of beautifying. Wants to make a more vibrant, colorful, or interesting. The shard that made our lives miserable. I am going to add the subgroup Positive Internal. Speculative shard Prudence: We know a little about a Wisdom shard. I choose Prudence because I think it is a good ant-Invention. I am going to add the subgroups Negative Internal. Speculative shard: Correction. A shard of elimination and judgement. Adonalsium might believe that something is no longer serving its purpose and required alteration. I am going to add the subgroups Negative External. Metallic arts to make things interesting and also let me guess a few things about fabrails. I decided to pair each shard to a metal based on its effects and then use that confection to figure out the rest of fabrails. I spoilered for length as I think the wall of text was bad enough.

I'm going to be offline for about a week because I'm going to fsy!

Oh there are plenty. Hmm... I feel like is potential with Hamilton and Kelsier. Something with Battle of Yorktown, but for Luthadel? With Vin, Elend, Breeze and Kelsier replacing Lafayette, Mulligan, Laurens and Hamilton respectively? And Hamilton and Kaladin actually. Hurricane for Kaladin maybe?

Well, crem, Brandon's managed to throw everything into shambles again. For the time being, please keep all discussion about the prologue to Book Five in this thread.

I finally got a friend to read Mistborn. After what feels like years of pestering her to finally get around to some Cosmere, she finally started it. She had read Rithmatist and Alcatraz, and had started Elantris, but hadn't really gotten around to any serious Cosmere reading. But yesterday was her birthday, and she got a copy of Mistborn. She has already sent me texts containing theories and questions, which I have gleefully RAFO'ed. She also seems to be using me as a place to gather her thoughts, as she sent me a nice summary of Allomancy as she understood it three chapters in. I'm so happy right now. Don't get me wrong, finding Sanderfans and making friends with them is incredible, and I wouldn't trade my Sanderfan friends that I've made that way for anything. But there's really something different about getting one of your closest friends to read these books and getting to watch them experience how incredible they are. (.....I may be getting ahead of myself. She's only four chapters in right now.)

Keep forgetting to post these here lolll.

An interesting theory, good job! I think other have speculated along similar lines, e.g. @LewsTherinTelescope asked a relevant question that got mostly RAFO'd: There is quite a bit to read in this thread (and it might not be the original birthplace of this idea), but one of the things I like from it is the linguistic examination of Ba-Ado-Mishram's Ba, similar to "bah," a Thaylen word that seems to convey the relationship between a master and an apprentice (e.g. Rysn Ftori bah-Vstim) but that could've easily started off as one suggesting parenthood. It is notable here that the Thaylen language may have been derived from the Dawnchant, so it's plausible that the ancient word for "child of" could've morphed into "apprentice of" or something like that Ado, half of adoda, the Alethi word for "light" and also the way you'd "read" the adoda glyph (you would "write" the characters for A, D, and O, and let the symmetric nature of the glyphs "autocomplete" the rest so it's symmetric) Mishram. The similarity to Mishim here is clear, but you go even further. If you treat Mishram's name the way you would some other names composed of Alethi words (e.g. Kholin is khokh + linil), you can break it into Mishim + Ramar. That's not super useful to us, but other names break differently - Sebarial's glyphpair, for example, comes from sebes + laial, and if you apply this logic to Mishram you get Mishim + Maram... which is awfully close to Mishim + Merem, and merem is the Alethi word of honor. All together, I think there are more connections that we can discard easily. I particularly like the idea that the two Hoid stories were inspired by the same historical events. Some of the details don't quite work for me, but I think the general shape of it is very sound and I am happy to support the theory

I know it's been a long time, and this has very few changes, but I just finished my OB reread and it struck me. Basically no spoilers:

Hoid is no stranger to overarching plans- his presence on Roshar is for one, a single, Stormlight-related plot goal. He is confirmed to possess a plan, when in Secret History, Hoid says to Kelsier: Neither Leras or Khriss give hints away, other than that Khriss considers her task futile when she hears he took the second to last Lerasium bead- but Hoid's search of adding new magic systems to his portfolio always seems secondary. Other than the theft of the lerasium, we know three things Hoid was doing during era 1. The first is that Hoid was a successful informant in Luthadel during TFE, one known to both the nobility and rebellion, who dealt with both, and was successful enough he was smoking tobacco, a high-in-demand luxury item on Scadrial. The only thing that seems notable here is that Hoid either doesn't know about House Renoux being a front of the rebellion, or he's trying to dissuade Kelsier in the guise of a nobleman from peering too closely into Renoux. The second, during WoA, is that he is primarily in Terris, not trying to get Feruchemy, but investigating it, because he has a power that is similar to Feruchemy, and he is attempting to secure guidance from the Synod and the Keepers. With the Razing of Tathingdwen, he ends up wrapped up in the event, and becomes the leader of a group of Terris refugees, securing their safety. The third, during HoA, is that he is doing the successful informant thing again, in Fadrex City- successful enough that the King of the Dominance, Ashweather Cett, encouraged Vin to seek him out for information, but the two never meet, as Kelsier guides her away from Hoid, and Ruin is unaware of his presence in Fadrex. Now, what was this plan? The biggest thing Kelsier did was overthrow the Final Empire, and pave the way for the death of the Lord Ruler- so Hoid was planning for him to die- but for what reason? I've seen speculation that the plan was to grab the lerasium and run, but if this was true, then Hoid would get the hell off of Scadrial, as opposed to sticking around after the Well of Ascension is emptied and there are no viable ways of getting off world. Hoid knew Scadrial would survive, and stayed on the world until the Catacendre. Leras states that he and Hoid were not in contact in the past few years, so Hoid possibly doesn't know Preservation's plan, but he has been on Scadrial before- the Terris Worldbringers was either founded by Hoid or someone influenced by Hoid. It's possible his plan was Preservation's plan, and he was aiding him secretly- and that seems the closest, but Kelsier was integral to the success of Preservation's plan, so why was he ignored by Hoid? Pre-Roshar, being a subtle actor is what Hoid's best at, and I have no doubt he used this to nudge rumors and people towards certain actions, and this made up a majority of his subtle influence on his world, but I am clueless about his ultimate plan- other than it does not involve the destruction of Scadrial.

After re-reading Oathbringer, I started wondering about the old magics. So I went and looked it up on the coppermind where I found that Lift's bane isn't listed. That made me think some more. It seems that the boon/bane effect is mostly physical with the Nightwatcher. She tried to convince Dalinar to choose a physical boon, either an object or physical enhancement. In addition the boon and bane can be completely unrelated: see Av's father who got a heap of good cloth in exchange for seeing the world upside down. The three times we have seen Cultivation step in, the boon/bane seems more cognitive/spiritual. More important they seem to be the same thing. The boon IS the bane, with a little added flair from Cultivation to influence the world without anyone knowing. To get what you want, you have to take all of the result. Like the old adage. You cannot have your cake and eat it too. If you eat it, you also have to lose the cake and potentially add a pound. Think of Dalinar: Boon - Loss of Spiritual whispers and guilt for the murder he had committed. -Cognitive loss Bane - Loss of all memories relating to Evi -Cognitive loss Cultivation's meddling: Allowing Dalinar to grow strong enough to resist the call of the Thrill and being used by Odium Now, the boon could not exist without the bane. If Dalinar could remember her death, the boon would be ineffective. If Dalinar could remember her enough to ask about her death or, really, have any meaningful conversation with other about her, her death would be brought up eventually. So Dalinar could not remember her and grow the way he needed to become the "good" Dalinar of present day. So it was all boon, just with side effects. Next, Taravangian: Boon - The intelligence to keep Kharbranth intact while Rayse was Odium and the capacity to become the Shard's new Vessel -Cognitive enhancement Bane - The inability to have both intelligence and compassion at the same time -Cognitive enhancement Cultivation's meddling - All of it really. Mostly replacing a dangerous enemy with a potentially more amenable one. Note: The boon and bane descriptions come from the coppermind oldmagic article. I would disagree a bit there. Taravangian needed BOTH intelligence and compassion to be able to do what he asked which was "Capacity. Capacity to stop what was coming. The capacity to save humankind." So, Cultivation gave him the capacity he needed: mental capacity and emotional capacity. She even made it inverse, which seems wise. It is very had to strategically plan knowing you will cause thousands of deaths and even more suffering if you are also being compassionate. At the same time, you need have time to be compassionate to be able to remember why you are doing what you are doing and relate to the people you are saving. You really cannot have both at once. If you really want to keep the boon/bane mentality, then I would say the bane was the unpredictability of the effects. But even then, someone smart enough to make the Diagram would figure out the pattern and design a way to work around the compassionate side. Like Dalinar, seems like all boon, just really annoying side effects. Now for Lift: Boon - Produce Lifelight from mass; using Lifelight to Surgebind, being partially stuck with the Cognitive Real, vision manipulation Bane - unknown Cultivation's meddling - Experimentation of creating her own kind of Radiant Note: As with Taravangian's section, I pull the descritions of boons and banes from the coppermind. That list of boons seems pretty long, doesn't it. Not really Cultivation or the Nightwatcher's MO, giving so many boons but no obvious banes. So lets theorize a bit here. Producing Lifelight from mass and using to surge bind are not part of the boon, but what Cultivation was trying to obscure with the granting of the boon. The boon it self was "she was suppose to stay the same and the world was supposed to change around her". So Cultivation uses this ask to change her spirit web to use Lifelight which pulls her partially into the cognitive realm. This in turn grounds her mind in how she sees herself ( ie not more than ten) cognitively like spren are controlled by perception. So she keeps her mental age, but her physical body continues to age. (Though I kinda like the idea of her being more like Returned, where when she hits a certain age, she will stop aging). Being partly in the cognitive realm allows her to interact with it more, hence touching of spren and vision manipulation. But there are what could be called banes or side-effects. Imagine being a child in a grown woman's body. Imagine being on the brink malnutrition constantly. Definitely down sides. But Cultivation doesn't have a storm. How else could she have gotten light to her budding Radiant? I went on this particular tangent because of a WOB: Note that he mentions boons and curses from the Nightwatcher. In reference to Lift, it is just a boon. Now this is some what proven to be an omission as in a different WOB he mentions both a boon and a curse: But I wonder if someone could actually use BOTH lights, or if the process of changing the spirit web makes that impossible or at least very unlikely. Note that he also calls it Stormlight here even though we now know it is Lifelight. Final supporting WOB: So, to sum up. Cultivation doesn't really give boons/banes. She sees a request that she can do a single cognitive/spiritual manipulation that will provide an effect at least correlated to the request but also serves to influence the world the way she wants.

So I wrote Bridgeboy(a parody of Gaston. It's not very good.) And I tried to do Lightweaver(a parody of Believer by Imagine Dragons. But it's hard. Any help?) I present: We Don't Talk About Moash! Any suggestions for fixing the struggling rhythm are welcome. MAJOR RoW spoilers follow: Also Surface Pressure for Kaladin is one I've thought of but not started. Any takers?

Shallan: Young woman who suffers from Alzheimer's develops split personality disorder to protect herself from her Alzheimer's

Did we just become best friends?

Alright its time for a full on essay's worth of game thoughts. This game is by far the most complex game I've ever run. It had 3 weird, distinct mechanics I've never seen before. 1. The Faction choosing. Any of you who have been in the community for at least a year know this idea has been bouncing around my head for a while. The idea of shifting factions interests me for many reasons, and this was the final culmination of that idea. Originally it was going to be a singer game, but Hallendren and the manywar caught my interest for a potential setting, which sent the rest of this into motion. Honestly, it didn't turn out too bad, thanks mostly to Devotary. I would have done things slightly differently, but the way Devotary ended up distributing it ended up with only a few small issues, which I'll get into. 2. Awakening Discovery. This mainly came about as a way to pace the game, make breath worth something, and help shift the game in interesting ways. The discovery was utilized well, but I found pretty much no one bothered to awaken anything at all. This gets into the third item, but I kind of wish the awakening system had been explored more. Perhaps the game was just too fast paced? I'm not sure. 3. The Breath Economy. Technically I stole the heightening system from... LG5 I think it was? With a few tweaks to make it work better in this game. The thing is, I thought there was going to be a lot more breath gain in this game than there ended up being, which actively messed with the Adjuncts. The thing is, people died really quickly. 3 deaths a cycle is fast, even with 17 people. That meant there wasn't as much breath flowing into the game as I was counting on, and there was no way anybody would have ever been able to hit the 10th heightening. We had 2 people hit the 6th, but my ideal was by the end of the game for someone to be able to hit the 9th and discover the final command, Destroy Evil. So basically, it really should have been more like 1-30 or even 1-40 breath, with the Adjunct action doubling that. It would have made that a lot more doable. The biggest distribution problem was Matrim. He should not have been in the Edgli faction. It was already a faction that didn't need to do much, but that made it so it needed to do nothing at all to win. But, it is what it is. The other big problem was a little loophole I left in the rules. When I wrote the rules, I wrote them so that none of the primary factions could win with each other. But, the way I worded the Revolutionaries' win condition left an edge case where the Infiltrators and the Revolutionaries could win together. I didn't consider it an issue, because of how complex it would be to actually win together, but I should have closed the loophole. I'm glad the players were able to work things out on that end, but I'm still a bit annoyed about it. Another weird thing: I included the Infiltrators to force docs to not be able to trust absolutely, but that ended up pushing the game mostly into PMs. PMs are a lot harder to manage and look over than documents, which made GMing and keeping track of everything a bit more of a headache. Especially when Kasimir and Fifth were making ungodly numbers of PMs. I'd probably change the infiltrators in some manner to help that. I think it was ok, but the docs didn't end up as essential as I thought they'd be. Serial Killers! I didn't think they'd actually be able to win with the primary factions, nor did I think the Doves were going to be able to win. But once Araris hopped factions to the Cult of Colors, that made that possible suddenly. Speaking of which, that was literally perfect. I'm glad the RNG gave the role to Araris, and I'm also really happy that the role got used to cause such an interesting ending. Looking at the primary factions, I feel like I should have given them some more Oomph. The infiltrators had both information and a kill. Now, what might have been a more interesting set up, would have been to have the Revolutionaries have the kill, the infiltrators have information, and then give some edges to the Doves and Hawks as well. Maybe a protect for the Doves and a bunch of awakened items for the Hawks? I'm not sure, I'd have to think about it more. And yeah, Edgli needed to be more interactive. Changing the protect would have been one way to help it, but I'd have to think about it more. Having Matrim in there was one problem, but they probably would have been able to find a returned fairly easily. Honestly it probably would have been better to have them be one of the win condition ideas I saw thrown around, like some sort of alignment changing faction, or something else. Just keeping someone alive was too simple. One more thing. Devotary is the best. The number of times she came in clutch for some reason or another was not insignificant. Please go give her an upvote somewhere because Devotary rocks! Alright, basically, this was a real learning experience for me. I tend to like to run mechanically unique games in unexplored settings, and this was kind of the most extreme of these. I don't think I'll be running another faction game anytime soon, they're hard to balance. And tie up all loose ends. And if I do, I'm certainly not letting players choose their own factions again. It was a fun one time thing, but... well good old RNG is probably more reliable, especially in games as complex as this one. But outside of a faction game, I hardly see another place that kind of mechanic could actually work? Certainly not in a normal V vs E game. So, IDK. I'm not even sure when I'll be running another game, but I promise will not be this experimental. I think that's about it. Thanks for playing another Steel game! Until next time I come up with some weird mechanic...

Poem 27 Undying Vision Upon the cliffs overlooking the violent seas that wage a ceaseless war stands a star plucked from the highest of heavens. She sees the carnage that sweeps across the world, the death that has fallen to the realm of mortals smothering regions, and so many unanswered prayers ignored. Twisted mountains and forests filled with the breathless taken into the darkest endless abyss. Children weeping over parents who will not stir or comfort them. Horrific wraiths with teeth of jagged razors dripping with poison fill her vision when they take up residence in this place that they claim for themselves. Markets once boisterous are silent such that even the winds do not sound to break this awful curse. Kings and kingdoms are no more now all that remains are the spilled tears that feed the gluttonous hunger of these unholy abominations. Slaughter is that which these dream about when they rest. Now the mistress of the most sublime of worlds begins to sing a song that drives itself deep into the soul of the cosmos. Those waters so contentious and full of strife, calm even as the light of day bursts forth from hiding. That shroud which took transforms into the finest powder and restores vigor to all that have died. Sadness is forgotten when joy takes root among the creatures that corrupted this plane. They have nowhere to flee to because of the tune that grows louder and chains them in place. Trapped monsters give strength to the breezes that they may join in heralding the one who has saved indiscriminately. Rulers bend the knee and hand their crowns to the most noble queen whose light makes all stronger than they ever were before that scourge stripped them of even their humanity. Eternity is yours to command as now you heal and renew existence as the sovereign whose equal will never rise.

I have to apologize, yesterday was nuts and I was unable to write anything at all. That said here is Poem 26 Splendid Sovereignty A city hidden in a valley home to temples of ancient heritage now burns beneath torches that seek to wipe it from the face of the earth. Primordials do not rush to aid those who for centuries kept their charges as most sacred writ. Palaces built to honor not mortal flesh, but the power of feckless immortals become killing grounds for priests and scholars. The fields run scarlet as any who rise up with a weapon are silenced forever. Neighboring lands rush to aid the fallen only for the carnage to spread as a plague of the most horrific sort. Those deities who would intervene are chained by their fellows who see humanity as slaves and providers for their desires. Cursed earth grows as even the most corrupt soon see their kingdoms crumble and all that they have vanish as the most fleeting memory. Soon an empire drags down those who did nothing and bends their knees and slaughters those weakened ones who would have acted. Then comes a haunting song from the west as the night begins to fall and a single mighty star falls from the heights. From its illumination comes the greatest of the luminaries in the heavens her music upon her lips as she dances among the enemy and smites them without a weapon of steel or iron to aid. No blade cuts down her foes as she sings and brings silence to all of the worlds both above the captured realm and below where the dead claw and beg to return and have their vengeance. Where she goes there is only a light that immolates those who wrought anarchy in the name of dominion. When nothing remains of the foul scourge all becomes as it was save the impotent fools whose crowns were ground into powder. They are taken away on high to serve a guardian whose eye strays not far and whose radiance adorns the upper worlds as a warning and monument to the sovereign of the mortals and divine.

Mid-year Music Update from last month, partially updated: Most Listened To: "Survivor" by Desiigner, "Numb & Getting Colder" by Flume, "Elevate" by Papa Roach, (several Polyphia songs, as mentioned later on), "Blasphemy" by Bring Me the Horizon, "Castles" by Paper Idol Best Vibes: "I Ain't Worried" by OneRepublic, "Dreamland" by Glass Animals, "Ah Yeah," by Robert Glasper, "Sleepy Tea" by Chon, "Castles" and "Clouds" by Paper Idol, "Earl Gray" by FN Most WTF???: "Storm" by Otyken, "Hide and Seek" by Polkadot Stingray, "Space Ghost Coast to Coast" by Glass Animals (NOTE: This category means that I didn't know what on earth was going on during my first listen. Rest assured that I thoroughly enjoy all three songs listed here.) Focus Band - Polyphia with "G.O.A.T." "OD," "Goose," "Nasty," "Playing God," "40oz," and now "Neurotica" (Glass Animals is in second place with "The Other Side of Paradise," "Dreamland," "Space Ghost Coast to Coast," and "Tokyo Drifting.") Best Remixes: "One Step Closer" by 100gecs, "Watashi Igai Watashi Ja Nai No," by PARKGOLF, "Toxic" Y2K Remix by Brittany Spears This Week's Songs: "Bad For You" by Vicki Vox and "Neurotica" by Polyphia Top Music Introducers: Steezy's Dance Channel ("Baguetti," "Coldblooded," "Light Switch," "Ooh Kill'em," "Indigo")

Poem 28 Stolen Aria? Monsters whose cultic worshippers are stricken by the carnage that burns across the mortal realm reduce the highest mountains to less than a handful of dust. Warriors wielding unrelenting storms, plagues, magics, and horrors reach for the crown that makes one a deity among deities. That song of creation that shaped all of the cosmos hangs on the precipice. The empress by whose will this tune plays keeping the universe intact watches the destruction and sends forth mortal armies blessed with the power to pierce primordial souls. All of these are torn apart as if by the wildest of beasts. Ever more powerful legions are lost while anarchy boils the seas and uproots all of the world. Weeping deafens everything and stars on high begin to burn themselves out until the anathemas that seek power smother everything shattering the hold of the sovereign whose incomparable countenance is ashen. Upon a chariot drawn by the weakened music that she now sings with closed eyes, she descends to wage war. Flashes of light and power emerge with greater strength the longer this composition floats from her depths. One by one those who lust after the ability to be a deity among deities is incorporated into that which they would destroy. The darkness deepens the complexity of the weave that makes up the realms. Rot sublimes leaving no scars as all of reality awaits her rage to call down devastation in retribution. However, no more devastation is visited on those who cried until they could find no more tears. Laughter roars as all is restored to its former glory as though nothing had occurred. In the heavens, constellations are brighter than they ever had been before this nightmare was visited upon all of humanity. A smile and the lingering strains of eternity follow her to her throne overlooking a new age.

I think adins father is someone inspired by the radiants. And now that they are down feels he has to step up to continue the fight or at least make sure the radiants are safe.

I'm no longer dead!

Go read Foundryside by Robert Jackson Bennett. It's genuinely fantastic and the cover quote is from ol' Brandon himself if that'll get you interested

I’m sorry if I miss any RP notifications, or if my writing is terrible. My family has gotten sick, and I’m starting to get a headache.

I think Lifeless and Shades have the same issue of too little Investiture, so I think you need to enhance the Shade back up to functional sapience before it would be able to support and control a physical body.

To add to what's already been said, Kaladin could use surges before saying the first oath because he had a bond with Syl already. Dalinar used Stormlight while fighting the Parshendi in WoR, similarly to Kaladin. It seems that having a spren that intends to bond you can begin the Nahel bond without oaths, although the bond could be ended much more easily than after the Radiant swears oaths.

This is one of my favorite character concepts for some reason: 'he's been in the woods for three years and hasn't spoken to another human in that same amount of time'. He's not Beren, and he's not Tuor either - at least, I don't think so. Anybody want to come up with a name for him? He needs one, but I can't think of anything.

Good to know, I was just starting a new topic Not what I've expected, really. Gavilar seems to be dead, with no plans made of surviving as a Cognitive Shadow. This chapter humanizes him (and Sadeas) to some extent - his final reaction to the Stormfather's lies is still extremely satisfying, though. Apparently Gavilar has been working with Thaidakar on starting a Desolation - assuming the math done by @CROSSENuUP here is correct, it seems that Shallan managed to do it before them. The original goal of the visions seems to have been tricking someone into taking Taln's place. I still wonder - what words (or attitude, or actions) did the Stornfather expect from Gavilar? The First Ideal? What was the thing about Gavilar's demand being close about, then? We get Taravangian's origin story, kind of. I'm not sure if the new Death Rattle is a general warning against the Desolation, or something that will actually happen in the books. Gavilar's last words make much more sense now.

So, I've been thinking about ways that a person could enhance their control over a Hemalurgic construct. More Spikes: this one's pretty obvious, as we've seen it happen already. More spikes in a controlled construct equals and easier time dominating it. Enhanced Mind: this one should also be intuitive, as we see from Vin in Hero of Ages that she begins to feel mentally fatigued by controlling tens of thousands of Koloss simultaneously. So, something like the Blessing of Presence might help, as might tapping determination from an Electrummind. Stronger Connections: this is more of a theory, really. Since it seems that the reason that you can control a Hemalurgic construct in the first place is a weakened Spiritweb on their part, plus a Connection forged via Emotional Allomancy or some other method. So increasing the strength of your Connection, possibly via Feruchemical duralumin, might be able to help. Weakened/Removed Identity: Since Identity is kind of the separation between the Spiritweb and the rest of the world, removing or reducing the Identity of your controlled constructs, which could be accomplished via Feruchemical aluminum, may increase your capacity to control them. So, does anybody have any other ideas on how to improve one's control over a Hemalurgic construct?

This was fun. Being the last in my faction, in my second game ever, in a game this complicated, was... a bit much, but I feel like I have some idea what I'm doing now. Enjoyed playing with y'all, especially Bard and Stick. I'll be doing it again!

Oh man, this will date me. I'll confess that some of this idea came from someone else's question on making fabrial mecha, but once I thought of it... if this wrecks anyone's view of Stormlight Archive, I apologize, and if comparing SA to something incredibly campy bothers you, turn back now. No, I don't think Brandon stole anything, any more than when a fan came up to him and told him that they loved Mistborn because everyone was Magneto. I'll need to set some things up first though. The main conflict really kicks off when Venli and her researchers accidentally release Rita Repulsa Odium and her minions the Fused from the moon (Braize). In preparation for this, and in response, Zordon Honor commands his servant Alpha 5 the Stormfather to find teenagers with attitude those with cracks in their souls who would fight for their world and sent them archetypal powers that would eventually allow them to fight in a united front, though for a long time those with powers got into conflict after conflict with each other. In the climactic showdown, this core team of the Power Rangers Knights Radiant, their bonds and friendships forged together through the war, they Unite the spren of their respective Shardplates into the Megazord and in the cockpit of their new armor, they strike down the champion of Odium, their Spren joining to form a massive Powersword Shardblade. Dalinar sits back in his seat, his hands dropping from the controls, his task to UNITE THEM, finally complete.

Nah, it's pretty clear he treats them with 'reverence', quote from the book. And they clearly deserve it

Introducing... The Elemms and the Wyvrns! The Elemms and their Guardians, the 6 Wyvrns, are the Koverse's equivalent of the Dawnshards and Shards (Vessel, not power. Or both. Whatever.) of the Cosmere. Spoilered down below (for size) is a report on all 6 Wyvrns and how their Guardianship over the 6 Elemms shapes their personalities. I did way too much world-building on vacation

here ya go

Is it just me or are 99% of these just text now? (It's nice that there are 100, so I can make an accurate percentage...)

In RoW, Adin seems to suspect that his father had attracted a spren. Do you think it is an unfounded teenage hope or there is some validity to it? Since Adin's father was awake during the occupation, he can't be of the first three ideals. Could he be a squire? Or perhaps, like Kaladin, he was close to the fourth one? On my first read, I though it unlikely that we have an unknown radiant in the tower, but now that I reread RoW, it seems interesting that the father is shown to be in the thick of resistance several times. I keep thinking that, perhaps, Adin's chapters are not about Adin, after all

Here’s Heather, Granite, and Ember from CBST! They’re a love triangle, with Heather in the middle.

The tropical habitable moon of a distant gas giant. Sometimes I think Earth is boring, because the largest celestial object we can see (besides the sun) is this small little sphere that barely takes up any of the sky. The moon is cool. But imagine standing on the surface of an alien world and looking into the sky, only to see a gigantic planet dominating a good fourth of the visible space in the sky. It would have swirling clouds that you could see with incredible detail, and you could probably also see nearby moons easily. It would be insane and incredible. Barring interstellar destinations, probably a Polynesian island. What is your dream interstellar destination?

Yeah... I kind of get the impression that the Thrill as the Alethi's "secret edge" is more of a morale thing. Not that it makes them better fighters, in the sense of skill, or physical strength (except in an "adrenaline rush" kind of way) - but it makes them less likely to hesitate, reduces fear, increases will to fight despite losses. Which can make a huge difference on a large scale of armies etc., but I don't think it helps much in the case of people like Szeth and Dalinar who we can assume are totally committed to the fight already and too well trained to hesitate. I think the Thrill is basically an emotional effect, like Ashertmarn's "revelry" effect, not actually giving powers; it's probably much like (Mistborn)

A UNICORN/PHOENIX. But if I had to choose an actual animal... it would be a snow leopard, maybe. Some people feel the rain. Others just get wet. That and also all Hoid/Wit/Cephandrious insults ever said. I would probably call 911...

Also I don't know how much traction the coins could have they might just fly off when subjected to enough pressure to open the door since that is the path of least resistance.

I always saw Copperclouds as having a kind of strength spectrum, like what you say here. It seems to me like someone who's really good at using Copper (savant, mayhaps?) could probably make a Coppercloud that even a powerful Seeker like Vin would need to push a little harder to pierce. And someone burning Copper who has a really low power level (maybe caused by the ability to burn Copper being granted by a severely decayed Hemalurgic spike) could have their Coppercloud pierced by a normal Seeker flaring Bronze. If a Mistborn uses Duralumin with Copper, maybe the only way to pierce that very strong (although very brief) Coppercloud would be an equally strong usage of Duralumined Bronze. As for how that translates to Bichromatic Auras....It's been a while since I last read Warbreaker, so I'm not sure. I'm going to guess that if it's a small aura, a Coppercloud could easily hide it completely, but it might take a stronger Coppercloud, even to the level of Duralumin Copper, to hide an Aura of hundreds or thousands of Breaths. You're right about the Coppercloud hiding Lifesense: So, Lifesense will be blocked by Copper. But I think you're right in that someone with Perfect Lifesense could probably pierce that Coppercloud, because their sense is stronger. However, if that Coppercloud is flared or Duralumined, maybe that extra burst of power would be enough to block even the Perfect Lifesense. It's all on a power spectrum, and so you have to take that in account. If the Coppercloud is stronger than magic sense, the magic sense is smothered. But if the magic sense is stronger, the Coppercloud is pierced.