Wreith

I'm not sure what you're trying to say. The parasite would have to survive on home-grown animals too. I'm not even sure we can assume that only birds can gain powers from the parasites. Other creatures obviously have intelligence and abilities. Birds are just all we see bonded with humans. We see one mainland bird and it successfully gained a power. That's 100% positive...not negative. And as far as I recall, we don't even know why Dusk brought Sak let alone any others. Ostensibly he finds the new ability far too valuable to risk other trappers finding out about by bringing more non-native birds

Preservation's plan wasn't a really very good, which is essentially stated outright in Secret History where Kelsier says no one knows the significance of the number 16. It also required an army of atium mistings, which no one would know existed because no one would test it with such an expensive element, to be gathered to burn it away. And note that mistborn, which Lerasium creates, are not required. Only mistings, which really just requires the potential for snapping to be present in the populace. The new mists that began appearing forced people to snap that wouldn't have over the course of their normal life. They had the potential but weren't spiritually broken enough. So part of Preservations strategy was to snap atium mistings. So there's no need for perpetual lerasium, just a few people to use it and then propagate.

The only WoB that comes to mind technically references them by planets rather than shards The suggestion that the ten planets are important implies that ten was a significant number to Roshar before the shattering.

I'm not confident I'm correct, but shashahes from the rattle is 6-5-1 the everstorm arrived on 10-10-03 10-10-03 1173 06-05-01 1171 That ends up at 1102 days, right? assuming "a couple" from the WoB means 2, that would match almost exactly

that is a splendid point that I hadn't applied to my thoughts on their travel back and forth.

So Taln did actually break. I was liking my theory that he didn't break and one of the other heralds (probably Ishar) went back just to allow the Singers through. As has been said, him breaking just before WoK doesn't mean the torture wasn't delayed when he arrived. I don't like the idea of the heralds having to traverse the cognitive realm to return to Roshar, but it would be one way to explain Taln thinking he's late. We should ask if Taln went anywhere besides Roshar when he left Braize. Maybe he's crazy and got lost. I prefer the idea that perhaps Taln was aware of some of what was going on around him when he got to the Shattered Plains and was concerned by the presence of Parshmen and possibly even realized the Alethi were already at war with the Parshendi, thus thinking he was late. That would mean Hoid saying he's late and Taln thinking he's late stem from two different understandings.

I think this is more a display of the fact that Szeth is more careful with his oaths now. I don't think other Skybreakers would reserve the right to change like that.

assuming Moash and Jasnah don't kill them all first

The heralds don't swear the oaths as a general rule, but Nale claims that he has completely joined the Skybreakers. We don't know that he's actively trying to subvert the oathpact specifically, but you are right that he is crazy and Nale is very wrong to trust him. That doesn't mean Nale's third oath can't have been to follow Ishar's orders.

The only thing I can think of that makes sense of him changing sides to support the Singers is what others have already mentioned, swearing to follow the rightfully passed laws of whatever land he's in. The fifth oath is what allows him to decide who he thinks the rightful rulers of the land are. I think what allowed him to not be involved in the battle was the fact that there aren't any codified laws of the Singers at present. I have a suspicion that his quest was retrieving his honorblade.

This isn't sufficient for Spicker's actual question: Any use of stormlight can be attributed to him having reclaimed his honorblade, which is confirmed by Szeth.

You make good points, but I don't see any reason to believe that is an actual restriction of soulcasting. Perhaps it would require more skill, but I don't see why it couldn't be done. Also, I'm not suggesting metal to metal soulcasting necessarily. Wood to metal would work too. Anything sufficiently easy to form to allow greater production quantity.

You'd still have to pull it out and be capable of processing it for it to be useful. I think you could store the memories, but you'd have the same comprehension problem when you eventually tried to tap them.

I don't think he was a member of his order then, so he had made no Oath that would cause an issue here. I'm not saying he wasn't broken. I'm saying he's getting better. This under the guidance of Ishar. Again, still very broken here. I don't think he began getting better until Lift forced him to confront the reality of the Everstorm. And the Nale we see in Oathbringer is significantly more forthcoming but less confident. He's painfully aware of his failings and he goes to significant length to ensure that the newest full Skybreaker doesn't swear to follow him. He is supporting the Singers because of oaths he hadn't taken the last time he faced them. But he made sure that Szeth was aware of this fact and free to choose to support the Humans.

I agree with you largely, but I feel compelled to point out that this is not evidence. There are all kinds of missing dead blades this could be if Nale were inclined to be deceptive.

That WoB was obviously before Oathbringer. I think Nale might actually be getting better. Which isn't to say that he shouldn't be suspect. Without knowing his third ideal I find it hard to judge his motives. A prevailing theory is that he swore to Ishar, but then we have to wonder what all Ishar has commanded him to do. The biggest point of evidence I see that he may simply be avoiding the use of his more conspicuous attributes is that iirc we still haven't even seen his second surge. let alone armor if he has it.

The knight was wearing his own armor. The radiant Dalinar was playing had to dismiss hers so she could be lashed. The windrunner himself didn't have any problems.

Nah, Spook offered his body for Kelsier to be stapled back in to edit: I posted that offhandedly as a joke, and now I'm wondering...

this. You keep saying that he could have corrupted the parshmen at any time and that isn't the case. They were unable to form bonds. Maybe you mean "if he triggered the everstorm back then..." but that wasn't clear from your first comment and isn't much better in your second. Also, I was reading the first vison dalinar includes Jasnah and Navani in and the Stormfather says that the heralds "...needed to be together in Damnation to share the burden of torture...". Implies that the burden wouldn't be shared with Taln trapped and the others free. Unreliable narrator, though so...

So do we think that the Aimian-created soulcasters came later? The Regrowth fabrials seem common enough for there to be at least one at every battle.

So in Talenel's chapter in WoR, he says they'll soulcast blocks of bronze to cast into weapons and armor. Then, in Oathbringer, in the first vision Dalinar includes Jasnah and Navani in, they comment on how the weapons are not iron or steel. The reason given for the bronze rather than the steel is that casting is easier than forging. While that would normally be true, in a world of soulcasters, I don't understand why they don't form weapons and armor out of some other metal and then soulcast it into steel. Is that addressed somewhere that I'm not remembering? My thinking is that bronze is an alloy consisting of just metal while steel includes non-metallic elements. In theory, this would mean it would require the use of multiple essences to be possible. Can they only soulcast one essence at a time? That doesn't explain not using iron. And in case anyone is confused, "casting" refers to forming molten metal in molds as opposed to the beating heated metal into shape that is "forging". It's not talking about soulcasting.

My understanding is as follows: logically (2*infinity) > infinity, but the distinction is taken as meaningless in most mathematics because with sets of the same order there just isn't enough of a difference. The distinction becomes meaningful when you have infinity of one order compared to infinity of another order {-1.1...,-1,...,-.1,...,0,...,.1,...,1,...,1.1}> {...,-2,-1,0,1,2,...} real infinity > cardinal infinity infinity^infinity > infinity infinity to the infinite power is still technically just infinity, but it's a much more meaningful difference at the higher order. ^ That just to try and help make the point that infinities can be different. With respect to shard power, I easily accept that the power of 2 shards is greater than the power of one shard despite both being infinite. And...you know...WoB

I don't understand. You say he needed someone to transform the Parshmen and then you say he could have done that before just like he did now. I'm missing something in your statement... It's not about "conning" anyone. it's about the last legion, aka, the parshendi of the shattered plains, being the only Listeners capable of voluntarily forming bonds at all. for the reason Tanavast said in what OP quoted He waited for Roshar to be too divided to react and he almost got exactly what he wanted.

I still like my idea in the other thread that Odium intentionally left the other heralds alive because he knew Taln would hold out longer. I'm still not convinced Odium is in full control of the Singer spirits who are performing the torture. We keep referring to "breaking" under torture, but iirc they have to agree to let the Singers pass. Maybe Taln held so long he lost his mind, but still never agreed to let them pass and at that point couldn't consciously do so. I actually wonder if one of the other Heralds went back voluntarily just to free the hordes. perhaps Ishar. Or Kalek, whose whereabouts we don't really know.

I don't know, but I pictured Macaws for the common cognitive hiding variety and a Raven for Dusk's unique aviar for no special reason. I don't even remember coloring or anything being discussed in the story now that I think about it.