Stockman

Hello Oh, so straight to the punches. I have a guess that the 5th oath will be something like "I will protect my heart" or "I will protect my true self". Kaladin's 4th oath of "I will accept that there are those I can not protect" freed him from the slave brand on his head, because he felt like he was a slave to saving others, and therefore making his internal world dependent upon the results of his actions which in truth he has no control over. The freedom from that is very similar to self realization and freeing oneself from the conditionals of life to find inner peace or power. In the same vein, the next step should be to get even more in tune with himself somehow. Maybe protecting his heart and emotions are the absolute best way he still has left to serve those around him. This is what I think his next oath will be, and the natural build up we have seen. Another minor theory, is what if the 5th Ideal is only for those who are immortal? Nale is the only person we know of who has it, and apparently he has kept his oaths because he still has a high spren. He's also the only herald who never gave up actively protecting Roshar. Does the 5th Ideal somehow provide sanity somehow that lets Nale be resilient? Is Nale being insane a red herring? Will Kaladin need it if he somehow becomes immortal in the next book? Also, Kabbalah Tree of Life looks a lot like the Surgebinding/Voidbinding diagrams... Deep thoughts Love you all.

Oh snap. You know what else supports BAM being freed, is that Maya was able to return to consciousness. BAM being locked up is the reason deadeyes exist. Do we have any good reason that Maya was able to come back after being a deadeyes? BAM being released is in line with the lore!

Awesome thank you. Seems like the points are: -nohadon is likely alive -and Dawnshards grant immortality of a kind I'm not 100% convinced yet. There could be more than one way to get immortality... Now I've got to reread everything with this new context aha Edit: Yeah, vision being from cultivation makes sense, because stormfather wasn't aware of the vision, so it prob came from somewhere else. Those visions seem the main form of communication between shards are mortals (per odium and honor). So it makes sense that a not-Honor shard made the vision.

Sweet. Im on my phone and still in the middle of reading the responses. Can someone explain the evidence for Nohadon having a dawnshard? I never considered that.

Hello friends! I am starting to get real convinced of a few of my new theories, and was hoping for some feedback. That's half the fun sometimes . Here they are!! 1. Lift is already a bondsmith for cultivation -She can enter dalinar's visions, which is only something that shards and thier bondsmiths have shown to be able to do -She creates lifelight. She's def different from previous bondsmiths it seems like, since Raboniel and others did not recognize her as a cultivation bondsmith 2. BAM is a bondsmith spren -she was able to make voidlight during the false recreance -she was able to manipulate singer bonds, and bonded them to her HERE'S MY BIG ONE THAT EXPLAINS A TON: 3. Ishar is already bonded to BAM as a bondsmith spren! -he was able to open a perpendicularity that the stormfather was not able to sense, meaning it was not of honor or cultivation (since that's what he's made of). if he made the perpendicularity with the honorblade he recovered, it would have been honor's perpendicularity. It may be Odiums perpendicularity! -Ishar was able to see the future in the fight with the windrunners, and any kind of future sight is of Odium! -Voidlight also tends to be contained within the body and not leak. this explains why it wasn't seen during his encounter with Dalinar. -being able to bring spren into the physical world is some bondsmith level voodoo Less consequential theory: 4. I'm pretty sure Oathbringer Chapter 103, with Dalinar's vision wherein Nohadon was acting off, that Nohadon was Cultivation -Cultivation can lie, per WOB -Immediately after the dream, Dalinar starts to remember things- Cultivation's "boon" stopped working or started working differently -Nohadon clearly knew more than he should have -only shards have been able to create visions, or enter and change them (see my previous post on SA prolouge. I think cultivation is in it and able to affect stormfather's visions https://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/111397-sa5-prologue-theory/#comment-1391000) Love ya'll Stockman

All of those happened right before Taravangian killed Odium.... this was when Taravangian fullfilled Cultivation's long term plans almost as a kind of sleeper cell to get close to Odium.. Is it possible that Cultivation shows her presence here? It's kind of a stretch, but I like the idea of Bravery being the combination of Cultivation and Odium. Odiums power in that chapter seemed to love the Bravery, and was part of what attracted it to Taravangian. So maybe Bravery was an offshoot of Odium's power, specifically when combined with Cultivation?

I thought some big evil happened on Threnody that caused everyone to travel to the other side of the planet and live more impoverished life .. I assumed that they could worldhop and had knowledge about the cosmere back then before they had to all flee the evil as refugees. Coppermind says Threnody was technologically advanced before this evil took over. That could mean Threnodites in SP4 were stranded on that planet possibly because access to the perpendicularity on Threnody was shut off. Did the Threnodites in SP4 mention the shades at all? That would debunk my theory that they come from pre-shade era. I think only Nomad brought up the concept up tho, so the SP4 Threnodites might be from pre-shade times. Edit: oh, i guess brandon wants us to think that too. Here's a quote from SP4

You know what order of the Knight Radiants both manipulated connection AND has Squires? The Bondsmiths. Also being a Bondsmith squire would fit Sigzil's history a bit better... He's technically a newbie to that order of Radiants. Thus a squire, and would train under a knight. My guess is Aux is a Cognitive Shadow of a Bondsmith. Sigzil wouldn't have full Knight Radiant oaths as a Bondsmith squire- that's possibly why Aux is acting like he didn't have any. If it's a prior Knight Radiant who's a cognitive shadow, that explains Aux's stark awareness that he's already dead, since cognitive shadows technically are :0. He would have memory of his past life while he was alive and everything. Also Aux being a cognitive shadow might explain how he has so much autonomy over manipulating Connection on his own initiative. Or maybe the way Honor isn't around to regulate the Surges let Dalinar do some weird bonding between a Cognitive Shadow and Sigzil to create a new kind of Nahel bond? It certainly seemed like a Nahel bond- the way Aux was able to become a shardblade or shardtools and whatnot. Aux is just referred to as a knight so often, I'm inclined to believe he is or was one. He's also got the power to translate, which was specifically a Bondsmith skill.

You know, kandra have a hard time imitating hair... and possibly other keratinized parts of the body like carapaces. If a kandra imitated a singer, they might not have the carapace, they wouldn't be able to hear the songs. Wouldn't it be weird if a singer like that showed up? Maybe they replaced all their carapace with metal.

Awesome feedback everyone!! Love it!!! I didn't even think of how speaking into someone's mind would be a big factor, especially considering how it was used in mistborn... But I suppose most spren can do that, so it's probably not as indicative of much in Roshar? Since I loved the feedback, I'll drop another theory that isn't talked about a lot. Spoilers for Secret Project!!! :

Hey All. I've had a lot of fun reading folks theories, and ya'll have some really good ones. I wanted to share a few of mine and get some feedback. No need to go easy on me! Let me know any holes . Also if these have been mentioned before, my bad! Regarding the SA5 Prologue, there's something I haven't seen mentioned much. The "most important words" the falsefather is trying to get Gavilar to say don't seem to be the Knights Radiant oaths Obviously these are similar to the first Knight Radiant oath, but falsefather says not even close? Later on: And here we have something that seems closer to the correct words that the falsefather wants Gavilar to say. Both of these quotes seem planted by BrandoSando to specifically suggest that these most important words Galvinar is looking for are not the Knight Radiant Oaths, but in fact something else. Something like "I need it" are nearly the opposite of the first Radiant oaths. Okay, but what kind of Being would benefit from Gavilar saying some kind of oath or intent other than a Radiant oath? Lets look at some hints at what it could be: So the falsefather is likely -not human -knows a lot about the Oathpact Eyes are the gateway to the soul! Falsefather's true perception of Roshar is as a small (stormy) frail world- a speck of blue against the vastness of black intergalactic space. This seems like a paygrade above the stormfather... The Stormfather's entire world is Roshar. To see Roshar as small would imply something bigger or more knowledgeable and more vast, yes? So falsefather is likely: -cosmere-aware- or more so than the Stormfather. Either shard or dawnshard or some similar level awareness -able to usurp the stormfather connection (including visions, etc.) Falsefathers main goals seem to be have someone say the words (which might loosely translate to have the right intent, since we know oaths can be taken nonverbally such as in Edgedancer. Also falsefather says "It’s not about what you are saying. That is not what is wrong." Maybe he was so close, but intent was wrong. maybe the problem was that he "demanded it"). My big suspect is: -Cultivation. She has certainly mislead in the past, by omission if nothing else. Also falsefather says "You do not consider with reverence the position you seek, the Stormfather said. I feel…you are not the one that I need. That I decided to find." We know that Cultivation picks out special individuals to accomplish long term tasks for her. She is a big long term planner! Here's the big thing: Does Cultivation ever bestow power based on non-radiant oaths? Is "I need it" something similar to what people ask for when they go to her for a Boon? Maybe she was tempting Gavilar to get a Boon? This is my main suspicion. The problem with his words, was that he demanded it, rather than asked for a Boon! We know Falsefather wasn't digging for a Radiant oath! Reread the second quote in this post and see if it doesn't vibe differently. Other candidates that seem less likely: -A sentient Dawnshard. They are centered around intents and fit all our other requirements. Assuming a Dawnshard Intent also conveys a lot of power. It's the only reason I know to say words/oaths besides the Kinght Radiant oaths. But without Investiture, Gavilar couldn't use the Dawnshard anyways, so maybe not! -Wit. He definitely misleads others to achieve goals and has some strong powers. Can he take advantage of the Stormfather's connection to Gavilar tho? Also he's human and doesn't really benefit from an oath/intent -Ishar. He prob could hijack Stormfather's connection (like he tries to do in RoW). He has good motives to try and get out of the Oathpack by having Galvinar replace him in it. But he's human, so I rule him out. Second part of my theory: There's this critical line near the end: Hmm.... Try again? What about previous attempts? Attempts at being a voice that speaks to someone... And tells the the same things that she told Galivar- that the voidbringers and Radiants are coming back... Someone with access to honor blades, who happens to be a main character for SA book 5? Maybe someone who gets labeled as Truthless? What we know of Sezth's background of hearing a voice fits the same M.O. of the falsefather we witnessed in the prologue. This voice tries to pick a candidate to take some action before the Final Desolation. We know it's not the Stormfather per se in this prologue, so why should we expect her to try impersonating him again? Using Stormfather was probably a good way to suck up to Gavilar's inflated sense of self. Cultivation being the voice Sezth hears would tie the prologue deeper into the story we already expect to hear in SA5. BrandoSando is the King of making everything look obvious in retrospect. I rest my case. Let me hear what you think! Edited for clarity