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So reading Oathbringer I was really confused. The Knights Radiant was refounded and the numbers were increasing. But mostly with just more wind runners. Shallan is kind of training squires... But not really. Kaladin is the only one we see who actually is trying to get more radiants. He is recruiting squires and making the most of it. Because of this we have several new radiants. Rock, Teft, Lopen, and maybe a few others. But Jasnah doesn't have any squires. Shallan accidentally gets a few but she isn't even meaning to get them. Renarian isn't doing anything. Why is Kaladin the only one who actually is actively working to expand the knights radiant?

Did anyone else think it was weird how when Szeth pops up during the battle for Thaylen City, everyone is just sort of okay with him being there? What Lift thinks: What Dalinar thinks: What Jasnah thinks: This last quote by Jasnah almost seems to be bordering on humorous, as if she's saying, "Hahaha, the Assassin in White, what a joke, I never thought I'd see him on our side! Sure, he brutally murdered my father, and half the rulers of Roshar, and then was killed himself by Kaladin so he's basically a zombie as far as we know, but we'll take all the help we can get!" This was just really weird to me, and seemed like a major oversight. You would think that at least Jasnah would be threatened by Szeth - she seemed to have a really close relationship with Gavilar, why is she so nonchalant about meeting his murderer? And why are they all okay with Szeth becoming Dalinar's bodyguard and joining the Knights Radiant - do none of them think for a moment that he might be trying to stab Dalinar in the back while no one is looking? Nobody has questions for him, nobody attacks him, nobody screams because he's apparently come back from the dead. I feel like the comeback of Szeth is supposed to be really cinematic and cool - he sweeps onto the battlefield, clothed in white, wielding a black sword, redeeming himself... and everyone is so awestruck that they conveniently forget the fact that he is the most feared, notorious and dangerous criminals in the world, and HE WAS KILLED by Kaladin as far as they know, so why is he even alive? I get that they're in a tight place and they're not going to interfere if Szeth is helping their cause, but everyone seems so unfazed by his appearance - they're mildly surprised, and a bit confused, but then they get over it almost immediately and he's just one of the gang as far as they're concerned. Did anyone else feel like the return of Szeth was really rushed, and that it was weird how easily everyone just accepted him as a good guy?

So I created an account just so I could pose this questions to everyone. Be warned, Oathbringer spoilers here! ---- We now have scenes from Oathbringer (as well as WoB) demonstrating the use of one type of investiture to fuel a different off world sub-type of magic (ex. Szeth using stormlight to fuel Nightblood rather than breath). Now that Hoid is Knight Radiant in addition to a fully powered lerasium mistborn what sort of effect would stormlight have fueling allomancy? We see Kaladain receive a renewing supply of energy flying at the front of the everstorm and Szeth able to unleash the full effects of Nightblood without having to utilize biochromatic breath. Would stormlight act as a "metal supply" for Hoid? And if so, would it also potentially fuel him with an "atium reserve", possibly even a renewing one if he was near the everstorm? Conversely what sort of effect would metal vials have fueling surgebinding?

I'd like to bring your attention to Maleshi, now mentione twice - in WoR and OB (emphasis mine): Melishi – the sole Bondsmith of the last Radiant generation during a False Desolation. He imprisoned Ba-Ado-Mishram, the highprincess of the Unmade and commander of Odium’s forces (according to Mythica), who was providing voidlight for the parsh in the absence of Odium - already imprisoned by Honor at that time I assume. These parsh are ‘the devils’ the KR were said to be fighting at Feverstone Keep in Dalinar’s vision of Recreance. Not only did Melishi and the coalition of Radiants manage to capture Ba-Ado-Mishram, but also caused the fighting parsh to lose their ability to form bonds with spren. Around this time the Last Legion escaped all and hid until their descendants were discovered by Kholin expedition. Somehow they managed to avoid losing the ability to bond spren, so the imprisonment of Ba-Ado-Mishram is not the main reason other parsh were stuck in dullform. So, matching False Desolation, cognitive destruction of most parsh and Recreanse, we get Windrunners and Stonewards abandoning their Shards for people to easily find and take. If the reasoning behind it was what was done to the parsh, surely this wasn’t the best way to do it. They deliberately left both Plates (that could have been dismissed for all we know and disappear as a footnote in history) and Blades out in the open for anyone to take at Feverstone Keep. The only threat I can think of that is worth fighting with Shards are Odium’s forces, so I suggest the Radiants were inclined to think they did not permanently defeat their enemy. In the light of all that, I do not believe the revelation humanity isn’t originally from Roshar played as big a role as the Stormfather claimed. They disbanded for whatever actual reason, yet left invaluable weapons to humanity for future war. It is interesting to point out previous books claimed Urithiru was abandoned before Recreanse, yet there doesn’t seem to be much of a time difference between the two. How whatever was happening with the Sibling, Urithiru becoming unsafe and uninhabitable (for more see Urithiru the corrupted city), along with the tensions between Windrunners and Skybreakers, the only ones who kept their Oaths to present day, is related to it all remains to be seen.

Looking through Arcanum, found this: (original link) I take it, the Radiant Order would be Willshapers, but they no longer accept humans.

Towards the end of Oathbringer, Moash was given a special knife with which he killed Jezrien and was later given the Herald's shardblade. With Jezrien being the first Herald to die a true death (which probably means he cannot be resurrected), Is Moash going to the the newchampion of Odium?

In one of Dalinars flashbacks, he met a beggar in The Beggar's Court at the Royal Palace to share his drink. Could this beggar have been Jezrien, The Herald King, Patron of the Windrunner later killed truly by Moash?

Hey 17th Shard, My best friend shared with me an interesting theory that I wanted to run past you. He is not much for the forums but he did say he would be OK if I shared it here. I took his idea and built up a quick assumption list to help solidify his insight. Assumptions: 1. Bondsmiths can make and break Nahel, and other, bonds between a person and a spren. This assumption is not, necessarily, pivotal to the theory but perhaps the Bondsmiths are the ones who figured out what to do. 2. There is some sort of fundamental, underlying principles that dictate how these bonds are formed. Perhaps it is the innate system of the Rosharan system that makes the rule, perhaps Honor/Cultivation have a hand in it, perhaps it is a mix of those two, or perhaps it is something else altogether. Whatever the reason is, I do not think it is too big of a stretch to say that Brandon would create governing principles for the Rosharan magic systems. 3. The Knights Radiant of old (pre-Recreance) knew that Parshendi (or Parshmen) were Voidbringers. Or, since there is some debate about what a Voidbringer actually is, we might say that the Knights Radiant of old were aware that Parshendi/Parshmen were involved, somehow, with Desolations and Voidbringers. Theory: The Knights Radiant, knowing that Parshendi were related to the Desolations/Voidbringers (see assumption 3), discovered a way to break (see assumption 1) the underlying magical principle (see assumption 2) that allowed Parshendi to bond with Voidspren. In doing so, however, they also had to break their own bonds as well because the underlying principle applied to both their Nahel bond and the Parshendi bond. The Recreance was a direct result of the Knights Radiant deciding to give up their bonds because they thought it would forever prevent the Voidspren from bonding with the Parshendi again. We know that one Order of Radiants (possibly the Skybreakers) secretly kept their bonds which means that whatever a Bondsmith (see assumption 1) did to break the underlying principle (see assumption 2) was not completely successful - either due to the Order that secretly refused or perhaps because the Bondsmith just did something wrong. This mistake/accident/betrayal meant that some of the Parshendi remained Parshendi (Eshonai's people) and most turned into the Parshmen. This also means that the line in the Diagram about Taravangian possibly reusing the secret that broke the Radiants before could be referring to this. If the current Radiants were told that they could break all of the Voidspren's bonds with Parshendi by sacrificing their spren what would Kaladin, Shallan, and the others do? Could they justify to themselves not doing this? If they could save the world by sacrificing their spren... well, I think it would be hard for them to refuse. What say you Sharders? Is it possible that the Recreance was caused by the Knights Radiant delibrately trying to break the bonding process so that Parshendi could never again join with a Voidspren?

There's been a lot of speculation about what the secret was that destroyed the Knights Radiant, as well as speculation into the causes or mechanics of the Desolations and the Oathpact. I have a wild theory that connects the two. There's probably a thousand things wrong with it, and even I see a bunch of holes and leaps in logic, but hopefully it will at least be entertaining. It starts with a WoB exchange I saw posted in another topic earlier today by Steeldancer, so credit goes to them for finding this quote: So we know that the Heralds all being present on Roshar causes another Desolation to occur. The question is, why? Well let's consider what we know of Worldhopping, because that is essentially what is happening. Spren (and perhaps originally the Listeners themselves) come from Braize to Roshar. Other worldhoppers transition between the Cognitive realm and the Physical realm using Perpendicularities. Other WoB have confirmed that perpendicularities could be caused by a massive amount of Investiture. I believe it was confirmed that Jasnah essentially did a miniature version of this to return to the physical world. My theory is that the Heralds act like Investiture lodestones. If they stay long enough in the world, there is a kind of critical mass that occurs, creating enough of a perpendicularity for Odium's forces to transition en masse into Roshar. This is basically how the new Everstorm worked. Once a critical mass of Fused Listeners was reached, they were able to call the storm. I believe the Everstorm itself is Odium’s perpendicularity on Roshar, at least this time around. We know it carries Voidspren with it, and could be what allows them to come into the Physical realm in large numbers. We also know that it was created by a large number of Fused (ie, Invested) Listeners pooling their energies. That sounds like a recipe for a perpendicularity to me. Now what if the Highstorm works in the exact opposite way (which would make sense, since they are reversed in every other way). The Highstorm is described by (suspiciously colour-obsessed and oddly familiar) “Zahel” as “invested to the hilt and looking for somewhere to stick it.” (As an aside: god bless “Zahel”). The Highstorm disperses Investiture. It takes a huge amount, maybe enough to form a perpendicularity, but then spreads it out across literally the entire world. I submit that this was its primary purpose (because remember, the Stormfather has been tasked with keeping the Highstorms coming, and presumably Honor would have some reason for unleashing these things periodically upon the world). My theory is that there are other ways to enable (or hasten) a Desolation. Perhaps with sufficiently concentrated Investiture, Odium can create a workaround, or at least speed things up, with less time between Desolations. The Highstorm is a check against this by dispersing Investiture, whereas the Everstorm keeps it concentrated (which is which it doesn’t infuse gems with Stormlight). So Honor works to prevent (large) perpendicularities from forming, and Odium tries to create more. Smaller perpendicularities ensure that the two worlds will never be entirely isolated, but might not facilitate a lare-scale invasion. The Oathpact, then , could be an agreement. Honor creates a bargain by which Odium has a shot at Roshar every once and a while. Honor essentially creates the Honorblades as a controlled means of opening a path between worlds by way of highly concentrated Investitute (which could be why Syl refers to Szeth using a dangerous amount of Stormlight with the Honorblade). At the same time though, he makes them double as a means of fighting against the very invasion they facilitate. Odium, in turn, agrees not to just come over to Roshar and destroy it himself, an agreement that binds him even after Honor's death. So how do the Knights Radiant fit in? Well we already know that they were not intended by Honor. They were the result of the spren taking it upon themselves to mimic what he had done. They mimic the Honorblades, which are presumably involved with the Oathpact (see above). What if, unintentionally, they have re-created certain aspects of the Oathpact as well, as a side effect of the nahel bond? The Heralds, when concentrated on Roshar, kicked off Desolations. The Fused, when concentrated on Roshar, kicked off the Everstorm. And for however many centuries, human beings, Invested to the hilt, as it were, were concentrating themselves in a specific location: Urithiru. What if this was enough to, if not cause the Desolations, at least exacerbate them in some way? What if it created enough of a perpedicularity to allow some of Odium's forces onto Roshar in a consistent manner, like a door propped open even between the Desolations. Spoilers from Edgedancer: To me, this seems like the kind of revelation that would utterly crush a group dedicated to sacrificing for the good of all. To learn that they and their spren had in fact been causing or at least hastening/worsening the Desolations, that all of their efforts and sacrifice were only perpetuating a cycle of endless violence, I could see that breaking them, and causing the Recreance.

I feel like I should know the answer to this, but I don't, so, here goes. What is the other Windrunner surge, after gravity?

[ Spoilers from the first 30 chapters of Oathbringer currently released ] So with the "final Desolation" pretty much officially underway as of the end of WoR, the main question going through my mind has been: how the hell can Odium actually lose??? Think about it. We know from Dalinar's visions and various other lore elements that in the past each Desolation nearly wiped out humankind. In fact, the justification for the current level of technology (or lack thereof) is that civilization is basically pushed back to the bronze age with each Desolation because of how devestating they are. And now consider this: that was with the full, organized strength of the Knights Radiant. Literal armies of them. Plus the Heralds! Now we have the Final Desolation coming, and so far there's only a handful of fledgling Knights Radiant, none of whom even have their Shardplate yet. Not only that, but the existing nations are super divided, and at the start of Oathbringer it looks as though it will not be easy to unite even a small number of them. So how can Odium screw this up? How could this be even a close fight? It seems to me that the only possibility is that the Listeners (at least some of them) are going to fight with humans. This is being set-up already at the beginning of Oathbringer, where we see groups of former parshmen slaves, healed by the Everstorm, basically just on the run. Not trying to attack, not out to kill humans in vengeance even (though they have real cause to want revenge). Just trying to survive, and most importantly not yet infused with any type of Voidspren (at least not in any obvious way). We also know that the Listeners way back made a choice to cut themselves off from their gods (Odium and co), restricting their forms drastically but earning freedom. They assassinated Gavilar in an effort to stop their "gods" from returning. They don't want to be Voidbringers, and I can totally see at least some of them fighting to maintain their freedom, refusing to be used by Odium. This could be what is "different" about this Desolation, the edge that humanity needs to balance the scales just enough to have a hope of winning. It would also fit with the themes established throughout the Cosmere books (spoilers for Mistborn series coming). We know from The Hero of Ages that the Deepness was in fact the mists. But more than that, it was Preservation's power tainted by Ruin. Ruin caused the Snapping process to be more brutal than it needed, killing people instead of just awakening their powers, covering the land and blocking out the Sun when it wasn't meant to, etc... This was Preservation's actual power, but Ruin managed to influence it. This shows that the influence of the Shards is not always rigid and distinct. There is overlap and intermingling, where multiple Shards use the same basic phenomenon. That is what the Thrill has to be. Dalinar's first revealed vision, where he fights Midnight Essence, with a poker. The Knight explains that any who feel the desire to fight should be compelled to go to Aletha. The Thrill USED TO BE a force for good, a way of telling people that they were destined to fight evil alongside the Knights (either as a full member or as a "squire." Since then, it has been twisted by Odium into something that makes people lust for battle and death. And without actual monsters around, they turn on each other, or make a game out of war, or almost kill their own brother. Odium is doing the same thing that Ruin did. But maybe it can go both ways. I've seen others here comment that it is odd that the Everstorm seems to heal the parshmen, making them whole again by reforging their Connection (incidentally, because of how we know this works from the second Mistborn series, this explains why they all speak unaccented Alethi). This seems like a very un-Odium thing for the Everstorm to do, especially since they do not seem to be possessed by Voidspren yet. What if Cultivation pulled the same kind of trick? Twisting the Everstorm just enough that it healed parshmen without automatically dominating them, giving them at least a chance to resist, run, be free, what have you? We know from the Jasnath-Hoid dialogue that the Everstorm is "new" or at least working differently than how the Desolations worked in the past. Perhaps the reason is that this time there are forces other than Odium at work on it. There are even hints about this in the depiction of the Midnight Mother. During Shallan's interactions, it is revealed that she was created to sow chaos, but that over time she became curious. Yes, it is a twisted, warped curiosity. But consider her actions at Urithiru. Did she flood the tower with monsters? Did she set about assassinating actual targets? No, she just copied what humans were already doing. Does this seem particularly effective? Or does it seem like a lost, broken creature trying to comprehend these creatures through the only relationship she understands: violence? My point is just this: she has actually changed since her creation. Just like the Everstorm is different this time. Just like maybe the Listeners aren't behaving the way Odium might want this time around. A big theme so far is how the good guys, left to their own devices, become corrupt and fell. But I think Brandon is hinting that maybe, just maybe, the reverse is true for the villains. Odium is banking on how time changes humans, makes them forget why they fought and abandon what they once were. But wouldn't it be poetic if the same was also happening to his forces? The Unmade have changed, however slightly. The Listeners seem to have changed as well. And maybe this time around they will surprise him, make him think that he could actually lose...

Okay, so I've been reading the free chapters of Oathbringer on Tor, and I got to Dalinar's conversation with the Stormfather about challenging Odium to a duel, and I wondered "what would the stakes have to be for Odium to accept?" I knew that Odium would only accept such a challenge if winning would put him significantly further ahead than he already was, and he was basically winning the war at that point. So what could put him so far ahead that it would be worth it? What could possibly stand in his way that he could remove more effectively by drinking a duel than his other methods? Radiants. They could pose a serious problem to his plans, and fighting then could be really annoying, even for a Shard. What if Odium could ensure that, if he won, all of the Radiants would go away? Say, break their oaths or something... So what if that's already happened before? What if that was the cause for the Day of Recreance? This actually makes sense, if you think about it. We know that one Order didn't break it's oaths, so maybe they had all agreed to break their oaths if their contestant lost, and one order broke that promise instead of those previously made to their Spren, or didn't agree at all. I'm not sure which order this would be, but what do you think? Could this be it?

What odd or interesting (or humorous) names could you make up for orders of knights radiant? thingpoker - they would go around poking things all day foodtaster - no idea what they would do windrunner + edgedancer = winddancer bondsmith + skybreaker = bondbreaker (downright genius this one is. kinda seems to defeat the purpose though.)

I know there are lots of theories floating around about what order so-and-so could be or what such-and-such a Surge might do, but the Willshapers are really intriguing to me, and there doesn't seem to be much discussion about them in particular. So here goes. (Also, apologies in advance for the long post, but I've been thinking about this a lot lately.) (I think my fascination may come from the fact that that description fits the Doctor to a T. Especially Eleven.) Theory 1: Lopen is a Willshaper So Lopen has some connection to the Knights Radiant. Whether he's a squire, a full Windrunner, or another order entirely is up for debate. I'm inclined to believe it's something more than what the other members of Bridge Four are experiencing, since Lopen took in Stormlight consciously and independently (neither of which can be said for certain about the men fighting the Parshendi.) Or, to be more meta about it, why single out Lopen to get his own scene if he's just one of a dozen squires? I think it's equally likely that Lopen will turn out to be another Windrunner vs. that he'll be a different order. But if he is another order, my money's on Willshapers. Of all the potential Radiants out there, Lopen seems like the best fit for the Willshapers. He's enterprising (his very first bridge run, Kaladin asks him to bring water. He grabs Dabbid and Hobber, builds a litter, and piles on twenty waterskins). I'm may have a certain fondness for him, but I'm sure lots of people find him frustrating and unreliable. And he loves adventure, novelty, and oddity. Various things from the training scenes in WoR Chapter 12. "Fly!" "Walk on walls!" "Stick me to a wall!" And of course It's really only going on his personality, but it's such a good fit! Theory 2: Axies the Collector is a Willshaper Of the three theories here, this is the one I'm least confident about, but I'll at least put it out there as a stepping stone to the next one. Axies is at least as fascinated by novelty and adventure as Lopen, as evidenced by his many travels in search of spren. Also, his shadow is seen to act erratically, much like Jasnah's. (This could make him an Elsecaller, but he doesn't seem to have the right temperament for it.) There's something from his interlude in WoK that stands out to me. I know this is thin, but bear with me. Axies got drunk, was robbed and knocked out, and woke up disoriented. Fine. I'll buy that. I'll even buy that he didn't immediately remember where he was before getting drunk. But I would think that someone who's just groggy would respond more with, "Oh, right. Kasitor." Not this kind of vague, "I'm just gonna take your word for it" response. He deliberately came to Kasitor to see Cusicesh. It probably took him a while to get there by land or sea, and he'd probably been looking forward to it for a while. Is it really that surprising to him that his pre-hangover self came here? Or was he expecting his assailants to have taken him to another city after they robbed him? It's not like he's in a field somewhere, or a shed or something. But if he can travel large distances in the blink of an eye, he might have just popped over to Kasitor on a whim. He might be used to traveling halfway across Roshar between one day and the next. And that's not the only time it's suggested. Superstition? Yes. But there's a fair chance it has grounding in fact. Now, maybe it's referring to the fact that Aimians can manipulate their body/appearance. But without some severe reshaping, he's not likely to get out of his bonds. If he could teleport away, on the other hand... There are obviously some major flaws with this theory. Most of what makes Axies distinct is implied to be because he's Aimian, not because there's something specific to him. (Though I would like to point out that it doesn't ever specifically say that Aimian=anything other than blue nails and eyes.) (1) The comment about Aimians refers directly to the first sentence, and then the narration appears to switch tracks. You could read this as. "Maybe it was because he was Aimian. Or maybe because he was a Radiant." (2) This suggests that "his kind" (that cast strange shadows) are Aimians. But "his kind" could just as easily be "Radiants." Or maybe the difference between Siah and Dysian is that Siah are Radiants/something similar to Radiants. The scouring of Aimia might have happened because Siah Aimians had access to unnatural powers (aka Surges.) (If WoB has said that all Aimians have wonky shadows, I missed it. Forgive me and move on to Theory 3 below.) The only real reservation I have about this is that Aimians aren't humans and thus might not be capable of becoming Radiants. In that case... Theory 3: Axies has some other connection to the spren of Willshapers or Elsecallers If Axies can't be a Radiant, he might still have magic and/or a spren bond. Maybe it's the Old Magic, or Voidbinding, or something else (Surgebinding that circumvents the Nahel bond? Symbiosis with spren lacking a proper bond? Some mixed human/spren blood???) It could be that the magic systems on Roshar function similarly to those on Scadrial--same catalyst, different (but sometimes related) effect. Tineyes and Windwhispers (tin Ferrings) both use tin to enhance their senses. Elsecallers and the corresponding Old Magic-bound Aimians bind the same spren, getting the same strange shadow, but otherwise aren't that similar. Could even be that each race on Roshar is particularly attuned to a particular type of magic. The Listeners/Parshendi to Voidbinding (formerly Surgebinding until humans lured the spren away), humans to Surgebinding, and Aimians to Old Magic. And while humans lost their magic, by and large, after the Recreance, Parshendi and Aimians may have held onto it. Any number of Aimians might have been Radiant analogues before the scouring.

This is a longer post than I intended. I foolishly read the thread about Taravangian after writing the first part of this post. That thread in turn led to the discussion of oath interpretation and Knight Radiant behavior. Advance apologies for lumping all that together here, but I think they are related issues. Radiantspren “True” Names I theorize each Radiantspren is the personification of the human ideal represented by their KR Order’s “Primary Attribute.” IMO, these ideals are the spren’s true names, reflecting what they are. The names in the novels are the names Radiantspren call themselves. These self-identifying names may reflect spren self-perception, but not the human perception each Radiantspren personifies. Examples: I describe the Radiantspren we know the most about in these terms. I don’t address all Radiantspren because we haven’t met them all. Honorspren IMO are “Protectingspren.” Syl protects Kaladin during the highstorm, holding back winds that would tear him apart. When Kaladin tumbles into the chasm, Syl’s last act before the bond breaks (Rock-a-bye Baby?) forces Stormlight into Kaladin, protecting him from the fall. She denies the Stormfather to help Kaladin reinstate his oaths. Protection is Syl’s purpose, what she is. Cryptics IMO are “Creativespren,” to be distinguished from creationspren. The essence of artistic creativity is pattern-recognition, seeing what others do not see. Pattern aids Shallan’s creativity by pushing her to more self-discovery and self-understanding, seeing the patterns within herself. That is necessary for her art to grow. He gives her creative advice throughout. When Shallan cannot see the “pattern” of the Oathgate, Pattern tells Shallan she should back up for perspective. Wyndle, whatever he and his fellow Ring members call themselves, IMO is a “Lovingspren.” He “mothers” Lift and frets about her health and safety. He scolds her to eat more (as every mother does), so that her Surgebinding won’t make her too skinny. Wyndle’s purpose is to love Lift, to care for her, so that she can love and care for others. Inkspren IMO are “Learnedspren.” Ivory seems willing to let Jasnah die in the WoR Prologue if she cannot learn how to use the Shadesmar beads properly. He acts like an exam proctor, testing her “learnedness” before he “passes” her into KR status. I think the following WoB (the third quote from @Calderis's “oath interpretation” post) supports the distinction between human perception and spren self-perception. Spren “self-identity” IMO doesn’t change their human-personified behavior. Rather, highspren think “honorspren will let their people break their oaths if they think it’s for a good cause.” IMO, an honorspren’s “good cause” is protecting people, which appears to supersede the oaths. I think the WoB’s last part addresses whether oaths are objective or subjective, not the human-personified nature of the spren itself – “how they work,” not what they are: KR Oaths @Calderis makes excellent points in his thread on KR behavior. (Upvotes not only for him but also for @Extesian, who supplied the quotations.) KR are not good or evil and may act “cruelly,” as Brandon says. Agreed, but I think a bit overstated. The Radiantspren won’t begin to bond unless the KR candidate has the same “temperament” – Primary Attribute – as the Radiantspren: protecting, creative, loving, etc. I think Attribute alignment places intrinsic limits on KR variance within the same Order. IMO, each KR Order’s Primary Attribute solely determines a KR candidate’s placement in that Order. Thus, I’d expect KR personalities to differ. I think many personality types can be protecting, or creative, or loving. It makes sense to me that the precise oath statement would differ from KR to KR within an Order. It’s also possible same-type spren themselves show personality differences. Radiantspren are “people” too. But IMO these differences don’t affect their nature, their Primary Attribute. I’m unconvinced all same-type spren personality variations “come from the person they are bonded to,” as @Calderis states (emphasis in original). FWIW, I think Radiantspren resemble Shards and their Mandates (intents). IMO both are power imbued with cognitive limitations. Both exercise their power subject to those limitations, even though (as Brandon says of Vessels) their personalities also affect their power exercise. KR Behavior So…to say KRs can act “dishonorably” seems obvious. Each Order is bound only by its common Primary Attribute. Oaths strengthen that bond, but again, only to more closely align a KR with its Order’s Primary Attribute. Attributes like Protection and Creativity don’t necessarily bear any relationship to one another. Windrunners and Lightweavers can have different goals and different means of obtaining them. Such differences can easily lead to conflict among Orders. @Calderis suggests Taravangian could be an Elsecaller like Jasnah. If I’m correct that Inkspren are “learned” spren, Taravangian clearly qualifies and could well attract an Inkspren. More so, because Brandon says in one of @Calderis’ WoBs that, until bonded, spren don’t fully comprehend the person they bond with. (That’s a fascinating comment!) I wonder how long Taravangian’s Nahel bond would survive, though. The Elsecaller Secondary Attribute is “giving.” Taravangian IMO deliberately misleads others. He does not share information, he shares misinformation. Maybe that counts as giving, but…. Posters discuss whether Taravangian is misguided or “evil” in a moral sense on the “Mr. T” thread. I won’t add to that discussion here. I do note the extent to which the Diagram seems to support Nale’s notion about the KR’s danger. Jiminy Cricket to the KR’s Pinocchio?

So recently i have been wondering if having enough or running out of stormlight was an issue post Recreance. during the Desolations it didn't seem to me like there was any mention either way and i just am wondering if maybe they just used bigger gems or if the level of oaths made them more connected to the spiritual realm and if they were possibly drawing investiture straight from there. maybe that's why their shardplate used to glow. I just wanted to get a discussion up, I'm interested to hear everyone's opinion

I had always assumed that Shallan's soul had "broken" and allowed spren to enter when she killed her mom. Or, maybe even later when she killed her dad. But then I was rereading it, and realized that her mom tried to kill her because she was a Radiant. She also had a shardblade. That means her soul was broken even before then. What could have happened? Was it something her dad did?

What would happen to a spren if a member of the Knights Radiant died? Would it go insane like the Shardblade spren, or would it return to the cognitive realm?

So my entire theory is this: The day before Lopen succeeds in breathing in Stormlight, a spren is watching Elhokar about to bond him and Lopen tries and fails to breath Stormlight. Then he's like "What were those Oaths Kaladin talked about?" Then he says the first Oaths (and maybe the second one for whatever order it is, or a truth if it's a Cryptic) and this makes the spren bond him. Basically the point is him bonding a Spren was a complete accident.

So, this is a very theoretical post. It's not mega-sourced (which I hope is ok), because it's more about how we look at larger, more abstract concepts related to language and literary themes. I don't believe there are any spoilers here. Here goes. As I’ve been thinking about SA’s language, I’ve realized that a lot of the terms it uses sound like they could be part of a standard fantasy series with stock villains who have generic goals. We often take them for granted. But we see in some of the archaic meanings of words in in-world songs and texts, the terms can be opaque or have a second, often older meaning. Sanderson has had some fun with misunderstood words in other series, too... This led me to try a linguistic analysis of SA’s in-world terminology and to contextualize it with some of the major thematic elements of the series. Major Themes: Loss, Corruption, Recovery of Knowledge The Integrity, Durability (or Fragility) of Bonds, Barriers, Seals, and Oaths Terminology: I, and perhaps others, have been thinking about “Desolation” in terms of a goal of essentially sending Rosharans “back to the stone age” and wiping out civilization. It’s a familiar goal in an ordinary fantasy series. Additionally, because of the theme of the loss and gain of knowledge, this makes even more sense to the reader in the early stages of the series. But “Desolation” can also mean forsaken or abandoned (the Latin root). The word “Void” also sounds like it would be a cliché end-goal of a “big bad” in a fantasy novel. More like emptiness, the void of space, etc. But “Void” also means the breaking of a contract or agreement, or even a hole or breach in a wall meant to shelter or protect. What I’m suspecting, is that these terms—and their compound and modified forms—are interconnected. Some of these connections are familiar, but I think that they are much more complex and work on more levels than we realize. I’ve thought of a few ways that these terms apply to the series, but I imagine there are many more. This is in no way comprehensive. It’s more about looking at the series through a lens that I suspect the author uses. Here are a few: Shards and their goals: Odium is the “Broken One.” He breaks bonds, vows, oaths, he renders them void. He shatters. What helps the Broken One break/void pacts and oaths? Voidbringers and the Unmade. Honor is the shard most associated with oaths, bonds, fulfilling/adhering etc. He creates walls to protect, walls made out of humans, spren, and oaths. Here, we see the root of their opposing interests. Stormlight, bonds, and cracks: We know that Honorblades let too much stormlight in, perhaps making the user more susceptible to malicious influences. Knights Radiant, too, have cracks, but the symbiosis of the Nahel bond protects in most cases. And Voidbringers (whoever/whatever they are) are perhaps the “Knights Radiant” of Odium, though without patterns, laws, and can include species that have an affiliation with gems, stone, or are actual stones. They are able to hold in stormlight because Odium’s influence has corrupted them, sealing the cracks to only his influence, and making them like stone. Misunderstanding the purposes of Stonewards and “Dustbringers”: I suspect that Stonewards, in particular, have become confused in popular understanding, at least in the past. They may be strong like stone, but more important, they guard and protect against things made of stone or like stone/rock. They “ward” against stone-like bonded Voidspren. “Releasers” or “Dustbringers” may turn animated stone enemies, perhaps even VoidListeners, to Dust, releasing—and hopefully destroying—the bonded Voidspren. Part of the reason they are feared, even though they are needed, is because they break bonds, not unlike the Broken One and his friends. An example of language and double meanings from the Listeners: Conclusion: Perhaps the conflict, at least for the first 5 books, is about Odium’s attempt to shatter bonds, pacts, and oaths, layers upon layers of these protective forces that put up a barrier between Roshar and Odium. Should Odium render these protective bonds void, perhaps weakening them with the help of a loss of knowledge about the larger conflict and the less abstract assistance of the Unmade and Voidbringers, he will break through and fully touch Roshar and destroy its shard and cognitive shadow shard. The True Desolation involves a final forsaking or abandoning of the vows and bonds that protect Roshar and the more literal, catastrophic abandoning of its inhabitants, by shards, heralds, and others sworn to protect Roshar from Odium’s influence. This may not all be new, but I think that really digging into words that Sanderson chose for very specific reasons could lead to some fun ideas...

I'm sorry if this is something of an incoherent mess, but I'm writing this half-asleep and I may not know what I'm saying. From what we've seen so far in SA, the budding Radiants have to figure out their oaths on their own. They reach a point in their development where they exemplify the spirit of the oaths, and then they suddenly know the right words to say. And they don't know that their spren can turn into swords. Wyndle says (or rather, dances around the topic not-saying) that bondspren are not allowed to mention the Shardblade thing before it happens. Since there's only a handful of proto-Knights scattered all around Roshar, and it's been thousands of years since the KR were a thing, they can't know anything in advance. But as you get more and more Radiants, sooner or later they're going run into someone else of their own order. And the Noobs Radient are going to ask their more experienced counterparts, "So how does this work, exactly?" The system is going to change, unless the bondspren have some objection to sharing the Words. Would the bondspren want the Words to stay secret? Would they object to their human partners telling the Noobs Radiant where Shardblades come from, or is it just against the rules for the spren to say it? Because if it's supposed to be all Top Secret Classified Keep Out That Means You, I can't see that working very well. It only takes one person to hear a KR talking to her sword and drawing a conclusion, or one Knight to have a Kaladin moment and find his Words while in public, and word will spread. Two possible conclusions about the Words: 1. The Words are instinctive when you reach a certain level, but nothing bad happens if you say them early. Nothing good happens either; the Words are just words until you grow into them. You can't just, say, bond a cultivationspren, read the Edgedancer oaths off of an index card, and boom, you're a full-blown Edgedancer. 2. It's the intent to fulfill your oaths that counts. You can read them off an index card and progress all at once if you sincerely mean to hold up your Order's Ideals. The KR 2.0 is doing things the slow way because they don't have anyone to tell them what the Ideals are until they level up themselves. Just to put that out there as a hypothetical possibility that I don't think fits with what we've seen; something in the back of my head that I don't have words for sees a way this makes sense, but that may be because of the aforementioned sleep-deprivation. I'll come back and see if still works when I'm not tired. Closemouthed Spren: Are bondspren mum about the swords because it's against their nature to give Radiant spoilers, or do they have a specific reason for keeping quiet? Also, do they forget the Ideals until their bond develops, or are they deliberately not telling those, either? Discuss.

"Speak again the ancient oaths..." Easier said than done, Your Almighty-ness. The Ideals of the Knights Radiant are one of the most fascinating and essential aspects of Surgebinding, yet with only a fifth of the Stormlight Archive published, we still don't have information about many of the oaths. The First Ideal is the same for all orders, and at least one order didn't even speak any oaths after the first. Clearly there is a wide range of speculation to be had. As I've seen a great deal of discussion about Ideals, I thought it would be convenient to have a place we can discuss our guesses at length. A place to enter guesses about what oaths an Order might swear, or possibly details on how the Ideals function at their core. Myself, I am currently espousing two possible oaths. WoR spoilers follow: Those are my ideas. I would really like to know what other people think of these potential Ideals, and I would love to see other suggestions for the Dustbringers, Skybreakers, and the other Orders! It's time to speak again the ancient oaths, people!

Does anyone know what division means?

Alright! I'm new to the 17th shard, and for my very first topic I thought that I would propose something we would all have fun with. Which kind of surgebinder would you be and how would you use your powers in OUR world!? Would you be a graceful yet erratic Edgedancer slicking around skateparks, a Lightweaver,using your powers of illusion strictly for good (I would steal only one cookie.) Or a Windrunner, gravity itself at your beck and call. Keep in mind, surgebinder, not Radiant. You aren't bound by pesky morals and obligatory oaths!