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Splinters and Foci


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We're still not entirely clear on what Splintering a Shard entails and what effects it has on both the magic and the Shardworld in general, but this has been swimming around my head for a while now.

What if, when a Shard is Splintered, the Splinters are in the form of the Focus for that Shardworld?

Seons are formed around an Aon, and those Aons are Splinters of Devotion (WoB). This means that Seons are an instance of a Splinter both being related to the Focus of a magic system and sentient. The second piece of this is the spren - and specifically Honorspren. Honorspren are Splinters of Honor (WoB) and are sentient. Where they fit in in relation to Roshar's Focus is as yet unknown, because all magic on Roshar that we know of in any detail uses both Stormlight and spren. If this theory was to hold any water, spren would have to be Roshar's focus rather than Stormlight.

There's not a lot to go on here, and I'd appreciate that if someone had WoB that contradicts this to point me along to it.

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Isn't Roshar's Focus Gemstones?

We don't know. I think gemstones are part of it, sure, what with fabrials and all. But it seems that once Kaladin obtains Stormlight it doesn't matter what kind of gemstone it came from, meaning the focus of his Surgebinding is not gemstones.

I personally think the Rosharian focus is the Essences themselves. The gemstones are related to the Essences. So are the spren and the Divine Attributes. All of these seem to be important in their own way.

@Username: A counter-example to your theory would be the Divine Breaths, Splinters of Endowment on Nalthis. Brandon said that Commands, not Breath, are the focus on that Shardworld.

Edit: Note to self, don't type multi-paragraph replies using the phone.

Edited by skaa
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The gemstones aren't focuses, as far as we know. They aren't involved at all in the use of the magic, beyond acting as batteries. (Focuses we do know: Commands, metals.) I personally would guess (Spiritual?) bonds are the focus of Roshar's magic systems, though it's possible there's multiple different ones.

 

Either way, I'm not sure on this theory. I always thought the Splinters of Ruin/Preservation, if they ever came to exist, would take forms after each of the sixteen metals, but that was based on the Seons taking on the Aons as their hearts.

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@Username: A counter-example to your theory would be the Divine Breaths, Splinters of Endowment on Nalthis. Brandon said that Commands, not Breath, are the focus on that Shardworld.

However, Devotion, as far as we know, wasn´t shatered and is creating the Divine Breaths on purpose. It could still be that Splinters that are created  by/after the shattering default to a form that is relevant to the focus, because they weren´t given another form at their creation.

 

It could also be that Divine Breaths, while obviously not a Command themselves, are centered around one, for example "live" or "go and do X", similar to how Seons are formed around their Aon.

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@Username: A counter-example to your theory would be the Divine Breaths, Splinters of Endowment on Nalthis. Brandon said that Commands, not Breath, are the focus on that Shardworld.

That's a good point, actually. I'd forgotten about the Divine Breaths - they don't really fit, do they? Perhaps Seons and Spren are another facet of the whole "Investiture gives sentience" side of things. 

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