Elhokar's Shardplate's broken gemstones

[smearedblackink]

I hope that I'm not repeating a conjecture posted by another member, but I've long since had an idea regarding the broken gems in Elhokar's Shardplate after the greatshell hunt.

 

Quote from TWoK: (Adolin PoV)

 

It was all just a moment. A breath. The third claw was falling toward the king, and Dalinar roared, leaping forward. He dropped his Blade—it hit the ground and puffed away—as he skidded beneath the falling claw. He raised his hands and—

And he caught it. He bent beneath the blow, going down on one knee, and the air rang with a resounding clang of carapace against armor.

But he caught it.

Stormfather! Adolin thought, watching his father stand over the king, bowed beneath the enormous weight of a monster many times his size. Shocked archers hesitated. Sadeas lowered his grandbow. Adolin’s breath caught in his chest.

Dalinar held back the claw and matched its strength, a figure in dark, silvery metal that almost seemed to glow. The beast trumpeted above, and Dalinar bellowed back a powerful, defiant yell.

 

There are a few points here I'd like to touch upon. One being that Adolin seems to see Dalinar or Dalinar's Shardplate glowing if only faintly. Another is that Dalinar tosses aside his Shardblade. 

 

What I posit here is that Dalinar, in an effort to protect Elhokar, invests Stormlight. Presumably from Elhokar's Shardplate's gemstones allowing him the additional strength required to catch the massive claw. This act being something that even other Shardbearers see as something a normal modern Shardbearer shouldn't be able to do. I feel that Brandon is also purposely drawing attention to the fact that Dalinar tosses his Shardblade away allowing him to invest when he otherwise may not have been able to.

 

In short, I think the king's broken gemstones weren't the result of sabotage, but the result of Dalinar's pulling all of the Stormlight from them rapidly.

 

I'd love to hear opinions on this 

 

~Ink

Edited January 19, 2014 by smearedblackink

[shdwfeather]

I believe this has been mentioned before. I think we have WoB on the fact that Dalinar is becoming a Bondsmith?

[DocHoliday]

The OP has been mentioned before, the glowing being unintentional Stormlight retention such as Kaladin exhibits in his fight with the Verb Veden Shardbearer. Other speculation includes Stormlight retention intercepting Elohkar ShardPlate in some fashion similar to Szeth being unable to use Plate and Lashings at the same time.

 

I hadn't heard it WoB yet, but current speculation due to the back cover of WoR is that Dalinar is the Bond Smith mentioned therein.

 

Also I think it's very intriguing you mention Dalinar throwing the Shardblade aside then pulling in more Investiture(either through armor or sheer 'Awesomeness'). I don't believe it's been mentioned before.

[Cayden]

The OP has been mentioned before, the glowing being unintentional Stormlight retention such as Kaladin exhibits in his fight with the Verb Veden Shardbearer. Other speculation includes Stormlight retention intercepting Elohkar ShardPlate in some fashion similar to Szeth being unable to use Plate and Lashings at the same time.

 

I hadn't heard it WoB yet, but current speculation due to the back cover of WoR is that Dalinar is the Bond Smith mentioned therein.

 

Also I think it's very intriguing you mention Dalinar throwing the Shardblade aside then pulling in more Investiture(either through armor or sheer 'Awesomeness'). I don't believe it's been mentioned before.

 

Indeed, its a very good catch almost like losing an ear-ring.

 

I had a suspision that it was Elholkar who drew in the stormlight somehow though and cracked his own, not quite sure how Dalinar would draw in stormlight from only Elhokar and ignore his own and Adolins gems. I dont think it could be that selective and if he drew in enough to crack them, from large gems then the observers would have seen the trail of stormlight flying towards Dalinar.

 

Though I suppose that last part depends on just how Dalinar absorbs stormlight

[11thorderknight]

I think it's fairly established that Dalinar did some surgebinding in that scene. However, it still doesn't explain Elhokar's gems. We are very specifically told in Szeth's PoV in the prologue that he cannot drain Gavilar's gems while they are inside his Plate. It's only afterward, once the Plate is opened, that he can use them. It would be a HUGE continuity error on Brandon's part to have anyone other than Elhokar drain those gems. 

 

My personal theory is that Elhokar drained them himself by accident, without knowing it. We know he's seeing Cryptics, after all. Many people have argued with me on this, saying that to drain such large amounts of stormlight would have caused some obvious effect. I don't necessarily think so - Elhokar at this point is probably very bad at holding stormlight, and could easily "leak" a huge amount over time, even if he only holds a very small amount at any given moment. (For the nerds out there: deltaVolume = Flux x Time). 

 

There is, of course, one more explanation: the gems could have truly been tampered with. In many ways, that would be the most surprising outcome of all.

[+eveorjoy]

It says in Szeth's prologue that he could not use plate because his power would interfere with the gemstones that power the plate. I think Dalinar's plate would have given out before he affected Elhokar's plate.

[Moogle]

I think it's fairly established that Dalinar did some surgebinding in that scene.

 

In what way? Stormlight gives you a ridiculous amount of added strength, so I'm not sure why he had to be Surgebinding when dealing with the chasmfiend. There's nothing really special about that level of strength, Vin even manages to carry a ridiculously large sword with Allomantic pewter. Shardplate makes you even stronger than that, so I don't see why Surgebinding has to be involved, particularly when there was no glow of Stormlight usage (potential investing by Dalinar, maybe).

 

Dalinar has seen no bonded spren, and honorspren like Syl (and probably spren like Order 10's spren, since they're so close to honorspren) are repelled by Shardblades. I doubt Dalinar is Surgebinding. In WoR, though, I fully expect him to.

Edited January 19, 2014 by Moogle

[Awesomeness Summoned]

It says in Szeth's prologue that he could not use plate because his power would interfere with the gemstones that power the plate. I think Dalinar's plate would have given out before he affected Elhokar's plate.

That's assuming what's true for Szeth is true for other surgebinders. It's possible his abilities don't play nicely with shardplate because he doesn't have a nahel bond. The KR in dalinar's flashback obviously used their surges and wore plate at the same time and there is indication the dalinar's plate was glowing slightly like theirs.

[+eveorjoy]

That's assuming what's true for Szeth is true for other surgebinders. It's possible his abilities don't play nicely with shardplate because he doesn't have a nahel bond. The KR in dalinar's flashback obviously used their surges and wore plate at the same time and there is indication the dalinar's plate was glowing slightly like theirs.

 

 True. Personally I think something is wrong with the modern plate and blade of the story. I don't think any surgebinder could use them. However, I admit this is speculation. Maybe a nahel bond would allow you to use plate. But even if Dalinar is a surgebinder, he still does not have a nahel bond at this point. The rules the apply to Szeth most likely apply to him as well.

[Natans]

Some already proposed this (and that Elhokar drawed the gems himself given the fact that apparently he see Liesprens,and soulcasting is more associeted with broken gems than any other surge that already appeared) but you take on this is very good. Take this upvote and be welcomed to the forum =)

 

Side note, in the recent chapter released Kaladin asked Dalinar this and the theme pop out again, maybe we will have some explanation in the next book.

 

=)

Edited January 19, 2014 by Natans

[Awesomeness Summoned]

True. Personally I think something is wrong with the modern plate and blade of the story. I don't think any surgebinder could use them. However, I admit this is speculation. Maybe a nahel bond would allow you to use plate. But even if Dalinar is a surgebinder, he still does not have a nahel bond at this point. The rules the apply to Szeth most likely apply to him as well.

Point taken about dalinar's not having a bond yet and there possibly being problems with modern plate. I was really just speculating with the bond thing, though. The main point was that we don't have enough evidence at this point to know if Szeth's plate issues are common or unique to his surgebinding.

[11thorderknight]

In what way? Stormlight gives you a ridiculous amount of added strength, so I'm not sure why he had to be Surgebinding when dealing with the chasmfiend. There's nothing really special about that level of strength, Vin even manages to carry a ridiculously large sword with Allomantic pewter. Shardplate makes you even stronger than that, so I don't see why Surgebinding has to be involved, particularly when there was no glow of Stormlight usage (potential investing by Dalinar, maybe).

 

Dalinar has seen no bonded spren, and honorspren like Syl (and probably spren like Order 10's spren, since they're so close to honorspren) are repelled by Shardblades. I doubt Dalinar is Surgebinding. In WoR, though, I fully expect him to.

 

Apologies, I wasn't clear. I didn't mean that Dalinar was using a specific Surge, just using Stormlight for strength. I thought Surgebinding referred to the internal use of Stormlight common to all orders, as well as the external use that varies among them.

 

As for the interference between Plate and Surgebinding, my belief is that, as Invested objects, Shardplate resists other Investiture. Therefore, it protects a Plate wearer from being directly Invested by hostile Investiture (i.e. Szeth couldn't Lash Gavilar to the ceiling if he wanted to). However, it also interferes with a Surgebinder's attempts to Invest themselves (i.e. if Szeth tried wearing Plate, he wouldn't be able to Lash himself, and might possibly even have difficulty inhaling Stormlight from outside sources).

 

Obviously, however, the original Radiants had no problem using Plate while Surgebinding, and it's been made clear that there is a difference between the original Shards and their modern version. My belief is that the original Shards were keyed to their original owners; they were not meant to be passed down from person to person. Therefore, the original Spiritual Identity of the Plate was identical to that of the Radiant - the Plate was literally part of them, and therefore a Radiant's own Investiture was not hindered by their own Plate. Outside, hostile investiture would still have been resisted, however.

 

So, modern-day Surgebinders like Szeth, Dalinar or Elhokar will still be limited by Plate, since the Plate they use or attempt to use is not truly "theirs". I'm sure at some point in the series, that will change. Either these guys will get their own, new, Shards upon mastering their respective Ideals, or they will somehow "reclaim" the modern Shards and bond with them properly. However, with respect to the hunting incident, I still believe that based on the rules Brandon has set up, it was impossible for anyone other than Elhokar to drain his gems during the hunt.

[Moogle]

Apologies, I wasn't clear. I didn't mean that Dalinar was using a specific Surge, just using Stormlight for strength. I thought Surgebinding referred to the internal use of Stormlight common to all orders, as well as the external use that varies among them.

 

As for the interference between Plate and Surgebinding, my belief is that, as Invested objects, Shardplate resists other Investiture. Therefore, it protects a Plate wearer from being directly Invested by hostile Investiture (i.e. Szeth couldn't Lash Gavilar to the ceiling if he wanted to). However, it also interferes with a Surgebinder's attempts to Invest themselves (i.e. if Szeth tried wearing Plate, he wouldn't be able to Lash himself, and might possibly even have difficulty inhaling Stormlight from outside sources).

 

Okay, this makes more sense - but where's this Dalinar Investing himself coming from? You state here a belief that Plate resists the effects of people to Invest themselves with Stormlight, and yet you're claiming that Dalinar did it? What's the mechanism? Where is his spren? Shallan sees her spren before she ever Soulcasts, and she gets it into the Physical realm maybe a week after the Soulcasting. Where has Dalinar's been?

 

I could see a theory revolving around Dalinar embodying the ideals of the Radiants when he uses his Plate to protect Elhokar, getting him a little bit of extra juice out of the Plate (and explaining it almost glowing), but I just can't see him Investing himself with any Stormlight. I'm also skeptical that the glowing of the Plate means anything special happened, but I grant that it happening for Gavilar and Dalinar and not others (though the Shardbearer who killed Cenn had 'gleaming' Plate) might be indicative of something greater.

 

As for Elhokar's shattered gems, that I could see as him Investing. He's in the middle of combat with a chasmfiend, it's about to crush him... so he takes in some Stormlight. He later attributes the feeling to the Thrill, or just general adrenaline. How he could take in enough to shatter gems without glowing visibly, I have no clue, and it's a weakness of the theory. Perhaps he Soulcasted during that? But what did he Soulcast that was big enough to shatter Plate-grade gems? Ugh. Elhokar is hiding something.

[HydrogenAlpha]

I like how you pointed out that he threw away his sharblade in order to be able to invest more. I always thought that summoning a blade is some form of investure and is somehow linked with the usage of stormlight ( whatever the magic systems is called ). I think thats somehow the reason that getting a shard makes you presumably a lighteye,

[smearedblackink]

Great discussion! So many interesting ideas and cross references. You've all given me a lot to think on 

 

I had considered the idea that Elhokar may have Soulcasted, but it seemed even harder to prove. For instance, Elhokar presumably has no experience Soulcasting, I say this because it seems unlikely that he would fear the Cryptics so much if he had gone so far as to interact with them, telling them a powerful hidden truth and so on. On top of that, we've seen a handful of Soulcastings in the book so far and the only cases in which gemstones broke were when Jasnah Soulcast the large stone to smoke for Taravangian, and again when she remotely Soulcast the two running footpads into smoke. In both cases it was a smoke Soulcasting of relatively large objects and in both cases it was the Smokestone that cracked. There is also evidence to support the idea that a specific type of gemstone is required to perform specific Soulcastings. For instance when Shallan was poisoned Jasnah is yelling that someone needs to bring her a garnet, again presumably because garnet is related to the essence of blood. 

 

So with that information, it seems odd (if we assume that Elhokar is of the same Order as Shallan) that he should break eight gemstones (of the same type?) Soulcasting. Of course it doesn't mean that he didn't, it just seems that in order for those stones to have cracked he would have actually had to Soulcast, and apparently something very large in order to break eight gemstones in one go.

 

Of course none of us have a good reason as to why Dalinar would be glowing if not for drawing in Stormlight from some source. I think it's safe to say it wasn't from his own armor or he would likely have many broken/dun gemstones as well.

 

How's this for a new speculation; maybe he drew it in from the Greatshell itself? Better yet, maybe Elhokar did Soulcast and in doing so he Soulcast Stormlight directly into Dalinar or Dalinar's Shardplate 

 

~Ink

Edited January 21, 2014 by smearedblackink

[EvilKetchupCow]

I'm gonna go off course and throw in my own wild speculation:

 

The Broken gems in the shardplate were meant to harm/hinder someone borrowing his plate for a duel. 

Edited January 21, 2014 by EvilKetchupCow

[el_warko]

So with that information, it seems odd (if we assume that Elhokar is of the same Order as Jasnah) that he should break eight gemstones (of the same type?) Soulcasting. Of course it doesn't mean that he didn't, it just seems that in order for those stones to have cracked he would have actually had to Soulcast, and apparently something very large in order to break eight gemstones in one go.

 

Unless he was "trying" to do something with the wrong gem type.  Like if you are trying to fix a piece of equipment with the wrong material (say a metal gear with a plastic cog), it keeps breaking. 

 

Personally though, I think he discarded his blade because he needed both hands.  I would attribute his glowing to strengthening the formation of his as yet established Nahel bond with his as yet undisclosed spren.  As yet.

[AerionBFII]

I think he is a surge-binder. Given the fact he can see those spren with twisted faces in mirrors. Since shallan can only see them in her drawings, i wonder if that means their abilities differ?