theory The secret that broke the Knights Radiant

[iamstick]

I remain confused about the recreance. What exactly are the mechanisms of Odium hopping over from Braize to Roshar and back? Could it really be as simple as "there exists one parshendi (or parshendi derived) person who has bonded with a voidspren?"

Or is it that "there are zero heralds on Braize" allowing the crustacean version of Bifröst to extend? Would killing all the heralds end the desolations?

If so, are the Knights Radiant sufficiently heraldic that they enter the mathematics of Odium gate logic? Could the recreance (minus Skybreakers) have deliberately mirrored the "all heralds but poor Taln" and been necessary to trap Odium? 1 order on Roshar + 1 herald on Braize == sufficient to maintain oathpact? 

Is the whole new desolation the fault of the spren, particularly of Pattern (who seems to be the earliest "success")?

[Darkness]

10 hours ago, iamstick said:

I remain confused about the recreance. What exactly are the mechanisms of Odium hopping over from Braize to Roshar and back? Could it really be as simple as "there exists one parshendi (or parshendi derived) person who has bonded with a voidspren?"

Or is it that "there are zero heralds on Braize" allowing the crustacean version of Bifröst to extend? Would killing all the heralds end the desolations?

If so, are the Knights Radiant sufficiently heraldic that they enter the mathematics of Odium gate logic? Could the recreance (minus Skybreakers) have deliberately mirrored the "all heralds but poor Taln" and been necessary to trap Odium? 1 order on Roshar + 1 herald on Braize == sufficient to maintain oathpact? 

Is the whole new desolation the fault of the spren, particularly of Pattern (who seems to be the earliest "success")?

If it helps, desolations were happening long before the spren figured out how to let humans surgebind. Ergo before radiants.

[Stormlightning]

The Desolations have been getting steadily worse throughout time (this is mentioned a few times, in addition to the Prelude where Kelek says "it was the worst so far" or something like that). I've often just somewhat assumed that the KR abandoned mankind when they found out that the Heralds "defeated the Oathpact" AKA lied about winning (I'm not sure which version of the story they would have heard, but it seems reasonable that they might have eventually learned that the Heralds lied). Perhaps the KR understood that this meant the next Desolation would be the worst, times nine (for the nine who broke their side of the oath) and would bring a change of circumstances in the Last Desolation. They believed that couldn't win it or didn't want to fight after their leaders betrayed them, so they left. Is there a simple way to debunk this theory?

As a tangent, does anyone know if the KR stuck around when it wasn't Desolation time? I've been a bit confused on this point.

[The One Who Connects]

8 hours ago, Stormlightning said:

As a tangent, does anyone know if the KR stuck around when it wasn't Desolation time? I've been a bit confused on this point.

Given that the Recreance is about 2,200 years away from the nearest Desolation, I would say that they stuck around between Desolations. They were meant to be a force for good, to help the world. After a Desolation, mankind needed a lot of help rebuilding, so I assume they stayed to help and keep the peace.

[gbazz4]

On 5/18/2017 at 1:12 PM, CaptainRyan said:

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...

Thanks for the theory. It is interesting to consider. Maybe i am not understanding the theory completely, but it seemed like you were arguing a reciprocal relationship so that if KR giving up their bond it would cause the Parshendi to lose their bond. My only thought was if there was one order that secretly kept their bonds wouldn't that allow them to still surgebind? If that is the case then wouldn't the Parshendi who remained still be able to voidbind and still use powers? if that is the case why would they have simply stayed near the shattered plains and not been voidbinding and attacking places all over the world prior to Gavilar finding them prior to the Way of Kings? There shouldn't be anything that would have kept them from using powers. 

Also, it has been a while since i read the books. I never picked up on one order secretly keeping their bonds after the Recreance, can you point me to where that was referenced? I would really like to see where i missed that. Thanks.

[CaptainRyan]

38 minutes ago, gbazz4 said:

it seemed like you were arguing a reciprocal relationship so that if KR giving up their bond it would cause the Parshendi to lose their bond.

This is close but not quite right. I am arguing that someone within the Knights Radiant organization, probably the Bondsmiths, discovered how to break the entire bonding process in some fashion - i.e. the process by which Knights bond with spren, by which Parshendi bond with spren, etc. My speculation is that the Knights knew this would destroy their bonds with their spren but they were willing to make that sacrifice in order to prevent the Parshendi from bonding with Voidspren again. Something, I don't know what, went wrong and it ended up only being partially successful - 9 out of 10 Orders lost their bonds as did most of the Parshendi (they became Parshmen) but Eshonai's people retained their bonds.

47 minutes ago, gbazz4 said:

I never picked up on one order secretly keeping their bonds after the Recreance, can you point me to where that was referenced? I would really like to see where i missed that.

The first clue is the epigraph of chapter 41 in Words of Radiance. I believe there are some WoBs (words of Brandon) floating around that provide more evidence to the idea that one Order of Radiants kept their oaths.

[maxal]

On 5/19/2017 at 10:55 PM, galendo said:

I tend to take Pattern's statements at face value, and therefore think that the betraying Order must be the Truthwatchers.  But it's not impossible that it's the Lightweavers, either.

Just a small comment: as far as we know, the Truthwatchers are the only orders with numerous members. I found it odd for an order I always took wasn't the most numerous.

[Fulminato]

23 minutes ago, maxal said:

Just a small comment: as far as we know, the Truthwatchers are the only orders with numerous members. I found it odd for an order I always took wasn't the most numerous.

source? I never read/hear of this bit of information

[Radiant_Jaeger]

1 hour ago, maxal said:

Just a small comment: as far as we know, the Truthwatchers are the only orders with numerous members. I found it odd for an order I always took wasn't the most numerous.

 

1 hour ago, Fulminato said:

source? I never read/hear of this bit of information

He's talking present day.. Renarin, Ym, and the Stump were all truthwatchers so far. However, there are two

Spoiler

sky breakers who flew in edgedancer,so we can assume they said at least the first two ideals, because thats how many it took Kaladin to fly. Also maybe Szeth is a Skybreaker as well, but we can't know for sure. Nightblood would make an interesting highspren lol.

But I'm sure we will see more of every order except of course the Bondsmiths, who we might only get one more of.

[jcoope91]

If this is true, then this was an attempt to put a bandaid on the desolations. The real problem is Odium. Kaladin and his knight friends would have to see this.