[OB] OB opinion poll

[Steeldancer]

So, what were your opinions, overall? 

I said best. It was amazing. Worldbuilding I did not expect, amazing character growth and depth, real issues, and deep emotional struggles. And awesome magic. So much cosmere tid bits. 

I really, REALLY enjoyed this book. So for me? 10/10. 

Edited November 20, 2017 by Steeldancer

[IndigoAjah]

I've given it an 8, which is a high score for me. Close to a 9.

[Stuperman]

I loved a ton of the parts in oathbringer but as a whole I think it fell a bit short (gave it 8/10).

Spoiler

Things I hated:

• The insane build up for the last fight with odium. Way too many character view points and timelines having to line up for it to be believable IMO
• Shallan's lack of resolution on her split personality. Must have been 300 pages dedicated to that
• Kaladin teasing the fourth ideal and instead being seemingly irrelevant for the last 2 parts of the book

That said, I loved so so so so many other scenes (taln, kaladins reunion in hearthstone, cosmere answers, dalinar scenes, and too many others to name)

 

[+robardin]

I haven't (fully) re-read Oathbringer (yet), but so far, "Words of Radiance" remains the one I would go back to when I need a Stormlight pick-me-up. It has been, for years. But that  will probably change, now that I know more about how Moash, Elhokar, Taravangian, and "Shalladin" story arcs developed in Oathbringer, re-reading my favorite parts of oR will now be... very hard.

It's really hard to say because Oathbringer pushed SO MUCH along. So much so, that it feels like some stuff it started was just left hanging - the Adolin Investigates His Own Murder line got abandoned early, rarely mentioned at all, and now, he's just going to be a Highprince? I'm sure Ialai is going to have a LOT to say about that - especially now that her regent Highprince Sadeas, Amaram, is dead, and we'll see if she believes the story about him turning to the enemy.  Heck, even if she does, you just know she's going to spin it like a Kholin lie to cement their position.

But it's hard to deny that Oathbringer delivered. In spades. Not just in spades, but like a slam in spades that required a double squeeze without the count to bring in. (Sorry if that just went over the head of 99% of anybody here, but the expression "in spades" did come from Contract Bridge, heh.)

I mean, just off the top of my head, things that have been poked at for years are now massively clarified:

• There's something wrong with Renarin and his "seeing the future", isn't there? ... You could say that.
• What is the deal with Dalinar forgetting his wife? Some kind of buried emotional trauma? ... Yeeeeah you could say that.
• Is Vivenna on Roshar? Oh yeah, she gets not just a cameo, but surfaces with a semi-Nightblood blade!
• Can Nightblood feed off of Stormlight? Um... Yes. 'Nuff said.
• Where are the Heralds? ... Here are several Heralds showing themselves. And, er, Jezrien freaking getting MURDERED with a mysterious golden knife that appeared to require Moash the Human to wield against him.
• Will Shallan ditch Adolin for Kaladin? Not unless she's going to be a Very Naughty Veil.
• Will all of Bridge Four "go squire"? Will any of them "go Full Radiant" and bond their own spren, and if so, would they be Windrunners? Yes, yes, and yes.
• Does Elhokar see a spren? Might he go Radiant, perhaps with a little Shallansketch to nudge his character growth? ... Yes, and no.
• What is a "Voidspren" exactly, and does that imply that parshmen who bond them can do "Voidbinding"? Ayup.
• Could a listener bond a spren and become Radiant? .... Venli doesn't just do this, she does this WITH a Voidspren in her as well!
• Since Moash seems to regret what he did in betraying Kaladin, is his a redemptive story arc? ... That would be one heck of an arc, at this point. Looks like he's going to be Odium's Champion at this rate.
• Speaking of which, we not only get more insight into the nature of Odium, we get MULTIPLE POVs WITH DIRECT INTERACTION with Odium!
• "No Shard is intrinsicall evil" - Not even Odium? Well, he's not just the Father of Hatred, he's the Shard of Passion.
• Kaladin faces off with Roshone (punch to the face) and Amaram (saved by Rock after Amaram powers up with an Unmade).
• Could Hoid bond a spren and gain Surges? ... Well, the Epilogue to OB sure suggests he's about to become a Lightweaver.
• Could a "dead spren" Shardblade be re-awakened? Is that will Adolin will do? ... YOU'RE SOOOO CLOSE MAN, DO IT, DOOOO ITTTT
• What's Taravangian's master plan / ultimate goal? He was hoping to "trick" Odium into saving "his people" after he became "king of everything". Not a bad idea, even if he's now cashed in his chips and folded his hand to go Team Odium for the promise of Kharbranth and its people being saved.

That's not even mentioning how super duper awesome it is that Dalinar's injunction to "Unite Them" referred, in one sense, to pulling together all three Realms (Ascending at will, essentially) and being able to personally infuse spheres.

 

 

Edited November 20, 2017 by robardin

[+robardin]

I agree somewhat that Kaladin's storyline felt irrelevant for the last two parts of Oathbringer, which is very different from the first two Stormlight novels, but I think fit the ending, which at its core is built around Dalinar and Renarin.

The massive battle at Thaylen City was hard to pull off with all the POVs involved, and it was unwieldy and dizzying at points for a first time read-through, but I suspect with re-reads it will feel fine. I certainly can't think of any story line there that would not suffer from being cut.

 

Edited November 20, 2017 by robardin

[17th Splinter]

15 minutes ago, robardin said:

The massive battle at Thaylen City was hard to pull off with all the POVs involved, and it was unwieldy and dizzying at points for a first time read-through, but I suspect with re-reads it will feel fine. I certainly can't think of any story line there that would not suffer from being cut.

 

Yes definitely. The first time I read it I was reading as fast as possible, and I was so confused. I've reread it and it was fine. (might have helped that is wasn't past 4am )

Anyway 10/10

[lordofsoup]

47 minutes ago, Stuperman said:

 

  Hide contents

Things I hated:

• Kaladin teasing the fourth ideal and instead being seemingly irrelevant for the last 2 parts of the book

 

Ya I'm not sure how I feel about the bridgemen being at the same level of ideals as Kaladin.  He has struggled with being a radiant for 3 books, and the moment he swore the 3rd ideal was so dramatic.  Now bridgemen are swearing it left and right like it's nothing.

[emailanimal]

To concentrate somewhat on the negative aspects of the book, there are certain progressions in the book that take way too much time to fully develop, and yet, there are scenes that would have been awesome to see, but that do not appear on screen, and, more importantly, do not move the action. (e.g., Kaladin and Shallan fly to Thaylen City together, spend a lot of time by themselves, but their relationship - not in a romantic sense, but purely in what they know about each other and how they talk to each other - does not evolve...).  

There are probably about 300+ pages of protagonists and some secondary/tertiary (I am looking at you, Teft) characters moping. This is all nice and everything, but there are only so many ways to mope and not be repetitive. 

 

On the bright side, this book has answered so many questions and has, I think, finally started pointing us in the real direction of what is going on on Roshar.  It also moved away from the "us and them" mentality of humans fighting parshmen, and started asking more important questions of who is enslaving whom, and what sort of resolution is actually an acceptable/good one.

 

8/10.

 

[+robardin]

5 minutes ago, lordofsoup said:

Ya I'm not sure how I feel about the bridgemen being at the same level of ideals as Kaladin.  He has struggled with being a radiant for 3 books, and the moment he swore the 3rd ideal was so dramatic.  Now bridgemen are swearing it left and right like it's nothing.

I think Teft had a very difficult time reaching the Third Ideal. Though we didn't see his POV in reaching the Second Ideal.

It doesn't surprise me that it's much easier for someone to reach the First Ideal in a KR Order once there is a visible example of one to lead the way. Much harder for Kaladin, who didn't even know anything about Surgebinding, Ideals, or any of that - it took Teft, as an apostate member of an obscure religious sect dedicated to the memory of the Knights Radiant who just happened to be in his bridge crew, to explain some of it to him. Certainly a barely bonded Sylphrena was no real help in explaining what was going on.

It's probably one of those "the veil once pierced" kind of things that once there are a certain number of Radiants, it's easier and more attractive for more spren to cross into the Physical Realm to bond to people. I mean, for all those new Windrunners, they have to be bonding honorspren, right? Who as a whole, are Forbidden to do what Syl did? What's up with that?

I did think Lopen reaching the Second Ideal being played for a comic relief moment at the end of Oathbringer was a tad incongruous. But if any character could pull it off, Lopen's the guy. And the Stormfather telling him "you weren't quite ready" during the battle of Thalyen City, which JUST ENDED a few days earlier and during which Lopen was evidently straining to achieve that Ideal, was unexpectedly funny.

 

 

[+robardin]

4 minutes ago, emailanimal said:

There are probably about 300+ pages of protagonists and some secondary/tertiary (I am looking at you, Teft) characters moping. This is all nice and everything, but there are only so many ways to mope and not be repetitive. 

My first reaction to the Teft storyline was the same as yours - yeah yeah, I get it, Teft has demons - but not only does it lead to him selling his Bridge Four coat, which ends up being a key plot element in terms of someone from the Diagram managing to steal Jezrien's Honorblade, Teft is also the only one other than Kaladin to have reached the Third Ideal of the Windrunners, which was key to him being able to open the Oathgate to bring in reinforcements to Thaylen City.

And why all the build-up of "Teft moping"? Because his version of the Third Ideal was different from Kaladin's. Where Kaladin was about rediscovering his core nature of putting duty above his personal feelings, I will protect even those I hate, so long as it is right, Teft is about reconciling - not conquering - with his inner demons: ...even if the one I hate most is myself.

I think to really appreciate that, we had to see exactly how deep Teft's pain goes.

[emailanimal]

2 minutes ago, robardin said:

I think to really appreciate that, we had to see exactly how deep Teft's pain goes.

Teft is not the only person caught moping in the book. Our trio of main characters had so much of it that at some point I was really-really craving Adolin's POVs. 

[autopilot_off]

I gave Oathbringer an eight. There were so many things that I liked about it, I will not attempt to list them all. My favorite scene was when Shallan/Wit did "The Girl Who Looked Up" story. I also enjoyed Rock's POV chapter. Along with that, it was also nice to spend time with others POV besides just the main three characters. Finally there were some really good reveals, such as the Oathpact, Dalinar's past, and the secret of the true voidbringers.

My biggest complaint is the Shallan/Kaladin/Adolin dynamic. Shallan and Kaladin barely speak throughout the entire book. Which we all know they have plenty to discuss. Like Kaladin said, last book they had an intimate moment in the chasm, now it is like it never happened. At times they act like they are just co-workers who hang out once in awhile. The resolution to this dynamic at the end was underwhelming. Also Shallan's personalities became tedious as the book continued on and that seems to be not entirely resolved still. Finally points off for Shallan's and Adolin's cheesy dialogue before the wedding. I face palmed after reading that.

In conclusion Oathbringer was a great book, I could hardly put it down except for going to work. This is still my favorite running series and 3-4 years for the next book cannot come soon enough. 

[+robardin]

18 minutes ago, autopilot_off said:

My biggest complaint is the Shallan/Kaladin/Adolin dynamic. Shallan and Kaladin barely speak throughout the entire book. Which we all know they have plenty to discuss. Like Kaladin said, last book they had an intimate moment in the chasm, now it is like it never happened. At times they act like they are just co-workers who hang out once in awhile. The resolution to this dynamic at the end was underwhelming. Also Shallan's personalities became tedious as the book continued on and that seems to be not entirely resolved still. Finally points off for Shallan's and Adolin's cheesy dialogue before the wedding. I face palmed after reading that.

Or, you could put 1 and 1 and 1 together and realize that maybe it's not neatly tied up in a bow just because Shallan decided it ought to be. Especially when "Shallan" still barely trumps the Veil and Radiant personalities, both of who have expressed a preference for Kaladin (particularly Veil).

This is going to become a full-on Arthur/Guinevere/Lancelot thing, I think.

 

Edited November 20, 2017 by robardin

[Steeldancer]

5 minutes ago, robardin said:

Or, you could put 1 and 1 and 1 together and realize that maybe it's not neatly tied up in a bow just because Shallan decided it ought to be. Especially when "Shallan" still barely trumps the Veil and Radiant personalities, both of who have expressed a preference for Kaladin (particularly Veil).

This is going to become a full-on Arthur/Guinevere/Lancelot thing, I think.

 

OH GODS no. 

Can't we just let something die? Kaladin doesn't want it. Shallan is MARRYING Adolin. 

And I'm going to be honest. I don't want some romantic shenanigans taking over SA. Just... Let Kaladin move on. 

Plus, now they've made oaths. I doubt Syl would approve of Kaladin acting to break those oaths.  

[+Bliev]

I loved that i got more of my two favorite women: Jasnah and Shallan, with a bonus appearance of Azure. I enjoyed Jasnah’s slow reveal of who she is and what she’s willing to do. She’ll make a good queen.

I liked what Brandon has done with Shallan. Showing her uncommon strength and the side effects of such talents in an unguided young person. That scene 

Spoiler

With her and Wit? Heartbreaking.

. 

Re: the “triangle”, I’m glad she chose the way she did—imho Kal never complemented her the way Adolin did, even if i think marriage is a bit precipitous. (Then again, it is the end of the world. Lol who am i to judge?) I think Adolin has a better shot of grounding her throughout her discovery of self more than Kal does, as two broken people often don’t make a whole. My concerns were confirmed when Kal approached her in Shadesmar and totally overlooked Shallan’s own issues in his envy of her “lightness”. She saw it then too—that it wouldn’t work. Though i was never convinced either of them had real love for one another.  I doubt this is the end of shallan’s struggles, of course. But i honestly hope we can leave the “triangle” behind. 

Edited November 20, 2017 by Bliev

[+robardin]

17 minutes ago, Bliev said:

I loved that i got more of my two favorite women: Jasnah and Shallan, with a bonus appearance of Azure. I enjoyed Jasnah’s slow reveal of who she is and what she’s willing to do. She’ll make a good queen.

Oh yeah. In addition to deciding not to kill Renarin for bonding a corrupted spren - which seems like it could be key to derailing Odium's "line of sight" - I had always wondered if a Soulcaster would be the absolutely most terrifying Radiant to face in battle, and holy chulldung was it terrifying. "OMG, a Fused one is flying in at ten o'clock" -- wave of hand -- wall of oil, glop, spark of flame, whoosh, good night. Or just literally smoking a bunch of red-eyed soldiers rushing to attack her... By TURNING THEM INTO SMOKE.

[Subvisual Haze]

It was a very enjoyable book, but probably the weakest out of the Stormlight Archive so far to me.  Despite being parts of a larger series, both Way of Kings and Words of Radiance felt very self-contained with satisfying conclusions.  Oathbringer though felt much more like a "middle book", setting up a lot more plot elements and character arcs than it paid off.

Kaladin felt purposely sidelined in the book, which makes sense if you want to maintain some sort of parity between the 3 Main Protagonists as Kaladin had already stolen the spotlight in the first 2 books.  The only problem being that the story suffers without Kaladin and Bridge 4. 

Kaladin is the most human character, he interacts with normal people and struggles with depression and feelings of inadequacy like all too many people do in their day to lives.  In contrast Dalinar is a prince who spends the huge majority of his time interacting with monarchs and Gods and Shallan for some reason has regressed into a Hollywood portrayal of Multiple Personality Disorder and debating which male character to pine over.  I love Kaladin, and love Bridge 4, but both feel purposely shoved to the side in this book.  Do Kaladin and Bridge 4 spend maybe a quarter of the book in the same location as each other?  Instead Kaladin gets sent off on an interesting solo mission in the first section (which unfortunately didn't have much of a payoff beyond shoveling even more misery and tragedy onto Kaladin), and then gets relegated to a supporting role in Shallan's weird side mission.  Even with Syl we get a little bit of her backstory, and she's a very kind and supporting person to Kaladin...but there's no growth.   Kaladin+Syl just didn't have an arc in this book.  There was a conflict, but no resolution yet.  It felt very "middle book" in that regard.

The book also felt a little too bogged down by side POV characters at various points.  I have great hopes that Brandon can keep all these characters juggled, but I've seen a lot of other major fantasy series really struggle to maintain narrative thrust when so many characters require regular updates.  I think I read that the original plan for the Interludes was to limit POV expansion, but now we see a lot of previous Interlude POVs escaping containment and just becoming normal POVs.

[Hischier]

Maybe a re-read will improve my opinion of Oathbringer. I enjoyed this book but I didn't love it. I gave it a 6/10 whereas WoKs and WoR are both 10/10s. 

 

[Morsk]

It's my favorite Stormlight book, but it isn't The Emperor's Soul, so 9/10.

I actually liked Dalinar's flashbacks; this is the biggest improvement on prior books to me. With Stormlight 1 & 2 flashbacks, it was "Let's read about a powerless child getting bullied or abused for 100 pages!" No thanks. Especially not for the 3rd time in a row. Dalinar actually had agency, created his own problems, and did interesting things in the flashbacks. The only part I didn't like was Adolin & Renarin fighting the Thunderclast. Compared to all the other action scenes happening at the same time, it was boring.

I do wonder if fandom killed Eshonai, by complaining about Jasnah and Szeth surviving. Did Brandon kill her and give her story to Venli, as a way of placating readers who wanted more deaths?..

[Steeldancer]

So it looks like we have an average of a 9/10

[Fifth of Daybreak]

10/10 would abandon all responsibilities to read again 

[kari-no-sugata]

I think tWoK was the best constructed of the 3 so far - there was a nice balance between all the characters, the world-building was great, the ending was great and I don't think there was any significant flaw.

I would say that WoR was more enjoyable (for me at least) but the balance between the characters wasn't so good and there were a few flaws.

I found OB the least enjoyable to read and despite a number of great scenes there were just too many flaws in too many areas - there was too much plot that didn't really do much, the world-building felt lacking, the characters felt rather stifled and there were a lot of minor plot and character points that just fizzled out, were left dangling or were poorly developed. I actually felt depressed for a few days after reading it, rather than invigorated like I was with the previous books. This is despite the fact that my favourite character (Shallan) finally ended a book on a happy note - her scenes at the end didn't feel real enough to counter what her character had been through in the rest of the book.

[StormingTexan]

This book felt a lot more segmented than the previous two between the parts. Not a bad thing but it makes me want to rate the parts separately. I'd give parts 1-4 an average of 9. The best of those being part 2 and 4. I loved the Bridge 4 POV and the tour through the Shadesmar was awesome. We learned a lot and while some reveals seemed a little underwhelming others caused my jaw to drop. I could go on and on but I will stop now. 

  Unfortunately part 5 I would give a 6. It felt way to chaotic. So much was going on at the same time and there were some amazing moments but way to much crammed together. Dalinar's Ascension felt a little deus ex machina. An enemy assassin that they thought was dead is casually welcomed in to the fold. As much as I didn't care for Amaram the entire turning him in to a monster thing felt odd. The shining lights of the part were Jasnah, Adolin and Renarin.

So all in all I enjoyed most of it and would give it a 8/10. 

[Bacon]

It was fantastic and defied expectations. The few things I knew would happen going in didn't happen at all, many things happened that I never would have expected, and entire plotlines resolved that I was so sure wouldn't even really be relevant until the back half of the series. I was afraid this was going to be a plodding book that just focused on building for what's going to happen later like the trap the middle Wheel of Time books fell into. But damnation was I wrong. It definitely set up some crazy stuff to happen later on, but did so while feeling like it had the pace and importance of the final entry of a series.

My only concern now is if Brandon keeps introducing new magic systems, it'll stop being interesting, and just become bloated and confusing. It's already hard to follow the rules to everything between surgebinding, voidbinding, old magic, adolanseum, the unmade, what you can do by trapping spren in gemstones, whatever is making the heralds and fused immortal, etc. With what Hoid is getting up to investing himself in all these different shards and all the extra levels of complicated stuff that implies, it's getting to the danger zone of becoming so complicated and technical as to be boring

[Leyrann]

Gave it a solid 10/10, definitely the best book I've ever read.