[OB] Argent's "Secret Renarin WoB", a.k.a. The Page™

[Oversleep]

I think that there are two things that can be happening here:

• Renarin has access to one Radiant Surge and one Void Surge (i.e. normal Progression and void version of Illumination). This would result in unique Resonance, although probably similar to the Resonance of Truthwatchers
• Renarin has access to all four Surges: Radiant Progression and Illumination and Void Progression and Illumination. Maybe they're separate and he has not learned how to access them all yet, maybe they blended together into some Radiant-void mix of Progression and Illumination. Either way, four powers would certainly produce an interesting Resonance (assuming four is not too much for Resonance to exist).

Thoughts?

[digitalbusker]

We have seen that the speed at which Stormlight heals you can vary depending on how you're getting it (in the fight with Gavilar, Szeth's Honorblade healing is much slower than what we'd later see with Kaladin or other Radiants). Is it possible that somebody with Regrowth just naturally heals faster from Stormlight than somebody without? We could get some hints from Lift chapters, I think.

Or Renarin's not a dummy and saw the giant stone fist coming to smoosh him, and fired up his Regrowth palliatively.

[Spoolofwhool]

1 hour ago, digitalbusker said:

We have seen that the speed at which Stormlight heals you can vary depending on how you're getting it (in the fight with Gavilar, Szeth's Honorblade healing is much slower than what we'd later see with Kaladin or other Radiants). Is it possible that somebody with Regrowth just naturally heals faster from Stormlight than somebody without? We could get some hints from Lift chapters, I think.

Or Renarin's not a dummy and saw the giant stone fist coming to smoosh him, and fired up his Regrowth palliatively.

Stormlight healing heals an Honorblade holder far more slowly and more inefficiently than stormlight healing for a radiant.

However, it is still likely that he also used Regrowth to heal himself more quickly, and I would imagine, more effectively, than Shallan or Kaladin could manage.

[desi_sparta]

8 hours ago, gbazz4 said:

 

I believe Hoid does an awakening in the epilogue. He whispers words to a doll and sets it down and the doll starts walking. It was a way for him to coax a little girl out of her hiding place. So if Hoid can do an awakening (I presume through stormlight since he has been on the planet for a while) then it would seem likely to me that it is possible for Vasher/Zahel to figure out how to do an awakening using stormlight. 

Hoid used breathes to reawaken the doll. He had a discoloured patch on his robe after he commanded the doll. Luckily for him, now that he had bonded a cryptic, he should be able to harvest stormlight directly

[Yata]

50 minutes ago, desi_sparta said:

Hoid used breathes to reawaken the doll. He had a discoloured patch on his robe after he commanded the doll. Luckily for him, now that he had bonded a cryptic, he should be able to harvest stormlight directly

This doesn't mean he would be able to use Stormlight to Awaken.

He had to figure how, It's not an automatic thing as the best Awakener around didn't figure the way yet.

For now I still believe the StormAwakening has mostly pratical problems rather than theoric ones.

Stormlight isn't sticky while the Breaths are. You could probably Awaken stuff with Stormlight but the object can't hold It for more than seconds...but It's only a speculation

[yulerule]

Renarin healing vs Lift healing. We know Radiants have two Surges. From what we've seen it's usually a primary surge and a secondary surge. Lift is an Edgedancer, her primary surge is Abrasion. Renarin is a corrupted Truthwatcher. However, he seems to use his primary Surge, Progression, completely normally. Since Regrowth is Lift's secondary surge, she isn't as proficent in it, it's not as instinctive for her. I think Renarin heals super fast because he has Stormlight - which is/has its own healing factor and he also uses Regrowth. (Does using Regrowth while also simultaneously healing with Stormlight compound the healing factor, or do they just add...)

[bo.montier]

6 hours ago, Kurkistan said:

I don't recall Breaths being lost over time when they're inside people: It's when they're in objects that you have to worry.

EDIT: Nevermind, somehow I just missed your parenthetical entirely. The Fifth Heightening grants agelessness without any mention of Breath-loss, for what it's worth, so I've never assumed a gradual loss of Breath for non-Returned.

I somehow missed the fifth heightening giving agelessness. That would answer most of my concerns about Azure using breath. Thank you!

[Mondaysjelly]

4 hours ago, Oversleep said:

I think that there are two things that can be happening here:

• Renarin has access to one Radiant Surge and one Void Surge (i.e. normal Progression and void version of Illumination). This would result in unique Resonance, although probably similar to the Resonance of Truthwatchers
• Renarin has access to all four Surges: Radiant Progression and Illumination and Void Progression and Illumination. Maybe they're separate and he has not learned how to access them all yet, maybe they blended together into some Radiant-void mix of Progression and Illumination. Either way, four powers would certainly produce an interesting Resonance (assuming four is not too much for Resonance to exist).

Thoughts?

33 minutes ago, yulerule said:

Renarin healing vs Lift healing. We know Radiants have two Surges. From what we've seen it's usually a primary surge and a secondary surge. Lift is an Edgedancer, her primary surge is Abrasion. Renarin is a corrupted Truthwatcher. However, he seems to use his primary Surge, Progression, completely normally. Since Regrowth is Lift's secondary surge, she isn't as proficent in it, it's not as instinctive for her. I think Renarin heals super fast because he has Stormlight - which is/has its own healing factor and he also uses Regrowth. (Does using Regrowth while also simultaneously healing with Stormlight compound the healing factor, or do they just add...)

Are we taking for granted that the Regrowth Renarin is using is from actual Surgebinding? Maybe it's purely the Voidbinding version. Sure, the consensual theory is that voidlight fuels Voidbinding and we have not seen Renarin have any contact with voidlight, but maybe it is as others suggest that Investiture is Investiture. Is it possible that Renarin is using Stormlight to fuel his Voidbinding?

[digitalbusker]

The color draining associated with Awakening doesn't necessarily have anything to do with what kind of Investiture powered it. 

Though I expect if you wanted to power an awakened object with Stormlight you'd have to attach a gem or sphere to it.

[thejopen27]

12 hours ago, WhiteLeeopard said:

Now I'm wondering how/why Renarin bonded Glys.

We'll probably get that in Renarin's flash-back book. Book 6 or 7

[Leyrann]

14 hours ago, Leyrann said:

But that does beg the question (sorry for going off-topic) wheter he can actually use Stormlight for Awakening as well...

Oops...

Edited November 23, 2017 by Leyrann

[dvoraen]

16 hours ago, WhiteLeeopard said:

Now I'm wondering how/why Renarin bonded Glys.

It's probably a very simple explanation.  Until Bridge Four, Renarin was, and still kind of is, considered different and partly ostracized by the rest of his kind.  Plus, he had a form of epilepsy, or a "sickness".  Glys is probably in a very similar circumstance, with his Investment changed by one of the Unmade.  Syl considered corrupted spren in Kholinar as "His", so Glys is probably in the same boat, even though he's clearly granting similar powers to Renarin as a normal Truthwatcher.  I think here's it's clearly an attraction of Renarin and Glys being two peas in a pod, on top of the normal criteria.

 

Now, on the subject of how this affects things, Glys being 'Enlightened', I think it's going to prove to be more in the nature of enhancing the regular repertoire, that he can do more with those Surges.  Part of the reason why I don't agree with him 'Voidbinding' Illumination, that he has half-and-half, is that he's sourcing it with Stormlight still, at least he did so in Thaylen City.  (This is explicitly stated on p1181 in the hardback.)  I'm talking his general uses for it and Progression, not his precognitive visions.  The other reason is that I think Voidbinding is something completely different from the Surges.  We've clearly seen the Fused fuel the same Surges that humans get, albeit powering them with Voidlight, but their general effects haven't really been different from Stormlight-fueled Surges.  They can Lash themselves and others; they can manipulate friction with 'Slickness' as Lift does with Abrasion.  In other words, I think the Fused we've seen are the counterparts of the Radiants and have identical powers.

We have not, however, seen any Fused rapidly changing forms or anything like in the WoR songs about the forms of power.  From the sounds of it, it's the Unmade that cause this to happen, and they are where we're going to see Voidbinding rear its head.  Could Renarin be a nascent Voidbinder, due to Glys?  Sure, it's very possible, but aside from the precognition I don't think we've seen him do it yet.

One thing I hope someone asks Brandon, is about whether there is a fundamental difference in the Surges the Fused and Radiants use, and whether the Fused Surgebinding are just using Voidlight as the power source.

[Oversleep]

3 hours ago, dvoraen said:

We've clearly seen the Fused fuel the same Surges that humans get, albeit powering them with Voidlight, but their general effects haven't really been different from Stormlight-fueled Surges.

Actually, they were different. Fused could not Lash as quickly as Radiants.

9 hours ago, yulerule said:

We know Radiants have two Surges. From what we've seen it's usually a primary surge and a secondary surge.

Sources on that? Unless you're taking the single Radiants we know using primarily one Surge due to not being trained in the other enough as proof.

8 hours ago, Mondaysjelly said:

Are we taking for granted that the Regrowth Renarin is using is from actual Surgebinding?

No, that was just example. Perhaps it's the other way around. Although Renarin *did* have problems with Illumination, since he could not make it work even when Shallan explained it to him a dozen times. YMMV.

[Aminar]

29 minutes ago, Oversleep said:

Actually, they were different. Fused could not Lash as quickly as Radiants.

Sources on that? Unless you're taking the single Radiants we know using primarily one Surge due to not being trained in the other enough as proof.

No, that was just example. Perhaps it's the other way around. Although Renarin *did* have problems with Illumination, since he could not make it work even when Shallan explained it to him a dozen times. YMMV.

The Skybreakers talk about gaining their second surge later and each radiant has had a focus that's easier for them(though for both Skybreakers and Windrunners it appears to be Gravity, which is odd.)

 

As far as why his regrowth is not voidish, it could be. And I don't buy that he needs voidlight. I don't think that's a thing perse, but a factor in voidspren metaphysiology. Voidspren can't facilitate intake of Stormlight. Renarin can take in Stormlight. From there investiture is investiture. Regrowth operates how Renarin expects/its his primary surge. Since then he's been trying to make illusions when his surge isn't lightweaving so it isn't working. Like if Kaladin thought he were a Skybreaker and tried to use Division he wouldn't accidentally use Adhesion. But it's still something to do with light. He's used it once and didn't need voidlight to do so. 

I would posit that it's still Illumination and it reveals truth, rather than creates a lie. So it... revealed the Thunderclasts's true nature, turning it back to stone. But this is probably wrong. It also would work with how he found the radiant memory gems though. And be thematic with Truthwatchers as a whole, suggesting that there is similarity in the Void orders. 

[jamskinner]

2 hours ago, Aminar said:

The Skybreakers talk about gaining their second surge later and each radiant has had a focus that's easier for them(though for both Skybreakers and Windrunners it appears to be Gravity, which is odd.)

 

As far as why his regrowth is not voidish, it could be. And I don't buy that he needs voidlight. I don't think that's a thing perse, but a factor in voidspren metaphysiology. Voidspren can't facilitate intake of Stormlight. Renarin can take in Stormlight. From there investiture is investiture. Regrowth operates how Renarin expects/its his primary surge. Since then he's been trying to make illusions when his surge isn't lightweaving so it isn't working. Like if Kaladin thought he were a Skybreaker and tried to use Division he wouldn't accidentally use Adhesion. But it's still something to do with light. He's used it once and didn't need voidlight to do so. 

I would posit that it's still Illumination and it reveals truth, rather than creates a lie. So it... revealed the Thunderclasts's true nature, turning it back to stone. But this is probably wrong. It also would work with how he found the radiant memory gems though. And be thematic with Truthwatchers as a whole, suggesting that there is similarity in the Void orders. 

Would it be more likely that the listeners bodies would be more attuned to storm light then voidlight since it is the original source of investiture for them?  So why would they have problems with using storm light?

[Aminar]

8 minutes ago, jamskinner said:

Would it be more likely that the listeners bodies would be more attuned to storm light then voidlight since it is the original source of investiture for them?  So why would they have problems with using storm light?

I said Voidspren metaphysiology not Parshmen metaphysiology for a reason. The Spren grants the ability to bring in investiture and so they would determine the form. It does make more sense for the Listeners to bring in Stormlight. But Voidlight is also a thing. 

[Fulminato]

12 hours ago, Mondaysjelly said:

Are we taking for granted that the Regrowth Renarin is using is from actual Surgebinding? Maybe it's purely the Voidbinding version. Sure, the consensual theory is that voidlight fuels Voidbinding and we have not seen Renarin have any contact with voidlight, but maybe it is as others suggest that Investiture is Investiture. Is it possible that Renarin is using Stormlight to fuel his Voidbinding?

all the fused use voidlight (fueled directly by odium, like the honorblades were a direct conduit to honor investiture)

[FeatherWriter]

In case anyone needs proof that my theory was free from Argent's page influence: 

Spoiler

 

Argent actually, as he said, told me about The Page™ because of the theory, not the other way around.

This is one of the reasons that I think Renarin probably is a voidbinder, even though without something extra-textual like the page I probably would have said he wasn't.

[WhiteLeeopard]

Sorry if you felt called out @FeatherWriter. I was more thinking along the lines that I was sure you of all people would have gotten the page out of him somehow . Because there was no way you'd let a Renarin piece of information unturned . 

I find Renarin to be interesting, but until now I did not speculate much, as I didn't feel I knew enough about him to make guesses. After OB I'm happy that has changed. 

Edited November 24, 2017 by WhiteLeeopard

[DSC01]

@Aminar The word you're looking for is "thunderclast." I believe there is some controversy over whether what Renarin did there was really Illumination or not, but it sure sounds like Illumination to me. 

[Beatsmorn]

On 22.11.2017 at 7:18 PM, gbazz4 said:

 

I believe Hoid does an awakening in the epilogue. He whispers words to a doll and sets it down and the doll starts walking. It was a way for him to coax a little girl out of her hiding place. So if Hoid can do an awakening (I presume through stormlight since he has been on the planet for a while) then it would seem likely to me that it is possible for Vasher/Zahel to figure out how to do an awakening using stormlight. 

Not necessarily, he has at least 2nd Heightening, probably 5th.

[PhineasGage]

I feel I have missed something pretty major here regarding Renarin and I'd really like some enlightenment.

So I get that "The Page" links us to voidbinding but I still don't quite see how this means that Renarin is voidbinding?

Basically, from what I have understood, Glys was a normal spren that could have bonded a human and made them a standard Truthwatcher. He got corrupted (either accident or intent) by Sja-Anat then bonded Renarin resulting in Renarin having unusual abilities like being able to see the future. 

That being said, I am not sure how this leads us to assume that he is "voidbinding" in any way - I mean presumably the Parshendi/Listeners/Regals/Fused don't only bond with spren corrupted by Sja-Anat? Wouldn't that have been a problem when the first desolation started - there wouldn't have been many of those corrupted spren to bond with?

I was under the impression that "voidspren" are different to what Glys has become, and those can bond with the Parshendi group. Those "are of Odium" as Syl would put it, but clearly Glys isn't. It is unclear if that is a product of Sja-Anat wanting to abandon Odium's cause or not.

I thought that Renarin is unique, not because he is a human voidbinder - indeed the history we now know suggests that was the norm for humans when they arrived on Roshar, but that he is possibly the first to bond a corrupted spren - Sja Anat used to only corrupt "lesser" spren according to the Mythica iirc. 

I can see that this corruption would alter both surges in unpredictable ways and result in things that are related to Odium (like future-sight) but I cannot see how this is definitely voidbinding. I also thought that in general Renarin's use of both his surges (we see him use illumination when he heal's Adolin's hand early in OB) seems pretty close to how they were predicted to be. This might also explain why he is invisible to Odium because he is a completely new thing.

Ok, that ended up a bit more like a theory than I was intending - I really just want to understand why it seems that people have accepted the idea that he is half and half. Links to other thread with details are very welcome.

[Michael Portz]

12 hours ago, PhineasGage said:

So I get that "The Page" links us to voidbinding but I still don't quite see how this means that Renarin is voidbinding?

Basically, from what I have understood, Glys was a normal spren that could have bonded a human and made them a standard Truthwatcher. He got corrupted (either accident or intent) by Sja-Anat then bonded Renarin resulting in Renarin having unusual abilities like being able to see the future. 

That being said, I am not sure how this leads us to assume that he is "voidbinding" in any way - I mean presumably the Parshendi/Listeners/Regals/Fused don't only bond with spren corrupted by Sja-Anat? Wouldn't that have been a problem when the first desolation started - there wouldn't have been many of those corrupted spren to bond with?

I was under the impression that "voidspren" are different to what Glys has become, and those can bond with the Parshendi group. Those "are of Odium" as Syl would put it, but clearly Glys isn't. It is unclear if that is a product of Sja-Anat wanting to abandon Odium's cause or not.

I thought that Renarin is unique, not because he is a human voidbinder - indeed the history we now know suggests that was the norm for humans when they arrived on Roshar, but that he is possibly the first to bond a corrupted spren - Sja Anat used to only corrupt "lesser" spren according to the Mythica iirc. 

I can see that this corruption would alter both surges in unpredictable ways and result in things that are related to Odium (like future-sight) but I cannot see how this is definitely voidbinding. I also thought that in general Renarin's use of both his surges (we see him use illumination when he heal's Adolin's hand early in OB) seems pretty close to how they were predicted to be. This might also explain why he is invisible to Odium because he is a completely new thing.

Hmmm, as much as it was my instinct to reject @PhineasGage's theory at first, I just can't. I reread Sj-anat's coppermind page and it seems much more plausible to me now as well, that Renarin is NOT voidbinding, but doing something completely new.

[FeatherWriter]

I'll say that my initial thought upon finishing Oathbringer was that Renarin was not Voidbinding, but things like the page pulled me back in the other direction. I agree with all of your points @PhineasGage, but in that case, why link him to the Voidbinding page at all? Which makes me less certain about what all is happening. At this point, I feel like we just need more information before we can be reasonably certain of anything.

[PhineasGage]

I suppose I wasn't that clear. Sorry! I am not saying that he isn't voidbinding, so much as I am not sure - aside from "The Page"-  that it is supported by in-book references. Would we have assumed it was "voidbinding" if "The Page" hadn't been a thing? I agree with @FeatherWriter that "The Page" pulls us towards voidbinding - and I agree that we need more info. Seeing a Fused Truthwatcher would be useful, but I suppose it would be difficult to see them use their powers (other than progression) from a non-PoV perspective

I don't feel I know or understand nearly enough about the differences between void binding and surge binding - there are people here who have a much better feel for the magic system than I do who I will happily defer to.  My own instinct is that because we know that resonance is a thing between two surges, perhaps by having a corrupted spren, it is the resonance that is most affected? What if "traditional" truthwatchers saw the truth of people's past/present as their resonant power, but voidbringers saw the future? Maybe Renarin uses the surges normally but "voidbinds" only in his resonant power? 

I just wonder perhaps, if each Unmade is linked to a specific KR order in some way (with one KR order unlinked because.... reasons?) if by having a corrupted spren as his bonded spren, this would be enough for Brandon to point to the page? I got the impression that the fact that the Truthwatcher and Bondsmith analogues on The Page were in gem-type shapes - and separated from their surges (they don't have lines connecting them), that perhaps those Unmade had been trapped in the past? If Sja-Anat was one of them, (although I see her more linked to what I think willshapers will be like) perhaps not only has that allowed her to break from Odium (she was separated from him and so became more independent?) but it might suggest that she previously was involved in allowing voidbinding in some way.

I don't know. I feel I am reaching to include voidbinding at this stage, I am not a good theory-crafter though. I'm much happier looking for canon evidence to support of refute a theory made by someone else.