[OB] Oathbringer Timeline

[Jofwu]

Making a topic in the Coppermind forum to organize a few thoughts, make room for anyone else who wants to contribute, and ensure it doesn't get swallowed up by book discussion posts.

I'll be making an effort to update my full Stormlight Archives timeline [OB spoilers!] here. If an Oathbringer-specific timeline (i.e. one with the other books cut out) would be helpful I can make that happen, I suppose. If you would like to make direct edits to that Google doc, let me know. 

So far I have filled things out through chapter 24 fairly well. This was easy to do during the slow release of preview chapters, but treating the whole book that way is a daunting task. My plan is to work on the backbone of the story first. Find all of the definite, strong references that I can which (hopefully) tie the overall narrative together. Then go back for more subtle clues and fill things in.

If you'd like to help, feel free to chime in below. I've also set up a spreadsheet to keep a list of references. The biggest thing I will need help with is catching every possible scrap of useful chronology info and keeping a record of it there. Most things won't be needed in the final timeline, so I'll be capturing data here before actually making use of it in the timeline. That spreadsheet should be open for anyone to edit.

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Note that there is one update on the timeline that needs to be confirmed. Copying my conversation with Peter below. I did my best to fit the timeline to what seems to be the intent.

Spoiler

[–]to PeterAhlstrom [+1]  M H sent 7 days ago

Peter, I was wondering if I could get you to confirm this comment you made on the 17th Shard. Bringing this up in the typo thread didn't feel appropriate. Ultimately I'm curious how certain you were about that 10 day number.

I've got the following dates figured:

Date	Event	Note
10.10.3	Battle of Narak	-
1.1.3	Kaladin leaves Urithiru	a week later
1.1.4	Sadeas discovered	next day
1.2.2	first Everstorm (Alethkar @ noon)	4 days after Kal left
1.3.4	Shallan goes bar crawling	10 days after Sadeas found
1.3.5	first highstorm	next day

From Kaladin's PoV, he mentions that the Everstorm came again the day before the first highstorm, which puts the second Everstorm on 1.3.4. The time between Battle of Narak and first Everstorm was almost exactly 9 days, taking "time zones" into account, which is confirmed later to be the normal cycle time. The interval you mentioned puts the second Everstorm at only 7 days after the first (plus or minus half a day depending on when it arrived).

[–]from PeterAhlstrom [+1]  M H sent 7 days ago

I will have to look this up later, but we’re quite sure on the timing of the Everstorms.

[–]to PeterAhlstrom [+1]  M H sent 7 days ago

I know you guys took a lot of care with the timing, which is what made me curious. Made me wonder if the 9 day interval is supposed to be precise or if there's an error in my math, and that 10 day figure is the only one I can't confirm directly for the latter.

[–]from PeterAhlstrom [+1]  M H sent 7 days ago

We're using 9.1 days, so it's 2 hours later each time.

[–]from PeterAhlstrom [+1]  M H sent 7 days ago

Everstorm 1 hits Hearthstone/Kholinar on 1.2.2 at noon. It hits Urithiru on 1.2.1 mid-morning.

Shallan does go bar crawling the night of 1.3.4.

Second Everstorm hits Urithiru morning of 1.3.5

Highstorm 1 hits New Natanan the afternoon of 1.4.2, and Urithiru in the early morning of 1.4.3. What made you say it hit on 1.3.5? Maybe there's an error in the book.

[–]to PeterAhlstrom [+1]  M H sent 7 days ago

Not sure if I'm making a bad assumption or not. See what you think...

Chapter 21 seems to pick up the day after the bar crawl. She wakes up hungover and recalls that night:

She put hands over her eyes, safehand still wrapped in an improvised bandage. What had gotten into her? Tossing around the symbol of the Ghostbloods? Drinking herself silly? Stabbing a man in front of a gang of armed thugs?

An hour later she meets with Adolin. They visit Ialai togther (into ch 22) and when they are leaving they hear news about the first highstorm:

“News from the coast,” the guard finally said. “Stormwall spotted in New Natanan. The highstorms. They’ve returned.”

That puts highstorm 1 hitting New Natanan sometime on 1.3.5, the day after the bar crawl. (Plus or minus several hours, depending on when Shallan woke up and whether the report came before or after the storm hit)

I didn't see anything in the text which specifically nailed down that 10-day number. No upper bound on it at least. If my interpretation of everything above is correct, swapping 10 for 12 solves makes the numbers work and doesn't contradict anything in the text. That's what prompted me to call it into question.

[–]from PeterAhlstrom [+1]  M H sent 7 days ago

Thanks. There does seem to be a contradiction. We'll look into it.

In that conversation, there was one particular tidbit that I think may be very useful:

Spoiler

The precise timing of the Everstorm is 9.1 days. It comes 2 hours later each round. 

Also this:

Spoiler

[–]to PeterAhlstrom Peter Ahlstrom [+21] sent 5 months ago

We're using 9.1 days, so it's 2 hours later each time.

Peter, I was wondering how to interpret this number.

I have the fall of Kholinar on the day after the 7th Everstorm. Venli arrives after this, and the Everstorm in I-11 is the second she experienced while there. (9th overall) She says:

“Ah,” Venli said to Mourning, looking past the city at the sudden darkening of the sky. The Everstorm. It came about every nine days, and this was the second since her arrival. “So that’s why they didn’t bring an evening batch to listen to me.”

Presumably it's the evening. But the 9th Everstorm should arrive 16 hours later in Kholinar relative to the first one at noon, which would put this one sometime in the morning. Come to think of it... There may be a similar problem with the Everstorm that arrives on the day of the revel. This would put it sometime in the middle of the night, but Shallan had time to go on a thieving run before attending the revel.

I know there's at least one case which clearly explains the timing can vary somewhat. (the one on the day of the Revel, I think) But I got the sense it would vary by maybe a couple of hours-- more than I can see making sense for the time of day with Venli. I see three possibilities:

1. The timing can vary significantly (more than a day? more than half a day?), and 9.1 days/cycle is just an overall average.

2. The time of day with Venli (and maybe other cases) is a small error.

3. Or perhaps you meant to say it's 8.9 days, coming 2 hours earlier each time? I think that would nicely put both of those storms within a couple of hours of what the text suggests.

Sorry for all the timing questions, I'm having too much fun trying to piece everything together.

[–]from PeterAhlstrom Peter Ahlstrom [+21] sent 5 months ago

So, it turns out the timing isn't exact. Also there's another reason this Everstorm appears when it does.

Some more stuff relating to Everstorm timing here: 

 

[BeskarKomrk]

Do you want literally every piece of chronological info on the second spreadsheet? As an example, you already have down that Chapter 29 takes place four days after Chapter 27. Do you also want lines from Chapter 29 like "Her team was tired, as was Shallan, who suffered from the long nights as Veil"?

[Jofwu]

On 11/29/2017 at 10:47 PM, BeskarKomrk said:

Do you want literally every piece of chronological info on the second spreadsheet? As an example, you already have down that Chapter 29 takes place four days after Chapter 27. Do you also want lines from Chapter 29 like "Her team was tired, as was Shallan, who suffered from the long nights as Veil"?

It's a judgement call, to be sure. I DID leave out some very vague references to time passing. But in general, I would recommend erring on the side of being exhaustive. I'd rather have extra, useless info to sort through rather than miss something helpful which seemed too small for inclusion.

Edit: I think everything through the end of Part 3 is finished besides interludes and Moash, if anybody wants to scrutinize it.

Edited December 7, 2017 by Ookla the Jof

[Zizoz]

Is there significance to the text color on the references doc?

I also can't seem to add rows to it for whatever reason, so is it OK if I add stuff on to the bottom? (I added one reference there already.)

[Jofwu]

@Zizoz thanks for contributing!

I must have an issue with the settings, but no worries. Easy for me to move it myself when I get a chance.

I have it set to display new things in blue text just so that I don't miss anything that gets added.

[Jofwu]

@Joe ST Some thoughts on how I'd structure a database.

Pretty straight forward should be easy to dump the spreadsheet in, with the small exception that I'd need to combine source texts with citations.

The hard part is pulling the info out and presenting it.

Edit: Oh, I spoke too soon. Also need a [categories] field, for filtering/sorting. You’d want to define those in another table and pick from there. And better to break out [chapter] into [book] and [chapter], separately.