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[OB] Why Didn't The Skybreakers Go After Szeth Earlier


Stormrunner1730

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Why didn't Nale/the Skybreakers try to take Szeth down while he was the "Assassin in White"?  I mean obviously Szeth makes a good Skybreaker/was recruited by Nale because of his dedication to the law (in the form of his Oathstone/the Shin religion) in WOk and WOR.  But he had to have broken dozens, if not hundreds of laws while breaking into various keeps/strongholds around the world to kill the people on Taravangian's list.  So why wouldn't Nale have wanted to take Szeth down while he was breaking these laws?

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As mentioned, probably a case of priorities combined with Nale's stated reasoning that while Szeth broke everyone else's laws, he was following his own laws to the letter, which Nale approved of. On the first point, the Skybreakers believed that they needed to kill budding Radiants to prevent the Desolations from coming again. Szeth's actions weren't threatening to bring back the Voidbringers (because while he's surgebinding, he's not doing it with a Nahel bond) so even if they had been inclined to punish him for criminal acts, he'd have been way down the priority list.

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Because they're the worst order, they're an authoritarian cult that just follow commands.  The head of their cult is a literal insane person who also happens to be a demi-God.  Said crazy-person cult leader follows the commands of a different even crazier demi-God without questions.

It's a pyramid of nutballs all working under the assumption that their boss must know what is really going on, and whatever they're told to do is the right thing to do.  Ishi's insane, Nale's insane, everyone else just follows their lead.

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8 minutes ago, Subvisual Haze said:

Because they're the worst order, they're an authoritarian cult that just follow commands.  The head of their cult is a literal insane person who also happens to be a demi-God.  Said crazy-person cult leader follows the commands of a different even crazier demi-God without questions.

It's a pyramid of nutballs all working under the assumption that their boss must know what is really going on, and whatever they're told to do is the right thing to do.  Ishi's insane, Nale's insane, everyone else just follows their lead.

I don't think that your condemnation of them is entirely fair

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7 minutes ago, Subvisual Haze said:

Because they're the worst order, they're an authoritarian cult that just follow commands.  The head of their cult is a literal insane person who also happens to be a demi-God.  Said crazy-person cult leader follows the commands of a different even crazier demi-God without questions.

It's a pyramid of nutballs all working under the assumption that their boss must know what is really going on, and whatever they're told to do is the right thing to do.  Ishi's insane, Nale's insane, everyone else just follows their lead.

I'm glad to see someone else shares my opinion on the Skybreakers.

The big issue with the order is that a ton of them have made their vows to follow Nale, and none of them have been able to get to oath 5, which is where the skybreaker "becomes law", which I guess would be the only way for them to stop following Nale outside of breaking the bond.  And since Nale's insane, most of the skybreakers are what I would call "practically insane", meaning that their actions are those of an insane person.

The skybreakers are bad news.

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3 minutes ago, Patrick Star said:

I'm glad to see someone else shares my opinion on the Skybreakers.

The big issue with the order is that a ton of them have made their vows to follow Nale, and none of them have been able to get to oath 5, which is where the skybreaker "becomes law", which I guess would be the only way for them to stop following Nale outside of breaking the bond.  And since Nale's insane, most of the skybreakers are what I would call "practically insane", meaning that their actions are those of an insane person.

The skybreakers are bad news.

But Nale isn't raving mad, his insanity seems to be more about having a lack of emotions. The Skybreakers have good reason to trust Nale. He is a cornerstone of their religion, why would they distrust him?

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5 minutes ago, King Cole said:

But Nale isn't raving mad, his insanity seems to be more about having a lack of emotions. The Skybreakers have good reason to trust Nale. He is a cornerstone of their religion, why would they distrust him?

Maybe because he won't shut up about how untrustworthy his mind is?

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45 minutes ago, King Cole said:

But Nale isn't raving mad, his insanity seems to be more about having a lack of emotions. The Skybreakers have good reason to trust Nale. He is a cornerstone of their religion, why would they distrust him?

Maybe because he also trusts Ishar, and Ishar is starkers?

Quote

“ ‘A warning,’ ” Navani read, “ ‘from Tezim the Great, last and first man, Herald of Heralds and bearer of the Oathpact. His grandness, immortality, and power be praised. Lift up your heads and hear, men of the east, of your God’s proclamation.

“ ‘None are Radiant but him. His fury is ignited by your pitiful claims, and your unlawful capture of his holy city is an act of rebellion, depravity, and wickedness. Open your gates, men of the east, to his righteous soldiers and deliver unto him your spoils.

“ ‘Renounce your foolish claims and swear yourselves to him. The judgment of the final storm has come to destroy all men, and only his path will lead to deliverance. He deigns to send you this single mandate, and will not speak it again. Even this is far above what your carnal natures deserve.’ ”

^ Does that sound like a man in possession of all his marbles?

 

 

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36 minutes ago, RShara said:

Maybe because he also trusts Ishar, and Ishar is starkers?

 

Ishar, who is also a cornerstone of their religion? Nale might be giving the Skybreakers a false view of what a crazy Herald looks like. He should have taken them to see Jezerin. Also, Szeth seems to travel quickly, infiltrate fast, and get out of town. I'm not sure the Skybreakers are good enough detectives to figure things out, particularly if they didn't know about his list of targets.

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31 minutes ago, Vortaan said:

Ishar, who is also a cornerstone of their religion? Nale might be giving the Skybreakers a false view of what a crazy Herald looks like. He should have taken them to see Jezerin. Also, Szeth seems to travel quickly, infiltrate fast, and get out of town. I'm not sure the Skybreakers are good enough detectives to figure things out, particularly if they didn't know about his list of targets.

The Skybreakers travel quite a bit, right?  So none of them have been in Tukim in the last few decades, to see first hand what the guy is doing there?

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  • Greywatch changed the title to [OB] Why Didn't The Skybreakers Go After Szeth Earlier
3 hours ago, Subvisual Haze said:

 

Because they're the worst order

 

They are not the worst order, they are the best order, they did not betray mankind and Just because you disagree with Nalan (I do to) doesn’t mean that the Skybreakers are bad, sure they may be siding with the Voidbringers, but you must understand that the parshmen ARE the rightful owners of the world. Also I’m sure that there are many Skybreakers who didn’t swear themselves to Nale. Nale himself mentioned that MOST follow the law of the land they are in, however some have chosen to follow him.

 

Edited by Herald Of Justice
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15 minutes ago, Herald Of Justice said:

They are not the worst order, they are the best order, they did not betray mankind and Just because you disagree with Nalan (I do to) doesn’t mean that the Skybreakers are bad, sure they may be siding with the Voidbringers, but you must understand that the parshmen ARE the rightful owners of the world. Also I’m sure that there are many Skybreakers who didn’t swear themselves to Nale. Nale himself mentioned that MOST follow the law of the land they are in, however some have chosen to follow him.

 

So they remained to do what? Kill surgebinders to prevent an occurrence that the presence of the Radiants has no bearing on. They are hypocrites who did abandon humanity, and hung around to guarantee that that abandonment was secure. 

It doesn't matter that they haven't sworn to Nale, they are still part of a structured order lead and based on his interpretation of the law, based on the letter of the law rather than the spirit, allowing the use of loopholes to twist the law for what they intend, instead of what it should be. 

Szeth breaking away from them is hopefully the beginning of something different. A Skybreaker who truly embodies what the law should be, and inspires his own group to redirect the order as a whole towards what they should be instead of the twisted mockery that exists under Nale. 

And I'm sorry, but no one can own a world. The humans and singers both live there. The current humans can't be held responsible for what their ancestors did millenia ago, and the Singers are not the Fused. 

Everyone is born their own person and is responsible for their choices and their choices only. Saying that the law of one people supercedes the law of another... Is trying to make everything far more black and white than it will ever exist in reality. 

Edited by Calderis
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1 hour ago, Calderis said:

 Saying that the law of one people supercedes the law of another... Is trying to make everything far more black and white than it will ever exist in reality. 

Yep.  Which is why Nale is utterly bugnuts, and the Skybreakers too, for following him.  Like, how do you NOT see your leader (and HIS leader) is a lunatic and a raving lunatic?

Edited by RShara
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6 hours ago, Subvisual Haze said:

Because they're the worst order, they're an authoritarian cult that just follow commands.  The head of their cult is a literal insane person who also happens to be a demi-God.  Said crazy-person cult leader follows the commands of a different even crazier demi-God without questions.

It's a pyramid of nutballs all working under the assumption that their boss must know what is really going on, and whatever they're told to do is the right thing to do.  Ishi's insane, Nale's insane, everyone else just follows their lead.

Totally agree with this. I think the real problem is that this order selects for blind obedience to Authority as a primary trait in new recruits. It seems like Nale is intentionally filling the ranks with recruits that don't think for themselves. The rest of the Skybreaker squires in the Szeth POV chapter Water Warm as Blood seem like a bunch of dun spheres, they don't even ask basic questions about what it is they are actually being asked to do. The thing that Kai is impressed with about Szeth is that he actually thinks about what he is doing.

Also, the two Skybreaker squires that were hunting the Stump in Edgedancer weren't the brightest spheres in the lamp either. I mean they had been looking for a proto-radiant for a couple of weeks and they are literally outside her door when they decide to take on a Dysian Aimian. Dumb. But this is the self-limiting faculty of stupidity, some orders of mistakes ensure that no further mistakes can be made.

I think it's incredibly disturbing that the Order of Knights Radiants with the dimmest minds and who are the most willing to blindly follow Authority have access to the surge of Division. Even when that Authority figure is, as @RShara so eloquently put it, "utterly bugnuts".

Skybreakers.jpg.1a681dd2bb4f94d04cf7f6cf536c11b3.jpg

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8 hours ago, RShara said:

Yep.  Which is why Nale is utterly bugnuts, and the Skybreakers too, for following him.  Like, how do you NOT see your leader (and HIS leader) is a lunatic and a raving lunatic?

 

Is it the fault of law enforcement is the law is lacking?

Can a soldier be guilty of war crimes if he is just following orders?

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13 hours ago, Subvisual Haze said:

Because they're the worst order, they're an authoritarian cult that just follow commands.  The head of their cult is a literal insane person who also happens to be a demi-God.  Said crazy-person cult leader follows the commands of a different even crazier demi-God without questions.

It's a pyramid of nutballs all working under the assumption that their boss must know what is really going on, and whatever they're told to do is the right thing to do.  Ishi's insane, Nale's insane, everyone else just follows their lead.

The part I highlighted seems a bit harsh. The way I see it organizations often start off fresh and hopeful, and with time they become stiff, arrogant, unyielding, and slightly corrupted, if for no other reason than that procedure becomes firmly entrenched and open mindedness is shot down. What this means for the skybreakers is that they have likely been around for 6000 years, become harder and more corrupted with the years. This is seen in Roshar in the kingdoms, all with their problems, the older the kingdom the more stupid traditions.

When the original Radiants left Urithiru some said they were sick and tired of all the politics and were happy to leave. The reason the other 9 orders seem so great right now is we are seing the orders in their pure essence without all the baggage and traditions they will doubtlessly gain with the centuries. All in all, I'd say its impressive the Skybreakers are as well organized as they are considering they have had millenia to gather vices.

The current Skybreakers seem quite impeded by their leader and structure, but I am hopeful that so many of them admired Szeth, and his differences instead of being jaleous of the extra attention he got and trying to shoot him down. I also respected that even after Szeth said he would fight for humanity against them, Nale said he was still one of them and they would train him. This made me hope that eventually a group of Skybreakers will splinter off to go to Urithiru.

They have some hurdles but they are hardly all bad.

P.s. I'd also argue Dustbringers are not looking too hot right now. :ph34r:

 

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14 hours ago, Stormrunner1730 said:

Why didn't Nale/the Skybreakers try to take Szeth down while he was the "Assassin in White"?  I mean obviously Szeth makes a good Skybreaker/was recruited by Nale because of his dedication to the law (in the form of his Oathstone/the Shin religion) in WOk and WOR.  But he had to have broken dozens, if not hundreds of laws while breaking into various keeps/strongholds around the world to kill the people on Taravangian's list.  So why wouldn't Nale have wanted to take Szeth down while he was breaking these laws?

As Szeth himself pointed, Nale only cared about proto radiants breaking laws, so he could execute them in the name of the greater good, hence a guy with a Honorblade was whatever. I wouldn't count the time from murdering Gavilar to present WoK day as being of any particular interest for the SB, Szeth didn't do anything noteworthy and wasn't actively being the assassin in white. There hasn't been that much time between Szeth going on a killing spree under Vargo's orders in WoK and Nale recruiting him at the end of OB. It's just a few months.

10 hours ago, Herald Of Justice said:

They are not the worst order, they are the best order, they did not betray mankind and Just because you disagree with Nalan (I do to) doesn’t mean that the Skybreakers are bad, sure they may be siding with the Voidbringers, but you must understand that the parshmen ARE the rightful owners of the world. Also I’m sure that there are many Skybreakers who didn’t swear themselves to Nale. Nale himself mentioned that MOST follow the law of the land they are in, however some have chosen to follow him.

 

They did in OB when apparently all but Szeth decided to follow Nale's insane move to join Odium despite technically already being the only Order who knew the Recreanse secret and brushed it off aside anyway. It made very little sense even with Nale's madness. He should have already known. The SB should have already known or at least be confident enough to remain at humanities side like their predecessors did.

8 hours ago, RShara said:

Yep.  Which is why Nale is utterly bugnuts, and the Skybreakers too, for following him.  Like, how do you NOT see your leader (and HIS leader) is a lunatic and a raving lunatic?

An outsider to a certain belief system sees it very differently and can have many takes on it that those who hold the said belief system see as unfounded. If you believe Heralds are messengers of God and saviors of humanity, you can easily believe a regular person cannot understand them and their reasoning is beyond mortals' comprehension, so anything that would have sounded loony from the average human, is perceived as wisdom from a herald. For example Rock in OB was confused by something Syl said and replied she was wise, yet his internal monologue noted he doesn't understand how that was wise. But he worships spren, so it must have been wise. In WoK she made him go to a pile of poo, yet Rock didn't see it as a childish prank like Kal did. Humans are very good at reasoning away things that contradict accepted truths.

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2 hours ago, Kaleid said:

Is it the fault of law enforcement is the law is lacking?

Can a soldier be guilty of war crimes if he is just following orders?

Yes and Yes

1) If you're a law enforcement officer who is enforcing an unjust law, you are acting unjustly.  Therefore, it is your fault.  It's that simple.

2) Dude, ever heard of the Holocaust?  Yes, a soldier is guilty of war crimes if he's "just following orders".  TBH I can't believe you asked this question seriously.

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1 hour ago, Patrick Star said:

2) Dude, ever heard of the Holocaust?  Yes, a soldier is guilty of war crimes if he's "just following orders".  TBH I can't believe you asked this question seriously.

I'm glad you brought this up, because that's exactly what I was thinking of. This "defence" of "I was only following orders" is known as a "Superior Orders Defense"

 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superior_orders

 

In perhaps the most famous of this legal concept was in an international trial known as the nuremburg trials, in which this exact question was asked.

 

Thankfully (and correctly, I'd say), it was found - like your comments suggest - that the nazis who carried out the Holocaust were found guilty despite "only following superior orders". However, the point I'm making is that this was deemed a question worth asking, and a trial worth carrying out. It was not assumed to be the case automatically.

 

That is justice: the fact that an arbitrary judgement wasn't made, despite such a judgement being seemingly self evident on the face or it. And as the Skybreakers are all about justice, it's worth asking the question here, too. The nazis were undoubtedly the extreme in the case of "superior orders" not being a defense. But it is possible to see situations where "superior orders" COULD be seen as a defence.

 

 

Disclaimer: I know I touch upon a topic that will likely be quite sensitive for some. I hope I didn't offend, as that was not, and is not my intention. - however, I am aware that sometimes one can be rather insensitive and cause offence when none is intended. Therefore, if I upset or offended anyone, please accept my apologies.

 

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16 hours ago, RShara said:

The Skybreakers travel quite a bit, right?  So none of them have been in Tukim in the last few decades, to see first hand what the guy is doing there?

Knowing that the God-King of Tukim is nuts is a separate thing from knowing Ishar is nuts. Nale seems to be keeping a lot of secrets from his Radiants, I would not be surprised if that was one of them. In fact the story of his betrayal of Taln and the fact that the other Heralds are still on Roshar is "one of the two greatest secrets I know"

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