so whats the go with thunderclasts

[Lushman]

please correct me if I'm wrong but,

so as far as I understand it. A thunderclast is a certain type of voidspren? spren? that instead of inhabiting a parshman body inhabits a body of stone? 

or am I completely wrong and it's another type of fused? 

anyways. what I'm trying to say is that when a thunderclast is killed do they actually kill the thing that's inhabiting it or do they just kill/destroy the rock entity so that it is no longer capable of doing anything significant? 

So would whatever is inhabiting it be able to go and just make a new thunderclast out of the next available bit of rock or what's the go?

 

 

 

Edited October 19, 2018 by Lushman

[Scion of the Mists]

The Coppermind (basically our version of Wikipedia) is a great resource for these types of questions: https://coppermind.net/wiki/Thunderclast

Thunderclasts are created when voidspren animate stone to form bodies.  The spren is generally not killed when the thunderclast is defeated; this can be seen in Oathbringer toward the end of the Battle of Thaylen Field when Renarin convinces the spren to leave the stone body.  (Sidenote, spren generally cannot be killed the way we understand death)  However, the other thunderclast is permanently killed by Nightblood.  

[IllNsickly]

9 hours ago, Scion of the Mists said:

  (Sidenote, spren generally cannot be killed the way we understand death)  However, the other thunderclast is permanently killed by Nightblood.  

A small aside to this.

Kaladin managed to do SOMETHING to the Spren tormenting Gavinor in the throne room scene with Syl as a Shardblade.

I can’t quote the scene, but I recall Syl saying that she didn’t think that even a Shardblade could kill a Spren, and it disturbed her quite a lot.

 

But, yeah, I think of Thunderclasts as a sort of Golem. Animated stone, with the Spren being the source of animation. Smash the stone to pieces and the Spren can just uninhabit what’s left.

Edited October 19, 2018 by IllNsickly
More words.

[Lightspine]

We actually get a description from Venli of the spren that animate the Thunderclasts when she peers into the Cognitive Realm:

Quote

"Those are the spirits of the dead, she realized. Fused who haven't yet chosen a body. Most were twisted to the point that she barely recognized them as singers. Two were roughly the size of buildings."

This leaves us with an interesting question as it could be interpreted that the Thunderclast spren are actually cognitive shadows, like the Fused. However, Venli might not be able to discern the difference. I'm assuming that she was able to discern the spirits there as Fused while Kaladin, Adolin, and Shallan just called them "voidspren" because Venli saw some resemblance between them and the Fused that Kaladin & co. did not. Thus, perhaps the Thunderclasts did somehow resemble giant Singers but we don't know for certain.