Kaladin wasn't ready for the 4th Ideal [theory]

[Benedictify]

...because he's not ready to accept that there are some people he can't save. He keeps trying to save everyone, it's deep down in his personality that he has failed every time he couldn't save someone, as if he killed them himself. Maybe he kills himself a little inside every time he loses someone. 

 

(and I just had the thought that Gavinor and Oroden (Kaladin's new little brother) are gonna be best buds. Just sayin.)

Edited March 13, 2019 by Benedictify

[Benedictify]

Maybe everyone else but me realized this as soon as the book came out...

[Karger]

Not a terrible theory.  It certainly makes sense in the context of what we know.  I personally feel that Kaladin can't swear it because he does not trust others to act honorably and save themselves or work to save others.

[+Oltux72]

7 hours ago, Benedictify said:

...because he's not ready to accept that there are some people he can't save. He keeps trying to save everyone, it's deep down in his personality that he has failed every time he couldn't save someone, as if he killed them himself. Maybe he kills himself a little inside every time he loses someone.

Kaladin always used to be able to see a battle as us vs. them. He lost that ability during the battle of the palace. Kaladin is facing multiple issue, one among them is indeed a feeling of impotence. Yet that was not new.
In Kholinar he directly faced knowing both sides and yet needing to kill people he should protect. This is not the same as accepting failures or imperfection. His duty was kill innocent honorable people and friends. Remember what the stormfather said about burning civilians? It boiled down to traitors needing to die no matter what. Skybreakers are supposed to care about justice. Windrunners carry out their mission honorably, but not ethically, humanely or justly.

[Karger]

But Kaladin's problem is that he can't act with the expectation that others will act honorably.  If he had worked a little harder he probably could have gotten a cease fire in place and that would have allowed him to stop Moash.  Several important actors did stop fighting when they saw him he just needed to trust them.  I also have a hard time believing that an Honorspren would bond someone who did not care about ethics, humanity, or justice.

No redemption!

[Quantus]

I like it.  it depends on the particular spin you foresee on the Windrunner 4th.  I lean toward it being more along the lines of "there are some battles I should not Fight" or maybe "I will Stand Aside to let others fight their Own Battles when I must", more than specifically "There are some people I cannot Save", but the difference is tiny. 

[+Oltux72]

5 hours ago, Karger said:

But Kaladin's problem is that he can't act with the expectation that others will act honorably.

During the battle everybody acted honorably. The Radiant team defended its home town. The Singers defended their freedom against slavery. The Queen's guard followed their oath to obey their queen. And so on.
Honor does not mean peace or justice. On the contrary honor means keeping your promise. That implies that you do what you promised even if that becomes senseless or counterproductive. Or cruel. As the Stormfather said. Slaughtering civilians whose lord abandoned his oath is the right thing to do.

[Karger]

41 minutes ago, Oltux72 said:

During the battle everybody acted honorably. The Radiant team defended its home town. The Singers defended their freedom against slavery. The Queen's guard followed their oath to obey their queen. And so on.
Honor does not mean peace or justice. On the contrary honor means keeping your promise. That implies that you do what you promised even if that becomes senseless or counterproductive. Or cruel. As the Stormfather said. Slaughtering civilians whose lord abandoned his oath is the right thing to do.

Different interpratations of honor.  It could also be argued that being honorable means expecting others to act rightly and giving them that chance.  The singers could have given the humans a chance to make up for what they had done, the Radiant team could have tried to broker peace, the Queen's guard could have trusted the Radiant team.

[+Oltux72]

Not really. The city was being attacked. Preventing that meant attacking now. A truce meant Kaladin would lose.

[Karger]

As it turned out attacking would not have made any difference as the oathgate was not working and the humans were incredibly outnumbered.  Ironically calling for a truce with one of the none fused singers might have been the only way to save the city.

[NoiseSpren]

 No. Gate didn't worked. Bye, bye, Kholinar. No chances at all.

[Karger]

Why would Sja-ahnat betray Odium to people who were doomed?

[Calderis]

Atruxe wasn't an option. 

Kholinar could have been taken at anytime by the Fused alone, as the one that Kaladin killed was shown to be something the Wall Guard had never managed. 

They intentionally waited for the singers to arrive to make it their victory and get them emotionally invested in the fight. 

The outcome was decided before the fight ever started.

[Karger]

The fused could have taken the city but they could not have held it.  Shardbearers can't hold ground remember?

[Calderis]

That's only an issue on isolation. The Fused are an army to themselves. 

They also have no need to hold the city. They just seem to be more interested in slavery than slaughter... And even that is shown to be debated in the books. 

[+Oltux72]

20 hours ago, NoiseSpren said:

 No. Gate didn't worked. Bye, bye, Kholinar. No chances at all.

Something Kaladin could not have known. Now, I am not going tro defend Elhokar's mission planning. Too many divergent objectives. Too complicated a plan. Nevertheless, Kaladin failed independent of that.

 

15 hours ago, Calderis said:

Atruxe wasn't an option. 

Kholinar could have been taken at anytime by the Fused alone, as the one that Kaladin killed was shown to be something the Wall Guard had never managed.

The Fused never tried to take the wall. For a good reason. They would have lost people fighting in close quarters. They could have destroyed at least parts of the city, dropping fire bombs and by other means, but not take it. They would have needed to land. And then they'd be at a servere disadvantage,

15 hours ago, Calderis said:

They intentionally waited for the singers to arrive to make it their victory and get them emotionally invested in the fight. 

The outcome was decided before the fight ever started.

Yes, but the Fused did not have a free hand in the timing.

17 hours ago, Karger said:

Why would Sja-ahnat betray Odium to people who were doomed?

They are Knights Radiant. They can fly or teleport away.  Their mission was doomed, they themselves potentially had options.

[Calderis]

5 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

The Fused never tried to take the wall. For a good reason. They would have lost people fighting in close quarters. They could have destroyed at least parts of the city, dropping fire bombs and by other means, but not take it. They would have needed to land. And then they'd be at a servere disadvantage

Why does losing anyone matter in the slightest to the Fused? 9 days maximum to the next Everstorm and they're back. 

5 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

They could have destroyed at least parts of the city, dropping fire bombs and by other means, but not take it. They would have needed to land. And then they'd be at a servere disadvantage,

Again, why? This assumes that the Gravitation Fused are the only ones who were present. We didn't see others but that doesn't mean they weren't there. 

Even if they were alone, they're still fighters with millenia of experience who have magic abilities and no need to fear dying. They land, they fight. What's the disadvantage? Especially in a city where the vast majority of people are non-combatants... And of those who are, a decent chunk are either going to ignore you completely or match out from the palace to join your side. 

It would have been the Fused VS the wall guard, with a few completely unorganized fighters spread around the city. The wall guard was spread thin to try and do anything on the wall. If the Fused had done anything more than just prod at the wall, they wall guard would have been hard pressed to even appear to do anything. 

[+Oltux72]

3 hours ago, Calderis said:

Why does losing anyone matter in the slightest to the Fused? 9 days maximum to the next Everstorm and they're back. 

1. Time. They Are still working to deploy.
2. Image. The Fused are not invincible.
3. Madness. Too any rebirths are bad.
4. Eventually they would run out of Singers.

3 hours ago, Calderis said:

Again, why? This assumes that the Gravitation Fused are the only ones who were present. We didn't see others but that doesn't mean they weren't there.

They have the same problem. Projectiles from rooofs, a shooter behind every window potentially.

(Scadrial)

Spoiler

Surgebinding is actually bad for this. Allomancy and Feruchemy feature sensory enhancements, precognition and crowd control functions.

3 hours ago, Calderis said:

Even if they were alone, they're still fighters with millenia of experience who have magic abilities and no need to fear dying.

 

They fought for a small fraction of their whole life time. And that was thousands of years ago.

3 hours ago, Calderis said:

They land, they fight. What's the disadvantage? Especially in a city where the vast majority of people are non-combatants... And of those who are, a decent chunk are either going to ignore you completely or match out from the palace to join your side. 

It would have been the Fused VS the wall guard, with a few completely unorganized fighters spread around the city. The wall guard was spread thin to try and do anything on the wall. If the Fused had done anything more than just prod at the wall, they wall guard would have been hard pressed to even appear to do anything. 

They'd also faced the forces Elhokar gathered.

[Calderis]

1 minute ago, Oltux72 said:

Time. They Are still working to deploy.

So much so that they've already conquered literally half the world. 

1 minute ago, Oltux72 said:

Image. The Fused are not invincible.

They don't have to be. 

2 minutes ago, Oltux72 said:

Madness. Too any rebirths are bad.

We have no idea of how this works, and it can't simply be "number of deaths" or all of the Fused should be equally insane. Personally, I think it's specifically death by shardblade wounding their Cognitive Aspect. 

3 minutes ago, Oltux72 said:

Eventually they would run out of Singers.

And this was mitigated in having the singers themselves assault the city how? I would be willing to bet that more singers died assaulting the city then would have been lost if the Fused had done it themselves and took them to rebirth. 

5 minutes ago, Oltux72 said:

They'd also faced the forces Elhokar gathered.

Which I accounted for. That group would have been scattered among the city. Not gathered together and organized. 

[Karger]

3 hours ago, Calderis said:

We have no idea of how this works, and it can't simply be "number of deaths" or all of the Fused should be equally insane. Personally, I think it's specifically death by shardblade wounding their Cognitive Aspect. 

The stormfather says that each rebirth injures their minds further.  Also their may be a large number of singers who are not willing or able to become a fused if the fused push to hard to get more bodies they might have a singer rebellion on their hands.

[Calderis]

46 minutes ago, Karger said:

The stormfather says that each rebirth injures their minds further.

He does. And it's clearly not that simple because we have obviously senior respected members who are much more sane. It's not just how long they've been around. I'm not saying that's not a factor, but I doubt it's the only one. 

48 minutes ago, Karger said:

Also their may be a large number of singers who are not willing or able to become a fused if the fused push to hard to get more bodies they might have a singer rebellion on their hands.

And I would expected that as soon as it was obvious that the original singer was gone when a Fused took them, and yet we have Leshwi who we know has died and been reborn at least once. 

 

[Karger]

The fused so far have died less then a few dozen times (once per desolation) if Odium expends them to much he could rapidly deplete the number of sane forces he has at his disposal especially because the fused will be more reckless as they assume that they can just be reborn.

[Calderis]

23 minutes ago, Karger said:

The fused so far have died less then a few dozen times (once per desolation) if Odium expends them to much he could rapidly deplete the number of sane forces he has at his disposal especially because the fused will be more reckless as they assume that they can just be reborn.

Still not addressing the point. If that is the case, and it is only number of deaths, why are some so bonkers and others functional? Leshwi has an additional death from this time around and still seems far more sane than any of the "crazy" Fused we've seen. 

The Stormfather gives us the information he has. That doesn't mean that that information is complete, or correct. 

[Turin Turambar]

It could still be number of deaths, it's possible that each one died more than once per desolation - and what's one death that would impact sanity when you died many hundreds of times? If Leshwi died only once or twice per desolation, she'd still be much more sane than another who died a half a dozen times per desolation. 

[Calderis]

10 minutes ago, Turin Turambar said:

It could still be number of deaths, it's possible that each one died more than once per desolation - and what's one death that would impact sanity when you died many hundreds of times? If Leshwi died only once or twice per desolation, she'd still be much more sane than another who died a half a dozen times per desolation. 

Except that without the Everstorm, that's very very unlikely. They couldn't simply respawn in a day or two like they can now. That was the entire point of the Oathpact.