How Does One "Kill" a Herald?

[Knight of Iron]

I'm sorry but I'm pretty new to this stuff so forgive me if I speak like I don't know what I'm talking about. But I sometimes wondered if the Heralds gave up voluntarily. I've heard all your points on their powers and whatnot and find probably their biggest weakness was they were still humans. I assume they could feel pain to some degree. What about the utmost degree? For a prolonged period of time? I personally think their will to live and prevent a Desolation would break before they were physically defeated... could be totally wrong, just an idea. They were however, still human. Maybe could be why Taln survived so long on his own, because personally he would not give in. When they give in I guess they maybe just let themselves die.

Good question though.

Yay I came up with my first cosmere theory.

Edited November 21, 2019 by Knight of Iron

[Weltall]

How do you kill a Herald? Nuke the entire site from orbit, it's the only way to be sure...

32 minutes ago, bxcnch said:

A Herald is technically just a Cognitive Shadow attached to an "artificial" body that didn't originally belong to them, right? We know that some things, like Kaladin's scars cannot be healed because of the way he sees himself. If a Herald thinks of his new body as something that doesn't belong to them, is Stormlight-based healing of that body even possible?

Not necessarily. We know that some Cognitive Shadows who are inhabiting Physical bodies can heal and we know that the Heralds aren't possessing bodies like the Fused do, they're being created for them each time they're reborn. Cognitively speaking, they're their bodies and we know they look the same across rebirths (Hoid being able to draw all of them from memory, Ash recognizing Taln instantly) so there's no reason they should be incapable of healing them under the usual Cosmere principles.

That said, you bring up a good point that I can't recall any instance where we're explicitly told that the Heralds have healing powers (aside from Pali and Vedel who have access to Progression) and if the Heralds drew Investiture straight from Honor that might not have included some of the effects of Stormlight, like healing.

[Karger]

3 hours ago, Knight of Iron said:

I'm sorry but I'm pretty new to this stuff so forgive me if I speak like I don't know what I'm talking about. But I sometimes wondered if the Heralds gave up voluntarily. I've heard all your points on their powers and whatnot and find probably their biggest weakness was they were still humans. I assume they could feel pain to some degree. What about the utmost degree? For a prolonged period of time? I personally think their will to live and prevent a Desolation would break before they were physically defeated... could be totally wrong, just an idea. They were however, still human. Maybe could be why Taln survived so long on his own, because personally he would not give in. When they give in I guess they maybe just let themselves die.

Good question though.

Yay I came up with my first cosmere theory.

Have you finished Oathbringer?

[Honorless]

Dear God, I didn't even think about it....  How did they manage to kill the Heralds to send them back to Braize?

At least, it looks like it wasn't easy, going by the fact that Taln was often the only one to die due to him intentionally putting himself in extremely dangerous situations

[Aon Tia]

4 hours ago, Knight of Iron said:

But I sometimes wondered if the Heralds gave up voluntarily. I've heard all your points on their powers and whatnot and find probably their biggest weakness was they were still humans. I assume they could feel pain to some degree. What about the utmost degree? For a prolonged period of time? I personally think their will to live and prevent a Desolation would break before they were physically defeated... could be totally wrong, just an idea. They were however, still human. Maybe could be why Taln survived so long on his own, because personally he would not give in. When they give in I guess they maybe just let themselves die.

Good question though.

Yay I came up with my first cosmere theory.

I thought of the same thing but I think it is not correct. I think that since the moment heralds died they went straight to Braize which was a torture for them beyond our imagining, I really think that they must have done everything in their powers to ensure that they do not die.. So, I do not see that they would voluntarily give up and let themselves be killed. However the Aharietiam vision suggests that they might have chosen to hide and not fight during the later desolations minus Taln of course..

1 hour ago, Karger said:

Have you finished Oathbringer?

Please.. there is no need of this.. 

28 minutes ago, Honorless said:

At least, it looks like it wasn't easy, going by the fact that Taln was often the only one to die due to him intentionally putting himself in extremely dangerous situations

I don’t think he was the only one.. I remember stormfather saying that “it was highly unusual that only one died in the last one.. may be dumb luck or cowardice”

So I don’t think that killing heralds was that easy but it was certainly not unheard of or something that never happened..

[Patrick Star]

The same way you kill Thanos, you aim for the head

[Honorless]

1 hour ago, The traveller said:

I don’t think he was the only one.. I remember stormfather saying that “it was highly unusual that only one died in the last one.. may be dumb luck or cowardice”

I think I remember that too, god, and still the rest had to go back to Braize to get horribly tortured for years and years

Maybe the Fused could kill them. They are Cognitive Shadows too and

Spoiler

originally Brandon intended for the Heralds to use the same method of coming back to Roshar, by possessing someone else's body

But they were probably mostly killed by the Unmade, seeing as Jezrien asked Dalinar "which one it was" and mentioned that Dai-Gonarthis the Black Fisher had done him in before

Edited November 21, 2019 by Honorless

[Aon Tia]

Yup I think unmades should be able to deal with heralds.. 

 

[Dancer]

Soulcasting should kill a Herald pretty quickly, or the Surge of division to separate all their molecules at once. Although with the Soulcasting I guess that would be a permanent death. Which begs the question, how is it that in all those Desolation's no Fused or Voidbinder was able to hit a Herald with Soulcasting. 

Anyway back to the main question. Is it not the Honorblades that are giving the Heralds direct access to Honor's Investiture. If you are able to separate the Heralds from their connection to the Honorblades then you should be able to kill them with a regular knife.  

[bxcnch]

2 hours ago, Dancer said:

Soulcasting should kill a Herald pretty quickly, or the Surge of division to separate all their molecules at once. Although with the Soulcasting I guess that would be a permanent death. Which begs the question, how is it that in all those Desolation's no Fused or Voidbinder was able to hit a Herald with Soulcasting.

Anyway back to the main question. Is it not the Honorblades that are giving the Heralds direct access to Honor's Investiture. If you are able to separate the Heralds from their connection to the Honorblades then you should be able to kill them with a regular knife.  

Soulcasting/Dividing a herald might be rather difficult, because of all the investiture they contain. And - I might be wrong about this - the honorblades should be back to their hands ten heartbeats later, right? (Maybe even less than ten heartbeats - I think Adolin's semi-sentient blade only needed 6 or 7 heartbeats, fully sentient spren-blades are just summoned instantaneously. "Sprenblades" are a spren's condensed investiture, Shardblades are a dead spren's condensed investiture. The honorblades we know are a dead shard's condensed investiture. We don't know for sure how honorblades worked back when Honor was still alive, I can imagine they would just appear without the "ten heartbeats")

[Honorless]

4 hours ago, Dancer said:

Soulcasting should kill a Herald pretty quickly, or the Surge of division to separate all their molecules at once. Although with the Soulcasting I guess that would be a permanent death. Which begs the question, how is it that in all those Desolation's no Fused or Voidbinder was able to hit a Herald with Soulcasting. 

Anyway back to the main question. Is it not the Honorblades that are giving the Heralds direct access to Honor's Investiture. If you are able to separate the Heralds from their connection to the Honorblades then you should be able to kill them with a regular knife.  

Permanent death? They're Cognitive Shadows, that will kill them if you manage to Soulcast a Herald, but it would still send them back to Braize

Edited November 21, 2019 by Honorless

[Dancer]

Just now, Honorless said:

Permanent death? They're Cognitive Shadows, that will kill them if you manage to Soulcast a Herald, but it would still send them back to Braize

Their souls will be changed to some inanimate object. They will no longer be Cognitive shadows so permanent death.  

[Honorless]

Just now, Dancer said:

Their souls will be changed to some inanimate object. They will no longer be Cognitive shadows so permanent death.  

Soulcasting changes physical makeup by convincing the cognitive self to influence the spiritual. So that will just kill them, which for them isn't permanent. Case in point, Odium devised a blade with an inset gem to kill one of them permanently

[Dancer]

29 minutes ago, Honorless said:

Soulcasting changes physical makeup by convincing the cognitive self to influence the spiritual. So that will just kill them, which for them isn't permanent. Case in point, Odium devised a blade with an inset gem to kill one of them permanently

Yes in the end their spiritual aspect is changed into something different. A Cognitive Shadow is just Investiture that has had someones Cognitive aspect Imprinted upon it. If you change the Cognitive aspect as well as the Spiritual then you should no longer be a Cognitive shadow. Case in point the infamous stick. Once it is Soulcast into fire its Spiritual, Cognitive and physical aspects are all now that of fire. It is no longer a stick on any of the three realms. The same would apply to a Herald

Edit: Also Shardplate can be soulcast and the going theory is that it is made of spren. Since Spren are very closely related to Cognitive Shadows and Shardplate will be destroyed when Soulcast then we can extrapolate that Cognitive Shadows will also be destroyed.  

Quote

 

Questioner

Can Shardplate be Soulcast?

Brandon Sanderson

Shardplate could be Soulcast, but anything Invested is very difficult to Soulcast and it would essentially destroy it. Which would be one of the few ways to destroy Shardplate.

Edited November 21, 2019 by Dancer

[Knight of Iron]

9 hours ago, Karger said:

Have you finished Oathbringer?

Yes, though it’s been a while and I was mostly focused on plot points. Usually I reread to pay closer attention to other stuff.

[Honorless]

55 minutes ago, Dancer said:

Yes in the end their spiritual aspect is changed into something different. A Cognitive Shadow is just Investiture that has had someones Cognitive aspect Imprinted upon it. If you change the Cognitive aspect as well as the Spiritual then you should no longer be a Cognitive shadow. Case in point the infamous stick. Once it is Soulcast into fire its Spiritual, Cognitive and physical aspects are all now that of fire. It is no longer a stick on any of the three realms. The same would apply to a Herald

Edit: Also Shardplate can be soulcast and the going theory is that it is made of spren. Since Spren are very closely related to Cognitive Shadows and Shardplate will be destroyed when Soulcast then we can extrapolate that Cognitive Shadows will also be destroyed.  

I don't exactly agree with the Shardplate made of lesser spren theory as you probably saw on that thread.

 

You will have to convince the Cognitive aspect of a Cognitive entity to change part of its Spiritual aspect in order to change its Physical composition. That entity has a direct line to a Shard supplying it Investiture.

Cognitive entities are composed of Investiture, the Heralds are their identity given new form by Investiture

So Soulcasting should be a a no-no

Edited November 21, 2019 by Honorless

[Config2]

12 hours ago, Knight of Iron said:

I'm sorry but I'm pretty new to this stuff so forgive me if I speak like I don't know what I'm talking about. But I sometimes wondered if the Heralds gave up voluntarily. I've heard all your points on their powers and whatnot and find probably their biggest weakness was they were still humans. I assume they could feel pain to some degree. What about the utmost degree? For a prolonged period of time? I personally think their will to live and prevent a Desolation would break before they were physically defeated... could be totally wrong, just an idea. They were however, still human. Maybe could be why Taln survived so long on his own, because personally he would not give in. When they give in I guess they maybe just let themselves die.

Good question though.

Yay I came up with my first cosmere theory.

I think this is a possibility. And before @Karger asks, I have finished OB, and I'm pretty sure we don't have a concrete answer by the end of that book.

8 hours ago, The traveller said:

I thought of the same thing but I think it is not correct. I think that since the moment heralds died they went straight to Braize which was a torture for them beyond our imagining, I really think that they must have done everything in their powers to ensure that they do not die.. So, I do not see that they would voluntarily give up and let themselves be killed. However the Aharietiam vision suggests that they might have chosen to hide and not fight during the later desolations minus Taln of course..

It's worth noting that there is they are only tortured on Braize "once caught." That implies that between being hurt or tortured on Roshar, and being caught and tortured on Braize, there would be some sort of reprieve. If they really were broken by the end, then they might have taken this brief respite instead of torture on Roshar. Also worth noting that Kalak seems to confirm the cowardice idea that the Stormfather brings up during the opening of WoK. He definitely seems afraid of normal combat on Roshar.

16 hours ago, Pathfinder said:

Llstml provided the WoB. Before Honor died, the honorblades let the heralds draw directly on his power. 

Ok so there is a WoB on it. Worth mentioning that "essence" is not technically investiture. There is WoB where he describes it (for Scadrial at least) as "super-fuel" for the magics that require normal investiture. So their regenerative powers should be greater than those of a normal radiant. Honestly this kind of swings me back to being confused. We've seen that various healing magics heal most types of pain. So if they have Vin-on-mist power all the time, then pain should only last a second, which kind of invalidates the point I support Knight of Iron on. On Braize the torture could be very different and surpass this regeneration (with Odium involved there isn't really a limit), but on Roshar, any kind of normal agony would be very very temporary. 

Division might be able to do it, but the surges don't work as well on invested subjects. With the level of super-investiture they should be capable of drawing on, the Heralds should be immune to division.

[Karger]

9 hours ago, The traveller said:

Please.. there is no need of this.. 

It does kind of answer the question though.  I do admit it is a good theory.

13 hours ago, Knight of Iron said:

I'm sorry but I'm pretty new to this stuff so forgive me if I speak like I don't know what I'm talking about. But I sometimes wondered if the Heralds gave up voluntarily. I've heard all your points on their powers and whatnot and find probably their biggest weakness was they were still humans. I assume they could feel pain to some degree. What about the utmost degree? For a prolonged period of time? I personally think their will to live and prevent a Desolation would break before they were physically defeated... could be totally wrong, just an idea. They were however, still human. Maybe could be why Taln survived so long on his own, because personally he would not give in. When they give in I guess they maybe just let themselves die.

Ohh.  You meant while on Roshar.  That does not really make sense to me as they can avoid the pain only by going back to being tortured but it is still a possibility.

26 minutes ago, Config2 said:

Division might be able to do it, but the surges don't work as well on invested subjects. With the level of super-investiture they should be capable of drawing on, the Heralds should be immune to division.

This is basically my problem.  They are all invincible.  Why are they dying?

[Aon Tia]

@Dancer I really don’t think that soulcasting would work on heralds. Firstly, we know that investiture is difficult to work on highly invested things or beings. Stick is not invested and therefore easy to soulcast thereby resulting in a permanent change in its physical, cognitive and spiritual aspect. But shardplate is highly invested and therefore will not be changed however if too much pressure is applied via supply of investiture for soulcasting, it would be instead destroyed. Understandable. However, I think that heralds that heralds are invested at a level much much higher than shardplates. So, I would guess that using soulcasting to destroy them would require such huge levels of investiture that it should be virtually impossible. 

@Karger How does that answer the question? Can you explain a little.

Edited November 21, 2019 by The traveller

[Karger]

1 hour ago, The traveller said:

How does that answer the question? Can you explain a little.

I was initially confused by the theory since it is confirmed in Oathbringer.  Then I realized I was misinterpreting it.

[Pathfinder]

15 hours ago, StanLemon said:

None of any of this means that they had power on TLRs level. That is merely an assumption being made. For all we know, being fueled directly by Honor meant they don't run out of Investiture. Allomancy is done by directly being powered by Preservation, but there is a limit to how much power that they can draw out at any given time no matter how much metal they have eaten. The amount of metal just indicates how long they can do it. It's entirely possible that the Heralds have the same limitation.

As this is the stormlight forum, I will spoiler the references I make to mistborn. There are annotations and WoB that I would need to pull up and would be happy to provide you later as I am multitasking at that moment but the long and short of it is this:

Spoiler

Vin was fueled directly by preservation when she leveled kredik shaw. She could "burn" metals in an unlimited supply, to levels no other mistborn could attain. A steel push, without duralumin was enough to destroy a building via the trace metals in the rock. The annotations confirm this was when Vin was fueled directly by preservation in two separate locations, as well as a WoB.

That is the example of someone being directly fueled by a shard that I am drawing from, and the WoB posted has Sanderson say the honorblades were fueled directly by honor and had access to levels of investiture no radiant could attain. So to me it is pretty clear the heralds were at that level. But I guess to each their own

[Honorless]

Huh, I never caught that bit about the Heralds "getting caught". It does make sense though, if they have to make their way back to Braize voluntarily in case they survive, then they definitely have to be caught in order to get them to break. And if they die then they get sent to Braize, we don't know the mechanism, so maybe they get sent to a designated area or a random area or an area of their choosing on Braize or the destination is highly situational somehow, except for the first scenario, all the others would require finding them, and even if the first scenario is true, that still leaves the Heralds who didn't die and now need to be caught.

[Pathfinder]

2 hours ago, Config2 said:

It's worth noting that there is they are only tortured on Braize "once caught." That implies that between being hurt or tortured on Roshar, and being caught and tortured on Braize, there would be some sort of reprieve. If they really were broken by the end, then they might have taken this brief respite instead of torture on Roshar. Also worth noting that Kalak seems to confirm the cowardice idea that the Stormfather brings up during the opening of WoK. He definitely seems afraid of normal combat on Roshar.

 

1 minute ago, Honorless said:

Huh, I never caught that bit about the Heralds "getting caught". It does make sense though, if they have to make their way back to Braize voluntarily in case they survive, then they definitely have to be caught in order to get them to break. And if they die then they get sent to Braize, we don't know the mechanism, so maybe they get sent to a designated area or a random area or an area of their choosing on Braize or the destination is highly situational somehow, except for the first scenario, all the others would require finding them, and even if the first scenario is true, that still leaves the Heralds who didn't die and now need to be caught.

@Config2  and  @Honorless   I always interpreted that to mean that after the herald returned to Braize, they were on the run on that planet. Once they got caught on that planet, then they were tortured. The implication I got was that they either died on Roshar and returned to Braize, or they survived and voluntarily returned to Braize. I could have sworn I read somewhere that if they did not return, then the desolation started up again. But what you say is an interesting thought, and could be. 

[Honorless]

1 minute ago, Pathfinder said:

 

@Config2  and  @Honorless   I always interpreted that to mean that after the herald returned to Braize, they were on the run on that planet. Once they got caught on that planet, then they were tortured. The implication I got was that they either died on Roshar and returned to Braize, or they survived and voluntarily returned to Braize. I could have sworn I read somewhere that if they did not return, then the desolation started up again. But what you say is an interesting thought, and could be. 

That's basically what I said?

I gave a run-down of how the Oathpact situation may be set up that the Heralds would need to be caught

[Pathfinder]

3 minutes ago, Honorless said:

That's basically what I said?

I gave a run-down of how the Oathpact situation may be set up that the Heralds would need to be caught

Sorry to clarify, I was mainly responding to what Config said, but included you because you agreed with him or her, so didn't want to seem like I was ignoring you. I reread your post again, and maybe I misunderstand but, I thought what you and Config are saying is this:

1. Heralds on Roshar

2. Some heralds die and immediately go back to Braize

3. Some heralds live, and hide on Roshar

4. They are tracked down and killed so they can be sent to Braize for torture

 

Which I was saying:

1. Heralds on Roshar

2. Some heralds die and immediately go back to Braize

3. Some heralds live. They must voluntarily travel back to Braize or the desolation begins anew

4. On Braize they can flee and try to hide to avoid their torturers. If caught, they are then tortured

 

At least that is what I thought I understood of what Config and you were saying. Sorry if I misunderstood

 

 

Now as to another point Config made:

 

2 hours ago, Config2 said:

Ok so there is a WoB on it. Worth mentioning that "essence" is not technically investiture. There is WoB where he describes it (for Scadrial at least) as "super-fuel" for the magics that require normal investiture. So their regenerative powers should be greater than those of a normal radiant. Honestly this kind of swings me back to being confused. We've seen that various healing magics heal most types of pain. So if they have Vin-on-mist power all the time, then pain should only last a second, which kind of invalidates the point I support Knight of Iron on. On Braize the torture could be very different and surpass this regeneration (with Odium involved there isn't really a limit), but on Roshar, any kind of normal agony would be very very temporary. 

Personally I think that the heralds then being cognitive shadows on Braize limits what they can do. They do not have a body, so potentially they cannot access the powers of their honorblade on braize. Mistborn spoilers below:

Spoiler

Kelsier could not burn metals as a mistborn and he was a cognitive shadow

So potentially the heralds cannot surgebind or heal like they can on roshar while being a cognitive shadow on Braize. But they are still subject to torture as another mistborn spoiler

Spoiler

Kelsier could be beaten and feel pain by Hoid

 

Edited November 21, 2019 by Pathfinder