Jasnah interviewing the Heralds

[+Mojulesttron]

As I saw a lot of different ideas being thrown around concerning Jasnah interviewing Ash, I thought we should open up a seperate thread for it. 

So here are my initial thoughts:

I think it's very cool that Jasnah actually spoke to Ash (and possibly Taln, depending on his mental state) to gain information about the previous Desolations and the enemy. There surely are some interesting bits of information to be uncovered. However, I think it is noteworthy that Kaladin does not know about the (presumed) Transportation-Fused. He infers the Fuseds surge based on his observations, not on anything he's been told by Jasnah or Ash. Furthermore, he speaks about Dalinar claiming that there are only nine types of Fused- not knowing - but wouldn't something like this be basic information for the Heralds to share? The easiest answer might simply be that Kaladin doesn't know about everything Ash has shared, but that seems unlikely (with him being a high-ranking Radiant and trusted ally to Dalinar). What might be the case is that, after Jezriens death, Ash is know zoning in and out of awareness, similar to Taln. 

 

I'm very interested to read your speculations on this topic and everything else concerning the Heralds!

[Harbour]

Actually, the dynamic that interest me the most is Ash and Shallan. I wonder did they met and did they talk. Ash could have give Shallan alot of useful advices. Would love to read this conversation.

[BloomAgeOne]

1 hour ago, Mojulesttron said:

As I saw a lot of different ideas being thrown around concerning Jasnah interviewing Ash, I thought we should open up a seperate thread for it. 

So here are my initial thoughts:

I think it's very cool that Jasnah actually spoke to Ash (and possibly Taln, depending on his mental state) to gain information about the previous Desolations and the enemy. There surely are some interesting bits of information to be uncovered. However, I think it is noteworthy that Kaladin does not know about the (presumed) Transportation-Fused. He infers the Fuseds surge based on his observations, not on anything he's been told by Jasnah or Ash. Furthermore, he speaks about Dalinar claiming that there are only nine types of Fused- not knowing - but wouldn't something like this be basic information for the Heralds to share? The easiest answer might simply be that Kaladin doesn't know about everything Ash has shared, but that seems unlikely (with him being a high-ranking Radiant and trusted ally to Dalinar). What might be the case is that, after Jezriens death, Ash is know zoning in and out of awareness, similar to Taln. 

 

I'm very interested to read your speculations on this topic and everything else concerning the Heralds!

I think that Ash may have simply forgotten some of the details about the fused and the desolations. It's been 4500 years after all, and Ash, like the other Heralds, hasn't had the best mental health throughout the years. Dalinar was probably told about the nine types of fused by the Stormfather.  

[+Oltux72]

1 hour ago, Mojulesttron said:

I think it's very cool that Jasnah actually spoke to Ash (and possibly Taln, depending on his mental state) to gain information about the previous Desolations and the enemy. There surely are some interesting bits of information to be uncovered. However, I think it is noteworthy that Kaladin does not know about the (presumed) Transportation-Fused.

Well, he does know about the possibility. And he does know about all ten Surges. But this rests on the assumption that this was Transportation, not something else or an innovation.

1 hour ago, Mojulesttron said:

He infers the Fuseds surge based on his observations, not on anything he's been told by Jasnah or Ash. Furthermore, he speaks about Dalinar claiming that there are only nine types of Fused- not knowing - but wouldn't something like this be basic information for the Heralds to share?

How woud the Heralds know? If there were three Bond-Fused, the Heralds would have never met them at so low a number.

 

The interesting question is that he should now know about all Forms of Power and the Unmade, as far as their capabilities are concerned.

 

[Nathrangking]

Perhaps Dalinar has been using his Perpendicularity at will powers to learn from them in moments of Lucidity. This painstaking process could account for gaps in knowledge as there is only so much they can learn at a time and he can't constantly be doing this.

[Honorless]

I think Dalinar's knowledge of 9 kinds of Fused was more instinctive, connected to the Spiritual Realm and him being a Bondsmith. That might be why he's been unable to share how he knows this. We've seen Dalinar just know things in this manner before, opening a Perpendicularity, trapping an Unmade, knowing there would be ten important people.

[+Child of Hodor]

1 hour ago, Nathrangking said:

Perhaps Dalinar has been using his Perpendicularity at will powers to learn from them in moments of Lucidity. This painstaking process could account for gaps in knowledge as there is only so much they can learn at a time and he can't constantly be doing this.

That would help. He may only need to be around a lot of stormlight or surgebinding. He breaks out of his stupor in WoR when Shallan uses Illumination in his cell. Granted he screams and starts rambling about Ishar's knights, but still better than he was before she did that. 

Ash is the youngest Herald, the only one who my not have been born on Ashyn.

 https://wob.coppermind.net/events/372/#e11945

She has the least firsthand knowledge of what led to all this because she was a wittle baby during some key events. And she's crazy like all of them, she mentions to Taln she's lost track of time. 

All of the Heralds have a very hazy grasp on time. Kalak isn't sure whether he'd been tortured for hundreds of years or thousands of years I the Prelude. It's at least several thousand. 

I guess my point is these two won't give them as much as we'd hope. Either because they'll lie or they just don't remember well. 

[Karger]

We are not sure how often either Herald is lucid.  As such they probably concentrate their questions on things of obvious intimidate importance.  If they have not sighted a fused they will not have yet asked about it.  How did the old Windrunners train.  What could the enemy here by interested in.  Asking about a type of fused that the Heralds might assume you already know about would not necessarily be a good use of their time.

[dbulick]

I am not sure if this has been brought up, but Ash is known to destroy art of herself.  I wonder if she isn't suffering some of the dissociative identity disorder that Shallan is?  It could be some of her personalities don't care for the images of herself that are displayed? 

 

That would make for a very interesting conversation with Shallan.

Edited August 5, 2020 by dbulick

[+Oltux72]

59 minutes ago, Karger said:

As such they probably concentrate their questions on things of obvious intimidate importance.

And they would concentrate on things that

1. are unlikely to have changed
2. the Stormfather does not know about
3. the gem archives do not explain

59 minutes ago, Karger said:

  If they have not sighted a fused they will not have yet asked about it.  How did the old Windrunners train.  What could the enemy here by interested in.  Asking about a type of fused that the Heralds might assume you already know about would not necessarily be a good use of their time.

What would be on the list

• what does the enemy want
• what powers do the Unmade have
• what powers do Regals have
• how to unlock the oath gates
• how to build oath gates

Yet the Heralds are unlikely to answer one of the most pressing questions: How to destroy the Everstorm?

[Destruction]

Its possible that the priority of jasnahs interviews was just to have a better record of history. It mentions how they were amazed about the fabrials powering the 4th Bridge. You could infer that Jasnah just focused on setting ancient records right. She is a historian and she might find out about information that is relevant but focus on the history of the past. That might be low in the list of priorities for her but it would be in her nature to question about the proper history of Roshar.

[GudThymes]

5 hours ago, dbulick said:

I wonder if she isn't suffering some of the dissociative identity disorder that Shallan is?  It could be some of her personalities don't care for the images of herself that are displayed? 

ehhhh, I like the idea and how it could make them foils of eachother in some ways. I'm more inclined to think that she destroys images of herself due to shame. She probably knows that what she did in "abandoning" the oathpact wasn't honorable. And modern vorinism and many cultures venerate her and the other heralds. I imagine that creates a large amount of internal conflict/turmoil. It wouldn't surprise me that she destroys images of herself as an unhealthy way to reduce that internal conflict.

[Kered]

I think a huge part of Ash's lucidity/giving Jasnah some relevant information will be rooted in the death of Jezrien. We see her pretty indifferent towards the whole conflict and only makes her way towards Dalinar because of Taln. Immortality and constant torture probably the cause of that feeling, which would make her resistant to helping the new Radiants. We see this after the battle, instead of meeting Dalinar, she attempts to kick rocks with Taln. The shock of loosing her father, the realization that the other Heralds(whom we know at least 2 she still kinda cares about) are in actual danger could be the catalyst to her assisting Jasnah. Or maybe Jasnah offers to try and help with Taln. 

 

Ooooooooor, shes a gibbering mess like Taln and Jasnah had to Sudoku the crap out of her gibberish. 

[Karger]

3 minutes ago, Kered said:

Ooooooooor, shes a gibbering mess like Taln and Jasnah had to Sudoku the crap out of her gibberish. 

I think this is more likley.  Maybe future epigraphs will be from "the ravings of Shalash and Talenel"

[Kered]

1 minute ago, Karger said:

I think this is more likley.  Maybe future epigraphs will be from "the ravings of Shalash and Talenel"

The "Gibbergram". 

[Crylorenzo]

I wonder if Dalinar creating the perpendicularity near them again would get them lucid again like it did for Taln the first time.

[Karger]

8 hours ago, Crylorenzo said:

I wonder if Dalinar creating the perpendicularity near them again would get them lucid again like it did for Taln the first time.

It could.

[Subvisual Haze]

Ash destroying representations of herself may be a way to combat her own madness.  I really liked this question from a recent stream:

Quote

Questioner

The Heralds seem to be insane in the ways of their Divine Attributes, at least somewhat. Is this because they're Heralds? As Cognitive Shadows, they're subject to people's perception, like how spren are?

Brandon Sanderson

That's a very astute question, and yes, that is influencing them quite a bit. I'm doing something here with the Heralds. Like, I want the Heralds "madnesses," as we call them, to be magical diseases. And the contrast of something like Kaladin's depression, which I'm trying to treat very real-world. I'm trying to treat them as these things that couldn't exist in our world. They're fantastical mental diseases, like we have fantastic physical diseases in Elantris. So I did make them thematic, and I would say part of the reason for that is people's perception of them and their mental state reacting against that. And that should be a theme among all of the Heralds.

San Diego Comic-Con@Home 2020 (July 23, 2020)

 

[joesleepsalot]

On 8/6/2020 at 6:29 PM, Karger said:

On 8/6/2020 at 10:14 AM, Crylorenzo said:

I wonder if Dalinar creating the perpendicularity near them again would get them lucid again like it did for Taln the first time.

 

This, and 

 

On 8/7/2020 at 5:15 PM, Subvisual Haze said:

Brandon Sanderson

That's a very astute question, and yes, that is influencing them quite a bit. I'm doing something here with the Heralds. Like, I want the Heralds "madnesses," as we call them, to be magical diseases. And the contrast of something like Kaladin's depression, which I'm trying to treat very real-world. I'm trying to treat them as these things that couldn't exist in our world. They're fantastical mental diseases, like we have fantastic physical diseases in Elantris. So I did make them thematic, and I would say part of the reason for that is people's perception of them and their mental state reacting against that. And that should be a theme among all of the Heralds.

.... tells me that if Honor is restored and “the light switch is turned back on”, so to speak, that the Herald’s will likely become sane again....similiar disease to Elantris as well as similar cure?

[+Oltux72]

3 hours ago, joesleepsalot said:

.... tells me that if Honor is restored and “the light switch is turned back on”, so to speak, that the Herald’s will likely become sane again....similiar disease to Elantris as well as similar cure?

But Honor died long after Aharietiam.

[joesleepsalot]

8 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

But Honor died long after Aharietiam.

I think they were just beat down at aharietiam?? Perhaps them losing their marbles is more recent