RoW Chapter 15 Discussion

[Innovation]

Just now, Pattern said:

I would interpret it more like: Former Type I and Type II Entities (Returned and Lifeless) are basically the same, they get grouped together into Type II. This makes sense, since Returned are basically Lifeless animated by one Divine Breath. The difference would be the Returned needing Investiture to keep alive while Lifeless just work until the body is too damaged. I would call them Type IIa and Type IIb. Cognitive Shadows stapled on a body - not necessary via Awakening, Hemalurgy should work perfectly fine, would fall into either subcategory, depending on whether they need Investiture to keep alive or not.
Type I are now entities of pure Investiture, spontaneously having gained sentience.

Yes. This. 

[LukeWasTaken]

Yay Zahel!

Kinda sad that we didn't get any more color related sayings like red on his ears.

[Valigus]

I wonder if kaladin could beat zahel with the syl spear and using all his powers, I guess actually using all his powers would be very unfair since kaladin is basically unkillable by any weapon zahel has, so I guess a practice match but with all powers, I think it would be something like 50/50 or 40/60 either way

[+robardin]

5 hours ago, Pattern said:

I would interpret it more like: Former Type I and Type II Entities (Returned and Lifeless) are basically the same, they get grouped together into Type II. This makes sense, since Returned are basically Lifeless animated by one Divine Breath. The difference would be the Returned needing Investiture to keep alive while Lifeless just work until the body is too damaged. I would call them Type IIa and Type IIb. Cognitive Shadows stapled on a body - not necessary via Awakening, Hemalurgy should work perfectly fine, would fall into either subcategory, depending on whether they need Investiture to keep alive or not.
Type I are now entities of pure Investiture, spontaneously having gained sentience.

I would like to think that at least one new Type was added to his classification scheme, and that Returned and Lifeless, while related, are (still) not considered the same - they were not before, why would they be now?

I mean, a human can create a Lifeless with a body that's been dead a very long time and a single Breath, while a Returned needs an act of Endowment and a Divine Breath and to happen at the moment of death/transition to the CR and Beyond for the original host. That's pretty significant.

Type I (naturally occurring sentient spren) are first in the scale because they happen all on their own, without any act of Shard or human, which moves everything else "up".

Edited October 13, 2020 by robardin

[Pattern]

13 minutes ago, robardin said:

I would like to think that at least one new Type was added to his classification scheme, and that Returned and Lifeless, while related, are (still) not considered the same - they were not before, why would they be now?

Well, Vasher/Zahel seems to be annoyed by the fact that he has to categorize himself now as Type 2 - getting on a level with the "lowly" Lifeless. Spren just having taken rank 1 wouldn't invoke that annoyance. But with Vasher/Zahel, who knows what makes his mood more sour - probably everything.

Quote

Zahel waved to himself. “Type Two Invested entity. Dead man walking.”

Edited October 13, 2020 by Pattern

[+Oltux72]

12 minutes ago, Pattern said:

I would interpret it more like: Former Type I and Type II Entities (Returned and Lifeless) are basically the same, they get grouped together into Type II. This makes sense, since Returned are basically Lifeless animated by one Divine Breath.

Well, no. Returned also have a replacement soul. They are Cognitive Shadows. A Lifeless has no soul left.

 

[+Bliev]

14 minutes ago, robardin said:

Sounds like it... I also found his comment interesting that "The place I come from, it didn’t have any of these. It’s too new."
 

So Zahel/Vasher knows that his homeworld of Nalthis... Is "new"? Like Scadrial is new? Curious.

I think he's definitely spent some time at Silverlight it seems. His journey with Vivenna must have both educated him and disillusioned him--somehow even more than he already was. 

Fossils do take 10,000+ years, and from @RShara's timeline v2.0, we're just about 10-11,000 years post-shattering in ROW. So yeah, fossils would pre-date the shattering at *least*. This suggests that either Nalthis was post-shattering, or that, maybe more like Roshar, Adonalsium created the world closer to its shattering. 

With that said, many fossils are much much older than that. So I'd say Yolen is a very good guess. Maybe that's why he holds it so dear. It's a metaphor for himself, yes, but also maybe he wants answers too? And yolen seems like the source of a lot of answers. I bet Wit is not very forthcoming either.

[Pattern]

4 minutes ago, Oltux72 said:

Well, no. Returned also have a replacement soul. They are Cognitive Shadows. A Lifeless has no soul left.

 

This I would disagree upon. Clod gives signs that there is more left of him - the rest is WoBs though. There is more to Lifeless than we might think. I think there is an imprint of the original soul left.

Spoiler

Quote

Joeh42

In Warbreaker, is Clod the Lifeless body of Arsteel? I like this idea because Arsteel would have had some Breaths within him when he died, as this is how Vashir defeated him and Denth, and this could help explain why he seems to be a little more self-aware than most Lifeless. Could you respond to this idea?

Brandon Sanderson

I confirmed in the Warbreaker annotations that Clod is Arsteel.

Clod is more self-aware than most Lifeless. There is something left of Arsteel within Clod. The Breaths that Vasher gave him when he killed him do have an effect on this.

Tor.com Q&A with Brandon Sanderson (Jan. 10, 2011)

Quote

Brandon Sanderson

Lightsong Sees the Lifeless and Takes Command of Them

They keep them in the dark. This is a bad idea. They don't realize it, but the Lifeless are far more aware than everyone assumes. Clod in this book is a foreshadowing of that, and there won't be much more about it in the rest of the novel. It's one of the focus points for the sequel, if I ever write it. (Which will actually have a Lifeless as a viewpoint character, if I can find a way to swing it.)

Warbreaker Annotations (March 21, 2011)

 

 

Edited October 13, 2020 by Pattern

[Nathrangking]

1 minute ago, Pattern said:

This I would disagree upon. Clod gives signs that there is more left of him - the rest is WoBs though. There is more to Lifeless than we might think. I think there is an imprint of the original soul left.

Clod is not your average lifeless though because he was returned prior to being transformed.

[ScadrianTank]

Something I'd like to point out is that Vasher is talking to Invested entities, not BioChromatic entities. So he mush have broadened the classification the Five Scholars came up with during their research of BioChroma to include all types of Investiture. 

Also, on the topic of Vasher, it may be the time to start thinking about how he can draw in Stormlight. It doesn't seem right to me that he would be able to slurp some Stormlight just because his Divine Breath gets hungry for Invested juice. If it was the case, anyone "in need" would be able to use Stormilight to fuel any other magic system. Unless the Returned are really like plants, eating sunlight in an Invested photosynthesis kind of process. The Read-Along article mentions a good theory on how he may be doing that.

[Mage of Lirigon]

I love, love, love all this Cosmere reveal stuff we're getting now. Logicspren acting kind of like logic gates is a big deal, it could catapult them very far very soon depending on how they use. 

Humans getting closer to the Rhythms is another huge deal. I'm strongly suspecting that this will have something to do with the Sibling.

And Zahel. His picture is probably next to the word 'curmudgeon' is the dictionary.  Glad to see he's sharing some of that ancient wisdom, unlike another fossil some could name...

[StormingTexan]

45 minutes ago, Rogueshar said:

I was under the impression from the text that he got it from Roshar. But I could be wrong, I've only read the chapter once. From how I was reading the text he was implying that Roshar was a very ancient planet.  
It can't be Scadrial, that planet was created post Shattering.
Possibly be Yolen, though from Khriss's notes Yolen is hard to get to or they can't find it or something. 

“A long time. A mind-numbingly long time. The place I come from, it didn’t have any of these. It’s too new. Your world might have some hidden deep, but I doubt it. That stone you hold is old. Older than Wit, or your Heralds, or the gods themselves.”

[Friendshipspren]

23 minutes ago, HoidWasTaken said:

Yay Zahel!

Kinda sad that we didn't get any more color related sayings like red on his ears.

Yeah I miss those too

[Govir]

1 hour ago, the_archduke said:

Is it just me or is rlain being set up to be a different order than wind runner?  Willshaper when he meets back up with venli?

Rlain seems to be overshadowed in this thread, but I was thinking that his denial of the honorspren (and for the specific reasons he stated) could actually *help* the honorspren wanting to bind to him. It sounds like Rlain wants to become a Windrunner, but no spren were willing.

I am open to him becoming any order though.

I do wonder though...what was Rlain up to both in the last year and slightly before that (i.e. Oathbringer)? Last I remember of him he went off on his own to do something.

[Pattern]

11 minutes ago, Nathrangking said:

Clod is not your average lifeless though because he was returned prior to being transformed.

I know - I went looking for the WoBs I was refering to. The second one I posted (in the edit), makes me think that the awareness of regular Lifeless in the armies - even if less than Clod's awareness - puts them in the same spectrum as Returned. 

I think the separation from Returned (Self-aware bodies) and Lifeless (non-sentient) was an error from the beginning. Now Zahel knows more - and refers to himself as a walking dead.

And yes, the categorization has been extended to other magic systems as well.

Now Cognitive Shadows, Returned (who are a kind of CS) and Lifeless fall into the same category (Type 2), while Spren and other self-aware Splinters of Investiture are to be found in Type 1.

Edited October 13, 2020 by Pattern

[StormingTexan]

3 minutes ago, Govir said:

Rlain seems to be overshadowed in this thread, but I was thinking that his denial of the honorspren (and for the specific reasons he stated) could actually *help* the honorspren wanting to bind to him. It sounds like Rlain wants to become a Windrunner, but no spren were willing.

 

This is exactly what I was thinking.

[+Bliev]

9 minutes ago, Govir said:

Rlain seems to be overshadowed in this thread, but I was thinking that his denial of the honorspren (and for the specific reasons he stated) could actually *help* the honorspren wanting to bind to him. It sounds like Rlain wants to become a Windrunner, but no spren were willing.

I am open to him becoming any order though.

I do wonder though...what was Rlain up to both in the last year and slightly before that (i.e. Oathbringer)? Last I remember of him he went off on his own to do something.

agreed completely. 

I think this is acting with honor, right? I wonder if the spren will see it that way. 

[+robardin]

11 minutes ago, Govir said:

Rlain seems to be overshadowed in this thread, but I was thinking that his denial of the honorspren (and for the specific reasons he stated) could actually *help* the honorspren wanting to bind to him. It sounds like Rlain wants to become a Windrunner, but no spren were willing.

That is what I'm hoping might happen. That Yunfah comes to him, as "commanded", and is turned away by Rlain with that explanation, which Yunfah will recognize as... Honor.

[Singer]

I spy with my little eye a capital "I" Intent!!

Always fun to watch Kaladin be confused by Zahel. Also, Rlain is the best!

[Schneeente]

I like that Rlain reacted exactly as I had hoped he would! Very honorable, that action might earn him the approval of Yunfah!

[Scriptorian]

Quote

“Did I hear you asking for Zahel?” [Syl] asked.

So, Zahel wasn't on Syl's list of people Kaladin can't intimidate. Theory confirmed!

Quote

Zahel whipped a sheet off the line and tossed it toward Kaladin.

I legitimately feared for Kaladin in this moment. Fighting a master Awakener amidst the laundry is like fighting a Mistborn in a minting facility.

[LukeWasTaken]

1 minute ago, Scriptorian said:

 

I legitimately feared for Kaladin in this moment. Fighting a master Awakener amidst the laundry is like fighting a Mistborn in a minting facility.

Like fighting an Elantrian in Elantris, Like fighting a Surgebinder in a highstorm. Everyone has their zone. Kaladin had just entered into Zahel's.

[+robardin]

12 minutes ago, Pattern said:

I think the separation from Returned (Self-aware bodies) and Lifeless (non-sentient) was an error from the beginning. Now Zahel knows more - and refers to himself as a walking dead.

Well no. He always knew Returned were "walking dead". Per his original classification and explanation in Warbreaker, "Type I" was defined as: Spontaneous Sentient BioChromatic Manifestations in a Deceased Host. Deceased = dead.

(So are we officially free to talk openly about Warbreaker spoilers in this thread, then? I'll be sensitive to spoilers, just in case.)

The key difference between what had been Type I and Type II (Lifeless) was the part about being "sentient" - a Lifeless is not sentient, as the defintion of Type II was Mindless Manifestations in a Deceased Host. (...or is a Lifeless not mindless? ...maybe this is the part he learns more about, via The Chronicles of Clod?)

Of course, "spontaneous" being instead an "Act of Endowment" seems to be something he understands now - referring to her as the "she" in "That’s why she takes our memories. She knows we aren’t the actual people who died, but something else given a corpse to inhabit" - that perhaps he didn't before.

There's also the fact that Lifeless are given a Command that drives them and which they cannot break, whereas Returned do not appear to...

Spoiler

Even though we see Lightsong "fulfill his function", what then had Denth or Blushweaver, or Arsteel, or Shashara way back when, seen and then forgotten to get them to Return?

 

[Schneeente]

1 hour ago, the_archduke said:

Is it just me or is rlain being set up to be a different order than wind runner?  Willshaper when he meets back up with venli?

I think Rlain showed a lot of honor by refusing to bond the spren. That's a very good first step to attract an honorspren I'd say.

Kaladin cannot even understand how Rlain could pass up on such a life-changing opportunity. That refusal shows a lot of character and I hope Yunfah observed the exchange.  

[+robardin]

7 minutes ago, Scriptorian said:

I legitimately feared for Kaladin in this moment. Fighting a master Awakener amidst the laundry is like fighting a Mistborn in a minting facility.

Yeah, I'm sure the other combat ardents find ways to avoid doing laundry duty that Zahel takes up, haha.

I mean he's hanging up colorful laundry where ardents generally wear gray or brown, right? Whose laundry is it and will they complain? LOL.