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Force Inequivalency in the past


adouloumis

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Hey guys, new member here. I finished reading RoW and processing it and wanted to discuss something that picqued my interest but I saw no dicussion about (if I missed something please point me out, there were so many threads).

First thing that drew my attention is how Kaladin was able to defeat the Pursuer with barely any powers, a foe that was known for taking down at least several 4th Ideal Radiants. That in itself is perhaps not that surprising, given that Kaladin is somehow special in addition to being trained to fight without powers. 

The second is a quote from Jasnah in the book: "Our battlefields are a careful balance of Radiant against Fused, Shardbearer against Regal, soldier against soldier." That implies that the forces of the enemy in the present are equivalent to those of Team Dalinar. A team with 50 Windrunners, some Edgedancers and a few other Radiants sprinkled in, with only Jasnah being of the 4th Ideal.

But in Dalinar's visions we saw at the at least 300 Windrunners and Stonewards, all of whom are described as having Plate and Blade. We can assume that there were perhaps lots more Knights from the other orders. And those forces, apparently far greater than the current strength of Team Dalinar during the Recreance had to face Ba-Ado-Mishram and not Odium himself, giving the singers Regal forms but no Fused and thus no Surgebinders. 

And yet those Radiants of the past seemed to have so much trouble that they had to follow a risky gambit that Melishi proposed, with apparently disastrous consequences. 

What posed a challenge for them? Was the infighting (amongst the Windrunners and Skybreakers) more than that? Perhaps a civil war? Was it Honor's deterioration?

Was BAM able to provide for Surges amongst her subjects? Perhaps due to connecting with the Parshmen directly?

What do you think?

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Greater number of Singers, active Unmade and their minions like Corrupted spren or Midnight Essence, more sane Fused, Thunderclasts were more active, we didn't even see anyone use Voidbinding which may have been used in past Desolations.

We didn't really see all-out war between Odium's forces and the coalition.

 

@Brgst13 that was said back in Oathbringer. I think Lezian and Raboniel waking up in RoW and their titles indicated that they were counted among these greater Fused. Raboniel especially, with her past accomplishments and being granted her own Rhythm by Odium. But there might still be some Fused who haven't been active, like El, but his inactiveness was indicated to have been a punishment. We'll see, I guess. 

Edited by Honorless
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I am talking specifically about the False Desolation before the Recreance. There were no Fused during the False Desolation. I am not sure about the thunderclasts, but those seem to be in Braize as well (being ancient singer souls).

And also if we did not see an all out war, as in not seen the full force of Odium (the R version), then why did he agree to terms with Dalinar, why was he convinced he could lose? It seemed to me that this was the best he could do right now, which seems to imply that he was somehow limited compared to the past.

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@Honorless The Fused surges powered by voidlight are voidbinding, though it seems each brand of Fused only has one surge and the void-surges are all slightly different from the Radiant ones. But we’ve definitely seen voidbinding. 

There is the issue that the current Singer forces are barely trained, while the ones in the past were probably much better soldiers. Their numbers were probably a lot higher too, with maybe a lot more Regals. I think Melishi’s gambit had more to do with making sure the war wouldn’t happen again because he knew Honor was in trouble and wouldn’t be able to support future Radiants. I would guess that he hoped to remove their access to forms of power but didn’t realize they’d lose access to all the forms. Also, it seems like past bondsmiths couldn’t open Perpendicularities the way Dalinar can? That ability of Dalinar’s seemed to scare Odium quite a bit at Thaylen Field. Although Ishar was able to do it to travel to Shadesmar... but he is also a special case since he doesn’t have oaths, and Honor may have prevented that before he died, so it might be a relatively new skill for Ishar too. 

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2 hours ago, adouloumis said:

But in Dalinar's visions we saw at the at least 300 Windrunners and Stonewards, all of whom are described as having Plate and Blade. We can assume that there were perhaps lots more Knights from the other orders. And those forces, apparently far greater than the current strength of Team Dalinar during the Recreance had to face Ba-Ado-Mishram and not Odium himself, giving the singers Regal forms but no Fused and thus no Surgebinders. 

 

And yet those Radiants of the past seemed to have so much trouble that they had to follow a risky gambit that Melishi proposed, with apparently disastrous consequences.

I don't believe it was a risky gambit. It was more of a targeted strike to remove Ba-Ado-Mishram and in doing so remove access to voidlight and forms of power. The Radiants could have won a prolonged war, but it would have been costly in terms of lives on both sides. I believe they would have wanted to avoid this.

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One thing that should be kept in mind is that maps of Roshar in past that we were given may not be actually correct. It is reasonable to assume that pre-Recreance large swats of land were under control of Singers. As such there could've been if not several nations then several nations worth of them all united under single goal: takeover of continent. I would also point out that we still know little of forms of power, their abilities, their number, and numbers of spren that facilitated them. Only clue to their numbers would be Battle of Narak where there were several thousands of stormspren alone. If we assume that average warform Singer was somewhat stronger than average human soldier and that average Regal was roughly on par if not slightly above average squire than I could see how they would pose danger to human nations.

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7 hours ago, LightReader said:

@Honorless The Fused surges powered by voidlight are voidbinding, though it seems each brand of Fused only has one surge and the void-surges are all slightly different from the Radiant ones. But we’ve definitely seen voidbinding. 

There is the issue that the current Singer forces are barely trained, while the ones in the past were probably much better soldiers. Their numbers were probably a lot higher too, with maybe a lot more Regals. I think Melishi’s gambit had more to do with making sure the war wouldn’t happen again because he knew Honor was in trouble and wouldn’t be able to support future Radiants. I would guess that he hoped to remove their access to forms of power but didn’t realize they’d lose access to all the forms. Also, it seems like past bondsmiths couldn’t open Perpendicularities the way Dalinar can? That ability of Dalinar’s seemed to scare Odium quite a bit at Thaylen Field. Although Ishar was able to do it to travel to Shadesmar... but he is also a special case since he doesn’t have oaths, and Honor may have prevented that before he died, so it might be a relatively new skill for Ishar too. 

I was referring to this:

5fc302913add4_chartofVoidbinding.thumb.jpg.42b6f0c5c48a6a0c909036379b14add9.jpg

I do not think what the Fused were doing corresponds to this

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That does seem to be the case, since there are ten surges here... maybe this is referring to what happens when radiants use voidlight? Except that when Venli uses voidlight the results seem to be the same as when she uses stormlight, so that seems unlikely as well. So maybe it’s the surges powered by anti-light... like anti-surges? Would a radiant even be able to use anti-light... and what would happen to a radiant if they tried to suck in anti-stormlight when they were already had some stormlight already? would they just not be able to absorb it, or would they just explode? That seems really dangerous. These questions might require a thread of their own, if there isn’t one already. 

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It seems like, during the year that passed between Oathbringer and Rhythm of War, the Unmade haven't been doing much (or that what they've been doing is behind-the-scenes prep work that's not showing immediate results). And we know at least two of them are currently trapped in gemstones and unable to do anything. In past Desolations, having all nine Unmade actively involved in the conflict likely made up for any deficiencies among the singers.

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