Anyway I really enjoyed the book! 

How did you like it?

We know Silver kills them, Aluminum shields them, Steels makes them grow away it and Iron makes them grow to it.

So let's try to extrapolate how others metals could affect them.

Pewter: Makes them grow faster

Tin: Makes them grow slower

Bronze: Makes them easier to control with thoughts and Commands.

Copper: Makes them harder to control with thoughts and Commands.

The only possible geostationary orbits (with standard orbital mechanics) are orbits directly above the equator, so the only possible configuration is with all 12 moons orbiting in the same direction around the equator:

Note: they don't technically have to be equally spaced since they are all moving at the same speed and thus will not directly collide, but they would either get gravitationally attracted to their nearer neighbor (if not equally spaced) and collide eventually, or perhaps tidal forces would pull them into equally spaced orbits over time.

However, Brandon has stated in a WoB (https://wob.coppermind.net/events/490/#e15444) that he envisioned the moons to be arranged more like the vertices of an icosahedron, equally spaced in 3d space rather than just around the equator. The icosahedron is the shape of a D20 die, which has 12 corners and 20 faces. In order for such an arrangement to be geostationary, the icosahedron would have to orbit rigidly, and below are two such symmetric configurations, which I've dubbed pointy-topped and flat-topped:

Pointy-topped: this configuration has 5 fold symmetry: 2 moons over the poles, and 2x5 moons on inclined orbits.

Flat-topped: this configuration has 3 fold symmetry: 4 offset rings of 3 moons each.

Personally, I think the flat-topped configuration looks cooler, and is slightly more feasible: the moons are closer to the equator, and there aren't stationary hovering moons over the poles.

Unfortunately, these orbits are not physical, since the moons are orbiting a central axis (i.e. cylindrically) rather than the center of mass of the spherical planet. If we instead consider the moons to be geosynchronous rather than geostationary (i.e. orbits once per day but not necessarily over exactly the same spot), and minimize non-axial angular momentum, we get this pattern (for flat-topped):

This corresponds to 6 pairs of circular orbits.

Unfortunately, this configuration is not actually possible, as the moons would collide over the equator. This can be clearly seen if we enter the frame rotating with the planet:

But don't worry: there is a configuration for the flat-topped icosahedron that does not have the issue of colliding moons:

Now, while this initially seems chaotic, it actually has more symmetry than the previous pattern. It consists of 3 groups of 4 moons in circular orbits along 3 orthogonal axes (of 3d space).

And, if we enter the geosynchronous frame, we can see that the moons follow staggered orbits along figure-8 paths such that they don't collide.

This is cool and all, but unfortunately this still doesn't really work with the spore oceans that Brandon has set up, which seem to require each moon to have its own ocean, and thus not share its space with other moons. Also, while the moons would form an icosahedron in the sky twice a day, they are not permanently in that nice D20 shape. Finally, I'm not certain these orbits are stable, with the moons constantly moving closer and further away from the other moons.

So, in the end, we must return to the rigid icosahedral orbits, which look very cool but are not physical... yet.

is really outstanding.

I tweeted to @GraphicAudio asking if a Graphic Audio adaptation of Tress of the Emerald Sea -- ideally, featuring Chris Davenport as the narrator -- might be possible. They suggested posting here with that suggestion. So, here I am, to make that suggestion!

(In case it's not obvious: This is my first post on these forums! Hello! Long time Sanderson reader, first time poster. If I'm out of compliance here with any established forum rules or guidelines, I would welcome being made aware of such!)

Is a Graphic Audio adaptation of Tress of the Emerald Sea something that any of y'all would be interested in happening?

(Tress ch. 29, p. 161)

Quote

Tress tapped her finger on the book. The caption was wily, and even Hoid--an obvious idiot (ouch)--had...

In Yumi, I recall him explaining something about Connection that allowed him to see through their eyes or something similar, but I don't remember him every giving an explanation in Tress. Here are some thoughts:

• Hoid had some Connection he didn't explain, like in Yumi.
• He asked the characters to give him the full story.
• Hoid made up parts (likely minor details, but possibly major parts) of the tale.
  • Are we trusting Hoid to be accurate/reliable while narrating?
  • If not, is that because he would intentionally alter the story, or because he may have made some more minor changes?

I also want to mention this:

(Wind and Truth spoilers)

So, how do you all think Hoid is able to tell the story of Tress?

Quote

She did her business in the cramped chamber with only a tiny porthole in the wall for light.  Huck politely waited outside without being prompted, proving quite gentlemanly for a rat.

Where I wrote "Huck is Charlie."

It was easy enough that I'm pretty sure Brandon intended us to figure it out early, so I'm wondering what your experience was.  

Edit:  I think there when Huck gave his "name" and seemed to stick around Tress early I was already suspicious, but this is where I pretty much flipped from suspicious to fairly certain.  

Submarines? Water guns? Fire hoses? Aircraft Carriers? What do we think? 

Is it clear to everyone how the flare gun works? I tried to understand, but it’s too confusing  Even chat gpt failed  Especially this, in ch.41: 

Where is water there? Is it in charge bag with zephyr spores?  The timer system is also complicated

Thanks for the answers. 

A little less: the Sorceress vs. the Wizard. OTOH the Sorceress is also like a Witch...

I haven't gotten far enough to know what's up with the talking animal character, so not sure if it's even thematically reminiscent of e.g. WICKED.

Also, I'd be implying an analogy between Tress and Dorothy, probably. Unless Sanderson read a bunch more of the old Oz books or something, maybe Tress is more Ozma-like, who knows but I wish I knew more about Sanderson's reading background... I did understand in advance that a different story he's writing was inspired, structurally, by FF6, but I think that was mostly luck at the time (my actual evidence base was almost totally the vibes I got from books written a while ago, before the ones where my guess was supported). (A horrible sample: I for some reason automatically visualized the FF10 sphere grid when I originally read about cosmere spiritwebs, and that accounted hugely for my belief that Sanderson draws inspiration from the FF games at all, which is true, fine, but that was not a clearly justified inference, by me, at the time. So I don't want to be like, "I was right about that, so maybe I'm right about Tress and Oz," I already feel even less inwardly confident in this newer analysis/cross-reference.)

Quote

The desk rolled to the side at an offhand whim of the Sorceress. She now stood in the dead center of the room. The fake Charlie had walked up to the doorway, and the Lightweaving had fallen away, revealing a creature that only resembled a human—reptilian with golden eyes and a toothy grin.

What exactly is this? I assumed Sho Del, due to the eyes (Sho Del have reptilian eyes), but I feel Hoid would have mentioned the four arms, as that is a pretty distinguishing trait. If it was a Dragon, I don't see why they would have to use a Lightweaving as they could simply shapeshift. 

So, is it just a Sho Del and Hoid didn't mention the arms, is it a Sho Del with some deformity making it only have two arms, or is it some other creature entirely? I don't know why nobody else is talking about this or asking Brandon questions about it. 

Here's the quotes for reference

Quote

“I need someone to slip in,” Tress said.
“Maybe we could ask one of the Dougs?” Huck said.
“Someone,” Tress said, “who is small, quick, and who won’t be
noticed listening.”
“Dang,” Huck said. “Don’t know if the Dougs will be sneaky
enough. Have you heard the way they tromp around on the deck? I was
trying to sleep last night, and I’d swear they have lead in their shoes.
It . . .” He trailed off, noticing her glaring at him. “Oooooohhhhh. Rat.
Right, right. Got it.”

and 

Quote

“We need someone small,” Salay said, “to sneak into the Sorceress’s
tower through her raven window.”
“Tricky,” Huck said, “since I don’t think any human could fit
through . . . Oh. Rat. Right.” He wrung his paws together.

On a first read through they are funny moments, but looking back it's seems obvious that he forgets he is a rat and can do rat things because he wasn't always a rat and hasn't been a rat for that long. 

I found a few other moments and I'm currently rereading every scene in awe of Brandon's writing. It feels like whenever I get accustomed to something like the absurd worldbuilding I find something like this and remember why I read these books.

What book should I review or read next??

The seethe of the spore oceans, which is responsible for the spores being fluid, has baffled in-universe minds, and I don't think the Shard knows either. While I was trying to fall asleep, my half-conscious self seems to have figured it out. 

My theory is this: 

Verdant spores are edible, and thus contain sugars (C6H12O6). 

When glucose is consumed or burned, it releases six CO2s and three H2Os, 

Water activates the spores, which would cause more vines. 

In other words, Verdant spores cause an infinite loop, which would replenish the water levels and cause the activation of the other spores, such as the Zephyr ones, which would be the main source of the actual bubbles. The sunlight spores could be the cause of the vine burning. 

However, this process would probably be slow, and would require time for the water to condense, because I don't think humidity sets them off. (Does ice?) Because the sunlight spores would heat the area up again, and all of the spores would block the water source, the pauses in the Seethe might happen. 

Anyway, that's my idea. Maybe someone else will elaborate on, further describe, or completely shoot it down. Thanks for reading! 

Some of these questions can be explained with investiture shenanigans, but others can't. I get that Brandon was trying to write a fairytale/whimsical story, but to me this just doesn't feel like it fits in with the rest of the Cosmere. I'm not saying Tress was bad; I liked it narratively, and I know that many people loved it, but there are a LOT of problems with the world.

Specifically, the curse said that Charlie needed to bring Tress to the Sorceress's home "to be cursed," but it doesn't say who would be doing the cursing.  So Charlie and Tress could go out the door, then Charlie could lead her back inside to be cursed by Hoid in exchange for his freedom.  Hoid could then give her a harmless, easy-to-break curse (e.g., your hair will be purple until you clap three times), or even not curse her at all, since all that matters is that Charlie brought her there "to be cursed" (the fact that "to be cursed" is offset by commas implies that his freedom would be given in exchange for him bring her there for that purpose, not in exchange for the curse itself).

Is there a reason this wouldn't work, other than the characters not thinking of it until after the Sorceress left?

*-Incidentally, even after the Sorceress left, the island itself might have counted as her "home" due to having been her home for centuries, similar to how people call Mt. Vernon "George Washington's home" even though he doesn't live there anymore due to being dead.  If I'd been on the crew, I would have recommended at least trying that.

As a reminder, here are the canonical spores:

• Verdant spores: Emerald green. Bursts into ensnaring vines. Technically edible.
• Zephyr spores: Azure or sapphire blue. Bursts into breathable air. Used to launch projectiles.
• Roseite spores: Rose pink. Bursts into glassy crystals. Used for repair and containment. Noted for its resiliancy.
• Sunlight spores: Golden? Bursts into heat and light. Flares, cookery, etc.
• Crimson spores: Crimson red. Bursts into spikes (which are made of coral, according to WoB)
• Midnight spores: Black. Summons a little shadow buddy. 
• Also technically dead spores, which are gray.

WoB also tells us that all twelve spore types are at least subtly different in shades.  Basic colors not yet represented would be white, purple, brown, and maybe orange. At least a few of the spores would need to be variants of the same color - perhaps a second shade of blue to go alongside zephyr, or a pale matte pollen-like yellow. A metallic Silver Sea would look gorgeous but might be too close to gray.

With all that in mind, here are some other spores I think would fit in on Lumar:

Silken spores: Dusty white color which could be mistaken for sand. Bursts into a snarl of pale thin fibers. The chief export of the Silken Sea is cloth woven from spore silk, valued for its durability and insulating properties. (It's a bit rough though, so nobles prefer worm silk.) In naval combat, spore silk snarls are less effective than verdant vines at immobilizing ships, but they might work better for Tress's net gun. Also, big snarls can sometimes get lifted from the sea and carried in the winds - something to keep an eye out for.

Penumbral spores: Purple. Penumbral spores burst into a frigid plume of cold smoke which obscures sight and leaves behind a violet residue. Sometimes thought of as the inverse to the sunlight spores, which create heat and light. Besides its use in smoke signals, economic applications of penumbral spores are currently limited. The residue makes for a gorgeous dye, but nobody wants clothes which self-bleach near salt or silver. The residue is also a problem for most applications where you'd like to rapidly cool things down on demand, though there's always a few tinkerers in the Amethyst Sea working on perfecting the design of the "penumbral freezer".

Umber spores: Brown. Bursts into something resembling rich brown clay. Umber clay, once fully grown, can be baked into porcelain or mixed into compost to aid plant growth. Umber clay is rarely a immediate hazard to ships, but can accelerate the decay of lumber with prolonged contact. And no, it's practically odorless, despite what some sailors like to say.

Note that my goal here isn't to try to figure out what the other six spores actually are. (The correspondence to the vorin essences is a good theory along those lines.) The goal is to come up with strange and novel ideas of what the spores could be.

Let me know if you have any fun spore ideas.

Here's the vid =):

And then here's my channel

https://www.youtube.com/@Rocks_Reviews

However, midnight spores are much different. The Luhel bond with them are complex, and they seem to have some amount of mind of their own. Would it be a Venom-like situation?

And I apologize if this question has been asked before. It just seems to be an interesting premise.

1.both narrators exist as characters inside the story yet narrate from the outside, (admittedly there is a difference here is that hoid actually appears IN the story, whereas  the Narrator in Lewis' stories only exist in the fact he describes the events of his own life)

2.Both narrator's clearly know more than they should, for the sake of the story, yet are not omniscient

3. Both narrators even while knowing the moral of the story intellectually have flaws and opinions of their own, sometimes outright contradicting the lessons of the characters they describe. Startlingly human in their sage-ness.

4. Both narrators see a humorous nature to human nature. Repeatedly both narrators present counter intuitive reasponses to simple stimuli (think King Miraz going to battle specifically because his advisors told him not to, or Laggart being terrified of being forgiven)

5. In the post script Brandon describes his novel as "a fairytale for grownups"  a phrase C.S. Lewis himself used to describe his own work, namely the Space Trilogy

6.Finally the piece of evidence I find most convincing. The simple but convincing logic that is present in both. The scene where Tress debates leaving with her parents is very similar to Peter and Susan's discussion with Professor Kirke. Nether hides the apparent contradictions nor confuses with word games they simply analyze the situation through reason.

I'm curious as to what you all think, am I reading to much into it, or do you think I hit something?

As Brandon has said at one point, we might be able to make guesses as to who the audience of TotES is. This will have spoilers for Mistborn(Possibly up until Wax and Wayne) and SA(only book one), and if you haven't read TWoK, you shouldn't try to read this, as everything, and I mean everything, is locked behind spoilers.

Quote

Brandon Sanderson

...

1. Yes, he’s telling the story in-world to someone. You might be able to pick up some of the context of who he’s talking to–but it’s not meant to be explicitly obvious. You don’t need to stress about that, as it’s not relevant to the story. Just know that this isn’t written to you (you don’t exist in the cosmere) but is instead meant to be him telling the story to someone in the cosmere listening

...

Secret Project #1 Reveal and Livestream (March 3, 2022)

It is my goal to present my best guess, and the reasoning behind it, so without further ado, let's begin.

Timeframe

We can use clues from the text to determine a range of time the story could be told.

Spoilers for Mistborn

This definitely implies that an amount of time has passed since the end of Era I

Location

Again clues help to figure this out, but I've noticed some conflicting pieces of evidence.

Minor, mostly worldbuilding, spoilers for SA

Personality

Finally, now that I've determined where and when I think the story is being told, I will explain who I think it is being told to.

Quote

Worldbringers like myself spend decades combing through folk tales, legends, myths, histories, and drunken bar songs looking for the most unique stories.

Ch. 24

This quote is likely directed at someone who is not a Worldbringer, seeing as Hoid doesn't say "us" , but Hoid also wouldn't tell a story without a reason, so maybe he was training someone to be similar...

Spoilers for SA

Thank you for reading this mess, tell me what you think, feel free to debate me(cough cough, FrustrationI'mNotGoingToTagYouBecauseIDon'tKnowIfYou'veHadAChanceToReatTotESYetButPleaseDoFeelFreeToDebateOrDisproveMe, cough cough) or just tell me I'm awesome.

(Basically all the books spoiler)

I also wonder what her goal is, is it as simple as ruling the seas, or is there something about the aethers that is important? Any ideas or such?

My only guess is a baby mistwraith he has or something like that. What do y'all think? 

I knew, of course, that the delays in production and shipping were primarily due to Brandon's (and the team's) desire to do something special with the cover and interior artwork - and the difficulties presented thereby - but Rust and Ruin this thing is an absolute work of art.  I don't even want to TOUCH it, never mind READING it!

Kudos to the Dragonsteel team and to everyone else involved in the creation of of this utter storming masterpiece.  I can understand a feeling of sticker shock at the $55 price tag if you are looking to buy it separately, but given the impressive amount of sweat, love, and craft that has gone into manufacturing this volume, honestly, it's a bargain.

1. Lumar is hollow, or at least has a massive cave structure through its mantle/core. Think Naboo. 
2. Some or all of the spore oceans have drainage holes at their bottoms, through which spores sink into the hollow space. 
3. One of the spores creates water when activated. The water drains into the hollow space as well. 
4. Inside the core, the mixture of this water with Zephyr spores creates immense gaseous pressure, which is then forced back up through the seabed and causes the Seethe. 
5. The water also activates Sunlight spores, which create the heat that is absent because of Lumar's non-molten core. 
6. Spores that create solid objects do so, but the solid vines and Roseite and such eventually decay in the absence of continuing investiture influx. If that decay doesn't happen, the continuing emptiness of the core could also be explained by the Rose, Crimson, and Emerald seas having fewer and smaller holes for spores to drain into, thanks to having plugged them up over the centuries. The outflow of air would prevent further spores from entering in large numbers. 

This is all wild speculation, but it explains a few things at the same time. The biggest one is the Seethe. We already have a magical way to generate air, so it isn't a huge stretch to say that it's causing the as-yet-unexplained source of gas from the ocean bed.

Second, a massive underground aquifer explains how islands like the Rock have groundwater despite rain being presumably unable to reach the seabed. Groundwater normally relies on rain soaking into the ground (I live in Arizona and we're veeeery concerned with recharging our aquifer this way). With the Verdant sea soaking up all rain, the Rock normally shouldn't have any groundwater to dig a well to. On a related note, having one of the spores create water also explains why the planet hasn't become uninhabitable through dehydration, with the moons sucking water away as fast as they can. 

Third, if there is a traditional liquid ocean, this explains why people thought it was feasible to settle on this world. There are some hints that they may not be native. 

Fourth and least important, if the Sapphire sea is draining at the quickest rate, that could be why it's so heavily populated. More land would stick out above the spores. This would probably have to be the case for the Seethe to be so ubiquitous. Granted, Sunlight spores adding heat would also increase the pressure and help drive the phenomenon. 

I won't focus on the exact orbit of moons as this was already greatly showed in this topic: 

For me, it is important that only one moon is visible from each sea of spores and that when crossing between two seas, both moons are visible for a short time, before one of them will set behind a horizon. So moons can't be in a geostationary orbit, they have to be in orbit around the entire sphere of the planet. So no matter where you are on the surface of the planet, you can see at least one moon.

The second piece of information, mentioned multiple times in the book, is that moons take 1/3 of the sky. That's a lot. And here we can start doing our math. Bear in mind, I'm not that good in math, so there are mistakes here (few of them I'm aware about), but I think this will give us nice approximations of the size and distance of Lumar's moons. 

For now, to have a good comparison, let's assume that each Lumar moon is the size of the Earth Moon. For the Moon to take 1/3 of the sky, he would need to be much closer than it is. And we can calculate how far he needs to be, based on the angular size. Right now, the Moon has an angular size of around 0.5 degree. On Lumar, it would need to have 60 degrees (that's 1/3 of the 180 degrees). And the formula for angular size is:

Angular size in degrees = (size * 57.29) / distance.

We have the size of the moon (diameter = 3,474.8 km), we have angular size (60 degrees), we can reposition the equation to search for the distance.

distance = (size * 57.29) / Angular size in degrees = 3317,85 km.

That's how far away Lumar's moon the size of Earth's Moon would need to be to cover 1/3 of the sky. That's almost 1:1 proportion between size and distance. 

But Lumar's moons can't be the size of Earth's Moon. Because only one of them is visible for each sea of spores. The crossing between two seas is very short, and as soon as you cross into a different sea, the moon of the previous sea disappears behind the horizon. Which means we need to look into how much is hidden behind the curve of the Lumar's surface, as this hidden amount would be equal to the distance between Lumar and moon plus the size of a moon (when standing on the edge of a sea of spores). So for simplicity we can assume that moons are like a tower or a mountain stretching from the surface of the planet, obscured by the curvature.

Because there are 12 moons and 12 seas covering the entire planet, 1 sea covers 1/12 of the planet's surface. Assuming that Lumar has the same size as Earth:

Earth's surface = 510100000 km^2
Surface of one sea of spores = 510100000 / 12 =  42508333,33 km^2

So assuming that each sea is circular (which has its own problems, as you can't divide surface of a sphere into circles without them overlapping, so here each sea would have to be bigger than 1/12, and each sea has a pentagonal shape, but let's ignore it for simplicity), each sea of spores would be a surface of a spherical cup. When standing on the edge of this circular sea of spores, the moon of that sea would be fully just under the horizon of the planet.

Here I'm looking for the length of the arch L, so I can use it as a distance between observer and observable object in curve calculator (which, as I see now, gives me another problem, because the distance between observer and observable object behind a curve of the planet is a straight, shortest line between them, not an arch along the surface of the planet, but I don't know how to get that line without having other values like height of observable object etc, so yeah, I did ignore that as well). 

Using the equations presented above for a spherical cup, I have the Area of that cup (1/12 of Earth's surface), the radius of the sphere (Earth's radius R = 6371 km), and pi = 3,1415 so from this I can calculate all values a, h, and angle θ, and from that I can get length of the arch L, L=R*θ.

Doing the math, I got: a =  3521,81 km, h =  1061,91 km, angle θ =  0,585706545, and L =  3731,54 km.

And now having L, I can give it into a curve calculator, which would calculate the hidden height of an object visible behind the horizon (assuming observer height of 10 m, standing on the deck of a ship) - https://www.metabunk.org/curve/

This gave me the value of the hidden height taking into account refraction of 878.62 km. This is the sum of the diameter of Lumar's moon and its distance from the surface of the planet. And here we can go back to the angular size:

Angular size in degrees = (diameter * 57.29) / distance.

Now assuming we're standing right under a moon, we know that the distance from the surface of Lumar to the other side of that moon is 878.62 km, and this is equal to diameter + distance. We need to only have diameter in the equation of angular size, so distance = 878.62 km - diameter, therefore:

Angular size in degrees = (diameter * 57.29) / (878.62 km - diameter).

And the angular size is 60 degrees, so changing the equation to have diameter on one side we get:

60 / 54.29 = diameter / (878.62 km - diameter)
1.05 = diameter / (878.62 km - diameter)
diameter = 1,05 * 878.62 km / 2,05

Diameter of the moon, right below it, is equal to 450,02 km. And the distance between the surface of the planet and a moon is equal to  428,6 km.

That's small, and very close to the surface. And here perspective would cause a lot of problems, as the further away you are from that moon, the smaller it is in the sky. And when you are 1000 km away from that moon, its angular size is already only around 30 degrees, as that's twice as far, 2000 km - 15 degrees, closer to the edge of the sea of spores 3000 km, and has only 10 degrees of angular size. Nobody in the book ever mentioned a moon shrinking or growing in size in the sky, and this had to be done. Moons can't be further away from the surface of Lumar than 878.62 km, as they would be visible from multiple spore’s seas at once. They can't be on Lumar's geostationary orbit (same as Earth's, around 36,000 km), as again, they would be visible from multiple seas at once, almost from one pole to the other. But only one moon is visible on a one sea, and it hides below the horizon as soon as you leave that sea. This means Lumar's moons have to be very close to the planet, and thus very susceptible to perspective. It's weird that Tress never was amazed by the Emerald moon shrinking, or the Crimson moon growing in size in the sky, as this should be happening, nor did Hoid mention it. Even right below the Crimson lunagree, nobody mentioned that the Crimson moon is huge, like nowhere else on the Crimson sea. And these are very drastic changes, hard to miss. We've been told only that moons take 1/3 of the sky, and that's it.  

Knowing now that the angular size of the moons changes with the distance, we can assume that moons can be bigger than 450,02 km, by decreasing the distance between them and Lumar's surface, but they can't be bigger than 878.62 km (as they would be touching the planet's surface). But this is basically a slide now, the bigger the moons, the closer they get to the planet's surface, the less changeable they're by perspective from a far away, but if you get too close to it, it will cover most of the sky instead, not just 1/3. So there is no good solution to it. 

Ignoring this blazing problem, I will now calculate the Roche limit for the Lumar - moon system. Roche limit is the distance from a celestial body within which a second celestial body, held together only by its own force of gravity, will disintegrate because the first body's tidal forces exceed the second body's self-gravitation.  For the rigid, solid satellites:

Assuming that Lumar's moons have a density of similarly sized moons in our Solar System (Mimas ~400 km, 1,15 g/cm^3), then Roche limit is 15367,61 km.

Assuming that Lumar's moons have a density of Earth's moon (3,344 g/cm^3), the Roche limit for Lumar's moon is the same as the Moon, so ~9482 km.

Now let's go crazy, assuming that Lumar's moons are made out of pure Osmium, the densest element on the periodic table (22,59 g/cm^3), and it's equally dense across its volume, the Roche limit would be equal to 5016,50 km. Which is still far too far to prevent Lumar's moons from disintegrating.

How dense would Lumar's moons have to be, for their surface, closest to Lumar, to be on the Roche limit (making spores fall on the planet), but the rest of the moon to be on a "stable" orbit? So changing the equation and finding the density of the satellite, gave me the value of 36222,46 g/cm3 - which is comparable to a white dwarf star's density (between 10^4 and 10^7 g/cm^3)! That's just crazy!!! A moon with the diameter of 450,02 km and this density, would have a mass of 1,73 * 10^24 kg, which is "only" 3.45 times less than Earth's mass. Therefore all of Lumar's moon would be 3.5 times more massive than Lumar's planet itself. Also, they would be extremely bright and hot. And I don't even want to know what would happen with the orbits of Lumar's system if that was the case. So that's definitely not possible. But that's the only way in which Lumar's moons won't be disintegrated by Lumar's gravity, be that close to its surface, and also make spore fall on the surface of the Lumar "naturally".

That's enough math for me. That was a fun Sunday, all of this to prove that Lumar's moons are impossibly close to Lumar's surface, far beyond their Roche limit, on orbits that can't exist in real life. Like we didn't know that already. But still, having some numbers for it is so much more fun (I'm a very weird person). Of course, keep in mind that spore seas aren't spherical, the distance between observer and a moon isn't the same as the distance between observer and the base of a lunagree, going along the surface planet, like I assumed in these calculations, but I think that these calculations provide a close enough approximation of the size and distance of Lumar's moons, to make it "useful". All of my calculations are done in a very chaotic Excel, in which I already got lost, but I'm almost certain there are no basic calculation errors there but feel free to check it out (I hope so, tomorrow I won't recognise that spreadsheet). 

And so here it is, the answer to the question that has been keeping me from sleeping at night for the whole year. How unrealistic is the Lumar planetary system? The answer is - very unrealistic. Thank you for reading this far, if you enjoyed it, you're as crazy as I'm. 

For the non mycologically-aware. Fungi reproduce via spores, which then become mycelium. Think of a mushroom—this is the fruiting body of the mycelium which lives underground. The mushroom exists to spread spores for reproduction, but isn’t the creature itself. Mycelium is incredibly complex organism but is consistently the same organism no matter where it is—like a hive mind. If you see a mushroom in the Forrest, walk a little ways further and see another of the same kind—it’s probably the same creature. And it grows…rapidly…and different kinds are referred to as “strains.” And can spread over great distances. They typically fruit after a rain

They’re also thought to be the first organisms to colonize the planet…which in the Cosmere would mean…

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Imagine him as the answer to the question: "What if that gunk from your shower drain were to come to life?"

-Tress of the Emerald Sea

Even the most technologically advanced planet, which is Scadrial, doesn't have showers... right? I haven't read all of Wax and Wayne, so I don't know. 

If this is resolved later in the book, don't tell me! I'm only 12% of the way through.

With the size of the moon that they are in the Lumar sky, they should reasonably be smashing into the planet, not in stable orbits. And even if we ignore that, with that many moons in that close of an orbit, they should all be smashing into each other. 

But this doesn't happen, because apparently the moons don't move. The seas stay in the same place! 

Don't move, huh? So we have twelve moons around the planet, none of which are orbiting it? And far too close to be in stable orbits anyway?

It's okay though, I can dismiss a lot. Perhaps theirs some distortion effect that makes the moons appear bigger without actually being really bigger.

But then we learn that the moons send produce spores that fall to the earth. So... the moons must really be that close then, huh? And it must not have it's own gravity, because otherwise the spores would stick to it.

It is here that I propose my grand theory.

The moons are blimps.

Oh now, I hear what your saying 'what, what?'

However, if the moons are blimps, then they can be much closer to the actual earth, without causing gravity issues or crashing into it. It would make sense that the spores would follow Lumar gravity, because a blimp wouldn't have much gravity of its own. It can just be floating up there, not moving, sending spores down to the earth. 

The moons are secretly just giant blimps in the sky. I rest my case.

Yet all the artwork features her with freely blowing hair.

Why?

Is this due to Kickstarter/pre-orders/back-orders being fulfilled? Or is Dragonsteel just slow to ship?

Maybe this is all answered. I'm only halfway done but I couldn't get this out of my head

Are we to assume this is space age cosmere? If so is it as late as Sixth of the Dusk? The audience obviously doesn't know about certain technologies, so it seems like THEY aren't yet on the space age, but is anyone?

Excerpt From
Tress of the Emerald Sea
Brandon Sanderson
https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewBook?id=0
This material may be protected by copyright.
 

does this mean the other spores are based around primal elements as well? what would crimsons element be?

roseite: roseite grows off them to form a protective shield

zephyr: wind blows anything dangerous away

crimson: spikes jut out to kill threats

midnight: midnight monsters form to protect them

sunlight: heat explodes out of them to burn incoming threats

brb off to rewrite every fairy tale ever written to be like this.

We need about 50 Brandon Clones, I have calculated this, to remake literature AND keep us all in new books every week for the rest of my life. I don't think any multiverse Brandon's have done better than Tress. I literally don't.

Anyone who wouldn't enjoy this story is a dirty conner.

Enough said.  I know that some of you must be film students.  Your great Brandon Sanderson high priest commands you...

In all serious though this book was surprisingly cinematic.  All of he characters have wonderful quirks that would be very easily portrayed and the world itself would create some amazing opportunities for images.  I think this book might be the best of any of brandon's for a story that is easily adapted to another medium.  Anyone have actors in mind for different characters.  Music? Direction?

This is interesting, because modern technology doesn’t appear in most Cosmere books. Era 2’s Scadrial is the most advanced civilization we’ve seen so far.

And that, combined with the fact that Hoid frequently comments on tropes and storytelling and all that, and sometimes fudges details for comedy (see: the Dougs), leads me to one realization: At least in Secret Projects 1 and 3, Sanderson is writing Hoid very similarly to how he writes Alcatraz.

Think about it! A powerful white dude snarkily commenting on storytelling while retelling his adventures from decades ago? That’s basically Alcatraz Smedry from “Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians”!

I don’t think this tone will really maintained for “Dragonsteel”, mainly because… Hoid is the protagonist of that story, so he’s not going to be robbed of his faculties or ability to move. He has much more personal investment, so he’ll be a lot less quippy.

Known oceans[edit]

• Emerald Sea (made of verdant aether; also known as Verdant Sea)^[11][12]
• Crimson Sea (made of crimson aether)^[11]
• Midnight Sea (made of midnight aether)^[11]
• Sapphire Sea (made of zephyr; also known as Zephyr Sea)^[13][14]
• Rose Sea (made of roseite)^[15]

However, both the oven and flare gun make use of "sunlight spores" that produce heat and light.  Does this not imply the existence of a Sunlight Sea (and therefore a Sunlight Moon)?

Is soooo creative... Fun, and yet, there is a depth to it.. 

Brandon, you have done it again, 

And dare I say, it might just be his best book. JUST. 

MAY BE. 

Brandon, you are awesome. And so is this book. 

Silver makes some sense as being useful at destroying investiture since it is used to combat shades on Threnody. That potentially ties these planets together, since we haven't YET seen magical applications of silver on other worlds. In another thread someone (I think Pagerunner) suggested that silver might be useful specifically against corrupted investiture and that since these are spin-offs of the og Aethers they might have been corrupted or affected by alien investiture in some way.

But why salt?

My first thought is that if these Aether spores are some conjunction of an organic and inorganic matter, then perhaps silver kills the spores by affecting the the investiture, while the salt kills the organic portion. There are parallels in the real world where salt is used to preserve meat or in the pickling process - killing off or at least retarding the growth of microbes. Some salts can be used to kill weeds. Thus the salt portion may suggest this is how the spores are formed.

This makes a lot of sense for something like Verdant which grows vines, but how not as much sense for other Aethers. Especially something like Amberite which creates rock/crystal. So that might count against the theory.

Another possibility is that its not salt in general, but the specific form of salt found in/near the Rock. This might explain why the King has to order people to stay there, and why a war hero was assigned this place as duke. He wants to continue mining the salt and using it without letting other kingdoms know whats going on. This might tie into how even the air near the Rock is salty enough to kill the spores, which seemed really strange to me when I first read it. If its something other than the salt involved, perhaps even some form of investiture, that might explain how this works.

I have trouble figuring out how salt can be used to negate investiture, since its such a common and easily obtained substance on every world. Someone else would have figured something out by now if this was a general rule. Therefore there must be something specific about either the spores or the salt that allows this.

First off, there are 12 geosynchronous moons which must be equatorial or they would move in the sky of the planet compared to land features. So, The Rock (Diggin's Point) must be very near the equator. The moons drop "spores" which fills the low lying areas. "The Sea" is not filled with water, but rather spores. The Verdant Lunagry is about "50 to 60 miles" from The Rock and this makes me suspect that the moon is named something like Verda. Lunagries are the location of each moon's place of pollen/spore drop. The other moons drop spores of different colors including red (a cup in the story has a butterfly flying over a "Red Ocean".  There also mentions of seas that are Emerald, Crimson, and Midnight and are presumably filled from different Lunagies. 

The Verdant Lunagry drops green spores. "Ship's sail that dust like ships sail water", but they are also light enough that they can be blown by the wind. When a ship sets sail, the ocean pushes air up which supports the weight of the ship. The mechanics are very unclear to me. 

"Verdant Spores" are specifically listed as growing plants when exposed to water. I suspect the other Lunagries drop spores with a different magical effect along with their different color. When Verdant Spores are exposed to water, they suddenly and explosively grow plants and vines. You can use salt or silver to prevent this from happening. The Rock has a salty aquafer which has wells in it and the salty water protects against the effects of the Verdant Spores. Gray spores are "dead" and do not explode to life when exposed to water. 

The ocean is filled with spores and not water, but there are "fish" and "elephant seal" so there must be life in the ocean as the residents are not allowed to leave The Rock but are familiar with these things. 

There is a similarity to Nalthis in the the spores fade from colorful to gray. 

There is a similarity to Taldain as the magic falls from the sky and reacts with water like the White Sand. 

There is a similarity with Roshar in that "Emerald" spores cause life to grow much like emeralds do on Roshar. This should offer hints at what the other Lunagries spores would do. Roshar has ten poles stones and this planet has twelve moons, so there will be two additional colors beyond what is shown on Roshar. 

Please help clarify what else we know.

Thanks,

Chip

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And the everyone got to blame another death on the sorceress

Things I heard:

• the Midnight Mother is doing things similar to what the Night Aether did in Aether of Night (their names are quite similar)
• he say wrote "Kingmaker" [sic] after writing Tress. He calls it Kingmaker a few times.  He then correct himself and calls it 'King Killer'. Is that something?
• " if you look at the Kickstarter page, there's that nice illustration of Hoid--also done by Howard Lyon--and in the background you will see some stars. Hmm? The new ones aren't in there yet"

First up, the WoB I got:

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Pagerunner: At JordanCon, you sharpie’d the Aether planet onto my constellation chart and said you couldn’t canonize the planet name until you wrote the book. Having been revealed as a dirty rotten liar to my face, can you now reveal the name of the planet? Has it changed from the prior incarnations of the Aether world due to the new worldbuilding?

Brandon: This is not the Aether planet. Ha ha! There are Aethers on this planet. The planet where the Aethers originate is a different planet in the Cosmere. This is a unique and different strain of the Aethers that is doing something different. If you have read the original Aether of Night, the original Aethers still act very similar to what's in Aether of Night. But these are different. You'll still see the same things, like Roseite and stuff like that. You'll still see that they do the same things, but it's a different take on the same magic system. Did we come up with a name for this planet yet?

Isaac: We're calling it Lumar.

Brandon: This is not the actual Aether planet.

So we've got two worlds with Aethers: the original Aether world, and now Lumar with a different strain of Aethers.

A few other WoBs from the livestream that are relevant to exactly how Lumar's Aethers relate to "true" Aethers:

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simonthekillerewok: How much have the Aethers changed since Aether of Night?

Brandon: The big change I made to the Aethers, other than adding this other world... A couple things going on with the Aethers. First off, when you finally meet people who bear the Aethers (which we're calling Aetherbound, currently, and I like that term), you will find that, in order to differentiate them from things like seons and things like spren bonds and things like that, I've decided that one core Aether bonds a lot of people, and it's one entity that you are all bonding with. So, if you meet five Aetherbound who have bound to the Verdant Aether, they are all bound to the same individual, at least on the core Aether world. And that just adds a different nuance to it. There is lore and worldbuilding that is different that I will leave. There's a lot that's the same; there's a lot that's different that I'll leave to you to discover. I am working quite a bit on this planet for future projects (which, no, I haven't secretly been writing yet). But that's the big change. And the other change is that I decided that I would have different things happening with them, different strains. In their own lore, they were not... the Aethers themselves don't believe they were created by Adonalsium. And so they're, like, a different sort of thing, a different entity, so to speak. And this goes back, even, to way back when I tried to write them into Liar of Partinel, them predating things like the Shattering and what not, and it feels right for how I want to treat them. Those are a few little tweaks that you will eventually get. But the basic mechanics of how they work is the same as they worked in Aether of Night. And I think that one of the things that really worked in Aether of Night was the mechanics of the Aethers. I thought they had a lot of interesting storytelling play, I thought they did different things than some of the other magics that I was writing did. And they have remained solidly a part of my brain for how the Cosmere will proceed. And that's why you see Mraize having a chunk of an Aether and things like that in his trophy case.

simonthekillerewok: We know there are multiple planets with Aethers; do both of these worlds exist simultaneously? Or is this one an evolution of The Aether of Night's Vaeria?

Brandon: They do both exist simultaneously; this one came from that one. So the answer to both is "yes."

Quote

Sapphire Bombay: I am new to the concept of Aethers and understand that they may have been introduced in the story. Can you please provide a broad overview of what the Aethers are and the role they play in the Cosmere?

Brandon: Sure. In a currently not canon but very close to canon book I wrote right before I wrote... [some stuff I'm not transcribing right now] And the other big one that I wrote during that era is a book called Aether of Night, which kind of pioneered the idea for me of the bond between a sapient piece of magic and a person. And what would happen in Aether of Night is that people would bond to a piece of some kind of primal substance, and it would bind into their hand, and then that would be a sapient thing that they could interact with, and they could produce that Aether. Like, if it was vines, they're able to produce from their hand an explosion of vines and do cool things with that. That was the core of their abilities. There was one rogue Aether called the Aether of Night, which was doing weird things that are very similar to what is happening with the Midnight Mother on Roshar. [more stuff about the story I'm not transcribing]

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MoriWillow: The spores react to water with sudden growth, which is very similar to Dayside lichen. Is the lichen an Aether, or significantly related to the Aethers?

Brandon: Read the book. That's a RAFO, but there are some clues in Secret Project One.

So, what exactly is the nature Lumar strain? I think it's a hybridization of Aethers and Taldain's White Sand. The lichen that grows on Taldain has been cross-bred, you may think, with the manifestations of the twelve Aethers, combined in a way that the release of Investiture from the microorganism now manifests the same way an Aetherbound would manifest it, not the traditional Sand Mastery way.

1. The planet is called Lumar [livestream 2]
2. The Aethers might be the moons themselves or are living upon the moons in some way
3. This is not the homeworld of the Aethers, but a world where an offshoot of aethers are doing something different  [livestream 2]
4. There are 12 moons. There may be 12 Aethers now (up from 6)
   1. Issac says there are 11 spores [mistake? Spoiler?]
   2. Brandon, much later on, says there are 12 kinds of spores and 12 colours
5. The moons are in geosynchronous orbit (possibly geostationary according to some comments by readers). The moons do not move in the sky, but match the same location always.
6. The moons are arranged like a d12 dice and not in a circle around Lumar (but this could change in the final draft) 
7. There are special places where one particular moon covers 30% of the sky. These are called a Lunagree
   1. Under these Lunagree, spores fall directly down to the planet. 
   2. You can see the spore-falls from more than 50 or 60 miles from the Lunagree, and you wouldnt want to be closer than that. 
   3. The Aether moons drop spores of dust at the Lunagree that can infect/destroy/corrupt a body if the spores get wet.
8. Silver (again) and salt can purify the spores.
   1. A grey spore is "dead" and cannot hurt a person. 
   2. Tress' island of Diggin's Point is made of "barren black saltstone". The island itself might provide protection from spores.
   3. Diggin's Point is 50-60 miles from the Verdant Lunagree.
   4. People drink salty tea and eat salty food in this world as unsalted water is dangerous. 
9. Verdent's spores cause vines to shoot from your body.
10. There are so many spores/dust-bits that the world has spore oceans.
11. There appear to be 12 distinct oceans. The oceans have different colours and traits. 
12. There is an unmarried sorceress. She lives in the Midnight Sea. Verdant sees her as an enemy. She may have bonded an Aether [unconfirmed but implied]
13. Charlie has been sent to "fight" the sorceress, but is not expected to live.
14. A ransom request has been sent the Verdant Duke, but that ransom request has been ignored.
15. Tress is going to go save Charlie by finding the Sorceress. 

Hoid:

1. Hoid is telling this story to someone.
2. Hoid is the "cabin boy" on one of the boats that delivers the cups from Charlie. 
3. Since Tress got many of her cups from sailors, some of her cups may have been given to her by Hoid himself
   1. Her Iriali Noble's cup "might" be authentic.  
4. It may be possible to figure out who the "audience" is for this story, but that detail is not vastly important [WOB]
5. Hoid is telling the story withing years or decades of the book events happening

The Iriali:

• The Iriali left this world 300 years before this story is being told
• The Iriali were gone one day and that event is considered a famous mystery
• The iriali lived on one island only
• It is not known where the Iriali went or why.
• The Iriali had their golden hair, and the golden hair seen as noteworthy and interesting
• The Iriali language was important enough for a Duke's son to either understand or recognize even 300 years later
  • It is unclear if Charlie actually can read the cup as the story about the King seems unrealistic. 
  • However, Hoid may have given her that cup, so who knows what she might have in her collection.
• The Iriali wrote "top to bottom" instead of "left to right" like on the other cups in Tress' collection.
  • Is this a hint that the Iriali were once on Sel? 
• Does the Iriali leaving imply that something bad happened to this world 300 years ago? 

Ecological Juxtaposition

• The story starts by saying these are not wet oceans, yet Hoid has mentioned Earth-analogue life more than any other Cosmere series. 
• In a world so alien, the number of terran animals is somewhat unexpected.
• Seeing as there appears to be no true oceans, the use of words like "whale" is somewhat suspect. Also: seals, fish, frogs, amphibians 
  • It may be that "whales" are not truly earth-analogue whales.
  • It is possible that oceans do exist underground, or that some regions are able to support other life. 
  • The only aquatic animal we see Tress interact with is a fish she purchases. Whales and some other animals may be considered mythical or extinct
• Animals need to salt or silver their water as well. How is this being done? Have animals evolved? Are there different ecologies? 
• How do trees and flowers grow naturally? Even a gardener seems like a risky profession unless we are missing something. 
• Despite being under Verdant, attention is given to the fact that the plants are withering away.
  • Does this imply the place used to have more trees? Has something been changing over time?
  • There is no way to know if Tress' island is typical because the inhabitants are forbidden from leaving and seeing other places. 

Note: We have never seen what happens when unsalted water hits a spore. It is possible that the the people of this island are misinformed or have been directly deceived by the King in some way.

• Animals:
  • It is mentioned that animals also must be careful with spores. It not mentioned if this applies to all animals or if there are spore-adapted animals. 
  •  A horse is seen on one of the cups
  • Tress laughed like an elephant-seal
  • cobwebs are seen meaning there are spider-like creatures
  • she buys a fish
  • like a frog upon a lilly
  • Pigeon pie with gravy
  • "I was telling him the story of the fish and the whale"
  • a "butterfly over a red ocean" is depicted on one of the cups from Charlie.
  • amphibians
  • honey -> honey bees
  • someone eats eggs -> birds
  • Charles had childhood pets
  • Animals also must be careful with spores 
     

• Water
  • Plain water is dangerous. If it mixes with a spore, there may be life-threatening consequences. Salted or Silvered water is safe.
  • Even human body secretions containing water may cause spores to react
    • This is said in a way that makes the problem seem common and important
    • Examples of safe vs unsafe secretions are not given
      • What would you do about eye moisture?
      • What do animals do?
  • At least some water is sourced from underground and beneath the islands. Tress' island is an important resupply area for water.
  • There is rain in the book [livestream 2]
  • Animals exist on this planet. How do they salt or silver their water? 
  • Despite water being dangerous, and there not being a real ocean, water does not seem scarce. 
    • At least some water is sourced from underground and beneath the islands. Tress' island is an important resupply area for water and for salt.
    • Poor people are able to afford fish
    • Poor people drink salted tea
    • People talk of elephant seals
    • People know what whales are
    • Alcohol exists
    • Wood exists and doesn't seem precious
    • Is their rain? Are there forests?
• Plants and Food
  • The last tree on the island has died. 
    • Again, this implies the island was once more "verdant"
    • Conventional farming is said to be impossible on Diggins because the saltstone ruins conventional soil over time.
  • Wooden cups are not seen as expensive
  • Wheat and flax are mentioned as hair colours
  • Alcohol is mentioned
  • Cobbler is mentioned
  • Honey is mentioned
  • Eggs are eaten
  • fish is eaten
  • small meat pie. “Pigeon,” she said, “and carrots. With a thyme-seasoned gravy.”
  • talks of baked goods
  • "carmel coloured" ---> sugar  
     
• The Rocks and Material Under the Islands
  • The "seas" would bunch up under each moon due to strong tidal forces. So the area under each moon would be at a very high tide permanently and the seas would be much shallower between the moons.
    • The Rock must be a very tall mountain to be above that tide.
  • Diggin's Point is made of barren black saltstone that can contaminate soil brought to the island
  • here are water wells in the ground.
  • There are salt mines deep into the island.
  • glass is available
  • porcelain cups are mentioned

                     [Not finished this list. Many kinds or rock are mentioned]

The Law

• The King forbids anyone but the Duke from leaving the island
  • "Regardless, with the spores, the smoke, and the salt, one can perhaps see why the king needed a law requiring the population to remain on the rock. The place was so inhospitable, even the smog found it depressing. Ships visited periodically to do repairs, drop off waste for the compost vats, and take on new water. But each strictly obeyed the king’s rules: no locals were to be taken off of Diggen’s Point. Ever"
• The visiting sailors are instructed not to take any inhabitant off of the island. 
• The Duke's own family has not even been allowed to accompany the King on trips (with one notable ceremonial exception to this rule)
• The Duke's Family is permitted to accompany the Duke in order for the Heir to find a courtly wife in another land
  • It is unclear if servents are ever permitted to join the Duke on standard trips or this special trip.
• There has been no rational reason given for why this rule exists
  • The King says he needs to ensure enough people for resupply
  • The reader is likely supposed to be suspicious of this plot point. 

The Oceans and Moons/Aethers:

• People who bond an aether are called "aether-bound"
• All people who would be Verdant-bound are bonding the same individual Aether (so many people bond the same source)
• The basic mechanics are the same as Aether of Night. 
• The Aethers believe they were not created by Adonalsium.
• This is not the homeworld of the Aethers, but a world with Aethers on it.
  
  Known Aethers or Moons or Oceans 
  NOTE: Issac said in reply to a joke about Chicken Scouts, that he would try to "collect all 11 spores". Not sure if it is a mistake or an accidental spoiler
  • Verdant/Emerald
    • Causes vines to grow out of people if the spore gets wet
      • "The least bit of water would cause the spores to sprout explosively, and the results could range from uncomfortable to deadly. Breathe in a burst of verdant spores, for example, and your saliva would send vines growing up out your mouth–or, in more interesting cases, into your sinuses and out around your eyes."
    • Tress' island is not verdant in a "lush greenery" sense. The only tree is dead and there are some potted plant mentioned. 
      • "The only food the island grew came from compost vats"
  • Crimson
    • Slightly less dangerous than Midnight
    • an unpopulated sea 
  • Azure
  • Golden
  • Midnight/Night
    • the most dangerous seas and is where the sorceress lives
    • Must cross Crimson to get there from Verdant
    • "He sailed the Midnight sea, Miss Tress, underneath Thanasmia's own moon"
  • Dormancy [Possibly]
    • The new princess is from a place called Dormancy. 
    • Most Aethers on this list are colour-oriented, but non-cannon Aethers did not all have colour names. 
  • Roseite
    • is mentioned in Spoiler Stream 2

The Location inspiration and Dialect of English Used

• The names like Charlie and Brunswick are very British Isles or Canadian East Coast
• The islands themselves remind me of New Brunswick or Newfoundland in Canada
• Uses British or Non-American words like calling someone a "strumpet" 

From Other Books or Wobs

• Foil (a character)
  • Foil is an unknown entity in the cosmere that lives deep in an ocean. He has often claimed that his goal is to master the aethers. Khriss believes the discovery of anti-Light proves that she was right on a specific disagreement they had and that he should listen to her theories if he truly wishes to control the aethers.^[1]
• Coppermind (may not be true anymore, but interesting) 
  • Only certain people can activate aethers, and physical pieces of aether are not particularly useful to anyone else.^[7] Even cosmere scholars such as those in Silverlight do not yet understand how to control them
• Aether of Night
  • The basic mechanics of Aether of Nights are still true on the Aether of Night planet.
  • However, as Lumar Aethers are an offshoot of the Aether of Night world, perhaps some things are now diffferent
  • THE 6 AETHER OF NIGHT AETHERS: (Credit to Frustration)
    • Verdant allows the user to create vines, like an organic version of spiderman. Shoots are also edible and widley consumed. 
    • Amberite allows it's user to create rock-like growths on their skin, and force them to fall off, this is used to make weapons and armor
    • Beastarian allows you to graft animal parts over your injuries
    • Corprate allows one to turn themselves into a machine, such as a walker, heater or even just a support beam, called corprates, however this change is perminent.
    • Illumous allows one to teleport other people
    • Night allows one to teleport themselves, and others if they are close enough
• Stormlight:
  • Mraize has a pink aether in his curiosity cabinet
  • A servant scrubs out an aether stain from Mraize's clothes. 

The Audience:
Note: It is unclear how "pure" this retelling is. It is uncertain and unstated whether or not Hoid is using translation/connection magic to make terminology translate more smoothly, or if this a literal and intentional usage of specific language like "geosync" or "whale" to his audience. 

• The exact audience has not been set by Brandon yet 
• The number of Earth Animals mentioned would make this harder for a Rosharian to understand
  • Kaladin was told a story about a dog, but the fact Kal didn't know what a dog was was highlighted in that story. 
• The Iriali being mentioned may be a hint of some kind. 
• Some science-literate terms used like  the phrase 'her planets had 12 moons is a very low geosynchronous orbit',
  • Could be a retelling to an advanced civilization or an educated scholar class? 
• Knows Hoid by the name 'Hoid'; wouldn't be surprised to see him insert himself into the story.
• Seems to imply that the person/people he is talking to have not Worldhopped or seen many "alien" ecologies
• Hoid is telling the story withing years or decades of the book events happening

The Cups:
[Note: Brandon has said only the Iriali cup has cosmere significance] 

1. She had fine porcelain cups with painted glaze
2. Some clay cups that felt rough beneath her fingers
3. wooden cups that looked rugged and well-used
4.  She’d sip salty tea from a cup with horses painted on it
5. It was made completely of tin, stamped with letters in a language that ran from up to down, instead of left to right.
   1. It’s old Iriali,” he said. “They vanished, you know. The entire people: poof. Away they went, gone one day, their island left uninhabited. Now, that was three hundred years ago, so nobody alive has ever met one of them, but they supposedly had golden hair. Like yours, the color of sunlight.
   2. “I’d wager this cup has quite the history,” he said. “Forged for an Iriali nobleman the day before he–and his people–were taken by the gods. The cup was left on the table, to be collected by the poor fisherwoman who first arrived on the island and discovered the horror of an entire people gone. She passed the cup down to her grandson–who became a pirate, a deadrunner even. He eventually buried his ill-gotten treasure deep beneath the spores. Only to be recovered now, after eons in darkness, to find its way to your hands.” He held the cup up to catch the light.
6. When the first [GIFT] cup arrived. It was delivered by Hoid the cabin boy. A beautiful porcelain cup, without even a single chip in it. It came with a letter and a card with a little drawing: two gloved hands holding to one another.
7. The second [GIFT] cup was made of pure red glass, tall and thin, like it was meant to appear as if it contained more liquid than it did. Perhaps it was from a particularly stingy tavern. 
8. The third [GIFT] cup was a good, solid pewter mug with heft to it. Perhaps it was from one of those places Charlie had made up, where people always needed to carry weapons. Tress was reasonably certain she could knock out an attacker by swinging this cup. T
9. The fourth [GIFT] package didn’t have a letter with it, just a cup with a painted butterfly on it with a red ocean underneath. She found it odd that the butterfly wasn’t terrified of the spores, but maybe it was a prisoner butterfly, being forced to fly out over the ocean to its doom.
10. The Fifth Gift Cup: He wanted me to give you this,” Flik said, handing her a small sack. It tinkled as she took it. Inside where broken pieces of ceramic.

Metaphors:

• Charlie is a royal pretending to be a "gardener" under "verdant". Despite the name of his moon, his island's last tree has just died. 
• Tress is a woman who loves cups, but can only fill them with salted water (salted water would kill a plant).

Mistakes I Made When Making This List:

• Update on Release Day
  • This story is before Stormlight as Sigzil likely knows the tale

-------------------------

Does anyone have a list of Irali metaphors that were used by a certain character in Stormlight? I wonder if any of those will be easter eggs in this story. 

So each moon orbits above the planet at approximately 1.8928 percent of the planet's diameter, and each is likewise 1.8928 percent of the planet's diameter. The top V shape is 60 degrees from the horizon and likewise 60 degrees between the two arms of the V, and the bottom V that connects to the planet centre is 30 degrees so that twelve of them may fit around the planet for the twelve moons. I used 60 degrees so that each moon would take up one third of the sky when seen from directly below (and this should still apply when considering a circular profile superimposed on a dome), and positioned the moons so that as one begins to dip below the horizon the other begins to rise above it. Again, please bear in mind that this is a rough sketch based on the information so far provided.

This is actually a lot smaller than I thought it would be, and also rather close. If the planet is the same size as Earth then the moons are each - assuming uniform size and distribution - approximately 241 km in diameter and their surfaces are 120.6 km above the surface of the planet, so (again, assuming the planet has the same proportions as Earth) they orbit at a radius of 6491.6 km from the centre of the planet (bearing in mind the planet is 6371 km in radius). This puts it above the Karman line, but only just, and I believe they would experience the effects of atmospheric drag, so this likely is being compensated for in some way. Also, further supporting that conclusion, they would have to be orbiting at a considerable speed to prevent them from colliding with the world. A quick and dirty calculation, again using the Earth as a reference, they would crash into the planet in two and a half minutes, so unless the planet orbits very quickly with a 1.27 hour day they likely are being held in place by some form of magic.

For comparison, our Moon - which is large as moons go - is around 3474.8 km in diameter (over 14 times the diameter of these moons) and orbits at an average distance of approximately 384400 km. Here is a graphic to display those proportions, as well as other objects in the solar system:

They are considerably larger than Phobos (22.2 km) and Demos (12.6 km), the two moons of Mars, which have orbits (if I have my facts straight) of 9377 km and 23460 km, respectively. This puts the distance between the surfaces of Mars and its moons at 5987.5 km and 20700.5 km respectively, just under 50 and 166.5 times the distance respectively between Tress's planet and its moons.

All this is based on the assumption that Hoid's description was mostly accurate, and using Earth as a base.

Here is what the planet would look like from a polar orbit with all the moons and with the pole marked:

This is a rather interesting configuration, and it almost certainly has to be maintained by magic.

However ... I'm assuming everyone reading this knows the plot of The Princess Bride, so I will come out right now and say something rather important to that plot

... don't read beyond this spoiler block if you haven't seen The Princess Bride.

Now, you may see where I am going with this. But maybe not - after all, the villain (or the person presented as an antagonist, but lets be real, the duke is the real villain so far, and the sorceress may actually be heroic or friendly) is called the sorceress (and without a capitol letter - that is odd, though the duke didn't get one either). Last I checked Charlie wasn't likely to be the sort to take on that name - he'd probably be the sorcerer if he did. Either way, it is unlikely Charlie will replace her.

Unless ...

Okay, so the rest of this ties directly to Aether of Night, the unpublished story, and this relates to something I hope is going to still be canon. So the rest of this post is in spoilers.

What could replace them?

• land plants - they require abundant rain. Where does the water come from?
• the spores being photosynthetic - that is possible. But - unless they generate their water by magical means, it must rain for that. The actual oxygen atoms in the air come from water consumed in photosynthesis
• something utterly alien - then why so terrestial a fauna?
• nothing - that is disturbingly plausible. The aethers may be a recent - meaning on the order of centuries - arrival and are killing the planet. That world is running out of oxygen, they just don't know it yet.

Albedo

This signifies the ability of an object to reflect light. Obviously a bright object is better at that than a dark or even black object. And this is a problem. One of the moons produces black spores. We are looking at a black spot at equatorial latitudes of an extent of at least a few hundred kilometers. If you sail that sea at day time, you'll be backed. And there will be severe winds. Hot air goes up and coller air is sucked in.

Clouds

The oceans are dry. They do not evaporate much water. Clouds that lose their water as rain will not be replenished. Lands and islands surrounded by a spore ocean will see less rainfall. And less cloud cover will worsen the albedo effect. The lands north and south of the Midnight Sea will be deserts when that dry air comes down again.

Heat transport

Here we are entering unknown territory. On our planet the higher latitudes are often warmed by warm ocean currents. These transports are likely less efficient on a world with dry oceans. Do we have an oceanographer or meteorologist under us?

Storms

Tropical storms are generally generated over warm, wet oceans. They will not form without evaporation. This will lessen transport of materials and species.

Any other effects? Should I keep updating this?

Lets look at the exact text:
 

Quote

The spores were only dangerous if you got them wet. Which is rather a problem, considering the number of wet things that leak from human bodies, even when they’re healthy. The least bit of water would cause the spores to sprout explosively, and the results could range from uncomfortable to deadly. Breathe in a burst of verdant spores, for example, and your saliva would send vines growing up out your mouth–or, in more interesting cases, into your sinuses and out around your eyes.

The conclusion to which I am pushed tortures the text quite a bit. They sprout explosively, but not immediately. So you get spores into your drink and you turn into a bush minutes later. Or do we get told here that it is water inside a human body that causes the sprouting, not just any water? Or does he tell us that salt and silver also kill vines already sprouted?

The air acting as the fluidizer (engineers have a broken relation with the concepts of liquids and gases sometimes) comes from vents in the ocean floor:

Quote

The ship pushed back, slipping off the dead, grey spores nearest the rock into the true spore ocean. This began to shake and vibrate as the vents deep below on the ocean floor began send up bursts of air.

With this agitation, the spores became as liquid. Wind caught the ship’s sails and it struck out toward the horizon, leaving a wake of disturbed emerald dust behind it.

But where comes the air from? At the first reading I simply thought about pumps, pipes and compressed air in the harbor. While that would work locally, working locally is insufficient. It needs to work the whole trip. Is this some arcane art at work? Do the spores themselves or the things they sprout into cooperate to cause this effect, that is is that a pseudobiological effect to capture/infect new hosts? Any other ideas?

Ok, I already like the premise enough. I don't think I have ever gotten sold on a love story so quickly( Maybe I just hate unnecessary drama), but it's small, simple and sweet, that I just really like them.

And not to mention, this is the aether world(maybe?) or atleast contains aethers, so super excited, since they are the last important cosmere pillar.

Iriali are here! I was so taken a back by that. How many planets could they be on?

The fairy tale style is not my cup of tea at all, i think that takes a lot of investment away( because then I get reminded that I am reading a story) and hoid I am afraid will be a lot more like Wayne than i would like( which is 0%), but this is going to transition to an epic fantasy, so fingers crossed.

Still super excited for this!

(Fairy tale style usually only works for children stories for me, like the Hobbit, Narnia, Princess bride which is something that I don't think fits with cosmere very well)

(Now I feel greedy and want an epic fantasy set on sel(it has the best magic systems))

So the question that opens up to me is simple. Are the moons the Aethers?

Does this tell us anything about their life cycle? So far it looks like: moon -> spore -> vine, but there it ends. Are human bodies just the wrong host or culture medium for the spores?

(Aether of Night)

  (Threnody)

Is the witch who was mentioned the first one to bond an Aether?