The Sword of Harmony vs the Son of honor

[alder24]

5 hours ago, cometaryorbit said:

Sure the Fused respawn, but they need singer volunteers for that. How many horribly one sided defeats in a row before the Singers just give up seeing these punching bags as gods?

Keep in mind that Singers don't fight just for fighting, they fight not only for freedom, but for their minds. If they lose, they could end up as mindless slaves again. For them Fused are the only ones that fight on their side and make this fight even. Humans retreating from 90% of Roshar would be a victory, and would be more beneficial for Singers than Radiants. Do they even have to attack them? For that there would be a lot of volunteers, and when Singers realized how much it cost them, it would be too late.

[lacrossedeamon]

14 hours ago, therunner said:

Now now, Kaladin does not have advantage of being focal point of millenia long plan orchestrated by a Shard, unlike the Mistborn in question
Or having the luxury of being trained in his powers by someone else

And also, his series arc is not yet over, so let us not get ahead of ourselves.

 

9 hours ago, Frustration said:

Yes, let's assume it was skill that allowed in to do that, and not Preservation chosing her.

Let's also ignore that it took Vin over two years in books to do that, and Kaladin has only been doing this for one.

One could argue if Kaladin were better his arc would be done in less time like Vin's. And that Preservation chose her because of latent skill. You don't pick a chump to be your champion.

13 hours ago, alder24 said:

Please always provide sources for claims like this. I can't find anything:

  Reveal hidden contents

shinarit?

There is that scene where Kaladin takes a sharp turn at high speeds and he almost blacks out. That is normal for jet pilots, since they experience high G forces when their airplane tries to accelerate them by their backs and bottoms.

But Lashing doesn't work that way, it generates fake gravity. Accelerating your whole body shouldn't cause you anything, you can't even feel it.

Is this something that is an admitted physics hiccup or I misunderstood this kind of Investiture usage?

Brandon Sanderson

This one is actually in the process of flux, as I do more research on the effects of acceleration (including interviews with fighter pilots, which has been fun.) Basically, I realized I needed to beef up my understanding of all this, and then make some decisions on exactly how this all works, because I've been relying on instinct too much in some of these sequences.

So...that's a RAFO, I'm afraid. More because I'm still tweaking some of the little details of how I want this all to work. (In ways that become increasingly relevant as I look forward toward things like Windrunners in space.)

There are a ton of details to consider, even if I eventually hand-wave some of it with the magic. (For example, the heart pumping blood in a high-g environment. How does that interact, if at all, with stormlight? And the direct oxygenation of the brain implied by not needing to breathe while holding stormlight...)

We have several very large math-ish projects going on behind the scenes.

Phoenixdown

I think it depends on if lashing independently impacts each atom within your body simultaneously, or if it is only a subset.

Brandon Sanderson

There's one important fact you're not considering, but which is vital: reader expectation.

One of the questions I have to ask myself is this: What will the reader expect to happen? How will they expect to feel? Granted, none of us have ever flown like this before--but we generally imagine similar things, similar feelings.

As a writer, one thing I need to balance is when I go against reader expectations and when I don't. Going against the expectations can be interesting, but often takes a large burden of words and explanation to keep reminding them something is not how they'd imagine it to be.

For example, it took a relatively large amount of reader attention (and explanation) to keep reminding people in Mistborn that plants weren't green and the sky wasn't blue. In many ways, making something new (like a chull) is easier on readers than making something familiar into something strange (like the horses in Dragonsteel, which were smaller than Earth horses--and kept causing confusion problems in my alpha readers.)

As annoying as this example can me, this is why Lucas had sound, fire, gravity, etc in space. Starships banking in formation felt real to the viewers, even if it didn't make sense in context. I hope to not go that far, but these questions are something in my mind.

I try to be careful not to remove the sensations of magic, in order to keep the movements of characters grounded. Windrunning has left me having to decide how far I want to go with things like this, in order to preserve the visceral feelings for the reader.

General Reddit 2018 (June 6, 2018)

 

 

10 hours ago, Frustration said:

It says the narative reason is that the reader expects it, nothing about Kaladin's preception.

This was the WOB I was thinking of. I mandelaed a in universe reason I guess.

[Frustration]

25 minutes ago, lacrossedeamon said:

One could argue if Kaladin were better his arc would be done in less time like Vin's. And that Preservation chose her because of latent skill. You don't pick a chump to be your champion.

KoW finishes up before the second year does.

And Preservation's mind was not working at the time, so it very well have just been her winning the shardaic lottery.

[lacrossedeamon]

23 minutes ago, Frustration said:

KoW finishes up before the second year does.

And Preservation's mind was not working at the time, so it very well have just been her winning the shardaic lottery.

Not including Prelude, Prologue, Flashbacks WoK starts in 1172 with Syl beginning to bond even before that and we are now in 1175.

[Frustration]

29 minutes ago, lacrossedeamon said:

Not including Prelude, Prologue, Flashbacks WoK starts in 1172 with Syl beginning to bond even before that and we are now in 1175.

If you want to start that early, I can take Vin from the fist chapter of FE, which puts it closer to 3 years.

[lacrossedeamon]

1 hour ago, Frustration said:

If you want to start that early, I can take Vin from the fist chapter of FE, which puts it closer to 3 years.

So Vin kills a shard within 3 years and Kaladin is within the third year already. Hopefully he gets his kill before the time skip then.

[Frustration]

8 minutes ago, lacrossedeamon said:

So Vin kills a shard within 3 years and Kaladin is within the third year already. Hopefully he gets his kill before the time skip then.

And ignore that Vin only did that because she was selected to, not based on any of her own merit.

Otherwise you would have to say that Taravangian would make a better Mistborn than her.

[lacrossedeamon]

18 minutes ago, Frustration said:

And ignore that Vin only did that because she was selected to, not based on any of her own merit.

Only if we also ignore that Cultivation passed up on not engineering a way to select Kaladin.

19 minutes ago, Frustration said:

Otherwise you would have to say that Taravangian would make a better Mistborn than her.

Well it took him like 7 years but yeah he would probably be pretty good.

[therunner]

5 hours ago, lacrossedeamon said:

One could argue if Kaladin were better his arc would be done in less time like Vin's. And that Preservation chose her because of latent skill. You don't pick a chump to be your champion.

3 hours ago, lacrossedeamon said:

So Vin kills a shard within 3 years and Kaladin is within the third year already. Hopefully he gets his kill before the time skip then.

2 hours ago, lacrossedeamon said:

Only if we also ignore that Cultivation passed up on not engineering a way to select Kaladin.

May I ask, what is the purpose of this? It really does not seem like you are really discussing anything with honest intent.

And just to address, Vin had training (Kaladin got none), Vin was selected by two Shards that manipulated her to her endpoint (Kaladin as far as we know achieved it without such intervention), Cultivation only affect people who make deals with her (Taravangian, Dalinar, Lift) no one else (Preservation and Ruin could learn a thing or two about consent from her ) so Kaladin could not have been selected by her.

I am not saying this to dismiss Vin, just feels like your points are intentionally oversimplified and miss important context.

 

[lacrossedeamon]

10 minutes ago, therunner said:

May I ask, what is the purpose of this? It really does not seem like you are really discussing anything with honest intent.

I used a meme from cremposting which led to this current tangent. My intent should be obvious. I find these threads to be inherently without integrity to begin with. If you wanna know how the fandom sides on a topic do it as a poll. Any else is a flimsy excuse to argue for ego points.

But anyways.

21 minutes ago, therunner said:

Cultivation only affect people who make deals with her (Taravangian, Dalinar, Lift) no one else (Preservation and Ruin could learn a thing or two about consent from her ) so Kaladin could not have been selected by her.

I actually accounted for that in my statement by saying that she would have to engineer such a meeting in order to bless Kaladin. That is something I fully believe she could do with her seemingly greater grasp of future sight but didn't.

[alder24]

7 hours ago, Frustration said:

KoW finishes up before the second year does.

7 hours ago, lacrossedeamon said:

Not including Prelude, Prologue, Flashbacks WoK starts in 1172 with Syl beginning to bond even before that and we are now in 1175.

You forgot that Scadrial's day is 24h in 365 day year (Earth-like), Roshar's is 20h in 500 day year. We don't know how Rashek's actions changed Scadrial's day and year, but it didn't affect the character's age and Scadrial's calendar because Rashek kept an old one. So Kaladin's 2 Rosharian years, are 2.28 Scadrial's years.

Spoiler

king of nowhere (paraphrased)

The lord ruler moved Scadrial closer to the sun, and orbital dynamics dictate that so its time of revolution would also become shorter. how did that impact the ages of the characters, and how did it impact the 1024 years of refilling of the well?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

He said that Arcanum unbounded will contain all the calendars and that peter made actual orbital calculations. Brandon also confirmed that the characters ages were really earth ages, and that the lord ruler kept the old calendar in the final empire, even though it did not fit with the length of the year. That sounded very strange to me, but then I remembered that we already have the Islamic calendar who doesn't follow the year, so a calendar not coinciding with the year is something never seen before. he also confirmed that modern Scadrial has an earth-like year duration, which we already knew. he said that people only started asking that in the last year and he was surprised it took that long to ask about that.

Lucca Comics and Games Festival (Oct. 28, 2016)

But this whole "age" argument has no point nor any sense. It's an argument just to disagree.

[lacrossedeamon]

20 minutes ago, alder24 said:

You forgot that Scadrial's day is 24h in 365 day year (Earth-like), Roshar's is 20h in 500 day year. We don't know how Rashek's actions changed Scadrial's day and year, but it didn't affect the character's age and Scadrial's calendar because Rashek kept an old one. So Kaladin's 2 Rosharian years, are 2.28 Scadrial's years.

  Reveal hidden contents

king of nowhere (paraphrased)

The lord ruler moved Scadrial closer to the sun, and orbital dynamics dictate that so its time of revolution would also become shorter. how did that impact the ages of the characters, and how did it impact the 1024 years of refilling of the well?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

He said that Arcanum unbounded will contain all the calendars and that peter made actual orbital calculations. Brandon also confirmed that the characters ages were really earth ages, and that the lord ruler kept the old calendar in the final empire, even though it did not fit with the length of the year. That sounded very strange to me, but then I remembered that we already have the Islamic calendar who doesn't follow the year, so a calendar not coinciding with the year is something never seen before. he also confirmed that modern Scadrial has an earth-like year duration, which we already knew. he said that people only started asking that in the last year and he was surprised it took that long to ask about that.

Lucca Comics and Games Festival (Oct. 28, 2016)

But this whole "age" argument has no point nor any sense. It's an argument just to disagree.

TBF when I said "less time" I actually meant less POV word count (Kaladin is about 100K more than Vin) and then had to scramble to just the exact wording. But your second point is spot on. That's all any of these posts are.

[IlstrawberrySeed]

22 hours ago, Frustration said:

make a bullet with both harmonium and water components so that they mix when the bullet hits.

Ah. I'll look into the TnT equivelent. What would you say is reasonabe, 1/2 the mass of a regular bullet in harmonium? I also meant more the 'Don't think that works' (Paraphrased) and less 'But this might' (Paraphrased)

18 hours ago, therunner said:

No one is arguing that strenght of Reverse Lashing is static, only that the stacking terminology does not apply as there is no equivalent of 'one Lashing'.
The strength seems to vary per amount of Stormlight, and Intent.

That assumes that primer cubes can be miniaturized, and that the mechanism would survive the quite violent acceleration of being fired from a gun.
And why would it not be affected by Reverse Lashing targeting bullets? It is still a bullet (i.e. projectile expelled from firearm).

Doubtful he could time it right, the speed bullet could attain from Reverse Lashing would be magnitude more than his reflexes could allow for.
And even then, he would have no way to ensure the bullet is oriented properly, to be in direction of Windrunner.

That would not do anything, the reaction requires Harmonium to be nearly melted from electricity, and polarized/pulled apart.
Regularly they just repulse each other.

That's how I understood the argument, so thanks for clarifying. Might I ask what you mean by Intent effecting it?

True. The not effected is for a fist sized or larger projectile - If all previous projectiles are bullet or coin sized, then decent chance Kal uses larger objects so Reverse Lashing doesn't mess up his.

Why would Iron/Steel not let him orient? This is more curiosity, as I already believe it isn't a viable way of getting through plate.

8 hours ago, lacrossedeamon said:

If you wanna know how the fandom sides on a topic do it as a poll. Any else is a flimsy excuse to argue for ego points.

I like these posts more than a poll because you can legitimately figure out why others think they way they do. A poll encourages click and go, while this encourages discourse, and even thread takeover (like that one about nukes in which order is second best). I prettymuch ignore polls because they only convey oppinion.

[Frustration]

Just now, IlstrawberrySeed said:

Ah. I'll look into the TnT equivelent. What would you say is reasonabe, 1/2 the mass of a regular bullet in harmonium? I also meant more the 'Don't think that works' (Paraphrased) and less 'But this might' (Paraphrased)

Harmonium isn't that explosive, only a little more than dynamite. You probably couldn't make more than 1/3 of the bullet harmonium without compromising its integrity.

[alder24]

44 minutes ago, IlstrawberrySeed said:

Ah. I'll look into the TnT equivelent. What would you say is reasonabe, 1/2 the mass of a regular bullet in harmonium? I also meant more the 'Don't think that works' (Paraphrased) and less 'But this might' (Paraphrased)

42 minutes ago, Frustration said:

Harmonium isn't that explosive, only a little more than dynamite. You probably couldn't make more than 1/3 of the bullet harmonium without compromising its integrity.

Yes, and you need water, so 1/6 for Harmonium and 1/6 for water. It probably would look like a mini rpg. I doubt you could do it that small

[lacrossedeamon]

14 hours ago, IlstrawberrySeed said:

I like these posts more than a poll because you can legitimately figure out why others think they way they do. A poll encourages click and go, while this encourages discourse, and even thread takeover (like that one about nukes in which order is second best). I prettymuch ignore polls because they only convey oppinion.

I would be hard pressed to call anything these style posts encourages discourse. More like people (including myself) shouting at into the void with very little factual basis.

[therunner]

On 25/02/2023 at 9:29 AM, lacrossedeamon said:

I used a meme from cremposting which led to this current tangent. My intent should be obvious. I find these threads to be inherently without integrity to begin with. If you wanna know how the fandom sides on a topic do it as a poll. Any else is a flimsy excuse to argue for ego points.

2 hours ago, lacrossedeamon said:

I would be hard pressed to call anything these style posts encourages discourse. More like people (including myself) shouting at into the void with very little factual basis.

If you find these threads to be without integrity to begin with, why participate? Others clearly feel differently, and find them useful and interesting.

If you feel you shout into void without factual basis why do so? Personally I try to root my arguments either in books, WoBs, or order of magnitude estimates from the books (like for the strength of push on coin).

I agree with @IlstrawberrySeed (took me while to figure out what are the first two letters ) that in the discussion people are at least forced to defend their opinion, making it (IMO) more valuable then a poll. And if someones opinion is clearly based on misunderstanding of the powers etc. it does affect the weight of their opinion. Of course it is at the end still a discussion about fictional powers and people, however the discussion can be fun purely for the rhetorical and intellectual exercise it offers.

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I actually accounted for that in my statement by saying that she would have to engineer such a meeting in order to bless Kaladin. That is something I fully believe she could do with her seemingly greater grasp of future sight but didn't.

Her future sight could allow for it, but possibly other restrictions could not.
Cultivation's vessel is a dragon, and from the other example (Xisis) it seems that their interference is limited to deal making, prohibiting Cultivation from overt manipulation of events in her favor.
Seeing that so far all of Cultivation's interference was from deal making, this suggest that she can plausibly operate under such restriction herself.
 

16 hours ago, IlstrawberrySeed said:

That's how I understood the argument, so thanks for clarifying. Might I ask what you mean by Intent effecting it?

Happy to help, and sorry for not being clear from the go.
On the Intent affecting it, I meant that seemingly the strength of Reverse Lashing is determined by the intentended effect, i.e. Kaladin wanted to draw arrows towards him, so the strength was appropriate for that effect. Kaladin wanted to rip a head off, so the strength was appropriate.
Effectively this makes it relatively instinctual to use, as you 'just' pull as much as you 'Intent' to.
This despite him being unpracticed and relatively unfamiliar with Reverse Lashing usage.

That is by contract with Basic Lashing, where it seems that the natural way to work with it is by applying 'single Lashing', and strength is then changed by applying it multiple times.
Later on with more practice, we see Windrunners use half/quarter Lashings etc, and later still SA5 reading spoilers

Spoiler

Kaladin casualy floats around, without really thinking about applying Lashings anymore.

So for the Basic Lashing you can get to the instinctual/only Intent usage as well, but it takes more time and practice.

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True. The not effected is for a fist sized or larger projectile - If all previous projectiles are bullet or coin sized, then decent chance Kal uses larger objects so Reverse Lashing doesn't mess up his.

Could you explain? I don't think I understand your point here.

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Why would Iron/Steel not let him orient? This is more curiosity, as I already believe it isn't a viable way of getting through plate.

It would require perceiving bullet as consisting of multiple parts, which while Wax was able to do a few times, not with consistency to rely on it.
Plus again, the speed at which the bullet would be moving would render such attempt to orient extremely difficult, you would need to adjust the bullet on ~0.01 seconds scale, which is beyond human reflexes.

[IlstrawberrySeed]

On 2/26/2023 at 1:49 AM, therunner said:

I agree with @IlstrawberrySeed (took me while to figure out what are the first two letters ) that in the discussion people are at least forced to defend their opinion, making it (IMO) more valuable then a poll. And if someones opinion is clearly based on misunderstanding of the powers etc. it does affect the weight of their opinion. Of course it is at the end still a discussion about fictional powers and people, however the discussion can be fun purely for the rhetorical and intellectual exercise it offers.

Happy to help, and sorry for not being clear from the go.
On the Intent affecting it, I meant that seemingly the strength of Reverse Lashing is determined by the intentended effect, i.e. Kaladin wanted to draw arrows towards him, so the strength was appropriate for that effect. Kaladin wanted to rip a head off, so the strength was appropriate.
Effectively this makes it relatively instinctual to use, as you 'just' pull as much as you 'Intent' to.
This despite him being unpracticed and relatively unfamiliar with Reverse Lashing usage.

That is by contract with Basic Lashing, where it seems that the natural way to work with it is by applying 'single Lashing', and strength is then changed by applying it multiple times.
Later on with more practice, we see Windrunners use half/quarter Lashings etc, and later still SA5 reading spoilers

  Reveal hidden contents

Kaladin casualy floats around, without really thinking about applying Lashings anymore.

So for the Basic Lashing you can get to the instinctual/only Intent usage as well, but it takes more time and practice.

Could you explain? I don't think I understand your point here.

It would require perceiving bullet as consisting of multiple parts, which while Wax was able to do a few times, not with consistency to rely on it.
Plus again, the speed at which the bullet would be moving would render such attempt to orient extremely difficult, you would need to adjust the bullet on ~0.01 seconds scale, which is beyond human reflexes.

I have had people in real life pronounce it "el" as in 2 Ls, but It's the start of a name, so it would be "Ll", not "Il." Then there are those that go for "eye -" or "ih." I always find it funny when something so seemingly simple turns out to be complicated. Also, some people try to ttrpg to cannon, and ttrpgs often go into unexplored territory. I am soon to start one such as that - interactions will happen much faster than the books, so I need to understand the realevence. And then there are interactions between cosmere and non-cosmere, and how do I mesh the magics together.

Ah, I see.

My point is that if I fire regular Era 2 firearms, and a windrunner Reverse Lashes them, all bullets no matter the type will be taken. But if I fire a handcannon, which has a fistsized or slightly larger sphere, and uses black powder rather than cartridges (filled with black powder), it may not be unaffected. Some would think of it as a (quite large) bullet, others would think of it as a diffrent kind of projectile. Does the reverse lashing target it?

The other section is if Kal doesn't know what a bullet is, be might set the RL to target "Small projectiles" and use "medium projectiles" himself, such that his projectiles are uneffected. Of course, this means a handcannon's projectile would be unaffected.

[therunner]

2 hours ago, IlstrawberrySeed said:

I have had people in real life pronounce it "el" as in 2 Ls, but It's the start of a name, so it would be "Ll", not "Il." Then there are those that go for "eye -" or "ih." I always find it funny when something so seemingly simple turns out to be complicated. Also, some people try to ttrpg to cannon, and ttrpgs often go into unexplored territory. I am soon to start one such as that - interactions will happen much faster than the books, so I need to understand the realevence. And then there are interactions between cosmere and non-cosmere, and how do I mesh the magics together.

Ah, no the fun with languages and letters and pronunciations   I have my share of those as well, with my RL name using combinations and orders of letters uncommon in English, leading to some interesting pronunciations.

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My point is that if I fire regular Era 2 firearms, and a windrunner Reverse Lashes them, all bullets no matter the type will be taken. But if I fire a handcannon, which has a fistsized or slightly larger sphere, and uses black powder rather than cartridges (filled with black powder), it may not be unaffected. Some would think of it as a (quite large) bullet, others would think of it as a diffrent kind of projectile. Does the reverse lashing target it?

I would say yes, as from the viewpoint of Windrunner it is effectively the same as bullet, being a projectile propelled by 'explosion'. More refined intent would possibly leave it unaffected (i.e. if Windrunner would want to shoot themselves). My opinion of course.

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The other section is if Kal doesn't know what a bullet is, be might set the RL to target "Small projectiles" and use "medium projectiles" himself, such that his projectiles are uneffected. Of course, this means a handcannon's projectile would be unaffected.

Yes, I reason along similar lines.
A lot would be riding on his perception there I think.

[cometaryorbit]

On 2/24/2023 at 4:32 PM, alder24 said:

Keep in mind that Singers don't fight just for fighting, they fight not only for freedom, but for their minds. If they lose, they could end up as mindless slaves again. For them Fused are the only ones that fight on their side and make this fight even. Humans retreating from 90% of Roshar would be a victory, and would be more beneficial for Singers than Radiants. Do they even have to attack them? For that there would be a lot of volunteers, and when Singers realized how much it cost them, it would be too late.

During the Desolations, the losing-their-minds possibility wasn't known: that was a total surprise at the time of the Recreance. I was talking about the ancient Desolations, not the current True Desolation.

[alder24]

6 hours ago, cometaryorbit said:

During the Desolations, the losing-their-minds possibility wasn't known: that was a total surprise at the time of the Recreance. I was talking about the ancient Desolations, not the current True Desolation.

Oh right, so the betrayal of spren has brought them there. But that's not good motivation so Singers could revolt if pushed too far, but it didn't happen, nor did humans use that brilliant tactic of forced relocations. I remember I already wrote why it wouldn't work, mainly because people are stubborn and wouldn't want to leave their home, but I don't know where it was.

[cometaryorbit]

On 3/2/2023 at 5:15 AM, alder24 said:

Oh right, so the betrayal of spren has brought them there. But that's not good motivation so Singers could revolt if pushed too far, but it didn't happen, nor did humans use that brilliant tactic of forced relocations. I remember I already wrote why it wouldn't work, mainly because people are stubborn and wouldn't want to leave their home, but I don't know where it was.

They clearly didn't do it, sure, but I disagree that's why. People being reluctant to leave their homes isn't enough, because this is a war of survival, and it wouldn't be smart tactics to waste resources protecting people who refused to move to your safe cities - especially if you have Soulcasting on your side for logistics.

I think the reason it wasn't tried was likely that they simply didn't think of it (I don't think Desolations era Rosharans, who were oherwise somewhere between stone and bronze age, had the cultural mindset needed to fully exploit the logistics possibilities of Soulcasting, and the Heralds were likely already 'worn thin' by the time Radiants became numerous and powerful), and also that Windrunners' and likely Edgedancers' oaths wouldn't let the Radiants just say "move or you will not be protected".

[alder24]

22 minutes ago, cometaryorbit said:

They clearly didn't do it, sure, but I disagree that's why. People being reluctant to leave their homes isn't enough, because this is a war of survival, and it wouldn't be smart tactics to waste resources protecting people who refused to move to your safe cities - especially if you have Soulcasting on your side for logistics

Tell this to Windrunners and Edgedancers.

[cometaryorbit]

Yeah, I agree - the limits of Radiant oaths are likely a huge reason why the later Desolations were not one-sided. The very people who had the mobility and logistics to truly organize a unified Roshar-wide war effort ... probably couldn't, and coordinating Orders with totally different requirements was probably a nightmare. Honor was around then, but his nature was oaths - he probably wouldn't/couldn't help find ways to get around their stricter limitations.

Hmmm, that might actually explain much of it. If the Fused weren't insane before the 4500 year imprisonment, and were directly coordinated by Odium (and/or Ba-Ado-Mishram), their side of the war might have been far better run.

Although, if the Fused were that good then how did they lose the earlier Desolations, before Radiants? I think there has to be some arms-race aspect to it too...

Edited March 14, 2023 by cometaryorbit

[therunner]

3 hours ago, cometaryorbit said:

Although, if the Fused were that good then how did they lose the earlier Desolations, before Radiants? I think there has to be some arms-race aspect to it too...

In very early desolations Fused did not have Surges yet.
Also the gaps between Desolations were longer, so humanity was allowed to rebuild.
And finally, Surgebinders started appearing among human even before Ishar turned them into Knights Radiant, so that would also help.