Blade math

[CtrlAltDepressed]

Hello friends,

 

@listerfeend and I were discussing deadblades and noticed some inconsistencies. Dalinar tells us there are somewhere around 130 blades that the Alethi know about. I think we can take this number as mostly accurate given they have warred with pretty much every nation and have an extensive spy network.

 

In Lasting Integrity during Adolin's trial, it is noted that there are far more deadeyes outside the walls than all the known blades on Roshar. In addition Dalinars vision shows hundreds of Radiants abandoning their oaths. This is the first inconsistency. Where are all of these blades? I think the current theory is that the shin have them, and that is a theory I can get on board with but it doesn't explain everything. 

 

Second inconsistency is the actual presence of the deadeyes. We know that when a person who has bonded a blade dies, they drop the blade in its physical form, meaning there is not a deadeye spren in the CR - they can only be one or the other. From this you would assume that any deadeyes who are not currently bonded would exist as physical blades somewhere. Its my understanding that a deadeye can only exist in the CR if they are bonded and their person does not currently have them in hand. How then are there permanent deadeye residents of Lasting Integrity? The ones that show up during the trial could be blades bonded to shin soldiers, but there is still an inconsistency here I think.

 

Can you all shed some light on what is happening here?

[alder24]

1 hour ago, CtrlAltDepressed said:

Dalinar tells us there are somewhere around 130 blades that the Alethi know about.

Correction 80. 300 Radiants from 2 orders abandoned their Oaths at the Feverstone Keep. WoK ch 52:

Quote

There looked to be a good two hundred Shardbearers out there. Alethkar owned some twenty Blades, Jah Keved a similar number. If one added up all the rest in the world, there might be enough total to equal the two powerful Vorin kingdoms. That meant, so far as he knew, there were less than a hundred Blades in all of the world. And here he saw two hundred Shardbearers gathered in one army. It was mind-numbing.
The Radiants slowed, falling into a trot, then a walk. The soldiers around Dalinar grew still. The leading Radiants stopped in a line, immobile. Suddenly, others began to fall from the sky. They hit with the sound of rock cracking, pus of Stormlight blossoming from their gures. These all glowed blue.
Soon, there were some three hundred Radiants out on the eld.

2000 Honorspren were killed during Recreance. That's the entire species of spren gone. Other spren were probably similarly numbered, but only Honorspren answered to the call in the fullest. So there still should be high thousands of deadeye spren all around Roshar. RoW ch 87:

Quote

“Are there many?” Adolin asked.
“In total? We have some twenty deadeyed honorspren in the fortress now, though there were some two thousand honorspren alive at the time of your betrayal. A single one survived.”

 

1 hour ago, CtrlAltDepressed said:

Can you all shed some light on what is happening here?

Yes, I've noticed that too and there are some WoBs on that, but they don't show the full picture. In my opinion two things have to  happen to leave behind a Shardblade:

1. You have to be at 3rd Oath to be able to summon the blade in the first place. Those of 1st and 2nd Ideal would not have left a Shardblade behind, just a deadeye spren in CR.
2. You have to break your Oaths while having your spren in the form of a Shardblade. If you don't do that, the spren would be deadeyed in CR, they wouldn't have left behind a Shardblade.

For example Syl wasn't left behind as a Shardblade when Kaladin almost broke his Oaths because he wasn't of 3rd Ideal, nor Testament was said to be left as a Shardblade in the garden because she wasn't summoned as a Shardblade at that time.

The Feverstone Keep was probably a unique event, one of a kind. The Recreance took place over a few days, most Radiants and their spren independently came to the same conclusion and abandoned their Oaths - they would most likely do it in silence, alone, without summoning their blades, thus leaving behind only a dead spren in CR. That's my explanation why there aren't thousands of Shardblades laying around, just a few hundreds. 

But that still is a lot of missing Shardblades . Maya is a Cultivationspren, even if only Windrunners and Stonewards left their Shardblades in such numbers, there clearly were others that did the same - probably for the sake of humanity in the future, leaving them weapons to fight against Odium, just in case. Where are they? 

Yes, I agree that many are hidden in Shinovar - they have a tendency to collect fancy swords. They also invaded Roshar on several occasions using cavalry, Honorblades and Surges. They might have even used those invasions to cover up that they were collecting Shardblades. They certainly have a small cache of Shardblades by now. Skybreakers also have a few of them. But many blades were lost to weather, crem, or the ocean. Around half of them. Not a satisfying answer but that's a canon for now.

Spoiler

Zykai (paraphrased)

Did the Shin use Honorblades in their invasions? If yes, did they also use Surges?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Yes and yes.

Stuttgart signing (May 17, 2019)

 

Spoiler

Questioner

Was the Shin invasion a cover for gathering lots of Shardblades and hiding them away?

Brandon Sanderson

RAFO.

Starsight Release Party (Nov. 26, 2019)

 

Spoiler

Questioner

The missing number of Shardblades. I just want to confirm that, when the Blades were abandoned, that all of them stayed in the Physical Realm. My question is, did some just evaporate?

Brandon Sanderson

Ahh, good question. They did not evaporate.

Skyward San Francisco signing (Nov. 8, 2018)

 

Spoiler

Jofwu

It seems that deadeyes can wander Shadesmar freely, but when summoned as a Shardblade and subsequently dismissed, they end up at the location in Shadesmar corresponding to the location of the Shardbearer. How does this work for deadeyes who are cared for by a loved one, like Captain Ico?

Brandon Sanderson

They would vanish if their Shardblade were summoned.

Adam Horne

But it's been a while since that's happened, so it's not as much of a concern?

Brandon Sanderson

You can assume that there are more deadeyes wandering Shadesmar whose Shardblades have been lost, than there are ones that the Shardblades are kept. Probably about an equal number, I would say, 50/50. Though I would have to really crunch those numbers. I'd say that across 5000 years-ish... not quite, but you know. That a lot of those weapons, even though they are powerful and things like that, are gonna get lost. Ships are gonna get sunk; things get covered over with crem on Roshar; people go up to cross mountain passes to go attack, and they end up freezing and dying. And I think that over the years, there's been a ton of those that have been lost.

YouTube Spoiler Stream 4 (June 16, 2022)

[The Stick]

A few things.

First of all, it is mentioned multiple times that a lot of blades were simply lost over the centuries, and are now probably in remote locations without owners.

Secondly, when blades are not summoned, the deadeyed spren has a physical form in Shadesmar that attempts to correspond it its location in the Physical realm. So all of the residents of Lasting Integrity are likely from lost blades that are not being actively summoned. We also know from the honorspren that a deadeyed resident being summoned as a blade will make the spren disappear from the current location.

Quote

87] Another difference between the two is that dead Shardblades do not automatically remain summoned when dropped or placed somewhere by their owner.[3] If a Shardbearer does not intentionally command their Blade mentally to remain, the Blade will automatically be dismissed and will have to be summoned all over again.[8] When a Shardblade is not actively summoned, the spren appear within Shadesmar as a deadeye, where their eyes take on an appearance of having been scratched away, like scraping paint off a painting.[88] This is related to how the eyes of people killed by Shardblades burn.[89] The deadeyes have no apparent personality or autonomy, instead they will wander to the location that corresponds with the location in the Physical Realm of their corpse, or the person bonded to it unless prevented from doing so. If the person it is bonded to is themself in Shadesmar the spren will follow them around within Shadesmar

 

Edited May 14 by The Stick
Added Coppermind

[CtrlAltDepressed]

13 minutes ago, The Stick said:

First of all, it is mentioned multiple times that a lot of blades were simply lost over the centuries

Yes, but are we to assume that thousands of the most valuable object are just lost? Sure some of them are lost but where are the rest? There were more deadeyes at lasting integrity than all of the known blades. Are we to assume all of those are bonded? Where are these shardbearers?

[The Stick]

Yes, especially on a planet where cream builds up regularly to cover pretty much everything old. Now that might now necessarily be the most satisfying explanation, but it works if Sanderson needs it to. 

Keep in mind some other stuff could have happened like potential worldhoppers trying to cart them away, or potentially the Unmade trying to manipulate them to get hidden.

[listerfeend]

49 minutes ago, The Stick said:

Secondly, when blades are not summoned, the deadeyed spren has a physical form in Shadesmar that attempts to correspond it its location in the Physical realm. So all of the residents of Lasting Integrity are likely from lost blades that are not being actively summoned. We also know from the honorspren that a deadeyed resident being summoned as a blade will make the spren disappear from the current location.

This is true, yes, however, when someone bonded to a blade dies, the blade appears in the PR, the spren does not stay in the CR. This should also be true of the Blades from the Recreance (Keeping in mind, there are more Shardblades in the single scene of the vision Dalinar had of the Recreance at Feverstone Keep than there are currently recorded, and that was only part of the entirety of the Knights Radiant of the time). So, you're saying that there are hundreds of spren from blades that don't have owners milling about in the CR, but that shouldn't be the case. The only way for there to be a Deadeye in the CR is for the Blade to have been bonded by someone, and then not be summoned.

So, what we have is an account of more deadeyes in and around Lasting Integrity than known Shardbearers in the world. So either there is a massive army of Shardbearers that literally no one has mentioned, or there is something else going on entirely...

Edited May 14 by listerfeend

[CtrlAltDepressed]

50 minutes ago, The Stick said:

Yes, especially on a planet where cream builds up regularly to cover pretty much everything old.

These aren't abandoned buildings, they are one of the most valuable items on the planet. We are told they are literally worth kingdoms. There is no way that hundreds of blades have been lost to the crem. Some of them, absolutely, but there are hundreds and hundreds of blades that are missing.

 

23 minutes ago, listerfeend said:

So, what we have is an account of more deadeyes in and around Lasting Integrity than known Shardbearers in the world. So either there is a massive army of Shardbearers that literally no one has mentioned, or there is something else going on entirely...

23 minutes ago, listerfeend said:

there are more Shardblades in the single scene of the vision Dalinar had of the Recreance at Feverstone Keep than there are currently recorded, and that was only part of the entirety of the Knights Radiant of the time

Exactly. 

Edited May 14 by CtrlAltDepressed

[+hwiles]

Something to bear in mind here is the existence of highstorms I think.

It might feel like an ex machina a bit, but...any blade dropped in a highstorm is likely gone forever. Maybe the stormfather takes them and collects them on purpose or out of mercy, or maybe they all end up dumped in the ocean at total random. Both would be pretty fair explanations given that blades are traditionally used most effectively in wars and the most ruthless types of wars, ie: the ones most likely to yield super high returns at very high risk, are fought on the extreme edges of their supporting logistics, ie: armies with lots of blades early after the recreance would be utilizing the storms to create ultra high value (ultra high risk) strategic boundary conditions for their conflicts...

[Treamayne]

2 hours ago, listerfeend said:

The math is not mathing for how many Deadeye spren there are in Lasting Integrity, vs how many known Shardblades there are.

I feel like you missed Alder's post (likely posting at the same time). More specifically:

2 hours ago, alder24 said:

In my opinion two things have to  happen to leave behind a Shardblade:

1. You have to be at 3rd Oath to be able to summon the blade in the first place. Those of 1st and 2nd Ideal would not have left a Shardblade behind, just a deadeye spren in CR.
2. You have to break your Oaths while having your spren in the form of a Shardblade. If you don't do that, the spren would be deadeyed in CR, they wouldn't have left behind a Shardblade.

For example Syl wasn't left behind as a Shardblade when Kaladin almost broke his Oaths because he wasn't of 3rd Ideal, nor Testament was said to be left as a Shardblade in the garden because she wasn't summoned as a Shardblade at that time.

The Feverstone Keep was probably a unique event, one of a kind. The Recreance took place over a few days, most Radiants and their spren independently came to the same conclusion and abandoned their Oaths - they would most likely do it in silence, alone, without summoning their blades, thus leaving behind only a dead spren in CR. That's my explanation why there aren't thousands of Shardblades laying around, just a few hundreds. 

But that still is a lot of missing Shardblades .

Spoiler

2 hours ago, alder24 said:

Jofwu

It seems that deadeyes can wander Shadesmar freely, but when summoned as a Shardblade and subsequently dismissed, they end up at the location in Shadesmar corresponding to the location of the Shardbearer. How does this work for deadeyes who are cared for by a loved one, like Captain Ico?

Brandon Sanderson

They would vanish if their Shardblade were summoned.

Adam Horne

But it's been a while since that's happened, so it's not as much of a concern?

Brandon Sanderson

You can assume that there are more deadeyes wandering Shadesmar whose Shardblades have been lost, than there are ones that the Shardblades are kept. Probably about an equal number, I would say, 50/50. Though I would have to really crunch those numbers. I'd say that across 5000 years-ish... not quite, but you know. That a lot of those weapons, even though they are powerful and things like that, are gonna get lost. Ships are gonna get sunk; things get covered over with crem on Roshar; people go up to cross mountain passes to go attack, and they end up freezing and dying. And I think that over the years, there's been a ton of those that have been lost.

YouTube Spoiler Stream 4 (June 16, 2022)

 

 

Also discussed:

• Where are the missing Shardblades?
• Missing Shardblade Theory

[Isilel]

On 5/14/2024 at 10:15 PM, listerfeend said:

Immediately post Recreance, ALL Spren that held a Nahel Bond were locked into Blade form in the PR. Still, no Deadeye Spren, they are all in the PR. 

 

I think that some Elsecallers and Lightweavers went to Aimia and figured out how to turn their spren into Soulcasters instead. 

[listerfeend]

2 minutes ago, hwiles said:

It might feel like an ex machina a bit, but...any blade dropped in a highstorm is likely gone forever. Maybe the stormfather takes them and collects them on purpose or out of mercy, or maybe they all end up dumped in the ocean at total random. Both would be pretty fair explanations given that blades are traditionally used most effectively in wars and the most ruthless types of wars, ie: the ones most likely to yield super high returns at very high risk, are fought on the extreme edges of their supporting logistics, ie: armies with lots of blades early after the recreance would be utilizing the storms to create ultra high value (ultra high risk) strategic boundary conditions for their conflicts...

That is a fair point, surely some have been lost to Highstorms, and flung into the ocean, or embedded deep within the ground or mountains. This still doesn't explain there being more deadeyes in Lasting Integrity than there are accounted for blades, nor for the permanent residence deadeyes within Lasting Integrity. 

It's been explicitly stated that Blades appear in the PR when their wielder dies. This is true, to the best of our knowledge, for all the Blades of Radiants that were a part of the Recreance. This also makes sense logically, as Spren bonded with a Human remain in the PR with their human. We are also shown this happening in the Vision of Feverstone Keep.

Let's attack this from a different angle. Pre-Recreance, there were no Deadeye Spren. Immediately post Recreance, ALL Spren that held a Nahel Bond were locked into Blade form in the PR. Still, no Deadeye Spren, they are all in the PR. (There may have been some Radiants that decided to break their oaths while they were in the CR, potentially, which would mean there could be a handful of Deadeye spren at this time, but the VAST majority would be locked in the physical realm in Blade form, so I'm going to just ignore those for the moment to make the argument clear). 

So, here we are, in the...well, we don't even know how long it took them to figure out how to attach a gem to the Blades to allow them to be bonded and dismissed and summoned. Let's just call it a decade. So, for a decade after the Recreance, there could be no Deadeyes in the CR. Just Blades in the PR. Then we get to the point where they figure out how to add the Gem to the Blades, and now they can be summoned/dismissed, so we start seeing Deadeyes in the CR. 

The math is not mathing for how many Deadeye spren there are in Lasting Integrity, vs how many known Shardblades there are. Only a Blade that was fitted with a gemstone should produce a Deadeyed Spren to be seen in the Cognitive Realm. Any Blade lost to the crem, or to Highstorms has either A) Never been bonded, doesn't have a Gem, and therefor should not have a Deadeyed representative in the Cognitive Realm, or B ) HAS been bonded, in which case cannot and would not be a permanent residence of Lasting Integrity (even soldier who retire would summon the blade now and again, or more likely, pass it on to someone else who will use it), and would be stuck in the Physical Realm in Blade form should the person wielding it happen to die in some far off remote place, or drowning at the bottom of the sea....

The only explanation is that there are hundreds more Shardblades, bonded by unknown people, or perhaps never bonded, and are still gemless, being toted around or hung on walls somewhere...