Does it bother you that Brandon relies on legalistic contracts for plot and storytelling?

[Lord Stormer]

It's a topic I shelved in my mind for quite a time already, but now I feel compelled now to ask your opinions about. For those who've read Stormlight and Mistborn I think you'll understand which parts I'm referring to, but since this thread is not posted under Cosmere Discussion, I'm not spoiling anything.

While I do respect and acknowledge Brandon's renown on hard worldbuilding, when I started the Cosmere last year, I felt foreboding I'm not going to get through easy. Brandon builds worlds like fixed frames - hard magic and something I can call closed lore. It doesn't fit well on me, but best if you want your world managable for future planning. For one specific aspect, though, he went too far.

I'm not a fan of hard magic systems, I have little against it. However, I am uneasy how he overstretched the importance of binding contracts for storytelling. There's nothing wrong in letting characters to be legally bound or face reprecussions, but in Stormlight's case (you know this), a grand fantasy conflict is governed by a complex set of legal mechanics from an ancient agreement to the final resolution. It's not just confusing, but because it feels abstract and inorganic, especially when characters debate loopholes to exploit, and I think that crossed a red line.

It's not the only example, as you might have read. Since Brandon has written about contracts early on, I have worries that it'll continue.

I just want to know your opinions about this.

Edited November 7, 2025 by Lord Stormer
Clarity on title and wordings

[KnightSkye Reforged They/Them]

Personally, I don't think that a contract needs to do away with an organic plot. That may just be my personal preference, but as we've already seen in stormlight, the contracts aren't hyper ridged. They have room to be interpreted and worked within. It reminds me somewhat of many old British faerie tales, where contracts play a constant and interesting role with Fae. They do not make the plot less fluid, but they limit very powerful beings to a point where they make sense and can work. 

It brings a sense of old fantasy, what we might call folk tales or faerie tales, to a modern fantasy setting, brining in the essence of one's word carrying great weight. I personally enjoy that.

[Hoid Slayer He/Him]

8 hours ago, Lord Stormer said:

It's a topic I shelved in my mind for quite a time already, but now I feel compelled now to ask your opinions about. For those who've read Stormlight and Mistborn I think you'll understand which parts I'm referring to, but since this thread is not posted under Cosmere Discussion, I'm not spoiling anything.

While I do respect and acknowledge Brandon's renown on hard worldbuilding, when I started the Cosmere last year, I felt foreboding I'm not going to get through easy. Brandon builds worlds like fixed frames - hard magic and something I can call closed lore. It doesn't fit well on me, but best if you want your world under control for future planning, but to an extent, he went too far.

I don't really like hard magic systems, but I have little against it. However, I am uneasy how he overstretched the importance of binding contracts for storytelling. There's nothing wrong in letting characters to be legally bound or face reprecussions, but in Stormlight's case (you know this), a grand fantasy conflict is governed by a complex set of legal mechanics, from starting terms to the final resolution. The problem lies not at the confusing terms, but because it feels abstract, which I think crossed a red line.

It's not the only example, as you might have read. From his earlier books, Brandon relied on legalist agreements to enrich the story, so I think it will continue on. For someone who wants the plot to be more organic, I have worries.

 

I agree with KnightSkye

And I also really don't think the legalism is really prevalent enough to be a problem; I hadn't really noted it as a consistent trend

The biggest example I can think of is Stormlight, and while it took me a while to understand, following book 5 it made a lot more sense as an important part of the plot

The only potential issue I see is this:

In a way, the legalism is kinda necessary. Brandon has put himself in a somewhat uncomfortable position where the power dynamics in many stories are absurdly skewed; without something like the legal mechanics in Stormlight, the good guys would stand literally zero chance against Odium. Shards are just too OP to be fought in what you call an "organic" manner

So, unless the bad guys get severely nerfed in some other form, I think the legal mechanics are here to stay, for good or bad

[Lord Stormer]

11 hours ago, Hoid Slayer said:

I agree with KnightSkye

And I also really don't think the legalism is really prevalent enough to be a problem; I hadn't really noted it as a consistent trend

The biggest example I can think of is Stormlight, and while it took me a while to understand, following book 5 it made a lot more sense as an important part of the plot

The only potential issue I see is this:

In a way, the legalism is kinda necessary. Brandon has put himself in a somewhat uncomfortable position where the power dynamics in many stories are absurdly skewed; without something like the legal mechanics in Stormlight, the good guys would stand literally zero chance against Odium. Shards are just too OP to be fought in what you call an "organic" manner

So, unless the bad guys get severely nerfed in some other form, I think the legal mechanics are here to stay, for good or bad

Very much agree with you when you said legalism has become necessary. The definitive and rational nature of Investiture allows for such mechanisms to arise. Brandon's structured writing style may encourage application of this, which I see as a potential drawback in the genre of fantasy where magic is intuitively supposed to be fantastical.

While writing this response I thought of this: it may be up to the reader's subconsious expectation. I generally favor soft magic and worldbuilding. As I'm working on my own novel, I prefer things to happen naturally and organic. We readers who are exposed to Brandon's defined brand of worldbuilding tend to demand for more reasonable explanations for what's happening, that's why the 17th Shard always have burning questions on how Investiture works. If Brandon were to create the Cosmere through a softer worldbuilding approach, the pursuit for satisfying answers may not be so pressing as we can excuse it as part of the mystery and wonder takes over.

Edited November 6, 2025 by Lord Stormer

[Treamayne]

5 hours ago, Lord Stormer said:

While writing this response I thought of this: it may be up to the reader's subconsious expectation. I generally favor soft magic and worldbuilding. As I'm working on my own novel, I prefer things to happen naturally and organic. We readers who are exposed to Brandon's defined brand of worldbuilding tend to demand for more reasonable explanations for what's happening, that's why the 17th Shard always have burning questions on how Investiture works. If Brandon were to create the Cosmere through a softer worldbuilding approach, the pursuit for satisfying answers is not necessary as mystery and wonder takes over. We can just excuse ourselves that we can never really understand how arcane magic works.

Have you read Sanderson's laws (Link is the third law essay, which has links to one and two)?

Excerpt from Sanderson's First Law:

Spoiler

When I applied to be on the programming of my very first Worldcon (following my sale of Elantris, but before the book was actually released) I saw that they were doing a “How does the magic work?” panel. I eagerly indicated that I’d very much like to be a part of it, and to my delight, the committee put me on it.

It was my very first panel at the convention. I arrived somewhat bleary-eyed after an extended flight from Utah to Boston, but managed to find my way up to the front of the room, notes prepared, ideas prepared, sharpened, and ready to be unsheathed. I sat on the end of the table, and so was the first to speak when the moderator asked “All right, let’s begin with the simple question. How should magic work?”

I said something I took as a GIVEN. After all, I’d read it in Orson Scott Card’s writing book (I highly recommend the chapter on magic [The Writer's Digest Guide to SF&F]) and had used it as a rule of thumb for some time. It was the thing that I assumed was the first law of magic systems.

“Well,” I said. “Obviously magic has to have rules.”

And every other person on the panel disagreed with me violently. “If you have lots of rules and boundaries for your magic,” they explained, “then you lose your sense of wonder! Fantasy is all about wonder! You can’t restrict yourself, or your imagination, by making your magic have rules!”

I was dumbfounded. Suddenly, I realized that most of the reading I’d done on the subject had been produced by a segment of the population who liked a particular kind of magic. However, there appeared to be another complete school of thought on the matter. I struggled to defend myself for the rest of the panel, and left thinking that everyone else there must have really weak magic systems in their books.

Then, I thought about it for a while. Can’t someone have a good story that does things differently from the way I do it? Can’t you have magic without explaining lots of rules and laws for their magic? Tolkien didn’t really explain his magic.

Yet, if the stories don’t have rules and laws for their magic, don’t they risk Deus Ex Machina (contrived endings) in their books? From the beginnings of the fantasy genre, its biggest criticism has been that it has no consistency.

It's okay that you prefer Soft Magic. Sanderson certainly knows and understands the divide - and he does write Soft Magic for his YA titles (Reckoners, Cytoverse); but Cosmere is Hard Magic. Cosmere follows the Three Laws (which, if you have not read them, should explain a lot about why he writes the Cosmere as he does). Moreover, the Cosmere would likely fail if it was written as a Soft Magic 'Verse.

I don't really know what you mean by "legalism" and all that (despite being outside of the Cosmere Discussion section , you can still provide correctly marked and tagged Spoilers) - SA is not a Grisham novel. But I do know that Cosmere only works because it is a Hard Magic environment, and it's okay if you don't enjoy that since there is so much soft magic that you should have no problem finding something else to enjoy. 

Hope that helps

Edited November 6, 2025 by Treamayne
SPAG/Clarity

[Returned he/him]

I don't mind the hard magic systems, though I think we've reached a point in the Cosmere books which will make the magic a lot less interesting and a lot less dynamic. We aren't going to get the same feeling from Allomancy or Surgebinding going forward as we did in The Last Empire or Way of Kings. Not my favorite situation, but so it goes.

I don't mind the idea of contracts either, but that might be because I feel that thus far very little of the stories are reduced down to that. The major reason for the "legalism", as the OP has described it, is because otherwise there isn't any real limit on what a lot of the major characters (and especially Shards) can do. One Shard has infinite power, so why don't they just vaporize their opposition in a conflict that matters to them? There has to be some reason, and "Shardic promises are binding" is as good of one as any.

The actual legalism itself doesn't seem to matter so much outside of this. The restrictions on Shards and Hoid are really important but they don't matter very much for people like Vin, Kelsier, or Shallan. I'll even argue that they're not very important for Radiants. So I will disagree with the OP that these contractual terms govern the conflicts as they play out in the books. They primarily keep the otherwise obviously dominant players from annihilating any chance of a story before it begins and provide exposition for why things are as they are.

I do have some concern that various cross-pressures will lead to future books having kludge-style solutions to problems, which tends to encourage shallower stories. We've already seen a little bit of that, and an inviolable contract certainly fits the bill. But if the books have more of that sort of thing then the specifics of the kludges won't matter to me nearly as much as the fact that any kludge was used at all.

[Lord Stormer]

18 hours ago, Treamayne said:

Have you read Sanderson's laws (Link is the third law essay, which has links to one and two)?

Excerpt from Sanderson's First Law:

  Reveal hidden contents

When I applied to be on the programming of my very first Worldcon (following my sale of Elantris, but before the book was actually released) I saw that they were doing a “How does the magic work?” panel. I eagerly indicated that I’d very much like to be a part of it, and to my delight, the committee put me on it.

It was my very first panel at the convention. I arrived somewhat bleary-eyed after an extended flight from Utah to Boston, but managed to find my way up to the front of the room, notes prepared, ideas prepared, sharpened, and ready to be unsheathed. I sat on the end of the table, and so was the first to speak when the moderator asked “All right, let’s begin with the simple question. How should magic work?”

I said something I took as a GIVEN. After all, I’d read it in Orson Scott Card’s writing book (I highly recommend the chapter on magic [The Writer's Digest Guide to SF&F]) and had used it as a rule of thumb for some time. It was the thing that I assumed was the first law of magic systems.

“Well,” I said. “Obviously magic has to have rules.”

And every other person on the panel disagreed with me violently. “If you have lots of rules and boundaries for your magic,” they explained, “then you lose your sense of wonder! Fantasy is all about wonder! You can’t restrict yourself, or your imagination, by making your magic have rules!”

I was dumbfounded. Suddenly, I realized that most of the reading I’d done on the subject had been produced by a segment of the population who liked a particular kind of magic. However, there appeared to be another complete school of thought on the matter. I struggled to defend myself for the rest of the panel, and left thinking that everyone else there must have really weak magic systems in their books.

Then, I thought about it for a while. Can’t someone have a good story that does things differently from the way I do it? Can’t you have magic without explaining lots of rules and laws for their magic? Tolkien didn’t really explain his magic.

Yet, if the stories don’t have rules and laws for their magic, don’t they risk Deus Ex Machina (contrived endings) in their books? From the beginnings of the fantasy genre, its biggest criticism has been that it has no consistency.

It's okay that you prefer Soft Magic. Sanderson certainly knows and understands the divide - and he does write Soft Magic for his YA titles (Reckoners, Cytoverse); but Cosmere is Hard Magic. Cosmere follows the Three Laws (which, if you have not read them, should explain a lot about why he writes the Cosmere as he does). Moreover, the Cosmere would likely fail if it was written as a Soft Magic 'Verse.

I don't really know what you mean by "legalism" and all that (despite being outside of the Cosmere Discussion section , you can still provide correctly marked and tagged Spoilers) - SA is not a Grisham novel. But I do know that Cosmere only works because it is a Hard Magic environment, and it's okay if you don't enjoy that since there is so much soft magic that you should have no problem finding something else to enjoy. 

Hope that helps

Very well, and I do respect your comment. Thanks also for giving light on spoiler rules.

I struggled to convey my thoughts with clarity, so I've spent many edits to the thread title and my original post's wordings. The day I'm writing when I wrote this thread hasn't gone well in real life.

Now I'm reading Well of Ascension. The book has been difficult going through. It was slow and made worse as I always had this "white room" impression for Mistborn books. In fact, it was reading chapter 13 (where Brandon introduced us to kandras and their contracts) that gave me spark to ask your opinions about this topic.

For all my understanding of soft and hard magic, I always see it as a spectrum. The Cosmere is not absolutely Hard magic, but it leans to that. Intent and interpretations give breathing room for flexibility. But since the universe is inherently built around magic, so I very much accept it works best that way.

To make it straight, not favoring hard magic doesn't mean at all I don't like the Cosmere. I enjoy Stormlight to the end of Wind and Truth, despite criticisms, length, and pacing. So many other things to cherish than the negatives. I am proud to be with Kaladin as he spoke Ideals from the First to the Fifth. Hard magic doesn't deny wonder - I'll send you to the end of Words of Radiance to prove you wrong - but I want to be candid. I like to ask questions and be open with criticism.

7 hours ago, Returned said:

I don't mind the hard magic systems, though I think we've reached a point in the Cosmere books which will make the magic a lot less interesting and a lot less dynamic. We aren't going to get the same feeling from Allomancy or Surgebinding going forward as we did in The Last Empire or Way of Kings. Not my favorite situation, but so it goes.

I don't mind the idea of contracts either, but that might be because I feel that thus far very little of the stories are reduced down to that. The major reason for the "legalism", as the OP has described it, is because otherwise there isn't any real limit on what a lot of the major characters (and especially Shards) can do. One Shard has infinite power, so why don't they just vaporize their opposition in a conflict that matters to them? There has to be some reason, and "Shardic promises are binding" is as good of one as any.

The actual legalism itself doesn't seem to matter so much outside of this. The restrictions on Shards and Hoid are really important but they don't matter very much for people like Vin, Kelsier, or Shallan. I'll even argue that they're not very important for Radiants. So I will disagree with the OP that these contractual terms govern the conflicts as they play out in the books. They primarily keep the otherwise obviously dominant players from annihilating any chance of a story before it begins and provide exposition for why things are as they are.

I do have some concern that various cross-pressures will lead to future books having kludge-style solutions to problems, which tends to encourage shallower stories. We've already seen a little bit of that, and an inviolable contract certainly fits the bill. But if the books have more of that sort of thing then the specifics of the kludges won't matter to me nearly as much as the fact that any kludge was used at all.

Regarding your first point, I have a lot of opinions, but one that stands out may be the expansion of the universe. As the scale becomes grander, an unforseen consequence is a dilution of depth. It's more appealing to read when magic emerges in a world that has mostly forgotten it, than when it comes to dominate the scene. It's exciting when we discovering something new about the magic or watching characters do what has never been done before.

For you last point, it's what in essence what I worry. As conflict and character dynamics complicate (a pattern consistent from the Way of Kings), I fear that straightaway solutions might be the only way how to solve.

[Treamayne]

2 hours ago, Lord Stormer said:

For all my understanding of soft and hard magic, I always see it as a spectrum. The Cosmere is not absolutely Hard magic, but it leans to that. Intent and interpretations give breathing room for flexibility. But since the universe is inherently built around magic, so I very much accept it works best that way.

Concur - it is definitely a spectum (just like Hard and Soft Science Fiction). Cosmere is on the Hard side, but I do not think there is a "6" equivalent for Hard Magic.

2 hours ago, Lord Stormer said:

To make it straight, not favoring hard magic doesn't mean at all I don't like the Cosmere. I enjoy Stormlight to the end of Wind and Truth, despite criticisms, length, and pacing. So many other things to cherish than the negatives. I am proud to be with Kaladin as he spoke Ideals from the First to the Fifth. Hard magic doesn't deny wonder - I'll send you to the end of Words of Radiance to prove you wrong - but I want to be candid. I like to ask questions and be open with criticism.

Thank you for the clarification - the initial post seemed, to me, that you did not like Cosmere. I am sorry for misinterpreting. 

I'm sorry for the sarcasm about Grisham, but I am honestly still unsure about what you mean by using "legalism" in that context. Are you using it as a euphamism for teh rules that govern the Hard Magic?

[king of nowhere]

On 11/6/2025 at 4:35 AM, Hoid Slayer said:

In a way, the legalism is kinda necessary. Brandon has put himself in a somewhat uncomfortable position where the power dynamics in many stories are absurdly skewed; without something like the legal mechanics in Stormlight, the good guys would stand literally zero chance against Odium. Shards are just too OP to be fought in what you call an "organic" manner

 

this. any fantasy setting with literal gods begs the question, why don't the gods intervene directly - since they could solve the plot by snapping their fingers?

brandon has to find excuses to avoid that. binding contracts among shards are the lesser evil.

 

on the more general topic, hard magic is specifically one of the main things i like about sanderson. i've read many fantasy books that were basically "and then the protagonist wishes it really hard, and poof! magic happens". no, i don't want that kind of magic. besides, i am the kind of person who likes to ask questions and analyze, and i like a story where I can dig deeper than "it's just magic, don't ask questions".

[Returned he/him]

8 hours ago, taylercoooper said:

Do you think the increasing emphasis on hard rules, contracts, and cross-pressures in the Cosmere risks making future stories feel more mechanical or ‘kludge-driven’? I understand why binding promises are necessary to limit Shards and keep the story intact, but I’m a bit worried that relying on inviolable contracts and rule-based fixes could lead to shallower resolutions down the line. Am I overthinking this, or have others noticed the same trend?

I think that ultimately the emphases you describe are more symptoms than causes of those feelings, at least for me. My perspective is that the legalism (as described in this thread) in the Cosmere sets up stories but doesn't resolve them. That can feel like a too-convenient, just-so scenario to make story conclusions possible but I would not say that those conclusions are, themselves, the result of those legalities being interpreted, executed, or extended. They definitely can lead to stories feeling less satisfying for a variety of reasons.

My own evaluation is that the hard rule, contract side of things only really came up in a meaningful way in Rhythm of War and Wind and Truth. I think it was inescapable there because the plot was written into a corner: it was necessary for Odium to have been really effective in the past (splintering Shards, everyone afraid of him), but then frequently present on-screen and regularly very ineffective while there despite being in a conflict he himself had devised and spent millennia preparing to decisively win. The key elements of the contract plot device address that as well as anything else (the circumstances were different then, and so what we see happen will be different too) while allowing Odium to still be a character in the story. But we still saw too much of Odium to satisfyingly resolve the contradictory description of his power and efficacy with his persistent, in-text failures.

I also think that people overinterpret the SA contract and how binding and meaningful it really was. We're plainly told that Shards can violate promises all they want, provided that they are willing to pay the cost (some not-at-all-defined vulnerability), and we have seen Shards do that in several cases with varying consequences. The major factor in keeping Odium adherent to the contract was basically just a statement from the Stormfather that Odium "could be hurt, as he has been before" if he were to violate it, with the implication that he wouldn't want to risk that. Even with how the story played out everything was reduced to a self-described loophole, which is hardly the mark of an inviolable contract.

My personal feeling about the first SA arc's conclusion is that a lot of it was pretty weak (definitely not all of it, though), and not due to anything about contracts or legalism. Odium's big plans for conquest were mostly straightforward, unoriginal, and dull. The parallel timing of the plot lines in WaT required some of those plans to be stretched out well beyond whatever plot they could  supply, highlighting things I found unsatisfactory. The need to set up another dozen (at least) Cosmere novels through the setting's flagship series meant that relatively few of the conflicts in SA actually got resolved at all but instead got bridges to being in future books. I got very strong "the princess is in another castle" feelings when I finished it.

Crucially, the contract barely even mattered-- Odium was poised to conquer the world, and now he's conquered... almost the whole world. It makes sense that the characters spent a couple thousand pages fretting about the contract, because that's what they were dealing with, but that also overstated what the contract actually was to the plot. So, in conclusion after my ramblings, no, I do not think that increasing emphasis on legalism and contracts (if it happens) poses a lot of risk for making the stories feel more mechanical or unsatisfying. I think that the factors which might push the stories in those directions already exist independent of that and are already cropping up for unrelated reasons. I tend to feel that bad or ineffective plot devices are more likely the result of weaker writing than they are things which make otherwise strong writing worse. At the end of SA's first arc there was weak plotting, weak pacing, and weak focus on the story at hand for reasons totally separate from the contract or any legalism. I think that we could swap out the contract entirely and still easily end up with the same outcomes and flaws/struggles that were actually published.

[+Oltux72 he/him]

On 12/17/2025 at 10:07 AM, taylercoooper said:

Do you think the increasing emphasis on hard rules, contracts, and cross-pressures in the Cosmere risks making future stories feel more mechanical or ‘kludge-driven’? I understand why binding promises are necessary to limit Shards and keep the story intact, but I’m a bit worried that relying on inviolable contracts and rule-based fixes could lead to shallower resolutions down the line. Am I overthinking this, or have others noticed the same trend?

No. The trend seems to be to the Shards mattering less and less. The Unoathed are rising on Roshar. Technology allows more usage of the wild card in the magic. Imagine what a hemalurgist who has a computational model of a spirit web can do.

The Cosmere is going softer, if you will.

On 12/17/2025 at 8:10 PM, Returned said:

My own evaluation is that the hard rule, contract side of things only really came up in a meaningful way in Rhythm of War and Wind and Truth.

White Sand had a procedural question about how votes are to be done as a central element of the plot. Shades are literally about rules. So, no, I am afraid this is just factually not correct.

[Returned he/him]

7 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

White Sand had a procedural question about how votes are to be done as a central element of the plot. Shades are literally about rules. So, no, I am afraid this is just factually not correct.

I've yet to read White Sand (in any form), so I'll take your word for it and stand corrected on that.

The OP describes books' plots which are dominated by inviolable agreements and resolved by the mechanics of those agreements, constraining all possible actions and only escapable with technicalities (or "loopholes"), which is what I was referring to in my post. I might be forgetting something about Shades, but which stories' plots turn on the technicalities of the rules Shades follow in the same sense that WaT turns on the promises made between Honor and Odium and, later, by the contract Dalinar struck with Odium?

[+Oltux72 he/him]

On 2/12/2026 at 5:52 PM, Returned said:

I might be forgetting something about Shades, but which stories' plots turn on the technicalities of the rules Shades follow in the same sense that WaT turns on the promises made between Honor and Odium and, later, by the contract Dalinar struck with Odium?

Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell. You can club people to death as long as you trap the blood in a bag. The whole story depends on following the rules to the letter disregarding the spirit of the letter.

[Aliroz-The-Confused]

Personally, I think that oaths, promises, vows, and other such word-magic are both resonant and consistent with fantasy.  For example, Cú Chulainn's geasa/geas.

The idea of words as just words and not magic is arguably a strange cultural quirk of modernity, and in exploring contexts outside the narrow confines of our own understanding, it feels more right to try to see things through non-modern eyes than to cram our boring notions onto the imagination.

After all, a book of magic is a Grimoire, which shares a linguistic root with grammar, which shares a root with glamour (both in the "style" and in the "magic, illusion, or mind control" sense).  Enchantment is word-siblings with Incantation, with chanting.

Many cultures have had a notion that Law is something that exists outside of and possibly predates humanity, with figures like Moses and Lycurgus being law-bringers rather than law-makers.  There is a notion of going somewhere to find the law, and then bringing it back.

As for finding loopholes, that's always been a favorite of tricksters, trickster heroes, and trickster deities.

As for contracts, that's been a thing for a long time with various types of faerie/fairy/fae, and the idea of the deal-with-the-devil.

And, as far as science fiction goes, Azimov got endless mileage out of the three laws of robotics.  A lot of science fiction revolves around understanding the laws of reality/physics, around robots who can't go against their programming, and with aliens who are in some ways the strange and otherworldly equivalent of fantasy's fae/fairy/faerie.

My problem is that mister Sanderson doesn't quite seem to understand that leonine contracts don't usually count in these sorts of things (typically, that gets Lawful Evil/Neutral beings like the Kindly Ones very very upset with you, since you're essentially making counterfeit law and thus trying to pass off Chaotic behavior as Lawful), and he lets his characters renounce oaths without facing the eternal consequences that they ought to face.

On 2/13/2026 at 3:13 PM, Oltux72 said:

Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell. You can club people to death as long as you trap the blood in a bag. The whole story depends on following the rules to the letter disregarding the spirit of the letter.

I disagree.  The spirit of the rules is "don't cheese off the spooky ghosts" not "don't kill people".  It's like staying downwind so a coyote doesn't smell you, you're not exploiting a point of law where coyotes are contractually obligated not to mess with you if you're downwind of them, it's being aware of your environment, of how other beings navigate it, and what the consistent patterns are in the actions taken or not taken.

Edited February 14 by Aliroz-The-Confused

[Returned he/him]

On 2/13/2026 at 4:13 PM, Oltux72 said:

Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell. You can club people to death as long as you trap the blood in a bag. The whole story depends on following the rules to the letter disregarding the spirit of the letter.

I'd meant along the lines of what I read the intent of the thread to be: major plots which are resolved because of specific technicalities in agreements which are struck between characters, sometimes off-screen. Certainly rules exist in all of the Cosmere books (they're kind of famous for it). Few of them feature binding contracts as the boundaries for how the on-screen conflicts unfold and are settled.

I wouldn't say that the plot of Shadows turns on those rules in the same way that WaT turns on the specific wording of the agreement Odium and Dalinar strike. Had Silence's bounties not gone to the forests she wouldn't have had to deal with any of that and the plot would have been the same. She had to follow the rules which govern survival where she happened to be, but there was nothing about those rules that was broadly required to apply to her endeavors. There was no contract nor any spirit of any agreement.

As another example, I'll argue that Shadows and Final Empire have similar features in this regard: Vin's victory over the Lord Ruler relies on specific mechanics of Feruchemy. She needs the power of the mists to steelpush on the Lord Ruler's highly-Invested atium rings piercing his skin, and being out of physical contact with those rings prevents him from tapping youth to continue living. Vin understands that situation and leverages that knowledge to win.

That's different from "here are a bunch of rules and restrictions that we've all already agreed to, so we will all follow those rules to the conclusion they allow". The OP (to my reading) is describing this, not the situation in the paragraphs above nor any other version of "rules exist in Cosmere settings". My position is that very few of the novels' plots are governed by the forma legalism the OP describes. They suggest Stormlight, where it really matters for RoW and WaT, and a so-called loophole in that contract is one of the key plot elements not just for those books but in resolving the entire first SA arc. They also suggest Mistborn (era 1, presumably), which I'm less convinced about.

Spoiler

I feel that the agreement between Ruin and Preservation, while important to the overall narrative and the setup of the conflicts in the books, doesn't really apply to how Vin and her allies deal with Ruin or approach the conflict-- the agreement doesn't limit or guide them, and Ruin's fixation on destroying Scadrial would be identically problematic for them if Ruin just decided to destroy the planet. They have to beat Ruin, not manipulate or work inside of any contractual framework, to prevail.

 

Edited February 16 by Returned

[+Oltux72 he/him]

16 hours ago, Returned said:

I'd meant along the lines of what I read the intent of the thread to be: major plots which are resolved because of specific technicalities in agreements which are struck between characters, sometimes off-screen. Certainly rules exist in all of the Cosmere books (they're kind of famous for it). Few of them feature binding contracts as the boundaries for how the on-screen conflicts unfold and are settled.

Fair point. I would counter that the rules of other arcane arts (Sel being another exception) are the kind of rules you'd expect laws of nature to follow. The Simple Rules of Threnody are not.

16 hours ago, Returned said:

That's different from "here are a bunch of rules and restrictions that we've all already agreed to, so we will all follow those rules to the conclusion they allow". The OP (to my reading) is describing this, not the situation in the paragraphs above nor any other version of "rules exist in Cosmere settings". My position is that very few of the novels' plots are governed by the forma legalism the OP describes.

In that case I have to point out the Stormlight Archive exists only due to the specific mechanics of the Oathpact.

[Returned he/him]

12 hours ago, Oltux72 said:

In that case I have to point out the Stormlight Archive exists only due to the specific mechanics of the Oathpact.

That's true. I still don't read that as the technicality-in-a-contract sort of element of the plot, more a thing that happened which set the stage for the situation characters encounter when the books start. I can see an argument that what the nine members did in abandoning Taln is that sort of thing, though at least that isn't the resolution of anything. Maybe that's why it doesn't rankle as much as the contest of champions plot line: it sets the stage for events but doesn't guide or end all that many of them. It's a setup and creates opportunities for things to happen independent of it (while influencing those things), while the contest of champions invites characters to constantly think about what is and is not allowed as events follow courses prescribed by those thoughts on a timeline the contract itself imposes towards an end point the contract itself defines. I don't know if @Lord Stormer feels that way about the Oathpact, maybe it's another example of what they talk about in this thread.

Towards the end of RoW and throughout WaT, you can't get any outcome outside of what the contract describes, and how you act is heavily circumscribed by that same contract. It feels like a category difference to me rather than a difference of degree, and while I don't love the contract I also don't mind it as much as the OP. But I perceive it as being relatively unique to those books (out of all Cosmere works), and the nature of the conflicts in SA do lean harder on the restrictions that limit Shards, if only because the Shards are more directly active in that series.

Edited February 17 by Returned
Removed a long section that was repetitive with earlier posts

[+Oltux72 he/him]

7 hours ago, Returned said:

That's true. I still don't read that as the technicality-in-a-contract sort of element of the plot, more a thing that happened which set the stage for the situation characters encounter when the books start.

No desolations without the Oathpact. Also no heralds to copy without it.

7 hours ago, Returned said:

I can see an argument that what the nine members did in abandoning Taln is that sort of thing, though at least that isn't the resolution of anything. Maybe that's why it doesn't rankle as much as the contest of champions plot line: it sets the stage for events but doesn't guide or end all that many of them. It's a setup and creates opportunities for things to happen independent of it (while influencing those things)

I mean if something last for over 4000 years, it is kind of a resolution. The proposed contest of champions would have yielded a result lasting less than a quarter of that.

7 hours ago, Returned said:

 If you want to spend time in the forest where there are Shades, you have to behave in ways that account for how Shades behave (or die).

But the bears have quite reasonable a reason for their actions. They want to eat your food. The shades react to arbitrary triggers.

7 hours ago, Returned said:

There is no contract governing what you may and may not do, and though there will still be consequences to the choices you make (like always) they aren't defined by any overarching agreement.

But there is a collection of religious texts that define what you are allowed to do, namely whether you are allowed to learn to read.

Edited February 17 by Oltux72
typo inverting the meaning

[Duxredux he/him]

Well... my beef with the legalese in WaT was more that there was no foreshadowing (not counting TOdium spotting the loophole at the end of RoW) for the vulnerabilities in the contract. Everything that went into the contest for the capitals of the Coalition was due to a hideously obscure section of Alethi legal code that had never been mentioned before but apparently existed in the contract created by Yolish Wit using a Connection language hack or the modified version made by Yolish Rayse in the really brief deal made by Dalinar. I didn't see either of them consult a lawbook. Too much weight on that little plot fulcrum. Maybe it's just that this is the consequence of the sudden knee-jerk deal they made, but to have Taravangian exploit a loophole in an agreement that he had no influence over... that bothered me more than the use of contracts. If it had been at the beginning of the series, no problem. This close to the end... it felt like a diabolus ex machina even though it was at the beginning of the book. Okay, I get that it was designed to be the inciting incident and premise for WaT than an arbitrary wrench thrown in at the end of the arc, but still...

Everything about Shards or denizens of the realm of the mind being bound by rules or agreements? Fundamental concepts of reality having to continue to be that concept and to be consistent? Sure, I'll buy that. The loophole that Leras exploited? Sure - that's backstory and premise and he paid a price with his mind. The arbitrary definition of a country for a single nation that applies to the entire coalition? That feels... less on point.

[Lord Stormer]

On 2/17/2026 at 10:41 PM, Returned said:

That's true. I still don't read that as the technicality-in-a-contract sort of element of the plot, more a thing that happened which set the stage for the situation characters encounter when the books start. I can see an argument that what the nine members did in abandoning Taln is that sort of thing, though at least that isn't the resolution of anything. Maybe that's why it doesn't rankle as much as the contest of champions plot line: it sets the stage for events but doesn't guide or end all that many of them. It's a setup and creates opportunities for things to happen independent of it (while influencing those things), while the contest of champions invites characters to constantly think about what is and is not allowed as events follow courses prescribed by those thoughts on a timeline the contract itself imposes towards an end point the contract itself defines. I don't know if @Lord Stormer feels that way about the Oathpact, maybe it's another example of what they talk about in this thread.

Towards the end of RoW and throughout WaT, you can't get any outcome outside of what the contract describes, and how you act is heavily circumscribed by that same contract. It feels like a category difference to me rather than a difference of degree, and while I don't love the contract I also don't mind it as much as the OP. But I perceive it as being relatively unique to those books (out of all Cosmere works), and the nature of the conflicts in SA do lean harder on the restrictions that limit Shards, if only because the Shards are more directly active in that series.

Reading this thread it seems to me there is something worth pointing out, but it's as slippery as soap. I'm not a good articulator. I do feel the same way as the Oathpact as to the WaT contest, because of the process of how agreed words earns its power, and that power is subsequently contested by interpretations that makes them seem technical and legal, or in my old OP "arbitrary." In the intent of my OP, I am comparing this sort of legal mechanic to the nature of fantasy, which I don't see so fitting. A reader should have their natural subconscious flow tuned to fantasy expectations when reading Stormlight Archive, but I felt "disrupted" by the debates of what words mean, and only for the truth - what happens in the end - to not be fully bound by these legalities. I just think there had to be a better way for power to be manifested in words than this.

Edited February 19 by Lord Stormer

[+Oltux72 he/him]

8 hours ago, Duxredux said:

Well... my beef with the legalese in WaT was more that there was no foreshadowing (not counting TOdium spotting the loophole at the end of RoW) for the vulnerabilities in the contract. Everything that went into the contest for the capitals of the Coalition was due to a hideously obscure section of Alethi legal code that had never been mentioned before but apparently existed in the contract created by Yolish Wit using a Connection language hack or the modified version made by Yolish Rayse in the really brief deal made by Dalinar. I didn't see either of them consult a lawbook. Too much weight on that little plot fulcrum.

True. I must say that this hits the problem on the head.

And it looked unforced at that. They could just have found out that Taravangian would have demanded that the Azish surrender or he would have destroyed the city and executed all civilians.

[clowncarcrash]

On 2/18/2026 at 4:41 PM, Duxredux said:

Well... my beef with the legalese in WaT was more that there was no foreshadowing (not counting TOdium spotting the loophole at the end of RoW) for the vulnerabilities in the contract. Everything that went into the contest for the capitals of the Coalition was due to a hideously obscure section of Alethi legal code that had never been mentioned before but apparently existed in the contract created by Yolish Wit using a Connection language hack or the modified version made by Yolish Rayse in the really brief deal made by Dalinar. I didn't see either of them consult a lawbook. Too much weight on that little plot fulcrum. Maybe it's just that this is the consequence of the sudden knee-jerk deal they made, but to have Taravangian exploit a loophole in an agreement that he had no influence over... that bothered me more than the use of contracts. If it had been at the beginning of the series, no problem. This close to the end... it felt like a diabolus ex machina even though it was at the beginning of the book. Okay, I get that it was designed to be the inciting incident and premise for WaT than an arbitrary wrench thrown in at the end of the arc, but still...

Everything about Shards or denizens of the realm of the mind being bound by rules or agreements? Fundamental concepts of reality having to continue to be that concept and to be consistent? Sure, I'll buy that. The loophole that Leras exploited? Sure - that's backstory and premise and he paid a price with his mind. The arbitrary definition of a country for a single nation that applies to the entire coalition? That feels... less on point.

Yeah, I can get this.... however if I can respond. I don't think that really matters much.

Because the legalese did not matter until Todium came into play. Odium says as much in Rhythm of War. Odium assures Dalinar that they didn't need to go into the weird legal specifics because Odium would honor the spirit of the deal. The only reason the legalese mattered was because the power shifted, and obviously Taravangian is totally different and is willing to do underhanded rust if you misplace a comma. So I actually thought that was appropriate. I love this concept because it reminds me of my favorite line from Julius Casesar by Shakspeare. I forget the context but Mark Anthony is making a deal with someone, and that someone wants to shake on it, and Mark Anthony says "Nah, we're men of honor. Our words are enough, we don't need to shake on it." [paraphrased] 

As far as OP is concerned....yeah I get his grievance but personally I can dismiss it. We're dealing with gods and the problem with stories of omnipotent gods is "Why don't they the powerful gods just do x and end the story". So there's always going to be a need of a contrivance to restrict them somehow. As much as Brandon is famous for his hard magic systems, the Shards are obviously the 1 thing that is super soft magic. Which is why I think in Mistborn, you're at your peak strength when you first pick up a shard, not because of the raw power but because your intent is likely going to betray your own personal prerogatives.