Honorblades

[RawToast225 he/him]

Q: You mentioned that human can’t bond Honorblades, but Nalan tells Szeth that his bond with his Honorblade has been broken. Can you clear this up?

A: Humans CAN bond Honorblades. There's a crucial difference between Honorblades and Shardblades. When you drop an Honorblade, it does not disappear, even if it has been bonded. A Shardblade will disappear when dropped.

From this WoB we learn that Shardblades differ from Honorblades in that Shardblades disappear while Honorblades don't. My thinking is that this happens because the power in the Honorblades isn't dead. The spren that were the main power of the Shardblades are dead, so when they are dropped they vanish. The power behind the Honorblades however, are still alive. The divestiture powering the special blades hasn't been broken or diminished yet. Honorblades, by this logic, could become very much like Shardblades eventually, given the right circumstances cutting off their powers.

Thoughts?

[Moogle]

As speculation: I wouldn't say it's a unique property of Honorblades, but rather the odd one out here is Shardblades-as-in-dead-spren. Shardblades are spren (even though they're dead/mindless), so they have a natural propensity to revert away from Blade-form when they can. Honorblades are just chunks of metal, and don't care, so they just stay in the Blade form when dropped.

Edited January 14, 2015 by Moogle

[Oudeis he/him]

...how do we reconcile this with the fact that Szeth's Blade vanished all the time? So, Honorblades CAN be dismissed, but if someone simply disarms you and grabs it, it's theirs now?

[vineyarddawg]

...how do we reconcile this with the fact that Szeth's Blade vanished all the time? So, Honorblades CAN be dismissed, but if someone simply disarms you and grabs it, it's theirs now?

 

Yes, you can certainly dismiss an Honorblade.  If you're disarmed, that doesn't break your bond, and if someone else picked it up, it wouldn't be automatically bonded with them... it would still be bonded to you.  If somebody were to disarm you, you just re-summon the Honorblade and it would come back to you.  I guess you'd just have to avoid getting hit with it during the summoning time, though. 

 

(That brings up an interesting question, too.  If someone picked up an Honorblade that was bonded to another person, would they be able to use it at all? Or would the blade fight back against them somehow?)

[RawToast225 he/him]

Vine, that is an interesting question. Will you make n original post about it? I don't wan mine derailed.

Can Honorblades eventually lose most of their power?

[Oudeis he/him]

Yes, you can certainly dismiss an Honorblade.  If you're disarmed, that doesn't break your bond, and if someone else picked it up, it wouldn't be automatically bonded with them... it would still be bonded to you.  If somebody were to disarm you, you just re-summon the Honorblade and it would come back to you.  I guess you'd just have to avoid getting hit with it during the summoning time, though. 

 

(That brings up an interesting question, too.  If someone picked up an Honorblade that was bonded to another person, would they be able to use it at all? Or would the blade fight back against them somehow?)

 

Interesting. Where is the source for all of this information? I don't recall it being mentioned in the book. Do you have a WoB that explains all this? I would very much like to read it.

[vineyarddawg]

Interesting. Where is the source for all of this information? I don't recall it being mentioned in the book. Do you have a WoB that explains all this? I would very much like to read it.

 

Your reaction tells me that I probably need to go back and look more closely at my assumptions (which is what they were).  I was just basing all of that on what I read in WoK and WoR.

 

But here's what I have:

- Szeth clearly had an honorblade, and he dismissed it and re-summoned it regularly.  (He summoned in the Prologue to WoK, in fact, during the Gavilar assassination, which means that it had to have been dismissed at some point previously. And we see Kalak summoning his honorblade in the Prelude.)

- I assumed that dropping an honorblade or being disarmed from the blade wouldn't break the bond.  Otherwise, what would be the point of bonding with an honorblade at all?

- We've seen that regular shardblades can be re-summoned at will if they, for example, are purposefully left in physical form but are not physically in contact with the holder (for example, when Adolin is practicing with throwing his blade in WoR). So, I assumed that honorblades would also behave the same way.

Edited January 14, 2015 by vineyarddawg

[Blaze1616 he/him]

I have to agree with Moogle here Arthur Dent. I have a personal theory that Honorblades aren't related to Spren at all, but are rather unique and more like Nightblood - heavily invested swords.

 

I would like to point this out: source

 

macros

Based on what we know currently about the ten heartbeats, why does Szeth require ten heartbeats to bring forth his Honorblade?

Brandon Sanderson

Perception is a very important part of how these things all work, and remember, the Honorblades work differently from everything else. Everything was based upon them. Why don’t you read and find out what’s going on there, but remember, the characters’ perception is very important.

macros

So then that’s why at one point Shallan requires ten heartbeats and now she doesn’t.

Brandon Sanderson

Right, just like—it’s the exact same reason why Kaladin’s forehead wounds don’t heal, because he views himself as need—as having those, somewhere deep inside of him, and that can’t heal until that goes away. And it’s the same reason why in Warbreaker, when you bring something to life your intention, rather than really what you say, is what matters. It’s all about perception.

 

 

Szeth may not have needed to wait ten seconds when summoning the blade. Moreover, the blade not disappearing could just be due to Szeth's perception of the blade. There is so much we don't know about the Honorblades, and I am of the opinion that it actually hurts our understanding of them to so blatantly assume they are similar to Shardblades. Perhaps they are, but perhaps they aren't. It wouldn't be the first time we're fed incorrect information because of how the POV character understands things incorrectly.

Edited January 14, 2015 by Blaze1616

[Kipper he/him]

I have to agree with Moogle here Arthur Dent. I have a personal theory that Honorblades aren't related to Spren at all, but are rather unique and more like Nightblood - heavily invested swords.

You've been confirmed correct on that as far as I know. We know that spren were trying to copy the Honorblades, which, we can assume, where invested by Honor.

That's interesting about the perception of the summoning. Thanks Blaze.

[Blaze1616 he/him]

You've been confirmed correct on that as far as I know. We know that spren were trying to copy the Honorblades, which, we can assume, where invested by Honor.

 

I would not say I'm confirmed correct. But, at least in my opinion, it seems more and more likely the more we learn about the Honorblades, such as them eating investiture like Nightblood does.

[Shlee]

Edit: Apologies for repeating many things, I wrote this after #4 posted, but I am in Ghana and the internet apparently just now decided to post it, so much of what I mention has already been covered by others

Or does Szeth's honorblade only work like a "modern" (dead spren) shardblade because that's how he (Szeth) THINKS it should work - since we know already that that's basically why he can't heal wounds from a shardblade - because he believes he can't and his beliefs and intent and how he sees things greatly affect how the magic works?

I'm curious as to how Szeth could have bonded with it at all - that seems to imply that when the Heralds left the blades, they didn't just leave them, they unbonded them.....is this perhaps what is contributing to the heralds' attributes getting perverted? *crackpot theory with no supporting arguments* Perhaps instead of the "spren" dying - which remember, they don't truly die, they just lose their minds and become mindless - this is what's happening to the heralds, just in slow motion? So the Heralds were bound to the blades, and when they broke their oath instead of the spren losing its mind/regressing/dying, the heralds are instead? And are now trapped in their own minds and can't escape?

Lol, okay, major ridiculous tangent there. But seriously, that's a very good question, I'm going to do some searching for WoBs on honorblades. There's also no time limit (ten heartbeats) to summon an honor blade in the prologue, so I don't think you'd have to worry about not getting hit with it - if you dropped it, I think it'd disappear, and you could resummon it instantaneously, a la Kaladin/Syl. But since the blades themselves seem to be able to convey powers, I think that points to there being some sort of greater power at work there, like the blades themselves are powered, rather than the person. The closest thing in my mind is Vin being able to use the mists, which would tie in with someone else's theory over in the Stormlight thread that honorblades are a physical manifestation of honor. I'd tend to vote more that they are a cognitive representation of honor that can be drawn into the physical somehow, since they seem to spend most of their time "dismissed" Although as far as we know, they are not spren, they could perhaps be more strongly associated with the cognitive realm in some way we aren't aware of, like the mists could disappear and reappear.....

Basically all I have is a bunch of off-the-wall off-hand theorizing, but you guys bring up some good points and got my brain spinning and now I'm off to bury myself in all my notes again, and the giant compilation of WoBs. I need a personal coppermind.

Edited January 14, 2015 by Shlee

[hoidhunter he/him]

I would have to say that the answer is probably no...after all...Honor is dead...and the honor blades still work.  But who knows...maybe nightblood can suck the investiture right out of them until they are just a really ornate and REALLY heavy swords.  Or perhaps a larkin and suck all of the investiture out of someone who is bonded with them until they do not work anymore...but I get the feeling that this is probably not the case.  Just sayin'

Edited January 15, 2015 by hoidhunter

[Shlee]

I would have to say that the answer is probably no...after all...Honor is dead...and the honor blades still work.  But who knows...maybe nightblood can suck the investiture right out of them until they are just a really ornate and REALLY heavy swords.  Or perhaps a larkin and suck all of the investiture out of someone who is bonded with them until they do not work anymore...but I get the feeling that this is probably not the case.  Just sayin'

 

I'm not sure what, exactly, you're saying no to, but I would like to point out that even after Preservation died, the mists on Scadrial still "worked"  I'm not saying that there might or might not be differences, and honestly I think the stormlight is more analogous to the mists than the Honorblades are, but I have yet to see a reason why it's impossible for honorblades to cease working after Honor was splintered, even if they were a part of him.

[Kipper he/him]

I'm not sure what, exactly, you're saying no to, but I would like to point out that even after Preservation died, the mists on Scadrial still "worked"  I'm not saying that there might or might not be differences, and honestly I think the stormlight is more analogous to the mists than the Honorblades are, but I have yet to see a reason why it's impossible for honorblades to cease working after Honor was splintered, even if they were a part of him.

Especially since we know that they work. Szeth used one.

[AerionBFII he/him]

Hmmmm the Herald Kalak mentioned that he had died before in previous Desolations yet presumably his Honorblade remained bonded.

It's interesting that when Szeth dies and Nalan revives him his bond was 'broken.

 

 

If Jezrien for example summoned his Honorblade would it leave the possession of Kal and return to him

since the Oathpact "Is not as broken as they think"

[18th Shard he/him]

I believe the Honorblades are actually a very large portion of Investiture, enough to dwarf a spren in comparison (since they are "orders of magnitude" greater than Shardblades [dead or live spren]). I think they drain Investiture quickly because they are bonded to the Heralds, not Szeth or their current wielders. You see, much as Shallan giving Pattern to Kaladin did not give him a bond with it, an Honorblade claimed and "bonded" by a non-Herald does not get the benefits of being Bonded to the Honorblade fully. The Heralds already have a large amount of Investiture (mainfesting as the Honorblade) and are bonded with it, like Kaladin with Syl, and so the Blade doesn't siphon off energy because they are Bonded with it. To utilize the Surgebinding capabilites of his Honorblade, Szeth had to fill that power difference with Investiture (Stormlight). The Blade not only utilized the energy of the Stormlight to use the Lashings, but also to simply grant Szeth the ability to Surgebind. Heralds would probably not consume Stormlight at near the same rate.

 

So, to clear that up with numbers, to Surgebind using an Honorblade uses 10 AUI [arbitrary unit of Investiture]. Being truly bonded with it grants 7 AUI (since my view is that the Bond actually Invests the bondee) and the Heralds only have to use 3 AUI of Stormlight. Szeth then has to have enough Stormlight to not only fill the regular 3 AUI to Surgebind, but also enough to boost his Investiture to a full 10 from 0. As comparison, Kaladin has a bond level of 3 AUI and uses an additional 3 AUI to Surgebind. He seems more powerful, but only because we haven't seen a Herald use their Blade to full potential.

 

Edit: More of my theory in the Bond is the Key theory in my sig.

Edited January 15, 2015 by 18th Shard

[AirsickLowlander]

Do we know if honorblades have one or two surges associated with them? Was Szeth manipulating gravity and adhesion or just gravity?

[Senor Feesh]

Do we know if honorblades have one or two surges associated with them? Was Szeth manipulating gravity and adhesion or just gravity?

 

Syl specifically states in the book that "anyone who uses that sword would gain the abilities of a Windrunner." (not necessarily verbatim). I think it's safe to assume Honorblades grant two surges.

Edited March 6, 2015 by Senor Feesh

[natc]

Syl specifically states in the book that "anyone who uses that sword would gain the abilities of a Windrunner." (not necessarily verbatim). I think it's safe to assume Honorblades grant two surges.

And when you think about it, Lightweavers and Elsecallers share soulcasting between them. If the Heralds only had one surge then it be pretty stupid for one of these orders' associated Herald to lack their eponymous ability to lightweave or elsecall.

[Asha'man Logain]

I've been gone quite a while, but dont we have WoB from a signing that the reason Kal could heal his arm was because he WASNT attacked with a shardblade, but an honorblade. I'm pretty sure i read that somewhere, and here seems likeliest

[natc]

I've been gone quite a while, but dont we have WoB from a signing that the reason Kal could heal his arm was because he WASNT attacked with a shardblade, but an honorblade. I'm pretty sure i read that somewhere, and here seems likeliest

Not really, we don't that I know of. And this is a hot topic so it's hard to miss.