Unique Abilities of Knights Radiant

[Arondell]

Wait...Are you talking about the post where you claimed Teft didn't even know there were different orders?  The one where you said that Teft thought Kaladin would have access to all the surges?  I responded to that post with specific quotes, including page numbers, where he discusses that each of the ten orders followed the five ideals of which only the first was the same for each order.  So he was dead right about that.  Can you please give a specific quote where Teft says something about Radiants that is actually incorrect?

[Savanorn]

I will find you quotes when I'm not running out the door.

 

 

 

Sounds excellent. 

 

You said there are three possibilities. Natural skill, extreme training, and outside influence. Neither of the first two make any sense from the text.

 

 

Okay, so if we're going to talk at length let me object to your tone. 

 

My argument is solid, to say it doesn't make any sense is hyperbole that cheapens the entirely rational argument we're going to have. If you want to sling mud and spin half-truths let me know, and I'll be glad to leave or spit venom as whim takes me. But let me get this clear, you do, in fact, believe Kaladin is skilled at arms sheerly due to his virtue of being a radiant? 

 

As it stands, Kaladin does train hard, do we disagree on this and are we in argument? If we agree, then it's a possible explanation for his skill. If we do not, then...well...that's a secondary debate to have. 

Kaladin could be good, simply by talent. Note that by 'talent' I refer to a mix of genetic, psychological and environmental factors. 

 

Now, to the piece-by-piece. 

 

 

 

 

Kaladin's skill the very first time is supernatural.

 

It isn't. 

 

He barely blocks a strike, he has his foot hit and he is then hit in the side. After a moment of pain and fury he laucnhes a counter attack and hits a boy in the hand and the side. 

 

Yes, some people are naturally talented at things and pick them up quickly. But in Kaladin's first fight he showed traits that you only get from practice and procedural memory. Someone who is an actual natural at a quarterstaff could train for an hour or so and then be good enough to take on a slightly-trained upstart like Kal's friend

 

No, he doesn't. 

 

 

 

Without Invested help, there simply is not a way for Kal's blows to be as accurate.

 

Sure there is, hell, when I was a boy we used to fight with sticks and knuckle and body hits are about as common as they come. Anecdotes aside, what happens there is not beyond a moment of inspiration. I'll go on to address this., 

 

That's like saying if you grew an extra arm that had no sense organs in it, you'd be able to use it to type even faster than you currently do as soon as it popped up.

 

 

No, it's not. This example is flawed, if further discussion is pertinent I'll return to it. 

 

A stick is a big, heavy, unwieldy thing that lacks proprioception. Hitting a specific target with it (a boy's knuckles) on your first try when you have had seconds to adapt yourself to its length, heft, counterbalance, etc., is beyond the bounds of what can be accomplished by a mundane "natural." A "natural" isn't someone born with actual skill, a natural is someone whose specific talents lend themselves to a new task. Kaladin might have had superior hand-eye coordination, balance, pattern recognition, a prior understanding of basic physics, and all of this would have made him a natural. There's no such thing as a person born with inherent genetic knowledge of how to hold and swing a staff.

 

 

We seem to have a different understanding of talent or natural skill. Suffice it to say I disagree with your notion. Someone with natural talent starts at a higher level of aptitude and/or better 'moment' skill and/or a higher rate of acquisition of skill. Any one of these three things could qualify at being a naturally skilled person. This is as I see it. 

Now, I'm going to split the thread here. 

Firstly, I'll share a little of own experiences. You can feel free to skip this, or not, as you desire. I'll italics it for your convenience.  It may or may not be instructive, but it's not argumentative. The important part is that I believe you misunderstand the reality of combat. 

I'm not sure if you've had experience at any martial arts or other form of loose combat analogue. I've done many things from grappling and striking to archery. I''m also a student of HEMA. 

Some guys start and they are hopeless, you swing a punch and they couldn't parry it, they swing a punch and it has no direction or force. Give them a bokken or a kinai and they're equally ham-fisted. In a moment you disarm them or knock them off balance.  

Other people just get it. From the moment they pick a weapon up they just know how to stand, how to hold it. You swing and they block, they swing and the weapon goes where they want it. They are clearly superior to their 'average' peers. You attack and they correct. They might not be perfect, or even 'good' in an absolute competitive sense, but they have a strong grasp of the basics as if by sheer intuition.  

It's the same thing with archery, some people are long in playing with grip and draw and struggle to hit a target from ten metres on flat ground. Others just get it. They might know anything about wind physics or momentum, but when they lift the bow and pull the string it hits the target, they make a mistake and they correct it. Oh, they'll still struggle, but they just simply breeze past the 'novice' mistakes and it becomes a matter of going from 'good' to 'better'. 

Basically, I'd say 'skill' is a normal distribution with outliers both to the upper and lower bounds.

 

Secondly. What is so hard about what Kaladin does? 

 

As for training. You pointed out Kaladin's display in the chasm with the Bridgemen. He hasn't touched a spear in months, hasn't had the opportunity to train, really train, in 8 months (closer to 10 earth months). And he breaks out an expert series of kata without a flaw. Training gives you primarily procedural memory, the difference between an implicit and an explicit action. It's not information saved on a flash drive, able to be booted up at a moments notice. There's a reason "off-season training" exists; if basketball players could finish their last game of the season, spend months relaxing, then show up to practice over half a year later making freethrows like they'd never left... they'd do that. But that's not how training works. If Kaladin had taken even just one day, worked out the kinks, remembered the balance and moves, sure. His incredible training would have helped him get back to where he'd been in record time. But in the real world, no amount of training in literally any skill lets you not do it for nearly a year, and then use your skill to a master level without a flaw first time trying. And in case you wonder, in that very chapter, many references are made to the fact that there is absolutely no Stormlight to be had, so it's not a matter of Stormlight enhancing his skill. The only explanation is that something is granting him skill. Syl says it's the Nahel bond. Mr. Sanderson apparently says it's not. If it's not the Nahel bond, it has to be something else Invested, because mundane reasons will not explain his actions.

 

 

I disagree with your interpretation of the example.

 

Kata are not competitive skill, they're not even measured on anything. . Kaladin wasn't fighting anyone else, he had literally no stakes. Hell, the big thing about procedural skill is that it takes so long to degrade. There's a reason the phrase 'like riding a bike' is a thing. Kaladin being able to execute a kata is just this. This is not a cyclist taking a year off and winning a tour de France, this is more like a cyclist taking a break and then cycling a long-familar road. Indeed, one could take this as proof of the intensity and drive which Kaladin must have trained at to be able to remember a high-level kata after months.  Especially, if one chooses to accept the Nahel bond is not responsible.  

 

And recall, when Syl "dies", Kaladin's skill leaves him. If his skill were the result of training or "being a natural," he'd be as good, or nearly so, without her as he is with her. But without Syl, he's awful. In addition, on three occasions from four different perspectives, one of them "all the bridgemen," either the wind or Syl herself visibly warps around Kaladin when he uses the spear. However good he is at surgery, that can actually be explained by talent and practice, and most notably no one ever points out the wind swirling around him as he heals anyone.

 

 

He's also depressed and nearly crippled.As good as one is, or as good as one can be, it's very hard to be any good when standing is troublesome.  He does a decent job with the chasmfied though.

I took the wind warping to be Kaladin tapping Stormlight, which doesn't grant skill, but does grant strength and speed.  Or unconsciously using Pressure,

 

You bring up how that distant day was before Syl found him. I'm sure I know a quote where they talk about it. When I return this afternoon I will try to find it for you.

 

 

Sounds double excellent. 

 

Shlee, on 26 Jan 2015 - 06:41 AM, said:

He says that Kaladin's specific ability is not his fighting. I would say that that doesn't necessarily mean it's impossible that Windrunners as a general rule have some enhanced fighting abilities, just like most Lightweavers have artistic ability, Bondsmiths have leadership ability, etc.

 

Shallan's Memory taking ability is her "specific" one, but would she be as fantastic of an artist without the bond? We've never seen her from Time-Before-Pattern so we don't know for sure, but I think we're kind of arguing semantics here. My opinion is that each order has a tendency towards a "natural" talent that is augmented by the bond, and each member gains something specific to them in regards to it.

 

That's kinda what I meant in my earlier post. You phrased it better. Have an upvote. 

 

Arondell, on 26 Jan 2015 - 09:07 AM, said:

My take on the scene where Kaladin was trying to practice was that his head "wasn't in the game" as it were.  He was the exact opposite of "in the groove."   We know Kaladin suffers from a seasonal depressive disorder.  So he can barely walk and he is feeling generally depressed because of the weather.  On top of this he is dealing with the fact that he just killed Syl who was essentially a part of his soul and he is dealing with conflicted feelings about the whole conspiracy to kill the king.

 

I would point out once he made his decision to save the king(i.e. gained a little focus.) his spear work notably improved.  Even with his severe wound he took out two guards before they could raise an alarm. Granted he took them by surprise but that is still kind of impressive given his physical condition.  If he was as incompetent without the bond as your kind of implying then he should not have been able to do that.

Pretty much as I took it. 

 

Oudeis, on 26 Jan 2015 - 10:14 AM, said:

He was presumably "sad" following the death of Tien, and that's when he starts training in earnest. If an enormous, formative chunk of his training was done during actual depression, sorrow should if anything improve his skills by reminding him of his training. That's how procedural memory works. The way a smell or a turn-of-phrase can suddenly remind you of an entire scene from your past, the temporal lobe of your brain makes those connections. Things that remind you of what it was like during a certain time in your life will call to mind the things you did, and learned, at that time. Also... you can't just handwave it away as "aw c'mon he was really sad." He's fought while depressed, while angry, while confused, while frustrated, and while distracted. Not only is "he can't fight cuz he was sad" not how actual skills work, but it's not how Kaladin has acted a dozen other times throughout the book. Do you think he wasn't conflicted and sad and in literal shock and angry when the Shardbearer slaughtered almost his entire squad? Yet he charged in, held his own for a few seconds, then stabbed a slit barely big enough for a knife blade against an opponent with not only training, but enhanced strength and reflexes. I'm sorry, but no. There simply is no way to believe that Kaladin is naturally inhumanly skilled without any Invested intervention, but that his kryptonite is "a specifically minor amount of sorrow."

 

And as you point out, he only takes out those guards with surprise. I'm gonna re-read that scene, but the capacity to sucker-punch two people who have been tricked into thinking you're part of their assassination conspiracy doesn't mean you're a man of exceptional fighting skill.

 

Kay... just re-read the scene. It was trickery, a suckerpunch, then he literally threw himself on the second guy. Some brawling and luck knocked the second guy out, then he lurched slightly upright and fell on the first guy, cold-cocking him. So... yeah. There was no skill there. There was no subtle play, drawing out your opponent and waiting for the perfect opportune moment to strike with just enough force. He literally threw his weight against two people who were stupid enough to let him inside their guard due to trickery. I'd say that's well within the limits of what someone with no natural talent but half a decade of experience could accomplish.

 

They are a different sort of 'sad', different sort of emotional trauma and even if they weren't...people have varying response to the same emotional trauma. It's the same reason why one day you might shrug off a bad day of training, or a break-up, or like...getting fired. Another time it might crush you.

 

We know that post Tien he was driven, and in risk of burning out, by his own testimony. In contrast, post-Chasmfall he seems bitter and drained, without focus. 

 

Arondell, on 26 Jan 2015 - 11:16 AM, said:

Two very different sources within the story agree on this point.  As things stand unless some other passage from the books contradicts Teft and/or Syl I'm going with their explanation. 

 

I agree. 

Edited January 26, 2015 by Savanorn

[TheBrian]

Actually... Yeah, it sorta does. Considering how much he trained, and that he'd been recovering for weeks from his injuries, if he had natural talent, he should have been able to pull off a few simple practice moves, maybe not perfectly, but without actually dropping his weapon. He wasn't out of practice, or exhausted, and he didn't act simply rusty, he was clumsy and uncoordinated. If he were a natural, even without supernatural skill, he should have been something between "Kaladin Stormblessed" and the spaz we see him as, weak leg or no.

Regardless. Even if he were a natural, the point is that a ton of evidence from the books tells us his skill is supernaturally augmented. And it's heavily implied that this is from the Nahel bond. However, then Mr. Sanderson flat out told us it was not. So now I'm confused.

 

I think Brandon was using Kaladin's clumsiness to show his internal conflict.  The way I understood his failure to perform basic maneuvers was that Kaladin had a ton of crap in his head.  He wasn't in the zone / his head wasn't in the game.  He was wrestling with himself:  his moral code vs his sense of justice.  People in real life perform poorly on just about any task when they are working through an issue.

 

And remember that just after he lost Syl, he managed to kill a Chasmfiend with only a little assistance from Shallan.  Based on this fact, I think you have to accept that his clumsiness had nothing to do with his inherent level of skill.

[Natans]

He was injured, demotivated, in the middle of the weeping, and even so knocked two guards. And after this he remarked that he indeed could fight without Syl.

Well if we are giving credit to the fact that he couldn't bring himself to properly do his training/kata, let give some credit to the fact that himself judged that he could fight without Syl.

Or like was said, A mad man is whose discredit the evidences that are presented just because them don't fit in the result that hi is looking for =)

Kal can fight. And he can fight better with syl given him help. Like Teft stormlight don't give someone skill stormlight just highlight the skill that one already have =) 





 

[king of nowhere]

I really don't see the problems with his skill coming from both talent, practice, and the bond. One does not exclude the others, and in fact assuming all three explains things better.

Although, if we had to drop one, I'd drop the bond. skill and talent are enough to justify what kaladin does. the first time he picks up that quarterstaff, he does nothing so special. he hit a hand, that's all. almost everyone can swing a staff and hit a hand-sized target. he is good at thinking under pressure, and that certainly helps him and his part of what makes him a natural and explains how he managed to come up with decent moves despite having no practice. everything he did there was withing the possibility of someone thinking with a cool head.

then there is the fact that his instructor was amazed at his skill "from the first time he picked up a spear". maybe that's not to be taken literally. maybe it means that after one hour of training he was already as good as he was supposed to be after one day, and his instructor was amazed by it.

performing a kata after one year without practice is, as others said, not the same thing as competing at high level, and the kind of thing one may remember. I am a competitive chessplayer, and if I went one year without seeing a chessboard, I'll certainly lose much capability for fast and advanced calculation, but I'd still remember how to play the most common openings, or how to perform certain endgame manuevers.

As for "losing his skill", well, without stormlight he manages to hold his own with a chasmfiend with only a blade (something that was dangerous to three full shardbearers combined, two of which were dalinar and adolin) and took down two men while barely standing; ok, by surprise, but you try that while hemorraging. that's a strange idea of "losing his skill". If he hadn't, I wonder what he would have done. maybe slain that chasmfiend blindfolded.

I'm with thebrian on the kata. he was doing it poorly because he was distracted more than anything else.

 

So, that justifies kaladin's prowess without calling into account the bond. It's a bit stretched at times, and it works better if we also assume the bond helps kaladin. but, if we were quantifying the contribution of the bond on kaladin's skill (if it was possible to quantify such a thing) I'd say it is no more than 20%, 30% tops. most of his skill is real and comes from himself.

 I'd trust syl when she said she's party responsible for it.

[tdogpete]

The way I see it, Kaladin got his skill with his talent and his training, but Syl kind of gave him "accelerated learning", because I beleive he picked it up EXTREMELY quick. However, he could probably train to his current level, but it would've taken him a lot longer time to do it without Syl.

But that's my 2 cents.

[Fallen Rope]

If it is adhesion that gives Kaladin his fighting skills and not his unique ability, then could the same thing be happening or will happen to Dalinar. Does his fighting skills also come from being a radiant.

[Calderis]

As far as his skill "leaving" with Syl dead. Yes he has dealt with loss before, but there is a vast difference between feeling guilty because you weren't able to protect those you care for from others, and knowing that the death of someone has occurred directly from your own actions.

In his mind Tien's death and Syl's would not have affected him the same way.

[Savanorn]

Just to let you guys know, Oudeis PMed me to say he will no longer be arguing in the thread. 

 

To return to the topic at hand...

 

My thoughts are like this. Every Radiant has a universal skill they all have, the ability to draw Stormlight. Every Radiant also has a semi-unique skill; Surgebinding. Surges are shared with one other Order and are thus a little more selective.

Finally, every order has a fully-unque skill. We know this to be Strength of Squires for Windrunners, for Lightweavers I suppose we can guess it'll be Memories or something like them.

I think Bondsmith's might have the ability to alter the Nahel bond.

As others have also noted, Skybreakers might also be able to tell truth/guilt. 

 

What I am suggesting is that between these unique/semi-unique and universal characteristics there is another level of semi-unique characteristics. 

 

For instance, suppose that Bondsmith's and Windrunners both get enhanced combat abilities. We know that the two Radiants we've seen from those orders are both good, Dalinar is a legend with Shardplate and Kaladin is gifted with the spear. 

This is the only way I could take the WoB to be true, the comment by Syl to be somewhat literal, and no conflict to exist here at all. 

Of course, I could be muddling cause and effect. 

 

Thoughts?

[Twenty@20]

I thought of something similar few days back. So yeah I can agree with you.

Perhaps I was a bit careless with my phrasing. When Brandon said that fighting abilities isnt the Windrunner Quirk, I took that to mean that other orders will also have exceptional fighting abilities- it isn't just unique to Windrunners.(I would expect the Skybreakers, Releasers, Stonewards, Willshapers too have supernatural fighting abilities)

Edited January 27, 2015 by Twenty@20

[kari-no-sugata]

Regarding the unique abilities in general: they've sometimes been referred to as 'passives' - this seems reasonable since they seem to be "always on" (though the strength might vary with depth of spren bond). Shallan's memory is good in general - being able to take a snapshot seems to be more like something she developed with many years of self-training rather than something intrinsic. Having numerous and particularly strong Squires seems like something that would also be "always on".

 

This is speculation but it seems reasonable: these spren-specific abilities are a direct result of bonding spren and depend directly on the nature of the spren. It doesn't necessarily mean that there's a direct correlation between the "type" of the spren. It also seems reasonable to say that these abilities are not Surges or the like and don't consume any Stormlight. There may be some exceptions though.

[Mckeedee123]

Man, this thread digressed a while ago.

 

Anyway, on a WoR reread, I may have noticed the Bondmiths' "thing". They have an innate sense of trust for honorable people/Radiants.

 

Okay, I can hear your laughter, but slow down. I know that Dalinar's "Radiantdar" is not the best (regarding Sadeas and Amaram), but the reason why I think this is a thing is because of his trust of Kaladin. There are several points in Words of Radiance where Dalinar asks himself why he trusts the guy so much, and he always just settles on the fact that there's some sort of overwhelming rightness that he can't explain to it.

[AerionBFII]

Man, this thread digressed a while ago.

 

Anyway, on a WoR reread, I may have noticed the Bondmiths' "thing". They have an innate sense of trust for honorable people/Radiants.

 

Okay, I can hear your laughter, but slow down. I know that Dalinar's "Radiantdar" is not the best (regarding Sadeas and Amaram), but the reason why I think this is a thing is because of his trust of Kaladin. There are several points in Words of Radiance where Dalinar asks himself why he trusts the guy so much, and he always just settles on the fact that there's some sort of overwhelming rightness that he can't explain to it.

Good point!! Dalinar does seem to have a social magnetism, even those who dislike him have to give him that much he seems more a force of nature than man.. 

[dvoraen]

On the subject of Kaladin's squires versus natural talent, I think it's twofold:

 

- The affinity for squires is due to the (much higher) presence of Honor in honorspren.

- The affinity for storms (and seeming 'precognitive fighting' talent while in the dueling arena) is due to the presence of Cultivation in honorspren, as they're "cousins" to windspren.

 

I'm not sure if I'm trying to insinuate that we've seen some of Cultivation's magic being used by our nascent Radiants, where the Nahel bond provides a separate, tertiary ability strictly related to Honor, but given that we've supposedly seen Cultivation's magic, who's to say that active uses of Stormlight hasn't been powering more than Surgebinding right in front of our faces?  In other words, I'm wondering if Kaladin's belief he could close his eyes and continue fighting was more an aspect of Cultivation's magic, than strictly his use of Stormlight.  

 

A bit of a non-sequitor, but...

I still claim that Nahel spren emulate more than just the Honorblades, and I assert this as one of them.  Jezrien was given significant relevance to the highstorms and more, including via a Death Rattle ("...daughter of kings and winds"), so this wind affinity is not exactly... unexpected, but the implication is that the Windrunner Honorblade does not bestow this affinity, apparently, which makes it a Heraldic trait.  So, then, where is this wind affinity coming from, then, if not the spren emulating the Herald him-/herself too?

 

What I'd really like someone to ask Brandon: If Shallan had only a single, freshly charge sphered with her and took a lot of Memories over the course of a day, would that sphere's level of Stormlight be notably less?

Edited March 11, 2015 by dvoraen