Houston Signing

[Arcanist Lupus he/him]

I just got back from the Houston signing at Murder by the Book.  Brandon did two readings - one from AoL 2 (Wax and Steris discussing the wedding), and the prologue of Words of Radiance.  Is the prologue been covered yet?  If not, I'll summarize what I remember.  Let me know.

 

 

I asked Brandon about world hopping.  Brandon said that not every magic system could be used for world hopping, but that there were methods of reaching every planet.  He then qualified that some of the minor planets might only be accessible by space ship.

 

 

I hope you find this as interesting as I did!

 

[LazerWulf]

I was also at the signing, and I have audio of the whole thing, including the Shadows of Self reading and the Words of Radiance Prologue. I am in the process of uploading them for transcription.

 

One thing I was able to ask when I got up there was "You've said that Seons and Skaze contain splinters of Devotion and Dominion. Were these splinters created when Odium killed the shardholders and Splintered their shards? Or are they more similar to how Endowment splinters himself (herself? I don't remember if I used any gendered pronouns here, but if I did, it would have been "him", and he didn't correct me) to make divine breaths? What is the difference between the two?"

 

First, he said that it was a very good question.   Then he said that those splinters weren't supposed to be there, and they were indeed created when Odium splintered the shards. He said that the difference lies in how each magical system works. Endowment's splinters are more similar to how Preservation invested a little bit of her shard into each human on Scadrial.

 

EDIT: Audio can be found here: https://soundcloud.com/lazerwulf214

 

Should go Intro -> Q&A 1 -> Shadows of Self -> Q&A 2 -> Words of Radiance

 

Unfortunately, there's about 15 seconds of silence at about 9:52 in the Intro. I recorded this from my iPhone and must have accidentally covered up the phone's microphone.

 

The two readings start with the reading itself, but there's a bit of intro to each at the end of the previous tracks.

Edited September 27, 2013 by LazerWulf

[Kurkistan he/him]

We have the prologue, I think.

[Miyabi She/Her]

0.0

Well now the NCC-1701 part he put in my book makes sense..... but why Jean Valjean's prisoner number... hmmm.

[Windrunner he/him]

I'm pretty sure we have both of those at this point. Maybe he read more? I haven't listened to the audio.

[Kurkistan he/him]

0.0

Well now the NCC-1701 part he put in my book makes sense..... but why Jean Valjean's prisoner number... hmmm.

 

Sorry, I missed the part where that made sense.

[zebobes]

I'm listening to Jasnah's excerpt, and it's definitely longer now. The document has been locked from editing, so I can't help out with it yet. 

[PeterAhlstrom he/him]

0.0Well now the NCC-1701 part he put in my book makes sense..... but why Jean Valjean's prisoner number... hmmm.

Didn't you read Alcatraz 4?

[Shardlet he/him]

There is much more to the Jasnah reading in addition to part he gave us at SpoCon.  There is a great deal of info on the two men we wondered about who were speaking to Elhokar when Szeth walked through the room and it appears that they are involved in something nefarious.  Also, Jasnah's shadow is behaving curiously.  Score!  Thx for the recording Lazar.

Edited September 28, 2013 by Shardlet

[Miyabi She/Her]

Peter - No I didn't. I read the first three then for some reason never picked up the fourth one. lol.

Kurk - NCC-1701 is the registry number for the Starship Enterprise, needing spaceships to get to places.

[Kurkistan he/him]

I got the Enterprise reference, but not it's connection to a need for spaceships in the Cosmere.

 

Though surely Brandon meant that the inhabitants of these minor worlds need ships, not that other Cosmerites can't worldhop to them using their own magic systems, right?

Edited September 28, 2013 by Kurkistan

[PeterAhlstrom he/him]

You have to read Alcatraz Four for those things to make sense.

[Arcanist Lupus he/him]

Though surely Brandon meant that the inhabitants of these minor worlds need ships, not that other Cosmerites can't worldhop to them using their own magic systems, right?

 

Maybe, but he definitely seemed to be talking about getting to planets.

[Windrunner he/him]

Based on what we understand about Worldhopping, that doesn't seem to make sense. Those planets would have people with thoughts and the like and take up Cognitive space in Shadesmar, so I don't understand why you would need a spaceship to get there.

[Mailliw73 he/him]

Maybe there's sometype of cognitive block?

[Arcanist Lupus he/him]

Based on what we understand about Worldhopping, that doesn't seem to make sense. Those planets would have people with thoughts and the like and take up Cognitive space in Shadesmar, so I don't understand why you would need a spaceship to get there.

 

Except we already know that it's not that simple, because otherwise the Cognitive Realm around Sel wouldn't be so hazardous.

My guess would be that the Cognitive space is created by thoughts, but defined by a world's magic, so if the world has no magic, it's cognitive space is too chaotic and ill defined to use for traveling.  It would be like trying to see your reflection in rough water - light is still being reflected, but it's too scattered to actually see any shapes.

[Windrunner he/him]

The Cognitive Realm around Sel is messed up mostly due to the Splintered Shards and unbound power there, from what we understand, so that shouldn't apply to worlds without Shards.

[Claincy he/him]

Honestly I had just been thinking that entering the cognitive realm required some shard power, or at least some power in general (given there is magic that wasn't part of Adonalsium). By that, people on any minor world which didn't have a shard wouldn't be able to worldhop.

[Pechvarry]

I hope, when he said "minor planets," he meant like Mercury. No atmosphere, no life, etc.

Because I don't think I much like the notion of not being able to reach the Shadows for Silence planet, for example.

[Morsk he/him]

Maybe crossing Expanses is more work than we're assuming, or different for every Expanse, and for some planets there's no practical way to get through it.

[Argent he/him]

Maybe crossing Expanses is more work than we're assuming, or different for every Expanse, and for some planets there's no practical way to get through it.

 

Refresh me on this real quick - are the Expanses the equivalent to interplanetary space in Shadesmar?

[Shardlet he/him]

Essentially.  That is how you worldhop.  Travel from the Shadesmar corrollary for the world you are on to an expanse which appears to be the Shadesmar corrollary for a different world.  Since the worlds are spheres (at least roughly) though, it is unclear (so far) how this would work in practice.  Is Shadesmar flat, like a map or is it also geographically spherical?  I personally am inclined to think it to be flat (that is not to say without topography, just not spherical). 

[Pechvarry]

According to tWoK, isn't everything spherical in Shadesmar? So one would, ostensibly, learn to look beyond the sphere and see the bigger picture.

[Shardlet he/him]

According to tWoK, isn't everything spherical in Shadesmar? So one would, ostensibly, learn to look beyond the sphere and see the bigger picture.

 

Well, the 'sea' is filled with spheres and each sphere appears to represent an individual cognitive aspect.  But beyond that, I don't recall anything else particularly spherical going on.