Reviving shardblades

[WindCaller]

Quote

http://www.17thShard.com/forum/topic/6583-adolin-Shardblades-skybreakers-wob-seattle-new-info-wor-spoilers-elantris-spoliers/
Q:  Is it possible then to reawaken a Shardblade if that blade is wielded by someone who speaks the oaths of a Knights Radiant?
A:  (Thinking)...Yes, but it would be extremely difficult.  The spren in a Shardblade are not trapped in a state of mid-transformation like the Elantrians.  They are stuck in an agony cycle after having a significant portion of their consciousnesses ripped out of them.  The Nahel bond is what allows Spren to think on [the] material plane and that has been torn away.  It would be like having a data jack installed and then having someone come up to your head and rip it out of your head.

Q:  So you would basically have to replace the part that was lost to wake them up?
A:  Exactly.
 

So if someone like Shallan or Jasnah brought a dead shardblade to the cognitive realm, shadesmar, would they be able to think?

Brandon specifically said the material plane, but if they are not on the material plane...?

[GenericGamer]

Its possible, but since they lost their consciousness I don't think they can think properly anymore. You might be able to understand more that is not just screams (perhaps pleading or other things associated with pain) but i doubt that it would be anything close to an intelligent thought

[Yata]

I don't think it may work. Because if this is true probably the Stormfather (or other organizated Spren) will already ask to some Human to take the Shardblade into the Cognitive 

[one winged jhereg]

I think the real question to ask is:  Why would you revive a shardblade?  Looking at it in a purely pragmatic way, you stand to lose more than you gain reviving a shardblade.  As they stand you have a wonderfully effective weapon that anyone can bond.  Revive the spren and at best you have a slight chance to make a KR if you can convince the, almost assuredly PTSD crippled, spren to bond with a human again.  If the human were compatible enough with spren to form a bond they most likely will attract a new, non traumatized, spren a become a KR anyway.  At worst you have a crazy spren that either wants nothing to do with humans, or even actively hates humans.  Either way you end up with no net gain of weapons to use against the voidbringers, and likely have a net loss. Not to sound to callous about it, but there is no reason to revive the shardblades.  Keep the practical weapons you have and hope you can bolster your forces with KRs.

Edited August 4, 2016 by one winged jhereg
wrong word bolded

[maxal]

1 minute ago, one winged jhereg said:

I think the real question to ask is:  Why would you revive a shardblade?  Looking at it in a purely pragmatic way, you stand to lose more than you gain reviving a shardblade.  As they stand you have a wonderfully effective weapon that anyone can bond.  Revive the spren and at best you have a slight chance to make a KR if you can convince the, almost assuredly PTSD crippled, spren to bond with a human again.  If the human were compatible enough with spren to form a bond they most likely will attract a new, non traumatized, spren a become a KR anyway.  At worst you have a crazy spren that either wants nothing to do with humans, or even actively hates humans.  Either way you end up with no net gain of weapons to use against the voidbringers, and likely have a net loss. Not to sound to callous about it, but there is no reason to revive the shardblades.  Keep the practical weapons you have and hope you can bolster your forces with KRs.

You are right: there is no valid reason to purposefully revive a Shardblade other than wishing to free them from their pain. In any advent, everyone think it so impossible, I doubt anyone would even think of trying, not consciously. If it happens, it will be a natural progression in a rare occasion of pure compatibility in between a more aware wielder and a not too traumatized spren.

[GenericGamer]

8 minutes ago, maxal said:

You are right: there is no valid reason to purposefully revive a Shardblade other than wishing to free them from their pain. In any advent, everyone think it so impossible, I doubt anyone would even think of trying, not consciously. If it happens, it will be a natural progression in a rare occasion of pure compatibility in between a more aware wielder and a not too traumatized spren.

Perhaps reviving a Shardblade has something to do with the orders? since the first ideal of the Edgedancers is "i will remember those who have been forgotten". So maybe those spren would want to save their own kind and get radiants to convince people to do that? 

 

[Killik]

5 hours ago, GenericGamer said:

Its possible, but since they lost their consciousness I don't think they can think properly anymore. You might be able to understand more that is not just screams (perhaps pleading or other things associated with pain) but i doubt that it would be anything close to an intelligent thought

This made me remember Adolin's duel against the 4 shardbearers.  When Kaladin preforms the last clap, the shardbearer runs away screaming "I didn't kill you!"  This clearly shows that he heard more than just indecipherable screaming which is all Kaladin seems to hear.  Renarin is clearly uncomfortable holding his blade, but we dont know if he heard just screaming or something more.

If we take the sharbearer's "I didn't kill you!" as a direct and appropriate response to what he heard, it would seem that spren believes whoever is touching it to be their lost radiant.  Perhaps if you could somehow convince the spren you are a different person it would allow a healing process to begin?  I also like the idea of the different orders needing to be involved.  I think that the process would require a knight of the order matching the spren to get anywhere, but I also think that you cannot simply repair the part of them mind that was broken.  The WoB states you would have to replace that part, I'm not sure how many spare spren minds are lying around.

 

[Stormgate]

Since spren are basically ideas given physical presence, how do you find the mind of an idea?

[Argel]

13 minutes ago, Killik said:

This made me remember Adolin's duel against the 4 shardbearers. When Kaladin preforms the last clap, the shardbearer runs away screaming "I didn't kill you!"  This clearly shows that he heard more than just indecipherable screaming which is all Kaladin seems to hear.

I'm pretty sure that was Pattern's doing. Shallan sent him over to help Renarin, and we've seen him play mind games with voices before. Only proto-KRs can even hear the screams, and we have no reason to believe those 4 dueling Adolin are proto-KRs.

Quote

 

“Pattern,” she whispered. “Go see if you can distract that Shardbearer fighting Prince Renarin.” She would not interfere with Adolin’s fight, not as he’d obviously decided he needed to keep going for some reason. But she would try to keep Renarin from getting maimed, if she could.

Sanderson, Brandon. Words of Radiance (The Stormlight Archive, Book 2) (p. 666). Tom Doherty Associates. Kindle Edition. 

 

 

[Killik]

Hmm, thats possible but what would the shardbearer think he heard if pattern was talking to him?  What would pattern say that would have him run away screaming like that?  The times I remember pattern doing this, they've all turned around trying to find who is talking to them.

  I thought i remembered a WoB saying he could hear the screams because Kaladin was touching it at the same time, but I can't find it now and its possible I'm making that up in my head.

 

Ah, here it is. Blue highlights are from search criteria.

Quote

INTERVIEW: Mar 29th, 2014

WOR Signing Report - Herowannabe (Verbatim)

QUESTION

Why does the shardbearer — when they're dueling with Adolin and Renarin — why does the shardbearer freak out when Kaladin grabs the sword — like, he screams, and shouts "I didn't kill you!" and ran away?

BRANDON SANDERSON

Yes.

QUESTION

Why does he do that?

BRANDON SANDERSON

Because when Kaladin was there and they were touching it, they actually heard the spren that was inside of it.

QUESTION

So it wasn't Syl that he heard, it was —

BRANDON SANDERSON

It was the sword's spren. That Kaladin was touching it — when a Knight Radiant touches it — you'll see when other Knights Radiant pick up sword, they can hear the screaming.

 

Edited August 4, 2016 by Killik

[one winged jhereg]

So if the shardbearer only heard the screams when a KR was touching it also, does this have dire implications for using these blades against the voidbringers?  Could the evil version of KR also produce this effect?  Have we just discovered a big weakness in what should have been one of the humans greatest assets?  I can see sending a squad of shardbearers with "broken" blades to help shore up a line of spearmen that are being overwhelmed by VB only to fall to pieces when their blades start screaming at them.  Total rout and now they have to rethink everything they thought they knew about how to fight the VB.  

Edited August 4, 2016 by one winged jhereg

[GenericGamer]

7 minutes ago, one winged jhereg said:

So if the shardbearer only heard the screams when a KR was touching it also, does this have dire implications for using these blades against the voidbringers?  Could the evil version of KR also produce this effect?  Have we just discovered a big weakness in what should have been one of the humans greatest assets?  I can see sending a squad of shardbearers with "broken" blades to help shore up a line of spearmen that are being overwhelmed by VB only to fall to pieces when their blades start screaming at them.  Total rout and now they have to rethink everything they thought they knew about how to fight the VB.  

It's an interesting idea but since the KR is returning and spren I assume, have begun to bond on mass or at least more commonly. Would the KR not want to discard all of the "broken shardblades" since their spren dislike them?

Edited August 4, 2016 by GenericGamer

[one winged jhereg]

I guess it's a matter of how effective the blades will be in the upcoming war.  If they are useful against the "forces of evil" i just can't see getting rid of them altogether.  You don't use them in KR heavy units, but KR can't be every where and it's down right foolish to discard at least 100 effective weapons just because your new friends don't like them.  Sure the blades won't be as effective as a full KR but they are still a substantial force multiplier that could have a major impact for non-super powered field units.  The soldiers in Dalinar's vision with the stone monster would have a much better chance with blades, especially if they were separated from their knight during a random encounter with something like that.  Unless there are enough KR to go around it just doesn't make an sense to discard, or even free the blades.  Use every method available to you to win. "Life before death" is the first part of the first oath, so you gotta make some hard choices to be around for the other parts.

[maxal]

19 minutes ago, one winged jhereg said:

I guess it's a matter of how effective the blades will be in the upcoming war.  If they are useful against the "forces of evil" i just can't see getting rid of them altogether.  You don't use them in KR heavy units, but KR can't be every where and it's down right foolish to discard at least 100 effective weapons just because your new friends don't like them.  Sure the blades won't be as effective as a full KR but they are still a substantial force multiplier that could have a major impact for non-super powered field units.  The soldiers in Dalinar's vision with the stone monster would have a much better chance with blades, especially if they were separated from their knight during a random encounter with something like that.  Unless there are enough KR to go around it just doesn't make an sense to discard, or even free the blades.  Use every method available to you to win. "Life before death" is the first part of the first oath, so you gotta make some hard choices to be around for the other parts.

Actually, I am deeply worried the Radiants will refuse to have anything to do with any Shardbearers because their Blades are abominations... I think we may very well end up in a conflict in between the two in the early days of the return of the Radiants, but as Radiants slowly become more numerous than the Shardbearers (only 30 of them while there used to be 1000 of Radiants), then the Shardbearers will be ancient history.

[GenericGamer]

4 minutes ago, maxal said:

Actually, I am deeply worried the Radiants will refuse to have anything to do with any Shardbearers because their Blades are abominations... I think we may very well end up in a conflict in between the two in the early days of the return of the Radiants, but as Radiants slowly become more numerous than the Shardbearers (only 30 of them while there used to be 1000 of Radiants), then the Shardbearers will be ancient history.

I agree as we have seen spren do everything they can to uphold their views so I think it's possible they would threaten to leave if their radiant worked with Shard bearers

[Eki]

I just realized there's a bit of a parallell between Heralds being connected to Damnation through the Oathpact, and the summoning of dead shardblades... Hmm....

[WindCaller]

Woah  Didn't expect so many replies, will attempt to reply to what I can.

8 hours ago, one winged jhereg said:

I think the real question to ask is:  Why would you revive a shardblade?  Looking at it in a purely pragmatic way, you stand to lose more than you gain reviving a shardblade.  As they stand you have a wonderfully effective weapon that anyone can bond.  Revive the spren and at best you have a slight chance to make a KR if you can convince the, almost assuredly PTSD crippled, spren to bond with a human again.  If the human were compatible enough with spren to form a bond they most likely will attract a new, non traumatized, spren a become a KR anyway.  At worst you have a crazy spren that either wants nothing to do with humans, or even actively hates humans.  Either way you end up with no net gain of weapons to use against the voidbringers, and likely have a net loss. Not to sound to callous about it, but there is no reason to revive the shardblades.  Keep the practical weapons you have and hope you can bolster your forces with KRs.

While I appreciate the thought, I wasn't thinking so much in terms of using that spren to create another radiant. It was more a case of convincing spren that have been held back by the Storm Father that humans can be trusted again. Carrying around the corpses of the spren's relatives is hardly going to help.

We have no guarantee that he would allow the other spren to come and bond, despite bonding Dalinar himself. He hasn't exactly been forthcoming about helping.

 

4 hours ago, Killik said:

This made me remember Adolin's duel against the 4 shardbearers.  When Kaladin preforms the last clap, the shardbearer runs away screaming "I didn't kill you!"  This clearly shows that he heard more than just indecipherable screaming which is all Kaladin seems to hear.  Renarin is clearly uncomfortable holding his blade, but we dont know if he heard just screaming or something more.

If we take the sharbearer's "I didn't kill you!" as a direct and appropriate response to what he heard, it would seem that spren believes whoever is touching it to be their lost radiant.  Perhaps if you could somehow convince the spren you are a different person it would allow a healing process to begin?  I also like the idea of the different orders needing to be involved.  I think that the process would require a knight of the order matching the spren to get anywhere, but I also think that you cannot simply repair the part of them mind that was broken.  The WoB states you would have to replace that part, I'm not sure how many spare spren minds are lying around.

 

Would you consider a normal spren to have that same part not there? That's why they can't think in the physical realm. So far they have only talked about waking up a dead spren in the physical world. A spren like Syl before she bonded Kaladin, while technically functional, could hardly be said to be intelligent or really truly awake.

3 hours ago, one winged jhereg said:

So if the shard bearer only heard the screams when a KR was touching it also, does this have dire implications for using these blades against the voidbringers?  Could the evil version of KR also produce this effect?  Have we just discovered a big weakness in what should have been one of the humans greatest assets?  I can see sending a squad of shard bearers with "broken" blades to help shore up a line of spear men that are being overwhelmed by VB only to fall to pieces when their blades start screaming at them.  Total rout and now they have to rethink everything they thought they knew about how to fight the VB.  

This is what I'm meaning too. While they are still powerful weapons, I do have to wonder whether or not they will actually help as they are.

 

2 hours ago, GenericGamer said:

It's an interesting idea but since the KR is returning and spren I assume, have begun to bond on mass or at least more commonly. Would the KR not want to discard all of the "broken shard blades" since their spren dislike them?

 Unfortunately this is where my idea begins to fall a bit (or maybe it doesn't). How many greedy light eyes would you expect to actually give up treasures that are worth kingdoms? They would hardly wish to divest themselves of such. The type that have them now are hardly going to be the ones that would bond a new spren as replacement.

 

2 hours ago, one winged jhereg said:

I guess it's a matter of how effective the blades will be in the upcoming war.  If they are useful against the "forces of evil" i just can't see getting rid of them altogether.  You don't use them in KR heavy units, but KR can't be every where and it's down right foolish to discard at least 100 effective weapons just because your new friends don't like them.  Sure the blades won't be as effective as a full KR but they are still a substantial force multiplier that could have a major impact for non-super powered field units.  The soldiers in Dalinar's vision with the stone monster would have a much better chance with blades, especially if they were separated from their knight during a random encounter with something like that.  Unless there are enough KR to go around it just doesn't make an sense to discard, or even free the blades.  Use every method available to you to win. "Life before death" is the first part of the first oath, so you gotta make some hard choices to be around for the other parts.

I agree with many points here, but somehow I don't see "Life before Death" being a good enough reason for all the orders to agree to using the corpses of spren. Some of them maybe though!

2 hours ago, maxal said:

Actually, I am deeply worried the Radiants will refuse to have anything to do with any Shard bearers because their Blades are abominations... I think we may very well end up in a conflict in between the two in the early days of the return of the Radiants, but as Radiants slowly become more numerous than the Shard bearers (only 30 of them while there used to be 1000 of Radiants), then the Shard bearers will be ancient history.

I actually really like this idea, but I am unsure whether or not they will have time. Humans will be battling other humans as well as Odium remember. It's very possible and almost guaranteed that shardbearers will be facing off against the newly formed KR group. 

Why is this an issue? Because our radiants are untrained. We have to remember that many of the new radiants will be like Ym. Unable to fight with a blade since their bond is too new. Unable to fight full stop because they may just not have fighting capability. Unable to use their surges due to lack of practice. Then we also need to remember that Nale/Darkness/Nalan is also hunting proto radiants as well. 

I just don't know that our KR will get the numbers in time. That's part of where the tension in Brandon's books come from. They need time and it is rapidly running out. 

2 hours ago, GenericGamer said:

I agree as we have seen spren do everything they can to uphold their views so I think it's possible they would threaten to leave if their radiant worked with Shard bearers

Now I wouldn't necessarily go that far. While Syl (and I assume other spren) would never allow her personal radiant to use a dead shard blade, She has never tried to get Kaladin to stop associating with those who do. I could still see it becoming an issue later though. 

 

Sorry about the huge big post, but you guys brought up a lot of points that I found interesting!

-WC

[Dahak]

On 04/08/2016 at 5:33 PM, Killik said:

I think that the process would require a knight of the order matching the spren to get anywhere, but I also think that you cannot simply repair the part of them mind that was broken.

I'm currently assuming the process of healing a broken shardblade requires the blades' bonded wielder to become a Knight of the relevant order without bonding a spren. At least to the Oath after the one that unlocks having your spren become a shardblade for your order and possibly to the Fifth Oath in all cases. Since you need to replace what was lost in the Recreance.

Which would mean Adolin would have to work through "I will remember those that are forgotten" and several other oaths on the way to being an Edgedancer as part of healing his blade.

[maxal]

15 hours ago, Dahak said:

Which would mean Adolin would have to work through "I will remember those that are forgotten" and several other oaths on the way to being an Edgedancer as part of healing his blade.

Without the help and the guidance of a spren to steer him in the right direction or to basically force him to say the oath and, perhaps even more importantly, without the surgebinding and he stormlight proto-Radiants have all used up through their progress. A journey seems to have have its fair share of dangers: Adolin would be asked to behave like a Radiants without the powers nor the advantages: a Radiant without a spren. No matter it is almost impossible.

Here is one I am not sure many people read from Brandon himself..

Adolin's shardblade is a RAFO, as I want this to play out naturally and not squelch discussion. Suffice it to say that a dead Shardblade, under normal circumstances, is locked into a single form.

We'll find out more about dead spren as the books move forward.

It is not much, really not much, but the "I want this to play out naturally" does more or less imply something will happen.

[Killik]

On 8/4/2016 at 5:21 PM, WindCaller said:

Would you consider a normal spren to have that same part not there? That's why they can't think in the physical realm. So far they have only talked about waking up a dead spren in the physical world. A spren like Syl before she bonded Kaladin, while technically functional, could hardly be said to be intelligent or really truly awake.

Yes i would consider a normal spren having a fully intact 'mind' as opposed to the bonded and betrayed spren having part of their mind ripped out as Brandon put it.  I think of it  as each normal spren is like an infant, they have a complete mind/brain but it has not been developed yet.  In most cases it never will be, they simply function on an infantile level and are drawn into the physical realm by whatever idea created them.

The Nahel bond allows spren to develop the mind to the point of advanced logic and reasoning.  The spren capable of bonding have the potential to be intelligent or "awake" from their birth(?), but that is not to say non-bonding spren done have that capacity.  We don't know that.  Each spren could have the capacity of intelligence, but not the ability to bond and therefor they would never achieve that.  

[Vissy]

This is a really sad thing, the "dead" spren. I really wish there will be something good happening to them... they deserve to be resurrected. I hope Brandon will deliver on that. I mean, a KR is better than a Shardbearer, so why not give the Shardblades to people compatible to them and try to make it happen.

[nervousnerd]

I do wonder what the current spren would want done with the dead spren blades though. Surely they wouldn't want them to be destroyed somehow? They are their brothers and sisters. But I suppose it is dangerous to leave powerful weapons laying around if you are not going to use them.