Walker Posted November 23, 2016 Report Share Posted November 23, 2016 Several people are unhappy that there are so many radiants in the Kholin family (except maybe Adolin; sorry maxal). However, there is an interesting reveal in Edgedancer that gives a possible reason for this. Nalan states that his reasoning for killing radiants is to keep them from grouping together. When left alone, radiants naturally group together, perhaps at the behest of your spren. Suppose you are a spren from the Cognitive looking for someone to bind to. You realize that to succeed, you will need to join up with other bonded spren. But you also see that proto-radiants are being killed off before they can join with others. Your natural inclination will be to bond someone in a group of already existing radiants, so that there is no danger of you being isolated. More importantly, you are going to pick as high-profile a person as possible so that attempts on that person's life will not be easy. Hence, the Kholins. 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stark he/him Posted November 23, 2016 Report Share Posted November 23, 2016 I wish this had had spoiler tags on it. Saw it pop up on the feed for recent topics, saw no spoiler tags and decided to read it. I just got my delivery notification for my copy of AU today, and have not had a chance to read it... Though it could be argued that I should have known better than to look at any new topics on the boards before reading the new material. Interesting thought though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Argent he/him Posted November 23, 2016 Report Share Posted November 23, 2016 33 minutes ago, Stark said: I wish this had had spoiler tags on it. Saw it pop up on the feed for recent topics, saw no spoiler tags and decided to read it. I just got my delivery notification for my copy of AU today, and have not had a chance to read it... Though it could be argued that I should have known better than to look at any new topics on the boards before reading the new material. No, you are justified in expecting "Edgedancer Spoilers" in the title. It's in the policy. @Walker, I find merit in your idea. If the premise - that Radiants are driven to seek other Radiants by their spren - is true, then it would make a lot of sense to extend that back to the time before the Nahel bond was fully formed. I could easily see spren being slightly biased towards Radiant candidates that are in the immediately vicinity of other Radiants. There are two decent counterarguments I can marshal against this. One, that not all spren are likely to want their Radiants to find other Radiants, especially if the latter belong to Orders whose spren have different... views. Wow, that sentence is horrid. I mean to say that I can't imagine Syl and Pattern encouraging Kaladin and Shallan to seek each other out, given that honorspren and Cryptics hate each other. And two, we haven't seen any of the Nahel bonded spren encourage their Radiants to seek others of their kind. It just kind of... happens. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DSC01 he/him Posted November 24, 2016 Report Share Posted November 24, 2016 (edited) The tendency of Radiants to group together certainly helps get over the perhaps too-convenient way that a whole gaggle of proto-Radiants just about immediately found each other. I have long suspected that so many Radiants coming from the Kholin family is in some way related to the request that Dalinar made of the Nightwatcher, though. Edited November 24, 2016 by DSC01 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zmann966 he/him Posted November 27, 2016 Report Share Posted November 27, 2016 We got glimpses that the Radiant Orders of yester-millenia were more than just full Radiants. And the methodology of "unlocking" powers with words definitely encourages the thought that becoming a Radiant is a process. It makes sense to me that Radiant Knights had squires and trainees, initiates and people who joined them with the intent to become a Radiant and went through boot camp and work to achieve their Nahel Bond, their Shardblade, and (presumably) their Plate. Such a system would very much support the "Radiants grouping together" and the fact that spren were more likely to bond those "grouped up" already. Think about it, to become a Windrunner you need to speak the words and live the ideals. Yeah you could do that on your own, and perhaps an Honorspren will be drawn to you and bond, but entire classes of initiates being groomed to live by the ideals and trained in combat and pushed towards this way of life of protecting others would draw Honorspren to them, bolster the ranks of the Order, and provide a very seamless "promotion" system from recruit to Radiant. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nervousnerd he/him Posted November 28, 2016 Report Share Posted November 28, 2016 I feel like I don't necessarily mind the high number of Kholins who are Radiants but I kind of would like Adolin to be an unpowered counterpart to the other two in order to add to their story. I do worry more that a bunch of the people we have already met will turn out to secretly be Radiants though. I suppose it makes some sense for some already introduced people to make that transition but I think I would prefer more new characters. Perhaps I simply worry that the Radiants may currently have a larger focus on Alethkar due to their membership at the moment. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KidWayne he/him Posted December 13, 2016 Report Share Posted December 13, 2016 Doesn't the fact that Adolin has a Ryshadium predispose him to obtain a Nahel bond? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Landis963 he/him Posted December 14, 2016 Report Share Posted December 14, 2016 9 hours ago, KidWayne said: Doesn't the fact that Adolin has a Ryshadium predispose him to obtain a Nahel bond? No, because the nahel bond has little to do with a normal human-horse relationship (albeit one where the horse has intelligence comparable to a human) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stark he/him Posted December 14, 2016 Report Share Posted December 14, 2016 I think it is more accurate to say that Sureblood had Nahel-bond like interaction with a spren, similar to that of the Chasmfiends, or whatever lets the skyeels fly. Being close to, or friends with, a bonded individual or being doesn't mean you are predisposed towards the bond, just that you have good choice in friends. Probably. Just like being a member of Bridge Four does not predispose you to being a Windrunner via proximity and friendship with Kaladin. It may be more accurate to view it as Adolin was predisposed to become Sureblood's squire, due to proximity and the nature of their interactions, more than anything else. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vissy Posted December 14, 2016 Report Share Posted December 14, 2016 Wait, a horse radiant? Yes! Make it happen, Brandon! Sureblood will be the best Radiant in history. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stark he/him Posted December 14, 2016 Report Share Posted December 14, 2016 @Rob Lucci you may have to set your hopes on Gallant and Dalinar... WOR Spoilers: Spoiler Sureblood was hit by Parshendi Stormform Red Lightning in the final confrontation... He was not moving after, heavily implying he was killed, with vivid description making it more a confirmation than an implication. Even if he wasn't, being left unconscious in the middle of the clash between a Highstorm and the Everstorm could not have been good for his health... That's why Adolin was on his way to becoming Sureblood's squire, and no longer can... Sadness for all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vissy Posted December 14, 2016 Report Share Posted December 14, 2016 Noooo! What a loss. I'm betting my money on Gallant. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dionysus Posted December 15, 2016 Report Share Posted December 15, 2016 I'm sure Brandon has an in-world justifcation, but I tend to not worry about such things when it is in service of a story. Having characters that have a backstory together and motivations to work together makes the story better. Just like we accept that our protagonists are the 1-in-a-million long-shots that arise in a sufficiently large population, I accept that the Kholin's are that 1-in-a-million (billion) family. One of my large complaints about WoT and other large scale epic fantasy is that too many characters reduces the impact of each protagonist. If you make all the characters origins separate, then you need supporting characters from their origins and you need to show the protagonist interacting with them so you can establish the protagonists personality and motivations. Another way to do it is to just tell the reader the origin, but I prefer showing not telling. Every word is precious, even in a 1,200 page book in a 5 book series. By having so many viewpoint characters originate in the Kholin family, he is able to establish the backstory of 4 viewpoint characters at the same time as well as the backstory of several important non-viewpoint characters. I've listened to Brandon speak at a book signing, he actually worries quite a lot about crafting large scale epic fantasy and not getting lost in the world building. He wants to tell as concise a story he can but also show off all the work he has put into creating the world. That is one of the many reasons for interludes, he can write a self-contained short story that builds out the world and setting but then cleanly cut it off (if he wants to, some will not be cut off like Lift.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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