[OB] Oathbringer Outline [Preview Chapter Spoilers]

[vividox]

Just because I'm having a hard time waiting until November 14th, I thought it might be worth the time to compare the chapters released so far to the original outline to see where we are at and what could potentially happen.

Here is a link to the outline shared in Stormlight Three Update #5: 

Here is what we know so far:
Flashbacks: Dalinar
Primary Main Character: Dalinar
Secondary Main Character 1: Kaladin or Shallan
Secondary Main Character 2: Shallan or Kaladin
Short Story Collection: Eshonai
Tertiary Character #?: Adolin

Notes:
* Secondary Main Character 1/2 is definitely Kaladin and Shallan, but I'm not sure we have enough to say who is 1 and who is 2. Unless I'm missing something, we may not know until we get to Part 2, where SMC1 will get very little POV time.
* Short Story Collection: I can only imagine this is a short story collection on Eshonai, since we saw her in the prologue, and the outline depicts the short story collection starting at the beginning of Part 1.
* Outside of that, Adolin has received a POV chapter already; while the outline doesn't explicitly state any tertiary characters gets a Part 1 POV, Brandon has historically played a little loose with these. That being said, we don't know whether Adolin is TC1, 2, 3, or 4, so it's hard to say which part will feature more of him. 

Likely candidates for interlude POVs or novelettes: Szeth, Eshonai, Jasnah, Adolin, Navani (these were specifically mentioned by Brandon in Update #2). I also wouldn't be too surprised to see an appearance by Nale, specifically because Brandon saw Edgedancer as a necessity in order to advance Nale's character progression before we got to Oathbringer. 

WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?

First of all, we should acknowledge that Sanderson has a tendency to finish each part on a cliffhanger. In addition, Sanderson views the entire five parts as a sort of trilogy, where part 1 is the first "book", parts 2 and 3 form the second "book", and parts 4 and 5 form the final "book". I'd speculate that this means the bigger cliffhangers will be coming at the ends of parts 1 and 3.

What are the cliffhangers going to be?

I think two of the biggest cliffhangers have to be (1) Adolin being accused of murdering Sadeas and (2) Jasnah returning to society / finding her way to Urithiru. It would then make sense for Adolin and Jasnah to be tertiary characters in books following their respective cliffhangers. Based on Brandon's comments about Parts 2 and 3 (Part 2 is more character and lore focused while three is more fast paced and climactic) I'm lead to speculate that we'll see Jasnah return at the end of Part 1 and Adolin be accused at the end of Part 2.

Based on this, my speculation is:
Tertiary Character 1: Jasnah - who will return at the end of Part 1 and have a significant role in Parts 2 and 4
Tertiary Character 2: Adolin - who will be accused of murder at the end of Part 2 and have a significant role in Part 3
Tertiary Character 3: Hoid (?!) - who was last seen with Jasnah and could potentially accompany her to Urithiru to help info dump (could we be so lucky?)

Other ideas on potential cliffhangers: (A) the Everstorm returns and some Parshendi do actually turn into Voidbringers, (B) Something happens between Shallan and the Ghostbloods, (C) Taravangian arriving at Urithiru / attempting to kill Dalinar, (D) Something else.

Anywho, I'd imagine that all the preview chapters we're going to get are Part 1 + Interludes, so I don't know how much info we're going to get here before the actual book drops on November 14th, but if you guys have anything I missed or anything else comes up in the Preview Chapters, I'll update this post. But as of right now, I've pretty well convinced myself that Jasnah's return will be the end of Part 1 and Adolin's accusation will be the end of the Part 2.

Edited October 9, 2017 by vividox

[vividox]

An afterthought since I clicked "post":

If Jasnah is indeed TC1 and I am correct about her being the cliffhanger at the end of Part 1, then SMC1 is most likely Kaladin, since we'd probably hear from Shallan (being in proximity to Jasnah) a lot more. It also makes sense that Kaladin would disappear for a bit, since he's off travel-logging and wouldn't be involved in much of the lore development. 

(And obviously this is predicated on a cavalcade of assumptions at this point, so who knows how accurate it will be)

Edited October 9, 2017 by vividox

[Blacksmithki]

I feel like the scene from the cover could make a likly ending to a part, if I remember correctly it's Jasnah on the cover and it most likely would be a climactic scene.

[Toaster Retribution he/him]

This is interesting. I don´t agree with everything though:

*I don´t know what you mean by Jasnahs return, but she will most likely not go to Urithiru early in the book (Oathbringer spoiler):

Spoiler

I think Brandon said that she would be in Kholinar

*I don´t see Nale being a POV. He will most likely hang out with Szeth, and get page-time when we have Szeth POVs.

*At least one part will probably feature a Moash POV to some extent (I think it is part 2).

[Pagerunner he/him]

For some reason, I can't follow your link, but I can find it anyways and I'll post it here in case anyone else can't find it:

I agree that the "Short Story Collection" includes the prologue, but I don't think it means it's focused on Eshonai. She was basically in the "Novelette One" slot for last book, as Szeth was for the first book. The Short Story Collection is mostly the standalone Interludes, like the Soulcaster and Ardent interludes that Brandon read at various events. I'm not sure who will be our main Novelette character, except it definitely won't be Szeth (since he won't have chapters until the end of the book), and I don't think it will be Eshonai (for the reasons I stated above, that her Prologue POV is not counted as part of the Novelette).

I think the blue/pink indicates that Kaladin is our SMC2 and Shallan is our SMC1. I'm not sure Adolin is a TC at all, in this outline, since there are no boxes at all for any of the TMCs in Part 1. If I were to speculate wildly, I could see Shallan disappearing, and Novelette Two being Adolin investigating. That would explain why she's not present in Part Two, but the thread of her story could basically be continued from Adolin's POV. But other than that, I think the absence of a TC in Part 1 does not bode well for him.

I'm very hesitant to speculate on what the various climaxes will be. Going into WoR, who would have thought that Kaladin being thrown in prison was one? There definitely are expectations that we have about the narrative, but considering the total curveball that has been coming our way with Kaladin's chapters, I don't think you'll be able to guess the important twists of the book at this point. (But you are free to attempt it, of course!)

[WhiteLeeopard she/her]

Looking at the outline, is it possible that Adolin didn't appear as TC in part one because it was either added afterwards or always in a subchapter? He doesn't have a full chapter to himself so far, just half or quarter of a chapter. Good for readers, but maybe doesn't appear on colored chart.

I'm guessing Szeth, Eshonai and Adolin are TC1, TC2 and TC4. Moash either novelette one or two, or TC3.

Edited October 9, 2017 by WhiteLeeopard

[Toaster Retribution he/him]

Moash is Part 2, I'd guess, which means tertiary character 3. Szeth I would place as TC4 which would mean Part 4&5 for him. Adolin is a wild card, but I feel that TC2 is most likely. He is big enough of a character to have presence in the climax. For the part 2 novella, my guess would be Lift. I think she will be shown finding her way to Urithiru. 

[+Wax he/him]

1 hour ago, Toaster Retribution said:

This is interesting. I don´t agree with everything though:

*I don´t know what you mean by Jasnahs return, but she will most likely not go to Urithiru early in the book (Oathbringer spoiler):

  Hide contents

I think Brandon said that she would be in Kholinar

*I don´t see Nale being a POV. He will most likely hang out with Szeth, and get page-time when we have Szeth POVs.

*At least one part will probably feature a Moash POV to some extent (I think it is part 2).

I agree that she won’t go to Urithiru simply because of geography.  A WoB states that she came back in the Unclaimed Hills whereas Urithiru is someway in the middle of Roshar past Alethkar and Jah Kaved.  So, she’s likely to go to Alethkar first.

[+Wax he/him]

5 hours ago, vividox said:

I'd imagine that all the preview chapters we're going to get are Part 1 + Interludes

I recall that only Part 1 is released without interludes prior to the book release.

[vividox]

15 minutes ago, axcellence said:

I recall that only Part 1 is released without interludes prior to the book release.

I've seen a few people mention this as well, I think what I had in my head was that Brandon considers the interludes to be part of Part 1 in his overall scope (which certainly doesn't mean we'll get interludes as free chapters, just explains why I was thinking it). 

[vividox]

1 hour ago, Toaster Retribution said:

This is interesting. I don´t agree with everything though:

*I don´t know what you mean by Jasnahs return, but she will most likely not go to Urithiru early in the book (Oathbringer spoiler):

  Reveal hidden contents

I think Brandon said that she would be in Kholinar

*I don´t see Nale being a POV. He will most likely hang out with Szeth, and get page-time when we have Szeth POVs.

*At least one part will probably feature a Moash POV to some extent (I think it is part 2).

Ah, that tidbit about Jasnah makes sense. I hadn't seen that quote.

For some reason I completely forgot about Moash when writing this up. 

[vividox]

1 hour ago, Pagerunner said:

I think the blue/pink indicates that Kaladin is our SMC2 and Shallan is our SMC1. I'm not sure Adolin is a TC at all, in this outline, since there are no boxes at all for any of the TMCs in Part 1. If I were to speculate wildly, I could see Shallan disappearing, and Novelette Two being Adolin investigating. That would explain why she's not present in Part Two, but the thread of her story could basically be continued from Adolin's POV. But other than that, I think the absence of a TC in Part 1 does not bode well for him.

Hmmm, I think Kaladin has a bigger chance to disappear for part 2 if not solely because of Brandon's comments that much of Kaladin's story line he'd originally planned for Book #3 actually ended up happening in Words of Radiance. That feels like to me that Kaladin's plot is going to be quite a bit slower in this book as a result. Of course, that in and of itself is just speculation. The blue/pink thing is something I hadn't considered, but it could just be coincidence. 

[vividox]

I also just noticed that with the apparent problem with my link, I'd actually been looking at the outline Brandon posted in Update #2, so my thoughts about Jasnah being TC1 and having POV chapters in both Part 2 and 4 aren't correct. If I tried to use the same logic with the newer outline, Jasnah would be TC3 and we wouldn't see any POV chapters of her after Part 2. 

[Straw he/him]

Hey, @vividox, it's usually considered polite to edit your new thoughts into your now post instead of double-posting. Thanks! 

[asterion137 he/him]

6 hours ago, vividox said:

Secondary Main Character 1/2 is definitely Kaladin and Shallan, but I'm not sure we have enough to say who is 1 and who is 2. Unless I'm missing something, we may not know until we get to Part 2, where SMC1 will get very little POV time.

IMO kal is probably 2 since shallan is with the other main characters and her storyline can be advanced without POVs

[treblkickd he/him]

My guess would be that that TC's are: Szeth, Jasnah, Adolin and Renarin, with either Adolin or Renarin being TC #3, so that the TC #3 PoV effectively replace Shallan's PoVs in Part 2. This would keep the PoV space on the Urithiru story arc while providing a different perspective on what's going on there. Eshonai would also make sense as a TC given her importance in the overall Stormlight Archive story arc, but until she's integrated more closely with other main characters I feel as though it's more likely for her to be a novelette in this book (similar to WoR I guess?). I have a hard time naming a leading contender for the second novelette with any number of characters making sense (Navani, Lift, Taln, who knows who else). 

I would also guess that what we see of Moash is likely to be in either an interlude, or in a series of PoV snippets at the end of chapters (similar to Adolin PoV at the end of Chapter 10). I don't think he makes sense as a character that gets a ton of screen time, but he does provide a nice opportunity to give us short glimpses into what's going on with the Diagram folks.

My dark horse candidate for any TC or novelette role is May Aladar, just because let's be honest, no one is hotter right now.

[The Invested Beard]

1 hour ago, treblkickd said:

My guess would be that that TC's are: Szeth, Jasnah, Adolin and Renarin, with either Adolin or Renarin being TC #3, so that the TC #3 PoV effectively replace Shallan's PoVs in Part 2. This would keep the PoV space on the Urithiru story arc while providing a different perspective on what's going on there. Eshonai would also make sense as a TC given her importance in the overall Stormlight Archive story arc, but until she's integrated more closely with other main characters I feel as though it's more likely for her to be a novelette in this book (similar to WoR I guess?). I have a hard time naming a leading contender for the second novelette with any number of characters making sense (Navani, Lift, Taln, who knows who else). 

I would also guess that what we see of Moash is likely to be in either an interlude, or in a series of PoV snippets at the end of chapters (similar to Adolin PoV at the end of Chapter 10). I don't think he makes sense as a character that gets a ton of screen time, but he does provide a nice opportunity to give us short glimpses into what's going on with the Diagram folks.

My dark horse candidate for any TC or novelette role is May Aladar, just because let's be honest, no one is hotter right now.

 

[vividox]

10 hours ago, treblkickd said:

 I have a hard time naming a leading contender for the second novelette with any number of characters making sense (Navani, Lift, Taln, who knows who else). 

The second novelette is from the POV of a character that hasn't had any viewpoints yet. From the second reddit update:

"Each volume, then, has a complete trilogy's worth of arcs and climaxes for the primary characters (Kaladin, Shallan, Dalinar) while also having a self-contained flashback sequence, at least one secondary novelette about a character that hasn't had viewpoints so far, and a related short story collection."

In re-reading, that actually kind of reads like the short story collection and the secondary novelette are related to one another. Since the short story collection appears to be about the Parshendi, could the secondary novelette be about Venli? Or maybe even a flashback to Klade?

[treblkickd he/him]

8 hours ago, vividox said:

The second novelette is from the POV of a character that hasn't had any viewpoints yet. From the second reddit update:

"Each volume, then, has a complete trilogy's worth of arcs and climaxes for the primary characters (Kaladin, Shallan, Dalinar) while also having a self-contained flashback sequence, at least one secondary novelette about a character that hasn't had viewpoints so far, and a related short story collection."

In re-reading, that actually kind of reads like the short story collection and the secondary novelette are related to one another. Since the short story collection appears to be about the Parshendi, could the secondary novelette be about Venli? Or maybe even a flashback to Klade?

Oooo that's interesting. So I guess the "no-viewpoints-character so far" information argues for Moash as one of the novelette or short story arc (unless I'm forgetting a PoV from him?). If Moash is one then I wonder who would be the PoV for the related novelette/short story arc. Taravangian is really the only person that makes much sense to me, unless it's some other entirely new person related to the Diagram-ists.

Mostly I find myself rooting for a decent amount of Jasnah PoV time in Oathbringer. That and a Jasnah+Kaladin cross-country trip ending in Kholinar.

[Guest]

A bit more data onto the book structure Brandon gave away on Reddit.

Brandon confirmed the main and the secondary characters were Dalinar, Kaladin and Shallan. He never commented on who was secondary character 1 or 2. However, knowing Brandon doesn't enjoy writing travels, preferring to skip those parts and considering Kaladin's story arc will likely have some, I am expecting he is the vanishing character into part 2. Brandon also stated secondary characters have skipped parts before when people interjected him on Kaladin potentially not having viewpoints into one part.

Brandon also confirmed the book has moderate amount of: Adolin, Szeth, Eshonai, Jasnah and Navani. So five characters for 4 tertiary character spots and potentially one of the novellas. Though, since Navani never really had more than 2 viewpoints per book she would count as an "occasional POV character" and not a "tertiary character". Thus, the line up seems highly likely to be: Adolin, Szeth, Eshonai and Jasnah.

Brandon confirmed Adolin did have one of the tertiary character viewpoints, but he never said which one. He later said Adolin's viewpoints would happen later in the book. I suspect he is tertiary character 1, the same as he was back in WoR. Tertiary one previously had viewpoints in part 2, but they were either removed or scattered in the book: this is consistent with Brandon saying he changed the outlay of Adolin's story arc. Him having viewpoints in part 1 merely indicates Brandon's structure takes notes of who owns a chapter, it does not track split ownership of a chapter. Adolin doesn't own any chapters in part 1, but he does have occasional viewpoints. It is likely he will have them all through the book as he did in WoK up until his big character centered story arc, likely in part 4.

Brandon confirmed Szeth was one of the tertiary character and he has viewpoints in part 4, so either tertiary 2 or 4.

Brandon said Jasnah was a supporting character for this book and had a small role: I expect either tertiary character 2 or 4. She needs to trek to civilization before she has viewpoints and Brandon said he did not like writing travels. I expect we'll see her when she gets somewhere. I could however be wrong and she could be tertiary 3 or even one of the novellas, but I am betting on tertiary 2 or 4.

Eshonai surely is one of the tertiary character, I would think tertiary character 3 as it makes sense, with Kaladin's Parshendi arc, to see what is happening with her soon. 

The interlude novella is supposed to be a new interlude novella character: I don't recall if Brandon said anything specific except not Szeth nor Eshonai. Popular guesses have been Jasnah or Lift or Taln as we are supposed to learn more about Taln in OB. It makes sense for him to be one of the unmentioned POV character, but he does not fit the Part 2 novella character as Brandon did say it was someone completely new. The interlude novella has been used to present future protagonist, so it makes sense Brandon would use it for Taln.

The part 2 novella character is supposed to be someone never having had POV. Popular guess is Moash. Based on OB so far, I would add Elhokar.

Any other character, except the mystery ones, are not allowed to have more than an occasional viewpoint which is one or two chapters. Brandon specifically mentioned Renarin. Hence if Renarin gets viewpoints, it will one or two chapters, nothing more. He is not on the chart. The comment probably includes other recurring viewpoint characters such as Taravangian, Lift and Rysn unless there is a curve and one of those happen to be the interlude novella main feature.

[vividox]

Thanks for the run down, maxal. Based on your comments and interjecting a few of my own thoughts:

Flashbacks: Dalinar
Primary Main Character: Dalinar
Secondary Main Character 1: Kaladin (or Shallan)
Secondary Main Character 2: Shallan (or Kaladin)
Tertiary Characters 1, 2, and 4: Adolin, Jasnah, and Szeth
Tertiary Character 3: Eshonai
Novelette One: Taln? Lift?
Novelette Two: Moash? Venli? Klade? Elhokar?
Short Story Collection: Parshendi?

I combined Tertiary 1, 2, and 4 since they are all analogous to each other - Part 4 and the end of Part 5. We can make the distinction that Adolin is most likely Tertiary 1 because of Brandon's comments and the deletion of the involvement in Part 2, but the end result is the same. 

It's also worth noting that if the Short Story Collection is indeed Parshendi-centric, that we could get one-off Venli/Klade/Sah POVs there and Novelette Two could go to someone like Moash or Elhokar. Although if you really read into the Brandon quote I quoted above and assume Novelette Two and Short Story Collection are related, it's possible they are both Parshendi-centric.

That's gotta be pretty close.

[MrWyndle_ThatsHisName]

Very cool topic! All I have to add is that I think the short story collection is a bunch of unrelated one-off PoVs, including Rysn, possibly Lift, some random Ardents (isn't there a reading that's available online that's set in something like a monastery?), and who knows what else. Hopefully Nale is done killing proto-Radiants otherwise I think we could expect another of those. Brandon seems to use the short story interludes to flesh out the world and story using a bunch of shallow looks at new characters, PoVs and settings.

[Toaster Retribution he/him]

It wouldn't be a Stormlight book without a random ardent Interlude.

[vividox]

2 hours ago, MrWyndle_ThatsHisName said:

Very cool topic! All I have to add is that I think the short story collection is a bunch of unrelated one-off PoVs, including Rysn, possibly Lift, some random Ardents (isn't there a reading that's available online that's set in something like a monastery?), and who knows what else. Hopefully Nale is done killing proto-Radiants otherwise I think we could expect another of those. Brandon seems to use the short story interludes to flesh out the world and story using a bunch of shallow looks at new characters, PoVs and settings.

One thing I'm not quite clear on: does Novelette One and Short Story Collection make up all of the interludes, or are there some other interludes that float around that aren't a part of those? 

[MrWyndle_ThatsHisName]

I had the impression that the interludes are made of of two things( individual vignettes and a series of chapters that combine into a novelette). Words of Radiance has one-off interludes from Ym, Rysn, Zahel, Taln, Lift, Lahn, and Taravangian, but then there are six chapters distributed through the WoR interludes that have Eshonai as PoV and together form her novelette.