[OB] Fifth Ideal?

[galendo]

It does seem like there ought to be some sort of reward/perk for swearing the final Ideal, though precisely what it would be is unclear.  There's no practical, Realmatic. or good literary reason for growing gemhearts that I can see, so that's out.

I only see the "permanent Stormlight tap" idea working if it were a slow tap.  If a Windrunner could only draw enough Stormlight to keep a single half-lashing going indefinitely, for instance, then from a practical standpoint one is simply trading the finite resource of Stormlight for the finite resource of Time.  It would also allow Brandon to "turn off" any Radiant's power at will simply by having them get injured, as their body would then prioritize healing over other uses of power.  So it's not like the idea would be overpowered from a literary perspective.

I think that's the theory I'm going with until we see further evidence.  It even fits with what we've seen of Nale -- pulling in Stormlight without inhaling, but not so much Stormlight as to allow for surgebinding, just enough to make him stronger and faster.  With our only fifth-Ideal Radiant also being a Herald, though, I'm not sure that we can reasonably draw any conclusions about what the fifth-Ideal perk might be.  It's impossible to tell where one ability ends and another begins.

[The Harlem Worldhoppers he/him]

On 15 July 2018 at 1:46 PM, BurkSpren said:

Something often overlooked, I am sure there was a quote somewhere claiming that the Windrunners of old could "bind the storms to themselves" or something similar.

Considering Kaladins nascent ability to divert the stormfront at only the 3rd ideal, I would think it entirely possible that a 5th ideal Windrunner would be capable of at least breaking off their own mini storm, and a group of them capable of all but summoning a high storm to their location at will.

This is similar to a theory I espouse. Jezrien, the patron of the Windrunners, is often confused with the Stormfather in Rosharan mythology and I believe the reason for this is because he was able to create his own storms. Adhesion controls pressure and vacuum so it could theoretically be used to create areas of differing air pressure, leading to high speed winds. This would require an immense amount of Stormlight which Heralds such as Jezrien had access to through their direct feed with Honor. In a near infinite Stormlight situation aka Thaylen City I think Kaladin could create a storm. 

A very small proportion of Radiants reached the Fifth Ideal historically so it likely has some pretty big bonuses. With each Oath sworn the surgebinder becomes increasingly efficient so a Fifth Ideal KR will be able to do much more with the same amount of Stormlight as a Third Ideal KR. 

The nahel bond grows stronger with each Ideal attained and from what Captain Notum said it would appear that a Fifth Ideal KR is so strongly bonded to their spren that they are inseparable. We know that Connection is an important part of Magic Systems and on Scadrial a stronger Mistborn has a stronger Connection to Preservattion. I posit that by reaching the Fifth Ideal the Knight Radiant will increase the strength of their Connection to not just their spren, but Honor and Cultivation as well. This increased Connection would allow stronger Surgebinding, probably a little bit closer to what the Heralds were capable of.