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How many "conspiracy" groups are there in the Cosmere, and what is the extent of each's influence/desired dominion?


notAustere

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Roshar: Ghostbloods, Diagram, Amaram's group, Creepy Bug People (added in edit)

Scadrial: Uncle Ladrian's group (forgot the name)

Cosmere: 17th shard, ~Silverlight, ~Ire

**I know some of this might be wrong also

Edited by notAustere
forgot part of post
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43 minutes ago, notAustere said:

Amaram's group

The Sons of Honor just wanted to bring back the Vorin strength by way of Desolation and Heralds. They're pretty much gone now.

Also on Roshar is the Envisagers, who were trying to bring back the Knights Radiant and Vorin strength. They might all be dead now, though, it is unclear. We know the only ones we've directly heard about that were confirmed to belong to the group are dead (Teft's parents and their group).

The Amians might qualify as well, because I'm sure they're up to something.

43 minutes ago, notAustere said:

Uncle Ladrian's group (forgot the name)

The Set.

The kandra might count as well, considering there's at least one off-world somewhere.

I think Hoid would qualify all on his own, honestly, with how wide-spread his influence is, being that he's been just about everywhere at one time or another.

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On 2/24/2019 at 1:29 AM, Invocation said:

The Sons of Honor just wanted to bring back the Vorin strength by way of Desolation and Heralds. They're pretty much gone now.

Yes. I was reading OB today and read that they were just trying to bring back the Heralds (that can be read in the Kalidan-Amaram boss fight) and all that they realized that the Heralds were already there. Amaram, at least began serving Odium, if not all of the Sons of Honor.

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7 minutes ago, John Flamesinger said:

Yes. I was reading OB today and read that they were just trying to bring back the Heralds (that can be read in the Kalidan-Amaram boss fight) and all that they realized that the Heralds were already there. Amaram, at least began serving Odium, if not all of the Sons of Honor.

Only Amaram knows and he was told by Odium I doubt that their leadership knows or has reacted.  We don't know much about the Set, the sleepless or the ghostbloods.  Silverlight and the Ire are both primarily research institutions and we have a Wob that compares the 17th shard to starfleet. 

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46 minutes ago, John Flamesinger said:

Yes. I was reading OB today and read that they were just trying to bring back the Heralds (that can be read in the Kalidan-Amaram boss fight) and all that they realized that the Heralds were already there. Amaram, at least began serving Odium, if not all of the Sons of Honor.

I think the majority of what's left has no idea, since Amaram got told by Odium, as Karger notes, and I think they're pretty much obliterated anyway. Gavilar and Amaram are both gone, and from what we've been shown, they were about the main two behind it as far as I know.

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Yeah, as far as cross-Cosmere 'conspiracies' go, the Ghostbloods are the really big one.

The Aimians are up to something but we don't know how far their interests stretch, only that taking the dust jacket quote and Arclo at face value, they seem to be aligned towards Honor. Oh, and there's a WoB that the Dysians will have a major role in MB Era 4 but we don't know if they've got serious interests outside Roshar right now or if that's entirely to come in the future.

We could probably distinguish the Set (who are solely interested in controlling Scadrial) from 'Trell' who is pulling their strings and definitely has multi-world interests. On that note, we could consider Autonomy and her avatars to be a 'conspiracy' in and of itself since she's meddling in multiple worlds.

In purely local terms we could also add the Keepers from Terris, who kept alive the knowledge of the pre-Final Empire world until it could be shared again after Raskek fell. We might add the Worldbringers who were their predecessors as well, if only because they seem like they might have been somewhat Cosmere-aware (Kwaan was apparently researching things relating to the Cognitive Realm) and because Brandon's confirmed that the similarity of names with the Worldsingers is intentional.

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I can imagine there might be several more we aren't aware of yet. We don't, for example, know all the "tasks" these groups focus on, as per their names (we don't know why the Ghostbloods are called that or why the Set is called that), so we don't know how many high-level "narrative" (Cognitive-Spiritual?) problems exist in the Cosmere, so we don't know whether there could be at least one group per problem (as far as those in a secret society or conspiracy or institute might be affiliated with/directed at it) or conflicting (or cooperating!) groups per problems, or whatever.

That being said, we have how many groups in operation right now, around 10? (We'll round it to ten, anyway.) That's in 12 Cosmere books out of a projected ~40. Since as the metaseries approached completion, the amount of page space available for introducing more and more secret societies would decrease, so that would be a decent reason not to keep adding more right until the end. I could see there being 16 in all, maybe...

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One more potential 'conspiracy' group that we could consider is the Ones Above. We know they're from a world we've seen before and they appear to be trying to circumvent some restriction in how they're allowed to interact with the people of First of the Sun but we don't know their motivations for doing so or whether this is a self-imposed restriction they're trying to sneak their way around or if it's some externally imposed restriction. Depending on what the underlying facts are, there's room in that relationship for more cross-Cosmere groups also involved at the same point in the timeline.

Related to that, do we want to count the interstellar trade that went on through Ruin's Perpendicularity during the Final Empire? It's not exactly a conspiracy group per se but it's people aware of the wider Cosmere (to some extent) operating under the nose of the Steel Ministry, even if their goals seem to have been strictly mercantile and Rashek was aware of it and let it continue.

1 hour ago, Ripheus23 said:

I can imagine there might be several more we aren't aware of yet. We don't, for example, know all the "tasks" these groups focus on, as per their names (we don't know why the Ghostbloods are called that or why the Set is called that), so we don't know how many high-level "narrative" (Cognitive-Spiritual?) problems exist in the Cosmere, so we don't know whether there could be at least one group per problem (as far as those in a secret society or conspiracy or institute might be affiliated with/directed at it) or conflicting (or cooperating!) groups per problems, or whatever.

Yeah, there's definitely lots of room for potential other groups and tons we don't know about the groups that we do know of. One thing Brandon has revealed is that the name of the Ghostbloods refers to specific events in the Cosmere and would probably be recognizable to people in the know like Khriss.

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The interesting thing is that IRL those happen to be terms used in the origins of set theory, which is the modern theory of the foundation of mathematics (not everyone agrees, technically). So it seems as if the Set knows about the Cosmere-equivalent of the aleph-numbers, the transfinite numbers. But in a world like the Cosmere, with a Cognitive and a Spiritual Realm, and in relation to living fractals like Pattern (among other things?), the transfinite numbers might end up having an interesting relationship to the "power levels" of beings in the Cosmere, mayhap...

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2 hours ago, continuumg said:

Does no one else think the Stormwardens are up to something?

I think they're up to counting down the days until the highstorms. Other than that, no, considering they're just there noting stuff about the strength of the storms (increasing) and trying not to make the Vorins too mad.

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3 hours ago, continuumg said:

Does no one else think the Stormwardens are up to something?

I don't think so, or at least they've shown no evidence for it yet. They're being subversive insofar as they've figured out a way to convey more complex ideas in writing than men are supposed to learn but there's no indication they're using it for anything more complicated than recording information that can't be conveniently recorded using the 'proper' glyphs. That the Sons of Honor have taken their system and are using it for their own purposes doesn't necessarily mean the stormwardens themselves are up to something.

Brandon has said that the stormwardens use a lot of information to arrive at their predictions, including information that's not actually relevant. Whether you think that makes them less likely to be Up To Something (because if they were, shoudn't they only be using the necessary stuff?) or more likely (because if they're ever found out, they can point to that stuff and claim literal ignorance) is I suppose up to individual interpretation right now. But my thinking is that there's nothing special about them right now, until they're seen doing something really suspicious.

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Just now, notAustere said:

What do you mean "one off-world somewhere"? Has a kandra been cited on another planet?

We know that they are out there... We just don't know who. 

Quote

Questioner [PENDING REVIEW]

Have we seen the worldhopping kandra on-screen in Oathbringer?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

Yes, I believe you have. Ahhhh, yes, she gets around. 

JordanCon 2018 (April 21, 2018)

 

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Just now, notAustere said:

What do you mean "one off-world somewhere"? Has a kandra been cited on another planet?

Yep! There is at least one kandra confirmed to be off-world, and probably more.

Quote

Questioner

Are there kandra hiding in any of your books, besides the Mistborn ones?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes there are! Yes there are.

JordanCon 2014 (April 11, 2014)
Quote

Questioner

[Is OreSeur...] she wanted to know if there's a worldjumper who's the same species?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, there are and several of them have, but they tend to be homebodies, but there are some who have gone off.

Shadows of Self San Jose signing (Oct. 9, 2015)
Quote

Questioner

Are there kandra on other planets?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. 

Questioner

There are?

Brandon Sanderson

There are.

Arcanum Unbounded Seattle signing (Dec. 1, 2016)

 

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On 2/26/2019 at 7:06 PM, Weltall said:

Related to that, do we want to count the interstellar trade that went on through Ruin's Perpendicularity during the Final Empire? It's not exactly a conspiracy group per se but it's people aware of the wider Cosmere (to some extent) operating under the nose of the Steel Ministry, even if their goals seem to have been strictly mercantile and Rashek was aware of it and let it continue.

(I highlighted)

What interstellar trade?

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14 minutes ago, notAustere said:

What interstellar trade?

It's brought up in Secret History when Hoid chastises Kelsier for upending an entire mercantile system by destoying all the atium geodes in the Pits of Hathsin and thus destabilizing the Perpendicularity. Here's a WoB on the subject.

Quote

Questioner

In Secret History, Hoid says something to Kelsier about him destroying the Pits and destroying an entire mercantile system. Is he talking about literal inter-Realmic trade?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. Interplanetary trade, yes.

Questioner

Follow-up: Is House Venture involved?

Brandon Sanderson

House Venture is not involved. People in House Venture might be.

Questioner

The guy who--

Brandon Sanderson

Here is a RAFO card for your follow-up. House Venture is-- Yes.

Footnote: The questioner was likely referring to Felt, a spy that worked for House Venture, who is a worldhopper.
Arcanum Unbounded Chicago signing (Dec. 6, 2016)

Felt was confirmed as being Cosmere-aware and involved with the trade during Era 1 but whether or not it was direct involvement is a RAFO.

Edited by Weltall
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