Odium's effect on planets: Why is Sel OK?

[cometaryorbit]

Given how destructive the Desolations on Roshar are, why is Sel still habitable? Once Devotion and Dominion were splintered, there wouldn't have been any force opposing Odium.

I used to think that Odium simply didn't have any interest in harming anybody below major Splinter/Herald/etc power level. But it seems from Oathbringer that I was wrong about the Desolations on Roshar in my old Recreance theory:

But then, I was focusing only on Odium's goals: at that point, I was expecting the Voidbringer/Everstorm-influenced listeners to be pure puppets with no motivations of their own (like Ruin-controlled koloss/inquisitors in Mistborn). If the Desolations' threat to humanity in general comes from the listeners' own desire to get their planet back, Odium might still not care.

But even so... Threnody is super messed up, and it doesn't seem like either Odium or Ambition Invested there. So why isn't Sel more damaged? It seems pretty Earthlike.

[RShara]

Odium is trapped in the Rosharan system, so he's forced to take measures that he wasn't interested in taking on other planets. On Sel, he was able to Splinter the Shards, shove them in the CR, and leave, so he didn't need to affect the people or the geography or the investiture (other than Splintering it).

Threnody, we don't know a ton about, but the Shades are almost certainly due to the aftershocks of Ambition's Splintering/power. I find it likely that small or large chunks of Ambition's investiture have gotten stuck on Threnody and are affecting it.

Edited June 25, 2019 by RShara

[Weltall]

To add to what @RShara said, while Sel looks reltively undamaged compared to Threnody and Roshar it's actually incredibly messed up, just not in the Physical Realm. Sel's Cognitive Realm is a massive storm of Investiture plasma that makes it extremely dangerous to visit and has thus left the world somewhat isolated from the rest of the Cosmere because of how risky it is to try and go there to such an extent that even Hoid finds it difficult to travel there. Also, because of the Dor being located in the Cognitive, Sel's magic is messed up by normal Cosmere standards what with the whole geographic locking.

So yeah, while Sel doesn't look as bad as other worlds Odium got involved with, it's partly because he didn't need to take the same steps there as on Roshar and partly because you aren't seeing the real damage directly.

[Karger]

In addition Sel might have been much easier for Odium as he could have been able to essentially ambush the two shards residing their and then leave.  In your other examples the fallout was all the result of extended shard battles.  What we see on Sel could have been more like a well planned assassination.

[cometaryorbit]

On 6/25/2019 at 9:51 AM, Weltall said:

To add to what @RShara said, while Sel looks reltively undamaged compared to Threnody and Roshar it's actually incredibly messed up, just not in the Physical Realm. Sel's Cognitive Realm is a massive storm of Investiture plasma that makes it extremely dangerous to visit and has thus left the world somewhat isolated from the rest of the Cosmere because of how risky it is to try and go there to such an extent that even Hoid finds it difficult to travel there.

Very good point, didn't think of that. Thanks!

Hmmm, I wonder why Seons don't get fried. Do they not live primarily in the Cognitive Realm like Rosharan spren? Or is it that they're made of that Investiture so it doesn't harm them?

[bxcnch]

It has also been stated somewhere that Sel's landscape and geography itself is Invested to some degree - and therefore more difficult to change with Investiture, shardic or not.

[Calderis]

14 hours ago, bxcnch said:

It has also been stated somewhere that Sel's landscape and geography itself is Invested to some degree - and therefore more difficult to change with Investiture, shardic or not.

This is a result of the damage done, and the Investiture being bound up in the Cognitive. 

Not protective mechanism. 

[bxcnch]

I didn't say that it was a protective mechanism. I meant that Sel's landscape is Invested as a part of the magic system(s) of Sel, which is why the form and shape of the countries and the ethnicity of its inhabitants or realms impact the way that the magic works. I thought that's what the Invested landscape referred to. I thought that as a side-effect of that, Sel would not be as easily affected. 

Edited September 21, 2019 by bxcnch

[Calderis]

2 hours ago, bxcnch said:

I didn't say that it was a protective mechanism. I meant that Sel's landscape is Invested as a part of the magic system(s) of Sel, which is why the form and shape of the countries and the ethnicity of its inhabitants or realms impact the way that the magic works. I thought that's what the Invested landscape referred to. I thought that as a side-effect of that, Sel would not be as easily affected. 

My point was that that situation is a result of what Odium did. It wouldn't have an effect while he was there. 

[Isilel]

On 25.6.2019 at 6:15 AM, cometaryorbit said:

But even so... Threnody is super messed up, and it doesn't seem like either Odium or Ambition Invested there. So why isn't Sel more damaged? It seems pretty Earthlike.

Except, didn't we see Sel many thousands of years after Odium's attack? It could have been pretty apocalyptic there for a while, after he killed the resident Shards. Just because they ultimately survived doesn't mean that it wasn't a close escape. And on Roshar, Odium was forced to Invest more heavily and also who knows how comprehensive destruction of the splinters of Honor and Cultivation would affect the ecosystem, since they are involved on a more intrinsic level in it's functioning than the Shards usually are?

As to Odium's use of pawns, unlike Ruin, his very Intent requires sentience. I do suspect that the intent of Desolations was never a military victory on his part, but something else. He has fooled the Fused and the singers/parsh for all this time.

As an aside, it is a bit of a missed opportunity, IMHO, that all of the Cosmere planets except for Roshar and First of the Sun have modern-Earth like feel. There were so many interesting and bizarre creatures in our own paleonotological record, even during the post-dinosaur period - wouldn't it have been more interesting if some of them had survived and flourished on Yolen and other pre-Shattering planets? After all, Yolen had the Sho-Del and intelligent dragons, so the more exotic animals should have been at home there too.

Edited September 24, 2019 by Isilel

[+TheFoxQR]

Another factor is the time scale.

Odium may want to destroy Roshar for similar reasons to why Ruin wanted to destroy Scadrial (apart from being... ya' know... Ruin).

We don't know how long Odium has stayed in each planetary system so far, but it is safe to say that he has been in and around Greater Roshar for significantly longer than Sel, Threnody, and wherever else he has been. So it may just be that by being around the Rosharan system for so long, his investiture has been seeping into it - and he may want this investiture back. Plus the Unmade, the Fused, the Voidspren, etc.

There's also that thing he says after Dalinar's moment in OB - that he would just have left the system, but the mechanics of how the realms interact with the magic means that leaving splinters of the other Shards behind is no longer an option for him.

Edited September 24, 2019 by TheFoxQR

[bxcnch]

On 9/24/2019 at 6:55 PM, TheFoxQR said:

(...) Odium may want to destroy Roshar for similar reasons to why Ruin wanted to destroy Scadrial (apart from being... ya' know... Ruin).

Wait, Ruin had other reasons than "being Ruin"?

[Zapata]

8 minutes ago, bxcnch said:

Wait, Ruin had other reasons than "being Ruin"?

Well, sort of. He and Preservation made a deal that if they created humanity, Ruin could destroy them at some point. So, while Odium didn't create humanity, he and the other shards did have their agreement to not interfere with each other.

[Calderis]

34 minutes ago, Bearer of Agonies said:

Well, sort of. He and Preservation made a deal that if they created humanity, Ruin could destroy them at some point. So, while Odium didn't create humanity, he and the other shards did have their agreement to not interfere with each other.

That's not a "reason" for Odium. It's a justification. His first target was Ambition, who wasn't because of the pact, but because he viewed her as a threat. He's breaking the pact himself, and using multi Shard worlds so that others like Edgli won't care as much.