The First (or potentially last) Ideal for a Fused

[+TheFoxQR]

I'm going on this premise:

1. Odium always asks from people to commit to him alone.
2. Odium converted some Singers to join his cause against Honor and Cultivation, by convincing them to fight against the Humans.
3. He makes these Singers Cognitive Shadows, and they become the Fused.
4. The Fused can Voidbind, or atleast use a version of Surgebinding.
5. One approach to becoming a Cognitive Shadow is to get an infusion of investiture in between the time when your physical body dies and when you pass on into the Beyond.
6. Knight Radiants get an infusion of Honor's investiture when they first speak any of their Oaths. This could also possibly true in Voidbinding, in which case the infusion is of Odium's investiture.

I was looking through the Death Rattles, and I came across this one:

Quote

The death is my life, the strength becomes my weakness, the journey has ended.

And I can't help but wonder if this is the initiation oath for a Singer to become a cognitive shadow upon death, and become one of the Fused.

The death is my life. The Singer only speaks this upon death, and accepts investiture from Odium to become a Cognitive Shadow. In doing so, they accept that they will never again be truly alive. They accept their death, and it will be the only life they know going forward.

The strength becomes my weakness. The old source of their strength, their belief in denying Odium and trust in the wisdom of other, ancient Singers/Honor/Cultivation is now their weakness. Following those old paths will only lead them further from their conviction in Odium.

The journey has ended. They have given themselves over to Odium, and absolve themselves of any responsibility going forward. Their journey has ended, they have arrived in a place in their life from where what they want will actually be achieved. Or maybe their Journey has ended, they no longer fight to get somewhere in life, now they fight for a prize they personally will never get. They fight for their descendents.

This imo would be genius manipulation by Odium. He literally makes people fight for something they will never get. And the ones they believe they are fighting for don't even know if they want it anymore. The modern singers don't even remeber how this fight started and would be willing to stay with the Humans in peace. But the Fused say "No, we are doing this because you want this, even though you don't know you want this, so come here, listen to our preachers tell you what you should want so that we can fight for it and you can join us. Trust us, we know better."

The other possible interpretation is that this from the perspective of a Radiant who has utterly given up - and to me it seems extremely unlikely, as the whole journey of a Radiant is to utterly and truly believe that they will not give up despite their pain and will keep going inspite of it.

Edit: In tackling @Scion of the Mists's post recently, I had the idea that maybe the Fused progression could actually end with this Oath (or Commitment?) rather than start with it. This could fit better with the theme of Symmetry that so pervades Rosharan culture. So each of Odium's orders could have a "commitment" based progression which is individualized for each order, but could end with (possibly ritualistic) death as the last commitment. In symmetry to this, Honor's Oath-based progression starts with a mirror of the end of Odium's Commitment-based progression. Commitment here being a stand-in for whatever Odium uses in place of Oaths.

Edited July 24, 2019 by TheFoxQR

[Karger]

8 minutes ago, TheFoxQR said:

The strength becomes my weakness. The old source of their strength, their belief in denying Odium and trust in the wisdom of other, ancient Singers/Honor/Cultivation is now their weakness. Following those old paths will only lead them further from their conviction in Odium.

Or perhaps other things.  Their sense of "humanity" their culture and their previously held beliefs.  The things "normal" singers do is now painful for them.

I also doubt their is any other ideal in Voidbinding.  The journey is ended.  I don't think you can move on to grow and change after that.

Edited July 18, 2019 by Karger

[Weltall]

The reason that Surgebinders 'power up' when they swear further Ideals is because the underlying Initiation mechanic is linked to the nature of the Shard(s) whose magic you're accessing. Swearing and abiding by oaths is acting in accordance with the principles that underly the Shard Honor. For Voidbinding you'd be accessing Odium's magic which wouldn't operate on those principles because the power's coming from an entirely different Shard. So yeah, with the possible exception of a Surgebinder who's bonded to a spren Sja-anat has corrupted, I don't see Voidbinding having the same kind of progression that Surgebinding does. Exactly how that first step works is a whole other question. That particular death rattle is interesting since it's such a perfect contrast to the First Ideal, though like you suggest it's also possible that it's just a Radiant who completely gave up. I don't have to stretch my imagination too hard to envision someone saying that in the aftermath of the Recreance.

[+TheFoxQR]

52 minutes ago, Weltall said:

The reason that Surgebinders 'power up' when they swear further Ideals is because the underlying Initiation mechanic is linked to the nature of the Shard(s) whose magic you're accessing. Swearing and abiding by oaths is acting in accordance with the principles that underly the Shard Honor. For Voidbinding you'd be accessing Odium's magic which wouldn't operate on those principles because the power's coming from an entirely different Shard. So yeah, with the possible exception of a Surgebinder who's bonded to a spren Sja-anat has corrupted, I don't see Voidbinding having the same kind of progression that Surgebinding does. Exactly how that first step works is a whole other question. That particular death rattle is interesting since it's such a perfect contrast to the First Ideal, though like you suggest it's also possible that it's just a Radiant who completely gave up. I don't have to stretch my imagination too hard to envision someone saying that in the aftermath of the Recreance.

The only thing that makes me hesitate to go with the Radiant giving up interpretation is the first part - "Death is my life"

While there could be scenarios where a Radiant close to death is just accepting their death, the specific phrase implies that the speaker has accepted death as life, as opposed to just death. That is what draws me strongly towards the speaker being a Cognitive Shadow of some sort, maybe even a Herald under torture.

Except recently, I'm being more and more drawn towards the idea that Surgebinding as we know it is a mirror to an older Voidbinding, rather than Odium having co-opted Surgebinding to make Voidbinding. There is one specific passage from the Eila Stele, which goes like this:

Quote

They came from another world, using powers that we have been forbidden to touch. Dangerous powers, of spren and Surges. They destroyed their lands and have come to us begging.

This implies that Humans were already using spren based access to surges before they came to Roshar and met Honor, and that the Surgebinding used by Humans to supposedly destroy Ashyn may actually be what we now call Voidbinding. It makes much more sense to me that a system of magic grants access to only one power, rather than an arbitrary combination of two. It makes more sense that Odium designed the original framework for Surgebinding where each Order got only one surge, and then Honor and Cultivation co-opted it and built it up so that it granted a combination of two Surges to each of the ten Orders in their version of it. The Bondsmith spren are also the odd one out, and if you discount them, the core framework works on nine spren - Odium's number. So it makes more sense if Honor and Cultivation added the tenth kind of Spren after the framework was already in place, and thus that one kind of spren is different. That is why the Stormfather and Nightwatcher, who actually serve a specific purpose on Roshar other than being Radiant Spren, are also Radiant Spren. They were shoehorned into an existing framework with which they may not have anything to do with at their conception.

This is further corroborated in the tale of "The Girl Who Looks Up", where the Humans live in pitch black darkness, and see white light as something that saved them, which could be an analogy to them using Odium's Voidlight (described as literal black light) first, and then switching to Honor's Stormlight (which gives off white light) later.

If this is true, then yes, it makes much more sense that Ishar was able to impose additional restrictions in Honor's version of Surgebinding. Because Honor is all about Oaths and Bonds, not Odium. In his version, there may only be one Oath, the one that makes you swear fealty.  That is exactly what Odium is trying to get out of Dalinar from the end of OB. And it may not be about bonding spren so much as getting directly infused with the Spren's investiture and spritweb. Instead of Honor's version where there is a more gradual progression, Odium slams the spren directly into you. Which also seems to have been a thing in Honor's version before Ishar imposed the Oaths.

Flip. This also explains the "Dawn-" prefix.

Edited July 18, 2019 by TheFoxQR

[Halyo_Alex]

Wait. 

Quote

Instead of Honor's version where there is a more gradual progression, Odium slams the spren directly into you.

...That reminds me of the Fused overtaking the modern Singer bodies. We know from WoBs that you can bond a Cognitive Shadow in a similar manner to a spren, in fact, almost identically. What if there's a reason for that? What if these two are parallels to one another?

"old" Voidbinding, where Spren are simply added onto the Voidbinder's spiritweb.

Surgebinding, where Spren bond to and gradually grow closer to the Surgebinder's spiritweb.

"New" voidbinding, where Cognitive Shadows (Fused) are simply added onto the Voidbinder's spiritweb (in this case, we know this destroys the mind of the original Singer. I'm unsure of if "old" Voidbinding would have replaced the Voidbinder's mind with that of the Spren).

And this unknown art of gradually bonding a Cognitive Shadow like a Surgebinder and Spren.

 

It almost feels like an "internal/external & push/pull" double duality like a quadrant of the Metallic Arts. Which, I know, isn't very relevant. It just reminds me of that sort of thing. 4 parts of a set, each one removed from the two adjacent to it by one trait. The method of bonding, and what is being bonded. A, a, and B, b. 1 or 0 in two bits for 4 combinations.

 

...anyway that's my midnight theory ramble over, go ahead and poke this full of holes with actual facts.

[Karger]

9 hours ago, TheFoxQR said:

Except recently, I'm being more and more drawn towards the idea that Surgebinding as we know it is a mirror to an older Voidbinding, rather than Odium having co-opted Surgebinding to make Voidbinding. There is one specific passage from the Eila Stele, which goes like this:

I am fairly sure that Voidbinding is Odium making use of an existing magic system.

[First Witness]

I mean, it does use red investiture. 

[+TheFoxQR]

57 minutes ago, Karger said:

I am fairly sure that Voidbinding is Odium making use of an existing magic system.

I know, and until fairly recently, I thought the same too. I was even advocating for it. But the pieces fit a lot more consistently better if you think that the sequence of events is something like this:

1. The Singers evolve a method to attract spren and change forms. Here, the external spren spiritweb extends the singer spiritweb to achieve a composite spiritweb.
2. Odium comes to Greater Roshar, intending to splinter Honor and Cultivation.
3. He thinks Roshar is too much of a stronghold, and goes to a relatively unprotected Ashyn to prepare and better position himself.
4. He needs converts to his cause, so inspired by the spren present on Roshar and the Singer forms, he creates a system of magic that works on Humans. In this system, he creates his own spiritweb extensions, wraps them as Spren, and initiation slams this odiumspren into you, hammering your old spiritweb into a shape more conducive to spren bonds - and you get the original prototype surgebinder. In this system, there are nine orders, and each order gets one surge. Except this system is also compatible with Singer spiritwebs, and gives them the forms of power.
5. Ashyn is destroyed, and Odium and a group of refugees come to Roshar.
6. Honor and Cultivation forbid the Singers to bond spren and become surgebinders, intending to protect them from Odium
7. Sometime later, The Girl Looks Up. Honor presumably changes the nature of Stormlight so that it can be used to power Surgebinding. The Humans are beginning to switch over to Honor and Cultivation. The Singers, possibly in an Odium infused fit of Jealousy, begin switching over to Odium.
8. Odium creates the Fused, and this is him corrupting something existing - ergo red investiture.
9. 10 Humans ask Honor for the Oathpact, and Honor and Cultivation pool in to give each Herald one power each, a powerup as a gift and an ode to their noble sacrifice, something that gives them an edge over the single surge Fused - this makes the dual surge framework that will later be used for the Knights Radiant.
10. Sometime later, Ishar will impose the Five Oath progression for each Order of Knights Radiant, and each Order gets to choose what kind of Oath they will ask for. This allows for the creation of the Nahel Bond - a method of binding that is much less traumatic on the participants and also serves as a moral compass.

I don't know. I could easily be wrong on multiple counts here. But this fits better than the other way around.

[Karger]

16 minutes ago, TheFoxQR said:

I don't know. I could easily be wrong on multiple counts here. But this fits better than the other way around.

Interesting theory but I think it takes to many leaps of logic for me to except it.

[Weltall]

11 hours ago, TheFoxQR said:

It makes much more sense to me that a system of magic grants access to only one power, rather than an arbitrary combination of two. It makes more sense that Odium designed the original framework for Surgebinding where each Order got only one surge, and then Honor and Cultivation co-opted it and built it up so that it granted a combination of two Surges to each of the ten Orders in their version of it.

No Shard 'designed' the magic of Roshar from scratch, like all the worlds in the Cosmere the magic is following certain natural pathways that were set up before the Shattering and the Shards are tinkering within those pathways. Since Adonalsium created the entire Rosharan System from scratch, the fundamentals that all three Shards are working within were already established long before they arrived. Spren for example predate the Shattering, though the sapient types who form Nahel Bonds arose after Honor and Cultivation arrived. Odium came later, ergo the spren associated with him are the relative latecomers to the party.

Edited July 18, 2019 by Weltall

[+TheFoxQR]

2 hours ago, Weltall said:

No Shard 'designed' the magic of Roshar from scratch, like all the worlds in the Cosmere the magic is following certain natural pathways that were set up before the Shattering and the Shards are tinkering within those pathways. Since Adonalsium created the entire Rosharan System from scratch, the fundamentals that all three Shards are working within were already established long before they arrived. Spren for example predate the Shattering, though the sapient types who form Nahel Bonds arose after Honor and Cultivation arrived. Odium came later, ergo the spren associated with him are the relative latecomers to the party.

I know, I'm not saying he created the Surges.

This is a smaller leap than to say that Preservation created Allomancy. In that case, the magic system was designed from scratch. Sure, Preservation didn't create the concept of the three Realms or spiritwebs or anything like that. But the framework for Allomancy was his. The definition and mechanisms by which the powers operate was his. He didn't create land, water and gravity in the universe, but he built a canal through which water flowed from one end to the other.

In this case, Odium only created a framework for people to access the natural Surges present in Greater Roshar, and took inspiration from something already present on Roshar. The Surge of Gravitation existed in Greater Roshar, Odium created a framework which allowed humans to access and manipulate it in certain ways. And even how to do that was inspired by the ecology and spren already existing on Roshar at the time. The spren already were present on Roshar, and already were bonding to the local flaura and fauna to grant various effects. Odium saw that, and created the framework of Surgebinding - namely defining nine orders, designing specialist spren spiritwebs which when attached to existing Human/Singer spiritwebs would grant access to surges, an initiation mechanism, and a way to power this manipulation of surges. All of this was built on existing systems already in play on Roshar.

This was later iterated on by Honor and Cultivation while creating the Honorblades. And later, that was the framework was used by... well someone, for the Knights Radiant. Which then went on to inspire Nightblood on Nalthis.

It's all the same things, just different people trying to put their own spin on it.

Edited July 18, 2019 by TheFoxQR

[Calderis]

Obligatory link because Fused were said to be voidbinding. 

Not saying they can't... Just that we haven't seen them do it. 

[+TheFoxQR]

On 7/19/2019 at 1:45 AM, Calderis said:

Obligatory link because Fused were said to be voidbinding. 

Not saying they can't... Just that we haven't seen them do it. 

Hmm.

Does this mean that the sequence of events is something like this?

1. The mechanics that drive Fabriels and the nature of spren imply that spren spiritwebs are essentially a Cognitive and Spiritual manifestation of the 10 fundamental surges. Proto-stormlight is already the fuel of choice here, for when the flaura and fauna of Roshar utilise this spren-surge connection.
2. Odium, on Ashyn, creates spren that can allow Humans and in the future Singers to access these Surges, and creates a framework where this can be powered by his investiture. This is proto-surgebinding, with 9 surges, and 9 single surge orders, each surge given to one order. These surges are powered by Voidlight. Possibly the first voidspren were created here.
3. After Humans arrived on Roshar, some sequence of events convinced Honor to help them against Odium. He modifies stormlight so it can be used by Humans to power this proto-surgebinding. This is potentially where a tenth single surge order is introduced. So at this point, there are 10 orders in this proto-surgebinding, each order accessing one surge, 9 of which can be powered by either Stormlight or Voidlight, while one is exclusive to Stormlight. My guess is that Adhesion came later, because that sounds like Honor's surge, focused on bonds. Also Windrunners and Bondsmiths, the two Radiant orders having access to Adhesion, are considered closest to Honor. We potentially see a proto-surgebinder in action in one of the Nohadon Visions - where the one thing that struck me was how that entity was referred to as a Surgebinder and not a Radiant. This to me is evidence of a later bullet in this sequence.
4. First come Regals? Odium convinces Singers to bond spren to use this Voidlight fueled Proto-Surgebinding, despite Honor and Cultivation having forbidden them to.
5. When these die, Odium will make them into Cognitive Shadows, and they will use this Proto-surgebinding inherently without spren bonds, using Voidlight as fuel. These Cognitive Shadows each fall in one of the nine original orders of Odium induced Surgebinding. They take advantage of the fact the singers can bond spren and take up forms, except these will play the part of invasive spren for a singer that is alive, taking over their body. They are literally two singer spiritwebs "fused" together when they're occupying a body.
6. Humans start losing, and on their request Honor grants the Heralds the Oathpact and Honorblades. This makes them true Cognitive Shadows, in mirror to the Fused. Here we get the First Generation Shardblade, and the dual surge framework which will later be copied and used for the Knights Radiant.
7. The Knights Radiant are established, and Second Generation Shardblades come into existence. The Radiantspren enter the picture. The idea of a moral check for a surgebinder is introduced with the Five Oath progression system, to be judicated by the spren of each order. This is why they are called Knights and not simply Surgebinders - these are Surgebinders with a moral code.
8. Somewhere along the way, the Unmade enter the picture. Sja-anat learns to Enlighten regular spren, which inverts the primal/fundamental spren-surge connection so that the manifested surge will have some component flipped. For e.g. Illuminating the future, instead of the past/present. This would in the proto-surgebinding framework have created proto-voidbinders. She will eventually enlighten Glys, and we will have our first half Void Knight (Knight Voidant? Knight Lacuna? Knight Abyssal? Knight Oblivious?), half Knight Radiant.

Does this mean that the Voidbinding chart is from a future date, from when Radiantspren can be completely corrupted to use two voidsurges? Sja-Anat only learnt to enlighten Radiantspren now, but the Voidbinding chart still has 10 surges and orders. Odium would create a 9-centric system, so when and how did the 10 surge 10 dual surge order Voidbinding truly originate? It would be fitting with the theme of Symmetry, if the front cover of the Way of Kings showed a System from a bygone era (from the past) and end cover showed a system that from an incipient one - something that will exist in the future in symmetry with something that was in the past. Also fits with the Voidbinding being of the Future theme.

If we accept this sequence, then I think we have a much more logical explanation for why Ishar makes Nale hunt the re-emerging Knights Radiant after the Recreance. The Heralds only see the Knights during desolations. To them, the Knights were a new thing, an experiment where access to the dangerous powers of Surgebinding would be checked by readiness and morality. After his death and the Recreance, Ishar sees these moral Surgebinders, these Knights as a thing of the past - a failed experiment. Possibly, it was decided that no more Spren will submit themselves to being bound, like @RShara's theory that the Spren saw the Recreance as a necessity and were in on it. To him, they were foiled by Odium, and Surgebinders were again going to be free of any checks. From his perspective, gone was Honor, and gone were his Knights. Cultivation was hiding. Any surgebinders coming forth from that point onwards would be old school Odium influenced Surgebinders, like the kind that destroyed Ashyn, which potentially most of the Heralds experienced firsthand. And so they needed to eliminate these Surgebinders before they learnt of their powers and could gain any traction.

@RShara, @Calderis and @Argent - At this point, I think this is offtopic enough, so should I move this into a new post? If so, which forum should I move this to?

Edited July 20, 2019 by TheFoxQR

[Scion of the Mists]

A couple of things:

1. I don't think there was ever a "proto-Stormlight," and I don't think that Honor modified it in any way.  Stormlight is just a Investiture in a physical form.  You can use it to power other magic systems, albeit with some hoops to jump through, without Shardic intervention.  In general, Shards have very little direct control over their magic systems, although they can certainly tweak it.  
2. I don't think that Odium made spren on Ashyn.  I doubt that the old Ashyn magic system worked by bonding spren.  Plus we know that the KR spren were formed later in the timeline and that they are a blend of Honor and Cultivation.  
3. There is a distinction between a Surgebinder and a Knight Radiant.  Knights Radiant are a subset of Surgebinders.  A Surgebinder is simply someone who has access to this magic system.  A Knight Radiant is a member of a particular organization.  
4. I doubt that the Regals came first.  Neither the Eila Stele nor the Stormfather's history of the Oathpact/Heralds/Fused mention singers who've bonded voidspren.  

[+TheFoxQR]

8 hours ago, Scion of the Mists said:

A couple of things:

1. I don't think there was ever a "proto-Stormlight," and I don't think that Honor modified it in any way.  Stormlight is just a Investiture in a physical form.  You can use it to power other magic systems, albeit with some hoops to jump through, without Shardic intervention.  In general, Shards have very little direct control over their magic systems, although they can certainly tweak it.  
2. I don't think that Odium made spren on Ashyn.  I doubt that the old Ashyn magic system worked by bonding spren.  Plus we know that the KR spren were formed later in the timeline and that they are a blend of Honor and Cultivation.  
3. There is a distinction between a Surgebinder and a Knight Radiant.  Knights Radiant are a subset of Surgebinders.  A Surgebinder is simply someone who has access to this magic system.  A Knight Radiant is a member of a particular organization.  
4. I doubt that the Regals came first.  Neither the Eila Stele nor the Stormfather's history of the Oathpact/Heralds/Fused mention singers who've bonded voidspren.  

1. I somehow internalised these WoBs, and yes, I seem to be wrong on that count:

   Quote

   Questioner

   I want to know if there was Stormlight before Honor.

   Brandon Sanderson

   So before Honor arrived there was a proto-version of the storms and a version of Stormlight. Yes.

   Questioner

   Okay, but it was different?

   Brandon Sanderson

   It-- Things were different.

   Emerald City Comic Con 2018 (March 1, 2018)

   Quote

   Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

   There was a point when the Heralds didn't need to draw Stormlight from gems, although the Stormlight-in-gems predates Honor's arrival.

   There was a following conversation about this topic, about how a lot of the elements were there before Honor arrived, but he co-opted them. So, Stormlight were there, but there are big differences now.

   Footnote: Unspecified question by Pagerunner.
   Arcanum Unbounded Hoboken signing (Dec. 3, 2016)

    

2. The more I think about it, the more this feels wrong. I agree - I'm not sure I like the idea of Odium making spren on Ashyn.
3. Again, I agree. In fact, even my original posts agree on this count - Knights Radiant were Surgebinders with a formal moral code and organisational structure.
4. On this, I don't know. It makes sense to me both ways - thinking Odium directly recruited dying Singers that had already joined his cause works, it also works if some of the Fused were parts of cult-like ritual sacrifice in Odium's name (although probably no). On the otherhand, Odium didn't design all his spren now, some had to have been existing prior to the creation of the Oathpact, some potentially before the Fused. In this case, what I say is the first ideal for a Fused might be - in line with the theme of being symmetric with Honor's system - be the last ideal for a Regal, where the Spren and they fully merge on death to become a Fused. In this case, the beginning of the Knights Radiant progression was designed to be purposefully symmetric with the end of Odium's surgebinding progression used by the Fused/Regals? The Eila Stele could have not mentioned it if it was written before the Singers switched to Odium. Similarly, the Stormfather mentions his memory isn't trustworthy, and it seems to be atleast partly discovery based. He also conveniently doesn't mention things he feels are not important. So, his recounting is unreliable in it's completeness, even if it is reliable in it's truthfulness.

[Elegy]

Swearing an oath and living according to ideals means taking responsibility. Odium is all about refusing responsibility, letting yourself go, giving in. Keeping oaths is the exact opposite of what what Odium wants people to do. I'm not saying it's impossible, but I'd find it very bewildering if his warriors would gain his Investiture by doing something that is inherently against his Intent.

[Scion of the Mists]

9 hours ago, TheFoxQR said:

      3. Again, I agree. In fact, even my original posts agree on this count - Knights Radiant were Surgebinders with a formal moral code and organisational structure.

I see that now.  I was referring to your post from Friday when you said that one thing that struck you about Nohadon's vision was "how that entity was referred to as a Surgebinder and not a Radiant."

 

9 hours ago, TheFoxQR said:

4. On this, I don't know. It makes sense to me both ways - thinking Odium directly recruited dying Singers that had already joined his cause works, it also works if some of the Fused were parts of cult-like ritual sacrifice in Odium's name (although probably no). On the otherhand, Odium didn't design all his spren now, some had to have been existing prior to the creation of the Oathpact, some potentially before the Fused. In this case, what I say is the first ideal for a Fused might be - in line with the theme of being symmetric with Honor's system - be the last ideal for a Regal, where the Spren and they fully merge on death to become a Fused. In this case, the beginning of the Knights Radiant progression was designed to be purposefully symmetric with the end of Odium's surgebinding progression used by the Fused/Regals? The Eila Stele could have not mentioned it if it was written before the Singers switched to Odium. Similarly, the Stormfather mentions his memory isn't trustworthy, and it seems to be atleast partly discovery based. He also conveniently doesn't mention things he feels are not important. So, his recounting is unreliable in it's completeness, even if it is reliable in it's truthfulness.

For the inverted First Ideal to be how the Fused gain power, that would mean that it came before the Knights Radiant First Ideal (as the Fused predated the KR by a lot).  That would mean that the Fused version was the original and the KR version was the inverted one, which just doesn't feel right.  

[brasidas]

On ‎7‎/‎18‎/‎2019 at 1:22 AM, Halyo_Alex said:

Wait. 

...That reminds me of the Fused overtaking the modern Singer bodies. We know from WoBs that you can bond a Cognitive Shadow in a similar manner to a spren, in fact, almost identically. What if there's a reason for that? What if these two are parallels to one another?

"old" Voidbinding, where Spren are simply added onto the Voidbinder's spiritweb.

Surgebinding, where Spren bond to and gradually grow closer to the Surgebinder's spiritweb.

"New" voidbinding, where Cognitive Shadows (Fused) are simply added onto the Voidbinder's spiritweb (in this case, we know this destroys the mind of the original Singer. I'm unsure of if "old" Voidbinding would have replaced the Voidbinder's mind with that of the Spren).

And this unknown art of gradually bonding a Cognitive Shadow like a Surgebinder and Spren.

 

It almost feels like an "internal/external & push/pull" double duality like a quadrant of the Metallic Arts. Which, I know, isn't very relevant. It just reminds me of that sort of thing. 4 parts of a set, each one removed from the two adjacent to it by one trait. The method of bonding, and what is being bonded. A, a, and B, b. 1 or 0 in two bits for 4 combinations.

 

...anyway that's my midnight theory ramble over, go ahead and poke this full of holes with actual facts.

So if you could bond a Cognitive shadow...

Does this mean you could technically (with hacking) make a Nahel-ish bond with Kelsier in those years before he got spiked back into the physical realm?

 

[Karger]

20 minutes ago, brasidas said:

Does this mean you could technically (with hacking) make a Nahel-ish bond with Kelsier in those years before he got spiked back into the physical realm?

On Roshar?  Maybe.  Cognitive entities behave a bit differently in the system but Kelseir was bound to the Scadrail system and could not leave.  Also I don't think he is realy designed for that kind of behavior.

[brasidas]

1 minute ago, Karger said:

On Roshar?  Maybe.  Cognitive entities behave a bit differently in the system but Kelseir was bound to the Scadrail system and could not leave.  Also I don't think he is realy designed for that kind of behavior.

Yeah, just thought it was funny that technically, in the right circumstances, you could bond Kelsier. Probably be kind of annoying to both of you though.

[Scion of the Mists]

52 minutes ago, brasidas said:

So if you could bond a Cognitive shadow...

Does this mean you could technically (with hacking) make a Nahel-ish bond with Kelsier in those years before he got spiked back into the physical realm?

 

Yes.  

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Blightsong

Could Kelsier theoretically bond with someone on Roshar?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

OdysseyCon 2016 (April 8, 2016)

[Lightblood]

On 7/17/2019 at 8:25 PM, TheFoxQR said:

The death is my life, the strength becomes my weakness, the journey has ended.

Wow. I really like this theory @TheFoxQR. I always saw this as someone that kinda feels like szeth's point of view. Death is my life, the radiant has accepted that their duty in life is to bring death to others possibly the parshmen/ voidbringers. The strength becomes my weakness, and like szeth they deeply regret having to do this but see it as their duty to do it. Or perhaps they were a compasionate person but now that they have accepted that bringing death is their life, they view their compassion, which was always seen as a strength, as a weakness as it brings added difficulty to the path they have accepted. The journey has ended I thought could refer to one of two things. One- It is referring to their journey as a radiant and self discovery. Like they were trying to find where they belonged in the order and in their world. But in accepting the life of war the journey is ended they have accepted their fate. Or two- After the war and life of bringing death they decided that it wasn't in harmony with their oaths or from the ravings of honor that they must break their oaths. This would also work with my strength becomes my weakness because they see their strength in war and surgebinding as something to be repulsed and ashewed. Disgusted by their past actions. 

So I have always seen it as a knight accepting his duty before the desolation or shortly after it started, or as a knight at the time of the recreance that, disagreeing with his oaths see that his actions and the information given by honor that the entire order is a contradiction.

[+TheFoxQR]

7 hours ago, Elegy said:

Swearing an oath and living according to ideals means taking responsibility. Odium is all about refusing responsibility, letting yourself go, giving in. Keeping oaths is the exact opposite of what what Odium wants people to do. I'm not saying it's impossible, but I'd find it very bewildering if his warriors would gain his Investiture by doing something that is inherently against his Intent.

This is one thing that I'm oscillating on. When you say Surgebinding and Voidbinding, then isn't the "-binding" supposed to represent Honor, who is the one focused on bonds? So, in both those systems, you're "bonding" spren. Different spren in both cases, but you're bonding spren. Yet the Regals exist. And so do the Fused. I talk about this in my edit from yesterday:

On 7/17/2019 at 9:25 PM, TheFoxQR said:

Edit: In tackling @Scion of the Mists's post recently, I had the idea that maybe the Fused progression could actually end with this Oath (or Commitment?) rather than start with it. This could fit better with the theme of Symmetry that so pervades Rosharan culture. So each of Odium's orders could have a "commitment" based progression which is individualized for each order, but could end with (possibly ritualistic) death as the last commitment. In symmetry to this, Honor's Oath-based progression starts with a mirror of the end of Odium's Commitment-based progression. Commitment here being a stand-in for whatever Odium uses in place of Oaths.

The idea that instead of a bond between you and your spren, the spren asks utter commitment from you, and you progress when they allow you to commit even more. I think you can see hints of something like this in the voidspren we have seen onstage in OB.

 

3 hours ago, Scion of the Mists said:

For the inverted First Ideal to be how the Fused gain power, that would mean that it came before the Knights Radiant First Ideal (as the Fused predated the KR by a lot).  That would mean that the Fused version was the original and the KR version was the inverted one, which just doesn't feel right.  

So this is one of those things that, while I don't personally like, still fits established facts better.

We know the Heralds were created in response to the Fused (yes I know technically they went to Honor, but this statement still stands in that light - their creation came after the creation of the Fused, and as a reaction to it).

So in other words we know this is definitely the sequence: Fused-> Heralds -> Knights Radiant

Now the Fused have 9 single surge orders that use Odium's investiture to Surgebind.

Yet, they came before both the Heralds - where Honor created Surgebinding by making Honorblades and the Knights Radiant - which copy Honor's original framework.

So either the Fused were given Surgebinding after their creation (which I doubt), or Honor copied and built on Odium's framework for the Fused. It makes sense that the Heralds and Fused are both the same kind of cognitive shadow, built on similar mechanics. Except the Heralds have more power because they were created by Honor to fight a enemy superior in number and so were given a distinct edge.

It sort of follows the paradigm of war, where, if the enemy has a weapon that can do x, you build a weapon that can do x better and also do y. You don't downgrade your weapon in response.

If the Fused were given Surgebinding after the creation of the Heralds, why do they have only one surge each? Wouldn't Odium have copied the entire two surge framework? If you're changing the nature of your troops mid-war, wouldn't you give them an edge over their enemy?

So it makes more sense that after centuries and millenia of fighting and getting tortured by the Fused, when Ishar got the chance to establish order among the Surgebinders following in the Heralds' footsteps, he created the Oaths of the Knights Radiant to perfectly reflect their enemy.

Edited July 24, 2019 by TheFoxQR

[Scion of the Mists]

5 minutes ago, TheFoxQR said:

So either the Fused were given Surgebinding after their creation (which I doubt), or Honor copied and built on Odium's framework for the Fused. It makes sense that the Heralds and Fused are both the same kind of cognitive shadow, built on similar mechanics. Except the Heralds have more power because they were created by Honor to fight a enemy superior in number and so were given a distinct edge.

According to the Stormfather, the Fused did not originally have access to the Surges.  

From Oathbringer chapter 38:

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THEY ARE THE SPREN OF PARSHMEN LONG DEAD. THEY ARE THEIR KINGS, THEIR LIGHTEYES, THEIR VALIANT SOLDIERS FROM LONG, LONG AGO. THE PROCESS IS NOT EASY ON THEM. SOME OF THESE SPREN ARE MERE FORCES NOW, ANIMALISTIC, FRAGMENTS OF MINDS GIVEN POWER BY ODIUM. OTHER ARE MORE...AWAKE. EACH REBIRTH FURTHER INJURES THEIR MINDS.

THEY ARE REBORN USING THE BODIES OF PARSHMEN TO BECOME THE FUSED. AND EVEN BEFORE THE FUSED LEARNED TO COMMAND THE SURGES, MEN COULD NOT FIGHT THEM. HUMANS COULD NEVER WIN WHEN THE CREATURES THEY KILLED WERE REBORN EACH TIME THEY WERE SLAIN. AND SO, THE OATHPACT. 

 

I think you are overestimating the amount of control that the Shards have over their magic systems.  Magic systems have been described as a natural outcome of the interaction between a Shard and a planet.  When Odium copied the Surgebinding that the Honorblades granted, he was probably restricted in what he could do.  Otherwise, why not make all Fused able to use all the Surges?  

[+TheFoxQR]

1 minute ago, Scion of the Mists said:

 

Yeah... that's pretty clear then. The Fused (gained/were given) access to Surges after Honor created the Heralds.