The Great Venn Diagram of Rosharran Magic™

[+TheFoxQR]

EDIT: This topic was previously titled Shardic Associations of Rosharran Magic. I just changed the title, not the content. If you were fairly familiar with the idea before, you don't really need to read again.

I'm making this post as a culmination (and will probably the last) of several posts and discussions I've been making recently, trying to understand and collate all the known facts about Roshar's magic into one coherent model. In this post, I'm trying to look at Rosharran Magic from a slightly different perspective - the idea of Shardic associations for all known Magic on Roshar.

First, let's take a look at another multi-shard world whose magic system we understand reasonably well - Scadrial. On Scadrial, we have two Shards, Preservation and Ruin. Preservation's magic system is Allomancy, and Ruin's system is Hemalurgy.

1. Access to Allomancy is genetic - it involves generating power by burning metals, which can be considered as some sort of Cosmic bargain. You give metal, and you get Preservation's (shaped) power in return.
2. Hemalurgy involves "charging" (or filling) a piece of metal by "spiking" someone with it, taking something from them (specifically a part of their spiritweb), and then "discharging" said metal into a new recipient by "spiking" them. This charge is something that is internal in both the donor and the recipient, you take some internal component (partial spiritweb structure) of the donor and give it to the recipient. Moreover the "charge" of a spike decays over time.
3. Lastly, the interaction of these two creates Feruchemy. It shares charging and discharging pieces of metal external to you with Hemalurgy. This charge comes from things internal to you (redirected flow of investiture from your spiritweb), which is also shared with Hemalurgy, but they differ in the nature of the type of internal aspect they both affect (the difference between extracting some of your own blood, perfectly preserving it for a while, and then putting it back inside you vs forcefully cutting out your kidney with a kitchen knife and giving it someone else, or putting it somewhere else in your own body). It shares gene-based access with Allomancy. It also shares the bargaining aspect, except here the bargaining is distinctly temporal in nature. You are essentially "preserving" what you store to be retrieved at a later time. Most of the spectacle seems to have to do with rates of storage and retrieval. Moreover, the "charge" of the metal doesn't decay over time, and is perfectly preserved.

The idea being each Shard has it's own system - something which acts as an expression of their intent. When two Shards invest in close proximity to each other, then a natural outgrowth emerges which combines the characteristic elements of both of its root systems. Thus, Feruchemy can be modeled as an interaction between both Allomancy and Hemalurgy, and thus it bears characteristics influenced and flavoured by both. 

Now, on Roshar, we have three Shards. By what we see on Scadrial, we should be able to say that each Shard would have one mono-shardic expression of intent - atleast one system that is uniquely theirs. But also by that logic, the interactions between them should create atleast three di-shardic systems - one for each Shard-pair. And one tri-shardic system - something that combines aspects of all three shards.

The problem with that assumption however, is that Adonalsium made Greater Roshar pre-shattering, whereas Preservation and Ruin built Scadrial post-shattering. As a result of this, investiture from bith Honor and Cultivation seems to be much better meld together, as they were both focused by a single will, rather than two seperate wills. This is my best guess for associated divisions:

Let me explain. The core, deeper system at play along all of the Greater Roshar Solar System is the idea of Surgebinding. I'm proposing that the Surges were originally set up by Adonalsium when he created that solar system - each surge being an abstraction of whatever fundamental force it represents. The Surge of Gravitation, for example, is not gravity but an abstraction of the concept of gravity as a fundamental force of Realmatic Physics, the Surge of Tension is not just surface tension, but an abstraction of the idea of Tension as an actual fundamental force. Think of this as object oriented programming, as opposed to Elantrian/Selish functional programming. The idea of "binding" these forces then, is to connect to these Surges and channel them to modify the rules/behaviour of the corresponding fundamental forces. Syl says this best I think, that gravity is just an agreement for things to behave a certain way. The Surge of Gravitation simply encompasses an interface to this exchange; under a Surge, the fundamental behaviour of everything that Surge represents is clay. Perhaps this is why Adonalsium made 10 Gas Giants in the Rosharan System - maybe they are blanket focii that define the Surges, like how Elantris was focusing the Dor around it, but more complicated and Spiritual rather than Cognitive. The only requirement I think this should have is that there has to be a cognitive component for an agreement to be made - and I believe this is playing into the basics of Realmatic Theory in the sense of the Spiritual representing what something is vs the Cognitive representing how it is perceived. The Surge is a spiritual ideal, and attaching (or binding) a cognitive component to it can allow you to change/modify it's manifestation in the physical.

Then, in the creation of Roshar the planet, investiture most closely associated with God's own Honor was used to create lynchpin agreements between the fundamental forces to behave in very specific ways - these are what will be used to make Roshar the planet - having no plate tectonics - function uniquely. For e.g. the physics that drive the Crem-cycle, the forces that make Highstorms, etc. God's own urge to Cultivate allowed life to flourish on this planet in both the Physical and Cognitive Realms. In the physical, we have all the different kinds of flora and fauna. In the Cognitive, Cultivation's investiture will pervade and infuse the Honor-affiliated pieces of investiture used to cognitively bind the Surges, and allow them grow sentient and to create their own ecology. These will eventually be called the spren - and they all have varying levels of sentience. Some spren are as sentient as humans, and have their own culture and society, whereas others (the vast majority) are much more basic/feral and display only rudimentary sentience - feeding on cognitive concepts. The spren are, then, cognitive entities connected to spiritual Surges. Because of this nature of theirs, life on both realms develops a certain level of inter-realm symbiosis, where fauna based in the physical will cognitively attract spren in order to utilise and beneficially channel their ability to affect the physical. The epitome of this phenomena will manifest in the Singers - they have 2 base genders (male and female), each of which can further be divided into two types (mating and non-mating) for a total of four. The Singers are almost composite souls, where a significant portion of their spiritwebs is detachable and exchangeable - this portion will be filled in by the spren they bond to. Once a bond is complete, the Form's Physical and Cognitive makeup will change to reflect the full new combined spiritweb of the Singer and their spren. 

Sometime after this, the Shattering happens. We can safely say that the investiture used to bind natural forces and encourage growth and evolution of life got associated with Honor and Cultivation respectively, and Odium came later. All known magic however, anything that I detail after this works on this framework - the idea that the Surges can each be bound and shaped by bits of investiture with right spiritual connections and cognitive makeup. This capability to create/facilitate these is not relegated or limited to any one Shard or planet in the Solar system, however how this is manifest will be flavored by each Shard and will be different on each planet.

First, let's look at the mono-shardic associations:

• Honor's mono-shardic system is the flavor of Surgebinding granted to the Heralds. Specifically this requires some Oath as means of access - for the Heralds, it was the Oathpact. It works by specific extensions and infusions into their souls, making them Cognitive Shadows. Because of this special nature of theirs, the Heralds' ability to bind surges is equivalent to a spren's ability to do so, and their specific abilities were probably modeled after existing complex spren surge-pair abilites on Roshar. A part of this infusion is external and can be condensed and passed on in the physical as powerful multi-realm swords - Honorblades. Each Herald got one surge-pair, and presumably their direct connection with Honor allowed them to pull in Stormlight from him without the need for a perpendicularity. Note that there is no concept of progression here - while the infusion was wilfully given and accepted, it was still an immediate change. There was no gradual adapting process, they were directly made into the Heralds. In the ecology of Roshar, the Highstorms seem to be carrying his perpendicularity - and seem to dispense his investiture. Consequently, the Stormfather as the spren of the Highstorm, is associated with Honor.
• Cultivation seems to be all about progressive change and growth. This reflects in her way of accessing surgebinding - through natural growth and temporarily attracting and bonding spren. We can safely say that her hand was in assisting/boosting along the growth and evolution of all life on the planet in both the Physical (flaura and fauna) and the Cognitive (spren sapience and capabilities) post-shattering.
  • I think it was her influence that assisted life on Roshar to develop chemistry that allows their bodies to organically bind and channel Surges. To accomplish this, a spren is needed. All spren - by nature - are spiritually connected to atleast one Surge, and because of their Cognitive nature, can change how the fundamental forces associated with those Surges manifest in the physical. Cultivation assists fauna in evolving Cognitive thought-patterns that some of the barely sentient spren would be attracted to and could feed on. These spren could also have been cultivated with this purpose. She also allows fauna to develop certain chemistry in their body that accumulates and condenses investiture into structures that can form connections to these spren and act as investiture batteries - the Gemhearts. The bodies of fauna on Roshar also evolved to grow around this gemheart (from bone?) in very specific ways structurally. These physical structural patterns around their gemhearts prod their connected or "trapped" or "bonded" spren into channeling its Surges to create beneficial effects in the physical. For example, the Chasmfiends trap Spren which can channel Gravitation, and the organic structure of their bodies around their gemheart prods these spren to channel it to create an effect equivalent to a partial lashing upwards - reducing their weight and allowing them to grow much bigger than they otherwise should be.
  • Later, this same system will be studied and emulated artificially. This will be called the art of making Fabriels. 
• Odium seems to co-opt other systems, and seems to hate investing in a world permanently, even though he has been forced to invest more and more in Greater Roshar just to break free. On Roshar the planet, the Unmade are splinters of Odium. This means that the effects associated with them are also of Odium - this includes Nergaul's Thrill, Moelach's Death Rattles, Sja-anat's enlightenings, Re-shephir's midnight creatures, and so on. There isn't a mono-shardic system from him other than the Unmade, and I think this is because he didn't create one - he only ever corrupted existing systems and people to get his way. His mono-shardic system is probably how he is able to consistently crack and worm into everything; it is the entire host of the Fused spren, including ones that run thunderclasts, the spren that were used to possess Amaram's men, etc.

The primary difference between Honor's infusion based access to Surgebinding and Cultivation's Fabriel based access is where the cognitive thought to channel the Surge comes from. For Honor, the Surgebinder in question can use their own minds and connections to their spren to spontaneously create new agreements and channel those forces. In Cultivation's system, the "thought" is artificially induced in the spren, by the use of physical constructs and properties. Both Systems need a constant flow of investiture to function to cover this disconnect between what should be vs what it is being "twisted" to do - a characteristic they share with Soulstamping.

Now let's look at Dishardic influences:

• Honor + Cultivation:
  • Practically everything on Roshar has investiture associated with these two, because of the fact that most of Roshar was created by Adonalsium pre-shattering with invsestiture that got assigned to these two post-shattering.
  • The Knights Radiant. These work on the same principles that drive Herald-like surgebinding, but with a hint of Cultivation to it. Namely, they have both the Oath based initiation and dependence on Spren to surgebind. Unlike the Heraldic system, where the Oath was one big doozy, the Knight Radiant progresses through several Oaths, each more binding and progressively more powerful. This system also reflects cognitively attracting and bonding spren, similar to how Singers and other fauna find and bond spren. However this bond is permanent, and it seems it can't be safely broken unlike the ones formed by Singers and/or other fauna. 
    • Whether the Herald's honorblades were modified versions of those spren that had achieved higher degrees of sapience or if the radiant spren were raised/cultivated from their less sapient brethren in response to Honor's designs, I don't know. I suspect it is more of the former and a bit of the latter, where certain spren with ability to manipulate certain surge-pairs were already present on Roshar (and were probably the most developed, or highest in shadesmar hierarchy), and these were used as a basis by Honor for the Honorblades. Over the years, these spren were then affected and grew in response to the perception of the Heralds and their "qualities". In this case, Shardblades came along because of certain people trying to replicate Honorblades by taking Honor's framework and applying it backwards (or just... sideways?) to these spren.
    • The other thing of importance here is the Oaths themselves. I suspect that as all spren on Roshar are attracted to (and are practically manifestations of or evolved in response to the personification of) some cognitive concept, so are the Radiantspren. The idea here is that... take firespren for example, which are attracted to fire. But a fire isn't seen as particularly sentient, so a firespren would also never really develop much sentience. Same thing applies to other Forcespren and Emotionspren (like Awespren, Angerspren, etc.). One step up would be Sensationspren, like Painspren, Alespren, etc. - which represent a mix of emotion and forces, or represent emotion in response to forces - a more complex, combinational concept. And lastly, the most complex of the spren would be what we call Radiantspren - which are attracted to the the most complex qualities that arise from consciousness - these are also what their respective Order is attributed with. For example, Honorspren like Syl might be attracted to the people displaying what might be perceived as leadership or protective qualities. Similarly, Highspren might be attracted to someone displaying confidence, or someone being just. Thus the debate between those two of who should truly be called Honorspren, as depending on your perspective, both those quality-pairs can be considered the most Honorable. These will also affect and inform the kind of Oaths each Order will require, and I suspect Ishar - in imposing order - just directed these extremely wide ideal possibilities to a much smaller and focused set, one that would be most beneficial to the role they were to play and in the conditions they were to play it in. Also, there was this whole Ashyn thing which nobody wanted a repeat case of. Except maybe Odium, he pretty much wants Roshar gone at this point, if only to get his invested investiture back.
    • Maybe there is also a correlation between the number of surges a spren can affect vs the complexity of the concept they represent. So Forcespren and Emotionspren will only have access to one surge, but Sensationspren will have two surges - one representing their emotional side and one representing their forceful side? Ditto for Radiantspren (for whom I'm tentatively coining the term Idealspren, since they can't have been the Radiantspren before the Knights Radiant were created) which I guess are cousins to Sensationspren?
  • Singers and their ability to change Forms. I'm leaning towards these being heavily of Cultivation, but Honor would be a part this too, as it is his perpendicularity that seems to have been set up to facilitate this pre-shattering. In the Cosmere, the Spiritual Realm is what contains the "blueprints" or base ideals for... everything. Singers souls, or spiritwebs, seem to be incomplete by themselves, and are very cognitively limited by design. They seem to have been designed to be complete in tandem with or when bonded to specific spren (remember, spren are cognitively "heavy") that may have also been designed with this purpose. When a singer bonds one of these spren, the result is a complete, composite spiritweb, which then manifests outward into a specific Singer Form. As a cognitive being, the spren also contributes to/influences the cognitive capabilities of said Singer. This explains why Singers need to be in a perpendicularity to change forms - their bodies are essentially dissolved and remade each time they change form and this potentially requires access to a place where they can survive in this period of transition. Not to mention the copious amounts of investiture that might be needed. This also explains why they need to have a particular mindset - as cognitive beings, spren could only really react to thought patterns. Some of these Forms may be granting access to surgebinding capabilities, but Cultivation and Honor may have forbidden the Dawnsingers from taking up those Forms for some reason.
• Honor + Odium: The Everstorm seems to be built on the same blueprint as that of the Honor affiliated Highstorms, but co-opted by Odium. This is why it is described as something old, but also something new.

And lastly, the tri-shardic influences:

• Honor + Cultivation+ Odium: 
  • Regals and "Forms of Power": These utilise the same base magic pathways as Singer Forms, but in this case the Forms are called the "Forms of Power" (propaganda?), and the spren required to access these are of Odium. Since all spren are on an Honor-Cultivation spectrum, these would probably be on an Honor-Cultivation-Odium spectrum. These have also been known to grant Surgebinding capabilites, and in the future, possibly also could be expanded in scope to cover Voidbinding as well.
  • The Fused which inhabit Singer Bodies: Now these are perhaps the most interesting. I've been debating if these should fall under Cultivation + Odium or here, and I think there is more/better evidence for these to be here than there. So, Odium makes certain singers into Cognitive Shadows at some point before the desolations. These Singers, as Cognitive Shadows, are closer in nature to Spren than actual living Singers. Now these Cognitive Shadows need to be attached to a physical body before they can affect much in the physical. To do so, they seem to be piggy-backing on the core nature of Singer Forms - but an extremely violent and corrupted hack of that framework. Living Singers bond Spren. These Cognitive Shadows can play the same role as the spren, and be bonded to by a living Singer. Except as former living beings, their spiritwebs are much more extensive. Moreover, despite being Odium infused to have more of an individual cognitive component than unbonded regular Singers, their spiritwebs have certain overlap with normal Singer spiritwebs. So they seem to be aggressively overwriting or burning out certain connections in the base Singer spiritwebs to keep their own spiritwebs primarily, and to assert their personalities in the physical, and keep them after that body dies.
  • Voidbinding. The only known example we have of somebody using this is Renarin Kholin. His spren, Glys was "enlightened" by Sja-anat, and has red visuals attached to it - a sign of corrupted or co-opted investiture in the Cosmere. Normal Radiantspren are on an Honor-Cultivation spectrum, so Glys could be on an Honor-Cultivation-Odium spectrum.
    • It is mentioned in text that Odium (referred to as the Void) is bound by the powers of Honor and Cultivation. Moreover, Odium never truly invested in Roshar so this is only emerging now, with Sja-anat having only recently learned to "Enlighten" Radiantspren. I suspect this was foreshadowed by the obsession with symmetry that certain Human Cultures have on Roshar, combined with the fact that the Surgebinding chart was on the front cover of the Way of Kings vs the Voidbinding chart being in the Back cover. The idea that a re-emerging system from the past is in temporal mirror-symmetry with a newly emerging system of the future. This may be hinting at the resolution of the entire arc of Stormlight Archives. Renarin could be the first Voidbinder, and even he seems to be between a true Voidbinder and a Knight Radiant.

Edited August 5, 2019 by TheFoxQR
re-written to make a better argument, re-titled

[Karger he/him]

13 minutes ago, TheFoxQR said:

Access to Allomancy is genetic - it involves generating power by burning metals, which can be considered as some sort of Cosmic bargain. You give metal, and you get Preservation's power in return.

The metal shows Preservation where it output himself it does not fuel the magic.  The metal is the key not the power.  Just a point.

 

16 minutes ago, TheFoxQR said:

This might be the weakest claim I make, but I'm gonna say that the Singers and their Forms are mostly of Cultivation, even though they use the bonding aspect of Honor.

I am realy not sure where you get that idea.  The bond seems to be of Honor and the spren can be of either Honor or Cultivation.  Exactly what makes you think it is of Cultivation?

18 minutes ago, TheFoxQR said:

Similarly, the Regals are di-shardic - this time between Cultivation and Odium. It uses Cultivation created Singer Form framework, but this time the spren - and consequently the Forms - are of Odium.

I still do not know why you think that Cultivation makes forms.  The bond seems like it is of Honor and even when voidforms are involved does involve a highstorm.  Cultivation comes in where?

 

19 minutes ago, TheFoxQR said:

In this case, is Voidbinding potentially one of the first tri-shardic systems we have seen? It seems like it is Honor and Cultivation's combined system, with added Odium in it. It is also additive in the sense that it seems all three - the Knights Radiant, the Fused, and the Regals - can get access to it. Glys could be on an Honor-Cultivation-Odium spectrum, rather than just an Honor-Cultivation spectrum.

I personally think Adonalsium created the entire shebang in some way and the surges just sort of developed based on how the shards built on top of that.  Voidbinding looks very interesting and the idea that three different shards influence it is pretty cool but I still do not see where Cultivation comes in.

[+TheFoxQR]

22 minutes ago, Karger said:

The metal shows Preservation where it output himself it does not fuel the magic.  The metal is the key not the power.  Just a point.

And the metal does disappear in the process. There is an exchange. You exchange metal for investiture, which is power shaped by the structure of the metal. While I know the specifics, I just didn't think it was important to get into them here. So I gave a simplified explanation.

22 minutes ago, Karger said:

I am really not sure where you get that idea.  The bond seems to be of Honor and the spren can be of either Honor or Cultivation.  Exactly what makes you think it is of Cultivation?

The reason I think Cultivation is involved is because while there is bonding, it's not the Honor-like bonding associated with Oaths. It's like, there is bonding because Honor and Cultivation's power pervades the world, and so there are elements of them used everywhere, but some are just passive rather than active. The Singer forms also don't give Surges. They seem more about change and specialisation - which seems more like Cultivation than Honor. It's like you can switch between evolutionary paths. And that voluntary ability to "switch" is what makes me lean toward Cultivation, who seems all about embracing change and growth. It seems more Cultivation than Honor, who doesn't seem like the type to allow making temporary Oaths. And as I said, that is the weakest claim I make, based more on hunches and feels rather than solid proof. It's sort of an assumption I'm making.

22 minutes ago, Karger said:

I personally think Adonalsium created the entire shebang in some way and the surges just sort of developed based on how the shards built on top of that.

This I mostly agree with. Even if Adonalsium didn't make everything exactly as it is now, it probably put the seeds for everything to eventually develop the way it did.

Edited July 25, 2019 by TheFoxQR

[Karger he/him]

42 minutes ago, TheFoxQR said:

The reason I think Cultivation is involved is because while there is bonding, it's not the Honor-like bonding associated with Oaths. It's like, there is bonding because Honor and Cultivation's power pervades the world, and so there are elements of them used everywhere, but some are just passive rather than active. The Singer forms also don't give Surges. They seem more about change and specialisation - which seems more like Cultivation than Honor. It's like you can switch between evolutionary paths. And that voluntary ability to "switch" is what makes me lean toward Cultivation, who seems all about embracing change and growth. It seems more Cultivation than Honor, who doesn't seem like the type to allow making temporary Oaths. And as I said, that is the weakest claim I make, based more on hunches and feels rather than solid proof. It's sort of an assumption I'm making.

Cultivation also has some kind of Cultivationbinding that we have not yet seen on screen.

[+TheFoxQR]

8 minutes ago, Karger said:

Cultivation also has some kind of Cultivationbinding that we have not yet seen on screen.

Can you give me a WoB, or a reference or allusion to this of some sort?

[Karger he/him]

10 minutes ago, TheFoxQR said:

Can you give me a WoB, or a reference or allusion to this of some sort?

I found this which is relevent to your topic

Words of Radiance Philadelphia signing (March 21, 2014)
#5 Share Copy

 

Play/Pau

EHyde

As Lift's spren refers to the Nightwatcher as Mother, right...

Brandon Sanderson

He definitely calls somebody a mother. The implication in the text is that it's the Nightwatcher.

EHyde

Certainly, so I'm just going to run with that right now. So the question that I'm asking is, is surgebinding in general a melding of Honor and Odium, a la feruchemy being in some sense not directly derivative of Ruin and Preservation?

Brandon Sanderson

It is...Honor and Cultivation is what you mean?

EHyde

Yes.

Brandon Sanderson

There are spren of all three Shards, and those spren can work within the bounds of the magic that has already been set up on Roshar.

EHyde

[Karger he/him]

19 minutes ago, Karger said:

Cultivation also has some kind of Cultivationbinding that we have not yet seen on screen.

and this which is the answer to your question.

Legion Release Party (Sept. 19, 2018)
#69 Share Copy

 

Play/Pause

 

PrinceDusty

At the Pixel Project event, you talked about a further extent of Cultivation's magic than just the boon and bane? Are there any people alive at the end of Oathbringer who are influenced by that magic?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, Lift. Well, I guess that's a boon, isn't it? Yes, there are. But nobody on screen that has Cultivation magic, other than boons or curses from the Nightwatcher. Yes, there is such a thing, no, there's no one else on screen. But what Lift does is a hint.

[+TheFoxQR]

10 minutes ago, Karger said:

Yes, Lift. Well, I guess that's a boon, isn't it? Yes, there are. But nobody on screen that has Cultivation magic, other than boons or curses from the Nightwatcher. Yes, there is such a thing, no, there's no one else on screen. But what Lift does is a hint.

I don't think this hints at a completely different, new framework. This and other WoBs like this are more oriented towards the idea that there is a Cultivation equivalent to Stormlight, and a way to access it.

[Karger he/him]

18 minutes ago, TheFoxQR said:

I don't think this hints at a completely different, new framework. This and other WoBs like this are more oriented towards the idea that there is a Cultivation equivalent to Stormlight, and a way to access it.

Skyward Seattle signing (Nov. 10, 2018)
#5 Share Copy

 

Play/Pause

 

Questioner

So Lift gets her awesomeness from food. Is that a Lift thing or is that an Edgedancer thing?

Brandon Sanderson

That is a Lift thing. She is a very specific thing, and what she is will come out more, as the series progresses. It's not just a little one-off, there is actually something more behind it, but it is not an Edgedancer thing.

Questioner

I was starting to think that maybe there was something that Cultivation's people had their own kind of Heralds, that had their own alternative energy so--

Brandon Sanderson

It's going to probably take until Lift's book to start to dig into it too much, but it isn't that far off, 3 books.

[+TheFoxQR]

1 hour ago, Karger said:

Skyward Seattle signing (Nov. 10, 2018)
#5 Share Copy

 

Play/Pause

 

Questioner

So Lift gets her awesomeness from food. Is that a Lift thing or is that an Edgedancer thing?

Brandon Sanderson

That is a Lift thing. She is a very specific thing, and what she is will come out more, as the series progresses. It's not just a little one-off, there is actually something more behind it, but it is not an Edgedancer thing.

Questioner

I was starting to think that maybe there was something that Cultivation's people had their own kind of Heralds, that had their own alternative energy so--

Brandon Sanderson

It's going to probably take until Lift's book to start to dig into it too much, but it isn't that far off, 3 books.

Hmm. Okay, these seem to point heavily towards there being more to Lift.

One day. One Magnificent day, I will truly connect all the dots in the right way.

[cometaryorbit]

Not everything described as a bond needs to be derived from Honor - the Seons on Sel are of Devotion, and they form bonds which are basically similar to spren bonds.

I think the original spren bonds with the Listeners/Singers (and with Rosharan wildlife) are older than the arrival of any Shards on Roshar: probably pre-Shattering, like the highstorms.

The Regals/Forms of Power are voidspren (spren of Odium) hijacking this natural system. I don't think Honor and Cultivation are involved at all.

Original (Herald/Honorblade) Surgebinding was a pure Honor system, yes. The Honorblades were pieces of Honor, and the Heralds originally drew Investiture straight from Honor rather than using Stormlight.

Nahel bond Surgebinding is a "hybrid" system in that the spren which form the bonds are a mixture of Honor and Cultivation. They are still basically using the same system, though - copying the Honorblades - so the system is mostly "Honor-y" (based on Oaths/Ideals) ... the Lightweavers use Truths, but even they still use the First Ideal.

Voidbinding could be tri-Shardic, yeah, but I don't think we know enough to say anything for sure (a WOB implies that what Renarin does isn't "Classic" Voidbinding).

[+TheFoxQR]

6 hours ago, cometaryorbit said:

Voidbinding could be tri-Shardic, yeah, but I don't think we know enough to say anything for sure (a WOB implies that what Renarin does isn't "Classic" Voidbinding).

There's also something almost tongue-in-cheek that (thematically) supports this that I only just realised. It has been said that Odium is bound by the powers of Honor and Cultivation. Let me repeat that. Odium. The Void. Is bound. By the powers of Honor and Cultivation.

6 hours ago, cometaryorbit said:

Not everything described as a bond needs to be derived from Honor - the Seons on Sel are of Devotion, and they form bonds which are basically similar to spren bonds.

I think the original spren bonds with the Listeners/Singers (and with Rosharan wildlife) are older than the arrival of any Shards on Roshar: probably pre-Shattering, like the highstorms.

The Regals/Forms of Power are voidspren (spren of Odium) hijacking this natural system. I don't think Honor and Cultivation are involved at all.

Original (Herald/Honorblade) Surgebinding was a pure Honor system, yes. The Honorblades were pieces of Honor, and the Heralds originally drew Investiture straight from Honor rather than using Stormlight.

Nahel bond Surgebinding is a "hybrid" system in that the spren which form the bonds are a mixture of Honor and Cultivation. They are still basically using the same system, though - copying the Honorblades - so the system is mostly "Honor-y" (based on Oaths/Ideals) ... the Lightweavers use Truths, but even they still use the First Ideal.

Yep, I mostly agree on all counts. Not all bonds could be Honor. Or even if the Bonding is using Honor's investiture, it's not actively of Honor. It's only using it as a realmatic tool to accomplish something - the bond - and is not actively driven by it. All investiture in the Cosmere is attached to some Shard, so even if something is pre-Shattering, it is now of some shard. Relevant WoB:

Quote

Overlord Jebus

Is all Investiture in the cosmere associated with a Shard?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, well, okay. So this is a complicated one. *pauses* So, Investiture predates the Shattering of Adonalsium, all Investiture was from Adonalsium, all Investiture got assigned to one of the 16 Shards when Adonalsium was Shattered. Some of the Investiture was not on Yolen but location is irrelevant. So Investiture is related to Shards even on planets where none of the Shards are inhabiting. 

Overlord Jebus

Are they aware of that Investiture?

Brandon Sanderson

That's part of the whole seeing into the infinite, being beyond even the power of a Shard. So, technically you could make the argument that Harmony could feel the sense of Preservation on every world in the cosmere, right? Because the building blocks of all life and creation are these things.

Overlord Jebus

So the Shard of Preservation embodies all preservation in the cosmere?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes but he just can't do that, right? Like, he's not infinite. The Vessels are not, even if their minds are enormously expanded by holding a Shard, they are not infinite. The Connection is all there in the Spiritual Realm

Oathbringer London signing (Nov. 28, 2017)

I think the idea is that investiture has some fundamental properties that are unique to each Shard. Say Honor's investiture, for example, is naturally good at being a form of cosmic glue and binding things together. Ditto for Cultivation's investiture having certain mannerisms/quirks. So when Adonalsium was originally creating Roshar, he used investiture to accomplish certain things, and due to some intrinsic property of that investiture (some specific type of investiture was used to bind things together, some investiture was used with the intention of encouraging growth), it got assigned to Honor and Cultivation post-shattering. That's why those two came to Roshar eventually - a bigly part of their known investiture was already at play there.

The idea being things like the Highstorms were using Honor-affiliated investiture even pre-shattering, but it only actually became Honor's investiture post shattering because Honor didn't exist before then. Adonalsium was already boosting evolution on Roshar to bring it up to snuff, and that investiture then became Cultivation's, who then took the reigns and made the system truly hers.

This is the same principle that allowed Nightblood to be invested with Ruin's investiture - when it was given the command to destroy things, the Breadth sought out the kind of investiture that realmatically specialises in destroying things. It wasn't created by Ruin, it's just using Ruin-type investiture as a tool to accomplish it's own goals.

Edited July 29, 2019 by TheFoxQR

[cometaryorbit]

On 7/28/2019 at 7:39 PM, TheFoxQR said:

There's also something almost tongue-in-cheek that (thematically) supports this that I only just realised. It has been said that Odium is bound by the powers of Honor and Cultivation. Let me repeat that. Odium. The Void. Is bound. By the powers of Honor and Cultivation.

That is a very good point.

Renarin's version of Voidbinding is definitely tri-Shardic in a sense, as it's accessed through Odium's corruption (via Sja-anat) of a Honor/Cultivation blended spren. It seems implied that ancient Voidbinding was a bit different, but the general principles might hold.

I think this 'corruption' of a system is something a bit different from a 'balance magic' between Shards (as Feruchemy is Ruin/Preservation), since Odium isn't really Invested in Roshar. That might be just a matter of terminology though, Odium's Investiture is involved either way (in this case through Sja-anat).

[+TheFoxQR]

8 minutes ago, cometaryorbit said:

I think this 'corruption' of a system is something a bit different from a 'balance magic' between Shards (as Feruchemy is Ruin/Preservation), since Odium isn't really Invested in Roshar.

Well, the Unmade exist, so he is invested somewhat, but I agree with you on that count.

Also, I'm reasonably convinced that there was no ancient Voidbinding. Renarin is a first. And by the end of the tenth book, Voidbinding will be the system that might replace a dying KR-Surgebinding, or at best will exist alongside.

Edited July 30, 2019 by TheFoxQR

[Halyo_Alex he/him]

Gotta say, I love the formatting on the new OP. Makes things much clearer imo, and I'm really agreeing with your theorizing here. I also like the idea that because Renarin is a sort of half void-binder (Void Knight? Knight Voidiant??) he's technically on that little purple circle segment inside the overlap of Honor and Cultivation, rather than smack dab in the middle of the three. Talk about being the 1%. But I digress; I love the formatting you've added, it clarifies a lot of stuff, it makes me agree more strongly. Great work!

[+TheFoxQR]

22 minutes ago, Halyo_Alex said:

Gotta say, I love the formatting on the new OP. Makes things much clearer imo, and I'm really agreeing with your theorizing here. I also like the idea that because Renarin is a sort of half void-binder (Void Knight? Knight Voidiant??) he's technically on that little purple circle segment inside the overlap of Honor and Cultivation, rather than smack dab in the middle of the three. Talk about being the 1%. But I digress; I love the formatting you've added, it clarifies a lot of stuff, it makes me agree more strongly. Great work!

Thanks! I spent some time on it over the weekend, going over and revising every concept I wanted explored.

I've also been thinking on the names for the Voidbinding Knights, and personally I like Knights Voidant. Then I looked at the synonyms for Void (Abyss, Oblivion, etc.), and also really dig Knights Abyssal or Knights Lacuna. But my personal favourite has to be the Knights Oblivious. 

[Halyo_Alex he/him]

6 hours ago, TheFoxQR said:

Thanks! I spent some time on it over the weekend, going over and revising every concept I wanted explored.

I've also been thinking on the names for the Voidbinding Knights, and personally I like Knights Voidant. Then I looked at the synonyms for Void (Abyss, Oblivion, etc.), and also really dig Knights Abyssal or Knights Lacuna. But my personal favourite has to be the Knights Oblivious. 

Audible snort- Knights Oblivious! Ahahahah! That sounds like a parody waiting to happen, man.

I think for a serious title, Knights Abyssal works quite well.

EDIT: I JUST HAD A THOUGHT.

Can a Fused bond a Voidspren and become a Regal at the same time???

Going off of your neat triple-venn diagram, that would... put them in the Voidbinding overlap...

Edited July 30, 2019 by Halyo_Alex
Had a moment of "wait a second," didn't want to double-post

[+TheFoxQR]

9 hours ago, Halyo_Alex said:

Audible snort- Knights Oblivious! Ahahahah! That sounds like a parody waiting to happen, man.

It even fits thematically, as the only known Voidbinding ability so far is the ability to see the Future.

9 hours ago, Halyo_Alex said:

Can a Fused bond a Voidspren and become a Regal at the same time???

Going off of your neat triple-venn diagram, that would... put them in the Voidbinding overlap...

This is one of those things I've been thinking about since the moment I put Voidbinding in the middle.

The idea is, Knights Radiant needed Odium's influence to get Voidbinding. So the Regals should need more Honor, and the Fused should need more Cultivation.

Except, why do the Fused actually need Singer bodies? From what we know of Cognitive Shadows, they need something to staple themselve to the Physical, like maybe a spike. So I was wondering, maybe the Fused are actually piggy-backing on the same magic as the Singer Forms. As in, instead of a Singer going out and bonding some spren and this affecting their Form, in the case of a Fused, the role of the spren is played by the Cognitive Shadow of an ancient Singer, but significantly more forcefully and overwriting some of the Cognitive aspects of the singer whose body is being taken over. Sort of a forceful and violent hack of that system.

In this case then, the diagram would be a bit more complex and look something like this:

 

Edited July 31, 2019 by TheFoxQR

[Halyo_Alex he/him]

3 hours ago, TheFoxQR said:

It even fits thematically, as the only known Voidbinding ability so far is the ability to see the Future.

This is one of those things I've been thinking about since the moment I put Voidbinding in the middle.

The idea is, Knights Radiant needed Odium's influence to get Voidbinding. So the Regals should need more Honor, and the Fused should need more Cultivation.

Except, why do the Fused actually need Singer bodies? From what we know of Cognitive Shadows, they need something to staple themselve to the Physical, like maybe a spike. So I was wondering, maybe the Fused are actually piggy-backing on the same magic as the Singer Forms. As in, instead of a Singer going out and bonding some spren and this affecting their Form, in the case of a Fused, the role of the spren is played by the Cognitive Shadow of an ancient Singer, but significantly more forcefully and overwriting some of the Cognitive aspects of the singer whose body is being taken over. Sort of a forceful and violent hack of that system.

In this case then, the diagram would be a bit more complex and look something like this:

 

That looks pretty cool, and also reminds me that whatever Renarin is would be on the border between KR and Voidbinding, in that case.

I also like this in that it makes the Regals and Fused more closely related on the chart, which feels good because, in a way, they are close. Both are odium-related Singer bodies, but one uses a variety of Voidspren to have many forms with the Surges, while the other is basically a cycling rebirth for ancient Singers' Cognitive Shadows.

 

Crap, now I wanna see [Mistborn Spoiler]

Spoiler

Kelsier escape the CR of Scadrial and yoink a Singer body for himself and be a pseudo-fused

but that's EXTREMELY not gonna happen.

Maybe with some protagonist from Roshar who ends up as a Cognitive Shadow could yoink a Singer body and become a Pseudo fused instead.

Or maybe just Venli. Who really knows at this point.

[cometaryorbit]

On 7/29/2019 at 10:08 PM, TheFoxQR said:

Well, the Unmade exist, so he is invested somewhat, but I agree with you on that count.

Kind of, I guess, but I think that's somewhat different. I mean, if Adolin worldhopped to Nalthis with his Edgedancer (cultivationspren) Shardblade, I don't think that would count as Cultivation Investing in Nalthis.

And are the Unmade Splinters of Odium - made of Odium's Investiture - or are they other spren corrupted ("unmade"?) by Odium in ancient times?

Quote

Also, I'm reasonably convinced that there was no ancient Voidbinding. Renarin is a first.

It must have existed in the past in some form, since it is known in Vorinism - Kadash tells Adolin in WOK "Voidbinding is a dark and evil thing, and the soul of it was to try to divine the future" (WOK, CH 18, Highprince of War).

[+TheFoxQR]

1 hour ago, cometaryorbit said:

Kind of, I guess, but I think that's somewhat different. I mean, if Adolin worldhopped to Nalthis with his Edgedancer (cultivationspren) Shardblade, I don't think that would count as Cultivation Investing in Nalthis.

And are the Unmade Splinters of Odium - made of Odium's Investiture - or are they other spren corrupted ("unmade"?) by Odium in ancient times?

It must have existed in the past in some form, since it is known in Vorinism - Kadash tells Adolin in WOK "Voidbinding is a dark and evil thing, and the soul of it was to try to divine the future" (WOK, CH 18, Highprince of War).

I didn't think of that quote at the time of writing - but I still do think that the Voidbinding that is depicted in the Chart isn't yet a big thing. The 10 Surge, 10 order thing is not something I see as Odium giving his enemy, not to mention that Sja-ant enlightening Radiantspren is a recent development. If there was Voidbinding before, it could be of other forms, like maybe workings of Fabriels or parts of Singer culture on the side of Humanity which could bond Voidspren (and would do so in controlled environments?) because the rules of magic allow it, and Odium couldn't stop it from happening.

I don't know about the Unmade - but they are definitely Splinters of Odium. I don't quite understand what they could have been before - if they were all Godspren, then it makes 12 in total and that's just... random. Maybe they were fewer entities before, and Odium split those into 9 supercharged pieces?

Even if you discount them, the core idea is some of Odium's investiture is now in play on Roshar - be it as corruptions of existing spren, the Fused or the Everstorm.

[Karger he/him]

On 7/25/2019 at 5:03 PM, TheFoxQR said:

Perhaps this is why Adonalsium made 10 Gas Giants in the Rosharan System - maybe they are blanket focii that define the Surges, like how Elantris was focusing the Dor around it, but more complicated and Spiritual rather than Cognitive. The only requirement I think this should have is that there has to be a cognitive component for an agreement to be made - and I believe this is playing into the basics of Realmatic Theory in the sense of the Spiritual representing what something is vs the Cognitive representing how it is perceived. The Surge is a spiritual ideal, and attaching (or binding) a cognitive component to it can allow you to change/modify it's manifestation in the physical.

No.  Sorry.

Skyward Atlanta signing (Nov. 17, 2018)
#305 Share Copy

 

Play/Pause

 

Jofwu

The ten gas giants, are they associated in any way with the Essences, the Heralds or the Knights Radiant other than culturally?

Brandon Sanderson

Only culturally.

Edited August 2, 2019 by Karger

[+TheFoxQR]

39 minutes ago, Karger said:

No.  Sorry.

Skyward Atlanta signing (Nov. 17, 2018)
#305 Share Copy

 

Play/Pause

 

Jofwu

The ten gas giants, are they associated in any way with the Essences, the Heralds or the Knights Radiant other than culturally?

Brandon Sanderson

Only culturally.

And that discounts everything I said how...?

The 10 Gas Giants have nothing to do with the System set up on Roshar - one where cognitive entities can shape spiritual ideals to change their manifestations in the physical. In fact what I'm trying to explain there is why the Spren are so intensely Cognitive in nature.

I'm not saying they define the Surge-pairs, or anything there after. The Surges and the Spren have to be two distinct things for their to be a one-many to a many-many correlation between the two.

All I'm saying is the Gas Giants help nail down and then keep the Spiritual ideal of what a Surge is from drifting. This has nothing to do with the Heralds, the Knights Radiant or the Essences.

Just think about it. Adonalsium "manufactured" the entirety of the Solar system for some specific purpose. Why would anything in it be wasteful/pointless? And planets live on a timescale that is irrelevant to any of our stories, so their function is probably never gonna be something that is important, or can even be proved beyond argument. It's not like you can destroy/change/temporarily remove a planet from a Solar System to see if this is the case.

[Karger he/him]

13 minutes ago, TheFoxQR said:

Just think about it. Adonalsium "manufactured" the entirety of the Solar system for some specific purpose. Why would anything in it be wasteful/pointless? And planets live on a timescale that is irrelevant to any of our stories, so their function is probably never gonna be something that is important, or can even be proved beyond argument. It's not like you can destroy/change/temporarily remove a planet from a Solar System to see if this is the case.

They could be keeping the planets in the habitual zone from falling into the sun.  Saturn's many moons help maintain it's rings kind of like this.

Edited August 2, 2019 by Karger

[+TheFoxQR]

2 minutes ago, Karger said:

They could be keeping the planets in the habitual zone from falling into the sun.

That's... not how orbits work. It's not even close to how orbits work.