Largest Order

[Nellac]

I was thinking about this the other day and, especially with the new information about the ordes that just came out, which would be the largest and smallest back before the recreance. Now I'm going to exclude bondsmiths from my discussion because we already know they only have three so there's no more reason to discuss it.  I would think that the largest group would be the windrunners. They are known for having the most squires. They were also constantly trying to save people which would likely lead to them picking up some of the people they saved as squires who could soon become radiant. I also think it is the most easily relatable oaths. I don't know anyone who wouldn't go out of their way to protect someone, even if it's just their close family members or friends. On the other hand I don't know a ton of people who go out of their way to seek justice, find truth, or try to understand themselves.

 

Now, I think the more difficult question is what order would have the smallest amount of members (again, not including the bondsmiths). I think the Truthwatchers are most likely. I think this comes from their oaths and their solitary nature. Seeking truth isn't something I think a ton of people seek out. I also think they wouldn't have a ton of recruitment because most of them stay in Urithiru a lot.

 

What is everyone else's thoughts? I just did the largest and smallest, but does anyone have a list of them from large to small?

[Karger he/him]

We have no way of knowing.  It all depends on the spren and we don't actually know much about them.  I think enough people exist who would be interested in being in an order that the spren cap things not the humans.

[Karnage]

My guess is that the Stonewards might rival the Windrunners, might even surpass them in numbers but as for the smallest groups I would suggest Truthwatchers,Elsecallers, then Lightweavers in that order for that spot as the order with the least amount of members.

[Nellac]

55 minutes ago, Karnage said:

My guess is that the Stonewards might rival the Windrunners, might even surpass them in numbers but as for the smallest groups I would suggest Truthwatchers,Elsecallers, then Lightweavers in that order for that spot as the order with the least amount of members.

I considered stonewards over windrunners. I think that the stonewards are more likely to sacrifice themselves in battle leading to them being a slightly smaller group than the windrunners

[Watchcry he/him]

So we know squires can be bonded to other orders if a spren takes interest.  When i think of largest order I think of the knights Radiant themselves (second oath and higher). Are they the Windrunners? Maybe.  Sounds easier to do than be a Lightweaver,  from examples we have of the past. There's also a lot of scholars/ scientists that are good candidates for the truthwatchers and elsecallers, so they could be large. I'd say the largest are the stonewards, the smallest are the dustbringers.  I chose dustbringers because i think it's really hard for people to focus so much on self mastery to be a big part in their life as to take oaths around it.  I'm a soldier and we are disciplined,  but it's due to training and compulsion sometimes.  Many of us don't seek it out, however.  Just my opinion...

Edited June 15, 2020 by Watchcry

[Cammac]

So for me the windrunners are like Paratroopers, dropping in where needed as the first assault team behind enemy lines and also scouting, gathering intel. They would also help out in small teams with other orders to protect, as we saw in one of dalinars visions.

I think that either edgedancers or sky breakers would maybe just beat them in numbers. The skybreakers are like a policing force, for the people and the knights so would need larger numbers spread out across Roshar. The edge dancers were like humanitarians being assigned in a groups to towns and citys around Roshar whilst also maintaining a presence at urithiru.

Without squires I'd go for this:

Skybreakers

Edgedancers

Windrunners

Stonewards

Lightweavers

Dustbringers

Truthwatchers

Elsecallers

Willshapers

 

 

 

[SanderFan69]

I think the Dustbringers were one of the biggest orders. I remember Malata saying something about hundreds of ashspren being killed during the Recreance which would put them at a higher number than stonewards and windrunners per Dalinar's vision.

[Nymeros]

Stonewards - Highest

 

Truthwatchers - Lowest

[Aminar]

7 hours ago, SanderFan69 said:

I think the Dustbringers were one of the biggest orders. I remember Malata saying something about hundreds of ashspren being killed during the Recreance which would put them at a higher number than stonewards and windrunners per Dalinar's vision.

This is actually one of the more confusing parts about the series. Like, we know there's a lot of High Spren now. But the Spren Civilizations basically went through a Desolation with the Recreance. Pattern talks about there not being many Cryptics who remember when the Radiants were around because they were all killed. And that's raises a lot of questions. Were there just a few hundred Spren that would cross over and the rest just stayed behind? No retirement. No rotation? Or did most Radiants break their oaths and kill their Spren at some point? And if so, what happened to the Shards? 

[Watchcry he/him]

11 hours ago, SanderFan69 said:

I think the Dustbringers were one of the biggest orders. I remember Malata saying something about hundreds of ashspren being killed during the Recreance which would put them at a higher number than stonewards and windrunners per Dalinar's vision.

I'm pretty sure at the top level of Urithiru there were seats for thousands per order. There were more than hundreds of the most populous for sure. 

[SanderFan69]

I just looked at that (its in chapter 27), and Shallan says that there would probably be hundreds of people in most of the orders to fill the whole auditorium. That would put the Dustbringers at at least one of the average sized orders.

Also, I doubt which order was largest stayed the same all the time. There was likely fluctuation in how many people were in each order.