What makes the sharp part of Shardblades cut souls, but not the blunt part?

[Tanavast_the_lesser]

Shardblades hurt people's soul, not their body. If you use the sharp edge of a Shardblade to swipe through an arm, the arm remains completely intact, without a mark. But when you hold a Shardblade at the handle or clap your hands on the sides, aka touching the blunt parts, it acts like a normal object, so you could theoretically clobber someone to death with the blunt part of the sword. Perhaps this is going a bit far for book lore, but what makes the sharp part special and cut souls, while the blunt part that is made out of the same material does not? Why does your soul care whether the spooky Investure metal has an acute angle or not?

[Honorless he/him]

It's just that the sharp part can cut and the blunt part usually can't, there's nothing extra special about the edges of a Shardblade. You just need a sharp edge to make cuts and blunt edges are better suited for bludgeoning.

And what happens when a Shardblade cuts off a limb is that it cuts your body's internal Connections, so that the arm is no longer recognized as your arm by your Spiritweb so you can't move it.

Hitting it with the blunt side of the blade or the pommel doesn't do anything because you're not cutting anything, you have to cut.

If you... hmm cutting a body with the flat of the blade just isn't going to happen, so say that you pound the pommel into and through someone's shoulder and pull it till you separate the arm, it would achieve the same Spiritual wound, except this process would be much more clunkier and the arm would actually be Physically separated so there's not really a point.

Edited November 29, 2020 by Honorless

[Weltall]

Yeah, it's all about the cutting since it has to get 'inside' you for the soul-damaging properties to come into play.

Relatedly, a blunt shardweapon is still going to hurt you and quite possibly kill you but it's not going to have the same soul-cutting property unless you're hitting someone so hard that they kind of splatter, at which point it's largely irrelevant. But something blunt like a Shardhammer has its uses; It's not always about pure lethality.

Edited November 29, 2020 by Ookla the Crimson King

[trav]

On 29.11.2020 at 4:55 AM, Ookla the Crimson King said:

Yeah, it's all about the cutting since

the problem with this is that Shardblades are not really getting past the skin. its left untouched. the blade just passes through.
theres no actual cutting so the shape of the Shard should not matter, but it does.

Shades are also able to pass through people. and Shades are "blunt" I would say.

all I can think of is Intent.

 

[Tanavast_the_lesser]

All right, thanks. That makes sense

[MealyPotatoes]

It's a shard blade, not a shard light saber.  It's directional.  The blunt part gives their soul a large bruise, and then they get a headache.

[Ghanderflaffle she/her]

 

22 hours ago, Tanavast_the_lesser said:

Perhaps this is going a bit far for book lore,

It's never too far in a Sanderson book!

[Ceradis]

Part of it probably has to do with Intent; in the case of dead Blades I would assume that it's mostly due to the Intent the old Radiants had when summoning and abandoning them. For Radiant Spren there Knight's Intent determines which parts cut and which don't.

Edit: didn't see your comment til after I posted this but i agree trav, seems to make the most sense as Intent plays a huge role in how Radiant spren take physical form as metal objects.

Edited December 1, 2020 by Ceradis