[Dawnshard spoilers] Theory about Odium's Intent

[The Kraken's Daughter]

So, after picking the pieces of my brain up off the floor following the Toadium event in RoW, I formulated a theory on how Odium might eventually be dealt with. Odium has been described as being particularly dangerous, and one of the epigraphs in RoW indicates that this is due to the Intent of the Shard itself, not just the personality of Rayse as its (former) Vessel. The standard way of dealing with something like this would be to kill/destroy it. But clearly Brandon laughs at the idea of doing what we expect, so what if there was some other way to neutralize Odium as a threat? What if instead of being destroyed/splintered, the Shard could be changed?

Rysn now holds (or is) the Dawnshard Change. I think that Dawnshard may eventually be used to mitigate the worst parts of Odium's Intent. This might be a straight-up softening, like changing it from Odium (hatred) to Anger. Or it could be a more subtle change, like directing hatred only toward evil things. (I'm thinking of something like the TV show Dexter here, which is about a serial killer who targets other murderers. It doesn't change his essential nature, but he manages to channel it in a way that's less harmful for society overall.)

What do others think? I recognize that changing the nature of a Shard would be a very tall order, but if the Dawnshards were used to shatter Adonalsium, I think they'd be up to the task of changing a piece of Adonalsium. (And because of their power, I think it's entirely possible Toadium will want to get his hands on the Dawnshard if he finds out it's on Roshar. I really hope he doesn't piece it together from whatever info about the expedition to Aimia the other monarchs let King T have.)

 

[ftl]

Another way to contain it would be to merge it with a different shard. Harmony did this for Ruin/Preservation. Merging Odium with Honor could make it less dangerous.

[Halyo_Alex he/him]

29 minutes ago, ftl said:

Another way to contain it would be to merge it with a different shard. Harmony did this for Ruin/Preservation. Merging Odium with Honor could make it less dangerous.

Why not both? Doubly temper it!

[Dreamwa1ker she/her]

15 hours ago, The Kraken's Daughter said:

So, after picking the pieces of my brain up off the floor following the Toadium event in RoW, I formulated a theory on how Odium might eventually be dealt with. Odium has been described as being particularly dangerous, and one of the epigraphs in RoW indicates that this is due to the Intent of the Shard itself, not just the personality of Rayse as its (former) Vessel. The standard way of dealing with something like this would be to kill/destroy it. But clearly Brandon laughs at the idea of doing what we expect, so what if there was some other way to neutralize Odium as a threat? What if instead of being destroyed/splintered, the Shard could be changed?

Rysn now holds (or is) the Dawnshard Change. I think that Dawnshard may eventually be used to mitigate the worst parts of Odium's Intent. This might be a straight-up softening, like changing it from Odium (hatred) to Anger. Or it could be a more subtle change, like directing hatred only toward evil things. (I'm thinking of something like the TV show Dexter here, which is about a serial killer who targets other murderers. It doesn't change his essential nature, but he manages to channel it in a way that's less harmful for society overall.)

What do others think? I recognize that changing the nature of a Shard would be a very tall order, but if the Dawnshards were used to shatter Adonalsium, I think they'd be up to the task of changing a piece of Adonalsium. (And because of their power, I think it's entirely possible Toadium will want to get his hands on the Dawnshard if he finds out it's on Roshar. I really hope he doesn't piece it together from whatever info about the expedition to Aimia the other monarchs let King T have.)

 

I totally buy this, I was thinking along the same lines. Use the Dawnshard to Change Odium from Passion to Compassion or Empathy.

[Leuthie]

14 hours ago, ftl said:

Another way to contain it would be to merge it with a different shard. Harmony did this for Ruin/Preservation. Merging Odium with Honor could make it less dangerous.

Has the combination of Hate and Honor been very good for Roshar? While they were both around, Roshar was locked in never ending war. Raboniel called it Warlight, the mix of Voidlight and Stormlight. Think about what Honor and Hate together might actually mean.

I don't think it would mean less Hate.

[seriodor]

I know we haven't really been told the mechanism for how the Dawnshards shattered Adonalsium, but I have an idea based on what we know already. It seems that they didn't really attack Adonalsium, but that they enforced a division of it's power into 4 categories. They told the power that was whole that now it is divided. Four major splits into categories, and then four splits along those categories. So like one category was created with one Dawnshard, then that category was further divided by the other three. This leads me to believe that one Dawnshard can't be used to just make a shard different, because they seem to work by splitting off a piece of infinity and defining it by an Intent. So I think a Dawnshard could be used to further divide a shard based upon a different command, but I'm not sure if any of the four used on Adonalsium could do this, because each Shard has already had those commands applied to them. I think that maybe two Dawnshards could be used on a Shard to further refine it into two Intents based on the two Dawnshards used. I also think that a fifth Dawnshard that wasn't used on Adonalsium could be used to split any of the Shards based on it's Command, because it was never used to define any Intents in the first place.

[DiePie]

4 hours ago, seriodor said:

I know we haven't really been told the mechanism for how the Dawnshards shattered Adonalsium, but I have an idea based on what we know already. It seems that they didn't really attack Adonalsium, but that they enforced a division of it's power into 4 categories. They told the power that was whole that now it is divided. Four major splits into categories, and then four splits along those categories. So like one category was created with one Dawnshard, then that category was further divided by the other three. This leads me to believe that one Dawnshard can't be used to just make a shard different, because they seem to work by splitting off a piece of infinity and defining it by an Intent. So I think a Dawnshard could be used to further divide a shard based upon a different command, but I'm not sure if any of the four used on Adonalsium could do this, because each Shard has already had those commands applied to them. I think that maybe two Dawnshards could be used on a Shard to further refine it into two Intents based on the two Dawnshards used. I also think that a fifth Dawnshard that wasn't used on Adonalsium could be used to split any of the Shards based on it's Command, because it was never used to define any Intents in the first place.

the problem I have with the idea that 4 dawnshards created 16 shards is that it has been said that it would have been easy to create a 17th shard for hoid and redistribute the power to make that happen, but if there's a 5th dawnshard that could've done that...