Bort

Hey Kas. Good to see you too, mate. I'm impressed to see so many of the old faces still hanging around.

I'm in. It's been a while since I last played

Well, this could explain where the Testament blade is..

So, I've been trying to work out what Shallan's 5th and final Truth could be, and it almost certainly has something to do with her mother's death, because there are still so many details we're missing from that scene. But, as discussed in this thread and so many others, Shallan is an unreliable witness, so her memories of that night are suspect. So, my personal theory... Feel free to shoot it down. Shallan killed her mother, but it was an accident, as she was trying to protect Shallan from the Skybreaker acolyte, who was going to kill Shallan, instead of taking Shallan away to be trained, as her mother had requested.

The door slams open to reveal a heavily armored figure standing in the opening. Heavy rain pounds the ground behind him. Dripping, he leaves wet footsteps as he enters the bar. The patrons turn towards him, but seeing his arms and armor, quickly glance away from the newcomer, hoping he’s not there for trouble. A hush falls over the bar and some eyes follow him across the room towards the notice board. He peers at the silent mass and begins to affix information posters to the wall. The first poster shows a warning, intriguing one older patron, who walks over and begins to read aloud: Curse of Strahd Travel to distant Barovia, a land saved from life and freed from hope. Will you be the heroes to restore the light to the land? Can you lift the Curse of Strahd? **WARNING** Curse of Strahd is a somewhat darker campaign than most. Not for the faint of heart or the queasy of mind. “I have heard of this land and it’s plight. This is quite the adventure you are advertising,” the older man says. The armored figure nods and hammers up the next poster: Ghosts of Saltmarsh Take to the seas, and face the dangers of the deeps, while using sleepy little Saltmarsh as your home port. Gather your crew, it’s plunderin’ time! Drink up, me hearties, yo ho! Upon reading this, the older man laughs in a way that sounds both nostalgic and guarded . He says “AHH my days upon the seas calls to me as I read this. Alas, those days are long past. But there are many here who would take up this call.” The armored figure looks this old man up and down…. and begins putting the last of his posters on the board: Descent Into Avernus A dark and terrifying threat has already claimed one city, and is making moves to claim Baldur’s Gate. Can you save the city from its fate? Will you take the fight to the true antagonists, the denizens of Hell? The older man, after reading this one, takes one more look at the figure and shrewdly says, “Ah, this is not a fool’s errand. This one could bring your very soul into peril. Truly, those that take this quest are the bravest of all.” He lifts his tankard in a toast to those that would go before him. The armored man finally speaks, his voice gravelly and coarse, but it carries through the space with great strength, “The risks will be great, the rewards never quite enough, but admit it, you don’t do this just for the gold! You do it for the fame, the attention, and the free beer! So, what say you, adventurer? Will you step up and be the hero the world needs?” ***** During the month of April, I will be launching a few new campaigns - Curse of Strahd, Ghosts of Saltmarsh and Descent into Avernus, maybe among others, and I am seeking brave or foolhardy adventurers to join me on these quests. The Perks Signature Items! While your party may need to face these threats alone, you won’t be unaided in your quests. Concerned merchants, adventurer patrons, or something more, will sponsor you and see you are provided with the very best equipment money can’t buy… Your very own Signature Item. Designed by you, the player, and reflective of your character’s skills and goals, these items improve and grow with your character potentially reaching artifact levels of power! Free One Shots! Signing up for one of the paid campaigns will also get you access to my one shot server, where I and others run regular one shot adventures. Even though the campaigns start in April, you would be given access to this server immediately, and are welcome to join any games that are running there. Anything Goes! There are a lot of options available in the Charactermancer, and any and all of them are open for you to play with. Warforged Artificer? Sure! Fairy Barbarian? Why not! The only limit is your imagination. Have Some Gold! I've noticed that quite a few GMs can be quite stingy when it comes to rewards for their players, especially in the published modules. I reward good roleplay, clever planning, and I'm not afraid to give my characters a pile of gold to spend. Of course, getting your hands on that much gold may have other consequences… Impact Your World! My games are a living world. The actions players take could have consequences that would be felt for miles around, and it's not realistic to expect everything to be back to normal when you've moved onto the next town. This does mean that both positive and negative effects can be seen due to player choices. Ripples may even stretch into other games I’m running, and campaign results will persist into future campaigns. Game: D&D 5e Campaign: Various Experience: From AD&D (2e) to 5E, I’ve been roleplaying for over 20 years, and GM’ing for nearly as long. The pandemic has given me extensive knowledge of Roll 20. I welcome players with no experience to my table. Game style: I provide a world and a story, and let the players interact with it as they want. While this does mean that it can sometimes be a challenge to keep the players on track, it also means that they have a lot of freedom. I also like to incorporate character backgrounds into the campaign, so like a good background from a player and reward accordingly. Location/Timezone: UK, but timezone isn't too important as we play online. So long as I can understand you, and you can understand me, we’re good! Schedule: Somewhat flexible as these are new games, so we are able to arrange them to suit the most people. I am expecting that most of them will be run in the evening, Eastern Standard Time (EST). I am hoping we can arrange them for Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday evenings, starting at 6pm EST, but this will be discussed with the players before any decisions are made. Roles sought: Any and all! Group type: Online - Discord for voice, Roll20 for the virtual tabletop. Free accounts for both Discord and Roll20 would be all you need. Payment: These will be paid games, likely charged at £12 per session, or £40 per month, but final pricing will be announced before the campaigns start. Please note that Roll20 is not responsible for any payment transactions and cannot enforce any private arrangements. Testimonials: "Freedom to have fun, be creative, to role play “your big moment”, to get items and loot galore… all with the constant fear your PC could be toast at any moment" - Jarndo, Dwarf Barbarian. "Bort lets the PCs be the best versions of themselves. He puts interesting challenges in front of the group and lets the group go to work on them." - Darvin, Human Fighter. “Bort provides the ideal setting for the player to express their creativity with the perfect balance of indulgence and RAW. If you have felt modules are a bit too stifling or homebrew a bit to freeform, Bort finds the sweet spot.” - Sunder, Hexadin “I went into the game with this incredible signature item…. And it just got better… and then… just. WOW. No spoilers – but oh man. Love his DM style and play, but this item??? BEST DM EVER!” - Voni, Human Arcane Archer “Bort's GMing gently gets under your skin until you realize you're effortlessly having a lot of fun. He's generous with the loot but he giveth with one hand and removeth with the other like an omniscient god should. If there's something you want to explore he will go there with you but keep things on track, giving everyone time to shine. Very importantly he knows his rules and his lore and like a good artist knows when to transcend them.” - Nico, Human 'I see dead people' Bard Still got questions? I have answers! Please contact me on Discord @Bort#7252 for more information. Current Numbers: 5/18 spots filled.

Thanks @Chaos

"WE CHOSE!" - Maya. "Journey before destination, you bastard!" - Navani. There were many good moments in RoW, but these two were truly outstanding in my eyes.

Third Ideal. Kaladin hadn't sworn the 4th Ideal yet, and this is another indication that it's something special about Kaladin. 4th Ideal is when they get their Plate, which Kaladin can control remotely to protect others, making it similar in form to what he did with the Windspren. But that was before swearing the Ideal that allowed him to do that sort of thing. It's this sort of thing that makes me think that Kaladin is special, and that the other Windrunners can't do this sort of thing.

Oh! That's nasty!!! That's like white-chocolate-shrimp-sauce nasty. But genius!!! Todium gets screwed by a promise he himself had made while mortal... I kinda think you're onto something here, and we're going to see Dalinar trapped, but if it backfires and gets Todium, then brilliant.

Awesome, thanks This will provide some interesting dilemmas in Dalinar's future, I think, but yeah, I can see this totally screwing him over.

Or, in other words, no, you can't provide ANYTHING that backs up the claims you are making. Also, one other thing we see Kaladin doing which no other Windrunner can do... So far as we have seen. Travel with the Highstorm... The visions he was having back in the Lumberyard, while a bridgeman. Where are all the perspectives from the other bridgemen about receiving their visions of flying in the storms? Surely there would have been something, even a single comment from any of Bridge 4. I mean, do you seriously expect that Lopen wouldn't have spoken of it? Yet, rather than admit that you have nothing to support your claims, you still attack my arguments which are entirely based on what we see in the books. And how can you claim my logic is based on what is not in the books when I am using EVERYTHING KALADIN HAS DONE WHICH SEEMS SPECIAL as my evidence, and you are using the fact that NO-ONE ELSE HAS SHOWN THESE TALENTS to mean that everyone can do them... Sorry, but which bit is not in the books? As for why I'm invested in this... It's because you are frustrating, Frustration. For all your comments about science, and your amazing talents at digging out specific WoBs, you don't provide reasons for why you think what you think, but you argue like you are so certain that you are right and everyone else is wrong. If you are that certain, share some of your reasoning, instead of just saying "You're wrong!" You say things like "Give a single line that says Kaladin alone can do the things you claim," yet you are unable to provide a single line that supports the claims YOU are making. That's why I argue against you so much. Like your line about Shallan... She sees the spiritual aspect of the deserters. Where are you getting this piece of information? What makes you so sure that this is what happened? How do you know no other Lightweaver can do this? This is EXACTLY the same argument we're having about Kaladin, and once again you are making unsubstantiated claims and presenting them as fact. If you want them to be accepted as fact, you need to do better in your presentation, like actually providing reasons for your logic, and in-book examples that support your claims. Now, I have freely admitted in this thread that I may be wrong... BECAUSE WE DON'T HAVE THE DATA TO SAY FOR SURE ONE WAY OR ANOTHER... So, why are you presenting your side of the argument as "I am right, you are wrong!"?

I think it would really depend on the exact wording his oath. I don't recall exactly what it was though.

And now you're just twisting words. Nowhere did I say that "nothing indicates" Kaladin is the only one to do these things. I said that all evidence suggests that Kaladin is the only one with these abilities because we have no evidence to show anyone else has these same talents. Why would I use these words? Could it possibly be because KALADIN IS THE ONLY ONE WE HAVE SEEN DISPLAYING THESE TALENTS? And I'm not asking you to prove anything. I'm asking you for examples that back the claims you are making, something any self respecting scientist should be able to provide. That's not definitive proof, just something that you've based your assumptions on. If you have nothing to offer about why you are making the assumptions you have, what are you even doing arguing about it when you have literally nothing to base your argument on? My assumptions are based on EVERYTHING we've seen in the books so far. What, exactly, are yours based on? Three words from an in-universe source? You complain about my evidence being based on the others not doing it, and yet, your evidence is based on "the others not doing it," but being able to. At least what I am saying is backed up by what we have seen in the books. Which parts of the books support your claims? Oh, that's right... They don't! And what possible reason could you have for thinking yourself capable of arguing against a point raised about A BOOK YOU HAVEN'T EVEN READ YET??? And your comment about Shallan is wrong. Although it's been a while since I last read it, I'm sure she discusses their mnemonic abilities with another of her Lightweavers fairly early in RoW. You definitely get other perspectives about it though, with one Lightweaver talking about the colours to, I think it was Dalinar, Might have also been an internal Lightweaver discussion though.

I'm not asking you to prove a negative. I am asking you to admit that, with the information we have available, it appears that Kaladin has some capabilities which do not appear to be shared with the other Windrunners. Nothing we know supports your claim that all Windrunners can do the same things. I'll admit, nothing we know confirms it's only Kaladin either, but everything we have seen points to it being just Kaladin, rather than everyone. And Teft isn't the one who has had the most screen time other than Kaladin. There is an entire book with barely a mention of Kaladin, but starring a couple of other Windrunners (not Teft). Read Dawnshard. You took my argument, and applied it to a character which has nothing to do with what was being debated, and one who holds a unique position in the world anyways, so wouldn't be very good to base information on, especially when discussing Windrunner capabilities. So... You seem to believe that characters not doing something provides no data. On the contrary, it provides some data, just not the data you want, because it doesn't provide a definitive answer. The more we see Windrunners in action, without displaying these powers that Kaladin seems to have, the more data we have suggesting it's just Kaladin, and not all of them. Is it proof? No. But there is far more case to be arguing that it's Kaladin only at this point, rather than arguing that it's all Windrunners.

Hey, I was hoping to put up a post advertising some paid D&D campaigns I've got starting soon, and while I couldn't find anything in the forum policies that says I can't, I figured it was a good idea to check in here first. The post will contain no links to other sites, no paypal info or anything like that, just basic details about the games I'll be running, and a Discord ID so potential players can contact me. I think this would be fine, but could someone confirm this for me please?

You're not wrong... That is kinda terrifying.

We're not talking on a small scale here though. Frustration was arguing that all Windrunners share Kaladin's special abilities, so their windshield should be powerful enough to split the highstorm for groups of people, not just themselves.

And yet, in arguing "how special" Kaladin is, you are assigning every single one of his talents (which to all eyes so far appear to be unique to Kaladin) to ALL of the other Windrunners. You say there is insufficient evidence that the powers are unique to Kaladin, but where is even a single shred of evidence that suggests the others may share these abilities? Simple answer, there isn't any, while there is plenty to support the "Kaladin is this special" hypothesis. We have a sample size of more than 1. There are way more Windrunners than just Kaladin. Each one is it's own little datapoint in the calculation, and so far, every single one of them is pointing at Kaladin and saying "He's special, we're not," This may change in future, if we start seeing others displaying the same talents, but right now, those abilities are Kaladin's and Kaladin's alone. And if you're talking about Windrunner PoVs, I can think of at least 4 we've seen, so that's not a sample size of 1 either. And now you're using a totally different debate about a totally different character to try to prove your point about Kaladin (also, it's a character that is ALSO displaying unusual abilities that surprise his Spren, so not sure he's the best example of your argument). And, let's not forget all the talk about science here, you not only brought in a totally unrelated character to the debate, you brought in one that adds literally nothing to the facts here. Maybe instead of diverging off into wild speculation that has nothing to do with what's being talked about, you could answer the question instead? We've seen the Windrunners in plenty of places where these abilities could be useful, so surely we should have seen at least one of them using them by now, other than Kaladin?

In science you always observe the results, ready to amend your hypothesis should new information come to light. I am willing to do this once we know that other Windrunners have these abilities too. NOTHING we have seen in the books suggest that this is the case, and everything we have seen in the books suggests that Kaladin is special. Arguing that Kaladin is special, so obviously all of the powers he is displaying, but no-one else is, means that every Windrunner has those same powers, makes no sense. Yet, this is exactly what you are arguing. In science, you don't say "All the evidence points towards that result, but we can't be 100% certain so we're going to look in totally the other direction and pretend this evidence doesn't exist." You say there is no indication that Kaladin is the only one that can do it. Well, I say we have more of an indication that he is the only one, due to an absolute absence of anyone else doing anything like it, in any of the books. How many Windrunners have we seen caught in a storm? Not many, but I again raise my earlier example. When flying through the highstorm, why didn't the Windrunners part the storm for Shallan, Adolin, Elhokar, and the team? It would have made the masks they were wearing unnecessary. That was literal hours spent in the highstorm. Surely someone would have done this little trick for at least part of the journey?

We also lack sufficient evidence to say that Kaladin is NOT doing something special, because we haven't seen anything like it confirmed anywhere else, but that didn't stop you coming into the thread and telling me I'm wrong without backing up anything you said. This is why I put the burden of proof on you, Frustration. Because you like to make claims without backing them up. At least if I post something, it explains WHY I think the way I do. 1. So, you're saying the ability to SENSE HIGHSTORMS is not a power, or the ability to PART HIGHSTORMS? (Also, how can you say this would not be a useful ability? There are dozens of times this would have been useful in the books, making me think that we'd have seen it already if someone else were able to do it. What makes you think that everyone has it?). 2. All of the other Windrunners have Adhesion too. Why have we only heard of these two using it for this? 3. This is a point, however, I think we've had plenty of opportunity to have confirmation from elsewhere. I mean, Dawnshard has PoVs from multiple Windrunners, and Kaladin is barely even in that book, so would have been the perfect chance.

So... Kaladin and a building can do this. Ok, with you so far... What about the other Windrunners? Where's your evidence supporting that they can do this (or indeed ANYTHING like this)? Or are you willingly ignoring all the evidence supporting that Kaladin is somehow special? You say it's "just" Adhesion, but look at the number of times Kaladin can either do something unexpected with his abilities, or the feelings he gets from time to time (sensing highstorms, etc). Not one of the other Windrunners display any of these abilities, making me think this isn't simply Adhesion, but rather a form of Adhesion Plus. In the same way Dalinar can do things the Stormfather never dreamed would be possible, so can Kaladin.

And how do you know this? Where is the WoB, or the passage in the books that confirm it? Have ANY of the other Windrunners shown this talent?

I wonder if this is how Odium was able to circumvent the Oathpact this time. If I remember correctly, WoB states that Taln didn't break, meaning that there had to be another way to start the desolation - the Everstorm. But what if it was Galivar's attempts to reach Braize that allowed Ulim to escape and make it to Roshar, and get the ball rolling towards the Everstorm?

I'm going with option 1 here, the 5th Ideal, and then we'll see him either Ascend or die in the back half of the series. Why do I think this? Because depression is a tricky one, and I don't think Brandon will be trying to to provoke people's depression into overdrive. Kaladin's major mental health issue is that he has severe depression, and we've seen him struggling with the question, "What's the point?" multiple times over different books. For him to reach book 5, then die before swearing his 5th Ideal, is a literal slap in the face of those who do have depression, who also struggle with "What's the point?" because the "point" has just been swept out from under them. It would be both cruel and heartbreaking for them to see that the ultimate endpoint to Kaladin's story arc is, "Well, you were right all along, there was no point."

Kaladin is the only Windrunner we've seen with this ability. It may be possible for others to do it too, but right now, it's just Kaladin. To the point where even Syl was surprised by what he could do.