nervousnerd

Well, I've thought about it more like something in Secret History. I do agree that there is no direct control over Szeth right now. He could have stopped himself at any time provided he was willing to go against his deeply held beliefs. I don't know if Odium has the power to control those who are filled with hate but I think he would need some kind of catalyst (perhaps a bonded spren).

Yeah I believe that is the case. I can only Imagine having to watch for tiny mouse and squirrel shades too. Now I suppose it is possible that without predators that nearly all animals die naturally, but I doubt it. Did we see what happened to the horses?

I remember Syl saying this. I'm couldn't find the Stormfather saying it. From the quote it is actually not clear. We know that Szeth has recently started to hate his victims for not being able to stop him (when originally he hated himself) but it could obviously be referring to Odium.

I'm not sure I would really worry about the violence. At least in the States, the ratings boards are very lenient with violence in a lot of cases. Shooting coins and not guns will work for it, I think. My main worry is that these movies are not going to be very long at first. If they aren't sure about the audience (which they won't be starting out), they usually don't want to alienate them with a 3 hour run time. This is why I wish they started with some of the shorter books. I'm not sure what can be removed. The balls are sort of necessary to introduce Elend and to help Vin discover who she really is. I think the Skaa rebellion in necessary for us to believe Kelsier's plan. I think if we thought from the beginning that it was just the crew versus the God then it would leave use either believing that TLR is weak or that there was never any tension for the crew.

Exactly. They allomantically burn their feruchemical metalminds to produce a large burst of that feruchemical power. That confused me a lot at first too. Also if they are smart, they will then use that burst of power to fill a new metalmind and repeat until they have near unlimited power (not really but sort of).

Jezrien actually said that Ishar believed the Oathpact might continue as long as Taln was being tortured. While I know that the swords do go with them and return when they go to damnation; are we sure that it is the swords that binds them to the Oathpact (meaning if they die while bonded to the sword they go to damnation)?

Aw man. Now I can't stop imagining Venli and her scientist buddies out catching spren by throwing spheres at them and trying to get each type.

Yeah, me too apparently. I probably should have quoted the person above who said that. Didn't mean to imply that you suggested it.

Well, that seems to say that Lift is not part Aimian unless she is descended from the other type of Aimian (I assume those groups are from Siah because of the blue coloring and because bugs aren't attractive to most people) or unless darker skin hides the blue better.

No, I agree. For me it would only really lessen it if the characters know and believe that they cannot die. I don't want every character to come back but at the same time as long as a character believes that they can die and are willing to for what they believe then it is ok.

I wouldn't think that Aimians and humans would be able to mate. Then again, I thought the same of the Parshendi and humans. I feel like it doesn't matter though. I kind of want to see her become a powerful hero despite her upbringing.

I'm not so sure that being good at dueling necessarily equates to being good at battle tactics. I think the only great tactic that we saw him come up with was cutting through the crem buildings in the battle of Narak. Other than that, he seems to have the same jump in first style.

Well, I'm not sure I would go that far. I think Dalinar is inspiring because he changed himself. Yes, he had to lose his brother and force himself to follow the codes in order to be a better person but I think that we will see how much that is asking of himself in the next book. I think he truly has changed to be a better person and the codes were just the catalyst (although I want to know if his wife had any part as well). I just don't think Dalinar will be able to lead well unless he believes that he truly is a changed man and any mistake he makes will lead him back down the wrong path. In that way, maybe the codes are holding him back.

Having read some of the Dalinar chapters from Oathbringer (Not the in universe one), I really don't think Dalinar was one for tactics. Perhaps he learned a little about it when he was young but he seemed to just do what was natural to him. He could tell what needed to be done and did it with very little thought. It is possible that he and Gavilar heard the story of the Sunmaker when they were very young and that is what inspired them though I suppose. I also feel like Dalinar would feel like Nohadon did in his vision at the moment. He hasn't really accomplished anything worthy of being chronicled yet. The Alethkar that he helped unite is as fragile as ever. The brother he helped to become king has died leaving his weak son as ruler. And while he has helped to refound the Knights Radiant, they are already facing an immense enemy with only 4 of them to face it. He doesn't even really have much of his own wisdom to share. So, far the majority of what Dalinar has done is follow what other people think should be done. He has let The Way of Kings and the Alethi codes lead him. While they have certainly helped him change from the warmonger that he was, he needs to learn to do what is right on his own before he has anything to tell the world.

I assume so.. It seemed to me like the more powerful you were, the longer you can easily resist the Beyond. This may be because using more power created more connection (if I understand this theory correctly).

I kind of do think that the oaths may have been added after the Nahel bond was discovered. The spren were were just imitating the heralds at first and I don't think that they would have had similar oaths to bind them. It is also unlikely that the different types of spren got together to agree on oaths because some of them do not like the others. Ishar seemingly saw how dangerous it was to give people these powers with no control over how they could act with them.

Yeah that makes sense. Perhaps Dalinar is trying to figure out what to do from one of the many new books they must have found in Urithiru. Uniting was technically what the Sunmaker was all about.

But how do you mechanically break the oaths of thousands of Radiants? And wouldn't they seemingly immediately lose access to their powers like Kaladin when he was going to break his oaths? It seemed to me that laying down their swords and armor was the act that truly broke their oaths. That was when the life drained from their swords and armor, not before.

Yeah. It is mentioned that shattering Adonalsium is seen by the people doing it as their only hope but that might be specific to those people somehow and not necessarily Yolen's only hope. I also think that with magic, it would be easier to spread humanity (and other races) to other planets. Maybe that is what worldhoppers originally did.

Well, I think we don't know that Adonalsium was Yolish. It could have just been a force that always existed in the cosmere (presumably before any other life but it existed) or it could have come from a race of equally powered beings that died out leaving only itself (I don't even remotely think this is likely). While it is therefore also possible that its force was centered on Yolen initially (Is that what you meant or did you mean it was a Yolish person who somehow ascended to godhood?), we just know so little about it that there is still no way to extrapolate what it was. I'm not sure I understand how terraforming new planets would be seen as a bad thing. I not sure I believe that Adonalsium was giving up on humanity by creating new races on new planets because don't think that creating new races (like those on Roshar) is a betrayal to humans. A race of dragons like Frost appear to have been around since before the shattering and it also makes sense to create life the fits the differences of the planet in my mind. There do actually seem to be a lot more planets with human life on them in the cosmere than any other at the moment so I do tend to wonder how much of that is because of the shards and how much is natural. I do think it is possible that Adonalsium was spreading its influence throughout the cosmere over time though. Whether that started at Yolen or not is hard to say but I do think that the new formation of the Roshar continent could have also been just a natural extension of this spreading of power rather than a conscious terraforming. I do wonder how much Adonalsium was a force at that point in history because even if there was technically a person weilding the mega shard of Adonalsium, I'm not sure how much ability to focus that power a person like that would have after a long time. The longer shards are held, the stronger their intent limits their choices until eventually the shard and the person are the same. I wonder if that is only because they are intents that are separated from the whole or if Adonalsium would be similar limited because of all of those intents together. (Sorry I feel like not much of that might make sense but I've been up all night so there is not much I can do about that.)

I do wonder what the current spren would want done with the dead spren blades though. Surely they wouldn't want them to be destroyed somehow? They are their brothers and sisters. But I suppose it is dangerous to leave powerful weapons laying around if you are not going to use them.

I'm not so sure about that mentally part. I suppose it may be true of a full Radiant but becoming a Radiant apparently requires you to be broken in some way. Taking all of the oaths may somewhat heal that but (just judging from Kaladin and Shallan,) I don't think most are ever going to really get over the things that broke them.

I kind of find it very easy believe that in a terrible situation a normal person could be convinced to do something just as crazy and terrible. Groups of people are even worse. I'm also not sure that I want it to be just some deception that influenced their actions. I think I would much prefer it to be some horrible truth which is just as true in the present as it was in the past and that the current group of Radiants must overcome. That would also explain to me why Taravangian believes he can bring them down with this great secret once again.

I also feel like splintering the shards would not be a good solution if you felt like the shattering of Adonalsium was a bad idea. I believe you would be more likely to try to combine them in that case.

I don't really think that anything in the Church of the Survivor was really about Kelsier as a god though (Survivorism I am not so sure). Kelsier wasn't their god so much as he was a leader and an inspiration. Maybe prophet is the right word like Oversleep says. Also I think that if Demoux met Kelsier in the Cognitive Realm, he would hold even more in the tenet that Kelsier is always watching them and that he will return in their times of need.