Laughing Fool

The hearts of my enemies, to gain their strength; the brains of my enemies, to gain their knowledge... ...and yeah, the Fruit Roll-Ups. I also feast on irony. The member name "Delightful" lured me here; I find it terribly ironic since I have yet to be delighted.

Yak meat is gross, and those enjoy it are not as culinarily discerning as myself.

My last words? Let them be this: Seek a dietary nutritionist; the flatulence in this Court is unbearable. Also, I look forward to one day working with some of you after my contract queue frees up.

Fixed the downvote.

As far as I know, there are no other members yet. My contract expires at 15 insults.

I'm not so sure I'll be so easily dismissed. After all, every Court needs a Fool. ...although it could be argued that this Court is nothing but fools...

Ah, excellent. Whilst you are knitting, would you be so kind as to loan me two wads of cotton for my nostrils? Also, I can't help but notice your member picture is a depiction of a shabby looking police box. A user of such a device strikes me as an unsophisticated bafoon; no wonder he refers to himself as Dr. Who rather than Dr. Whom. James Bond would school that silly Dr. any day.

Greetings, Newcago Court! I have a few questions about your organization; specifically, why would you follow a leader whose name rhymes with Steelfart? There is a foul odor in this thread, and I think I've just discovered the source. That rhyme is no mere coincidence.

Hm, an interesting idea...but I don't think it matters much since "Awesome Points" are proofed into creation arbitrarily as payment. Anyone who is not an offical agent of another faction may accept contracts as a member of the Mercenaries Guild...so yes, any memebr may earn them. I actually envision members spending time in the Merc Guild earning points while they're between factions. Or you could attempt to take contracts while in another faction, though that would slightly diminish the RP factor. Use your best judgement and just have fun with it. Sorry for the double post.

Mmmkay, sounds good! Reputation changed to Awesome Points.

Ah, if this is really a thing, I'll have to change it from rep to something like AUC's (Arbitrary Units of Currency) or something like "Awesome Points" that can just be collected in the signature.

Where there is war, there are soldiers of fortune. Anyone unaffiliated with an existing clan/guild/faction is welcome to join the Mercenaries Guild. The Rules 1) The Mercenaries Guild is not a political faction, though individual Mercenaries may act politically. 2) Mercenaries accept private contracts solicited via private messages. Mercenaries will have only one active contract at a time. Contracts must be fulfilled exactly. A Mercenary who betrays his contract, takes multiple conflicting contracts, or who fails to faithfully complete a contract before accepting a new one will be exiled from the Guild. 3) Mercenaries work for "Awesome Points.". The amount of "Awesome Points" a Mercenary has acquired should be displayed in his or her signature and will be negotiated by the Mercenary and his or her employer prior to the Mercenary officially taking the contract. 4) Mercenaries will include their currently loyalty in their signature as well as a time and date that contract expires. 5) Mercenaries will not accept contracts to feign contracts with another faction. To remain apolitical, a Mercenaries current contracted loyalty will never be a secret. 6) Mercenaries will NOT accept contracts asking them to downvote another members posts, nor will they be contracted to upvote another members posts. Example Let's say I am currently unemployed. My signature would reflect this. Let's then say, for example, that a Wafflesworn would like to solicit my services. He or she would send me a private message with their request; say, "I want you to openly and adamantly support the Wafflesworn for five days time." I would reply, "I will accept this contract for a price of five "Awesome Points."" If the terms were acceptable to both parties, I would accept the contract and update my signature to, "Contracted by the Wafflesworn until 06:13 pm EST 06/17/2014. The possibilities are endless, so let's have some fun! I hope to see some of you join the Mercenaries Guild. If you do, please post in this topic so that people will know to message you with contracts. EDIT Mercenary's now work for "Awesome Points" and NOT reputation points. Please respect this rule above all others. One "Awesome Point" should be considered equal in value to one reputation point, but again, DO NOT use the reputation system as currency; use it as a reference for the value of "Awesome Points."

It's nothing to be ashamed of; just gotta laugh it off.

You know, I think I've overrepresented the things I didn't like about KKC, but only because I've spent years singing its praises. A few observations that particularly interest me are: There seems to be two sides to every magic system. For example, there is Sympathy and Sygaldry. Namers and 'Shapers' are often mentioned together. I suspect that Naming is the art of manipulating something through its True Name and that Shaping is the act of creating something by shaping a new True Name. Bast uses both glammorie and grimmorie (sp?), which I don't understand but seem to be creating illusions and affecting actual changes, respectively. Haliax, while chastising him, asks Cinder who protects him from various organizations. One of these groups are "the singers." This could have two implications. First, the singers are just story tellers who preserve legends through their oral traditions; stories that the Chandrian want suppressed. The other possibility is that the act of singing a True Name increases your power over it. Note that Kvothe doesn't speak Felurian's True Name, he sings it. Ever notice the similarities between the Edema Ruh and the Adem? I believe they share a common ancestry. They both have origins as wandering outcasts from society. It makes sense that, when the Adem settled down, some of them continued to wander. These would become the Edema Ruh. Even their names sound similar. Imagine the Edema Ruh as the Adem Ruh; Edema Ruh could mean something like, "Wandering Adem." Both cultures have an extreme respect for music, if expressed differently. Also, in both cultures the left hand is used to express emotions. The Adem with literal sign language, the Edema Ruh through their music. (Right handed musicians use their left hands to form chords while thw right hand strum. "This hand is clever (left), this hand is strong (right)." is a common Adem proverb.) What is the Chandrian's plan? To release Iax from beyond the Doors of Stone, as he is likely powerful enough to break the curse on Haliax. I'm sure of it. Edit: Also, Kvothe swears by his name, his power, and his good left hand that he won't try and find out who Denna's patron is. Now he is Kote, can't do magic or fight, and doesn't do magic anymore. These are things that required his name, power, and left hand to do. I guess he broke his promise.

Dalinar wins, hands down. Combat would begin, both opponents would recognize that the other had access to unknown magics, so they would feel each other out. Kelsier would drop a coin and push himself into the air and then... ..."I claim the skies!" would be the last thing Kelsier ever heard as an angry Kaladin, valuing his obligation to protect Dalinar over his obligation to respect the rules of the cage match, tore through him like a Highstorm.

@ Shardmancer I prefer people to disagree with me; that way, I'm exposed to ways of thinking that I would have otherwise missed out on. I've been thinking about it lately, and I must concede that, as goofy as it is, all that sex in Fae was instrumental in Kvothe's understanding of Felurian, which he needed to have to call her True Name. I stand firm in my disagreement with women being better fighters. The fluidity of movement that women have that you mentioned is not combat oriented. A woman's grace and litheness advertises a healthy body and genes and serves to make her sexually desirable. Rothfuss does do an excellent job of making it sound plausible, but everything we know about evolutionary psychology and biology contradicts that idea. This is why, in competitive sports like boxing or MMA, there are seperate male and female leagues. This distinction is older than civilization. It's not some outdated discriminatory prejudice, either. It's a simple fact of life, and no amount of rationalizations by Rothfuss, who is talented enough to almost make me believe Sympathy could actually work, can make this plausible. ...not unless there is some sort of Word of Rothfuss that the humans of Ademre are fundamentally different, biologically, than the humans of Earth. As far as his other books are concerned, I know that he said Doors of Stone is the end of Kvothe's story, but not the end of the Four Corners. I wonder if he will be mentioned in other books of the same universe? It would be interesting if Doors of Stone brought us up to date with Kvothe's story, but we learned of his future actions through the viewpoint of other characters in other books. Although, honestly, after Doors of Stone is released I'm going to read it and then forget all about Rothfuss for a decade or two. His pace of writing is just not good for my sanity. Sanderson has spoiled me rotten!

I have a pretty gnarly Eldrazi deck that I barely play because...it's just so boring. I always win. Essentially I use the Urza lands, combined with Expedition Map, to get Urza Mine, Urza Tower, and Urza Power Plant by turn three more often than not. I definitely have it by turn four. Together, those three lands tap for (7) colorless. Usually by turn four I have all three Urza Lands and an Eldrazi Temple, which lets me play (9)CMC creatures, like Hand of Emrakul. Play All is Dust to clear the board except for colorless and I pretty much win. If you can somehow hang on til round 7, you're reward with a rare appearance of Emrakul, the Aeons Torn. And then you lose.

When I DM, I only allow core classes. This allows me much more flexibility with introducing custom weapons like Shardblades because I know and understand the core classes abilities and limitations. Some of those expanded classes can do some truly outrageous things even without overpowered magical gear. The first time I ran a campaign with no limits where everyone rolled in at fifth level, I just couldn't challenege the party. I play with guys who have more fun with the optimization of classes than the actual role-playing, so needless to say, it was a disaster. If I had let them use Shardblades as well, I wouldn't have been able to control them at all. Not even if I lied about roles. A fun suggestion for any DM who is concerned about being able to balance the party while keeping things interesting, especially if your players are min maxers like mine, is to occasionally host an entirely hypothetical campaign seperate from your main one. For example, my group meets Thursday nights, and every third Thursday is just a couple rounds of hypothetical combat. Last Thursday I had the players compete in gladiator games against each other. They would roll to randomly decide a class, then they had one hour to roll a tenth level character. We did various matchups. 1v1, 2v2, FFA, etc. There were only a few limitations, like no using your starting gold to create a golem or something to bring to the arena. At the end, each player must nominate a player other than himself for MVP, and that player would recieve a reward in the main campaign. Usually in the form of a small amount of gold, a little experience (leveling up one session before your friends is fun!), or a novelty item. My fighter, Khandrak, loves his magically weighted dice that requires a DC 25 check to determine the dice are cheating. Petyr Baelish, our rogue (I know...), has used his diminutive iron golem quite cleverly (an iron golem that stands about an inch tall.) The point is, allowing custom items isn't the hard part. Controlling your party's almost pathological need to abuse the item to break the game is the hard part, and giving them an outlet outside the main campaign is a good strategy to help.

I am also an atheist, but that doesn't stop me from thoroughly enjoying the mythology. Judeo-Christian symbolism actually gets much, much deeper than even the average Jews/Muslims/Christians are exposed to. If Brandon adds a sufficient level of depth to the mythology, and explains it with plausible physical laws, then I'll find it intoxicatingly entertaining. There are so many twists he can put on the mythology, too. It's limitless, really. For example, one version of the Judeo-Christian story of the fall of Lucifer casts Lucifer in a tragic light. In this version, Lucifer was God's most loving and dedicated servant and never once coveted God's authority. Instead, God created Adam, the first man, and was pleased with how Adam turned out and demanded that all of Heaven bow to his creation (to acknowledge how great God is). All the angels did except Lucifer who claimed that he loved God too much to pay homage to anything in all of Creation except God himself. Lucifer just couldn't make himself worship anything other than his beloved God. So God was like, "Fine. Gtfo." I don't believe any of it, but I do think twists on even the oldest of stories has the capacity to be entertaining...and Brandon has something of a reputation for putting twists on worn out themes.

So I guess Rothfuss is going to release at least one (The Slow Regard of Silent Things), possibly two books before he finishes Kingkiller Chronicle. I think he might be worried that the ending to Kingkiller Chronicle will be an anticlimactic let down and wants to squeeze in some other books before his fanbase stops reading his stuff after that happens. Also, does anyone else feel like nearly a third of Wise Man's Fear was completely superfluous? Especially the whole bandits in the Eld bit. It read like he recounted an old Dungeons and Dragons quest he played in his youth. I can practically hear Kvothe saying, "I'm gonna take a 20 searching for tracks through the forest." He spends several chapters learning sex moves...and gets a short conversation with the Cthaeh. Just about all the sex and romance in the books made cringe. It shattered my suspense of disbelief every time. Rothfuss clearly doesn't understand how love and sexual attraction actually happen. Or the Adem women being better fighters than men?! I almost quit reading right then. I will concede that some women will be better than some men, but overall, with equal training, men will be better fighters than women. Male bodies and minds have evolved to fill that exact role. If it was true that women made better fighters than men, then every country ever would have used women as their infantry. I mean, come on! The ironic thing is that Rothfuss writes so beautifully that I'll believe anything he writes...except that he takes so long between books that I have time to snap out of the hypnosis his words put me in. Lastly, I'm afraid he'll take his theme of "how stories evolve" too far and leave too many loose ends open. Emotionally, I want closure. Intellectually, I know that it's infinitely more likely that Kvothe's tale will end without learning more about the Amyr, Chandrian, Far, Cthaeh, etc.

Ha! "Twilight Love Triangle?" At least holding Stormlight doesn't make Kaladin sparkle. And we can safely say that it's almost certain that Kaladin and Shallan won't have a baby girl that Adolin falls in love with. And even if the love triangle becomes a thing, at least it will still be a better love story than Kvothe and Denna from Rothfuss' Kingkiller Chronicle.

@ Moogle Ah, ha! That is a quote I was looking for. Thanks. And honestly, "Purgatory" is the weakest part of my whole post. It just doesn't seem to fit like the "Divine Realm" seems to.

@ArrrGent I agree. It is extremely fascinating, and there really isn't enough canon information to make any solid conclusions. Even worse, canon information is suspect since it is the observations of in-world characters who are capable of being completely mistaken. Also, I just added a whole lot of content, so check out even more metspeculations!

So lately I’ve been fascinated with Realmatic Theory, and here are a few observations and speculations I’ve made. So far, canon Realmatic Theory tells us that the Cosmere is made up of three Realms: Physical, Spiritual, and Cognitive. All entities exist in the three Realms, but are manifest more strongly in one and are shadowed in the others. However, Brandon has noted that Sazed has not yet touched Heaven or Hell nor does he know what the final beyond contains. He has, however, made contact with some people who have been sticking around in something of a middle place. This very strongly implies that there are three realms; and I do not mean the Physical, Cognitive, and Spiritual Realms. Here is how I think of the three greater realms. Brandon’s nomenclature, which is almost certainly not canon, is in parenthesis.The Mortal Realm (Cosmere): This is the Realm we’re most familiar with. It is governed by Canon Realmatic Theory; namely, the Physical, Spiritual, and Cognitive Realm. This is the most relevant Realm as the vast majority of Cosmere stories take place almost exclusively here. Speculations: The interactions between the three Realms has been difficult to explain due to a lack of concrete, canon information. Even some of the canon information is suspect as it is the observations of in-world characters who are capable of being mistaken. So, without any supporting evidence, here are a few of my hypotheses. The Mortal Spiritual Realm allows for Investiture, which transcends the three Mortal Realms, to flow between the Divine Realm and the Mortal Realms. Adonalsium is described as being the, "Power of Creation," but isn't, to my knowledge, referred to as God. This is especially intriguing when you consider that the Cosmere takes place in a dwarf galaxy in a larger Universe. If Adonalsium was God, why would it choose to only be involved in a dwarf galaxy rather then being equally present throughout all of Creation? If Adonalsium is merely a tool of the Divine, then its exclusion from the rest of Creation isn't quite so unusual. Not to mention that the idea of humans literally destroying a God is absurd, even in the fantasy genre; misusing and breaking a portion of God's power, however, is plausible and makes for an interesting and compelling story. Brandon mentions both Heaven and Hell in the above quote. He has noted elsewhere that there was a Cosmic Force that opposed Adonalsium. If Adonalsium is a tool of Heaven, then it stands to reason that Adonalsium's opposite is the tool of Hell. Several real world religions explore the concept of Holy and Evil deities competing with each other via their mortal servants and followers. On Roshar, Tanavast suggests to Dalinar that he should attempt to force Odium into using a champion. Even in the Cosmere there is precedent for deific entities using mortals to settle disputes. This supports my hypotheis that the entities of the Divine Realm use the Mortal Realm, using the Mortal Spiritual Realm as a medium, as a battleground for their disputes. Perhaps the force that opposed Adonalsium influenced humanity enough to have them Shatter Adonalsium. The Divine Realm (Final Beyond): We have next to no exposure to this Realm. Brandon specifically mentions Heaven and Hell and refers to both together, in my interpretation of his quote, as the final beyond. This is the location of the afterlife. Speculations: This is likely where the truly significant, yet behind the scenes, conflicts are taking place. There is a Heaven and a Hell and there isn't a myth, legend, or religion in yhe real world that has a Heaven and Hell that are not in conflict with one another. It is also unusual for Holy and Evil to directly war with each other; they prefer to use mortals like a divine game of chess. Investiture transcends the Mortal Realms. Shards of Adonalsium are large, sentient pieces of Investiture. Shardic actions are determined by Intent. I've already proposed that the Mortal Spiritual Realm is the medium through which Investiture from the Divine Realm manifests. My hypothesis is that Investiture is a spectrum, much like the frequency of sound waves, and that different Intents fall on that spectrum. If you pluck a single string on a guitar and the string adjacent to it is tuned to the same note, the second string will vibrate from the soundwaves of the first while the other strings are unaffected. In this case, one string is in the Mortal Spiritual Realm and the other is in the Divine Realm. When Shards use Investiture in the Mortal Realm according to their Intent their Mortal Spiritual Intent reverberates in sync with Divine Investiture and energy can then flow from the Divine Realm to the Mortal Realm. Note to Self: come back and explain that better. Purgatory (Middle Place): Again, we have nearly no exposure to this Realm. This is where Kelsier waited to take up Preservations power. We know that you need strong ties to the Physical Realm in order to linger here. Speculations: This actually just plain baffles me. -------EDITS-------- Edit One: Improved formatting. Removed speculations from the end of the post. Edit Two: Added Speculations under the Mortal Realm, Divine Realm, and Purgatory.

Thanks, Tempus. You said in a dozen words what I tried to allude to with hundreds. I'd by lying if I said I hadn't hoped this thread would catch your eye. Investiture must transcend/saturate all three Realms. Spren are cognitive entities that have been Invested but have the unique property of bonding with humans to have a physical manifestation. It makes sense that their Cognitive Investiture carries over to the physical realm and behaves very similarly to Physically Invested objects (arguably what we're most familiar with). I would assume that Physical objects in the Cognitive Realm, Nightblood, for example, would have a much greater presence than non-Invested entities. Spiritual Investiture is what's throwing me off at the moment. Could that be what humans are? Scadrians have a little bit of Preservation and Ruin in them, but I wouldn't say they were Physically Invested - not the way a Hemalurgic Spike is, at least. And that's assuming there even is a distinction between Physically/Cognitively/Spirituality invested entities.