dantlee

Available here: https://www.brandonsanderson.com/state-of-the-sanderson-2019/

The thing that really jumped out at me, other than Sanderson's clarification on future Cosmere works and us getting an actual fall 2020 release date for SA4, is Brandon saying that "I consider Wax and Wayne’s final book to be imperative to finish before I start Stormlight Five." 

Now, the very anodyne and straightforward interpretation of this is that it's imperative to finish The Lost Metal because he plans on writing Mistborn Era 3 in between Stormlight 5 and Stormlight 6.

BUT, what if the real reason is because there is some big reveal in TLM that would make it really helpful to read before Stormlight 5, much in the same way Warbreaker helped us understand one of the mysteries in OB? I doubt it would be a major plot point/character, since IIRC the Wax and Wayne novels take place (cosmere timeline wise) AFTER Stormlight 5 in the 10-15 year gap  before Stormlight 6. But I could definitely see us getting a lot more information on how Connection/Identity/Fortune work in TLM, which could help us understand, for example, the mysterious relationship between the Sibling and Urithiru or something else that may not be revealed until SA5. 

15 hours ago, Karger said:

Shardblades can cut through invested people fairly easily.  Kaladin did not feel any resistance while killing Szeth.  An awakened cloak might be able to catch a shardblade but I personally doubt it will be able to block one.

Same as breaking a metalmind in Mistborn.  No real problems getting breath out of it I should think.

I actually think an awakened cloak could be able to block a shardblade at least two times, especially since shardblades are weird when it comes to inanimate objects. IIRC Adolin explained that you have to cut inanimate objects twice with a shardblade to actually slice through them (once to cut through the object's soul, then to cut through the actual material) - so I'm assuming it would be at least three times for an awakened cloak (an additional time for the breaths), and that's without any of the interesting investiture vs investiture reactions we normally have. 

In addition to what people mentioned above about her literally taking away Odium's champion at a decisive moment, the fact that the Stormfather explicitly says in OB that Odium fears exposing himself to a strike from Cultivation makes it pretty clear that she's taking a very active role in the conflict, not just hiding and surviving. 

On 4/6/2018 at 6:24 AM, kevinivek2 said:

Does anyone know who this could be?

 

 

My first thought was the Returned. As long as they have their weekly supply of breath, they don't age and can theoretically live forever (like Vasher), but we've seen them get killed from a simple knife to the throat (RIP blushweaver). They don't seem to be able to heal easily from conventional wounds, either. 

Quote

 

Viridian

Why did Hoid give the memory coin to Wax? What was his intention?

Brandon Sanderson

He thought that certain information was being kept, and certain lies were being perpetuated. And Hoid was a fan of that information being out.

Viridian

I'm still suspicious.

Brandon Sanderson

Oh, you should be suspicious of Hoid's motive. He and Kelsier do not get along. Let's just say... Kelsier did not want that information to get out.

Arcanum Unbounded release party (Nov. 22, 2016)

 

Well, we know that the main reason Hoid gave Wax the coppermind at the end of BoM is because Kelsier doesn't want the fact that he's alive and "up to something" getting around. 

My current theory, given that Brandon has repeatedly said that what Kelsier's been up to won't really be revealed until Era 3 (and that Kelsier will play an important role in Era 3), is that after Kelsier figured out how to staple himself back into the physical realm and become a fullborn, he wanted to get off-world. Everything we see in Secret History reinforces that Kelsier has a compulsive need to discover the "next secret" and wants to become more Cosmere aware, and presumably get revenge on Hoid too.  

Given his inability to worldhop through the Cognitive realm, he probably realized at some point that technological advances are his best bet. We see in Era 2 that Sazed doesn't want Northern Scadrians to get complacent, and he's worried that he's held back their technological progress by giving them too easy a life in the Basin, so I think Kelsier is doing what he can to accelerate that timeline - which is why he helped out the southern Scadrians.

The Southern Scadrians, unlike those in the basin, have lived brutally difficult lives since Sazed accidentally killed off most of them in the Catacendre, and been forced to adapt and evolve for over 300 years. Kelsier probably came to the same logical conclusion as Sazed (that struggle leads to evolution), and/or remembers enough from when he saw into the future through Preservation, and when he ascended, that he knew the Southern Scadrians were the most likely to create these technological advances that would allow him to get off-world through the physical realm. 

On 4/17/2019 at 6:35 PM, Khyrindor said:

That stupid silver chain from Oathbringer... What is??

 

We don't know (ignore the guy that said it's aluminum, we have zero confirmation from Brandon and he's RAFO'd the living crap out of any silver necklace questions). But my favorite theory is that it's made of dragonsteel. 

What are some of your favorite theories you came up with in WoK and/or WoR that were later proven incorrect (or are very unlikely to occur after OB)? I read on my phone so it's often funny to see my old annotations/highlights/theories on re-reads. 

I formed this theory in WoR that Pattern would be the key to reading and properly understanding the Diagram. Pretty unlikely now that Mr. T has switched sides and he's re-interpreted the Diagram after his day of brilliance, but I thought it was a pretty good one at the time. 

2 minutes ago, supersmith said:

But aren’t dovotion and dominion paired? I guess not all shards need to be paired to a different shard, but those two seem like a pair.

My understanding is that they traveled to Sel together because of pre-shattering relationship, not because they were paired in the same way ruin and preservation were.

There are plenty of signs in Era 2 of the increasing commercialization and wider availability of allomancy to regular people. Now that we have nicrosil medallions that allow anyone to access feruchemy, I'm sure that there will be plenty of wide-scale uses of both allomantic and feruchemical powers. Aviation will definitely be commonplace by Era 3, and I could definitely see power generation factories like you mentioned. But I think the most interesting uses are related to emotional allomancy and the temporal metals. We've already seen soothing parlors in era 2, and I think Bendalloy would have really profound effects on Scadrian scholarship (i.e. once bendalloy becomes easier to make and more widely available, you could read/study exponentially more in the same amount of time, which would lead to even faster technological advances on Scadrial).

One fun (but less useful) thing to see would be how chromium feruchemy works when someone else is using Fortune at the same time as you; do they cancel out? Like if you're playing a high-stakes poker game with someone else who's using a chromium medallion, would you both get insanely good hands? 

20 hours ago, SwordNimiForPresident said:

I have two conflicting theories about how Era 2 will play out and would love to hear what others think.

Theory 1: Marsh will be attacked & killed. Before he dies he will give Wax his Allomantic Atium spike & his secret stash. Wax will go Grammaton Cleric on the enemy & wipe out an army single handedly.

Theory 2: Ranette will get spiked by the Set early in the book. They will track down the killer & recover the spike. It will become necessary for Wax to use the spike on himself to save the day. Bonus points if Wax is having an internal struggle about the moral implications & Wayne spikes him to settle it. Double bonus points if he says "she would have wanted you to have it".

 

Theory 1 sounds cool & matches the expected title of the book. I like theory 2 more because it would be more painful to lose Ranette (even though Marsh is one of my favorites) & it would make Wax feel more "complete" in terms of his powers. He would have both halves of the external physical metals. He would also be an Iron compounder which frankly would make him a god when combined with his pushes. He would also gain half steelsight like Kelsier if he gets it in the eye.

Well we know Marsh is going to be important in the next trilogy (before the space opera) so theory 1 is out the window. As for theory 2, we're not sure how the Set's hemalurgic spikes work, but I wouldn't be a huge fan of this, especially if it's primarily just a Wax power-up. We've seen plenty of godlike allomancy and use of massive amounts of investiture already (especially on Scadrial), and I think one of the things that makes Wax so interesting is that the 1st Mistborn trilogy primed us to think that mistings were relatively weak, but he shows how mastery of one skill can be incredibly useful, especially when combined with feruchemy. 

On 12/17/2018 at 5:02 PM, Toaster Retribution said:

Agreed. This is in fact my main criticism of Brandons writing. Sometimes he does really funny characters really well (Lightsong, Breeze, Axies and Cody for example) and sometimes he makes characters whose comedy is so unrealistic it becomes bad (Lift, Sebarial, Lopen at times). Granted, the first one is way more common than the second, and the annoying characters are alright most of the time, but there are occasional scenes (Sebarial chilling in battle, Lift randomly showing up in Dalinars vision to talk about butts, the scene where Lopen becomes a Radiant) which bother me. 

Wow, not liking Lift is one of the hottest (and IMO worst) takes I've ever read on the shard. I think it fundamentally misunderstands her character, especially after Edgedancer - she is intentionally inane in really serious and dangerous situations because that's how she deals with trauma and fear, and also because she doesn't want to admit that she cares deeply about helping people. Her background - at least what little we know of it - is actually very similar to Vin's, she just has a very different way of coping.

Also, she's 13 - I was certainly making crude jokes at incredibly inappropriate times at that age, as I think most people were. 

I'm really hoping (though I'll doubt we'll get it in Book 4) we'll get to see some breath-powered surgebinding from Hoid soon, since he's the only character that has both a spren bond and breaths.

On 12/12/2018 at 6:54 PM, Calderis said:

I don't think the Set's Immortals are literally Kandra. 

I agree they're definitely not the Kandra that Rashek created, since Sazed knows who/where all of them are. But given that they can also shapeshift, seem to be immune to/totally fine taking explosions to the face, it seems pretty clear that Autonomy has co-opted hemalurgy with her/their own investiture (since she can also make her own version of hemalurgic spikes). 

On 12/12/2018 at 6:00 PM, BooksBeforeDeath said:

What if this Kandra isn't one of Sazed's, but is one of those evil ones we see at the ends of BOM? This would mean that there's a semi evil world hopping orginazation! I wonder where we've seen that before? *cough* Ghostbloods *cough*.

But seriously, if it is an evil one, and it's from the Ghostbloods, that would mean so much for the Cosmere.

I actually like this theory, since we know Autonomy has interacted with the ghostbloods before and at this point it's extremely likely that Trell = an avatar of Autonomy.

Quote

Questioner [PENDING REVIEW]

Are the Ghostbloods affiliated with Autonomy?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

"Affiliated with" is very wiggle-room-ish. I'll go ahead and give you a RAFO on that one, even though I can totally wiggle on this one. I'm just gonna say "RAFO"; I'm gonna do the ultimate wiggle. There have been dealings.

Billy Todd [PENDING REVIEW]

Interactions?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

Yes, there's been interactions.

source

I think Drehy has already done a lot of interesting stuff (does saving Adolin and Gavinor's lives not count to you?), although admittedly most of it has been as a support character to Kaladin and Adolin. I think he and Skar are well on their way to becoming full windrunners, and although I doubt he'll ever be a main character, we could definitely see some PoV chapters in the next two books.  

Winds Alight, what post are you referring to? Not doubting you at all, I'm just genuinely curious. And I'm glad you Brandon a second chance!  

I'm also not surprised his views would have changed significantly over the past decade - just think about how far America (and most countries) has come re: LGBT rights since 2007.  President Obama literally had to be browbeaten into pushing more openly for LGBT rights by Biden, and every democratic candidate in 2008 thought openly embracing gay marriage was political suicide. None of this is an excuse for how backwards we used to be, but I think Brandon deserves the same leeway we give most public figures. 

1 hour ago, Toaster Retribution said:

I kinda disagree. I feel that we get enough info on the Squires and Bridge 4 as it is. But if you dont want to cut those, you can trim the Kholinar parts, or Moashs story. 

And an Odium POV would be cool. 

I agree that we definitely should've gotten to see why Amaram came to the decisions he did. The turn to Odium just seemed super rushed and didn't make sense given everything we've seen of his character up to the battle at Thaylen. 

As for an Odium POV, I would love one too, but we've literally never gotten a shard POV before so I wouldn't hold your breath - if we do ever get one, it probably won't be until the end of Stormlight. I'm not counting Sazed since we only gotten his POVs pre-ascension.  Kelsier is the only one that somewhat qualifies, but even then he only held Preservation for a very brief amount of time and his mind was still expanding when he gave it up to Vin. 

On 11/13/2018 at 0:50 PM, Mailnaise said:

Speaking of Taln...

I went to the Skyward book signing in Seattle this last Saturday, and Brandon talked about the first version of WoK that he wrote in 2002. (It was so different than what we all know! No spren, no Knights Radiants, and no Bridge Four. Basically, the story starts with Taln stumbling into a town with a shardblade, and saying a disasters coming, and the story goes through trying to figure out whether he's actually a herald, and whether he's telling the truth or not. According to Brandon, it failed, but he plans to maybe publish it after he's finished the Stormlight series as another thing for fans to enjoy. Some of it is still cannon apparently.) Anyways, he talked a lot about Taln, and apparently Taln is the flasback character of Book 9. Taln will obviously become more important, and a whole book exploring the background of Odium's champion would make a lot of sense.

My new vote is that Odium's champion will be Taln, but we'll see. 

I do like the idea of one of the heralds becoming Odium's champion, although we don't know nearly enough about how the oathpact works to figure out if that's even possible. I don't think it will be Nale, but I could definitely see it being Ishar considering what we found out about him in Edgedancer and OB (i.e. he's the one who told Nale killing off surgebinders would prevent a desolation, which was clearly false and aligns with Odium's goals, and the stormfather said that he seeks "death, his own and perhaps that of every man.") 

When I was reading the OB preview chapters, I definitely thought it would be Adolin or Renarin given Dalinar’s visions of Odium’s Champion and his feeling that there was something familiar about him. Now, I’m not so sure. 

Out there theory with very little evidence: what if Ishar becomes Odium’s champion? There would be a poetic and tragic symmetry to a herald and former Bondsmith becoming the champion of the enemy. 

5 hours ago, Toaster Retribution said:

Welcome to the forum! Cool username!

As for your theory, I think that Kaladin, Shallan, Dalinar or Szeth are the candidates for Odiums Champion, because of the text at the back of WoK, which says that one of them will destroy the world. I think it would be a huge change for Kaladin to sideswitch though. Currently, I think Shallan is the more likely one. I do think that Kaladin is more likely than Szeth or Dalinar though. 

Not be that guy, but the back cover actually says that "One of them may redeem us. One of them will destroy us." Given that the back covers are confirmed to be written by the Aimians, "one of them will destroy us" is quite different from "one of them will destroy the world." It's very easy to see a scenario in which none of those 4 are chosen as Odium's champion but still end up destroying what is left of Aimia/the Aimian people. 

As for who actually will be chosen, I think the frontrunner right now is Moash, who is being set up as Kaladin's "big bad" for at least the first 5 stormlight books. On the other hand, I would be surprised if Brandon made it that obvious.

My favorite theory on this topic is that Odium will choose one of the children that we've been introduced to as his champion: either Oroden or Gavinor. 

My speculation is primarily based on this epigraph from WoK:

I hold the suckling child in my hands, a knife at his throat, and know that all who live wish me to let the blade slip. Spill its blood upon the ground, over my hands, and with it gain us further breath to draw.

If Kaladin were chosen as Honor's champion, and Odium chose either baby Gavinor or Oroden as his champion, I think it's very likely that Kaladin would be unable to sacrifice a child for the sake of ending a desolation, or "gaining us further breath to draw."  That could very well be how Stormlight 5 ends, with the forces of Honor losing because of Kaladin's choice. 

When Kaladin decides to save one of the bridgemen from another crew in WoK. That's the closest I've ever come to crying while reading a book/watching a movie (I'm just not much of a crier). 

Quote

"If we care for the wounded of other bridge crews," Drehy said, shaking a blond head, "we'll have to feed them, tend them..." 

"I will find a way," Kaladin said. 

"I---" Rock began.

"Storm you!" Kaladin said, standing and sweeping his hand over the plateau. The bodies of bridgemen lay scattered, ignored. "Look at that! Who cares for them? Not Sadeas. Not their fellow bridgemen. I doubt even the Heralds themselves spare a thought for these. I won't stand there and watch while men die behind me. We have to be better than that! We can't look away like the lighteyes, pretending we don't see. This man is one of us. Just like Dunny was. The lighteyes talk about honor. They spout empty claims about their nobility. Well, I've only known one man in my life who was a true man of honor. He was a surgeon who would help, anyone, even those who hated him. Especially those who hated him. Well we're going to show Gaz, and Sadeas, Hashal, and any other sodden fool who cares to watch, what he taught me. Now go to work and stop complaining!" 

Still gives me chills every time I re-read it. Kal is a very flawed and narrow-minded character at times, but he just cares so damnation much that it's impossible not to root for him. 

Only tangentially related, but this new WoB got me really excited for Era 3:

Quote

 

Questioner [PENDING REVIEW]

Are you going to do a Mistborn: Secret History part 2 to talk about what Kelsier's doing during...

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

Likely, but not 100% promise. It's kinda my time frame. A lot of the stuff that's happening right now is foreshadowing for Era 3 where Kelsier will have a much bigger role. Era 3, the 1980's one. So we'll see when I'm writing those if I need a Secret History to catch us up.

source

 

7 hours ago, Quantus said:

Sure, at that stage in his journey.  But he could very easily have taken the same path Moash did (ie more devoted Vengeance) with only a few small differences in his Choices made.

Totally agree with this. I actually think Moash is a really interesting character, and a perfect counterpart to Kal - he's what Kaladin could easily have become without the guidance of Syl. In fact, had it not been for Syl's quasi-death, Kaladin was basically on the exact same path to kill Elhokar in WoR; and he didn't even have the same personal history that Moash did. 

Now, I don't believe at all that Moash will become a bondsmith, and I don't think he'll have a redemptive journey (I think his destiny is more like Miles Hundredlives). But I think the Moash hatred in general is pretty overblown: one of Brandon's most consistent themes throughout the Cosmere is that depending on time and circumstance, a villain in one story could easily be a hero in another (see: Kelsier). 

I think the new short story “The Traveler” adds some more (circumstantial) evidence that this is indeed what Hoid is trying to do. 

Sorry I’m so late to the party, but during my OB reread on a long flight to Asia, I stumbled upon this little quote from the stormfather (context - it’s after Mr. T and Dalinar’s fireside chat about innocence, guilt, and the duty of kings, during which Dalinar brings up a parable from WoK):

Quote

“He was a good man,” the stormfather said. 

“Nohadon?” Dalinar said.

”yes.” 

Chapter 28, Oathbringer

The way that the stormfather speaks of Nohadon implies direct familiarity, which would make sense if Nohadon were a bondsmith. I’m going to preempt the argument that he could just be speaking from his knowledge of the visions Tanavast left him with - while that could technically be true, I can’t recall another unequivocal compliment from the stormfather about pretty much anyone. He certainly didn’t feel that way about any of the Knights Radiant, and he even sees Tanavast as flawed. 

14 hours ago, IllNsickly said:

I am admittedly terrible at search functions. Google is my Nemesis, always.

That said, I remember seeing a map that Mr. Sanderson wrote ‘Great Magic Unleashed Here’ on someones copy of WoK.

Have we figured out what that was yet? 

I am stuck on either:

1: The Splintering of Honour.

or (My favourite)

2: the Shattering of Adonalsium

Hoid was present at the Shattering and seems to spend an inordinate amount of time on Roshar. 

 

As massive as the Shattered Plains are (and ‘Shattered’ just sounds... well..) How much energy would it take to cause that level of destruction? 

 

Have you read OB? There's a LOT in that book that strongly hints at what happened to the shattered plains.