vineyarddawg

Regalia. The middle code should be Newton, by process of elimination.

I took the first code. Thanks!

Great points, Shlee! I'm going through a re-read of WoK and then WoR right now, but sort of on the side as I read a couple of other books, so it's going slowly. But on my first read-through I obviously didn't have all these things in mind, so I was hoping to find examples like the ones you cited that I missed in the first go-round. I'd think the Unmade would be more like Marsh in this example if Marsh had been an inquisitor for centuries (as the Unmade seem to be), because they're basically directly "spiked" by Odium. (Or, maybe they're more like kandra. It's not really a perfect analogy either way, I guess.) They initially could probably have rebelled subtly, as Marsh did, but by now they've surely lost all of their own independent will. Also, Odium is far more powerful than Ruin was, because Odium has no power with which he's "in check" like Ruin was with Preservation. I don't know that there's a good analogy from the Scadrial system to what stormform is, since the parshendi are bonded with a Odium-corrupted spren. I think it's clear Eshonai has her own personality still inside and can influence what she does to some extent, but the Odium-enhanced power of the corrupted spren is just too much for her to handle, especially without any training or even forewarning as to what to expect. It'll be interesting to see if Brandon gives is any more insight into this situation in SA3.

Thanks for the WoB's, Panda! So I guess Brandon has already more or less explained this, but I'm pleased to see that I came pretty close on my own. So the spren are not exactly Odiumspren, but they basically have a kind of "cognitive spike" in them that Odium can use to take control of them. And since the parshendi are bonding with the spren when they change forms, they're basically bonding with Odium. (/shiver) Oh, and this is my theory post, so I'm allowed to hijack it and swerve off in another direction. Based on what I've seen, I think Adonalsium created the humans on Roshar. Either that, or the Rosharian humans are scions of the original humans on Yolen (of which Adonalsium's holder was also a member, according to this theory).

Ok, I've already had 1 crackpot theory shot down, so I think it's time for crackpot theory #2. (I have a hard time believing no one else has come up with this theory, but I did a forum search and haven't been able to find a post about it, so I'm writing it now.) To me, one of the most fascinating aspects of WoR was being introduced to Eshonai and actually being able to learn more about the Parshendi and their society. I think there's still a lot more about them we don't know, but one thing that's clear is that somehow, in the ancient past, they lost most of their knowledge on how to create most of the different forms that used to exist in their society. We also know that the newly-discovered storm form basically changed Eshonai into a completely different personality, which wasn't really the case with the other, "milder" forms that the modern-day Parshendi had been using to that point. So, my theory is this: the spren that the Parshendi have to capture to change into storm form is Odiumspren, and once they change into that form, it's analogous to being spiked by Ruin on Scadrial. Odium can overwhelm their personality and pretty much make them do whatever he likes. Also, since Odium is not splintered like Honor, there aren't just millions of little Odiumspren floating around in the cognitive realm. Instead, Odium "releases" (or otherwise makes the capture of an Odiumspren available) in a highstorm when he knows a Parshendi is waiting to receive it. In this manner, he doesn't lose control of his own essence, but he is also able to directly control the Parshendi, much like I'm presuming he did in the Desolations of old. I don't know that I've quite thought through all of the ramifications of this, but the point that the Parshendi are being "spiked" by Odium seemed pretty clear to me when you see how radically they change when they enter storm form. It makes me wonder if there are other beings that Odium can awaken out of a "dullform" state. Like, for example, chasmfiends... EDIT: So, the WoB's that inexorablePanda quoted below make it clear that the spren are not odiumspren, but are instead spren that have been "spiked" by Odium. That's close enough for me to think that the effect is generally the same, though, with the exception that Odium can't directly tell the stormform parshendi what to do. Maybe they are just imbued with Odium's intent or something.

Ninja-edited... nope.

Worked for me. EDIT: Whoops... Nevermind! It went to a web page saying, "You found a card," but wouldn't let me download the goodies associated with the code. It said it had already been downloaded.

I apologize if my comment came across as implying that you couldn't both have a vivid imagination and be looking forward to a movie about a Sanderson book... that was not my intent. Rather, it was to encourage Sanderfans to enjoy the pictures we create in our own imaginations without asking the Hollywood filmmakers to tell us what the "real" image should look like (which, I suspect, would almost always fall short of the rich descriptions Brandon gives us in the books). I would go so far as to say that Lord of the Rings is not just an exception, but that it's practically a one-time event in the history of cinema (or certainly a once-in-a-long-time event), so I don't think it's fair to use that as a representative sample of how Hollywood tells epic stories in today's world. After all, Peter Jackson followed up that masterwork with The Hobbit, which is far more representative of the kind of story-killing, special-effects-heavy, money-grab form that most "epic" movies take nowadays. As for the Narnia series, I thought the first movie was so bad in comparison to the book that I never saw any of its sequels, so (speaking solely for myself, of course) I wouldn't want to use that series as a model for how I'd like to see a Sanderson book translated onto the silver screen. I don't hold any malice or judgement towards anyone who looks forward to seeing a movie made out of one of Brandon Sanderson's novels. In fact, I hope Brandon does get a movie (even multiple movies) made at some point, because he deserves to be able to cash in far more than some of the hacks out there that rake in the dough on the back of pure drivel. My point was that it's almost inevitable that the movie will not be as good as the book, so I don't see the point in getting overly excited about it.

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO (But I would never downvote Peter because that scares me. I bet his Epic power is pre-emptively banning people who decide to downvote him.)

That theory is literally worse than Hitler. (Sorry, couldn't resist. )

I voted for Denth, because to have been around as exceedingly long as he has and still intentionally choose to surround yourself with close associates like Tonk Fah takes a truly malevolent mindset.

What, you don't want to see a love triangle between Tia, Prof, and Steelheart?

I almost always save the Ars Arcanum until the end of the book, to help me understand things I might have missed in my first reading of the book.

Welcome! EDIT: Taking out something I said that would eventually lead to a spoiler for a book he hasn't read yet...

Peter already pointed this out, mostly, but for the sake of thoroughness, I'll say what I was thinking, too. You can't really have data points in the north, because almost all of the action in Babylar takes place in the middle and southern part of the island (and in the bunker, which is way out to the east on Long Island). When David goes out to Central Park and all the way up to Harlem (the north end of the park) I got the distinct impression that this was possibly the northernmost data point the Reckoners had gotten so far. I might be mistaken in my impression, but that's the conclusion I drew from David's implication that he thought it would be a useful data point. To be honest, I'm not sure that there's a super-easy solution, other than just reducing Regalia's suspected range to something like 3 or 4 km.

Please tell me I'm not the only one who does a little head-flip thing and sings, "That's the pooowwwer of LOVE!" Back-to-the-Future style every time they read that phrase.

Yeah, Mistborn's option sat around forever without ever being made, if memory serves. Studios option books all the time and never make them. Until and unless Sanderson says something to the effect of, "It's happening!" I wouldn't get too hot and bothered about it.

Man, I bet I would hate an Odium milkshake.

Yeah, this is actually the biggest hole in the Reckoners' logic to me. If you look at the map of Manhattan and the surrounding area as it exists today, it should be fairly obvious that the circle of Regalia's powers could include a location in New Jersey or in any of NYC's boroughs. IMO, the easiest "fix" for this would be to say that since Regalia can keep water levels at different heights over a large area, then she just submerged enough of the New Jersey and New York coastlines to make it so there was a 5-mile radius around Babylar.

Well, poop. All these WoB's are starting to make me go cross-eyed.

I think there's no such thing as harmonium because ruin and preservation still exist as two separate shards in Sazed's control. It's Sazed who perceives them as "Harmony." Also, since we know Preservation's investiture is partially consumed by the humans on the planet (just by the fact that they exist), it means that Ruin still has the upper hand unless Sazed does something to "burn off" the extra Ruin. In fact, there's a WoB on this where Sanderson teases that point a little bit: Some people have theorized that the Pits of Eltania, where it's said that the Koloss have discovered some "previously unknown metals" could be a place where Sazed has regrown a stock of Atium.

Regalia gave that deceased epic's name as Waterlog, if memory serves. (The one used to create the sypril.)

Well, they call themselves "The Coven," right? So maybe they'd go with Summerland.

Yeah, eventually one of them would get bored/too frustrated and just fly away. And we know we only saw a small fraction of Prof's power in the Steelheart fight because his corruption didn't get nearly as bad as it did when he handled the Oblito-bomb. I don't think he'd be able to kill Steelheart even at full power, though, because Steelheart's invulnerability would probably withstand Prof's forcefields. (Unless Prof didn't fear Steelheart at all, though, in which case Steelheart go bye-bye.)

Ahhhhhh... I got it, Oudeis. (See that light bulb that just went on over my head? ) I agree, I think we're on the same page. Your post helped me overcome my misunderstanding of the differences in our respective terminologies.