galendo

My own suspicion is that Brandon's written himself into a corner with this one. I'd really like it not to be the case, but the honest truth is that I can't come up with any reasonable way to completely and satisfactorily explain the Recreance. In my experience, ten friends can't agree unanimously on where to go for dinner; trying to get a hundred times as many people to unanimously agree to abandon their oaths and betray their beloved companions to an eternity of torment seems utterly impossible. Even if you adopt the theory that the spren are going around murdering potential Radiants' families and whatnot (the explanation that I think Brandon is going with), it still doesn't hold water, IMHO. The one theory that I think does kind of work is that the Radiants being on Roshar somehow allows Odium to build up force, which he will then use to break free, splinter Cultivation, and destroy everyone. If you're all doomed just by existing, you might as well break your oaths and give everyone else a chance, slim though it may be. But honestly, I'm having a hard time imagining unanimity even given such terrible options. I suppose you could get there with the idea that there was a schism among the Radiants, that the majority agreed that abandoning their oaths was necessary, that said majority hunted down and killed those Radiants that didn't agree (much like Nalan is doing presently), and that therefore the unanimity we see in Honor's vision is an artificial product of killing everyone who disagreed. But I don't see how the Radiants would successfully hide such a decision from their spren. I suppose the "betrayal" Dalinar senses could be a betrayal-of-oaths, and not a betrayal-of-spren. But why would Tavargian assume that such a secret could be used to break the KR again, if the modern-day variety don't even know that Cultivation exists? The theory almost works, but it doesn't quite hang together.

Wait, wasn't this a description of Preservation's shardpool? The Well of Ascension? My Mistborn knowledge is a bit shaky, since it's been a while since I read it, but I don't think it belongs to Ruin/Ati.

It's possible, I suppose, but why would Cultivation need a successor? She's alive, as far as we know, and Shards don't really die. So unless Cultivation's planning on killing herself or knows that Odium's going to kill (but not shatter) her, I don't really see the point.

I didn't much like the Jasnah/Szeth "deaths" less because I found them cheap (though I did a bit, for both) but because of the lost potential. See, Roshar already had a well-established method of bringing characters back from the dead (the Oathpact), and I was hoping that the rest of the series would play death as final so that sometime way later, probably around the climax of book 7 or 8 but possibly as early as 5, a character (probably Kaladin, since in my hypothetical story Dalinar's already dead by then, and no one else really fits) could make a heroic sacrifice only to find that he's inadvertently bound himself to the Oathpact. This would give all the gravitas of a heroic sacrifice, since no one would have the "on Roshar, death is cheap" mantra running through their heads and it wouldn't be clear right away that the character "survived." It would also give a way to show what Damnation is like for the Heralds through the eyes of one of the viewpoint characters, maybe give some insight into Odium's workings, stuff like that. Then, when the character finally made it back to Roshar, you'd get a bunch of cool homecoming/reunion scenes. Not to mention that, if said character were Kaladin, you'd get to see all the lighteyes' consternation as they realized that a darkeyed bridgeboy was now a Herald of the Almighty. That's mostly why I dislike the oh-no-they-died, oh-no-they-didn't patterns in SA so far: lost opportunity. A part of me still hopes that Brandon will do something like that, because it would be cool, but even if he plays death entirely straight henceforth, I don't think he can ever quite get rid of the precedent that these "deaths" have established. That's why we've got threads like this one, wondering if Sadeas is really dead, when from every sort of narrative and logical sense, he ought to be dead, dead, dead. He is dead, by the way. I'm like 99% sure of it. My prediction is that Brandon does try to play death straight in the Stormlight Archive from here on, or at least for the next few books. The main reason is just good storytelling: if characters can just be resurrected willy-nilly, the impact of character death is lessened, which lessens the stakes, which lessens the tension and worry for the characters' well-being, etc. The story just becomes less in every way. I don't think he can ever completely regain the ground lost to the "death is cheap" precedents so far, but I'm willing to bet that Brandon will work hard at regaining that ground in the future. So Sadeas has to be dead. There's no reason to suppose otherwise, and quite a few reasons to suppose so.

Okay, in the past few weeks I've reread Worm and finished up the Reckoners series, so I can now discuss both while they're relatively fresh in my mind. More on that in a moment. First things first, I want to clarify the difference between the terminology I used in my first post and the terminology that Worm's author uses. Being a web novel, Worm is written as a series of posts. Worm's author uses the word "chapter" to describe each individual post, where I used "chapter" to describe a series of posts bound together in a cohesive whole; the author uses "arc" to describe this same sequence. So when I recommended that people read through chapter 8 to see if it's their cup of tea, be aware that I'm not recommending only reading the first eight posts; I'm recommending reading through what the author has titled "Arc 8: Extermination." Just to be clear. Second, now that I've finished both series recently, I feel I can and should compare them further. Since I requested no post-Steelheart spoilers in my original thread, I'm going to spoiler-tag this discussion, too. For those looking for the quick summary, though, or who haven't finished the Reckoners yet and don't want to be spoiled, Worm went up in my estimation and The Reckoners went down. Without further ado: There are a great many casual similarities between the series. I was struck by just how many there were as I read. For instance, both have a character who can teleport away and leave destruction in his wake. There are some more fundamental similarities as well, though the most obvious two or three are pretty heavy spoiler-only territory. One fundamental difference, though, that I thought about while reading them, is the difference the two books have in their outlook on the human condition. Remember that both are set in dystopian worlds, where things suck for pretty much everybody compared to not all that long ago, when people got powers. The Reckoners is very optimistic, while Worm is more pessimistic. In The Reckoners, people are generally still good, but power makes them evil. In Worm, people are not so good, on the whole, and power just lets them amplify their basic tendencies for good or ill. Personally, I like Worm's approach better, on the whole, because it seemed a bit more realistic to me (I'm a bit of a pessimist myself). Whether you think that people are basically good or not might have some effect on which work you like more. Long story short, though, is that Worm is still worth your time just as much as it was previously, especially if you liked the Reckoners and perhaps even if you didn't. Go try it out. Once again, here's a link to the first part: https://parahumans.wordpress.com/2011/06/11/1-1/. Read through Arc 8. My guess is you probably won't regret it.

I'm glad to hear there's a good answer. I thought it might be that characters' powers/weaknesses were due to their inherent tragic flaw (like, maybe Steelheart was really afraid of being hurt by bad people or something, so he gains super-protection from being hurt by anyone meaning him harm, but not from anyone who doesn't see him as a potential target/enemy...or something. It still doesn't all hang together in my mind, so it's probably something else). I gave up looking for an answer in that regard when it was mentioned that someone had a weakness to people who were exactly 37 years old, which seemed completely arbitrary. I haven't read your spoiler, in case you can't tell, because I'm the kind that likes to be surprised/figure things out myself. Just the reassurance is good enough for me, at least for now. I did like how the darkness-maker was weak to UV light, for instance. I just wish all the weaknesses tied in like that. Yeah. Cool powers used cleverly are the main thing I like about Worm, along with some of the characters that I thought were really well-written. I did mean to add that Worm does have a good overall plot, but I guess that got overshadowed when I focused too much on its epic-ness. Thanks for pointing that out. I wouldn't have guessed Worm to be quite so long. I put it at 8-10 Reckoners books, and that's sounding more like 10-15. But yeah, I'm not too worried about Sanderson fans falling off partway through, and it does have reasonable stopping points. Chapter eight, for instance, is one such spot. It's where I'd end the first book if I were publishing it. There are still a large number of unresolved plot lines at that point, but that's the case throughout the novel, and I don't think that's entirely a bad thing. Out of curiosity, can I ask where you stopped reading? I've got my theories about parts that are likely to bore readers, but I don't know that everyone feels the same. I know I thought chapter 17 was particularly out-of-place. That's the chapter that But I wouldn't mind hearing where you dropped off the train. If it was near the end, it'd be worth picking up again, probably, because the last arc is the most epic, IMHO. Though the second-to-last arc is probably the most boring arc overall, so there's that. It's worth going for if you're close, though.

Okay, I’m not sure how apropos this is, but I’m going to recommend that anyone who liked the Reckoners should at least check out an online web novel called Worm, by someone going by the handle Wildbow. It’s available for free online. I wouldn't necessarily recommend it instead of The Reckoners, but if you've already read the Reckoners' series and are looking for something in the same vein, it's a good place to start. Given the similarities of the two series, I doubt I’m the first person to make the connection between them. Heck, for all I know, the forum is littered with such comparisons and everyone’s sick of them. You’ll have to forgive me for not checking, since as of this writing I’ve only read Steelheart. I hope to get to the others in the next month or so, but for now I’m avoiding any possible spoilers. I’ll check this thread and reply to it, but for my sake please keep mum about anything post-Steelheart. I’m going to somewhat assume that ‘most everyone reading this thread has read and enjoyed at least Steelheart, because otherwise, what are you doing in an online forum on the topic? I will try to keep spoilers for both series to a minimum, however. In an effort to help you decide whether Worm might be worth your time, I’m going to give a brief rundown on which series does a particular topic better, so you can decide whether you’re interested in reading or not. For instance, if you’re really attracted to the action in the Reckoners, you might not want to read Worm, because IMHO the action scenes that Wildbow writes don’t really hold a candle to Sanderson’s; but on the other hand if you like to see clever applications of cool powers, that’s a place where Worm is superior to the Reckoners. Without further ado: Setting Advantage: Neither Both works are set in a dystopian future/alternate universe. Both are set in what tvtropes.org would call a Crapsack World – the sort of world that sucks even for the people with powers, and sucks even worse for the people without powers. Not much of a contrast here. The worlds are pretty darn similar: just our world, wrecked by people with superpowers. Memorable Characters Advantage: Worm Maybe it’s because Worm is a really long book and Steelheart isn’t, but about a month after finishing Steelheart, I really only remember four characters: the main guy, the main girl, the eponymous Steelheart, and the inventor/mentor. I remember there were other characters, but I couldn’t tell you much about them. On the other hand, in Worm, two or three years after reading it, I could pretty much tell you all the powers of the main characters, their personalities, their major contributions, etc. Tightness of Writing Advantage: Reckoners This is the main advantage that The Reckoners has over Worm. The Reckoners is very tightly written, with pretty much every scene contributing to the work as a whole. Worm, on the other hand, is a sprawling epic, probably the equivalent of about 8-10 Reckoners books, and not all of it is good. There’re two or three arcs that drag on too long, and one or two that could and should have been cut entirely, IMHO, or at least very seriously reworked. When it’s good, it’s really good; but when it drags, it really drags. This might be because… Quality of Action Advantage: Reckoners …Sanderson writes great action scenes, and Wildbow really doesn’t. Some of the action scenes are pretty cool, but a lot of them just aren’t. If action’s your thing, read the first eight chapters of Worm (roughly the equivalent of the first Reckoners book, probably; I’ve got Worm mentally divided into about five or six books, and chapter eight marks the end of the first one). There’s a pretty epic fight in the eighth chapter, but understand that this is pretty much Worm’s high point, as far as action goes. With the possible exception of the very last fight, it never gets that epic again. And it’s not worth reading all the way to the last arc, if you didn’t like the first one. Coolness of Powers Advantage: Worm This is one topic where Worm just blows the Reckoners out of the water, though. Worm has cooler powers, and the characters use their powers more cleverly than do those of the Reckoners’ universe. Also, the weaknesses of people with powers tend to tie directly into the powers themselves, which is one point where I thought Steelheart really dropped the ball. Like (major Steelheart spoiler incoming) the eponymous Steelheart’s main power is his invulnerable metal body, and his weakness is not being harmed except by…people not afraid of him? It’s just weird, it doesn’t fit. In Worm, if someone’s power were that they were made of metal, his weakness would be extreme temperatures (vulnerable to melting/shattering), hydrochloric acid (or any acid that can etch metal), any force strong enough to rend/crush metal, etc., etc. He probably also wouldn’t have the power to fly, either. Though there are exceptions, most people in Worm get only one main power and a few required secondary powers, and their weaknesses tie directly into their powers. In Steelheart, everything comes off as completely random. Maybe it’s explained later on – I haven’t finished the series yet – but I can’t really see the connection between a steel body and flight and vulnerability to unafraid people. The Reckoners is too random for my taste; Worm doesn’t have this problem nearly as much. Epic-ness of Plot Advantage: Worm With the exception of one or two arcs that don’t contribute directly to the overall plot, Worm has a pretty good overarching plot. In my opinion, a strong ending will cover a lot of ills, and Worm has a pretty strong ending, both for the main characters and for the world at large. Most of the mysteries are satisfactorily resolved; there are a few plot holes, a few places where it seems the author deviated somewhat from his/her original plan, but for the most part the entire story hangs together pretty well. Maybe the comparison isn't fair, but if The Reckoners has an epic plot, I'm not seeing any hints of it as of the end of Steelheart. Conclusion If you liked the Reckoners, you should probably give the first eight chapters of Worm a try (maybe the equivalent of a Reckoners novel in length). It’s free, and costs you nothing but time well spent. I wouldn’t recommend stopping before chapter eight, since that’s the chapter that pulls together a bunch of the earlier stuff and indirectly answers a few nagging questions. On the other hand, if after reading the first eight chapters you don’t feel like you want to read more, I’d recommend dropping it. It’s not that it doesn’t get better, but it doesn’t get a whole lot better, and there’s a lot of slogging in the meantime. If I’ve convinced you to give Worm a try, here’s a link to the first part of the first chapter: https://parahumans.wordpress.com/2011/06/11/1-1/. If anyone has any questions they’d like me to answer, any other topics they'd like me to compare, or any other similar works they'd like to recommend, I’ll be checking this thread and replying as able for the next few days; just try to keep Reckoners spoilers to a minimum, please. Merry Christmas and Happy New Reading!

He could have started the summoning earlier, though. The blade comes in on heartbeat ten, but you can still act normally in the meantime, so without knowing exactly when he started the summoning, we can't really say that there wasn't enough time for him to bring out a Blade.

The problem with this is that we actually see the Recreance through Dalinar's eyes. We see the moment when it happens, and it doesn't coincide with any sort of attack, at least on the Windrunners' and Stonewards' part. They just cruise on in and abandon their shards. I suppose you could salvage the theory if you suppose that they were doing something powerful and dishonorable but without obvious local effect, or if you suppose there was some sort of delay between the breaking of the Oaths and them losing their powers. But this goes against basically everything we've seen done with Stormlight, and while we don't have much to compare with on the Oath-breaking part, it doesn't seem to match too closely with what happened with Kaladin, either. So it doesn't seem a likely explanation to me.

As far as I know, the only WoB on the subject is the following: Note the part that says "But she would be the most pure...many would view her as the purest form." It sounds like for a moment Brandon was going to confirm Syl's statement, but then decided to back off. Even without that WoB, though, I think Syl's statement is probably reasonably correct. Windrunners are pretty clearly Honor-aligned (much more so than, say, Lightweavers, the only other Order we've got a really good look at), and some Order has to be the most Honor-oriented of the bunch. The Bondsmiths would be a good competitor for the title, but remember that the Stormfather is a mixture of Honor's cognitive shadow and the Rider of the Storms. Whether he's 50/50 or some other mix, I don't find it at all unreasonable to suppose one or more of the other Orders have the Bondsmiths beat in terms of Honor-purity of their spren.

That's an interesting observation -- I never picked up on the number of parables, or that there'd be precisely four per Order if divided evenly. Still, that presupposes that they divide evenly. We know from the book-within-a-book Words of Radiance that the truths of the Lightweavers, at least, didn't follow a fixed pattern, so it would be difficult to come up with parables that directly addressed them. Are they the only Order lacking formal Oaths? Maybe, maybe not. Yeah, but the days of the week aren't directly tied into the magic system. Everything that Honor set up involved the number ten -- ten Heralds, ten Surges, ten Honorblades, ten gemstones. Even things that he (presumably) didn't set up directly, but that still involved the magic system adopted the number ten (ten kinds of Radiant spren, for instance, or ten heartbeats to summon a dead Shardblade). So even though the Oaths were maybe technically introduced by Ishi (and maybe not, too -- we don't really know for sure), because they tie directly into the magic system I'd expect there to be ten of them as well.

Well, I just happen to think that it'll be a bit boring if there's only five oaths. I guess a lot of people feel differently, but given the importance of the number ten, having only five seems like doing it halfway. Pretty much every other part of the magic system has to do with ten (ten Orders, ten Surges, ten Heralds), so having the Oath stuck at five seems wrong to me. Plus, think how awesome a revelation scene you could have, probably around the end of book six, when both the characters and the readers find out they've been wrong the whole time. I'm just saying, I'm going to be pretty disappointed both from a sense of asymmetry and a sense of lost potential if there end up being only five.

I'm hoping for: 10 oaths. The last five books are going to be pretty boring if we've already seen all the cool power-ups there are to see.

I dunno, that doesn't sound at all like the First Ideal to me. Much too selfish and not very idealistic. While I'm reasonably sure that someone could, eventually, intuit the correct words or a reasonable facsimile, I think it's much more likely that Shallan just came across the Words somewhere. She did say she'd read every book in her father's library; and while it was admittedly not large, it's not impossible that Shallan came across the First Ideal there. Or even that her mother knew the oath and told it to her -- we still don't know much about Shallan's mom at all.

I'm pretty certain 1) is the correct scenario. As you note, Syl says that she'll go stupid again if Kaladin dies. I don't see any particular reason why Stormlight would halt aging, though. If I understand correctly, Stormlight restores a person to what they think of as their natural state (or something like that), but I don't think there's anyone who really thinks they're twenty years old forever. Aging is a natural part of life for everyone, even Radiants, so Radiants should age just like everyone else. They might age more gracefully, sure -- think the active, marathon-running seventy year-old, not the bedridden one -- but I can't think of any particular reason why they should stop aging entirely.

This is a cool idea that unfortunately doesn't check out mathematically. If the Blades and Plates were distributed randomly, it would actually be more likely than not that at least one matching set would exist (at least, assuming that the large majority of Shardbearers had both Blade and Plate, which seems to be the case judging by in-book examples). Moreover, given that there's still the occasional redistribution of sets of Shards into new sets, the chance that at least one correct match has been made and its heightened powers recognized in the relatively recent past is even higher (again, assuming that the added powers are significant enough to be recognizable; but if not, then whether one has a matched set or not doesn't seem to matter much). Basically, a situation like you describe would be actually pretty unlikely unless some individual or organization has engineered it. Of course, your theory might still be correct if the boost is subtle and not easily recognizable. Maybe there's someone out there who's thought to be a great duelist, when really he isn't any better than anyone else but gets a slight boost in strength and speed over everyone else, or his Plate just has to be hit a bit harder than everyone else's to crack. But if you're hoping for some sort of massive power boost, it's just not going to work out without some heavy behind-the-scenes manipulation.

Dunno about the Heralds, but I don't find the Radiants needing to manage their Stormlight silly at all. Think how many times in the book lack of Stormlight has played a key plot role. I figure that's what the Ryshidium (the super-horses) were for: getting the KR to the battlefield quickly without needing them to burn through their Stormlight reserves. If the Orders weren't restricted by available Stormlight, there wouldn't be much need for the super-horses at all. A Windrunner could fly there (or an Edgedancer glide there) without needing other means of transportation at all.

I don't know that there's any "somehow" to Syl taking a physical form. I mean, she can turn into a full-sized person as of WoK and can take physical form as of WoR, so unless there's sort of density or complexity limitation, she could probably already be a full-sized, physical person if she wanted to. Whether to ship her with Kaladin or not...well, the only two women I absolutely wouldn't want to see Kaladin end up with at the moment are Shallan and Navani (and sort of Laharl; I'm inclined against her, but not necessarily irreconcilably so). Anyone else, literally anyone, is fair game as far as I'm concerned, Syl included. Or no one at all; I'm fine with that, too. If I had to put Kaladin with someone, though, at the moment I'd probably pick Lift. Yes, yes, age difference, different kingdoms, complete strangers, blah blah blah. All could be overcome with time. There's just something strikingly similar between "I will protect those who cannot protect themselves" and "I will remember those who have been forgotten" that makes me think they'd understand each other in a way that others wouldn't, and complement each other as a result.

The best possibility for an Order that "broke" their oaths (i.e., pretended to break their oaths but didn't) is probably one of the two Orders with access to Illumination -- the Lightweavers or the Truthwatchers. We know from Shallan's scenes that Illumination can be used to mask Stormlight, so the Knights of either Order could have pretended to break their oaths by Lightweaving to make their Blades look dull. No need to break your oaths at all, either in whole or in part. Just make it look as if you did. If you believe Pattern when he says that all the Cryptics from that time got killed, then the betraying order is probably the Truthwatchers. They're the one my money's on, at least. If you're more the conspiracy-theorist type, though, you might wonder whether a spren so fascinated by lies is really quite as truthful as he seems....

Eh, it's no big deal. I was just taken aback because, like I said, I can frequently tell a person's gender from their writing. I test myself sometimes, on books where I've forgotten the author's name (which happens more often to me than you might think) or when the name itself is gender-neutral, and I'm right far more frequently than not. I never dug into your profile because I honestly don't really care either way. Er, don't take that as an insult. It's just that there are a lot of people on the Internet, and most information on people's profiles just doesn't matter much in cyberspace, gender included. Anyway, apologies to all for semi-derailing the thread with an offhand comment. Let's see if we can bring it back to Adolin and Shardblades. Here's a question: say Adolin somehow revives his Blade. Now, at present the Blade's spren pretty clearly has the ability to manifest itself as a Blade. Would being revived make it lose that ability? If not, would Adolin get a Blade-spren earlier than other Radiants of the same order? Or would he have to speak enough Ideals to get to the "physical Blade" level in order to revive the spren in the first place?

Wait, maxal's a girl? That's...huh. Normally I can get a pretty good idea of a person's gender if I read enough of their writing, and given the amount she's written about Adolin, I thought I had her pretty much pegged. But I guess I was wrong. Can you clarify what you mean by the plate and blade being sets? I don't think I quite understand. I think pretty much everyone agrees that each Radiant probably had one Blade and one Plate, so that can't be what you mean by "both bonded to an individual KR". That being said, if you mean that the Plate is also from a singular Radiant spren...it's possible, I guess, but Blade and Plate behave pretty differently. Like, Plate can shatter and Blades can't, so that kind of seems to indicate that they're different things at the core. Also, Blades can be summoned and Plate can't. Plate requires Stormlight and Blades don't. Etc.

To clear everyone straight on what (I think) Nightblood is saying, he's wondering if Radiants might be bonded to two spren, e.g., Kaladin is bonded to Syl and another spren we don't know about. Syl would presumably grant Gravitation and the other spren Adhesion. I doubt this theory for a number of reasons that mainly boil down to Occam's razor and a lack of evidence, but I thought I'd set the record straight.

@Darkness I don't think whether the spren hurt things or not has anything to do with how distant they are (or not) from their Radiant. After all, the dead Shardblades are certainly not anywhere near their original Radiants any longer. Rather, I think it's a matter of the natural form of movement for the shape that they're in. Like, when Syl is a human, she only ever walks like a person does. Yes, she walks on air, but she always gets around by walking. She never moves differently than the natural form of locomotion for the shape that she's in. So when she's a Blade, she never moves independently, because swords don't have any form of locomotion themselves. She could still be thrown, and would be just as deadly, but that's the natural effect of a thrown blade. Also, when she's a person, or a leaf, or a skyeel, or whatever, she doesn't cut things because it isn't part of the nature of people, or leaves, or skyeels to cut things when they land on them. So I imagine Syl or any Radiant spren would be able to pierce things in the form of an arrow, but I wouldn't think it would be that much of overpowered hack. First, she'd have to turn into an arrow, then move forward along a more-or-less straight line. Then, if she missed, she'd have to turn into a shape that can turn around, do an about-face, turn herself back into an arrow, and try again. While she's doing this, Kaladin is completely unarmed, which against someone like Szeth means he's basically dead. Also, she can't be "instantaneously resummoned", I wouldn't think. We know it doesn't take her ten heartbeats to form a Blade when she's with Kaladin, but if he needs to summon her from elsewhere, I imagine it'd take the same ten heartbeats that everyone else requires. She could probably fly back herself in less time, if she hadn't gone too far, but it's not exactly an overpowered ability. At best, you'd have the equivalent of a really slow bow that never ran out of arrows. (Okay, whose arrows go through walls and stuff, I guess. Then again, so can Shardblades, so that's not all that much of an improvement.)

I'm not sure about this, though. At one point, doesn't Wyndle basically say that Cultivation has given up on humanity and doesn't care anymore? Coming up with a plan to save everyone doesn't seem like giving up. I suppose he might be wrong, but it doesn't seem like he'd be wrong in this when he seems to remember a lot more about the way things are than Syl and Pattern do.

Touching Plate does not cause Radients to hear screaming -- we may safely conclude that the Plate is therefore not formed of dead spren. This doesn't contradict the "Windrunner's Plate is wind spren" theory, though, because in this theory, the minor spren aren't dead, just trapped into another shape (as we see fire spren trapped by measurement in one of the interludes). Thus no screaming. This theory also seems more likely to me than Plate being hardened Stormlight, though hardened Stormlight would be my number two theory.