hoser

Thanks (upvote)! Given the quote you provide later (about the strength of the truth affecting the bond), the fact that Pattern crossed from the cognitive again in WoR (hence had to have been in the cognitive in tWoK) and the reference to his voice being a deeper hum in Shadesmar (in chapter 11, when she is trying to make fire), I still believe that she was always working with Pattern. Not that I want to convince anybody else, but it just makes no sense to me that she would speak truths to a different spren after having bonded with Pattern, when Pattern would have likely been there. It also fits that if she had strengthened the bond with Pattern by telling him truths, he would then have crossed over to the physical.

Really? I missed that. Could you please give me a hint about where it says that? I think the humans and H&C arrived together. The bonding spren all came from H&C, and really were never the spren that bonded the Listeners. So the "abandonment" and "betrayal" that the listeners imagine could be from the "all your spren are belong to us" mindset.

And Syl's cognitive abilities are only dependant on the bond in the physical realm. She was apparently fine when she was in the cognitive. It isn't clear to me that the Stormfather isn't always in the cognitive realm also. Pattern was apparently fine in the cognitive realm when Shallan regressed in her Radiant development.

I am impressed that you are absolutely certain that you know what Brandon is doing. I am much less certain. Things you seem to just know seem to be involve discarding parts of the information that we have and deciding that others are absolute truth. The circumstances of the preservation of the Way of Kings are also interesting, as it was found at Vanrial, where the words of Nohadon were also preserved in the original Dawnchant. Did the knights make provision to rise again by preserving knowledge at Vanrial? I asked Brandon about Vanrial at a signing and got a complete RAFO.

There is a conundrum: how would you write a parable that would address Shallan's "truths," which seem so personal and unique? It's particularly hard when we don't have enough of them to generalize and of the two or three we have, one or two are to recover levels that she had previously achieved. However, it doesn't seem impossible to me. Here is just one possibility, but a writer of Brandon's skill and creativity could easily find others (I am not saying this is right, but just showing that it is possible to solve the puzzle). "I am terrified": a parable about the importance of knowing one's feelings and the impact of those feelings. "I am a murderer": a parable about the importance of admitting what one is capable of. "I killed my mother": a parable about how understanding our past and learning from it. Or Brandon could just not explain how to address Lightweavers' "truths" using parables. Or some orders could have more than four unique "words," and multiple Lightweaver "truths" could be addressed be addressed by a single parable. There are many possible solutions. Kaladin is supposed to struggle. If Brandon had wanted the book to be more about something else, he could have made Kaladin struggle less or have the resolution come more easily. Just as Szeth could have easily seen the Voidbringers all around, noticed one of the two storms that he was in the middle of during a weeping or seen through Mr. T's obvious and self-serving lies and not attacked during the climax. Kaladin not using a parable from the Way of Kings to more easily level up does not seem like evidence supporting anything. In the vision, Nohadon was dealing with Surgebinders who were not Knights and the destruction they caused because they were not principled enough. Exactly the problem the Radiant's ideals solves. The Heralds are already gone. Urithiru is created during his lifetime, because he writes about walking there. Desolations must be more widely spaced (because 90% population loss and surprising) and the Heralds don't come back until a few years before the next one. There is evidence that Ishi may have been involved in the Radiant Ideals, but that does not prove that Nohadon didn't also describe them. There is significant evidence suggesting that he did describe them.

While there are a number of sentences that make no sense to me, notably the ones including "Did people in the book miss the mention in the book" and "It's unlikely his book has a minimal impact on the Orders," I guess you are trying to say that: The in-world Way of Kings was just a manual for leadership and had no role in helping people become or advance as Radiants. The forty is just a coincidence and the parables do not correspond to the four levels of the ten orders Radiant ideals/truths/tests/whatever. The parables would particularly not apply to a Lightweaver like Shallan, who does not have fixed oaths. Since the Skybreakers and Windrunners had disagreements, they were fundamentally opposed and their ideals would have contradicted each other. The book would then have had to be self-contradictory. Here are some other things that seem relevant to me: The figure in the visions encourages Dalinar to read the book so that he can return to men the Shards they once bore. Shallan did read the Way of Kings and it did help her become a Lightweaver. Information from the book, relayed through Teft, helped Kaladin become a Radiant. Partly through reading the Way of Kings, Dalinar became a Radiant. The story of the walk to Urithiru is a rendering of the first, shared ideal of the Radiants. With ten orders having different goals and priorities, there are bound to be disagreements. This does not mean that the orders or their ideals are contradictory. Consider the Skybreaker ideal "I will put the law before all else." There could easily be a parable illustrating the importance of following the law. There could be a different parable illustrating the importance of protecting even those one hates. In practice, there would inevitably be conflicts between people dedicated to one over the other and vice versa. These conflicts could exist without predominating. The Radiants worked together (apparently led by the Heralds) and helped fight off multiple Desolations.

There is WoB that the Oathpact is between the Heralds and Honor. But the powers of the Heralds (more the five female Heralds in the bottom of the Surgebinding chart) are also of Cultivation. Wyndle speaks of his mother (presumed Cultivation) and the Nightwatcher as more influential. Brandon has also said that the spren we saw in tWoK (mainly referring to Syl and Pattern, I think) are of H&C or both. So there must be more specialness to the Heralds than the Oathpact. MaybeTaln speaks of a "Gift." There are references in tWoK to a Proving Day. I think the Heralds were chosen and given certain abilities by H or C or both before the Oathpact. At the Oathpact, they swore something with H and were given the swords (I think the swords were part of the Oathpact because they decided they had to leave them when they walked away).

It's not authoritative, but Nohadon's book is said to have 40 parables and the introductory story about walking to Urithiru. Each parable supposedly alludes to an ideal, so it would work for 10 orders times 4 unique ideals. This is somewhat confirming to me, so until I see evidence that one order has more or less than 4 unique ideal (or ordeals, or tests), my working assumption is that all orders have 4 unique whatever. I like this idea. Where Kaladin's purpose has to be all about protecting and leading, creativity and honesty really don't constrain Shallan. I think of a truth about life purpose. Much as I want to know about it, for me, neither her current romance nor the next measure up to her purpose in importance for her evolution as a Radiant.

Shallan apparently said the first Oath and enough truths to be able to use Pattern as a Shardblade to kill her mom. It seems like that must be the shared oath and two truths, because at the end of WoR she is one level more advanced than Kaladin. After her mom died, she regressed and "I killed my father" must have gotten her back to third level. This is based on her only leveling up once in WoR and being ahead of Kaladin, who is at third level at the end of WoR. Is this responsive to your question?

Okay, now I see where you are going. Kaladin levels up and all of a sudden can and does do amazing things that he couldn't before which affect the outcome of the book. Shallan levels up and ... then the book ends. It's sort of like a reverse cliffhanger. A really good thing has happened, but we don't know the resolution. I guess I'm OK with it because she was re-leveling up and making a difference all through the book. It might also say something about the different ways the Cryptics and Lightweavers operate, as opposed to Windrunners and honorspren.

Nice catch. What an intriguing quote. Certainly possible for a Knight to be a traitor. I'm more inclined to think there could be a Herald traitor (cough, cough, Nale). The use of the present tense seems wrong to be referring to knights, as they are not necessarily knights yet and are not working together. Less likely to me is the possibility that one of the Unmade is a traitor to the others.

Welcome! Introductory upvote! 1. The Parshendi attack at a time when the Parshendi are no longer contesting gemhearts and there is not one at stake seems like bad plotting. That it exactly coincides with an assassination attempt seems ridiculous to me. Given that it is a particularly large scouting expedition being attacked rather than an emergency response to a gemheart sighting makes even less sense. I guess it's to explain the lack of body recovery effort. Since there are a relatively small number of Alethi bodies below, it could not have been a very significant engagement. I don't think we get any POV other than Shallan and Kaladin for days, so I don't see an inconsequential engagement as a significant loose end that needed tying up, but your mileage varies, obviously. 2. She avoids thinkong about the Shardblade while really knowing about it. The way the Shardblade nature is not revealed does seem a bit contrived, but I really liked it. 4. To say an ideal every time you had to use an Oathgate would limit you to 5 Oathgate uses. The way it is done, you just have to be of high enough level to have a livespren Shardblade and you can use Oathgates many times. The Oathgate seems to me to have a spren. It would be weird to have to reveal a deeper truth or further oath to a spren you don't even know.

I'm sure it makes sense. It is a clue about the story Brandon wants to tell. Just guessing here, but I imagine that she works for Herald backstory. She would have a unique perspective on her father, whose story I am really interested in.

Well, I would assume that the highstorms all hit Urithiru. The rain might not be as heavy, the crem might be less or maybe the crem is much less at higher altitudes. I certainly don't know why there is less crem than there would be at lower altitudes further east. All Radiants can jump off and land safely if infused. Two orders can fly to Urithiru. Two other orders can teleport there. Jasnah suggests that there are teleporting and flying fabrials in tWoK. The presence of the Stoneward in the Starfalls vision points to an additional smaller scale teleport fabrial (or the ability to teleport others, but would she then have to walk back?) in addition to the Oathgates. With so many ways for Radiants to get to and from Urithiru, I don't see the need for secret mountain passages (which doesn't mean there aren't any, of course). IIRC, in WoR that the listeners put the gems next to plants to have them grow faster. It explains why they need the gems and the gems help them eat even though they apparently don't have Soulcasters. Or Nohadon could just walk to the base of the mountain. He could easily be a Radiant with the ability to fly or teleport. A Radiant could pick him up or teleport him or he could use a fabrial. There are many solutions that fit what I know, so I don't know how to decide which is true. In addition to the above, I suspect Renarin will have things that he is uniquely suited for other than administer and lead the bridgemen. This assumes that she can transfer stormlight to and from gems like Kaladin. I can imagine her ability to get investiture from food as an alternative to the "normal" method although she could easily have it as an additional ability.

Yeah. Lift is puzzling. My completely unsupported guesses are that there is investiture in the food or she uses food as a catalyst to draw investiture from somewhere. It has built-in limitations based on it being only what one person can eat.

Consider that stormlight is investiture: the stuff of a Shard. The Shard's power is finite (apparently, as the Shards are comparable in power and the only way one gets more powerful is by combining two. If Odium could just generate investiture, he would have made himself ultra-powerful and splintered all the other Shards long ago.). A stormlight generator would allow you to essentially freely drain the power of a god. Not necessarily something that a god (even Honor) wants freely available. I can imagine a limited conduit, which might be what you mean, but I'm not sure about that. Investiture is available outside of highstorms, as we saw when Kaladin said the second Windrunner oath, but I have no idea where it came from or what other circumstances might make it available.

The back cover of WOR seems relevant, but lacks the authority of WoB. Could this be what you are looking for?

One way of seeing Pattern's initial attraction is that he was drawn by the creativity Shallan's lies demonstrated (Creativity being the primary attribute of lightweavers). While Shallan did break more later and her lies saved her, that was after Pattern had bonded her and she actually weakened the bond when she was broken. Syl reported being drawn by Kaladin's squad's gratitude and she worked with him before Amaram enslaved him. Between depression and the loss of Tien, he was somewhat broken, but the emotions that drew her came from Kal's protecting and leading. I would argue that positive behavior is vital to the spren's initial attraction. For the bond to develop, I guess there needs to be brokeness, but I see that the Radiants have all demonstrated positive behaviors. Even Szeth's lawfully evil into insanity behavior could be seen as a positive devotion to rules should he develop a bond.

Is it the Ghostbloods? I assumed that Tyn was the liaison to the Ghostbloods and this was a gang that Tyn assembled that didn't include any Ghostbloods (unless the Ghostbloods were spying on Tyn).

Snap-upvote for "precision about the uncertainty."

The biggest problem for this theory, I think, is a line from his POV interlude (I-7): This suggests to me that these things were transferred to him and he is not the original Taln. If the Gift is the heraldic abilities, then he didn't have them before. Now did someone else's mind get put into Taln's body? Part of Taln's mind put into somebody else's body? I have no idea. A minor issue is that Heralds seem to speak without accents. This person apparently has a northern Alethi accent. If you come back at distant intervals, it would be useful to not have to relearn languages. It has been theorized that Heralds have some trick involving the cognitive realm that gives them instant unaccented linguistic skills.

As I said before, if you are willing to accept his subjective world and blame his cultural background, He gets an auto-pass. It doesn't seem like a judgement process to me, but if it works for you and helps you enjoy the books, go for it. Using the above logic, I don't see how anybody can be condemned. As long as we are collecting excuses to avoid assigning Szeth any responsibility, let's not forget Odium, the Unmade and Mr. T. We don't know how Odium operates, but he seems very interested in Szeth's activities. The "screaming" of his victims seems to be an Unmade phenomenon. <snarky sarcasm>As for my "far too simplistic" judgements, I'm sorry for basing my judgements on what he says in his POV, rather than making up stories that lack any textual support. </snarky sarcasm> You do make a good point that there may be more relevant information, but if we are to make a judgement at this point, I would argue that we have to use what we have. Certainly reserving judgement is a reasonable choice given that we don't have complete information.

FWIW, Dalinar seems evasive when he is describing his whereabouts during the events involving Moash's grandparents. Dalinar said, "Elhokar was crown prince then, commanded to rule over Kholinar and watch the kingdom while his father organized our first camps here in the Shattered Plains. I was ... away at the time." My guess is that that may coincide w/his trip to the Nightwatcher, as the Nightwatcher is what Dalinar has seemed most evasive about. I'll need to check on the information we have about the timing of his trip to the Nightwatcher to see if it fits. IIRC, Dalinar claims to know his curse and blessing. If the blessing was forgetting he murdered his wife, then he wouldn't know what it is. Of course, if the Nightwatcher gave him a different blessing, he might not realize his original intent. He would have to wonder why he went, which he doesn't seem to be doing.

He tells us in his internal dialog what is at stake. He specifically says that if he follows the terms of his punishment, his soul will reside in the stone. If not, he believes his soul will be annihilated. He doesn't talk about punishments for family members or his life when he talks about why he obeys. He is doing all these evil actions to maintain the post-life existence of his soul, which he tells us clearly. I think that if you want to judge him on a subjective basis, you can talk about Shin societal values and insanity and give him an easy pass. If there is a significant objective component to the judgement, it seems hard to pass him. He knows that the foundation of Shin society may be wrong. That is why he is being punished. If he is in doubt, he should resolve his questions before meekly submitting to a possibly flawed sentence.

As for Szeth, I just don't get it. He questioned foundational beliefs of the Shamans with such forcefulness that he was punished horribly. But then he meekly decides that he was wrong and accepts the punishment. If he is weak, he doesn't do the former. If he is strong, he doesn't do the latter. He does horrible things that he hates to follow his punishment. His explanation is that he is trying to maintain the existence of his soul. If he is strong, he doesn't do the former. If he is weak, he doesn't do the latter. The existence of Radiants or voidbringers proves his punishment false. He has multiple encounters with a Radiant and he arrives in the middle of a war zone with thousands of voidbringers calling the Everstorm in the middle of the weeping (when there could be neither highstorm nor everstorm). He continues to follow his evil orders. I expect Brandon will come up with something brilliant to cover what appear to me to be inconsistencies. And I guess "madness" allows you to make a character do anything. At the least, it allows Brandon to tell this amazing story.