Landis963

23 hours ago, Lightspine said:

There are a few aspects which I think are missing a bit from this discussion.
First of all, when speaking with Nan, Szeth says that the gods of the Shin are the spirits of the stars and the stone. Nan says that Szeth does not worship them, and that Nan is one of his gods. (Please correct me if I got this paraphrasing wrong, I don't have the book with me right now).
Secondly, Szeth calls the Sun the "god of gods". How is this belief related to the others? We know (from above) that they worship the spirits of the stars. The Sun is the nearest star.
Lastly, their treatment of stone is just bizarre. They certainly see it as sacred, and that is the reason they consider mining and building with stone blasphemous. But walking on stone seems to be different - when Szeth is in Urithiru, he says he can walk on the stone there, not because it isn't sacred, but because it is especially sacred. It's the only place in the world where the "stones aren't cursed."

He calls the stones of Urithiru "unhallowed", or unblessed.  He's saying he's not penalized for walking on stone in Urithiru because it doesn't qualify for whatever reverence the Shin have for stone.  

I suspect that Sadeas was never "a decent bloke," and that it was Dalinar (and Dalinar alone) who changed.  I'm looking forward to that, and to the Nightwatcher episode.  

2 hours ago, Killik said:

"This act of great villainy went beyond the impudence which had hitherto been ascribed to the orders; as the fighting was particularly intense at the time, many attributed this act to a sense of inherent betrayal; and after they withdrew, about two thousand made assault upon them, destroying much of the membership; but this was only nine of the ten, as one said they would not abandon their arms and flee, but instead entertained great subterfuge at the expense of the other nine." Words of Radiance, Chapter 38, page 20

I've always read this as the 10th order "entertained great subterfuge" in order to survive the assault from non-KRs after the Recreance.  But as this is from the perspective of a outsider some 200 years after the Recreance, perhaps the great subterfuge was the 10th order orchestrating the Recreance itself.  Perhaps like the Heralds thought that if at least one returns to Braize it will be enough to maintain the oathpact, if only one KR order remained it would be enough to break whatever contribution the KRs had on the desolations to end, but still maintain one order to assist in the rebuilding of the KRs should it be needed.  

I haven't decided if I am leaning towards the remaining KR order betraying the others and causing the order's destruction, or if they were well-intended and it was more of a democratic decision that the one particular order would remain.

"...At the expense of the other nine." Which would indicate that your first hypothesis is correct, and doesn't really match with the second one. 

On ‎8‎/‎27‎/‎2017 at 1:24 AM, jamskinner said:

Is this a hint about what happened on threnody? The magic users become cognitive shadows because the vessel is dead. 

I specifically asked about a hypothetical Shard of Tenacity, which logically would lend its magic to any random soul that didn't want to pass to the Beyond.  Also, Ambition didn't die in the Threnodite System, according to Khriss.  He was mortally wounded,  but limped to another (as yet unknown) location before expiring. 

On ‎8‎/‎24‎/‎2017 at 7:52 AM, Pagerunner said:

That's one of his default personalization, where he writes a significant line from the book. Arcanum Unbounded gets "Are You Listening?" I think Way of Kings gets "Life Before Death."

Better luck next time you catch him! Just remember, he's as big a fan of the cosmere as the rest of us, he just happens to also write it!

He wrote "Can I eat your lunch?" in my copy of Arcanum Unbounded.  Which is annoying, because that's the copy I was going to give to my mother, who has only read Mistborn.  So there's going to be some awkward explanation happening, and some spoilers because she'll need to read Edgedancer to make sense of that and she hasn't read one word of Stormlight and it's not the sort of thing she's into and arglefrargle grah. 

EDIT: Just remembered though, I did get a couple of WoBs during the signings that might be of interest to someone other than myself.  These are highly paraphrased, as it's been a while. 

Q: Is the programming-esque nature of the Dor a product of the power being in the Cognitive Realm or is it for some other reason?

A: A mixture of the Vessels' personalities, the fact that the power's in the Cognitive Realm, and the nature of Sel's focus. 

Q: Imagine a hypothetical Shard of Tenacity.  What happens when the Vessel of that Shard dies? 

A: The magic will change drastically. Among other things, it would be very easy for practitioners of that magic to become Cognitive Shadows.  [Note: This is not what I asked - I was hoping something along the lines of how the power itself would react to its Vessel dying - but this will be useful for my purposes nonetheless]

Sahr Ngaujah (voice of Doomfist from Overwatch) might be a good fit.  

EDIT: admittedly, I don't know the rest of his career, so he might not be as good a fit.  

On 8/20/2017 at 2:02 PM, Calderis said:

Nothing can "remove" investiture from the system. Investiture is a third state in the Cosmere, like matter and energy. It can't be destroyed. 

Nightblood is the only thing we know of that can do something like what you're saying and it's not actual removal, but a corruption that changes the investiture to a form that's inaccessible. It still exists though. 

Hemalurgy on the other hand does nothing of the sort. The decay that happens within a spike returns into the system. Hemalurgy is a magical outgrowth of entropy, which is itself a part of the system. The only long term effects of Hemalurgy are the weakening of the genetic traits that grant access to the magic. The traits stolen are either not passed on (as the person they were taken from most likely dead, and even if alive lost the trait), or they are passed on through the new bearer in a weakened state (but we've been told that hemalurgically granted traits pass on with weird and unknown complications.) 

This is both entirely correct, and the reason I specified "usable Investiture."  (I did assume that any Hemalurgy-induced Investiture loss would give the lost power to Ruin and not Preservation, but there's no evidence for that)

Well, one would assume, but 1) Endowment has the power to spare (note that the power it takes to Return someone is roughly the amount of power it takes to provide 5000 babies with a single Breath) and 2) those Breaths naturally decay over time (as the express purpose of feeding Lightsong and co. Breaths of children is because they're stronger than those of adults).  So not only is there a steady stream of Investiture returning to Endowment from every living person, there's also one booster-shot a week from every Returned still alive.  

Only Hemalurgy and Nightblood explicitly remove usable Investiture from the system.  Otherwise it returns to the source, be it a Shard (as with Allomancy) or a practitioner (as with Feruchemy).  

On ‎8‎/‎3‎/‎2017 at 10:14 PM, Nathrangking said:

There would be one less fool from the forts.

One less fool? 

15 minutes ago, Calderis said:

  Hide contents

Go read the bridgemen training with Zahel again. The swords are only light in comparison to normal swords. 

The bridgemen all say they are heavier than they expected. 

And you totally missed my point. 

Those blades are investiture made physical. The investiture in The bands was not. As I've stated elsewhere in this thread, I think that the investiture used to make Nightblood, just like that of a Shardblade, was shoved into the space between molecules that make up Nightblood. 

He's extra heavy because the physical investiture was added to the weight of the sword he was made from. 

If that investiture was not made physical, it would be like the Bands and add negligible weight. 

SA and Mistborn spoilers in there. 

Oops, yes, that does make more sense. 

On ‎8‎/‎7‎/‎2017 at 4:36 PM, Calderis said:

(I can't ping you on mobile so disregard the quote please) 

The reason I say this is because we've seen some insanely invested objects. One in particular in Mistborn Era 2 was a completely innocuous lump of metal that, other than Nightblood is probably the most invested thing we've seen, period. There was no odd weight to it. And Nightblood is described specifically as heavier than expected "for a sword of its size." 

I don't doubt that there is a mass to investiture. I agree, but I believe due to other objects as stated above, that that value is so low as to be imperceptible if it's not been converted into a physical state.

Counter-example from SA: 

21 minutes ago, Fatling said:

 

Sorry I'm cutting out most of your stuff out of the quote boxes to avoid mile lomg posts. So this discussion of background characters is making me think about Hoid. So far our exposure to him has been him popping up, making witty or mysterious remarks, or maybe doing something weird, and then disappearing again. I feel like writing Hoid as a major viewpoint character (will he be one in Oathbringer? Do we know? I know he will be in later books) could pose a considerable challenge, because he has to have some depth to him, but at the same time he has to be presented in a way that will let Brandon unfold all the mysteries of the cosmere little by little, even though Hoid knows so much. As a major viewpoint character he won't be able to just pop up and then disappear again. He'll have move beyond just being witty and mysterious all the time. Of course I'm sure the great wizard Brandon will amaze us once again, but how?

Hoid's being saved for the Cosmere's grand finale, I believe, and is set to be a major character in that particular story.  It wouldn't do to kill him off permanently before that point.  (An aim aided by Hoid's ridiculous durability, among other powers). 

EDIT: Dang ninjas!

I believe the Fool attribute was Cabin, who talks about what he does not understand in front of those who do.  (Referring to Kaladin's now-shattered prejudices re: Shallan)

16 hours ago, Oversleep said:

I have some stuff here

Which are...?

Scadrial and Nalthis, although whether or not Aslydin is in fact the Terriswoman nurse is unconfirmed.  

That depends entirely on your confidence in your drawing abilities.  Not knowing such, I would recommend staring at it (and at fanart of it) and drawing something of your own.  (I'm assuming he'll notice a trace-and-color)

4 minutes ago, Watchcry said:

If it's astral projection then they can't physically teleport from one location to another unless they enter completely and find a perpendicularity? That sounds kind of lame as far as supporting a battle on Roshar. 

We know Elsecalling can go point-to-point within a given Realm (see also: the Oathgates).  That's probably where most of its utility comes from.  Jumping from the Physical to the Cognitive Realms, on the other hand, is a touch more involved.  

6 minutes ago, WhiteLeeopard said:

Personally I'd be happy to always have him around. After all, the world could do a lot worse than having someone who cares for the people, even if not always for the right reasons, to keep an eye out and protect them from some of the worst elements that can rear their head. He is not, and I doubt he will ever be a shining white hero, but those are boring anway and are often very limited by their codes. Maybe he will die some day, but his journey would have to be completed, and I feel it will take a very long time for that to happen, if it ever does. Even if the Beyond is a happy, peaceful place, he is not the person to be happy doing nothing other than basking in "heaven", but rather someone that always is most alive when doing something, the bigger the scope the better.

If, as I suspect, The Beyond is like the Spiritual Realm, then he'll be doing anything and everything except "basking."  Of course, none of those things will matter to the living, but if Kell ever decides to go Beyond, then he no longer cares about the living.  

1 minute ago, StormblessDave said:

Yeah and the fact that her apprentice just went to shadesmar would have induced shock, disbelief and alarm, leading to a chance of panic.

Jasnah doesn't seem the type to panic, but I don't think further nitpicking is productive here. 

Just now, StormblessDave said:

that's true but its pretty clear its not easy to transport into shadesmar especially when your in a hurry, you can end up making mistakes, like Jasnah choosing a weird location at WOR epilogue because she was in a hurry, but yeah the same room would have made it easier, true.

Jasnah's weird location there is probably partly due to her need to escape pursuers in the Cognitive Realm.  She ran away from whatever spren was menacing her at the time, Elsecalled out of the Cognitive Realm, and emerged in whatever random spot she escaped to.  Where Hoid just so happened to be, explaining her alarm.  

Just now, StormblessDave said:

Yeah the part where Shallan slipped into Shadesmar and Jasnah located her effortlessly does indicate an enhanced sense of direction.

Perhaps, although Shallan and Jasnah were in the same room with each other during their respective jaunts into Shadesmar.  Which would make the problem easier, at least.  

46 minutes ago, Cephandrius said:

The Nightwatcher grants your boon, and brings you to the Tenth Heightening immediately.  Your bane is that you lose a few every time you sneeze.  

I beseech the nightwatcher to grant my boon: Give me a copy of these three books: The Lost Metal, The Winds of Winter, and Doors of Stone.  (I canhold out for Oathbringer since it has a few more months to go.)

Granted.  However, from hence forward, whenever you read a book, you immediately forget the contents of that book.  

I wish I had the power to persuade people to do anything.  

Well, for starters, I don't think we need a "to be continued" stinger such as Makkal and Agaris reforming.  Next up, Alean's disposal is quite problematic, and Leane needs some comeuppance (Also, those names need to be changed to be less confusable for each other).  I'd move toward splitting the book in two:  One section for the politics, the identity hijinks, and Raeth coming to power.  The second section for the metaplot, and perhaps a few targeted mirrors toward the first book, seeing Raeth find himself on the opposite side of choices made about him previously (e.g. I really, really, really want to see how he handles choosing his sons' Places).  Obviously there would need to be some plot rejiggering for the first half to work correctly - maybe one of Leane's early bids for power goes off instead of the Pool bubbling up?  

On 5/13/2017 at 0:39 AM, Extesian said:

One property would be that it would take a looong time to draw. Unless you can generate chalklings by mathematical function. Otherwise it's a fractal so, um, I'm not sure, perhaps dazzle the enemy with the beauty of a structure of increasing complexity? 

I may need to brush up on my Rithmatics

The more detailed the Chalkling, the smarter it is?  It's been a while since I've brushed up on those particular rules.  Judging from general shape, I'm seeing a scorpion/horseshoe crab hybrid.  Given that scale is no object, that would mean your fractal chalkling might be best suited for a tank role, something to tie up incoming chalklings while you aim your Lines of Vigor at opposing structures. 

Hoid does not use Feruchemy.  The exact words Brandon used to describe Hoid's plot sense were "He uses an unknown application of Feruchemy."  Era 2 then told us that Chromium Feruchemy stores Fortune.  Dialogue from SH plus other followup WoBs confirmed that Fortune, not Feruchemy, is the mechanic at hand.