1stBondsmith

Or perhaps "I will speak for those with no backbone, or too much decency to respond to unevolved blabbering".

What is a "casual Sanderson Reader"? Isn't that like saying you only perform subatomic particle disassembly as a hobby?

Sanderson says he is going to try and avoid the "Avengers" style, Everyone-in for the last battle. in his books, but......It could be fu-u-u-un!

Recently in Theylen City...

I too feel that the infinite cycle might be too broad a story line even for the largest story line of all time- (The Cosmere). But I do like a premeditated natural law of unity that will eventually bring all investiture back to its origins, like gravity collapsing the universe when other forces are too weak to hold them back. It seems Odium must be trying to shatter investiture as fast as he can, since he is even going after worlds where the Shards invested most heavily. Harmony will be a big issue for him as he is now. What will be the tipping point to bring them all together? Will it be a point when all sentient life has equal portions of investiture, or when none is available to life? Will Intents like Ambition and Dominion overpower Autonomy (who by the way does not want to help Hoid and applauds Odium's mission) and others? Is a subtheme of Unity going to happen everywhere till Adonalsium is reformed? I think this would be epoch enough for any person's writing, even the Branderbots. No cycle needed.

Do not forget, Kaladin is no longer 4th Dahn. He is storming Knight Radiant Lighteyes, Captain of the Cobalt Guard, Blooming Bridge 4 Crew Leader. Dahns do not apply anymore to him, and should be ignored by those dealing with him. He and the other Radiants are above Dahns. He is loyal to who he chooses to be. I suspect his parents have as much political pull on him as Dalinar does. Things are different in Hearthstone today!

Why archery? Line up a few boulders and give them a gravity parallel to the land, and no army could stand up to you. Logs, walls, boulders, flaming logs, all slowly falling towards the enemy; or swiftly ripping through them. Arrows are small potatoes.

@Firerust, I have been thinking along the same lines. But to save yourself some undeserved criticism, you may want to change the Intent of Adonalsium to it's current mandate or drive. The shards seem to have a fixed intent, but Adonalsium would have had all the intents, with the tempering effect having them together would entail. I like the demonstrable points of Unity, and effective conglomeration of the shards. This fits well with the well documented cyclical nature of matter, energy, and investiture Brandon has encouraged throughout his books. Further, a unification drive, seeming to counter Odium's apparent desire to further shatter the Investiture of the other shards, seems to promote a long standing agenda that some of the shards might still approve of, since they started the process. That fits well with some of the letter responses Wit has received. Others, perhaps wiser (read Frost) have noted the Touch of Adonasium's hand" on Roshar and other worlds, and perhaps trust more to the Fate or Destiny of the long cycle of Adonalsium, rather than interfering with what will happen (even if it means the destruction or imprisonment of current Shards). It gives real personality and depth to the various attitudes of the different shards. It also is the best explanation of Odium's shock at the making of the perpendicularity, and the best reason for him to state that Dalinar had Ascended. Is Autonomy living out this spreading of investiture because of a certain philosophy that made Bavadin help shatter Adonalsium to begin with? Is Wit trying to reassemble, not just the powers, but the intents of Adonalsium, because he is familiar with this new drive, but wasn't before the shattering? And finally, how well this matches "The One" becoming All" and experiencing all things so it could understand all experience before becoming the One again? (That should sound familiar to you). I like this train of though very much.

What I think you are all forgetting here, is that you assume Hoid want's to be Lightweaver, but have not discussed the possibilities of the personality of THIS SPECIFIC Cryptic. What does he know, and what information is he guarding? Does he know the location of the other hidden perfect stones, the Dawnshards, or other items hidden in Roshar's CR? The benefit to Hoid of being a Knight Radiant is small compared to information he may need. Just a thought I had when reading the epilogue.

Boy, I hear you on the "multi-year projects" side. "Awesome, a few years from now" is far better than "above average today". But is has a big price, doesn't it? I have several projects on hold till all my kids are gone. I work on them in depth about 3-4 times a year, then back off to include my more important priorities. Just a hint though; helping you kids achieve awesome in what they want is as fulfilling as achieving awesome yourself. It just takes longer.

I know there is not a published answer, and there appears to not be a WOB, but the question is: If an Elantrian (someone with enough investiture) makes a new Aeon, (as we know they often did) does that create a new Seon or Skaze with the Aeon at its center? Or: Is there a fixed set on Seons and Skaze that dictate which Aeons will work from any attempt. I realize that there are other options, but these are both a cause and effect looking at opposite sides of a 1 to 1 relationship. This does not address how the Seon might be made, like "if enough Elantrians use and Aeon the same way, does it eventually have a spren-like reality that causes it to have sentience?". It also does not address the death of Seons or their mindlessness and bond to people that become Hoed. It just asks if there is a one to one relationship, and, if so, which one is the cause?

Very good question. If an Elantrian creates a new Aeon, and it had a purpose and use, does it create a Seon to match? I think this could be possible since the Aeon draws (releases) investiture from the Cognitive Realm. Does the extra amount of power held there by two captive Shards automatically create a Seon when an Aeon is made? Would that count as a heavily invested "spren" with a physical manifestation? Or is it the other way around; if the Seon exists, can you draw on its power by making the exactly correct Aeon to match? Is this true for Skaze as well? I think a 1 to 1 correlation would be very interesting indeed.

I offer myself as an example of said traits coexisting. I'm: deeply detailed, engineer, nerdy, notice everything, focused and inventive. However, all people who know me call me an extroverted, in-charge, deep-plotting, never-lose-my-temper, find-a-way-to-accomplish-the-mission kind of guy. If Navani were strong enough to hold her own on the battlefield, I would be the most like her of all the SA characters. However, in defense of what the OP wrote, I am told I am the exception to most peoples' expectations and stereotypes. But we are here... despite personality studies, so watch out!

Well posted. Whether these are Shard allusions or just happens to be how Brandon has categorized influencing things on a world level, it was a very wise categorization. If Hoid did mean it as a commentary on the Shards, (which I can see being the case) he commented on the short-sightedness of men but could mean all levels of invested people. This has proven true many times with the Shards as well (or even the Lord Ruler's world-level mistakes), so it seems appropriate.

We know the following: Odium appears to want to destroy all (maybe most) of the other shards He has been stuck on Roshar a long time. Humans destroyed "their world" before coming to Roshar using Surges Odium was the Human god at that time. It leads to follow that: Odium would be willing to stay in a place where humans can gain such great power through the surges, and with the help of corrupted spren, cause the humans to do the destruction. Now, he has both Listerners and Humans with surges that can travel into and through Shadesmar. If it was his goal, he could use them to destroy all Roshar worlds, and the other 10 uninhabited worlds of the system. If the cognitive shadows can travel, like Kelsier, through Shadesmar, other worlds could be threatened. With Shadesmar, The three Roshar moons, the other 12 planets (inhabited and uninhabitable) all at stake, and possible conquest into other worlds through the Cognitive Realm, this would be a huge power grab. This would be worth waiting for the Long play. Are Wit and the Sleepless too late to stop this? Are people in Shadesmar aware of this threat? Are the Ghostbloods clued into this? (and is that why they don't want the listeners or the Humans to dominate too early?)

I concur. It does strongly seem that an existing disorder in the individual who took up the Autonomy shard might be amplified by this Intent. Kind of, wanting to be separate from the other personalities. The other thought I had on this is if the individual was also a shapeshifter, dragon, or changeling of some kind, a powerful Intent of Autonomy might give them issues similar to Shallan trying to stay the same person while lightweaving. Shallan might be a Bavadin foreshadow. Brandon said he was having a lot of fun with Bavadin's potential, so maybe Shallan's issues are an exploration into that mindset.

Excellent deduction. I agree with these being the Dawnshards. If you split a perfect stone ten times, the original stone would comfortably be called the Stone of Ten Dawns. A thought on cutting large stones- to make multiple perfectly cut stones from a flawless larger one, many many smaller ones would also be cut. Each one would be flawlesss, but not necessarily cut perfectly. Are these also Dawnshards, or only the 10 perfectly cut ones? On a deeper level, it might also have to do with the 10 uninhabited planets- each having a dawn- and their effect on the magics of Roshar, but we don't know enough to do anything but speculate there. (After all, there is always another secret!) But a perfect stone of that size being cut into 10 would indeed be suspect for holding beings with spren or spren. This would cover the Unmade, the Heralds, the Listeners in any form, and anything with a Gemheart. Only Humans would appear to be exempt. You can see why finding these would become very important to the fight with Odium. Your comment about hiding the stones in Shadesmar (deduced from the Elsecallers' message) might also be why the Listener army seemed intent on finding a certain Cryptic that they expended much effort to find at the Kolins' Palace (and which it appears was very important for Hoid to find). Perhaps he knows the location for some of the other stones? Could be... On a slight tangent, If Rayse can control the Roshar portion of Shadesmar with the Fused, can he also take over the rest of Shadesmar? Is this why "worlds"" would be at risk if certain secrets were known?

Approaching the two was a fright; With long spears and a terrible height. Huge spren of their class, Guarding gates over glass, Intimidating in both black and white. Though she longed to pass through, they said "No, Honor ordered that none here should go". Shallan tried every trick But as stolid as Stick, They tossed her in glass beads below.

It should be no surprise that I would be a Bondsmith. I wanted to be a Windrunner for selfish reasons, but I have been assured by all my family members that I am definitely a Bondsmith. They are likely correct. Brandon Sanderson seemed to think so too, as he gave me my handle long before he finished writing Oathbringer.

You are not Dalinar! You are a Lightweaver fraud! I know Dalinar when I see him, believe me! Dalinar would never look so,...so. You just aren't. I know because I am... really sure...we can't both, er... be right!

Well, this is the crux of it, isn't it. Amaram and Dalinar and Szeth could not be brought to justice because they were too powerful (see Dalinar's quote on not being able to imprison a shardbearer). Capital Punishment is almost always not about keeping the public safe or reforming the guilty. It is for a deterrent. It it to keep others from following their example. It is the ultimate removal of any reward from the crime. The trouble with a Governmental Justice System, is it cannot bring justice unless full restitution can be made. If that is impossible, it is not about justice, it is about protecting future victims, and keeping others from doing the same. The idea of reforming prisoners only came about after people said, "now what do we do with these humans in prison?" It is a good question, but secondary to the deterrent that living as a prisoner, or being executed truly is. Revenge doesn't even come into this. The question in the story becomes, "do we work with people who have murdered, and is it murder under organized circumstances like war, chain-of-command, etc." Very few countries today allow an officer to counter a higher officer's commands even if they think it is immoral. The US is one of about two handfuls of counties that do. I wonder if Kaladin would have agreed to protect Dalinar at the end of TWOK if he knew all of Dalinar's past. I wonder if Dalinar would have asked him to, if he remembered his own past. Obviously some of them were fine with Szeth, even knowing his past. I think that is what stuck in my craw. Probably had something to do with Szeth working with Lift and not the others.

"The glass was full of screams; half of them were for me, so I took responsibility. The remainder are for someone else"- Unique Skybreaker

Being older puts some real POWER into the stronger Sanderson scenes. I caught the tail end of the "Frodo Lives!" counterculture movement in the early 70s. I read a LOT of junky fantasy till I bored myself with the same plots, and lost hope for the genre. The age of the Sanderson reader is really limited to their attention span, vocabulary and curiosity. If those are high, interest in the Cosmere books will be high. But the fact that there is ALWAYS another secret, drives much of the loyalty the brand enjoys. Wheel of time was about endurance to see the end of the plot, but SA keeps feeding you new info, changing characters and larger plots. I would start these books between ages 12 to 16, depending on the three factors I mentioned above. I am very interested in these books, have read extensively my whole life, and really appreciate the time Sanderson has spent on research to make individual personalities believable and relatable to people with similar backgrounds (maybe minus the spren, investiture and ascension!) I am currently old enough to be a general, smart enough not to be one, and blessed enough to love life where I am. I would recommend reading the Archives again when you are over 50. There is a lot in there that experience will likely enhance.

The scene was well written, but... In response to the OP, if one of my men defects, and then shows up on the other side of a battle, and within my sight kills one of mine and then turns and salutes me... We have a vendetta. I would hunt him down and all my team would make a mission out of bringing him down. You train and arm a soldier, the price is loyalty. Doesn't matter what he meant by the salute. We don't accept the Honor Among Thieves argument, and we don't count being revered and feared by our enemies as ego building. Treachery yields retribution.

So I don't have it @Steeldancer. The Sandersons are particulary generous with their time, attention and patience with us, the fans. You don't see that in many successful writers. If I had taken it, I would undoubtedly have read it, and be sworn to secrecy till the release. But I am really looking forward to the artwork and style of the Hardbound copy. It will set a new standard for books that will be hard to replicate in the future.