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cometaryorbit

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  1. cometaryorbit
    I don't think the parallel is very close. The lighteye/darkeye caste system is a pretty direct corrspondence to historical RL things, but not the humans/parshmen or Alethi/Parshendi situation. Pre Everstorm the Parshmen didnt appear... well, maybe sapient is the wrong word since they could talk and understand language, but they didn't seem to have wills of their own. They were basically zombies - though not biologically dead. I think it's really notable that they apparently never tried to run away or revolt or anything; indeed when the Everstorm comes the concept of them being dangerous is *totally alien* to Rosharan humans. That is *not* the attitude of RL oppressors, they are generally quite concerned about revolts and keeping control. So their will-less-ness seems to be real, and I don't think Rosharan humans can be blamed for not realizing Parsh were people- that wasn't observable at the time. As for the war with the Parshendi, this is largely a result of no one knowing what Gavilar was doing to return the Desolations and thus seeing his assassination as an unprovoked attack. That doesn't really correspond to any RL colonial situation.
  2. cometaryorbit
    Re hypercompetent, I was more thinking about stuff like her figuring out the Parshmen/Voidbringer connection and surviving Shadesmar in WoR. I agree she doesn't always make the best decisions or set the best goals. But she's very good at accomplishing those goals.
  3. cometaryorbit
    I think that means Cusicesh's fixed time of appearance and behavior isn't specifically because of people writing down that he does that. Not sure if "something there" just means that his behavior is fixed by something, or that it's actually perception related.
  4. cometaryorbit
    Sliver = former Vessel of a Shard, or former holder of a large portion of a Shard's power Splinter = Investiture separated from a Shard, either self-aware or at least separate enough to potentially become so (distinct from the Shard's own identity/mind) Spren are Splinters. We haven't seen Slivers in Stormlight, though we have in Mistborn. We've seen 50,000+ Breaths (10th Heightening). I think Shard level is ridiculously beyond that, by many orders of magnitude (Nalthis' population is likely somewhere in the hundreds of millions, and I doubt Endowment is seriously diminished by that number of Breaths).
  5. cometaryorbit
    To be fair, according to the Stormfather in OB, the torture and Desolation cycle was not the original plan. The trapping was meant to be permanent without Returns/Desolations. The Fused discovered later they could torture the Heralds and make them "bend their oaths" thus allowing Desolations to happen. Apparently the Heralds did not originally realize that was possible (and the Stormfather confirms Honor did not realize). But yeah, no reforming the Oathpact. It essentially failed way back at the first Desolation. And it's probably not relevant now that there are weapons that can permanently kill Fused*, and a new Odium with different goals. *EDIT: I think the Oathpact was only invented since they had no way to make the Fused stay dead. If they'd had Anti-Light they never would have gone that route IMO.
  6. cometaryorbit
    Basically, I think that when - say - Khriss in the Ars Arcanum says "Investiture", she generally really means something like "Investiture that is not bound up in currently being matter or energy and thus is available to be involved in magic". Similarly, when how Invested something is matters - e.g. for how difficult it is to Push or Pull Allomantically - I don't think Investiture bound up in mass-energy is considered. Yeah, this. Much like Sazed's analogy of a rock vs atium in the Hero of Ages epigraphs- technically the rock is all made of Ruin and Preservation Investiture too, but it's all kind of self-canceling-out and thus irrelevant.
  7. cometaryorbit
    Jasnah is ... really controversial. I see her as genuinely hypercompetent, but also having major blind spots that lead her to use that ability to do questionable things. She may be a really good queen for getting Alethkar through the immediate crisis, but yeah, I don't think she would necessarily be good in other situations, and she'd definitely be a *terrible* precedent/example for future rulers. (Her utilitarianism is frightening enough as is, but at least it's coupled with a very strong introspection/analysis of her own actions which is likely to keep her from going full on tyrant. I think 99% of rulers who tried to follow her model would end up full on tyrants.)
  8. cometaryorbit
    Re-Shephir is compared to a twisted creationspren, and she's said to be understood by Lightweavers, so maybe the loose parallel with the nine non-Bondsmith Orders/Heralds is because the Unmade are derived from the Shardplate spren of those Orders? Do we know if the Unmade existed before the Radiant Orders were founded?
  9. cometaryorbit
    One slight annoyance to me is that the characters seem to have "modernized" too fast. I get that Navani and Jasnah are super awesome, but it seems like fabrial tech and political changes are going very quickly and smoothly. Especially with the mental health discussion... it feels too modern. Like, the characters have jumped through progress that took tons of people a century and a half or something (with lots of false starts and totally wrong directions) in RL. I understand there are writing/out-of-world reasons for that, especially on the mental health side, but it still seems weird in a setting/in-world sense.
  10. cometaryorbit
    I doubt the Investiture making up a Shard itself is "accessible" to that kind of change. She'd need half of Odium trapped as Voidlight in gems, and there's probably not enough gems in the entire Cosmere to do that. The Light alteration doesn't rely on a Radiant bond, so Rysn could do that, but maybe not better than anyone else (though, OTOH, the Heightening like effects of the Dawnshard might give her some intuitive understanding... but I doubt it would be super dramatic.)
  11. cometaryorbit
    Not before Stormlight, but before RoW- isn't the term avatar in Oathbringer's epigraphs, with "a new avatar of our being" forming on Obrodai?
  12. cometaryorbit
    I think the Unmade were likely far less significant spren in their original forms... Re-Shephir is described as basically a twisted creationspren, so I'd expect them to be supercharged, Odium-infused versions of "ordinary" spren. Nergaoul might be derived from an angerspren, Ashertmarn from an alespren, etc. Maybe not all of them, though. I am not sure what common spren would correspond with Death Rattles (Moelach) or possessing someone and granting Surges (Yelig-nar)... though Yelignar is called Blightwind, maybe he's derived from a windspren? And maybe Moelach comes from whatever the Truthwatcher's Shardplate spren is? Ba-Ado-Mishram was apparently an important commander even before the False Desolation. The mindless ones like Nergaoul and Ashertmarn were probably used much as we see them in Oathbringer, to mess with human forces' emotions.
  13. cometaryorbit
    The eyebrows would probably be more like a founder effect (where an otherwise rare trait becomes common in an isolated population derived from few ancestors, since one or more of those ancestors had that trait) than allopatric speciation, since the Thaylens aren't nearly distinct enough to be forming a different species from regular humanity.
  14. cometaryorbit
    Oh. Wow. That is exactly true, and I totally missed that. Taravangian taking up Odium makes way more sense now.
  15. cometaryorbit
    Yeah, exactly, so it might be harder to make Navani's techniques work with Mist (or Ruin-Mist). I do think they are set up in RoW for future broader Cosmere use, though. The science/technology will just need more development.
  16. cometaryorbit
    Yeah, I think the blank Connection in BoM is the only use we see. How normal non-blank Connection works is still unexplored.
  17. cometaryorbit
    Kind of, but I think not in the relevant sense. Matter, energy, and Investiture are all *interconvertible* in the Cosmere, just as matter and energy are in RL physics. But that doesn't mean the Investiture equivalent of matter or energy is "available" *as* Investiture, either Innate or Kinetic. Someone's Innate Investiture is a soul thing, distinct from the Investiture-equivalent of the mass-energy of their body. Kind of like how the mass of a 1kg rock in RL theoretically represents 9 X 10^16 joules of energy, but there's no way to get at that energy short of an equal mass of antimatter.
  18. cometaryorbit
    I mean, that's just my assumption, but I think splitting the combined investiture (Harmonium -> Atium + Lerasium) would be the reverse process from Navani's combining of investiture (Stormlight + Voidlight -> Warlight). Scadrian Investiture might be harder to work with though... gems left out at night didn't accumulate Mist*, so there's no similarly convenient container. *We know Era 1 Scadrians used gemstones - Vin has sapphire jewelry at one point for example- and Elend thinks Mist is nothing supernatural; if it seeped into gems, nobles would have noticed. And it might take extra steps to do this with solid Investiture. There might be a way to change physical state of the investiture (e.g. condense Lerasium from Mist, or turn Shardblades to Stormlight or Towerlight) but it can't be easy IMO - creating lots of Lerasium would be crazy powerful, and so would vaporizing Shardblades.
  19. cometaryorbit
    Marasi mentions at one point that mistwraiths are thought to be extinct since the Catacendre. Maybe Sazed did turn them human (though that would wreck the best Kelsier-body theory). I agree that Harmony isn't necessarily good - he's Ruin as well as Preservation. I definitely question some of his choices (ignoring Southern Scadrial when it was freezing right after the Catacendre, and leaving koloss with their bursting-skin/fatal-growth problems... even if he would see it as a loss to turn them human again, I'd think he could cap their growth at nonfatal levels). However, I do think he's trying, that his intent is generally good and that he is aware of the Shardic influence on his mind and trying to work around it. I don't think *he* considers the kandra to be slaves, and I don't think non-Paalm kandra see it that way either. I thought the kandra agreed to work for Harmony - do we even know if that was Harmony's idea or the kandra's own? The Hero of Ages was part of *their* religion (the former Terris one) after all- becoming his followers would seem to be a natural choice, at least for the "loyal" ones (not sure about the Second Generation ones who took over - did they get re-spiked like the others?) The fact Harmony can control their minds isn't his fault- it's just the result of him holding Ruin and them being a Hemalurgic species. He doesn't seem to use that power except in very extreme circumstances.
  20. cometaryorbit
    Don't the HoA epigraphs say that if you use one of the spikes that steals a Quadrant of powers, it's the bind point in the recipient that determines which power? (e.g. getting Allomantic Steel rather than Iron, Pewter, or Tin) So I'm not sure it's as simple as 16 genes*, unless the spike steals 4 at a time. And I don't think the type of Allomancy is necessarily genetic, judging from Straff's illegitimate children not being mostly Tineyes. The specific power a Misting gets might be random or determined in a non-genetic way. *Also, Mistborn can burn other stuff like god-metal alloys. And apparently they can try to burn non-valid metals, though it sickens or kills them rather than giving power? Still, the burning itself would be a magical effect of sorts...
  21. cometaryorbit
    I agree. Certainly Allik says that they need Metalborn and Excisors to make medallions. And if the decline we've seen by Era 2 is already maxed out, natural Allomancy will remain a thing indefinitely. And there can be advantages to having a natural ability even if ability-granting medallions are common. It's a lot easier to search someone for medallions and take them away than to get metal out of someone's stomach. Also, I wonder if mechanical use and natural use are exactly the same. On Roshar, we see that So a natural Misting who's very practiced with their ability might be more flexible or safe in some way than a medallion user? Maybe Kelsier's pushing on just parts of a metal bar (not center of mass) or Wax's steel bubble wouldn't be possible with a steel Allomancy medallion?
  22. cometaryorbit
    Kelsier's violence could have kind of gotten the idea started .. but I think in book one he was worried about Kelsier jeopardizing the plan due to his impulsiveness, rather than concerned about the *morality* of Kelsier's actions.
  23. cometaryorbit
    TLR seems to be Soothing basically constantly, so I think he'd almost have to be a savant in it. I think flaring tin very often, not just burning near-constantly, is a big part of what made Spook a savant in a *relatively* short time (about a year). But TLR has been doing it way longer. EDIT: as for the amount of brass TLR needs, there's very little metal in a vial - just tiny flakes. Even if he's using far more than a normal Soother, it's still probably not that much actual volume - and TLR is going to get more Allomantic effect per gram of metal.
  24. cometaryorbit
    I believe there's WOB that he would have tried to fix the planet, but by then he was warped enough that it might not have actually improved anything. EDIT: hmm, I wonder if he would have tried to alter people more thoroughly to cement his rule/social system- delete Feruchemy genes from the Terris population, make skaa less aggressive/more docile, mess with Spiritual DNA to make it harder for skaa to develop Allomancy, stuff like that.
  25. cometaryorbit
    Not having a Vessel presumably makes a difference, but Harmony could have been Discord, so maybe not *that* different. Yeah, I think this is correct. A Honor+Odium dual-Shard would have Warlight for its Investiture, etc. Navani's techniques are probably the first step toward learning how to, say, split Harmonium into Atium and Lerasium, etc.
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