cometaryorbit

That is a very good point. Renarin's version of Voidbinding is definitely tri-Shardic in a sense, as it's accessed through Odium's corruption (via Sja-anat) of a Honor/Cultivation blended spren. It seems implied that ancient Voidbinding was a bit different, but the general principles might hold. I think this 'corruption' of a system is something a bit different from a 'balance magic' between Shards (as Feruchemy is Ruin/Preservation), since Odium isn't really Invested in Roshar. That might be just a matter of terminology though, Odium's Investiture is involved either way (in this case through Sja-anat).

I don't know what distinguishes an Avatar from a Splinter, so it's hard to tell. I mean, the Stormfather is the primary surviving remnant of Honor, does he count as an Avatar? Nohadon seems way too human in Dalinar's visions to be a Shard-or-major-spren/Splinter-like being. I don't see how that would be possible, since Nightblood's Investiture is primarily/originally of Endowment. Possible, but I think Austre and Jaddeth are somewhat inaccurate descriptions of Endowment and Dominion, not actual beings. Who are those? Quite possible.

Yeah Voidbinding is something else. Yeah I guess I misread, sorry. But I don't think they are of Cultivation either - they are almost certainly pre-Shattering. It's not really... the original Rosharan Surgebinding with the Heralds and Honorblades was all-Honor, with no Cultivation-containing spren, but still had paired powers. Yeah, Voidbinding seems to be what Renarin is doing with his visions (although it's somehow not 'classic' Voidbinding, probably because he powers it with Stormlight rather than Voidlight). I'd disagree there - since the Fused have 9 Orders rather than 10, they are more likely using the Braize "Surgebinding" system, similar-but-not-identical to the Herald-derived Rosharan kind (and the ancient Ashyn kind). Voidbinding is Rosharan, since it has 10 symbols on its chart. It's probably Odium's hack of Rosharan (Herald-derived) Surgebinding, since Odium isn't truly Invested in Roshar (so probably hasn't formed a real "balance magic" in the way Feruchemy is Ruin/Preservation).

Eh, I disagree. I don't think the Listener bonds with normal spren, voidspren (forms of power), or Fused have anything to do with Honor at all. Infusions into the spiritweb is the normal way most magic systems work... foreign Investiture has to get in somehow (mist-snapping or ancestral use of Lerasium for Allomancy, spiking in a piece of foreign spiritweb for Hemalurgy, the Shaod for AonDor, buying or accepting Breaths for Awakening*). That's not specifically of Honor. And the native spren bonding on Roshar isn't necessarily of Honor either, any more than the Seon bonding on Sel. Natural spren bonds on Roshar are core to how the Listeners/Singers work, and they existed before Honor showed up. *Although Breaths are a bit more Physical Realm than most Investiture, they don't really seem to be part of your spiritweb.

Not everything described as a bond needs to be derived from Honor - the Seons on Sel are of Devotion, and they form bonds which are basically similar to spren bonds. I think the original spren bonds with the Listeners/Singers (and with Rosharan wildlife) are older than the arrival of any Shards on Roshar: probably pre-Shattering, like the highstorms. The Regals/Forms of Power are voidspren (spren of Odium) hijacking this natural system. I don't think Honor and Cultivation are involved at all. Original (Herald/Honorblade) Surgebinding was a pure Honor system, yes. The Honorblades were pieces of Honor, and the Heralds originally drew Investiture straight from Honor rather than using Stormlight. Nahel bond Surgebinding is a "hybrid" system in that the spren which form the bonds are a mixture of Honor and Cultivation. They are still basically using the same system, though - copying the Honorblades - so the system is mostly "Honor-y" (based on Oaths/Ideals) ... the Lightweavers use Truths, but even they still use the First Ideal. Voidbinding could be tri-Shardic, yeah, but I don't think we know enough to say anything for sure (a WOB implies that what Renarin does isn't "Classic" Voidbinding).

Yes, there's probably not much point in arguing this further. (I would point out, though, that I think it's less the physical planet and more its Cognitive and Spiritual aspects of the planet and the way the Shard's Investiture infuses and interacts with them, and Connects to human and/or mechanical users of the magic.)

There are a number of WOBs that say that it is based on the planet... Because the system of KR-style Surgebinding, with its specific Surge pairs, was produced by the interaction of Honor and Roshar. Honor on a different planet, or a different Shard on Roshar, would produce a different system. It wasn't Honor's decision to make the system work that way - that was the only system that the combination of Honor + Roshar could produce. But while the potential for the magic system existed as soon as Honor Invested in Roshar, no one actually had the ability to access it until Honor handed out the Honorblades. (This isn't necessarily unusual. In Scadrial's early history there were no Allomancers either. And Awakening appears to be only a relatively few centuries old at the time of Warbreaker.)

Harmony doesn't seem to know what Trellium is, from what MeLaan says in Shadows of Self. So I'm not sure that he can. I read that part as representing Sazed stopping a "direct" destructive attack on Scadrial. He might be able to stop an overt attack (eg, destroying the planet or making it uninhabitable, or a full scale invasion) or a full scale Investing in the planet to the degree that Harmony is Invested in it, but not a small degree of Investment (enough to create a few hemalurgic spikes of condensed 'Trell' investiture) or a couple of worldhopping "red-eyed Faceless Immortals" popping in.

I don't think so... What I'm arguing for is that the "natural" paths for magic to follow are largely 'set' when a planet is created (or forms naturally, if any of the Cosmere planets did). The magic systems don't actually exist until a Shard Invests in the planet... but when a Shard does, its power "fits into" the paths that are already there. The magic system(s) that actually form are dependent on both the individual Shard and the individual planet... If Honor had Invested in Nalthis instead of Roshar, or if Endowment rather than Honor had come to Roshar with Cultivation, a different magic system would have resulted - different from both Awakening and (KR-style) Surgebinding. (Since both the Fused and ancient Ashyn use or used the Surges in some form, the hypothetical Endowment-linked Rosharan system probably would still have manipulated the Surges, but not through a bond with spren or an Honorblade.) I don't think that's quite correct. The specific metals having their specific effects would have been set at the time Ruin and Preservation created the planet, not at the time Allomancy and Feruchemy were granted to people. Steel sitting around by itself doesn't have an Allomantic or Feruchemical effect, true, but (Bands of Mourning spoilers)

I'm not sure that's necessarily the case. The Fused 'order' that uses Gravitation seems to work very similarly to the KR version of that Surge, and probably Abrasion also (though we have only very brief mentions of that one), but what about the Fused that grow Shardplate-like carapace? That seems pretty different from KR abilities (maybe a warped version of Progression or Tension?) Due to the 9 Orders thing, I really do think the Fused are using the Braize magic system, not a copy of Rosharan Surgebinding.

Sure. but Roshar is presumably also artificial (Julia set continent, etc.) - just the work of Adonalsium rather than one or two specific Shards. But I think the same principle applies, decisions made in the creation of the planet itself largely (though not entirely) fix what the magic systems will be. Yelig-nar, sure, but I think the Unmade are something completely different that is basically outside "magic systems" in the sense that we normally mean, more like the Stormfather's ability to create a highstorm or the Nightwatcher's Old Magic boons/banes. I think the unique powers of these mega-spren are more like the abilities of Shards than the magic systems used by humans; it's just that in Yelig-nar's case, he can "hijack" the Rosharan spren bonding system to grant those powers to a human. So I guess what I said before wasn't quite right. Honor probably could have Invested a significant part of his power to create an unique Honorblade that could grant all 10 Surges (though I'm still not sure "off-pair" combinations like Gravitation+Abrasion+Transportation would work), but it would have remained an unique one-off. The spren couldn't have copied it to become part of a magic system used by many different individuals. I really can't see that WoB as being compatible with Honor choosing Surge pairs for specific purposes, since Honor didn't design the planet. Adonalsium making the planet in a way that the Surge pairs were ones that made sense, yeah, but not Honor deciding on them "after the fact".

Yeah, and Preservation mentions to Kelsier "the metal, flared at the moment of transition" - so I think it was a combination of flaring malatium and the 'Realmatic transition' of dying that gave Kelsier that better glimpse.

As for the Odium vs Passion thing... Odium is definitely lying about being all emotion (he doesn't include love for example, that's in Devotion's purview), but it does seem to be implied that there is more to Odium than just hatred in the normal sense. I think it's all aggressive/consumptive emotions, but anger being included seems likely.

I think this is it. The Surges themselves are probably common across the entire Greater Roshar solar system. The KR and Heralds have the bond-based, 10 Orders, paired Surges system; the Fused have a 9 Orders, single Surge system (initiation not yet known); and the original humans of Ashyn had a third system we don't know - but all three are different ways of accessing the same basic powers. Well, what is meant by "natural"? It's not just Scadrial, Frost says that "these worlds bear the touch and design of Adonalsium". I think 'natural' is being used in the sense of 'inherent to the thing under discussion' (ie in the same sense as 'human nature'), not in the sense of 'occurring without intelligent intervention'. That is, the Surge pairs are inherent to Roshar. Honor didn't just arbitrarily say "hey I think it would be cool to put Adhesion and Gravitation together"; instead, Honor decided to grant Surgebinding powers, but the way Roshar is put together means that Surgebinding powers manifest in these specific ways. Shards do have some degree of freedom to mess with things, (Mistborn) But there are significant limits -- I don't think Honor could just have decided to make an Honorblade with Gravitation, Abrasion, and Transportation.

Jasnah soulcasts viable blood for Shallan though... That involves cells, not just relatively simple organic molecules like starch/cellulose. I think that it is kind of the other way around. Soulcasting is a "Cognitive-first" system. The Soulcaster doesn't choose a group of Physical atoms/axi - they choose a Cognitively defined object* and persuade it with stormlight to become a different Cognitively defined object. Then the atoms/axi conform to whatever the changed Cognitive aspect tells them to become. So I don't think Physical complexity, in terms of atoms and molecules, is relevant. Some of the Essences are chemically complex, like grain and meat, others can be pure elements like metals. Also you run into questions like, do you use Metal or Blood ("all non-oil liquid") to Soulcast mercury? If it's below freezing outside, do you have to use Crystal instead of Blood to Soulcast water, or can you not do it at all? There are potential overlaps between the Ten Essences. I think the definition of what is what has to be Cognitive. *Which is probably why Jasnah tells Shallan in OB that air is harder to work with, as it's so amorphous. I don't think it's without limits, just that the limits are Cognitive in nature rather than Physical. It might be more comparable to AonDor, in the sense that the system as a whole can theoretically do an immense variety of things, but no individual user could ever learn to do more than a small fraction of those things. And Soulcasting is way more limited than AonDor - it's only ever going to turn one kind of matter into another kind of matter. (It is somewhat broader than the other Surges, but I think that is a relic of its being originally more of a separate magic system rather than just one of ten Surges... there are a couple of WOBs that talk about it that way.)

I think it might be one of these Cosmere Realmatic things that is kind of on the edge of magical and not; magical in the sense that it's different from how it would work in our universe, but not magic in the sense that there is an active use of Investiture powering the effect. I doubt that Shallan is actively burning through Stormlight just by hanging around people and making them feel better. It's probably a Connection thing of some sort. IE, is Shallan altering the people around her via some sort of active Investiture effect, or are her otherwise-mundane social interactions just more effective at influencing people than they otherwise would be?

According to the Stormfather, Odium was imprisoned ("sealed") by Honor and Cultivation - the Oathpact/Heralds imprisoned the Fused, not Odium himself. (OB Ch 38, "Broken People")

Oh, OK, I misunderstood - I thought you were talking about something like the Stormfather's power to cause highstorms. Yeah, a really huge-scale application of Adhesion could cause all kinds of messy weather/atmospheric effects. I kind of doubt Odium is going to be able to fuel the Honorblade directly, since it's a chunk of Honor's Investiture in physical form. It's possible, though - maybe by some mechanism like Sja-anat corrupting spren, since the Honorblade is kind of like an inert/static/non-living spren. EDIT: The Stormfather in OB does say that some humans confuse Kalak with him, as well as Jezrien, though.

As in, even though it had become unworkable, since the Oathpact had already been sworn, Honor's Intent forced him to leave it as is? That's quite possible.

Mostly. The one thing I don't think has actually been confirmed (though hinted at) is my claim that all of Roshar's natural magic involves gems/gemhearts of some kind. The 2 things I'm uncertain of are skyeels and the Purelake magic fish, which don't really seem to be crustacean-ish like most of the native Rosharan wildlife. (And maybe the Ryshadium, but I'd guess that their spren bonds are not truly natural evolution but the result of Honor, Ishar, a Bondsmith, or a Stone Shaman with the Bondsmith Honorblade messing around.)

Sure, they couldn't store the fire itself, but if the Feruchemist was storing up all the excess heat, there wouldn't be any burning since the temperature wouldn't rise. (A live human body isn't really very flammable anyway, it's too water-rich.) Even hair, which is dead cells and comparatively dry, would probably count as part of the Feruchemist's body Cognitively and so wouldn't burn, since it wouldn't heat up enough to ignite. The reduced oxygen & smoke inhalation could still be harmful though.

I'm not sure the Fused got their Surgebinding by Odium copying the Honorblade/Herald/KR system. Apparently the Surges were used to destroy Ashyn, though that magic system wasn't identical to modern KR-style Surgebinding (derived from the spren copying the Honorblades), and also not identical -- though similar -- to the modern Ashyn disease-based magic. And there are 9 orders of Fused, not 10, and 9 is supposed to be Braize's number. So I think the Surges in general might be shared across the whole Greater Roshar system, and the Fused use Odium's/Braize's means of accessing it. The reason the Fused didn't have it originally might have been a result of having to adapt the Braize system to work right for Rosharan-native singers.

That's what the robot/cloned shell would be for. I had the same question when I read the story, but I figured it was just some part of their own moral code that they had to tell people at a certain point.

It's a comparison of the way the Dark One is imprisoned in the hell-like realm of Shayol Ghul in Wheel of Time, to the way Odium is imprisoned in the hell-like realm of Braize/Damnation in Stormlight Archive. Cuendillar is a WOT magical material that the seals on the Dark One's prison were made of. The Stormfather's description of the Oathpact in chapter 38 of OB does use the word 'seal' rather a lot, so I can see the connection...

To Braize, sure... I was speculating that their link to Honor was likely far weaker once they got to Braize. The Stormfather says they fought there as well, not just on Roshar: (Oathbringer Chapter 38, "Broken People") The Stormfather also says the Fused didn't have Surges originally. So I think the Heralds must have been far weaker on Braize, as I really can't see Heralds with near-infinite Stormlight access and Honorblades being able to be defeated and captured, and kept captured, by any number of non-powered people. My guess is that on Braize - Odium's planet - their direct Investiture draw from Honor was cut off or vastly weakened. That is a very good point. But I don't think they can permanently kill the Fused (destroy the Cognitive Shadow), otherwise there wouldn't be any Fused left after so many Desolations. I think Shardblade-killing them must just separate the CogShadow from the body, not actually destroy it. Well, sure, in general I see that. It just seems a bit odd because at that point, it seems like the Heralds had to break their oaths or Rosharan humanity would have died off very shortly. It seems like that is a situation that Honor wouldn't want to let stand due to the very nature of his Intent. Certainly, but it seems that the "stopgap" thing was only done because there wasn't a way to permanently kill the Fused.