alder24

Ashynite Surgebinding wasn't the same as Rosharan, Rosharans would call what was happening on Ashyn as Surgebinding but they would also call Allomancy a Surgebinding too. Whatever it was, Ishar was able to manipulate connections, just like Rosharan Bondsmith, but he wasn't like Rosharan Bondsmith. Plus the entire star system is invested by Honor and Cultivation (and Odium), not just the planet Roshar - just because Odium came with Ashynites on Roshar doesn't mean Ashyn was invested by Odium and manifested Odium's magic system there. Also Brandon is calling most magic on Ashyn Cultivation-based, as Cultivation once visited that planet. However it's hard to say if that was pre-destruction or post-destruction, or even if the destruction of Ashyn changed anything in terms of from which Shard the magic comes from. I now think that Ishar was using Cultivation's magic system, that naturally spawned on Ashyn, and was encouraged by Odium to experiment more, but Odium wasn't invested on Ashyn - at that point he was still hunting Shards and was careful not to invest too much in a system, so he wouldn't get bound to it and stuck.

Oh we did comment on that but we have no storming idea what it is. Sho Del is likely but missing arms makes it unlikely. Dragons are out of the question because Riina surely wants to avoid them. So I guess if there are sapient pancake-like beings, why not some lizard humanoids? There are no WoBs on that. Not every dragon can shapeshift, Lesser Dragons can't but still Riina was very unhappy to know a dragon lived on Lumar, so I doubt she would employ one. But that being has to be powerful enough to kill or deal with Hoid. That's not just any species, I doubt regular Sho Del could do it. Maybe that's a mix of human and Sho Del? But that doesn’t sound strong enough to deal with Hoid.

I should have just searched for WoB:

There is a problem, they are sapient, they are very intelligent. I think trying to domesticate them might be morally questionable. But they would indeed be very powerful assets in war, just one ramming into enemy ranks would destroy the whole formation, which your troops can easily follow and exploit. Shardblades are mostly useless against them, and if you fortify their legs with some invested or aluminum armor they're fully immune to them. Mount spikes and blades on legs for extra damage. They would be like Mumakils from LoTR but bigger and deadlier. We don't know young Chasmfiends, they are making chrysalis and then emerge as Chasmfiends from it. We've never seen their young ones. Please avoid double posting, you can edit your previous post to add new things:

This, WoK ch 36: I don't think that's the eye of the Highstorm, rather a vision sent by Stormfather (massive face in the sky is a clue). I don't know if the eye of the storm is completely silent (I know light can reach it). But I might be wrong. Wouldn't the leading edge with the strongest winds appear once more on the other side of the main body, after it passes? It should appear twice, instead Kaladin noted clearly that winds weren't that strong anymore after this vission/eye. For me that suggests that Highstorms are unnaturally not rotating, just straight stormfront moving across the continent. But I don't know hurricanes well enough to know this. But if Highstorm has the eye, how wide would it be for spheres across the entire Roshar to be renewed? It has to be either as large as Roshar is high or weirdly elongated, so spheres could be renewed almost at the same time in Herdaz, Kholinar, Kharbrant and Thaylen. For me this doesn't make sense, it can't be circular.

Highstorm is a massive hurricane-like storm, but unlike hurricanes, it isn't circular or rotating but it's a massive straight stormfront, moving ~370 mph across the Roshar (for comparison the strongest winds on Earth ever recorded was ~250 mph, while the cat. 5 hurricanes have sustained winds reaching ~150 mph, and move with speeds 10-40 mph across Earth's surface). It's natural, but also magical - it provides Stormlight, Honor's investiture, and is somewhat controlled by Stormfather. It causes massive amounts of rain (that's why chasms on Shattered Plains are flooded, as they are holes in the ground to which water flows), and crem (which contains minerals and nutrients necessary for plants to live) and has very strong winds. Because of how strong the winds are, it can rip trees from the ground and even throw boulders into the air. Highstorms travel from east to west, but get weaker the further west it goes. Everstorm is basically the same but opposite. It travels from west to east every 9 days, 120 mph, has strong winds and rain, and lightning too - but not always, sometimes Everstorm has no rain or winds, only lightning, conditions can change drastically and unnaturally. That's because the storm of Odium, it carries with it his spren and also Odium controls this storm - he can make it stronger/weaker, target lightning strikes at will or even stop it in place. Where both Highstorm and Everstorm meet, they amplify their power creating even stronger winds - that is what knocked whole plateaus down. Highstorms are inspired by Jupiter's Red Spot. Those are basics, if you want more details you can read coppermind page about Highstorm and Everstorm, but be aware, there are Oathbringer and Rhythm of War spoilers there: https://coppermind.net/wiki/Highstorm and for Everstorm https://coppermind.net/wiki/Everstorm

Yup. Because there is nothing suspicious in advertising a weird page, unrelated to Brandon. Just report those. Recently I had a weird dream. Chaos made me a mod so I can ban bots when no other mods are present. It felt sooooo gooooood.

Actually draining of color changes something in the soul, I think it does drain a tiny portion of investiture from it: There is this WoB:

Interesting but that's not possible. I don't think Rysn needs healing. Judging from Hoid and his healing abilities, which came from Dawnshard, Rysn might be able to heal herself if she just changed her self-perception. As long as she views herself as a cripple, even a Divine Breath won't be able to heal her. If she were to get just regular Breaths from Vasher, she could use them with Dawnshard. But Divine Breath doesn't stick with a healed person. There is no need for Vasher to give up his Divine Breath for Rysn yet. But with Divine Breath you can do something else than just healing:

Ruin influenced and changed those prophecies. There is a chance that Ruin changed this part of prophecies to fit them with Vin and make her release him. If those prophecies would always use male pronouns, it would be much, much harder to justify Vin as the Hero of Ages. Or it was Preservation's plan all along as he knew Vin had to pick up Preservation to kill Ruin. She also was the Hero and she had to believe in it. Therefore those prophecies had to use gender-neutral pronouns to refer to both Vin and Sazed at the same time. But you're right. Vin and Mare. But rest is true. I disagree. It's more fun this way. There is always another secret, and revealing everything at once would just leave nothing for the future. We got a lot from Kelsier and we know this will be explained in SH 2 - that's enough. We also know from WoBs that he most likely stamped his soul to a Mistwraith with hemalurgic spike, and gave it his bones. It's not his body.

Thank you. I hope everything gets better for you. They definitely can build them but I haven't thought of how to make FTL. Normal space engines would likely work like ion thrusters - just pushing some small stuff out of the craft. Yes, the idea is that Esma is moving with a significant fraction of the speed of light, so fast that it takes just hundreds or even a few decades to move from one star to another. This messes up Cognitive Realm and travel routes quite a lot, but also makes this planet hard to find. However this speed is far too big for the planet to stay in the galaxy - it should get launched into intergalactic medium, but it not only stays within the galaxy, but also within the Cosmere star cluster - that's because Progression nudges and changes the trajectory of this planet so it would remain in Cosmere. So technically Esma is the spaceship As long as it's unkeyed, they can. No, it's too big to fit through any perpendicularity, and there are no nutrients in CS, it can’t live there. It possibly would be able to live on different planets if it was somehow transported (probably not on Roshar, no soil or large water sources), but there is no way to do so, as it isn't made out of seeds and it's huge even as Neruna-Kai. And you would need to feed it throughout the entire journey otherwise it would simply die. No it doesn't work. Naturally it doesn't exist so I haven't thought of it. Unknown. That's why I said "The technological magic system exceeded my abilities." I wasn't able to think of every metal effect. But for example Esmium-chromium alloy wouldn't just attract like iron, but it would be a way for the tree to absorb minerals or stuff better into itself. I recently made up a short story in this word (literally an hour ago - this includes worldhoppers trying to collect An-Neruna for use on different planets) where Esmium-chromium with pure unkeyed investiture in it would leech investiture like A-chromium out of people, and if you put a small hemalurgic nicrosil spike in it, it would overwrite the effect and consume innate investiture directly from people souls, consuming them. Now I think in the same way putting an unkeyed coppermind with some memories would leech those memories out of people or something like that. Maybe alloy of gold to create some healing effect with proper stuff inside the bubble? I don't know, it's too complicated for me. Not really, I wasn't able to make them up. And you've praised me for naming convention

Good to know. I was afraid we're getting too heated, because sometimes it's really hard to know the tone and emotions of others. And I myself got more aggressive so I wanted to back down just in case. Sorry if you felt that. Yes, it is, but you have all rights to defend your theory and you're doing quite a good job with that, at least with Honor helping Taln part, as I feel it's difficult to explain why this didn't happen and there aren't any concrete proofs for that, but it derailed into "are Shard and Vessel one or not". I enjoy fierce discussions too. Yup, that's the problem.

That sounds weird, that tapping Harmonium would grant Feruchemy, but your logic fits the pattern. However would it be permanent Feruchemy or would it stop as soon as you stop tapping? Allomancy is granted because Lerasium itself is used to forge a connection between you and Preservation. You need to forge the same connection to both Ruin and Preservation to gain Feruchemy - you need investiture for it. If so, tapping Harmonium should "burn" it as it's used to create that connection. Sounds very weird to me, as that's not how Feruchemy works. I think it's more likely burning it like Lerasium would have a side effect of making you into a Feruchemist. Another WoB: But then if Harmonium makes people into Feruchemist, what made the first Feruchemist on Scadrial, when there was no Harmonium? You can "report" the other topic as a double post:

Yes, many types of healing can heal spiritual wounds, that include F-gold healing. You can recover your power with enough healing as it would patch the stolen part of the soul with the same thing. But the healing has to be done in the moment of spiking. I don't know if Regrowth would be able to heal a soul, as healing someone else is a weaker method of healing, and has some limitations: Btw this topic should be in the Cosmere Discussion subforum, as it includes spoilers from SA. Yes, in TLM they did it but they only took innate investiture, not powers. We don't know if you could do the same with stealing powers, but I think that's unlikely.

I don't like the way this discussion is progressing. I feel like it becomes unnecessarily heated, and we're going in circles repeating the same things over and over again. We're going nowhere with this. The WoB has quite decisively disproves your theory: "If I was pinned down on that, I would say no." For now it looks like it can help a lot on its own. Because 7000 years ago Heralds didn't have access to Breaths. Awakening started to be practiced and developed around 600 years before Warbreaker, which is "few generations before WoK". When Breaths became more understood and common across Cosmere, it was already too late for Heralds. And Vasher seems to be the one who discovered the command to transfer memories. Of course this doesn't include Hoid, as Hoid is Hoid, he could either get them earlier, or use some other methods like Feruchemy. You claimed that the power can't be hurt, I gave you examples of the power being hurt. They're not separate, Vessel is the mind of a Shard, at that moment Odium's mind was fully concentrated on Taravangian, it was there, with him, that's why it took the blow. But it still weaken Odium a bit. In the same way your body sometimes does things you don't want it to do, your immune system sometimes tries to kill you, or your mind thinks about depressive stuff you don't want it to, or you fight with yourself to achieve something. Are you not one with your mind and body despite internal conflicts? The same way Kaladin scars remained while he was struggling with depression. Shard's power is keyed to its intent, but the mind can affect that intent via self-perception. Perception is the key in Cosmere. What? Honor is Splintered. Devotion and Dominion is Splintered. Isn't that enough for you? What's your source on "Splintering is usually done after the Vessel is dead."? It's the opposite, Coppermind: It is. Creating spren is called Splintering. Cosmere Spoiler: BAM connected herself to all Singers giving them forms of powers without Voidspren, that's why it was so surprising for Radiatns. Ulim is the proof, RoW ch 73: By serving Leshwi, killing Jezrien and becoming Vyre, giving his emotions to Odium. Odium is forbidden from using his powers on people, that's different from interactions. No Voidspren are present on Roshar. Thrill can only change the mind to a specific mindset, which isn't suitable for most Voidspren (as Singers have to have a very specific mindset when they get new forms). Odium provides forms of power by using Voidspren, like he did with Venli. He can't directly grant forms of power, but he can make Voidspren give them to chosen people.

He was influencing Dalinar through the Thrill. It provided a connection for Odium to use.

Yes, you did: KoWT Jasnah reading: Yes, that's the fundamental nature of a Shard, that if Vessel is in conflict with Shard's intent, his control over it is weak. But that is still one entity. Nightblood weakened the Shard directly, not only killed the Vessel. Splintering hurts the power, and it can be done in a way that doesn't kill Shard nor Vessel. Dominion, Devotion, Ambition and Honor would disagree with your last statement. Not a human anymore, but some weaknesses are still present, like flawed thinking, susceptibility to emotional reactions etc. Those things remain because the personality is carried into the Shard, and slowly changed to fit the intent. That's the nature of the Shard. Mind which controls the power, but this control is filtered through the intent of that power. 11th is the Shard, it's incomprehensibly greater than 10. Vessel's mind got expanded when they Ascended is too great to be affected by a simple torture. That's not what I've said. No. Intent blinded him. This isn't the first Shard that was blinded by his intent and couldn't accurately predict the future. OB ch 38: Connection isn't severed, it's just very weak. With which I disagree as we have WoBs saying that Heralds madness is due to them living longer than they should and dying over and over again. That's another part of your theory that is contradicted by WoBs. Does the quote have the word "harm" in it? No, it's general "using my powers on people", which include giving them forms of power. No connection, no ability to interact with people. No Voidspren, no forms of power. That's so simple. BAM wasn't restricted in that way. He didn't make any new connection, he used the existing one that Moash had. RoW I-4:

If he breaks his deal then it's too late to release from it - Odium will be wounded and open to Cultivation's attack, or even Dalinar's attack, Odium would have to retreat, even if there would be nobody that could force his will upon Odium (if Kharbranth gets destroyed or champion form it dies, only Taravangian would be able to force his will on Odium, so that's useless, but Odium will still be wounded). That makes sense. Possible. I disagree. The break between SA5 and SA6 is too short for a completely new adversary to appear. Odium will be a major player, but I believe that he and Honor would ultimately merge.

Both Brandon and Hoid specifically said that what Hoid is doing helps him avoid the fate of Heralds. That's confirmed. I guess living that long messes up with your brain, as there is too much you have to remember. You don't control what you forgot without Breaths, it messes up with your perception of time, personality and connections. Using Breaths to store all those memories there helps mitigate this madness. Perception. The power has an intent which Rayse tried to change. The same way your self-perception affects your healing. A Vessel definitely is a vulnerable part of a Shard - RoW has proven to us - but they're still merged. A Vessel is not a human anymore, as WoBs and books confirmed. A Vessel is a mind that controls the power. No it's the opposite. The plan stopped working the moment one of the Heralds broke and allowed for the Return. If Honor intervened back then, the pain would be spread among 11 entities, note 2, it would make much more sense for hi, to help them back then, as they all would have lasted far longer. That's why id just doesn't make any sense. He didn't lose connection to other Heralds, it's still there, Dalinar saw it. Jezrien shows the signs of madness in Prelude, Kalak too. It started much earlier than your theory suggests, and that's consistent with the nature of CS. Because he couldn't. Odium gives forms of power with Voidspren. Honor bound him to Roshar in a way so he can't openly influence people. I've literally given you a quote explaining why, and you've ignored it. He can't make connections, he needs to use existing ones, like we saw with Kaladin - he had to use Moash's connection because he couldn't make his own connection to Kaladin. Because Brandon said "no". There is no notable connection between Honor's death and Heralds abandoning Oathpact. The WoB made it very clear.

Nah, people are always like this, everywhere (Ashyn...). Threnody was a different situation, there was a direct clash between 3 Shards, which threw chunks of Ambition on the system. If you were to Splinter Odium the way Honor was Splintered, and maybe making smaller pieces, Roshar would be fine. Those pieces would eventually become self-aware and sapient, but if they're small enough, you will be dealing with new Spren or Unmades, rather than new mini-Shards. The moment Dalinar would place a champion from Kharbranth, Odium would know, which would void Taravangian's deal. That sounds possible. I doubt however Dalinar would win the Contest, I think he must lose it, otherwise Taravangian's Ascension would be pointless. Brandon made the decision to switch Rayse with Taravangian because he knew that after his failure in RoW, he stopped being a fearsome adversary, so he changed him for Taravangian. This would be truly pointless if the very first thing TOdium did was to lose again. That's why I believe that TOdium has to win, draw or force Dalinar out of the Contest somehow for him to remain threatening, and that would backfire later on, forcing him to withdraw. But he has to score a big win. WoB: Also per Coppermind Lirin trained near Hearthstone, but in his youth traveled to Kharbranth - I doubt that around the time Kal was born, but it's still possible. I like it, it's a very interesting idea. However if we're looking for Kal's unknown connection to the wider world, we have to look at Helsina and her connection to Aesudan. There is something going on there. We agree here, maybe it won't seal Odium for good but at least for 10-15 years, till the SA 6 starts, giving both sides to develop tech, grow in numbers and start a new conflict. I don't think a rebellion in Kharbranth would do it as it has to be Odium who destroys it, not some random people. And there is nobody in rule connected to him anymore, as his family cut ties with him and denounced him.

Honor got killed and it wasn't that bad. The power is still on Roshar, and most didn't even realize that. But mindless power is very dangerous, it would have to be thoroughly Splintered to small pieces. Taravangian couldn't have done this, his deal with Odium specifically forced him to serve Odium. Revealing that and working with Dalinar against Odium would be a betrayal of Odium and it would mean breaking off the deal. OB ch 122: But that would be smart, I admit. However that's why I think whatever TOdium will do will somehow cause the accidental destruction of Kharbranth, forcing him to withdraw from Roshar. Winning the contest and making Dalinar into Fused, might deadeye Stormfather, thus causing eternal weeping, flooding parts of Roshar - destroying Kharbranth.

Yeah, that's natural for CS. Breaths would help IF they were using them to store their memories through all those centuries like Hoid did, not now. Now it is too late. Human mind just isn't built to last that long and to remember that much, that's why Breaths are so helpful. Permanently restore Taln? No idea. And no, the main cause of their madness is because of their CS nature, proven by WoB. Oathpact might have helped a bit but that's unknown - Taln who remained loyal to it, is now the most insane Herald. No, they aren't. You're wrong. The Vessel ceases to be a human/Sho Del/Dragon the moment they Ascend. It's not a human anymore. It's a Shard. And with it comes a massive amount of Shardic knowledge and intuitive understanding of Shard's nature and its abilities. A Shard is everything but stupid. Because Vessel holds the whole power of a Shard, it's infinitely more invested than Taln. Vessel's mind was also expanded to massive size when they Ascended. Whatever was used against Taln is simply nothing compared to a Shard. There is a very simple explanation - Honor was already dying and that was a prolonged event. This isn't about Shard's Intent anymore. Honor was already mortally wounded by Odium, and was losing his mind. He died after Recreance and Tanavast's CS merged with Stormfather. OB ch 113: And he still did it and got Splintered. That makes no sense. Why not share the pain with all 10 Heralds, saving them for longer? He made plans when he was dying, warned future humans of incoming True Desolation, gave them hints on how to fight with Odium and prepared Stormfather to take his place. Good plan in my opinion, all made when he was already mad. Not to mention binding Odium to Roshar which also turned out to be a good idea, saving other Shards from Splintering. Now he has Voidspren, Fused, active Unmades and Everstorm. That's why he can do so much on Roshar now. But he still needs connection to act against people. He said in RoW that breaking his word would open him to her attack. He is omnipresent, he already is on Roshar but can't reach there easily. Just acting won't expose him to her attack, he is doing it right now and Cultivation didn't directly attack him. And apparently Honor and Cultivation binding him to the Roshar system somehow made him unable to influence people, there is you explanation why Odium wasn't active after Aharietiem. RoW ch 112: Rift and imprisonment isn't a wound. Those all are separate things mentioned by Taravangian. Rayse was weak because he was fighting with Odium's intent and trying to change it to Passion. He was enslaved by Odium's power. That, and failure to take Dalinar and Kaladin, made Rayse weak. RoW ch 114: Plus look at "he became the power", which proves Vessels aren't separate from Power, but one with it. Vessel is a Shard. We know he did fight back, wounding Odium. It is because in your theory abandoning Oathpact made Honor intervene and caused his death. And even if you count is as a tangential relation, that's still in conflict with the WoB "If I was pinned down on that, I would say no."

That's why I gave you dozens of different quotes. Read them again. Venli calls Fused "Listener's gods" on multiple occasions. Why? If the point was to prevent the from summoning their gods, warning them which form is from gods and how to avoid gods' return is far better than telling them something that they wouldn't experience anymore. Voidspren do grant forms, they are also Singers' gods. Everything checks out.

What I meant is that taking away memories is the only known way to minimize the damage done to the mind of CS, we know it from Hoid, who stores his memories in Breaths because he has been living for far too long. But Heralds seem to experience no memory loss so it's unlikely Oathpact will help them avoid madness. Their madness is because they have been living for millenia and dying dozens of times, straining their souls (keep in mind, Honor did though that Heralds will die more than once). They aren't separate. They are almost one. The Vessel's mind doesn't deteriorate like CS's one, but changes to fit Shard's intent better (which is reversible, if a Vessel drops his Shard, he will slowly go back to how he used to be, at least mostly). Vessel's mind is just too big, to strongly connected to a Shard to be affected by a simple torture. Mistborn WoB: Is Honor about what's right? I think that Honor is mostly about oaths, but partially about justice, order and natural laws. Help of a Shard. Yes, that's a lot. If that was all it took to bind Fused and Odium permanently on Braize, why Honor didn't do that earlier? After the Second Desolation he knew his plan failed. If he could directly intervene and prevent Odium from returning on Roshar, why didn't he do that? Yes, but he's bound mainly to Braize - he requires connection to work with something/somebody on Roshar, and once Fused and Voidspren are sealed off on Braize too, he has almost nobody to connect to. He still needs Everstorm to talk with Taravangian in OB/RoW. He's limited in what he can achieve on Roshar. Only Unmades remain, but they usually disappear or hide. He simply can't do more. Moreover your theory didn't explain how Odium was wounded by Honor. If Tanavest made himself so weak, how could he fight back? No, it's directly related. In your theory if Heralds hadn't abandoned Oathpact, Honor wouldn't be Splintered. The WoB even said to not seek any relation here: "If I was pinned down on that, I would say no."

At least 7000 Rosharan years since the First Desolation. And it's very likely still can be the case, as Honor's death was a very protracted process. It could take thousands of years. Mistborn spoilers and WoB: I don't think there is any proof for this. This insanity comes from living longer than humanly possible and dying multiple times, and it would still manifest, because this is the nature of CS. It would take something like stealing their memories to save them from this madness and we know from books that Heralds have good recollection of the past, while not always able to accurately tell the passage of time. You really think that whatever tortured Heralds could affect a Shard, an infinite pool of investiture, to that degree? I highly doubt this. I doubt Honor would be willing to do something like that in the first place, Shards rarely directly intervene in the Physical Realm, and we don't know what Oathpact allowed Honor to do. Also that would massively deminished Taln's achievement of withstanding 4500 years of torture. Because between Desolations Odium was trapped on Braize just like Fused were, he couldn't influence Roshar in almost any way, especially in a direct way like BAM. Odium being bound to Braize is not from Oathpact, but from his entrapment by Honor. To add more, breaking of the Oathpact isn't related that much to Honor's death, your theory would make it a direct consequence of abandoning Oathpact, which would contradict this WoB: Honor's death is more related to Honor trapping Odium on Braize: