Vortaan

You know, I had forgotten about the stone thing with the Parshendi dead. It's an interesting link to the Shin, don't you think? Also I made a post somewhere where I described my theory on the Parshendi/Dawnchant connection. The points raised against it were that someone would have probably twigged to it by now, which I find unlikely. Alethi male nobility aren't exactly a group with a well-rounded education

Although actually you're kind of making my point, come to think of it. Neither Seons nor spren seem to be able to function very well without borrowing the Cognitive aspect of a human. Seons do it with the master they are bonded to (probably), and spren with the nahel bond. So while I'll agree that both could be Splinters and give us clues to how holderless Shards would act, Nightblood still falls outside that category.

Oh, possible third reason. We don't have an example of Inquisitor double bronze. Vin's spike is her earring, and she doesn't wear it constantly. Presumably it's lost a lot it's charge over the years. Maybe a fully charged double bronze would work.

Atium probably existed before the Lord Ruler, since Preservation made the Pits to contain Ruin's essence. I'm guessing the Well cycle occurred more than once, but if each one wasn't a Feruchemist, then they might be remembered as gods (Trell and company, perhaps?) or maybe just really powerful kings. Rashek may have just been the only one who thought of shoving the planet close to the sun.

Not quite right. Ruin could build something up, but Ruined it in the process. Koloss are 5 Ruined lives turned into 1 strong monster. Inquistors are at least 9 Ruined lives to make one pseudo-Mistborn... anyway, you get the point. Ruin always creates by destroying more raw materials than he gets out. Admittedly what he gets out of it is very very strong, generally strong than the ingredients used to make it, but still... large amounts of life loss.

I can't recall Brandon confirming that either of those things is true. Seons definitely not, and I seem to recall some spren being of both Cultivation and Honor.

Hrm. So instead of creating the Parshendi, he implants them with splinters, making them more sentient than the average Parshendi and gifting them with the music thing? Alright, I'll buy that as a possibility. Have an upvote, good sir.

The only problem I see here is that it isn't an apples to apples situation. Shards only have a weak will on their own (per Sazed), and no intelligence really. I don't think they actually do much to service their intent without a guiding mind. Nightblood is a fully sentient being. He tries to figure out how to destroy evil, there are just conceptual gaps in his knowledge because... well, he's a sentient piece of metal, and has no experience really to draw on to create such distinctions. Both Shards and Nightblood need people to function at their fullest, but it's almost for opposite reasons. Nightblood really just needs a hand to wield him so he can go to town, whereas Shards actually seem to need a guiding mind to be able to accomplish much of worth.

I don't know. Rayse was apparently a pretty awful person to start with. Splintering away some of his memories might actually have made him nicer, if you prescribe to the people are basically good theory. The most powerful bad guys are the ones that actually have some kind of way to see themselves as the hero.

Remember that the wielder of the Shard's intent also works to influence how they can use that Shard. Sazed's logical enough to see that you might have to Ruin something to Preserve it. For example, to Preserve your garden you need to Ruin the weeds and prune the plants.

Well, I'll give it a thumbs up for gumption. I don't think I've ever heard this theory before. That said, there's a couple of things I think are wrong with this theory. 1) The timing of Tanavast's death seems more than a little off. The last vision he shows Dalinar that shows a historical event is set at the time of the Recreance. That would mean, to me, that Tanavast was probably killed and Honor splintered somewhere around that time frame. The other theory, I guess, would be that nothing of importance to Dalinar's current predicament occurred between the Recreance and modern times, which seems kind of implausible. 2) Shards require someone to hold them to have more than a "weak will" as Sazed put it. It stretches what little we know of Shardic theory for me to believe that Odium could splinter Honor into a nation of corporeal, sentient beings with a culture and biology able to interact with Roshar. 3) The visions are not targeted to Dalinar. This is made pretty clear when Tanavast says "I don't know who you are". If Tanavast chose Dalinar at the time of Gavilar's death, then don't you think there would be some more specific advice? I do agree that the Parshendi are likely more than just the Voidbringers, or possibly not even Voidbringers at all. I also agree that they seem to be committed to the war more for the benefit of the Alethi than for themselves. Personally I think they are the Dawnsingers, but that's another thread (although the symmetry is kind of nice).

Hrm, I remember that now. Then I'm not sure. But I would imagine that the effect is a correspondingly mental external effect, if the pattern holds true.

Same here. I can't see how just uniting the Alethi, or just the Vorin kingdoms even, could stop something like what Dalinar witnessed in his last vision. Honestly, I'm not sure how any physical force could stop a Shard bent on their destruction anyway. Mistborn people kind of lucked out in that there was a handy Shard ready to be scooped up by a hero.

I'm kind of curious how this theory explains the fact that, even though Shards may be mainly spiritual in nature, their impact on the world is largely physical. Mist, Snapping, the shape of Sel, the Tears of Edgli, the odd biosphere of Roshar... perhaps too much spiritual concentration actually warps the physical world, in not necessarily beneficial ways?

It's entirely possible the downside to being a Rioter/Soother is being less able to distinguish Rioting/Soothing on yourself. Take a look at Breeze/Allriane. Breeze, being the Soother he is, probably should have been able to figure out he was being Rioted skillfully. Instead, he was pretty oblivious.

Right before Kaladin is betrayed by Amaram is the incident you're talking about, but... I always kind of doubt people talking about things like that in front of the conveniently disposed of tools are speaking the truth.

Heck, let's go simpler. Honorspren bind things, Blades cut them apart. Of course she wouldn't like them.

... You know, this has me questioning whether the Oathpact was a kind of mutual bargain like Preservation. It's fair to say that Odium had Honor on the ropes, since he lost the Tranquline Halls. Maybe Honor threatened to kill them both ala Vin, but Odium instead proposes the Oathpact, sacrificing some of his weapons or essence (the Shardblades), provided Honor gives him ten Heralds to torture. The Honorblades are created by Honor to bind them to the Oathpact, and are functionally different in that there is no way for them to kill non-Voidish creatures. Shardblades, being of Odium, work on both, but the Heralds tell people not to use them in man-made wars or else it will strengthen the Voidbringers. Fastforward, and the Heralds abandon their posts, the knowledge is lost, and after centuries of being tools/peacekeepers, whatever, the Knights Radiant abandon their posts and Blades. People start using them to kill en masse, directing enough corrupted spiritual energy into Roshar to actually kill Honor, as the energy would be corrupted by Odium, his opposite. This could explain why the last vision Dalinar sees is of the KR giving up their Blades, at it's the literal smoking gun to why Honor is dead.

Which begs the question of how the Feruchemical metals are determined. How exactly did someone figure out that by touching iron they could store their weight in it? Feruchemy has never struck me as an instinctive art.

I don't know that they could. As people say, it's almost an automatic response. Actually, with this theory... it seems pretty unlikely that a Mistborn could kill a Feruchemist who has a decent amount of health, speed, and mental speed stored. Probably some weight too to offset Pushes/Pulls.

Ruin mentions that he was surprised Preservation wanted to make humans, life that can think and feel in the nature of that which they'd seen before. Makes me think that Scadrial humans are maybe a new subtype, but still not the original source of humans in the Cosmere. I'm inclined to think of Hoid's world maybe. That said, the reason that a lot of religions on Scadrial seem to have analogs on different Shard worlds could be as simple as the fact that all the Shards probably come from the same origin point, and therefore probably draw from the same culture to a degree.

If Honor did create such a system, it could explain how Odium killed him. They both get bound to this deal, and Odium's champion ends up killing Honor's, thereby killing Honor. If I were to take a bet on when this took place, I'd bet when the Sunblesser (I think is his name) destroyed the hierarchcy.

That's actually a good point. It does bring up why copper is the sole binary storage. Everything else is incremental.

If you haven't finished HoA, there are major spoilers ahead. So I won't comment more. But yes, there is evidence that atium mistings burn Ruin's metal.

Atium mistings likely take more to snap because of the nature of their power. They are mistings that ONLY burn Ruin's essence. You likely need quite a dose of pain to make their inner Preservation reach to Ruin's power. As for Mistborn being able to be Snapped through the mists, I find it really really unlikely. Mistborn are by their nature closer to Preservation than other Allomancers, evidenced by the fact that before the Lord Ruler there were no Mistborn at all. You would think it would actually take less to snap the average Mistborn. Why Kelsier didn't snap until he was in the Pits is actually one of the bigger mysteries of the series to me.