Beatsmorn

First, Surgebinders having gemhearts is RAFO, and not very likely.

Second, Nale is damnation Herald, Connected to Honor. Even after Tanavast death, he can probably still draw directly from Honor power. About regular KR of Fifth Ideal having access to Stormlight without spheres, I think that's great idea.

14 minutes ago, Ookla, the Incalculable said:

Snapping is a Cosmere constant. We know that Awakening is an exception to this, but not the reason why. 

And while looking for those ones, I stumbled on this one

As to Adolin, I'm probably repeating things said earlier in the thread, but lifts oaths git him remarkably well in my opinion. He listens to everyone regardless of rank. The murder of Sadeas was directly tied to his remembrance of the men lost at the Tower.

For soulcasting... For one thing, the word soul is used interchangeably by Brandon for the Spiritual and Cognitive aspects, and it really annoys me. Hemalurgy targets the soul, and rips off chunks of the Spirit Web. But  a "Cognitive Shadow" is created when investiture has suffused the "soul" and keeps it from being pulled to the Beyond... And it is the cognitive aspect that goes beyond. Both the Physical and Spiritual aspects leave corpses behind. So in short the word soul is unfortunately not very determinate.

Every use of soulcasting we've seen has enacted a physical change by targeting the Cognitive aspect. By necessity it must change the Spiritual as well, but that's not where it is targeted. 

Regardless, it's a mute point, because neither Adolin or Maya have access to the surge of Transformation, so I don't see how it could be applied in any case. 

But it's no longer about Adolin, it's now about who is RIGHT! Contest, rivalisation! ODIUM!

Seriously though, I agree with everything you said. I won't answer to next quotes, as it is pretty pointless now.

Shallan was "talking" to Cognitive aspect of stick. I recommend you read Emperor's Soul if you haven't already - it's my favorite Sanderson' book and it explains this stuff better than me. 

Spren are Investiture given shape by human conscience and perception. They are drawn to certain ideas, they represent certain ideas but it's not like some kind of Stickspren exist - Shallan was talking to Stick' mind, and everything has a mind in Cosmere, even noninvested and inanimate things. 

2 minutes ago, Ymawgat said:

Ok I feel like a pedantic jerk for continuing to argue about this but

It's called Soulcasting, and like, what else is Shallan talking to when she talks to the stick in Words of Radiance?

Again like, you can't just say this as an argument, what is your evidence?

Ok cool, I guess it's more subjective then. Thanks for doing the work in looking for that.

Questioner

Why have we not seen strong emotions like love or hatespren?

Brandon Sanderson

So. *pause* That's a good question, it actually is something I've considered a lot. Spren, it's hard to explain, but I'm going to try and vocalize it. It's partially that s-- that emotions that are like that are so individual to each person that you can't as easily create an identity for the Rosharans in their collective unconscious, if that makes sense? That they're just so-- and they're so ubiquitous that it didn't end up working the right way. That doesn't mean that they don't exist, but it's just not the same sort of ubiquity of some of the other ones. And I treat spren like races. Of animals. It's like saying "Well why didn't an animal grow that looks like a cat but has floppy ears?" or something like that. Well it just didn't happen, right? The organic nature of it-- There's no reason it couldn't have happened, and maybe you say "That's a fox, Brandon" but there's certain creatures that could have grown in our world that didn't and it's kind of a mixture between those two things. I kind of had to decide I didn't want a spren for everything for those reasons. And I wanted some spren to be really, really rare. And so you might see like a lovespren, but it doesn't pop out for puppy love, does that make sense? Or you might feel it, but there are none of those in the Cognitive Realm nearby, so they just don't show up.

Ok, seems I was kind of wrong about snapping? Up to your interpretation. 

Questioner

So there’s Snapping on Scadrial, where an event happens and then you can use the magic.  Is there something like Snapping on Roshar, where...

Brandon Sanderson

Yes and no.  They’re working under the same sort of assumption, the spren are just looking for a specific thing that is similar to what Snapping does.

1 minute ago, Ymawgat said:

I guess that's a fair point. My only real counter argument to this would be like, if it's going to take a miracle too happen no matter what, why not make it a miracle that better suits Adolin?

1: I gave a good chunk of evidence in my original post.

2: Edgedancer and Truthwatcher are orders that are next to each other, so they're bound to be more similar right?

3: What evidence do we have that "Radiant breaking" works the same way as snapping?

I was under the impression that this was how soulcasting worked?

Soulcasting works by changing Cognitive aspect of object. That is not the same as transforming spren. Not every object has an spren, no matter what Rosharans think. 

Basic mechanics of magic in whole cosmere are the same. Every positive-end magic system requires snapping before u can access the power. Allomantic snapping is just the same thing as Surgebinders' one, Surgebinders having to follow Ideals are different thing. 

13 minutes ago, Ymawgat said:

 

1. I'm not arguing that he doesn't show Edgedancer traits, I just don't think those things are personal enough to him for them to result in oaths.

2. I don't think being broken so that you can become Radiant is the same thing as being snapped?

1. I think we can stop at this place, as you will probably shrug any example with "this isn't IMO personal enough" 

2. It is the same thing. 

Oh, come on.

There are PLENTY of situations in first two tomes when he acts following Ideals of Edgedancers. You know, like him defending prostitute in Sadeas' camp? Or remembering the names of his whole personal guard? He cares for his soldiers and his people, and I don't really see what he has in common with Stonewards.

Also, he may be broken. Check scene when he kills Sadeas. You do not need to survive tragedy or physical pain to be Snapped.

Shallan is my favourite character since Book 1. Unluckily, character writing was pretty poor in Oathbringer - Shallan, Jasnah, Amaram, even damnation Kaladin - they all suffer from bad character development so much.

I think you missed a point - her bad jokes were written to show, that she's acting unnaturally, forcing herself to be funny - and they are compulsion from times, when her jokes where only source of happiness for her. She's still IMO most interesting female character Sanderson ever wrote and I love her backstory. But I'm the guy who loved Sazed crippling deppresion interludes in Mistborn too, so you've got the idea.

*me reads the title*

Omae wa mou shindeiru

*flies away*

Questioner

I wanted to ask, is the Shardbearer [Vessel] of Odium a human?

Brandon Sanderson

Not any longer.

Questioner

Ok, that's... I didn't expect that one.

Brandon Sanderson

 But what the answer to your question you really want to know is, was he originally human?

Questioner

Yeah.

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. That's a good question! But I don't think he counts anymore.

I think that it's pretty safe to say that Odium can be referred to as 'Broken One' in this case. It's certainly not Honor, as Honor is dead, and Cultivation doesn't really fit. She's hiding. 

Plot twist: Odium was part of Adonalsium which goal was to take humanity darkest feelings away from them, thus his 'voidish' theme and seizing emotions.

And Rayse is the secret hero who is trying not to allow anybody recreate Adonalsium, because Adonalsium got totally crapped up in the end.

I think true spren was bonding with Singers at some point, thus songs about betrayal of spren and stuff.

20 hours ago, splinters said:

Does this mean that Nightblood gets to keep most of the investiture it eats? I was under the impression that 1000 breaths was a lot, but not when compared to shards. If nightblood gets to keep some of the investiture it gathers and only consumes some to stay alive (like a returned), then it sure would be powerful (especially after being supercharged from something like a perpendicularity).

Number of Breaths used in Awakening isn't proportional to power of Awakening. Awakening which uses more Breaths will not necessarily be more powerful than one using less Breaths.

4 hours ago, lastofus said:

@Michael Portz

I have some trouble finding the proper words as English isn't my native tongue, so I probably would do a bad job. Let's see if I can show my reasons.

Dalinar had a vision about Nohadon in which Nohadon was a surgebinder and actually talked to Dalinar in the end.

It can mean 2 things:

1. Either it's something that all Bondsmiths experience. The thing only related to Bondsmiths that WoR (in-book) referred to. (Probably not. It's too generic).
2. Somehow, Dalinar's troubled mind created that experience (out of the book) to help him understand his path.

I think it's the second one. Which the message is that "if a man fall and don't rise again, his journey is at his end (Oathbringer preface)", which again means that "the most important step in your journey is always the next one", and so the oath, "If I must fall, I will rise each time a better man.", meaning that I swear to continue the journey no matter how many times I fall, the only thing that matters is that I will learn from my mistakes.

Is it not enough for an Oath?

 

I don't know where, but I remember something like "You cannot bypass the Oaths". So like for example, if you're a Windrunner, you have to first swear to protect everyone, then swear that you don't distinguish between who you should be protecting.

So, either Dalinar swore

all the previous Oaths, or the final one cannot be "I am Unity". And of course there's a chance that Bondsmiths only have 3 or 4 Oaths to say. So what do you choose?

As I've said previously, I think Dalinar spoke at least 2 Oaths, possibly 3. 

 

 

 That mad Herald is actually swore the 5th himself. Even if he doesn't trust his mind to be the law, he will accept the choice he will eventually make.

1st Oath: "Life before death, strength before weakness, journey before destination." 

2nd Oath: " I will unite instead of divide [...]"

3rd Oath: "I will take responsibility for what I've done" 

4th Oath: "If I am to fall, I will rise each time as a better man" 

5th Oath: "I am Unity" 

How I understood it. 

11 minutes ago, FuzzyWordsmith said:

So, everyone is bringing up Hemalurgy. I have a question. Does Rayse even know Hemalurgy? Correct me if I'm wrong, but Hemalurgy was specifically invented by Ruin, and Rayse has been stuck on Roshar for a long time. We have no indication that he's been to Scadrial in the past. We know it can be used off world, but you have to know how. Do we have any evidence that Rayse knows how to even use hemalurgy?

Probably not, but god is not limited by magic systems in what can he do. I think dagger is made from Odium divine metal and infused with primal Odium magic to his goal. I think his goal was either capturing Jezrien soul or what makes him Herald - thus glow on the gemstone in the hilt in this scene. I think glow wouldn't be shown, if dagger was just about destroying Jezrien soul.

We know that Odium communicated with Autonomy and is aware of Harmony, I'm just not sure of the timeline.

I wonder if becoming Unity is 5th Oath to Bondmiths like becoming Law is 5th Oath of Skybreakers?

This book changed what I thought about Oaths. I thought one becomes a KR at Oath 3 and full Radiant at Oath 5 originally, but it looks for me more like this for this moment:
- 1st Oath - fortifies bond with spren, one begin becoming Knight Radiant
- 2nd Oath - you're not yet Radiant, but already Surgebinder fully bonded to spren
- 3nd Oath - you become KR, you receive your Shardblade for most Orders
- 4th Oath - that's where most KR end their progress, you possible receive Shardplate and increase in powers on that level
- 5th Oath - ultimate Oath, only few KR reaches this Oath, it's about becoming one with what your Order represents

On 23.11.2017 at 1:25 AM, Argent said:

The reason metal glows in the Scadrian subastral is because its conduit to the Spiritual Realm manifests as light in the Cognitive; Stormlight actually does the same thing, it glows - because it offers a pathway to the Spiritual. The gems themselves seem mostly special for their ability to hold the Light.

Source or didn't happen.

If it was true, metal would glow in every world's Cognitive Realm, as Metallic Arts can be used on any world. I don't think metal glows for EVERYONE in Cognitive Realm, just to Cognitive Shadows/Shards/beings of Investiture, and it's because there is something going on with metal in cosmere - like Investiture condensing to metal in its solid state. Maybe it's somehow connected to metal crystallic structure?

I think that goes the other side - metal glows for those beings because of it's nature in cosmere, and because of it's nature Metallic Arts occured.

On 22.11.2017 at 7:18 PM, gbazz4 said:

 

I believe Hoid does an awakening in the epilogue. He whispers words to a doll and sets it down and the doll starts walking. It was a way for him to coax a little girl out of her hiding place. So if Hoid can do an awakening (I presume through stormlight since he has been on the planet for a while) then it would seem likely to me that it is possible for Vasher/Zahel to figure out how to do an awakening using stormlight. 

Not necessarily, he has at least 2nd Heightening, probably 5th.

Options i considered:

1. Voidbinding is connected to the Unmade, each Unmade grants Voidbinding power, for example, Yelig-Nar Voidbinding allows to mimic KR Surges. Fused are or are not Voidbinding. - kind of likely. 

2.  Voidbinding is connected to voidspren similarly to Surgebinding being related to true spren, Parshendi forms of power are very similar to human Voidbinders. Voidbinding is accessible to both races. Venli can Surgebind at the end of the Oathbringer. Fused are not Voidbinding. - kind of likely, but I don't like how it makes human Surgebinders/Voidbinders and Parshendi so similar, when it was told they are distinct, and the bond they make with spren is different

3. Voidbinding is connected to voidspren. Parshendi forms of power are voidbinding. Voidbinding is not accessible to human.  Venli can or cannot Surgebind at the end of the Oathbringer. Fused are not Voidbinding. - very unlikely, due to what we know now about destruction of Tranquiline Halls.

4. Voidbinding is connected to voidspren. Parshendi forms of power are NOT voidbinding, but something different. Only human can voidbind. Venli CANNOT Surgebind at the end of the Oathbringer - she is something different than Surgebinder. Fused are not Voidbinding. - my favorite theory so far, as it makes human Surge/Voidbinders and Parshendi forms of power distinct.

5. Voidbinding is not connected to spren or Unmade - is granted by favor of Odium. Fused are Voidbinding. - very unlikely, as it is magic SYSTEM, and it sound too Old-magic like to be magic system.

6. Voidbinding is not connected to spren or Unmade, it is accessible by other condition, for example rituals, sacrifices or stuff like this. Fused are Voidbinding. - almost no evidence in books for this, except little story in WoR about human sacrificing his son to Voidbringers, and this story is at least partially false. Sounds cool though.

On 15.11.2017 at 9:35 PM, Leyrann said:

Let's be real. Odium wasn't what we expected.

Yes, he was the bad guy and people had to fight him. But he also claimed to not simply be the Shard of hate, and if we assume that a Shard cannot lie when showing someone his 'true self' like he did with Dalinar (and I think that's a safe assumption) then indeed, he is not simply hate, but rather, as he himself also sees it, Passion. Caring. I still don't trust him one inch - even if only because we know Rayse was "among the most loathsome, crafty and dangerous indiviuals I [Hoid] had ever met". Sounds like a bad guy to me.

What, however if this Shard were held by someone who can only be described as honest, caring and strong? Someone like, say, Dalinar. And the thing is - we've already seen something special from Dalinar. Something he did in Thaylen City seems to have granted him a bit of Honor's power. At the very least, Odium Passion recognized something from Honor in there, and Dalinar managed to bring Honor's Perpendicularity there, even infusing all spheres. I personally believe that he has, in a way, ascended like Sazed has done. However, because Honor is splintered, he only ascended with one or maybe a couple of splinters, meaning he is nowhere near as powerful. But what if he starts gathering splinters, building up more and more power and - in the process - making Honor whole again with him as the Vessel? We know, after all, that a splintered Shard can be mended.

So what if Dalinar were to restore Honor this way, and then, maybe through help from the Knights Radiant, maybe with help from Cultivation, or something else, manages to defeat Rayse (not Passion, but Rayse) and then pick up Passion himself? We'd have a shard of Honor and Passion, which I think would be a Shard that would do well as the god of a world and which would align pretty well with who Dalinar is right now already.

And one last thing, Cultivation's holder is still alive, but what if she were to somehow die (maybe to kill Rayse?), and Dalinar would pick up Cultivation as well? Not only would we have a god with Honor and Passion, but also Cultivation. I don't know what we'd call that shard, but I do think that it would make for a 'god' that I wouldn't mind governing my world. Not only honorable and passionate, but also cultivating the world to make it better. Let's call the shard Guidance.

I don't think is that simple. Odium is of passion, sure, but he's also of void. He feeds other passions to the point they can't sate them, leave them fighting for more and more, and then takes it, leaving nothing but void in them - as he tried with Dalinar. Most passions he represents are kind of self-destructive or impossible to sate. (Jasnah conversation with Dalinar at the end of the book I made a mistake - but it was said in both Dawnchant and by Syl) He's also Shard of bond-severing, something said in WoB and presented in Dalinar's vision. 

I'm not saying good old Odium doesn't have a bright side, but he's definitely something bigger and darker than just Passion.

[EDIT PART 2]
I just quoted wrong person by an accident. To Damnation with me

40 minutes ago, Argent said:

That scene with Jasnah has been bothering me, as neither Stormlight's enhancing properties, nor the Elsecallers' Surges explain the thrown enemy. Plate does. 

These words are accepted.

Surge of Transportation is descriped as surge of *movement* and Realm Transition, so maybe flying enemy was effect of Surge. But that doesn't mean Jasnah didn't summon something like-plate.

Just now, Leyrann said:

That would directly contradict "I will protect even those I hate", though.

I meant something like "Let's pick a side in a conflict and protect those on that side"

I think this will be something about deciding arbitrary WHO to protect, like Skybreakers decide arbitrary which code to they follow. It was mentioned in epigraphs, that those who Orders weren't so distinct as they thought.

Typo, sorry. And I don't know how to edit title nor remove topic.