Mulk

I'm pretty geeky about it and have been for...closing in on 40 years. I don't think we need an "IN THE END THERE CAN ONLY BE ONE" argument about it though, lol. Regarding learning it, there's a whole bunch of quenya and sindarin dictionary links if you google them, there's also some hits for how to learn it. I've not done any of them, mind you, though I know a fair bit of the Elvish just from years of reading it all - none of that stuff (dictionaries, how to's, etc) really existed in ways I could get at when I was growing up, so you had to do what you could with the appendices. At one point I had most of Daeron's runes memorized, but it's been quite a while. I never spent just a ton of time learning the Tengwar. Lack of time there, mostly.

Ditto (obviously) I was taken by the very name of it the first time I ran across it while reading the Hobbit when I was...like 7 or 8 or so. It was a word that felt old, grandiose, historic. It was much harder back then to find any art of it, since the internet didn't come around till I was an adult and married already. Years ago someone gave me a calendar that amongst other things had this image by Ted Nasmith that I always gravitated to: I would just stare at it at times, wishing I could have lived there and seen it, walked its streets. (edit: finally found it - it was a 1996 calendar. Good Lord that's been ages ago)

Really wish Tolkien had lived long enough to rewrite the full tale of Tuor and the Fall of Gondolin as a cohesive whole. That is probably my favorite of all the First Age tales, all things considered, though I do still really love the Lay of Leithian

Indeed. Like...I forget just how many generations it is from Elros to Aragorn, but they're all recorded, the full span of like 6400 years. Not to mention all the major elf lords, the doings of the inhabitants of Rohan and where they came from. The only stuff not really sketched in are the doings of the Longbeards in Khazad-Dum over the course of the First Age and up till when they and the Noldor strike up their friendship in the Second Age, and where exactly it is the Hobbits come from and just how long they've been around. I've read everything I own so often. My copies of Unfinished Tales and books of lost tales 1 and 2 are falling apart, I had to finally give up and replace my original LOTR set, will have to do the same with the Silmarillion some time soon

Well, here's another one for you then: Audiomachine - Uprising You probably will recognize the art used for the background...

I think a certain section of the fanbase will have their own headcanon and ignore the sequels just like a certain set ignore the prequels. Honestly, viewing it as 'you end up at the same stupid place' robs the ability to fully enjoy what you have in front of you. I never want to be there. I kinda really hope they put something in place to this akin to how Marvel had Kevin Feige over everything, someone to make sure everything fits and communicates together. Maybe that's Favreau and Filoni, maybe not, but I think they'd all benefit from it.

I had so many serious nerdgasms over Mandalorian this season. Really wish we didn't have to wait so long for another

Hey, more Tolkienophiles! Seriously, I'm by far the most into his stories of anyone I know, enough that I regularly joke to my friends whenever we get into discussions about it that I probably know more about it anyone you're likely to ever meet, unless you happen to know a professional Tolkien geek... Favorite characters across the whole Legendarium is such a huge thing. Fingolfin, Tuor, Luthien, Huan, Nienna, Glorfindel, Samwise, Faramir... I kinda go on and on and on. The Elves (at least with respect to the High Elves, I don't believe it holds for those who never went into the West), I took to mean the light of the spiritual shown through them, that they were themselves hallowed, possibly akin to the way the Silmarils were, save when they dispose of it by their own actions. And that light cannot be born by creatures of shadow.

I still feel this way every time I get to the end. Even after...35 years or so of reading this at least once a year.

Odium chose Dalinar as a champion. Dalinar said no. Even made Odium flee. Ergo, the champion chosen must be willing and able to say yes. That rules out some people. Probably rules out Gavinor, he does love his grandfather. And for Taravangian to win, the champion chosen must also be able to actually kill Dalinar. Something some random baby certainly cannot do, and something that Gavinor probably couldn't do either; I doubt he could even be convinced to swing a sword at Dalinar. And honestly, I'd think less of Brandon for making Gavinor the champion of hatred. He's like four years old. I've had three of them in my time as a dad. They may say they hate you when you tell them no or something of that ilk, but a few minutes later they're crying and asking for a hug and a snuggle. Whatever's coming, I think the outcome will not be fully satisfactory for anyone. I kinda think there will be a huge offensive to take as much as possible in 10 days while Dalinar is learning how to be an unbound Bondsmith. Either that will succeed leaving our heroes with just Urithiru and a few other disparate places, or Ishar and/or Dalinar will learn how to fully reset the Oathpact so that it blocks the Everstorm's ability to transfer Fused back to Roshar and Dalinar and Taravangian will work out another deal in place of the contest of champions.

The entire Myst series aside from the original, which gets remade fairly regularly as the tech updates. Prince of Persia: Sands of Time Need for Speed: Most Wanted, the 2005 game, probably the best driving game I've ever played I've not played these, but two good friends think of Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross as fantastic games, and I never got to play them at the time.

May be of interest? There's a for real Green Gables house on Prince Edward Island: https://www.pc.gc.ca/en/lhn-nhs/pe/greengables

I loved the heck out of the entirety of season 2

For Odium to win, Gavinor would have to 1) be able to accept this, and I don't know that he can or would, given his age; and 2) be able to kill Dalinar, which even if Dalinar fell down and let him, I don't know that he could. It strikes me that the whole Intent thing applies not only to shards choosing their champions, but to champions choosing to say yes. Can a kid his age really do that? I don't know. This whole line of thought is probably one of the more disturbing ones frequenting the Shard currently, to me anyway. I have a lot more thoughts on this particular issue, but they are mostly covered by Jofwu in the post above mine. I currently think a far more likely outcome is that Dalinar wins the challenge against whomever, but Toadivangian's ideas about how to get around the agreement result in him finding a way out of the thousand years of peace; or that the Fused gains in the 10 days leading up to the challenge lead Dalinar to make a different deal. Another possibility that I have no evidence for aside from Ishar's brief moment of lucidity is that if Ishar or Dalinar are able to reset the Oathpact, it will somehow capture the void-specific or respawn effects of the Everstorm and rob it of its ability to put Fused back on Roshar for the duration of someone/several someones' stay on Braize. What I think would be far more interesting is that the outcome of this somehow results in the Fused being at peace, Odium free to escape into the Cosmere because he's 'totally working with Cultivation now and is not at all evil, no' which results in him returning to Roshar a few years down the road to take a different and much firmer shot at getting rid of Cultivation.

Actively playing? ESO, finally finished all of the quest content available. Been spending quite a bit of time roaming in Cyrodiil. That started off as a way to get more skyshards (46 of them) and just see the zone in general as ESO is a pretty game and the zone itself is gigantic. I found I got hooked on siege combat though. I prefer defense, but there aren't that many spots that are guaranteed to get combat on a given night so I do a fair bit of roaming and assault as well. Also doing a replay of HZD on the setting just below Ultra Hard, and taking my time with it. In part because you die really fast if you're not careful, and in part because I'm trying to explore and find all the data dumps and stuff as I go. Don't really have time for much more right now, unfortunately

I don't disagree with that, AirSick, and I'd probably have dropped the phrase "at his feet" personally, but it's in my nature to try to see why what is written might not be as odd as it is on first pass (if it's not a straight typo/grammar error that is), particularly since I kneel with one foot in front because I find it much easier to get up from that position. Both knees on the floor hurts pretty badly after a bit

You can kneel with one foot in back and one in front and saying looking down at your foot feels odd unless you only have one foot...at least that's my opinion

pretty much precisely that!

I see whimsy as the part of Adonalsium that created giraffes (assuming they have them somewhere), greatshells, a tidally locked planet, comets, and so forth. It will probably be a real problem untethered from any other context (as we find many of the other Intents are) but I'd imagine anything a Cosmere resident looks at in their universe and thinks 'you know that's really cool' probably had an aspect of Whimsy in its creation.

I don't think Adonalsium suffered the same restrictions Sazed does. If it had been the same, he/she/it/they'd not have been able to create as widely and wildly as we can infer happened. I've thought about it a fair bit over the last few years, and I rather doubt we'll ever get an Adonalsium point of view to explain the thoughts behind why the severing was allowed, but I don't think there can be any doubt it was allowed. Maybe we'll get a few audible words during the actual encounter, but I don't expect we'll get more than that.

Maybe Ishar's lucidity will come with Szeth's completion of his fourth Ideal?

This is so awesome I love it

Really enjoyed it, but the triple-whammy of Taravangian not only not dying as he deserved, but ascending as Odium, making it abundantly clear that Cultivation made a huge mistake, followed by the Wit epilogue was a gut punch that left me with a real downer taste in my mouth. Really wish it had ended on a better note. Good book otherwise! Real page turner. Took me around 9 hours, in part because when I got to the trial scenes I went back and revisited the entire run up to it because it had been long enough since I'd seen them that I thought I'd somehow missed some stuff mid-book. In no particular order: Larkin/Lanceryn can talk? That will make Rysn's life even more interesting. Of all the things I thought I might get in this book, Chiri-Chiri's viewpoint, no matter how brief, wasn't one of them. Holy Shard Names Batman! Er...Bat-Sazed? Sazed-Man? BatHarmony? (ok I'll stop) Storm Moash. I'd quietly wondered if the messages to Navani about spren were the Sibling. Yay, Sibling. The existential dread of the Sibling combined with the weakening of Stormlight related powers was quite the horror element. Kaladin gets so painful to read for me at times. I've not been dark enough to actually jump/pull the trigger/use a knife, but I spent a lot of nights thinking about it when I was younger. When your parshman/Parshendi/listener whatever we call Rlain is now is a better defender of who you are than your dad... Thank you that Lirin came around some at the end. Huzzah for Hesina. That sounds like a celebration or holiday. Wild use of Plate, Kal. Unexpected, creative and effective. Restares as Kelek, eh? Didn't see that coming. Nor Thaidaikar as maybe Kelsier. Storm Moash. Maya speaks! And confirms a suspicion a lot of us had - that the Radiants had the agreement of their spren for the Recreance. Given the epigraph about releasing Ba Ado Mishram and some other stuff in the book, I'm wondering if to fully revive Maya would require the release of BAM as it really seems that had some far more reaching effects than -just- whatever it did to the parshmen. Ishar unbound and insane is scary stuff. That he could reset the Oathpact is just unreal to me. And I believe he can do it, I don't think that was a delusion. I don't think that was delusion. Bondsmith might be the greatest and furthest reaching scope of power available to the non-Ascended. It's almost like the role itself somehow encompasses a Dawnshard, though I don't know how that's possible. Eshonai's last ride made me weep. Navani...so complicated. Inventive, naive, compassionate, destructive, stubborn, powerful, and ultimately merciful. Finding the Rhythms, discovering/creating anti-investiture, bonding the Sibling (which I thought was going to happen but not like it did...) and so on. Wonderful story for her. Raboniel ... yeesh. So horrible. So manipulative. And yet there was a seed of something genuine in there, enough that she fought Moash. How does Brandon do this? Dalinar coaxing Stormfather to stretching out Kaladin's jump to save him and THEN forging the Connection he needed was incredible. Spren can be for real killed now. That's horrifying. The corpse scene gave me chills. Storm Moash. Teft...sadness. He got a good death, a strong death....but still sadness See ya, Lezian. That ending was mostly perfect, I thought. Rhythm of War being co-written by Navani and Raboniel was quite the twist. Shallan having two Cryptics was something that clicked for me right before you see it happen in the book. The place Shallan went to when she confirmed Pattern had been lying...goodness that was bad. As bad in its own way as Kaladin's fight. The Honorspren of Lasting Integrity remind me of nothing so much as a self-righteous group of believers (whatever their stripe) they will demonize, distort, destroy and demean anything that isn't exactly what they expect it to be with one exception - they responded to Maya, generally. How awesome is Maya, anyway? Kaladin really is legendary. Not just to his people, to his enemies. Crippling depression, unable to use Stormlight as it went on, broke Lezian, destroyed the Sibling fabrials, just...freaking wow. I've never seen someone written so broken and yet so strong. And the number of people wearing the glyph at the end, because Kaladin still gets up...goose bumps. Lift makes Cultivation/Lifelight...of course... And for a final time - STORM MOASH There's more, so much more, but I have to get back to work.

You didn't miss anything. It was never mentioned explicitly ahead of Marasi's comment and then Wax's BoM reminiscences.

My personal thought, until proven otherwise, is that the Dawnshards came into existence because the original commands to bring the Cosmere and everything in it into being by Adonalsium were so powerful and far reaching that they took on a sort of existence of their own - a sort of coalescence of the echoes of creative power as it were. Probably, it was a single thing/being/item/coalescence of Investiture prior to being taken up and used against Adonalsium, which either had to be broken apart in order to be used by non-Adonalsium beings, or broke as a result of the use it was put to.