Blacksmithki

5 hours ago, More Cynical Than Funny said:

What's this in reference to? Elantris? I've only ever read that one once, before i even knew who Hoid was.

3 minutes ago, Weux082690 said:

*Also, many people here seem to be worried about Taravangian being the new Odium. I am not. Taravangian is a very "the ends justify the means" kinda person, but his goal is to save everyone. I think the Odium switch is a good thing, though it may not seem the way in the short term. I also think that the Shard is Passion, not Odium per say, and that Rayse molded it to be Odium because of his own personality. Taravangian could fix that.

Here's my problem with that idea. We see how the shard attempts to influence Taravangian when he takes it up, and it definitely seems like Odium fits.

Sanderson has said (where do i search for specific answers he's given?) that while the vessel is capable of influencing the shard, that influence would not last after the vessel is replaced.

While this doesn't actually provide us with a timeline for how long that takes to revert, it's not a good sign for the idea that Odium (the shard) is anything other then what we see of it when taravangian first takes over.

1 minute ago, robardin said:

 Have you read Dawnshard? It outlines the nature of Chiri-Chiri in some detail (while of course, raising yet further mysteries). But reasons for her sentience or intelligence don't seem to translate in any signaled way to chasmfiends to me... Would be very interesting if that was what was getting set up.

I know i'm not the person above, but sadly i haven't. It's only out in E-book so far where i am.

3 minutes ago, Topgoon said:

Dual-wielding will only be the start of it. The applications are quite insane IMO. With two living, bonded sprens, Shallan can form:

• a proper shard bow. One spren as the bow, the other as the arrow. The arrow automatically comes back.
• a shard sword-and-shield (or net and trident like a gladiator)
• more far-fetched, but if she can add mass to her light weaving (like in OB), can she form a double wielding the other blade?

 

 

1. We know that dead shardblades can be thrown, but do we have confirmation live ones can be? If so, could the arrow also slightly home towards it's target?

2. This would just be very effective, net runs into the above problem though.

3. This would be incredible. I need to see this.

Also, while Brandon RAFOd shard-guns a while ago, that was in relation to a single shardblade. I imagine that even if one spren cannot form a shardgun, two might.

I personally lean toward Tod or TOdium. Both are very simple whilst still avoiding any confusion, because who is ever going to actually be called Tod?

9 hours ago, ftl said:

So, I've got this (maybe) crazy theory that all of the things we've been sold at the end of book 4 as the finish line are actually red herrings.

The Contest of Champions is going to happen... but TOdium is going to weasel out of it with a draw (since both a win and a loss are an end to the war, and neither of them are on terms that are that bad for the humans - as Dalinar remarks at the end of RoW!). In the first four books, the win condition was "Make Odium believe he can lose; then he'll agree to a contest of champions to limit his losses." The Radiants got there. In book 4, they convinced ROdium that he could lose, and he agreed to pretty favorable terms to limit his losses.

...but then ROdium went and got himself killed. And now TOdium doesn't want to play to "limit his losses" - he wants to win. So the Radiants are going to actually have to push for the whole victory instead of getting the easier way out with a Champion.

One problem with this, is that unless the duel explicitly overwrites the previous agreement binding Odium to Roshar, there's no particular reason that this would happen.

Also, what does a tie look like? Because even if you have neither side willing to kill the other, that's not actually a tie, it's just a fight that is not over, and will never really end.

15 minutes ago, Dareios said:

Finally, even though Odium is confined to Roshar right now, what would happen if he merged with Cultivation? Is it possible that all previous agreements would be null and void, since Evolution, as an entirely new Shard, has never agreed to anything?

Well the trouble with this is that the main reason that Odium follows his agreements is because to not do so would damage him and allow another shard to destroy him.

Also, it wouldn't exactly be a new shard so much as it would be two individual shards combined. For example with harmony we know that Sazed is being pulled in two directions by the two shards (per WoB i found through the bottom text people have, of some random person's post. Sorry.), so this would heavily imply that when two shards are taken up they are not just transformed into one shard.

However, a similar result could still happen if cultivation took up two shards. She might be powerful enough that she could break an oath that Odium made, and since each shard is functionally equally powerful, the only one capable of posing an actual threat to her would be Harmony, as Odium would be damaged but Cultivation would not be.

Of course, the epigraphs have said that each shard is functionally infinite. So it might be that having two shards is not in any significant ways more powerful then having one shard, because when you start dealing with infinity or similar issues, things get strange. This fits more with the idea that the vessels can never be unbound like Wit is, because if they could just stop keeping oaths by picking up more shards then they'd be loosing one massive restraint.

Well one problem i have with this is that Dalinar might well just not be the champion in the end.

After all, if you are trying to find your greatest warrior, sure Dalinar is a good choice, but who could be better then Taln? And he'd have far far less trouble killing Gavinor or really any other child. He's not even bound by oaths as he is a herald.

I know Dalinar implies he should be the champion, but really, somebody has to realize that Taln, if healed, is the absolutely perfect choice. Why else mention that he's the best warrior out of all the heralds?

Also, something i just realized and am now editing this:

If neither side is willing to kill the other, that's not a tie, that's just a fight that hasn't ended yet. There's no provision for what defines a tie in a duel to the death, so unless one was created (which it hasn't been), then both sides refusing to fight just means the fight is ongoing.

42 minutes ago, silver-the-thruhiker said:

What if Honor did not wish to beat Odium, but just to fight him?

What if he was content with the endless cycles of the Desolations?

What if there is honor in battle, and so this single-minded Shard was happy with battles evermore?

What if the Radiants learned of this, and they decided they didn't want to be part of his little agreement - his Job-like wager - any more?

That's honestly one of the more plausable theories i've seen, because it actually explains why all the radiants left their oaths. It was a coordinated attempt to destroy Honour as the only thing they could actually do against him. (I'm Canadian, so should i call him Honour or Honor? It's strange.)

My main problem with almost all theories is just why every radiant leaves. For example if it was to stop the destruction seen on Ashyn, there would be some who were stubborn and stayed, or if it was because of the bondsmiths, why everyone else? It couldn't have been Ishar he only just got back his blade and therefore his powers.

2 hours ago, CaptainRyan said:

2. But some other Windrunner (Teft? Sigzil?) does it first during the Tower attack. Maybe to save Kaladin from the Fused that is hunting him. [incorrect]

So close though, you were so close to being correct but it was stolen away in the worst way.

4 minutes ago, TiaOmi said:

And showing them his feet 

Also, he accidentally caused like half the plot in shadesmar because he was trying to talk to wit because he likes his jokes/insults.

1 minute ago, Oltux72 said:

What then was the purpose of throwing four new Shards into the game? And why the change of vessel?

It was stated. "willingly chosen".

 

Actually it states "Willing champion" but yes, i did miss that one word.

As for the change of vessel, I would say that if it were just Rayse, then where it stands right now he's absolutely doomed.

I mean, he's currently facing against the full power of the radiants, with all the spren once more behind them, possibly with the eventual support of a Singer nation bonding corrupted spren and with freaking chasmfiends on their side, the bondsmiths reunited, and honestly i think that the ability to die for good is more of a downside for the Fuzed then the Spren. Spren can flee or just not take a harmable form but the fuzed cannot. Not to mention they just lost their only real scholar and we know how skilled at developing massive new technology the humans are. Odium's blindness is now effectively spreading with more corrupted lightweavers, and don't forget the full support of Hoid. And for the sake of it, lets include already being down 3 unmade (2 out of the fight, 1 working against him).

But Taravangian is completely out of the blue and is a huge wildcard.

3 minutes ago, Singer said:

I am really hoping to see a moment in book five where Hoid/Jasnah/someone realizes that Hoid's memories have been altered and infiltrated in some way. I would much rather that than Wit secretly outwitting TOd when he didn't even know about the TOd switch in the first place.

Well there's actually quite a few ways he could know about it and be faking for Taravangian's sake (I'm proposing things that might be the case more so then arguing that they are here)

If he saw Rayse's body he probably would know. If Renarin talked to him he would likely know. If anyone told Jasnah about Taravangian being killed in an incredibly strange manner he could very likely have gone to see the body. He may have a way of communicating with Cultivation, does anyone know what his relationship with her is like? He's also aware enough of a lot of information that if Taravangian decided to change from what Rayse was doing in Roshar in general Hoid may have become suspicious.

So it's not really a perfectly safe bet that he didn't know about the vessel changing.

1 minute ago, WindJogger said:

Right, Also I am seeing more and more that a potential solution to most of the Cosmere's shard related squabbles seems to be along the lines of what was done in Scadrial; as Navani described the Stormlight & Voidlight mixture as being in some sort of Harmony. Having seen Sazed's current limitations, I think that it allows for a deity to exist while allowing its world to just be; this last thought just gave a whole new meaning to "Unite Them". 

Well that only works because Harmony is made up of two completely opposite shards. Unless you can find two shards that perfectly opposed you wouldn't have someone quite so limited.

3 minutes ago, Karger said:

That is still not confirmed.

 

Yeah, but it is incredibly heavily implied, to the point where it's a very safe bet. I think it's best position is something the audience knows to be true and there's a few people who just keep reminding everyone it's not confirmed.

Like did Brandon ever outright say what Kaladin's fourth oath was or did we just all know it? (before RoW)

11 minutes ago, Oltux72 said:

Why? Who has that level of ability but uses it to check up on a park regularly.

If we had a cadmium bubble and a seon in that house, it would make sense that somebody is sending out status reports.

 

Personally i'm leaning towards it being some ancient entity not someone from Scadrial. That would explain them not seeming to need anything, them being some sort of functionally immortal being similar to Hoid. It also explains them just not caring much about time. Going out every 16 days is probably quite often.

2 minutes ago, Oltux72 said:

He wants out of that duell or render it moot, not win it. Taravangian considers it a mistake.

Insanely risky. The other side's champion could choose suicide.

To destroy the world he would be confined to?

He does not care. The alliance is a roadblock, not an enemy.

 

1. Winning the duel is still pretty much the next best thing to a perfect result for him.

2. Then he wins. That's even better then just an unending duel.

3. The humans didn't exactly destroy the world when they arrived (Roshar not Ashyn). it would be more of a solid circle back to where everything started.

4. We don't exactly know his plans, but it was definitely an enemy to Rayse. It was the main thing holding him back from his goals, and it'll definitely be resisting Odium whoever holds it.

8 minutes ago, Nameless said:

I was serious, thanks for going through them all for me.

Wait, there are other versions than numbers 10 or 16? Man, I though those others were jokes. Maybe I should've read the other ones, but number 4 was literally just "I am a stick" repeated over and over again.

Get an electronic copy of 4 and try running it through a bunch of cryptographic software. I think you might be surprised. There's a lot of ways to manipulate text that a computer can see but won't appear to people.

Did you try 9? That one gets dark. I suppose it makes sense though. I just didn't think Brandon had it in him.

As for the more serious part: (spoilered even though i don't really need to, but this thread started before release)

11 minutes ago, the_archduke said:

I suspect it has to do with the Shattered Plains.  Narak was destroyed intentionally using massive surgebinding.  The Listener songs claim it was not them that did the deed.  This almost certainly happened during the False Desolation, if the details are in the Listener songs.  The Radiants, horrified that such acts would continue must have met together and all agreed to what would become known as the Recreance.  The Spren might have thought they would simply return to the CR and lose what they had gained form the Nahel bond.  But the capture of Ba Ado MIshram changed something, and the bond breaking killed the spren.  The Radiants, horrified further at the unexpected deaths of their spren, slunk from the word stage and passed on in obscurity.  

It could also just be that the shattered plains are where BAM was captured. That would explain the massive magical destruction. I seriously wonder what sound would have caused that pattern, and if maybe sounds can be used for more then just the few means of manipulating light we know about.

On 2020-11-19 at 2:01 PM, Nameless said:

So, did anybody on this thread actually get anything right?

If serious: I mean, there's a few that are different levels of close, and one or two that nearly happened.

If not: Which copy of the book did you read? Because it really depends on which ending you got. Personally i preferred number 2 but i could see someone arguing that 4 is the best one, but most of the spoilers here are for the most common version, version 1.

43 minutes ago, Singer said:

I think a lot of folks, including me, figured that Navani would bond the Sibling, I think many people also suspected after the preview chapters that Leshwi wasn't going to stick with team Odium.

TBH, I may have to start a thread of "I didn't see THAT coming!" Because RoW sure brought A LOT to the table that I didn't see coming!

Technically this thread does fit, but the title makes you think it's just correct predictions.

'mention things they got right and wrong' in the first line

8 minutes ago, CaptainRyan said:

Perhaps Hoid planned this encounter to go the way it did, or perhaps not. Personally, I hope Hoid was outwitted (pun intended) because no character should be unbeatable. Plus, seeing Hoid be outsmarted is an excellent way to set up Tod's credentials as the Real Deal (TM). I worry that Brandon is being clever, and that Hoid planned this as a way to throw off Tod. I guess we can wait 3 years to find out haha.

It could also just be both. It could be Hoid being careful and paranoid but still caught completely off guard at actually needing to use it.

Something i am very very curious about is whether or not a champion actually needs to be willing to fight, or if Rayse was simply playing entirely to win. This would allow for some brutal backup plans if he can't find a good champion in time.

Taravangian wants to make sure that he wins no matter what happens in the duel and i can think of a few terrible ways this might happen.

1. If Taravangian thinks he has an advantage, what if he just chooses someone who cannot really die? The armies have no truce, only neither side can interfere with the combatants. This would allow for the battles to continue despite the duel being set at 10 days.

2. Even if Taravangian loses, there are still 2 main problems. first, there's still the insane fuzed armies that need to be fought. second, Odium may be able to draw in a threat from another world using his agents.

So what if he could manage to absolutely shatter the spirit of the alliance in his defeat? If he could make them fall apart he still wins the war despite loosing the battle.

We already know that pretty much everyone looks up to Kaladin. What an absolutely sadistically evil twist would it be if he was chosen as Odium's champion and had to decide whether to fight for Odium or to die for the sake of the world. This might well completely shatter the spirits of so many people, and the time between the first and second halves (books 5 and 6) could be trying to prepare for a new threat from offworld, a perfect cycle of what happened with the humans.

Until we get an explicit statement that the champion must be willing to fight, i will remain terrified that one of these two things may well be the backup plan of Taravangian.

12 minutes ago, WindJogger said:

I completely agree with you, some part of me keeps thinking that T was under the influence of Cultivation's "Boon" which made him stupider which would in turn drive him towards a path that Odium wasn't anticipating thus giving him an edge, but based on Harmony's letters, it is foreshadowed that TOdium is going to be an even worse enemy which just makes it a bit shortsighted for her to set T loose like that. Now, If she did it for revenge, then that is something I can also understand, but right now I am just wishing and grasping for straws; I am sure once we zoom out onto the Cosmere, things will start to make more sense. 

I really liked the idea that Cultivation has just expanded her scope. Clearly the holders of shards are wearing out, so what better job for Cultivation then to cultivate new vessels?

This creates a perfect bridge to the greater cosmere if she decides to make new vessels for other shards, and surgebinders are strong enough to pose a threat to anyone if they can solve the problems with going offworld. It also allows mistborn to move into the greater cosmere at it's own rate, as it doesn't need a new vessel, it already has one.

2 minutes ago, Necessary Eagle said:

Now that I've had a few days to think about it...

When Oathbringer came out, I was in a sort of daze for a few days because I couldn't reconcile my feelings. There were a lot of parts I had complaints about, but the Sanderlanch was boss. "Always the next step," "It's not a journey if it doesn't have a beginning," "I will protect those I hate even if the one I hate most is myself." I'm still repeating these lines to myself years later, trying to live up to themWith Rhythm of War, I had similar feelings of "I have a lot of problems with the plot"-- but not the "storms, yeah!" feelings at the ending. RoW left me worried about Todd, shocked and upset about Testament, sick feeling in my stomach after the epilogue... sure, Kal swore his fourth oath, but everyone knew what it was going to be; practically knowing it in advance robbed the scene of emotion for me, the same way knowing from WoBs that humans weren't native to Roshar made the Big Reveal of OB fall flat.

As Hoid says, expectations are a story-killer, and I'm sure on further rereads I'll like the good bits better and find the flaws less glaring, the same as happened with OB. But for now, I'm just... in a disappointment daze.

(feel free to jump in and tell me I'm being silly, it helps when other people praise the book to the heavens)

As time goes, you will always remember the parts that stand out as opposed to the parts you felt fall flat.

Someone I talked to said that they were reading WoK. They had previously tried to read it years ago, but got a lot of whiplash at the first few chapters, and how they just jumped so much that after reading the prelude, prologue, chapter 1 and 2, they just put down the book. The thing is, i have absolutely no idea if i felt the same way when i first read it. Books usually work best when they are a bit smoother, and naturally the first time you read any book it's going to be extreme. You'll be disappointed with the things you already knew because you hoped they'd tell you something new, but when you go back through, you'll focus more on what is, not what you hoped would be.