Wreith

8 hours ago, Toaster Retribution said:

This is kinda interesting. Do you have an idea for where the different Heralds are?

Taln, Shallash, and Nale are obvious in Oathbringer
Jezrien was in Kholinar and is now dead
Ishar is the leader of Tukar, this is not-quite-explicitely confirmed in Oathbringer
Taravangian claims to have met Battar.

It is theorized that Vedel is a "nurse" helping the silent gatherers of the Diagram. I know I've seen it but I can't find it. I'll keep looking.

Chana:
Has been seen on screen. As stated, since no one has been to Shinovar, this means she's not there. I thought we had a guess as to who this was, but I can't find anything more concrete.

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Wetlander

Speaking of the other Prologues… I have a looney theory that the assassin Liss is actually the Herald Chana in disguise.

Peter Ahlstrom

Chanaranach has definitely been seen onscreen by at least one character at least one time in the first two books.

source

Pailiah:

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Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

The old ardent in the Palanaeum is Pailiah.

source

Unfortunately, while forming this post, I hit a snag in Kalek.
We know he was in Kholinar for Gavilar's assassination, but not really anything before or after that, though Jasnah's observations indicate he was in Kholinar for a little while prior at least.
The only thing I have is that his comment to Nale in the prolog for WoR

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...What We've done was wrong. That creature carries my lord's own blade. We shouldn't have let him keep it...

That implies to me that he wasn't responsible for actually providing Szeth the blade, but that he noticed it and feels he should have taken it back.

I believe we've seen all the heralds but Ishar and we know where he is. 

We've not seen anything in Shinovar except a trade for chickens. 

I have theorized this myself. I think Odium used the bitterness of the spren's betrayal of the Listeners to lead the Listeners to attack Humans who had left the area that became Shinovar.

Some points of clarification
The Stormfather, not necessarily Honor, was with the Listeners. The two were originally entirely distinct.
As Quantus said, Odium may not have actually been 'with' humanity to begin with.
The betrayal of the Listener gods was the spren beginning to bond humans. This include the Stormfather
The Oathpact between the Heralds and Honor was just to block the Fused. It is not what contains Odium.

Is there though?
In Szeth's conversation with Nale before he joins the battle, he implies that the Shin have been waiting for some event.
 

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My people watched not for the return of an invading enemy, but for the masters of the house.

I think the Shin have been hording the honorblades and likely dead spren-blades and plate waiting for this battle.
I don't think there's anything wrong with them. I just think they have vastly different motives than we've assumed. 

I agree that the coalition will most likely fight them, but that doesn't affect the accuracy of Szeth's personal quest.
His stated idea (not actually spoken as his fourth ideal yet) Is to remove "false leaders".
My contention is that there aren't any that fit that description.

4 minutes ago, Angsos said:

Do we actually know the Shin are Team Honor?

We really only technically know the concept of the oathstone from Szeth and that he has a high degree of personal honor.
Additionally the reference to Honor as God in Nin-sonGod as stated above.

The WoBs on Ashyn and the Iriali do kill the separate human worlds portion of my theory.

So I'm left without an explanation of the epicanthic fold distinction between Shin and non-Shin.

I can agree with parts of your theory, but at this time I don't believe Odium was actually the Ashyn humans' god.
I think the Listeners just believed he was because he followed humans to Roshar proper.

1 hour ago, Thurin said:

Do we know for sure if the translation of the Eila Stele we get at the end of Oathbringer is correct?

I had my suspicions because Taravangian tries to undermine Dalinar's coalition by publishing this text, and it is mentioned that "Teams in Kharbranth and the monasteries of Jah Keved have arrived at the news separately", but both Kharbranth and Jah Keved are ruled by Taravangian. Could Taravangian have made some small changes to the Eila Stele like Ruin did with the Terris prophecies?

I don't think it was modified.

The Ellista interlude references a "certain patron" wanting a particular passage translated by a deadline.
I think Taravangian just knew that particular passage would be problematic and had his people focus on it.

Additionally, the Stormfather confirms at least parts of it to Dalinar.

from a meta perspective, it confirms things we've long suspected, but that's not real evidence.

Indeed. The facts you mention had slipped my mind.

But what if Cultivation was originally on one planet and Honor the other.
If the Shin originally served Honor and then merely added Listener religious aspects to their existing beliefs the complications you bring up go away.

The idea of oathstones, their remaining in their agreed upon location, and the fact that Honor is referred to as god (Nin-son-God) support this. 
They would revere the Heralds as being close to Honor.
They would also support their original deity over the followers of newer aspects of their religion when the conflict began, thus their inclusion in the Radiants

This enhanced theory is complicated by Dalinar and Kaladin both being referred to as children of Honor, though...

edit: This would also mean that Honor and Cultivation did not originally break the Shards' agreement to isolate them selves; technically if not in spirit.
That's something that had bothered me about the shard Honor sharing a planet

Szeth has decided that, if Dalinar allows, he will "cleanse the Shin of their false leaders"

Now, we know that he was named Truthless because he made the claim that the "voidbringers" were returning.
With the Listeners and the Fused reclaiming their land, Szeth has determined that his statement was true and that the Stone Shamenate was wrong.

However, I propose that the Shamenate knew that the "Voidbringers" were, in fact, humans., and thus could not "return" because they never left; making it technically true that Szeth's claim was false.
I expect this to be a complication of his quest.

As a corollary, I believe the Shin to be a group of humans who attempted to begin following the Listener religion upon their arrival. Hence their language being included in the dawnate group, their reverence for stone and spren, and their remaining secluded in the area created for them on Roshar.
That last point requires an explanation of the Shin Conquest and possibly some explanation of why only humans lacking the epicanthic fold decided to do this.

For the Shin Conquest I'm on board with the theory that its primary purpose was to recover an honorblade or shardblade until a better theory presents itself.
For the epicanthic fold distinction, is it possible that Ashyn and Braize had distinct groups of humans and each had a cataclysm as a result of surges. Perhaps Shin are from one planet and other Rosharn humans from the other.

Thoughts?

7 minutes ago, Johhny_Eastland said:

True, but as for the topic it doesn't matter that Herald was killed at the end of OB. Nale bonded a spren with the Oathpact still in tact-ish. 

yes, this whole topic is tangential to OP.
I'm just saying that at this point, it's possible that Nale won't return to Braize if he's killed, in which case OP's specific example of a complication is moot.

As for if the spren would go with Nale if he does still still return, I'm inclined to believe it would.
WoB states that getting spren off world is difficult, but the same is said of cognitive shadows which Nale is.
I actually think the Heralds may have greater connection to Braize than to Roshar proper and have to be forcibly reconnected to a body in order to return to Roshar. I suspect this connection to extend to a bonded spren.

There's a WoB about bonded spren and their radiants in effect becoming a single entity. I'll see if I can find that.

2 minutes ago, Johhny_Eastland said:

Fair enough lol. But in chapter 38 of OB the Stormfather says "The Oathpact has almost been weakened to annihilation." They read it on the Shardcast Oathpact discussion.  

which was before the herald was killed.
no comment on the oathpact after that event iirc

5 minutes ago, Johhny_Eastland said:

The second Wob was just before Oathbringer released in September. So it would still stand

umm...no...

Brandon's answers on the "current" status of Cosmere peoples is based on our knowledge, not his.
newly published works affect any answers we've gotten previously; even up to the release party.

that WoB was before Oathbringer.
my theory is post-Oathbringer

edit: That top WoB actually supports my theory,

Rather than think Hoid *is* the antagonist, I believe everyone will *think* he's the antagonist by the end.
I like the theory that Adonalsium either planned for or instrumented its own shattering.
In keeping with that, I think it gave Hoid a task before that happened.

I also think that the behavior we see from Hoid at the end of Oathbringer is not in keeping with a "big bad" unless you try to argue that Hoid is attempting to remain morally neutral by doing enough "good" to counter-act the "bad" of his ultimate goal.

1 hour ago, Scion of the Mists said:

Because Nale is a Herald, bound to the Oathpact.  Everytime before, when a Herald died, they were sent to Braize to be tortured.  

It's an interesting question, because the Oathpact is still in force, Odium has just found a hack to get around the Fused-imprisoning portion of it.  

I think it's possible that the Oathpact is actually broken now...

(not sure the tag is necessary for Oathbringer stuff but whatever)

58 minutes ago, Weltall said:

We know that a Nalthian week is a bit longer than a normal Earth week (eight days versus seven)

The Nalthis week is seven days long
If the Returned don't get a new breath on the first day of the new week (8th day), they consume theirs and die again.
 

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https://wob.coppermind.net/events/250-warbreaker-annotations/#e6776
 

Brandon Sanderson

Siri Enters and Sees Returned

Just a little note here. Returned live for eight days without a Breath, though the week is seven days long in this world. Why? Well, I figured that they'd need an extra day as leeway. On day seven, they start to grow weak and sluggish. If they don't consume a Breath, their body will consume their own on the eighth day of their life, and they'll die again.

In some parts of this world, Returned aren't worshipped, but instead seen as something akin to vampires. They draw in Breath to survive, and need a supply of people to feed off of. They tend to wear black, since it's the most powerful color for draining to Awaken things.#returned

 

edit: is there some secret to including WoBs from Arcanum in a post or do people just use quotes?
 

Just now, Ripheus23 said:

TBH I forgot that Oathgates are supposed to move objects in the Physical Realm. I had some weird notion that they were Perpendicularities.

The Oathgates each ARE a sort of perpendicularity as far as I understand.
I base that on this:

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Question

So, I don't know if this is a RAFO sort of question, but you call them Perpendicularities, will we see this sort of thing created?

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah, Perpendicularities can be created. You'd need a ton of Investiture. But, basically what Jasnah does is create a little mini Perpendicularity and slips herself into the Cognitive Realm.

Question

So it's just a question of skill, not a question of--

Brandon Sanderson

Yeah. It's hard to pull off...but some of the powers are built to do it.

I have two problems with that idea as presented

1. the Realms aren't dual, they are triunal. Physical, Cognitive, and Spiritual. The theory needs to address the Spiritual.
2. we have no other examples of a cognitive entity forming another cognitive aspect. It could theoretically happen I guess, if say a higher order spren was brought fully into the physical realm for an extended period and then went back, it might meet itself.
 

I haven't put a whole lot of thought into this, but based on the idea that each shard has a pseudo-opposite here's my list with the shards we don't know indicated by '?'

Honor
Deception?

Affection?
Odium

Autonomy
Reliance?

Contentment?
Ambition

Endowment
Requirement/Withdrawl?

Cultivation
Neglect?

Preservation
Ruin

Devotion
Dominion


I propose that either Neglect or Contentment be the "survival shard" that is okay with hiding while the universe dies.
Survival as its actual name is too closely related to Preservation. And we're told that the desire to survive and its knowledge of events are only tangentially related to its Intent

4 minutes ago, Toaster Retribution said:

Not necessarily. Ponder that Kelsier kills Elend as quickly as you said. He would then have an automatic win ticket over the others. 

*sigh* of all my recent posts to actually get a response, it would have to be the one I care virtually nothing about.

Story still ends the same since Kelsier's supply would be limited.

Atium limitation is irrelevant since you have a mistborn on both sides

Kelsier kills Elend almost instantaneously, having no hesitation with the concept, by shooting a coin and throwing a blade at the same time 
Elend's less experienced reaction moves to block the coin he can sense and takes the knife in the gut.

If Kaladin's lashed kick in the arena can crack plate, I'm confident a steel push assisted storm of bullets can.
So Wax takes Eshonai pretty quickly.

Vivenna holds Nale off long enough for the other two engagements to end.
Nale is then torn apart by coins from Wax and Kelsier....

...only to return the next day because he's a herald and they can do that.


Vivenna and Wax eventually succumb to exhaustion and are killed.

Kelsier does too, but himself being a cognitive shadow, also manages to find a way back.

Eons of fighting between Kel and Nale eventually give way to regular pancake eating contests, Nale having developed an affinity for them due to the influence of a certain ten year old.
 

My idea about 2 was that the bird itself functions like the Gem in fabrials or the Metal in allomancy
The parasite they get is what provides the power, the bird's physiology functions to determine what type of power is granted.

If that's true, any bird from any world could be brought and might provide an ability, but I would always expect that ability to be unique to First of the Sun not from the bird's homeworld, because, again, the parasite is the source, not the bird itself.

Pretty sure at least one of the two spren is responsible for Oathgate function.
Sja-anat says she touched the spren so the gate would not function as expected. before Shallan activates it in Kholinar.

Then when the team is in Shadesmar, one of the spren is Red (co-opted investure indication) as opposed to the rainbow colors of its counterpart when they eventually get to Thaylen City.

Theory:
The gate in Shadesmar is *not* a manifestation of the physical gate but rather a distinct machine.
One spren is for the Physical Realm gate, the other is for the Cognitive Realm gate.
The OathGates normally function as a three step process.
Physical to Cognitive, Cognitive to Cognitive, Cognitive back to Physical.

The corrupted spren at the Kholinar gate is the Cognitive gate's spren, so the Physical gate worked to get them to the cognitive realm, but the Cognitive gate did not work to transfer them to Urithiru.

it does appear that got a straight answer later

https://wob.coppermind.net/events/93/#e2685

no