Rainier

I was pretty disappointed that Amaram turned into a super-bad-guy. I was hoping that he would be humanized, or justified in his actions, and we'd get to see more of exactly how and why he thinks he's doing right. Instead, he turns to the enemy the first chance he gets, robbing us of any further moral ambiguity and ensuring that everything he ever did was evil. Given that WoB says Gavilar was on the path to be a Bondsmith, I was hoping that Amaram would have more depth than simply big-bad-guy #2 (after Sadeas), and I hope that Moash has more depth than simply big-bad-guy #3. I want Moash to have to confront what he's doing to his people and his friends, as he's shaping up to have some of the moral ambiguity of Amaram. He's been wronged and has exacted his revenge on the man he deemed responsible for that, but moreso he's turned his back on all of humanity in the process. It seems pretty clear that Moash is being set up to be the primary antagonist in the next book, and possibly the following book as well. The question is what will become of him: will he realize what he's doing, now that his vengeance is satisfied, or will he embrace Odium and the powers offered? The best bad guys are the ones who think they're the good guys, and who can justify their actions within their morals. That's what I was hoping for from Amaram, and since that went up in smoke (or was frozen in crystal), I'm hoping for the same thing from Moash.

Honestly I'm more interested in radio waves as a means of communication than the weaponized uses. We've seen how much trouble it is when the spanreeds go dark, so having an invisible, unstoppable method of communicating long distances could be very valuable.

Oh boy, not only do you put them opposing on the Law-Chaos axis, but on the Good-Evil axis. I just assumed they were both good, because that's not the contrast I wanted to make, but I like your arguments for how Adolin can be evil, from a DnD perspective if not a Cosmere perspective. I'll disagree with you, because I think Adolin matches Lawful Good better than Lawful Evil/ So in these three alignments, I see Dalinar as Lawful Good, Szeth (surprise) as Lawful Neutral, and Sadeas as Lawful Evil. I don't think any of these are very controversial, although Dalinar was absolutely Lawful Evil in his flashbacks, and his experiences at the Rift, his brother's death, and his visit to the Nightwatcher moved him slowly from Evil to Good. Szeth I feel I shouldn't have to explain. He held to his personal code and it nearly destroyed him. He's bound to a spren that expects him to hold to those oaths. He will follow those oaths, period. Sadeas is the one who methodically takes what he wants. He's the one who has plans and plots that won't ever come to fruition, because they're backup plans. He's the one who doesn't care whether Dalinar is right or wrong, he just cares about advancing his own interests. However he still works within the Alethi society and its customs. Adolin, on the other hand kills Sadeas for exactly this reason, and he does so outside of the Alethi customs. He's probably between Lawful Evil and Lawful Neutral, because he still acts in accordance with his laws and codes, most of the time. Killing Sadeas definitely moved him towards Lawful Evil, but he was probably close enough to Lawful Good beforehand that I wouldn't move him straight there.

In Dungeons and Dragons, and various derivative works, a character's alignment is represented along two axes: Good-Evil and Law-Chaos. There's some debate about which characters fall into which sections of the alignment grid, and it's generally a fun and illuminating way to interpret a character's actions. My specific point was about a distinction in these arguments about the nature of the Law-Chaos axis. Good-Evil generally has fewer confusions, but lots of people think Law is following the laws, or a code, or keeping your word. I like to think of it as the opposite of Chaos, so it's closer to Order-Chaos or Civilization-Wilderness, and that was the distinction I was trying to make regarding Kaladin and Adolin: Adolin as Order, Kaladin as Chaos. But that's more of an argument on the characterization of the system than anything really specific about our characters, although you can see how it's prompted some reactions already. So to try again, Adolin is Law/Order: the sculpture, the fashion, the wines, the everything pomp and circumstance and High Society. Kaladin is Chaos/Nature: the rock formation, the sullen intensity, the lack of patience for propriety and social strata, the constant allusion to winds and storms and natural phenomena that cannot be walled in or restrained. It's not perfect, but it's where my mind went when I started thinking about Adolin vs Kaladin as a whitespine. I'll have to concede on that particular imagery, as I like @PhineasGage explanation of Adolin as whitespine and Kaladin as chasmfiend. It doesn't quite get at the raw wild nature vs constrained human society, but that's my fault for shoehorning it in to a slightly separate idea.

I'm not a fan as Adolin-as-whitespine, as I still assign that sybolism to Kaladin (like he needs any more). Kaladin is the one we see wilt in captivity. Kaladin is the dangerous beast (shash brand). Kaladin even had a flashback scene that featured a whitespine off screen. Remember, Kaladin is the wild, chaotic nature and Adolin is the proper, upstanding civilization. Rock formation (or apex predator) vs sculpture (or duelist). This is why Adolin is a duelist and not a hunter: his is the civilized violence of men, not the raw simmering volence of a beast. Even the chapter title, Whitespine Uncaged, is referring to Kaladin, not Adolin. After all, everybody knows that Adolin is a duelist. He's not caged, and if he were at one point by this point he's already been uncaged for a series of duels. It's Kaladin that comes out of his cage by putting himself in the midst of shardbearers and using stormlight to defeat them. He's the whitespine who's been uncaged, and he's the dangerous beast they throw in prison afterwards. I think this is the major difference between Kaladin and Adolin. Adolin is civilization, high society, fashion, commerce, law, and trade. Kaladin is the wild, low society. Even though he's educated and a surgeon, he's still a loner, standoffish, and generally still described as a natural phenomena such as a rock formation instead of a delicate piece of art such as a sculpture. In DnD, Kaladin is Chaotic Good and Adolin is Lawful Good, given the law-chaos axis represents civilzation vs the wild and not literally follows the law or doesn't. Everything else in this thread is golden, however, so I won't let that minor disagreement derail anything.

I'm surprised you caught the phrase immediately before this, but didn't quite make the connection with this phrase. I think it's very clear that Amaram was consumed by Yelig-Nar and it was the Unmade that was responsible for his transformation into crazy crystal-beast with all 10 surges. He swallowed the stone and got the power, which we may see another time depending on what exactly happened to that stone.

And like any good fetch quest, I bet there were a dozen intermediary items and relics he needed to cart across the Cosmere to trade for the one thing he needed to trade the next guy on the other side of the Cosmere to get what he actually wanted. Biggorons Sword quest writ large.

For what it's worth, Malata uses her safehand to inscribe the table in her scene at the end of Oathbringer.

It's also an English word, pronounced like the start of tambourine. tim·bre ˈtambər I'm assuming mixed-gender pairs unless specified otherwise. I look at it like handedness: right-handed is much more common, but left-handed isn't unknown at all, just less common.

I love the keteks we've had so far, and I appreciate your bringing this one up, especially since it was written for Shallan's wedding. There's something bout it that raises my hackles, and I think it's the combination of ending with new beginnings and the phrase about truth defy/defying truth. Shallan is the last person who should be denying truth, but she's the number one most likely (OK, #3 behind Nale and Szeth) at defying truth. She refuses to accept the truth (her dissociation, her multiple personalities) constantly. Not sure what else it means, but by having the defy-truth-love-truth-defy turnaround and by ending on new unity it makes me think somethings amiss. Again, I'm with you in interpreting this as Brandon sneaking in hints, not Jasnah perceiving anything untoward. At what point will it be a good thing if she fades? Life's not so bad as a drab. A good distinction. Misdirection is one thing, but you're right that this doesn't feel like misdirection. It's too obvious and consistent to be misdirection. If it really were just a smokescreen, I would have expected the hints to die off as we progressed through the book as the real ending asserted itself. It wouldn't be the first time we see Kaladin refusing to acknowledge his emotions, or lying to himself about them. Good thing his bond doesn't rely on self-awareness. This is my biggest struggle when trying to tie Adolin to Shallan. Adolin simply doesn't have the personification or the symbolism surrounding him. Good catch on the sunlight, I'll have to keep my eyes peeled for these mentions on the re-read. I love me some keteks and I'm loving your connection here. I actually 'spoiled' the book for myself because I couldn't wait until the end to read the entire ketek. This would be consistent with his character (lying to himself, refusing to admit to his feelings, pretending he's fine when he's not) and it would make the break serve a purpose in the narrative. You can't have sparks fly all the time, but you definitely can have sparks fly the first time the characters see each other in months. However, this is the most wishful of my wishful thinking. There are many, many reasons to put that break in there and many different narrative purposes it can serve. And 42+ page forum topics....

So you're saying we need a Shard-trebuchet that can launch a 90kg spren projectile over 300 meters...

I've said it before and I'll say it again: Shallan is the last person who should care about oaths. Hers is the order that doesn't have oaths, after all, but instead powers up with self-awareness. He's got his out already built-in.

You jest, and it won't be Nightblood, but imagine a sentient invested object with the command: reproduce yourself. I don't doubt that she has her goals, but I do doubt that she's fully thought through the consequences of what she's doing to accomplish them. Alas, we'll have to wait for more content because right now there's just too much uncertainty. Did Vasher betray her, or did she betray Vasher, or did something else cause them to part ways? Did Vasher help her with this sword, or was it Yesteel? If so, what difference does it make? Is the difference indicative that this is Yesteel's handiwork and not Vasher's? She says Vasher and Nightblood are criminals. What crimes did they commit? When? Where? Against whom? All unanswered, as of yet. Most likely is theft of Nightblood himself, but again, why? And then who brought Nightblood to Roshar in the first place? Was it Vasher? Why does't he have it now? Vasher was haunted by the changes his inventions wrought on his world, Nalthis. I don't think he'd agree to build more swords, but I can absolutely see Vivenna repeating Vasher's mistakes.

Hey man, I had the same thing with Teft. Not sure how exactly, but I was certain he was Jezrien is disguise and that he had somehow along the way partially bonded an Honorspren who he had left for dead years ago. And then nothing ever happened to confirm it and we saw exactly what Jezrien was up to the whole time. For Azure, at least, I didn't pick up on it just from the name (which I should have), but the first time she used a colorful idiom it slapped me across the face. I knew to watch for those from the Vasher/Zahel remarks in WoR. Prior to that I thought she was a Surgebinder of some sort.

It absolutely IS risky, which is why Vivenna selling the knowledge of how to make more is, I think, the most important thing to happen in Oathbringer. Let me say that again: of all the crazy rust that goes down, the single most important event may have been the selling of weapons technology between two factions we hardly understand. Who knows where that technology will lead? That question, by the way, is also the heart of the Mistborn trilogy-of-trilogies: how does magic interact with technology? One last note: we have no idea what the differences are between Nigthblood and Vivenna's sword. It could be that her sword has a different level of investiture, or that it isn't really like Nightblood at all. It may or may not destroy on all three realms. It may or may not consume investiture, thus lowering the total amount available in the Cosmere. I'm inclined to think it isn't quite the doomsday weapon that Nightblood is, both because we see Vivenna use it and it just drains color but doesn't make the poor bastard at the pointy end disappear in a puff of smoke and because More Warbreaker Spoilers: So yeah, Nightblood is AI, and AI is scary. The spread of AI technology is scary. And the connotations of Nightblood on Roshar go farther than simply taking out Fused. I can't wait for Nightblood, the book. It's #1 on my list of Cosmere books I want before SA#4. I think when it comes out we're going to see much more of the backstory and motiviations of these characters, and what exactly brought them to Roshar. I'll also shamelessly plug a topic I started a few days ago: Vasher, Vivenna, Nigthblood, and Szeth where I talk about the chain of custody and possible motivations.

Which itself is hilarious because people on Scadrial actually wear aluminum-foil-lined hats to reduce emotional Allomancy. Tinfoil hats are actually good for something! It also makes me want to wear a tinfoil hat (aluminum, of course) to a signing. Thanks, @Ookla the Beardspren, I thought you were referring to Dragonsteel (the metal) being mentioned in the first part of Oathbringer. I haven't actually read the Dragonsteel Prime chapters, so I guess I should make a point of it.

This has been brought up more than a few times since release, and it's a great idea. We've seen Nightblood take down a Thunderclast, which we know was a large spren in the cognitive realm. I'm pretty sure what we know of Nightblood makes him the ultimate Fused-killer. However I don't think that's why Nightblood is in the series, I think there's got to be something bigger than that. Since you didn't specficially say spoilers for Warbreaker (which you should for all Nightblood topics, in my opinion), I'll put the rest in a spoiler comment.

Can you remind me where this is? I figured I'd remember at least vaguely something so cosmere-relevant, but I'm drawing a blank. This might be plausible. I'm liking the idea of Dawnshards being all kinds of strange artifacts we wouldn't expect, like the Bands of Mourning. I also like this idea, although it's really annoying trying to figure out which silvery metal it could be. Silver is inert, Aluminum is some kinds of uber-metal, but nickel is silvery and who knows how many alloys you can get to a silvery color. Every time something silvery gets mentioned we start playing the aluminum-or-not game.

So maybe not a red herring, but a blue herring. I'm trying to figure out what I'm actually wanting and more importantly why I want those things, and I think I've come to something of a realization. The character I'm most invested (hah, more bad puns) in is easily Kaladin. He's the one I see as myself in the story (because nobody sees themselves as slaughtered bridgeman #27) and he's the one who success and failure feels most personal, in a way that simply doesn't hold with Jasnah, Adolin, or Shallan (Dalinar is my #2, so I'm more invested in him than these others, too). What this means is that I don't really care if Shallan is strong or weak, dependent or independent, because to me she's a character in Kaladin's story (and Dalinar's, to a certain extent). She can be other things to other people, but this is my personal, emotional opinion. Now, this is all #1 from your criteria. This is how I read, and what I want when I'm reading. What this means is that I want Kaladin to get the girl that's the object of his affections, in this case Shallan. But it's #2 that led me to believe that Kaladin wants Shallan. It's the clues about their connection, their subtle similarities despite their obvious differences, that made her into (what I think is) the object of Kaladin's desire. It's #2 that makes me angry because while I'm firmly on Kaladin's side in everything because of #1, it's because of #2 that I'm on Kaladin's side vs Adolin in the Great Shallan Shipping Wars (2014-present). Don't worry, nobody is going to hold that against you, and frankly one of the reasons it was closed for a week or two is because it was getting repetitive. This is a wonderfully succinct way to put it that also plays on the realmatic theories we all know and love so much with the Body/Mind/Soul as a person's connection to the Physical/Cognitive/Spiritual realms. Your entire post is quite good, as evidenced by the quick accumulation of credit you're getting. For what it's worth, most people still sticking around this long seem to be working on a similar idea: that this can't be it for the triangle because of all the foreshadowing and hints.

Ship's....lawyer? Sure, why not. Ah, but can we tell what's foreshadowing and what's our own wishful thinking? I agree with you both that the foreshadowing in pointing due Shalladin, but I also acknowledge my own expectations and, yes, wishful thinking. Also, it's good to be back. I'll try to contain myself to this thread, although I must say I enjoyed seeing both Adolin-hate and Shallan-hate threads on the frontpage. Everybody has their own little space, I suppose, although the latter moving too quickly for me to really catch up. When you have a point you want to respond to on the first page, but the thread is five pages deep already... There is it again, wishful thinking or deliberate foreshadowing. We can tell where you're coming down on this topic.

Count me among those who is thinking Dawnshards, and also thinking that these Dawnshards are what destroyed the previous world of the original humans on Roshar. The plural, ends of worlds, tells me the stakes are much higher than we're giving credit for, and a cache of ancient artifacts with the power to destroy worlds fits that bill. It seems that Aimia and the Dawnshards are being set up as our next 'level-up' in power as the series continues.

For obvious reasons these three people will be coming together over a common thread: Nightblood.What face-time Szeth gets in book 4 will surely be dominated by his multiple commitments: Dalinar as the subject of his third oath, his fourth oath and the purging of the Shin, reforming the Skybreakers, and Nightblood. By bearing Nightblood Szeth will eventually draw Vivenna and Vasher. This seems the most certain to happen in book 4 and especially before the end of book 5 (I hope, I pray), although I can absolute imagine being teased for a full 10 12 books on Nightblood's fate and influence so I won't will get my hopes up. Whenever it happens, these three will either be enemies or intimate, depending on Vasher and Vivenna's motives. The crux of this conflict will lie in Nightblood's chain of custody and the creation of Vivenna's Type IV BioChromatic sword. The last we saw Nightblood before he showed up in Nale's hands, he was with Vasher and Vivenna at the end of Warbreaker. We've been promised a sequel which should clear up these custody issues, but regardless of how (at least) three two Nalthians and their two sentient swords ended up on Roshar, we know they're all coming into conflict. This whole post started from speculation on 'shipping Szeth, so I'll end with a twist. How will the two swords react to each other when they meet for the first time? Nightblood is ostensibly masculine, and Vivenna refers to her sword as she. Can we get some Type IV BioChromatic lovin' on?

I'll take a stab at this. In short, it's because he hasn't been a real character to us for very long, and thus we don't know much about him. Szeth is an assassin, feared throughout the lands. When we get inside his head, we don't understand his motivations, or the context of his suffereing. He's a mystery to us, and the answers aren't forthcoming, so it makes it hard to empathize with him as a real character. What are his hopes and dreams? What does he love, and what makes him smile? Not only is Szeth an outsider by virtue of his Shin heritage and upbringing in Stone Shamanism, he's doubly an outsider due to being Truthless. He's an exile and an outsider. After his tenure as Truthless, he's as broken a man as any we've seen in the Cosmere. He holds on his shoulders the deaths of countless souls, and they haunt him. Once, he may have been a regular man (most likely extraordinary, given he saw the Desolations coming), but now he seems capable of little else but his word and keeping the screams at bay. Essentially, we haven't had time to see Szeth as a real character. He's tragic, and menacing, and he's got a cool sward, but we know almost nothing about him as a person, and whatever personality he may have had has been scoured away by his time as Truthless. Given these struggles, how can you try to find him a partner? Do we try to ship him was Jasnah because they're opposite sex and similar ages? I say yes, because why not. And that's about as much as you can do with Szeth when it comes to romance. Combine this with the dearth of available women and you'll see my point. Who is there to ship him with? Shallan is thoroughly covered, Jasnah is the most likely due to no choices, and who else is there? Anyone of note? I expect we'll see him slowly become more human, but given his soul isn't perfectly aligned with his body due to being killed and revived, it also wouldn't surprise me that he stays forever an outsider. EDIT: Rather than clutter up this thread with posts about Szeth, I'll put the rest in a spoiler.

For a while I thought Teft was Jezrien, who had somehow bonded an Honorspren and was becoming a Windrunner. I'm not sure why I thought that, maybe an offhand comment by Teft about Damnation, but I spent the whole book waiting for him to reclaim his Honorblade and acknowledge that he was a Herald. Needless to say, I felt rather foolish at the end of the book. I'm curious to find out when, exactly, he first started seeing his Honorspren. We're led to believe that Syl is the only one who defied the Stormfather, and that she's special somehow because she was the last Honorspren 'born' of Honor who wasn't killed by the old Knights Radiant. However it seems clear that Teft may have had an Honorspren much earlier. If he wasn't broken by his strange upbringing, he certainly was when he turned in his parents.

Not to completely derail this thread, but does this have anything to do with the short story we get about the woman who trades places with the moon, and bears the child of another moon? I've had that scene jostling at the back of my mind since reading it, but I haven't found any significance, or even much speculation. That story could definitely be described as moon-love. As for Rock, I think the best evidence we have that he's a Lightweaver is the thematic reveal of his self-awareness. "I am a warrior" could easily be his first truth/secret. He's got lies and secrets in his past, more so than most (with the exception of Teft, who had some of his mystery dispelled). The best evidence against Lightweaver would be the relationship between Honorspren and Cryptics. It would be a bold Cryptic to tag along with the only bonded Honorspren, and be around a large group of other Honorspren. You'd think we'd see something, but there's no guarantee.