king of nowhere

I think pulsers would be very useful in hospitals or other emergency stuff. possible circumstances where they would save the day "we need those medical supplies that will arrive in two days, but the patient will not survive that long." "This guy will die before the medics can reach him" "our freezer is broken, all the supplies will go spoil before we can fix it" "the building is burning with people trapped inside, and firefighters are trapped in the traffic" I'm sure I could think of many more

That is the point where i disagree. dalinar would not charge enemy archers while unarmored and carrying a bridge, but I see no particular concerns with charging enemy archers while carrying a bridge with heavy armor and large shields. or with carrying a bridge hoping to arrive before the enemy, and waiting the chulls if you don't. Some may argue that the way bridgemen were worked was inhuman, but that was only because they were underfed and untrained. If they get good meals and good exercice, carrying a bridge is no worse a job than many others in the army. EDIT @ cabbagehead: i agree, there is a significant chance dalinar will change the strategy in a way that will make bridges unneeded. maybe building fortified positions in inner plateaus.

of course this strategy, to minimize losses among spearmen, would also need to fit them with bigger shields. sadeas complained that the parshendi focused the army when he gave armors to the bridgemen, so dalinar would need to give his men some better cover. so maybe there is a logistic reason. for my second idea, however, that of using a regular bridge crew until the last chasm and then get the gemheart if you arrive first, wait the chulls if you arrive second, I see no problem at all. In fact, it is pretty close to what dalinar was already experimenting. And it would require no more than 5 bridge crews, which wouldn't be many men for the logistic of dalinar's army.

Someting I've been thinking every time I read wok. Sadeas send the bridgeman unarmored because they double as bait, and dalinar of course refuses to do the same, so he has to stick to slow chull-pulled bridges. Why he didn't considered armored bridgeman? Charging the archers with an heavy armor and big shield is no more dangerous than regular fighting, and it would not violate the war codes nor be immoral or honorless. In fact, Sadeas mentioned that he tried armored bridgemen and the parshendi didn't focus them, so those bridgemen would take little or no casualties. For speed sake, the bridgemen could go unarmored until the last plateau, the armors being carried separately to be donned at the last moment. This tactic would also allow to have specialized, well-trained bridge crews. bridge 4 was much faster than the other bridges because kaladin trained them, but most bridgemen died before they got the chance to build stamina. armored bridgemen would survive for long, would train regularly, and would be well fed. they would be faster even than sadeas' bridges, and that would allow to win more gemhearts with less bloodshed, arriving before the parshendi. being a bridgemen would be a position like any other in the army, not a status of pariah. Basically, it would be better for the army, and wouldn't break any of dalinar's ideals. So why the option was never mentioned? the only problem i can think of with this idea is that the army would receive a few volleys of arrows when cahrging the plateau, thus taking some extra losses. The chull pulled bridges provide cover for the troops. but the spared lives of the times when dalinar would arrive before the parshendi would by far outwheight those. Anyway, if Dalinar's primary objective was to avoid losses, then he should just avoid plateau runs. He's a general, he need to seize some objectives and he knows some of his soldiers will die for it. Another chance would be to send the army with bridges like sadeas ones, and send the chull-pulled bridges separately. If dalinar arrives first, he gets the gemheart without losing lives. if he arrives after the parshendi, he stops at the last plateau and waits for the chulls. No bridgeman would have to charge archers, ever. Dalinar still has the same option of chull bridges as before - in fact it would be a bit faster, the time it takes for the army to cross the bridges in intermediate plateaus would be saved, while the time for deploying the bridges and have the chulls cross them would be the same - but he also has a chance of taking the gemheart without fighting. Why hasn't dalinar done any of those things?

In the beginning of the first book, when kelsier is testing vin, he gives vin a vial of 2 different metals. then he either took the fact that vin could acccess the reserve as proof she was mistborn, or he actually rquired her to burn the metals. I don't remember and don't have the books available. Someone should check. If kelsier was satisfied with vin feeling the metal, then it proves you need to be able to burn a metal to feel it. otherwise, it proves nothing. But I don't think a mistborn could burn any metal with no allomantic properties. if that was the case, then they would feel traces from the water all the time. there are 90 elements occcurring in nature, and most of them are metals. so a mistborn should feel dozens of sources all the time. shouldn't they feel a big source from all the sodium, magnesium and calcium that are commonly dissolved in water? and lesser ones for all the other metals? So I guess it must have some affinity to an allomantic metal for you to feel it.

shouldn't maps be quite easy to get? you go a cartographer and buy them. I doubt the ghostbloods would need to kill someone to get some maps. so those maps probably had something special, which is probably related to urithiru or the shard pool or some stuff like that. As for the parshendi, they probably did not have access to any cartographer, but since they were preparing for war against the alethi, finding maps would be a reasonable preparation. So, I would conclude that parshendi and ghostbloods were looking for different, unrelated things. However I don't trust that conclusion, sanderson is quite prone to the conservaion of detail and so the maps probably have something important. But why can't the ghostbloods just buy them? And if they are looking for one specific old map with particular informations, how can the parshendi ask it to somne totally unrelated person? I don't understand it

yes, the shin appear a lot different from the final wok. But I wonder how much they are different and how much it just wasn't revealed in wok. for example, even if they are peaceful, they may still have a tradition of trained assassins. in general, just because their warriors are slaves, it don't mean they are poorly trained. they may even be better trained than the alethi, that recruit soldiers among the poors and don't seem to put much effort in their training. So this piece tell us that the shins may be more dangerous than it appears in the book. but the most surprising thing is that szeth don't appear to have any powers at all. he climb the roof with grapples, kill the guards with conventional means. apparently surgebinding was conceived later, or szeth wasn't supposed to have it.

I don't think so, because otherwise all that stuff about the 16 metals would be moot. plus, it's not like there are different ways of burning metal. you can burn it or you can't. if your theory was true, than a (for example) smoker would be able to burn steel, but he'd die for it. instead, he just don't feel the reserve. Also, being sick from burning wrong metals only happens when you burn an impure metal or an alloy with wrong percentages. if the metal has no allomantic properties (for example nichel, manganese, platinum) a mistborn just can't burn it.

I don't have the book at hand, but I remember that quote. it said ruin caused the mist to be more widespread and to linger more during daytime, killing crops. I don't think it said anything about ruin making the mist killing people too. Also, alendi said that the mist "had aused the death of thousands", because of the famine consequential to the crop failure.

I think we have quite confirmed that the mists made people sick to snap them, and some of them died because of the sickness. Just like the nobles beating their children. it's nothing to do with ruin, I think. In the army less people than expected died, even if the same amount got sick, because they were healty men and so more likely to survive the sickness. the alternate idea would be that there were less mistborn among them, which make no sense.

I think I read somewhere that brandon mentioned that sazed could choose to regrow atium (or lerasium, for that matter) but he prefers not to. so the answer would be "no, there will not be new atium, except maybe some nnuggets he'll make specifically for marsh to keep him going". But I'm not 100% sure of this, I may remember wrong

I always read BS books in english, because my brother casually got his hands on a wot book in english and after that it felt natural to continue in the same language - plus, the italian transation quite sucks: all the specific words used for the magic systems don't have a specific translation and must be invented, but they are just not the same. I also have been able to turn a few friends of mine into bs readers, if not fans. however, their english is not as good as mine and so they have to read it in italian. my arguments that their english would be improved by reading in the original language were not enough to persuade them. also the economic argument was ineffective, despite the ludicrous price of books in italy (over 80 euros for the mistborn trilogy). so they are waiting for the translated versione. Currently they loved the mistborn trilogy and they are looking forward to alloy of law, which hasn't yet been translated in italian. I made a google search as well as a search into the site to see if I could find a release date for the translation, but found nothing. i figured that brandon should know when his books are translated in various languages and maybe keeps the information on his site somewhere, can anyone point me to the place where I can find such information? Or at least confirm that it don't exist so I stop looking? Thanks

maybe they stack partially. the drumming example could fit here: if you are drumming to cover another sound, then adding a second drum would not make twice as hard to ddetect the smaller sound, but it would make it harder. Anyway, from what we know of allomancy there's no reason they should not stack. Possible reasons for why the inquisitors sensed Vin and Kelsier there: - someone of them was so strong at bronze that he could pierce the cloud anyway - there were some moments where vin and kelsier got separated, being at opposite ends of long corridors. maybe in those moments their clouds were not close enough to stack - the lord ruler himself felt them. he was surely srong enough to pierce 2 copperclouds - they just felt them through something more mundane, like for example all the noise they did in breaking in killing a dozen guards

I think the idea of a broken odium makes sense. However I don't think we can say anything on harmony. since saze holds 2 shards, i expect he would bhe stronger than odium anyway. or maybe odium never went there because harmony is unlikely to interfere with anything.

sanderson has finished his work with the wheel of time. Now he only has to make 9 stormlight books. and 6 mistborn books. and possibly one or two sequels for elantris and warbreaker (quite looking forward to that, since he promised somewhere that nightblood and a lifless would get pows) and whatever new project will come to his mind. Maybe he should remember that there are only 24 hours in a day... And the most ridiculous part is that, if he keeps going at that pace, he's going to finish all those books within a couple of decades...

I seem to remember that it has been established that hemalurgy do not need necessarily to kill the person it steals power from. apparently you can steal power hemalurgically even with nonfatal wounds. in which case stealing one own's power that way and then burning the spike could have some of the fancy effectes. I wonder if it will be worth it

I don't see them interacting, and even if they were to start talking to each other, I don't see them having much in common. I realize the same could be said of vin and elend, so I will not all it completely impossible, just very unlikely. Now that I think of it, both of them grew up almost secluded from the other sex: shallan in her house, kaladin in the army. they may have a crush for each other just for the sheer novelty of having someone of the opposite gender to sstay with, but I don't see much there.

I don't think szeth would ever run away from a trap. he's looking for a way to die without breaking his oath, and he's been hoping for an opponent capable of killing him all the time. so, if they set a trap on him, he'd charge headfirst, hoping that it will kill him. Also for capturing him there are many ways already established by other posters. I have another idea that would end up with him captive: his back is broken. that would leave him paralyzed, and allow to capture him. stormlight would eventually heal him, but he could be restrained just by denying it to him.

the "adon" part evokes somehing divine. However, given the huge amount of names given to god(s) in different religions and languages, it may as well be a coincidence.

intersting ideas, I hadn't considered the "capture" option. it could easily happen if szeth takes a blow to the head and loses consciousness, or if he's disarmed and runs out of stormlight. also shallan and hasnah may do something. I wonder, since you can soulcast air to stone and make buildings, if you can soulcast air to metal to iinstantly create a cage around an enemy.

There's something else I'm considering. At the end of the book, the king of karbranth mentions that he's going to send szeth against dalinar. he'll proibably do so in book 2. Now, given what we saw of szeth, he will abide the order or die trying. there are two obstacles to killing dalinar. one is kaladin, the other is dalinar himself. both of them stand a decent chance against szeth. the point is, if it came to such a fight, at least one of the three has to die. Except that I don't see any of them as being a goner. all of them have open stories that are unlikely to be fulfilled in the next book. I mean, kaladin and dalinar both have a long way to go and have been established as main characters of the series. Not the kind that will die in book 2. And szeth, why give him all those points of view if it was only to get him killed like that? if his place in the plot was just that of an assassin that would kill some kings and then die at the hand of the protagonist? So I see this fight as either not taking place in book 2, or szeth rebelling and breacking his oath on the climax. That's where I think his story is pointing. I wonder what will happen to his poweers in this case. breaking theoath could be a disonorable action, but then again it would be the honorable option since his oaths are being exploited to do evil. Anyway I'm really curious to see how the three characters will interact.

Thanks for the image, it was impressive. I think highstorms would be even stronger, since a man tied and exposed to a hurricane would not be in a great risk to his life. Also, the more I learn about other climates, the more I realize how lucky I was to be born in northern italy. no hurricanes, no storms, a winter mild enough that it don't inconvenience much but cold enough to keep the bug populations under control, a summer hot but still manageable.

about the marriage question, I don't think there's a rule for marrying in different ranks. I think a high noble could marry a paesant if he wanted, it's just something not done. in the same way that no law forbid the king to marry a beggar, but it's something that happens only in fairy tales. so kaladin could marry laral whatever his nahn was, but it would have been considered shaming for her in the noble circles. that's why laral wanted kal to win a shard.

assuming all are aware of each other's skills, at least broadly. otherwise wax wins against szeth and kell simply because they don't recognize a gun until after they've been shot, and then it's too late (an unexpected bullet is too fast to dodge or push even with stormlight or pewter). let's start with dalinar dalinar - szeth, that's a close one. we saw szeth - gavilar, and szeth was the best but gavilar stood his ground and got a good chance near the end. dalinar is said to be better than gavilar, that would make him pretty much balanced with szeth. I'd call it a coin flip. dalinar loses easily to the other 2, since they can just stay out of range, dalinar has no way of reaching an oppponent who can "fly" by steelpushing. true, kelsier would have a long time hitting him with metal stuff before he can break plate, but he's got time. a vial of steel and iron lasts for hours. bullets instead would be bale to crack a plate quickly. kelsier - szeth, i would bet on kelsier but it's open. the main advantages of kell are that he can stay out of range, and stormlight run out much faster than metals. all he has to do is pelting szeth with coins until he run out of stormlight. however, szeth is far from helpless, since he can leash objects to try to hit kelsier - he would use non metallic stuff, so kell would have to resort only to dodging. with some shrapnel blasting maybe he'll get a lucky shot before kell can finish him. he can also try to prepare sticky traps on surfaces and lash himself to jump around, so kelsier could easily lose to a single mistake. I'm also assuming stormlight > pewter for phisical enhancement here, as seems likely. kelsier - wax depends on the specific equipment of wax. if wax has aluminium bullets, kelsier is a dead man as soon as he is on sight. or if has steel pistols, he will never get to use them and kell will kill him fast, or at least force him to flee. or that hazekiller rounds for coinshots, they were quite effective. against those, kelsier would also die quickly. the only way to make a lasting fight would be to have was equipped with aluminium pistols and regular bullets. kell would be able to repel them if prepared. however, it would still be possible for wax to get a lucky shot, while the chance of kelsier hitting wax with a coin is negligible. bullets are much faster. so if wax can keep his distance, he will eventually kill kelsier with a lucky shot. if kelsier can close upp, he will kill wax easily thanks to pewter. it would basically boil out to who would outrun the other. both have steel, both have an edge on the other. kelsier with iron and pewter reflexes, or wax with wheight changeing? both are possible wax - szeth, i think szeth is dead. I really don't think his item-attracting skill would work on a bullet. wax would just headshot him. even lacking that, he'd still be able to keep his distance. however, if szeth could deflect bullets, wax would be able to survive much less than kelsier. he don't have pewter reflexes and endurance, and without iron he has less manueverability against thrown objects. still, bullets are more difficult to evade than coins. Those are all the pairings. If they were to fight in an arena, however, i think everyone would go into hiding. here it really comes down on who would surprise who. I think kelsier would have a big edge thanks to tin - eventualy with duraluminium. wax would find a sniping place and do what in fps videogames is called "campering". he'd knew to keep his metal off for kelsier. szeth wouldd lurk around. dalinar would not be good at hiding, however no one can kill him quickly and attacking him would reveal their position to the others. so it would be a very intersting situation that could go all way. EDIT: I'm assuming kelsier has no atium of course. if kelsier has atium, he win easily against anyone. atium would probably be enough to compensate to szeth superior physical skills and stab him, or to dodge wax bullets and close range with him quickly - or even stab him with a thrown glass dagger. or to kill dalinar in melee kaladin's style.

Even the middle age nobles would acknowledge that without farmers they would be unable to eat, and that it is a noble thing to do to provide food for everyone, and so on. that did not change the fact that they were treated little better than slaves.