king of nowhere

don't we know for a fact that the third (previously second) mistborn trilogy will involve a rogue mistborn and a swat team of allomancers going after him? it is fairly certain therefore that someone will breed a mistborn. which works pretty well with the set's plan. As for the fact that not all the kidnapped women were allomancers, that's irrelevant towards the breeding. they share the bloodlines, they have the right genes, they will be likely to pass the right genes even if they aren't allomancers themselves. I mean, if your family is full of tall people, and you are of average height, you are still more likely to have tall children. in fact, kidnapping women of allomantic bloodlines but uncertain allomancy makes sense only for breeding purposes. Also, as far as we know, what power you have does not influence what power your children will have. so the fact that marasi burns cadmium does not giive her a greater chance of breeding cadmium allomancers, but of breeding any kind of allomancers. even if she was an aluminium gnat, she'd still be as good for breeding as a coinshot. chull for why they don't kidnap men, well, men are only needed for the sexual act, and it''s likely the members of the firm are the "donors". or they can pay others for it. Women have to undergo pregnancy, so there is no way to make those women pregnant without everybody knowing of it. it's just a matter of logistics.

some numerology is based on the shards. also, ten is a recurring number in human culture, since we have ten fingers, so it is widely expressed in many cultures without being anything more than coincidence. aside from that, vorinism and pathism have nothing in common.

It's been a while since i last read elantris, but if i remember, he was afraid to show himself as an elantrian. Yes, we know the others would have accepted him. He didn't. Yes, it was a mistake. Well, not even raoden is perfect.

a god metal would be way too rare and allomantically valuable to use to make guns.

very possible. although i always took it that he is the kind of easy-going person that is capable of laughing at his own myseries.

I'm wondering if the result of the poll means that 75% of the people in this forum are male, or that males are more inclined to answer that poll. or that females are more inclined to answer, and there are even less of them. Whatever. Numbers are not an opinion, but how you interpret them is the trick. I just discovered this thread and I'm sad I missed the chance to participate earlier, there were some interesting discussions. Anyway, I see many people are confusing "being genderqueer" with "not fitting in gender stereotypes", which are completely different things. The way I understand it, you are straight if you are a man, feeling a man, and attracted both sexually and romantically only by women, or a woman feeling a woman and attracted both romantically and sexually only by men. Anything else falls under the "genderqueer" umbrella. If you look closely, very few people fit the gender stereotypes, and most who do are actively trying to because they feel they must be that way to be respected or to have self-esteem. also, according to gender stereotyes men are morons and girls are silly, I don't see how someone would want to conform to that. Sometimes I think my life would have been easier if I had been born a straight girl with the same exact personality. I have three or four good friends who are single and of whom I think "if I were a girl, or he was one, I'd hit on him/her". While it is very rare that I find a girl with the right personality to fit me, and each one of those I found are already taken. And I would like, if it was possible, to get a female body for a while, explore how it feels. But ultimately, I feel male, i like girls, i'm not attracted to men, so I am a straight guy.

I've had a world in my mind ever since I was 8. I used to imagine stories about it when I was idle. In the next twenty years, it never left my mind. It went through plenty of revisions while I became less naive and my own knowledge expanded, but it has always been there. I never considered writing something about it until about one year ago. Frequenting this forum, I read about many people writing stories for fun, and others reading them. Slowly, I started to want to put my idea on paper. Except that it's actually a screen, but you know, metaphorically. Anyway, this forum finally convinced me that yes, I could actually give a shot to writing a story, and yes, there would be people who would read it. So, here is the result. I've written prologue and chapter one. Prologue basically introduces the setting, showing a battle through the eyes of a common soldier to introduce the various elements, describe the situation, show the technology they're using; at 17 thousand words, it's by far the biggest part of what I wrote so far. Chapter one sets the story in motion. Chapter two, if I will write it, will start with new characters going to do what was planned in chapter one. I don't have a complete story, and while I have several ideas, and I at least know an outline for a few more chapters, I'm not sure on how I'm going to develop it. I also haven't decided on a title for it. But if I get enough positive reviews, I will keep working on it. Here it is. need a better title.docx P.S. I wanted to point out that I developed the concept of powered armor by myself before it went mainstream. In fact, I was a bit disappointed when suddenly every sci-fi movie or videogame started to feature them, like they stole my idea and now will make me look like a copycat. Of course, the idea of strapping electronics and other devices to an armor to turn it into something more is fairly easy to conceive. EDIT: Forgot to mention, since some of you care about this. profanity content: there is some mild swearing, mostly indirect (as in "he swore" instead of "he said ***********"). The thing is, soldiers swear a lot, especially when they are fighting and things are getting hairy, so including any less swearing would have seemed irrealistic to me. sex content: there is a passing mention that the armor contains a sex simulator, but nothing is done about it. I plan to show it used in the future, but it will be mostly played for laugh - and i intend to avoid being too direct in descriptions anyway

i think it would be a great story arc, but the fact that most of the audience is already half-expecting it sort of spoils it. THat's the downside with having a forum with an active fan community and giving them years between one book and another.

i assumed that they could ask to stop being tortured at any time, but when they ddo the desolation starts. however, we have no elements for it.

I suspected the same all the book, but given that she died without a reveal, it clearly was not the case.

well, there is the peacespren who won't turn into a weapon but will instead become a loudspeaker to start a negotiation. but it's not much use against odium.

apparently, big movie studios will buy filming rights for almost any succesful book that comes out. very few of those get turned into actual movies. I suppose it's a matter of costs, actually making the movie is vey exxpensive and so you buy filming rights around and then sit quietly and decide what projects put forward. It's quite a common decision-making process, really. At least, I know that's the same thing that NASA does to decide which instruments will be on board of a space probe: they ask for ideas, they get hundreds of ideas, then they fund a few dozen of those until they get more detailed projects, then they choose some of them for an even more extensive revision, and finally they pick the half-dozen instruments that they actually can fit oonto the probe and start building them. Or maybe they scrap the project because of cost overruns. I don't know much about the movie industry, but I suppose it's similar. They start a wagonload of projects, but they only carry through a handful. To me, it seems an incredibly inefficient and dispersive way of conducting business, but if so many succesful organizations use it, maybe it has its perks.

I don't know how to post images, but mine looks like a triangle. I scored a 93% on mastery, as I fully expected because I put a great deal into doing my best on a game and I take pleasure mostly by being good, planning good strategies, and even getting recognition as a good player. I realized that I can acctually feel insulted if other players adopt a strategy that implies they ddo not recognize me as a worthy opponent - like trying stupid tricks that only works against inexperienced players. I also got a 93% on social, which I did not expect. But then, that test counted "social" as "on the internet". I am not the "social" player in the classically intended sense. I don't give a damnation about forming guilds or stuff, I simply like to compete against other humans, because as challenges they are infinitely more rewarding that the AI. Which is a bit of a paradox because for all my competitiveness I am a very nonconfrontational person otherwise, and in many games I even don't like 1v1 because I feel winning or losing would be too personal. I also like to cooperate as a team, but again, not without any real intention of forming a community. So I think that profile is a bit skewed on that. Then I got almost nothing for all the other four factors. I am a focused guy, I like few things but I like them a lot. Although, again, I don't think the test really catches me, because those other things are actually important for the times I play in single player. I don't care about story when I go multiplayer, but when I run a game in single it can be the most important thing. In general, I can play different games, or even different modes of the same game, with different goals, and getting entertainment in different ways, so that test fails to consider that in me. All in all, it wasn't very accurate. But then, I never found a test who could do more than get some general vague ideas right. Then again, I am a particular guy and I realize many of the subtle distinctions that make me adore something and hate something apparently very similar, or consider something of the utmost importance in one context and utterly irrelevant in an apparently similar context, are only clear to me, and even some of my oldest friends don't really understand me, so maybe I'm just a difficult person to model.

I would just like to point out that we cannot take the fact that shinovaar has soil as evidence that it is protected from the everstorm. A highstorm is akin to an hurricane, and an hurricane does not strip away all the soil. If there was a hurricane or two every week, always blowing in the same direction, for millennia, then it would do that. But previous desolations lasting a few years at most would have gad little impact on the soil of shinovar. Besides, the soil is formed by geological processes like everything else. Wind and water and roots break the rock into sand, while organics and clay and other things stabilize the soil to give it the appearence we know. The only reason soil is not formed in roshar is that every loose particle is blown away by the storms. So even if the shinovar soil takes some damange from the everstorm, it would recover with time. Given how sedimentation changes riverbeds in a matter of centuries, I would guess that is the timescale it would need to reform. As long as enough soil remain here and there, the animals and plants would also survive, and would spread again when the soil forms again. So, shinovar having soil proves nothing about the cycle of the everstorms. Just that no single desolation had ever lasted enough to blow away all of it.

I'd much rather see an adaptation with real people. In the first place, because i'm not a fan of anime. In the second, because I would like to see roshar in some good realistic computer graphics. I don't need drawings. i have them already. EDIT: of course, that would be ideally. From a practical point of view, I don't think likely it will ever be adapted live (too many special effects needed) and an anime adaptation would be better than nothing.

I can piicture movies in my head, including stuff I made up, so I clearly do not suffer from it, but I tend to read like you do. architecture, fashion and appearence also bounce off my brain, in part because it's stuff I do not understand/care much about, and especially in english literature many words related to those fields are unknown to me - in particular in the wheel of time some descriptions are outside my understanding, and if I look for the translated words, I find out that I have never encountered that word in italian either, nor do I know what it means. but part of that is just from the way I am. If I read a description of how a character is dressed, I can form it in my head. But when I read the scene, and I picture it in my head, the clothing changes. or it is undefined. It's like my mind economize brain-power by avoiding what it perceives as unnecessary details, and it uses some sort of preconceived image for them. A most telling example is a sci-fi setting I have in my mind (I may write something about it in the future). There are soldiers fighting with golden-colored powered armors, and while I can see pretty well the armors, the starships, the alien environments and stuff, I always envision the enemy aromors as black. Even if I know, in my head, that they are identical, and should be golden-colored too. If I concentrate, I can see both sides in the fight with the real color. as soon as I start paying attention to something else, those of the other side revert back to black. I experience similar situations with most descriptions: I read the description, sometimes I even envision it, but then it goes back to what I percceived in my head before. That's one reason I'm grateful for the art in the stormlight archive: it's much easier to see it correctly when you have a picture in the book.

about jasnah, there is a scene released about her (that may be part of book 3 or may be cut out entirely) that explains how she survived: no real spoilers, but I spoiler it anyway: Unfortnuately i cannot find a link, but maybe someone will provide

If you look at the hystory of the world, you see that social progress has gone hand-in-hand with technological progress: the civilizations that were more advanced technologically were also those with the most developed concepts of morals. probably the two are related: if you live in a mud hut and famines and epidemics put your life expectation at less than 40 years, you don't mind much about killing the people in the next kingdom and taking their stuff, while if your problem is that the unemployment rate is going over 10%, that's not enough to invade someone else over it. or maybe more technology is related to more instructions, and more instructed and cosmopolitan people are more likely to pose philosophical questions and wonder whether it is right to kill those guys and take their stuff just because they talk funny, or not. Either way, it makes a lot of sense that a more advanced race would be also more moreally advanced. in that, the elves in dragonage are well justified: they had a superior civilization, while the humans were more backwards.

I have recently gained a t-shirt with "winner of the widelands tournament 2015" written on it, on account of winning a tournament of widelands (an open source videogame, that I'm blatantly trying to advertise with this post). the t-shirt also features some images from said videogame. I decided I have to wear it in the presence of any girl I find interesting. There's a good chance she won't speak to me afterwards, which will save a lot of time for both of us. And possibly I must find a way to mention that I have a shower curtain with the periodic table of the elements printed on it. And a poster of discworld over my bed (where a normal men would keep some naked woman).

if something makes me look pretty, then i like to wear it, even if it is uncomfortable. unfortunately, i have no capability to discern male beauty, so i have no idea what looks good on me. but if girls compliment me over a piece of clothing enough that i feel pretty wearing it, then I do, and don't care much about comfort. For that reason, I always try to compliment girls when I like how they're dressed, because feedback helps. And because of that, I will say that I really like heels in the 5-10 cm range. Bonus points if she's wearing them specifically for me, because I feel choosing to be uncomfortable to be prettier for me is incredibly nice, in a cute way; I'd do almost anything for a girl who did that just out of gratitude and cuteness. However, I would never insist that a girl wears heels for me. Ask, yes, but never more. Anyway, action girls wearing heels during combat make me shake my head. I'm looking at you, league of legends! I don't know the right word for what I feel when I see that. it's a mixture of "that's ridiculous" "that's sexist" "that's gratuitous fanservice" (I feel gratuitous fanservice is highly insulting, for the implications "you will buy this product because we show you some boobs" and "you're too stupid to see our trick" and "you're stuupid enough that yoou'll buy anything if we put boobs in it". Not to mention "we prefer to spend effort to put boobs in our product, rather than making it a bad product"). Oh, right, another romantic/social trope I hate: "you have to change yourself to be accepted". Hell, no. If you do, even if it works, you're on for a life on unhappyness doing stuff you never really liked to please people who don't have much in common with you. And that's another trope my parents tried to pass me. Took me a while to realize you must be yourself, find people who like you for it, and there's 7 billions people in the world so you don't need to please everyone. I also find particularly annoying the tropes related to girls and good catch, because most of those are traits I actually like. Especially the idea that men don't like smart girls, which I find rather offensive for men. As if we were stupid runts with an inferiority complex, needing a stupid girl to make us feel better. in fact, I realized I actually feel attracted by girls describing me the content of their PhD thesis. At lenght. Regardless of the actual subject. (EDIT: but especially for STEM fields, except for chemistry, because that's my job so it feels more like "you're meeting a coworker" than "an intelligent girl is sharing with you something she's passionate about")

I hate that one too, because my parents have been triying to use that on me for years. that, and the concept of "good catch". the way they talked about it, they gave mme the impression that marriage in their time was a social contract where the man was looking for an household servant (skill in domestic chores made the woman a good catch) and the woman for an advance in social status (cause social success for a woman wa achieved by being married to someone immportant). That, and fear of being alone. Which also make me dislike all the tropes where you have to have a romantic interest in order to be happy. being convinced of that trope in my youth caused me a lot of anguish that could have easily been avoided. EDIT: you don't always have action scenes. and sometimes you need to seduce someone rather than punch/stab/shoot (choose the appropriate one for the kind of world you are in) him. just don't fight in heels. maybe make sure that your feet are hard enough that you can kick off your shoes and run/fight barefoot if the unexpected happens.

shinovar certainly took dramatic damage from the everstorm, but how much destructiion they exactly faced is unknown. most of their population may be dead, or they may have gotten away with the loss of most infrastructure. anyway, their main problem is long term food: all their crops are destroied, and the everstorm will prevent new ones from growing.

just because we will see szeth's past, it will not mean it will absolve him of his actions. they still are there, and it can count at most as an extenuating circumstance. it doesn't say anywhere that a major viewpoint character must be good. on that count, i am more worried about dhalinar's past: we know he was a warlord. a power-hungry, bloodthirsty warlord. he probably killled more people than szeth ever did, iin the name of a meaningless glory and to conquer land that would be lost shortly after. I am afraid reading his past will make me dislike dhalinar. ultimately, however, i doon't worry. i trust sanderson to know where to bring the story. not all characters are meant to be liked.

most people think squires get the passive bonus of stormlight, but no activesurges. we stilll don't know foor sure, though. lopen'ss potential order was already discussed in the past, here http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/8048-the-lopens-order but i will repeat what i said at the time: the lopen is an order all by himself, with the power to summon cousins to do his bidding we may tentatively call his surges cousingbinding and favorcalling here an example of how his power works: -kaladin can fly with the power of stormlight. lopen cannot, but he has a cousin who has a cousin who owns an airplane factory, and owes him a few favors, so he can loan a plane (favorcalling) and fly. -Kaladin can fight like a little god with the power of stormlight. lopen cannot, but after all they've been through kaladin is practically his cousin (cousinbinding), so lopen can get kaladin to fight for him (favorcalling again).

it wil take the time it will take. brandon writes as brandon wills