king of nowhere

Dude, I think you missed my first answer to that. "Isolated" means that he got it pure, and that was 100 years before they had the right furnaces. I don't know where that thing about chromium being identified in 1854 come from, but to the best of my knowledge wikipedia is almost as good as a primary source for stuff like that. Chromium was identified as an element back in 1761, not from thermite but from crocoite. Just because for us it is now more convenient to use a process requiring 2000 degrees, it do not mean that is the only process available. Plus, even disregarding all that, they had arc furnaces in alloy of law. with those you can go well over 2000.

Well, unless one order of radiants bonded democracyspren, that's not gonna stop them Anyway, I'd say it depends on several factors. one is, are the spren thinking like thebrain suggested? in which case, them focusing on the kholin family would make perfect sense. how manny radiants are there? if there are dozens of radiants for every order it is no so singular anymore that there are half a dozen in the same family. How well can sanderson justify it? that is the more important question. By the way, I know full well the cases for adolin and elokar possibly being on their way to becoming radiants, but I never heard anything about navani. Is there something solid there?

I think you are reading too much in one single technical advancement on our planeet, and at the same time not reading enough into it. for once, progress on scadrial is ddifferent from our, to the point that they have automobiles but they do not have telegraph nor the heroult proccess for the extraction of aluminium, both of which were invented several decades before automobiles on our planet. so I would be careful in assuming that just because something was invented after 1900 scadrians don't have it, or viceversa. but second, and most important, just by reading the introduction in wikipedia, "Isolated" means that he got it pure, and that was 100 years before they had the right furnaces. I don't know how he did it, but metallurgy is definitely not the only way to get a metal pure. he probably used a more chemical route. so, that means it is perfectly possible to get chromium without furnaces. it certainly costs a lot more, but allomancers don't need much and can pay a lot for it. furthermore, While we do not use them commercially because they are too little, scadrial may well have, simply because allomancers needed it and they had no other source. Again, they don't need much, so that would be enough for them.

Well, actually he did try. He said it in his rant to kaladin. he tried to be wise and listen to counsel, and ended up being manipulated by roshone and sadeas. he then tried to make himself the decisions, but they were bad ones. he tried to be merciful and people took advantage of him. he tried to be severe, and made a mess of it. Elokar tried, it's just that he really isn't king material. just having someone show you how it is done is not enough to learn the real thing. my mother and brother have been trying to teach me to iron since i was a teen, and I've been living alone for four years so i was forced to practice ironing, but I'm still no better than I was the first time i tried, and the best thing i can accomplish is to move the wrinkles around without adding new ones. they keep being baffled because i follow all their advice and still can't do it. so, i can't learn ironing, even if i try. elokar can't be a good king, even if he tries. The right decision would be to abdicate, but alethi culture say that people are put in their position by god, and if god deemed elokar fit to be a king, how can elokar disagree?

three weeks ago I visited washington dc. Today I read in the annotations from mistborn and immediately thought "oh ****" because I didn't visit it. not that I'm really intersted in cathedrals, I was there mostly for the iconic american stuff and the smithsonian museums, especially thoose dealing with technology and space exploration, and that left no time for anything else. Plus, I'm pretty sure that if i wanted to see majestic cathedrals, I could just stay in italy - I can think of at least half a dozen of them within a one hour car trip from home. No, the only reason I now deeply regret not visiting that place is that it inspired some locations in mistborn. Now I'm going to gooogle it so that I can see some pictures and get a better idea of how keep venture looked like. EDIT: well, it looks pretty much like the notre dame, which I actually visited. so I can just think of that next timeI read those scenes. I wonder if also on keep venture there is a darth vader head

Yes, certtainly a vast part of the kholin's talents are because they always got the best teachers for their children and had a chance at becoming great. This was much more evident before mass schooling. BUt still, they are not the only important people around. there are plenty of other nobles who have the same chances they have. That the kholins have so much stretches a bit my suspension of disbelief. On the other hand, it's not like if elokar were to join the radiants it would change much. they are so accomplished, one radiant more or less won't make much of a difference

all that investiture would cause him to combust. end of the super lord ruler.

kal973, maxal: yes, that's pretty much what I understood - albeit I didn't consider that he wasn't simply unfit for his place, he was also surrounded by exceptional people who made him feel even dumber by comparison. But then, as non mother-speaking I'm confused by the grammar involved: can "bulliying" be used to refer to that? to indicate any case when one is put under pshycological pressure by those around him, even involuntarily? or where you just using an improper term for lack of a better one, letting context clarify the meaning? Because I always associated "bullying" with the classical "mean kid" scenario, while for more pshycological violence "mobbing" was more appropriate, and I have no idea if there is a word for when no one is trying to do anything to you but you feel under pressure anyway. I agree with that sentiment, regardless as how it will turn out. If would be a tad annoying if all the kholins where such great people. The best duelist in the army (with a fair margin on the second), probably the best scholar ever, a very skilled scientist, two accomplished generals that single-handedly reunified alethkar (and both of them were at least close to adolin for sword skill anyway), three radiants... they don't need more than that.

I don't understand why many people say elokar was bullied. I see no evidence for it, and if i remember correctly jasnah in the prologue said something about him being used to get what he wanted, which would point in the opposite direction. I think his insecurity is simply coming from being bad at his job. as much as he tried, he kept screwing things up, and that was bad for his self esteem, hence the insecurity. but at the same time, being son of a king, he was used to getting what he wanted, hence the whining when the world stopped conforming to his wills.

Well, it is not the first time elokar sees spren that no one else can see. So there's definitely something going on there that will be expanded upon in further books. I also believe he's no radiant material, but then again, we don't know much of elokar personally. We know he's a bad king, and that make it seem like he's also a bad person, but could it be that he's simply a decent fellow who just happens to be bad at the job he got for heritage alone? IT could be that we never saw him in the right circumstances. take kaladin and his hatred of lighteyes. if you only read chosen chapters of wor, you could also conclude that he's nowhere near radiant material. So, while i do absolutely agree that he don't seem likely to become a radiant, it may just be that we've never seen the bright side of him yet. Or, it could be something else. Or maybe the spren actually broke the bond with him, and we'll see elokar as a case of someone who failed at becoming a kr.

Can you see kaladin and shallan becoming heralds and going to damnation together? "Remember the good old times when our loved ones suffered in our place?" "Yeah. Don't know why we ever complained about" They were better men than you, than me, or basically than anyone you'll ever know. A pity such worthy people had to endure such a fate.

Roshar is not a binary system, and the reasons for season unpredictability are already explained by others. Though I wonder, since air and water currents play a major effect in the climate, if they would, on a planet without axial tilt, bring seasons with some predictability. many such currents on our planet are seasonal, like the monsoons, but then again, they are seasonal because of axial tilt and its consequences on solar irradiation. I guess if we really found a planet with negligible axial tilt it would be a good study fro climatologists. As for a planet on a binary star, I remember reading a few months ago that one such planet was found. No idea if that kind of orbit would be stable in the long period, but if it was - and if the orbit didn't cause it to have too big thermal excursions - then I'd see no reason why such a planet could not have life.

I guess it depends on how you think the command. if you do things right, the book will shut itself if you try to skip ahead. if you do them wrong, the book will try to kill you when you read the epilogue.

Or, it could just be that jasnah didn't have stormlight in shadesmar. do gemstones get recharged in the cognitive realm? and even if they were, it was the weeping. maybe she had to save all her stormlight to elsecall.

if i remember correctly, it was stated that most pewter burner could burn metal inconsciously, so it wasn't that particular.

That's a good point here, we don't know very much how a spren think. Generally, for either magical creatures or artificial intelligence, I tend to assume that sentient is humanlike until proven otherwise, but it may not be the case here. I don't think we've ever seen a spren pow, that could help a lot. However, I think more likely that sentient spren have humanlike feelings becase pattern acknowledges that spren gained existance and sentience because of human perception. So, if the human mind shaped them as living ideas, it is reasonable to assume that it also shaped their mind. It's true, they are in many aspects alien entity, but I don't see their questions about "human biology" (let's call it that) as a sign of an alien mind, merely of alien bodies. However, even if spren can't love, it still poses a question. if a human was in love with his spren, would the spren be freaked out? would it affect the bond?

well, it may simply be that compounded Feruchemical gold is more effective than stormlight. however, I do wonder what would happen if we had put miles' head under an industrial press and flattened it. would THAT have been enough? how about we also make the press scalding hot so that his brain would not only get squashed, but coocked too? Or, is it possible that miles was an exception? maybe a shard made him more powerful than he should have been and used him for some purpose? Because generally all of sanderson's magic systems are well balanced with strenghts and weaknesses, and there are always ways to fight magic users. So I would be a bit surprised if it turned out that there is no equivalent of hazekillers for miles or a knight radiant. Well, except for stripping off their powers with a hemalurgical bullet to the heart, of course, that can kill anyone if aimed properly and the right metal is used, but it is hardly a practical way.

probably you cannot store the lashing, but you can make yourself wheightless so as to ignore them. what moogle suggested is also an intersting possibility, it may cause the other guy to accidentally drain all his stormlight.

I also think, now everyone among the alethi armies - or at lleast anyone important, and certainly adolin - should know that shardblades are really dead sprean. so adolin, knowing about it, could consciously try to reanimate his.

Although, I reread the first min/rand chapter, and i understand rand much better. There is a point that says "It was the sheepherder and woolhead that stilled his alarm. The truth was, she felt remarkably nice sitting there. But she was Min". Basically, Rand was fooled because it was min who did it. I have a lot of physical intimacy with my best friend (well, not as much as min did with rand, but still more than most best friend relationships) and I take as normal from her behaviours that, from any other girl, would lead me to either date her on the spot, or telling her that she's not my type. Her boyfriend also don't see anything wrong with it. So, Rand was not totally dumb in that scene. Only mostly.

yeah, I definitely liked egwene starting to act like an adult in this book. unfortunately, and without spoilering, there are still circumstances where she behaves like an inflated brat. In future books, I keep going through wanting to kneel to her out of pure respect, and wanting to slap her silly in the next scene. "kneel, or you will be knelt" is one of the most badass lines in the story of literature. loved that. as for rand and aes sedai, I feel for both, but I also think both sides deserve each other. really, this is one of the many times where the plot of the books could have easily been solved by the characters sitting down and talking their differences like adults, instead of wanting to be in charge. rand behaves like he's the most important person in the world, and the fact that he actually is is not a good enough excuse to ignore the advice of people with much more experience than him just because he don't like that advice or because he has deep issues with the death of women. and the aes sedai behave like they are the only people in the world with two neurons to rub together. also, people letting their own expectations clouding their assesment of facts. when the aes sedai was stabbed by an aiel, they were already expecting rand to try to intimidate them, so they bought it immediately and didn't even try to get confirmation, didn't get suspicious when rand didn't understand what they were talking about. they should have reasoned that if rand wanted to send them away, he could do so very easily, and if he really wanted to stab one of them to intimidate them, denying it when confronted in person would undermine the point. by women well versed in politics, the possibility that it was a darkfriend trying to sow dissension should at least have been considered. Oh, and that was the book where min starts seducing rand? wow, those were among the funniest scenes in the series, with min teasing and him being utterly clueless.

the op was about the first time kaladin gave up shards, back in way of kings.

You're not the first to come up with this theory. I certainly would like it.

I'm wondering about the possibility of humans falling in love with sentient spren, and eventually being reciprocated. But before that, a couple of disclaimers are in order Now that those points are cleared, I can expand on the introduction. upon forming a nahel bond, spren start becoming smarter and smarter. at first they are like children, but they soon progress, and syl and pattern appear to have a perfectly human intelligence and personality. with a superhuman knack for mathematics in pattern's case. that is likely to lead to the spren and knight becoming best buddies besides the nahel bond, and in the case of spren with a definite (and appropriate) gender identity it certainly would be possible that the knight could develop a crush on his/her spren. i'm especially thinking of honorspren, who are humanlike in appearence - because it would take a very particular mind to develop that kind of feelings towards a growing vine. So, how would a spren react to that? Could they reciprocate, or would they be more prone to run away? is the nahel bond already the equivalent of love on the spren's part? would it affect a radiant's progression? is it even possible that a spren would develope love first? And what if a spren had an affaire with someone other than his own radiant? I would think that, as spren are mostly the personification of human ideas, and their consciousness is directly influenced by how humans perceive them, a radiant loving his own spren would change the spren and make it more prone to emotions. if a spren was loved by his knight, it would make it much more likely to reciprocate. I think it would however be an obstacle to a radiant's progression, as the radiant would be more likely to seek the ideals for the sake of his relationship than for the ideal itself. I believe that a spren forming a relationship with someone other than his knight would be theoretically possible, but practically in won't ever happen, as we never saw a spren having any interest to talking to someone other than his knight. Furthermore, I think man-spren engagement would be relatively common among radiants: shackle two people together for some months, and they will either become best buddies - and possibly lovers - or hate each other. and the nahel bond basically consist in shackling the human and spren together. I'm curious to see how that will be played in the future. I guess a knight and his spren hating each other but still being compelled to be with each other by the bond could be another intersting discussion, by the way.

it was common in many cultures, before family names were invented, to use patronimics. i guess that and the place of origin would be enough. by the way, it is not the first time sanderson uses that trick: also in mistborn skaa had no surnames.