Looter

Alright there is a little bit of a spoiler here so if you don't like them please don't read it. During his Steelheart release at the Kings English, (And 15th street gallery,) Brandon read two chapters from up coming books one was a chapter for the future Alloy of law book which was excellent and my wife may start reading some of his works if she ever has time due to it. The second was the Purelake reading which has been read before and linked at the top of the forum page since I have heard this before and read it as well I didn't think it was worth to record so sorry all of this will be secondhand. The reading was the same as before which is to say epic, then he read past his previous stopping point. Here is what I can remember of that little but at the end. Now seeing as how I have not yet really heard anyone mention this on the forums I will just try and remember it for you all. Sorry about the quality of my memory I generally average about 2 to 5 hours of sleep a day broken into fragments, thus causing my memory to be foggy quite a bit.

Well there is also the reasons the now recently deceased king of jah keved had for concealing his own ownership of at least a shard blade. This could be in response to other events in Roshar. I don't doubt there are many hidden blades and sets of plate around that the guestbooks or another faction may be able to use in recovery operations should they be needed.for a situation like the loyalty of a king such a thing may be worth it.

Ok since I have not found info on this reading I will post what I can remember in a new thread.

It was during his reading in salt lake for Steelheart. He did two one was from the new Alloy of Law the other was from WoR. It was effectivly the same as the first time with a little bit more at the end of it I guess not yet seen.

So I think that it is that Spren serve a function other than to create the KR bonds. I just don't know what that function may be.

That is my thought as well. But I can imagine it is not so simple as that. One thing I was thinking is what if there is an armory there for all shard blades when not summoned and it currently resides under the water or at least those shadesmar water beads in place of water. Meh random thought. As I said I think you may have the idea shardlet.

I totally agree hoser. Lies are not always bad, trust me I am married and small lies that make someone feel better at a cost to your own comfort are while not necessary at least in the realm of honor. Lack of honor is something that you serve yourself above the needs of all others. Shallen could have chosen someone lower than the sister of the most powerful king on the planet to try and commit her theft. She chose jasnah because of her views and reputation which would have put Jasnah in a position of low reputation. Shallen was not the most honorable at that point but taking from an enemy to save your family while only you are at risk of the wrath of one of the most important people on the planet is not wholly expedient nor honorless.

Ok I have a few minutes and I just read another thread here that was awesome and meshes well with my thoughts and takes them to another level entirely. http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/3744-investiture-is-a-two-way-street/ I hope that worked. Anyway So a bit of a theory on the oathpact and the splintering of Honor. Odium and Honor are/were bound together in a way by the oathpact. How? Well what if due to the theory posted in the thread above it was an exchange of investiture? 1.Honor Invested 10 Heralds that would be effectively immortal to lead his side of the conflict in battle and once dying or after volunteering to transfer to Odium for an attempt at turning. Odium would then have them as long as they were not needed for the fight itself. This would involve making them more Hateful than Honorable. Just the action of turning a splinter of honor against its master would work for odium and give him the leverage to begin the splintering of Honor. But it was a best a tie as Talenel still went to Odium, but the others did not but are still living in Roshar to unknown effect on the Oathpact. 2.Odium would invest in something else, something that would give power to men to use hatefully against one another. He would give them shard blades. But he was somewhat thwarted by sometime after their disbursement the orders of Radiants were formed. These people would then bind themselves to Honor as tightly as possible by their Oaths which would also allow them more access to the power of Honor as they were able to be trusted not to use the shard blades in hateful ways. This was a Loss flat out and I believe humans giving into their base desires of power through the use of force in the form of shardblades was what Odium had wanted. 3. The results seem to be a draw from the Heralds but a loss from the Radiants. Thus a win by Odium against Honor, now only Cultivation stands in Odium's path and yet Odium is still bound to portions of the oathpact as Talenel still upheld his part and the Radiants may have disbursed some of their taint by abandoning their plate and blades. Maybe it was the only way to allow their spren to be free even at the cost of their power and even the sentience of the spren involved. Syl did say she could withdraw her bond and become a windspren again. Anyway that does seem to left some bits unexplained but it seems to make some sense to me at least. I do still wonder about Cultivation since I don't think she was bound by the oathpact at all. I wonder if she is using some of Honors splinters somehow? Sounds interesting to me. As always please feel free to tear into this as much as you want but please read that posted thread it is very good.

I think strife has a better ring to it as well as something that can be internal or brought upon an external source. Just my thinking of course.

I have said this on another topic I think that the blurb on the back that says one will destroy them is a kind of Point of View from a Herald. I think that breaking the oathpact means they have to die in some way to be able to properly fight of Odium. So while Shallan might be the destroyer that does not mean that it is a bad thing.

To be honest I would have to say that much like Szeth it is Kaladin that is a weapon not a shardblade, or spear, or stick, or anything else. We even know that people in shardplate use other weapons, such as hammers, to fight different ways or even if they are lacking in a shard blade. Much like the radiants having the ability to near instantly don and remove their helmets I think modern people don't know as much as they think they do about shard blades. Besides can you imagine how awesome it would be to have a few dozen Windrunners dropping down onto a wave of enemies all at once using the force of their drop to propel spears all the way through enemies while emitting a huge Pressure wave of energy to blow back their opponents? Talk about going from offensive to defensive in about a second with a morale crusher in there as a side benefit. Windrunners are the ultimate shock troops. Fall into battle, Kill something in the front, Jump, Fall into battle, Kill something in the rear, Jump, Fall into battle, Kill something somewhere else. An enemy would then have to try and look everywhere to make sure that some one is not performing a DFA (Death From Above; a battletech term,) on them. Mix them with some solid wall front line guys and they would be nigh on unstoppable.

Yeah Szeth I think does look better but I have to say that Kaladin with the Storm looks amazing even with the awkward position he is in to get the storm and Title in. I do think that without Szeth there I don't like this nearly as much but as a whole I think it is one of the best fantasy covers out there, and one of the best alluded to fight scenes I have ever seen on a book cover ever.

There seems to be more complaining about this awesome cover than excitement. I hope this changes because I am a little disappointed by fan reaction here so far and was looking forward to more people as truly excited as I am. I mean it looks to be a fight scene between Kaladin and Szeth. How awesome is that.

Thanks you for the welcome and thread move.

No to the 2b question. I am thinking that the shattered plains may have had an event that removed some kind of influence from the chasmfiends and actually caused the shattering itself. Or they can exist in the same spot as a coincidence. I doubt Brandon does a lot by coincidence

Alright I am always very tired anymore so absolutely feel free to shoot holes in as much of this as possible. Ok With some of the readings and knowledge gained from the end of WoK I have been thinking some of this for a bit but cannot keep it all anymore without forgetting it. Brief summary. Fabrials are Items with spren in one way or another connected (Imprisoned) to/in them and have simple functions. The Thunderclast seems to be some spren touched by an entity, and corrupted toward destructive purpuses that bonds to the stone and give it some kind of basic lifelike functions. Spren inhabit nearly everything and are drawn to/ cause certian effects that generally give them their names, such as pain, fire, wind, death. The parshendi can bind forms to themselves to create new forms. Theory 1: Parshendi were originally corrupted and bound using these Evil Touched spren and formed many of the foot soldiers of Voidbringer forces, These Parshendi sometime after the "last desolation" were freed by a group (Possibly just Pre-Recreance KR) and in their spren less forms were essentialy harmless beasts that for their own protection as much as anything else were brought to groups of people in roshar. Theory 2: Gavilar wanted to somehow release the gods of the parshendi. In his notes it is said the Parshendi Worshipped the Chasmfiends as dark gods. What if much like the parshendi themselves the Chasmfiends were voidbringers when bound to a spren of some sort and in its place another spren has been bound to them all this time. Theory 2a; What if killing the Chasmfiends as the alethi and parshendi currently do is releasing the "Dark" spren and creating a window for the Chasmfiends to once again be in changed form. Theory 2b: What if the act that freed these Chasmfiends was somehow to cause the Shattered plains? Theory 3: What if the Radiants were bound to spren that were considered honorable and enhanced through this process like the Parshendi? What if that is how someone knew how to sever the bindings of the parshmen from spren? What if that same process was used on the radiants and the first that had that happen to them could use the stormlight they had once more to go to Feverstone keep since they were the only ones capable of moving at incredible speeds and that fort was as far as they could go on their levels of energy? Could that have happened? Theory 3a; What if Tanavasts deathblow was the act and his words that "these were the first and the last" was that these were the first Radiants to give up on their ideals once they had been stripped of the bond, and last radiants of their orders? For my final thought in this post. I think that This series seems to be about bonds of living things to one another. Bonds of families, bonds of loyalty, oaths, honor, and mostly just the binding of everything individually to everything else to create an amazingly intricate world. Whatever his reasoning I look foreward every day to more about this series in particular and all of Brandon Sandersons writings in general. Thanks now hack away gentlebeings. Edit for grammar, I really forget words alot these days.

I can see your point and it is a good one, so yes it really is the word "Innocents" that is at play there. Honor can be gained or lost not only on your actions but on how, and why you act. So, two stories here for you to choose to decide which is the more noteable and honorable after having taken out the actual actions. 1. A man was named Hero after killing a thousand men and turning war around. 2. A man stayed with the rearguard and died last among them. Which has more honor? The expanded stories are: 1. A man snuck into the enemies supplies and poisoned the water killing a thousand men and changing the war overnight. 2. A man stayed with the rearguard in a pass fighting man after man non stop for hours killing dozens if not hundreds before falling allowing his army to regroup to make a stand that would win the war. Context and intent are everything. Kaladin did not attack the parshendi to enslave them and was content to leave but for the fact they were killing surrounded men wholesale and he could not leave men to die without giving them a chance to win their freedom and lives. Kaladin did not have the pretext to kill parshendi because some of them had committed a crime some number of years ago. He risked his life and the lives of his men to give other men the chance to fight free of a certian death. That has honor. The parshendi view of things is not fully known but throughout the book they did seem to fight in ways that seemed honorable as well. I think both sides could be mistaken adversaries fighting a terrible war that only benifits the crows. I will also say that in general Dalinars men acted with much more honor than Sadeas' men did. So I am also sure the Parshendi have done several notably honorable things from their point of view when fighting Sadeas' and his thugs.

That is twisting things a bit. Killing in itself is not the issue. Both sides are soldiers and soldiers fight one another and kill one another. But if you go to a family of eleven and you know there is a group killing families of eleven out there and you decide that killing grandpa saves the other ten you are not better then the evil group you were saving them from. Lives have a value and a soldier fighting another soldier for his friends, leaders, and ideals has an honor that both side of the fight risk their lives for to earn.

Actually I think they may have assassinated him because they may have known that he had an Honor spren following him and wanted it to leave his presence so they could try and bind it. Say that they had a Parshendi in his camp near him and thought they would somehow be able to learn an Honor form.... Which would be cool. Also they may just not know how much a terrible thing it would be to kill him, maybe the Parshendi don't die the same way as humans and that is why they have the reverence for their dead. Could it be that the death of Gavilar was looked at as a way for him to somehow ascend to a higher plane or something akin to a higher Parshendi form? Well my 2 cents worth.

To be honest I am fairly certain that the back of the book is one of the Heralds talking about the Heralds themselves being Redeemed and then Destroyed. Which considering they are now functionally Immortal beings that broke their Oaths I am pretty sure they would welcome oblivion about now. So while I think that one or more of the four main characters will redeem their broken oath it would probably release them entirely from their lives thus Destroying them. So I think in 9 more books that could be not only truthful but a good thing for everybody involved.

After looking through this thread I have an interesting flip to this idea above me. What if this line is about Amaram not Kaladin. In another thread here someone noted that he references Restares and the Ghostbloods. So I think this could be an interesting twist of where you think it could go. As a side note; In 4500 years do you think it would be interesting if both sides of this conflict turned portions of the others forces? Could there be forms of Knights Radiant working for Odium and say the parshendi working for Honor?