agrabes

I personally think if we look at this it's showing at least a little evidence of my personal pet theory, which no one else really likes: Adolin isn't being counted as one of the characters in the Visualization charts. I personally think there's evidence of this for OB, but don't want to repeat all that stuff from earlier. We've got the title bar from the Tor preview chapters which says the Part One characters are Shallan, Kaladin, Navani, Venli, and Lirin. Though, we don't know for sure what this means in the context of the visualization charts. We know from what Sanderson has said that Group 1 will have four major characters and one very minor character. So - the 5 characters named line up perfectly with Group 1: four major characters and one minor. Where does this leave Group 2, Group 3, and Adolin? My theory: Group 3 is Dalinar and Szeth. We know Szeth is in jail. We know that he and Dalinar both have a relatively minor role in RoW. I think it's pretty highly likely that they are in Group 3. So, Group 2 leaves Jasnah, Adolin, and various slightly less important characters as possible members. Jasnah and Adolin as a pairing just makes no sense at all. There doesn't seem like a lot the two of them would need to do together. My theory is that Group 2 is Jasnah and Renarin. They will become closer together in RoW and have their own self-contained scholarly plot. This leaves Adolin out of the named slots in Sanderson's outline as usual. Adolin appears with Group 1, but is not counted as one of the POVs because as I theorized earlier he does not have his own plot. So far, up through Oathbringer he has never advanced his own goals or come up with his own original ideas, with the exception of his "Dalinar is going insane" plotline in WoK. He will still have a decent number of POVs though. His role in the story is to show us what Dalinar, Shallan, and Kaladin look like from the outside. Crackpot theory? Maybe. To tie it to the new info we've gotten in the past week: Group 1: Shallan, Kaladin, Navani, Venli, and Lirin with Adolin as an unlisted hanger-on. The main battle group working on the war and its problems. With Kaladin temporarily sidelined and working as a surgeon, I expect Lirin to appear a lot with Kaladin as they work together as surgeons in the early part of the book. Once Kaladin works through his issues, Lirin will stay behind in Urithiru. Shallan and Adolin break off for a short time to do the mission to Shadesmar with Teft or another windrunner, but return to the main group by the end. Navani leads the effort for fabrial development. Venli does the expected and fully breaks away from Odium, creating a new component to the war. Everyone ultimately works together against Odium in the main war effort. Group 2: Jasnah and Renarin work on the mysteries of Urithiru and Renarin's corrupted spren, occasionally assisting Navani with Fabrial stuff. Group 3: Dalinar and Szeth philosophizing across the bars of a jail cell. Szeth tries to convince Dalinar to let him go fulfill his crusade idea. Dalinar tries to convince Szeth that what he's done is wrong and he needs to atone for it and he needs to feel remorse. Dalinar pops in on other groups when they cross paths to do Bondsmith stuff.

I think it's a fair point and I want to be careful that I make clear that I believe there is a fine line between being very angry and upset with someone in a marriage or relationship that has gone bad and actual abuse. I went back and read it a second time and Gavilar comes across worse to me than the first time. My opinion still is that Gavilar is walking right on the line between bad relationship and abuse. I read it as him expressing anger and frustration in an unhealthy way. His behavior is something he should be ashamed of. He treats his wife in a way no one should be treated. The situation read to me as a marriage that has gone bad, with huge amounts of anger and frustration built up over the years and never properly dealt with. It's not just a one time lack of communication, it's what happens when you have a lack of communication for years which causes issues that then cause other issues and all of them are there boiling under the surface, ready to jump out at the slightest provocation. It read to me as Gavilar not caring about Navani's happiness, and Navani not caring about Gavilar's happiness. Navani says nasty things to Gavilar in that scene too. Gavilar just takes it way too far in response to relatively minor provocations from Navani. Both have a right to be angry with the other. Again - I reserve the right to completely reverse my opinion if we learn more about the situation and find out it's all because Gavilar is just a terrible and abusive person and it's completely not Navani's fault. But, just my opinion, I think this is going to be a situation where we find out that Navani has done something very hurtful to him in the past. Not that it justifies him being the way he is, but that makes you understand why and it changes the character flaw from "evil, abusive man" to "man who can't forgive and does terrible things because of it." You're forgetting the other, equally important lesson that humanity learned about war in the 20th century. The reason that France and Britain were so willing to pursue what is now called "appeasement" policies was because in their lifetimes they'd seen tens of millions of soldiers killed and nations bankrupted for absolutely no gain. I suppose if you were a communist you might like the results of WW1, but no one else did. The leaders at the time knew the extreme cost of war and felt that they should do almost anything to stop it. Obviously, their failure was that they didn't understand that the regimes in Germany and Italy were not like the rulers of the past. They weren't playing the same game - they only wanted domination and nothing else. I personally feel that the world could use a lot more people who remember the world before WW2. People who realize that not every situation will end up like that. If it does, then we need to stop it. But we shouldn't assume that will always happen. There have been countless wars and conflicts throughout human history. Only a small portion are genocidal wars of extermination. You provided a good quote about Odium's plan which I had forgotten. So, Odium's goal (or at least the goal he says, which could be a lie) is to destroy the world. I think a lot of us are forgetting that Odium and the Singers are not totally aligned. In fact, most of the Singers we see have almost as much distrust and dislike of Odium as they do the humans. This is why I don't think falling under their sway is all that bad. They're only going along with Odium so far (a pretty short time) because he gave them freedom. My own pet theory is that the Singers under Venli will split off and form their own 3rd faction, along with Nale.

Do we know that killing the Stormfather and shattering Cultivation would wipe out all life on Roshar? It would definitely mess up the environment, but not the same as killing all life. Also, it seems like from what we know in Elantris that just splintering the shard does not destroy its investure. It just severs it from the intelligence of main Shard and leaves it to sort go based on physics or whatever you want to call it in the Cosmere. I think that Humans and Singers would survive the death of the Stormfather and Cultivation, but it would be a very different life. Some Fused want to exterminate humans. But we also know some are gone mad with bloodlust. I always took that to be a sign of the crazy ones if they want nothing more than to kill. I think we are shown some who don't want to exterminate all humans. I guess the whole point being - we shouldn't assume that everyone and everything dies if Odium or the Singers win. And more importantly, we shouldn't assume that the loss of one small country will result in that fate. Accept the loss, retreat and consolidate forces at Urithiru. Fight when you can win, or you have no other choice. As for Gavilar/Navani - the reason he doesn't say so is because they're in a rocky marriage. Communication has broken down. Also - I don't think it would have forestalled the whole argument even if he had said it. She would have still been mad at him for shutting her out of his exciting secret plans and making her sacrifice her own goals in order to fulfill all of his more boring responsibilities for no good reason, or at least none he's willing to tell her. This kind of lack of communication is SUPER common in real marriages. It's easy for people to take the ones closest to them for granted. I've personally made this exact mistake and it's led to this same kind of misunderstanding. It feels totally realistic for Gavilar to have this flaw.

I think each person can decide for themselves what is meaningful. But they should think about it in concrete terms, not abstract. In other words - is it more valuable to defend the abstract idea of the country of Herdaz or the concrete objects of life and limb? Some people, knowing all the factors, may still choose to value abstract ideas over concrete ideas. But Lirin's whole point is each person needs to think about that, what it really means to sacrifice your life and possibly even the lives of your family and countrymen just so you can hold to a few cultural traditions or preserve a line on a map. To say the humans are now being treated roughly like the Parshmen used to be treated has not been shown in any of the excerpts from RoW. In Moash's POVs in OB (at least in my memory) we see that as the Singers first take over, they do put the humans to work. But for most of the humans, that's no different than what they were doing before. Working, in a career they had little choice over, without the ability to move around and go elsewhere. They make a point of showing in OB that the treatment from the Fused or leaders of the Singers is not all that different from the treatment they got from the Alethi Lighteyes. This makes sense because the Singers would have learned their leadership style from those Lighteyes. Lirin says in RoW Ch. 1 that they are keeping a close eye on refugees - which is a legitimate war time need. Those refugees could easily be enemy combatants. In fact, we're shown that some are. You also see that Lirin is still placed in a trusted position based on his skills and capabilities, despite being human. He doesn't have a Singer breathing down his neck. The threat of instant death is not everywhere for the conquered humans. It has not been shown that the Fused or any Singers have indiscriminately killed any humans, to my memory. They have only killed or harmed those who are involved with active rebellion or military resistance. It has also not been shown that Odium plans to wipe out all life on Roshar, nor has it been shown that the Fused are waging a war of extinction against the humans. This may be your personal theory, which is fine, but it seems most likely that Odium's only goal is to shatter Cultivation and then leave Roshar to shatter the other Shards. The Fused themselves may want to kill all humans (we don't even know if that's true or not), but they are a small minority of the Singers/Listeners/Parsh. It's pretty likely that if the humans are defeated militarily, the Singers would settle for being rulers over the humans and not continue a war to kill them all. I think it's definitely a valid interpretation of it, but I didn't get that from my read. I took it as him understanding the value of that stuff, but feeling that Navani is good at it and has it handled. Navani says they used to plot and scheme together, which to me says he knew the value of what she was doing for him. I think he's just so focused on whatever he is doing with the Heralds that he is neglecting her now and assuming she will just take care of all of it for him because she always has. Just another source and/or symptom of friction in their marriage.

I mean - think about things objectively. Does it matter who rules? It might, if one side or the other mistreats their people. But it might not. I don't get the sense from chapters released so far that the humans of Hearthstone are suffering under the singers' rule. It seems like life would have been better for the Herdazians if they had simply surrendered and lived under the rule of the singers. A whole lot less people would have been killed. The only cost is the loss of a few cultural traditions. It's one thing if they had a reasonable chance of winning the war, but they didn't. And that's what Lirin points out. For some people, fighting and death and destruction is good for its own sake. But I don't think that's an objective truth, or even a commonly held opinion in today's world. There's a difference between being a pacificist and wanting to fight only when it's meaningful. Personally, I would have said the Herdazians should have either submitted or fled to Urithiru where they could join the Radiants and fight in meaningful battles.

What is it that makes you think Sadeas has no goal, or is bad at politics? He is one of the best, if not the best politician in Alethkar. Sadeas basically has two goals: 1 - Establish and secure the Alethi monarchy. He wants Alethkar to be a united country with one ruler. He may not respect Elhokar (nobody does) but probably holds out hope for future children. 2 - Maintain the political and ethical environment that he personally advocates: Might makes right. All his actions are based on establishing the idea that Alethkar should keep its warlike nature and the values that Sadeas, Gavilar, and Dalinar used to unify the High Princes. He wants to keep Alethkar on the offensive, and prepare for their next war of conquest, ruthlessly eliminating all competitors. He believes the more honorable values that Dalinar promotes are a weakness. If Dalinar is allowed to make the Alethi more like him, then they could allow themselves to be killed by treachery. For Sadeas, it's better to kill the enemy and protect yourself and worry about your conscience after you've survived. Dalinar didn't get the better of Sadeas with the shardblade offer. He just got one thing out of Sadeas at huge cost to himself. Sadeas still got the better end of that deal by a long shot. A shardblade for a few thousand slaves that could be easily replaced was an easy trade for him. The bridge crews were worth much more to Dalinar than they were to Sadeas. Politically speaking, Sadeas won that conflict. The pattern of WoK and WoR was that Sadeas beat Dalinar every time in the political arena. It was in battle that Sadeas lost - usually because of Kaladin's unexpected intervention and use of Radiant powers that Sadeas didn't know about and therefore couldn't plan to accommodate. Sadeas was never going for a civil war, he was looking to eliminate Dalinar's influence on Elhokar and the High Princes and make himself the main influence on Elhokar. He wanted to do that without sparking a civil war, which you can see based on how his plans involved things like making Dalinar a martyr or assassinating him in enemy territory so it could be claimed as an act of war by the enemy.

Is it a bad thing that reading this whole prologue made me feel -less- bad about Gavilar than the original excerpt we got? When we read the excerpt, it was like Gavilar was being a jerk because he was probably a bad person and/or a sexist. Now, we know context. I feel like a lot of you are missing some key aspects here. First, we know that Gavilar is treating Navani the way he does because he's hurt and he doesn't trust her. Navani clearly says that Gavilar started acting like this after rumors started that she'd been unfaithful to him. He makes it clear that is what is motivating him. I don't think you can blame someone for being upset about that. I mean, it seems like they have probably had conversations about this and I wouldn't be surprised if Gavilar does believe that Navani has not cheated on him. But like he says, she keeps doing the things that make other people think she is unfaithful. How would you like it if you had to keep constantly defending your spouse against those kinds of accusations? Especially if his or her behavior is legitimately suspicious? That you might have believed she was faithful that first time, but if it keeps happening again and again you can't keep the doubts out of your mind. The Gavilar/Navani relationship reads to me like an argument between a married couple who know their marriage is on the rocks. Navani knows she has done some wrong too, she admits it to herself. I think it's reasonable to say that people can be nasty to each other when they love each other and have been hurt by one another. It doesn't make you a bad person to react badly when you're hurt. To me, this gives us a lot of context as to who Gavilar is as a person. He's someone who's playing the deeper game, he's focused on his goals and how he needs to meet them. He trusts Navani to cover for him on the regular kingly duties front, which is why he pushes all those responsibilities on her. He is trying to marry off his daughter for political gain to achieve his greater goals. He knows his son is incompetent and probably has plans in place to deal with that. He's not a particularly nice person, but he's not evil. I mean, he conquered Alethkar by military force... We already knew what kind of guy he was. He's someone who would have been considered a great man 500 years ago, but doesn't live up to today's moral standards. His biggest failure, imo, is that he doesn't let Navani and Jasnah in on things. He clearly trusts both and feels they are highly competent. If he were to let Navani in on what he's doing, I think she would happily run interference for him with the Alethi nobles. Jasnah might even be willing to have a loveless, political marriage with Amaram if she thinks it would serve the greater good. I wonder if the SA5 prologue (if it's from his perspective) will show his true thoughts during these arguments. I suspect we'll get his reasoning for why he won't let Navani in on this. Of course, now that I've said this we will learn Gavilar is even worse than we thought and I'll look like an idiot.

Yeah - could be that there are 10 forms of voidbinding. But, I don't think it's certain. That's a pretty old quote. He's said additional things since then that kind of indicate the 30 number may be outdated. For example, he's said that the number 9 is tied to Braize the same way that 10 is tied to Roshar. It could easily be that he just threw out the concept of 3/10/30 as a high level concept and maybe his original vision 10 years ago, but it may not be the final plan. That statement would require 10 surgebinding types, 10 voidbinding types, and 10 fabrial types. Like - is it likely there are 10 forms of fabrials? I don't know that it's all that likely. Maybe, but it doesn't seem to fit with what we know about fabrials. I think more recent and specific information he's put out implies there are probably 9 forms of voidbinding.

Something I think is important is that you need to take the charts printed in the books with a grain of salt. They are confirmed to be representations of in world knowledge, which may not be accurate to the "true" way things work. We know the human scholars think that everything is based on a system of 10, which is why they would make a chart with 10 things on it for Voidbinding. But, if you look at the number of Unmade, we know there are 9. So, we have at least one point of evidence that Odium bases his systems on the number 9. There's a good chance the Voidbinding chart is wrong or inaccurate. Could you clarify what you mean here? What is the reason the Stormfather doesn't want the Sibling woken up? Are you arguing that the Sibling is actually the Unmade?

No, in the sense that he was not a member of the Willshapers order and probably never would have become one. Yes, in the sense that he seems to have the right temperament for it. Seeking freedom and holding slaves are not mutually exclusive. Think about Friedrich Nietzsche's philosophy that essentially each person's goal should be to take what they want for themselves. So long as slavery isn't hereditary (which I don't think it is in Alethkar) then I think Sadeas still squares with a Willshaper and the value of seeking freedom. Those slaves were able to seek freedom, but weren't able to find it. Sadeas also seemed to be against things like banding together, higher authority, etc. He was all about every man for himself, which again is an expression of freedom.

Yep, very fair. My mind just doesn't work that way and that's why I stay out of that kind of shipping discussion. I think it's a category all on its own, somewhere in between fan fiction and just discussion of the books. To me, ships are theories, or maybe a better term for it is arguments. To me the reason ships exist is because there's an unresolved romantic conflict in fiction and people take sides and try to prove who is right or wrong. Like the infamous Team Jacob and Team Edward. I just want to discuss opinions on what has happened or what will happen in the books. But that's just me. To be fair, a lot of the pie in the sky theorizing people do here drives me nuts too. Like - Ok, yes Sanderson did say a throwaway line about some obscure property of an unlikely Allomancy/Hemalurgy combination at some Q&A event. Maybe Nightblood could destroy the whole cosmere if wielded by the reformed Adonalsium! That has no bearing on anything! But, I know I can get pretty pedantic on stuff and anyone who isn't part of this kind of community would have a good laugh if they realized how much time I spent debating the theoretical economic conditions of a fantasy world.

I think it comes down to the fact that not everyone sees things the way that you do and not every community is the same. What you dislike about this community - the lack of interest in more speculative shipping - is something I like about it. For you, it may seem equally fine to ship anyone with anyone else. And that's great, if that's what you like then by all means do it. I've got nothing against people doing the kind of shipping that you like, though I personally don't want to participate. Normally, I just stay quiet about this stuff and participate in discussions only about ships that I personally enjoy. The reason I posted in this thread was to try to understand the perspective of people who do the more speculative shipping, especially male/male slash pairings. And I thought LadyLameness' post was a great explanation. I'm only saying what makes the kind of "lesser shipping" that I like enjoyable for me personally. And for me personally, shipping against a character's sexuality feels like a violation of that character. It feels like taking who that character is and what they believe in and changing it based on your own desires. It may not feel that way for you, but it does for me. No, attraction to women does not equal lack of attraction to men. But, when an omniscient third person narrator is telling us a character's thoughts and feelings and they do not include attraction to men, then that does equal lack of attraction to men in my view. I guess what it comes down to is that I think the parts of shipping that you like fall more into the category of fan fiction. And again, nothing against that, but it's not what interests me. Like some of the stuff Negative_Null is saying about alternate realities, etc. I mean, hey that's cool and I'm glad there are people out there who love to write this stuff. But I'm not going to read it. I'm interested in talking about what might happen in the books - dissecting the potential relationships that are actually shown in the canon. The Venli/Kaladin ship to me is interesting and a cool idea. I just think there's not enough to go on yet to have much of a conversation, but I predict after RoW there will be a lot more material!

I don't think there's a need to "prove" it - but you should have at least some kind of reason to believe the two characters might be interested in each other sexually. I think that if there is a character in a book who is never shown expressing any sexual interest in anyone of any gender, then you could in theory ship them as any sexuality. Or, I guess "ship" them as an asexual. But, with characters like Adolin and Kaladin who have clearly expressed only straight sexuality, then it's a stretch to ship them together, imo. I mean, at least it makes no sense to me. Again, I'm not attacking people who do this, but to me the fact that doing something like this is so common just seems strange. This was a good response and definitely provides perspective. I guess if you think about the world of shipping, it's often only based a little bit in canon. People might ship two characters together who have barely even talked on screen. Basically, a hope that character X is secretly in love with character Y even though it's not been explicitly shown on screen. So, I guess this is only stretching it a little further. That even though character X has never been shown on screen to have a certain sexuality, it might be there somewhere if you read certain lines in the right way. Especially if you are that sexuality yourself, I could understand it. But the shear amount of male/male pairings still feels disproportionate. I guess maybe that says something about the demographics of the fan fiction community? Your point about how female characters are often written in lower quality (or at least the ones beyond maybe the one or two major characters) leading to fewer f/f pairings does make sense too though. I think a lot of this is why someone like me can't enter the world of the "true" shippers. I personally feel a ship has to have at least some basis in canon - officially published material, not the author's answers in Q&A sessions or Reddit AMAs. I don't want to say it's invalid if it doesn't have that basis, but I guess it's just outside what interests me personally. Also, I have to be able to see a little of myself "in" the ship for it to really click with me and I just can't relate to it for gay or bi ships. So while I could support bi pairings for Shallan because I think there is enough evidence in the books to imply she would be into it, it's not something I get fired up about. I can respect people having a desire for a male/male relationship between more major characters, but I guess I'll leave those ships for the people who are into it to discuss.

One thing I've never understood about the shipping and fan fiction community is how popular male/male slash pairings are. Nothing against those who like it, but I just can't understand the allure of two straight men who have expressed no interest in a same sex romance getting together. I could at least understand it if one of the characters was shown to be into other men in the main story. I don't think you see as much of this for female/female pairings between two straight characters, but that equally bothers me. I suppose maybe the under representation of gay/bi men in most mainstream fiction leads to a big pent up demand? I'm not really into reading male/male romance anyway, so I'll probably never understand *shrug*. My first real entrance into shipping was Macross F - amazing anime, but I went down with poor Ranka Lee's ship. I remember reading pages and pages of shipping wars over that love triangle. The less mainstream ship I'd most like to see in SA is Kaladin/Laral. I'd settle for a bit more development between those two, not necessarily them ending up together. I think Kaladin still likes Laral at least a little. He respects her intelligence and competence and resiliency. If he shows up in Hearthstone in RoW then there's a chance that Roshone will die and Laral and Kaladin will spend time together again. I could see a cool plot where maybe during the gap year Kaladin's been set up with appropriate land and titles and the privileges and responsibilities that come with it. Laral and Kaladin meet again only this time Kaladin is the one who is higher in society and it's an interesting role reversal from before. I don't really see Kaladin trying to start something with Laral, but I could see her trying to start something with him to marry into his now higher status position.

A little mundane, but I think it will have the ability to be modified like live Shardblades. You could make your plate look the way you want both in design and things like color and opacity could be changed. Possibly make it thinner/more form fitting or make it more like a "deflector shield".

I believe it is a requirement to be a piece of investure that is intentionally broken off from a shard. I don't think you could call Nightblood a splinter of Ruin, at least so far as we know currently. The way Sanderson discusses it, a splinter is always intentionally created. You can't have a chunk of a certain shard's investure just coalesce and become a splinter on its own. It's either intentionally separated by the main shard, or broken off by a rival shard. At least, that's my understanding. So I don't believe it's possible for the Heralds who are basically splinters of Honor (or maybe just the Honor Blades are splinters, but either way) to have parts ripped off which would then become splinters of Odium. I really like the idea of the Unmade being parts of the Heralds, but I feel like that requires the Unmade to not be splinters of Odium. They would be corrupted splinters of Honor in that case. Basically, pieces of Honor's investure that are warped and twisted so that they are separated from the It's also hard to say for certain if the Fused are splinters. I think if you read between the lines, then they are probably bonded with a splinter similar to the Returned or some other similar mechanism. But it also seems like it's possible they are not splinters at all - that they are just the cognitive shadows/spirits of regular people that Odium himself can snatch them up before they go beyond and keep them and then send them back into someone else's body. I suppose it's possible that Odium's plan is to split off as many pieces of the Heralds and other investure from Honor as possible and then try to force it to work against its intent. But it still doesn't make sense why he'd bond them with splinters of himself. Why not just store them up until he has enough to Splinter honor? To be fair, I suppose he may have done that and the Unmade may have only appeared around the time Honor splintered. But, it still seems unnecessarily complex to me. I think that Odium could have forced Honor's investure to work against itself much more directly by just torturing the Heralds into doing something wrong. That may have been the whole point of the torture and desolations to begin with - force the Heralds to break their word over and over?

Don't agree - that's a completely different Shard and completely different situation. Returned = People chosen by Endowment who, when they die, are reborn with the Splinter attached to them. Endowment is a shard whose intent is to give its power to others (AKA endow them with power). The people it gives its power to are friendly to it and also are dead before it happens. I also wouldn't call the Returned "splinters of Endowment" - they are people who are granted the power of Splinters of Endowment. This WoB indicates the Divine Breath is the splinter, not the Returned. Unmade = (if your theory is correct) Pieces of the Heralds, shredded off by Odium, then fused into a Splinter of Odium. Odium is not a Shard whose intent is to grant his power to others. He also is a Shard who specifically wants his power to remain pure and unmodified by other influences. This makes it highly unlikely that he would fuse parts of himself with parts of others. It seems needlessly complex - why create splinters of himself, then fuse them with ripped off pieces of the Heralds? If he can truly rip off pieces of the Heralds, why not just destroy them or lock them away? Like I said, I love the theory (especially the version where each hyphenated name means the associated herald has broken an additional time), but I really don't think it's very likely true. A lot of things Sanderson has said make it seem unlikely. First, that they are splinters of Odium. And second, that the only Herald without a pseudo counterpart is Ishar, even though we know that Taln is the one who has never broken.

I really like the theory that the Unmade are pieces that were "unmade" from the Heralds. But I think Sanderson has directly said it's not true, unfortunately. They are simply Splinters that Odium made from himself.

I think that's a valid conclusion, but also I think the reason you didn't include it earlier is because in RoW the flashbacks apparently only appear in Parts 3-5. So for RoW, Sanderson must have changed it up at least a little bit compared to what he did for the first three books. I think it could go one of two ways: 1) Venli is in all parts because she's the flashback character and therefore she's Group 1. 2) Venli is in all parts that line up with her flashbacks. So, I guess that would still make her probably Group 1. Just maybe not appearing with a POV until Part 3? Or maybe not with the main group until then? I do wonder if there's something to the idea that Kaladin might be in Group 2 or 3, with a more personal arc in this book. I agree with your point that it seems like Kaladin and Venli should be together. But, it does say in your WoB 17 that each of the main characters will take have a book or two where they are less important. I guess you could argue that in a way Kaladin was not super important in OB, though he still had a lot of page count. OB was not his book to be the hero. I have a hard time imagining Kaladin with a truly small page count though.

Yeah, a little predictable but not necessarily bad, repetitive or boring to me. Kaladin has saved the day at the last minute twice and failed to save the day at the last minute twice. But each time was different and interesting. I want the one who saves the day to be a character I like. So if it's not Kaladin, Shallan, or Dalinar I'll be a little disappointed. They are the main characters of the front 5 and also my favorite characters. Venli would be an interesting dark horse choice if she develops enough power in the last two books. Honestly, I've never been a fan of Szeth or his mindset. To me, he's not worthy of being the champion at least as he is now. But, that's just me.

Agreed about the anti-Syladin ship. Sorry to those who support it, but it just feels wrong to me. I think to me what makes it feel messed up is that Syl is in many ways like Kaladin's child. She was given a mind by her relationship with him. Her entire life depends on him literally. The balance of power is too messed up. This chapter didn't give me romance vibes at all - just a close, loving, but non-romantic relationship. Syl loves Kaladin in some ways like a daughter loves her father - she wants to help him and ease his burdens. I think for me, in terms of the Champion thing, I think there will be a "fake out" where it really looks like it won't be Kaladin, but at the last minute he gets himself together and it turns out to be him. It sounds like Kaladin is going to be in really bad shape mentally at the beginning of RoW. Dalinar probably expects the champion to be Kaladin as of the end of OB and gives Kaladin extra responsibilities, etc to prepare him for being head of the military arm of the Radiants. I think this is what beats Kaladin down - the inability to let go of soldiers killed in battle under his command, the people he's failed to save. With Kaladin out of commission, Dalinar starts planning for someone else to be the champion, working with that person to prepare them for it. Maybe even Dalinar himself expecting to be the champion. It all looks good, but then something goes wrong and Kaladin has to step it up again - which he does after a lot of struggle.

I was surprised to see that I scored pretty highly toward Truthwatcher in the order personality test. Never thought this would be an order that would fit me, but I've taken a little more interest in it since taking the test, so I thought I'd throw in my two cents. I really like your 2nd and 3rd Oaths, but I'm not sure the 4th or 5th one fits for me. Your 4th Oath- I will not force others to accept the truth. I don't know if this fits with the Truthwatchers description provided in the order test. In the description, it emphasizes the interaction between Truthwatchers and the political rulers. That is the "watcher" part of Truthwatcher - they see a part of their order's goal to make sure that people in power don't use lies to deceive and/or abuse the people who they have authority over. I think the 4th oath for Radiants in general is about learning the exceptions to the rule - learning when you -shouldn't- just always tell the truth as loudly as you can. For example - if Truthwatchers know the true, complete secret behind the Recreance it would be a moral dilemma for them whether or not to reveal it. On the one hand, it's telling the truth which can never be truly "wrong", on the other there's a good chance that it's better for others to remain ignorant because knowing the information may cause a second Recreance and have devastating consequences. It's a sign of maturity - the young reporter goes and tells the world the instant he thinks he's got a juicy story, while the more mature reporter thinks about the consequences of what might happen before he does. My proposed 4th Oath - I will speak the Truth only when it is right. Your 5th Oath - I will accept when I am wrong. To me, this doesn't seem quite right. It feels too.. negative to me. I could see this possibly being an oath for the Truthwatchers because it is an important thing to internalize, but not the final oath. I think the final oath has to be something about completely mastering the way and/or purpose of seeking truth. My suggestion would be to replace your 3rd Oath with this oath and have something like the concept of your 3rd Oath be the final oath. I'm not sure I'm totally on board with Karger's idea either but I think it hits closer to the mark for me. I think it's got to encapsulate what it means to seek and preserve the ultimate truths of the universe and keep people informed. My proposed 5th Oath - I will spread Truth as far and wide as I can for the good of Society.

I don't know that we've been told the order is corrupted. It's leaned in a certain direction, but that direction is never explicitly defined as being corrupt. Nale is a Skybreaker of the 5th Ideal and is in compliance with his oaths. That says that his actions cannot be out of line with the values of the Skybreaker order. If Nale was violating the principles of what it means to be a Skybreaker, he would be violating his oaths and therefore have no powers. The same applies for all the Skybreakers who serve under Nale. Also, Brandon Sanderson has explicitly said that Machiavelli and the Skybreakers are compatible. It seems that the Skybreakers are an order than can have a lot of variety. Sanderson has also said that it would be valid for a Skybreaker to swear to uphold something like the Pirate Code - something most people would consider the opposite of the law. It is all relative to the individual Skybreaker - what is the "law" or moral code to them and do they uphold it? If so, then they are a valid Skybreaker even if that moral code is something that many people would consider evil.

That's true that Sadeas had been intentionally killing the Parshendi to make the war nastier. But, that's the entire purpose of talking and discussing terms. Had Dalinar and Eshonai actually met, Sadeas' behavior would have quickly been discovered. Dalinar had been named High Prince of War by that time and had the authority to do something about Sadeas' troops committing war crimes. He had the authority to promise Eshonai that it would stop and make it happen. The purpose of having talks is to build trust, so over time the Parshendi could have built up enough trust to understand that the Alethi would at least not slaughter them all or enslave them like the Parshmen. Trust is a lot less necessary for the Alethi than the Parshendi. They had a commanding lead in the war. There was no real chance the Parshendi could defeat them, though they didn't really know that completely. The assassin in white was already coming for their leaders anyway, so there was nothing to lose on that front - talking with the Parshendi was not likely to trigger new and/or unexpected assassination attempts. They would be fully on their guard. They have the ability to dictate terms and impose their will. Force the Parshendi to leave the Shattered Plains, pen them into a certain area, whatever they want to do. The Parshendi basically had 3 options: 1) Fight on until they all die. 2) Have talks with Dalinar and Elhokar to negotiate surrender and live on in defeat - likely to lose political independence and be assimilated into Alethi culture as second class citizens, or remain on a "reservation" in Alethi lands. 3) Risk using the forms of power. I can understand why Venli chose option 3 and don't think she's evil because of it. I'm just saying there was another option that would not involve complete genocide for the Parshendi. They could have taken a different path, but it would have required them to prioritize survival of their people over pride in their culture and national identity. We don't value this choice very much at least in western culture, but I think there's really something to be said for it.

Agreed - finally decided to sign up for the newsletter so I could read this section and that is also what I took from Dalinar's comment. The impression I got is that Kaladin has been forced to do things he that are hard on him morally in the war during the last year or so and it's weighing heavily on him. Dalinar saw that he was about to crack and had him change duties for a while.