Pagerunner

Time to dig up an old conversation! Brandon's assistant Peter just tweeted some comments [1, 2] that are relevant to this topic: This almost seems to imply that there are more than 10 gas giants in the Rosharan system, and that planets have a presence of some form in Shadesmar even if there are no inhabitants and they are not observed by the Rosharans.

The spike's metal is from a Shard we know. We had not seen Autonomy, but we did know of her, so Bavadin is not ruled out as a candidate.

I think Ashyn is a major Shardworld. Its story, The Silence Divine, started out as a full novel, but Brandon is thinking of shortening it to a novella. Contrast that with Sixth of the Dusk and Shadows for Silence, which were developed as stories and placed on Shardworlds which Brandon had already created for worldbuilding purposes. (See Brandon's postscripts in AU, especially for SSFH. Threnody has existed as a concept since his unpublished days, and when he was asked by GRRM for a story he created one set there.) It's also possible that Ashyn will play a large role in Stormlight, possibly being connected like Warbreaker is, with Vasher being a Way of Kings Prime character. Brandon has RAFOd questions about it in the past because of the influence of Rosharan Shards on it. The now-defunct 36 book outline which Brandon had spoken of back in the day consisted of: 10 Stormlight, 9 Mistborn, 7 Dragonsteel, 3 Elantris, 3 White Sand, 2 Warbreaker, Silence Divine, and one other book. (Possibly Aether of Night, but I've never been able to find a direct confirmation of that, and the unpublished novel was supposed to kick off a series. I won't speculate more outside of the Aether spoiler board.) I only say this to show that, even counting Ashyn and Braize as core Shardworlds, there are still only 8 represented in the series that we know. So, there are at least two core Shardworlds unaccounted for, and possibly as many as 5 in an extreme case (if the three worlds of the Rosharan system all count as 1, and something funky is happening with Yolen such that it doesn't count).

"try not to get too hung up on gender, race, or even human appearance where Bavadin is concerned." How on earth do you expect us to do that, Brandon?!? The very fact that those attributes are considered malleable for an individual is noteworthy! It's like saying 'don't worry that there's no oxygen in this room, you'll be fine.' How can we not get hung up on it? Huh? Anyways... I wonder which of Bavadin's personas we've seen? This statement, combined with the revelation from the Taldain essay that Bavadin influences other worlds, opens the door that some of the gods we've seen on other planets might have actually been Bavadin. On Nalthis, Austre might be Bavadin. He forbids using Awakening, similar to how the Kerztian Sand Lord on Taldain considers Sand Mastery an abomination. Brandon has recently RAFOd whether or not Austre was Endowment, so the possibility is open. (I'm trying not to read too much into a RAFO; just that we haven't confirmed that Austre is Endowment.) Roshar seems like too busy of a place, Shard-wise, for Bavadin to be involved. We've seen several religions which involve conflict between gods, which seems to be explained as the Honor/Odium clash. I'll let this one sit for now. On Scadrial, Trell obviously is a big one. But maybe some of the other religions, the ones Sazed spoke of, were from Bavadin, as well. Although the system is dishardic, for a long period of time (at least 2000 years) one Shard was trapped and the other had a ruined mind. She could have had plenty of opportunities to sneak in and plant new religions, so maybe the original Trell was her, as well. (If Kenton Street has an in-universe explanation, then Bavadin may have incorporated him into one of her Final Empire Scadrian religions.) It's been a while since I've read Elantris, but since both Shards had been Splintered here, this would be another easy target for Bavadin. No specific proposals, though.

Here's the quote (I have it in my bookmarks, since this topic comes up quite a bit): Source.

Right, that's the whole point. Asking if there's any connection doesn't give enough clarification. (I don't think we have a quote saying that Trell is a Shard, but there's a recent book signing telling us that Wax has seen the influence of a Shard not native to Scadrial.)

You mean this excerpt?

Eh, that's one of those basically-RAFOs where the question is so broad the answer really doesn't mean anything. Odium's a Shard, Trell's a Shard, so they're both connected through once being part of Adonalsium. I wouldn't put too much stock in it.

I'll second that question. Latest I've seen is a "big, fat RAFO."

I agree with combining topics, but as I understood the spoiler policy, discussion of essay material is not confined to a single forum ("Spoilers are okay"), but any new topics should be placed in Cosmere Theories? Even Edgedancer information is explicity allowed outside the Cosmere Theories and Edgedancer subforums, as long as it is in spoiler tags. Could you please clarify whether or not all AU information is allowed in individual series subforums?

From an Adamant reading the summer before last:

Like Adamant, it's gone back and forth. Rithmatist was at one point, but Brandon decided against 'cause he didn't want Earth in it. He's got a story, maybe it fits in the Cosmere, maybe it doesn't.

Yeah, I know that now! I wish I had some of that knowledge a year or so back when I first proposed this theory. Oh, well, you can't win 'em all...

Let's make sure we're not getting confused. Per Khriss, Yolen is hidden, not necessarily inaccessible: Taldain is the planet that's Brandon has referred to as "currently inaccessible," with Khriss "in exile" in Secret History. From AU: There have been several proposals for why Khriss can't find Yolen: No Cognitive Activity (debunked) Hidden by a Shard (my personal opinion is that Frost is a Shard on Yolen trying to keep it isolated) Blockaded to prevent the fain life (now where did I hear that one...) She has found it, she just calls it by a different name But each of those theories comes with assumptions, and it's very easy to conflate what we know of Yolen's situation (very little) with what we know of Taldain's situation. If it's hard to find, not necessarily hard to reach, then someone who already knows where it is (Hoid) would be able to get there no problem.

Don't get me started on the color wheel.

What a great idea about Foundation parallels. (It's at the bottom.) Hoid is the total Mule to Taravingian's psychohistory.

Wyndle's vines are in the Cognitive Realm, yet they grow on Physical surfaces to let Lift climb them. Shallan drew the Cryptics in existing scenes in the Physical Realm, crowded around her bed and what not. It seems Secret History's view of Scadrial's subastral is consistent with this approach, being able to literally reflect the physical world: There, men are viewed as a shadowy silhouette (Physical) with a light shining out of them (Cognitive? Since it's a form of Investiture?) The main geography of Roshar's subastral is unchanged, just inverted, as seen in the Shadesmar map. (Would pneumography be a good word? A better Greek word would probably lead to something like nougraphy, but that looks pretty stupid.)

Yeah, this was a spur-of-the-moment response. I had no idea when I was reading it, either. The point I'm going for is that Lift is essentially seeing Szeth's Cognitive Shadow. When Szeth died, it separated from his body. Nale repaired the connection (probably not capital-C Connection) between them, but there's a spiritual scar of sorts that results in a temporal disconnect. When we next see Szeth, I'll be watching if his skills in battle have suddenly become muddled, as if his mind can't keep up with his hands.

Not worthless at all! No one has provided the actual quote yet, with good reason - it's brand-new information. At least, the first I've seen of it came from the AU release party. We've seen offworld Hemalurgy somewhere before, but it's not obvious at all - so it will be like hunting for the Kandra worldhopper. Felt is my #1 suspect, since he's from Scadrial and all. Although, the Ghostbloods seem to have a lot of magical trophies from other worlds, so maybe one of their members has a spike in them?

But are we sure he's the Herald with an Honorblade? Or did he abandon his blade, then join his Order the old-fashioned way? (I think he does have an Honorblade, but that's the question that @thejopen27 seemed to be asking.)

Maybe. Probably. Who knows? In the Elantris Ars Arcanum (new to the 10th anniversary), it's mentioned in a list of other planets we've seen. So, there's a strong implication there that it's a location, at the very least. Brandon has been especially tight-lipped on the subject. It becomes more and more apparent that he only gave us those two name-drops to specifically antagonize us. And he has succeeded.

Maybe, in the far future, they can bind every single Cosmere book, novella, and short story together in a single, massive volume. Then, Brandon will finally be able to fulfill Robert Jordan's threat from the Wheel of Time, that the book would come with its own library cart.

Have you read Edgedancer yet? If you have, then you surely weren't listening.

I suspect that only Lift sees it, because she sees somewhat into the Cognitive Realm. As to what caused the phenomenon in the first place, his death does seem likely, as if his Cognitive and Physical selves weren't put back together quite right, so his Cognitive self is a little out-of-sync. EDIT: [All right, @Pagerunner, don't be smug.] This appears to be confirmed by WoB here. [Well done. Next time, don't talk to yourself in your own post, though.]

I'll make the argument that Stump and Ym are actually Edgedancers. They are both following the Edgedancer's second oath, remembering those who are forgotten, specifically orphans and urchins. Wyndle was the first sent, but other cultivationspren were sent later, to other candidates. Spren look very different in Shadesmar than they do in the Physical Realm - just look at Pattern. Cryptics manifest in Shadesmar as symbol-heads, but look very different in the Physical Realm. Ym's spren is described with elements of both; the specks of light, but it moved like a growing plant. The only other spren we've seen in both realms is Ivory, and we never really got a good depiction of him in the Physical, but at the very least there was a size difference.