Ixthos

Sorry about not posting here for the past few days. A few points to consider: Ruin wouldn't need a base to function from if he sent all his forces to attack weaker worlds first - his constructs don't function well when left alone to try and maintain themselves as they tend to wear themselves down rather than build themselves up, and work best when sent to claim new areas. Also, remember that loses can be restored by harvesting fallen Koloss and Inquisitor spikes to use on new species. Ruin would work best not functioning from a single base. Ruin might be able to take control of others with cracks in their souls, and so might be able to interfere with Fused and Knights, while it isn't clear if other shards can do this Odium has never made other shards into vassals, instead breaking them and occasionally turning their spren to his side, and even then it is dubious is they are on his side, as the Unmade have shown. Odium hasn't been able to recover from destroying shards, getting weaker and weaker, as Rayse, and Taravangian doesn't have a lot of experience in that regard, any more than Kelsier and Vin were experienced with the shard Preservation. Sazed gained his knowledge from the copperminds, so while Taravangian would be able to learn, his lack of experience, or Rayse's own wounds (and if I am right and Rayse requires pitting two shards against one another to win in a fight, hence why Cultivation hasn't been destroyed yet) means fighting Ruin, the shard with control over the concept of Destruction, just as Honour had power over - and used that power against Odium - the concept of bonds, means Ruin is more likely to be able to resist Odium's attempts to apply his own power to himself. So it is like someone who has a lot of passion and filled with hatred who has just taken down four people and hasn't been able to recover, and then having to fight someone who is fresh, in this example having killed their arch enemy, and is just as passionate as you are while also being much more skilled at breaking things, or fighting someone filled with hatred and very intelligent, but who is inexperienced, fighting the previous example. The Avatars of Autonomy haven't been shown to be less powerful than a combined shard, so it could be that each avatar is equal in power to a whole shard, just as it could be each only has a fraction of that power, though see next observation Harmony is having to apply a lot of power to keep out Trell, whatever Trell is. Therefore, as noted by Harmony is the letters in Rhythm of War, a combined shard isn't necessarily more powerful than a single shard or an Avatar, only the combined shard can use the tricks of the component shards, such as Harmony being able to do what both Ruin - speak - and Preservation - listen - can do, but also bound to obey their natures as well.

Hi guys, I'm going to leave the poll open for a little longer and I'm hoping to close it on the 18th. After that a few days later I'll post the background and some basic sketches of the chosen species, both human subspecies and aliens, as well as some of those that could have been, and some of their background, in a new topic. Hope you are well until then, and take care!

Perhaps. This mainly is to show the idea that Ruin wouldn't be too easy to destroy, that Odium doesn't automatically win. Those are good points though.

This goes into what I have been thinking before, but I think Scadrial was built with a purpose to allow the magics on it to exist. What Ruin planned to do when he left Scadrial after destroying it we can't know for sure, but he was certainly looking towards the rest of the Cosmere, and he made the Inquisitors for a reason - he didn't need them to help destroy Scadrial, so why make them? Ruin likely was preparing them to assist him in taking over other worlds to destroy them, and using Hemalurgy - including giving Marsh the power to store youth, not just the allomantic power of atium but actually to continue living a longer life, which wouldn't make sense if he didn't intend for them to be a force he could use for centuries - to assimilate the magic and life on another world to form an army. Ruin can choose a planet, sent all his resources there, devour it and turn its magic and people into more tools, and then move on. Odium I think requires the power of two shards to destroy another, using the dissonence between them. Odium has also been wounded by killing shards. If Ruin killed Preservation, Odium would find it more difficult to kill Ruin, who would be free from a planet and so have access to much more power than Odium, and with Odium's own wounds and Ruins power over the very concept of destruction, I think Ruin would actually have an edge.

I think you can, and like as others have said I think you can do so through the nexuses - I think when you go to the Rosharan system you can find a few paths that lead to it, and each leads to a different planet, and from each planet or moon or gas giant there is a nexus or more than one nexus that allows you to travel from one to the other, and each planet's cognitive realm size depending on how well known or travelled or inhabited it is, thus the expanses are to places away from the star, and the nexuses are to places bound by the star - subastral does mean "below a star". I think there likely are paths between the planets, so those four are just the closest to Roshar - though closest due to belief or closest in reality isn't clear - and from them you can then take other paths to other shardworlds.

@Valigus don't forget that Ruin has hemalurgy and can steal and combine powers and even native abilities of different beings to form new abilities and species. Ruin could make new beings like Kandra, or entirely new species, and possibly gain access to the metals of other shards - imagine Inquisitors with access to the Dor AND to Surges, and hybrid Parshendi-hemalurgic constructs, along with Kandra infiltrators. Also, as an idea, Ruin likely would be more effective at splintering a shard than Odium as it is the very idea of splintering.

The theory I remember from before was that the Expanse of the Broken Sky is Taldain, as it has two distinct permanent skies, one for Dayside with the visible star, and Darkside with the twilight, thus their cognitive belief and view of the sky would be different, two views for one planet. So Densities is Sel, Vibrancy is Nalthis, Vapours is Scadrial, and Broken Sky is Taldain.

Indeed! :-D It would certainly be a fun read! The characters might disagree though!

@TheOnlyEdgedancersss, On the original question, think of investiture and anti-investiture like matter and antimatter. When a particle and its antiparticle (so it has to be the type corresponding to the particle, like an electron and a positron, rather than for example a proton and a positron) come into contact they annahilate one another, releasing their collective energy. When investiture comes into contact with its corresponding anti-investiture (stormlight with anti-stormlight) they annihilate. Thus she was killed, the material composing her gone. On the idea of souls, I will have to mention my own real world beliefs here, and to do so I will need to define a few terms. I believe we have three bodies in two worlds, with a physical body occupying the physical world, a spiritual body occupying the spiritual world, and soul which occupies both the physical and spiritual world, the soul being the union of the physical and the spiritual. The soul is fundamentally a pattern, and should not be confused with the spirit of a person. In cosmere terms the soul - the body I believe lives in both the physical and spirit world - would be the part living in the cognitive realm. In both cases I believe they would correspond to patterns. When someone is prevented from going Beyond that means their pattern remains, the medium on which it is stored changes but the pattern remains, just as Kelsier remained by being bound to the well, the pattern he was made of starting to disappear in the cosmere and enter the Beyond - which may have simply been ceasing to exist - but when the power suffused it it remained. And that power's compositon later changed when he touched the walls of the Iree fortress, absorbing investiture from there, the pattern changing slightly and new connections to his spiritual component forming due to the power that now made him up also including Selish investiture with its own connections, yet nevertheless despire the COMPOSITION of his cognitive shadow changing, the PATTERN remained fundamentally the same. Thus higher spren are like people, a unique and precious iteration of an idea in the form of a pattern, and when the body that houses that pattern is destroyed, the pattern is "gone", with gone in the cosmere meaning travelling to the Beyond. Thus any pattern fully removed from the cosmere is one that has entered the Beyond, and spren can then likewise do so.

It might be a little hard for him to be chosen, seeing as how he can't even leave his current system :-P

I suspect saving the Rose Empire was a byproduct, and the Rose Empire itself may either be a force of good or a force of evil in the region with how it absorbed other nations - perhaps it falling would have caused great harm, true. However, if Hoid could save the Cosmere at the expense of Roshar, do you think Jasnah would do so? Also, consider, if she wanted to fighting to stop she should just join Odium and add her forces to his and the conflict would end - so clearly her goals aren't to ensure their is peace but rather the type of peace. Would you let someone destroy the Earth if they told you doing so would save the civilisations on three other planets, knowing doing so would kill everyone you love?

Imagine if, on Scadrial, Ruin had won, and the Inquisitors and Koloss were unleashed across the Cosmere. Preservation splintered and Ruin freed from the system, but the magic still remaining. Imagine if, on Roshar, Odium succeeded and Dalinar became the leader of the Fused. Odium unleashed, Honour and Cultivation dead and their spren turned to Odium's side. Imagine if Elantris had fallen, and all of Sel eventually was ruled by a single empire, lead by someone such as Wyrn, all the regions united into a single nation or a few strong nations able to travel the Cosmere and laying power lines like the Iree fortress made use of to access power further away. Imagine if Taldain, Threnody, and others had their emperors, splinters, dark forces, released, and Endowment was determined to bring the other shards into line. Consider the armies, all villains, fighting one another for the Cosmere, and imagine, due to whatever factors could slow some down or speed them up caused these events happened at the same time. Avatars of Autonomy fighting Ruin fighting Odium fighting Endowment fighting the remains of Ambition (and possibly Mercy). And presumably the shards already know, just as Harmony knew of the radio before one was in theory built, how to make fabrial weapons and advanced real world weapons. We don't know all the other remaining worlds and organisations, but considering these possibilities, it certainly is chilling. Shards fighting shards and remnants of shards, magic against magic, weapons used.

My mistake. Either way, someone who could join the other group of possible jilted ex-loves of Hoid, only with far more pragmatic motivations, a foil to their attitudes towards him.

To clarify, I am not saying Jasnah is going to go after Hoid because he just up and left one day - we know from Hoid's interactions with Shai that he will betray people to possible death - or at least to situations he knows they can get out of but which might lead to death - in order to further his goals, which might well be noble goals. He has said he will let all of Roshar burn if he has to. I am not suggestiong Hoid leaves, cheats, insults the way she looks in a dress and that is why their relationship ends (though I imagine if any of his other lovers are still active they might consider what he has done to be any of the above). I'm suggesting that he does something that puts Roshar in danger, that he uses Jasnah and her affection for him to put those she cares about in danger, undermining their efforts. So then he becomes a danger, possible in possession of something they need, AND a betrayer. More to the point, if Hoid's other lovers are still around then Jasnah, as an Ace Aromantic, would be a nice counterpoint to the others who likely aren't Ace or Aromantic, someone who was a lover but whose motives for hunting him aren't from being jilted.

Who wants to bet that Hoid and Jasnah is not just going to end badly, but that, if Jasnah survives the end of the Stormlight Archive, whether or not she becomes a shard (and DEFINITELY if she becomes a Worldhopper) she is going to be gunning for Hoid. I think Hoid might well end up betraying her in order to achieve some important goal to him and the cosmere, and even if she can appreciate the logic of it .... Bonus points if Hoid already has other former lovers as worldhoppers who have a grudge. It would fit the theme of everyone who interacts with him for extended periods wanting revenge or just disliking him (Shallan's reaction of warmth towards him being one of the few moments he is rendered speechless).

Well it is just a preliminary idea, and I really like your idea as well. I might use your idea, and even if I don't I might have later stories involving some characters using the portal moon to reach another solar system - or finding a way to ride a soul horse through the nanoscale city to another solar system, something otherwise thought impossible - which uses your idea. Either way the idea of a planet perpetually in the eclipse is a great idea, and I'll definitely try to make use of it in something :-)

What I mean for my example is that they both are equally far from the binary stars, rotating in a plane orthogonal to the plane or rotation, so imagine if the Moon and the Earth's orbit was rotated 90 degrees. I'll attach an image to explain.

Interesting idea, though that would imply that one of them is in the L1 point of the other which would make the orbit unstable. I might be able to say it remains stable due to the Benefactors, but I'd like to reduce their impact on the solar mechanics of the system. Something that might work in a similar way is if they orbit one another in a plane that is orthogonal to their orbit around the binary stars, and then they remain tidally locked to both one another and to the binary stars, so think of it as they orbit one another while keeping the same face facing one another, while their "north" poles always face towards the stars, and their "south" poles always face away - that could then also tie to your idea of the eclipsed planet being cooler. I do like your idea though :-)

Let me put it this way: what actions do you think Kelsier would never do, and in what ways can he become a better person? If you asked Rashek why he did what he did, and you asked Kelsier, what would be the difference in their responses? Do you think there will or won't be a scene where one or more characters compares Kelsier to Rashek, whether or not Kelsier intended that? [Edit] To go further, remember Kelsier has already faced the prospect that he lost, and indeed even was responsible for almost destroying the world when he realised Ruin had been playing him.[/Edit] Also, heads up, Brandon is thinking of changing the focus from the SWAT team due to Wax and Wayne covering similar ideas, and shifting the focus to the Terris Nicroburst tech and being a spy thriller, though keeping the SWAT team present.

They are indeed different people, and Kelsier certainly has - or had - more emotional grounding than Rashek. My point is that, thematically, wouldn't it be sense for Kelsier to have to face this possibility. What arc do you think would be appropriate for Kelsier, who is now immortal and aware of how insignificant their planet really is to the dangers out there? Let us look at this from another perspective - imagine the story of Mistborn, but from the point of view of a noble who isn't a bigot and monster, someone who just doesn't see how badly treated the Skaa are but who themselves doesn't abuse them. Imagine that person seeing their loves one being killed by Kelsier, a supernatural assassin in the night, whose goals were initially to see the nobles switch places with the Skaa. The story of Mistborn could easily be told from a noble with Kelsier as the villain - because they never saw what Kelsier was facing, and never knew how evil their society was and why it needed to fall - just as Kelsier never saw what Rashek was facing until after Rashek was dead. We have seen a similar story before, in Warbreaker and the other possible Kelsier of Denth, a Kelsier who is the villain while still having nobility. If Kelsier had to choose between Scadrial, everyone he knows and loves there, and the combined lives of Taldain, Sel, Nalthis, and Roshar, along with all the other worlds in the Cosmere, who do you think Kelsier would save? I can see an argument for Kelsier choosing to save them all, but he certainly wouldn't save them and leave them as they are. We are talking about someone who - either he or Spook - wanted to get the elderly to volunteer to be spiked. I am not saying he is identical to Rashek. I am saying he is just as ruthless and just as prepared to go as far as Rashek did because he knows if he doesn't do the terrible things he is planning, Scadrial is doomed. The man who says "I could never be like that," is the man who is most likely to become it, because they aren't guarding against it. Kelsier does, as you say, want to be a better man. And I think he will be, but only after he is forced to see that, despite that, he has actually become as vile as Rashek, only a Rashek whose friends and the memory of his friends still gives him some humanity. In Secret History Kelsier reflects on himself and his actions, including how Vin saved someone Kelsier would have just casually murdered. That is a great start, but that doesn't mean Kelsier has ended the journey. I think we are looking at this from similar perspectives - I see your example, and ask you to consider the idea that Era 3 might involve characters trying to take down Kelsier just as they tried to take down Rashek, only to realise that he was guarding them against something terrible. And to take him down for reasons the characters in world might compare to Rashek, and hearing that makes Kelsier reexamine himself.

Hmmm ... you could do the cosmere symbol rotating into place, so each of its parts turning and then locking together.

So far the hot planet part of the poll has one hot planet and two planets as neck and neck. If they stay close I might set them as a binary planet. That would be thematically appropriate and match some other elements in the story. Also, once I close the poll and post the setting info should I include some sketches of the aliens and regions in the system?

@Kingsdaughter613 It might be useful for me to clarify that I don't think Kelsier is destined to be the ultimate villain, only that he is in danger of becoming one. Kelsier can come back from the edge, can become a better person, but only after facing the fact that he is becoming more and more what he hates - I think an important part in the potential arc of him becoming a better person requires him facing his darker nature and realising he is doing the exact same things as Rashek for the same reasons