Journey Before Pancakes

I assumed either Kelsier or Vin. I think Kelsier is most likely, since Demoux was in his crew for awhile, and he seemed to like that story. Vin is also possible. Spook for example says it was Vin who told him what flowers were. That was likely because Kelsier didn't spend much time with Spook from what we saw, but he was part of Vin/Elends "crew" for years after TFE fell.

He willingly entered an agreement with Preservation to create a world so that he could destroy it. Everything tells us that he was a willing participant in that. Everything about Odium tells us that he cannot leave Braize; which doesn't seem like something he would willingly allow to happen; considering until that point he was travelling through the Cosmere splintering shards with Intents that threaten him and shards that inhabit world's together. Most of the evidence points towards him coming to Roshar the same reason he went to Sel; there were two Shards together, so he wanted to shatter them. I think one of the biggest points is how they go about things. Ruin has barely any foresight compared to other shards like Preservation (you can see that in HoA where Preservation planned Ruins defeat well in advance with amazing detail and subtleties. Odium seems to have much better foresight than Ruin. Ruin wanted to break everything down without discrimination. Odium has hate. He's not just trying to ruin things, he chooses specific targets and acts with a passion. Ruin would be closer to a mindless need to destroy. Odium is more of a crafty passionate actions to destroy specific targets. The way I see it, although Ruin may appear like much more violent and furious use of power; that's because Odium has a far more structured and intelligent approach. He feels more like an actual villain to me. Ruin felt like more of a natural force that had come unbalanced.

That's the opposite, where the Radiant dies and the spren lives. When oaths are broken though, the spren dies.

I do think Harmony could end up defeating Odium; though Nightblood probably isn't needed. Of all the shards that could fight Odium, I think Harmony has a really solid chance. He could balance his intents by Preserving other shards and Ruining Odium.

Ruin chose to constrain himself though. He entered a deal with Preservation to help create a world so that he can destroy it. Odium on the other hand seemed to avoid investing himself in other worlds. He was only going around to destroy and solidify his strength. He bascally did this two ways - destroy shards that might challenge him on his quest (which is why he went after Ambition), and destroy shards that go to the same world together. Presumably he was going after the second because two Shards working together would obviously be more powerful than him. I assume that's why he didn't target Ruin/Preservation first; their intents were too opposed to be an immediate threat. That said, I assume they would have been a pretty big target for him had he been able to leave Roshar after splintering the shards. He might have been gambling on Ruin splintering Preservation; but had that not happened and had he not been trapped, I think it's very likely he would have visited Scadrial eventually. He definitely should have, considering Harmony is now more powerful than him (even if the intents make it hard to use that power to do things).

Odium seems to be greatly constrained right now. Everything we've heard about his past makes Ruin seem like he was slacking on his intent in comparison. For example, based on Odium's MO, Ruin and Preservation would have been likely targets had he not been trapped in Braize when he came to the Roshar system.

Well thanks for bumping it, I ended up reading all the way through. I suggest checking out the hemalurgic rat farm discussion in the middle of this thread. It's some good stuff.

I wouldn't say he outwitted Ruin at all. TLR wasn't Preservation's plan as far as I can tell. He was supposed to rise and fall. Vin was chosen to take the power before TLR was killed; so it seems safe to assume Preservation was not planning on TLR to retake the well. TLRs plan seemed to be holding off the inevitable and hoping he came up with a better way to use tWoA in the meantime. TLR thought he had the best plan against Ruin, but he was really just another cog. Based on his reaction in SH, he never realized that he was supposed to die, so he never really had a plan to defeat Ruin like Preservation did.

"Storms" "Spren" and "Land" don't seem like a very related set of things though. If they were like land, sea and skies, or; spiritual, physical and cognitive, I would be more on board. I don't see yours as a natural trio though, so it's not that convincing IMO.

That's totally not the same as Urithiru = the sibling though. The sibling could have caused it without being Urithiru itself.

Why are we associating the Nightwatcher with land? Why would the third one be of spren and not like oceans or something? Have we ever confirmed that Urithiru is actually the sibling? This makes too many assumptions for me.

I'm only expecting return of Stick around book 8 or 9, after they defeat Odium, only to realize that Stick holds the shard of Long Cons. He will then destroy Roshar by the end of the series, becoming the ultimate bad guy for the final Cosmere books/series.

Mat's plot armor was in-universe though; so like allomancy it still has a lot of merit to include it with his abilities. I don't think it's safe to say Mat would immediately lose just because his opponent is physically more capable and/or had an extreme advantage like steel pushing and iron pulling. Mat's plot basically consisted of surviving that, and trouble with women. At the end of the day though, the whole idea of Mat vs. Kelsier is pretty hard to determine, because they both seem near unkillable, even when they technically die.

Is Mat still Ta'veren for this comparison? That + the luck was extremely thick plot armour.

Remembering those that have been forgotten? As cool as it would be to see Rlain become a Bondsmith, this kinda sounds more like an Edgedancer thing to do to me. A lot of the focus we got on Rlain involved being forgotten and being ignored. That's literally what happens to him in the book. It seems strangely coincidental to me.

The audiobook reading of that by Michael Kramer is amazing in my opinion. You can feel the emotion in it.

I'm not sure if she would count for this list, because we've definitely seen her a bit. That said, I totally agree, and have high hopes for Wandersail. I didn't think I would want more Rysn, but after OB I can't wait.

But what if you were to have 10 gas giants in your system...

This makes the most sense. It's simple friction acting on the dull sides of the blade. Considering how fine a point shardblade can probably cut, I'd imagine the friction gets pretty strong pretty quickly on the sides of the blade assuming it even tapers out a little (and if it didn't taper it wouldn't be much of a blade; just a thin sheet of metal).

We never saw Shallans soul caster work and I don't think we learned what it would take to fix it.

I think this is made a bit more clear later in the novel. They're definitely closely related. Those are Aimians, the one you're talking about is a Dysian Aimian https://coppermind.net/wiki/Aimia#Aimian_Races

But a returned is causing the investiture in the form of breath (which is usually pretty well conserved) to be used up in a way it isn't from normal use. To an extent, it _does_ cause a net loss in the ability to use breath; because if a non-returned had been given those breaths instead, the breath would stay "in circulation" so to speak. Most breath-related processes are reversible, but returned use of breath isn't. (This also happens when they give away the breath, it can heal; but then no more divine breath) I don't really know if it would count as "end negative", but there is definitely some investiture being spent in a way that doesn't seem to actually manifest itself in a useable form.

I really didn't see it that big. Sure, it set Amaram up to fight for Odium, but I think the same thing could have easily happened with Sadeas in charge had Brandon set it up differently. That was really all Odium's doing. The characters we follow seemed to focus on the relevant parts. Most of them didn't like Sadeas though so he didn't come up much. He was dead and there were better things to think about.

I honesty think the Sadeas lack of focus made sense. It's the type of thing that could have been a big deal; except for the fact that Roshar is experiencing the start of a desolation, so the murder of a high-lord is basically secondary. For the same reason the book had no time to focus on those things, neither did the characters. IMO it would have been a strange change of pace to focus on these minor points in light of the major situation. Now that OB tied a lot of loose ends though, I could see some of these "buried" points coming back.

That could have been on purpose. As interesting and important as those things are; most of the characters we followed knew little about it. They had their own problems they focused on. It makes some sense that the story highly avoided focus on them.