Oudeis

Keep in mind he might only have realized what he was recently. Kaladin was using powers for a while and conversing constantly with Syl and had no idea. We know from Ym that spren like Glys are not very talkative.

My phone is eating my attempts to reply, I'll try again on a computer tomorrow.

The power in the Well was of preservation, so it's knowledge of Hemalurgy would be limited. I believe an epigraph made it clear that all three hemalurgic constructs were the result of Ruin whispering to Rashek.

Since the Lord Ruler feared feruchemy, and we see he didn't want the Inquisitors to get too powerful, and he believed they were already unstoppably powerful, and in any case if something came up they couldn't handle he himself could... that seems like it would be out of character for him. Far too much risk for far too little gain.

Tekiel had contracts to deliver goods, and due to the thefts was unable to deliver on these contracts. They owed money to the people who had trusted Tekiel with their goods. They could not pay because all of their things had been stolen. The original contract was something like, I promise to get a shipment of steel to this place and then you will give me money. Since Tekiel couldn't pay the fee to break the contract, they basically sold their half of the contract. So they sell to Company B, who now has to ship steel for the people who hired Tekiel. This is a terrible deal, and very few people have a way to eke out any profit, so they sell it for a crazy small amount. And that's where the fraud comes in. Transporting steel which was stolen is hard. But when the Vanishers are all caught, the property shows up. So, Company B entered into this contract at a bargain price. Now, suddenly, delivering the steel is incredibly easy, and Company B gets paid by the people who wanted the steel shipped.

Kelsier and Vin both were always more engineers than scientists.

I am instinctively biased against such a flagrant mix of business and governance. Can anyone with a more objective viewpoint and a solid foundation in politics comment on the pitfalls or advantages of such a system?

Breath expanded his mind from "sword" to sentient, but didn't let him grasp evil. Vasher's comment was not that he wasn't smart enough to have evil explained to him, it's that the concept of evil is alien to his nature. There's no reason to assume a second expansion would change that. If I don't have a tail, no amount of tapped pewter will let me lift a barbell with my tail. Beyond which, this wasn't really a realmatic theory. What we know for sure about Shards, the Spiritual Realm, and all that could fit in a thimble. Everyone has a strong opinion and no one at this point (unless there's a WoB I know not of) can say my idea is or isn't plausible. Just if that person believes it or not. My argument was from a narrative perspective. These elements all exist. They would not have been set up without a purpose. It's a narrative mechanic we call Chekov's Gun. I'm saying this is how I think the elements will all coalesce. Maybe when Shadows of Self comes out in a month and a half we'll learn something about Shards proving my entire idea is flawed.

I thought I had posted this theory already but I can't find it...We know Nightblood was made by Mr. Sanderson for Stormlight Archive and that Warbreaker exists to introduce him, so Nightblood has a huge part to play. We know he eats Investiture and have been warned against underestimating his hunger. Finally, we know he has difficulty with his Command to "Destroy Evil" because he is a sword and cannot understand what evil is. For what it's worth, we also know he was modeled after sprenblades. Here is what I think. Whether by the design of someone who helped make him or not, it has always been Mr. Sanderson's plan that Nightblood would end up slaying, and replacing, Odium. I have a few ideas how this might come to pass, but regardless of how, I'm fairly certain it will. Intents corrupt... But Nightblood is still just a sword. God's own divine hatred will whisper in Nightblood's mind, hate. Hate all. Hate everything and everyone. And Nightblood will reply, right, yes, of course. Getting right on that. Er... Hate. What's that again? And we get an odd, imperfect, but safer-than-Rayse Odium.

I took it a little differently... that moment was her moment of revelation. She says aloud, because there's something wrong with your Shardblade. There's something wrong with everyone's Shardblade... except for mine. And she summons him. She's finally grown enough to begin to acknowledge that her Shardblade is different. And that's why she calls him instantly, without waiting. If she weren't finally acknowledging that her Blade wasn't just any Blade, there would have been no need to summon it and try to operate the Oathgate.

Oh right! He says he is due a broken Soulcaster, and she qualifies. I had forgotten that part. Interesting. Keep in mind, he's a worldhopper. He might have access to knowledge or devices, or even arcana, which might reveal more to him than we realize. Perhaps he knows Hoid?

While valid, I wasn't saying we should take the Letter as gospel. I'm just saying, if we're looking for a definition of Odium's Intent, it's almost axiomatically a better source than googling the definition of the word "Odium".

I don't see a confirmation there that he knows she can Soulcast, or that her order is the Lightweavers.

The fact that he's cool with the traits being swapped around suggests strongly that there is not, in fact, any pattern to be found. I've read this WoB but when I tried to find it I couldn't; do you happen to have a direct link I can bookmark for future reference?

Did we know that Mraize knows she can Soulcast? I don't recall that part.

I'm working on trying to predict the gaping holes in the hemalurgy chart. In the process, I'm collating data on the other Metallic Arts to look for commonalities. Working my way up to hemalurgy, I've come up with an idea on how we can divide up the feruchemical traits. TL;DR if you don't want to read this wall of text: But if you reply to this over-simplified summary and my reply is in this OP, I will ignore you. So in short, the classifications I propose for feruchemical metals: Alloys require Intent, Base metals store traits that happen without Intent. The split between Metal Group 1 and Metal Group 2 (what in Allomancy is called the Internal and External metals) is that Group 1 must be powered from inside yourself, while group 2 can be powered from an external source. I'm going to throw out one caveat to start this. Recall that allomantically, copper and bronze are not obviously internal metals. Bronze allows you to sense bronzepulses; this is similar to how the external iron allows you to see ironlines. Copper sets up a cloud around you; this is similar to how the external bendalloy creates a bubble around you. It is mostly from its placement in the group that we know they must be internal, changing something within the person that indirectly causes the external effects. So even if something initially looks like it doesn't fit the category, it might just be that we don't yet fully understand the mechanism. That said, onto my theory. The easier one is Base Metals versus their Alloys, since we know this is always going to be the case. From the charts, we know the four metals in the Allomantic Mental Quadrant are the same as the ones in the Feruchemical Cognitive Quadrant, and we know bronze is always going to be an alloy of copper. Whether the eight "internal metals" and eight "external metals" will all share one feruchemical group is less certain; we have no evidence that they will, apart from the fact that everything else about the allomantic classifications has, in fact, translated. So. Tin, Iron, Copper, Zinc, Aluminum, Chromium, Gold, Cadmium. Feruchemically, they store Senses, Weight, Memories, Mental Speed, Luck, Health, and Breath. Contrast with Pewter, Steel, Bronze, Brass, Duralumin, Nicrosil, Electrum, and Bendalloy, which store Might, Speed, Wakefulness, Warmth, Connection, Investiture, Determination, and Food. Note, all of this is more easily viewed and broken down on all of my charts in the link at the top of this post. What I eventually concluded is intent. Most of the alloys are things you must willfully choose to do. All of the base metals are things which will happen on their own, even if you're unconscious. This isn't exact, but it's the best I could come up with. Anyone who wants to posit another solution, I am all ears. If you're unconscious, you will keep breathing, but you must be awake to hunt/gather food, prepare it, and eat it. Your body will try to repair itself even if you're asleep, but you must be awake to be determined about something. Luck happens to you, but per WoB, Intent is always needed for Investiture. Identity; you're always yourself, even your sleeping self, but if you're not actively engaged with someone you're not building social connections. You weigh the same asleep or awake, but you must make the choice to move to have speed. Your senses passively gather information all the time; you can choose to focus on one or more, but as a whole it's a passive thing. But you must make a choice to exert most of your muscles. The cognitive metals are a big sticking point. They appear to be fully reversed. Recalling memories and cogitating both require acts of will. Warmth... has always been odd. It's either a thing that happens to your body or a thing your body does outside of your conscious control. Wakefulness. You've either had enough sleep or you haven't; coffee can cheat the system but actually feeling rested is a thing that just is about you, it's not like you're sitting at your desk and suddenly exert some muscle and feel more rested than you did a moment ago. Perhaps there's some reason the Cognitive metals break the pattern, or mayb these four fit the pattern in a non-obvious way like copper and bronze. Or, of course, I'm simply wrong. If this sparks any ideas in other people, give me a shout! Group 1 and Group 2. In allomancy, we call these the Internal Metals and the External Metals. For whatever reason, tin, copper, aluminum, gold and their alloys are all one "group" in allomancy. Is this true for feruchemy? Might, senses, wakefulness, memories, connection, identity, determination, and health. What separates them from speed, weight, warmth, mental speed, investiture, luck, food and breath? I propose: Power source. The first eight must be powered from within one's own body. There's no way to artificially increase your own storage limit. You can store as much strength as you have, you can store as much identity as you have. You cannot draw wakefulness from something outside of yourself, nor health. However, you can gorge yourself and store all the excess food. You can sit in a sauna for hours, building up huge reserves of warmth. The sticking points: Physical and mental speed. Neither of them seem like things you can power externally. I would be very surprised if you could leap off a cliff and store your forward motion; the impression I get is that "physical speed" is how quickly you can force your muscles to work. Not sure how they fit into this category. Kay, that's the short version. More charts and more deductions and more information to be found in the chart above. And of course, this all supposes that there even is a split in the metal feruchemically. Just because this exists in allomancy doesn't mean it must be reflected in feruchemy. I fully admit and accept that there might not be any distinction.

My first time through the books was tough. Everything is so alien and it was a lot of information to process. My second read of the books had a TON of stuff I missed the first time, and even my third read revealed a great many details I missed, or cleared up things I was unsure about.

Just want to point out... Odium is just a name. I've heard people say that the Progression Surge should let Renarin see the future because "Progress" means "forward". The Progression Surge is what it is, defined by its attributes, and "Progression" is a word used to label it. It doesn't work the other way; you cannot take every definition of the word Progression and decide, well this means that the Surge can do that thing. Odium will prove to be defined by what Odium actually is. "Odium" is the name given to it. The fact that a definition for "odium" might indicate something slightly different doesn't mean that it defines Odium itself. I'm inclined to pay more attention to things like The Letter, where someone starts to describe Odium from a first-hand basis. In that, he makes it more clear what the Intent is, and it seems to be undiluted hatred. As for him not being "pure evil"... I'm going to refer back to Ruin. The idea of Ruin is, itself, not evil. It's an often necessary part of existence. However, this does not stop the Shard Ruin from being a bad things. Because it's not necessary Ruin, or Ruin for a purpose, or Ruin as part of a greater whole. Like many things, taken to an extreme it is a terrible, terrible thing. Much like Preservation itself, in fact. The urge to keep everything in stasis, to never let anything grow or change, is stifling. Water is good. Water is not inherently evil. A cool drink of water can provide many health benefits, and a total lack of water will kill you. The rampaging flood about to destroy a village is that same water. It isn't evil. It is just too much, and incredibly dangerous, and should absolutely be stopped. Is it perhaps wrong for people to take Odium personally? Should people hate it less? Perhaps. But I'm not gonna tell the people living in the village, "Look, let's all take a break from building these levees to acknowledge that it isn't really the water's fault."

There's a line when she first summons it on-screen, when she's about to be killed by Tyn. She thinks how she needs ten heartbest, then quietly thinks to herself... but I don't really need them, do I? And then immediately thinks, NO I TOTALLY NEED TIME MY SHARDBLADE ISN'T DIFFERENT. A clue that the ten heartbeats are a self-imposed rule.

Also, he's an incredible spymaster. Through luck and possession of resources they are unaware of, she's been able to avoid a few of his attempts to learn her secrets. It's entirely plausible that he tried another method of spying on her that she failed to detect.

I interpretted it as saying, "Can a Parrot do X?" "No. X requires Intent." Meaning, a parrot cannot provide Intent. I acknowledge there is another way to say it. Regardless, I'm not personally sold on the idea that everyone Invests all the time from Stormlight, down to plants. Although... maybe? Are these the bonds of spren? When fearspren show up around someone, is that person "bonded" to them ever so slightly, allowing them to Invest just the tiniest bit of Stormlight? When Lifespren dance around a rockbud, does that allow the rockbud to Invest? Okay. I still don't believe it, but I'm considering it more.

Haha! I was going to say you don't have to rescind everything... then I saw this is your third post. So you're rescinding basically one thing, which happens to be the only things you've said. It's cool! Fresh start. We all get a mulligan.

Bullets specifically are tricky... as Wax points out, by the time you've heard the gunshot, if you're not already jumping out of the way, it's too late. I feel like the speed you've have to move to get out of the way of a bullet after you've heard the sound of it being fired but before the bullet hits you would fry you from air compression. But, I get the idea. Dodging "something dodgeable" as opposed to taking an actual that clearly requires specific thoughts and planning. I do agree that steel feruchemy will enhance your own mind a lot to compensate, if it's something that your body could account for without thinking anyway. I just see a lot of people acting like it makes you The Flash, able to take in information and fully process it as fast as your body is moving, even outside of relation to your own speed.

I absolutely concur. I wonder, how is it determined? If Lord Harms recently came into a Senate seat, that would mean we could comb for information on him, and learn more about how Senate seats are awareded/determined. And lost (or merged?) since they don't seem concerned about multiple heirs. I'm inclined to believe Lord Harms does not have a Senate Seat. Just a general sense.

We just learned, however, that parrots cannot Awaken because they cannot provide Intent. If parrots can't do it, I don't believe plants can.