Galavantes

I met Brandon in Raleigh. Although it was for the WoT signing and idk if that demographic is somehow different than his core demo, but I can't see how it would be.

Also I'm from Raleigh, NC. The South. I just had to upvote everything Shardlet said. Because he was right.

I found it neither offensive nor funny. It was utterly "meh". There was a much funnier article a while back about Sanderson being mugged and hit over the head with a copy of tWoK. 

I sort of assumed that the dome of not day-time thing was actually his secondary power, and therefore didn't have to have the same weakness. For instance I don't think steelheart lost his super strength or ability to fly around David's dad just because there was a guy nearby who wasn't afraid of him, that particular weakness only affected his invincibility. 

I think Brandon can pull it of logically. Brandon has explained earlier how he divide his worlds into the cognitive, the physical and the spiritual (?, not sure about the last one) The cognitive being buildt from the idea that every object has some sort of awareness. Therefore intent from humans can influence the physical world.

This book is not placed in the Cosmere, therefore the 3 realms construct doesn't apply here. That doesn't mean he doesn't have a logical explanation. it's just not going to have anything to do with Shadesmar, etc.

Wow I utterly do not recall that quote. Already time for a reread I guess.

I actually don't think that gifting a power has any "evil-inducing" effects on normal humans. It seems to warp the Epics fairly quickly. Like within a few minutes. However the team used the tensors for hours while they were prepping the stadium and didn't seem any worse for the wear. Someone made an argument that David was having some delusions of grandeur, but it was slight enough that it could really go either way.

On the other hand it was fairly well accepted that the diggers went utterly insane. 

On the other other hand, we haven't seen any ill effects from Conflux gifting his powers either.

Conclusion being we can't assume gifted powers warp normal humans. Not yet anyway.

Bro you nailed it.

As always Brandon has left me wanting a sequel right NOW. I thought it was excellent. 

Mcmillion, I can see how the formula looks similar to mistborn. But let's try to give Sanderson a little credit. After all not a single one of us nailed the "theory of weakness". Things never end up being exactly as they appear. I'm willing to bet that Calamity is more unique than just being a ruin clone.

Edit: I'm also betting there is a reason their powers twist their minds. Although I'm sure that particular mystery won't be solved until the 3rd book.

Yeah it's a bit un-sandersony isn't it? particularly in a YA novel where he even substitutes in silly curse words. But yeah, I read it as

 Or you might even be able to get

 out of it if you tried.

My theory is that Hoid can actually use all of the cosmere powers. Due to the fact that he is a human created by Andolsium before being shattered. We know he can use at least some feruchemy, and we know he has a breathe. Throw in lightweaving and we have 3 totally seperate magic systems. I see no reason that it should stop there.

We also have no idea what the time frame is between desolations. All we know is that it has been about 5,000 years since the last one. That is more than enough time to forget. Our own world shares that trait. The events from the new testament come from less than half that amount of time in the past and today no one can agree on the facts of that either. Give it another 3,000 years and who knows?
 

I do think there is more to the parshendi, because this is Brandon and we only have 1 book of 10. But this seems like a feasible reason as to why the parshmen are the way they are.

Just quick theory to attempt to explain what makes the Parshmen different from the Parshendi. The basis of the premise is that every Parshendi form requires the bonding of a spren. The Parshmen however are without form. They have no spren, and no song. So why are they like this? And how did it happen?

To try and answer that we'll run on the assumption that the Parshendi really are voidbringers. Perhaps they become forcibly bonded by the "evil" spren we see in Dalinar's newest vision in WoR. Bonding to a "void spren" or "odium spren" or what have you causes their transformation into something similar to a Koloss or Inquisitor, in that they are now controlled by Odium and become members of his army. 

So after a desolation I can see two things happening:

1. The void-spren withdraw and leave naturally, the parshendi suddenly have their free will and are allowed to change forms to whatever they wish. This is the natural course of things and result in perfectly functional Parshendi.

2- During battle some of the parshendi and forcibly unbonded from their spren, or their spren is somehow destroyed through some Surgebinding or Fabrial art that we haven't yet seen. Perhaps Soulcasters are able to affect these voidspren directly, since their entire art seems to center around manipulating spren. These Parshendi are never given to chance to naturally change forms and are essentially lobotomized when their bond is broken. Thus becoming the Parshmen we see today.

The other interesting thing we see from Dalinar's vision is that the void-spren seems to forcibly bond to create a thunderclast. If they are also able to do this with the unbonded Parshmen then we are in for quite a bit of trouble with they suddenly become voidbringers.

I'd probably give it a PG-13. Simply for some violence and slight creepiness at times. Language is fine and sexual content is non-existent so far.

I haven't read the Belgariad yet. Personal failing.

So I feel as though I should put this out here. The House of Blades is a first novel by a new author named Will Wight. It's the first book of his planned trilogy and the second book is due out this month. For a $3 download it's an excellent book, the author has a great imagination and the imagery is wonderful. While this book seems to be a staging book for the rest of the series, simply introducing us to the players, there are hints throughout of a very interesting game being played. 

His premise is somewhat Brandon-y. In that he is taking a known fantasy trope, that of the small town farmboy who comes into great power and begins to act out ancient prophecies, and flips it around by telling the story from the viewpoint of his entirely un-prophesized friend. 

If you want a very fun read with great potential, and to support a very promising new author, check it out.

But that begs the question of how Hoid managed to get on Sel so he could supply illegal weapons to the Elantrians. If it is not possible to travel through Shadesmar ...

Hoid is not a good example of what is feasible in the cosmere. YOU should stay away from Shadesmar near Sel, as should most other people. Hoid ain't got no time for that.

Real question is how have the Selians(?) that are hopping with the 17th Shard get through Shadesmar? Perhaps shardic assistance?

Yes at the moment the "Something in the vault" scenario seems most likely, if only because Steelheart glanced back into the vault in the very same paragraph that he realized he was injured.
However there was also mention of Deathpoint possibly having a second power that he was trying to use at the same time. It's possible that this second power was responsible. 

What about drawing a line of Forbiddance on a movable surface? Like say a plank of plywood. When I was reading the book I even imagined the Rithmatists standing in a circle just outside the huge circle of warding, holding planks with extremely think lines of Forbiddance on them, and slowly advancing towards the tower. Constricting the space that the wild chalklings could be in. Then maybe once it's small enough start tossing acid into the middle and killing hoards of them.

It's still possible it was his coin. Yes, the church is filled with gears, but who's to say those aren't there to keep the Shadowblaze locked in?

 

Or maybe it was simply because. as has been stated, all spots were filled.

I do think that a shadowblaze bonds with a person to make a rithmatist, and since there was a shadowblaze in the chamber then that implies to me that there was at least one spot free. So I think something else spooked it. 

Also...why July 4th? Or why even only one day at all? Why not on a child's 8th birthday? Or every Sunday?

Further more, if there IS a way to influence who is chosen, and the upper hierarchy is aware of it, then it seems that a better system would be to train Rithmatists FIRST, then send the very best ones in to attempt to bond with a shadowblaze. Resulting in more powerful rithmatists like Joel. (btw my name is Joel and reading an entire book with a main character of that name was a little odd)

Ah my mistake. I just reread that scene. Still not very much information there however. All we saw him do with it was determine the trajectory of a flying object. Still something that could be done with either interpretation of the power.

I don't know, but it makes sense. Rep

And yet, how would they have accomplished it? The only time we've seen anyone defeat a shard was

I can't imagine what means a group of humans would have at their disposal to shatter Adonalsium.

I've never been certain that Zinc actually works that way. It seems to be the general idea that it simply speeds up thoughts. As in tapping zinc allows more calculations per second, but doesn't actually allow you to figure out a problem that you wouldn't be able to figure out normally. 

Are we entirely certain that is how it works? Or is that simply something that has been generally assumed? Do we have any WOB on that?

After all we have no scenes of anyone actually tapping it. Only storing it. It seems that it can be difficult to tell the difference between reduced speed of thought and reduced capacity.

From the text I emphasized, it looks like the shadow-like, red-eyed spren isn't an Odiumspren, but rather a spren that was "touched" by whoever (a name) is. I think an Unmade was using Odium-based magic (Voidbinding? Something else?) to make various spren do his/her bidding.

That works fine with OP's theory. It could be corrupted spren bonding with parshmen to turn them into voidbringers. Void-form? Makes sense.

Yes still very up in the air. Hoid could have been the original holder of Adonolsium (I don't think so though), or he could have held a shard for a short time. Or neither. 

Also none of the quotes I've seen answer the question as to whether Hoid is a sliver. I agree that it certainly sounds like that in his conversation with Kaladin. But it could also just be Brandon screwing with us. 

I don't think we'll get an answer regarding Hoid holding a Shard until Dragonsteel unfortunately.

I can't wait for Nightblood to go up against a shardblade.