Brightness Jencee

Ha, I had forgotten that they were married! I do know that you are correct about why Vasher killed her, I just didn't want to write it all out, lol.

So I just finished listening to the Nightblood 2 Shardcast (I know, it’s an older one) and several things sort of coalesced in my head that sort of make sense. Interestingly, they started down a similar thought path regarding Endowment at the very end of the episode. I had never heard that Nightblood was modeled after shardblades, btw. Interesting.  Anyway, realizing that Endowment was most likely afraid of Odium coming to Nalthis to destroy her, it totally makes sense that she might intervene in Nightblood’s creation. Also, knowing now that the five scholars had been to Roshar, it seems vary possible that they knew of Odium as well.  I find myself wondering if Nightblood was an attempt to create something that would destroy Odium that went very wrong in the process. First, Endowment intervened and gave it a supercharge of investiture. This gave Nightblood way more power than anticipated. The second happened in the Command. If part of the purpose of creating Nightblood was to kill Odium, then a command was needed that would work across realms to destroy, but would only destroy the intended target(and other bad dudes). That’s why it took so long to come up with the perfect command. Understanding the importance of Intent in the command, any mental imagery had to be avoided that would corrupt the Command, such as thinking about Odium. Trying not to think about something after you’ve told not is nearly impossible, however. I wonder if somehow, subconscious thoughts and conclusions about Odium entered in to Shashara’s visualizations and that magically allowed a bunch of his random investiture (Some of Adonalsium’s investiture that was sitting around on Nalthis at the time of the shattering and was was assigned to Odium), to also get sucked into Nightblood, corrupting Endowment’s investiture and supercharging it even more.  This is sounding way too complicated now (not sure I like it) Oh well. Whatever happened, Shashara thought it was great. Vasher not so much. They fought, Vasher killed Shashara. Vasher took Nightblood into protective custody.

Years pass, Vasher meets Vivenna, they go on an off world Yesteel chase where something really bad happens on the planet. Vivenna decides to return home and stay out of other world business.  Vasher, saying he is tired of living off of other people’s breath, says goodbye to Vivenna and heads for Roshar taking Nightblood with him. He assures Vivenna that he is just going to live a simple anonymous life and keep the world safe from Nightblood. I’m sure he is also thinking that it can’t hurt to have the weapon designed to destroy Odium in the same system that he (Odium) resides. Sometime after returning to Nalthis, Vivenna happens across a member of the 17th Shard, finds herself in agreement with their policy of nonintervention, joins up and accepts an assignment to go fetch Vasher and Nightblood back to Nalthis.  

This is just an example of the crazy places my mind goes when listening to Shardcast episodes.  Now you know what kind of nonsense goes on in the frightening recesses of my mind. You may now all commence tearing apart and completely disproving my meanderings.

PS. Apologies for any misspellings etc. Autocorrect and my iPad both hate me.

Nice. Thank you. I had assumed his daughter was out there somewhere to bond a radiant, but had missed the conversation with Venli.  Do we have radiant identities for the cracked stone spren (Stoneward?) and the ash-like spren seen in Shadesmar?

Curious question…what order bonds Reacher spren? Ico’s father was a radiant spren that is now a deadeye.

I just finished my current WoK reread, and this part of Dalinar's last vision in the book jumped out at me...

"The sky was dark and he stood on a field of dull, bone-white rock, jagged and rough, extending in all directions. Off into eternity. Amorphous shapes made of curling grey smoke rose from the ground. Like smoke rings, only in other shapes. Here a chair. There a rockbud, with vines extended, curling to the sides and vanishing. Beside him appeared the figure of a man in uniform, silent and vaporous, rising lethargically toward the sky, mouth open. The shapes melted and distorted as they climbed higher, though they seemed to hold their forms longer than they should. It was unnerving, standing on the boundless plain, pure darkness above, smoke figures rising all around."

I feel like I've seen this place somewhere else in the books, but can't think where. Do any of you experts out there know where this is?

@Alderant All fair points. I would really like to see an Edgedancer Adolin in a shardblade fight though. Seeing how Kaladin's accomplished spear skills were taken to a whole new level as a Windrunner, imagine what Adolin's shardblade skills would be like with Edgedancer abilities added in.

1 hour ago, CrazyRioter said:

His dad was either absent or alcoholic for most of his childhood and adolescence and his mom is dead. Clearly the epitome of a normal, happy life.He has major self-esteem issues that are coming increasingly to the forefront as of Oathbringer. He's only a shallow character if you read on a surface level and don't read deeper. And any character is 'shallow" if you only look at the surface layer. That's part of the reason I like him, he looks like the stereotypical self-confident jock, but he really isn't.

Regardless, this is getting a little off topic for this thread, there's other threads to discuss Adolin's character in general.

I agree, not to mention that his dad remembers nothing of his beloved mother's how weird would that be? I also don't think he's a victim, I just don't think he's lived a perfect sheltered life.  Everyone has a different story and different obstacles to overcome.

I've been thinking about whether or not Adolin even personifies the Edgedancer ideals that we know so far...

1. I will remember those who have been forgotten.  I guess you could count remembering his mom who his dad had forgotten. Adolin helped the whore being abused by Sadeas's men. In a way, he remembers Maya, who has been forgotten by everyone.

2. I will listen to those who have been ignored. He listens to Maya once he really knows she is real. Adolin listens to Renarin, who is ignored by pretty much everyone, all the time and values his input.

Any other thoughts about how he does or does not personify the edgedancer ideals? It seem he must personify them to an extent in order to revive Maya since she is an Edgedancer siren.

I am rereading WoK(again) and something jumped out at me from Kaladin's flashback where Amaram killed his squad and gave him the slave brand. This may be old news to y'all, but it was new to me...

“Why?” Amaram said. “Why did you reject it? I have to know.” “I don’t want it, sir.” “Yes, but why?” Because it would make me one of you. Because I can’t look at that weapon and not see the faces of the men its wielder slaughtered so offhandedly. Because … because … “I can’t really answer that, sir,” Kaladin said, sighing." (underlines mine)

It appears to me in this part that what Amaram really wants to know is if Kaladin is a surgebinder. I think that the Sons of Honor know more about the knights radiant than we give them credit for. The several hours spent in Amaram's office before this scene were probably spent arguing about what to do with Kaladin, kill him, recruit him, or what.  We don't yet know the extent of King Gavilar's progression toward Bondsmith, but if the Stormfather had revealed to him a fraction of what he has revealed to Dalinar, then Gavilar would have known about the nahel bond and passed that information along to Amaram. They probably were keeping an eye out for the appearance of possible radiants in order to confirm if they were on the right track. Now,here was a darkeyed spearman who, not only survived an encounter with a full shardbearer, but also killed him and then, for some totally unfathomable reason, refused to take the shards. Had Kaladin answered his true thoughts, confirming he wans't Radiant, Amaram probably would have killed him along with the rest of squad. Had Kaladin aswered anything that hinted toward a possible nahel bond forming, Amaram may have recruited him into the Sons of Honor where he could keep tabs on him and then swore him to secrecy. Kaladin's answer of "I can't really say" left Amaram in the position of "I can't leave him around to blab that that I took his Shardplate and blade can't kill him if he is forming a nahel bond and thus further delay the desolation." As a result, Amaram gives him the slave brand to descredit anything he might say and sends him off to his fate, whatever that may be. Amaram probably figured that he'd never see Kaladin again and, knowing he had covered his bases, promptly forgot about him.

Sorry if this has already been hashed out somewhere. I thought it was interesting, though. I'll keep blaming being new to the forums if I miss stuff, lol. What do y'all think? Am I just reading too much in to this?

So is it possible that the humans on Ashyn were actually voidbinding and accessing the surges directly through Odium since he was their god (assuming my understand of voidbinding is correct)? Then, when they came to Roshar and abandoned Odium for Honor, he (Odium) took voidbinding away from them and gave it to the Singers?

@CrazyRioter Well, I was sort thinking about realmatic theory. Do spren have a spiritual aspect at all? Could the nahel bond help them enter both the physics and spiritual realms? Could the connection to the spiritual realm be what was ripped away? 

And on the human side... Is only the physical aspect hereditary or could a person inherit something of their ancestors' cognitive and spiritual aspects as well? If so, could Adolin have inherited enough cognitive and spiritual "genetic" stuff to give back to Maya what was taken when the 1st bond was broken. I think I do view all of this as more of a "connection" thing  like @Calderis was saying earlier because Maya's entire sentient existence in the physical realm was dependent upon her connection to her first Radiant, so losing that connection would be akin to having her life ripped away. If Adolin was a direct descendent of that Radiant and had a very similar cognitive/spiritual blueprint, maybe he would be able to provide that specific connection that Maya had lost.

I don't know if any of that made sense at all, but I hope so. My understanding of realmatic theory is very basic so this may be totally of base.  It was just a thought I had.

37 minutes ago, Invocation said:

Roshar is the only one that has spren that are the way they are on Roshar itself.

Seons and skaze could be classified as a form of spren, as well as the Shards, technically. It really just depends on what you mean by spren, but they're not even sure about the definition themselves.

I was thinking more Rosharan specific(probably should've should've posted this under Stormlight) and how people accessed surges on Ashyn.  I have often wondered if Shinovar has no spren because when it was constructed as a home for humans, some sort of cognitive barrier was put around it to keep spren out so humans couldn't access the surges. However, I'm now remembering that spren had nothing to do with accessing the surges until after Honor appointed the Heralds and gave them the honorblades. Now I'm wondering if humans even had access to the surges on Ashyn....

What if Adolin happened to be a direct descendent of the Radiant that had bonded Maya? Could that give him the extra "something" needed to revive her? Just curious.

Is Roshar the only planet in the system that has spren or are they on Ashyn, Braize and the other planets as well?

@dejrasvu That's actually why I started reading him. I wanted to know what the author who would be completing Wheel of Time was like. Jordan made a good choice on that one. Now Sanderson is my favorite author in the fantasy realms.

@17SarcasticGhanderflaffles I liked Skyward a lot too. It is also full of mysteries to ponder, and at least there is a sequel on the horizon for it, lol. It's funny, I keep trying to mentally fit Skyward into the cosmere even though I know it's not. The magic system just feels so Shardic to me.

@17SarcasticGhanderflaffles That is a tough question. I would probably say the Rithmatist. I think the way he took the North American continent into the United American Isles and such is fascinating. I also really like the chalklings and detailed defense systems. I am very interested in springworks technology and wonder why it affects chalk creatures.

After reading the bridge four chapters from Dragonsteel Prime, I had to make an attempt at drawing Drephrast. It's a work in progress.

Jesus is coming back, yay! Hopefully sooner rather than later. Someone needs to come fix this world!

Pickle in a jar of mayonnaise... Um... Gross!!!

Do you have any good thread recommendations on the hierocracy or recreance? The search tool hates me.

14 minutes ago, RShara said:

Adrotagia can't be a Herald. T remembers her being a kid, and them growing up and old together.

That is a definitly a problem. I remember them talking about their childhood. 

10 hours ago, RShara said:

Sadly, we never did get an image for that one, so we have to regard it as paraphrased. Also, when I asked Brandon about it, he said there have been several Heralds in proximity to T, but only one is influencing him now, and he wasn't willing to give a name.

 

If there have been several heralds around Taravangian, then maybe Adrotagia = Vedel isn't completely far fetched after all, provided the Maben theory isn't confirmed of course.

Adrotagia has always struck me as a "more than meets the eye" character. She appears to be Mr T's most trusted advisor and other people follow her orders without question. She is currently with Mr T.  Killing people to collect the death rattles is rather the perfect twist of her earlier self who trained surgeons and had the divine attributes of loving and healing.

@Inklingspren Thanks. It wouldn't let me tag people on my first couple of posts for some reason so I answered each individually. Now it works though. 

Bring on the fortune cookie.

I've seen lots of posts about the Batter/Pailiah debate. Not sure where I fall on that one.

I had wondered if Adrotagia was possibly Vedel, but that seems like too many heralds in Kharbranth.

I have also wondered if Yesteel fled to Roshar and became a herald and that is what eventually brought Vasher, Nightblood, and Vivenna to Roshar since they were pursuing him.

@Gray to Warbreaker, Elantris, Emperor's Soul, Sixth of the Disk, Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell, Mistborn(everything published so far), Arcamum Unbound, White Sand(prose version).  

I've read a good chunk of Sanderson's non-cosmere books too. I like his writing style, what can I say. I probably need to branch out, lol.

@Inklingspren Definitely Vai. Fortune cookie? 

Is there a thread on here about the heralds we have seen and what they are doing and theories about their current identities. If so, can someone point me to it because I can't find it using search. Thanks