KandraAllomancer

After thinking about it for quite some time I have finally come up with something that, I believe, might be a satisfying solution to the problem of genesis of three different magic systems on Roshar. Unlike other planets, we shouldn't consider Rosharan magics to be of this Shard or that; Roshar is simply too complicated for that. It has a long magical baggage of being designed by Adonalsium for something, and a lot of things were either changed / repurposed by Honor an Cultivation, or corrupted by Odium.

Instead, we should split the issue into two independent questions:

• which Shard shaped the fundamental forces – the answer would be obviously H&C for Surges and Odium for Voidbindings
• who bound the fundamental forces – which usually means creating (or changing) some spren and making the powers accessible for people to use. The answer, I believe, could be H&C, Odium, or selected types of special, large spren – most notably, the Sibling and the Unmade

Surgebinding

The Surges are obviously of Honor and Cultivation, we have both book quotes and WoBs to confirm that. Surgebinding, however, was created (or, in other words, Surges were bound) at least three times:

• Ishar bound the Surges on Ashyn, possibly using Dawnshards and Odium's Investiture
• Odium created the Fused on Roshar
• Honor and Cultivation created the Radiant Spren and then added the Oaths

The KR Surgebinding is, in my opinion, the only Rosharan magic system where the Shards behind the fundamental forces and the binding of powers are exactly the same

Voidbinding

Things get slightly more complicated here. I think that Voidbinding (the binding of Void i.e. Odium) is the direct result of Odium being forcibly bound to the Rosharan system by the powers of H&C, rather than Investing on a planet willingly. As a result, the powers (Voidbindings) are of Odium, but the whole structure of the magic system (10-centric, two Surges per “Order” / level) are identical to KR Surgebinding, not the Fused Surgebinding.

This is obviously rather speculative, but I think the history might have been more or less like this:

• Odium creates the Fused and gives them Surgebinding
• Odium is bound to Braize by Honor. Voidbinding is created and Odium's Tone becomes one of the pure Tones of Roshar, as the effects of Honor's actions extend to all habitable planets in the system
• Odium creates the Unmade and realizes that they can grant Voidbinding, which hurts him. Still, they are too useful to throw away, so he keeps them and tries to control them. He doesn't create new Fused, though, as they might have Voidbinding rather than Surgebinding now
• Honor tells the Heralds about Voidbinding, who then warn people about the dangerous power of futuresight. Ishar creates the Voidbinding chart
• Honor tries to suppress the Voidbinding (or, more generally, Odium's Tone), but fails shortly before he dies, which leads to Odium's powers becoming stronger and causes the False Desolation

I believe that true Voidbinding would require bonding a sapient Voidspren, which is currently fully suppressed by Odium. The only way to get Voidbinding is through the Unmade, which are actually tied to the third magic system

Fabrials and beyond

The third magic system is tricky, as we know that it includes fabrials (Surge fabrials, presumably, as modern fabrials look like they could exist on a minor Shardworld) and some unknown esoteric powers. The possible solution to this, I believe, is the Sibling.

The Sibling has a specific ability to suppress magic of the enemy, which can be replicated by a fabrial (Voidfabrial used by Lezian), but not any Surgebinding we know of. They most likely can change some spren to be used in fabrials and give them restrictions on their own, as demonstrated by the Oathgate spren that refer to them as their parent. My proposition is that the esoteric powers Khriss mentions in Ars Arcanum are the powers of binding spren and forces by ten powerful spren,  the Sibling being the only one we've seen in uncorrupted state.

As you can guess, I believe that at least some of the Unmade used to be the same class of spren as the Sibling (Sja-anat even refers to them as a cousin). They would include:

• Yelig-nar – grants all ten Surges, yet another method of binding Surges
• Sja-anat – her Enlightening changes spren and gives them new powers
• Ba-Ado-Mishram – can grant Forms of Power, Voidlight and Voidbinding, possibly crucial for Ghostbloods' plan to et Investiture off-world

The fact that Voidbinding  currently seems to only be granted by large spren (and only one Vodibinding for that) has some nice parallels with the Surges being widely known and understood only from Soulcasters before the return of the Knights Radiant. That's also the reason Khriss treats Voidbinding as a cousin to the Old Magic, which would technically refer to the Unmade alone, not the Voidbinding itself.

I'm not convinced that all Unmade were like the Sibling before, particularly the mindless ones. There are some weird large spren around (Cusicesh, the Stormstriders) that might be relevant here. Also, Aimia was, until relatively recently, kept habitable by some incredibly powerful fabrials, possibly linked to another huge spren.

Interestingly, as a result of the creation of the Unmade, the third magic system seems to be of all three Rosharan Shards now, with H&C powers (fabrials) working as an equivalent of Scadrian magitek and Odium's powers (granting enormous powers at a cost, merging powers of different Shards, working outside Roshar?) largely covering the niche of Hemalurgy

On 2.03.2021 at 2:45 PM, Harkain said:

That being said I do like the idea of him cannibalising the individual forces as the abilities of the Voidbringers. I'd be hesistant to look for too many clues in WOK tho, from my understanding he's really changed a lot since thing.

That is a very real possibility, but, on the other hand, the original Epellion Forces seem to correspond nicely (at least better than Surges, in my opinion) to the powers of the Unmade:

Time - shared by all Unmade, not tied to any specific one

Wind - Yelig-nar, based on being called Blightwind

Movement - assuming that Movement is more or less the Transportation Surge (which we see in WoK Prime), Moelach would fit, as he grants visions "at the transition point between realms"

Energy - Nergaoul gives people the strength and ferocity to fight beyond the point where they would give up. He was also imprisoned in a ruby, and Energy is Connected to the Essence of Fire

Decay - Chemoarish, based on being called Dustmother

Life - Re-Shephir creates Midnight Essences that imitate living creatures

Thought - Dai-Gonarthis can apparently consume emotions, possibly leading to the sociopathic thinking that characterizes Moash or Nale

Adherence - Ba-Ado-Mishram was able to Connect to the (almost) whole Singer species

Awakening - what we know from WoK Prime

matches Sja-anat's Enlightening quite well

Stasis - Ashertmarn induces inaction by causing people to indulge in excess

On 2.03.2021 at 8:21 PM, teknopathetic said:

The only Taln death rattle on the copper mind is "The burdens of nine become mine. Why must I carry the madness of them all? Oh, Almighty, release me", which doesn't seem too time-sensitive imo. My apologies if there is a death rattle I am not seeing (they aren't all on the coppermind it seems). 

Yeah, that's the one I was thinking of

On 2.03.2021 at 8:21 PM, teknopathetic said:

As well, Deathrattles can be inaccurate somewhat. Such as the one about Shallan and Khaladin coming out of the chasm, but it says "Two men" likely being because Shallan and Khal looked like grubby men when they emerged.  

"Men" can be gender-neutral, technically (e.g. "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal")

1 hour ago, mathiau said:

Adherence is a specific form of friction (and one Lift have proven she could use in Edgedancer) so it was an early version of Abrasion, the early form of Adhesion (=pressure) was Wind. On the other hand: Awakening

I mean, technically adherence and adhesion are synonyms (at least according to synonyms.com :)). I think it's entirely possible that Wind is the pressure part of Adhesion, while Adherence covers sticking things/surfaces together as well as Abrasion. As for Awakening, WoK Prime clearly indicates that it is (spoiler)

I think the fact that it was Taln who broke is supported well enough by a Death Rattle, but I'm not gonna lie - the theory has huge appeal for me. "I've killed a Herald" seems like a natural progression for her Truths

On 21.02.2021 at 8:40 PM, Frustration said:

I like that, it also has it's conections to Yelig-nar's wind, and confirmed Foresight.

There's also one more interesting thing about Yelig-nar - the bonding process. For some unknown reason it seems to require an amethyst, associated with Willshapers in Surgebinding. In the Eppelion chart though, the Order occupying Willshaper's spot and Essence has Adherence, which is probably an early version of Adhesion, potentially explaining the role in bonding spren. Venli also gets Adhesion-like powers due to Envoyform, which might or might not be a nod to what we see the chart. Although, as I realized, the right and left part  of the chart has two Orders getting the same one Force, which seems hard to explain.

3 minutes ago, mathiau said:

I don't really follow how you go to that conclusion. Yes the essences of Flesh and Wood are switch but almost all other are at the same place except Crystal and Fire wich are switched too

Yeah, you're right. I was looking at the Truthwatcher/Bondsmith equivalents only

4 minutes ago, mathiau said:

From what we've seen of Voidbinding (Renarin's future Sight and Sja's Enlightenment) it doesn't seem to be end-negative

In WoK Prime the powers only hurt users in a visible way if they use it too much. Renarin is also a Surgebinder, which might be a factor here - even if he is hurt by his futuresight somehow, he is eventually healed by Stormlight anyway

On 20.02.2021 at 7:11 AM, CruelSadist said:

I think KA's saying that Odium's true magic is similar to Hemalurgy, in that if no other magics exist, it literally does nothing.  In this case, 'Voidbinding' is just Odium's twist on Surgebinding, and if Surgebinding didn't exist, neither would Voidbinding.  Or I'm just interpreting it that way because it's my own theory, that whatever you want to call it (I really hope "Voiding" sticks, because I have a ten year-old's sense of humor), all Odium does is rip everyone else off.

My main analogy was Allomancy + atium (using a magic system to "burn" Shard's power, hurting them in the process), but hemalurgy works as well, to some extent. Although, as @LewsTherinTelescope pointed out, the analogy is not perfect, as hemalurgy can steal things other than powers

On 20.02.2021 at 6:06 PM, Argent said:

To be clear - and I think I got myself turned around during that one Shardcast - I do think Voidbinding is manipulating the Surges, but it's doing so through a Connection with Odium as opposed to a Connection with spren. I think the way I phrased it during the episode was "Surgebinding -> binding the Surges, therefore Voidbinding -> binding the Void, a.k.a. Odium", which I think is a valid interpretation, but the soul of my theory, as it has been for a long time, was that Surgebinding -> performing magic through a bond with spren, while Voidbinding -> performing magic through a bond with Odium. This is all mostly coming from the belief that what defines a magic system is not the effects, but the access (though the effects often end up being different as well). So when looking for differences between Surge- and Voidbinding, I look at where the magic comes from - spren in the former's case, Odium in the latter's.

This being said, I recognize the appeal of the theory as I phrased it on the podcast - I must have liked it then, to have it temporarily overwrite my primary theory on the subject  I am not 100% sold on either version (or anything else I've seen on the topic), but I feel like they are in the right neighborhood.

The one thing that still bothers me is that Khriss refers to Voidbindings and some esoteric fabrial-related powers as "sets of abilities". They must be different from the Surges somehow, and Surges are already quite extensive in what they cover. I think that it might be possible that Voidbindings are an alternative set of fundamental forces, based on the fact that the Double Eye chart from WoK Prime seems to match the Voidbinding chart (I posted more details here)

1 minute ago, Frustration said:

Also they were called the Knights Epellion.

Thanks

I feel like one of the Ten Fools for not seeing this before.

WoK Prime has the Double Eye chart on the twelfth page, showing ten Essences and ten Forces:

https://www.brandonsanderson.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/The-Way-of-Kings-Prime-by-Brandon-Sanderson_web.pdf

I treated it as an early version of the Surgebinding chart, with Forces being an early attempt at Surges.

However, after looking at it again for one of my new theories, I realized something: the topology of the chart is slightly off. The two Essences at the center are not connected to any Force. I doesn't look like a Surgebinding chart, but it's the same as the Voidbinding chart, just upside-down, with time manipulation / futuresight at the top.

We know that Brandon cannibalizes a lot of elements from early books into later ones. Is it possible that the whole Magical Knight Magic (I don't remember the name, sorry) from WoK Prime became Voidbinding? That the Forces are the "set of abilities" Khriss calls Voidbindings? Something like a set of fundamental forces alternative to the Surges?

There is actually one clue: in WoK Prime, using the Forces hurts the users somehow, which would indicate it might be an end-negative magic system. And we have this WoB from 2016, which possibly refers to Voidbinding:

Quote

Herald (paraphrased)

Have we seen any of the system or the world that has end-negative magic system other than Hemalurgy?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

Yes there is one more end-negative magic system and you have seen minor hints of it.

Arcanum Unbounded San Francisco signing (Nov. 30, 2016)

Just now, mathiau said:

I think these two things are unrelated. Vin is unchained in a moar power way while Ishar is unchained on a far more fundamental level

Maybe, but both are winning fights against multiple very powerful enemies without breaking a sweat due to their special connection to a dead Shard. Also, Vin is literally Ascending at the moment, which is as fundamental as it gets

1 minute ago, mathiau said:

I don't see why RoW changes anything

Unchained as a certain crazy Bondsmith

A funny line I found in the original Mistborn trilogy, gaining a new level of meaning after reading RoW.

When Marsh removes Vin's earring and she starts fighting the Inquisitors using her suddenly overpowered Allomancy, she describes it this way (Hero of Ages, chapter 73):

Quote

Within the embrace of limitless pewter, she seemed to move as the mist did. Light. Quick.

Unchained.

I really like the idea, but also wonder if the KR Orders wouldn't be a better match than Surges. Stonewards for Hoid's Dawnshard, Bondsmiths for hypothesized Unity, and Lightweavers for the Change Dawnshard (as both Transformation and Illumination match it quite well)

4 hours ago, mathiau said:

If it was that simple you wouldn't need to change the frequency of tie Rhythm to fuse Stormlight and Voidlight

Yeah, I agree that is a decent counterargument

4 hours ago, mathiau said:

 Isn't that contradictory to you're previous idea?

Why? I see Intents as corresponding to quantum states here; some might be pure, some might be linear combinations of others

4 hours ago, mathiau said:

There are perfectly stable mesons just as there are perfectly unstable baryons, and most of the time the reason they're unstable is because their quarks are unstable, not because they're matter-antimatter compounds

I'm not aware of any fully stable mesons. As for baryons, my point was about confinement (which matches Roshar's situation quite well, in my opinion), not about stability

After watching the last few Shardcasts, I decided to play with @Argent's idea that Voidbinding might be about accessing the power of Odium directly, not about accessing Surges. It actually led to some interesting conclusions, which I'll try to present below

Voidbinding doesn't use Surges
The basic premise, obviously. There are some reasonable arguments that support this idea:

• The Knight Radiant, the Fused and fabrials all use Surges. Surges were also what destroyed Ashyn. Despite their ubiquity, we have not a single description of Voidbinding that mentions them explicitly. We only know about the ten levels and the existence of “Voidbindings”, whatever they are. Khriss is also unsure how they fit into the whole Orders/Surges/Essences paradigm
• Voidbinding is a cousin of Old Magic, which isn't Surge-based
• Renarin's futuresight isn't necessarily a Surge. He does have access to a separate, distinct version of Illumination, while his visions match what Tanavast says about his own futuresight (also, Renarin seems to see things that are of interest to Odium, not random visions). It seems possible that Renarin is accessing the Shardic power directly, rather then filtered through Surges
• In this WoB, Brandon describes futuresight as “dangerous territory, and drawing upon a Shard”
• The futuresight is described as “the soul of Voidbinding”. It's the only Voidbinding power that is widely known. It stands to reason that it might not be available to a single Voidish “Order”, but to all Voidbinders, possibly forming the first level of the magic system
• Additionally, per Taravangian's word, all Unmade have some sort of access to futuresight, despite having other distinct powers and roughly matching the KR Orders. Given that, futuresight doesn't seem to be tied to any single Surge

Comparison with the Metallic Arts
Comparing Rosharan and Scadrian magic  leads to some interesting analogies that might elucidate the nature of Voidbinding:

• Surgebinding corresponds to Allomancy/Feruchemy, with 10 Surges / Orders / KR Spren types fulfilling the same roles as 16 metals
• Fabrials correspond to ettmetal-based magitek
• Old Magic corresponds to lerasium, as both can be used by anyone to change their spiritweb
• Voidbinding, finally, has the same role as atium

There are two important thing about atium that I believe are relevant here (besides the obvious fact of providing futuresight):

• Atium requires the power of another Shard to work. Without Allomancy, Feruchemy or some magical ability to steal via Hemalurgy, atium is useless
• Preservation tweaked Allomancy, so that atium could be used against Ruin

I'm not sure if Voidbinding can exist as a fully standalone magic system; it might require some other power (typically Surgebinding) to work. Based on this WoB:

Quote

Argent

Let's talk about Renarin, and Voidbinding. So, with that page we talked about, Renarin Voidbinds. I asked about visions, you pointed to Voidbinding chart, he Voidbinds. Is that using Stormlight to power abilities different from the Surgebindings we've seen?  

Brandon Sanderson

Yes. 

Argent

Is that what voidbinding is? 

Brandon Sanderson

No, but close. You're on the right track. We are gonna get into that, I'm not gonna tell you what the chart means, and things like that. But yeah, something really weird is happening there. 

Footnote: The chart referenced is the back endsheet in The Way of Kings.
Oathbringer Chicago signing (Nov. 21, 2017)

I think that what is called Voidbinding might actually stem from Surgebinding hacked (e.g. via spren corruption) to give people non-Surge powers, to Odium's detriment. It would also explain the name “Voidbinding”, which doesn't sound like something Odium's followers would use

The Voidbinding chart
If that is the case, the Voidbinding chart isn't a Voidbinding chart per se; it's more like a Surebinding +  Voidbinding chart. My current theory is that it might have originated on Ashyn, and its history might have been more or less like this:
People were experimenting with Surges provided by Odium and his Voidspren, creating a chart that is extremely similar to the one for Rosharan Surgebinding, but with different Surges / Orders (e.g. “Voidish” Illumination would be Renarin's balls of light)
Two “Orders”, Bondsmiths and Truthwatchers, turn out to be special though:

• both have access to the Surges with the most Spiritual aspects
• they kind of match Dawnshards quite well: one on them can bind people and spren, which seems very Bondsmith-like, and the Change Dawnshard is a “will of a god to remake things, to demand they be better”, which fits nicely with Renarin showing people their perfected selves
• Sja-Anat has a weird affinity for Truthwatchers and BAM started exhibiting Bondsmith-like powers  during the False Desolation; both happen to provide Voidbinding abilities, to Signers and humans respectively

I believe Bondsmiths and/or Truthwatchers might have been the ones to figure out that you can use the magic to tap Odium's power directly, likely with the help of the Dawnshards – which is why they are surrounded by a red gem on the chart and not connected to any Surges. Odium wasn't very happy about it, so he pushed them towards the planet's destruction.
Voidbinding was left unused and partially forgotten, until some Unmade started experimenting with it again during the False Desolation, possibly given some knowledge by Cultivation or a Herald starting to go mad. BAM sudden unexplained powers might actually be our only hint at the higher levels of Voidbinding

Thanks

46 minutes ago, Chaos said:

Possibly. Good question to ask I suppose. I wouldn't take the Herald portraits as being completely accurate though. They are in-world representations and could be wrong. 

When it comes to Heralds' look, sure, but I think it would be pretty weird if they had the cousin spren wrong

I'd like to discuss some doubts I have about this particular WoB:

Quote

ExhibitAa

We know now Kaladin's plate is made of windspren. Is Jasnah's made of logicspren?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes.

General Reddit 2020 (Nov. 24, 2020)

Unfortunately, Jasnah attracting particular type of cousin spren doesn't seem to be described in the books and we don't have Battar's portrait yet. We do have Pali's though, and she does seem to be surrounded by logicspren - their shape matches the description (tiny stormclouds) and logicspren arguably fit Truthwatchers as a whole even better than Elsecallers. Could this WoB be another example of the "Oathbringer is an Honorblade" situation?

3 hours ago, Cephandrius~Maxtori said:

Could Honor potentially be "un-splintered?" According to the Stormfather, Dalinar is doing things that bondsmiths in the past were unable to do. He clearly holds the largest concentrated amount of Honor's power on Roshar, so is it possible he could ascend into being the next Honor?

It will be answered in Book 5:

Quote

CaptainObvious0927

The really question is, given the death of Rayse, is Honor really dead? Or is his essence out there, still available to be claimed?

Brandon Sanderson

I will answer this for certain by the end of Book Five. For now, RAFO.

General Reddit 2020 (Nov. 22, 2020)

18 hours ago, mathiau said:

Are we sure he's not talking about Renarin? He confirmed he had a crush on Rlain and I don't know if it was before or after the WoB you quote.

Hints about Renarin come from Oathbringer (chapter 55) and WoBs; RoW, on the other hand, points to Rlain

Actually, the whole thing was resolved just a few days ago: Brandon was part of the last Shardcast. At 1:31:00 he talks about Renarin and Rlain, and how he wanted a same sex relationship from two PoVs to avoid tokenism and have more variety in representation

1 hour ago, Honorless said:

Maybe Voidbinding is how the Ashynites accessed the Surges.

1 hour ago, Ixthos said:

Ahhh! That would be cool :-) that does make me wonder why they stopped using it though, either Odium or the Heralds. Was it too powerful? Or is that what happens when a Knight has surges unrestricted, they stop surgebinding and star voidbinding?

The more I think about this, the more I'm leaning towards these opinions as well.

First of all, after seeing the Fused Surges and what unchained Ishar can do, Renarin's futuresight looks more and more like fully unrestricted (and barely controlled) Illumination. If that is the case, Voidbinding might simply give users access to unrestricted Surges, while terms like "Voidbindings" or "ten levels" might relate to how the power is obtained (corresponding to Oaths or Nahel Bond, maybe?).

Anyway, here is my proposition for the timeline:

Odium arrives on Ashyn and people start bonding some Voidspren (the bond is probably temporary and depends on the emotional state) or maybe even Unmade (if they exists at this point). The combination of Odium's Surges and Dawnshards leads to unrestricted Surges, which destroy the planet. Still, people learn about Surges and create the Voidbinding chart, which explains this WoB:

Quote

TheFoxQR (paraphrased)

Is there temporal symmetry in between the Surge-binding and void-binding charts, from the front and back covers of The Way of Kings? As in, Surgebinding is a re-emerging system of the past, vs Voidbinding being a newly emerging system that will fully exist in the future?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

You can assume that Voidbinding has not been fully explored, but that parts of it have been looked into in the past. So I wouldn't say that temporal symmetry fully holds.

General Reddit 2019 (Aug. 3, 2019)

Later, Surges (of both KR and the Fused) are generally restricted, at least until the False Desolation happens. Something weird is going on with the Unmade (at least with BAM and Sja-Anat), Odium's tone becomes a pure tone of Roshar and both sides gain access to futuresight (Nightforms and corrupted Truthwatchers). Hopefully we'll get some answers in Book 5, because there are so many potential reasons / factors here (Honor being close to death? act of Cultivation? broken Oathpact? Ishar's unchained Honorblade? Dawnshards?) that figuring out the exact reason of the change seems impossible at this time. Releasing BAM (and Honorblades possibly leaving Shinovar) should lead to even easier access to unrestricted Surges, which I expect to be a major (or even main) topic of Arc 2

This is something that occurred to me completely randomly yesterday: Ba-Ado-Mishram's powers during the False Desolation are, in many ways, analogous to the effects of duralumin in the Metallic Arts. Somehow I didn't make the connection (pun unintended) before, but the parallels are quite interesting:

• Allomantic duralumin could be used to create superpowered bursts of Surgebinding:

Quote

Paladin Brewer

If a person had the power of Mistborn and other powers like Surges, could he use duralumin to power the Surges?

Brandon Sanderson

This is possible.

Skyward Houston signing (Nov. 19, 2018)

• Duralumin Compounding allows for accumulating huge amounts of Connection, which could be used to control Hemalurgic constructs even without emotional Allomancy:

Quote

Dopetruffles

And finally, whether a duralumin compounder could break into a kandra?

Brandon Sanderson

Um... yes, possible, yeah.

WorldCon 76 (Aug. 18, 2018)

• Hemalurgic Duralumin steals Connection and Identity, which happens to be exactly what was ripped from the Singers when BAM was imprisoned

I'm fairly sure BAM wasn't suing duralumin and/or Scadrian magic, but the underlying mechanisms between these two might be very similar

This is a side effect of being a Dawnshard and/or holding certain levels of Investiture:

Quote

The21stPotato

Can you tell us the equivalent Heightening she [Rysn] now has? She seems to be at least Third Heightening equivalent but I'm not sure how much else she has gained from holding a Dawnshard. Do ALL Dawnshards grant these Heightening-like effects?

Brandon Sanderson

All Dawnshards would grant the same effects in this regard.

As for specifics, I think I'll leave that as what is mentioned in the text, for now. (Sorry.)

Dawnshard Annotations Reddit Q&A (Nov. 6, 2020)

Quote

tskyeguye

From Rysn's observations in the epilogue, it seems like she has a lot of the same aspects of a Fifth Heightening/Returned at the least. Is this because her Dawnshard is particularly connected to Endowment or because the effects of a certain level of Investment result in similar effects?

Brandon Sanderson

The latter.

Skrimyt

Interesting. So are actively Surgebinding Radiants or metal-burning Allomancers just not Invested enough to gain those passive effects, or do they not experience perfect pitch/color/etc. because their Investiture is just not as tightly bound to their Spiritweb as Endowment's Breaths or a Dawnshard would be?

Brandon Sanderson

Be aware that the two groups you mention don't generally hold much Investiture themselves, at least not in large quantities over time. More in Surgebinding. Almost none in Allomancy.

But RAFO to specifics.

Dawnshard Annotations Reddit Q&A (Nov. 6, 2020)

21 minutes ago, KSub said:

I'm having a hard time recalling the symbol you're referring to. Is there an image you could attach for reference? 

Spoiler tag just because of the image size:

The diamond consists of four arches as well, so maybe there are some other four fundamental things besides the Dawnshards? We have some names like Unity or Passion that appear on different worlds and seem to apply to some Shards only, but we don't have any explicit confirmation that they must be Dawnshards