feruchemicalrockband

I don't think the "Unite them!" plot line is over, or was ever necessarily part of Honor's intent. Dalinar started hearing them when he began to touch the spiritual realm through the visions, but it appears he may not be the only character to experience this. In the vision where Melishi binds Mishram, he's able to connect with her and capture her only because they both wanted to "unite them". This is stressed multiple times in the passage. Melishi was a Bondsmith, so this makes sense, but what about Mishram? We know that in order to connect to and empower the Singers, Mishram used Odium's perpendicularity, becoming closer to the spiritual realm. "Unite them" may be part of connecting to the Spiritual Realm, and not from Honor, as Honor was still Tanavast at this point. The Spiritual Realm still has many mysteries associated with it, namely Nohadon somehow being alive in it. The Unity stuff is probably going to be explored alongside that. However, seeing as Navani probably won't be active in the back half until someone manages to protect her and the Sibling from Retribution without needing her to go into a coma, I'm not sure who will be getting the "Unite them!" messages. I guess probably Kaladin as Syl is (maybe) the new Honor Godspren, and they notably picked up a copy of the Way of Kings earlier in WaT.

Definitely a solid analysis, and well-thought-out! I do have some reservations about it, though. I'll present my changes, then defend them. First, I think it's almost a certainty that Unite will be our third Dawnshard. Melishi, Mishram, and Dalinar were all connected to the Spiritual realm around Roshar, and seemed to have a distinct connection to the phrase "Unite them." (This was seen in the vision before Mishram was captured). If Unity was an intent specific to Honor, it wouldn't make sense for Mishram, an Unmade of Odium, to be connected to that intent. My best guess is that it has to do with what's up with Nohadon in the weird Spiritual Realm city, but we won't know for a long time. I'll use your double-intent grouping to explain my thought process for my changes: 『Exists』Ambition「Feel」 Ambition is a requirement for a living being. Without Ambition, there is no drive to survive, reproduce, find safety, or look past those things. Ambition is also a desire, and so has the sub-intent of Feel. 『Exists』Mercy「Unite」 I've moved Mercy to the Unite sub-intent as there's a specific requirement for Mercy to be given to others, and it requires them to be under your power in some capacity. Essentially, there's a necessary Connection to be made before Mercy can be given. 『Change』Endowment「Feel」 Endowment is absolutely Change, as it's adding to something that wasn't there before. Endowment is freely-given, meaning there are no strings attached. This implies there is no structure or Connection necessary, leaving Unite out of the equation for the Sub-Intent. This really only leaves Feel, as giving freely depends on emotions, and not some sort of logic or structure. 『Change』Cultivation「Unite」 Cultivation is structured growth, which makes Change/Unite fairly obvious. 『Feel』Virtuosity「Unite」 I found this one hard to place as well, but I'm choosing to lean towards the "artistic appreciation/expression" side of the intent. It's expressing or recognizing feelings, but specifically through the lens of art. This makes me lean towards putting it in the Unite sub-intent as it gives it a requirement, or structure, or Connection. 『Unite』Honor「Exist」 Making bonds, and keeping them. Fairly straightforward. 『Unite』Autonomy「Change」 It would be a mistake to see Autonomy as an individualistic Shard. The Coppermind states that Autonomy's intent is closer to natural selection, finding the best option by pitting different versions against each other. This doesn't just apply to individuals, but also to social structures and infrastructure. Autonomy wants everything to become the best version of one thing, consistent and perfect. It's the opposite of Cultivation, which is more about using structure to change something. 『Unite』Devotion「Feel」 I'm always surprised when people put Devotion as primarily Feel, when Devotion is very much a connection between two things. Devotion can't be found by itself, and covers much more than just love. Also, Devotion isn't necessarily unidirectional, or singular. Two people can be Devoted to each other, or multiple people can be Devoted to the same cause. 『Unite』Dominion「Unite」 Dominion is another word for control, or sovereignty. This one shouldn't need much explanation, either.

I've always viewed Harmony/Discord as the resulting intent of combining two Shards that were polar opposites. It's not that Ruin and Preservation specifically combine into Harmony/Discord, but that Ruin and Preservation are so completely opposite that they have to become either Harmony or Discord. This would be true of any other Shard combo with completely opposing intents, like Odium and Devotion, maybe. Also, a sacrifice doesn't necessarily lead to protection. Sacrifice reminds me more of the Aztecs, and how ritual sacrifice was used to produce a number of results.

Time seems to have slowed down in the Spiritual Realm around Roshar after Retribution's ascension, even compared to Roshar's time relative to the rest of the Cosmere. We see this in how Retribution doesn't seem to realize how much time passes after he ascends (months go by before he takes direct action again after absorbing as much of Honor's power as possible), and how the Heralds are in a Spiritual memory of Ashyn that passes time slower than the Physical/Cognitive. The sped up time might not be an option until Part 2. I don't think we can make this assumption. We don't have a real metric to determine how a Shard can split it's attention, especially in the Spiritual Realm. In fact, in one interlude Taravangian clearly states he won't spend much energy on Shallan, Renarin, Rlain and Navani because he's too busy with other things (Gav and Dalinar).

Adding to what everyone else has said, but I'm willing to bet Stormlight itself can still be made. Urithuru is still full of tower light, which Radiants can use to invest spheres. There's no reason to assume they can't make Stormlight from Towerlight using the methods Navani figured out in Rhythm of War. It just heavily limits how much they can make, as it requires vacuum tubes and what not.

Was the temporal anomaly due to two Shards merging, or specifically because of Honor and Odium merging? If it was just because of two Shards, doesn't this change the timeline of Scadrial? Era 1 to Era 2 would be roughly 400 years to the rest of the Cosmere, not 300 as we've been told.

So, with the reveal of the 4th moon and tone on Roshar, it seems like there may have been a 4th Shard there all along. Current front-runners for who it is are Valor and Reason, as they are both Shards who can't be found. Personally, I prefer Reason as the 4th Shard since some other Shards have been able to contact Valor, and it would be odd to contact someone without knowing where they are. There has been some discussion that only the Shards within the Rosharan System were unable to contact Valor-with external Shards being able to-but that's another topic entirely. If it is Valor, I have a suspicion that the current state of Roshar was manipulated by her. If we look back on when Taravangian took Odium, the primary emotion he felt wasn't anger, or hatred, or lust for power, all emotions specifically stated to be loved by Odium. He specifically felt Bravery, something even he felt was surprised by. What if Valor has been on Roshar this whole time, and gave Taravangian the slightest push, rioting his courage to take up Odium? To help get Roshar, and the entire Cosmere, out of its old state? Again, I kind of prefer for it to be Reason, because Valor having been on Roshar when others were communicating with her seems unlikely, but this sort of twist is pretty fun too. This second point only requires having a fourth Shard, but I also believe I have the answer to what exactly Nohadan is. We see Taravangian save his city by taking them all into the Spiritual Realm, and making them a new home there. What if this is what happened to Nohadon and his people? Living in an eternal Spiritual City, placed there by the 4th Shard? We don't know the reason, but I suspect it has something to do with "Unity", as we see that Melishi and Ba-Ado-Mishram both seemed to hear "Unite them". Maybe Nohadon was given the Unite Dawnshard for safekeeping in the Spiritual Realm by the fourth Shard, and anyone sufficiently connected to the Spiritual Realm (minus Shards) could hear it?

Hmm. We know Taln wasn't originally supposed to be a Herald. And Elithanithile is the "Forbidden" 10th name... Maybe a singer was originally meant to be the 10th Herald? But something led to him being forbidden, or cast out?

I was rereading RoW as part of my pre-Wind and Truth reread and I got to the Navani light experiment chapters, which I already knew contained experiments that were tangential to the double slit experiment. This wasn't surprising, but reading through this bit with more knowledge on modern day physics compared to the first time I read it made it more entertaining. I got to the Dalinar chapter, Bearer of Agonies, and the Stormfather just drops quantum correlation on Dalinar? It's so funny? He uses it to describe weak Connections and how even if they exist they can't be manipulated, but it lays some serious ground work for the space-era cosmere stuff. Got excited to see more of that all over again.

I'm in agreement with you, but the biggest counter-argument I've had when bringing this up is "Why would they refound the Oathpact? The Fused can no longer be trapped on Braize because of the Everstorm." That being said, I don't think any character has ever said that the Oathpact reforged would be circumvented by the Everstorm. Odium just states that he can't hold them back. The other side of the argument is that it's fairly unbelievable that Kaladin would willingly subject himself to torture on Braize at this point of his story. I do think there's something there with the Wind coming with them to Braize, supporting the Heralds. In RoW, Kaladin's mental torture may have been happening on a place similar to Braize, where the wind "hated him". Perhaps this is why the Wind disappears at the end of the book? Here are some extras ideas I had that lean towards Kaladin as the Windrunner Herald, (or just the Oathpact being reforged): - The Fused have to leave Roshar for some time, otherwise having a 10-15 year gap between books 5 and 6 makes no sense. That's a lot of room for a lot of conflict in an era that is absolutely stuffed with progress, and saying that nothing overly important happens during that period would be wild. The 10-15 year gap allows the singers and humans to create some common ground, turning the conflict in Arc 2 into a very different one. - Adding onto your thoughts about the 12 people in Renarin's vision, Szeth may also be in a position to become the new Herald (I really like the narrative element of him starting the story with Jezrien's Honorblade and ending it with it as well), but he's not a good fit. - The Kholin house's symbol of the tower and crown will likely end up meaning something else. Kholinar has a lot of references to the Windrunners (Wind blades and the Windrunner river). I could see the tower and crown having a relation to Jezrien. Alluding to the tower, crown and spear death rattle. - In the prelude to the Stormlight Archive, I do not believe there is a single mention of Honor, the god. There is a lot of talk of Heralds, the Oathpact, and forgiveness, but nothing on Honor or shards. That's worth mentioning since a prelude typically refers to a short opening piece of music that conveys the major themes of a work. Long winded, but yeah that's all. Oh also I think it would be really cool to see the other Heralds be all "Don't make this choice lightly, this will not be an easy task" and Kaladin responds with something like "it's fine, I was in Bridge Four."

Rather than the other heralds needing structure, it's that they've become the opposite of what they originally were meant to represent. Where Nale was once just and valued the spirit of the law, he is now a slave to the letter of the law. Kalak was once decisive and sure, and is now indecisive and paranoid. Ishar in myth was meant to be pious and guiding, now he has become heretical and discordant.

It's interesting that Ishar had no idea who Kaladin was, but seems to be aware of all the other characters. I wonder if he knows about Shallan? The Sleepless seemed to know about the main 4, Odium was likely aware of all of them as well. It's strange if Ishar was only unaware of Kaladin.

I for sure think Ishar was making stuff up talking about taking everyone's pain onto himself. There's no way that's a true statement alongside stuff like "I'm God" and whatnot. I'd say it's more likely that Taln was taking the pain on himself instead, and that why he's so insane right now. When Taln has lucidity, he's way more sane than Ash is, when Dalinar swearing the 3rd should have only taken away the magical mental issues, not the physical trauma.

Odium says that the Fused can't be kept back anymore, but Ishar seemed to believe in his moment of sanity that there was a reason to reforge the Oathpact anyway. Also, I'd really like to see the Oathpact reforged just to see the Heralds in peak condition lol. Taln manifesting in TWoK all dewy like a deadblade does makes me think that if the Oathpact was reforged they'd appear with frost, like a radiantblade.

It was in the Day 1 epigraphs. The author of Knights of Wind and Truth tells us the Wind disappears, the Heralds disappear, and there are only 2 witnesses who were in Shinovar at the time. With Renarin's recent chapter of seeing the 12 people in Shinovar (one of whom was likely a physical Syl) we can start to make some more guesses.