AquaRegia

I've been wondering about those faces for YEARS. I even started doodling ideas on paper in a halfhearted attempt to "crack the code"... but nothing like @Smye has done. (This was, of course, before I found this amazing community and saw that others had compiled the data far more completely than I could ever have been bothered to do.) I'm glad to see some official confirmation that it's a complex and deliberate artistic choice, rather than some arbitrary pattern or cipher. Hats off to Lurcher, for making such excellent progress, and to @Weltall, for finding and posting it!

Agreed. Rather than "manipulate" or "corrupt", the effect might be better described as "amplify". I found this in RoW ch. 31 (Raboniel, to Venli): Certainly, support for the idea that the characters see Voidlight as capable of increasing the emotions of those infused with it.

Nale doesn't strike me as someone who cares about good vs evil. His only ideal is LAW over CHAOS. He directly states to Szeth his belief that humans (himself included) are incapable of judging what is "good" or "right", which is why following external law is the only correct path to action. My impression is that not only would he never ask for a way to "end evil", he would be unwilling to accept any definition of evil. He may be crazy, but he's CONSISTENT. That said, I do think it makes sense in terms of Nightbood's path - from Nalthis to Szeth - for Cultivation to be involved somehow.

NOW you're talking. I had some burning Rosharan moon questions when I joined a month ago, and then I found THIS: Welcome to the Shard!

You mean like Wyndle the Shardfork? LOL "I wanted to get some work in the garden done... but that rusting rake just won't shut up!" In this sense, it could only be a living spren bond, right? Do we have any reason to think that can happen on Scadrial? I thought we were confident that spren can't leave Roshar. Regular Shardblades don't talk, plus, a deadeye Shardblade would always be a blade. Which IS certainly a "tool", but not what the average civilian thinks of when the word "tool" is mentioned. The ad showed a picture of a hammer saying "hello!" I do love the idea of a rake that talks your ear off. I think it might make more sense if they are actually looking for Hemalurgic spikes, which might be allowing Harmony, or Trell, or (insert godlike being here) to speak to the holder. We know Khriss is deeply interested in Hemalurgy and thinks it will be of great use in the Cosmere.

Thanks for recognizing my composition... but I meant exactly what I typed. I think Gavilar makes a lot more sense than Gavinor. Odium's Champion is, I think, going to be a character we already know very well, not a 7-year-old we've seen on screen twice.

You are falling into a classic Brandon trap: just because the CHARACTERS believe something does not make it true. Yes, it's common knowledge on Roshar that bonding a normal deadeye Shardblade requires gemstones... in exactly the same way that it's common knowledge among spren that deadeyes can't think or talk. Surprise! Turns out neither one is the whole truth. Do you deny the fact, explicitly stated, that Shallan now has two Shardblades? If not, what's your explanation of how she is bonded to Testament NOW? Things characters "know" often turn out to be wrong, or only part of the story. There is always another mystery. It's one of the things that make BS's writing SO GOOD.

The Fused have known about Raysium and some of its properties for a while, but only in the last Desolation did they learn about the possibility of capturing Cognitive entities inside gemstones. This is the first opportunity they have had to try it on a Herald, Moash had shown himself - by killing Elhokar - to be a trustworthy servant, and I'm sure it made more sense to have a human do it, rather than a Fused striding into the Beggar's Banquet and stabbing someone. I expect Leshwi knew, but didn't want Moash to know, that a "cognitive capture" was the actual objective, preferring for him to view it as a simple murder.

I don't think we have ANY evidence of the existence (or lack thereof) of eternal souls for ANYONE, human, animal, spren, or otherwise. Nor do I expect any.

Yes, thanks for reminding me about that. Another reason why it seemed strange and unreasonable to me. Indeed, I think we are forced to accept this as the most likely explanation. EXACTLY! I feel like there have been some odd inconsistencies in SA regarding language barriers; when are they important, and when are they completely nonexistent? I'm experiencing some Cognitive Dissonance here. I look forward to seeing more spren and learning how many have their own (nonhuman, nonsinger) languages.

I think many of us have concluded that the most likely candidate is Gavilar. At least, I know I have.

I agree with @LuckyJim and @Kyn. Yes, it's going to end, and probably awkwardly. I mean... HOID. But Jasnah isn't the type to get bent out of shape by something like that. If anything, she will be the "yes we had a relationship and now it's over but I'll still be formally polite and treat you as an important ally" type.

People have already put A LOT of thought into this question, for example: There is a big difference between "breaking a bond" and "breaking an Oath"... and there are degrees of each, they are not simply black and white. Unlike the Recreance, Testament did not want to break her bond with Shallan, and I think the text makes it clear that Shallan's bond to Testament has remained in effect, to some degree, for all the past 10 years. Many of us feel that the Testamentblade was probably NEVER really behind the painting; it was dismissed, and was nowhere in the Physical realm. It was Shallan's guilt, shame, and imagination which conspired to make her "see it glowing". Also, many of us feel confident that it was Testament that she used to kill Tyn. Regarding the original question: Shallan's father was unstable, but he was sane enough to recognize that you can't just TAKE a Shardblade from the person it's bonded to - they can always simply resummon it.

Card probability problem from real life: my wife and I are playing a variant of Pinochle. 4 players, 48 card deck, 9-10-J-Q-K-A only in 4 suits, so two of each card. Each player holds 12 cards and bidding team pass 3 cards to each other before play begins. If I need one specific card from my partner (say, an ace of clubs), what is the probability they will have it? My thoughts: I already know the card I need is NOT in the 12 I have, so it must be in one of the other 3 hands. P=1/3 that it is in my partner's hand, yes? That means P=2/3 that it is in one of my opponents'. But there are TWO aces of clubs, and I only need one. So the only BAD outcome is if BOTH of them are in my opponents' hands. Pbad = (2/3)(2/3) = 4/9 = 44.4%, therefore there is a 1 - 4/9 = 55.6% chance my partner has at least one of the aces I need. Is this the correct solution? And how would I extend this work to cover the case where I need TWO cards (say, K and Q of clubs)? Is it just (5/9)(5/9) = 25/81?

That's awesome, thanks! Humans are pretty smart. We're also littering the solar system like a boss.

I think the motions of feather and the hammer will be EXACTLY equal in a vacuum. F = GMm/r^2 , so the masses of the two interacting objects don't ADD, they MULTIPLY. Yes, the force on the hammer is bigger... but its resistance to being accelerated (inertia) is also bigger by exactly the same factor, so they cancel out. At least, that's the high school level Newtonian physics I'm competent at.

Just reread chapter 26 in RoW, in which we find that "Motif, Ishnah's Cryptic... His Alethi was not good, so he preferred to speak in the Cryptic language." Say what, now? Have seen this before? Do other types of spren have their own languages? Did I miss something? I'd been under the impression that spren could speak to anyone. Why? Partly due to the Stump's spren performing as a translator, partly due to the fact that there has never (until now) been an encounter between a spren and a human where communication was a problem, and partly due to the fact that they are - as Syl would say - "immortal slivers of god" and stuff. Suddenly we are supposed to think that spren have to LEARN human languages? If so, doesn't it seem odd that so many of them seem to speak perfect Alethi? Did Wyndle have to study Azish as a prerequisite before being allowed to bond Lift? I feel like everything has changed. Am I nuts?

Anybody else start reading the title of this topic and say "what happens in Shadesmar... STAYS in Shadesmar" ? What I want to know is where deadeyes end up when their holder dismisses their Blade. To to place in Shadesmar they were when summoned? Or where the holder is now? Say I'm in Thaylen City; I summon my Blade, go through the Oathgate to Urithiru, then dismiss my Blade. Where in Shadesmar is my deadeye now?

That person was Tyn. There is still debate amongst Sharders about whether it was Testament or Pattern that Shallan used to kill Tyn... but I definitely think it was Testament. There are contextual clues in that scene (10 heartbeats, for example) that imply the Blade used was not a living spren Blade. That's a really good point, you may very well be right. In any case, Testament would have been able to stay close to Shallan while she went to the Stattered Plains, but would have a long walk indeed to Urithiru. Since most of what we know about deadeyes comes from 1) Adolin and Maya, whom we KNOW are a special case, and 2) living spren, whom we know are wrong about many things, we don't have a lot to go on yet.

My understanding (please correct me where I’m mistaken) is that deadeyes, in the Cognitive Realm, are drawn towards the Physical Realm location of the human who has bonded them, but they can be elsewhere, and they are limited to walking speed in following. Captain Ico comments “they’ll walk right off the deck and into the ocean, looking for the human who holds their corpse.” When a shardblade is summoned by its holder, the spren disappears from the CR (RoW ch. 75). My assumption is that when a shardblade is dismissed the spren returns to the CR in the corresponding analogue of that PR location. Thus Testament would have been at the Davar home when Shallan left to find Jasnah. Once Shallan boarded a vehicle moving faster than a walking deadeye, Testament was left behind. She tried to follow, and ended up on an island, probably close to the Shattered Plains. There she was found and cared for by her old friend, the inkspren shopkeeper, on the shores of the bead ocean nearest to Urithiru (RoW ch. 29).

I enjoyed the analogy of Sanderson as the God of the Cosmere. It was not what I was expecting, and it made me happy. I absolutely LOVE the way Brandon explores the idea of religion - how they start, how they change, and how they influence people's experiences of the world. It's really quite beautiful and optimistic. We see people from different cultures and religions getting along, working together, learning from each other; a lot of the character growth in the Cosmere novels happens because someone's worldview is expanded by either 1) a relationship with another character with VERY different beliefs, or 2) learning a deeper truth about their own religious beliefs.

I'm in agreement with @Kingsdaughter613 and @Bzhydack. At some point I expect we will see an entire enemy army sunk armpit-deep in solid stone.

I have the impression that we're expected to think she's been practicing, although we certainly never see it. I am a bit frustrated at what a mystery Jasnah still is, but it's not like the books are too short and could use some filler - there is a LOT going on behind the scenes. Plus, she's got her own flashback POV novel coming. Also, in principle, "medicine" could mean 100% pure compounds (like aspirin or acetaminophen), which would be MUCH simpler to soulcast than a complex mixture like strawberry jam.

Welcome! I have a master's degree in chemistry, and know I passed at least one graduate course in linear algebra. I was supposedly able to do eigenvalue/eigenvector calculations... and I'm STILL not clear on what they are LOL Do you have a single favorite Cosmere novel?