Rune

Where do you want to go? I got my call like a month and a half ago to El Salvador and it’s gotten me excited.

Does Polly want a cracker?

I started my journey through the Cosmere with the Stormlight Archive and it has remained my favorite all throughout (though there have been some contenders!). I cannot wait to read book five and look forward to seeing how this chapter of Roshar will end. But how will it end? Do you think we will have a positive end or a more negative one? I hate to see things going wrong for our heroes but I would not put it past Brandon if it was what the story required. We do know a little of Roshar’s place in the future cosmere but no specifics. And regardless of the wide world outcomes, what of the outcomes of individuals characters like Kaladin, Dalinar, Szeth, Shallan, Hoid, Adolin, etc? Kaladin has been my favorite but what if this spells the end for him? His and Moash’s arc needs to end in some way and no matter how much I hope it can all go awry. The end of Stormlight’s first arc could be a sad one. What are some of your theories/hopes for the end?

Sanderson did a good job in giving different advantages to different planets. I think everyone can agree that it is nigh-impossible to take Roshar whereas the Scadrians have a very portable magic system. They lend themselves to different tactics that we already get hints of: Roshar is the planet of high quality, less maneuverability, and an amazing home defense. Scadrial has relatively easy-to-dispatch and disperse magics (though fabriels may counter this depending on their efficiency/portability). Overall it seems to be a well planned stalemate by Sanderson. I’m team Roshar but anything can happen.

Essentially, the metal arts are spiritually genetic (ignoring you hemalurgy) I believe which could allow for some breeding. We see that the metallic arts have become watered down among the population esssentially removing the possibility for mistborn or full feruchemists but what if, with careful breeding, there could be a way to bring these power sets back into being outside the use of godmetals like Lerasium. Would this sort of breeding allow for a Fullborn perhaps? I do recognize that these people would most certainly not come close to the power level of an original allomancer or feruchemist but that is not quite the point. Perhaps you could strengthen the power level of people with this but the first priority I’d assume is giving someone a greater skill set in metals. What do you guys think? Am I missing some important info that would throw all this out the window?

Alright, so Dune’s been a bit popular lately and it sparked a thought as I was reading a thread discussing Breaths. Essentially, I am asking if there would or is a “best” planet to be born on. Replacing genetics with Connection here and imagining some hypothetical group as a parallel for the Bene Gesserit and their breeding. Unfortunately, Connection is not hereditary and is entirely reliant on the individual person (as far as I know) which removes the possibility of a “natural” tricking of a planet into believing that someone has a Connection with it (from their parents Connection, allowing for natural access to its magics) rather than being reliant on methods like Hoid’s to artificially manipulate Connection. We do have an example of someone gaining access to almost all forms of Investiture in Hoid and could use him as a case study but for the sake of making this interesting rather than just saying “do what Hoid does” we can restrict it to planetary magics. Meaning that your stuck to using whatever is on your planet. This does allow for magics that enable a person to manipulate Connection to do whatever shenanigans they want to in collecting as many magics as they can. Simply put, what would be the best planet to start from and with what magic system?

If you look at anti-investiture as a parallel to antimatter in the real world then it absolutely would destroy any highly invested beings. Theoretically there should’ve been an equal amount of antimatter and matter irl - at least there’s no reason for there not to be but in reality everything we know of it just normal matter except for the tiny amounts of anti hydrogen and maybe helium we’ve made for experiments. Theoretically, if you had an entire “anti cosmere” right next door to the cosmere then you’d find people able to use anti investiture and godmetals the same way they do in the cosmere. I’m pretty sure the effects would be the exact same (similar to anntimatter) other than if they came into contact with “real” counterparts as then they would destroy each other. Additionally we have no idea how anti-investiture would react to normal matter and vice versus. It seems to have no effect but that’s delving into some really thick weeds that I have no clue about. Basically the most interesting bits of the “anti” is its interaction with the “real/regular/normal” and not with its own kind.

WoT is what introduced me to Sanderson and I started following my dad and uncle as they began the audiobooks for SA. I’m pretty sure I surpassed them by Oathbringer and they never caught up. I enjoyed TLM as it introduced us to a wider cosmere aware setting and got me excited for the future. I agree that it really is just a tack on to Wax and Wayne and that they mostly had finished their story arcs. I enjoyed it nonetheless. My favorite books by far though (sorry SA you were up there for a while) is Elantris and the secret novels. They honestly brought in something the cosmere had kinda lost for me. I began seeing everything interconnected too much. As much as I love it, it began to be a little stale for me. The (mostly) unconnected stories were wonderful and gave some “breathing space” for what’s up next. I don’t think I would be as excited for where Sanderson would be going next if I didn’t have some plain good stories before. Also, if you do choose to read WoT then you better be ready for a long stinkin story, loved it, but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to fully reread it again

There is only the stick for all is but a stick

Does The Unknown Noel know what thread this is?

So, what’s everyone’s favorite books by Brandon? (Doesn’t have to be Cosmere) Mine has to be either the Stormlight Archive (first books of his ever read) or Elantris. Close behind though is Skyward and the Rithmatist.

Hmm, was the fall greater than 3 stories?

How high a fall?