ShardlessVessel

2 hours ago, Argenti said:

And Cultivation/Odium, don't forget Wildlight!

Of course! We do get their combined Rhythm in ROW along with Honor/Odium's, IIRC. And the Old Magic is supposedly a cousin to voidbinding.

The term "Wildlight" is new to me, though. I like it.

10 minutes ago, alder24 said:

Why would Odium replace Cultivation?

Because.

It's one possible combination. You could have all three, or you could have two separate combinations - one for Honor/Odium, one for Honor/Cultivation.

32 minutes ago, alder24 said:

I wouldn't say that every Voidbinder would be able to see the future, this is mostly Truthwatchers thing.

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"Voidbinding is a dark and evil thing, and the soul of it was to try to divine the future."

TWOK 18

While Kadash is quoting Vorin dogma in this passage, that it has to do with futuresight is pretty much all we know about it. Remember that this IS a cracktheory, lol It's possible that only some voidbinders can see the future, though.

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Also I don't think it would be in Odium/Honor vibe to swear about breaking their oaths, Odium isn't about breaking Oaths, he isn't the opposite of Honor.

I was looking at it as a contrast to the Honor/Cultivation mix in the KR. Honor is broadly about swearing and keeping oaths, while Cultivation is broadly about progress. The Knights Radiant swear oaths of self-improvement. Odium seems to be broadly about conflict, and if you replace him for Cultivation in the KR, you might get Knights that swear oath that are in conflict with themselves (e.g. swearing that you'll break the oath you're swearing). That's what I meant, if it makes sense.

41 minutes ago, alder24 said:

However I believe that this particular Death Rattle is about breaking Oaths in general, heavliy related to Shallan, as it's very similar to the way Shallan broke her own bond with Testament: 

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“I don’t want you! I hate you! I’m done! You never existed. You are nothing. And I am finished!”

"Life never existed, the Strength is nothing, and the journey is finished" - Sounds similar?

I support this theory as well.

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The death is my life, the strength becomes my weakness, the journey has ended.

—Observed on Betabanes 1173, 95 seconds pre-death, collected secondhand and later reported to the Silent Gatherers. Subject was a scholar of some minor renown. Sample considered questionable. [WOK 60]

I've resisted the idea that this death rattle is related to voidbinders, but I have just now had an idea that I feel I must put out into the world, in the slim chance that it's right.

Between the voidbinding chart and Brandon's implication that Renarin uses voidbinding, there is reason to think that voidbinders are something similar to the Knights Radiant (I sometimes like to refer to that hypothetical organization as the "Knights Vibrant"). The soul of voidbinding is to divine the future, so my theory is that the Ideals sworn by a voidbinder are actually the ending for their actual Ideals, as if they were seeing the end of their own service in the future.

• The death is my life (I have lived before I die, but my death comes now)
• The strength becomes my weakness (I was strong, and now I'm weak)
• The journey has ended (I have journeyed, and now I have arrived at my destination)

The Knight (?) means to swear the actual oaths, but they simultaneously prophesy their own failure/ending/death. It would be a very Honor/Odium vibe to swear that you'll break your own oath, I think.

I never agreed with the sentiment that having too much Cosmere in the books means you have to read the entire Cosmere before any future releases. It really just means that the other books exist for greater context, and you can get all the information you need to understand their relevance for the plot inside the current book. Just like in TLM. You can go read TES if you want to better understand soulstamps, but TLM already tells you what they do, so it's not like you have to read TES first.

On the other hand, I don't care about spoilers and am not particularly attached to "reveals," so my perspective is skewed in that direction.

On 08/07/2022 at 0:00 PM, Tacitus said:

So I recently heard a rather interesting term, which was 'Divine Investiture of Authority'.

What that term means is basically exactly what it says. A god or deity, summat, putting the authority to act in their name, into someone else. 

Sounds a lot like cosmere Investiture actually. Investiture could just be a physical representation of Adonalsium's authority over the universe (Or whatever it is exactly Adonalsium had power over), being put into other beings.

'Investiture' isn't exactly a common word. Especially considering it has been said that Adonalsium is the source of all investiture in the Cosmere, this could make sense as to why that's the word Brandon chose for his magic energy stuff.

(There might be an actual WoB or something on why the word 'investiture'. I don't know, but I just typed this out so too late for extra research now.)

That seems to be exactly the case:

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Pod (paraphrased)

You said at the Starsight release that [Adonalsium] was intentionally preventing the spren from accessing Surges through fabrials and such pre-Shattering. Was this a passive or active effect?

Brandon Sanderson (paraphrased)

It was kind of both - the way [Adonalsium] worked was just that the way he saw the world [magic] was the way the world [magic] worked. He didn't want the spren to be able to do that, so they couldn't.

American Fork High School Signing (Dec. 12, 2019)

22 minutes ago, Trusk'our said:

Yeah, I suppose it depends on whether it's the Investiture of an Identitymind that temporarily grants an Identity, or if it's the Identity imprinting on the attribute stored in the form of Investiture. If it's the latter, what would tapping a blank Identity do?

Identity is stored in aluminum. It shouldn't even be possible to Invest that metal! Until we see it happen in a book, I will not believe that aluminumminds can be tapped.

Assuming they can, though, tapping blank Identity should erase your sense of self, I think. Make you easier to Soulcast or Forge and possibly open you up to control like a Hemalurgic construct.

This runs into the two issues of:

- Can you even tap an aluminummind?

- Assuming you can tap the aluminummind, is it keyed or unkeyed?

Both are, to my knowledge, RAFOed currently.

1 hour ago, cometaryorbit said:

Nahel bonds were pre-existing on Roshar,

To add: the Nahel is pre-existing everywhere. Seons and other cognitive entities can bond in the exact same way as spren do, though the effects of such bonds are different. It's a basic feature of the Cosmere - a form of Connection.

In the case of the Radiant bond specifically, I believe Ishar's input was to add more structure to it. The Ideals of the Radiants are probably Ishar's doing. My speculation is that the Immortal Words are actual Spiritual Ideals that ishar used his power to Connect the spren to. A true spren could no longer empower a human who did not reflect the values represented by the Herald who held those Surges, thus creating a filter that hopefully prevents the wrong people from getting those powers.

2 hours ago, Frustration said:

That is strictly speaking untrue. The metal may not provide the power itself, but it is neccesary for the magic to function.

The whole crack theory is that this is a misconception of people both in-world and out. That metals are not actually necessary for the magic, and that their use in the Metallic Arts is an incidental byproduct of the natural affinity of metals for Investiture, and that there is a nontrivial method/alternative methods for using those magics which do not rely on metal.

On 02/07/2022 at 8:09 PM, Trusk'our said:

Hemalurgic duralumin is the only non-godmetal to take more than one attribute

Copper: steals mental fortitude, memory and inteligence.

Allomancy, Feruchemy and Hemalurgy have absolutely nothing to do with metal.

The Scadrians simply don't know how to properly use their magic and have been working with a hack this whole time, by using metal to conduct and key Investiture.

It may also be a matter of density. Nomad needs a lot of Investiture. The sunlight may disintegrate him before he can Invest himself enough to even Connect to the planet, let alone Skim away.

On 27/06/2022 at 1:49 PM, Trusk'our said:

If Wax were to wear an iron chest plate and fill it with Investiture, would he have a harder time Steelpusing because of the Investiture, or would it act more like a Radiant's own plate, allowing one to still use their abilities unhindered since it is keyed to their own Identity?

I think the latter is likely, but I'm not certain.

On the one hand, Investiture resistance seems to be linked to Identity - you can't easily Invest something that had been Invested by someone else.

However, when Wax picks up Kelesina's unkeyed goldmind, its steel line is thinner than it should be, indicating that it resist his Investiture. If the metalmind lack Identity, shouldn't it not resist Investiture?

34 minutes ago, Argent said:

I think the idea is fascinating, but I am struggling to see how the symbols can be human bodies, regardless of how heavily they are stylized. Do you think you can explain that a bit more?

My assumption is that the dot represents the head of the receiver of a hemalurgic spike, while the arcs represent the rest of the body.

Looking at the symbol for iron, I envision a human body curled up, with the head facing towards the right and and a pair of spikes though the torso.

Looking at the symbol for duralumin, I envision a human body seen from above, with spikes driven into the sides and center of the torso (though as I mentioned before, the spikes seem to be backwards - maybe those are arms?).

The symbol for brass also looks vaguely like a human body seen from above, with a spike through the neck or head and a pair of spikes through the torso or shoulders.

I was looking for a WOB on Hemalurgy today and happened upon this gem:

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CoffeeHolick

Did you intentionally make Kredik Shaw resemble hemalurgic spikes coming from Luthadel?

Brandon Sanderson

Yes, I did. The modern symbols of the metals (Spikes piercing skin) are also done intentionally.

General Twitter 2011 (Jan. 18, 2011)

I had already noticed that the symbols for the Allomantic metals look a lot like a simplified human body with spikes piercing it, but I didn't know how intentional that was.

Well, apparently it's very intentional.

Problem is, we don't know where most spikes go, so I can't easily validate this hypothesis, but I can speculate.

The first thing is to determine whether the symbol refers to the placement to the spike that grants that power, or to the spikes that are made of that metal. There's a world of difference between the two - to grant the ability burn pewter, you apply a steel spike to one of the shoulders; a pewter spike, on the other hand, steals Physical Feruchemy.

Let's look at one of the symbols:

I've screenshotted a piece of the Table of Allomantic Metals containing the symbol for iron. Looking at it from the perspective that it's a human body pierced by spikes, it looks like the dot is the head and there are two spikes in the upper torso. Sure enough, according to the Table of Hemalurgic Metals, there are Physical bindpoints in the torso - four of them. Which are the relevant two? I'll assume for now that they're the two bindpoints located in the sternum, on top of one another, as you would not need a frontal view of the body to represent them.

There's still a problem here. Iron steals strength, while to steal the Allomantic power of Iron, you use a steel spike. The bindpoints for both metals are listed simply as "Physical" in the Table of Hemalurgic Metals, so it's ambiguous whether this symbols represents the placement of spikes for the ability to pull metals or spikes for strength.

Let's find an allomantic metal that is stolen by a spike in a different quadrant. Duralumin should do - to steal duralumin (a spiritual metal), you use electrum (a temporal metal). There are two problems, however. The first is that the Hemalurgy Table is incomplete; the second is that the placement of all spikes except physical metals is symmetrical. A symbol that means "put electrum spikes here" can also mean "put duralumin spikes here".

Regardless, here's duralumin:

This looks like a view from the top of the head, with one spike through the center of the torso and four spikes through the sides of the torso (all of which seem to be inverted, with the back of the spike inside the torso). I can see one issue immediately: there are four bind spots for spiritual and temporal metals each in the torso - and they're all between the ribs (actually, not exactly - some of them are in the abdomen, in the place where ribs would be if we had them below the chest).

My results are inconclusive so far, but maybe someone else can make more sense of the symbols. I'm most bothered by those spikes that are "backwards". I believe that's just in-world artistic license, as the ancient Terris symbols don't have stylized spikes (the spikes are still there, though):

(screenshot from the Coppermind)

As a last note, I think these two symbols, plus what we know of Inquisitors, can help solve the puzzle: iron, steel, tin and pewter all display piercings in the torso; iron shows a body bent to the right and spikes coming in from the left - the spikes for iron go into the left side of the torso. Steel is the reverse, while tin and pewter go into the center of the chest, assuming that the vertical bar is the spike. If I'm right, that confirms that the spike placement is for spikes of that metal, rather than bind points for the allomantic ability. Spook during HoA had a spike for allomantic pewter in his shoulder, which could match the placement of a steel spike - inner shoulder, on the right. I'm not sure whether the books ever say which shoulder held the spike, and I can't find it, so it's still inconclusive.

EDIT: Well, the images didn't load, apparently. You can find them yourselves and have a look, though. This is the link for the Steel Alphabet: https://coppermind.net/wiki/Steel_alphabet

I want to know people's interpretation of the Intents of the various Shards.

Occasionally I see people talk about what each Shard would do, or what the various combinations of Shards would be like, which are more fearsome and which are more interesting.

However, to me the meaning of most Shards is incredibly vague, and I'd like to know how the community interprets the various Shards.

I think the issue here is that you're not just adding strength, or power, or whatever you're spiking. You're splicing a spiritweb into another.

Some modifications may just make you stronger, for example, but some must just kill you, or horribly deform you in ways that nullify the advantages the spikes would give you.

9 hours ago, cometaryorbit said:

Absolutely, I just meant that it's interesting (to me) that if Ruin eventually really "won" then that would mean stasis and further change couldn't happen, which is a bit more Preservation - ie Ruin in isolation (without opposition) would be ultimately self-defeating.

Which is probably why Rayse expected Ruin to implode.

Found the WOB:

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Questioner

Is Hemalurgy the way that they returned in the Desolations?

Brandon Sanderson

Oh, did they know Hemalurgy during the Desolations on Roshar?

Questioner

Yes, is that how they returned originally?

Brandon Sanderson

No, that's a good question. They knew some skill similar, but when they were originally returning, it was something else.

Dragonsteel Mini-Con 2021 (Nov. 22, 2021)

It's more to do with Hemalurgy than voidbinding, but I'm not one to shy away from wild extrapolation.

46 minutes ago, Treamayne said:

So, if AonDor existed first, then the Shaod had to exist first.

I disagree. I am inclined to agree with you (I think the Shaod came first and is not caused by the city) but I can see scenarios in which the Shaod comes second.

For example, AonDor may originally have been something that everyone in the Arelon region could learn, it just took a lot of dedication and wasn't as strong. Then they built Elantris to create the Shaod, making the power stronger but limited to fewer people.

I like this a lot, and I think there's precedent. I'll see if I can find the WOB, but IIRC Brandon said in a livestream that the singers used something similar to Hemalurgy before the Fused were created.

2 hours ago, cometaryorbit said:

I think Dalinar might be very likely to become the Unite Dawnshard ('known to bind') in the future

 

I think he is the Dawnshard-That-Binds since at least the start of the visions, and potentially since his visit to the Nightwatcher.

3 hours ago, Nameless said:

The Shaod's function seems to be linked to the city of Elantris. When it got messed up, so did the Shaod. When it got fixed, so was the Shaod.

I can't find the WOB right now, but I believe Brandon has stated that Elantrians existed before the city was built.

My understanding is that the zombification is a separate effect from the Shaod. Once the Shaod takes you, the city's Aon tries to amplify your powers, breaking the transformation in the process because the Aon is broken.

I'm one of the people who believe that Dalinar is a Dawnshard. Specifically, the one that binds. The voice in his head that tells him to UNITE THEM would be a parallel to the "voice" that Rysn hears telling her to CHANGE.

The problem with the theory of Dalinar as a Dawnshard is Sigzil. According to WOB, Sigzil's Torment is part of the reason why Rysn was warned not to bond a spren (the more important reason is that the Sleepless don't want anybody actually using the Dawnshard), implying that being Invested, or perhaps being bonded to a spren, can have unpleasant consequences. Does that mean Dalinar cannot be a Dawnshard, as he seems to lack a Torment?

It could be that it takes a long time to develop a Torment - Sigzil has likely been running from the Night Brigade for decades or centuries, and he seems to still be adjusting to his limitations, unlike Hoid, who can navigate it with ease (although he usually has enough control over any situation not to need to start a physical fight). It could also be that Dalinar has a different kind of Torment, one we haven't noticed yet.

I thought about this when remembering the passage where Dalinar opens a Perpendicularity for the first time. Odium panics, screaming that "we" killed "you", which is rather ambiguous, as he could be referring to either Honor or Adonalsium, or even someone else entirely. In that scene, Dalinar hears the voice in his head telling him, many times, with mounting intensity, to UNITE THEM. Immediately before he UNITES the Realms, he says "I am Unity". My unhinged speculation is that Dalinar is subconsciously acknowledging his status as the Dawnshard That Binds. Odium senses the Command and mistakes it for Adonalsium itself, and panics.

There's a part of me that is actually hoping this theory is proven false, because it means Roshar isn't monopolizing half of the rarest artifacts in the Cosmere.