Argent

Sliver. Slivers are people who have held the power of a Shard (or a large portion of it), but no longer do*. Splinters are "pieces" of power that have attained consciousness, but have never been alive. * The requirement that a Sliver must lose the power before they get called "Sliver" has always smelled fishy to me...

Knowledge is power and burden combined

Well, welcome to the more vocal aspect of the forums then! Though I don't know if I would mention being a reader and reading the back of shampoo bottles in the same breath. Even those... non-readers read the back of shampoo bottles!

That's what makes me believe he is a Brightlord and not some this party, or a Ghostblood guy (and nothing else).

I'd say they are Surgebinding, but not necessarily following the range rules as the Radiants. Though a couple of scenes lead me believe that they probably don't have free reign over all the surges.

You know, here's something that feels off to me. Here's a quote from the prologue: So Gavilar tells Szeth he had expected this, assuming it was Thaidakar (and the Ghostbloods) who was behind the attack. When Szeth denies this, Gavilar continues guessing - Restares and Sadeas are his next guesses. I think all three of them are Brightlords Gavilar believes to be in with the Ghostbloods, but that's still besides the point. Only when Szeth claims to be sent by the Parshendi, then does Gavilar offer him the voidsphere. Szeth doesn't seem interested - or even aware of it - before that. If the Parshendi wanted Gavilar dead because of the sphere or something he did with it, wouldn't they want to get their hands on it? To use it, to protect it, to hide it, to control it? Szeth commands - to kill Gavilar and be seen doing it - don't seem to include anything about the sphere. So I don't think it was the reason Gavilar died. To play the devil's avocado, it is also possible that Gavilar didn't want the Parshendi to get their hands on the sphere. So, for some reason, he decides that Szeth is completely trustworthy and on his side, and he gives him the voidsphere with instructions to keep it away from them - the Parshendi they had just spoken about. Maybe he was working under the assumption that unless he sends the sphere away with someone who is not a Parshendi, Szeth's masters will come and collect it from his corpse. It is linguistically possible, but I don't find it likely. Possible, but not likely.

@Kurkistan, your puns are like the light in the storm that dispels the mists of the city of the gods. Also, all this has made me realize that I actually kind of like it when Brandon is wrong about stuff (on signings). Because we hear what he says there, take it for canon, run with it, make our theories, and then when he comes back to us and gives us the correct information, it feels like he has said something new.

Whaaat? Time to abandon all theories (and hope! Abandon all hope!) from the last two days. Well, put them on hold at least. Also, Peter, if it's wrong because Brandon messed up during the signing, tell him he owes us more information! Maybe this will work...

Okay, let's clear some things up, so at least the science is right: Surface tension is not a force - it's a result of a force. "Force," actually. This "force" is cohesion, though a better way to call it would cohesive force (because it's not a real force) Cohesion, or cohesive force, or force of cohesion, is a property of matter. It describes how well the atoms and molecules stick together in a substance. Most importantly, it doesn't depend on the number of atoms or molecules in the substance, or compound, or object; it depends on their structure, how they are organized - their configuration. A good example of this. If you imagine a graphene molecule (which is a damnation strong molecule) and then look at some organic molecules, even with no understanding of science, you should intuitively understand that the structure of graphene gives is better rigidity. If you wanted to build a house out of only one molecule (because you are really weird or something...), graphene should feel like the right choice, because it's symmetric, it doesn't have any dangly bits, it doesn't have a weak spot, so to speak. Every one of those organic molecules (and pretty much every other complex molecule out there) has a strong core or center, but if you wanted to break it, you could just rip one of the "tails" off. You will also (kind of) notice that a graphene molecule doesn't have all that many atoms in it either - certainly fewer than those organic ones. So it's neither the density, nor the number of atoms, nor the distance between the atoms - at least not directly. All of those are parts of the shape of the molecule. And you can't claim that the higher (or even the lower) any one of those is, the more powerful the substance is. Because that's not the case. All that matters is the 3D structure. A couple of reference Wikipedia pages: Cohesion (chemistry) and Surface tension. P.S. Sorry, I like science...

Pressure & Transformation: Stockpile some stormlight Soulcast cheap stuff into carbon Use stormlight to apply high pressure to that carbon and turn it into diamond Use diamond to capture even more stormlight Repeat the process ??? Infinite diamonds and infinite reserve of stormlight!

Your spoiler tag seems to be burning cadmium and hasn't quite caught up on you fixing it so it works properly

It's possible - I thought to plea to someone to ask Brandon during the next signing whether we'll be getting new in-world art (likely) and new maps / endpages (possible, but not as likely).

An upvote and two sacrificed goats from me - you should be thankful for the goats, since I already kept an eye on those artists!

Except the Parshendi then killed him for it. Also, interestingly, they don't seem to have given Szeth any instructions regarding the sphere - didn't he just hide it somewhere and move on with murdering people? If the Parshendi gave / traded the sphere to Gavilar, then had him killed for it, and then just hide it... wouldn't it have been easier to just hide it in the first place? Though, to be objective about it, I suppose they could've traded an inert voidsphere (I think I'll coin the term) a long time ago, and Gavilar (or, probably, the researches who are "close to creating new Shardblades") figured out a way to actually capture a spren in it. Which is what finally provoked the Parshendi.

That's a scenario I could see happening.

Be mindful of the Steelhunt content, please. A remark here and there has gone ignore, but I think this is a little too much.

I don't agree with your assessment of the Edgedancers' role, MadRand. Growth and Friction don't speak spies to me - Lift's case, due to other reasons, is a special one.

That's what I thought of when I was reading about him. But I wouldn't draw parallels with our world, considering how many religions Roshar has.

If that's the case, I don't feel it's necessary. Maybe a few interesting tidbits could be included in the Trivia section, but I can't justify giving this an entire section.

Tien was excited about everything, however. He was a talker.

I too have been wondering about communication, or perception, or something along those lines.

I vote no. Sounds too similar to the crossfire thing the Reckoners attempted.

Of course there is no better evidence - since there is no evidence. But I would imagine meeting the king of Alethkar, or even a Brightlord, would've impressed Tien enough for the topic to come up in Kaladin's flashback chapters. Moreover, if the black sphere is core of a Voidbringing fabrial (or something along those lines), whoever created it would probably try not to lose it out in the wild, where anyone can find it. Those things are not exactly common. Of course, you could argue that this person could've been killed, or they really could've lost the sphere... but I think any one of those options is pushing the limits of plausibility.

I wasn't trying to imply that he had discovered the Second Ideal, I was merely hypothesizing about what that Ideal would be. But I agree, it would be a tough call choosing which attribute-Ideal he is closer to - the giving or the learning one (assuming there is one for each; maybe you need to exhibit both of them for your Second Ideal, and the Third one has nothing to do with those attributes).

I don't know, if I am trying to learn about a new character, I probably want to learn their history first and then their abilities. Because the history will likely explain how they got to have those abilities. If length is a concern, there is a table of contents right on top. Adding "Return to Top" buttons around should also be easy - I think it's standard now.