AFdooda

There is a reoccurring theme across the Cosmere of black smoking Investiture. While not absence this seems to be a kind of Investiture 'pollution' that cannot be directly used without doing something.

Khriss seems to think Adonalsium was a being and not just a force of living Investiture. Now I don't think someone Ascended to Adonalsium because that seems... Extreme, but God may have had morals/thoughts/ideology of its own outside the division of the Shards. Also, note that Adonalsium could have split into a different number of different Intents. The Shards do not perfectly reflect what God was.

Did this test a year ago or something and got Skybreaker. Did it just now and got Skybreaker. Guess that makes sense, Skybreaker's aren't exactly the most variable types. Did get a total change in the order the Orders (haha) appeared in the list though. Previously got Windrunner really high now its dropped to below halfway and randomly Elsecaller and Edgedancer jumped up loads. Didn't think I had it in me.

My only concern is with the chronology. Big epic Shard fight yes, me like... But Scadrial has a whole load of books that take the world through many levels of technology and Roshar is basically still medieval (book-wise). I suppose Shards (as in Knights) helps but at what stage would Roshar and Scadrial meet? If Scadrial was making interstellar journeys and Roshar hasn't even worked out gunpowder that could present a problem. Of course fantasy glowing medieval knights vs metal-eating space wizards would be great and very Cosmere but the two series just seem very far apart chronologically speaking.

This may actually be my new favourite Sanderson book. Hoid as a narrator just seems to work and I'm glad that the Mighty Sanderson in the afterword says that more Hoid-centric books are coming.

Said Guest Cognizantastic I believe the problem has been fixed.

But there Syl is barbs or spikes on a shield that hook onto and trap the Shardblade, not truly a net, unless I'm mistaken? Changing the shape of the shield is exactly what we know to be possible. A net that would be thrown/fired/whatever would be different because it would need flexibility while being made from a Godmetal as well as being large, complex and entirely unlike anything we have seen so far. Perhaps it is the viability of non-rigid Godmetals that we should be discussing? A Radiant spren that forms into a wire, is it ductile or rigid like a Shardblade (which, as observed by Adolin, do not break or seemingly bend)?

You mention exactly what might be the answer: "It will fear you!" Renarin is connected to Odium by Glys. The Thunderclast could have feared this. We already know Renarin is no ordinary Truthwatcher, indeed his powers are distinctly Voidish. Light making it go away is odd. Perhaps some further aspect of Renarin's abilities? Like what @Jn819 said? An end of RoW spoiler may eventually reveal some answers: Sorry I think my post has been garbled in where it was meant to be. I've replied to posts from ages back, I think? Well, see what you guys make of it anyway .

Aaaaannndd here is the slight issue with weapons that can change their shape independently. Presumably there is a limit in size but a net of wire would cut through the enemy with ease. Fortunately it is an idea that does not seem to be coming up in Stormlight books because I think it could get very complicated very quickly, although it is a very interesting idea.

You know... I totally forgot that Stormlight is technically going to be two separate series going up to ten books. The second part is the Heraldic Epochs, is it? I think that would answer a lot of questions on these forums.

@Treamayne and @alder24 's WoBs show fairly clearly that Harmony is a RAFO. We can speculate about how two Shards interact in that way but there's not much more we can say. I do think it is apparent that Harmony is not using tones to combine the Shards, perhaps the tones are not enough to combine two whole Shards into 'one'. I assume that tones could be used to combine the Investiture of Ruin and Preservation in the same way as in Stormlight. Presumably this will be expanded upon in Stormlight 5 and perhaps the limitations of tones will be revealed. Afterall, there must be limitations otherwise the war on Roshar would be somewhat invalidated by an ultimate tone that could end all the problems between the Shards there.

This raises the question of whether Harmony is really so harmonious... We know from Stormlight that tones can be used to combine Investitures of different Shards in a peaceful manner. I would assume then that Harmony has also peacefully combined Ruin and Preservation. Scadrial is suffering from corrupted Investiture problems though so I suppose that could be a result of Harmony if things aren't nearly so harmonious. Minor Spoiler:

The idea that futuresight may have been a power of Surgebinders before becoming the KR is intriguing. We know Ishar made the KR to impose order on the Surgebinders and stop them going totally rogue. This is a very 'Honor' thing to do and so futuresight may have been restricted or heavily frowned upon from that point onwards. I mean, how much do we really know about Surgebinding pre-Knights Radiant? Woefully little as it's not a period that has been focussed on much so far. Perhaps things could have been very different. What we do know is that spren made the Nahel bonds independent of the Heralds and Rosharan Shards (despite being pieces of Investiture themselves). It can thus be presumed that the spren dictated the effects of the bond in some way and that it was only when Ishar formed the Knights that Surgebinding as we know it began as this directly linked the Surgebinders to the Shards.

This is a miracle I never knew happened.

The significance of the number 16 outside of the Cosmere may reveal a little inside the Cosmere. The number 16 is associated with wholeness. 16 Shards that together once made up Adonalsium who was essentially all Investiture combined. This kind of stuff is why people argue over whether there could be a 17th Shard in the Cosmere but the weird coincidences that BS is so fond of don't seem to match (yet).

Wait what? Stormlight 5 has a prologue that can be read!? Please tell me! Where can I find this!? I can't believe I never noticed...

Throughout the Stormlight Archive we come across Radiants that are different to what their Order normally does. I mean, pretty much every major character who is a Radiant has something anomalous about them. Yes the period of Roshar in which Stormlight is set is a unique period in that it is a unlike anything ever before but surely unique Radiants with odd abilities granted by this or that great power existed before? A Truthwatcher who could see the future could perhaps have existed far in the past, granted that ability by Cultivation through the Nightwatcher (for example), as we have seen already in the books. Yes the main characters of the Stormlight books are the main characters and thus get favour from the plot and storytelling but in a world as deep as the Cosmere I don't see why unique abilities should be limited to the heroes of the books alone. Honor and Cultivation have been resisting the Desolations for thousands of years, it is only reasonable to assume that other plans have been created, mortal agents selected and power granted unto them - just like in the Stormlight books, really. Of course we must assume that these plans were largely unsuccessful because the Desolations continue but it is reasonable to assume that many attempts to stop them have been made.

I'm no Cosmere expert but I had always thought that the point was that corrupted investiture was totally different to that created from tones. 'Combined' Investiture is that which has achieved a level of harmony (not the guy from Mistborn ). The aspects of the Investitures have been brought together peacefully. 'Corrupted' Investiture is that which has been forcefully assimilated into another aspect. In the case of the Stormlight Archive Odium forcefully takes over the Investiture of Honor and Cultivation while forcefully infiltrating and attacking Roshar from his prison on Braize. I'll leave the forum people to analyse my outlook!

breaths are, ultimately, just Investiture. They are linked to Identity but so are other things in the Cosmere. If someone could get rid of the Identity part of the Breath (feruchemy etc) then that Breath would be usable by anyone. Regenerating the Breath would require mental conditioning to consider the health effects of having a Breath (rather than being a Drab) as part of the person. Theoretically the Breath can be 'healed' then although I would say this would not be done in the normal way. Feruchemical gold etc regenerates the body based on people's ideas of themselves. Perhaps the Investiture stored in the gold could be used to regenerate the Breath but I don't know. However, ignoring that minor issue, a Breath as a piece of Investiture linked to a person via Identity (which is readily removable) could perhaps be regenerated and so a 'farm' would work in essence? The Coppermind describes Stormlight as being able to heal Spiritual damage such as that from a Shardblade and if Breaths are connected to people's Spiritual part then perhaps this is a basis for regenerating Breaths. However, regenerating Breaths is 100% linked to how people see their Breath(s) as part of themselves, like @Quantus said, either a part of their soul or as an Investiture commodity such as infused spheres. That's my conclusion from all this, I'm no expert but the idea of a Breath farm seems sound but it would be hella complicated and convoluted for a Worldhopper organisation to manage but perfectly possible, if one had a master understanding of how to use the various magical arts from across the Cosmere to bypass the innate roadblocks with each.

I think that the idea of the ancient Truthwatchers having futuresight is 100% possible but we'll have to wait to find out. The Truthwatcher's featured in Stormlight currently are either anomalous or not really mentioned. Do we have an explained Truthwatcher character that isn't corrupted-you-know-who (I'm avoiding spoilers, its a habit) or not? It's been a while for me and I can't remember what the Truthwatcher's do in Rhythm of War.

Darkness is a great character I think and he will feature more which is even better. Prepare thyself @Amira for you are entering the Cosmere...

This sounds really complicated and expensive, though. A black market operation would aim to turn a quick profit with minimal need to provide for any people involved or reveal itself to any authorities. A breath farm would require hundreds, or better yet, thousands of people to finance the acquisition of items from other worlds. I would speculate that rather than running a 'farm' breathstealers (?) would find some way to scam or force people to give up their breath(s). Think email scams but instead of downloading your life when you click the link it downloads a part of a your 'soul' instead. I hope I haven't given scammers a new idea.

What I feel we're going to get in future Elantris books is some kind 'science' of Aons. The art of 'refining' your Aon would not only grant it extra effect but also an advantage over an enemy (looking at you Fjorden). Creating better Aons would be vital and make for interesting drama and purpose in a book (think how science works in real life where everything has to be a race).

I love the way this thread keeps being revived. IT'S ALIVE!!!!!!!!

Lift is probably a good example of what would actually happen if a child was suddenly granted magical powers in a medieval world. Plus I'm a very cynical person so Lift's outlook on life appeals to me.