NewbSombrero

Pagerunner is correct.

Yeah, we have definitely not seen Shallan's shardblade, and Honourblades have been confirmed. I don't really know what business Cultivation would have for making shardblades. All I know is that we've seen three: 1) Honorblades, wielded by the Heralds; 2) your average, run of the mill shardblades, which Syl seems to hate, and the only other thing we've really seen her hating is Odium, so I'm connecting them for now, as tenuous as that connection may be; and 3) Szeth's smaller shardblade which would be taken back to Shinovar, a place many theories connect to Cultivation. As I have stated, I don't currently have a lot of ground to stand on; this is mostly just speculation. However, I feel rather confident in my interpretation of the data I currently have at my disposal. Also, I just discovered I'm not the first to suggest the Odium connection.

Let me try to flesh out my thoughts in relation to Forgery just a little bit more. I thinking that perhaps the Spiritual aspect is where we get what is considered plausible and what the thing "wants" to be as described by Shai. This gives us what is available to be manipulated in the Cognitive Realm. I'll need to grab the book again to start forming a more coherent interpretation and fact checking, but I think I can probably work something out. And I don't really care if you were mostly joking. I really like this and enjoy the thought of working it around a bit.

Haven't had time to read the whole thread to see if this has been addressed, but I would like to propose a simple amendment to the original concept that I think might help tie things together. What if, rather than changing the Spiritual make-up of things, the various magic systems alter the way the Cognitive Realm interprets that data. This would make Shai's comments about Forgery altering things in the Cognitive Realm fit into the theory overall. To make the alterations stick, the Spiritual component of the magic helps tie the new interpretations of the Spiritual commands to their Physical manifestations.

He has said in a few different places that there are three types of shardblades. I'll go digging for a quote in a bit, but I'm pretty sure he's also said that we've seen all three at some point in the first book as well.

So apparently my new hobby is finding theories BS has said are almost right and trying to tweak them in ways that make sense. Today's theory relates to Splinters on Roshar. In the reddit AMA, someone asked if shardblades are Splinters of Honor, and BS said that this theory is close. After seeing this, I thought about the fact that we know three Shards are present on Roshar and that there are three types of shardblades. My interpretation of these three pieces of information would be that each type of shardblade is a Splinter of a different Shard. This could explain Syl's aversion to your everyday shardblade, particularly if they are of Odium. Honorblades would pretty clearly be of Honor, leaving the third type (Szeth's maybe?) to be of Cultivation, the Cultivation possibility for Szeth's sharblade being enhanced in my mind by her theorized connection with Shinovar.

Just a random thought off of 2.3, but what if "He Who Adds" is Cultivation? It certainly seems to match the intent. Edit: I just thought about the fact that we know Cultivation to be female, but the thought still stands. Maybe the Shin perception of her is just slightly shifted.

A week or so ago, I was talking to one of my Theater major friends, and she mentioned a paper she was writing about rioting in theaters for her Theater History class. I heard it as Rioting and got to thinking about the possible uses of Allomancy and or Feruchemy on the stage. Metal strategically placed around the stage could help Coinshots and Lurchers do various stunts. Rioters and Soothers could be stationed throughout the audience to help tug their emotions in the desired direction to enhance the experience. Archivists would get an obvious advantage in the line memorization department. The possibilities just seem way too fun.

Since question about Aona/Devotion's color did come up, the fact that her shardpool is blue seems to indicate to me that her color would be blue based on this theory.

I think the red flecks in soulstone, which are explicitly mentioned in a way that makes me think they're important, may point to a Dominion connection. This of course depends on the Shardic Colors theory. That was the thought I had while reading anyway.

So the prevailing theory seems to be that Seons themselves are Splinters of Aona/Devotion. Source Given that Brandon has said this is close, I got to thinking about how it could be slightly off and started comparing Seons with our only confirmed Splinter, the divine Breath that makes Returned. Then I realized that the parallel here would not be the Seon itself, but the Aon at its center. This seems to be supported by the fact that Seons can expend [complete] their Aon for a bonus magical effect, much like Returned can with their divine Breath. Since it seems no one really wanted to take me up on this, and we now have confirmation on it, I'll just throw in a link here the the confirmation for it. It's the long one about Aona.

I actually have been theorizing that Stormlight may be the Spiritual component in Surgebinding because in one of the Q&As Brandon said that Awakening and Surgebinding share some defining characteristics. (I'll find the exact quote later when I'm on my own computer. Can't figure out how to find things on my friend's Mac.) My thought has been that Breath and Stormlight parellel each other in this similarity.

Greetings! I got started reading about the cosmere with Warbreaker just before Christmas and have now read everything but Alloy of Law, which I am currently unable to get my hands on. I've been waiting until now to actually get on these forums because I accidentally got some spoilers regarding Sazed reading the Q&A thread. But now I'm actually here.