Eri

What feeling are you aiming at with the world? Because I think this has a big impact on haw you should name things.

Buy! Even if it's unlikely, I love the idea. Hoid/Shallan is my OTP (yeah, age difference, I know)

My guess: Vasher will die in the sequel. (why? well, he's Vivienna's mentor, he's a Returned, he's got a lot of things to feel guilty about...)

A foreigner in the holly grotto? Vun Makak forbid! ;-) (I doubt it)

Another one: Was Tien really Kaladin's biological brother?

Cool idea.

I think we'll see quite a lot of Scadrial "fabrials" in the southern continent, in Mistborn Second Trilogy.

If Purelakers never mention Nu Ralik loud, how did the worldhoppers know that name?

I like the iridescent look and I was going for something similar to that at first. The problem is when you start shrinking it down to around 150x150 like the profile icons are you can't really see the colors and it just looks like someone smoking. I had to use more bold colors and designs to make it obvious what you are seeing in the profile picture.

True, mine does look bad in 150 px. I tried to fine some compromise between it and the ones you did:

I think it looks ok at both big and small resolution and more or less fits the description in Warbreaker. Or at least how I imagine it.

Kurkistan: Sorry, I hate that cover ;-)

Edit: Also: (150px, 2 versions) (src https://et.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pilt:Katana-Dresden.jpg)

What do you think?

I don't remember the name and Elantris is the only book I don't have, but wasn't one of the Elantrians canonnically autistic?

 it looks like

I've been playing around with ideas for warbreaker since there aren't really any symbols i can think of to pull from it for an icon. Breath is the central magic so this was the best idea I could come up with. Thoughts?

 

I can't find any good silhouettes(sp?), but for the Breath I imagine it more like that:

More iridescent than actually colored. What do you think?

BTW if you use polar coordinates (polar to rectangular; as I remebmer, Ps has it, but I don't remember the filter's exact name) on void glyphs, they get interestingly similar (in feel and look, I'm not sure if in exact patterns) to surge icons:

Isn't a catquisitor freaky by definition?

I would appreciate it if you would post any new icons you plan on sharing with the community that were made from these psd's within this same thread so they are easy to find.

 

If you have any questions, please let me know.

 

Edit: GIMP can open psd's while Photoshop does not natively open gimp files (to the best of my knowledge) so for being most widely useable, I just uploaded psd's

Thank you!!!

I'll surely post if I manage to do something nice.

Yup, use them however you like. A part of me would like them to stay within the 17th shard but it really won't bother me if they start showing up other places too.

Thank you!

Maybe just the source images with the tinting and texturing layers overtop removed then? I wouldn't mind figuring out my own textures - I need some photoshop practice anyway.

Agree. (Except GIMP, not Ps )

I'll take a look at the various sets later today and see which ones I'm comfortable with sharing publicaly. Was there a particular set you wanted the psd for?

The gems. Or, if the gems are unavailable, the glyphs.

Cool! Awesomness, thank you for making them.

I like my picture (so thet people won't call me a 'he'), but may I use one of those as icon for my Tumblr with Sanderson quotes (I need to finally have some non-paper Realmatic reference compiled to make my theories and Tumblr is good for easy posting of quotes)?

PS: I know there is a wiki and probably other references, but I'd like to have my own compilation as well.

PPS: Would you maybe share the source psd, so people can tweak colors and stuff? If you don't feel like it, ok.

Thanks!

I converted it to Spotify playlist, for those who prefer Spotify, 2 songs were unfortunately unavailable, but anyway: here

So I run a campaign, for something like a year now, we've had about 20 sessions. I wanted to write it down, but didn't have time to do it in English. Anyway, some moments are so funny or cool or just moving that I wanted to share them.

Disclaimer: I threw the canon out from the window. Everything that people (nobles mostly) know stays, the rest (like Ruin, Preservation, what was the well of Ascension, what are the unknown metals, why are Inquisitors crazy etc) is changed, because the players knwe the Cosmere too well. Hemalurgy and Feruchemy stay, but with changed metals (so that the table looks more cool).

Also, sorry for bad English if any.

The action is set something like 500 years afterr the Ascension.

OK, so the cool parts:

(Shadow is a nickname of one crazy NPC, who is a skaa Mistborn and... kinda like darker, crazier Kelsier, but he isn't a noble-wannabe, he's just a paranoid village boy with superpowers believing he's a hero... and not much people have ever seen him or even heard that nickname)

Night. Mists. Zane Larabeck, a (very) noble Mistborn is rowing a boat on Lake Tyrian (where, in the volcano is a top secret atium mine... I've mentioned killing the canon, right? ;)/> ) with a box of stolen atium. He sees a Ministry Mistborn (on a weird kind of boat, but that's not important) holding his friend (an NPC, but still, he liked her) with a knife to her throat.

Obligator: Who are you? What are you douing here?

Zane: We are called Shadow and we're stealing your atium.

Obligator: (gets so surprised that he drops the girl. Gets killed by Zane in a few beats.)

Rene Lekal, another Mistborn (also a noble), team scientist has studied the allomantic signatures and believes he found a pattern. Zane got a new, supposedly allomantic, metal from an NPC.

Zane: (burns the metal, which does very cool things, namely paralyzes the target)

Rene: Zane! This is great!...

Zane: (smiles)

Rene: ...it supports my theory!

Everyone: (a bit of facepalm)

OK, a bit of backstory for that scene: Zane had a brother, believed him dead for having a half-breed, learned that the half-breed (BTW a 4 year old crazy sociopathic monster with Wolverine-like hands) was Zane's son with one girl that said she was noble. And his brother (named Brandon, which is itself funny, because the plaer was thinking about Amber Chronicles and didn't notice the name...) is now a Steel Inquisitor because he was a really competent Mistborn (yes, they're both Mistborn. Probability, I know...) and he was given the choice – either he joins or Zane ends on the hook.

Zane had talked with his brother, told him that he recognized him, they talked a bit about philosophy and stuff, Zane told him to meet him again in a place some distance from Luthadel (grave of the monster-half-breed, actually).

Ah, another thing: Steel Inquisitors are a bit different from canon – they're inherently crazy from pain (hemalurgy...), kept more or less sane only by a weird bond between TLR and them. And when an Inquisitor in any way betrays TLR and his orders, it breaks and he goes all weird and berserk. Of course, the Heroes discovered this bond and it's use, mostly by accidents, guessing and really weird uses of Gold allomancy.

Also, the fact that skaa + allomancy = often monster is a secrret that the Ministry really does not want anyone to know (because it's a way to make really powerful Allomancers)

Oh, and the Heroes know a Duralumin-like metal. (which I made because I don't like canon duralumin)

Zane: (is sitting on the rain for a long time)

Brandon: (finally comes; they talk a while about unimportatnt things)

Zane: (pointing at the grave) I saw his hands.

B: You what?!

Z: I digged the grave. [yep, he did]

B: You fool! You idiot! You... Now I will have to kill you. What, by Lord Lurel, were you thinking?

Z: Well, actually I was thinking that you wouldn't want t kill me, you'll go crazy and I'll bind you with emotional allomancy, because that is what Lord Ruler does to you.

B: (goes crazy as Zane said)

Z: (fixes him as he said)

(happiness ensues, some time later the rest of Heroes come, including one rogue kandra)

B: Oh. You know that you'll have to kill the kandra, because when his contract ends, he'll tell the other kandra about what happened here and they'll tell the Steel Ministry. [yes, they would, the TLR-kandra relationship is well... complicated]

HazeTan, the beforementioned rouge kandra: (laughs out loud)

More kandra stuff:

Once, a kandra tried to kill (yes!) Rene's sister. He wasn't rogue, he was working for the Ministry. And so, Heroes learned that unbeknowst to most kandra, some of them have the license to kill. That was the moment, more or less, when HazeTan decided that he does not like First Generation and their rules anymore. They killed the kandra and HT absorbed his blessings.

Also, HazeTan is looking for one kandra from First Generation who went rogue, is believed to be dead but (..long story...) HT believes he just removed his blessings and went back to being a mistwraith. And that his mind may still be somewhere, so finding him (he has an idea for that) and giving him another pair of blessings may be a good idea.

HazeTan: ...so I need a pair of Blessings.

Zane: You have one additional pair, don't you?

HT, in a very offended tone: Hey, I'm using them!

One last quote, not funny, but really really strange (what would you do with that if you were the Narrator?)

There is another kandra, an NPC, serving Zane... well, to make long story short... when you're a rogue kandra, comforting your kinda friend (after she was tortured with Allomancy, just for fun) first and telling her that you have gone rogue, some time later later, may not be the best idea. And they had some really weird dialogue, culminating on this line:

HazeTan: So, I'm not asking you to answer me now, but I hope you will think about it, I know it's a hard one: Between a kandra and a... well... something, someone that once was a kandra and now is not, is friendship possible?

...really, what would you do with something like that?

The number 16 is important metaplot-wise, regardless of number of metals. That's why Preservation used it as a sign. I think it was in the annotations on the website or somewhere.

Just saw this thread again. I know it's an old post, but... Google some *real* Polish surnames, please... "Merszywyzk" makes me go facepalm. I dunno... change it to "Merszywski" or something. Because now it does not sound Polish, it sounds Shin or something.

Page 11: sending Xerress seems like a plot contrivance. Why did the other witches decide to send her? Just because she was late? That seems unlikely, but you've given no other reason why the rest of the witches (who all seem to hate each other equally) ganged up on her.

Disagree.

For me it seems like there is some interesting politics and scheming we haven't seen yet, and the fact that they're sending her is an outcome of that. I hope we'll learn the reasons later.

As to Xerress being the villain, I don't get that impression, though I do agree it's too early to be spotlighting a villian as a POV. I may be wrong, but I get the impression that Xerress is the mother of the boys in the first section.

I agree here, I thought the other witch is going to be the antagonist.

The one that sends her far away. And Xeress seemed a protagonist.

Some infodumps, long descriptions and PoV issues (switching between limited and something that sounds omniscient), but you can fix that after you write the whole story.

I'm not sure if the bad guys are best VPC for first chapters. My biggest problem with feeling a connection to those characters is that they're evil. Or seem.

Are they protagonists? After the prologue clearly shows them as antagonists... I know it can be done properly, but in this case does not work for me.

The witch has some interesting conflict, though. I don't like her (eeevil) but I'd probably like to read more about her. Much more than the brothers who have actually no conflict yet, just wander around.

The antagonist witch is well introduced, I clearly thought "oh, this one is going to be the VPC's biggest rival".

PS: I do not like evil characters in general, so I may be biased.

Wow, I thought I read it very late, and still I'm the first one to comment?

Interesting chapters.

Wordbuilding is better, now I can see it's a future thing, and they have/had space travel. I like how they use space as a curse word. I guess mankind must have had some bad experiences there. Also the word "greenie"... I guess they met some aliens?

I like the characterization of Lance very much.

Jorah seems a bit too undecided for a protagonist. He's believable, but not very interesting. Also, probably more important, he seems to lack any kind of goal.

Dexter is OK, except for the ending of ch6 which seems off. If you were paraniod, and some strange and not very trusted "friend" made you go to a weird place, and there some weird magic attacked you and another person, but not *him*... wouldn't you be suspicious? Even with Jorah helping them get out, I feel like Dexter should suspect something bad about him after the adrenaline ends and he starts thinking. I mean, it's really weird that Jorah can release things from whatever holds them on the clearing.

When the heads of whatever-monsters-they-are come from the ground, I think some description could be useful? Are they rotten like zombies? Just dirty? Weird with glowing eyes? Angry, shouting, looking in pain?

The names Molly and Hollie are a bit too easy to confuse, in my opinion.

I remember it too. And that it is similar, because... I don't remember, but it seemed like there was an in-Cosmere reason for that.

Wow, this thread is cool!

I am afraid he has some middle name also.

Congratulations for beginning!

One thing that strikes me: Kaliban is a name from Shakespeare. OK, it's spelled Caliban, but pronounced the same. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caliban I could not help thinking about your legendary hero as that guy.

If it's incidental, you ahould probably change the name. But no need to worry: Elantris was in first draft called... Atlantis. Unintentionally.

I liked the beginning, read it with pleasure and I would probably continue to read if it was a book. The battle with the witch was rather anticlimactic — he attacked her, they fought (he must be really good BTW if he survived this long), she died without his action. I wish he had some influence on the events.

Also, if Kaliban is later revealed to be a warlock or something like that, it would be kinda predictable. But I play too much RPGs or read too much Sanderson, I'm paranoid of characters, universe and everything, so maybe you should just ignore that.

Generally, it reads really well and I think it's OK as the first version. Do not fix it, write further.

As for making Beloken the viewpoint charaacter, it's an idea, but my plan was to have someone who seems to have it all, and then take it away from him(later chapters).

If their chapters are really rare, and as cjhuitt said more like interludes than chapters, you can probably make one Beloken PoV's interlude, and, after some "regular chapters" where things go wrong for Inaken, have an interlude with Inaken's PoV? I'm not sure if interludes count for the "you shall not have more than 3 PoVs" rule. ;-)

The theological discussion seems fake, doesn't sound like real people talking. Their arguments seem cliched and very modern. Dialogue lacks emotions — those guys are arguing about existence of God/god like they were discussing weather. I'm just not buying it. Similar but weaker problem is the fake Lord of Light's speech — also doesn't seem that compelling, I do not feel Inhaken's excitement that much.

I think Inhaken and Beloken may deserve some more time (to show their philosophical conflict etc) before the fake Lord of Light shows up. Beloken seems an interesting character (more conflict), I wonder if his PoV wouldn't be better? He got more sympathy from me ­- he's in love and unsure if she loves him, he disagrees with all of his tribe (and, seemingly, with facts)... I like that guy.