WordOfBrandon

A mistborn could likely aways escape an Unoathed, but let's say they both need to fight, and can't run away. In close combat, I can't see how the mistborn could do more than survive using Atium, then it would run out. What weapon do they have to crack plate? Really the question is could a mistborn's gun, normal steel pushing, or steel pushing with duralumin crack plate? If multiple shots would then could they hit the same spot against a moving opponent consistently? I think if an unoathed has a shard bow, then a mistborn has little chance of doing more than dodging. Looking at all the allomantic metals most only have a chance to do anything with duralumin.

I do like Adolin as a character, but I think he and Shallan are too wholesome. It feels like such a safe way to write a romance. The few romances I like in fantasy have more tension and relatable relationship problems.

I would have liked the drama that comes with Shalladin.

So the first thing that's worth mentioning is that Kelsier is in the know about Roshar's capabilities, and at the end of TLM he's has very low confidence in Scadrial's capabilities. What if Roshar starts out by sending Thunderclasts or Unmade? What if they send the Thrill or Sja-Anat? What if windrunners fly through and hide before they can be killed? What if deepest ones move through the ground as soon as they get out? Roshar's magic is so OP that I don't think guns alone can deal with these scenarios. Why wouldn't Roshar send fused first? They don't run out easily and if they die after causing mayhem then the will just be reborn. Is the perfect way to scout an enemy force first. Scadrial would still have to mass produce all of this aluminum. Meanwhile the coppermind says that Aluminum can be soulcast. Also the books have several examples of Rosharans using logs of Aluminum (Adolin getting trapped at the end of WaT, Zahel getting tortured in a full aluminum room, Sheets of aluminum in Kholinar, and Taravangian's half-shards are speculated to be aluminum). So Rosharans are also good with Aluminum Where are they going to get the extra trellium? Nuking an encampment isn't the answer to all problems. You also have to transport this device, and get it across the cosmere, so why would this be easy for Scadrial. If anything Rosharans are closer to creating deadly explosives they understand how to create anti-investiture and know what happens when it mixes with normal investiture. They could create opposing gemstones and throw them like grenades, or drop them from airships. First off they can't easily get lerasium or atium. The other problem with theoretical situations like these is that the Rosharans also have things they could do to be better They could make human fused like Ishar did in WaT get those rare gemstones that hold crazy amounts of stormlight, learn how to make soulcaster for everyone, create devices that shut down metalborn powers (in theory), use Dai-Gonarthis to make a perpendicularity behind enemy lines. My point is that once we speculate about potential for both sides the options are a bit much.

Maybe the uses of division are more on the spiritual and cognitive side. I would love to see someone use mental division, or do something like splicing Connection with some sort of spiritual division.

@AlmightyGir Warlight is described as black-blue and also the creature in sixth of the dusk speaks in rhythms. I'm pretty sure its a Parshendi. I think the violet-blue light will be something from stormlight 6-10.

Its possible the 5th Ideal does more, but Kaladin basically didn't demonstrate it. He basically watched Szeth fight for a few minutes and then nightblood consumed all stormlight.

Sorry if this is somewhat off the last few messages I wanted to throw in after reading all these threads. Kelsier at the end of The Lost Metal is not confident about Scadrial's chances in open warfare, so clearly guns don't mean much in the face of invested arts (Not until we get invested bullets). It seems like the arguments for Scadrial keep coming down to guns, leeching, atium, and steel pushing a bunch of coins around. Guns While guns are effective most of your opponents aren't going to be sitting out in the open for you to pick off, they will be heavenly ones dropping things from the sky, deepest ones coming from the ground, light weavers sneaking through your city, soul casters changing air into poison or smoke. Also radiants can always transform their high spren into shields to create cover. Sigzil does this in Sunlitman. Lightweaving is hard to detect in most examples and brandon has a wob talking about the limits of the average seeker. Also its really not a practical solution to leach every person you come across. Leeching If you can get in range to leach an opponent, then they can also use division on you, they can also stab you with a shard blade. Also is there a concrete reason why people think a metalborn can instantly leech someone with stormlight, towerlight, voidlight? Roshar is supposed to be the high investitture planet compared to scadrial. Atium Guys they have no atium thus the whole problem with Marsh aging rapidly at the end of the Lost Metal. I know they got some more, but It doesn't mean that its much. They scraped it off of an explosion in Wax's lab just to get some. Steelpushing To me this argument is similar to guns and is defintely one of the scadrians most powerful weapons, but the one time we saw this effectively used against a serious opponent was Kelsier's last stand against an inquisitor. In particular an inquistor that didn't seem to have F-Gold. Invested creatures with light have crazy healing and pain resistance. Shallan got shot in the eye in Wind and Truth and a sentence later was calmly analyzing the battle field. If anything I think the purpose of the time dilation was to give Scadrial time to advance given that Rosharan invested arts have such crazy potential.

So was Dalinar connecting to the Beyond in his visions when he ascended to Honor? I feel like this may be the first time we saw someone kind of interact with the Beyond.

So my assumption in reading was that the Stoneward Honor bearer (Rit daughter Cutio???) was a savant. Since Taln never broke his oath his blade still is connected to Honor and provides stormlight. https://wob.coppermind.net/events/117/#e1572 Any honor bearer has no spren so doesn't this mean savantism is more likely? https://wob.coppermind.net/events/431/#e14008 So... no spren + infinite stormlight should make a savant right? Wouldn't that explain why Szeth was shocked at her skill?

I think cultivation’s goal is to create a senate of shards on Roshar, and it this way cultivate herself and the other shards, so that they can be "United" in cultivating the cosmere. I think the shards will be the newly introduced Reason (secretly active on roshar) eventually joined with Retribution = Odium + Honor | Vengeance for breaking an oath Redemption = Cultivation + Honor | Forgiveness for breaking an oath Responsibility = Reason + Honor | Accountability for actions with a sense of honor (helping to govern Retribution and Redemption) Honor will be what binds Odium, Cultivation, and Reason. In fact we have already seen an instance of this at the end of Wind and Truth. When Taravangian tries to absorb the spren the power of honor within the heralds communicates with honor in Retribution to say their oaths must be respected. Forming the first senate like ruling of what actions a shard can take. We all know that cultivation has been playing the long game, and I think she has been doing so with the help of a shard introduced in this book Reason. It would make sense with cultivation being able to see further ahead then other shards. Also Taravangian has acknowledged his creation of the diagram had a “touch of divinity” even when was a mortal. While we believe that the touch of divinity was just cultivation, the connection to his increased reasoning makes me wonder if cultivation connected Taravangian with Reason in some way. This paragraph appears on the back of cover of Wind and Truth and obviously all the highlighted words start with Re. Throughout the book we see our main characters searching for redemption, and trying to take responsibility for their past actions. Brandon is teasing us with all the Re prefixes, and the suffixes imagined, forged, formed, and born all point to the concept of things being "Remade" or cultivated into a better state. As Tarvangian, Dalinar, and I believe Cultivation have realized… the shards are “broken gods”. They are too pathological in their intent to make sensible decisions. Odium’s power wants to rage out of control, Honor’s power cares more about oaths than the spirit of the oath, and I believe cultivation’s power will cultivate anything against all “reason”. Dalinar’s key realization after ascending is that Honor does not care for people’s self improvement. Worded another way Honor lacks a sense of redemption and generally has a childish understanding of what it means to be honorable. Ultimately the other themes in the first few Stormlight books have been Jasnah preaching about replacing kings with a republic structure. Wit teasing Dalinar that he controls unchecked power, and can wager the fate of a planet. Dalinar realizing even in his attempts to do good he was sometimes a tyrant, and Szeth realizing that a singular authority dictating right and wrong may not be possible. Lastly and not least Taravangian’s obsession with the idea that as a former king he should make all the decisions and knows what’s best for everyone. The next few books will be about defining what Honor means to different people and how it can unite with the shards mentioned above. Additonally I believe some of the radiant orders will be more closely associated with some of the dual shards. Overall Brandon has managed to create a complex dialogue that talks about the danger of oaths for their own sake what the nature of honor really means!

coppermind dakhor Just wanted to point out that we may have already seen arts that have the potential to do do anti-dor.