ChillPenguin

I agree with most of what you wrote and really enjoyed the book myself. One thing I want to add is that Nightblood can take investiture remotely now. Kaladin wasn’t even holding him for the entire fight and neither was Szeth at the end yet Nightblood continued to pull from them. I think there was some discussion about an aluminum suit of armor or something but I bet Nightblood would still get investiture from you between the gaps in the armor.

Based on Taravangian’s statements at the end, I think they were just sent to the SR. Also, I’m not sure the Heralds are in the SR but they are in a vision and that’s where all visions have happened so far. I think though that Retribution is actively maintaining the bubble around his people so I would guess he’d know pretty quickly if someone is there that shouldn’t be. I guess there’s a chance he won’t be aware because he will be busy preparing to fight the other shards. In any case, his saving them will be relevant.

There are wires used to cut soft cheeses and egg slices. Of course you could just imagine a sword that is really long and thin. The problem is that if it’s too thin it might droop/sag. I don’t know if we have anything indicating how flexible shardblades are.

In WaT, Ishtar scolds Szeth for casting aside his 5th ideal oath saying that Szeth could have been immortal. Not long after, Kaladin swears his 5th ideal so I would assume he’s got the same benefit. Then when we get the forging of the new Oathpact, Ishar does something to Kaladin to make him immortal. It seems like Syl is all in on this anyway, so Kaladin should already be immortal. Is it because the Radiant immortality depends on Stormlight? Or is it just that Kaladin has to share the same kind of immortality the Heralds have? Or is it because Ishar expected Szeth to just become a Herald at that point? Kind of a crazy thing if 5th ideal radiants can be immortal though. Would that mean they have enough investiture for other passive benefits?

I would guess that spren tried but they couldn’t manage it before. I don’t see why a spren seeking a bond would cause them to fade. Unless this is one of those Intent things. Seems unlikely to me. Also, Notum can’t actually hold anything. He’s controlling the plate from the inside, which is holding the shardblade, but he couldn’t hold the blade on his own.

Buuut Hoid burned a Lerasium bead and we KNOW he is a Mistborn (I mean he can at least use emotional allomancy of one type). He is a weird case too I guess - having held a Dawnshard and existing pre-shattering. I’m just saying he’s definitely not Scadrian. About the atium though, yes all Scadrians should be able to burn it. I feel like Brandon could have been like “atium is a weird godmetal because… reasons.” Or maybe that Preservation is just different and can be burned… Anyway, I agree that the atium advertised is fake.

I’m not sure how much that would help. I think in WaT we see this for the first time, but clearly Nightblood doesn’t have to touch someone to consume their investiture. Wow that’s terrifying.

See I thought based on the conversation Brandon had about it (something about a being with less intelligence/wisdom being given a ton of power), and when Gavinor got pulled into the SR, that Gav would take up honor and then we’d have a young child at the helm of a shard which would really make for interesting choices. Children’s sense of right and wrong can be so brutal. Especially with Gav being upset about broken promises with Dalinar and Navani. I also thought it’d be hilarious to see Dalinar rejected by Honor only to have Gav take it up. Follow this up with Gav being mad at his grandparents… Well anyway that didn’t happen so we are where we are. I’m not super satisfied with the way it played out but I am glad Taravangian was proven wrong. Disclaimer, I don’t mean to say that children are less intelligent than adults but that it would be terrifying if a child held that much power.

I wouldn’t be surprised if Hoid was able to talk to the Wind. Still he seemed very surprised at what Dalinar did… and him having foresight into what happened to Kaladin doesn’t quite jive with that. Maybe he thought a repaired Oathpact would be needed even if Dalinar won. My take on it is that no one knows Kaladin survives as a Herald. Hoid probably won’t be surprised when he finds out though.

I was thinking about Szeth sending furniture all over the place in WoK (it’s been a while since I read it so be kind if I’m off a bit…) and lamented a little that we haven’t seen windrunners fighting inside buildings like that again. Then the thought occurred to me why we don’t see more windrunners sending things flying at their enemies. Now as I’m writing this I remember the Sixth of the Dusk story and it seems the maybe skybreaker has a gun…. As a stepping stone couldn’t anyone with the surge of gravitation carry a pocket full of pebbles and just lash them at high speed at someone? I bet they’d be just like bullets. It works for coinshots right? And actually coinshots are a bit limited in trajectory. Gravitation would allow one of those “bullets” to travel along a more complicated trajectory. Forgive me if this has been talked about before. I did search but didn’t find anything about it.

Doesn’t Urithuru still have TowerLight? This would let anyone still in/around the tower use their surges right? I get that they couldn’t leave and keep using them but Renarin should still be able to read visions. Jasnah can also make elsegates from there - she just would have to not cross through or else she’d be trapped. I also agree that some characters could put the pieces together but my bet is that most of them won’t. Zahel, for example, usually keeps info to himself unless it is really needed and he also knows when something is best kept a secret. As much as it could be comforting for Lirin, etc to know Kal is still out there, Zahel won’t tell (if he even suspects). Also, this explains why Sig feels the way he does about Kaladin in SLM. He’s a scholar and had a ton of time to think, but it seems he doesn’t even think it’s possible that Kaladin is still out there. I assume he also is too busy to care/get news from Roshar.

I just finished the book today and my first overall impression is satisfaction! The main reason I’m satisfied is because I feel we got a ton of answers about things, especially what happened in the past on Roshar. Sanderson did this in a clever way with the spiritual realm. The book also set up the future well too. It wove in a few things from books further in the timeline and set the board. My favorite moments of the book are Szeth and Kaladin, learning to work together. I especially loved Nightblood and his learning to not eat everyone - we will see if that lasts. The final bright point I want to highlight is the Lift interlude. Lift has never been one of my favorite characters, but storm it if I’m not excited to see what she can do in the back half! I think the most underwhelming moment for me is the Contest of Champions. On the one hand, Taravangian toted out his favorite argument and that’s to be expected in a way, but he just beat Jasnah with it. I expected Dalinar to apply “talk no jutsu” to get Gav to forfeit. I am sure that when taken in context of future books this contest will look way better than it does. It truly has been great to spend time with these characters. While many of them ended up in a different place than I’d hoped, there’s still more journey to be had.

I think you’re on to something, but maybe you need both. The Bavadinum would start the separation and the resonant frequencies would convince the investiture to separate more efficiently, possibly with less of an explosion.

I just want to add that we’ve seen mixed condensed investiture be separated with solid Harmonium and Trellium as a catalyst. Yes it was a very violent separation and it didn’t work very well (made only small amounts of Lerasium and Atium). With tones and Trellium you probably could make it more efficient and less explosive. That being said, I will paraphrase Brandon: you can do many things in the Cosmere but the question is how easy it is to do and if it would be a good idea to do it. The answer to those two things is probably “no.” Since purified Dor is a thing and clearly Elantrians figured out how to use AonDor off Sel, the separation isn’t likely to happen. But I do think you could, to some degree, separate some of the investiture. Try it with some captured Dor first in a small lab…. Away from anyone else…

Brandon has talked about the push and pull within investiture in the cosmere, and so with allomancy the pure metal is one of those and the alloy is the other. I don’t know that there’s any mixing recipe going on like you say with base metals. However, godmetal alloys do seem to take on a flavor of the metal the god metal is alloyed with.

Didn’t Hoid say something during one of his story tellings (maybe this one) that the story is intended to be interpreted by the audience. He says he’s not actually pushing a particular message? If he did say that, I think it’s half-true. My impression of his stories are that he’s trying to influence an individual but it’s sort of like inception. He doesn’t directly tell Kaladin a specific thing, doesn’t make it too on the nose because the audience will reject it if the message runs counter to the current beliefs. The story delivers something for Kaladin to think about, probably partly to distract from the emotional hell he was in, and partly to give Kaladin some building blocks to build a new way of thinking. He could say “don’t be so hard on yourself, Kaladin, you’re doing great” and maybe Kaladin needs to hear those words from someone (Lirin!!!), but not from someone like Hoid - he wouldn’t listen.

To add to this a little, Raoden didn’t understand the structure of Elantris until he was on the way to the pool. It’s been a very long time since I read it, but I remember feeling that passage was written so well, the tension when he finally solved the mystery of the Aon that made up Elantris and was about to be thrown in the pool. I also want to add that we should have known even properly drawn aons wouldn’t have worked in the library because the Elantrians were still Hoed and so their connection to the investiture was still weak.

Yes exactly. Vin and Kelsier did not eat Lerasium so they would be weaker steel pushers than Elend and Hoid who ate it. I edited my post to make it more clear. Thanks for pointing that out.

Correct me if I’m wrong but I think all allomancers aren’t created equal. Elend probably can produce a stronger steel push than Vin, and probably also Kelsier, because he (Elend) ate a Lerasium bead (same with Hoid I guess). We do know that a coinshot (or mistborn) needs to balance the forces so if they want to go into the air they have to push against something really heavy. If two coinshots got in a fight and are pushing against the same metal object between them, I don’t think the mass of the coinshot determines how hard they COULD push. If both coinshots are braced against a wall then the one who wins might not be the heavier one. If they are just standing without bracing the heavier one might win out because they have more inertia. You are right though that if a coinshot/mistborn wants to hover then heavier ones have to be able to push more than a lighter one. If you’re a weak coinshot though and you are heavy well…. you probably can’t hover. As to Wax being able to push harder I think it’s because he increases the mass he can push against so he has more capacity to push other objects. If he had his back to a wall, he would be able to allomantically push as hard as he possibly can (assuming his body can take it and the wall doesn’t break).