NH2316

I LOVE this. That would be an incredibly cool explanation, and fit into the Roshar-Scadrian conflict in an interesting way

You're probably right, this is some artificial vessel holding investiture (for, etc.). I also wonder if a shard-gun needs external ammunition, practically speaking, because a ranged projection of the spren itself as a "bullet" seems like it might not work efficiently. From other examples it takes a lot of concentration to make shard-weapons manifest at range for even limited periods of time, like when adolin has to concentrate really hard to throw Maya and keep her manifested after leaving his hand.... although that's with an unbonded/deadeye spren and not a radiant bond...so...?. Nevertheless, spren can't venture too far from you just generally, which would seem to make any manifestation of the spren-as-projectile more limited than an actual projectile. Also, if bonded spren can manifest as viable/practical projectile weapons all on their own, why haven't we seen that yet? e.g. - A shard crossbow seems like it would be pretty game-changing in SA1-5 (a lot more efficient than a sword or spear) and its kind of implausible to me that zero radiants by SA4 would have realized that and tried it out if it really was so easy. Caveat there is ranged shard-weapon capabilities may just be a 4th/5th ideal thing which would also explain why it hasn't been seen....maybe SA5 is going to be shard-crossbow fights in the sky and stuff haha Anyway, because of ^these things, it's been my general theory that a shard-gun would seem to require or at least be most practical with external ammunition - e.g. the spren-gun launches some bullet-like projectile so the spren themselves doesn't have to extend to range. So I wonder if the "power-pack" as Dusk describes it could have two functions - holding a power source plus holding ammunition. I don't know, maybe I'm overthinking this.

Discussions of mechanistic plausibility aside, I do like the idea of everyone gets revenge on Gavilar for F&*%& so many things up and being such a jerk to everyone who ever loved him. That said, that feels very neat and happy to me in a way I don't personally expect to happen. Not entirely. Yes, he will win against Dalinar but I believe by doing that Taravangian will deadeye the Stormfather, which will cause endless Weeping, causing flooding that will destroy Kharbranth, thus Odium will break the deal with Taravangian and that will either be exploited by the Coalition, or it will force Odium to withdraw for a time being. Future Cosmere spoilers, SotD2: I do expect SA5 ends in tragedy - if not an overt version of "Odium Wins", at least "Odium doesn't lose and therein survives to do everything he wants to in the cosmere once the Space Age rolls around". It's an end to an arc (SA1-5), but also a midpoint in the overall SA.....that just seems like too great a chance to end on tragedy to pass up (for presumably some kind of redemption arc in SA6-10). Who know, though?

Oh It's MUCH more complicated. First, going halfway through the spinal cord you *obviously* get Radiant Brown-Sequard Syndrome (google it). You lose motor, vibration, proprioception, and your primary surge on the ipsilateral side below the lesion. On the contralateral side, you lose pain and light touch sensation, and your secondary surge. However, it would be difficult to achieve hemi-section of the spinal-cord with a shardblade without *also* disrupting the other part of your neck. Importantly, you would knock out the carotid, vertebral artery, and internal jugular on the affected side. - Losing the IJ is bad, but with radiant healing maybe it's survivable without lasting damage (obviously you'd need surveillance for developing thromboembolic events proximal and distal, but you could probably survive the bleeding long enough to achieve hemostasis). - Losing the common carotid is a much bigger problem. You stroke out essentially the entire ipsilateral hemisphere of your brain. Maybe some of the brainstem is saved....depending on where you cut the vertebral artery you might have enough collateral flow from the contralateral vertebral to supplement the vertebrobasilar syndrome through it....especially with radiant healing. But your ipsilateral middle, anterior, and posterior cerebral artery territories are TOAST (maybe you save some PCA territory, sight, by vertebrobasilar contributions....but that's a stretch.) Now, this is where things become tragic. Since the stroke is above the pyramidal decussation, it *obviously* means you lose motor on the contralateral side. Now, even though the spinal cord hemisection alone would have preserved contralateral motor function, you now lose motor on that side too. So, you've now lost all voluntary motor movement. Also, you lose effective use of your ipsilateral lung, as the phrenic nerve is likely lacerated. The other effects of the MCA/ACA stroke are varied: - If the cut was on the right, you get hemineglect of the left side. This is bad enough for normal people, but for a radiant it's WAY WORSE. If you or your spren accidentally position yourselves so the spren ends up to the left of you, you stop perceiving their existence. This immediately murders the spren. No take backs.* The only silver-lining is if Shallan stands to your left you also aren't aware of her when she's making puns. - If the cut was on the left, you lose speech function. For a normal human, Broca's or Wernicke's aphasia could apply, but for a radiant something special happens - you end up getting "Shallan's aphasia", wherein you can no longer MAKE cheap puns. Lastly, if your were previously suffering from hyperthyroidism the loss of half your thyroid results in partially-treated thyroid disease. You still need to see lirin to get the other half taken out, but maybe it temporizes your symptoms until you get an appointment. "Be thankful for small blessings..." and some-such. --Anyway, hope this very serious explanation helps! *The mechanism here should again be *obvious*, but if not...... it's because once your spren passes to the neglected left side you no longer believe they exist or in fact ever existed. Like a baby lacking object permanence, the object literally does not exist in your mind if you can't see it (or, as in your case, you technically can see it but the object unfortunately stood to the left of you so you neglect the seeing). For regular objects that's fine - once they pass back to your right side they exist in your mind again. Unfortunately for your spren..... if they don't exist in your mind (as their heavily-Connected radiant), they stops existing in the cognitive realm. Again, sadly, no takebacks.

I think this above is spot on. There are lots of fantasy stories (and Chronicles of Narnia is a great example) which start from an assumption that there is one capital G god. As Duxredux said - nothing wrong with those stories....but the cosmere doesn't seem be as interested in "who's the real god" as a primary end. Instead, it's a lot of more nuanced and novel questions about god and gods (plural) - - What would necessitate that people decide to kill a god? (adolnasium) - How would people respond to learning their god is long dead? (honor & Vorins) - How does a society respond to learning their god is not the only god? (various rosharan peoples) - What is the connection between monarchs and gods? Is godhood simply increasing degrees of relative power over others? Is it right for any being mortal or immortal to place themselves above others even if they have the power to do so? (Taravangian's paternalistic and Machiavellian philosophy of the role of kings..contrasted vs. the less certain, conflicted, and slightly more progressive views of Dalinar/Jasnah/Nohodon). - What of "god-kings" who present themselves as gods to a people....until that people learns that there's some power higher? (The lord ruler / scadrians) - Can a god be in conflict with itself? (Harmony) - What would a god want? And what would they do to get it? (possibly the Iriali One...whoever the One may actually be) ....and plenty more. The thing all these themes and questions have in common though is that they require degrees of godhood and perhaps the "who is GOD full-caps?" to be left unanswered. Moreover, what is interesting about a story focusing on questions like this is not just finding definitive truths....I'd argue its just as much or more what any truths you do find about god/gods say about the people who believe in them. I can understand how you could feel frustrated with this. My own take is that to ask some of the questions above, like "what happens when you learn god is dead", you have to show many possible responses to create contrasts and conflict narratively. It wouldn't be realistic otherwise. A centuries long religious order won't accept that their god is dead overnight - that's asking people to deal with a truth that contradicts their senses of self, community, and being in an absolutely profound way I don't think most people can imagine. In real life, the loss of a long-held faith is a massive and potentially even crippling challenge for people....imagine then what happens if that came with some form of "hard proof" your god was dead.

Love it thanks! I've read The Witcher books, but not The First Law, so I'll try the latter!

Cormac McCarthy? It'll be interesting to hear your thoughts when you finish. In my experience, it's polarizing that way. Slight Spoilers "Truer words......" Etc, re: your feelings in the hidden content. I have similar feelings for Love in the Time of Cholera and The Stranger, which I read around the same time as The Road (very different genres...similar feelings). Alternatively, Anyway..... I'm looking for the next thing to read and would love suggestions. In the past 3ish years I've read a lot of sci-fi and fantasy series I've enjoyed - Foundation, The Expanse, Remembrance of Earth's Past, the Cosmere (all so far), Wheel of Time*, His Dark Materials. Also American Gods (as a single book), plus a ton amount of comics/graphic novels (Hickman's Avengers/FF/X-men, Saga, Invincible, Ewing's Immortal Hulk & Defenders, Grant Morrison's Doom Patrol & X-men, Gaiman's Eternals plus Sandman). With the above in mind as touchstones, does anyone have a single "best" next novel or series they'd recommend while I wait for SA5?

I'm not certain any of that changes what I said. Yes the Shardic Intent (from the power) can't be overwritten entirely, particularly in the long run, but clearly the actions of the Shard as a total Mind + Power entity can be influenced by the Vessel (as the mind).....we know that specifically because of all the examples you cite here. The shard isn't just the power, it's the mind plus the power. So too, then, must the actions of the Shard as a whole entity be both driven by the mind and the power.....and again since action implies actor implies intent....the total entity has an Intent that is some amalgamation of the Intent of the power and the Intent of the Mind. THat's not really that different than human intention, in fact.....your actions (and therefore your lower-case "i" intent) are an amalgamation of emotions and cognitive reasoning (and depending on spiritual or cultural beliefs, some component of "soul"). A person's "mind" and "heart" (and/or "soul") may be in direct conflict in choice and intention, yet ultimately an overall intention leads to a singular action and thereby a singular choice..... all after the compromise/amalgamation of these various components of the person pushing things in one direction or the other. By your own definition, the Vessel at least has some control over perception. So....what's stopping a new vessel from perceiving that contract differently than the old one? Doing so has nothing to do with the Shardic Intent....the Odium Shard's Intent isn't to uphold oaths in the most honorable way possible (that's....Honor). Doing something that completely violates the spirit of the Oath (but follows the letter) seems not only to not be in conflict with the Odium Shardic Intent....it's arguably baked in to it. Yeah, Rayse as Odium didn't or couldn't see it that way, but just as you've cited he also did/perceived a lot of things that probably were from him the vessel and not the Shardic Intent (like re-branding himself as passion, through some sense of self-delusion that Brandon mentions in that quote). Clearly, Taravangian does and can see the Oath as malleable in spirit (if not in letter) - evidenced by the fact he says so. If the Shardic Intent prevented that....then it would have prevented that. Maybe that's not Intent (and I'm not certain it isn't), but if not it's ultimately immaterial. Put differently - even if you think a vessel's perceptions don't count as "capital I" Intent and are some kind of "lower-case i" general intent....it really doesn't matter - it's just semantics. I agree the Shard (both the power and the mind) is bound by an Oath, but the perception of what is or is not allowed by an Oath is what determines an individuals' actions under that oath. That's how oaths work - they're a promise that only has value if all the involved parties understand (i.e. perceive) that promise in the same way. Seems to me the change in Vessel has to at least theoretically allows the Shard (i.e. the Mind plus the Power) to act differently and make different choices with regards to the oath. Otherwise....the Vessel is NOT the Shards "mind" but just an empty husk blindly led by the Shardic Intent.

Vessel's intent? That's not a thing. Vessel's goals and perspective is what you're talking about. What matters is Shardic intent and Vessel's interpretation. Shardic intent is constant, Vessels can change and have different goals and interpretation. The terms are still binding however, even if they are against Vessel's goals. However Taravangian's new perspective can give him different interpretations on those terms, thus finding a loophole, but it's not like he purposely misinterprets those terms - he just sees them in a different light. RoW ch 116: Actually....I'd say that's more of an open question, unless you have canonical confirmation on some finer aspect of Intent mechanics relevant to this of which I'm unaware (completely possible!). Otherwise, the idea that "goals and perspective" are somehow different from Intent rather than just a semantic difference...well I think you could argue that both ways (and to me it certainly seems like semantics, but again that's just speculation in the absence of an in-canon answer, at least to my knowledge). Generally speaking, to have goals and perspectives and actions imply making choices, which implies free-will, which in turn implies intention to make that choice. Action implies actor implies intent to act....roughly speaking. Of course, maybe the in-world metaphysics don't act like this; not everyone in the real world agrees with the idea that free-will and by extension choice exist in the way most people in Western cultures believe they do (aside: some Eastern philosophies are a bit more mixed on "free-will" as a concept, because the concept of free-will as Westerners understand it primarily comes from Judeo-Christian cultural traditions). With that said, I think it's a fairly safe bet to say Brandon the person and the Cosmere (as his creation) probably don't subscribe to the philosophical positions which violate/contradict this view of actors and actions.....e.g. that free-will does NOT exist at all, or that it exists only in the strictest Compatibalist / Hume-type interpretation. Again, of course these are possibilities, but I'm not aware of a confirmation out there where an in-world character says something like "Oh yeah Intent follows Hume rules and not St. Anselm or Descartes".....because that would be ridiculous! Anyway, the point is the fact that since a vessel does act (or even the fact the vessel has goals and perspectives as you put it) it almost certainly implies the Vessel has Intent in this world. The question then comes down to "Whose Intent?". Do the actions/goals/interpretations of the Vessel have anything to do with the Vessel's person? Or are they a Vessel in the most literal sense - i.e. The vessel is just a non-thinking non-acting husk of a container that the Shard's power acts through. In other words, does the container get part of the say in the Shards' actions (and therefore Intent).... and if so how much does this say matter to guide actions? Harmony's letter to Hoid in RoW is about this exact question, and they appear to disagree: "You say that the power itself must be treated as separate in our minds from the Vessel who controls it. I find this difficult to do on an intrinsic level, as although I am neither Ruin nor Preservation, they make up me. Regardless, I will try to do as you suggest. However, you seem more afraid of the Vessel. I warn you that this is a flaw in your understanding. However, though you think not as a mortal, you are their kin. The power of Odium’s Shard is more dangerous than the mind behind it. Particularly since any Investiture seems to gain a will of its own when not controlled. My instincts say that the power of Odium is not being controlled well. The Vessel will be adapted to the power’s will. And after this long, if Odium is still seeking to destroy, then it is because of the power. Of course, I admit this is a small quibble. A difference of semantics more than anything. In truth, it would be a combination of a Vessel’s craftiness and the power’s Intent that we should fear most. Regardless, please make yourself known to me when you travel my lands. It is distressing that you think you need to move in the shadows." Hoid seems to be more "Pro" for the idea that the vessel can guide the shards' actions, while Harmony is a lot more cautious about how much a Vessel can override the Intent inherent to the Shard's power. That said, even Harmony doesn't seem to rule out the idea that the Vessel has some say in what the Shard does in its actions and interpretations (which again, action implies actor implies Intent to act and probably therefore "Intent" in this world). He warns that the combination of Vessel and Shard's power is a real potential problem.....even if he is of the opinion that the power, rather than the vessel, is the more dangerous part of the Shard overall. Point being, if it's not clear to Hoid and Harmony that the Vessel affects Intent (and indeed they seem to both think it does, but are just differing on degrees) it's clearly an open question in the world. In fact, it would be pretty lame if it wasn't an open question and I fully suspect there's no point at which this in-world metaphysical question will be definitively answered....just like the analogous question in real life (via literally thousands of years of philosophy debating questions related to "free-will" and human intent). ....Which then gets to the below. I take your point that when Rayse was the vessel there was clearly no getting out of the contract by all in-world indication. But....all this happened before Taravangian Ascended. So, if a vessel can affect the Shards' overall Intent, everything binding the Shard by intent before ascension could be moot. Not Rayse, Odium as the whole. RoW ch 115: What I meant is that the terms were established based on what Dalinar and Odium meant by saying those words. And what they've meant was said a page or two earlier. Sure it can be misinterpreted but it can't be changed because it's already done and set in stone. Of course, it totally might not work like that. There's near-endless possibilities....it is fantasy... But it certainly doesn't seem crazy or impossible to me. If it does work out that the differences in Rayse and Taravangian as people, via the effect of each on the Shard's actions, leads the latter to be able to do things the former couldn't regarding the contract....well, I think that'd be a really clever and interesting narrative choice. It would pay off Harmony's worry above in a profound dramatic irony for both themselves and Hoid - Harmony is worried that a really crafty and terrible Vessel plus a Shard like Odium is bad news, but they're ostensibly thinking of Rayse as the worst possible example here. What if Taravangian plus Odium is actually worse? (Personally I think it's a decent bet he will be....it sure seems to be the most obvious reason for that twist Ascension in the first place).

Right, forgot about this part.....guessing that's where the idea for Gavilar's immunity from Nale (at least directly) via being King came into my head in the first place haha

Spoiler - This has really made me wonder....Intent matters, but whose Intent? For Intent vis a vis a contract, does that mean the Shard is bound in perpetuity irrespective of the vessel....or does the Vessel's intent matter here? Vessels have some intent separate from the Shards' Intent, though over time the Shard's intent seems to take over In these early stages of Taravodium, Taravangian as Vessel clearly has some measure of Intent different than Rayse and more importantly independent from the Shard overall.....otherwise he wouldn't be able to see/do things differently with the contract compared to Rayse (who held the Shard for tens of thousands of years). So, is the binding part of the contract, via Intent, applied to the shard regardless of the vessel? If so, that'd mean if a vessel took over who didn't agree with the contract negotiated by the previous vessel, the contract would implicitly go against the new vessel's Intent. Would a vessel with Intent strong enough to consider the contract void at the time of Ascension be able to do so, even if only in part? Put simply: The contract is by its nature an agreement between sentient parties, namely Dalinar and Rayse the vessel..... So Rayse was bound by intent.....but is Taravangian? My theory is either (like some have mentioned here) Taravangian does something that forces Dalinar back to the bargaining table (and the contest never happens), or (via this above possibility of a "Well it wasn't ME who made this deal" loophole) Taravangian ignores the contract in part or in whole (and the contest doesn't happen). Ether way, I'd lay speculative odds on the contest not happening (or, if it does happen, occurring only in a Taravangian rigged game) being more likely than the contract actually happening.

I love this. The idea of a single rogue spren bonding humans again and again only to get killed by Nale every time could be a really interesting story - I'd definitely read that novella. Brandon does seem to be interested in borderline-Sisyphean character arcs - i.e. where a hero faces challenges that border on the absurd, yet they persist anyway (a la Camus' "One must imagine Sisyphus happy"). Taln is probably the most pure Sisyphus analogue, but I think you could argue other characters have at least some of that flavor - Kaladin grappling with the somewhat impossible answer of what it means to be a protector in world where multiple parties at war each deserve protecting in their own way (also, whether violence can ever "save"), and certainly some from other stories *spoiler* Anyway, a Spren who binds humans again and again despite getting killed every time would fit that mold and I think be a compelling story. I wouldn't guess Syl specifically, just because we do know a lot about her activities prior to binding Kaladin (at least compared to other spren), but could totally see it as something that's plausible within the continuity....including for most other radiant spren we now know about. I actually wouldn't count on the spren remembering each time about their prior attempts - we know that Syl doesn't remember her previous radiant until she's progressed quite far with Kaladin and regained a large portion of her Physical Realm sapience & sentience. However, she does seem to remember the pain associated with losing a bond long before she remembers the prior radiant and details about her life before kaladin. Maybe the same for Pattern? Although - always has been unclear to me how much or how little Pattern knew about Testament early on. He's super matter-of-fact all the way back in WoR that Shallan is going to kill him and the cryptic will send someone to replace him and that's mostly something they're OK with....so maybe the differences compared to honorspren means he knows more. Either way though, that would make a great novella or secret history type story. Yeah this is the part that bothers me too. It would seem to me that not chasing our three earliest Radiants likely eliminates Nale using a magical method of locating them (e.g. sense of Connection via spiritual realm between radiants/heralds), and moreover implies that whatever the mechanism he used it actually had a lot of flaws.....and hence he should have missed more radiants in the past (depending on how long he's been at it). I like the "masking" idea - reminds me of how in Star Wars Jedi like Yoda hide their presence in the force by remaining close to strong wells of power (Dagobah swamp). I could see a few issues with some of the individuals...but like you said this is pure speculation until further details which could explain the discrepancies: Also, I guess a masking effect wouldn't need work only by "physical" proximity....maybe it is a masking effect but it's more like masking via people close to you via Connection who were "port-radiants" then died. That would clean up some of the above "messiness" since you have relatives in each case. Either way, though, all the above leaves so many questions about how it worked and (at least to me) really raises doubts that whatever Nale used to find surgebinders was actually that effective....hence, leaving the door open to write in another radiant or two being in hiding until Nale gives up his hunt in oathbringer.

Thanks. Right, I should have been clearer - I meant other than skybreakers, since they didn't participate in the Recreance. Yeah this is the part that's interesting to me...assuming he stopped all of them.... How did he know where and when to find them? Maybe the skybreakers were more integrated into society for intelligence gathering about possible radiants than I've assumed, plus or minus getting some knowledge from the Highspren via what they knew of other radiant spren movement in shadesmar. That said, it seems like someone could likely have slipped through especially in light of the WoB you cited above (thanks for that!) suggesting that this was more of a Nale thing and the rest of the order wasn't exactly laser-focused on hunting surgebinders 24/7 like he was. It just seems strange and intriguing - to my knowledge we don't really have an in-world mechanism yet where someone would be able to "detect" a spren bond happening just anywhere in Roshar, other than the stormfather /bondsmith, when an ideal is being sworn. Presumably there is another way, which Nale used, and we just don't know it yet.....

I'm re-reading books 1-4 before wind and truth (currently at beginning of RoW), and one question that's been going through my mind is....how many radiants were there since the Recreance, if any at all, before the current story starts? I've had more trouble finding a confirmed answer to the "how many, if any at all" question than I expected (searching the coppermind, forums, WoB, and in my re-read), which has only made me more intrigued. Of characters we've seen in the books, the first to bond a spren would seem to be Shallan/Testament. Of course, Nale also has been around killing surgebinders for a while, starting sometime after the Recreance. As far as I can tell, we don't have confirmation when Nale started this, but I'd guess "a while before Shallan/Testament?" Technically, even if Nale was doing it for a long time that too doesn't rule out the possibility that Shallan is the overall "First", because we don't know if any of the surgebinders Nale murdered were bonded & progressed enough to get their blade. Which raises other questions in turn, like how "successful" was Nale at preventing radiants before Shallan? Did he kill them all before they progressed far enough? Does anyone know the answer to this? Do people expect we could learn more in future books about Radiants before the current characters (but after the Recreance)? Note, I've made a few assumptions her, namely that "Radiant" means they've not just bound a spren but gotten their blade. While I'm still unsure on whether getting a blade is the "true" cutoff for "Radiant" vs. "Surgebinder not yet a Radiant", it seems to me from what's said about Kaladin in books 1/2 that the very earliest steps of binding a spren and surgebinding aren't considered as such.

Love this.

I think you've convinced me. The (seemingly incorrect) way I've been thinking about the future sight is that its' not just presenting the user with a "Menu" of equally-probable possibilities, it also has to have a second component that helps the user understand the likelihood of each possibility beyond their base-level judgement. i.e. - I'd felt the future sight had to give powerful future-seers the ability to not just know not only the the options but also infer which future was most likely. Like I said above, that would imply the future sight gives a window into peoples' Intents and Identities (or "heart"), since you need to know Intent/Identity to estimate the likelihood of a person making any given choice.... But... So....future-sight really is just a "menu" of (from the seer's perspective) equally-possible futures....and the seer has to make their best guesses regarding the choices people will make from nothing more than external observation and conjecture (i.e. as opposed to knowing anything about Intent/Identity/"Heart"). Therefore, the seer has to use decidedly human levels of conjecture from prior observed events to guess at probability of outcomes on that menu: 1. You can with nearly 100% confidence rule out the absurd futures (e.g. Taravangian spontaneously turns into a potted plant), because though *theoretically* possible they are absurd 2. You can with extremely high confidence rule out the highly implausible (e.g. Navani and Lirin collaborate to invent the world's first antipsychotic/mood-stabilizing medications which, along Kaladin achieving breakthroughs in cognitive behavior therapy, allow Ishar to manage his psychosis and thereafter lead a happy and productive life that doesn't involve vivisecting/defiilng corpses and spren....he also takes up yoga). 3. You have to guess for all the rest (the plausible futures) what choices people will make and what futures are likely based on nothing more than your external observation of past actions (Taravangian building hospitals and presenting himself as champion of the sick, Renarin as a seemingly minor player seemingly overshadowed by the rest of his family). You filter those through your own internal biases, and then get extremely imperfect judgements on how to act on your future sight (Cultivation: "This taravangian guy is a really kind grandfatherly soul....he'd be a much better Odium than Rayse", or Odium: "Renarin who? Only the Blackthorn is a threat to me from that family because I only value rage and strength and a capacity for violence"). To put a cap on it all, a framework to understanding why future sight is so fallible could be that, while basically every seer will agree on the massive gap in probability between categories #1 and #2, some seers (by virtue of imperfect knowledge and implicit biases) may disagree on what scenarios fall in #2 vs. #3. Jokes aside about a mental-health revolution on Roshar and Ishar opening a yoga studio, Rayse may see the "Renarin gets the best of me" scenario as equally implausible just because of who Rayse is and what he values (strength through violence, blood lust, hate, defeating ones enemies through overtly masculine notions of strength)....whereas others would correctly conclude that Renarin was arguably the most dangerous Kholin for Rayse, especially if underestimated.

Hmmmm yeah I forgot about this part. You're right - the point of this exposition by Cultivation clearly seems to be establishing that the unknowable "heart" of man is another key limitation of the way future-sight works (and maybe the biggest limitation) I guess that just leaves me with more questions though, and a bit of frustration at how vague "heart" is here. You could read "heart" as meaning the persons' Intent, except that can't be right because even lesser beings burning atium clearly see the other persons' Intent. You could read it too as meaning what a persons' Identity is, since Identity will influence their future actions in a probabilistic way.....yet this too doesn't make sense because if future-sight isn't able to draw inferences about a person's future actions from their identity then it seemingly shouldn't work at all (Identity directly informs a persons' choices under any set of circumstances, and choice is the literal difference between any possible futures, making it seems pretty implicit that future sight has to draw inferences about causality between the two). With those two possibilities out of the way, I don't know what "hearts of men" would literally mean in this worlds' established rules, at least in any way that makes sense to me for allowing the prediction of possible futures.... the term just feels like vague hand-waving to avoid the problem of giving an omnipotent entity the ability to see the future (i.e. it makes them overpowered). How overpowered the future sight for a Shard seems like it *should be* bothered me in RoW, because it seems to me there should be no reasonable way a being as powerful as Rayse-Odium could get outplayed by Renarin. Odium's consciousness is otherwise presented as insanely far-reaching (as are most of the shards), being able to see and act in multiple places across space and with a multi-tasking power orders of magnitude greater than any person. No matter how powerful Renarin is, at the end of the day he's still got the brain of a human, which can only focus on a couple of things at a time and can only act through direct effects on the world (unlike Rayse-Odium, who can act through the singers, spren, and other much more far reaching vectors, and seemingly focus Intent on a large though not limitless number of tasks at once). That said, it probably just relates to mechanisms we don't know enough about yet, and the unknowability of the "heart of man" will take on more specific meaning in later books. There's a WoB out there about the fact that we really haven't been made privy to any character yet through whom we can glean the mechanics of Fortune, and that this is on purpose....so presumably there's more here. Here I agree it seems like she miscalculated, outside the possibility that she's actually playing a much longer game and for some reason Taravangian instead of Rayse as Odium was somehow preferable to her long-term goals (seems highly unlikely based on what we know about Taravangian, and the fact that RoW sets him up as seeing opportunities Rayse did not). Or maybe it's just due to her Shards' Intent - she cultivates, which implicitly means letting fostering growth into something new and possibly unexpected. All that said, I actually seriously question whether Cultivation is *truly* the most powerful Shard at future seeing. She's been identified, along with Preservation, as one of the strongest....but to my knowledge it's not explicitly been established that she is THE strongest being at future-sight. Since we also know very little about a lot of different Shards who we either haven't met yet or have only met in limited circumstances....I've generally suspected there's another Shard out there who is stronger than Cultivation in this regard (or, possibly, a non-Shard being like Hoid carrying one of the Dawnshards...since we don't know what all of them do yet and how that interacts with Fortune and the future/futures) .

This certainly seems more likely than Ishar having seen/visited/gotten confused by alternate timelines. But... don't bondsmiths (or at least Dalinar) need to establish physical touch to see another persons' full web of Connections (RoW ch.66)? So I don't know if he could see Dalinar's connections here. That may just be Dalinar, and bondsmith powers are decidedly the most varied between individuals of the order, and Ishar being powered by the Honorblade instead of the Stormfather's bond could mean the difference. Regardless, I wonder if it's' even simpler than that. The way I read that passage is that Ishar's seemingly boundless paranoia and insanity doesn't require much more than "this dude is living in my house" to jump to "he must be serving Odium, and he must be his Champion.... because the only way someone could have become a Bondsmith post-Recreance MUST be a pact with the devil, because anyone who isn't me is the devil <insert maniacal crazy laugh>." As you said, he's mad as a hatter. This got me thinking - How does two Shards both divining the future affect the outcome of the future, especially since... 1. ...some are canonically better at future-scrying than others.... 2. ....all are REALLY powerful at it compared to mortals.... 3. ....there's only 16 Shards.... ...? To most beings it certainly will seem chaotic....and even to some Shards...but what happens for the Shard who truly is the best at telling futures? When two atium users fight, their abilities to see futures *mostly* cancel one another out because both parties see a positive feedback loop of reactions to possible actions, and reactions to those reactions, etc. This is because, presumably, both atium users are pretty balanced in investiture, and (again, *mostly*) have similarly-limited processing powers of the mind to interpret and react (and equal and opposite Intent - i.e. survive and kill the other person). We know the Shards are literally omnipotent (i.e. their Investiture is a fraction of infinity, which is to say, still infinity), but not truly omniscient. To know a certain future, the Shards have to have Intent to see that part of the otherwise infinite possibilities just like humans do. The "processing power" component for a Shard is orders of magnitudes greater than baseline humans, so much so that by comparison to a human it's like they are "functionally" omniscient, but its' nevertheless still true that they need to "try"/"want" to know a particular part of the infinitely branching timelines before they *actually* know it and therefore can act to achieve the future they desire. Moreover, we know some Shards (Cultivation) are simply better at telling the future than others (I've assumed this is due to their variable "processing powers" and inherent Intents, among probably other factors like the Vessel). So - you have up to 16 entities actively trying to achieve their ideal future, by obtaining predictions of "The" future obtained in parallel, doing it by a process where through their Intent they choose to "mine" finite parts of the theoretically infinite future, having differential power between one another in how comprehensive their finite grasp of the infinite is at any given time, and then all of them reacting to these finite "slices" of infinite future (and reacting, and future telling, and reacting, ad infinitum). By the atium example, where a balance between parties makes everything even out mostly net-neutral, you could expect the converse should be true here since future seeing power is unbalanced - i.e. whichever being (e.g. Cultivation) can combine infinite Investiture with the largest parallel-processing power to mine possible futures at the fastest/most comprehensive rate possible *should* inevitably always "win". Specifically, "win" here means that among all the beings reading and acting (and reacting...) on their future-telling to produce their desired future, the best Shard at future telling will by definition collapse all possible futures into ironically just one inevitable "True" future - i.e. the one they want, which they WILL get, since they're just better at predicting and acting then reacting than everyone else. Effectively, that single Shard best at telling the future is the only entity for whom the process ISNT chaotic and ISNT wrong, and conversely EVERY vision of the others will ultimately turn out wrong (because they get left several steps behind in the future-telling - acting - future telling - acting cycle from the GOAT future teller at the top). Except.....we don't see evidence yet that things actually work that way. If the best future telling Shard is destined to collapse all futures into their desired one, it should make future-telling fail for all lesser beings, and fail literally every time except for when their desired short or medium term outcomes align with the "Ultimate future-teller's" desired future. Since that's one option out of infinity, the odds of a future-teller getting ANY prediction right would be infinitesimal. Moreover, it should make that strongest future-telling shard to be invisible to all the other shards in the future, which would be an ironic "tell" that one Shard simply is destined to "Win" (as defined above) - i.e. the other shards would be expected to changes their actions to give up future-telling since they realize its' pointless (they can't keep up with the GOAT). Maybe we just haven't seen from that "top future-teller" character's point of view (or even met that character...though references to Cultivation being a strong future teller are abundant), and so to us the readers like all the other characters it just looks like chaos. Or, as would be ironic, maybe the character with the greatest "future-telling" ability in the Cosmere lacks the will to act on that ability (since the inevitability of their "win" depends on an assumption that they are actively using their "scrying" to the fullest extent to guide their actions to a desired future, and moreover doing it constantly until the end of time). The latter would seem to me like it would just cede "inevitability of the Win" to the next strongest Future-telling Shard who WAS actively trying to steer events to a desired future...possibly again and again until you get to Odium (since we KNOW he's trying to do this).... Basically, does the above imply Odium "Wins" unless a Shard stronger than he at future telling (e.g. Cultivation?) wants to win? I don't know my head has started to hurt.

Yes, I think something Fortune related, or at least adjacent. Maybe a sort of "atium-fabrial" (though I doubt literally powered by atium, since its' rare). My initial reaction, reading "Are you certain this is the right time?” followed by "Of course I’m not sure....The device is always unpredictable, don’t you know?”, was holy $%&# did Brandon just introduce time-travel and that's a time travel device and this is Demoux/Galladon/Baon coming to observe an event they know about in the past from sometime in the future??? It had a "When are we?" quality to it that triggered my spidey-sense for every fantasy/sci-fi story involving time travel and the multiverse. ....After settling down for a sec and thinking about the likelihood of Brandon introducing time-travel as a real thing that happens in the cosmere, for these 3 characters we already know and whom we have already seen on Roshar presumably traveling by normal means (perpendicularity), with no prior hints to suggest that time travel is a thing in this universe, and revealed in an interlude preview reading.....well, suffice it to say that reaction was silly. That said, I think there may be something going on here about, if not traveling to/from the future, then predicting the future. It could be that the device just pings in the presence abnormal/abnormally strong spren or other Invested phenomena and that's all it is....but personally it felt more to me like them showing up to that spot and that time had intention to it and the device was how they knew when and where to be (i.e. it seemed like they were there to witness some specific event they expected/hoped to witness in the future). Seeing/divining possible futures is a well-established in-canon thing, often at the Shard level, but also at the individual level under certain circumstances (Renarin, using atium, last words of dying Rosharans....etc.). We also know that in general the number of futures you see by these means is semi-limited (hence "Of course I’m not sure....The device is always unpredictable, don’t you know?”) to a finite number of futures rather than true infinity (though for shards with strong future-divining skills maybe it gets close to "functional" infinity?). Incidentally, there was a new WOB (#38 Nov. 21, 2023) discussing how much Brandon dislikes a truely infinite multiverse but is a bit more interested in a limited/finite approach to alternate futures/timelines......and all that seems to fit mechanistically here. So, my theory is that the device is something that forecasts future events, but (because magic is more interesting when it has downsides/limits/costs) it will show you say 5-7 possible times of possible future events and you can't really know which is the "true" future. Thus, the 17th shard crew is using it to predict within some margin of error where they should be to have a chance of observing possible, but not inevitable, events of Realmatic interest. There's also got to be more limitations to it then that, namely I can't imagine its' an overt crystal ball that can predict any/all "interesting/important comere events" imaginable. Again, this would violate the general spirit of probability in this world where the number of alternate futures/events is potentially large but nevertheless finite....for instance when you burn atium, the possibilities you see notably do NOT ever include the person attacking you spontaneously turning into a potted plant or blue whale a la the Hitchhikers' Guide. Moreover, following the principle that doing anything impressive with an inanimate object usually takes a good amount of investiture at a high burn/decay rate (e.g. Fabrials, hemolurgic spikes, all the Breath-powered things, etc.) it would seem that you'd need a near-Shardic (i.e. actually infinite) amount of Investiture to power a device that could predict any possibility happening anywhere at any time. More likely, it's something that needs "tuned" to a specific target type of event you already suspect *could* happen (e.g. Iriali migrations, given that they've already done it 4 times before). In that case, the device simply helps you to get a (still unpredictable) estimate of when the thing you *think* *might* happen could/might/will actually happen. A need to target a specific type of event/future to be seen with the device would also kind of mirror how seeing the future for Shards is described, wherein they have to turn their attention (i.e. with Intent) to the parts of possible timelines they're interested in before they can see/learn those possibilities (even if they have exponentially more processing power than a mortal, the Shards clearly do not have "true" omniscience....though the ones better at telling futures seem to come close). In that vein, a "future-fabrial" would certainly have to be even more targeted/limited than the way Shards see things, likely by several orders of magnitude. Still, it's an interesting possible development. ....Or.... its' just a run of the mill Investiture-o-meter that dings when a lot of Investiture is about to be expended such as (but not exclusive to) a mass perpendicularity exodus, and the 17th shard crew's reason for knowing to be in that place and time had nothing to do with the device ...or its' a time machine.... ....except no still definitely not a time machine.

Playing off of this, I think a really nice and on-theme 5th ideal would be an acknowledgement (and commitment to) a more proactive approach to "Protection". Right now, the forms of protection that Kal and the windrunners have showcased are just a minority of what "protection" can really mean. Specifically, their actions in the name of protection have all been decidedly "reactive" (rather than proactive) and occur at the time of an active threat (as opposed to before a potential threat, or after a threat has passed). Kal et. al are always jumping in to defend someone who is actively in harms' way right now, both for obvious external threats (war, physical violence) and acknowledgement of more subtle internal threats (Kal's mental health, and helping those already struggling with trauma). Protection can be/is far more than that though, and I see two really intriguing and opposing possibilities for the 5th Ideal stemming out of that observation. First, it is arguable that preventing conflict and harm in the first place is a much more effective form of protection than waiting to act until harm is imminent. The analogy here would be the difference between giving antibiotics to those who contracted a disease vs. vaccinating (or applying other other preventative/public health measures and public health) to prevent the disease in the first place (note these aren't mutually exclusive....just different focuses of protection). In practice, this would be an ideal to lead by brokering peace between opposing factions (to prevent conflict), building resilience in communities and people before they suffer harm, and even a recognition that sometimes your efforts to protect people might harm others (and that therefore you need to step back to prevent further harm, like the prior radiants did). So, the Oath would be something like this: "I will lead us into a world where people no longer need protecting". The whole saga of Stormlight 1-5 is based around an endless cycle of violence destined to forever repeat itself and put generation after generation in harms' way....and how the inevitability/cyclical nature of that horror just grinds the worlds' protectors beneath the ever-turning wheel of despair until they have nothing left to give (the Heralds walking away when they can no longer take another cycle of torture, the radiants walking away when they learn that the singers are victims and that humans are essentially an invasive species, and Kal's own personal journey from SA1-4.). Thus, a 5th ideal embodying a more proactive vision of protection, changing the world to prevent the sources and root causes of harm, really fits the overall series arc. It's a kind of "I will break The Wheel" reckoning, which in turn could lead to some very interesting (and not all necessarily positive) places. Note it also nicely builds off the 4th ideal - in recognizing you can't save everyone (i.e. your 1st through 3rd ideal version of protection is insufficient), you then naturally look to how you can prevent people from coming to harm in the first place (to address the insufficiency by swimming "upstream"). Second, there's also a sort of "opposite" way a 5th ideal could cause the windrunners to re-interpret and expand their mandate of protection compared to how they've approached it thus far. Besides stepping in to fight active threats to people now (the status quo of "protection"), or seeking a preventive approach to change the root causes of harm in the world and protect future generations (the new more proactive, and arguably "healthier" approach to "protection"), the remaining possibility is acting on behalf of those who have already been irreparably harmed by avenging them. "We will avenge those we could not protect", or "I will defend the Honor of those I failed to protect". It's certainly not as poetic, but it would be a very interesting and dark approach to the 5th ideal because it takes the Intent of Honor to its' most extreme conclusion. Namely, the most extreme adherence to lower-case "h" honor demands you defend honor, and an oath to protect the honor of those experiencing harm would dictate a need to seek vengeance on behalf of those who were harmed and we could not save. Thus, it would be a bit of a heel-turn for the Windrunners, since implicitly they would be mandated to disperse vengeance or rectify debts based on the decidedly subjective nature of honor (i.e. how does one decide what honor "demands"? And how do you prevent perpetuating a cycle of never-ending retribution and violence?). In a dark way, this would also build off the fourth ideal ("if we can't save them, then we will avenge their honor"). It would also be a a pretty strong mandate once you've sworn it - I can imagine a few interesting ways TaravOdium could co-opt an Oath to protect honor (i.e. by righting the worlds' wrongs). Odium could leverage the subjectivity to (lower-case) honor in order to capture the windrunners' aims for their own designs (never-ending cycle of violence-retribution-retribution for retribution). Or, less overtly, Odium could position things so that honor (or Honor) demands those swearing this dark possibility of the 5th Ideal have to direct their retributive violence at Odiums' enemies even if they don't support Odium's goals ("avenging" the Shattering of Adolnasium by attacking the remaining Shards, maybe?). In these kind of ways, Odium would effectively achieve final victory over Honor by perverting their Intent to its' darkest possible conclusion. I don't know if this second possibility is overall very likely, given that at some point this conception of the "dark side" of Honor/honor starts to overlap with the more obvious dark side of the Law (defending/enforcing an unjust law), and especially since we've seen multiple Skybreakers but no Windrunners in the "space age". However, it'd be an interesting - if incredibly tragic and dark - twist.