Jult

I meant the four pure tones - not rhythms. My bad. Venli hears them in WaT: The argument given for Valor are that Taravangian can't see Valor when he looks to the skies in WaT I-4: So, the idea is, if there is a 4th Shard on Roshar, it must be Valor since they are the only Shard that Taravangian could not see. Also, Wit says dragons are "tricky lizards who hide where you least expect them" in WaT Chapter 21. Valor's original Vessel was the dragon, Medelantorius (although I'd point out that we don't know if Medelantorius is still Valor and there are WoBs that suggest she may not be). There are additional bits of evidence too, but those are the big ones. It's not a horrible theory. I'm just a bigger fan of the 4th godspren idea. Although, I suppose both could be true. One being true wouldn't disprove the other.

As Treamayne already said, it's from the Cosmere RPG - specifically the Stormlight World Guide. I plug RPG information into Topics a lot because I'm a big fan of it and I know a lot of readers don't plan to play so they may not see the info otherwise. I strongly agree with this. I am primarily speculating and theorizing. Odds are I'm wrong and Brandon has something different up his sleeve. I'm really hoping we get at least a little more data. Maybe from some WoBs or the Horneater novella (if that ever comes out). One thing that ign__o's comment reminded me of (I couldn't tell you why - I guess because they mentioned children and moons in the same post) is the story Wit tells in Oathbringer about the 3 moons. The one where the Natan Queen Tsa tricks Mishim into trading places so she can have Nomon's child. I have absolutely no idea how that could be connected to the 4th moon. But it is an interesting coincidence that: A. The Natan people's myths connect them to the child of a moon. B. The 4th moon was buried under Natanatan. I truly don't have anything more interesting to say about that, but does anyone else see a stronger link there than I do?

I think Tin gets misrepresented a lot. It's often referred to as enhanced or increased senses. But it's really increased sensitivity. Or, as I prefer to phrase it, weakened tolerances to certain stimuli. Enhanced strength and weakened tolerance still aren't perfect opposites, but I think they fit better as a push/pull pair when you imagine them this way. It also fits a bit better with certain non-Mistborn Cosmere facts about these metals such as [incredibly minor Stormlight Archive non-plot spoiler]:

Did someone say RPG? I've got you. They do need Voidlight to compress their bodies. The skill is called Tight Form. Here's the description: However, they can decompress their bodies explosively for free since it's done by just releasing the Surge. The Hair is a bit different. They can use it as a spear or whip without spending Investiture, but it does cost Investiture if they use the hair to restrain someone. Still, I'd vote for the hair thing as their passive Tension power. The skills where they can use it without spending Investiture still feel very Tension-related.

Actually, in Oathbringer, Rayse taunts/compliments Taravangian about how impressive the Diagram is for having been created without access to Fortune. Taravangian's predictions were very accurate, but they were calculated from the information that he had available to him and Kaladin's existence wasn't included in that information. As for Ishar, I don't actually think he was specified to be using Fortune. I think he only briefly glimpsed into the Spiritual Realm, which (based on the Rayse quote) above seems to be a separate means from Fortune for seeing the future. That's just me being nitpicky about definitions though. Whether by Fortune or some other means, Ishar did seem to be using some kind of future sight. And he mentions twice how strange it is that he missed Kaladin, especially considering Kaladin's Connections to Szeth and Dalinar, who Ishar was watching closely. Wind could be causing this. But I think the more likely culprits are Rlain and Tumi. Rlain bonds Tumi immediately before Navani bonds the Sibling. And Ishar saw into the Spiritual Realm because of Navani bonding the Sibling. I think Rlain and Tumi's presence at Urithiru hid Kaladin from Ishar in the same way that Renarin and Glys hid things from Odium.

Actually, Endowment may have also accomplished this. WoB:

Well, none of the Shards are inherently good or evil. Brandon has stated as much before. I haven't personally heard Devise as an option before. I would maybe suggest putting Whimsy in that category instead of Autonomy. Whimsy in the sense of improvisation or imagination would fit with the other 3 nicely in my opinion. Of course, then Autonomy would be stuck under Feel, which feels a bit odd. But maybe Autonomy in the sense of freedom could work there? Or you could swap Autonomy again with Honor, Valor, or Ambition. I think any of those 3 could fit under Feel depending on how you define them.

Brandon did mention a very long time ago that Kaise and Daorn would be main characters for Elantris 2 (WoB). Not sure if that's still the plan, but he did have bigger plans for them at some point. I mean obviously we know Kaise joined the Ghostbloods, but it's cool to know there were plans for Daorn too. Also, they hate when Lukel calls them "the Twins". And, if Hoid knew that about them, he'd call them "the Twins" every chance he got just to antagonize them.

This never occurred to me, and I find it super interesting. "Terris" just comes from the word "Terr" which means "to Preserve". If "Terris" means "people of Preservation" then it pretty much just means "people" since all living things are of Preservation. So, the three prophecies that mention the Terris people specifically, could just be translation errors: “The Hero of Ages was removed from the Terris people. He was not royalty himself, but came to it eventually. ” “...One who is separated from the Terris people, a king of men, a rebel caught between two worlds. ” “The Terris people rejected him, but he came to lead them. ” I wonder if there is a character somewhere in the Cosmere that will fit every prophecy.

Hey! This sounds fun. A few questions (spoiler tagging the whole list since some of them are Emberdark spoilers):

Oh, that's probably specific to me, but my PCs are very untrusting toward Alethi soldiers. They wanted nothing to do with Bordin and company. So, they followed the caravan at a distance rather than joining it. Still, I agree the 2-day gap I have is too large. The PCs probably would arrive around the same day as Taln. That just leaves awkwardness around the timing of the duel. I was just trying to avoid that altogether by shoehorning some extra days in, but you're right - it'd be better to keep them occupied with some of the side missions while the duel is happening.

Agreed. The very last change I made was adding an extra week of travel time between the events of Chapter 1 and 2 to get the dates to line up how I wanted. I think this was a bad fix. I should have just extended the amount of time that the party spends in the Warcamps instead. So, something like this: Chapter # Vorin Date(s) Novel Chapters Chapter 1 + One Week of travel 1173.10.4.1 through 1173.10.5.1 47 through 60 WoR Chapter 2 1173.10.5.1 through 1173.10.6.3 60 through 62 WoR Four Weeks of travel + Chapter 3 1173.10.6.3 through 1173.10.10.3 63 through 88 WoR Nine days of sailing 1173.10.10.3 through 1174.1.2.2 Time between WoR and OB (also overlaps Edgedancer) Chapter 4 1174.1.2.2 through 1174.1.8.3 5 through 47 of OB Downtime then Travel to Emul (Two weeks total) 1174.1.8.3 through 1174.1.10.3 47 through 68 of OB Chapter 5 1174.1.10.3 through 1174.2.4.2 68 through 99 of OB Two days of Prep and SIXTY-FIVE Days of sailing 1174.2.4.2 through 1174.3.7.4 99 through End of OB Chapters 6/7 1174.3.7.4 through 1174.3.8.2 After OB but months before Dawnshard and nearly a year before RoW That would make the highstorm in Chapter 1 the 8th Highstorm on 10.4.1. I'd still place WoR I-7 on 10.4.4. Meaning Bordin and company took 3 days to finish their journey to the camps after the events of Chapter 1. That's consistent with the Shallan quote you gave and it's the day Wit arrives back in the camps as well. I know Wit took a slight detour, but I'd speculate he has some speedier ways of getting around. And then the PCs can show up 2 days later on 10.5.1. I'm personally trying pretty hard to show up in the warcamps after 10.4.5 because that is the day of Adolin's duel. I feel it simplifies things a bit to do this because: There's no way my party would miss that show if they had a chance to attend. I think many of the NPCs in Chapter 2 would have gone to watch the duel. Amaram absolutely was there. There's a nice little lull in novel events here since Kaladin and Adolin are in prison. So, there's not much to keep track of. I've really been trying to pin down the order of events here. In WoR Chapter 58 (10.4.5), Dalinar argues with Kaladin for challenging Amaram post-duel. Kaladin convinces his to look into Amaram again. In WoR Chapter 60 (10.6.1), Navani sends Shallan a letter saying Dalinar has fallen ill and is taking time to recover. We later find out that this was a ruse to cover the time Dalinar spent bonding the cleaver Shardblade that Taln arrived in Camp Kholin with. It sounds like he's already been "sick" for a few days, but we aren't given any exact numbers. 10.6.1 could very well be his last "sick" day if he started bonding the Shardblade if he started bonding it the day after speaking with Kaladin. Whenever Dalinar finished bonding the blade (presumably between 10.6.1 and 10.6.4) he had it hidden in a cave and had Bordin spread rumors that Taln spoke of a hidden cache of Shardblades. Amaram made arrangements to see Taln in person because he wanted to verify the rumors. The Ghostbloods found out about these arrangements while spying on the Sons of Honor. And both groups paid sneaky visits to Taln on 10.6.4. At some point afterwards, Amaram went and took the Shardblade from the cavern, but pinning down what day this happened is hard. Amaram shows up to the feast in WoR-67 on 10.8.2 and tells Dalinar he's "still investigating". On 10.8.5, Amaram lies and says the Investigation turned up nothing. Dalinar knows this is a lie and calls him out on it on the same day, revealing his ruse. The reason I think the PCs run into Amaram before he visits Taln is because I suspect Amaram departs for the cave rather immediately after visiting Taln. He seemed very eager to go get the Shardblade and had every excuse to since Dalinar sent him on an "official" mission to verify "Taln's claims". Although a good counterpoint is that if he had picked the cleaver Shardblade up any day before 10.7.5, he (or some other Son of Honor) would have had time to bond the blade before his confrontation with Dalinar.

I love that he called out readers who "compulsively track these things" and I still failed to track it.

Ooh now THAT is something I didn't notice. That's the beautiful thing about the Cosmere. There's always more to discover. I was hoping to help OP find a layer that they'd enjoy. It's clear they really liked the first few books. I get the impression their ranting is less about them hating the book and more about them hating that they hate it.

Both fun ideas. If the Dor is fully used up, I think Selish MoIs would probably continue to exist in some form, but the rules around them would change. Specifically, the rules around geographic location would probably no longer apply since that's a direct effect of the Dor being in the Cognitive Realm. I think that would just be apocalyptic for Sel. WoB:

Oh, we are on the same wavelength. I've been working on this too. I tried to collect my notes here, but they're kind of ramble-y and I needed to circle back and revise some dates as I went which is hard to capture and keep organized. So, they're here in this spoiler tag for people who care about showing your work. But I'd probably just advise people looking for a quick answer to skip past it and look at the table I summarized the dates in after. Chapter # Vorin Date(s) Novel Chapters Chapter 1 + Two Weeks of travel 1173.10.4.1 through 1173.10.6.1 47 through 60 WoR Chapter 2 1173.10.6.1 through 1173.10.6.3 60 through 62 WoR Four Weeks of travel + Chapter 3 1173.10.6.3 through 1173.10.10.3 63 through 88 WoR Nine days of sailing 1173.10.10.3 through 1174.1.2.2 Time between WoR and OB (also overlaps Edgedancer) Chapter 4 1174.1.2.2 through 1174.1.8.3 5 through 47 of OB Downtime then Travel to Emul (Two weeks total) 1174.1.8.3 through 1174.1.10.3 47 through 68 of OB Chapter 5 1174.1.10.3 through 1174.2.4.2 68 through 99 of OB Two days of Prep and SIXTY-FIVE Days of sailing 1174.2.4.2 through 1174.3.7.4 99 through End of OB Chapters 6/7 1174.3.7.4 through 1174.3.8.2 After OB but months before Dawnshard and nearly a year before RoW I think the timing on Chapter 2 matters the most because that's the closest you get to novel events. Also, Chapter 4 has an exact date in it because we know when the first Everstorm hit, but they built in a 15-day buffer for that, so you don't need to try very hard to keep on a schedule. For the rest of the adventure, you can play pretty loose with the timelines and not really worry about impacting canon events from the novel. The only other way I can think of to mess up timing events with the novels would be to somehow waste 12 weeks between Chapters 4 and 5 and fight a battle in the Eighty's War after it is over.

Bigger spoilers so anyone who hasn't read Mistborn Era 1 and 2 shouldn't open it:

I'm also curious to know if you've read any other non-Stormlight Cosmere novels? If you haven't, I'd suggest doing it. Stormlight, in particular, references other Cosmere events extensively. And not being familiar with those may be part of the reason that this book fell flat for you. I'm gonna dance around spoilers for other series as much as possible, but I'll tag this next bit for any purists: There are other examples too, but you probably get the point. I don't know if this would turn RoW into an amazing book for you (it IS the weakest of the 5 in my opinion), but it may elevate the book to a point where you don't hate it. _________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ I don't think Brandon wants you to care about these specific Parshendi. I think their purpose was just to help readers transition from seeing Singers as the 'faceless bad guys' into a people with their own culture, thoughts, and feelings. I agree that many of them felt unrelatable. But I do think they were necessary. And, yes, Moash leading the assault would have been more impactful, but that likely would have stolen the spotlight from the Singers who were admittedly already easy to overlook. More of a teaser than a spoiler for WaT (seeing as you already read a synopsis, I doubt you'll be concerned): As for the 'repetitive' mental health stuff with Kaladin, Shallan, and Dalinar. Yeah, they relapse but so do people in real life. And it can be frustrating to see them repeat mistakes, but that's true to real life too. If they magicked all their issues away in the first few books, it would have felt cheap to me. The fact that they are locked in a continuous struggle with their issues makes them more relatable and realistic. If they spent this whole book just being "cured", they start to be very boring one-dimensional characters.

I'd also vote that the Shin did not have any Parshmen. We know: there were no Singers in Shinovar when it was given to the humans the Shin are famously xenophobic and have been for millennia (WoB) Szeth doesn't seem very familiar with them Singers In Edgedancer there's a scene where Shinovar warns other nations of the Everstorm's first approach, but they don't confirm the presence of the red-eyed Voidbringers that Alethkar warned everyone about. Presumably because there were no Parshmen there to be awakened by the Everstorm No Parshmen showed up in Szeth's WaT flashbacks and he got around quite a bit. And moved pretty far down, up, and then down again in the social hierarchy.

That's a valid standpoint. It's not an airtight theory. I was thinking about this some more last night. If we ever get an Elantris sequel, I really hope we get to learn more about what happens to spent Investiture on Sel. Does it return to the Dor? Or does it go back to the Spiritual Realm like it would on other planets? If it's the later, then maybe Sel's people are unknowingly re-creating Unity by slowly returning pieces of their Investiture to the Spiritual Realm?

That was Rayse's goal, yes. Or at least part of it. He also wanted to make sure no new Vessels could pick up Devotion or Dominion. WoB: But we also know that Rayse was improvising and didn't really understand what he was doing. Another WoB: I don't think it's a stretch to suggest that Rayse's Cognitive Realm hack could have failed to work as he predicted. Well, assuming Unity is the Dor and retains some remnant of Aona and Skai's consciousness (which I realize is a big swing)... Unity has good reasons to hate Rayse. They may have simply been keeping an eye on Roshar and saw a good opportunity to ruin Rayse's day.

It's in Chapter 6 of RoW, yes. They say he can only make some simple light effects instead of creating proper illusions. That could just be a skill issue specific to Renarin. Similar to how Jasnah can't elsecall as well as she should.

I don't recall anyone bringing this up yet, but Enlightened Truthwatchers do have access to the normal Illumination and Progression trees. I think it's long been speculated (by the fanbase and by Renarin) that they got future sight in place of normal Truthwatcher abilities. But this seems to confirm that they get their Enlightened abilities in addition to the normal ones.

I'm a big fan of the theory that 'Unity' is the Dor. And that it has gained a sort of self-awareness similar to Honor's (perhaps with some remnants of Aona and Skai's consciousness mixed in). Then "We killed you" would mean "Autonomy and I killed Devotion and Dominion". Shu-Keseg, the original religion on Sel that split into Shu-Korath (the Teod/Arelon relgion) and Shu-Dereth (the Fjorden religion), was heavily based in the concept of unity: And Dalinar's vision of the Blackthorn conquering a city with 'high walls' and a 'strange pale moon' in WaT sounds an awful lot like Elantris (we know Sel's moon is pale blue from this WoB). I think this vision is Retribution is retaliating against Unity for interfering with Roshar.