Shardlet

Yes, he was not specific. But that seems to be the most likely balance in play for Harmony personally and for Harmony in regards to Scadrial which was formed (in its present state) using the joint powers of Ruin and Preservation. However, you are ultimately correct that he was not specific so I amended the OP accordingly .

Harmony is half Ruin and half Preservation, essentially a balance. There appears to be at least 2 (likely 3, maybe 4, or more?) broad Cosmeric endeavors in play: 1) Odium wants to trash the other Shards leaving himself as the most powerful being in the Cosmere. 2) Many of us (at least would like to) think that Hoid et al. are trying to reunite the shards. 3-ish) It is not inconceivable that at least one of the present Shards is content with being a Shard and would rather maintain things as they are. 4-ish) It is also not inconceivable that some Shard-savvy human wouldn't mind taking a shard for themself thereby obtaining supreme cosmic (Cosmeric) powers (*note: this is a lame Aladdin reference. Obviously, the power of one Shard would not be "supreme"). In any case, back to Harmony. I would presume that the Ruin aspect of Harmony would be a cheerleader of sorts for Odium (at least in the short-term) because Ruin want to trash the other Shards. This is supported by Ruin's apparent desire in Mistborn to kill and destroy everyone and everything. The Preservation side of Harmony seems like it would be keen on maintaining (preserving) the status quo. In Mistborn, the only apparent reason Preservation acted against Ruin was because Ruin was going to trash the place if preservation didn't act to stop him. Preservation wanted to maintain Scadrial and the life thereon. I did not see any indication that Preservation was interested in making anything better than it was. We also know from Mistborn that, working together, Preservation and Ruin were able to create life on Scadrial. So, it is conceivable that Harmony could work towards, or at least be in favor of, goal 2. But, to temper any action or goal, we have the words of Harmony from AoL saying that he has to be careful playing favorites lest he upset the balance (his internal balance between Ruin and Preservation?). So would Harmony, presumably seeking harmony, be able to only act as a mediating influence in Cosmeric events (a neutral party like Switzerland)? Or, do you think that Harmony could actively work towards an alternative goal? EDIT: In the OP, the underlined portion was not in parenthesis and originally read "between Ruin and Preservation".

I would like to lean that way, but the very act of making the shavings of the metal is going to significantly effect the microstructure. I doubt that this is a foundational and critical aspect of how allomancy uses metal to access shardpower. It is just a little bit for me.

I was basing that off of the reports of others. After a semi-extensive search of both 17thshard.com forums and the theoryland database, this is what I found: -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Quote- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2011 Pleiades- Was just reading through the list of questions, and one that I once asked but is not on there - I had asked him if humans and horses were native to Roshar, since everything else seems to be all crustacean-like. He said, "whoa, good question" and then told me RAFO. 2012 Windrunner- I read a quote somewhere that Brandon confirmed that humans and horses are not native to Roshar. Windrunner- A recent interview with Brandon indicates that it is humans and horses who aren't native to Roshar, not the other way around. 2013 Elwynn- We actually had WoB that horses are indeed not native to Roshar. Elwynn- I KNOW for a fact I have read a quote from sanderson along the lines of, "...humans and horses are not native to [Roshar]..." but now it seems to have gone *poof*. Zas, or WInd, help me out here. Why can't I find this quote? I know we have seen it before. Windrunner- It's a common theory, but I'm not sure there's a quote... I'll keep looking for it, but I'm not sure it exists. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- There were also a couple of speculative quotes (including one from you, Meg), but I did not include those because they did not really support that it is definitely WoB. The person most certain is/was Elwynn. In 2011 Windrunner was more certain than he is now. So! It is not definite that horses are not native to Roshar. However, it seems likely that they would not be since the only other mammals we've seen (that I recall) are humans, Ryshadium, and rats. This would be expected since mammals would not be particularly resistant to the highstorms. I suspect we will find a vastly different variety of animals once we get a better picture of Shinovar since Shinovar is protected enough from highstorms (whether because of the surrounding mountains or the distance from the origin East to West). If horses are native to Roshar then I am rather certain that they must be from Shinovar or some other similarly storm-protected location.

I am kinda disappointed in this confirmation. I am a metallurgist by education and I probably have too much info on the subject for the purpose at hand. But the microstructure of a metal is dependent not only on the composition of the metal, but also (if not more so) on its method of manufacture. For example if you have two peices of brass having the same composition which have not been subjected to any post-casting treatment (i.e., after full solidification and cooling) but one was cooled rapidly by quenching and the other was air-cooled you would see substantially different microstructures between the two pieces even though the composition was the same (in this case the quenched piece microstructure would show a much smaller average grain size than the air-cooled piece). If you then took one of those pieces and bent it then the microstructure would be vastly different (at the bend) from what it was originally (the grains would be twinned [visible parallel lines crossing the grains] all over the place). I hope BS has considered this when he made the confirmation you are referencing. Missing details like that is a major pet pieve of mine. Not that it would diminish my love for BS's work, it would just make me a little bit sad.

Other than the presumption that all of scenes seen in Dalinar's visions occurred prior to Honor's death (based on the idea that Honor prepared the packet of visions in view of his impending death), do we know for sure that all the scenes occurred before his death?

I suppose it would depend on when the letter was written. In the overall chronology, isn't Dragonsteel (the upcoming series) early in the chronology? If that is the case, and there is a lot of time between Dragonsteel and the letter. I don't think it terribly unlikely that the recipient joined two or more shards in a similar manner to Sazed.

Something occurred to me today. We know from WoB that horses are not native to Roshar. So, how did they get there? Did he mean not native in terms of the horses not originating on Roshar or that there were no horses at the time of the arrival of Cultivation and Honor? I am inclined to interpret "not native" in the strictest sense (i.e., did not originate on Roshar). If that is correct, then the horses were obviously brought from somewhere else. I did not bat an eye at the prospect of carried objects being able to be transported via worldhopping, but horses are something else entirely. To my way of thinking, this opens up a whole new aspect to worldhopping. What might be the scope of what you can bring with you when you worldhop? Can you take something living with you into Shadesmar? What other means of worldhopping might there be other than traveling through Shadesmar? What do you guys think?

Am I the only one who thinks that the dragonwasps are more likely to decorative rather than symbolic? I mean, it adds a lot of artistic flair. If it is actually symbolic, then cool. But we (so far) have not seen any connection between animals of any kind and the KR, the Heralds, or any surges that I am aware of. In the table there doesn't seem to be any particular interaction with the the orders/Heralds or the surges except that the center two orders/surgesHeralds appear at the junction of the beastie mouths and the most prominent forelegs. I am holding any determination of any symbology in abeyance until we have at least something to base it off of rather than just a background image on the table. That being said, there is nothing wrong with enjoying some wanton speculation. But, we have a profound lack of evidence of any symbology in this case except that greatshells (which the dragonwasps are not) have gemhearts, the larkin described in the WoR Rysn interlude does hearken to the dragonwasps (in size and appearance) and they are rare and valuable (for as yet unknown reasons). I suppose we could draw a tentative link to the fact that the dragonwasps are from Aimia, Aimians freak people out, Aimia was scoured, and people aren't keen on the KR. But, like I said tentative.

Even though I am shown to be wrong about the letter, I still think it is very interesting that Hoid is "friends" with the Yomens.

Szeth doesn't disagree, even though he is generally being contentious. This Quote got me musing on Szeth's blade. The Honoblades and the Radiant Blades are huge and are apparently designed (I think Dalinar even says/thinks something to this effect) for fighting a huge entity. Conversely, Szeth's blade is not huge and I picture it in my mind as being similarly sized and shaped as a katana. It seems to me that Szeth's blade is designed to fight human-sized entities. Presumably the Honorblades and the Radiant blades were never intended to be used on humans, hence their incredible power. Whereas, that same incredible power has been invested in Szeth's blade, perhaps, for the express intent to destroy humans. It seems to me that this may be why Taravangian calls it a "monstrosity of a Shardblade". A blade formed with a corrupt and evil intent. Edit: Szeth's blade is obviously double edged. So, clearly not a Katana per se. That is just what I picture in my mind when I read Szeth.

Ah well. What can you do .

Although not a creation in the strictest sense perhaps, but the KR seem to me to be a joint effort between Cultivation and Honor. The progressive nature of the 5 Oaths smacks strongly of Cultivation to me while the ideals of the KR, as found within the Oaths, are virtually an embodiment of Honor.

This may be rather off-topic, but I find it very interesting that Joshen Yomen and/or his new bride is/are friends with Hoid. If the epigraph letter was written to Harmony from Hoid, this would add greater significance to the Hoid-Yomen friendship since Marsh (ironeyes) has similar goals as Harmony but decidedly different methods (IIRC the end of AoL when Marsh is speaking to Marasi) and the writer of the letter has different methods but similar goals to the Seventeenth Shard and House Yomen is the only great house to worship Ironeyes (Marsh). Although, Marsh says different methods than his Brother which suggests that either Kelsier is playing an active role in events on Scadrial or after hundereds of years, Marsh identifies with Harmony in a brotherly fashion.

The tricky bit is that this could be a bit of a chicken and the egg scenario. Hoid uses Feruchemy to know where he needs to be and when he needs to be there. So he would have had to have either gone to Scadrial prior to TFE (for a social call?) to receive his Feruchemy so that he was able to know that he needed to be there at the time of the Mistborn trilogy, or he had an ability already that was so similar to Feruchemy that it might as well be called Feruchemy. If I am not mistaken, the Lightweaving that Hoid has (at least non-canonically from Liar) has a close similarity to a surge on Roshar. This may be a precedent for Hoid perhaps having access to Feruchemy from a source other than Scadrial. Now, having said that, we know pre-shattering abilities are not as potent as Shard powered abilities. So it is likely that's Hoid's Feruchemy, while sufficient for his needs (worldhopping and timing), may not be as powerful as Scadrial Feruchemy.

So if spren are simply cognitive aspects manifest the physical realm, why would they not be present on other worlds. Realmatics says everything has a physical, spiritual, and cognitive aspect. Yet spren are only manifest on Roshar. I think this makes it clear that Cultivation and/or Honor (but to my mind mostly Cultivation since spren seem to jive more strongly with Cultivation's apparent intent) have a definite role, whether direct or indirect, in at least the manifestation of spren in the physical realm. I agree that, since spren don't seem to be present in Shinovar, it strongly suggests that the highstorms have a role in facilitating the manifestation of spren. A possible hitch in that Idea is the case of Cusicesh in Kasitor which is just about at the same longitude as the Eastern border of Shinovar. In other words, if the highstorms have run out of steam so much by the time they reach Shinovar then they would also have run down by the time they reached Kasitor. If so, and if the spren are juiced by the highstorms, then how could such a large spren be supported in Kasitor. However, that seemingly large mountain range which completely covers Shinovar's Eastern border could perhaps put a bit of a smackdown on the storms thus protecting Shinovar but not protect Kasitor. I am leaning towards the Catquisitor's first posibility. With Hessina's description of spren, there seems to be a simple-completeness-and-readiness-with-vague-answers-which-don't-seem-to-quite-jive-upon-examination that tends to only come packaged in folk wisdom. You know, the kind of answer you give your kid after they have responded with "Why?" a fourth time after a series of explanations to the first 3 why's. So, while there is very likely a foundation of truth to what she says, it seems she is rolling a number of things together in a neat vague package. As to Dalinar not seeing spren in his vision, does he ever note a conspicuous absence of spren or are we drawing conclusions because of the lack of mention of spren? I like the idea of Honor being blind to spren.

I know this is an old thread and most of you have picked up on this already, but for those who have not, here is a quote from Brandon in the recent Reddit AMA: Q: "If Sazed were to die, would he drop the shards Ruin and Preservation or would he drop the shard Harmony?" BS: "Excellent question. The shards are now intermingled, and would take effort to split apart. He would drop Harmony. (This is what Odium feared would happen, by the way.)" Shards can be merged. I read the other day a quote from BS which stated that a splintered shard could also be reformed. (I'm sorry, I don't have time to hunt it down right now). I suspect that such a reforming would be challenging and would require collection and congregation of every splinter of the shard. But if a splintered shard can be reformed and multiple shards can merge, then Adonalsium (in the sense of all sixteen shards being merged together in a [Crystal?]) can be likewise reformed. Now why did they simply not reform Adonalsium at the time of the shattering? I don't know. Perhaps the shattering caused the shards to be scattered throughout the Cosmere and a group went in search of the shards? Perhaps there was a power grab similar to the one at the time of the Recreance in Dalainar's vision in WoK when normal soldiers rushed to claim the plate and blades abandoned by the Radiants?

I am firmly in the camp that the typical shardblades (i.e., not Honorblades or, for lack of a better term, Szeth-blades) are indeed corrupted blades once wielded by the Radiants. I also don't think that they were corrupted by the KR. On page 732 (hardback), during Dalinar's vision of the Recreance, Dalinar notes in the third paragraph that after the KR abandonded their Blades their glow began to fade. If the KR corrupted them, presumably the glow would have already faded. As evidence of this, I note that during particularly honorable and valorious actions Dalinar's plate seems to glow and as Kaladin moves closer to his knighthood he begins to glow more readily (other than just stormlight glow). I suspect the reason Syl hates the blades and plate is that they have been corrupted by the bastardized and base use that they have been subjected to by generations of squabbling Alethi (and others). Consider the reprehensible behavior of the soldiers at Feverstone Keep at the Recreance where they were attacking and killing each other for no other purpose than to claim plate and blade for themselves. Likewise, for hundreds of years they have been used as the ulimate weapons in border squabbles and international wars where the likely purpose for the fighting was merely for financial gain and power struggles. Even the vengeance war with the Parshendi, honorable perhaps in its origin, has debased into nothing more than a game and a means to fatten one's purse. All at the expense of 'lesser' soldiers who bear the brunt of death and injury to advance these base goals. The shardblades were gifts (from Honor?) to be used to defend Roshar from an invading evil bent on the destruction of Roshar. A series of wars fought in defense of the innocent for the protection and preservation of life. This is an honorable fight. A noble purpose served well by powerful weapons, presumably designed and intended to be used in honor and virtue. Now they are corrupted to the point of being no more than instruments of death and enrichment. Used primarily for the purpose of vaunting one's self over others. It is no wonder that a being of honor such as Syl finds them repulsive.

Most people don't realize that everyone has an accent except for the people who speak exactly the same way you do. Shallan's perception of the lack of accent in the advisor means only they means they sound like a native speaker of the language they are speaking (I don't recall what the language is off-hand). I would expect that if we were to judge whether someone was a Herald or not by the way they speak, then it would be described as a strange, unfamiliar, or unrecognizable accent. Also: Consider also that this may refer to elevation as well. A typical Christian tradition is that Heaven (the dwelling place of God) is above us (altitude-wise) and is frequently depicted as being in the clouds. Although this has little doctrinal grounding and appears to be depicted this way by convention, it is still a pervasive idea. It could very well be that a similar sentiment is/was present on Roshar and that the dwelling place of Honor is in the heavens. Alethkar does not appear to be particularly mountainous. Could Urithiru be located in a high mountain range which happens to be to the West of Alethkar, for example, the Horneater Peaks? Note: I am not putting forth a theory that Urithiru is/was in the Horneater mountains. It was just an example.

Perhaps, but we do not, to my knowledge, know what Adonalsium was or what its nature or purpose was. I think it is a bit premature to make the assumption that Adonalsium controlled/established/guided the entire Cosmere. If it was a sentient god-like being, then what purpose or interest would it have had in developing humans accross the Cosmere? More questions than answers are there down this path, hmm?

While it would be possible for Humans to evolve independent of one another, in the sense that it happened once and therefore could happen again, the propability of such a thing happening would be beyond astronomical without some overarching common influence. Consider, the calculated odds of life foming spontaneously are somewhat on the order of putting all the pieces to an old television (i.e., no soldered connections, etc.) into a box, shaking the box, opening the box and finding a functioning TV in the box. And that is just the formation of life from a soup of proteins. When you factor in the Cosmere consisting of a dwarf galaxy with a relatively small amount of star systems, the likely varying nature and levels of radiation produced by the stars of each human inhabited world, and the variability of weather, gravity, and atmosphere from world-to-world (i.e., Roshar is high-oxygen and low-gravity), the independent formation of genetically compatible humans really must be ruled out based on the staggering enormous impropability. This leaves us with two options. 1) All humanity in the cosmere originated on Yolen and all other pre-shattering interplanetary travel was accomplished by worldhopping (due to the tech-level as pointed out by PM above); or, 2) there exists in the cosmere an overall power/sentience which guided independent human evolution. EDIT: By way of clarification, I am not suggesting in the second possibility that BS is planning a great big overall God reveal at some point in the story. In fact, I figure it to be so unlikely that that would happen that I would be absolutely flabbergasted, dumbfounded, and even a little bit (disappointed?) if he went down that alley.

Here is a quote from the 17th Shard Q&A with Brandon Sanderson last Fall (sorry, this is a cut and paste. So far I only know how to quote within a thread. I haven't figured out how to do a quote from a separate thread yet.): 'Aethling', on 25 Sept 2012 - 16:37, said: Brandon: The first planet with humans on it was Yolen. And here is a paraphrase of another quote (forgive me that I was not able to find the actual text and context of the quote, but I am 100% sure that I read itthis week): Brandon was asked about humans on shardworlds before the arrival of the Shard and Brandon affirmed that on some worlds there were humans existing on the world at the time of the arrival of the Shard. Assuming that these quotes are accurate and Brandon wasn't having a brain fart, humans were able to travel (presumably by worldhopping) pre-shattering. Any ideas on how this was accomplished? Obviously, realmatics was in play prior to the shattering since physical, cognitive, and spiritual realms and forms form the underpinnings of the cosmere. So, while Shard abilities may enhance the ability to worldhop, they do not seem to be required. The caveat in that statement is perhaps Adonalsium enabled any and all worldhopping pre-shattering and thus all post-shattering worldhopping is accomplished by virtue of the powers of the shards. What does everyone think about pre-shattering worldhopping and how it may have been accomplished?

I think I failed to clearly express what I meant with my master key analogy. I did not mean to say that because Hoid has Yolen DNA (according to my idea the master blueprint for all Shard-power created humans) that he naturally has the ability to use any shard-based magics. Rather, I meant that he has the capability of recieving any Shard-based investiture. Since each investiture is only capable of being used by humans of the associated shardworld (because of the need for compatible sDNA), Hoid's sDNA, being of the source-world DNA (WoB is humanity originated on Yolen) is likewise compatible with the sDNA of each of the shardworld sDNA giving him the capability of receiving an investiture without a (major) sDNA rewrite. I think the biggest flaw in this theory would be the case of Scadrial where, upon consumption and burning of Lerasium, a native Scadrian would have his/her sDNA rewritten to grant allomancy. In other words possesion of Scadrian sDNA does not equal allomantic ability. Perhaps the only case I can think of where the Sard-based ability would be universal to the general populous would be Nalthis where if one (having Nalthian sDNA) has sufficient Breaths, then they would have the ability to Awaken (although I may be inccorect on this, I only read Warbreaker once). That being said, there is a great deal of variety in the utility off-world and by offworld humans. For example, an allomancer would be able to have their full allomantic strength available to them regardless of the world they were on insofar as they had the metal needed to catalyze the ability. In contrast, an Elantrain's ability to access and use the Dor is geographically associated so an Elantrian would have a challenging time accessing the Dor effectively if far away from Elantris (such as was shown when Raoden was in Teod) much less off-Sel. This variety of versatility and limitations among the Shard-based abilities may well give some excuse to quandry of the above paragraph. To sum up (perhaps I should put a note saying read the last paragraph first), I doubt Hoid had any abilities (except for perhaps lightweaving) pre-shattering, but, because he has Yolen DNA (i.e., universal DNA, in the sense of a unverrsal remote), he has capability of receiving investiture of Shard-based abilities from any shardworld without an sDNA rewrite. Edit: edited text in italics.

Forgive me since I have not yet learned to quote yet. But in the 17th Shard Q&A with Brandon last fall Windrunner asked if Nalthis already had humans on them at the time of the arrival of Endowment, to which Brandon answered "Some planets had people before the shattering." If this is the case, was the sDNA of the existing inhabitants subsequently altered by the Shardholder to give the people their investiture or did the Shardholder simple work around the exiting sDNA?

I agree that people not from Nalthis would not have 'Breath', but as you pointed out, Hoid probably has at least one Breath, given his penchant for acquiring skills. I don't read Brandon's response as necessarily being absolutely limiting. I read it as more like someone from <insert name of shardworld> would not be able to awaken if they acquired Breath (other than Nalthis, of course). Hoid has been shown to be a special case in a variety of ways. While he has Lerasium and could have, or could yet, have therefore acquired allomancy, how did he get his Feruchemy? Unless he is spiked or has been changed by Harmony, such was the case with Spook, he acquired it given his existing sDNA. It is hard to say for sure, since, to my knowledge, Hoid is the only Yolan(ian?, ite?) that we've met other than the Shardholders. But I think, given the extremely limited number of mortal Yolanites, that they could be a reasonable exception to Brandon's response. Also, I may be misinterpreting what you said, if you read Brandon's response carefully, he says that people from Nalthis do not inherently have 'Breath'. He leaves the door open for a person not from Nalthis to acquire the awakening ability and to receive 'Breaths' in order to use that ability. In other words, inherent 'Breath' is a feature exclusive to Nalthis (i.e., a result of Endowment's particular variant of 'humanity'). Other than that, the field is wide open.