Zmann966

Hate corrupts everything. That's basically the overarching theme for the whole series, distilled. Odium destroys Honor. Fear destroys the Oathpact (and subsequently, the world). Lust (for power) destroys Alethi Highprinces. Pride segregates the Darkeyes. Vengeance gets Kaladin in trouble (numerously). And, best of all: Arrogance and Laziness enslaves the Parshmen (and well all know how that is going to end up) It's only our protagonists, our heroes, who are rallying (slowly) against this domination of hate... Makes sense. If opening up to Odium's influence twists the Parshendi into hate-filled forms, then Spren being twisted towards hatred-fueled mentalities seems more than plausible. Especially if you can draw similarities or opposites to other spren/attributes. Spren are, naturally, of creation. They are born, and drawn to, changes and manifestations of... "stuff." Hatred turns it into destruction, the Ten Deaths. The Thrill is a twist upon Taln's pension for War. Dependable becomes Arrogant; Resourceful becomes Hungry. Jezrien's desire to protect? Protecting becomes Vengeance. (Ding ding! Kaladin's struggle) Leading becomes Tyranny. Hatred twists everything ugly. It's even paralleled in Kaladin and Adolin's plot for WoR. They hate Amaram and Sadeas, respectively; so their normally-sound rationality and mental-state is corrupted by the mere presence of these men. Kaladin's ideals turn petty and vengeful; Adolin's casual confidence turns angry and violent. Did Kaladin crawl out of his low point in WoR? Yeah... Has he completely overcome that side of himself? Not quite yet. He's trying to be honorable, and protecting. But he still struggling with it, and I wouldn't be surprised if we see him slip again. I wouldn't be surprised is Odium has some way of twisting both men and spren. It would draw another good parallel to what he's already done: Splintered and destroyed Honor. Kaladin's struggle just seems to... Contrived. Everything he touches, everything he tries to protect is destroyed and taken from him. There's more at play inside him and behind the scenes with him. He seems perfectly groomed throughout his life for Odium to slip in and turn him into a vengeful destroyer. And remember, Shards usually play the long-game very well.

My daily writing warm-ups have been turning towards cosmere-fiction of late, probably due to the re-read (and listen! <3 the audiobooks) I've been going through again. With Sanderson's wonderful worlds on my mind, it's hard not to probe their secrets just a bit deeper. I thought perhaps you guys might enjoy my short forays into these familiar realms. To Hate: 2 http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/12248-to-hate/?p=150137 To Hate: 3 http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/12248-to-hate/?p=150358 To Hate: 4 http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/12248-to-hate/?p=153062 To Hate: 5 http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/12248-to-hate/?p=187159 To Hate: 6 http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/12248-to-hate/?p=211692 To Hate: 7 http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/12248-to-hate/?p=303224 To Hate: 8 http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/12248-to-hate/?p=394677 To Hate: 9 http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/12248-to-hate/?p=399306 To Hate: 10 http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/12248-to-hate/?do=findComment&comment=576133

Am I the only one who feels like Kaladin is going to be Odium's champion? I mean I thought about it, and went back through to read tWoK and WoR and it really fits. He goes dark at the slightest breeze, in WoR goes far enough to lose his bond with Syl. He's angry, vengeful, and quite frankly, very susceptible to hate. Even at the end of WoR we feel he's made peace and become a good guy, gotten Syl back, saved the day... But then he hears the Everstorm is gonna royally SCREW Roshar and what does he do? Take off immediately to go save his own family. Not the world, not try and "protect" the peoples of the nations, he makes the selfish decision to protect those he wants to. Not to mention the summary on the backs of the books: The more I re-read, the more I feel like Kaladin is not the hero we want him to be. Dalinar is strong and capable, and will follow his oaths no matter what. Shallan fights with her past to follow her oaths for the greater good. Even Szeth is honorable, and will make an excellent Skybreaker because of his devotion to his oaths. Eshonai isn't even mentioned. And she's simply a pawn of Odium's. One of a million Voidbringers, (once the Everstorm changed the parshmen) helplessly slaved to their shard of hatred. But Kaladin? Kaladin struggles every step of the way. Would it make for a heart-warming character-arc of struggle and redemption? Sure. Would it also make the most sense for him to be corrupted by Odium, by hatred? Ohh yes. Kaladin is a much better choice to slip into that darkness inside him and succumb to the greater pull of hate.

The. Best. Quote. Ever. Roshar Tourism Department, I think we have a new slogan.

Hey fellow fans! I just wanted to stop by to promote a little teaser I put together in honor of the #1 NYT Bestseller for Words of Radiance! Fellow sharder Alex Crandall allowed me the use of his absolutely haunting rendition of Shallan's lullaby for the video, and I think it fits perfectly! Tell me what you think! (Also, NO SPOILERS. I promise.) (Better, naturally, in HD with good speakers!)

Makes perfect sense, Phonetically, it's everywhere in the books. Knights Reyadiant No? Alright, I'll take my cheap pun and sit in the shame-corner, XD

I would say not only possible, but probable. Give it time (lots) It took how many DECADES to do Lord of the Rings? And 15 years to do Song of Ice and Fire? Something as big as Sanderson's tales won't go forever without Hollywood jumping on the bandwagon. That's why most of this stuff GETS movie deals. It's a safer bet than anything original: pre-established fanbase, plot basics already ironed out, increases attention and, therefore, booksales. I actually think SA has a better shot than Mistborn, honestly. Even the idea of production costs, getting the script shortened down, and visuals figured out, is nothing when it comes to Hollywood thinking they have a new cash-cow. It'll happen. But it won't be for years and years. (Then another few years of production, a few more for editing/compositing) I'm gonna ballpark 2041. Until then, let all wonder and fanboy at how amazing a Stormlight Archive movie would be with my mock-up teaser trailer for the WoR book!: /shameless plugging

Makes sense. Stormform has those elevated emotions, the Rhythms to much-stronger, twisted states of mind. Fury instead of Anger; Craving instead of Anticipation. Ridicule instead of Amusement. If opening up to Odium's influence twists the Parshendi into hate-filled forms, then Spren being twisted towards hatred-fueled mentalities seems more than plausible. Especially if you can draw similarities or opposites to other spren/attributes. Spren are, naturally, of creation. They are born, and drawn to, changes and manifestations of... "stuff." Hatred turns it into destruction, the Ten Deaths. The Thrill is a twist upon Taln's pension for War. Dependable becomes Arrogant; Resourceful becomes Hungry. Yelig-Nar consumes souls, Jezrien's desire to protect? Protecting becomes Vengeance. Leading becomes Tyranny. Sja-Anat in contrast to Vedeledev perhaps? Healing becomes "Improvement", to the point of Corruption. I mean, the matching needs to be aligned, but the idea is solid. Hatred twists everything ugly. It's even paralleled in Kaladin and Adolin's plot for WoR. They hate Amaram and Sadeas, respectively; so their normally-sound rationality and mental-state is corrupted by the mere presence of these men. Kaladin's ideals turn petty and vengeful; Adolin's casual confidence turns angry and violent. I mean... Hell, the entire Stormlight Archive looks like one big morality-play on just how nasty Hatred makes even the best of things. Odium destroys Honor. Fear destroys the Oathpact (and subsequently, the world). Lust (for power) destroys Alethi Highprinces. Pride segregates the Darkeyes. Vengeance gets Kaladin in trouble (numerously). And, best of all: Arrogance and Laziness enslaves the Parshmen (and well all know how that is going to end up) It's only our protagonists, our heroes, who are rallying (slowly) against this domination of hate... Actually, know what Brandon? Now that I see all this I'm calling you out. It's just a bit TOO on-the-nose that you named the bad-guy "Odium". Hahaaha. At least Preservation and Endowment are subtle with how they work.

Hahhaha! Okay, without sounding crazy, laughing to myself and all, I want to quote Szeth and Taravangian from their talk in I-14: I'm sorry what? One of the other seven?! Ohh yes, aside from our poor-Damnation-maddened Herald of War, another of the Honorblades is missing... I know many think, possibly Nalan, of the Skybreakers (or "Darkness" as Lift prefers) might have his... And yet... Well, it either proves the Skybreakers don't hold THAT strictly to their own rules (at least to the abandoning of the Oathpact) or.... Or something else is amiss. Which, knowing Brandon we won't find out until Book 9 and it'll leave all our brains exploded on the walls. But for now, we know that Shinovar has only eight Honorblades, seven total now that Kaladin possesses (what is assumed to be) Jezrien's blade.

Wow, wall of text. Apologies. Last thing I wanna say is there HAS to be some kind of mythology connection between Nalthis and Roshar. Some legend or something... I know it's been postulated: http://www.17thshard.com/forum/topic/4841-kaladin-and-kalad-the-usurper-warbreaker/ But you don't name a character KALADIN if, somehow, his parents haven't heard of KALAD's legend. Especially if you're going to bring Kalad himself in to train Kaladin as a swordmaster, I'll accept they're not the same, as speculated, but if Vasher's been in the employ of the Kholin's for a dozen years, and AROUND the cosmere for at least 300 (not even COUNTING the pre-Warbreaker 300 he lived) there's gotta be some mix of mythos. I'll even accept that a worldhopper jumped to Roshar and told a story about Kalad the Usurper and the Manywar in a tavern somewhere and the name got around the Alethi.

I literally leapt out of bed shouting "No!! NOOO!!! YESSS!!!" When I read the end of that scene. Makes me very glad I re-read Warbreaker not too long ago. As for Nightblood vs. a Shardblade... I remember asking Brandon at SDCC years ago something like this... Right after I finished my ARC or WoK: "So... Nightblood and a Shardblade have some pretty similar qualities. Both cut clean swaths through material, burn out people souls. Any comment?" Got RAFO'd at the time, but it simply makes sense when you think about it. A Shardblade is the physical manifestation of a spren into a weapon. It is, literally, a "soul" manifest. And, keep this in mind: spren are created by humanity's cognitive perception. Humanity's emotions, ideas, thoughts; we perceive the world and create spren in the image of our perception. We personify and they exist. Spren, in turn follow and bind oaths and, in turn can become weapons for their sworn Radiants. Now, our favorite sentient sword of the cosmere (close to catching up Syl, but you're still #2) Nightblood. He was created by shoving a vast amount of breath into a weapon. Thousands of humans' souls were extracted and invested into this blade. And we already know that Awakening personifies the invested object, it gains "life" and, in turn acts like we, humankind, perceives life. Awakened object imitate life, partially due to our soul's investiture powering it, partially due to our cognitive perception of anything that lives. When creating an Awakened object, you bind it to orders in your own native tongue. You, essentially, give it an oath. And it obeys. Please tell me you've drawn the same connections by now? Without trying to be too inflammatory: Nightblood is a Shardblade, albeit created a little differently. When put into perspective, created backwards. Spren are created in humanity's thoughts, then manifests spiritually and physically. A bonded spren will hold its Radiant to their oaths, and give him a weapon and the power over Stormlight (investiture). Nightblood was created physically then forced with humanity's sprirt (breath) and thought. Nightblood demands it's wielder obey the oath to destroy and takes the power of investiture. It stands to reason that he will function a bit differently than a Shardblade: Dark smoke instead of glowing mist. Never progresses out of the innocent "dumb" phase of intelligence, and perpetually in that "bad memory" loop. Self-vowed (to destroy evil) with no perception of evil, rather than oath-bound to a human soul and exacting those oaths with back-and-forth of such things, such perceived things, like evil, truth, etc. The final kicker I can say is: A Sharblade cuts through the soul of a thing. It slices stone cleanly and severs the soul of living things. Nightblood destroys the entire thing. It evaporates entire objects in a puff and rips through living flesh. Even lifeless, who are non-living things with a bound-soul disappear entirely, rather than be cut (I know the gray-flesh connection of lifeless and shard-severed flesh has already been ironed out right?) In my opinion, most Shardblades will completely evaporate when confronted with Nightblood. And I imagine the still "alive" ones carried by the Radiants will see it for what it truly is: a bastardization of their own kind.

I just want to add a small point; found in the Ars Arcanum of WoR, under the Lightweaving Surge entry Hoid's Lightweaving seems likely from his origin on Yolen, which we know to have happened quite a while back. Causes me, at least, to further wonder how exactly the Shards-Hoid-and the subsequent magic system overlap. We know a bit about the "fuel" of Investiture and the like, but this is a blatant overlap of ability. This is directly saying that The Surge of Illumination is traced back to Yolen. I wonder how much else overlaps beyond the normal realmatic rules we already know. They even point out that Roshar Lightweaving is far more connected than the illusionary magic used on Sel (probably referring to the Elantrians, but could, just as well link to Forging... Which has me confused because Roshar Lightweaving is said to require a more spiritual element than Sel's... I guess Forging is more cognitive isn't it?) Truthfully, more so than anything else, whoever put this Ars Arcanum together on Roshar (hinted to be Navani, but possily Jasnah? Probably neither) knows quite a bit about the cosmere, suspiciously so.