Gloom

Ahh, we came close to the same numbers because I misspoke, but figured correctly. In a given week (not necessarily per battle), thousands could die. I got this by figuring a smaller cost per battle spread amongst the ten camps. If any one prince lost more than your estimates per battle on a reoccurring basis, it is likely their house would fail. I agree that most of the bodies wouldn't last very long, but I'd argue that many of them would at least temporarily be pushed into the shallow western end of the canyons by highstorms before being pushed to the eastern side of the plains where they are likely eaten by scavengers. For the number of weapons that are found with the dead, I'd say that the flash floods that move through the canyons are under a lot of pressure. I wouldn't be surprised if the stone bottoms of the canyons are a type of sandstone that is highly porous. This could allow uneven erosion of the canyon floors and still allow drainage. It the walls are soulcast stone, that could be why they are more durable than the stone beneath them. It's also likely that the stone floor is covered in enough jetsam from the highstorm flash floods that the difference might not stand out under casual inspection by someone without training or reason to look for these differences. To be honest, I think Brandon may be the only one capable of answering the issue with the varying canyon depths to anyone's satisfaction.

I really wasn't questioning whether the Chasm Fiends had enough to eat. I was questioning what their prey had to eat after entering a population boom, and how aggressive that prey may end up being towards humanity when there is a food crunch. I would hypothesize that the Chasm Fiends generally hunted on the eastern side of the Shattered Plains, and possibly in the western part of the Unclaimed Hills. The western side of the Shattered Plains may not be ideal for their prey due to the flash flooding and lack of available shelter. Most predators either eat often or eat something that is their own size or larger. Now terrestrial crustaceans don't require as much food as a warm blooded animal of the same size, but, I think it's safe to assume that Chasm Fiends eat fairly often. The question is what are they eating? How big is their prey? It could theoretically be something in a size relationship of a human to a crawfish, but I find this unlikely. I would think that a Chasm Fiends normal prey is at least man sized, probably bigger. They are predatory, so we can reasonably assume that, at least before pupating, they eat meat. Their prey could be something as docile as chulls, but then again, it could be something as opportunistic a crab as well. If it is an opportunistic omnivore, it may begin to disperse into the western half of the plains in search of additional food. This prey animal may not be as formidable as a Chasm Fiend, but I wouldn't be surprised if it could still kill humans fairly easily.

Okay, so I'll admit I'm fishing, but were getting at something here. Why the Oath Pact? Because Odium realized that he needed to bind Cultivation and Honor in a manner that would prevent them from coming to each other defense. I can't even begin to reason another motivation that Odium would have had to create a pact with someone as far removed from himself as Honor. To do this, he needed bait, and not just any bait, but bait that would be very tempting to both Honor and Cultivation. Both Shards would have needed to get something out of the Pact, and would need to be convinced that Odium did as well. Odium wouldn't have invested himself unless he believed that he would benefit from doing so, and we know he invested himself in Roshar, we have WoB on that. Odium appears to be a patient hunter. Ultimately, I don't believe he ever intended to honor the Pact, but needed it create the opportunity to kill Tanavast and eventually Cultivation. Once they were dead, he could withdraw his investment from Roshar and move on to the next Shard. I'm speculating that the Pashendi, at the least, may have been part of this.

Yes, what will be the effect of a population boom for a creature that is deemed worthy prey by the likes of a Chasm Fiend? Not just a population boom from a lack of hunting mind you, but quite possibly a population boom from a surplus of food as well. In the last five years, it is likely that over a hundred thousand Alethi and Parshendi corpses found their way into those canyons, and possibly two or three times that many. Will they make their way through the canyons to the west perhaps? Find entire camps full of those tasty morsels that they've been eating for the past five years?

Brandon based much of the life on Roshar around tide pools. That's how I see the Shattered Plains, as a giant tidal pool. The High Storms are the tides. From the explanations and the art, I see High Storms as the Roshar equivalent to hurricanes in our world. They are circular and while they move east to west, they blow in a circular pattern. Their winds are strong enough to hurl boulders. Even with reduced gravity, this still means they are the equivalent of a category four to five hurricane. If you have enough force, you can make water travel in any direction. High Storms certainly have the force required to push water uphill. When water rushes through a canyon it carries everything with it, but as it goes uphill, it shallows out and leaves more debris behind it. Like a tide leaves jetsam on the shore. Side canyons should also be considered. These are places that water is forced into, but lacks an outlet. So if you force a bunch of water into a side canyon, it will stay there until the pressure holding it in place is alleviated, then drains back out with less force than it had when it was shoved into that space. In an average battle, it could be argued that thousands can die. The Alethi have been at war on the Shattered plains for over five years. They appear to go to battle at least once a week. We're looking at about 250,000 bodies lost down in the canyons. Granted, most of them are decayed or scavenged before too long, but a pile of thirty dead isn't really very large in the scheme of things.

Or find a new food source that recently moved into the area in large numbers over the past five or six years. Most crustaceans, which is what Brandon based much of the life on Roshar off of, are scavengers. They'll eat anything, plants, animals, dead Chasm Fiends, broken chrysalises, people, it doesn't matter. Sure, some of them are purely herbivorous, and others are pure predators, but most are scavengers, omnivorous. Most of the Chasm Fiends are to the east. They mostly go to the western side of the plains to pupate. Instinct may drive them to pupate away from their natural prey for safety from their prey while vulnerable.

Well, I could speculate that Odium realized that Honor and Cultivation were likely to combine their power in mutual defense since WoB is that they came to Roshar together. Odium needed a way to limit their ability to do so. Using the creation of new races as a pretext to forge a pact that would incidentally prevent mutual defense sounds reasonable. I can't think of any other reason why Odium would make an exception and actually invest himself into a world. I agree that Odium isn't interested in creating armies or worshipers, but he is interested in splintering Shards, and he isn't interested in gathering those Shards. He isn't getting more powerful with each victory, he needs to use his intellect to out think and out maneuver his opponents. Two against one he'd lose.

I recently read a quote from Brandon mentioning that the hunting on the Shattered Palins would have a serious ecological impact and that we should expect to see signs of this soon. I'm expecting to see at least the start of the impact in the next book. What do you think? So what do we know about Chasm Fiends? Chasm Fiends are massive, they're predatory, and they're carnivorous. We should also assume that they are active hunters since the Bridge Crews had no knowledge of safe times to scavenge, nor do we have any indication that the Alethi high command had such knowledge. We know they ate goats, chulls, and people during the hunt, but what do they eat the rest of the time? I'm of the opinion that we are about to see the regular Chasm Fiend diet consisted of something omnivorous that finds people tasty. That the population of this critter has exploded due to lack of hunting, and that both the Parshendi and the Alethi will soon begin to encounter these critters regularly as these critters spread westward through the canyons. I think these critters may be why the Parshendi can't retreat to the east. I could be totally wrong about how this over hunting will impact the area, so lets hear some other theories if you have them, or reasons why mine is a good or bad one. Edit: I'm directionally challenged

I'm going to agree with Shardlet here. From the book I got the impression that the plains were fairly level with only minor fluctuations other than the tower, and that the chasms were sloped away and provided drainage westward during Highstorms.

How about we settle on that they could plausibly have been walled in mustering areas for the KR. One for each order. Give the Heralds or, later, KR leadership a place to address their troops. Regardless of whether their were enough KR to fill them, we have some pretty strong evidence that they weren't the only warriors fighting. In the event these are the remains of Urithiru, it would make sense to train these warriors in a central location. This would be even more likely during the time when people could be shuffled about through gates. I'm going to agree that these were unlikely to have been finished buildings. On top of what you've already pointed out, we can also assume that at least some excavation has been done in the camps. Latrines are the very least of what some of the Highlords may have had excavated over the past five or six years. Stone may have been quarried for some of the buildings, etc. I doubt a lot of excavation has been done, but I don't doubt that enough has been done that someone would have found evidence that they were buildings by now had that been the case.

On Earth, this would be correct. Roshar has lower gravity which would provide lower stress levels. We can also assume that at least some of the materials were soul cast. Provided they had the engineering expertise, these factor could feasibly move impossible to improbable. I'd almost go so far as to say that building anything in an unsheltered area and expecting it to withstand Highstorm after Highstorm was impossible, but we have cities in Roshar, and not all of them are hidden away.

WoB

The map preceding chapter 12. 'Observer', on 25 Sept 2012 - 20:58, said: />One question really quick: What are the smoke-y spren that appear around a dead chasmfiend? ['Brandon'] They are in a symbiotic relationship with the chasmfiend, and are part of what allow the creatures to grow to the size they do with an exoskeleton. (Along with a high-oxygen, lower-gravity world.)

Page 182. The plains are Shattered, except the ten camps. If you're right, the shattering of the plains may be the physical manifestation of the shattering of the Honorshard, but their most certainly was a shattering. One could also argue that according to your own theory Closest to Honor may be closest to the Origin.

So what was the Oath Pact about? What's different about Roshar than the other worlds we've seen. Well, Roshar has been invested by three Shards. Roshar has three fully functional races. Scadrial has three races as well, but one could argue how functional the Koloss or Kandra are as a species. The Parshendi are a fully functional race with a cultural history. I'm assuming that the Aimians are as well. Then of course there are humans. I would theorize that each Shard had a chosen people, but each of them realized that they lacked the versatility to create a well rounded functional sentient life-form. So each Shard invested some of their energy into each race. I think this is what the Oath Pact was centered upon. I also believe this was where things began to fall apart. I would further theorize that the Aimians belong to Cultivation, the Humans belong to Honor, and the Parshendi belong to Odium. I think that Odium tried to cheat right from the start by putting more of himself into humans then agreed upon to weigh things more in his favor, but instead of simply accepting this and letting things play out, Honor invested additional energy into the Parshendi, corrupting Odiums favored race with an excess of Honor. This action pitted Honor and Odium directly against each other and made Honor the focus of Odiums displeasure. The Aimians were ignored in this process, and are the most balanced of all the races on Roshar. If the Aimians weren't forced to share their world with more aggressive races, they would probably build a thriving prosperous civilization, but because they are balanced, they lack the aggressiveness to compete with the other races. We know that the Parshendi have dark gods. The humans worship the Almighty, and we can assume that the Aimians worship Cultivation.

I'm going to disagree. If Shards are permanent, and finite in number, why haven't Odiums minions captured them over the thousands of years of desolations and removed them from play permanently? A set here, a set there. How hard would it be? Eventually, the KR as a whole could be disarmed. Odium isn't a mindless force. I doubt he has less control over his minions than Ruin did. The primary reason we believe that the total number of Shards is finite in nature is because they were never disseminated to regular soldiers. So let me theorize here for a moment. What do we know. We know that every Knight Radiant we've seen was a Shardbearer. We know that no one except KR wore Shards before the Recreance, and we know that post-Recreance Shardplate functions at a reduced capacity. Now we have to determine why Shards were not wide spread prior to the Recreance. I would theorize that the bond between a KR and their Shards was broken upon death. Once the bond was broken, the Shards would deteriorate as Shardplate does now when a piece is abandoned on the field and a new piece is regrown. The Recreance is probably the most under rated significant event that has occurred since the Heralds abandoned the Oath Pact. When the KR broke their oaths, they severed their bonds to their Shards. This new development stopped the natural cycle that had been perpetuated throughout history. It left the Shards permanently invested but at a reduced capacity. Where the Shards were once maintained through a Nahel bond, now the Plate required infusion through gems to continue functioning. But what about the Blades? They appear to function at full capacity. How have they been degraded? Brandon rarely creates a magic system that lacks an upkeep cost. So after thinking long and hard about what that cost might be, I've reached a tentative theory that the Blades recharge while in use. Instead of being fueled by Stormlight as the Plate is, they consume spiritual energy. This could explain why Syl hates them. They may sever the bond between the body and the soul and feed on the energy created by doing this. A side affect of this process may be the Thrill. The Thrill could be a warped kind of feedback from a Shardblade. I would speculate that in the hands of a KR they may have had a similar effect, but that they drew energy from the bond instead of through the act of destruction. This would explain why a KR or any other surgebinder wouldn't feel the Thrill. I don't think that the KR ever tried to sever these bonds for Fallen Knights. These were killed as enemies, and their Shards decayed. I don't believe a KR was ever forced to give up their Shards because they got to old. I think they maintained their bonds throughout their natural lives, even after retirement. I could be wrong about all of this of course, but I don't think this is any less valid a theory than most of the others out there, and does a better job of tying up loose ends than most. If there is an example of someone without a Shardblade feeling the Thrill, that portion of the theory is, of course, dead on arrival. It's possible, we don't really know enough about the process. I'd hazard a guess that if you had a fragment and enough stormlight it could be done. I believe the only way a set of Plate would be likely to be destroyed is in a freak accident where it took to long to reach it after it became extremely damaged.

It does make sense, and Sadeas would agree with you wholeheartedly, but at one point, their was a set of Plate for every Blade. It seems that more Plate has been lost than Blades. We have been led to believe thus far that Blades are indestructible. Nothing seems to damage them. Plate, while very resilient, is not indestructible. It can be shattered, and the person wearing it killed. This being the case, it should theoretically be possible to completely destroy a set of Plate. I mean, I wouldn't do it, but it should be possible provided all the infusion points are Shattered. For instance, lets take this unlikely example. A Shardbearer is caught in a rock slide while sleeping and a huge slab of granite falls on him. Depending on the surface the Shardbearer is lying on (almost every surface is stone), and the size of the rock, the Plate could be flattened along with the Shardbearer, but someone else with a Shardblade could come along and cut the buried blade free of the rubble. Now we have one less set of Plate. All I'm saying is that theoretically it should be possible. The value of the Plate would keep people from testing this intentionally.

Yes, I said you'd have to destroy all the infusion points, that includes the one in the gauntlet. If the Plate has no infusion points left, then I don't see how it could be recovered. It would almost certainly deteriorate. I also believe that there are currently more Blades than there is Plate. At least we see more Shardbearers who have a Blade but lack Plate than we do Shardbearers who have Plate and lack a blade. Granted, the sample population we have at the moment is rather small.

I'm of the opinion that if all the pieces were shattered, the Plate would decay. I have serious doubts that this happens accidentally, and the value of Plate is such that you'd have to have a really good reason for doing this, but I think it's possible. If you don't have at least one infusion point left in the plate, I don't see how it could be regrown.

Well, there are several different ways that Amaram could reach the conclusion that a Desolation is imminent. We have Taln of course. Depending on how credible people find what he has to say. I'm assuming a Herald knows a few tricks that ordinary Shardbearers don't, which may sway the minds of some important people even if they try to discredit him publicly. We have the stormwardens. They are considered to be wise and knowledgeable people. If enough of them become convinced that a desolation is imminent and espouse this belief, people will take notice. We have Taravangian, who may or may not have a code name, but probably does considering how vulnerable his city state is to the more warlike nations which surround it, and how deeply he dabbles in the politics of those nations. There is this quote by Crysanja which is also a very valid point. From what I understand Jasnah and Shallan will be nearing the Shattered Plains at the beginning of Words of Radiance. This means that we will have at least a short time skip between these book. During this time, Dalinar will most likely have been pronounced High Prince of War. Dalinar will at the very least be organizing how the codes will be enforced throughout the camps. Kaladin will have begun training with Bridge Four, begun organizing the rest of the bridgemen, and established Dalinars honor guard. I wouldn't be surprised if Jasnah and Shallan arrive with Amaram. I suppose there is an outside possibility that she may sail to The Shallow Crypts or New Natanan before making her way overland, or even through Shadesmar which I find unlikely. If she travels to Karanak or Dumadari though, she will need to pass through Alethkar to reach the Shattered Plains in the Frostlands (Nantanatan). We know that bandits are a concern, so I doubt that Jasnah will travel such a distance without an escort. Amaram is also traveling to the Shattered Plains, so it would make sense for Jasnah to attach herself to Amarams army since Amaram and Dalinar seem to be on good terms, and it is unlikely that news of Sadeas betrayal would have reached Alethkar yet. I don't really think that Jasnah will volunteer her belief that a desolation may be on its way to Amaram outright, she seems more subtle and intelligent than that. I don't doubt that she would leave him with the clues he needs to put things together on his own as additional evidence mounts. As far as Kaladin and Amaram are concerned, I can see one of two things occuring. Either Amaram will have heard of Kaladin Stormblessed, the man who lived through a highstorm and saved Dalinar's army, as well as the position he holds in Dalinars household, connect this to the man he took his Shards from, and takes precautions. Or He doesn't, and fails to recognize Kaladin, who was just a squad leader prior to killing the Shardbearer. Kaladin has been hiding his brands behind his hair, so this is entirely possible. In the latter case I think Kaladin will grin and bear it rather than attack a guest of the man who traded a Shardblade for his freedom. At least initially.

Ten Essences, Ten Heralds, and Ten Fools. If each of the Heralds is tied to an essence, then each of the Fools may be as well. If men can attain investiture by following the ideals of the Heralds, then perhaps men can also attain investiture of a sort through the Fools. If so, perhaps this grants them the ability to summon the Midnight Essence.

We don't have a single reference to a Knight Radiant existing post Recreance. We know they all had bonding spren, so where did the spren go? The idea that almost all of the bonding spren are imprisoned in existing Shards is certainly plausible with the information we currently have. Those bonding spren not imprisoned, such as Syl and the Cryptics, may have been freed through the complete destruction of Plate, or they may have been awaiting a new bondholder. Now, based on Syl's reactions and the impermanence of Plate, it could also be speculated that the Blade is the part invested with a spren, and the Plate is a secondary result. On the Day of Recreance, the KR all drove their Blades into the stone prior to removing their Plate. This may have more significance than we suspect. The screaming may have been the spren lamenting the sudden separation from their KR. It could have also had something to do with the act of driving a Shardblade into stone as the Heralds did with their Honorblades when they abandoned their own oaths.

The following quote appears to support that cryptics are bonding spren. At least from the way I read it.

I'm going to add Gaz to the 'possible list' based on some quotes I've read and his behavior regarding his missing eye.

I think I'll reference Dalinar in regards to blind trust. We saw how well that works out. Kaladin made a decision to trust the men of Bridge Four to prevent Bridge Four from tearing itself apart with suspicion. He was true to his word. Kaladin didn't turn around and ask Syl to watch the men. Only a fool would refuse Syls offer to do so though. Trust is independent of honor. Trust is given only to those who earn it individually or as a group. Kaladin knew he could trust Bridge Four on the field, but he had limited knowledge about how far they could be trusted beyond that. Syl's offer isn't a sign of deceit, but a offer of protection. Syl never promised to trust Bridge Four and wasn't mentioned in the discussion. It may be a fine point, but as you said, Syl is growing. As far as Kaladin's comment "best be safe" Kaladin does trust Bridge Four, but Kaladin has had his trust betrayed numerous times. His decision to trust Bridge Four was independent of Syl's offer, but Syl's offer created a loop hole that he could exploit. He wasn't watching them to ensure they remained honest. Kaladin kept his word.