Bloodfalcon

Right, I am still trying to map that all out in my head. There is a definite connection between the two charts being that the symbols for surges are just cut down the Y axis and flipped on one side. The inversion is very similar to that of the maps of Shadesmar and Roshar being inverse land and water. That inversion follows with the change in style on the pictures. Shadesmar is Cognitive -> Spren are Cognitive -> "Voidbinding chart" is Cognitive. It still makes sense to me if it goes with my other theory - The pictures of Orders on the Surgebinding chart come from the hilts of the Honorblades, which are the Physical aspect. Roshar map is Physical -> Honorblades are Physical -> Surgebinding map is Physical. Again, trying to piece this all together, but now that that connection is there, I think a lot of this theory is correct and I'm going to run with it.

I'm going to keep editing the main post with crazier theories that just compound on one another until you disprove it with a WoB or something. Pressure's on. Wild claims flying left and right, yo.

Oh I really liked balefire. I wanted more of it but in crazier ways. Maybe a portal stone world where balefire instead hits someone and makes it so their future actions have no effect. Something like that. I thought it would be a cool way for Rand to handle female Forsaken - by dragging or coercing them into another portal stone dimension, then blasting them and making them useless. Also wondered how terrible it would be if he shot some balefire into that... dome he made over shadar logoth and just vaporized.... stuff? Not even sure but it could have been magnified and directed at the True Source or whatever Shai Tan's power was and who knows.

Scott how did you know I was 3 cups deep?

Still in early stages of thought on this, but it has been mentioned on a couple threads recently that the symbols on what people have been referring to as the "Voidbinding chart" look like creatures. I started thinking that maybe instead of creatures, they were actually symbolic of various spren forms. This might be the reason that the flag on the cover of WoK is a creature that looks similar to the 4th order symbol on the chart - perhaps that is the spren that the Parshendi bond with to produce their war form? I'm not sure, but if it was an anger spren, which we know is red, it does line up in a way. Also, the lifespren is green, and that is the 5th order on the chart which sits between what is thought to be Light and Growth on Surge chart. It just seems to line up well in my mind. I haven't looked over all of the descriptions and tried to line them up, but we also don't know of all the spren out there, so I'm not sure there could be a definite thumbs up on this even if we tried our best. Give it a look! EDIT: Now I have an even worse theory that goes along with this We had an entire interlude dedicated to showing us that spren qualities can be manipulated, done by writing it down in the interlude. What if the spren characteristics are actually what is denoted on that chart. It is a chart that someone made that says "the creatures that are a combination of these two natural forces look like THIS" and they drew a picture. It's a long shot but it really is fun to think about. EDIT 2: UHHHHH maybe that is the reason that there is a large gem shown with two of the symbols in it? That could represent spren stored in "orbs" OR show how stormlight is stored. I think there might actually be a connection here, whether or not any of this is correct. EDIT 3: UHHHHH also why there are 2 Larkin seemingly eating one of the orders and storing the others inside of them or something something something. EDIT 4: Dang that theory just connected the interlude, both charts, Gavilar's Orb, the Parshendi, and Larkin. EDIT 5: I'm going to keep going, because why not? The two charts are creations of Honor and Cultivation meant to lock down how the powers work on Roshar. Honor's establishes who the owners of each ability/Order are, while the border of Cultivation's chart gives ownership of all the spren to herself/Nightwatcher. That is why the Heralds call Honor Almighty and seem to ignore Cultivation in their concerns, and the spren call Cultivation "Mother" or whatever Wyndel does (Great, now this needs to be moved to Steelhunt). We noticed that the figure has a "safe hand" sort of look going, and I bet that entire tradition comes from this single picture. It may not have even been important to Cultivation, but was picked up in a religious sect (Vorinism) and they just ran with it. Whatever stained glass window Brandon was talking about was not the origin of the chart, it was another representation. That thing is not made from stained glass. It was picked up by the Vorin "church" and represented in holy sites. The stained glass thing was a pseudo red herring. A half truth if you will.

When I moved into my college dorm several years ago and didn't have room for my entire WoT collection, Calibre was my savior.

Yes, I LOVE Calibre. Went on an epic quest for a program like it for a long time and when I found it I just went wild. I don't suggest it often because some people do find that idea kind of sketchy. It's really fine, though. I use it to put all of my ebooks onto my itunes or MagicScroll (an addon to Chrome that kicks butt).

Shardlet, you seem like a very competent and able person, so I'm sure you have already looked into this, but some books are actually able to run on multiple/unlimited devices at once. I forget the process, but it is a permission that must be given by the publisher I believe and is different for certain books and series. Might be something to double check before you submit to one of those admittedly lacking options. Source: Earlier this year I had to set up a company-wide kindle account for all new employees to access training books.

If Szeth was going to disobey, I think he'd have done it before he started slaughtering families.

Yeah I loved Nightblood! I actually could see Szeth being an Unmade pawn. The equivalent of Kaladin where the relative Unmade would be a mirror-Jezrien. Szeth is constantly hoping someone will be better than him and defeat him and I haven't said it much on here, but I think Kaladin is going to kill him near the end of WoR. Later we'll get a Szeth flashback book when we need the information it holds. Those are my hopes at least.

I tend to also believe there is a greater connection with the Honorblades, but I think that it was just as equally severed as any other when the Heralds abandoned them. It was enough to destroy their Oathpact connection, so I think it did the trick in disconnecting them from their blades as well.

Thanks Gloom! I've read a fair amount of Q&A posts, but I hadn't seen that one. Edit: Wait, spren and stormlight could be related to two different Shards, so this is till a potentially valid theory. Voidlight was suggested, but not specified in the answer.

Again, the theory I proposed initially is concerned with what they believe him to know, not the stone.They mistake his possession of the stone as proof that he knows how it works. If Gavilar was found dead with the stone and never said what he did, I doubt anyone would have even considered what it was. They all walk around with gems constantly.

This theory suggests that they did not kill him for the sphere, but for what it represented. He spent lots of time with them - enough that he was able to work out a treaty. There may be things that he shared with them or asked them about (I'm talking about the stone here) b/c they had more knowledge on the subject then he did. It's even possible the he TOOK the stone from them without permission, killing their secret, and that is where Navani got the subject that inspired her study.

What? It would be easy to know. They see the stone, and know what it is and what it means and assume Gavilar is the one who knows the secret they are trying to keep. Navani did the research but THAT is what they don't know. Gavilar spent a lot of time with the Parshendii and if he didn't show them the stone purposefully, they might have seen it around.

Natans sponsored a theory on Gavilar's death over in the WoR forum that got me thinking about the relationship between spren, Parshendii, and Gavilar's stone. I'll make this as quick as I can as it was a pretty quick thought. Is it possible that Navani's (or was it Jasnah's) theory on the ability to capture spren is really the cause of the murder, and not the stone itself? What if there really is a spren, just any spren, in that stone, and the murder was misdirected b/c the Parshendii thought Gavilar was the brains behind it? It would mean that Gavilar knew how to trap spren, which might be the key to wiping out the Parshendii on a massive scale. Consider the possibility of Jasnah walking onto a battlefield with a bag of spheres (not suggesting this is specifically what is required, just run with it for a moment) and then sucking the spren out of the Parshendii warriors and turning them into Parshmen on the spot. I don't think this theory fits as well as some of the others, but it seems possible to me. Thoughts?

Well said. This is where I meant to go with the topic, but sometimes my word has very bad.

Yeah, that's what I think, but I don't know if it is a popular opinion. I like it though. But I've always been a fan of the "power weapon" stories that attach someone's abilities to their weapons that they keep with them. In fact it is one of the main reasons I get turned off by A Song of Ice and Fire; the Valerion steel blades are kind of built up, and then the people who have them don't seem to be very much better off for it. But that's enough about me...

There are theories on this. Some people think Szeth has one, which would probably be assuming the Shin control them, or some group Szeth is associated with. Not sure, but pretty confident the Knights Radiant did not use them as their own - there were just too many of them. This is one of those questions that you could spend hours reading about if you type Honorblade into the search bar, but by the end you would be exhausted.

Do you think gemhearts grow inside chasmfiends all the same awesome shape? Or do they have to be cut on a huge scale?

If the opposite, cubes it is!

Sounds plausible. If so, lets start rounding out all of our gems then. Air-tight seal effect.

Right, all of that is understood. But Shardblades don't cut through things like normal blades, as I'm sure you have read once or twice. If they sever the soul / feeling / idk of people, what do they do to an item containing stormlight? They don't cut through Shardplate easily, so I am curious. Would the product be a whole gemheart without Stormlight? Or two clean cut halves, each with half of the Stormlight? Or shattered pieces? Not really about what how gems react with Stormlight as much as how gems react with Shardblades.

Dalinar walks over to the Parshendii leader and says "I'm gonna slice every single gemheart in half. You get one piece, we get the other. PEACE SUCKAS, LETS HAVE DINNA SOMETIME." It would mean no more mass slaughters on the Plains, and depending on how it works, it could still provide more than enough food for both sides. Maybe that is how Dalinar wrecks everyone's fun.

They use them to break they chrysalis, but not to chop the gemheart.