Darkness

Brandon says we've seen three different types of Shardblades. Shardblade is too all-inclusive, so I'll break that down by shard. I would qualify that as: 1. Honorblades (from Honor's shard? Remembering that the heralds actually came from off-Roshar, where did the blades come from?) 2. Radiants' blades (dead and alive)… for lack of a better term Sprenblades (some from Honor, maybe some from Cultivation's shard?) 3. Blades from Endowment's shard (Nightblood, Wit's sword (?) <-- I don't really buy into that one, but I'd love to be proven wrong!)

The website http://www.bestbookread.com/ is running a poll on the book that has 'touched your life' the most. So far, over 13,000 people have voted on this list, and notice goes out to each person about the top 20 books at the end of the poll. Words of Radiance only has one vote. Mine. Please change that and get the news of this book out to people who haven't read it! This is a little way to say "thank you" to Team Sanderson, and maybe get a few more people interested in this beautiful book! As a side vote, I've been wondering which Brandon Sanderson book is the fan-favorite! Feel free to click it here, but please also get to the link and spread the schtick!

This is perhaps the best spoiler-free review of a book I have ever read. From what I can tell, that is very appropriate. I love how you gave it 10 heartbeats. 2:1 stars:heartbeats = 20 stars:10 heartbeats. That's 20 stars out of 5 folks Oh, and for 'regular' schmucks like me that don't get to be beta or gamma readers... 1 week. One Earth week. 7 days. Yessssssss...

It would be awesome to have a shard arrow. Let it fly from a bow at 300 yards (or even 500 with the enhanced strength of plate), and then summon it back once it hits. It probably wouldn't do all that much more than a regular arrow passing through people, but think of how nice it would be to shatter shardplate before the bearer even got to you!

So… Hatespren? From Odium? That's why they're so many on the horizon?

Quoting this because it's where I got the idea from: To recap - Spren are described by Shallan, and confirmed by Jasnah, as 'living ideas'. Brandon says they are fragments of shards that attained sentience. This has been documented in other places, like Sel: - Seons seemingly lost their sentience when their people got taken by the Shaod during the Reod, but recovered when Elantris was restored. They are Splinters of Devotion, patterned in the shapes of Aons. I would suggest that the Seons are powered by bonds with their humans. When the Elantrians were trapped in stasis, that bond was put on hold, and so the Seons' power source was halted, and they drifted aimlessly. Little bits of the Dor were still getting through (the power had a slow leak into the world), but only enough to attract the Seons to their people and to Elantris, but not enough to power them (or power the Aons). - In a similar fashion, spren have attained sentience through the people of Roshar. They are fragments of power, wandering about (like Seons without an active bond, but staying 'sentient' on the 'slow leak' of cognition from random humans) until they make a bond with a human. Because spren are most related to the cognitive realm, their bond strength manifests cognitively (E.g. no bond = no/limited cognitive function, strong bond = strong cognitive function). This would mean that, when the bond is broken, the spren loses its cognitive strength. - For spren, this would mean that they will remain sentient (although perhaps not cognitive; meaning they function, but not at a high level) as long as there is some leakage of cognitive energy - powered by human thought. So how would spren 'die'? I can think of 3 ways: 1. Spren count a return from cognitive function to base sentience as death, think of a person that goes into a lifelong coma. 2. Once spren make a bond with a human (a Nahel bond), its existence becomes exclusively linked to that of the bond. The spren becomes attuned to the thoughts of that one person, and so it dies when that person stops thinking (i.e. dies). This is disproven because Syl remembers being cognitive in the past, and so spren can cycle between people. 3. Spren are splinters, like small-scale shards. The same way shards are driven by ideals (or forces with a focus), splinters are driven by very small-scale (specific) forces. Syl is powered by any ideal that is honorable, Wyndle is powered by the force of growth, the Cryptics are powered by intrigue (lies, secrets, whatever), etc. This would mean that when honor died (not Honor, but honor) among men, those spren died, or at least a great majority of them. I'm sure some men still had shreds of honor. Further, spren that are powered by specific forces (e.g. creation, wind, rot, anger) are attracted to areas where that force is present, much like Seons were attracted to Elantris during the Reod. I would go further to say that individual spren are uniquely attracted to certain facets of a force (with overlap), which would explain how it was debatable if some spren were actually Honorspren (who's to say if a specific way of thinking is honorable… Amaram, anybody?) - Spren are ranked in hierarchies based on how much free energy of each type is available in the cognitive realm. For example, Honorspren used to rank high, and Cryptics now do because of all the intrigue in the thoughts of men. This does not make the Cryptics more 'powerful', but it does make them more cognizant. - Finally, spren are more interested than ever in preserving humankind, not because the Rosharans' thought are particularly useful at the present, but because if Odium wins, thought ends. Humans die, and the spren lose all cognition that they once had. They will be doomed to float like unpowered Seons for the rest of time. This is all built mostly on air, but it seems to make sense to me. Anywhere I should update, any information I'm missing?

Man, it would be cool to see Darkness take on Szeth though! Szeth seems overpowered, but Darkness is probably very familiar with his abilities, and has a few tricks of his own!

Here's a question. Did the Radiants voluntarily return after desolations by travelling realmatically through their own abilities, or did they get towed back by their honorblades? Perhaps this is one thing the honorblades can do that shardblades cannot: take their holders back with them to wherever they go. Perhaps that is why the heralds had to leave their blades behind, so they could not be taken back when the time came. When a herald dies, the blade disappears, or is transported… bringing the herald with it.

Well, I just spent another 2 hours of class time

I like the theory simply because it's something that would appeal to Brandon's method of writing. He hasn't done something like this before. A broken God, who exists on two levels, one mostly consumed by Honor, one the vestige of what was not taken. Driven to madness and drooling in his own duality. It would be a fascinating view to write, and a beautiful dichotomy to explore!

Regardless, crystal and gemstone aren't the same thing, because the crystal walls don't suddenly flash and burst with light in result of every highstorm. I'm pretty sure that would have been remarked upon, and famous even, if the whole building (or even just some of the rooms) lit up like a beacon every single storm. Unless the crystals was restricted to the inner walls… but where would the sense be in that? If the crystal lit up at all, you would almost certainly put it on the outside of the building. Light is useful, and showy. I can't see people resisting the idea. Edit: spelling

Maybe they figured that the Heralds must have been onto something. I mean, the Heralds were basically their General-Gods for all intents and purposes. Maybe one of the Heralds (in their decomposing morality) told the KR that the presence of men bonded to spren was what made Odium able to visit Roshar in Desolations. I for one could see Darkness believing this and telling his order about it. Then the KR would believe it was a great sacrifice to give up surgebinding and the Nahel bond, but by doing so they were protecting mankind. For all we know, the Herald could actually be right. Surgebinders could be providing a conduit for Odium somehow. Lot's of maybes, but I could see that playing out: 1. Heralds leave their swords because they are sick of it and can't do it anymore. 2. They see that the desolations have stopped and the Oathpact seems to be in force because of Taln. 3. They slowly become less honorable, perhaps corrupted by Odium to despise the very ideals they sought to uphold. 4. They reason, maybe poorly, maybe correctly, that the KR don't need to keep fighting the voidbringers. If they gave up like the Heralds, then the opposition would just stop. 5. Some Herald finally suggests/orders it en masse, and a KR order agrees to do it. 6. Recreance day. Deadly to spren, betrayal as seen by man (KR refusing to fight anymore), and extremely hard but seemingly self-sacrificing on the part of the KR. 7. Aftermath: Voidbringers go away, Herald seems vindicated, and then carries the thought further. This propels Darkness into a homocidal quest to 'save mankind' by killing all surgebinders, thereby preventing the return of the voidbringers. Edit: Woah! Sorry, this topic got way off course! Um… yes, Kaladin will probably get a shardspear at some point, but not in WoR. A sword is just a tool, probably not with any special symbolism in itself. Although the design would have to be quite unique for it to be effective as a shardspear. Haft:Hilt is a pretty big ratio when comparing spear to sword.

hee hee politicspren (Cryptics). I could see why Brandon would laugh at truthspren and Jasnah would say liespren Edit: spelling

I realize that most of these comments are just idle speculation, but Prof would be a lot harder to take down if you don't know his weakness. You could throw him into the ocean. Even if he can get rid of water with his hands, he can't create oxygen… there'd just be more water. Eventually maybe he'd drown in a big pile of fish You could gas him; there are gases that knock people out in less than a second, but you'd have to continuously replenish the gas so he couldn't just heal himself out of it. You could laser him, but to what extent? Also, considering steel is mostly made up of carbon, and the term 'organic' is synonymous with carbon-based, it's not a simple question of steel or glue. You'd have to pin down exactly what materials Prof's vibrations work on and - even more helpful - why. For example, if he were only able to reduce non-living entities (or even just metals), then that alters the resources you have available. Can he burrow through normal ground, or is it just the steel-transduced ground he can get through? Can he get rid of flames like he does bullets? Heat? Lasers? There's just too much uncertainty to devise a suitable plan of takedown without knowing a sure limitation, or better yet, his weakness.

So… Firefight's weakness is being burned by fire? I don't buy it, but it could be cool. Maybe the melting of her DNA (+74 degrees Celsius) prevents her from being reincarnated or something. and… I wonder if Calamity has a weakness?

I'm pretty sure she can do sound and earth-tremor illusions too. I have no idea of how she would actually go about it. Her manifestations are obviously outside the mind, since she doesn't have to know you are there to trick you. But how else would Steelheart have convinced people that an entire building was torched to the ground if there weren't any concussive blasts or noise?

Secretspren? No, they seem to react stronger to the revealing of a secret more than the secret itself. Discoveryspren? That would go well with how Shallan captured her bonded cryptic. She attracted all the creationspren as she was exploring the memory in her mind (cognitive link), when that creative act came to a climax, she crossed the threshold into discovery. Also, you could say that revealing secrets about oneself is an act of discovery… Shaky, but supported and possible.

I wouldn't use "why certainly my dear" as a motive for Odium. Perhaps Rayse at some point had an affinity for Cultivation's holder, but remember the shardic intent of Odium. It isn't about war or destruction, those are just byproducts. Odium is all-encompassing, intense hatred. I can't see him forming a coalition or even agreement with any shard voluntarily. He even went so far as to refuse gaining the power of other splintered shards to avoid becoming contaminated by another intent. Although… it would be scary to see a combination of Odium and Endowment

Brandon Was… 'Fuzzing' (for lack of a better word) With Us?

Makes sense… Shadesmar is basically the cognitive kingdom. When Shallan blinks, it freezes a 'memory' in her mind. Memory work seems pretty cognitive to me. She's probably taking an image of exactly how she perceives everything around her, which is the very essence of the cognitive realm.

That's actually what makes me think that the 'spren giving themselves up to create shard blades' theory isn't quite right. Spren are creatures of the cognitive realm, while shardblades affect the spiritual. I'm waiting for more information about the realms before I subscribe to a theory.

Studying the 'void bringer' chart, it seems to me that it's Cultivation's way of accessing the surges. Not only is the picture of a woman (Cultivation?) surrounding the chart on the four sides (where in the Honor chart it has the faces of the heralds), but if we are to believe the Cultivation/Nightwatcher theory (which I think is fairly well founded), then flipping one of the sides to get the corresponding surge image makes a great deal of sense (it goes well with providing both yin and yang so to speak, a blessing and a curse). If that's true, then I'd be interested to see what Odium's access chart looks like… upside down symbols? Inverted colouring? One other thing that popped out at me. Szeth says that voidbringers were said to hold stormlight perfectly. I don't think I want to put this forward as a theory because I don't like it, but follow this chain of thought: In WoR, Kaladin is learning to hold stormlight much better, to the point that he is holding small amounts almost subconsciously. This would hint that he is on the way to holding it perfectly. This hints that he is becoming a void binder, and Syl is tricking him, not actually being an Honorspren. Darkness is actually doing a good work by preventing surge binders from binding false honorspren. The betrayal is something to do with real honorspren being mistaken and scorned? Maybe? I don't like it though... While I'm at this, is there a thread about the thrill being related to taking in stormlight? The effects seem similar, and it could go a long way toward recognizing potential surgebinders among the soldiers.

Tim, I love that you first signed on at 9:50am, and your last comment was 8pm. I know you probably went off and came back online, but it reminded me of my first day or two… well, let's just say I spent more time here than I did away from the screen.

Probably, but you'll have to petition the daydreamspren. I don't make the daydreams, I just live them and pass them on Maybe something happened when they were all talking about it after? Anyway, hopefully I'll have another one in class again… but that'll have to wait until Monday And thanks for the compliment IllNSickly! First time I've ever written something fictional. It was a joy for me too!

"Wetlander: So is that like the mists and the Well? Are they… A: They are not, because they have not attained self-awareness. But, the Seons are self-aware. So, any piece, for instance there were some spren on Roshar before Honor and Cultivation got there. Those were already splinters of Adonalsium where he had left power which attained sentience on its own. So, it can be intentional is what I am saying, does that make sense? You have seen other splinters." Two things I never noticed before. Brandon refers to Adonalsium as a 'he'. So there was probably a male holder of Adonalsium. This is intriguing because I've always been a fan of the 'Hoid held Adonalsium before it splintered' theory, and now he's trying to collect pieces of his former glory. In fact, in this same interview, Brandon says that Tanavast did not die when Honor was splintered, so it's theoretically possible. Second, Shallan describes spren as 'living ideas', but Brandon says that at least some of the spren are splinters of a shard that attained sentience. No point to be made, I just thought it was an interesting perspective. Oops! Ninja'd by Kurk!