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Correct as usual, KamorianKandra. (Sorry about the delay. Your guess must have posted while I was composing my hint, and I didn't see it until just now. Does it count as being double ninja'd if you don't notice until after going back to edit your post twice?) I am glad to know I'm not the only one who used to watch that show.

@maxal I'm surprised that has been your experience. I have spent the majority of my time in SA, (though more recently in Signings and Cosmere Theories, and admittedly I read a lot more than I post) but I don't think I've noticed much down voting. I guess I do avoid the threads that argue about character merits, so maybe that's where the problem is. Re: the question of anonymously voting... My attitude about rep probably influences my stance here, which is basically agreeing with zas. I admit that I'm pretty proud of my few popular posts, but to me that number is a proxy for, "Hey, people came and read this post even if they didn't respond. I contributed something!" My aggregate rep doesn't matter much to me after having passed the fuzzy number threshold that in my brain means "no longer a newbie." That said, I use my upvotes exactly how zas described, and though much more infrequent, I have also used downvotes as outlined by zas. I haven't ever given a down vote because of disagreement, and unless it's something inappropriate/offensive I never drop posts below zero, but I do think downvotes as aggregate feedback on posts is a worthwhile feature of the system. I think the low-threshold-to-action, low-impact version of anonymous voting makes more sense. I wouldn't be very bothered if it changed, but I think anything that puts more emphasis on reputation points is a bad thing. If there are tools to look at who is voting on your posts, I think people will get more fixated on the votes, to the detriment of the discussion. Frankly I'm a bit surprised that people (e.g. Kobold, since he brought it up) notice when their rep fluctuates up and down. I like the way that reputation is fairly unobtrusive, (especially true now that I use the mobile site more than half the time). It occurs to me that if badges/awards do get implemented and widely adopted, there is potential to partially divorce rep from contribution achievements, in which case other changes might make sense. But I don't think you can ever fully decouple those, and in my opinion finding more ways to focus on reputation will only hurt the openness (e.g to newcomers with low reputation counts) and friendliness (e.g. enable vindictive voting/posting) of the community.

I will add a vote for Brent Week's Lightbringer series. I absolutely love them, and of the ones mentioned so far they are most similar to Brandon's style. (For the record, since a lot of people may be reading this thread, Weeks has a bit more violence, intimacy, and language than Brandon's books, which is why I sometimes hesitate to recommend them to several of my Sanderson-loving friends who have particularly sensitive triggers. But in comparison to many things on your list above, these will be nothing special.) Another of my stand-by recommendations is Jonathan Stroud's Bartimaeus trilogy, set in a magical England from the perspective of an enslaved jinni whose primary magical ability appears to be conceited snark. The characters are simply delightful in that one. Stroud is currently in the middle of a younger series called Lockwood & Co. Think British teen ghostbusters with swords.

He is fond of presenting morality tales with puppets, often featuring a presumptive monarch who likes to be told that he is right. EDIT: Now deceased, the man's interaction with you has been continued through one of his puppet characters, but in animated form. EDIT2: Transportation to the puppet show is provided by an iconic red trolley.

Because I'm good at hangman... Neon Genesis Evangelion. Okay, how about this one: A man changes his clothes in front of you, then talks about all the people who live near you. He repeatedly asks you to live near him.

I'm holding out for the Stormlight Archive single volume anthology.

Terminator (not sure which one)

http://www.reddit.com/r/books/comments/2ytg2h/im_novelist_brandon_sanderson_ama/cs4oedl?context=3 http://www.reddit.com/r/books/comments/2ytg2h/im_novelist_brandon_sanderson_ama/cs4oejw?context=3 http://www.reddit.com/r/books/comments/2ytg2h/im_novelist_brandon_sanderson_ama/cs4ogq2?context=3 http://www.reddit.com/r/books/comments/2ytg2h/im_novelist_brandon_sanderson_ama/cs4rtod?context=3 (not from the AMA) http://www.reddit.com/r/WoT/comments/394k3d/finally_picked_up_a_copy_of_amol/cs550zt?context=3 http://www.reddit.com/r/books/comments/2ytg2h/im_novelist_brandon_sanderson_ama/cs551kh?context=3

Where is the list? I voted a few days ago but I can't find a way to confirm that it went through.

:lol: <---my uncharacteristic use of smileys should indicate how much I love this. Tin: as mentioned above, solder is your best bet here. Apparently, though, a very thin coating of tin is (usually galvanically) applied to the steel in "tin cans" to prevent corrosion, so you could potentially get some there. On the other hand, I grew up in New Mexico where all of the shops in the historic district had tin-punch lanterns and other tin artwork, so depending on where you live and the local decor, there may be more around than you think. Iron: wrought iron is a good option, and cast iron skillets, etc. could also work. Historically, "iron" doesn't actually mean the pure metal, since the process to isolate it left impurities. How that relates to allomantic properties I don't know, but I suspect the "regular" iron (including both cast and wrought iron) is good enough. Technically, wrought iron is more pure than cast iron, but the modern use of "wrought iron" often refers to the look of the thing rather than the metal itself, and many things called wrought iron are actually mild steel. Other than paint (if any), a wrought iron fence shouldn't have any additional coating except maybe the galvanic zinc already mentioned. In contrast to tin, a zinc layer does not need to be unbroken to protect from rust, so if you scrape off flakes you wouldn't be damaging it any more than you already planned on. Bronze: The windings on strings for pianos and acoustic guitars are usually bronze (the center is steel). Cymbals are bronze. And if you just happen to need allomancy when you are in one of those parks with war memorials or visiting another historic site, cannons made before 1850 were usually bronze. Just don't let the tour guide see you.

I have to say this is an incredibly awesome birthday-palooza campaign. I have been wanting to help more with the Coppermind, but recent work deadlines have been a major impediment to that. I really doubt I will be able to contribute much during this month, but I'm excited that it is being worked on!

What I mean is, the topic title says that doing this will help the site too, not just the music shop. Obviously the grant money isn't going towards anything to do with this site, and most of us don't log in here so we can play locally-made tubas. So, after we feel good about supporting a good cause and Rubix's friend, how does 17S figure into it? As best I can tell, it means Rubix's job as business partner will have more breathing room, so he plans to dedicate some additional time to doing stuff on/for 17S, but I'm not sure.

I'm happy to support the project, but I am still a little confused about how 17S figures into this partnership. I don't really see the connection between this (official fan site) and that (independent music shop), aside from Rubix being partly in charge of both. Is there something I'm missing?

To be clear, the samples of Alethi script we have are not writing Alethi words. So, if Shallan were to write something about Bridge Four, in-world she would write it as "Vev Gesheh," but if we got that notebook page reproduced in our book, Nazh or someone else doing the compiling of these documents would supposedly have translated those words into English, then transliterated them back into the Alethi script to give the feeling of the culture while also making the content accessible. At least, that is my understanding of the (rather convoluted) in-world explanation for why we let Isaac develop at least two really cool writing systems without having to make up the entire language(s) spoken on Roshar. (Plus, it would be a whole lot less accessible for us fans to decipher with limited clues if we had to come up with phonemes and cognates together.)

My Creation Daily find: Here is a very cool video describing different counting systems from cultures around the world. It looks like great material for world building. @mail-mi: Yes, you are correct; the summer/winter labels just describe the state of that sun. In practice the two days would basically cancel out the seasonal effect. The axis can be "frozen" in any position you like if the right rotation speeds are chosen, but it would affect both stars. You can't choose just one to stay the same and let the other vary.

Great points all around. LabRat's note about bio-availability is a good one, and could explain the danger of drinking stormwater without letting it settle: stomach acid liberates the P/K bound up in crem, but it isn't soluble initially so there aren't dangerous levels in the water after settling. I'm probably a victim of the Assuredness movement here. I overstated the case a bit, and looking up agricultural economics since then hasn't really supported my interpretation. Since only ardents soulcast, and the soulcasters are kept out of view of other people, I'm not sure there is evidence either way for how much they operate usually. Certainly the war campaign is abnormally high, but I wonder how much higher than normal. I think that at least historically soulcast food probably has been a crucial element of society, even if it is limited in application. If you soulcast 5% of the food you eat, that basically translates into 5% more population you can support, and that additional 5% can all specialize into non-farming social roles. That sounds like an incredible boon to advancing civilization (or recovering from a recent Desolation. Again.) For currency, I was referring to the denominations of spheres, with emerald as the most valuable specifically because it is useful for food soulcasting. That may be a holdover from a different economic situation, but it indicates that at some point the ability to create food was considered a value standard. (Not that it counts for much. I wouldn't say that all the economies that adopted the gold standard were functionally dependent upon the properties of gold. It was useful as a standard for other reasons.) I don't recall the Kholinar riots being a result of agricultural problems so much as flagrant mismanagement of trade, etc. So what food there was didn't make it to the people who needed it. Someone with a book can check me on that--maybe there was an actual shortage. I think that "cremlings" is a very broad umbrella term covering basically anything small that you see crawling around after a highstorm, and it probably refers to a wide range of creature types-possibly including all of the above. I'll admit that options 2&3 hadn't occurred to me before. I had gotten the impression that the majority of cremlings were terrestrial arthropods that remained active but hidden in the absence of a highstorm, along with some others that hatch/revive as you suggest. I'll have to watch descriptions on a reread. While I find option 3 intriguing, the sheer distances that creatures are carried make it less plausible that they could then return to the Eastern sea in their next life stage. And But it seems a bit of a stretch really really cool to suggest a rolling population moving around the entire planet, carried by highstorms. The more I think about that the more potential I see. Neat idea! That situation could lead to a lot of the "doomed sea creatures" happening since presumably most of the possible touchdown locations are oceanic. (Unlikely as it is, I have to say that abiogenesis would be an entertaining twist for Brandon to throw in. "What, you thought only spren could suddenly pop into being in the physical realm?")

This is only partially true. While Navani's writings are directly transliterated from English spelling, the mirrored text seen behind some of Shallan's pages (taken from Jasnah's notebook) contain words with alternative, more phonetic spellings, suggesting that Alethi writing probably does not have standardized spelling yet. See this thread for details.

Welcome! This is an excellently reasoned and explained theory, exactly the sort of thing that I find irresistible on this site. Overall I think you may be on to something. I have a few comments and quibbles, but for the most part (even if my interpretation is correct) they just reduce the amount of Shardic intervention necessary. This is definitely plausible. First, on the meta-level, I initially thought, "Yeah, sure, but Brandon wouldn't have planned that. He has admitted in interviews that they couldn't figure out the greatshell issues, and settled on an It's Magic explanation with spren." However, knowing the amount of research that goes into his worldbuilding, I could definitely see this as a canon element. Thanks to skaa for finding that WoB, even though it isn't about the planet directly. Now, for the in-world treatment. To me, the weakest part of this argument is the "airsick lowlander" evidence. Yes, the atmosphere is different, but the only "healthier" evidence we have is Rock saying so, and his comments always struck me as simple cultural elitism. There is little to convince me that the airsick comments are any more evidence-based than a slur like "stupid lighteyes," etc. Regular old altitude sickness could be reason enough for their thought process. Similarly, the diet piece doesn't ring true to me either. I agree with the heavy food production statement, but as far as animal parts, there are Earth cultures that eat bone-in fish, shell-on shrimp, etc. that (to my knowledge) don't do so for scarcity reasons. Maybe scarcity caused someone to eat crickets the first time, but after that the tribe just decided they were a good food source. Basically, the difference in productivity between peaks and plains may be real, but I don't think horneater stew is real evidence of that. So, let's think about rockbuds. I really like the sea urchin comparison--it is quite apt. And I agree that using rockbuds as the model makes sense since they are the most widely cultivated and therefore probably have the best calorie density per farming effort available. I agree with your reasoning, but want to point out a few things. The Listeners enhance their crop growth with stormlight stored in gems. I got the impression from the books that this works by much more than "shine a light on it" mechanisms. I believe that the inherent power of stormlight is doing something here, contributing more energy for growth (via surges or something, not photosynthesis). And since you get a highstorm with a shot of extra energy every few days, that could be enough to make the ecosystem thrive. And while civilization requires more food production than just living does, humans also have access to soulcasting. In fact, soulcasting food seems to be the thing that, at least historically, has driven Alethi currency valuation. This suggests it is fundamental, and I suspect it is what allows any sort of approach to the population density we observe. I agree with you that partial pressure of CO2 must be greater than on Earth (and I'm glad you brought it up, because I had forgotten it was a limiting factor for photosynthesis.) But maybe it doesn't have to be too much greater. Especially since, according to the graph on this page, at a certain point temperature becomes limiting and adding more CO2 won't help. (I have no idea what that partial pressure is at human-friendly temperatures, or how it relates to healthy breathing. Off the cuff I would guess that CO2 would get unhealthy for us before it reached excess concentrations for photosynthesis.) See, this is the part where I reveal my ignorance. I am a biologist, but for the most part I ignore plants. I know, sorry. I will just point out that I had imagined rockbud shells as being deposits/extrusions of minerals derived from crem, sort of like the exoskeletons of corals, rather than the chitinous shells of arthropods. Still an effort, but not nearly as energetically expensive. Okay, so now... About crem. I think you're probably right, but (as a non-plant person) what other possibilities did you rule out? I have been imagining crem as including minerals, but also oceanic biomass caught up in the highstorm. If an algal bloom is happening out in the eastern ocean, the next highstorm is bound to deposit tons of free food to support the land-based ecology. Sort of like organic detritus drifting down to lower levels in the ocean creates a conveyor belt bringing in raw materials for the local energy budget. Here I've mostly got questions for you: What is the rate of an algal bloom? What would a normal hurricane do to life in coastal waters (like algae)? Do periodic highstorms make it more believable that the strait is clear, despite "massive nitrogen and phosphate pollution" in the water? If the algae gets both churned into the water and lifted onto the land, would that keep the plant matter in check enough to let other oceanic life catch up and just have a very fertile ocean in life that isn't obviously visible from the shore? And Surges I guess this part confuses me a little bit. Not that it wouldn't work, but I wonder why Cultivation would do it that way. The "drain an attribute here to supply it elsewhere" is a Feruchemical mindset, which is distinct in that it is internally powered. Not only are the Shards not limited to surges or the other subdivisions of investiture that are used by people, they are working with a vastly larger power source. Perhaps magically fertilizing a whole continent is a big enough use of magic to be a drain, but I personally get the sense that even that is small potatoes unless opposed by another Shard. And since the ecology of Roshar appears to predate Odium's arrival, she would have been at this for a long time. (Then again, she's good at seeing the future, so maybe she would know she needs to be careful with resources. I don't know.) Anyway, that's my input for now. I don't see much in the way of holes to poke, just questions to ask. Overall, thanks for a great theory! I'm pretty sure you are on to something here. I'm always glad to have more science-minded theorists to present neat ideas to discuss, and I look forward to seeing you around the forums.

I'm not familiar with the software so I could be wrong but I don't think that is a possibility. I like the idea, though, and you could do an easy workaround by linking to a Google doc that has multiple owners or open editing. Periodically copy-pasting the content into the post below the link would let our show up and be searchable for forum users who don't click through.

Here are my family's experiences: Me: loved it (also hugely loved Mistborn and usually like long involved fantasy) Wife: liked WoK okay, hasn't bothered to pick up WoR (enjoyed Mistborn TFE but not enough to read the rest of the trilogy.) Brother: "Best book I've ever read" (thought Mistborn was pretty good.) Sister: loved it (much more a Reckoners and Rithmatist fan than Mistborn) Mom: not awful. but terribly long and slow. fell asleep during the audiobook and didn't feel compelled to catch up on the parts she missed. (Hasn't read any other Sanderson except Alcatraz, not really into alternate world fantasy) Dad: not interested (he loves Tolkein and that's about it for fantasy) In my opinion there is plenty of intermediate action to keep the pages turning, but it is true that there is a whole lot of "nothing important is happening yet." However, that length is part of what I thought really makes the story work. For example, it gives the characters time to make crucial decisions, experience the outcome, and change their mind later (and even again after that) without seeming to flip-flop. They actually have room for growth in between those points and it feels organic.

Short answer is no. The planet is at a location where the two gravitational fields result in zero net acceleration. These are called Legrangian points, and objects in space really do inhabit such points. In this example the planet is sitting still in the center while the two starts orbit each other. It is extremely unlikely to arise naturally, but apparently something was messing with the system.

source I don't know whether it is the cognitive or physical aspect that matters, but we do know that the metallic arts only work with metal. Even if it is cognitive, it shouldn't be hard for the Feruchemist to think about the nail in the table as a separate entity. I suspect that if the restriction is cognitive a skilled feruchemist could concentrate really hard and store an attribute in just part of an all-metal table.

You're so dumb! You wouldn't even need an aviar to hide on Patji.

When i get that message it is because the URL I am using is one to (for example) Google Drive, where the link is simply a string of characters and does not contain an explicit image file extension like .jpg or .gif at the end. Finding a way to get a direct url to the image solves it for me. The problem is that the "sharing link" provided is actually to the dynamic image viewer that Google etc. use, not to the image itself. After you share the image, right click on it (or ctl+click for Mac) and select "copy Image URL" for the link to use, or select "open image in new tab/window" then copy the URL from the address bar.

Brandon answered some of our questions on his reddit AMA. KalynaAnn and I both asked follow-ups, so hopefully we'll get some additional info soon. Here are the relevant posts: Thanks Kalyna for correcting me on the parabola business. It sounds like it would work for a LoF though.