ROSHtafARian

Right, that's the sense that I'm getting. That Odium's presence isn't part of the natural Shardic atmosphere of Roshar, and thus magic on Roshar wasn't derived/influenced by him until he changed some things, possibly creating voidbinding or warping existing surgebinding to a mirror version of it. Which brings me back to the quote 'Three of Sixteen ruled, but now the broken one reigns...' - I just don't feel that quote fits if Odium wasn't native to Roshar to begin with, and more and more I'm convinced there is (or was) another Shard on Roshar alongside Cultivation and Honor.

Gah, you're right, I forgot that Commands were the focus on Nalthis, not Breath. I hadn't realized that Brandon had said Szeth wasn't bound to a spren. Hmm. Definitely holes then. I do still think there's a connection between Splinters taking the form of the magic system created by a Shard, but obviously the exact nature of that connection isn't quite sound. These comments do raise a different question for me however: The Splinters we've definitely seen thus far are Divine Breaths, Honorspren, and the Aons at the heart of Seons and Skaze. Of these Splinters, Honorspren and Seons and Skaze (referring to them as such for simplicity's sake, though of course its the Aons that are actually Splinters) have individual cognitive aspects. Divine Breaths on the other hand seem to have no cognitive aspect of their own. Is this distinction because Endowment, unlike Honor, Devotion and Dominion, is possibly still alive? For instance, if Ruin and Preservation had created Splinters of themselves while still alive, would those Splinters have no cognitive aspect....versus if their Shards had been Splintered upon their deaths, would those Splinters then have a cognitive aspect? Alternatively....the Divine Breaths not only bring the Returned back to life....they also give each Returned a vision of the future, and Lightsong heard Endowment's voice....so perhaps Divine Breaths DO have a cognitive aspect?

Standard disclaimer: If someone else has already connected these dots, please link me to the thread where its discussed, because I couldn't find this conclusion anywhere but I might have missed something. But something jumped out at me when looking at discussions of various splinters recently. In hindsight, it seems really obvious, but I haven't seen any attention drawn to it yet.... All the splinters we've seen thus far take the form of the 'focus' component of a world's pre-existing magic system. Breaths are a natural part of the magic native to Nalthis. But some Breaths (the Divine Breaths) are Splinters. Aons are a natural part of Sel's magic, but some of them, the ones at the hearts of Seons are Splinters. Recently Brandon confirmed that spren already existed on Roshar before Honor's shattering, but after he was shattered some were different, and some new ones were created. So essentially it seems to me that when a Shard is Splintered, or Splinters themselves partially, those Splinters are a super-charged or specially endowed version of the magic that already exists due to that Shard's interaction with their Shardworld. So if there were Splinters on Scadrial (which we know there aren't, via Word of Brandon), those Splinters would be metals of some kind. So post Splintering of a Shard, some focuses are natural, pre-existing ones, like human Breaths, and some focuses are supercharged (or super Invested?) Splinters. If I'm right, that tells us a couple things. One - That spren are the focus component of magic on Roshar, rather than the Oaths, Stormlight, or anything else that might have been speculated to fill that role. Two - My first thought was that meant that spren were definitely of Honor, not Cultivation. If some spren (but not all) were Splinters of Honor, that meant even the non-Splinter spren were his contribution to the magic of Roshar, right? But then I realized, duh, it means exactly the opposite. In the Reddit thread, Brandon referenced the aons at the heart of Seons AND Skaze. There's only one focus on Sel, despite the presence of two Shards: aons. Same as metal's the only focus on Scadrial despite two Shards. Roshar has three Shards. If spren are the focus of Roshar's magic, then they're of Honor, Cultivation and Odium equally. Ergo the presence of things like painspren and deathspren, which didn't make too much sense to be purely creations of Honor and/or Cultivation. So 'Alas, not all spren are as discerning as Honorspren' - of course not, if some spren (ie painspren, etc) are a result of Odium's presence on Roshar. Honorspren are the Splinters. If Odium did ever Splinter himself the way Endowment has on Nalthis with Divine Breaths, his Splinters would be Odiumspren. If Cultivation is Splintered, there are Cultivationspren out there as well. Three - Again, I refer to the 'Alas, not all spren are as discerning as Honorspren' line. We've been singling out the Honorspren, since they seem inherently connected to the Knights Radiant and their Surgebinding. But if spren are truly the focus of magic on Roshar, that means all spren can be used in Roshar's magic, not just the spren that are Splinters. Much like all aons and all breaths can be used in their worlds' respective magic systems, not just the Splinter versions of each. That's why surgebinding existed before the Splintering of Honor and the creation of Honorspren. That's why there's no sign of a sentient bond between Szeth and whatever spren might be fueling his surgebinding. Spren don't need to be sentient to fuel surgebinding, anymore than aons need to be sentient to fuel magic in Elantris. Now, my question if I'm right is - we've been told that the magic of each Shardworld has as much to do with the world itself as it does the Shard(s). But how much of the shape a magic system takes is due to the world, and how much due to the Shards? For instance, if Odium had left Splinters of himself on Sel for whatever reason (just a hypothetical, Brandon's already said he didn't), would those Splinters take the form of spren, or would they be a new kind of Aons? If Endowment came to Roshar for whatever reason, and left Splinters of himself/herself, would those Splinters be Divine Breaths, or would they be Endowmentspren?

I haven't seen much speculation about the getting Odium to choose a champion line, but its always been of interest to me. Its not the kind of thing I'd expect Brandon to throw out there without reason - I really expect we will see Odium choose a champion at some point. And while there's every likelihood we haven't seen or met that character yet anyway, I wonder if there are any candidates from WoK. It could be very interesting if it turns out to be Szeth, for instance. Just a random thought, we have way too little information to speculate about that in earnest yet. *Shrugs*

I'm definitely in the 'Dustbringers are KR order' camp as well. The WoK prologue was through Kalak's POV after all, and the context/phrasing of the sentence about Dustbringers definitely lent the implication they were on the same side as him. 'The Dustbringers had done their work well,'....I dunno. Technically it COULD go the other way, but if Dustbringers were the enemy, I'd expect a little...animosity or something to have colored Kalak's thought. LOL trust us to analyze seven words to death. Maybe someone can ask Brandon pointblank at a signing if the Dustbringers are a KR order to put us out of our misery? As for Brightcaller, that sentence made it sound more like a singular entity rather than a plural order. I'd agree that Brightcaller is the name of the Herald for either the Lightweavers or the Skybreakers, though my money's on the Lightweavers. Stormfather, Brightcaller, Stonesinew, potentially Dustmother...it seems to fit.

Hey, does anyone know anything about this one? It's Brandon's story in the upcoming DANGEROUS WOMEN anthology edited by George R. R. Martin, who just announced on his blog that they'd just delivered the completed anthology to the editors at Tor, though there's no official publication date yet. I'd seen this title on Brandon's list of upcoming projects, but what was new to me was how long it would be....GRRM said on his blog: So a new Brandon novella, likely sometime this year....do we have any idea what world its set on? One we've already seen, or a new Shardworld? I'm assuming its going to be a Cosmere story.

Ruin and Preservation always reminded me actually of Hinduism's 'Trimurti', or a trio of three linked Hindu gods, Brahma (the creator), Vishnu (the preserver) and Shiva (the destroyer). For a time, before the Word of Brandon confirmed Ruin and Preservation were meant as a pair of polar opposites, I wondered if there was a Creation shard to complement them and make a similar trio, rather than all the Shards being aspects of Creation like a lot of people theorize.

It could be possible for a Forger who didn't know their full ancestry. For instance, someone who was raised not knowing who their father was, thus there's nothing to contradict the Forged possibility their father was Aonic. Add to that the theory that the Shaod chooses people according to their level of Devotion to some ideal or purpose, and the sheer amount of effort, imagination and magical artistry that would have to be committed to the act of Forging an Elantrian Essence Mark could serve as enough Devotion to a cause or purpose that it could be worked into Forging a history where the Shaod chose them. I imagine it would be extremely difficult, it would require a few starting parameters (ie not just any Forger could do it, just a Forger who met certain requirements), and it would take years of study and trial and error...and could potentially backfire in a big way. But it probably IS doable. (And at the very least, I imagine some Forger at some point in Sel's history would try it).

Hmm, well technically the Returned aren't Splinters, the Divine Breaths that fuel them are the Splinters, right? So what if the Seons are Splinters like we assumed...and the Seons play some role in determining who the Shaod takes?

Exactly. Hoid obviously did use Shadesmar to get to and from Sel, so its definitely possible. Just dangerous and difficult, ergo why it possibly took Galladon and the other Elantrians centuries to figure it out, which follows the timeline of cosmere novels' publication well.

Elantris is supposed to have two sequels, but I don't think its meant to be considered a trilogy in the traditional sense as each sequel will follow different characters and storylines, rather than being a single narrative spanning three books the way Mistborn is.

Okay, full disclosure, I found an early release of Emperor's Soul and it did prompt my thoughts in this direction but there are NO spoilers for it here. Really, a couple throwaway lines in it made me look back at Elantris and a few things that Brandon's said about Sel over the years. This topic assumes a knowledge of Mistborn and Way of Kings, so look away if you haven't read those books, though I don't think I've included any specific spoilers. Also, apologies if I'm stepping all over anyone else's theory or duplicating thoughts. I've looked through a lot of the more recent topics and didn't see these ideas repeated anywhere, but I might have missed some older topics. So first off, we've talked a lot in the Mistborn forums about how snapping is the way to access Allomancy because its the magic user acting in preservation of himself or others, ie he's acting in accordance with the intent of the Shard who powers his particular magic system. It's basically understood that Preservation set it up to work that way, right? Same thing with the Shaod here. I think before she died, or way back in Sel's history, Aona set up the Shaod as her version of snapping....it seeks out those whose Devotion to particular tenets or ideals are in accordance to her intent and 'opens the channel' as it were, to the Dor. If you think about it, all the Elantrians are Devoted to learning and higher ideals like the betterment of their fellow man, etc. They're about as selfless a group a people as you can find, really. But I don't think aimless, generalized Devotion is enough to do it. I think that the required Devotion has a....patriotic aspect to it, for lack of a better word. We've speculated a lot about shapes and symbols being the focus for magic on Sel the way metals are on Scadrial, but I don't think that's precisely accurate. Look at Scadrial...metal is the focus for magic. Specific types of metal and their structures, frameworks are what differentiate how the magic takes form, and why burning pewter has a different output from burning steel, etc. Basically, I don't think shapes/symbols are the focus for magic on Sel. I think geography is the focus. The shape of the land...with the different magic systems corresponding to the shape of the lands they originate from, and then the various symbols that achieve specific effects all stemming from those initial, root geographic shapes. I'm not quite sure how or why yet, but I think this is tied into why accessing Shadesmar is dangerous around Sel. Because as we've seen in TWoK, the geography of Shadesmar is related or reflective of the geography of the physical realm....and if the geography of Sel is the focus for magic on Sel, then I think there could be some definitely dangerous aspects to the way the geography of the cognitive realm, and the way the people of Sel view or think about their planet...I dunno. This is where it gets fuzzy for me as I'm not sure we know enough yet, and there are a few things from Emperor's Soul that play into this idea that I don't want to get into yet, but I think there's definitely a connection. I mean, we saw how the Reod, a physical disturbance to the land, had a very real and catastrophic effect on Sel's magic. What I'm wondering is....what effect did the Reod have on Shadesmar? I can't help but think that an earthquake on Roshar or Scadrial wouldn't effect Shadesmar near those worlds nearly as much as it must have on Sel, where geography is obviously so important, and I think that's a big part of why Shadesmar is dangerous there. Anyway, this brings me back to Devotion. If I'm right, and geography specifically is the key to magic, then I think that its Devotion to the land, or one's homeland, that's the trigger for the Shaod, rather than just Devotion in general. All the Elantrians have very strong emotional connections to their homelands, and Raoden in particular is an example of that....both before and after the Shaod, it was always made clear that his devotion to his land and his people was his defining characteristic.

Well, by my understanding, the Liar of Partinel was set before the Shattering so there were no Shards yet, and in the first samples chapters there are several references to dead gods, and that always intrigued me....but apparently Liar has been scrapped now so I'm not sure if that's canon anymore?

Oh come on, guys. Lightsong is clearly Tony Stark.

I agree. It looks like its around 40K, which is pretty lengthy for a novella but it read so seamlessly I didn't even realize it was that long til I was done. But yes, can't wait til everyone has it and we can discuss freely, because I have definite thoughts on the Dor, spren, soulcasting and Nightblood now.

I'm kinda curious if there are any Shards who remained on Yolen after Adonalsium was shattered.

I like your train of thought, but I wish we had just one new non Stormlight/Mistborn/Elantris novel coming soon, because eight Shards isn't quite enough to guess accurately at divisions, considering the most likely divisions are either groups of eight or four. Knowledge of just one or two more shards would make it a lot easier to compare and contrast possible groupings. I do definitely think whatever the groupings, Honor and Devotion are definitely similar enough to belong in a sub group. I don't quite agree that Dominion fits in with them, but its impossible to tell this early. I actually think Endowment could fit in with Preservation, Ruin and Cultivation, because they make up a mini-spectrum. Endowment is the creation, Cultivation builds on it, Preservation maintains it and Ruin destroys it...I dunno. Ruin and Preservation always kinda made me think of the Hindu triad Bhrama, Vishnu and Shiva (creation, preservation and destruction, essentially), so the Endowment/Cultivation combo kinda feels like the first half of a possible quartet with them. But I think this line of speculation is definitely worth pursuing, because once we're able to figure out what the groupings are, it becomes a lot more possible to speculate on the final shards, based on what groupings still have openings.

For what its worth, in the recent Q&A I asked Brandon if the shards separated into different groupings the way the 16 base Allomantic metals had groupings like Enhancement metals, etc. He said 'Good question....RAFO', which isn't a no, so I think there might be something to that. I've always thought shards like Honor and Devotion and Odium seem to have more in common with each other than they do shards like Endowment, Ruin and Preservation. Like, Ruin and Preservation feel more like universal, natural forces, whereas Honor and Devotion feel more human focused.

Hi Brandon, thanks so much for this opportunity, and I'm absolutely drooling here at the chance to see you answer even some of these amazing questions. To throw a couple more into the ring (playing fast and loose with my definition of 'a couple') - 1) Will the fact that Roshar and the Silence Divine planet exist in the same solar system come into play at all in The Stormlight Archive, or is that only relevant for later books? 2) In the Mistborn trilogy, the base 16 Allomantic metals separate into different groups like the Enhancement metals, etc. Given that there are 16 Shards, do they also separate into different groupings as well? For instance, are Shards like Honor and Devotion part of one 'grouping', with Shards like Cultivation and Endowment part of another? 3) There's been enough speculation that an Elantrian world hopper appears in Way of Kings and that an Elantrian world hopper wrote the Ars Arcanum in Alloy of Law to make it likely that by the time of both books, at least some Elantrians can world hop. So my question is, at the time of Way of Kings, does Sel have the most cosmere-awareness out of any of your shardworlds (including ones we have not seen yet), or is there another Shardworld that's more aware of the greater cosmere at this time? 4) We're aware by now of eight of the sixteen Shards (Devotion, Dominion, Ruin, Preservation, Endowment, Honor, Odium and Cultivation) and seven of the ten core Shardworlds (the Dragonsteel world, Roshar, Scadrial, Nalthis, Sel, the White Sand world and The Silence Divine world). Given that you now how we love to obsessively speculate based on only the tiniest of information, and also given that it seems an endless source of amusement to you that we do, would you perhaps like to tease us with a smidgen of information about one of the remaining eight Shards or the three remaining Shardworlds?

This has come up somewhere before, but I believe it's been confirmed by Brandon that Bavadin is on Taldain, the setting for his unpublished cosmere story 'White Sand'.

You know, I've long thought that something like Sacrifice seemed a good possible name for the Silence Divine shard based on what we know of its magic system (you accept a consequence for a 'greater good', ie get sick to gain a power). So Odium came to Roshar and came into conflict with the three of sixteen who ruled....we know Honor and Odium formed the Oathpact, presumably as Honor's way of protecting Roshar/humanity, but who says those were the only two Shards involved in the Oathpact? What if the third shard (Sacrifice-esque) left Roshar as part of the peace treaty with Odium? Totally speculative and circumstantial, but my point is I could see several ways this theory could be plausible and how it could work with what we know so far.

Sorry if this has been asked elsewhere, but are there any plans to release this and The Emperor's Soul on Kindle at some point?

Well you could argue that Hoid didn't know Honor was shattered before he came to Roshar, and that's why 'to his surprise, he found himself running from [his remains in the Highstorms]', going off the OP's interpretation.

Hi Zas, I was wondering, where did the information about Shadows for Silence come from? Specifically that it was probably on Yolen, Taldain or the SD world?

Reading through every bit of info I can find on the Silence Divine world, I couldn't actually find confirmation or a place where Brandon specifically said it was a SHARD on the Silence Divine world. This might be a shot in the dark theory, but while a lot of people have taken notice of the close proximity of the Silence Divine world to Roshar....everyone seems to be assuming that if there's a connection, it involves a Shard or people coming FROM the SD world to Roshar. But what if its the other way around? Given what we know of the SD magic system, a lot of people have speculated that it might be powered by something like Sacrifice or something similar. Sacrifice sounds pretty honorable to me, and Brandon's said that some worlds only have a Splinter or Sliver of a Shard on them. What if the Shard powering the SD magic system is actually a Splinter of Honor that went to the SD world after Honor shattered?