Tempus

Axehounds, Chulls, whitespines and the native vegetation have all evolved with the highstorms in mind - it seems weird to think they could have evolved in only a few thousand years. Especially since we know at least axehounds were around when humanity migrated to Roshar (from Wit's 'hound' comment). So the highstorms should be really old.

If Iyatil is a character we know, it could be the Terriswoman worldhopper, or Khriss (I'm assuming Khriss is a girl, I do not have a copy of said book, I just think the way the name is spelt feels like the tendency to 'girlify' names by spelling them weirdly). I don't believe we know of any other female worldhoppers, and those are the most likely candidates to my mind.

I was able to find this: Somewhere else, I thought there was a quote that expanded on the latter part, which I recall being excited about because it suggested that the way power manifested was a combination of the investiture it gets from a specific shard and the sDNA of the other planet native. I recall thinking to myself 'perhaps this implies that a Roshar native who took lerasium would be able to burn gemstones of stormlight or something similar'. But, since I can't find it, I'm gonna have to chalk it up to a pipe dream. =(

Brandon has suggested that if a non-scadrial native were to swallow lerasium they wouldn't necessarily gain allomantic powers. Who knows what it would do feruchemically.

I assumed it was Hoid. Could Darkness be a candidate?

I was formulating a theory exactly along these lines, and I agree with everything you've said. And you said some things I hadn't thought of, specifically heraldic gender. Likewise, it was my thought that the vertical axis corresponded also with the rigidity of the oaths. Regarding the second chart, I had not heard it was cultivation related. I assumed it was Odium related due to: • It's violet. Odium is all about dem purps. • It has dark storm clouds. Cultivation seems to be against the highstorms - Shinovar is protected, and it's fauna distinct from highstorm fauna. Odium, however, is directly related to the everstorm. • It has a big gemstone in the middle. So far, shinovar does not meet the gemstone heavy criteria. If Old Magic is cultivation related, no gemstones have been shown in collusion with it. Odium, however, has voidspren in gemstones all over the book. I was also wondering about the designs in the backgrounds. The KR diagram has some sort of two dragons rampant fighting image, though they appear slightly insect or chull-like. The VB chart has progressively coloured damsels, meteors in the corners, progressively brightening stormclouds, a giant gemstone, and what appears to be stylized stormlight extruding from it. Also notable are the alternate shapes of the interior VB orders. Interestingly, Sanderson has stated there are 30 magic systems in play on Roshar, or three times ten. One is confirmed as the 10 Knights Radiant orders. One is confirmed as 10 categories of Fabrials. If the last one is for the void bringers/parshendi, then where does the old magic fit? If the Parshendi/Voidbringers "don't count", then how do we divide old magic up into ten parts?

Yes, the two are essentially similar - I wouldn't say Forgery is all about the physical realm though. You're essentially just encoding cognitive data into a physical form. The story you want the object to tell is written down and realized with shardic investiture, but it's essentially just a representation of the cognitive way you see the object. Which you then stamp to bind it to the object in question. So... cognitively imagining what you want -> applying it to the object with investiture (forging or stormlight) -> changes the way the object views itself, transforming it On Sel the method is 'Form', so you encode it in a written form. On Roshar the method is 'surgebinding', so they use a surge to transport the stormlight and information to the cognitive realm directly.

Has anyone reread the Kaladin in Amaram's army scene, looking for squires?

There's a better possibility. Nalan is a liar. We know very little of Nalan, his origins, or intentions. We are certainly not sure that it is the original herald. All we have are guesses. The most likely scenario in my mind, is that Nalan, aprised of the situation, chose the words and terms most suitable to convince the truthless Szeth. He wants Szeth for his own reasons, after all.

Possibility - people do not get special abilities related to their order, like mnemonics. Instead, they are chosen for that order because they have those abilities, the ability likely aligning with their orders two essences, and the nahel bond potentially enhances it.

basic lashing - gravity Full lashing - adhesion Reverse lashing - adhereing gravity to an object Also, brain waves are not waves. The measured output of neural oscillation LOOKS like a drawing of a wave, similar to a seismograph.

Do you have a source for that?

The very recent addition to the WoB thread here from the Seattle Signing. It was added after my post, which is why the post has been edited! I would link you to it, but I see you already found it and replied.

All the worlds are connected through the cognitive realm, Moogle. So if you think really hard about fire, you might be able to watch the worlds burn. =D

Now THAT is a cool theory. I wanna take it further still. The Old Magic is an end-neutral magic system, like feruchemy (but not feruchemy). Like all Rosharan magic that we know of, it relies on bonds. For Old Magic, the bonds are in the form of deals - trade for equivalent value. The boons granted always remove some unspecific thing and grant some other specific thing, while remaining of netural value. T gains the capacity, but the amount stored fluctuates. Dalinar trades and gets memory or knowledge - loses the memory of his wife and gains perhaps some other memory or knowledge in return? Fascinating line of inquiry.

So what you're saying is Brandon has learned the perils of creating things and then looking for comments on the internet.

People are absolutely capable of destroying themselves without shardic help. That said, I think this whole thread may be in error - the only word we have that Taragon loses his compassion is his own. I would like to argue that he does not lose his compassion at all when he becomes more intelligent, no, instead he simply has a stronger control over himself. My evidence? Tarantula tries to do the good, compassionate thing even when he is intelligent. He is able to weight compassion against pragmatism, and make hard decisions that force him to cry on days when he is less intelligent. NOT when he is more compassionate, but when his compassion is untempered by a full and complete understanding. He cries not because he cares and knows he must do wrong, but because he knows he must do wrong and CANNOT UNDERSTAND WHY. When Tarama is moderately smart, he pursues the path most likely to save humanity - a compassionate endeavour. When he is very smart, he crafts laws and rules designed to benefit humanity as a whole - and gets so caught up he forgets to factor in empathy. When he is incredibly smart, he calculates every piece of knowledge to the last extreme, for the sole reason of saving as many people as he can. That is not the action of a man without compassion. That is the action of a compassionate, desperately intelligent man striving against total annihilation and all indications of complete and utter destruction to come up with a plan, any plan, that can save them all. That's not to say that it discounts the idea that an 'end does not justify the means' homily is coming our way. I just think that the idea that he loses compassion is misinformed.

Here's the big issue. Ruin can't talk, except to certain people, spiked in certain ways. Ruin can't easily communicate. The Lord Ruler, however, could control just about anyone he wanted to with a few words. So, Ruin would have to somehow exert his (relatively small) potential communication influence in such a way as to overcome the Lord Ruler's grasp enough to make a small mine, refinery, and distribute the knowledge of the metals. Seems pretty bleeding difficult when he could only talk to Vin, his central target who he spiked specifically to be able to communicate with, every so often. And not without deception either. So basically, all of Tarion's points, but with the additional point that it seems to be bleeding hard for Shardholders to communicate at all, never mind one that is actively being thwarted.

I don't believe that Iyatil is Vin, simply because Sanderson has said many times that he is not in the habit of resurrecting characters - if they die, he wants them to die, even if their influence lives on. Another huge point, Iyatil's turns of phrase are very formal - not at all like Vin. Iya talks even more formally than the lighteyes. Iyatil also shows a tendency to prefer infiltration by deception rather than infiltration by stealth. Let's be honest, Vin would never talk her way into a building when she could creep . That said, there are a lot of coincidental traits with Vin. Iyatil is the master of Mraize. Mraize is widely suspected to be worldhopper, and the ghostblood layer in specific had a large number of off-Roshar items in it. It is extremely likely she is a worldhopper, or at the very least is in collusion with a world hopper. Iyatil mentions that she wears the mask because it leaves her less exposed, and makes it easier to adapt. Similar to say... mistcloaks and the mist? But I think these are just coincidences. It's not unusual for writers to stock a number of habits and traits that they reuse over and over again to show particular things.

It's not clear that the Ancient of Stones was holding back the desolations, only that his 'cracking' is related to their return. It could be he was guarding something. It could be the oathpact is somehow involved and he required sanity to uphold it. It could be that his presence deterred Odium simply because Odium believes he could not win if a Herald was against him, and so Odium was playing the long game voluntarily to eliminate him, or even actively trying to make him go mad. As for itty bitty textual clues, I believe discussing the finer points of a series of three words in an epigraph not part of the core plot could qualify as both evidence and a clue for discussion. Oh look, word of Brandon:

The mists are similar to Stormlight in nature, not intensity. Vin exploded the palace with the assistance of Preservation - no other allomancer has demonstrated such allomantic power, not even lerasium Elend, or Vin at other times. Satsuoni is corrct about compounding speed - it is in fact one of the effects I mentioned likely to trump anything a windrunner can bring to bear. Atium on it's own is basically a few seconds of godhood. In fact, I imagine electrum and mental speed would be effectively extended atium in ability.

I looked up quotes regarding spren in the theoryland database, and there was conflicting information from Brandon. Thus my confusion. As for the bondsmith thing, the individual might have passed away, but I was referring to the action taken. The action taken by the bondsmiths may have ended the desolation, and the nature of that action may have later caused the recreance.

I searched the ebook for 'earring', 'criminal', and 'execution' and found no relevant quotes. Wax got his earring from a woman on a train, no further info. Theoryland, however... and and and lastly So... no. I can't find anything about a spiked criminal who was executed.

The Ancient of Stones is clearly Taln. Supporting points: Taln is associated with the ninth essence (Stone). His moniker is Stonesinew. He was of the order of the Stone Wardens. Mr. T has not demonstrated any knowledge of the Shards, or that they have holders, so it's highly unlikely he is referring to them. At the beginning of Way of Kings, Taln was left as the sole holder of the Oathpact by the other Heralds - the timeline given in the book by Church doctrine is not-so-coincidentally four millennia. We know that Taln did not used to be mad, and used to 'return' before each Desolation to warn and to give instruction. He says so himself. The quote implies that the Ancient of Stones has gone mad (cracked). This is open-closed, the Ancient of Stones is Taln, the evidence is really kind of overwhelming. There are other things, though. We know the Knights Radiant were founded after a large number of Desolations had already occurred. We have both the word of the Church, the word of Taln, and the WoK prologue to support this. Ergo, the KR can not be the cause of the desolations. We know that the Recreance was approximately at the time that the desolations stopped occurring. We know that the Bondsmiths had some sort of plan, involving bondsmithy bonding things, to end the desolations. We also know the bondsmiths were the 'guardians' of the Nahel bond. Suggestive. We know that around the time the desolations stopped, the Parshendi were all turned into Parshmen, which is not Dullform, but something lower still. We do not know how, but considering the bondsmith bit, and the fact that the Parshendi also bond to spren to control their forms, and the fact that the Recreance involved all the Knights Radiant breaking their bonds with the spren... Suggestive. We don't know when Honor was shattered. It should have been before the founding of the KR, as spren are splinters/shards of Honor and are required to have existed for the KR to bond to. We don't know when, or how Odium was bound, or why Odium has a specific spren, voidspren. Spren are splinters/shards of Honor, and we know Odium is not shattered. Well, Brandon has been a bit muddled about Spren - he's said before they are in fact all splinters from 'the shattered one', but he's also said they are a combination of Honor and Cultivation. Not certain how Odium spren exist at all, either way you look at it. And lastly, we know that the voidspren started appearing in the books around the time we first saw surgebinding, and increased in numbers as we saw more surgebinders. So, what I'm trying to build this all up to is, I think it's likely that the reason Odium was bound, the reason Parshendi lost their spren bonds and became Parshmen, the reason the Knights Radiant underwent the Recreance, and the reason the desolations stopped for a time are all related to the mysterious bondsmith plan in someway, which is in turn likely to be related to the Oathpact of the Heralds in someway (upheld exclusively by Taln at this point). The Parshendi mentioned explicitly that the stone would bring back their gods, and that their gods were the cause of the stormform in the past (and thus, the everstorm and the desolations). So it's quite probable that the stone is indeed some artifact related to the bonding of spren/voidspren. It's also likely that there is a key piece of information that goes along with the stone in some way that we are unaware of at this time, possibly involving the binding of Odium. If anyone else can fit these pieces a different way, or has other pieces that might be significant, I'd be interested to hear it.

The Ars Arcanum in Mistborn talks of end-positive, end-neutral, and end-negative investiture systems. Surgebinding by the stated descriptions falls squarely and cleanly into the 'end-positive' system, along with Allomancy, Fabrials, and the form based investitures on Sel. End-positive is described as when power is accessed from an external source, and then used, without net loss to the power itself. Awakening and Feruchemy are end-neutral, that is to say, the investiture is neither gained nor lost. Both systems take an innate investiture that exists, and transfers it, with neither gain nor loss. End-negative arts 'lose' power, that is to say they have a diminishment of the investiture. In case you're not following, if an allomancer burns 20g of metal, they would get the same amount of power, each time. If you hemalurgically spiked a chain of 20 individuals for the same ability, it would be significantly weaker by the end of the chain. Old Magic, the disease system, and other systems we aren't familiar with can't be classified this way without more information.