JamHeretic

karaokeang is recording as we speak and will hopefully join in on this thread to share, but in the meantime, here's a transcription of the Q&A for your enjoyment! Would the powers of a magical object change if it went to a different world? It is plausible that they will, but most likely is that they don't work right. Most of them will not. I've lost track of the number of magical systems that you have created and I was just wondering if you could say a little bit about your process of creating magical systems. What I'm looking for is something interesting. It is kind of hard to explian, because to create a magic system, I've read a lot of fantasy, and personally I feel that one of my duties is to push the genre in different directions. There was a period where our worldbuilding was not as extensive as it should be. Stuck as we were for a while, it felt like the genre hit a bit of a rut, and I wanted to push it in different directions. The screwy magic systems I create are part of that. I feel excited about them, it's sometihng I feel ?? Google Sanderson's First Law. If you could burn one metal from Mistborn, what would it be? Coinshot. I want to fly. Why are Ryshadium cooler than regular horses? I suspect a spren bond. There is Investiture involved. Can you tell me who the herald is for the Truthwatches. RAFO, sorry, good question. How about one of the surges? I am RAFO'ing the truthwatchers entirely. Can you go into healing a bit more? Regrowth in the books - Healing is an aspect, Regrowth is ??, Best fantasy author debuted in the last year: Brian McClellan with the Powdermage books, but that's a year and a half ago so it doesn't count. I'm reading a book right now by one of my former students that's really good but it's not published yet. Most of the books I've read in the last year are either friends or things I needed to catch up on. Strategies for the Sagging Middle. Middles are tough. My experience has been that the writer thinks the middle sags more than it does, because you're not at the exciting beginning wherever everything's fresh and not at the end with the climax. Stagger the climaxes. For instance, Words of Radiance, I built it and plotted it like three books with multiple climaxes from major characters at the end of part 1, at the end of part 3, and at the end of the whole thing. It'll make your novel read like a trilogy. Travel time frame of reference - how long is a day's ride? There's two answers. One is the official answer, and that depends on the horse, what you're feeding the horse, how you're pushing the horse - I think a wagon can go 1-2 miles an hour, a good horse if you're trading horses can go further. My expectation that it's usually 20-30 miles but that's pushing the horse hard. You're usually not going that much faster than people can walk, 2-3 miles an hour. Humans are better at going long distance than horses. But horses are more comfortable and can sprint if they need to. This is not something that I do a ton on because most of my books take place in one location - that's what we're looking at for a day's ride. Eight hours between 16 and 24 miles, but someone can correct me if they know better. Speaking of Rothfuss, can you tell us how far along he is... No, I don't know how far along Pat is, when I hang out with Pat I don't ask him because he gets that enough. I'll tell you this, in my outline from ten years ago, the third book is named Stones Unhallowed, and his third book is named Doors of Stone. So either I've got to beat it or change it - I thought, "I have to write this book faster". Out of all the characters, who do you identify with the most? Hard to say because each of my characters I identify with in some way. Can't pick favorite characters or books becaues they're all my children. Will you write any more books in the Alcatraz series? Yes. I bought them back and sold them to Tor. I'm looking at doing it soon, this year or the next. I finished Firefight; the next book on my list is the Rithmatist and after that Tor has requested is Stormlight What Radiant order would you be? I want to fly, so Windrunner. Interludes having characters on the other side of the world - when can we see Lift again? She is seated (ceded)? for future use, indeed. Some of these interludes are for characters that I'll need in the future. Lift is there because she's going to do much Awesomeness in the future. When do you expect to finish Shadows of Self? It was on the schedule for this fall to finish, but the third Stormlight book has pushed that aside, so it'll probably be the next book after that. Tom Doherty didn't want to have a four-year gap twice in a row, and I don't want to let it go so far. It's better to establish that I'll be doing Stormlight regularly before deviating. When I pitched Mistborn to my editor, I pitched a series going to modern times to space opera in the same universe. There will be another trilogy of thick books at 1980s technology, I pitched to my editor as "Tom Clancy Allomancy" and we will eventually get to the space opera, which will be allomancers in space. Is Vasher the swordmaster-ardent? (coy) I have no idea why you would ask that. Zahel the Swordmaster ardent was in the 2002 WoK by a different name and it blew my assistant's mind when he looked back in the original draft. It was ALL PLANNED. When do we get to officially get to know what's going on in the Cosmere? All of my epic fantasy books are connected with continuing characters. That's a way off, and that's because I don't want people to feel like they have to have read all my previous books to enjoy the series. It should be about the characters. Eventually I will write one that's a mashup, but we're not there yet. I'll be very upfront about it when I do it. For now it's just easter eggs. How do you pick names? It really varies based on the book. I'm often picking a linguistic paradigm. Alethi - there are two separate paradigms because I like linguistics to be messy. Usually based on symmetry being holy, so they'd pick names one letter off from symmetrical to avoid hubris. Also suffix - like Kaladin is Kalak (herald) + din which is a suffix, all of them mean things, like the old Hebrew names have "born of" or "comes through". Stick that on and drop the last letter. Dalinar, Elhokar, all of those have suffixes - nar, kar. In Mistborn, I didn't want linguistics to be your focus, for in that I picked a simpler naming paradigm - I lifted linguistics from the real world. Central Dominance is French. The Germanic area, we have Elend and Straff, and then we hav eSpanish on the other area. I just kind of took Earth cultures and appropriated them. That's an easier way to do it, because Mistborn is kind of an earth analogue. But Roshar is very different. Mistborn I didn't want you to think of the difference, which is why I gave everyone nicknames that are easy to say. What would happen if Alcatraz tried to wield Nightblood? They would get in a long conversation about random things and the book would just be those two having a discussion, and then the entire world would break probably. Navani's fabrial bracelet: The stones don't have to be all heliodors. "They will change." (???) The number of prongs is not significant; the artist made the decision.

WoB from the Seattle signing is that "Investiture is involved". So... maybe? At least we know it's not natural.

When asked if Renarin would ever have a viewpoint, Brandon told me that he will be "one of the ten characters". YES! I took a quick and dirty transcript of hte Q&A, which I will also be posting until we can get a clean version from the recording.

It's Brandon! Everything is significant! (And speaking as an amateur jeweler, jumping through hoops to make a two-prong setting secure is a huge PITA and I can't imagine doing it if you didn't have to. Much less doing about twice as much fiddly grinding and soldering as necessary for a ten-prong setting.)

I'd love to make Navani's fabrial bracelet, but looking at the picture, it appears that each gem has a different number of prongs! The stones are arranged in a double eye, so I tried matching it up with the order numbers on the Radiant chart (under the assumption that the arrangement and numbers, at least, are significant in Vorinism, even if Navani wasn't intending any association with the Radiants). Unfortunately, it didn't work. I know the different numbers of prongs have to be significant, but for the life of me I can't figure out how. Does anyone have any theories? If I want to make one, it's either deduction or counting the prongs in the picture, and that's not really very clear. I'm also wondering if the gems are all heliodor, or if there is one of each polestone. I'd try matching up the emotions to Herald attributes, but I really don't think there's a Hate herald. (I'm also curious - do we have WoB about what metal the bracelet is made of? Or any fabrial for that matter.)

I have no point here, I just want to say that I'm gonna come to the signing! My very first signing! And I have some questions lined up and everything. SO EXCITED Also, I bought a hardcover, but I'm totally going to ask Brandon to sign my Kindle. Then I'll see it every day. (Until the next version comes out. Then I guess I just have to go to another signing.)

Yes, I was referencing Pratchett.

Clearly. Spren all the way down.

The conclusion I've come to after hanging around the forums: SPREN ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR EVERYTHING. And you know how the Purelake fish are like cooler versions of regular fish - because of spren? Or how chasmfiends are like cooler versions of other lifeforms - because of spren? Or even my pet theory about Ryshadium being cooler versions of horses because of spren? Clearly, Syl is a cooler version of a windspren because she has a spren. Discuss.

Problem is, Brandon's not afraid of giving the characters misinformation. Generations of Allomancers thought there were only ten metals, too. I'm not willing to accept Axies' word on it with no substantiation.

None of those are crystalline gems, though - they're opaque (well, ok, not all opal is entirely opaque, but it's not clear in the same sense that a sapphire or a diamond can be clear).

Do gems other than than the main ten store Stormlight? I mean, if smoky quartz and amethyst can store stormlight, what about regular quartz? Opal? Peridot? Aquamarine? There's so much focus given to the ten essence stones that I've been wondering. (And if the essence stones are valuable simply because of their Soulcasting utility, and other gemstones collect Stormlight, it seems like that'd be a decent way of forging spheres by using a less valuable stone that still provides stormlight.) I'd also be willing to believe that other gemstones don't exist on Roshar. There's enough oddness in Roshar's geology and ecology that I could be convinced that there's something like Atium going on - I mean, who heard of a natural metal only found in slowly-growing geodes? Another thought: if they do exist and store Stormlight, could they be used for soulcasting? What effect would that have? Presumably they wouldn't be attuned to any essence.

Oh bother. I totally forgot that there aren't spren (that we know of, anyway) in Shinovar. That's a pretty big hole in my theory. I think I'll ask Brandon at the Seattle signing :-D

If you can't tap, how did TLR keep from dying of old- Oh. Duh. He stored awakeness so he never had to sleep. That's an interesting abuse of compounding that I hadn't thought of.

Soren?

You know, I bet spren are why skyeels can fly as well. I mean, it's not like they have wings.

I feel the same way, but wouldn't rule it out. I mean, maybe it's broam-sized - not enough to make a fuss about.

You just blew my mind.

Can I buy one too??

I could possibly be convinced to coordinate a screenprinting order. I'm worried about stepping on Brandon's/Badali's toes, though. I wonder if it would be ok if we're just covering costs and not making a profit...

I think that bioengineering with Growth/Regrowth by the KR is too cool an idea to shelve, but spren symbiosis is a lot more plausible. :-/ Anyone want to ask about it at a signing? I can't figure out how to phrase the question in a way likely to be unambigously answered. "Is there a spren" is a yes-or-no question that wouldn't give us much information if the answer is "no", and "does magic have something to do with it" wouldn't give us all that much information if the answer is "yes". Hm. Phrasing Brandon questions seems to be an art form I have yet to master.

Ooh. I like that explanation for why it's different. Voltron spren! Upvote!

Why does appearing at only a certain time of day make it a spren?

Cusicesh is so different from every spren we've ever seen that I'm reluctant to take people's word for it that it's actually a spren. Character misinformation isn't anything new (c.f. Mistborn...). "It's weird, it must be a spren!" That said, if it weren't a spren, what would it be? And if it's actually a spren, what is it a spren of?

(Hi guys - first post in the forum!) I have the sneaking suspicion that some sort of spren symbiosis, or some sort of investiture, is what makes Ryshadium so much smarter and more durable than ordinary horses. Perhaps the same way that the symbiotic spren let the greatshells grow so large? Alternately, meddling by the Knights Radiant (so still magic, but at one remove); after all, there were plenty of them, and if the Ryshadium are the only horses capable of carrying a bearer wearing Shardplate for any length of time... Ancient bioengineering! Thoughts?