GroundPetrel

Honestly I would be kind of disappointed if Kal had some kind of doubly special supernatural influence. Being the first new Windrunner and having a special spren is plenty of special for one dude. Also it would kind of cheapen his achievements IMO.

Honestly, Sadeas walked into that one. He spent months if not years insulting and demeaning Adolin, Renarin, and Dalinar to Adolin's face in an attempt to get a rise out of him, betrayed Dalinar and Adolin and eight thousand of their troops in one of the most vile and personal ways possible, then spent months rubbing it in in an attempt to get Adolin to lose it in public. Then Sadeas decided that a really smart idea would be to corner one of the most infamously badass people in the entire kingdom, who would probably be able to beat 3 shardbearers at once and was still kicking ass against 4 for a good half a minute or so, who'd just come out of seeing the apocalypse begin and his dad who he idolizes nearly die, and said to this guy, "I am going to continue betraying you and your family out of spite and I am going to make it my personal mission to destroy everyone you love even though there's an apocalypse going on and I really should reconsider my priorities". That is effectively committing suicide, in the same way that being a dwarf making rock jokes on Quarry Lane in Terry Pratchett's city of Ankh-Morpork is a form of suicide.

Now imagine Adolin as a fashion designer to every mage on Nalthis. "Look, this won't just look fabulous while tie-dyed, it'll look just as gorgeous when it's gray and drab!"

XD I was honestly thinking on pure practical terms (GBs are stealing Investiture for Thaidakar per ROW, and Nalthian Investiture is pretty easy to access because worldhopping trade is big there) but yeah strikes me as at least willing to experiment no matter where he ends up. LOL The Lopen and Lift teaming up to stop Adolin from being an obtrusively inobtrusive mess XD that's perfect.

We already have a decent sketch of with one eye spiked on the Coppermind IIRC. I'm a mediocre artist at best, but I can visualize it. with a coin in between his index and middle fingers on each hand, big pirate hat, with a feather, an Aviar on one shoulder, tie-dyed tunic and pants, rainbow mistcloak, and an eyepatch over a spike that's driven through one eye. Marsh standing behind him facepalming as makes some overdramatic statement.

Bridge Four offers to cater because they picked some tricks off of Numuhukuakiaki'aialunamor in their spare time. Adolin spends the entire affair hiding badly behind a large tapestry and directing the wait staff with obsessive care (but being sure to tip heavily, because he's not a savage, if people have to tolerate him at his most off-kilter he's going to compensate them for it, storm it) and everybody just sort of pretends he isn't there. Lift drops in about halfway through, steals some of the food, and is chased away by Adolin. This is something that the happy couple and possibly Bridge Four organized to get Adolin out of the storming restaurant. It works fabulously. Cue zany adventure involving Lift, Adolin, Maya, and a rainbow pirate Mistborn crudely stapled into a makeshift body that results in a series of duels, Adolin and teaching Lift how to look as fabulous as she is awesome, a really storming beautiful hat, and Shallan and Adolin getting into a custody battle with over who is allowed to adopt Lift, which gets referred to Jasnah who refuses to have anything to do with it so they have to go to Nale to adjudicate but he's already busy with a case involving Vasher, Szeth, and Vivenna squabbling over Nightblood, so Adolin goes to Kaladin for help but Shallan refuses to allow this because this would help Kaladin evade the 10,000+ young women who want Dr. Highmarshal Stormblessed to have a look at the oh so sore finger they're sure they bruised, and finally Dalinar tracks them all down with Hoid's help and immediately gets into a fight with Hoid over several centuries' worth of personal drama and related nonsense. By the time TOdium shows up, half of the tower is a smoking ruin, the Windrunners and rogue shanay-im are evacuating people, and Adolin still looks absolutely fabulous. That's what I think is going to happen. Prove me wrong.

Yeah, something like that. Also from a reader's POV, we hear so much bad stuff about the Ghostbloods, but all they really seem to do is get blamed for stuff and exploit ties to white-collar crime. Going after Jasnah was the most evil thing they did and we still don't know their motivation or reasoning there.

It also could be that Kelsier's new crew has an undeserved bad rap...or that Kelsier has enough layers of propaganda out there that many believe they have an undeserved bad rap.

"Trust me, Father, you need to look your best for the big duel with Odium's champion." "Son..." "Father, please, just wear the outfit." *Dalinar acquiesces as Navani elbows him* *Dalinar shows up to the duel in a ridiculously badass costume that would make the Three Musketeers kill him out of envy* Dalinar: "I look ridiculous." Adolin: "Trust me, Father, there's no way this look can fail." TOdium: *takes one look* "...well storms, I may as well just surrender now. I'm never going to look that good!" (or something much less crack-y and more plausible, anyway, XD)

My dearest hope is that he becomes Shallan's personal fashion designer as well as her husband and then badgers Kaladin into letting him dress Kaladin up fancy for a bunch of dates that Kaladin finds himself with because of a diabolical conspiracy involving Adolin, Hesina, about half of Bridge Four including Rlain and Renarin, and of course Syl. I am also praying that we get to see Adolin setting up the "perfect" first date for Rlain and Renarin, but if we don't get that, I know what I'll be doing for fanfic, lol.

And that's the most important part, obviously! XD I really hope Adolin doesn't die. If he does I think I'll straight-up quit reading the series, he's so wholesome and I need that so much.

...alright, @Kingsdaughter613 has convinced me, Kelsier and Navani would be one Hell of a power couple, though they'd never actually get together because they both have too many hangups and/or personal rules to do anything. So it'd just be sexual tension thick enough to cut it with a knife.

I suspect that the whole "killed somebody to get the body" element would be a dealbreaker for Kaladin.

Also he seems to have gaslit and manipulated Dalinar bigtime over the course of their youth. And admitting that Gavilar was a bastard who deserved what he got is something that I bet Dalinar would not want to do because it would risk letting himself abdicate some responsibility.

Yeah, at least Dalinar's terrible father-ness is limited to alternately neglecting and smothering one son when he feels like a jerk about the neglect, and stifling the other in his shortsighted attempts to make that one a better person than he sees himself as. His motivations are still good ("I want to protect Renarin", "I want Adolin to be a better man than I, the man I believe he can be", these are pretty good parenting motivations). Even his treatment of Ehlokar is objectively better than Gavilar's. "I want this kid to be a good man and a good king, and I will do everything in my power to keep him alive and teach him how to be that way even if he's an annoying paranoid wreck". The only times he even suggests turning on Ehlokar are when he just got back from nearly dying at the Tower, where he delivers a beatdown that can't physically hurt Ehlokar to deliver an object lesson in Dalinar's loyalty to Ehlokar (in fact, Dalinar is careful to avoid really injuring Ehlokar there), and after the duel in Words of Radiance, where Ehlokar is threatening a guy who Dalinar owes thousands of lives because that guy embarrassed Ehlokar in public. And the latter is the only case where he was clearly serious about turning on Ehlokar. Dalinar loved his wife, and while he ignored her opinions a lot in the midst of his PTSD and the influence of a literal spirit of mindless violence, he didn't tear her down or hit her. When she died as a result of his actions it broke Dalinar, and that was an arranged match where their relationship comes off more as friends with a having-kids job. Meanwhile Gavilar was such a crap parent that he left one kid clearly traumatized and avoiding her family, and the other so paranoid, twisted, and maladjusted by the experience that he couldn't run a storming bath, let alone a country. And he emotionally abused his wife, deliberately, so badly that she has self esteem issues years later. Gavilar Kholin was a power-hungry conqueror with an Amaram-like eye for good PR. I bet you that if Adolin, the guy with the keenest eye for people in the whole series, is ever asked about him, he'll say that Gavilar was an abusive bastard with good PR.

I read him as a power-hungry emotional abuser who severely damaged his wife and kids, and possibly even his brother, then precipitated the apocalypse for what appears to be a desire for personal power and/or a lasting legacy. He definitely had contact with numerous worldhoppers, and treated Dalinar like an attack dog who he used and abused for his own ends. He emotionally abused his wife to an almost cartoonish degree, ruined his son (Ehlokar is very clearly a kind and decent person beneath the chip on his shoulder and paranoia and emotional issues) by providing a bad example and teaching him the wrong lessons (note that Dalinar, who is probably the least justice-focused Kholin protagonist (in that he's not willing to break things to fix them as much as Jasnah is or as "storm the rules, this is evil and I gotta stop it" as Adolin is), thought that Gavilar's judgement of Roshone was much too merciful), abused his daughter and tried to force her into marriage with a self-centered sociopath who I'm about 80% sure tried to rape her, then probably committed Jasnah in retaliation (not 100% sure since we know little of Jasnah's backstory, but her reaction to Amaram reeks of instinctive terror covered by personal insults, and I wouldn't put anything past Gavilar at this point), used Dalinar like a Rottweiler on a chain to the point that Dalinar is still clearly screwed up by it and gaslighting himself DECADES later... Basically, what I'm saying is that Gavilar was clearly a vile person with good PR. The difference between him and Amaram seems to primarily have been age and ambition.

Maybe. But why would a probable South Scadrian have personal beef with him?

Holy cow I just realized. In WOR, Mraize tells Shallan not to kill Amaram because "his life belongs to another". Did the GBs maybe know about Kaladin's beef with Amaram? That seems a lot like a Kelsier kinda thing to mandate. "Don't touch this guy, some plucky kid wants to kill him, and I think that kid deserves the chance for some payback"?

Dalinar might not but I'm pretty sure that's how Adolin hears it.

Ah, thanks. He does seem to try to do better in TWOK and WOR but boy howdy is he overprotective and accidentally smothering. Poor Adolin's the one who gets Judgemental Dalinar and Actively Stifling Dalinar. The way my buddy put it is like this. "Dalinar is good at "I don't get it more more power to you" with most people, but Adolin is too close to him for him to accept "not getting it". So he has to invent a version of Adolin that he does get." Which definitely fits with Dalinar's fears of Adolin being a mini-me. It's just that Adolin is SO different from Dalinar and Dalinar doesn't understand that he ends up crushing Adolin's passions and treating him as a disappointment for not abandoning Maya to do the practical thing and get himself a hotter, younger spren.

Ehlokar is well-known--Dalinar mentions this as early as TWOK--for reserving seats for darkeyes at the dueling arena and otherwise making concessions to the common people that men like Sadeas sneer at. He does care, in an inept sort of way, he's just thin-skinned, shortsighted, had a horrible education on leadership, never was that great a leader anyway, and is trying to live up to the example of an evil man. He's also not stupid, he's smart enough to see things that Dalinar overlooks in WOR and Dalinar admits in both TWOK and WOR that he underestimates Ehlokar's intelligence and competence, which is an impressive feat considering how often Ehlokar messes up. And his judgement of Roshone was motivated by compassion, albeit severely misplaced; Dalinar's testimony IIRC implies that Ehlokar realized he screwed up, called Dalinar for backup, Dalinar said "off with his head", Ehlokar said "wait shouldn't I be merciful if I'm going to be king someday? Kings should be merciful, right?", Gavilar said "yeah don't execute the lighteyes, he has powerful buddies", and Dalinar said "well, OK, I don't like this but I do think Ehlokar should learn to be merciful". Ehlokar's got horrible judgement and is easily bullied and browbeaten, but he's not evil or even, by Alethi lighteyes standards, particularly bigoted. I don't think Dalinar really shows favoritism towards Adolin? He definitely coddles Renarin more but he treats Adolin like a ticking time bomb who must be strapped tightly to a Dalinar-shaped mannequin at all times lest he start murdering people for fun, and that gets consistently worse over the course of books 3 and 4 even as he starts trusting in Renarin's ability more.

I've been thinking about this for a little while and decided to give my list of the worst Stormlight fathers in order from worst worst to least worst. Obviously Shallan's dad was a literal domestic abuser, but Dalinar, Gavilar, and Lirin have all been hot messes at various times too. My ranking: Gavilar Kholin: Emotionally manipulative, possibly sociopathic, appears to have been a power-mad religious zealot. Even Dalinar in the throes of uncontrolled PTSD and alcoholism was a better parent and leader. Gavilar left his son, a basically decent and intelligent human being who was willing to do unnecessary and socially controversial things for the sake of the lower caste as a group, broken into a thin-skinned paranoid wreck with a massive chip on his shoulder and the self-esteem of a bruised pear; and as for Jasnah, we don't know much but it seems pretty obvious that Gavilar tried to force her to tolerate Meridas Amaram (who I'm about 85% sure hurt Jasnah somehow) and was likely responsible for subjecting her to the locked-room method of "therapy" that seems prevalent in Alethkar. Left every single person in his immediate family with some degree of emotional issues or trauma. Helped precipitate the apocalypse. Lin Davar: Literal domestic abuser. Physically abusive and, with his wife, left his daughter with DID and enough trauma to rival even Kaladin. Dalinar Kholin: I keep having trouble deciding whether to put him or Lirin higher on this list, they're both crap fathers but at least Lirin recognized his mentally-ill son's accomplishments after some browbeating by his wife. Dalinar is an alternately distant and repressive father to Adolin, who he consistently treats in a patronizing and judgemental fashion, not recognizing that Adolin is an adult (who had to grow up too fast thanks to Dalinar's alcoholism and PTSD), making adult decisions, with a far better sense for other people than Dalinar can ever hope to have. Even when making an effort he is dismissive of Adolin's passions and refuses to understand Adolin's most deeply personal choices, as well as being a massive hypocrite about Adolin stabbing Sadeas in the eye when Sadeas clearly and openly stated his desire and intent to worsen the apocalypse just to storm over Dalinar for petty spite. While he is kind to Renarin, he is overprotective and stifling to him when he isn't distant, requiring Renarin to blurt out self-destructively depressed thoughts to realize that he's stifling his younger son. (and even then, he gets Renarin the Plate first, while Adolin is the one to give Renarin the Blade) Only reason Dalinar isn't higher is because he has buckets of trauma and didn't physically or intentionally emotionally abuse his kids. Lirin: A bullheaded, strict moral absolutist who contributed significantly to his son's mental health crisis and realized how badly he'd stormed up too late. It took Dalinar of all people to break Kaladin out of his depressed spiral before Kaladin could do something stupid like kill himself. Simultaneously bullheaded and weak, Lirin is not fully capable of addressing how his own trauma affects his attitudes and thoughts, and his hyper-rigid moral code leaves no room for "but these guys are literally spirits who have sworn allegiance to a god of hate who have murdered people to occupy their bodies". What do you think? How would you rank the Stormlight protagonists' dads?

I was going to make that joke and decided it was too obvious. XD

Yeah, there was this Pakistani guy, Abdul Sattar Edhi, who spent most of his life running a medical charity in Pakistan. Took care of everybody, no matter their class, caste, religion, whatever, even when terrorists and political groups tried to strong-arm him. IIRC Malala Yousafzai nominated him for a Nobel Peace Prize, he's a big deal in Pakistan. Had only two sets of clothes. I cannot imagine Adolin living without at least ten fashionable outfits, two for each day of the week, plus two spares in case one gets wrinkled or there's a special occasion.

And brothers. Tien, Reen.