Brandon Sanderson's The Stormlight Archive

Hm, yeah, that's pretty good evidence. But then again, Helaran died in Plate and Blade. That's a strike against.

I believe Word of God is that if a Surgebinder dies it hurts their bonded spren, but they won't actually die. So, yeah, strike against it.

I'm atm reading Words of Radiance (so I'm quiet here to avoid spoilers) but this little conversation came together:

3of4: Also: Shallan and Kaladin met twice so far. First time she scams him out of a fine pair of boots. Second they have an epic insult fight. True Love?

Dr Tentacles: Heheheheheh. OT3, maybe?

3of4: …oh god now I can't stop thinking of the term "Odium's Threeway" as Roshan equivalent to the devils threesome

What's "devil's threesome" mean? Never heard the idiom. (And yes, Aladin/Shallan/Kaladin is the OT3.)

"Devil's threeway" is two guys and a girl. There aren't cool nicknames for the other possibilities.

Something tells me that term was coined by a straight guy.

Oh, obviously.

3 of 4: Let us know what you think of the book. Live reads are always fun.

edited 31st Mar '15 11:25:52 AM by Discar

I am way to cynical to make an enjoyable live read :P I will post some reactions though (mostly snark)

And I heard the term "Devil's Threesome" on How I Met Your Mother so I am using it purely non-serious

I'm always apprehensive about people skewering books I love. What are your thought so far, though?

Well I read both Way of Kings and Words of Radiance back to back, so I like them

Dalinar has already a little shrine in my pantheon of awesome Lawful Good characters.

And just reached the point where Wit Yes, I know its storming Hoid already. Got spoilered :P is back and trolling Kaladin.

Dalinar gets a spot next to Michael, yeah. Need more like those.

.....fucking Nightblood?

Because obviously what Roshar needs to be more fucked up is the bastard lovechild of Stormbringer and an Apperture Science Turret from the Dark Side of Hell.

And it couldn't have found a more fitting wielder!

You read Warbreaker, right? What'd you think of Zahel?

I think Vasher needs a bigger business card

I was going through some of Dalinar's visions again, and the one where he fights the Midnight Essences with the two Knights is interesting. For one thing, their Plate is clearly more automated than he's used to (he notes that their helmets seem to disappear and reappear when he's not looking; clearly they're folding away like high-tech armor), but one of them uses a healing fabrial. It seems to be like the soulcaster fabrials; a device that allows a normal person to access a single Surge. That one is obviously Progression, but I wonder if there were any others, and if they survived. The Oathgate is basically Elsecalling expanded over to an entire plateau, so maybe?

Speaking of which, I wonder if the Alethi have any ability to make more soulcasters. I would think not, just because that seems like the kind of thing you would talk about, but at the same time nobody ever talks about trying to make more.

Navani speaks about fixing Shallans broken one, so I figure it is probably possible for them to be built, but probably not practicable or easy to make them.

Also, since Soulcasters belong to the King, to be used by his Ardents I figure the kings in Question (Veden also has them?) are not that keen on having too much of them beyond what they really *need*

One of the things I really like about this series is that they're making efforts to understand the magic system in-universe and use it to advance technology. Even if it conflicts with dogma, hell, many of the researchers we've seen are ardents (which is a nice parallel to the Middle Ages' monks-as-scholars intellectual elite). Seriously, Medieval Stasis is one of those tropes that can't die fast enough.

Still wanna know what the deal with Shardplate is, though.

I theorize that Shardplate used to be powered by the Knights Radiant directly, not needing the Jewels that are used in modern time, maybe with the Knights Spren being able to directly adjust it.

Like with Master Chief and Cortana?

Never played Halo, but it seems fair. That said, something has changed the nature of Shardplate, perhaps the same that did so for Shardblades, given that they used to glow and allow for Surgebinding. As Kaladin proved, now Surgebinding and Sharplate are counterproductive together.

Maybe with the next Ideal Syl is able to split herself into Shardspear and Plate?

The problem is that the Plate doesn't scream when Kaladin touches it. In fact, the first time we see a Blade scream, he steals that guy's helm a couple minutes later with no issues. So it doesn't seem like the same "corpse of a spren" deal.

I said before, but I'm thinking it's sort of like shell. The spren creates a set of Plate to match the Blade, but it's not quite part of them. More like a fingernail. Their Radiant then powers it using their Stormlight, no need for the gems.

That seems plausible. It would take a hell of a lot of Stormlight to power a buffed-up Shardplate, keep up the physical enhancements of Stormlight and work Surgebindings, though.

Maybe there's some facet of the magic system involving stormlight, spren and Ideals that we are currently missing that explains it.

Something like the interactions between feruchemy and allomancy in Mistborn I'm thinking, but more like increased efficiency rather than Game Breaking ability

edited 5th Apr '15 12:11:38 AM by 32ndfreeze

Syl did say that Szeth would need a lot more Stormlight as compared to Kaladin with his Honorblade.

Maybe fully-fledged Radiants have gemhearts to power their Shardplate and Surgebinding at the same time. There's definitely something different about 'living' Shardplate, though, since it glows with Tron Lines and allows Surgebinding. I guess we won't know for sure until (hopefully) book three.