Brandon Sanderson's The Stormlight Archive

But Nale's all about following the established law of wherever he happens to be to the letter? Like when he was trying to kill Lift in her first interlude, he had to back off when she got pardoned and he no longer had a legal pretext to execute a child. He'd only be able to do whatever he wants in some no-man's-land where there's no other law to take precedence.

I'm skeptical of the notion that Windrunners are inherently more heroic than the average order. Like, let's look at the Skybreaker oaths for a sec.

standard Radiant virtue ethics -> For Great Justice -> dedication to a higher cause -> righteous quest -> embody justice and truth

That's the paladin classic right there. You don't get much more conventionally heroic than that. And yet Nale went and fucked it all up. The reason the Skybreakers are now the villain order strikes me as less about the oaths than about the people interpreting them. Specifically the immortal head case who's been running the show and shaping the culture since antiquity. There's no reason I can see (at least with the information we have now) that you couldn't have Windrunners decide that Odium's the one who needs protection. They just haven't had a Nale to fill their heads with fucky ideas.

Exactly my point. It's harder to turn "protect the innocent, defend the weak" into anything we would consider un-heroic, while the Skybreakers are dedicated to law, which means it's very easy for them to choose that over good or veer straight into Lawful Stupid, the Bondsmiths ideals of unity can be used to justify conquest, the Lightweaver's truths have no obvious moral component, etc.

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

Let's not forget that the way Teft explains it ("The Radiant seeks to defend life, always. He never kills unnecessarily, and never risks his own life for frivolous reasons. Living is harder than dying. The Radiant's duty is to live.") makes it sound like the whole thing is about keeping the Radiant from pulling a Senseless Sacrifice every five minutes. Since all Surgebinders are clinically depressed basically by definition, they apparently need an iron-clad rule to keep them from committing suicide.

Well, the ultimate reason that the Skybreakers are siding with Odium is because the parsh are the victims in the whole mess (even though helping Odium is not going to make that situation any better). So it would be very easy for the Windrunners to turn their Ideals into "defend the parsh from the humans."

Oh, and it's still not clear if Nale really has gone completely over to Odium. He had all the Skybreakers just floating over the final fight, not bothering to interfere, and after he casually tells Szeth that they'll continue his training later. And he prevented Szeth from swearing some oaths earlier that would have been more likely to bind him to Odium.

Szeth never swore to follow the law, though. He swore to seek justice, follow Dalinar, and cleanse the Shin leadership, and that gets him as far through the oaths as anyone's managed in centuries without mentioning the law once. If Skybreakering covers a range from that to the more familiar Nale-style "the only problem will killing that child was your lack of proper paperwork" thing, I think it likely that Windrunning encompasses a range of protectiony things beyond the straightforward heroics of "protect the innocent." Taravangian cut a deal with Odium to protect his people, after all.

I note in the interests of transparency that despite what I just said about Windrunners I have no idea how you'd get a villain Edgedancer.

An Edgedancer who represents forgotten criminals?

Skybreakers make a big deal about that law, but in practice, their thing is suborning themselves to an outside authority, of which the law is the most consistent and reasonable standard to follow. They bear a disturbing resemblance to book 1 and 2 Szeth, actually, which is part of why they recruited him.

One wonders if the Nameless thing is the Shin attempt at following the Skybreaker philosophy.

Criminals aren't necessarily evil, though.

Maybe an Edgedancer who goes the Magneto route and decides that the only way the complacent people who've been ignoring their subjects for so long will listen is through a little blood and mayhem. (That could still be not too evil, but it could also be awful.) Imagine an Edgedancer who's basically Kelsier.

Edgedancers of the White Fang!

Oathbringer reread chapter 25 updated. The Girl Who Looked Up.

I know we all assumed it was an actual mistwraith when we were discussing the preview chapters. And the tower in general apparently feels so wrong because of Ra-Shephir permeating it through what seemed to be the central control mechanism. But that's getting ahead.

Of course, it helps that we know that all those twisted pieces of anatomy aren't actual parts of a biological entity, but just an amorphous black mass molded into the shape of living things. Dilutes the Body Horror quite a bit.

"It takes an idiot to do cool things, that's why it's cool" - Haruhara Haruko

You know, the fact that Shallan was doing a bunch of drawings of different forms of herself around the same time she started fracturing into Veil and Radiant is a major red flag in retrospect.

Damn I hope she gets an opportunity to learn Forging at some point. Some point when she's stable enough to not have an existential breakdown over it.

Oathbringer reread chapters 26-27 updated. Dalinar's flashback to earning his Shardplate, and then Shallan.

Of course, religions don't like their dogma being overturned. If that means ignoring their returned saints, then so be it.

I still think that this is sort of a pre-Radiant situation. The entire reason the Knights were created in the first place is because the Surgebinders kept causing trouble. Since they haven't had the Orders in millennia, they're back in that situation again even though they nominally have their Orders. I mean, they haven't even officially named the heads of the various Orders. Is Kaladin Highprince rank as the leader of the Windrunners, or just Shardbearer rank due to his Shardblade?

edited 21st Jun '18 8:12:21 AM by Discar

I note that whatever the Releasers were up to it apparently wasn't bad enough to set people like the Windrunners and Edgedancers gunning for them, so this uncharitable view strikes me as implausible.

Surprised to see such animosity towards Malata, given that all she's really done is be mysterious, hang around Taravangian, and burn a table.

I doubt there's gonna be a comprehensive defection by anybody, considering we just saw the Skybreakers go Odium en masse and there's still one on the side of the angels.

Oh no, the've started embedding their terrible memes instead of just linking to them.

I think they're being rather too hard on young-Dalinar. Yes, the fact that he's killing dozens and dozens of people is horrible, but it's not like those people wouldn't die if it weren't for him. It's war. If Dalinar didn't do it, then his men would — and many of his men would die in the process. Dalinar is only doing what he's been taught his entire life is right and proper for an Alethi nobleman — obeying his liege, waging war, and defeating enemies. The fact that he's able to pull back from the brink even in the midst of the Thrill is a testament to his fundamental moral character, a sign that he's not simply surrendering himself to raw bloodlust.

I doubt that Ryshadiums are native to Roshar, as almost all the actual natives seem to be crustaceans, but I think it's pretty clear that they're Roshar-adapted versions of the horses that humans presumably brought with them when they arrived. They seem to have picked up the Rosharian trick of bonding to spren to make themselves bigger and stronger, though oddly enough it seems to have made them smarter too, which I'm not sure we've seen in anything else except the spren getting smarter as a result of the Radiant bond.

edited 25th Jun '18 7:42:32 AM by NativeJovian

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

Or the Ryshadium could've come to Roshar at some other point. Isn't there Word of God that the Iri came to Roshar at a completely different time from the rest of the humans on the planet?

edited 25th Jun '18 8:20:01 AM by RavenWilder

"It takes an idiot to do cool things, that's why it's cool" - Haruhara Haruko

Oathbringer reread chapter 28 updated. Dalinar talking to people, Oathbringer, and bringing people into visions.

I had assumed that Nohadon was a Windrunner, due to his line about "not all spren are as discerning as honorspren." And doesn't he use Gravitation when Dalinar sees him later in this book? We'll see.

As for Urithiru, I would assume that either it was made by Honor and Cultivation at the same time as the Dawncities (whenever exactly that happened) or it was stolen from the parsh, and was originally their holy city.

One thing that got glossed over was Amaram's racist attitude towards the darkeyes. Kaladin summoning a Shardblade isn't "a nursery tale," it completely invalidates the entire basis of the noble class. Fitting that Amaram would simply ignore it because it doesn't fit his worldview.

Edited by Discar on Jun 28th 2018 at 8:06:24 AM

Although, if I remember right, Amaram initially seemed like he was going to go along with Kaladin claiming the Shards. It was Kaladin's decision to pass them over to one of the soldiers under him that had Amaram decide to take them for himself, since he felt they'd be wasted on some random grunt, rather than a spear-fighting savant.

"It takes an idiot to do cool things, that's why it's cool" - Haruhara Haruko

His justification at the time was that he thought Kaladin would inevitably change his mind and show up to demand his shards back, which would make Amaram look bad. The thought of having a set of shards and preemptively eliminating a threat to his reputation (which he's spent much time and effort building up) was apparently too much for him.

No, it actually reinforces it. Alethi society has a fair amount of social mobility, for what's essentially a feudal system — the only utterly impassable barrier is between lighteyes and darkeyes (but 1st nahn can marry 10th dahn and their kids may be either). Becoming a shardbearer is the sole exception — if a darkeyes becomes a shardbearer, they become a lighteyes, which would seem like a confirmation of the system to the people inside of it. It's the universe itself recognizing such a legendary feat.

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

Even if it didn't, it's like that bit in Sixth of the Dusk where Vathi talks about how the one legendary female trapper is used to tell girls who dream of being trappers to Stay in the Kitchen because they are not whatserface. On exceptional person can be acknowledged without changing prejudice to their general class.

Now all those darkeyes Kaladin's squiring, that might be a different story.

Maybe "invalidate" isn't the right word, but remember that Vorin teachings don't really say much about Shardblades. The lighteyes are supposedly marked for rule directly by the Almighty, and the fact that darkeyes gain light eyes if they bond a Shardblade is just sort of a side detail. It's like the difference between old money and new; the old money has breeding and experience and tradition, and (in their eyes) the new money just got lucky. That luck earns them a place at the table, but they're not at the same level.

The new Radiants could be used to justify it all even more, by saying that as the descendants of the ones who originally claimed the Blades the current lighteyes have the strongest bloodlines, but that would require some adjustment of dogma. And as we've seen with Dalinar and his claims of the Almighty's death, religions don't like adjusting their dogma. It's much easier to say that everyone else is wrong.

Oathbringer reread chapters 29-30 updated. Re-Shephir.

I'm definitely on the "control panel for Urithiru" bandwagon. Especially note that the oppressive darkness around the tower that many people felt disappeared once Re-Shephir was no longer in this particular spot.

A good chunk of the first two books would have been easier if Shallan could stop lying to everyone. It's not that bad, and most of the time her lying is more helpful than hurtful, but then stuff like this happens, where it's clear it's more a compulsion than pragmatism.

As for the question of the 10 surgebinding essences and the 9 voidbinding essences... I wonder if there might be an essence, being, herald, or association that is of both, and just gets classed with the surgebinders.

I tend to agree with their comment that "control panel" and "power source" may be a distinction without a difference for the gem pillar. Every fabrial we've seen so far has used a gemstone to hold stormlight for power, and has been controlled by tapping, twisting, or moving the gem. The only exception I can think of is shardplate, where the gems are just batteries, but shards aren't really fabrials.

Is there some connection between Scadrial and long-limbed people? Terrismen were said to have disproportionately long limbs, IIRC, but I thought that was a side effect of Lord Ruler era terrismen being castrated, not a general Terris thing.

There was some of this mentioned during the flashback chapters with Kaladin's dad and the stolen spheres. I believe the specific term mentioned was an "inquest". Kaladan's family was second nahn, and I'm not sure that Roshone's dahn is mentioned, but a citylord would be midranked (lower dahns work for a living, and the higher dahns are royalty, highprinces, and their families). So we know that there's some kind of official court system, and a high-ranking darkeyes can expect to go up against mid-ranking lighteyes and get a fair shake, at least.

I am super interested to see more about the mechanics of "corrupted" spren — especially a sapient type capable of forming a nahel bond. It doesn't seem to be anything as simple as mind control, and corrupted spren can still do mostly the same things as their uncorrupted versions (operating the oathgates, bonding to a Radiant and granting surges), but they're definitely different somehow and we don't really know the details.

Knowing Sanderson, it'll be something cool.

The Illumination connection is my guess, personally. Seems like the most straightforward thing. The other possibility is that Shallan can sense it because of the connection between the Midnight Mother and Lightweavers, and Renarin can sense it because he has a tie to the Unmade via his corrupted spren.

Really from Jupiter, but not an alien.

Personally I suspect it's closer to "heart". I can't remember the exact quotes but I remember some of the epigraphs caused me to have a strong suspicion that Urithiru is much more than most people are expecting; specifically that it's not only an artificial spren but that it's the third "God Spren".

Edited by Jaustin89* on Jul 6th 2018 at 6:26:21 AM

Seems to me that most of it is gonna be of both, q.v. the associations the Midnight Mother has with smoke and Lightweaving.

My gut instinct is that it's gonna be Bondsmith-related things that Odium's system lacks. I'm guessing Adhesion for the, er, do we still call them Surges in Voidbinding?

Edited by rikalous on Jul 6th 2018 at 8:51:18 AM

Well, we don't have another word for them, so...

Besides, it's implied that Voidbinding is basically just Surgebinding but powered by Voidlight instead of Stormlight. Evil Is Sterile and all that. It's notable that while red is the color of one Shard using the power of another, pretty much everyone mistakenly believed that Odium's color was red. Everything he has is something he corrupted.

Anyway, the Ars Arcanum mentioned ten levels of Voidbinding, but the author didn't seem to know much more. So I'd expect the Fused have access to all ten Surges, but since each type only has one Surge instead of two, they don't have any of the cool fusion abilities.