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Messages - Harakeke

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Oh, yeah -- as I reader, I definitely love seeing Shallan's viewpoint and would hate to see her die. (In-character, though... she's trouble. Probably even supports rights for Spren.)
The only one I wouldn't mind seeing bumped off would be Sadeas, just to rub that smug smile off his face.  "Haha!  Yet again I triumph in some small way at great expense to you. You will rue the day you underestimated my crafty-- " *random Thunderclast appears* *crunch* *splat* *dies*

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As long as we're discussing murderers, liars, and thieves who are merely victims of circumstance...  Shallan. 
<.<
>.>
Jus' sayin'.  Well intentioned she may seem, but I bet she ends up doing more harm than good.  Kill her now, before she develops crazy superpowers.  It's the only way to be sure.

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I posted some scans of the Navani pages with English-translation overlays on the Stormlight Archive Wiki
(I'd consider this to fall under the comment/scholarship provisions of fair use -- but if it causes copyright problems, let me know and I'll remove them.)

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Herald Chapter Pictures--Identities *spoilers*
« on: October 09, 2010, 08:25:30 PM »
Aha!  Yes, I agree that that's another form of the Almighty's powerful Capitilization magic.

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Thunderclasts *WoK Spoilers*
« on: October 08, 2010, 07:52:10 PM »
Hey, I already posted that theory!! ;D
A part of it at least...
I think it's likely because a gem discharges over the course of weeks, whereas the longest a human can hold his stormlight is a couple of minutes.
[see prologue and sezth's comment about voidbringers]

Heh, sorry.  Didn't mean to steal your thunder. This seemed like a good place to summarize what people have been speculating about Greatshells. I've noticed a lot of threads tend to digress, so I just wanted to pull everything together in one place. :)


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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Rights For Spren!!!! (minor spoilers)
« on: October 08, 2010, 07:45:11 PM »
Hear hear!  And who's to say those Storming merchants will stop at taking away our fabrials, once we're wholly dependent on their coalition?  What's next -- free all the slaves!?  ::)

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There's also no mention of spren in the Interlude that happens in Shinovar.
Fabrials brought in from outside function in Shinovar, but natives find the idea of using Soulcasting to transmute materials to be "bemusing".

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: WoK: Shalan - near end of book **SPOILERS**
« on: October 08, 2010, 09:46:55 AM »
Maybe the blood in the picture Shallan drew doesn't mean there was actually blood in that scene when it really happened - maybe she added blood because she expected it to be there, subconsciously, or because the presence of blood was true in a metaphorical or spiritual sense. Just like when she draws the symbol-headed spren into her pictures, they weren't actually visible in real life (but were present in some other way).

Shallan has a photographic memory. If she drew blood, then blood was probably there, she would've been drawing straight from her memory.

Not just a photographic memory -- but a Memory (with a capital M!).  The detail in which it's described reminds me of Dalinar's Thrill (with a capital T.)

Hmmm... Memory, Thrill, Shardblade, Soulcaster, Oathpact, Heralds...
I've got it -- the power of the Shard of Adonalsium that was held by The Almighty was... Capitalization!

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: WoK: Shalan - near end of book **SPOILERS**
« on: October 08, 2010, 09:32:13 AM »
It also assumes that any Soulcasting requires fabrials.  We've only seen a broken fabrial and a decoy.  The ardents, who use the rest of them, always use them in secret.  They could all be fakes, just useful places to carry infused gemstones to use in spren-fueled soulcasting that the ardents still remember how to do from the Shadowdays.

Shallan raises the same question in Ch. 72, and Jasnah assures here that Soulcasting fabrials are not a hoax, and that there's something special about people who can Soulcast on their own.
Jasnah is about to explain exactly how Soulcasting is related to the Knights Radiant (apparantly two orders of Knights could pull off the soulcasting trick)... but then decides to hold off until the next book, just to tease us.  =P

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Thunderclasts *WoK Spoilers*
« on: October 08, 2010, 08:51:25 AM »
From the "Horses" thread...

Here's a theory - Greatshell carapace strength (and by extension maximum phyiscal size) is determined by the capacity of the individual's gemheart (i.e. natural fabrial).

Thus, the spren that emerge from a dying greatshell escape the gemheart at the moment of death are the physical manifestation of the Shadesmar concept {improbably big crab thing that is alive and does not crush under its own weight}.  When the greatshell is alive, these spren are attracted to and trapped inside the gemheart.  The spren make it possible for their host to breathe Stormlight which not only solves the oxygen-CO2 exchange problem, but also allows for great feats of strength.  (We see similar effects as a result of Kaladin's bond with an honorspren.) This allows the greatshell to grow to Chasmfiend size. When the greatshell's connection to the cognitive realm is severed by death, the spren are no longer bound. Their departure leaves the gems inert and able to be cut by an autofabrian to target other varieties of spren.

Greatshells exist throughout Roshar (if I recall), but the ones in the Shattered Plains are particularly massive.  Something about the nature of spren or Highstorms in that region (perhaps as a result and/or cause of the final battle of the last Desolation) makes them able to grow much more effective gemhearts.

Chulls would have comparably smaller gemhearts compared to Greatshells, which explains their more docile nature.
At the other end of this growth spectrum would lie Thunderclasts, which have super-efficient gemhearts that can hold/metabolize Stormlight much more efficiently.

To go even further out on a limb... Parshendi would be parshmen that use gemhearts as natural fabrials to maintain a level of shared consciousness.  Their fabrials are tuned in pairs, much like spanreeds and are operated using vocal harmonics (i.e. songs) to evoke cymatic resonance.  At the far end of this spectrum, you get Voidbringers, which hold Stormlight perfectly and have all sorts of crazy powers.

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Dalinar's visions
« on: October 08, 2010, 08:43:34 AM »
Given Vorinism's extreme taboo regarding predictions, I'm not ready to take time-travel paradoxes off the table just yet. ;)  Enjoying the discussion though.   ;D

If we bring Shadesmar into play (my catch-all explanation for everything!), we could potentially eliminate the mechanics of time travel from the equation.  I don't see any particular reason why a "cognitive realm" would have to follow the same rules of time as the physical realm.
It's pretty clear that Dalinar's body isn't going anywhere during his visions (much to the chagrin of his troops) -- it's just his mind that is bouncing around (or just going unhinged).  It could be that the entire scene takes place simultaneously in the cognitive realm for all participants, but is directly correlated with a specific moment in the past in the physical realm.


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Brandon Sanderson / Re: WOK: Horses
« on: October 08, 2010, 08:25:23 AM »
edit: moved my post to the Thunderclast thread, because it didn't have anything to do with horses

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Dalinar's visions
« on: October 08, 2010, 07:47:47 AM »
It seems more likely to me that the Almighty would be able to take a "snapshot" of the personality of the people involved in the event he is 'recording', thus instead of a static recording the visions are able to react to Dalinars actions within the scope of the personality that each character in the vision was modeled after. If the Almighty's powers are equal to even a simple computer (and I have to assume they are) then its no big deal at all to just run the simulation.

Thus the visions aren't "custom molded" to the viewer so much as dynamically generated based on the recorded personalities. In this case we could assume that if the simulation is run without the presence of the viewer to affect it, then it would play out in exactly the same way as the Almighty first saw the event in real life, so long as the simulation was running an accurate portrayal of the characters involved. Then when the viewer does enter the simulation, the character's responses to the situation should reflect what the actual people would have done in a reasonably accurate fashion.

That explanation works for me anyway. ;)

But then why doesn't the Almighty react to Dalinar like the rest of the simulation? It seems like that would be an important feature to include in an interactive message to the future, especially given the trouble Dalinar gets into because of the lack of it.

The sort of situation I have in mind is something along the lines of the Dr. Who episode "Blink", in which the characters have a "conversation" with a pre-recorded video message from a time traveller: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZRhj03MZD4&feature=related.  The viewers can have causal interactions with people and objects in their perceived "present", but cannot interact directly with the narrator.

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I'm more inclined to think Shardblade creation has something directly to do with the Almighty's Shard of Adonalsium, and that the reason no one can make new Blades is that the Almighty is dead.

Shardblades are only able to physically cut materials that aren't linked to a living mind.  When interacting with living tissue, my guess is that they sever the physical object's connection to the cognitive/spiritual realm -- which is the sort of raw "laws of magi-physics" shenanigans which I'd place deeper than spren.

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Dalinar's visions
« on: October 08, 2010, 06:48:22 AM »
Does that stop it being time-travel? It complicates things but still, something doesn't feel right.

I think of it as time travel with a voiceover.
Given that we don't really know anything at all regarding the Almighty's actual capabilities -- I'd say pretty much anything goes when it comes to speculation.

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