Author Topic: Warbreaker: Free Ebook  (Read 234763 times)

Peter Ahlstrom

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #840 on: July 09, 2009, 12:34:56 AM »
There are some mysteries that are supposed to be easy to figure out. Not everything has to be Asmodean. :) (Though supposedly that one was also meant to be easy to figure out.)
All Saiyuki fans should check out Dazzle! Emotionally wrenching action-adventure and quirky humor! (At least read chapter 6 and tell me if you're not hooked.) Volume 10 out now!

happyman

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #841 on: July 09, 2009, 09:13:43 PM »
Clod being Arsteel was indeed easy.  What this meant for the Lifeless made out of his body is somewhat trickier.  It brings up questions about whether Clod did indeed have emotions/feelings/whatever Vivenna thought she saw in him.
Nature hates being reified.

Renoard

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #842 on: July 11, 2009, 06:09:08 PM »
Ummm
The walrus was Paul. . .
You can always get what you want if you never count the cost.

Eri

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #843 on: July 16, 2009, 01:45:01 PM »
I hope I don't have to read all 57 pages before posting?
pirsquared, I like your theory about Returning=Awakening and Commanding oneself. Or being A&C-ed by some higher force, maybe?

Some things I want to mention:
Really good book. Not as great as Mistborn, but still very good.

I wonder why the high priest was so rude to Siri. I just don't understand that guy. I don't understand most of their religion. They could let the God King grow with his adopted family and be happy for some more time. Explain things to him. Not "how to Awaken things and become powerful", but simple things, like family matters and such.

I agree that the idea of Siri going to be raped by a tyrant is very disturbing. Yup, she does not but we don't know that in advance.
It's more disturbing because it's unnecessary, even from in-world point of view. If the priests could claim that Siri is pregnant than why couldn't they just put her into Susebron's room and claim that they have had sex? Or maybe that is what they wanted, but Bluefingers told her to undress and kneel just to scare her more?
Well, the priests could go even further and claim that she'll automagically get pregnant by king somehow using his BioChroma on her and then give birth in much shorter time than normal. She wouldn't have to touch him and they will be able to present the child they found as new king sooner. Anyway why did they want to have a new king as soon as possible? I guess that again half of what I think about it is wrong, and than there will be more about it in next book(s?).

I wonder if the fact that the marriage have been consumed is as unimportant as it seems. Maybe (because of Siri being from royal family or some other odd circumstances) they will have a child anyway.

Mercenaries being evil was a bit easy to guess - after Mistborn I am quite paranoid on important characters not having their PoV chapters. But the scene in cellar (dead Parlin and animals) was great and shocking. Probably the best scene in whole book, in my opinion.

BioChroma... is it just me, or does it looks a bit futuristic? More like some cybertechnology than magic. Maybe it's not magic, in fact.
Maybe it would look better as Biochroma, without second capital.

I wonder why did they bring only(?) children to give their Breaths to Lightsong. Is it because he died saving a child? Or do children deal more easily with losing it? Are their Breaths stronger? Or is it just because most of poor people were already Drabs, because their parents have sold their Breaths and so it went... ?

(petitions, s 125/126)
Quote
   “Please, Great One,” the woman said. She sniffled, then bowed her head.
“Oh, please. He was brave, like you. My Breath, it would be yours. The
Breaths of my entire family. Service for a hundred years, anything. Please, just
heal him.”
Why is she offering Lightsong these things? Doesn't she know that he would have to die to help her child? Or does she promise Breath and service to the Court of Gods in general or to his successor (the next deity of bravery, or something like that)?

Quote
It’s Tax, all right. Goes by a different name now.”
Denth nodded. “Vasher. He’s used it for a while. It’s a joke on his part.”
I hope the joke will be explained someday, because I don't get it.

Site 314/315:
Quote
    Vasher stood openly atop the building. He didn’t really care who saw him.
He rarely did. An endless flow of people passed on the colorful street.
VaraTreledees—Denth, as he called himself now—walked among them with
his team. The woman, Jewels. Tonk Fah, as always. The clueless princess. And
the abomination.
?!
Why does Vasher consider Lifeless an abomination? Or is it some different kind of Lifeless? Or a mistake?..

Clod being Arsteel... there may be more to it than just "they animated their old friend's corpse to make a bodyguard construct". I think he still has have some important role to play.

I wonder who Egdli was/is.

BTW - is there a way to buy Mistborn or other books as PDFs? It would make searching for metaplot elements (like Hoid) easier...

zas678

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #844 on: July 16, 2009, 04:30:35 PM »
Brandon Sanderson said on the Barnes and Nobles forum that there does need to be an actual child of Suseborn in order for Suseborn to pass his Breath on. He said he would explain more in the annotations.

Also, Vasher considered Clod as an abomination because he was an abomination. How would you feel if someone you knew had his corpse reawakened? True Vasher did kill Arsteel, but he still thinks it's creepy to have him walking around still.

I don 't  think a lot of the peasants understand the religion (like in Mistborn). After all, you have to eat before you can think about whether there is an afterlife.

I think Edgli is just kinda like The Pits of Hathsin (name wise). I think it's just a name, not an actual person. But who knows?
“It’s a fun tradition.”
“So was witch-burning,” Melody said.  “Unless you were the witch.”

Eri

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #845 on: July 16, 2009, 05:34:32 PM »
Thank you for your explanation. So the kings have had children... interesting.

I thought Hatshin was a name of place. "The Pits of Hatshin" like "the city of Paris". Maybe i got suggested by the Polish translation. And Edgli seems like a person or people.

Clod wasn't IMO much more an abomination than Phantoms. Animating corpses of people you knew isn't much more vile than of people you didn't know. Or... wait. If Arsteel have been a Returned and after he'd died his body was used to make a Lifeless, Vasher could consider it an abomination, for some reason.

Renoard

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #846 on: July 18, 2009, 08:27:51 PM »
I think most people would react more strongly to a familiar face on a golum, zombie etc. than a stranger. The reflex to have familiar emotions would make the horror of it more poignant.
You can always get what you want if you never count the cost.

JakobLayn

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #847 on: July 19, 2009, 12:19:01 AM »
Vasher, Denth, Arsteel, Yersteel and Shashara are the original Returned and so yes Having Arsteel a Returned and friend becoming a lifeless would probably make Vasher think of Clod as an Abomination, who knows maybe thats why Vivenna noticed emotion in Clod. Idk thats for darn sure im just guessing on that part
The fear to explore the unknowns in life is to deny yourself all the joys and happiness as well

JakobLayn

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #848 on: July 19, 2009, 12:21:23 AM »
hah i just read a post already bringing up the thing about emotion in Clod...i feel stupid :-[
The fear to explore the unknowns in life is to deny yourself all the joys and happiness as well

Chaos

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #849 on: July 20, 2009, 12:28:33 AM »
Vasher, Denth, Arsteel, Yersteel and Shashara are the original Returned and so yes Having Arsteel a Returned and friend becoming a lifeless would probably make Vasher think of Clod as an Abomination, who knows maybe thats why Vivenna noticed emotion in Clod. Idk thats for darn sure im just guessing on that part

Not the "original" Returned. Vo, the First Returned, lived centuries before the Five Scholars. They are, however, all Returned, so you are right on that account.
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Aranfan

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #850 on: July 20, 2009, 12:31:42 AM »
I wonder if you could use Hemalurgy to steal Breath?

Chaos

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #851 on: July 20, 2009, 12:46:35 AM »
You can't. In order to use Hemalurgy, you need to have the right spiritual and genetic codes. People on the Warbreaker don't have those same codes as the ones on Scadrial.
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Aranfan

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #852 on: July 20, 2009, 01:22:00 AM »
You can't. In order to use Hemalurgy, you need to have the right spiritual and genetic codes. People on the Warbreaker don't have those same codes as the ones on Scadrial.

And here I thought that you needed those codes for Allomancy and/or Feruchemy, and that for Hemalurgy you just needed Ruin to be around.  I'd need to check my copy of HoA, but I'm pretty sure that for Hemalurgy you just need a spike of the right Metal (probably Atium for Breaths), a person with the powers you want that you wouldn't mind dead, and Ruin's presence.

Chaos

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #853 on: July 20, 2009, 01:29:23 AM »
Well, in order for a spike to become Hemalurgically-charged, the target would need to have Ruin and Preservation's spiritual codes, because when you are stealing a quality with Hemalurgy, you are either taking part of Preservation, or you are taking Allomantic or Feruchemical powers. Both require those genetic and spiritual codes. What Ruin likes to do is to have that metal, now that it's imbued, to actually go in the right spot so it grants a power.

As Brandon said on B&N to my question on the subject,

Quote
What is happening with Hemalurgy, essentially, is that you're driving a spike through a specific point on a person's body and ripping off a piece of their soul.  It sticks to the spike on the Spiritual Realm.  Then, you place that spike on someone else in a specific place (not exactly the same place, but on the right spiritual pressure point) and 'hot wire' the spirit to give it Hemalurgy or Feruchemy.  It's like you're fooling the spiritual DNA, creating a work-around.  Or, in some cases, changing the spirit to look like something else, which has the immediate effect of distorting the body and transforming it into a new creature.
 
Hemalurgy is a very brutal way of making changes like this, though, so it often has monstrous effects.  (Like with the koloss.)  And in most cases, it leaves a kind of 'hole' in the spirit's natural defenses, which is how Ruin was able to touch the souls of Hemalurgists directly.

Now, atium can be a wild card for Hemalurgy, as Brandon stated later (spoiler alert, anyone? :P) in that post. So, you might make the case that you could stick a Breath to a spike. However, that doesn't mean you can figure out where you need to place that spike in order for the recipient to gain that Breath. So it's probably unlikely that it would ever happen, because magic derived from different Shards appear incompatible.
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Aranfan

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Re: Warbreaker: Free Ebook
« Reply #854 on: July 20, 2009, 04:12:53 AM »
Incompatible?  Spook got Preservation's powers from Ruin, how in the world do you get incompatible from that?  And why would you need any specific spiritual codes when you are getting your powers stolen?

And I could see the victim needing the spiritual codes for the magic in question that's being stolen, but the explanation you quoted at me seems to imply that you can take any power from someone who has it, and give it to anyone.  Yes, he specifically mentions Feruchemy and presumably meant to say Allomancy when he said Hemalurgy, but every other part of the explanation (Fooling the Spiritual DNA) sounds like it could apply to the other magic systems just as well. 

Also, why should Hemalurgy only work on Allomancy and Feruchemy?  Ruin is the primal force of destruction and decay, it makes sense for him to be able to use the magics of the other Shards against them.