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Messages - happyman

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1
Brandon Sanderson / Re: Cosmere Discussion ***SPOILERS for ALL books***
« on: August 22, 2011, 02:28:15 PM »
Since they all take place in the Cosmere.  What if a Feruchemist ate some Lerasium, then went and bought enough biochromatic breath to reach the 10th heightening, and then randomly got picked to become an Elantrian?

p.s. I haven't read WoK yet.

That's nothing, what if a Feruchemist, by some twist of fate, somehow found himself with the power of two Shards, which together have the power to create worlds. Wait... That sounds familiar...

Yeah, but at least those are the powers that he already had access to, via his genetics.  Nobody is quite certain what a normal person would do mixing completely different magics.

2
Brandon Sanderson / Re: Timespan for Stormlight Archives? (Spoilers)
« on: August 22, 2011, 02:26:45 PM »
It doesn't matter if it's the same size, bigger, or smaller than Earth.  If it takes 20 hours to rotate, then it has a 20 hour day.

Let's use Mars and Mercury as examples:
Mars has a 24.6229 hour day and is only has 11% of Earth's mass.  Mercury has a 1407.5 hour day and has about the same mass as Mars.  Mercury has nearly the same density of Earth.  Mar's radius is 0.533 Earths, and Mercury's radius is 0.3829 Earths.

The mass only matters for gravity.

This is exactly correct, barring some extraordinarily small effects from General Relativity.

Gravity depends only on mass, and the length of the day depends only on how rapidly the planet is turning.  The two can be changed quite independent of each other.  In fact, even black holes have these two parameters independent.

3
Brandon Sanderson / Re: Limitations of magic in WoK ** spoilers**
« on: August 17, 2011, 04:41:36 PM »
Dunno.

Stormlight seems to be one of the limiting factors.  The main one, in fact.  Combine this with the fact that Jasnah's gems cracked under extreme use, and we've got a couple of useful limits.

Beyond that, though, we just don't know enough.

4
Brandon Sanderson / Re: Dalinar as a possible radiant? *Spoilers*
« on: August 17, 2011, 04:40:05 PM »
But it has already been confirmed that both Kaladin and Dalinar are incredibly skilled anyway. Also, where did Kaladin get his stormlight from if he was surgebinding before we see Syl? He says when he is part of bridge 4 that he has to carry his spheres so no one steals them, which suggests that he did not do so before. So although I do think that Dalinar will become a Radiant, I don't think it is happening yet. (unless, of course, his powers manifested due to his visions from the Almighty)

I don't remember the details, but I'm pretty sure he was carrying spheres as part of a bribe to get the raw recruit onto his squad.

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Dalinar as a possible radiant? *Spoilers*
« on: August 16, 2011, 05:10:00 PM »
But if I remember correctly, the Radiants all gained their Powers from spren. If this is the case why haven't we seen any evidence of an intelligent spren around Dalinar like Syl and Kaladin?

There's good evidence Kaladin was tapping his powers slightly while the bond was still relatively weak.  In the introductory scene, his fighting seems superhuman.  I mean, he fought a Shardholder and won!  Syl hadn't introduced herself at all at that point.

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Howard Tayler / Re: Using a robot to watch Para?
« on: August 15, 2011, 03:23:18 PM »
Oh, hah! Were it not for you I'd have missed the br'er rabbit connection. The robot is named Tarball...

Nice catch!  That's a good one.  Oh, solid character development followed by a payoff is sweet.

7

I'll be honest, I've read the series many times , and I never once even considered there to be any hazing in the books at all. Even now I can't think of a single scene of true hazing. There are some nasty things that happen to people and there are some difficult tests, but no actual hazing that I can recall.

Well, Rand's treatment at the hands of the Aes Sedai was true abuse.  And treated by the books as such, with no excuses made for the abusers.

8
Speaking of consequences, does anyone really believe that three women sharing one man ever really works as well as RJ imagined? 

*Spoiler Alert*

I think Rand is supposed to in the end, anyway. If that happened they wouldn't all be living in the same house and whatnot. I suppose that was RJ's entire point with Rand. He's going to die, so . . . why not? What could three people do to him that he isn't already going to endure? (Note: I'm not saying I approve.)

Supposed to what?  Suffer consequences?

It's just that the women of WoT, especially those with power, are not generally any less jealous, petty, ambitious or competitive than real women except in this one case.  Inconsistent much?  I think so. Besides, none of Rand's internal dialogue mentions this reasoning.  At least none that I can remember.  He just seems to be reacting to opportunities of the moment.  Being controlled by women is a consistent theme in Randland, but not the lack of consequence.

Come to think of it, since he's become Min-ogamous, there has been no sharing of him at all.  Except for getting Elayne pregnant, which was a hilarious scene.  That's where there should have been more friction, though.       

Dunno.  The situation described is possible, but rare.  You are also taking it way to far, as well.  All three have story arcs in which they struggle with the idea before accepting it.  Remember what Avienda suggested she and Elayne do to Min?  Neither to I; RJ censored it, just describing Elayne's shock at the suggestions.  And Rand does have some idea how odd the situation is, but because his main personal motivation was to get out of all their lives and never see any of them again, he never spent much time worrying about how it would work out, because he wasn't trying to make it work.

Also, it's not just Rand, people.  The Aiel have polygamy, openly and with the apparently eager participation of the wives.  That's odder than Rand's situation by a long shot.

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: The Next Annotations
« on: August 12, 2011, 09:16:50 PM »
Mythwalker has 22 chapters. It has 3 races from lowest ranked to highest called Skaa, Eruntu, and Kkoloss. The Skaa are kind of like the Parshmen. The Kkoloss are the nobles. The main character (boy from a small town) is an Eruntu. Vvenna and Siri are Kkoloss who are cousins and look nearly identical. A thousand years ago, the dark god took over the world.

Wow, I'm seeing a lot of familiar concepts here.  Hmmmm.......

Yeah, that's why these books will never be published as anything except free excerpts.  Brandon freely and happily borrows concepts from unpublished books for the published ones.  Most authors do once you get a look into their unpublished manuscripts, but he is very open about it.

10
Brandon Sanderson / Re: Dalinar as a possible radiant? *Spoilers*
« on: August 12, 2011, 09:11:15 PM »
No, I wasn't on this forum then. I would be pretty impressed to see such predictions pan out as described. But I would also challenge how many other theories were proposed at the time? Sure, one or six start to emerge as more plausible as more people clamor to refine it.

An educated reader can make almost any theory sound plausible, even if it was not the athor's intent. Ever read the essay which demonstrates that Fight Club was about Calvin and Hobbes? Or any of the more plausible theories from the WMG (Wild Mass Guess) section of tvtropes?

Everyone invovled will remember the correct theory with vigor once it has been proven, regardless how many erroneous theories were proposed alongside. Or how many erroneous details were accidentally attached to the correct theory, though they were part of a different puzzle.

Dalinar-as-Radiant may well prove to be true (likely), this text may even point to it (I have my doubts). I'm just reserving judgment because the passage quoted doesn't prove anything conclusively to me-as-reader without something more substantial.

I'm still not remotely certain why you think the evidence is bad or weak.  Two knowledgeable characters, over the course of a few very crowded minutes, notice in passing that Dalinar is doing things that shouldn't be possible, even in the magic system they are already familiar with.  It can't be the grandeur of Shards, like you've been trying to claim, for the very simple reason that the viewpoint characters are all familiar with the normal behavior of shards, and it isn't anything they have seen before.  (Most observers, even in-world, would probably not have noticed anything out of the ordinary.)  They don't remark on them afterwards, because the minutes were so crowded, and it's easy to write things like that off as being due to a heated imagination.  They don't expect anything unusual to happen, so they write it off.

We, on the other hand, are readers.  We know, from other characters' viewpoints, that the magic is coming back.  Kaladin, Shallan, Jasnah, etc., have begun manifesting things that are the stuff of legend.  We also know that the Knights Radiant had more powers than "modern" shardbearers manifest, and we even know some of the manifestations, such as the glowing armor, manipulation of forces, and so on.  In fact, we even know that one of the orders is called Stonesinew, which strongly suggests increased stamina, speed, and so on, very much like Thugs from mistborn.  In addition, we have the further meta-knowledge that the books are about interesting characters.  Combine all those with the fact that, for a very short time, Dalinar exhibited unusual strength, speed, stamina, control over his trajectory when he shouldn't have had it, and even possibly began to glow during this unusual burst of strength (although the viewpoint character writes that off as imagination), it seems extremely likely that he is manifesting the powers of one of the orders of Knights Radiant.  Lastly, we have the fact that magic on Roshar is related to character traits, and that Dalinar has been improving his character enormously from reading Way of Kings, making him more likely than the average Schmoe to be a Radiant, and I have a hard time doubting this theory.
Just putting it out there, but if Dalinar is slowly becoming a KR now, why was his Blackthorn state present before even knowing about The Way of Kings? Before he started becoming what he is at the end? I've only thought of this so far as one explanation-
He was incredibly skilled with the sword beforehand, and it's now even better because he is enhanced by unconscious use of stormlight


Remember what it says in the book?  Stormlight perfects what is there, but it does not grant skill.  Dalinar is clearly skilled without any magical help.  I just feel that, like you said, he's now excelling beyond what even he thought was possible.  Certainly in that little skirmish, he did things without knowing how he did them.

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Allomancy: full powers of metals (spoilers)
« on: August 01, 2011, 02:38:22 PM »
Atium: Corrects for its own effects, except against Atium, Electrum, and conscious thought. (how Vin defeated Zane)

If it didn't do this, it would not be nearly as powerful as it is portrayed.  Dodging by inches only works if they don't change their swing to hit again, as a second or two is plenty of time for a subconscious correction.

Remember that Atium is explicitly stated to enhance the mind to use the extra information.  Presumably recognizing which, out of all the shadows, will actually miss you after all the corrections is part of your ability to process the information from the Atium shadows.

Incidentally, the fact that Atium did things in two different quadrants should have been a hint that it was special from the first introduction.  Not that I realized that.  Just didn't know enough yet, I guess.

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Allomancy: full powers of metals (spoilers)
« on: July 29, 2011, 10:33:02 PM »
Electrum: can you use it to find out your capabilities?  For example, if you run at a gap between two buildings while burning Electrum, would you see all of your shadows fall into the alley if the gap was too wide for you to jump?  This would allow you to stop running in time.  If it could be used this way, then it could be useful for seeing where you will land with a steel jump.

I like this idea.  I would say, though, that this probably has the caveat that it can only tell you what you are capable of if you are likely to consider the idea in the first place.  That is, if it involves you using Allomancy in a way you don't know about and which you aren't likely to discover in a few seconds, you won't see it, even if it is possible.

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Allomancy: full powers of metals (spoilers)
« on: July 29, 2011, 07:16:48 PM »
EDIT: another question, why do Inquisitors see out of their "eyes", instead of out of the middle of their chests?

Regular Allomancers "see" the lines as coming out of the center of their chest, but they "see" them with their eyes.  Inquisitors were human once; they probably perceive it the same way.

I use the word "see" in quotes because I believe that it is really an extra sense unique to Scadriel, not related to the twenty-odd ones we normally use in the real world.  That Inquisitors "see" using them is more an analogy than anything else, or perhaps force of habit from when they didn't have their metal-sense.

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Brandon Sanderson / Re: So many tiny details
« on: July 15, 2011, 02:53:33 PM »
Start a new one.  There's plenty to find.  What makes your top ten?

The first ones on my list are the ones from Mistborn during Kelsier's planning session where Vin thinks that it would be as possible to kill the Lord Ruler as it would be to stop the mists or make the sun come up at night.

She's absolutely right.

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It would be interesting, and a pretty cool twist.  On the other hand, it doesn't really fit with what we know about the worlds.  For starters, Brandon has said that the three Metallic Arts manifest on the other side of the world as well.  Also, we know the names of the various worlds in the Cosmere, and only Mistborn occurs on Scadriel.

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