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Brandon Sanderson / Re: The Koloss
« on: May 07, 2008, 06:10:03 PM »I love how they feel the need to explain why they do what they do.
Me too. As you might guess from my signature, "He ate my horse." is one of my favorite lines in the book.
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Me too. As you might guess from my signature, "He ate my horse." is one of my favorite lines in the book.
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Ashfalls
« on: May 07, 2008, 04:44:23 PM »
It's like Hrathen said (or thought) in Elantris - his policy was to keep his promises, partly because that made it easier to lie convincingly when he had to.
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Vin as HOA?
« on: May 07, 2008, 04:39:01 PM »Do you really think Ruin has that much power? I'd say that's a little extreme.
I think it's extreme too. I meant the theory as a joke, but I obviously didn't make that clear. Tone of voice is hard to express online.
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: The Koloss
« on: May 07, 2008, 04:36:40 PM »It is possible that the nails provide some benefit, but it is more likely they are there strictly for control, and may have the side effect of enhancing their emotions, especially anger.
Or perhaps preventing them from having any other emotions than anger and boredom.
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Ruin and Preservation
« on: May 07, 2008, 04:30:43 PM »I think I know how the lord ruler is using hemlalurgy to limit ruin's influence!:
Vin says that Kredik shaw is like a capstone for the well, and it's made of thousands of spike-like spires. When I read that it got me thinking. Why make Kredik Shaw have spikes, unless it's somehow related to hemalurgy? My guess, is that the "spikes" that the towers make pierce the ground somehow, overtop of the well, and limit the influence of Ruin. Sure there's no flesh involved, but that's jsut my guess to how the lord ruler limit's ruin's influence.
Fascinating! I never thought about the Kredik Shaw spires being significant before. I believe they are made of several different metals, which would support your theory.
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Ashfalls
« on: May 06, 2008, 06:08:43 PM »The beauty (and frustration) of this book is that it is hard to tell what is fact and what is mere opinion, or even flat out lies, kinda like these boards.
Absolutely. It's like how Aes Sedai cannot lie, but can twist the truth till it's unrecognizable. Then in later books it turns out some Aes Sedai - the Black Ajah - CAN lie, but we still have no idea which Aes Sedai are Black.
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Vin as HOA?
« on: May 06, 2008, 06:05:10 PM »It does seem to be cheating a bit though.
I agree, why even have a map in the book if the things it depicts are actually in different locations, relative to each other? Unless there was a plot twist where the mist spirit moves Keep Venture to another part of Luthadel (like when the Dark One moved rooms and walls and corridors around in the Caemlyn Palace and the White Tower). In that case, the map would be a clue as to what Luthadel will eventually look like when Ruin is done.
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Written in Steel - Spoilers
« on: May 06, 2008, 05:57:41 PM »
In my opinion, that would be way TOO much of a twist, for the major twist from MB1 to turn out to be false. Authors can only throw in so many surprises before their readers start feeling manipulated and betrayed.
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Vin as HOA?
« on: May 05, 2008, 05:31:23 PM »In the first drafts of the book, the Well was not located under Kredik Shaw. Instead, it was in the north like everyone assumed it was. For good narrative and plot reasons, Brandon's agent (or was it his editor?) suggested changing the location of the well. This was a really good idea; the last part of the book reads much more smoothly now than it did in the first drafts.
So the stuff about Vin sensing pulses far to the north had to be re-explained a bit. They weren't really far to the north; they were coming from Kredik Shaw the whole time, and Vin just happened to be south of Kredik Shaw most of the time. They felt distant at first only because the pulses were so weak at first. Still, it's a little bit more clunky now, and I don't recall any hint in the story that Vin notices any change in the direction of the pulses when she's in different parts of the city.
When Vin and Elend go north of the city, she starts feeling the pulses from the south (the direction of Kredik Shaw) and it really confuses her. ^_^
I was looking at the map recently and noticed that Keep Venture is not south of Kredik Shaw, it's west. Maybe in the revision, Sanderson should have removed all references to the direction she feels the pulses from. Either that, or change the map (which would probably be harder, since I assume MB1 was already out at that point).
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Wheel v. Mist
« on: May 05, 2008, 04:57:36 PM »
I think Elantrian magic is a lot closer to Aes Sedai than to Mistborn, in that it doesn't require materials, simply skill. Also, Elantrians look different, as do Aes Sedai (female, anyway). There's nothing physical to indicate whether someone is Mistborn.
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: The Koloss
« on: May 05, 2008, 04:52:03 PM »And are nails really similar to spikes ? I mean, it is two different words, it must represent a difference of some sort.
The English words "nail" and "spike" refer to things generally similar in shape, but nails are usually much smaller than spikes.
EDIT: This post was intended as an explanation for Vintage, from a native-English speaker. I didn't mean to imply any particular significance to the difference.
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: MB1 Prologue Epigraph Thingy
« on: May 05, 2008, 04:48:13 PM »
Fascinating find, Andrew. When I was re-reading the annotations last week, I saw that same comment and wondered what the clue was. I was thinking along the lines of everyone actually doubting Alendi, but what you found has far more potential.
I'm thinking the word "future" is significant. We know that metalminds can store history, what if they can also store reverse memories, "memories" of things to come? There might be a way to use enhanced atium to see the entire world's future, then keep those visions for later reference. (Incidentally, this might explain how TLR was able to lay an ambush for Kelsier with the prisoner carts in MB1, when Kelsier thought he was the ambusher.)
However, all this is weakened if not demolished by Avalon's point that the epigraph was Alendi, not Rashek. So unless Alendi and Rashek shared some power (hemalurgy?), observations about TLR are pretty irrelevant in interpreting Alendi.
I'm thinking the word "future" is significant. We know that metalminds can store history, what if they can also store reverse memories, "memories" of things to come? There might be a way to use enhanced atium to see the entire world's future, then keep those visions for later reference. (Incidentally, this might explain how TLR was able to lay an ambush for Kelsier with the prisoner carts in MB1, when Kelsier thought he was the ambusher.)
However, all this is weakened if not demolished by Avalon's point that the epigraph was Alendi, not Rashek. So unless Alendi and Rashek shared some power (hemalurgy?), observations about TLR are pretty irrelevant in interpreting Alendi.
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Do Steel Inquistors need to burn metals? *Possible Spoilers*
« on: May 01, 2008, 05:06:25 PM »In regards to what Sarah said about female villains, One only has to look at the Drow society in the forgotten realms books to understand that even female's can be just as brutal as men, in that series even more so.
But I do agree with Darxbane over the Lord Ruler Seeing men as the superior sex. One thing that I Enjoy about Mr. Sanderson's books so much, is how much Class struggle plays apart in his stories. So along with class struggle, one would assume Gender would be involved as well.
Excellent points. I haven't read the forgotten realms series, so I'll take your word for it. I guess what I meant was that there are some female villains - Shan Elariel, Semirhage, Mohgedien, Galina - who can be very cruel, sadistic, and ruthless but who still look like humans. But we don't as often see female monsters - ugly, deformed, twisted bodies like trollocs or orcs or Inquisitors.
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Written in Steel - Spoilers
« on: May 01, 2008, 04:42:30 PM »
OK, assuming Ruin couldn't change the words written in steel, what interest do the Inquisitors have in preserving it? I wouldn't have thought of them as wishing to safeguard the true history of Alendi, Rashek, and Kwaan over the past millennium.
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Brandon Sanderson / Re: Kandra of Preservation?
« on: April 30, 2008, 10:42:15 PM »
Well, it certainly would provide an ending like no other I've seen.