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eke out posted:
This is the theory I had on the 17th shard discord. I 100% think it's correct
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Nov 28, 2020 02:04
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Just finished the last few chapters of ROW, and now some speculation: *Since Taravodium is trying to find a way to beat Dalinar despite the limitations of the contract, my home run swing is that he's going to manipulate Dalinar into reuniting Honor and taking up the Shard, which Dalinar thinks will be necessary to put unchained magic back in the box, but will also inherit Dalinar to the oaths that bound Honor... so suddenly he can't fight Odium in the contest of champions without breaking a different, previous pact against the Shards directly harming mortals or each other. Masterstroke, Dalinar either wins and breaks the oath chaining Odium to Roshar, or loses and Honor has to go forth and conquer on behalf of Odium. Making the good guys win at that point could be Wit circling back to the story about ties being a loophole, but in Dalinar's favor instead of Odium. Or it could actually be a noble sacrifice on the part of someone else (Szeth and Kaladin are both on that arc, especially if those are the three that travel to Shinovar) that volunteers as Honor's champion and wins against all odds anyway. *I would very much like to see Navani hold both Honor and Cultivation, becoming the Science shard, even though that would probably mean Dalinar dies after reuniting Honor. And thoughts on ROW: -Venli's flashbacks really were bad. She was already a marginal character, all of those events were already clear from previous flashbacks and exposition, and if anything, it painted her as being even more cowardly and ineffective than we knew. -Lirin was an absolute joke. The dude is not only unimpressed with his son's achievements, he looks down on him? And thinks that his son wanted to abandon his entire life as a world leader and the most celebrated human hero in millennia, to go run the family business? The ego on this fucker... -Shallan going from weird, secret pseudo-disassociative identity disorder, to everyone who knows her explicitly knowing that she has several named alter egos was even weirder. Unlike in Oathbreaker, she didn't actually do anything important while juggling her multiple personas, she just argued with herself and Pattern, and actively avoided doing things. When she finally did something, it all happened in a single chapter, with a minor character, and ended up not mattering anyway to the plot. Her being a main POV character was a waste. -Navani continually self-owning was pretty tiresome. She was trying to figure out how to help the Sibling, and did a decent job, but then she accidentally also did painstaking work to create WMDs as a side project. +Navani continually inventing cool things was cool, in spite of the fact that she got tricked every time and helped Raboniel more than herself. I thought it was broadcast from a mile away when she learned to feel and sing the Rhythms that she was going to help the Sibling hear them again and reactivate, but it was good when it finally happened. +Kaladin's lows were weirdly paced, but his highs were phenomenal. Die Hard-ing his way through hell and always rising to the occasion is what high fantasy is all about. +Adolin was also perfect in every way. Every chapter from his POV was delightful to read and made him come alive as a character. Showing how he treated Maya and even his drat horse was fantastic. Infinite Karma fucked around with this message at 02:41 on Nov 28, 2020 |
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Nov 28, 2020 02:38
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w/r/t the other radiants, Sanderson's been pretty up front with "I don't want to bloat the books with 10,000 characters where you can't keep track of them all" a la Wheel of Time (where you had like, half the Tower named). Plus, edgedancers aren't combat troops; they're treated as field medics at the moment. They can fight but it's not their thing. Truthwatchers are pretty much in the same boat, for both of them that exist. The Stonewards aren't really mentioned much at all. I was also expecting the others to come charging in to help Adolin, but remember they were out of Light and couldn't summon Blades, so they'd be nigh-useless outside of intimidation by numbers. Raboniel is definitely a one-book antagonist. She's dead and gone for good; even if she was wrong about the anti-voidlight not killing their respawn mechanism she's all but guaranteed to come back catatonic like the other lost fused. She was a pleasant surprise in her depth though, absolutely. With the final book of this arc more or less set to cover the final 10 days/1 rosharan week it's looking to be an intense ride. It'll be interesting to see how he structures the book around that concept...in 3 years or so.
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Nov 28, 2020 03:35
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I'm going to drop my devestatingly nuclear-hot takes here:
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Nov 28, 2020 04:19
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I've finally started reading ROW but I am taking it slower than most and will probably take a week to finish. At chapter 33 so far and one theory I current have about Shallan is that dead-eye cryptic we saw earlier, that was Shallans previous spren, she had another spren before Pattern and she betrayed her oaths and killed it, that's her secret. That's my fan theory on that little part.
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Nov 28, 2020 09:53
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OAquinas posted:w/r/t the other radiants, Sanderson's been pretty up front with "I don't want to bloat the books with 10,000 characters where you can't keep track of them all" a la Wheel of Time (where you had like, half the Tower named). All the Fused fight and only have one surge each. That is a pathetic excuse. Yea they didn't have Stormlight but seriously what was their purpose at all? Why even name them at all if he had no plans to do anything with them? It was just completely pointless all the pages spent on who would go in the mission and who was the spy. My question mark about Raboniel was that I don't even think she was a villain not that she would come back.
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Nov 28, 2020 10:02
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RoW What if the unmade are somehow splinters/parts of the Heralds (due to them breaking in torture) and the reason there is only nine known is because Taln never broke until recently?
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Nov 28, 2020 11:43
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jebrown84 posted:RoW was a very common theory pre-ROW, now seems less likely as we see a Fused attempting to Unmake a godspren and hear Sja-Anat call the Sibling her cousin. they were probably spren before this also Odium's number is 9, he only grants 9 surges, etc etc
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Nov 28, 2020 15:34
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eke out posted:was a very common theory pre-ROW, now seems less likely as we see a Fused attempting to Unmake a godspren and hear Sja-Anat call the Sibling her cousin. they were probably spren before this they mention as well that Adhesion is the true surge of Honour, so it makes sense that Odium can’t grant that
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Nov 28, 2020 15:42
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HidaO-Win posted:they mention as well that Adhesion is the true surge of Honour, so it makes sense that Odium can’t grant that if I recall, at one point one of the voidspren/unmade (don’t recall which) state that they don’t consider it a real surge. Not that it isn’t, but it was a point made to show their biases. It being solely of Honor and not Odium is why Kaladin could still use adhesion in the corrupted tower. And that the voidspren don’t consider it a real surge made Kaladin using it to literally tear the Pursuer’s head off all the more poetic
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Nov 28, 2020 17:28
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I am reading Well Of Ascension again, and I must have forgotten how bad Zane was. I knew he sucked, but it's so much worse than I remember. Then again I was in high school when I read it.
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Nov 28, 2020 17:31
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RC Cola posted:I am reading Well Of Ascension again, and I must have forgotten how bad Zane was. I knew he sucked, but it's so much worse than I remember. Then again I was in high school when I read it. It's so weird because he really doesn't add much of anything to the book. He accomplishes next to nothing. He injects some artificial drama that amounts to nothing.
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Nov 28, 2020 18:57
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Mordiceius posted:It's so weird because he really doesn't add much of anything to the book. He accomplishes next to nothing. He injects some artificial drama that amounts to nothing. He lets Vin complete the hat-trick of mudering Elend's fiance, brother and father
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Nov 28, 2020 23:52
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Subvisual Haze posted:He lets Vin complete the hat-trick of mudering Elend's fiance, brother and father Elend's line about Vin's amazing homicidal hat trick gets me every time.
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Nov 28, 2020 23:56
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Wow, I do not like this "The Citizen" guy.
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Nov 29, 2020 00:23
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eke out posted:was a very common theory pre-ROW, now seems less likely as we see a Fused attempting to Unmake a godspren and hear Sja-Anat call the Sibling her cousin. they were probably spren before this Yeah i just saw that Taln doesn't have adhesion so that nipped that
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Nov 29, 2020 01:10
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Finished ROW this morning, holy poo poo. My thoughts -I was right about shallan and that dead eye radiant! Woo! -loving finally Kaladin, I wonder if it was really Tien. I think it was. -gently caress youuuu Moash -Nooo kelsier don't be a bad guy  -gently caress yeaaaah Nightblood! -Get screwed Rayse! -drat no, no no, Taravangian this is bad -Hoid, god damnit drat I hope you got an off-site backup somewhere. -You aren't as clever as you think Cultivation, you've probably made things worse.
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Nov 30, 2020 07:18
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Proteus Jones posted:Eh, I kind of liked those. Plus it gave us how this whole poo poo-show kicked off, with Venli being involved and all Hopefully though, less of that in the next book. I feel the next book needs to be more tightly edited. EDIT: Also on the whole Ghostblood issue Goddamnit you assholes, why so antagonistic towards each all the time? Like fucks sake this seems like something that could be easily solved if people just sat down and talked to each other honestly for 5 minutes. You've insulted us, this means war? That's the talk and thinking style of an incompetent villain, Mraize. Feels like they could have gone about things in a far less antagonistic manner and probably gotten a lot more in return and faster to boot. His Divine Shadow fucked around with this message at 08:11 on Nov 30, 2020 |
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Nov 30, 2020 07:56
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Sometimes I feel like fantasy reading is a young persons game. I've read every mainline Cosmere book, from the day I picked up Elantris on a whim back in the mid 00's, to Rhythm of War a couple weeks ago, and I'm just getting overwhelmed by the storyline. I've heard the books described as the literary equivalent of the MCU, but I think it's more accurate to say it's the book equivalent of a comic book universe, not the cinematic one. There's just so many plotlines and characters and systems and interactions, I get bogged down. I can enjoy the stories/books individually from one another, but reading the theories of putting it all together and keep it all in line - my teenage self would have no problem. My current 40 year old self is just tired.
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Nov 30, 2020 17:21
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Lucas Archer posted:Sometimes I feel like fantasy reading is a young persons game. I've read every mainline Cosmere book, from the day I picked up Elantris on a whim back in the mid 00's, to Rhythm of War a couple weeks ago, and I'm just getting overwhelmed by the storyline. I've heard the books described as the literary equivalent of the MCU, but I think it's more accurate to say it's the book equivalent of a comic book universe, not the cinematic one. There's just so many plotlines and characters and systems and interactions, I get bogged down. I can enjoy the stories/books individually from one another, but reading the theories of putting it all together and keep it all in line - my teenage self would have no problem. My current 40 year old self is just tired. The book series are self-contained within themselves in terms of plot threads, to keep it easy. The Cosmere-spanning stuff are mostly the Shards (which are still relatively static to their respective systems), Hoid (who does his usual thing; RoW is the most he's been active in a book yet), and any worldhoppers (who are usually background cameos/flavor at most). We're only now seeing more active worldhopping that matters, with Nightblood as well as the Ghostbloods (who appear to be led by Kelsier). Granted, keeping each world's magic systems straight can be a bit trivia-picky, I'll give you that.
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Nov 30, 2020 18:14
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His Divine Shadow posted:Finished ROW this morning, holy poo poo. My thoughts (ROW ending spoilers) It 100% is Tien, at least as much as it can be. Dalinar's able to interact with all 3 realms, so connecting Kaladin to the Spiritual Realm's remnant of Tien is fully within his power.
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Nov 30, 2020 18:31
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Hero of Ages - Uhhhh why did Kelsier’s ghost appear in flames to talk to Spook? What the gently caress is going on?
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Nov 30, 2020 21:05
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Mordiceius posted:Hero of Ages - Uhhhh why did Kelsier’s ghost appear in flames to talk to Spook? What the gently caress is going on? Read and find out. You're in for a ride 
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Nov 30, 2020 21:13
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Yeah, that's a definite RAFO. Lololol.
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Nov 30, 2020 21:28
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Mordiceius posted:Hero of Ages - Uhhhh why did Kelsier’s ghost appear in flames to talk to Spook? What the gently caress is going on? This one actually doesn't get explained within the trilogy... you'll want to pick up secret history when you are done with it mistborn though!
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Nov 30, 2020 21:30
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Avalerion posted:This one actually doesn't get explained within the trilogy... you'll want to pick up secret history when you are done with it mistborn though! *Done with Misborn era 2 book 6, not just the original era 1 trilogy. There is a reason Secret history didn't come out till years later.
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Nov 30, 2020 21:32
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After he's done with Bands of Mourning, though. Dont want to spoil that reveal.
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Nov 30, 2020 21:33
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Torrannor posted:Read and find out. You're in for a ride The leap in quality from Well of Ascension to Hero of Ages is insane. Also the stakes feel impossible in a way I’m excited for.
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Nov 30, 2020 21:52
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Mordiceius posted:The leap in quality from Well of Ascension to Hero of Ages is insane. Also the stakes feel impossible in a way I’m excited for. Yup. Now you're getting the real taste of the scope of things.
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Nov 30, 2020 22:13
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Mordiceius posted:The leap in quality from Well of Ascension to Hero of Ages is insane. Also the stakes feel impossible in a way I’m excited for. I get what you mean here. There are plenty of novels that attempt an ‘end of the world’ setting. This one nails it.
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Nov 30, 2020 22:15
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TheMadMilkman posted:I get what you mean here. There are plenty of novels that attempt an ‘end of the world’ setting. This one nails it. Yeah. The Lord Ruler being an immortal godking was a challenge but didn’t seem impossible. Nearly impossible, sure, but not impossible. “The world is ending” feels a lot more impossible.
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Nov 30, 2020 22:24
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Avalerion posted:This one actually doesn't get explained within the trilogy... you'll want to pick up secret history when you are done with it mistborn though! Spoilers for Secret History: I still hate the Kelsier's spirit arc. Brandon left "hints" in the original books but he clearly hadn't fully thought this stuff through, and it shows--it's a mess of "ok THIS mist ghost or vision or voice was Kelsier or Leras, but ok this one 5 minutes later was Ati, and then ok ok this one was Leras with an assist by Kelsier, and then this one was Kelsier until Ruin hip checked him and took his place real quick". None of the motivations of any of those 3 in this context ever made sense as explained in Secret History, and it's especially clear if you read Secret History immediately after marathoning the trilogy. Like I get that he wanted to tie up loose ends and give the fans a look behind the curtain, but either his Fact Check Force was on holiday, or he really was just backed into the corner by having written the Trilogy without having plotted out Kelsier's actions to see if they made sense. This sort of thing is common with prequels, but it just feels especially bad here for some reason
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Dec 1, 2020 01:54
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Agreed aside from White Sand the Secret History era 1 mistborn stuff is my least favorite thing he has done.
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Dec 1, 2020 04:16
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socialsecurity posted:Agreed aside from White Sand the Secret History era 1 mistborn stuff is my least favorite thing he has done. I'd forgotten that vol2 of White Sand came out. The first volume was... eh. I can respect the attempt to take some light material and turn it in to a story via another medium but it was definitely rough.
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Dec 1, 2020 04:24
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i don't mind misborn era 1, even if it felt a little YA and showed immaturity as a writer. elantris is still a slog though, even if parts are interesting--especially since it feels like he reused the characters from it in other books, they just feel familiar lol
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Dec 1, 2020 04:38
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Slanderer posted:i don't mind misborn era 1, even if it felt a little YA and showed immaturity as a writer. elantris is still a slog though, even if parts are interesting--especially since it feels like he reused the characters from it in other books, they just feel familiar lol Looking forward to starting Elantris after finishing Hero of Ages. 😂
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Dec 1, 2020 04:45
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Mordiceius posted:Looking forward to starting Elantris after finishing Hero of Ages. 😂 Do you have a reading order planned or are you sort of winging it?
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Dec 1, 2020 04:49
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Mordiceius posted:Looking forward to starting Elantris after finishing Hero of Ages. 😂 Despite being his first published books, Elantris contains one of his best-written characters. So you at least have that to look forward to.
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Dec 1, 2020 04:50
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Slanderer posted:Spoilers for Secret History: Yep. I guess I give him credit for not just explicitly retconning it, but it ended up being a convoluted mess. Yeah it technically all works but the characters are servicing the plot holes in a really obviously awkward way. RoW Spoilers I finished this today. It was a pretty meh book overall, but I did enjoy parts of it a great deal and continue to be a fan of the cosmere.
aparmenideanmonad fucked around with this message at 05:07 on Dec 1, 2020 |
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Dec 1, 2020 05:02
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M_Gargantua posted:Do you have a reading order planned or are you sort of winging it? Currently, I'm just getting through Hero of Ages and then my next thought was to move on to Elantris. From there, I was thinking of just tackling his stuff in published order, so I'd likely end up bouncing around a bunch. Dunno if this is the best way to handle things though. Just figured it would allow me to discover things as many here did. Because all these books and the Cosmere are starting to remind me of this -  I figure that the best way to pick up on hints/clues/references between the books is to just tackle them in the order he presented them to the world. As for Hero of Ages, I'm really enjoying it still. Based on the audiobook, I'm almost exactly 1/3 of the way through it (9 hours 15 minutes in to the 27.5 hour audio book). I am getting a little fatigued with just how many parallel character stories we have going - I think there are like 4 or 5 "main" characters we keep bouncing between. But to offset that, I really like that he has gone for making a bunch of short chapters vs fewer larger chapter. In The Final Empire/Well of Ascension, each chapter was 30-45 min long. Chapters in this book tend to run 10-25 min long with the rare 30-45min chapter. So it moves at a decent pace. Ready for the TenSoon story to kick into gear because every time we check in with him it's more "yup, he's waiting."
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Dec 1, 2020 05:37
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