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pik_d posted:Well what was the answer
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# ? Dec 7, 2023 22:21 |
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# ? Jun 3, 2024 22:51 |
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What's the science on where the mass comes from when you transform into something heavier than your regular self? Do you just have a large goo supply? Is there an upper bound to what you can turn into?
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# ? Dec 7, 2023 22:22 |
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pik_d posted:What's the science on where the mass comes from when you transform into something heavier than your regular self? Do you just have a large goo supply? Is there an upper bound to what you can turn into? it comes from your mom so the supply is essentially infinite
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# ? Dec 7, 2023 22:24 |
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I'm not sure if they ever answered that, I always presumed they were borrowing goo from elsewhere
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# ? Dec 7, 2023 22:25 |
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ChubbyChecker posted:it comes from your mom so the supply is essentially infinite
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# ? Dec 7, 2023 22:26 |
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pik_d posted:What's the science on where the mass comes from when you transform into something heavier than your regular self? Do you just have a large goo supply? Is there an upper bound to what you can turn into? Not particularly, the main antagonist with the same power has a bunch of forms that are whale sized or larger and the kids all turn into Sperm Whales so at least that big. Its basically magic replicating mass stored in the same magic pocket dimension that allows FTL travel.
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# ? Dec 7, 2023 22:30 |
Soonmot posted:reexperience this by going into the goldmine and reading the animorphs thread. I've also took over the Everworld thread that Epi had started before he passed for more Applegate content. Still rocking my ALLORAN WAS RIGHT shirt
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# ? Dec 7, 2023 22:54 |
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CainsDescendant posted:Yeah, like some sort of scene before the story where we see how bad things could go for a Dragon that doesn't succeed. There's the segment in the final climactic confrontation with TDO where he's showing Rand versions of the world after he wins their battle that was a cool "here's the stakes" section. I agree it'd be cool and useful, especially for people who have never read the novels, to have something along those lines. Rand also has some LTT memories when talking about the Forsaken throughout the novels telling people about their horrors during the War of Power that would useful to put on screen since they're all awake now. Or like an eagle eye montage of the world being shattered and remade in the Breaking, to drive home just how bad men channeling ends up. There's a lot of fluff that comes through in the writing throughout the books that is excellent scene setting and makes for a picture that TV only folks would benefit from seeing. But I'm not a TV writer and I can't imagine how you'd glean the relevant parts of the five million words in these books and turn them into something that make sense to put on screen at this stage, given the context we have so far.
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# ? Dec 7, 2023 23:19 |
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I just finished my re-read of the series, and part of the final faceoff with TDO always kinda bugged me. When Rand shows the future where he's destroyed the TDO and for some reason Elayne has become vapid and Rand hates it. The entire book series is full of examples of the difference between people who are evil shits for people reasons, and people who are Evil Shits because of The Literal Metaphysical Embodyment Of Evil's Influence. And then at the very end, that's not true and all evil is actually caused by TDO?
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# ? Dec 7, 2023 23:32 |
Rand's goal in killing TDO is to purge all "evil" from the world. That's literally what he was setting out to do. Thus, his projection of the world he would create has that as a given no matter what the reality is.
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# ? Dec 7, 2023 23:34 |
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Gnoman posted:Rand's goal in killing TDO is to purge all "evil" from the world. That's literally what he was setting out to do. Not literally no, his literal statement is "I'm going to kill the dark one"
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# ? Dec 7, 2023 23:35 |
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pik_d posted:What's the science on where the mass comes from when you transform into something heavier than your regular self? Do you just have a large goo supply? Is there an upper bound to what you can turn into?
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 00:00 |
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CainFortea posted:I just finished my re-read of the series, and part of the final faceoff with TDO always kinda bugged me. When Rand shows the future where he's destroyed the TDO and for some reason Elayne has become vapid and Rand hates it. TDO is the shadow cast by the existence of free will. He is a natural consequence of an eternity of people having will and making choices and sometimes using those choices to be evil shits for people reasons. However, since this is a fantasy series he is also a conscious, thinking being. The "natural state" of the world has him outside of it and unable to directly influence people, so in the AoL real-world mundane evil was the only kind there was. The Bore allowed him to reach out and give feedback, making the world in his own image to create more evil. The existence of free will, and people as we understand people, requires mundane evil to exist. If mundane evil exists, the Dark One must also exist. For it to be stable and sustainable, the Dark One must be sealed outside of the world.
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 00:01 |
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Killer robot posted:TDO is the shadow cast by the existence of free will. He is a natural consequence of an eternity of people having will and making choices and sometimes using those choices to be evil shits for people reasons. However, since this is a fantasy series he is also a conscious, thinking being. The "natural state" of the world has him outside of it and unable to directly influence people, so in the AoL real-world mundane evil was the only kind there was. The Bore allowed him to reach out and give feedback, making the world in his own image to create more evil. The existence of free will, and people as we understand people, requires mundane evil to exist. If mundane evil exists, the Dark One must also exist. For it to be stable and sustainable, the Dark One must be sealed outside of the world. That's a pretty well put together argument, but I don't vibe with it. If TDO is a reflection of free will, then TDO would cease to exist in the world where he wins cause there is no will of any kind. When faced with the absolutely void of nothingness that TDO offers as an option to Rand where neither of them win, TDO is saying this is acceptable to him. Also TDO normally exists outside of the pattern, and is so cut off from the reality inside the pattern that even time doesn't exist for him. So it just doesn't seem metaphysically viable to have him be a reflection of reality when he's so cut off from reality that even time has no meaning.
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 00:17 |
CainFortea posted:If TDO is a reflection of free will, then TDO would cease to exist in the world where he wins cause there is no will of any kind. When faced with the absolutely void of nothingness that TDO offers as an option to Rand where neither of them win, TDO is saying this is acceptable to him. This is, in fact, the entire point of it. TDO doesn't _want_ to exist, TDO is hate, and thus hates even itself. For it, it no longer existing is a win. edit: I maintain that TDO is not, in fact, actually sentient, it just appears to be in the same way a shadow appears to act on its own if you don't know it's a shadow being cast by something else.
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 00:41 |
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NinjaDebugger posted:This is, in fact, the entire point of it. TDO doesn't _want_ to exist, TDO is hate, and thus hates even itself. For it, it no longer existing is a win. The whole "break the Wheel and remake it in his image" thing is a lie, told by the Father of Lies, because it's way easier to get people to follow you with it. Turned out that there was approximately one (1) dude in all of existence who was on board with the "non-existence" plan and that probably made things a bit difficult.
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 01:16 |
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CainFortea posted:When Rand shows the future where he's destroyed the TDO and for some reason Elayne has become vapid and Rand hates it. I mean,
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 03:12 |
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bio347 posted:Not only that, but I'm relatively certain that that's the ACTUAL goal of the Dark One. Annihilation. Just because he's lying to everyone except Ishy about what would happen if he actually won doesn't mean that he wants to not exist at all. I think he does want to destroy the wheel and the pattern, but not out of a desire to not exist. He just hates everything else.
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 06:22 |
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NinjaDebugger posted:This is, in fact, the entire point of it. TDO doesn't _want_ to exist, TDO is hate, and thus hates even itself. For it, it no longer existing is a win. shaidar haran is tdo's avatar and is both sentient and sapient, so tdo must be too
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 10:55 |
TDO has to talk to rand over and over and over and over. Just ponder that for a moment. I’d want to be annihilated too. Oh gently caress, not you again. Yes, yes, you defy me. Lock me away lews. Stop drilling back in to see if I missed you. Leave me be.
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 18:24 |
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ADVERSARY! MY POSTING ENEMY!
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 18:25 |
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Rand: I WILL NEVER LOG OFF
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 18:41 |
So if TDO wins does Rand get reincarnated to make life a living hell for the shadow world blasting light all over the place? I have won again Shadow Fucker!
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 19:14 |
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Soul Glo posted:Rand: I WILL NEVER LOG OFF The Dragon Rereged
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 19:26 |
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 19:47 |
Invalid Validation posted:So if TDO wins does Rand get reincarnated to make life a living hell for the shadow world blasting light all over the place? I have won again Shadow Fucker! Actually yes. Every time TDO gets a perfectly sealed prison, ie wins, rand loving al Thor comes along and drills a hole in it to blast it with light.
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 19:54 |
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nine-gear crow posted:The Dragon Rereged
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 19:56 |
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# ? Dec 8, 2023 20:03 |
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Data Graham posted:Tangentially — a thing I've been thinking about that I find a little bit immersion-breaking about the conceit of the book is that it spends a lot of time talking about geographical and geological features that could only have been created over millions of years, like the Waste which is described as being basically Monument Valley/Zion, with pillars and buttes and arches that would have been the result of long slow processes of erosion. They couldn't really have formed that way through a single sudden cataclysm.
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# ? Dec 10, 2023 04:39 |
Shageletic posted:Yeah the show sometimes has good ideas but it's execution has usually just left me befuddled and left wondering at the showrunner's choices. Like Perrin's and Egwene's escape frim Valda for example. Yeah pretty much. Finally got around to watching S2. Significant improvement over S1; if S1 was a C+ with some amazing highpoints then S2 was a solid B+ that had lower highs but more of then and overall a much better balance in terms of pacing, plotting, etc. That said, they made some weird or inconsistent choices left me feeling like they flubbed the landing a little bit and set themselves up to be stuck in corners later. What did work: - They continue to make great casting choices. Everyone was pretty much perfect, especially Lanfear and Ishamael. I hope they keep the same actor for Ishamael's eventual resurrection, anyone who has to follow that act would be in a tough position. Nu-Mat was good enough that I pretty much forgot about the original guy. Elayne was really good, clearly haughty but with the right amount of vulnerability. Min also great. Excited to see Moghidien being creepy as hell later on. - S2 does a great job of giving Ishamael more interaction with the whole Two Rivers squad, which is great and layers in their importance without the Scooby-Doo villain vibes in the books. They also did a great job of giving Lanfear and Ishamael space to bounce off each other so we get more of a sense of their motivations. - Letting Rand roam free for a while in Cairhien was great. We get to see that he is capable of being cunning and sneaky and methodical, and acquiring some worldliness that will come in handy later on. The relationship with "Selene" and his interactions with Logain were very good. - Lanfear was terrifying but not incoherently so. Easy to see how she goes from this to the showdown at Rhuidean as Rand comes more into his own and builds relationships separate from her. - Thinning out the roster by combining certain characters went a long way. Sucks that we didnt get Hurrin, but having Elyas in that spot makes a ton of sense. Same for smushing Liandrin and Alviarin together. Combining Verin with Vandene was smart too. - Verin clearly Black Ajah from the jump but not so overtly that it would raise suspicion. - Moiraine's family stuff in Cairhien was solid. I expected it to bog down the story but it worked great. - Seanchan were great. Costuming was on point, the culture was sufficiently weird, all the damane/suldam stuff was well sold - props to Egwene's actress for performing the hell out of those scenes. - Everything in Atuan's Mill was amazing. I can't remember if they mentioned the name of the village or not, but either way I was surprised as hell when the Seanchan showed up. The battle was very good, the oath swearing sequence was great, and Perrin's interactions with the Dain Bornhold and the whitecloaks was a nice piece of new plotting. - The flashback scene with Ishamael's sealing was very good, much better than the AoL flashback in S1. It looked like all the channelers making the seal were men (100 companions), which would help explain why the seals didn't work so well on Ishamael. - Whitecloaks not being idiots was very good. Using child soldiers to do their smoke cover thing was both tactically effective and completely in line with their level of religious zealotry. - Big step up in quality in the sets and costuming. S1 had a lot of issues where stuff just didn't look lived in or sufficiently weathered or distinct but they seem to have gotten over whatever hurdle was causing that. What didn't work: - Lan getting jobbed by 2 fades and then holding off dozens of Seanchan. I know they wanted to sell the importance of the bond as well as his relationship with Moiraine but didn't work for me. Just felt like them playing pretty fast and loose with bonds and power-ups. - Similarly, Moiraine nuking a whole fleet of Seanchan ships from...3...5 miles away? I get they wanted to give Rosamund Pike a big scene for this season but it just didn't make sense. - Perrin killing the elder Bornhold over Hopper...I don't know how they write themselves out of this later on. I know they want to show Perrin as being less mopey and self-pitying but it is a pretty big deal, at multiple points in the story, that he is falsely accused. That dynamic informs a lot of the tension in his plotline. My guess is that they will lean into his interactions with the Aiel and the ji'e'toh concept to resolve it - maybe he goes to Rhuidean with Rand instead of Mat? IDK. - The final showdown at Falme fell flat. Showing the whole Two Rivers squad fighting together against the Dark to show why Rand isn't the only important one works great. Ishamael throwing fireballs in a straight line for 5 minutes at a shield of air, not great. I know we were never gonna get the swordfight in the sky, but the sequence we did get was underwhelming. Ingtar getting his line about holding off 50 men but then getting ganked after dropping like 6? Bad. Nynaeve somehow not angry enough to channel despite everything else going on? Bad. Moiraine doing the flaming dragon thing to proclaim Rand? Bad. - The Aiel were...fine. One of those things where seeing it on screen makes it clear how silly the concept is but they did it as well as they could I think. - Flashback with Gitara Moroso's foretelling was very out of place, althought seeing more of Siuan and Moiraine's relationship was nice. Not sure what they were trying to do with Siuan at all this season, felt very much like a fumble. - Not enough Padan Fain. Overall it was a good, and a marked improvement over S1 to the extent that I'm excited to see S3. Curious to see where they go with a couple of things. Is it always two dozen Heroes of the Horn or does it scale up to match the need? Are the Seanchan gonna find out about the Damane/Suldam dynamic? Why did all the other Forsaken bug out immediately instead of ganging up on Rand? I also get the feeling they're going to skip the Stone of Tear, or at least not have it be as big of a deal - Rand will get Callandor somewhere else (or it will get cut out). But all things considered they've covered two books in two seasons in a much better manner than I would've expected. Mat Cauthon fucked around with this message at 18:21 on Dec 10, 2023 |
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# ? Dec 10, 2023 18:18 |
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Mat Cauthon posted:- Similarly, Moiraine nuking a whole fleet of Seanchan ships from...3...5 miles away? I get they wanted to give Rosamund Pike a big scene for this season but it just didn't make sense. I hated this the most. (I saw the other day Sanderson has this in his top two as well.) I said in the show thread back when it aired: they already introduced sa’angreal at the end of season one. All they had to do was have Lanfear shove one in Moiraine’s hand while she’s saying “you’ll know what to do when the time comes” before booting her out of the Ways. Maybe she overdraws it and it cracks so we don’t have it solving problems forever. (I don’t think there’s precedent for that in the books but I wouldn’t complain.) Mat Cauthon posted:- Not sure what they were trying to do with Siuan at all this season, felt very much like a fumble. They were trying to do the bare minimum, because the actress was busy. its HIM fucked around with this message at 04:09 on Dec 11, 2023 |
# ? Dec 11, 2023 03:22 |
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its HIM posted:I hated this the most. (I say the other day Sanderson has this in gods to two as well.) I said in the show thread back when it aired: they already introduced sa’angreal at the end of season one. All they had to do was have Lanfear shove one in Moiraine’s hand while she’s saying “you’ll know what to do when the time comes” before booting her out of the Ways. Maybe she overdraws it and it cracks so we don’t have it solving problems forever. (I don’t think there’s precedent for that in the books but I wouldn’t complain.) The Choedan Kal literally cracked and melted after Rand cleansed saidin Granted that's like THE craziest expenditure of Power ever, but it's a precedent!
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# ? Dec 11, 2023 03:31 |
its HIM posted:I hated this the most. (I saw the other day Sanderson has this in his top two as well.) I said in the show thread back when it aired: they already introduced sa’angreal at the end of season one. All they had to do was have Lanfear shove one in Moiraine’s hand while she’s saying “you’ll know what to do when the time comes” before booting her out of the Ways. Maybe she overdraws it and it cracks so we don’t have it solving problems forever. (I don’t think there’s precedent for that in the books but I wouldn’t complain.)
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# ? Dec 11, 2023 08:05 |
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DTurtle posted:I can't recall all the details, but in the books we regularly see casters doing similar things at similar ranges. During the battle at Cairhien against the Shaido Egwene and Aviendha is the biggest example from the earlyish books I can remember. Also when they take the bowl of the windows from Ebou Dar through gateway and Elayne is unweaving it, the damane shields her like a mile out.
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# ? Dec 11, 2023 08:23 |
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CainFortea posted:Also when they take the bowl of the windows from Ebou Dar through gateway and Elayne is unweaving it, the damane shields her like a mile out. I recall it being a theme that if you can see it, you can affect it with channeling irrespective of distance. Given the way the text describes flows of different thickness, I would imagine there's like some loss of dexterity as things are more distant. Like, you can't see a flow of spirit as thin as a hair when you're channeling it at something a mile away or whatever, so you can't make a flow that thin at that distance. That's something that I always enjoyed about Robert Jordan's handling of the One Power. There's a lot of descriptions that are basically "fire and earth woven just so" where a lot of other fantasy authors wouldn't be able to resist the urge to give a detailed description of the warp & weft of the weave. I like when my fantasy acknowledges that something is alien to my understanding and manages to also convey understanding on the part of character in the text.
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# ? Dec 11, 2023 16:34 |
I think a lot of those descriptions come from Rand who is like.... the best channeler ever and kind of work with him understanding the power at a completely intuitive level
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# ? Dec 11, 2023 22:45 |
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Comrade Blyatlov posted:I think a lot of those descriptions come from Rand who is like.... the best channeler ever and kind of work with him understanding the power at a completely intuitive level OTOH, book Moiraine has an angreal pretty much entirely so that she can do badass things so. Y'know. Just use that.
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# ? Dec 12, 2023 01:15 |
Finished The Shadow Rising on my reread. Still my favorite of the series, possibly one of my all time favorite fantasy novels in general. Rhuidean, Nynaeve v Moghedien, Corpse Reanimation, Showdown with Asmodean, Everything Two Rivers, Tower Split. Just so many great moments and arcs packed into the book. Shooting to finish The Fires of Heaven before year's end. its HIM posted:I hated this the most. (I saw the other day Sanderson has this in his top two as well.) I said in the show thread back when it aired: they already introduced sa’angreal at the end of season one. All they had to do was have Lanfear shove one in Moiraine’s hand while she’s saying “you’ll know what to do when the time comes” before booting her out of the Ways. Maybe she overdraws it and it cracks so we don’t have it solving problems forever. (I don’t think there’s precedent for that in the books but I wouldn’t complain.) The only limit on using the Power on something is line of sight. Rand, Egwene, and Aviendha are wrecking stuff miles away in their tower in FoH. If you can see it, you can channel at it. Devorum fucked around with this message at 09:18 on Dec 12, 2023 |
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# ? Dec 12, 2023 08:57 |
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IIRC there are still limits at a distance. During the siege of Cairhien, Rand blows up a hill and mentions that it was about as far as he could channel (or maybe as far as he could without an agreal?). Additionally, in one of the books its mentioned you can channel without line of sight if you know precisely where something is located, but this is never expanded upon. Instead, they introduce the rules of travelling, which seem to be "you can make a gateway to wherever as long as someone roughly describes the destination to you", which always seemed not well thought out (ie, if Sanderson had done something like this, he'd be using travelling for blind scouting or prospecting just by trying to see if you can find a way to open a gateway to somewhere that might exist) edit: I googled it and someone on reddit had found the reference: quote:Channeling and distance
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# ? Dec 12, 2023 18:48 |
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# ? Jun 3, 2024 22:51 |
The moiraine scene at the beach would have been in arguably fine if she had just used the power to build up a giant wave, then sent that wave out st the boats, crashing them.
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# ? Dec 12, 2023 18:52 |