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The oaths go by whatever the person swearing to them believe. I guess most people wouldn't see that as a weapon so it wouldn't count.
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Feb 22, 2013 21:35
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TheGreySpectre posted:So I've just started into the Brander Sanderson books. I'm about almost halfway through The Gathering Storm right now and I had a question. In Chapter 16 where Elaida and Egwene come head to head in Elaids study and Elaida calls Egwene a Dark friend, Elaida beats Egwene with switches of air until she bleeds. If you don't think of something as breaking one of the Oaths, it isn't. Siuan could make a knife out of Air to cut her dinner, even though that's "making a weapon by which one man could kill another"; Moiraine could say things that weren't true as long as she believed them true. Similarly, Aes Sedai can Gentle men, i.e., kill them with the one power, but they don't think of that as using the power as a weapon -- it's more like a judicial penalty -- so it isn't.
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Feb 22, 2013 21:35
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*edit* better answers above
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Feb 22, 2013 21:44
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:If you don't think of something as breaking one of the Oaths, it isn't. Siuan could make a knife out of Air to cut her dinner, even though that's "making a weapon by which one man could kill another"; Moiraine could say things that weren't true as long as she believed them true. rodbeard posted:The oaths go by whatever the person swearing to them believe. I guess most people wouldn't see that as a weapon so it wouldn't count. I guess I look at this and wonder when it does become a weapon then. If I carry around a pocket knife, that is a tool under most uses. As soon as I try to stab someone with it becomes a weapon though. It is all in how you use it. A pen becomes a weapon if you try to attack someone with it. Suian cutting a steak not her attacking anyone. Every single definition I have found of weapon involves using something for attacking or attempting to injure ( I checked a few different dictionaries). I can't come up with anyway that you could switch someone without the intent to injure. If you can switch someone until they are bleeding, can you switch them until they bleed to death? What if you use a switch fast enough to cut them in half? How is that any different from using the power as a sword and nicking someone? At one point does it become a weapon?
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Feb 22, 2013 21:50
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TheGreySpectre posted:So I've just started into the Brandon Sanderson books. I'm about almost halfway through The Gathering Storm right now and I had a question. In Chapter 16 where Elaida and Egwene come head to head in Elaids study and Elaida calls Egwene a Dark friend, Elaida beats Egwene with switches of air until she bleeds. At the moment Elaida thinks Egwene is a Darkfriend, so the oath's don't apply. I think they talk about it a bit later in the book.
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Feb 22, 2013 21:52
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VelveetaAvenger posted:At the moment Elaida thinks Egwene is a Darkfriend, so the oath's don't apply. I think they talk about it a bit later in the book. That makes a lot of sense, and I did not think of it that way.
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Feb 22, 2013 21:52
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I think the relevant difference here would be between "attack" and "punishment," where a "weapon" is defined as "a tool used for an attack."
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Feb 22, 2013 21:53
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:I think the relevant difference here would be between "attack" and "punishment," where a "weapon" is defined as "a tool used for an attack." Under many definitions a weapon is a tool used to injure or cause harm. Punishment can be inflicted with the use of a weapon, they are not exclusive. If the mob punishes someone by shooting them in the kneecap that does not stop the gun from being a weapon. If you beat a someone with a leather whip as punishment then the whip is a weapon while you punish them. Furthermore, within the context of WoT I think your defintion would be too easy to circumvent the oath entirely. If you can punish someone then it would be too easy for Aes Sedai to say "we are punishing the invading army for being in our land against our wishes", they could get around the weapon oath by punishing people for the most offenses so trivial that they can just pull them out of their rear end so willy nilly that it would be meaningless. I think VelveetaAvenger's idea that the oath's exception takes place as soon as Elaida calls Egwene a darkfriend probably makes the most sense as it clear cut and does not involve trying to rule lawyer the oaths. It just works.
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Feb 22, 2013 22:03
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I don't think it's rules-lawyering to say there's a difference between punishing someone and attacking them with a weapon; for example, it's legal in some places to hit your child with your belt, but it isn't legal to take a belt-like piece of leather and beat someone you just met in a bar, even if you say you're punishing that stranger for making you mad. Novices are children, in the eyes of the White Tower, and novices are regularly punished by being spanked, paddled, or birched, so even sisters who have sworn an oath not to use the One Power as a weapon would probably not see using the One Power to replace a hand, paddle, or birch as using a weapon.
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Feb 22, 2013 22:29
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TheGreySpectre posted:Furthermore, within the context of WoT I think your defintion would be too easy to circumvent the oath entirely. If you can punish someone then it would be too easy for Aes Sedai to say "we are punishing the invading army for being in our land against our wishes", they could get around the weapon oath by punishing people for the most offenses so trivial that they can just pull them out of their rear end so willy nilly that it would be meaningless. They can't just have a rationalization. They have to believe the rationalization. They need to fully believe that what they're doing isn't using the power as a weapon, not be able to come up with a way you could argue it isn't.
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Feb 22, 2013 22:31
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zonohedron posted:I don't think it's rules-lawyering to say there's a difference between punishing someone and attacking them with a weapon; for example, it's legal in some places to hit your child with your belt, but it isn't legal to take a belt-like piece of leather and beat someone you just met in a bar, even if you say you're punishing that stranger for making you mad. Novices are children, in the eyes of the White Tower, and novices are regularly punished by being spanked, paddled, or birched, so even sisters who have sworn an oath not to use the One Power as a weapon would probably not see using the One Power to replace a hand, paddle, or birch as using a weapon. Plus, I'm fairly sure it's also mentioned somewhere that there are rules about not using the One Power to discipline Tower initiates. If it were prevented by the Oaths, a separate tradition wouldn't be necessary.
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Feb 22, 2013 22:37
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TheGreySpectre posted:I guess I look at this and wonder when it does become a weapon then. If I carry around a pocket knife, that is a tool under most uses. As soon as I try to stab someone with it becomes a weapon though. It is all in how you use it. A pen becomes a weapon if you try to attack someone with it. Suian cutting a steak not her attacking anyone. The rest has been covered, Egwene specifically thinks to herself later on that she didn't draw blood with the switching. It was from shattered glass.
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Feb 23, 2013 03:12
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Also keep in mind that Elaida is deep in Fain-inspired paranoid madness. When your perception of reality isn't quite up to snuff with everyone else's, and with the oaths functioning primarily off your belief and perspective, she can probably get away with doing some capricious and severe poo poo that a 'sane' sister couldn't. She probably really did believe her accusation; at the least she saw her actions as righteous justice. There's a big difference between switching/corporal punishment and annihilating an army that's merely trespassing. Now, if they were attacking Tar Valon and warders and sisters were in danger that's another story...
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Feb 23, 2013 04:05
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I think it's also a pretty good illustration that the Three Oaths are flimsy bullshit.
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Feb 24, 2013 00:17
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Holy geez... took me 3 days to read the book, and 5 days to get through this thread. Loved it. One long battle... it was so wearying reading it at times (in a good way) it made it easier to feel the fatigue the characters must have felt. So meta. Anyway, here's something I find interesting. Depending on who is asked, Mat is the "Son of Battle" or "Lord of Battle..." but at the end, Demandred defeats him, as far as I am concerned. Mat was composing a symphony on the battlefield, was dancing note for note and beat for beat with the enemy general. He knew he needed to do something Damandred didn't expect, so he started arraying his forces to appear weaker than he was. He even staged a fight with Tuon and had about a quarter of his forces removed from the battlefield, in order to get Demandred out of position... but as far as I can tell, Demandred never got out of position. He just kept chewing up the forces of Light, and then... wildcard Lan rides up and kills Demandred. Mat saw that as a culmination of his big genius plan? Put his forces in a vulnerable position and hope someone wins an unplanned duel against Demandred and then pull the Seanchan back in and beat everyone? That doesn't seem like a good plan to me. Mat didn't call the Seanchan back to the fight until after Demandred was killed... so what was Mat's plan if no one killed Demandred? Let his army get chewed up to nothing, as they were, and then... what? Correct me if I am wrong, but even the Hinderstap villagers only released the river after the Trollocs were retreating, after they lost their command and control structure. So I don't see anything Mat did as LORD OF BATTLE there at the end of the fight. Seems like Lan won it all, and Mat just mopped up. Mat kept it all from being a 10v1 rout, but he was just getting crushed in slow motion.
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Feb 24, 2013 03:26
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Well, if you look at like the battle was literally hopeless, you could say that he "won" it by holding out until Rand could handle Shai'Tan.
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Feb 24, 2013 03:35
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rafikki posted:Well, if you look at like the battle was literally hopeless, you could say that he "won" it by holding out until Rand could handle Shai'Tan. If that's the case, then it makes Mat seem a little... something... it was a hopeless battle, so just in case Rand lost (or wildcard does not defeat Demandred in a duel), make sure there are some Seanchan forces left to try to defend Ebou Dar, at the expense of the Two Rivers men, Andoreans, Ogier, Aes Sedai, etc?
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Feb 24, 2013 03:47
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GORDON posted:Holy geez... took me 3 days to read the book, and 5 days to get through this thread. He fought the greatest general of the war of power to essentially a draw with inferior forces. He doesn't have the forces to win outright: he is stalling for time and maintaining a reserve he can use to exploit any opening he's given. But since his forces are inferior and he's against someone as good or almost as good as he is, he lacks the ability to force a mistake. Anyone else commands their forces and they'd have gotten crushed well before Demandread died.
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Feb 24, 2013 03:53
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Or, to put it simply, a battle doesn't need to result in the other side being routed and their ground being secured for it to be a victory for your side. RJ was a military historian if I recall, so this probably falls under the category of "stuff that isn't very fantasy adventure-ish but is definitely realistic"
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Feb 24, 2013 07:57
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evilweasel posted:He fought the greatest general of the war of power to essentially a draw with inferior forces. He doesn't have the forces to win outright: he is stalling for time and maintaining a reserve he can use to exploit any opening he's given. But since his forces are inferior and he's against someone as good or almost as good as he is, he lacks the ability to force a mistake. Anyone else commands their forces and they'd have gotten crushed well before Demandread died. And given how lopsided it was by the end, it's a miracle to even hold out at all. Numerically they are vastly outnumbered by the Trollocs. Channeling wise, the Sharans completely tipped the scales, coming in when both Tower forces are exhausted already. Mobility wise they are superior only because the Shadow's forces are so large that even Traveling and Portal Stones wouldn't do the trick. Information wise they are infiltrated, and on every level, with all the subverted Great Captains having already cost the forces of the Light more than they can spare, while extant spies are still everywhere. The Forsaken provided finally, an edge in skill and experience. All the advantages lay to the Shadow...except for luck. Mat has to use all his skill to buy an opportunity for luck to kick in. A decapitation strike would seem the obvious solution, except no military endeavor could get near Demandred. It would take lone madmen to make it work.
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Feb 24, 2013 08:52
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I also really liked how that finally played out. Sanderson did a really good job of faking the reader out twice before it finally worked.
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Feb 26, 2013 14:43
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I was kind of hoping that Galad would end up taking down Demandred. I think it would have been a nice gently caress you to Demandred to be killed by the Dragon's half-brother.
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Feb 26, 2013 20:17
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Haraksha posted:I also really liked how that finally played out. Sanderson did a really good job of faking the reader out twice before it finally worked. I don't think anyone thought the first one had much of a chance though.
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Feb 26, 2013 20:34
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Antioch posted:I was kind of hoping that Galad would end up taking down Demandred. I think it would have been a nice gently caress you to Demandred to be killed by the Dragon's half-brother. I did enjoy him spitting on the ground in contempt, defiant right to the last. Galad was awesome.
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Feb 27, 2013 09:49
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I just reread the entire series in one 35 day marathon, 16 years after first picking up the series. It was gloriously cathartic and everything teenage me could've hoped for. And most important, it's done. Forever.
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Feb 27, 2013 17:42
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pac man frogs posted:I just reread the entire series in one 35 day marathon, 16 years after first picking up the series. It was gloriously cathartic and everything teenage me could've hoped for. Until the HBO series, then we'll be back to waiting another 14 years for it to be finished again.
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Feb 28, 2013 00:49
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A truly epic novel; it was one of those rare books that really hurt when you put it down, because we've spent so long being invested in it. I've read the first 13 more times than I care to count, but I'm not entirely sure I'll be able to read it again now that it's (read: I'm) complete.
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Feb 28, 2013 04:20
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veekie posted:I don't think anyone thought the first one had much of a chance though. No, but the rings had been built up for a book at that point and he sure was wearing a lot of them. It was an outside chance, but it could have happened.
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Feb 28, 2013 11:47
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It being Gawyn takes away all the edge that they granted.
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Feb 28, 2013 14:01
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veekie posted:It being Gawyn takes away all the edge that they granted. It's not that, it's the fact there was about half the book left to read that you knew he would fail. If I had been reading it on a kindle and didnt know how many pages were left I may have seriously thought he had a chance.
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Feb 28, 2013 15:52
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evilweasel posted:They can't just have a rationalization. They have to believe the rationalization. They need to fully believe that what they're doing isn't using the power as a weapon, not be able to come up with a way you could argue it isn't. Thats what I was thinking about using the power and being bound by the Oaths- Its all about intent, if you use a knife of air for cutting food, or trimming something that would be perfectly fine. Even if you made some sort of whirring saw out of power with the intent to cut down trees that would be just fine as well. Even if you didn't mean to harm anyone and someone was harmed by it, say by slipping and then falling into that saw made of air, I think it would still happen because the caster had no desire to actually do it.
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Feb 28, 2013 16:10
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Kinetica posted:Thats what I was thinking about using the power and being bound by the Oaths- Its all about intent, if you use a knife of air for cutting food, or trimming something that would be perfectly fine. Even if you made some sort of whirring saw out of power with the intent to cut down trees that would be just fine as well. Yeah if you were using the Power to explode trees into firewood, and then somebody happened to be hiding in it, that's an accident and not a weapon. Likewise if you used the Power on Shadowspawn and hurt someone else by accident, or if you believed beyond reasonable doubt somebody was a Darkfriend.
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Feb 28, 2013 16:42
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veekie posted:Yeah if you were using the Power to explode trees into firewood, and then somebody happened to be hiding in it, that's an accident and not a weapon. Likewise if you used the Power on Shadowspawn and hurt someone else by accident, or if you believed beyond reasonable doubt somebody was a Darkfriend. Another example, when Elayne unraveled her gateway in POD it created an explosion. Accident, not weapon.
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Feb 28, 2013 20:30
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caleramaen posted:Another example, when Elayne unraveled her gateway in POD it created an explosion. Accident, not weapon. She wasn't under Three Oaths at that point, however, so the distinction is noted and irrelevant.
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Feb 28, 2013 21:03
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Just reread the series again and given all that happens in the series, the prologue to EotW is one of the creepier bits. I mean, for all intents and purposes LTT is Rand, it's essentially the Rand al'Thor we've come to know over the course of 14 books in the prologue, just a version of him that is 100% batshit crazy. Seriously, reread the EotW prologue, substituting 'Rand' for Lews Therin (and Aviendha or Min or Elayne for Ilyena) and see if it doesn't read creepy as gently caress. Also, books 1 and 2, with the benefit of hindsight, seem to be Jordan looking to find his footing. Some kind of odd bits and tone that changes in book 3 and beyond. Moiraine will not shut up about "The wheel weaves as the wheel wills", like every sentence. The blue 'focus' gem in her diadem thing is something that wouldn't have been done later, ditto her staff being the focus for her channeling. And I'm like 99% sure that Taim = Demandred at least at first. An old page that still makes decent arguments: http://www.angelfire.com/ego/tzarchasm/wot/theories/taimandred_full.html I think Jordan retconned it later to have Taim be an analogue of Demandred to Rand's LTT, with Taim bitter about always being second best. And after this reread, I'm declaring FoH the best book in the series. Lots of good stuff in there. e: If there ever were 'extended universe' type books, my biggest wish would be for LTT's story. It'd be way too long (given that he lived hundreds of years) and way too dark, but drat would that be cool. e2: The Lord Bude posted:
I always pictured Verin as looking like a mid-1980s Diane Wiest  Tough to put an age on her imo Mid 1990s Stockard Channing is also tough to pin down to an age  I'm sure there are current actresses that could pull it off. Cate Blanchett? regulargonzalez fucked around with this message at 14:23 on Mar 4, 2013 |
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Mar 4, 2013 13:57
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My fan-casting for Cate Blanchett would be Elaida or Graendal. And no, I still don't believe Taim was ever meant to be Demandred.
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Mar 4, 2013 14:38
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Verin I've always imagined as a kind of grey haired Miss Marple type. (In fact, now that I think about it, Miss Marple may very well have been a partial inspiration for the character, they are very similar in the way they both poke around, squirreling out facts, pretending to be dotty eccentric old bats while secretly soaking in every nuance people provide in a conversation. Cate Blanchett would make a good Aes Sedai, but as I'm pretty sure I've mentioned before in this thread, Elaida reminds me so much of Kai Winn from DS9 that I kind of want to see Loise Fletcher play her. (With lots of makeup to make her seem younger). Actually putting 'young' makeup on an older actress and 'old' makeup on a young actress might be a good way of portraying agelessness. I do love me some Stockard Channing, but I think she'd be wasted on Aes Sedai serenity. Make her a wise one, or Egwene's mother or perhaps Morgase. While we're at it, lets cast Josh Hutcherson as Perrin and Logan Lerman as Mat. Dye his hair red and I think Nicholas Hoult would be a decent Rand; there aren't many really good actors who are both over 6' and young enough to be convincing as an 18 year old. Taim has never been Demandred. People need to stop being butthurt that their pet theory was wrong and shut up about it.
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Mar 4, 2013 15:12
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api call girl posted:And no, I still don't believe Taim was ever meant to be Demandred.
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Mar 4, 2013 15:13
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regulargonzalez posted:Do you think he was an intentional red herring, or it's pure unfounded speculation? Leaning to unfounded- there was no sign that it was him, other than Taim was a darkfriend. And, I would think that Demandred would have been more circumspect that Taim was in the beginning where it was showing he had turned darkfriend.
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Mar 4, 2013 17:24
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regulargonzalez posted:Do you think he was an intentional red herring, or it's pure unfounded speculation? I think Taim was always supposed to be the new Age's version of Sammael and Demandred. Given only those parallels, he was turned, at latest, right after Rand turned him loose on the farm. If Amico and Joiya were entirely truthful (and Joiya could have been, because if Taim had already been freed, it's not a current plot any longer) then he could've been recruited when freed. Every Forsaken would have been freed in the TGH time period when Egwene was a novice in the Tower and Rand was stuck in a time forward thing, giving (who we now know was) Demandred the opportunity. I don't think, given the risks, that there was ever any real opportunity to insert a disguised Forsaken in Rand's retinue which is what Taim was originally aiming for, until Rand picked out a reincarnated Aginor later on, which everyone, including Aginor, was surprised by. Aginor was probably inserted to keep an eye on Taim the recruit and also to help recruit Darkfriends, since the 13x13 would have been too obvious to use early on. Taim also has a very pertinent parallel to Mesaana, who was originally denied a research position at the Collam Daan, and became a school administrator instead. During the War of Power she was a resentful technocratic governor who was extremely efficient and ruthless and started a number of schools where she taught them all. The short of it is, Taim just has too many parallels to any or all of these Forsaken that joined the Shadow because they felt slighted by the Light, and there's no way Taimandred would have known he would have been assigned to the Black Tower. The real play for Taimandred as a theory would have been to get close to Rand to do unspecified action X, which at that point was completely irrelevant to the Shadow's plans. Point being, every other 2nd round Forsaken had something else going on--Rahvin with Andor, Sammael with Illian, Graendal in Arad Doman, Mesaana plopped into the White Tower, Semirhage in Seandar, etc. No loving way in hell Demandred, with his ties to Semirhage and Mesaana, would have taken a gamble to just put himself near Rand, when there was no way anyone would have known at that point Rand was going to start the Black Tower for Demandred to subvert, and no opportunities for him to cultivate his own power base aside from. As a total aside, I have a problem whenever people pick dictionary words to quibble over as main points of support for pet theories. Which is where all this "renegade" and "so-called" poo poo comes in. VAGENDA OF MANOCIDE fucked around with this message at 18:58 on Mar 4, 2013 |
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Mar 4, 2013 18:44
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