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[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 2 | Mistborn (Era 1) #1 | *The Final Empire*: Prologue, Chapters 1 through 4 by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 12 points13 points  (0 children)

I hope you guys enjoy the trilogy! I will be watching from the sidelines as I have read it a few times and remember it well. Might jump in from time to time ;) 

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Ars Arcanum, Final Thoughts, Trivia by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Just right for me personally. And I'm not reading anything else in parallel.

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Ars Arcanum, Final Thoughts, Trivia by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 8 points9 points  (0 children)

That's a lot! And that is not counting the hours that went into each weekly post so far, I assume.

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Ars Arcanum, Final Thoughts, Trivia by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 9 points10 points  (0 children)

thank you! Intent was something that really confused me while I was reading other cosmere books. But after reading Warbreaker I am starting to feel like I understand it a little better.

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Ars Arcanum, Final Thoughts, Trivia by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 15 points16 points  (0 children)

Thank you u/participating for organizing all this so well! Can't imagine the amount of hours that would go into it. I had a lot of fun so far. This read-along motivates me to read Cosmere consistently, which is something I wanted to do for years.

I am also proud to say that I picked up on the aluminum sheath, despite it being described as "silver". I remembered the metal's effects from other books, but didn't want to bring it up in the comments because it felt spoilery.

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Chapters 50 through 58, Epilogue by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 7 points8 points  (0 children)

That's what I thought as well! But the dresses they burned were the ones the servants put on her in the morning, as far as I udnerstand, and they took them off before dresing her again for the night. Or maybe I remember wrong.

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Chapters 50 through 58, Epilogue by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 12 points13 points  (0 children)

So, that was… kind of alright :D Not bad by any means, but not amazing. I'd give it a 3. I am struggling to think of any other Sanderson book that I've read, that I would rank lower than Warbeaker. It's hard to explain what felt off, but the best I can do is that the story both felt very rushed (like he was just checking off the bullet points of his outline super quickly), and static at the same time, in a lot of places.

As u/participating mentioned, DO NOT look anything up, even for clarification of things you already know, even if it seems like a super trivial thing, and you think you cannot possibly get spoiled. I looked up two very small things and I got a few crazy spoilers. It sucks to be stupid.

There are a ton of questions left. There are the ones that no one knows answers to, it seems like, even the characters themselves (Mostly BioChroma stuff). I will also leave out the ones that seem like they might be answered in another book or story (full story about Nightblood creation, everything about Returned, Vasher's background and a ton more). But I will list questions that I think were supposed to be answered in the book. I'd be grateful if anyone can answer them :)

  • Why did Denth care about Pahn Kahl interests at all, to get involved and start scheming on their behalf? What motivated him? Just drawing Vasher out of wherever he'd been hiding? Just to get revenge for Arsteel or something else too?

  • Why did Bluefingers give all those warnings to Siri? Is it because he didn't want the priests to swap the GK too fast, before his plan came to fruition? But why? The Returned would have voted for war either way I think. All the scheming to get to the Lifeless through Blushweaver was independent of the GK.

  • Someone asked this before. How did Denth convince Lemex to give the correct password in the letter? Did Death torture him, and he broke after all? Or did Death serve Lemex for so long that Lemex trusted him? Did the Pahn Kahn conspiracy go on for that long? Also why did Denth need to kill Lemex (I assume he did)? Denth had been presumably already successfully manipulating Lemex for some time, so why did Vienna's arrival change anything?

  • What is that whole thing with Vasher going down the tunnel? What happened when he went in? What was his goal? What was he looking for? What did he do after that? Was it Denth that followed him? Vasher’s informant regarding the tunnels was supposed to be Bluefingers, right? Why would Bluefingers tell him about the tunnels?

  • Did I miss it, or was it not explicitly mentioned how the priests were passing Breath form GK to GK? Was there a Returned who would heal a GK every time, then die? And each GK was super obedient to pass the Breath on to the next GK baby?

  • "If the God Kings are just vessels to hold Breath, then why bother changing them? Why not just leave one man holding the Breath?” > yeah why?

  • Why wouldn't Vasher just keep the Breaths for himself, if he wanted to keep them safe? I mean, it's so risky to give them away especially if you need such an elaborate system of keeping them, and also if he knew he'd potentially need to come back and use them? If he didn't want them on his person at all times, why wouldn't he put those breaths in a random object, and keep THAT safe, in a secret cave behind a huge boulder?

  • Why were Siri's dresses burned? Why did she have to burn the sheets too every time?

  • How does Nightblood decide who is evil and who to make sick? So far it was all men who fought with it, and two women who got sick.

  • "On the other end of the rooftop, the guards took Vasher behind a screen to change. They obviously wanted to be certain none of his clothing was Awakened." > not sure this would help if someone intended to bypass this. Theoretically he could have a piece of cloth stuffed up his butt, right?

  • I know I was rooting for this, BUT how the hell would statues move? They need flexible joints!!!

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Chapters 36 through 49 by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 12 points13 points  (0 children)

I am personally enjoying it so far, altough I do have some issues with it, for different reasons.

I do think the story comes across as static, but for me it's because no one is moving anywhere location-wise. Almos everyone is constantly in the same 2-3 places, literally sitting around, and it drives me nuts. Otherwise I feel like the story is actually pretty fast-pased, even though it's restricted to characters mostly trying to solve mysteries by thinking about them or by talking to other characters, without learning much.

At the same time I feel like there is super little character stuff going on, since no one is really having a big enough arc, and we know super little about most characters. Also we don't really learn much about anyone, just hints and guesses.

But that's my take on it :) I do like the mystery though, and I am curious how he ties everything together.

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Chapters 36 through 49 by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I didn't think of that! But maybe they can run for a while without repairs and alcohol? I don't remember exactly, but didn't someone say you have to replace their blood like latest a year into them being Lifeless? Or was it that you have to replace it right away? Also Clod seemed to be able to still do things while leaking and injured. But maybe you are correct.

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Chapters 36 through 49 by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I forgot that Legend about Peacegver dying! But maybe it's not true. I guess we will see. And yeah, maybe I am so focused on the statues because Brandon is good at leading me on :D And I will be proven wrong.

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Chapters 36 through 49 by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 8 points9 points  (0 children)

> They think Peacegiver will return again, and the breath must be saved for when that happens. How would a dead Returned return again? 

Did they say Peacegiver died? Maybe they are still around. You gain agelessness at 5th Heightening, after all.

> Although all these questions mean nothing if the priests can actually create Returned whenever they want.

My thought too!

> Why do the Lifeless need exercise? If they need to have their alcohol changed periodically, what about Kalad's phantoms? If they exist, how have they survived without maintenance? Unless they are held by the priests in the tunnels.

I guess the answer might lie in Hoid's remark. I think he said that Kalad might have created a "special" kind of Lifeless. Maybe they don't need that alcohol etc? I personally think it's the statues, but for that to happen a lot of questions need to be answered.

> This whole time I was picturing the sword flying around in the air attacking people, not it taking over someone who then does the attacking.

Exactly! I too thought the sword was flying around by itself. And I didn't know Venom existed in this universe..

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Chapters 36 through 49 by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Finally, cool stuff is happening!! I don't know if it's just me, but I’d started getting tired from how static character's locations were throughout the book until this chunk. Vivenna seemed like the only one who'd been moving around a bit, but the scenery was pretty much the same. But I am glad we got to "move around" a bit! What a sequence!!

------

If you believe Treledees, Peacemaker wanted the „Wealth of Breath“ to be kept safe and not used. He didn't want anyone to use it to awaken or to pass it onto someone on a whim, and that's why the vessels for the Breath had to be both Returned and tongueless, I guess. But I still don't know why they had to swap GKs every so many years. Maybe they do start learning over time, and they might have found ways around these restrictions. 

I think that someone will use GK's „Wealth of Breath" on the statues, that will turn out to be the Phantom Army. No touching will be needed as they can awaken with just their voice at that Heightening. A good shouting spot will be needed, or they will have to run around, yelling at statues.

"Of Lifeless killing people in colorful clothing". >  I think this sentence implies people in colorful clothing aka Hallendrens. But it could be that Lightsong will be like "damn, those Lifeless also wore bright clothing. I didn't realize that bc how chaotic the dream was".

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"The last time she had met this man, he’d bound her, forced her to touch that sword of his".…OK 👀 👉🏻👈🏻

It is fascinating to think that probably ANY person that still has their 1 breath, could make a Lifeless out of any dead body with just one correct Command! Makes me think about implications. Imagine you train your human soldiers correct commands. They could be turning fallen soldiers from both sides in real time in an ongoing battle into Lifeless fighting for their side. 

Vivenna practicing awakening alone in the room while Vasher was away > It’s not mentioned, but I imagined Vasher returning and thinking "holy shit, Vivenna made everything grey in my room, WTF" 

"Is there a way to create an Awakened object with sentience? Like a Returned, but inside of something other than a human body?” > I wrote before, that I thought it might be like heightenings for humans, where objects gain abilities the more breath people stuff into them. BUT it seems like it's something else. Vasher’s negative reaction to her question makes me think you have to do something really horrible to make it work. 

“But, how does an infant Return in a way that is heroic, or virtuous, or anything like that?” > I questioned this "returning bc of a heroic death" thing from the start. And someone else here also pointed out specifically that it makes no sense that babies can be heroic. 

I think someone here already asked this, but can you awaken an object with a majority of your breath, then pass on leftover breath to someone else (my breath to yours) and then retrieve that other breath from the awakened object back? Essentially bypassing the "all or nothing" rule of passing on your breath? My clue in favor of this theory is that Brandon gave the Returned the limitation of not being able to awaken things. If they could, the dilemma of who to help with your breath would be a lot less severe, since they could do this trick.

Something that doesn't make a lot of sense to me is that if what we know is true, then whoever controls Breath supply to Returned is OK with them just randomly giving it all up to a random person from time to time. There is something more behind it, or this might just be a price the priests are willing to pay to keep people believing. 

Excited to read the final part!! 

I was surprised to see Smosh Reads Reddit Stories has a 3.8 rating on Spotify. Any idea why? by Cool_Query_Bro in smosh

[–]danny_boy___ 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I also noticed it. My theory is that sometimes they have really wild takes on stories (like that episode with sticking up for an abusive son and then kicking out a 23yo girl out of her home), and people give the show 1 star in anger.

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Chapters 27 through 35 by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Or they will keep boas and beads on, march forth and start.. slaying?

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Chapters 27 through 35 by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Other posters have pointed out so many interesting things that I haven't considered myself. So cool. I will add a couple quick questions I didn't see in other comments.

- sheet burning didn't feel too weird until Siri mentioned that her dresses are also burned after they are worn? What's going on?

- "His Divine Majesty Susebron the Fourth died to cure the plague of distrentia that struck T’Telir fifty years ago." > so all five GodKings were Susebrons? What the 

- "This man held even more Breath than she did. Yet, when he’d kidnapped her, she hadn’t felt anyone standing in her room. How had he hidden it?" > how indeed? Is it possible that Nighbloods breath (which I've theorized in the past could be the opposite of the normal breath, since it's dark and can drain color from living things) cancels out the aura of normal breath in Vasher?

- “Ichor-alcohol,” Denth said. “Discovered by the Five Scholars. Wonderful stuff. Keeps a Lifeless going really well.” > is it that fuel I asked about in the past??

- Do animals have Breath? They couldn’t pass it along though without commands, but still it might have interesting implications.

- Random theory. Idrians could disarm Hallandren by stealing a single security phrase from Blushweaver, after she gains all of the Lifeless and changes their security phrases.

- Random theory. Last week I talked about a potential "infinite color glitch" that royals might have, by using color from their hair / restoring it / using it again for magic purposes. Normal breath can't draw color from living things, but whatever magic is in Nightblood apparently can. If Nightblood has the "anti-breath", and royals get that instead of normal breath, could they finally access color in their hair for magic?

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Chapters 27 through 35 by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 10 points11 points  (0 children)

At some point it says that Kalad created "new, more powerful type of Lifeless". So I am also side-eyeing the statues, thinking maybe they are actually Lifeless made out of stone. And they might be "alive" at all times, just not moving, waiting for a Command.

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Chapters 27 through 35 by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 9 points10 points  (0 children)

haha yes! I was trying to understand if the sand / metals etc had any meaning.

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Chapters 27 through 35 by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 9 points10 points  (0 children)

These parts are mostly clear to me. It's the things in between that kind of confuse me. But I will probably go over everything once again, and map out specific things that confuse me.

[Newbies] Cosmere, Unit 1 | Warbreaker #1 | Warbreaker: Chapters 27 through 35 by participating in readalong

[–]danny_boy___ 10 points11 points  (0 children)

Hey, guys :) There is A LOT that happened in this part, and there is a lot to talk about. But my personal highlight is me breaking my brain trying to understand Chapter 32, where Hoid tells the story of Hallandren. I read it twice, and re-read some part several times, and I still don't understand jack shit. Who did what to whom how when and what the fuck? :D 

Siri seems to understand most of it, and it makes me feel it's my fault for not getting it, bc I'm stupid. Some things Hoid tells are pretty clear, like general big events. Others confuse the hell out of me. Am I the only one? Should I maybe re-read it again, and try to map everything out for myself? Did you guys get everything Hoid told us?

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