Lux ever gonna get a hardcover edition?
Currently there are no plans. One reason is that there are continuity errors in Lux that we don’t have the resources to fix currently while we’re focused on Stormlight 5.
Are there any plans for further entries?
Nothing to announce, and may never be.
How's computer stuff going to work in the 80s version of Mistborn? Very rudimentarily. It'll work like you expect it to from our world in that era.
Without Aux, can [Zellion] keep doing it? Can he still sync with future worlds?
RAFO.
Has Zellion been to Nalthis? Or did he learn about the Breaths from somewhere else?
RAFO.
If Zellion/Sigzil gets rid of the Torment, could Hoid get rid of...?
Theoretically, it's possible that Hoid could get rid of the distortions to his soul. He held the Dawnshard a lot longer, and his distortions are more... how shall we say... pervasive.
If [Canticle] is spending years, if not centuries or millennia, just sucking in all that Investiture, is that gonna be the most heavily Invested thing in the cosmere?
RAFO.
It is theoretically possible to be part of two Orders at once and to have bonded two spren at once.
What I'm unsure about is the timing of when [Sigzil] gets the Dawnshard versus when he became a different Radiant.
You'll find this out eventually. RAFO.
When did Hoid give [Sigzil] the Dawnshard?
This is a RAFO.
Do the deceased that die on Canticle, do they return into this Reliquary? Was the brother really there? Or do they just die? Do they still become Shades?
They don't get to go to the Reliquary. They actually die, and their Investiture that would become a shade is instead turned into one of the sunhearts.
How old is Sigzil [in The Sunlit Man]?
RAFO.
When does [The Sunlit Man] happen?
Pretty late in the Cosmere, but not the latest you've seen.
There's this scene where there was a nightmare, and Painter didn't have a paintbrush, and he just reached out to the side and a paintbrush appeared, and there was a flash of light. I need details, 'cause that seems so much like a Shardblade!
This is also working under the exact same mechanics, so yes, Investiture that he is Connected to is indeed being manifest as something physical.
What Awakened the father machine? Was it the same system that we've seen with Breaths? Or was it something else? If it is Breaths, how did some one who can use that magic system, how did they get here?
These all work on the same fundamental mechanics. You should not be looking for someone from outside to have done this.
There's a drama, and it has a hion sword in it. Is it just for the drama? Or can hion sword be real, please?
Uh... we'll make you one.
We learn [Yumi]'s repeated this day for 1700 years, and her memory is patched over by the father machine. If memory and Investiture are so closely tied together, is the father machine also taking her Investiture? How does that work, because she's such a highly Invested individual, it seems like if it could take any Investiture from her, it would take all of it, like the nightmares did.
When I play with this, with tweaking memory and things like that, my go-to in the cosmere, in the three cases where you've seen it happen, is that those excising memories have to be really, really careful, or the body will reject what you're doing. So, all three times you've seen it happen, it's been one little sliver of memory is getting changed. The father machine might even just be overwriting it each day, basically blanking that Investiture, but not stealing any of it. Vasher does pull a little bit out when he takes the memory, and the same thing happens with Wit when it happened to him. But I think the father machine's doing it in a slightly different way, and it has to be really careful, or it'll be too obvious, and the whole illusion, the facade, will collapse.
Are you still planning to write a book with a magic system based on disease and sickness?
If I'd really been on the ball, it would have been one of the Secret Projects I wrote during Covid. But I haven't found the right story for that magic system yet. So it's still in the back of my brain, and someday perhaps I will write it, but we'll see. Yes, I still am planning it, but we'll see.
I know what was in the first four storage caverns; but what was in the fifth storage cavern? I always wonder.
RAFO.
Do any of the civilizations in the cosmere celebrate a holiday like Halloween?
Yes.
What's Hoid's favorite regional curse word from the planets he's visited?
He's gonna like something pretty weird. He's gonna like the outlandish ones. I'll have to think about it for a while. It's probably not one that I've used yet, would be my guess. Something that might sound a little ridiculous to our ears. I think he would really like the Wheel of Time one, "mother's milk in a cup," just because it's one of those things that sounds vulgar, but isn't.
I've always wondered how the Threnodites are so well known. Beyond shades, we don't see powers there. How are they so well-traveled?
There's a couple of things going on here. One is: there are ways on and off Threnody, and any of the planets that you can get on and off without needing FTL do spread through the cosmere pretty well.
The other thing is: the event that created Threnody as it's known in the cosmere (which is the death of Ambition) has wide-reaching ramifications. It's a very famous place in the same way that most people know the Bikini Islands when they might not otherwise know it, if that makes any sense. It's the source of something that has had great implications for the entirety of the cosmere.
Why did Brandon name a world Threnody?
I wanted a planet where I was making use of religious terminology (sometimes pseudo-religious terminology; things that are religion-adjacent also), and things that had to do with poetry and music. Lots of names like Elegy as a name. And Threnody, I believe Isaac suggested it. He'll have to correct me if I'm wrong; he might have named some other things in that system, but I think he recommended Threnody. And it felt appropriate, being a song for the dead, a dirge. Just kind of clicked.
What would Halloween look like on Threnody? Or would such a holiday hit far too close to home for them?
They are not celebrating Halloween on Threnody. They would not understand at all. They live lives of constant terror, so why you would want to do that to yourself...
Would a compass needle point towards a perpendicularity?
No, a compass needle wouldn't, good question. You might be able to make some other device that could do that, but a compass needle would not naturally point toward one.
On a scale of one to ten, how much terror would a Scadrian feel upon seeing one of Roshar's moons?
It's gonna depend on the individual. I think some will get a sense of immediate dread by having that thing looming over them. That would probably be the consistent feeling. But there's probably people who are just like, "Oh, look at the thing in the sky. That's cool." So, depends on the individual.
Would you consider working with a professional linguist to translate a Cosmere novel into that planet's native equivalent?
Seems like a lot of work for a very few number of people. I can imagine getting, like, a short story. Like one of Hoid's stories, maybe, translated into local. But creating the full conlang is not a thing that most of us do unless there's, like, a strict need for a film. (Dothraki didn't exist as a full conlang until the television show and they started needing to be able to speak it in full sentences.) I imagine that most of my conlangs won't get fully developed until that.
Maybe... I know people love their Klingon Christmas Carol. It is a thing. It's a possibility; it's a thing I could consider. But I think a short story is way more likely.
If koloss are made using five people, spikes, and recycled blue skin as opposed to the traditional breeding method, how can someone be part koloss?
In Era Two, koloss breed true, and are the kind of bluish-purplish-skinned people. (They'll call them koloss-blooded at that point.) And they can interbreed with humans. A full-grown koloss undergrows a ritual that adds the spikes and turns them into Era One style koloss. Allomancer Jak's story kind of gets into this a little bit.
Is there an Awakening Command that could stick a Cognitive Shadow to a corpse?
Yes, but that would be a bad way to do it. You'd need something more.
More Investiture?
Not necessarily. The body at that point died because something happened to it, plus it started decomposing. You'd need to do something to it to really get the Cognitive Shadow to stick.
like a Hemalurgic spike?
That's one way to do it.
Oh! To follow up... because Regrowth is Spiritual... if a Cognitive Shadow was Awakened into a corpse, then healed with Regrowth, would the body be healed to appear like the Cognitive Shadow's body?
No, it would heal... wait, yes, Regrowth would heal based on the Identity of the Cognitive Shadow attached to it.
Auxuiliary and Nomad, the Knight Radiant Bond is kind of flipped around a bit. Is it possible for Adolin and Maya to something similar happen to them?
There’s something that could happen there. Don’t hold your breath, but possible. I won’t RAFO that; it's possible.
Are there any other dragons on Roshar other than Cultivation?
There have been. There might be some. How about this: you shouldn't be looking for dragons among the characters of the Stormlight Archive.
Can a kandra eat a dragon? Either in human or just regular dragon form?
They can eat one in human form. Getting the whole thing in dragon form would be a little like that scene in Elden Ring.
If Mraize took an atium spike and put it through Hoid's chest and then into himself, would he gain different abilities because of Hoid's altered spiritweb?
Yeah, he probably would. That's really terrifying to think about.
I have a question about Hoid. If he was previously a Dawnshard that prevented him from hurting himself or others, how could he use a hemalurgic spike on himself?
We don't know that he has.
But would he be able to?
I think there is a way he could get around that if he needed to. Basically, he has to convince himself that this isn't actually hurting him, it's helping him.
Similar to how he could do damage to Cognitive Shadows, because they're not really...
Yep, exactly.
At any given point in the cosmere, would Yolen be more technologically advanced than any other planet or society in the cosmere?
I think Yolen falls behind because of certain things that they have access to. The point where it is the furthest along is during the early days, when it's, like, Bronze Age and everyone else is, like, Stone Age. So, right at the beginning. I think other planets have passed it by since then consistently. Once the Shards started meddling in things, planets started going faster, and the Shards weren't meddling on Yolen. So Yolen has had a more natural, maybe even slowed technological progression. Where some of the other planets have been super fast.
If I were to visit Canticle in the subastral, what would that look like?
I think it'd be pretty violent, and a source of constant shaking and tremors.
Would it be dangerous?
Yeah, I think it'd be dangerous.
A few years ago, you told us a story about the future Skybreaker *inaudible* Scadrial. Were they doing that on behalf of their Shards? Or were they doing it for their own reasons?
RAFO. Excellent question.
You can find that reading online, a possible sequel to the Sixth of the Dusk that I had worked on for a little while.
If a shade attacks a non-Threnodite, do they turn into a shade?
Nope.
Can regular Threnodites from Threnody exchange heat like they do on Canticle?
RAFO.
What color are the flightsuits?
Have I never described the color of the flightsuits? I've always imagined light blue. Light blue to dark blue. That's one of my favorite colors, it shows up all the time. Maybe the team would convince me to do a different color. I always end up with blues and reds; I don't do enough greens, and I see you've got green on. In your version, you can canonize it as green. But I've always imagined blue.
Originally, you RAFO'd information about whether or not Vivenna and Vasher got together as a couple. But with the fact that the Nightblood story has kind of been put on hiatus, is there any way you're going to unRAFO that information?
Nope.
Throughout the Stormlight Archive, there's multiple times where we see characters... most often it's the Lopen, where he'll do, in response, a rude or obscene gesture. Will you please demonstrate it for us?
Lopen's going to be mimicking something you would do with two hands, because one hand represents men, and one hand represents women. I'll just leave it at that. It's gonna be something like that.
You people...
Does Shallan unwillingly shapeshift when she is holding Stormlight and an alter takes control? If not, why do her alters' Identities not affect her in the same that other people's Identity does?
Yes, she does shift. Sometimes it's conscious, sometimes it's unconscious, but yes, it does happen.
Assuming you have a way to siphon out a Vessel from a Shard, how much hemalurgic metal would be required to contain that Vessel?
An astronomically large amount. Oh, the Vessel? Or contain a Shard? The Vessel, just a little dude... not that much. Basically, like a decent-sized gemstone would hold an Unmade, and that's more Investiture than we're talking about.
Can hemalurgic metal hold around the same amount of an Invested creature as a pure gemstone?
No, gemstones can do more.
I have a question about the end of the The Lost Metal, where one character lives and one character dies. That character kind of explicitly talked to Harmony asked if there was a way to not die. Was Harmony lying? And if Harmony was not, *inaudible*?
I would say that Harmony was not necessarily, but... Harmony's not lying by Harmony's perspective of things. In other words, is there a way to make this not, like... Maybe there is, like... bringing together powers. Is there a theoretical path? Maybe. But not realistically, if that makes sense. I would say Harmony wasn't lying by the way Harmony was seeing things.
It seems a little bit like we've seen gold compounding recover from pretty significant things, if he blasts out of the bubble with a duralumin push, and he uses pure Dor to heal, even considering all that?
Harmony's seeing all that and being like, "None of this is gonna work in this situation."
What is the biggest editorial change you have ever made to one of your stories from your arcanists who said, "Oh you can't do this because of *inaudible* or for canon content?"
I'm not sure if I can come up with the biggest. I can list a couple of them that I did change.
They have a lot of influence over Sunlit Man and my weird little tiny planet, my Little Prince planet, that you're traveling around. Getting me to do that accurately... to the point that, at some points, I'm like, "Yeah, I'm gonna give a magical solution to that." And they're like, "That's fine. Know that physicists will complain." And then they did. But then they got mad... not mad, but they're like, "But there is a magical reason."
I only have a full arcanist team on a couple of books so far. They've been involved in all the Secret Projects. They're working with me on Stormlight Five. This is just me finding the people who ask the questions that make me go, "Huh, I hadn't considered that," and then putting them to work to be doing that on my behalf. Really, most of what they do is not say "no," they say "we would like an explanation; you should make sure that this is included." And once in a while, it makes me pull back on an idea. But they're usually really small things that are gonna cause issues for the future, and things like that. I just met with them on Stormlight Five, for instance, and they gave me a few pointers on things. They'd say, "You probably should explain this. You probably should not use this line, because people are gonna explore that and extrapolate that direction." And I'm like, "you are right."
Most of the cases, they're like, "What is this?" And then I explain it, and they're like, "Great. You have an answer. We can move on." You'd have to ask them, but I'd say that one out of ten times, I don't have an answer. But those one out of ten times are really handy for them to be asking those questions that I don't have answers to. Because I have to go do this for all of you, and I'd better have the answers by then.
Is Vasher a dragon?
Vasher is not. Keep searchin'!
Can dragons only be born through biological means? Or can someone become dragons through another means?
The way dragons exist in the cosmere is that they are a race. Dragons have this thing where they actually... in the cosmere, dragons breed in their human form (they have both forms) and give birth in their human form. And the dragon form is separate. They raise families and have children as humans, and they consider both an equal form, to them.
What are the four Dawnshards?
They are the weapon used to Shatter Adonalsium. What they actually are, I won't tell you yet. Like, what their different... But that's what they are, in case you didn't know that much.
In Yumi and the Nightmare Painter, when Yumi is flying out into the Shroud, Hoid makes a comment. He said, "She didn't even have to burn tin." Does that mean that the mists on Scadrial is made of something similar or even the same thing as the dispersed souls on Yumi's planet?
Yeah, something similar. The idea is that being able to see through the Investiture happens when you are kind of aligning to it in certain ways, it stops disrupting as much, and you gain some sort of extrasensory perception, that it doesn't interfere with you as it might with someone else. And it's really nothing more than that; she's aligning with this, and in Mistborn, it's aligning to theirs. It doesn't mean she'd be able to see through the mists.
That's kind of the answer to my second question, which was: does that mean that any highly Invested individual could see through Scadrian mist, whether they be using Breath or Stormlight...?
Not necessarily. There are ways you could do it, but not necessarily.
Given that kandra can replicate human organs, is it possible for a human and a kandra to have a child? And if so, would that child be purely human, or some kind of combination?
That's a yes, and it would be some kind of combination.
