I'm planning a game for Mistborn roleplaying. What are your thoughts on an obligator, an Oracle obligator Misting who (and this is pure theorycrafting on my end) can, burning the alloy of atium and cadmium, put himself into a stasis to last into Alloy of Law era, realize "Where has my Lord gone?"
I think that's a great story. I don't know if it would work 100% in canon, but in a roleplaying game, that sounds feasible and great.
Are you ever scared someone's going to ask you a question you don't want to answer?
Scared, no. But the thing that worries me is I flub some of the questions 'cause I'm just not paying attention. I get into the groove of signing and they hit me with something. And I usually flub one or two a night, where I'm just not paying attention. Or I think they ask something, and I'm thinking they asked something they didn't. Those are the ones I don't like. I don't fear them, but I'm like, "Argh." They only happen once a night. But it happens consistently.
If you write down a measurement of a firespren, it locks into that. If you write down a measurement that's not true, will that still work? Can you just write down the measurements of a firespren and quadruple its size?
Let me just say this. Human perception of spren has an intrinsic effect on how they act, react, and interface with the world.
So if I were to take a picture of a firespren, increase the brightness on my phone by 5000, and then write down that recording, the firespren would multiply brightness by 5000?
I didn't say that. I said, "Human perception of spren influences their behavior and their form."
I'm an illustrator. I know a couple illustrators in the area have worked with you on some illustrations. So how does that work? I know usually the art director is the only one who has a say in the art.
Isaac is my art director. We have enough influence with the publisher that we hire out everything except the cover, and we say, "You're just putting this in." I pay for it. I started that on my second book, after they didn't pay my illustrator on the first book, because they forgot and lost the check. And it took them, like, eight months to get another check. I'm like, "I'm just gonna pay for this. So I make sure my illustrator gets paid." And from then on, I've just done that. When you're paying for it, the publisher lets you do a whole bunch of stuff.
Is the conduit that seems to be powering the Ire fortress, can that act as a safe passage through the Cognitive Realm of Sel?
Yes. Maybe not the way that you're implying, but yes.
The screams on Roshar. Is that a cosmere-wide phenomenon?
RAFO.
Did Adonalsium have a god metal?
RAFO.
If Adonalsium was whole, would there be other powers in the cosmere that could threaten it?
RAFO. But I would say the fact that Adonalsium was Shattered answers that question, itself.
The namesake of the Nahel bond. Was that a person, or is just a name?
It's a word in original Alethi as I was working on it. And actually, the original didn't use "bond." Bond was implied by it. The word meant, "connection to the divine." It's gotten larger since then...
So when Vasher takes a similar name, he's trying to imply that meaning?
Yes.
Hesina received a letter from her family talking about new fabrials. Is she related perhaps to someone like Navani?
See, there's too much wiggle room in that. Yes. But. Not probably as closely as your question is implying.
Was there life in the cosmere before Adonalsium?
RAFO.
Most of the Shardblades and Plate abandoned by Radiants during the Recreance are somewhere, missing. Are they mostly, kind of in the same place?
It's a good question. RAFO.
The Listener Song of Secrets. Is that significantly related to the Taker of Secrets?
RAFO.
What happens to god metals when a Shard is Splintered?
God metals are unaffected.
And atium and lerasium stayed unaffected when they merged?
Lerasium and atium that existed before were unaffected.
When the Everstorm passes over Kholinar in Oathbringer. That is when Ashertmarn appears, that's when they start reporting, "Hey there's a darkness around the palace." Did the Everstorm bring Ashertmarn there? Or did it kind of awaken or unleash it?
A little of both.
When Hoid met Kaladin, he said he came chasing an old acquaintance, ended up spending most of his time hiding from him instead. Is he referring to Rayse or Odium? Or someone else.
Yes. Not the someone else. He was referring to Odium.
In the Way of Kings epilogue, Hoid was playing an enthir. That instrument looks very similar to the one played by the musician in White Sand.
Yes. They are related.
One of Kaladin's early chasm duties, he examines a very distinctive knife with a figure at the center of the hilt, nicely carved with a man of fine armor... How similar is this knife to the one Moash used?
RAFO.
Was Hoid at any point the Dark One in any world?
Not the Dark One as defined by the series The Dark One. There are definitely legends of him that are... darker than perhaps his lighthearted appearance might imply.
Someone had asked you a question about Marsh being a worldhopper, and you mentioned that there was nothing about his Investiture that would prevent him from going off-world. Which implies that there are other people who their Investiture would prevent?
Kelsier. I don't count him as going off-world, despite him getting very close.
Is there anyone living on Scadrial who that would also apply to?
As a default, no. I can't say 100% whether there's nobody. But as a default, that wouldn't prevent people. Not in the same way that you would have trouble getting off-world with a spren bond.
Any new Dustbringers in Stormlight Four?
Yes, there will be.
I was wondering if there's any correlation between the spren in the Axies interlude in the Way of Kings with his faces, and what Shallan does in Oathbringer when she's going through the faces telling them it doesn't hurt? 'Cause it said the refugees saw her nature as a spren, and I made a connection there. Is it a coincidence?
I will call that mostly coincidence.
The Ghostblood that's from the southern part of Scadrial. Does that mean she can use the [Allomantic] metals?
She was not born there. Iyatil is from somewhere else... She has a.. Scadrian heritage. Whether she's an Allomancer or not, I will RAFO. It is possible that someone with her lineage could.
So she doesn't have to be born on--
No.
On my reread of Reckoners, I remembered it being really kitschy and light-hearted, but the prologue of the first book is really dark. Is the rest of the book so light-hearted because it is David trying to make the best of a really crappy situation, or is it because it's Young Adult?
Yeah. It's also partially, I wrote the prologue, stepped away, came back, and wrote the rest... One of the things I regret about the books is that-- I was telling a story about assassinating superheroes. So I thought it was going to go darker than it did, once I found David's voice. And if I could go back, I might take out the baby skeleton... I couldn't cut it because it's such a great image, but I should have. My biggest regret with that series is the tonal mismatch... It's this thing where I'm like, "That would be the best book for, like, a fourteen-year-old to read of mine, except the prologue which involves dissolving babies."
Toilet paper. Does the extra go over or under?
I am actually agnostic on this one... ambivalent. I don't even notice.
I have a question about the Sleepless. So you have confirmed that distance does matter. Is there a limit or a factor affecting how many hordelings they control?
Yes.
Can you elaborate?
No, but there is an upper limit on both mass and number.
Will Eshonai's in-world book be, like, geography or an atlas?
Right now... her book was named after a song, one of the Rhythms or Songs, but I haven't picked the actual name. That's the working title.
If Lift went to Nalthis and got Breaths. Could she then eat the local food and turn it around and use it to Awaken?
RAFO.
People tend to hear a lot of voices on Roshar in their heads. And I've noticed that a lot of people either have been confirmed to be in contact with Unmade or show a lot of signs of that. Is there a correlation there?
Yes.
You've said that, AI in the cosmere, creating one is kind of like having a child realmatically. Would that extend to most sapient creations?
Yes.
So could a created spren from a Returned inherit Royal Locks? Within a reasonable possibility?
*ahhing in a very curious manner* You could make this happen, but I don't think it would happen naturally.
Was Roshar equally Invested by Cultivation and Honor originally?
Yes.
How 'bout now, since he's been--
So the Investiture is all still there... It is not all accessible. So, at this point, you might say-- I'd say it's a point of disputation. It would be worth arguing either way. I will say at this point, no, it's not equal anymore. But definitions of where the power is and what it counts as is ambiguous.
So Cultivation has more active Investiture?
Yes, I would say yes... Well, but she's been very coy. I'm gonna leave it at that.
If a [Vessel] were to hold Nightblood, who would give up first?
RAFO.
So... Shardblades are modeled after Honorblades. Are Honorblades modeled after something else?
The Honorblades were provided for the Heralds. The person doing the providing was aware of certain things. So, yes, but not really. I think it is-- I can answer a "yes," but it's more like a big asterisk.
With Shards, are there any... limits? What can't they do? Besides being opposed by another Shard and their own intent?
It varies a lot. It varies based on experience and situation. They are not omnipotent, though the power is infinite. So that is the weird part that you get into. So, they are limited partially by their own limitations, and also the limitations imposed upon them by the situations they're in.
Is there anything universal about all of them?
They all have bits of them in all of the cosmere, so that's universal. They all are bounded more by themselves than by the power itself.
In Hero of Ages, is Durn a worldhopper, Spook's beggar friend who has the perfect disguise?
I'll RAFO that.
Was Nightblood always the same size?
*chuckles* I will RAFO that.
You know how the whole group goes into Shadesmar. What would happen if they accidentally eat a bead, and then leave Shadesmar?
That would not be good for them.
Would they just explode with whatever the object was?
That's not exactly how it works. Fortunately. But I wouldn't recommend ingesting any beads.
When Shallan asked Jasnah about the Soulcasting with the jam, was Jasnah intentionally trying to reverse-assassinate Kabsal?
RAFO, but more I just need to make sure I look at the details before I can answer that one.
In which part of your process do you start designing [maps]?
In the old days, it was during the prewriting phrase, before I got into it. Now that I have Isaac, I can generally just write the book, give it to Isaac, and say, "All right, here's what I was imagining. Give me some iterations on this." And he's very good at that... It depends on the book. For Stormlight, I gave him a map and said, "Here's what it looks like." But for Skyward, I'm like, "Feels like this. It's, like, this distance. Come up with something."
How do the Heralds come back? As Cognitive Shadows, how do they a physical body?
That system will be explained in the coming books, so that is a RAFO. I'm gonna dig into it pretty deeply. It's relevant for multiple reasons...
In the original version, Taln ended up in someone else, like they would get a body from someone else, which was part of fueling the "Is he crazy, is he not," because people were like, "I recognize this guy!" I don't use that system anymore.
That's what I was wondering, because the Fused--
They use something kind of more like the Fused in the original draft, it's not that process anymore.
Is that gonna give us lead-ins to how it worked with Kelsier?
Maybe. Maybe. You shall see.
When did you first really realize who the Lord Ruler was, if he was good or bad? Because I feel like you turned him into a good guy.
He is complicated. I started with that concept in mind. In fact, I had written a different book that had used the same concept that had not turned out, and I kind of recombined it into Mistborn. So I went into it knowing he was this complex character.
At the start of previous Desolations, how long would it take the Fused to get back after one of the Heralds broke?
I'll RAFO that for now. I'm gonna be digging into it. We will have some-- I'm just going to RAFO it.
In The Way of Kings, how did Lopen get in and out of the chasms with only one arm?
So, he had a little help. And he can do it. Getting down and up-- I've actually seen people, looking online. You can climb a ladder. It's not easy. It's better if you have some help. But you can get up and down.
Just give me a worldbuilding quirk, some weird quirk of a world. Something you haven't written or don't intend to write.
Something I don't intend to write but that I someday will. Crab people.
As far as Hemalurgy, when you give that-- when it's done to somebody, would that create a new resonance?
It's possible that it could. Though I'm gonna say, most of the time, no... Lots of things are possible, but I'll give you a "mostly no" on that one.
What about savantism? Is that possible with Hemalurgy?
Yes, it is.
Were you gonna do anything with The Stormlight Archive with an RPG?
I would like to. We'll have to see. We want to support the Mistborn RPG while it's out, we don't want to abandon it. But once we feel like we've done that one the way we want to, you might see a Stormlight.
I need to get ahold of that, because I would almost be worried about, if you have a Mistborn character, especially in Era One, it would be too overpowered.
They made it work. The game is less combat-focused. There's social influence and gathering resources influence and combat influence are all separate, so you can have a duel of words where you attack someone's social influence that can be as valuable as attacking them on the streets at night. So because those two elements are so useful, what you end up having is, you can balance characters who don't even have Allomancy with characters who are Mistborn or with Mistings, things like that.
I was more thinking something like Twinborn, that you can almost balance that without getting any Mistborn.
The problem with Twinborn is, you get the right combinations, it's kind of OP. But it's a storytelling based system.
How much creative control does Graphic Audio give you?
Graphic Audio, I give them pretty much free rein. I like what they've done. So with Graphic Audio, I generally don't even cast the people or anything. I just say, "Do your thing."
Do the Heralds know about AonDor?
I would say, conceptually, a few of them do, but not in specific detail.
'Cause Ash's name is a combination of Transformation, Beauty, and Light. I didn't know if that was a coincidence, or--
There are some non-coincidences in the linguistics that people have started to pick up on, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the people who have those names know about the origins of their names.
This is purely hypothetical, but if Dalinar was to become the Vessel for multiple Shards, would he have had more difficulty with Preservation separately if Harmony was involved? Because that's the only of the Shards I can't see him holding onto particularly well.
Hmm. I can say yes on that. I think that's a good theory... you phrased [that] very well.
If Hoid encountered a larkin, would anything happen?
Hoid is aware of larkin.
So he's avoiding them?
I'm just gonna say he's aware of them.
