|
Not only does Rand channel without knowing it, he eventually starts channeling while thinking that the made up second person in his head is actually taking the lead. Both Cadsuane and Semirhage mention that it's not uncommon for channeling madmen to attribute their actions to a second personality. Whether the memories are real or not, I doubt this is something that the oath rod could prevent.
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2012 09:11
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 25, 2024 12:10 |
|
|
Jedit posted:Thinking about it, the real reason severed men die so fast is probably because they're kept in the Tower. It's possible to avoid the fatal depression, but you have to put the Power behind you and get busy with something else. The severed men can't forget because they're surrounded by the Power every day, and they can't find something else to do because they're kept captive. It's probably ridiculously hard anyway to find that something that you'd want to do/achieve badly enough to overcome the loss of something like that, though. I mean, the only example we have is Siuan Sanche, who has the equivalent of an oath under the Light to make ready and steer the world towards the Last Battle. Even assisting it nearly wasn't enough for Leane.
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2012 14:34
|
|
|
api call girl posted:It's probably ridiculously hard anyway to find that something that you'd want to do/achieve badly enough to overcome the loss of something like that, though. I mean, the only example we have is Siuan Sanche, who has the equivalent of an oath under the Light to make ready and steer the world towards the Last Battle. Even assisting it nearly wasn't enough for Leane. Seatelle Anan is a burned-out Aes Seadai (I think you can even figure out which one, though I forget the name), who appears to have pulled it off completely. Cadsuene's gentled men also lasted much longer on average (ten years, for one).
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2012 14:36
|
|
|
evilweasel posted:Seatelle Anan is a burned-out Aes Seadai (I think you can even figure out which one, though I forget the name), who appears to have pulled it off completely. Cadsuene's gentled men also lasted much longer on average (ten years, for one). Oh poo poo, yeah, she'd be an example of the complete opposite of what it took Siuan Sanche. Still wouldn't really count Cadsuane's men though.
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2012 14:53
|
|
|
Don't forget that by the time they get caught they are almost certainly going to be pretty tainted already. Unless an Aes Sedai was RIGHT there to see it happening it'd be months or years before they expose themselves too much, and the taint kills just as well as gentling.
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2012 15:09
|
|
|
You can hold the Power, but not channel, right? If a gentled man is going to die soon anyway, might as well just use an Oath rod to swear to not channel, but still allow him to touch the Source. Let him go mad, but don't deprive him of the only thing he's got going for him! Besides, it'd be a lot more fun to see a bunch of insane man running around than sad, broken gentled men moping their way to an early death. Obviously this is a moot point now that the taint is gone, but still..
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2012 17:01
|
|
|
I think that the reality of the situation is that the Tower doesn't really care very much about gentled men. They don't execute them because technically it's not their fault, but they don't really want them to live: gentling as practiced (gentle them then keep them on the grounds where they're certain to die of despair) works perfectly.
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2012 17:04
|
|
|
We've actually not seen anyone be affected by the "flesh rot" as far as I can recall, it might be more myth than fact. I mean, not even Rand who took on a massive amount of taint compared to everyone else suffered from that, and he already had other "evil wounds" to contest with. Would have been pretty cool though if he walked around rotting alive for the last couple of books  "Uh, Rand? Your ribs are showing  "e: I don't think it's even been attributed to any specific male channeler either - just off-handedly mentioned as a general thing that "happens", that some guys start to rot (but don't go insane? Well, maybe from rotting alive...). More plausible than Semirhage being an expert on the taints effect on the mind though. Pimpmust fucked around with this message at 18:42 on Oct 1, 2012 |
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2012 18:39
|
|
|
Pimpmust posted:We've actually not seen anyone be affected by the "flesh rot" as far as I can recall, it might be more myth than fact. I mean, not even Rand who took on a massive amount of taint compared to everyone else suffered from that, and he already had other "evil wounds" to contest with. I'm guessing it's like certain carcinogens, or asbestos. Ingest a little on a regular basis and you'll eventually come down with a terminal illness, but if you ingest too much too fast you'll be fatally poisoned before you get that far. All the male channellers we've seen channel a lot, so the taint drives them mad before the rot can set in.
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2012 19:13
|
|
|
The Midniter posted:You can hold the Power, but not channel, right? If a gentled man is going to die soon anyway, might as well just use an Oath rod to swear to not channel, but still allow him to touch the Source. Let him go mad, but don't deprive him of the only thing he's got going for him! Besides, it'd be a lot more fun to see a bunch of insane man running around than sad, broken gentled men moping their way to an early death. Actually I posit that the oath rod won't work on somebody crazy enough. See Mesaana dodging the whole "are you black ajah/darkfriend" whatever question with her full realization that "No i'm actually chosen not a petty darkfriend" a crazy person will easily convince himself that he isn't actually channeling, this power is somethin new that he's discovered. Or even like if Rand got bound by it before going sane I bet "Lews Therin" would be able to still channel. Since he's a different person.
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2012 19:58
|
|
|
Affi posted:See Mesaana dodging the whole "are you black ajah/darkfriend" whatever question with her full realization that "No i'm actually chosen not a petty darkfriend" If you believe a lie to be truth, you can say it even if bound by the Oath. Regardless, Mesaana was neither crazy nor bound by the Oath Rod so it's completely irrelevant.
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2012 20:32
|
|
|
I don't know why, but I always imagined the "rotting alive" part of the taint to be a straight up form of radiation poisoning. It still fits the horrible description, but it's more of a slow rotting death than some kind of crazy zombie Leprosy.
|
|
#
?
Oct 1, 2012 20:36
|
|
|
Pimpmust posted:We've actually not seen anyone be affected by the "flesh rot" as far as I can recall, it might be more myth than fact. I mean, not even Rand who took on a massive amount of taint compared to everyone else suffered from that, and he already had other "evil wounds" to contest with. It was referenced to in one of Rand's alternate lives in the portal stone in "The Great Hunt". The one where Egwene died of not learning to channel the power and he became a member of the queen's guard. It was described as a "wasting sickness" and the he was scarred from it.
|
|
#
?
Oct 2, 2012 02:22
|
|
|
Pimpmust posted:We've actually not seen anyone be affected by the "flesh rot" as far as I can recall, it might be more myth than fact. That's because in the current time there's virtually no way for someone to get that far gone: the Red found them long ago, or they got poisoned in the Black Tower once it became clear they were insane. I think that was something that only happened when insane men still roamed free once they'd gone fully mad (i.e. not often since the breaking).
|
|
#
?
Oct 2, 2012 02:25
|
|
|
L-O-N posted:It was referenced to in one of Rand's alternate lives in the portal stone in "The Great Hunt". Depending on how much those visions were actually true and within "THIS CAN ACTUALLY HAPPEN" or if they were more like plausible events pulled out from - or interpreted - by Rands own state of mind. The only mention being through  -land vision is a very loose basis for how the rot works.Would have liked to see a some sort of chapter mirroring Perin's run in with that "crazy" penned in wolfbrother, except a male channeler that's been hiding out in the woods for decades and begun to rot (may or may not be insane at that point). Potential awesome character: Semi-Crazy Hermit Leprosy Guy That Make poo poo Go BOOM - teams up with Team Logain for the Black Tower Arc. Despite massive angsting from everyone else involved survives the entire series and opens up a kebab shop, selling 100% mystery meat 
|
|
#
?
Oct 2, 2012 16:03
|
|
|
Pimpmust posted:Potential awesome character: Semi-Crazy Hermit Leprosy Guy That Make poo poo Go BOOM - teams up with Team Logain for the Black Tower Arc. Despite massive angsting from everyone else involved survives the entire series and opens up a kebab shop, selling 100% mystery meat So he's basically Tim from Holy Grail?
|
|
#
?
Oct 3, 2012 20:24
|
|
|
subx posted:So he's basically Tim from Holy Grail? That was one of the guys I pictured, yeah Speaking of the guy... (Would certainly make the various fetch-quest parts more entertaining) Pimpmust fucked around with this message at 21:44 on Oct 3, 2012 |
|
#
?
Oct 3, 2012 21:39
|
|
|
veekie posted:Don't forget that by the time they get caught they are almost certainly going to be pretty tainted already. Unless an Aes Sedai was RIGHT there to see it happening it'd be months or years before they expose themselves too much, and the taint kills just as well as gentling. I could be wrong on this, but I thought the taint by itself was a passive poison that built up in the body over time -- i.e., basically, something like if you have 1000 "taint tolerance points", at say 800 "taint points" accumulated you'd necrotize and at 1000 you'd die, with a chance to accrue a point every time you channeled, but as long as you were sub-1000 you'd still be alive (however leprous). At some point I need to buy a copy of the d20 gamebook they had rules for this kind of thing >_<.
|
|
#
?
Oct 3, 2012 23:20
|
|
|
Calenth posted:I could be wrong on this, but I thought the taint by itself was a passive poison that built up in the body over time -- i.e., basically, something like if you have 1000 "taint tolerance points", at say 800 "taint points" accumulated you'd necrotize and at 1000 you'd die, with a chance to accrue a point every time you channeled, but as long as you were sub-1000 you'd still be alive (however leprous). I think the RPG stuff was just those guys making up poo poo as they went along with very little Jordan involvement, except to veto stuff.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2012 01:02
|
|
|
evilweasel posted:I think the RPG stuff was just those guys making up poo poo as they went along with very little Jordan involvement, except to veto stuff. Yeah, my second-hand understanding is that it was basically just the RPG guys making up poo poo with, at best, some fact-checking by the people we'd now call "Team Jordan)" (i.e., mostly Maria). It's all pseudo-canonical at best. Still fun grist for theorycrafting though.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2012 17:44
|
|
|
Not a lot of fact-checking from what I can tell. I played it a few times years ago, and remember it basically being just D&D 3.5 with Wheel of Time names for the character classes and monsters. I remember there being a weave for flying in the RPG, so that's one thing that definitely got past whoever was checking that thing.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2012 19:38
|
|
|
Marchegiana posted:Not a lot of fact-checking from what I can tell. I played it a few times years ago, and remember it basically being just D&D 3.5 with Wheel of Time names for the character classes and monsters. I remember there being a weave for flying in the RPG, so that's one thing that definitely got past whoever was checking that thing. Did flying ever actually get established as impossible? I thought in the early books they talked about how Aes Sedai could fly in the AoL, but we certainly haven't seen it since.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2012 20:27
|
|
|
Hieronymous Alloy posted:Did flying ever actually get established as impossible? I thought in the early books they talked about how Aes Sedai could fly in the AoL, but we certainly haven't seen it since. It's been established as something no one knows how to do, and that sometimes people think they've rediscovered it but actually haven't, but I don't think it's been established as impossible. That said, "no one knows how to do it" should have excluded it from the list of weaves in the RPG just as much as "it's not a possible weave", I would think.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2012 20:53
|
|
|
I think they can't do it mostly because nobody understands how flight physics work anymore. It doesn't seem too difficult to make yourself wings out of Air (if you knew the right shape & size), and then have some method of propulsion; could be as simple as making small explosions under your heels.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2012 21:11
|
|
|
None of the Forsaken do it and neither does Rand despite his increasingly integrated knowledge of the Age of Legends from the Lews Therin memories bleeding through. And this was from a time when they did have something like the equivalent of airplanes.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2012 21:49
|
|
|
api call girl posted:None of the Forsaken do it and neither does Rand despite his increasingly integrated knowledge of the Age of Legends from the Lews Therin memories bleeding through. On the other hand, they can all just teleport to wherever they want to go anyway, so why fly? Even in combat it's just "target here".
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2012 22:43
|
|
|
Hieronymous Alloy posted:On the other hand, they can all just teleport to wherever they want to go anyway, so why fly? Even in combat it's just "target here". 1) There still weren't that many Aes Sedai that anyone can just get teleported anywhere, and, 2) in line of sight.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2012 22:46
|
|
|
Hieronymous Alloy posted:On the other hand, they can all just teleport to wherever they want to go anyway, so why fly? Even in combat it's just "target here". Yeah, Flight is kind of a liability when you're dealing with a fight of the Power, you're just asking to get shot down. Most sustained weaves are also fairly steadily taxing on the channeler. Assuming Flight is complex, sustaining the kind of flight needed to get anywhere seems rather silly if you could just Travel there and skip the intermediate distance. I recall the basic problem with Power based flight was leverage. Weaves that move stuff use the channeler's position as an anchor, which is simple enough. Weaves that actually try to lift the channeler meanwhile, have nothing to anchor on, at best they fake it with a platform. Propelling the channeler with reaction force meanwhile is dangerous(they're made of meat, and so you'd need some kind of shield to convert the blast into motion rather than shredding the channeler). I imagine actually making it work would involve basically making Power wings and then flying with those or some reality bending tricks(like transiting to Telaranrhiod). Which begs the question of why not just make wings proper.
|
|
#
?
Oct 4, 2012 22:54
|
|
|
When pressed about how to do it, Moghedien said that flight was impossible without sho-wings. I think Rand remembers seeing sho-wings flying in the sky in his Rhuidean flashbacks, I'd like to think it's hardly coincidental that they resembled modern conventional airplanes. I'm pretty sure that's all flight using the one power was, a way to power conventional powered flight. That's the thing, the Age of Legends isn't too different from the modern age, just a more futuristic version, only instead of using some magical fusion power for electricity as it's sci-fi conceit, they used magical magic power. It goes to show just how amazing yet grounded and underwhelming much the Forsaken and their age was. Like how Aginor couldn't make anymore shadowspawn without bio-engineering equipment, or how the Bore is noting more than a Large Hadron Collider experiment gone horribly wrong.
|
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2012 04:40
|
|
|
Recursive Expanse posted:It goes to show just how amazing yet grounded and underwhelming much the Forsaken and their age was. Like how Aginor couldn't make anymore shadowspawn without bio-engineering equipment, or how the Bore is noting more than a Large Hadron Collider experiment gone horribly wrong. "I win again, Higgs boson".
|
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2012 09:50
|
|
|
Hieronymous Alloy posted:On the other hand, they can all just teleport to wherever they want to go anyway, so why fly? Even in combat it's just "target here". I want to see Rand make a gateway to like above a battle and just fall straight down blasting away and before hitting the ground make another gateway underneath himself to high up in the sky again and just keep going like that. Portal style.
|
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2012 09:58
|
|
|
I think they mention somewhere that they can't make a gateway lay flat, but the reference escapes me now. I think it's one of Rand's POVs around TSR...
|
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2012 13:43
|
|
|
Don't deathgates open and close on a horizontal plane?
|
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2012 13:51
|
|
|
j3rkstore posted:Don't deathgates open and close on a horizontal plane? Algid fucked around with this message at 15:38 on Oct 5, 2012 |
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2012 15:34
|
|
|
Affi posted:I want to see Rand make a gateway to like above a battle and just fall straight down blasting away and before hitting the ground make another gateway underneath himself to high up in the sky again and just keep going like that. The al'Thor Maneuver? 
Pimpmust fucked around with this message at 16:00 on Oct 5, 2012 |
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2012 15:57
|
|
|
I've been rereading all of the books in order, just got to TGS. While Sanderson did a good job, the shift is really apparent, much more than I realized when first reading it.
|
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2012 16:02
|
|
|
evilweasel posted:I've been rereading all of the books in order, just got to TGS. While Sanderson did a good job, the shift is really apparent, much more than I realized when first reading it. It could be worse, anyway. We could've gotten Kevin J. Anderson.
|
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2012 16:08
|
|
|
ElMudo posted:I think they mention somewhere that they can't make a gateway lay flat, but the reference escapes me now. They made a skimming gateway horizontal for the Gholam, didn't they?
|
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2012 18:03
|
|
|
I know this is off-topic, but I can't help but note that the linked video is one of my favorite moments in any work of sci-fi ever, and it's the first thing I thought of when reading Affi's post.
|
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2012 19:41
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 25, 2024 12:10 |
|
|
 http://twitter.com/dragonmount/statuses/254318523130736640 A new Wheel of Time short story will be released in the "Unfettered" anthology. Spring 2013. Yes, it ties into #AMOL. http://goo.gl/uZR0J http://grimoakpress.com/2012/08/unfettered-edited-by-shawn-speakman/  quote:River of Souls by Robert Jordan & Brandon Sanderson (a Wheel of Time tale)
|
|
#
?
Oct 5, 2012 22:38
|
|
