The Oath Rod and the Madness

[Scarloc99]

I know we have never seen it so this is something to which there may never be an answer but could the oath rod have been used in a way to control a male chanaller before the taint was healed? 

We see that collared Aes Sedai are unable to be used as weapons, the oaths bond them and prevent them from killing meaning the Seanchan have to fund alternate uses for them. So could a Male be bonded to the oath rod in a way that prevented them from hurting anyone when they went mad? Or would the madness override the oaths? 

 

[Cipher]

Does the oath rod work on male channelers?  Too many unanswered questions.

[Scarloc99]

8 hours ago, Cipher said:

Does the oath rod work on male channelers?  Too many unanswered questions.

There is a wider questio here about how many Ter Angral work when used only by a woman, but also have a male"setting", imagine, the first time a male channeller looks at the arches and realises that they have a different setting that men can activate. 

[HeavyHalfMoonBlade]

I would say that there would be binders for both genders, the stories about criminals being bound were not limited to women. But I would also say it would not have worked. Just as an Aes Sedai can tell a lie if she thinks it is true (Logain set up by the Red Ajah, for example), when the men were mad they could have thought that they were doing something quite different than they were. Even making swear not to touch the source (which they probably would not have done, or they could have stayed in the steddings) would not help if you did it unintentionally or subconsciously. Probably.

[Sabio]

An oath rod can be used on everyone.  The companion says it can be used on those who can't channel.  It was originally used on violent people who were incorrigibly violent due to personality flaws or madness.  As a way to stop them from committing crimes.  The current Aes Sedai have no knowledge of its orginal purpose.  They would never consider using it on a male who could channel or an ordinary person.  

Edited September 23, 2023 by Sabio

[HeavyHalfMoonBlade]

Yes, though we were discussing the Aes Sedai of the Age of Legends. - Edit, or actually maybe we weren't, lol. I was thinking of the breaking, but I notice the OP seems more directed at "current events", my bad.

 

Though that bugs me, if the Oath Rod and the Warder bond can be used on non-channelers, why are both broken for channelers on severing? Surely that implies that the ability to channel is inherent in the oath/bond? But yeah, wondering about such things is a bit fruitless.

Edited September 22, 2023 by HeavyHalfMoonBlade

[Bugglesley]

On 9/21/2023 at 4:24 PM, Sabio said:

An oath rod can be used on everyone.  The companion says it can be used on those who can't channel.  It was originally used on violent people who were incorrigibly violent due to personality flaws or madness.  As a way to stop them from committing crimes.  The current Aes Sedai have no knowledge of its orginal purpose.  They would never consider using it on a male who could channel or an ordinary person.  

 

On 9/13/2023 at 3:50 AM, HeavyHalfMoonBlade said:

I would say that there would be binders for both genders, the stories about criminals being bound were not limited to women. But I would also say it would not have worked. Just as an Aes Sedai can tell a lie if she thinks it is true (Logain set up by the Red Ajah, for example), when the men were mad they could have thought that they were doing something quite different than they were. Even making swear not to touch the source (which they probably would not have done, or they could have stayed in the steddings) would not help if you did it unintentionally or subconsciously. Probably.

 

Given both of these, I feel like during the Breaking someone must have thought of it, right? "Jim's going mad, he knows it and I know it, so let's make him swear not to hurt anyone unless he's personally threatened." Jim wakes up, sees the whole room full of Trollocs, and only after smashing the walls together does he realize it was his loved ones all along. I feel like you can credibly extend this to the cleverest oath that doesn't itself break AoL-Aes Sedai morality/that isn't tantamount to severing/execution (in which case.. just do that). The Dark One is awfully creative.

 

So I think the answer to the original question is that the madness wouldn't override, necessarily, but it would almost certainly seep around them and you'd still get unfortunate results.

Edited October 2, 2023 by Bugglesley

[wotfan4472]

I do not think the Oath Rod would help with the madness and channeling.

 

The key reason, is it corrupts the mind into thinking things are there when they are not.  Androl's shadows, and Naeff's Myrdraal are examples of that.

 

Eventually, I think that had Nynaeve had not Healed Naeff, he would have started channeling to kill those Mydraal, and then his madness would have made anyone he looked at look like one, and so channel to kill it. I doubt the Oath Rod would have stopped him.

Edited October 2, 2023 by wotfan4472

[Scarloc99]

7 hours ago, wotfan4472 said:

I do not think the Oath Rod would help with the madness and channeling.

 

The key reason, is it corrupts the mind into thinking things are there when they are not.  Androl's shadows, and Naeff's Myrdraal are examples of that.

 

Eventually, I think that had Nynaeve had not Healed Naeff, he would have started channeling to kill those Mydraal, and then his madness would have made anyone he looked at look like one, and so channel to kill it. I doubt the Oath Rod would have stopped him.

I don't think Naeff was going to start doing that, the whole point was that his madness wasn't getting any worse, it was just now a constant. 

[wotfan4472]

Yeah, sorry. I forgot that the taint was removed. So, it would simply add if the taint was fully affecting a male's channelling mind at the point saidin was cleansed. 

Edited October 5, 2023 by wotfan4472

[Sabio]

Another issue is when a male is going mad, not many are trying to take them alive.  Few would willingly submit themselves to be binded.  Telling them they can't channel or something of the sort would be the same as gentling them, a fate few would willingly give into.

[Ioulaum]

On 10/2/2023 at 8:43 AM, Bugglesley said:

"Jim's going mad, he knows it and I know it, so let's make him swear not to hurt anyone unless he's personally threatened." Jim wakes up, sees the whole room full of Trollocs, and only after smashing the walls together does he realize it was his loved ones all along.

 

A practical solution there would just be "Don't channel except in a link where the woman controls the link" - or just don't channel at all, outside of linking.

 

I think the set up though is supposed to be that a ton of male channelers went completely mad instantaneously when Saidin was originally tainted. So, it was like millions of people were suddenly terrorists with rocket launchers.

 

It's true though that common sense should've prevailed eventually once things stabilized, and some mature Aes Sedai that were still alive, and thinking long term, should've tried stabilizing a group of male channelers... Because they were necessary for a lot of advanced stuff.

 

But, if they were sensible, how would we get so much drama?

 

Ultimately, an author has a story that they want to tell. And it's hard to account for the many details of how billions of real humans might have acted in a given situation.

 

That might end up being the kind of thing that you can simulate with AI... It'll be interesting to see some of the virtual worlds that will likely be created in the future.

Edited October 18, 2023 by Ioulaum

[Yamezt]

18 hours ago, Ioulaum said:

A practical solution there would just be "Don't channel except in a link where the woman controls the link" - or just don't channel at all, outside of linking.

I think this solution would more or less have the same effect as severing as they will lose the will to live because they can feel the source but cannot touch it.

 

I can't imagine a woman will want to head the link as then she would be exposed to the taint (certainly there will be outliers - but in general I can't imagine that would be the case)

 

18 hours ago, Ioulaum said:

I think the set up though is supposed to be that a ton of male channelers went completely mad instantaneously when Saidin was originally tainted. So, it was like millions of people were suddenly terrorists with rocket launchers.

 

From recollection, it was the 100 companions that were instantly mad. Then the remaining male aes sedai gradually became mad.

 

Some Male Aes Sedai used Stedding to avoid madness for a time, the Reds blamed the Ogier for prolonging the breaking, while the Blues felt that it helped reduced its severity. But in the end, they couldn't bear the loss of the power and went out and became mad

 

18 hours ago, Ioulaum said:

It's true though that common sense should've prevailed eventually once things stabilized, and some mature Aes Sedai that were still alive, and thinking long term, should've tried stabilizing a group of male channelers... Because they were necessary for a lot of advanced stuff.

 

Given the amount of knowledge is lost, even just for Saidar, I think the breaking was really terrible, and knowledge about working together with the power would have been lost.

Edited October 19, 2023 by Yamezt

[Ioulaum]

6 hours ago, Yamezt said:

I think this solution would more or less have the same effect as severing as they will lose the will to live because they can feel the source but cannot touch it.

 

If we think of it as akin to withdrawal from a drug... You'd just need someone to continue administering the drug regularly.

 

6 hours ago, Yamezt said:

I can't imagine a woman will want to head the link as then she would be exposed to the taint (certainly there will be outliers - but in general I can't imagine that would be the case)

 

The taint only seemed to hit the body of the man it was being channeled through. At most the female Aes Sedai could sense that the taint was there.

 

6 hours ago, Yamezt said:

From recollection, it was the 100 companions that were instantly mad. Then the remaining male aes sedai gradually became mad.

 

You may be right. 

 

I would think though, given that the taint appeared to be finite (which allowed Rand to channel it away in a day of use of the Choedan Kal)...

 

That on Day 1, the taint was a whole lot stronger. And you would be hurt a whole lot faster if you channeled.

 

Maybe some male Aes Sedia just hadn't channeled that day yet, and started getting the news that something appeared to have gone wrong with Saidin. Which would have given them some ability to adapt.

 

6 hours ago, Yamezt said:

Given the amount of knowledge is lost, even just for Saidar, I think the breaking was really terrible, and knowledge about working together with the power would have been lost.

 

Mostly, it seems that the female Aes Sedai of the time didn't do a good enough job in getting organized. 

Normally, you'd build some kind of defensive base that you could try to act out of.

 

Collections of female Aes Sedai who could link should have been able to pull that off, against male Aes Sedai that were just acting individually.

 

But... One can't overthink the setting of a novel. There's nothing to say that RJ put a lot of thought into the details of the breaking and exactly what was done by whom at the time.

 

 

 

[Bugglesley]

In the first place, the easiest and most correct response to this discussion is "this is the deliberately vague and tragic backstory to a story, if the backstory happened differently the story wouldn't happen, also it's deliberately vague, so talking about it is deeply pointless." And that's true. However, this still is stuck in my craw.

 

At the second meta level, in all honesty, arguing that people should have just all got together, sat back and thought logically, then all proceeded as a group about what was best for everyone on a thousand-year timeline just as a second apocalypse was crashing in on the heels of a first one (the consequences of the bore in the first place and the War of the Shadow had already functionally destroyed the AoL civilization) is to fundamentally miss the point both of the Wheel of Time and also to demonstrate an utter lack of understanding of history and/or of human beings in general. Like things in the WoT are honestly going way better than they were at the conclusion of the War of Shadow, and look how that went. If RJ has a single thematic consistency through the skirt-smoothing and the spanking and the character bloat and the flowing between randomly named sword forms it's that evil will always be with us because humans are selfish, and that even when people are all acting selflessly, they still are operating with limited information and without being able to communicate or trust or agree on what is the best selfless way forward (but, of course that evil will always lose because selfishness is ultimately self-defeating).

 

On the first in-universe level, the Breaking had to happen because it was the next step in the Turning of the Wheel. Fate is another pretty frequent theme here and it's really consistently highlighted that there's no clever wordplay or legalese loophole that's going to get you around something the Pattern needs to happen. It's unbelievable arrogance to think that oh yes, "building a defensive base" and "setting up a clever oath to swear on the binding rods," both things that can know would be logistically impossible and also not work even with the incredibly limited and unreliably narrated information we have, would have simply allowed the Pattern to be completely altered and the AoL to snap right back. Like my brother in the Light, the name of the series is the Wheel of Time. The metaphorical wheel that spins out the Pattern inevitably as it wills, beyond the power of any mortal mind or will, even those with literal earth-shaking magic power. And you're going to sit here and type "well, the reason the AoL ended is actually because those fee-males screwed up." Really. Blood and bloody ashes.

 

It's some kind of hilarious combination of arrogance, woolbrainedness, and misguidednes to actually will your fingers into typing:

 

"Mostly, it seems that the female Aes Sedai of the time didn't do a good enough job in getting organized.

Normally, you'd build some kind of defensive base that you could try to act out of."

 

In getting organized? Half of their military, including their most trusted friends had suddenly turned into uncontrollable living weapons or were slowly turning into living weapons, decades into a total, genocidal war (that they were losing) that started because half of of their trusted friends at that point had actively betrayed them to the cosmic horrors prosecuting said genocidal war. Every piece of your infrastructure to command or communicate is being or has been destroyed. Building a defensive base? My dude, everything left was a defensive base. More to the point, what exactly do you think the Stone of Tear is and where did it come from? Have you, perchance, heard of a crazy little fortification that the female Aes Sedai still use called the bloody White Tower!? The problem here isn't "having a defensive base," it's the minor issue that each of those defensive bases is staffed by the people now going mad. Light!

 

Bear in mind, and again, we have literally nothing from the books to go on, but we're operating with the thousands-of-years later out of universe explanations of what happened and why. What is this experience like for someone there? Are all the men going to go mad or only some? Is the taint going to spread to saidar? Is it temporary? Why is it happening? How does it work? "Modern" Aes Sedai (and thus us readers) have pretty clear answers to these, it's a little different for someone at the dawn of the Breaking trying to figure them out by discussing it with your husband when he suddenly starts laughing and replaces all the rock in the "defensive base" you're in with lava. They have no idea what the right decision is! There are no right decisions!

 

And then we get to the single word that meant I couldn't not post----- "Normally."

 

Normally. NORMALLY?! Please, share with me in what world anything about that situation is normal to you or I!? "Ah yes, well when I am facing down the barrel of the entire world collapsing due to magic that we thought we understood and it turns out absolutely did not and for decades half-man half nightmare magic abominations have wiped out entire cities with the aid of my old university professors and half the people I just sacrificed everything to fight alongside and unbelievably have just managed to locked the enemy's main source of power and strongest leaders away, have suddenly started imagining their children and friends are demons and are currently turning what's left into mountain ranges and/or oceans for reasons I could not predict and can't understand. Well normally you'd build a defensive base that you could try to act out of. I just did it last week it's nbd."

 

 

tldr without the breaking there's no story and the literal name of the series is a symbol of the grinding inevitability of fate so this is a dumb argument, but no, you wouldn't have done a "good enough job" either, sorry.

 

Edited November 28, 2023 by Bugglesley

[Aan-Alone]

Well stated @Bugglesley. Very well stated.