Ask A Simple Question, Get a Simple Answer (No AMoL Spoilers)

[herid]

hey, why not? I recall somebody posting a theory recently that Demandred is posing as a woman. And Arnie in Junior is a literary character parallel.

I really think we should tell BS that we finally cracked Demandred's identity.

Edited October 9, 2012 by herid

[thisguy]

hey, why not? I recall somebody posting a theory recently that Demandred is posing as a woman. And Arnie in Junior is a literary character parallel.

I really think we should tell BS that we finally cracked Demandred's identity.

 

Now wonder he's so testy. He's carrying twins!!!

[yoniy0]

Ahm, this is the simple question thread, not a 'who's Demandred' thread. Let's keep it that way?

[Whizbang]

Could a severing weave miss and hit someone else? Okey the way Rand did it with those three Aes Sedai who held his shield that was rather directed to them, but normally when just a sharp shield is made, if two channelers is standing right next to one another and you are trying to sever one of them could you miss and hit the other one, or in other words is it dangerous to get to close to someone being severed?

 

I am not sure what gave me the impresion, but I always envisioned shielding to be 3 dimensional, a weave that wraps all the way around a channeler. I know this doesn't jive with the descriptions in the book, which tend to describe more of a wall between a person and the source, but this is how I feel it should be. You wrap someone up in a Spirit shield that prevents them from reaching The Source. This kind of breaks down with severing, because of the desciptions about a razor sharp weave slamming between the person and The Source, though. So, I guess the wall is more accurate. I just envision/rewrite the description to include some sort of sharp edge as the shield wraps around. In tEotW, however, Rand "sees" the rope of The Power behind Aginor, so I guess a shield wall would cut this rope temporarily, and so a 2-D weave works. But then what happens when the channeler moves? Do you have to move the wall in unison? It seems not. The Source and shield are is some other-reality/spirit realm that has no physical place in reality, except somehow tied to the body of the channeler. So, where to aim the weave? Right between the eyes? Is it enough to just touch a hand? "Where" is the connection to the source, and how would you miss it? 2-D shields just don't add up for me, so I envision a 3-D shield encompassing the person.

 

So, in summation, 2-D I see no reason why you cannot miss and hit someone else by mistake. 3-D, it would be much harder to miss, but I suppose possible if the person weaving were completely inept. If the weave is entirely spiritual and not tied to the physical body, then no, you cannot miss.

[yoniy0]

It's worth mentioning that we see people both duck to escape weaves that would physically hurt them (such as fire) and scramble to sever the weaves before they reach them, but to the best of my recollection, they only ever use the second approach with Shielding weaves. If I'm right, that would suggest a negative answer to that question.

[Mulk]

From what I can recall, I think when we see people ducking and weaving to avoid something, we are seeing them avoiding secondary effects. Things like the lightning, earthquakes, storms, are all secondary effects that seem to originate along the weave and then flow in the aimed direction - or, they are weaves that are completed and then "thrown" to use a baseball term, like Cyndane's fireball tossed at Alivia during the cleansing, or balefire, which originates at the channeler's hands and flows in the pointed direction. They are vectors then, with direction and magnitude. Anything with a vector can be dodged, and anything with a vector can hit something who wasn't the original target - anyone who wanders into the path of the force in question can be hit by it.

 

A shield seems to me to be a bit of a different animal. The only ways we know of to defeat a shield attempt are to either be strong enough in your connection that the one or ones trying to shield you cannot successfully stem the flow, to cut the shield before it cuts you off, or to break line of sight or greatly increase your distance from the caster of the shield. In addition, your connection to the Source is not a physical place, it's more of a metaphysical reality - we know it exists, but it is not a single, physical location. So, as long as you are in sight and in range, you can be shielded as your connection to the Source does not move in the same way a physical object would. There is a bit of apparent paradox in here, but RJ used several seeming parodoxes in describing the way the Source works, where it exists and how it is touched, so I think that's only to be expected.

 

I hope I explained that ok. It's clear in my head, but explaining invisible realities that are described with the use of paradox isn't something I'm all that practiced at.

[Hagazussa]

Thank you for the replies. I agree with QuietAiel, the connection to the Source is not one physical location but a spiritual thing. I do not either think that a shield or a severing weave could miss, I just wanted to ask as my RPG gaming group had some discussions on this when in a game we had a player character who was holding someone being severed in her arms and the question then came up on whatever or not the weave could miss and hit our player character, but I agree it could not.

[Kara]

In chapter 4 of ToM Perrin has a vision in the wolf dream of Mat "..fighting against himself,a dozen different men wearing his face...(he) never saw the shadowy figure creeping behind him, bearing a bloody knife."

Is this something we will know more about in aMoL? Does anyone have theories re what it might mean?

[Amandera]

Fact 1: A person can hold more of OP than he/she can handle and burn himself/herself out.

Fact 2: Angreal raise the amount of OP a person can hold and they have a buffer to protect that channeller from that raised amount of OP.

Fact 3: If we were to ignore the fact 1, according to fact 2, a person would hit a bar when he/she reaches a certain limit and could not hold unlimited amount of OP. Otherwise angreal would just be the buffer, they would not be built with a buffer.

Fact 4: Callandor has no buffer.

 

Question: When Rand seizes saidin through Callandor, he holds much more of OP than he could have unaided. But since it doesn't have a buffer, the amount he could handle safely should stay the same. Therefore any time he seized saidin through Callandor, he should have burned himself out. Why didn't he?

[MasterAblar]

Fact 1: A person can hold more of OP than he/she can handle and burn himself/herself out.

Fact 2: Angreal raise the amount of OP a person can hold and they have a buffer to protect that channeller from that raised amount of OP.

Fact 3: If we were to ignore the fact 1, according to fact 2, a person would hit a bar when he/she reaches a certain limit and could not hold unlimited amount of OP. Otherwise angreal would just be the buffer, they would not be built with a buffer.

Fact 4: Callandor has no buffer.

 

Question: When Rand seizes saidin through Callandor, he holds much more of OP than he could have unaided. But since it doesn't have a buffer, the amount he could handle safely should stay the same. Therefore any time he seized saidin through Callandor, he should have burned himself out. Why didn't he?

 

He only used Callandor twice if I recall correctly, so he probably just lucked out (coughtaverencough), and hasn't gone overboard. Yet.

[Amandera]

Two times as it was meant to be used (Rand's thought), a third time when killing Ishamael. Luck shouldn't matter though. Everything I remember reading indicates if you go over the limit, you are burned out.

[MasterAblar]

Two times as it was meant to be used (Rand's thought), a third time when killing Ishamael. Luck shouldn't matter though. Everything I remember reading indicates if you go over the limit, you are burned out.

 

But what makes you think he went over the limit?

[yoniy0]

The buffer doesn't simply mean that the extra amount one can draw can safely be handled. Angreal actually allow a channaler to draw more than they would otherwise be able to safely, but they also have a buffer, stopping them from drawing even more than that (i.e., you can't burn yourself while using an angreal, just like you can't in a Circle).

 

Now, different angreal allow a different amount of the Power to be drawn. Sa'angreal allow even more. Callandor in particular is an immensely powerful sa'angreal, but unfortunately it also lacks a buffer, meaning that you could burn out using it. Could. It still allows a whole lot more Power to be handled safely, it merely doesn't stop you from drawing even more than that. And, in addition, it's further flawed, inducing wildness of the mind, and perhaps opening you to other vulnerabilities, but that's besides the point.

[Amandera]

From tPoD, Chapter 24

He had only thought the Power filled him before. Now he held more than ten men could have unaided, a hundred, he did not know how many.

It is not described this directly in tSR but you can still deduce it from the chapter when he fights the Shadowspawn in the Stone. Also, he thinks he used Callandor as it was meant to be twice. All of this points to the conclusion he went beyond what he could have handle without Callandor.

[Amandera]

The buffer doesn't simply mean that the extra amount one can draw can safely be handled. Angreal actually allow a channaler to draw more than they would otherwise be able to safely, but they also have a buffer, stopping them from drawing even more than that (i.e., you can't burn yourself while using an angreal, just like you can't in a Circle).

Thank you. This answers my question perfectly.

Edited October 10, 2012 by Cem Önal

[MasterAblar]

From tPoD, Chapter 24

He had only thought the Power filled him before. Now he held more than ten men could have unaided, a hundred, he did not know how many.

It is not described this directly in tSR but you can still deduce it from the chapter when he fights the Shadowspawn in the Stone. Also, he thinks he used Callandor as it was meant to be twice. All of this points to the conclusion he went beyond what he could have handle without Callandor.

 

Burning out might only be a risk. As in, it's not 100% sure it'll happen. I believe Rand over the limit in VoG with the CK. But he came out of that just fine.

[Clouded]

Burning out might only be a risk. As in, it's not 100% sure it'll happen. I believe Rand over the limit in VoG with the CK. But he came out of that just fine.

 

How could he, if the Choedan Kal are not flawed like Callandor?

[Whizbang]

Perhaps Fact 1 does have an upper limit. A low level channeler could never channel as much as Rand or a Forsaken, even if they just kept sucking the stuff up. Just as Rand/LTT ran into a limit for the size of the platform in skimming, the human mind sets limits on itself.

 

An angreal somehow changes that mental/metaphysical limit.

 

Perhaps that is one of Rand's Talents? He can draw more above his limit with a lower risk of burning himself out. He does seem to push himself harder than anyone else. LTT comments, in Rand's head, that he channeled almost as much (don't remember the exact quote) as through the CK when he made Dragonmount, yet his soul was not burned out. Maybe his only limit is in his mind, and if he opened himself up, he wouldn't even need any Angreal.

[Amandera]

Burning out might only be a risk. As in, it's not 100% sure it'll happen. I believe Rand over the limit in VoG with the CK. But he came out of that just fine.

 

How could he, if the Choedan Kal are not flawed like Callandor?

I think he was referring to Rand thinking "that much Power would destroy him". Well, yoniy0 put an end to that discussion. Rand probably thought it was just too difficult too fight that much of saidin and he would eventually lose control of it and unwittingly unleash something that would destroy him.

[MasterAblar]

Burning out might only be a risk. As in, it's not 100% sure it'll happen. I believe Rand over the limit in VoG with the CK. But he came out of that just fine.

 

How could he, if the Choedan Kal are not flawed like Callandor?

 

No idea, but I distinctly remember that he reached his limit, thinks that he had only reached it twice before (LTT's suicide and the Cleansing), and then began to draw more.

 

Perhaps the buffer is just a warning, it's your body telling you to cut it out. You can draw more but it'll be very painful, and very dangerous. After all, LTT managed to reached the same amount as Rand channelling max power through the CK, on his own. Which is pretty crazy when you think about it.

[Amandera]

According to Lanfear there are two sa'angreal more powerful than Callandor. CK is one, maybe LTT was using the other. I agree it's extremely crazy LTT created the highest mountain in the world unaided.

[MasterAblar]

According to Lanfear there are two sa'angreal more powerful than Callandor. CK is one, maybe LTT was using the other. I agree it's extremely crazy LTT created the highest mountain in the world unaided.

 

Like the Ring of Tamrylin?

 

I doubt LTT would have risked taking such a powerful sa'angreal with him to SG.

Edited October 10, 2012 by Master Ablar

[Amandera]

Nah, if the Ring is an object of Power, I think it would be a ter'angreal since they are not gender based.

 

He was pretty desperate before the strike at SG. He probably thought if he failed, they were goners anyway. If he thought he needed its power, I'm pretty sure he wouldn't hesitate the bring in the big guns.

 

I know I'm shooting in the blind here and there is no real evidence to what I'm saying but read yoniy0's post. It's the only thing that makes sense if he was holding that much saidin.

[MasterAblar]

Nah, if the Ring is an object of Power, I think it would be a ter'angreal since they are not gender based.

 

True. Honestly it was probably just a normal ring. If a pretty one.

 

He was pretty desperate before the strike at SG. He probably thought if he failed, they were goners anyway. If he thought he needed its power, I'm pretty sure he wouldn't hesitate the bring in the big guns.

 

He expected to die though, even if he succeeded. That would leave the most powerful usable sa'angreal in the world in the hands of the Forsaken. And it would be pretty rich of him to bring along that kind of power when he's the one who claimed that power was not the way to defeat the DO.

Edited October 10, 2012 by Master Ablar

[Amandera]

Did he expect that? I don't remember reading something like that. He would probably consider it a likely scenario but no more likely than surviving. Like a fifty-fifty thing. There were no prophecies as far as I'm aware as in the case of Rand.

 

Does it really matter that much though? LTT believed his strike was the key to winning the war. Most scholars thought he would rip open the Bore if he displaced the Seals in the attempt. He was willing to risk destroying the Pattern, risking the strongest weapon you have to fall into enemy hands is not that significant compared to that.